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diff --git a/14527-h/14527-h.htm b/14527-h/14527-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5a66eb5 --- /dev/null +++ b/14527-h/14527-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,16402 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Children of the Mist by +Eden Phillpots</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + /*<![CDATA[*/ + + <!-- + body {margin-left: 7%; margin-right: 10%;} + p {text-indent: 2em; text-align: justify;} + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 {text-align: center;} + h1 {margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 0em} + h2 {margin-top: 4em; margin-bottom: 2em} + h3 {margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em} + + pre {font-size: 0.7em;} + + hr {text-align: center; width: 50%;} + hr.full {width: 100%;} + hr.short {text-align: center; width: 20%;} + + .note {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; } + + .pagenum {text-indent: 0px; position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: 8pt;} + + .footnote { margin-right: 10%; margin-left: 10%;} + + div.trans-note {border-style: solid; border-width: 1px; + margin: 3em 15%; padding: 1em; text-align: center;} + + .illustrations {margin: 0.5em 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + + .author {text-align: right; margin-right: 5%;} + .center {text-align: center; } + .signed {text-align: right; margin-right: 5%;} + .dateline {text-align: right; margin-top: 2em; margin-right: 5%;} + .fnheader {margin-top:5em; font-weight: bold;} + .i0 {text-indent: 0px} + .i2 {text-indent: 0px; margin-left: 2em} + .i4 {text-indent: 0px; margin-left: 4em} + .i6 {text-indent: 0px; margin-left: 6em} + + .poem { text-indent: 0px; margin-left: 4em} + .thoughtBreak {margin-top: 3em} + ol.TOC {margin-left: 15%; list-style-type: upper-roman; position: relative;} + p.TOC {left-margin: 5%; text-indent: 0px} + li { margin-top: 0.53em; line-height: 1.2em } + --> + /*]]>*/ +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14527 ***</div> + +<h1>CHILDREN OF THE MIST<br /><br />by<br /><br />EDEN PHILLPOTTS</h1> +<h3>Author of “Down Dartmoor Way,” “Some Everyday +Folks,” “My Laughing Philosopher,” “Lying +Prophets,” etc.</h3> +<h2>1898</h2> +<p class="TOC">BOOK I: <a href="#I_I">THE BOY’S ROMANCE</a></p> +<ol class='TOC'> +<li><a href="#I_I">THE PIXIES’ PARLOUR</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_II">A CLEAR UNDERSTANDING</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_III">EXIT WILL</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_IV">BY THE RIVER</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_V">THE INCIDENT OF MR. JOEL FORD</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_VI">AN UNHAPPY POET</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_VII">LIBATION TO POMONA</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_VIII">A BROTHERS’ QUARREL</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_IX">OUTSIDE EXETER GAOL</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_X">THE BRINGING OF THE NEWS</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_XI">LOVE AND GREY GRANITE</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_XII">A STORY-BOOK</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_XIII">THE MILLER’S OFFER</a></li> +<li><a href="#I_XIV">LOGIC</a></li> +</ol> +<p class="TOC">BOOK II: <a href="#II_I">HIS ENTERPRISE</a></p> +<ol class='TOC'> +<li><a href="#II_I">SPRINGTIME</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_II">NEWTAKE FARM</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_III">OVER A RIDING-WHIP</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_IV">DEFEATED HOPES</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_V">THE ZEAL OF SAM BONUS</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_VI">A SWARM OF BEES</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_VII">AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_VIII">MR. BLEE FORGETS HIMSELF</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_IX">A DIFFERENCE WITH THE DUCHY</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_X">CONNECTING LINKS</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XI">TOGETHER</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XII">THROUGH ONE GREAT DAY</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XIII">THE WILL</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XIV">A HUNDRED POUNDS</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XV">“THE ANGEL OF THE DARKER DRINK”</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XVI">BEFORE THE DAWN</a></li> +<li><a href="#II_XVII">MISSING</a></li> +</ol> +<p class="TOC">BOOK III: <a href="#III_I">HIS GRANITE CROSS</a></p> +<ol class='TOC'> +<li><a href="#III_I">BABY</a></li> +<li><a href="#III_II">THE KNIGHT OF FORLORN HOPES</a></li> +<li><a href="#III_III">CONCERNING THE GATE-POST</a></li> +<li><a href="#III_IV">MARTIN’S RAID</a></li> +<li><a href="#III_V">WINTER</a></li> +<li><a href="#III_VI">THE CROSS UPREARED</a></li> +<li><a href="#III_VII">GREY TWILIGHT</a></li> +</ol> +<p class="TOC">BOOK IV: <a href="#IV_I">HIS SECRET</a></p> +<ol class='TOC'> +<li><a href="#IV_I">A WANDERER RETURNS</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_II">HOPE RENEWED</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_III">ANSWERED</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_IV">THE END OF THE FIGHT</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_V">TWO MIGHTY SURPRISES</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_VI">THE SECRET