Then he locked up the church
doors, for the keys had been left in them, and slowly and sadly went
away.
"Thy mother would be sad to see this work," he said to Steadfast, as
he stopped by her grave. "They say 'tis done for religion's sake,
but I know not what to make of it."
The old Parish Clerk, North, had had a stroke the night after the
plunder of the church, and lay a-dying and insensible. His wife gave
his keys to Master Kenton, and on the following Sunday there was a
hue-and-cry for them, and Oates the father, the cobbler, a meddling
fellow, came down with a whole rabble of boys after him to the farm
to demand them. "A preacher had come out from Bristol," he said, "a
captain in the army, and he was calling for the keys to get into the
church and give them a godly discourse. It would be the worse for
Master Kenton if he did not give them up."
John had just sat down in the porch in his clean Sunday smock with
the baby on his knee, and Rusha clinging about him waiting till Stead
had cleaned himself up, and was ready to read to them from the
mother's books.
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