d between the two friends.
Well, on the Sunday morning in question, when it came to be fairly
understood that Mr. Shuttleworthy had met with foul play, I never saw
any one so profoundly affected as "Old Charley Goodfellow." When he
first heard that the horse had come home without his master, and without
his master's saddle-bags, and all bloody from a pistol-shot, that had
gone clean through and through the poor animal's chest without quite
killing him; when he heard all this, he turned as pale as if the missing
man had been his own dear brother or father, and shivered and shook all
over as if he had had a fit of the ague.
At first he was too much overpowered with grief to be able to do any
thing at all, or to concert upon any plan of action; so that for a long
time he endeavored to dissuade Mr. Shuttleworthy's other friends from
making a stir about the matter, thinking it best to wait awhile--say for
a week or two, or a month, or two--to see if something wouldn't turn up,
or if Mr. Shuttleworthy wouldn't come in the natural way, and explain
his reasons for sending his horse on before. I dare say you have often
observed this disposition to temporize, or to procrastinate, in people
who are labouring under any very poignant sorrow. Their powers of mind
seem to be rendered torpid, so that they have a horror of any thing like
action, and like nothing in the world so well as to lie quietly in bed
and "nurse their grief," as the old ladies express it--that is to say,
ruminate over the trouble.
The people of Rattleborough had, indeed, so high an opinion of the
wisdom and discretion of "Old Charley," that the greater part of them
felt disposed to agree with him, and not make a stir in the business
"until something should turn up," as the honest old gentleman worded
it; and I believe that, after all this would have been the general
determination, but for the very suspicious interference of Mr.
Shuttleworthy's nephew, a young man of very dissipated habits,
and otherwise of rather bad character. This nephew, whose name was
Pennifeather, would listen to nothing like reason in the matter of
"lying quiet," but insisted upon making immediate search for the "corpse
of the murdered man."--This was the expression he employed; and Mr.
Goodfellow acutely remarked at the time, that it was "a singular
expression, to say no more." This remark of 'Old Charley's,' too, had
great effect upon the crowd; and one of the party was heard to ask,
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