OUT</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_VII">SMALL TIMOTHY</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_VIII">FLIGHT</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_IX">UNDER COSDON BEACON</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_X">BAD NEWS FOR BLANCHARD</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XI">PHOEBE TAKES THOUGHT</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XII">NEW YEAR’S EVE AND NEW YEAR’S DAY</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XIII">MR. LYDDON’S TACTICS</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XIV">ACTION</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XV">A BATTLE</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XVI">A PAIR OF HANDCUFFS</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XVII">SUSPENSE</a></li> +<li><a href="#IV_XVIII">THE NIGHT OF JUBILEE</a></li> +</ol> +<h1>CHILDREN OF THE MIST</h1> +<h2><a id="I_I" name="I_I"></a>BOOK I<br /> +THE BOY’S ROMANCE<br /> +<br />CHAPTER I<br /> +THE PIXIES’ PARLOUR</h2> +<p>Phoebe Lyddon frowned, and, as an instant protest, twin dimples peeped +into life at the left corner of her bonny mouth. In regarding that attractive +ripple the down-drawn eyebrows were forgotten until they rose again into +their natural arches. A sweet, childish contour of face chimed with her +expression; her full lips were bright as the bunch of ripe wood-strawberries +at the breast of her cotton gown; her eyes as grey as Dartmoor mists; while, +for the rest, a little round chin, a small, straight nose, and a high +forehead, which Phoebe mourned and kept carefully concealed under masses of +curly brown hair, were the sole features to be specially noted about her. She +was a trifle below the standard of height proper to a girl of nineteen, but +all compact, of soft, rounded lines, plump, fresh of colour, healthy, happy, +sweet as a ripe apple.</p> +<p>From a position upon swelling hillsides above the valley of a river, she +scanned the scene beneath, made small her eyes to focus the distance, and so +pursued a survey of meadow and woodland, yet without seeing what she sought. +Beneath and beyond, separated from her standpoint by grasslands and a hedge +of hazel, tangled thickets of blackthorn, of bracken, and of briar sank to +the valley bottom. Therein wound tinkling Teign through the gorges of Fingle +to the sea; and above it, where the land climbed upward on the other side, +spread the Park of Whiddou, with expanses of sweet, stone-scattered herbage, +with tracts of deep fern, coverts of oak, and occasional habitations for the +deer.</p> +<p>This spectacle, through a grey veil of fine rain, Phoebe noted at +mid-afternoon of a day in early August; and, as she watched, there widened a +rift under the sun’s hidden throne, and a mighty, fan-shaped pencil of +brightness straggled downwards, proceeded in solemn sweep across the valley, +and lighted the depths of the gorge beyond with a radiance of misty silver. +The music of jackdaws welcomed this first indication of improved weather; +then Phoebe’s sharp eyes beheld a phenomenon afar off through the +momentary cessation of the rain. Three parts of a mile away, on a distant +hillside, like the successive discharges of a dozen fowling-pieces, little +blotches of smoke or mist suddenly appeared. Rapidly they followed each +other, and sometimes the puffs of vapour were exploded together, sometimes +separately. For a moment the girl felt puzzled; then she comprehended and +laughed.</p> +<p>“’Tis the silly auld sheep!” she said to herself. +“They ’m shakin ’theer fleeces ’cause they knaw the +rain’s over-past. Bellwether did begin, I warrant, then all the rest +done the same.”</p> +<p>Each remote member of the flock thus freed its coat from the accumulated +moisture of a long rainfall; then the huddled heap, in which they had +combined to withstand the weather and show tail to the western storm, began +to scatter. With coughs and sneezes the beasts wandered forward again, and +pursued their business of grazing.</p> +<p>Steadily the promises of the sky multiplied and Phoebe’s impatience +increased. Her position did not, however, depend for comfort upon the return +of sunshine, for she stood out of the weather, where sundry giant rocks to +the number of five arose in a fantastic pile. Nature’s primal +architects were responsible for the Pixies’ Parlour, and upon the awful +morning of Dartmoor’s creation these enormous masses had first been +hurled to their present position—outposts of the eternal granite, +though themselves widely removed from the central waste of the Moor. This +particular and gigantic monument of the past stands with its feet in land +long cultivated. Plough and harrow yearly skirt the Pixies’ Parlour; it +rises to-day above yellow corn, to-morrow amid ripening roots; it crowns the +succeeding generations of man’s industry, and watches a ceaseless cycle +of human toil. The rocks of which it is composed form a sort of rude chamber, +sacred to fairy folk since a time before the memory of the living; briars and +ivy-tods conceal a part of the fabric; a blackthorn, brushed at this season +with purple fruit, rises above it; one shadowed ledge reveals the nightly +roosting place of hawk or raven; and marks of steel on the stone show clearly +where some great or small fragment of granite has been blasted from the +parent pile for the need of man. Multi-coloured, massive, and picturesque, +the Parlour, upon Phoebe Lyddon’s visit to it, stood forth against the +red bosom of naked land; for a fierce summer had early ripened the vanished +harvest, and now its place was already ploughed again, while ashes of dead +fire scattered upon the earth showed where weed and waste had been consumed +after ingathering of the grain.