The Reverend Short had been extremely thorough, and his notes contained references to other matters yet unproven.
Many who were present at this meeting had a great deal to be concerned about.
Josiah Hewlett felt no remorse over his thefts or his consigning children to lives of misery and abuse; he only felt anger at those more powerful than he who had pressured him to resign his long held post as Beadle.
He’d had a fright with the discovery that someone had gone through his concealed safe box, and the failure of his plans for the Farrier brat had given the damned clergyman and several others the opportunity to look into the apprenticing and the issuing of death certificates—matters which might lead to other accusations. By his way of thinking, it was better to depart with a clean record
