Book 3 - Chapter 7

How a Hen Takes to Stratagem

The days passed, and Mr. Tulliver showed, at least to the eyes of the
medical man, stronger and stronger symptoms of a gradual return to his
normal condition; the paralytic obstruction was, little by little,
losing its tenacity, and the mind was rising from under it with fitful
struggles, like a living creature making its way from under a great
snowdrift, that slides and slides again, and shuts up the newly made
opening.

Time would have seemed to creep to the watchers by the bed, if it had
only been measured by the doubtful, distant hope which kept count of
the moments within the chamber; but it was measured for them by a
fast-approaching dread which made the nights come too quickly. While
Mr. Tulliver was slowly becoming himself again, his lot was hastening
toward its moment of most palpable change. The taxing-masters had done
their work like any respectable gunsmith conscientiously preparing the
musket, that, duly pointed by a brave arm, will spoil a life or two.
Allocaturs, filing of bills in Chancery, decrees of sale, are legal
chain-shot or bomb-shells that can never hit a solitary mark, but must
fall with widespread shattering. So deeply inherent is it in this life
of ours that men have to suffer for each other's sins, so inevitably
diffusive is human suffering, that even justice makes its victims, and
we can conceive no retribution that does not spread beyond its mark in
pulsations of unmerited pain.

By the beginning of the second week in January, the bills were out
advertising the sale, under a decree of Chancery, of Mr. Tulliver's
farming and other stock, to be followed by a sale of the mill and
land, held in the proper after-dinner hour at the Golden Lion. The
miller himself, unaware of the lapse of time, fancied himself still in
that first stage of his misfortunes when expedients might be thought
of; and often in his conscious hours talked in a feeble, disjointed
manner of plans he would carry out when he "got well." The wife and
children were not without hope of an issue that would at least save
Mr. Tulliver from leaving the old spot, and seeking an entirely
strange life. For uncle Deane had been induced to interest himself in
this stage of the business. It would not, he acknowledged, be a bad
speculation for Guest & Co. to buy Dorlcote Mill, and carry on the
business, which was a good one, and might be increased by the addition
of steam power; in which case Tulliver might be retained as manager.
Still, Mr. Deane would say nothing decided about the matter; the fact
that Wakem held the mortgage on the land might put it into his head to
bid for the whole estate, and further, to outbid the cautious firm of
Guest &Co., who did not carry on