</p> +<p>Patches of August blue now lightened the aerial grey; then sunshine set a +million gems twinkling on the great bejewelled bosom of the valley. Under +this magic heat an almost instantaneous shadowy ghost of fresh vapour rose +upon the riparian meadows, and out of it, swinging along with the energy of +youth and high spirits, came a lad. Phoebe smiled and twinkled a white +handkerchief to him, and he waved his hat and bettered his pace for +answer.</p> +<p>Soon Will Blanchard reached his sweetheart, and showed himself a brown, +straight youngster, with curly hair, pugnacious nose, good shoulders, and a +figure so well put together that his height was not apparent until he stood +alongside another man. Will’s eyes were grey as Phoebe’s, but of +a different expression; soft and unsettled, cloudy as the recent weather, +full of the alternate mist and flash of a precious stone, one moment all +a-dreaming, the next aglow. His natural look was at first sight a little +stern until a man came to know it, then this impression waned and left a +critic puzzled. The square cut of his face and abrupt angle of his jaw did +not indeed belie Will Blanchard, but the man’s smile magically +dissipated this austerity of aspect, and no sudden sunshine ever brightened a +dark day quicker than pleasure made bright his features. It was a sulky, +sleepy, sweet, changeable face—very fascinating in the eyes of women. +His musical laugh once fluttered sundry young bosoms, brightened many pretty +eyes and cheeks, but Will’s heart was Phoebe Lyddon’s +now—had been for six full months—and albeit a mere country boy in +knowledge of the world, younger far than his one-and-twenty years of life, +and wholly unskilled in those arts whose practice enables men to dwell +together with friendship and harmony, yet Will Blanchard was quite old enough +and wise enough and rich enough to wed, and make a husband of more than +common quality at that—in his own opinion.</p> +<p>Fortified by this conviction, and determined to wait no longer, he now +came to see Phoebe. Within the sheltering arms of the Pixies’ Parlour +he kissed her, pressed her against his wet velveteen jacket, then sat down +under the rocks beside her.</p> +<p>“You ’m comed wi’ the sun, dear Will.”</p> +<p>“Ay—the weather breaks. I hope theer’ll be a drop more +water down the river bimebye. You got my letter all right?”</p> +<p>“Ess fay, else I shouldn’t be here. And this tremendous matter +in hand?”</p> +<p>“I thought you’d guess what ’t was. I be weary o’ +waitin’ for ’e. An’ as I comed of age last month, I’m +a man in law so well as larnin’, and I’m gwaine to speak to +Miller Lyddon this very night.”</p> +<p>Phoebe looked blank. There was a moment’s silence while Will picked +and ate the wood-strawberries in his sweetheart’s dress.</p> +<p>“Caan’t ’e think o’ nothin’ wiser than to +see faither?” she said at last.</p> +<p>“Theer ban’t nothin’ wiser. He knaws we ’m +tokened, and it’s no manner o’ use him gwaine on pretendin’ +to himself ’t isn’t so. You ’m wife-old, and you’ve +made choice o’ me; and I’m a ripe man, as have thought a lot in +my time, and be earnin’ gude money and all. Besides, ’t is a +dead-sure fact I’ll have auld Morgan’s place as head waterkeeper, +an’ the cottage along with it, in fair time.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t for me to lift up no hindrances, but you knaw +faither.”</p> +<p>“Ess, I do—for a very stiff-necked man.”</p> +<p>“Maybe ’t is so; but a gude faither to me.”</p> +<p>“An’ a gude friend to me, for that matter. He aint got nothing +’gainst me, anyway—no more ’s any man living.”</p> +<p>“Awnly the youth and fieriness of ’e.”</p> +<p>“Me fiery! I lay you wouldn’t find a cooler chap in +Chagford.”</p> +<p>“You ’m a dinky bit comical-tempered now and again, dear +heart.”</p> +<p>He flushed, and the corners of his jaw thickened.</p> +<p>“If a man was to say that, I’d knock his words down his +throat.”</p> +<p>“I knaw you would, my awn Will; an’ that’s bein’ +comical-tempered, ban’t it?”</p> +<p>“Then perhaps I’d best not to see your faither arter all, if +you ’m that way o’ thinkin’,” he answered +shortly.</p> +<p>Then Phoebe purred to him and rubbed her cheek against his chin, whereon +the glint vanished from his eyes, and they were soft again.</p> +<p>“Mother’s the awnly livin’ sawl what understands +me,” he said slowly.</p> +<p>“And I—I too, Will!” cried Phoebe. “Ess fay. +I’ll call you a holy angel if you please, an’ God knaws theer +’s not an angel in heaven I’d have stead of ’e.”</p> +<p>“I ban’t no angel,” said Will gravely, “and never +set up for no such thing; but I’ve thought a lot ’bout the world +in general, and I’m purty wise for a home-stayin’ chap, come to +think on it; and it’s borne in ’pon me of late days that the +married state ’s a gude wan, and the sooner the better.”</p> +<p>“But a leap in the dark even for the wisest, Will?”</p> +<p>“So’s every other step us takes for that matter. Look at them +grasshoppers. Off they goes to glory and doan’t knaw no more ’n +the dead wheer they’ll fetch up. I’ve seed ’em by the river +jump slap in the water, almost on to a trout’s back. So us hops along +and caan’t say what’s comin’ next. We ’m built to see +just beyond our awn nose-ends and no further. That’s +philosophy.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t comfortin’ if ’t is,” said +Phoebe.</p> +<p>“Whether or no, I’ll see your faither ’fore night and +have a plain answer. I’m a straight, square man, so’s the +miller.”</p> +<p>“You’ll speed poorly, I’m fearin’, but ’t is +a honest thing; and I’ll tell faither you ’m all the world to me. +He doan’t seem to knaw what it is for a gal to be nineteen year old +somehow.”</p> +<p>Solemnly Will rose, almost overweighted with the consciousness of what lay +before him.</p> +<p>“We’ll go home-along now. Doan’t ’e tell him +I’m coming. I’ll take him unbeknawnst. And you keep out the way +till I be gone again.”</p> +<p>“Does your mother knaw, Will?”</p> +<p>“Ess, she an’ Chris both knaw I be gwaine to have it out this +night. Mother sez I be right, but that Miller will send me packing wi’ +a flea in my ear; Chris sez I be wrong to ax yet awhile.”</p> +<p>“You can see why that is; ’she ’s got to wait +herself,” said Phoebe, rather spitefully.</p> +<p>“Waitin’ ’s well enough when it caan’t be helped. +But in my case, as a man of assured work and position in the plaace, I +doan’t hold it needful no more.”</p> +<p>Together the young couple marched down over the meadows, gained the side +of the river, and followed its windings to the west. Through a dip in the +woods presently peeped the ancient stannary town of Chagford, from the summit +of its own little eminence on the eastern confines of Dartmoor. Both Will and +Phoebe dwelt within the parish, but some distance from the place itself. She +lived at Monks Barton, a farm and mill beside the stream; he shared an +adjacent cottage with his mother and sister. Only a bend of the river +separated the dwellings of the lovers—where Rushford Bridge spanned the +Teign and beech and fir rose above it.</p> +<p>In a great glory of clearness after rain, boy and girl moved along +together under the trees. The fisherman’s path which they followed +wound where wet granite shone and ivy glimmered beneath the forest; and the +leaves still dripped briskly, making a patter of sound through the underwood, +and marking a thousand circles and splashes in the smooth water beneath the +banks of the stream. Against a purple-grey background of past rain the green +of high summer shone bright and fresh, and each moss-clad rock and +fern-fringed branch of the forest oaks sent forth its own incense of slender +steam where the sunlight sparkled and sucked up the moisture. Scarce half a +mile from Phoebe’s home a shining yellow twig bent and flashed against +the green, and a broad back appeared through a screen of alder by the +water’s edge.</p> +<p>“’T is a rod,” said Will. “Bide a moment, and +I’ll take the number of his ticket. He ’m the first fisherman +I’ve seen to-day.”</p> +<p>As under-keeper or water-bailiff to the Fishing Association, young +Blanchard’s work consisted in endless perambulation of the +river’s bank, in sharp outlook for poacher and trespasser, and in the +survey of fishermen’s bridges, and other contrivances for anglers that +occurred along the winding course of the waters. His also was the duty of +noting the license numbers, and of surprising those immoral anglers who +sought to kill fish illegally on distant reaches of the river. His keen eyes, +great activity, and approved pluck well fitted Will for such duties. He often +walked twenty miles a day, and fishermen said that he knew every big trout in +the Teign from Fingle Bridge to the dark pools and rippling steps under +Sittaford Tor, near the river’s twin birthplaces. He also knew where +the great peel rested, on their annual migration from sea to moor; where the +kingfisher’s nest of fish-bones lay hidden; where the otter had her +home beneath the bank, and its inland vent-hole behind a silver birch.</p> +<p>Will bid the angler “good afternoon,” and made a few general +remarks on sport and the present unfavourable condition of the water, shrunk +to mere ribbons of silver by a long summer drought. The fisherman was a +stranger to Will—a handsome, stalwart man, with a heavy amber +moustache, hard blue eyes, and a skin tanned red by hotter suns than English +Augusts know. His disposition, also, as it seemed, reflected years of a +tropic or subtropic existence, for this trivial meeting and momentary +intrusion upon his solitude resulted in an explosion as sudden as +unreasonable and unexpected.</p> +<p>“Keep back, can’t you?” he exclaimed while the young +keeper approached his side; “who ’s going to catch fish with your +lanky shadow across the water?”</p> +<p>Will was up in arms instantly.</p> +<p>“Do ’e think I doan’t knaw my business? Theer ’s +my shadder ’pon the bank a mile behind you; an’ I didn’t +ope my mouth till you’d fished the stickle to the bottom and missed two +rises.”</p> +<p>This criticism angered the elder man, and he freed his tailfly fiercely +from the rush-head that held it.</p> +<p>“Mind your own affairs and get out of my sight, whoever you are. +This river’s not what it used to be by a good deal. Over-fished and +poached, and not looked after, I’ll swear.”</p> +<p>Thus, in ignorance, the sportsman uttered words of all most like to set +Will Blanchard’s temper loose—a task sufficiently easy at the +best of times.</p> +<p>“What the hell d’ you knaw ’bout the river?” he +flamed out. “And as to ’my affairs,’ ’t is my +affairs, an’ I be water-bailiff, an’ I’ll thank you for the +number of your ticket—so now then!”</p> +<p>“What’s become of Morgan?” asked the other.</p> +<p>“He ’m fust, I be second; and ’t is my job to take the +license numbers.”</p> +<p>“Pity you’re such an uncivil young cub, then.”</p> +<p>“Gimme your ticket directly minute!”</p> +<p>“I’m not going to.”</p> +<p>The keeper looked wicked enough by this time, but he made a great effort +to hold himself in.</p> +<p>“Why for not?”</p> +<p>“Because I didn’t take one.”</p> +<p>“That ban’t gwaine to do for me.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t it? Then you’ll have to go without any reason. +Now run away and don’t bleat so loud.”</p> +<p>“Look here,” retorted Will, going straight up to the +fisherman, and taking his measure with a flashing eye, “You gimme your +ticket number or your name an’ address, else I’ll make +’e.”</p> +<p>They counted nearly the same inches, but the angler was the elder, and a +man of more powerful build and massive frame than his younger opponent. His +blue eyes and full, broad face spoke a pugnacity not less pronounced than the +keeper’s own finer features indicated; and thus these two, destined for +long years to bulk largely each upon the life of the other, stood eye to eye +for the first time. Will’s temper was nearly gone, and now another +sneer set it loose with sudden and startling result.</p> +<p>“Make me, my young moorcock? Two more words and I’ll throw you +across the river!”</p> +<p>The two words were not forthcoming, but Will dropped his stick and shot +forward straight and strong as an angry dog. He closed before the stranger +could dispose of his rod, gripped him with a strong wrestling hold, and +cross-buttocked him heavily in the twinkling of an eye. The big man happily +fell without hurt upon soft sand at the river’s brink; but the +indignity of this defeat roused his temper effectually. He grinned +nevertheless as he rose again, shook the sand off his face, and licked his +hands.</p> +<p>“Good Devon, sure enough, my son; now I’ll teach <i>you</i> +something you never heard tell of, and break your damned fool’s neck +for you into the bargain!”</p> +<p>But Phoebe, who had wandered slowly on, returned quickly at the sound of +the scuffle and high words. Now she fluttered between the combatants and +rendered any further encounter for the time impossible. They could not close +again with the girl between them, and the stranger, his anger holding its +breath, glanced at her with sudden interest, stayed his angry growl, suffered +rage to wane out of his eyes and frank admiration to appear in them.</p> +<p>“Doan’t be fighting!” cried Phoebe. +“Whatever’s the mischief, Will? Do bate your speed of hand! +You’ve thrawed the gentleman down, seemin’ly.”</p> +<p>“Wheer ’s his ticket to then?”</p> +<p>“Why, it isn’t Miller Lyddon’s young maid, +surely!” burst out the fisherman; “not Phoebe grown to +woman!”</p> +<p>A Devon accent marked the speech, suddenly dragged from him by +surprise.</p> +<p>“Ess, I be Phoebe Lyddon; but don’t ’e fall ’pon +each other again, for the Lard’s sake,” she said.</p> +<p>“The boy ’s as tetchy in temper as a broody hen. I was only +joking all the time, and see how he made me pay for my joke. But to think I +should remember you! Grown from bud to pretty blossom, by God! And I danced +you on my knee last time I saw you!”</p> +<p>“Then you ’m wan of they two Grimbal brothers as was to be +home again in Chagford to-day!” exclaimed Will.</p> +<p>“That’s so; Martin and I landed at Plymouth yesterday. We got +to Chagford early this morning.”</p> +<p>Will laughed.</p> +<p>“I never!” he said. “Why, you be lodging with my awn +mother at the cottage above Rushford Bridge! You was expected this +marnin’, but I couldn’t wait for ’e. You ’m Jan +Grimbal—eh?”</p> +<p>“Right! And you ’re a nice host, to be sure!”</p> +<p>“’T is solemn truth, you ’m biding under our roof, the +‘Three Crowns’ bein’ full just now. And I’m sorry I +thrawed ’e; but you was that glumpy, and of course I didn’t know +’e from Adam. I’m Will Blanchard.”</p> +<p>“Never mind, Will, we’ll try again some day. I could wrestle a +bit once, and learned a new trick or two from a Yankee in Africa.”</p> +<p>“You’ve come back ’mazin’ rich they say, Jan +Grimbal?”</p> +<p>“So, so. Not millionaires, but all right—both of us, though +I’m the snug man of the two. We got to Africa at the right moment, +before 1867, you know, the year that O’Reilly saw a nigger-child +playing with the first Kimberley diamond ever found. Up we went, the pair of +us. Things have hummed since then, and claims and half-claims and +quarter-claims are coming to be worth a Jew’s eye. We’re all +right, anyway, and I’ve got a stake out there yet.”</p> +<p>“You ’m well pleased to come back to dear li’l Chagford +after so many years of foreign paarts, I should think, Mr. Grimbal?” +said Phoebe.</p> +<p>“Ay, that I am. There’s no place like Devon, in all the earth, +and no spot like Chagford in Devon. I’m too hard grit to wink an eyelid +at sight of the old scenes again myself; but Martin, when he caught first +sight of great rolling Cosdon crowning the land—why, his eyes were +wetted, if you’ll believe it.”</p> +<p>“And you comed right off to fish the river fust thing,” said +Will admiringly.</p> +<p>“Ay, couldn’t help it. When I heard the water calling, it was +more than my power to keep away. But you ’re cruel short of rain, +seemingly, and of course the season ’s nearly over.”</p> +<p>“I’ll shaw you dark hovers, wheer braave feesh be lying +yet,” promised Will; and the angler thanked him, foretelling a great +friendship. Yet his eyes rarely roamed from Phoebe, and anon, as all three +proceeded, John Grimbal stopped at the gate of Monks Barton and held the girl +in conversation awhile. But first he despatched Will homewards with a message +for his mother. “Let Mrs. Blanchard know we’ll feed at seven +o’clock off the best that she can get,” he said; “and tell +her not to bother about the liquor. I’ll see to that myself.”</p> +<h2><a id="I_II" name="I_II"></a>CHAPTER II<br /> +A CLEAR UNDERSTANDING</h2> +<p>Monks Barton, or Barton Monachorum, as the farm was called in a Tudor +perambulation of Chagford, owed its name to traditions that holy men +aforetime dwelt there, performed saintly deeds, and blessed a spring in the +adjacent woods, whose waters from that date ever proved a magical medicament +for “striking” of sore eyes. That the lands of the valley had +once been in monastic possession was, however, probable enough; and some +portions of the old farm did in truth rise upon the ruins of a still more +ancient habitation long vanished. Monks Barton stood, a picturesque +agglomeration of buildings, beside the river. The mill-wheel, fed by a stream +taken from the Teign some distance up the valley and here returned again to +the parent water, thundered on its solemn round in an eternal twinkling +twilight of dripping ferns and green mosses; while hard by the dwelling-house +stood and offered small diamond panes and one dormer-window to the south. +Upon its whitewashed face three fruit-trees grew—a black plum, a +cherry, a winter pear; and before the farmhouse stretched a yard sloping to +the river ford, where a line of massive stepping-stones for foot-passengers +crossed the water. On either side of this space, walled up from the edge of +the stream, little gardens of raspberry and gooseberry bushes spread; and +here, too, appeared a few apple-trees, a bed of herbs, a patch of onions, +purple cabbages, and a giant hollyhock with sulphur-coloured blossoms that +thrust his proud head upwards, a gentleman at large, and the practical +countrymen of the kitchen-garden. The mill and outbuildings, the homestead +and wood-stacks embraced a whole gamut of fine colour, ranging from the tawny +and crimson of fretted brick and tile to varied greys of drying timber; from +the cushions and pillows of moss and embroidery of houseleeks and valerian, +that had flourished for fifty years on a ruined shippen, to the silver gleam +of old thatches and the shining gold of new. Nor was the white face of the +dwelling-house amiss. Only one cold, crude eye stared out from this +time-tinctured scene; only one raw pentroof of corrugated iron blotted it, +made poets sigh, artists swear, and Miller Lyddon contemplate more of the +same upon his land.</p> +<p>A clucking and grunting concourse of fowls and pigs shared the farmyard; +blue pigeons claimed the roof; and now, in the westering light, with slow +foot, sweet breath, and swelling udder, many kine, red as the ripe +horse-chestnut, followed each other across the ford, assembled themselves +together and lowed musically to the milkers. Phoebe Lyddon and John Grimbal +still stood at the farm-gate, and they watched, as a boy and an aged man came +forward with buckets and stools. Then, to the muffled thud of the water-wheel +and the drone and murmur of the river, was added a purr of milk, foaming into +tin pails, and sharp, thin monitions from the ancient, as he called the cows +by their names and bid them be still.</p> +<p>In John Grimbal, newly come from South Africa, this scene awakened a +lively satisfaction and delight. It told him that he was home again; and so +did the girl, though it seemed absurd to think that Phoebe had ever sat upon +his knee and heard his big stories, when as yet he himself was a boy and the +world still spread before him unconquered. He mused at the change and looked +forward to bringing himself and his success in life before those who had +known him in the past. He very well remembered who had encouraged his +ambitions and spoken words of kindness and of hope; who also had sneered, +criticised his designs unfavourably, and thrown cold water upon his projects. +John Grimbal meant to make certain souls smart as he had smarted; but he +feared his brother a little in this connection, and suspected that Martin +would not assert himself among the friends of his youth, would not assume a +position his riches warranted, would be content with too humble a manner of +life.</p> +<p>As a matter of fact, the ambition of neither extended much beyond a life +of peace among the scenes of his childhood; but while the younger traveller +returned with unuttered thanksgivings in his heart that he was privileged +again to see the land he loved and henceforth dwell amid its cherished +scenes, the greater energy and wider ambition of his brother planned a +position of some prominence if not power. John was above all else a +sportsman, and his programme embraced land, a stout new dwelling-house, +preserves of game in a small way, some fishing, and the formation of a new +rifle-corps at Chagford. This last enterprise he intended to be the serious +business of life; but his mind was open to any new, agreeable impressions +and, indeed, it received them at every turn. Phoebe Lyddon awoke a very vital +train of thoughts, and when he left her, promising to come with his brother +on the following day to see the miller, John Grimbal’s impressionable +heart was stamped with her pretty image, his ear still held the melody of her +voice.</p> +<p>He crossed the stepping-stones, sat down upon the bank to change his +flies, and looked at the home of Phoebe without sentiment, yet not without +pleasure. It lay all cuddled on the bosom of a green hill; to the west +stretched meadows and orchard along the winding valley of the river; to the +east extended more grass-land that emerged into ferny coombs and glades and +river dells, all alive with the light of wild flowers and the music of birds, +with the play of dusky sunshine in the still water, and of shadows on the +shore.</p> +<p>A little procession of white ducks sailed slowly up the river, and each as +it passed twisted its head to peer up at the spectator. Presently the drake +who led them touched bottom, and his red-gold webs appeared. Then he paddled +ashore, lifted up his voice, waggled his tail, and with a crescendo of +quacking conducted his harem into the farmyard. One lone Muscovy duck, +perchance emulating the holy men of old in their self-communion, or else +constrained by circumstance to a solitary life, appeared apart on a little +island under the alders. A stranger in a strange land, he sat with bent head +and red-rimmed, philosophic eyes, regarding his own breast while sunset +lights fired the metallic lustre of his motley. Quite close to him a dead +branch thrust upwards from the water, and the river swirled in oily play of +wrinkles and dimples beyond it. Here, with some approach to his old skill, +the angler presently cast a small brown moth. It fell lightly and neatly, +cocked for a second, then turned helplessly over, wrecked in the sudden eddy +as a natural insect had been. A fearless rise followed, and in less than half +a minute a small trout was in the angler’s net. John Grimbal landed +this little fish carefully and regarded it with huge satisfaction before +returning it to the river. Then, having accomplished the task set by sudden +desire,—to catch a Teign trout again, feel it, smell it, see the ebony +and crimson, the silver belly warming to gold on its sides and darkening to +brown and olive above,—having by this act renewed sensations that had +slept for fifteen years, he put up his rod and returned to his temporary +quarters at the dwelling of Mrs. Blanchard.</p> +<p>His brother was waiting in the little garden to welcome him. Martin walked +up and down, smelled the flowers, and gazed with sober delight upon the +surrounding scene. Already sunset fires had waned; but the high top of the +fir that crowned Rushford Bridge still glowed with a great light on its red +bark; an uprising Whiddon, where it lay afar off under the crown of +Cranbrook, likewise shone out above the shadowed valley.</p> +<p>Martin Grimbal approached his brother and laid his hand upon the +fisherman’s arm. He stood the smaller in stature, though of strong +build. His clean-shaved face had burned much darker than John’s; he was +indeed coffee-brown and might have been mistaken for an Indian but for his +eyes of ordinary slate-grey. Without any pretension to good looks, Martin +Grimbal displayed what was better—an expression of such frank benignity +and goodness that his kind trusted him and relied upon him by intuition. +Honest and true to the verge of quixotism was this man in all dealings with +his fellows, yet he proved a faulty student of character. First he was in a +measure blinded by his own amiable qualities to acute knowledge of human +nature; secondly, he was drawn away from humanity rather than not, for no +cynic reason, but by the character of his personal predilections and +pursuits.</p> +<p>“I’ve seen father’s grave, John,” were his first +words to his brother. “It’s beside the mother’s, but that +old stone he put up to her must be moved and—”</p> +<p>“All right, all right, old chap. Stones are in your line, not mine. +Where’s dinner? I want bread, not a stone, eh?”</p> +<p>Martin did not laugh, but shrugged his shoulders in good-tempered fashion. +His face had a measure of distinction his brother’s lacked, and indeed, +while wanting John’s tremendous physical energy and robust +determination, he possessed a finer intellect and instinct less animal. Even +abroad, during their earlier enterprises, Martin had first provided brains +sufficient for himself and John; but an accident of fortune suddenly favoured +the elder; and while John took full care that Martin should benefit with +himself, he was pleased henceforth to read into his superior luck a +revelation of superior intelligence, and from that moment followed his own +inclinations and judgment. He liked Martin no less, but never turned to him +for counsel again after his own accidental good fortune; and henceforward +assumed an elder brother’s manner and a show of superior wisdom. In +matters of the world and in knowledge of such human character as shall be +found to congregate in civilisation’s van, or where precious metals and +precious stones have been discovered to abound, John Grimbal was undoubtedly +the shrewder, more experienced man; and Martin felt very well content that +his elder brother should take the lead. Since the advent of their prosperity +a lively gratitude had animated his mind. The twain shared nothing save bonds +of blood, love of their native land, and parity of ambition, first manifested +in early desires to become independent. Together they had gone abroad, +together they returned; and now each according to his genius designed to seek +happiness where he expected to find it. John still held interests in South +Africa, but Martin, content with less fortune, and mighty anxious to be free +of all further business, realised his wealth and now knew the limits of his +income.</p> +<p>The brothers supped in good spirits and Will Blanchard’s sister +waited upon them. Chris was her “brother in petticoats,” people +said, and indeed she resembled him greatly in face and disposition. But her +eyes were brown, like her dead father’s, and a gypsy splendour of black +hair crowned her head. She was a year younger than Will, wholly wrapped up in +him and one other.</p> +<p>A familiarity, shy on Martin’s side and patronising in John, +obtained between the brothers and their pretty attendant, for she knew all +about them and the very cottage in which their parents had dwelt and died. +The girl came and went, answered John Grimbal’s jests readily, and +ministered to them as one not inferior to those she served. The elder +man’s blue eyes were full of earthy admiration. He picked his teeth +between the courses and admired aloud, while Chris was from the room.</p> +<p>“’Tis wonderful how pretty all the women look, coming back to +them after ten years of nigger girls. Roses and cream isn’t in it with +their skins, though this one’s dark as a clear night—Spanish +fashion.”</p> +<p>“Miss Blanchard seems very beautiful to me certainly,” +admitted Martin.</p> +<p>“I’ve seen only two maids—since setting foot in +Chagford,” continued his brother, “and it would puzzle the devil +to say which was best to look at.”</p> +<p>“Your heart will soon be lost, I’ll wager—to a Chagford +girl, I hope. I know you talked about flying high, but you might be happier +to take a mate from—well, you understand.”</p> +<p>“It’s all very well to build theories on board ship about +bettering myself socially and all that, but it’s rot; I’ll be +knocked over by one of the country witches, I know I shall,—I feel it. +I love the sound of the Devon on their lips, and the clear eyes of them, and +the bright skin. ’Tis all I can do to keep from hugging the women, and +that’s a fact. But you, you cold-blooded beggar, your heart’s +still for the grey granite and the old ghostly stones, and creepy, lonely +places on the Moor! We’re that different, you and me.”</p> +<p>Martin nodded thoughtfully, and, the meal being now ended, both men +strolled out of doors, then wandered down to smoke a pipe on Rushford Bridge +and listen to the nightly murmur of the river. Darkness moved on the face of +land and water; twilight had sucked all the colour away from the valley; and +through the deepening monochrome of the murk there passed white mists with +shadowy hands, and peeped blind pale eyes along the winding water, where its +surface reflected the faded west. Nocturnal magic conjured the least meadow +into an unmeasured sea of vapour; awoke naiads in the waters and dryads in +the woods; transformed the solemn organ music of great beetles into songs of +a roaming spirit; set unseen shapes stirring in the starlight; whispered of +invisible, enchanted things, happy and unhappy, behind the silence.</p> +<p>A man moved from the bridge as the brothers reached it. Then Will +Blanchard, knocking out his pipe and taking a big inspiration, set his face +steadily toward Monks Barton and that vital interview with Miller Lyddon now +standing in the pathway of his life.</p> +<p>He rapped at the farm door and a step came slowly down the stone-paved +passage. Then Billy Blee, the miller’s right-hand man, opened to him. +Bent he was from the small of the back, with a highly coloured, much wrinkled +visage, and ginger hair, bleached by time to a paler shade. His poll was bald +and shining, and thick yellow whiskers met beneath a clean-shorn chin. +Billy’s shaggy eyebrows, little bright eyes, and long upper lip, taken +with the tawny fringe under his chops, gave him the look of an ancient and +gigantic lion-monkey; and indeed there was not lacking in him an ape-like +twist, as shall appear.</p> +<p>“Hullo! boy Blanchard! An’ what might you want?” he +asked.</p> +<p>“To see Miller.”</p> +<p>“Come in then; we’m all alone in kitchen, him and me, awver +our grog and game. What’s the matter now?”</p> +<p>“A private word for Miller’s ear,” said Will +cautiously.</p> +<p>“Come you in then. Us’ll do what we may for ’e. Auld +heads be the best stepping-stones young folks can have, understood right; +awnly the likes of you mostly chooses to splash through life on your awn damn +silly roads.”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee, whose friendship and familiarity with his master was of the +closest, led on, and Will soon stood before Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>The man who owned Monks Barton, and who there prosperously combined the +callings of farmer and miller, had long enjoyed the esteem of the +neighbourhood in which he dwelt, as had his ancestors before him, through +many generations. He had won reputation for a sort of silent wisdom. He never +advised any man ill, never hesitated to do a kindly action, and himself +contrived to prosper year in, year out, no matter what period of depression +might be passing over Chagford. Vincent Lyddon was a widower of +sixty-five—a grey, thin, tall man, slow of speech and sleepy of eye. A +weak mouth, and a high, round forehead, far smoother than his age had +promised, were distinguishing physical features of him. His wife had been +dead eighteen years, and of his two children one only survived. The elder, a +boy toddling in early childhood at the water’s edge, was unmissed until +too late, and found drowned next day after a terrible night of agony for both +parents. Indeed, Mrs. Lyddon never recovered from the shock, and Phoebe was +but a year old when her mother died. Further, it need only be mentioned that +the miller had heard of Will’s courting more than once, but absolutely +refused to allow the matter serious consideration. The romance was no more +than philandering of children in his eyes.</p> +<p>“Will—eh? Well, my son, and how can I serve you?” asked +the master of Monks Barton, kindly enough. He recrossed his legs, settled in +his leather chair, and continued the smoking of a long clay pipe.</p> +<p>“Just this, Mr. Lyddon,” began Will abruptly. “You calls +me your ‘son’ as a manner o’ speech, but I wants to be no +less in fact.”</p> +<p>“You ban’t here on that fool’s errand, bwoy, surely? I +thought I’d made my mind clear enough to Phoebe six months +ago.”</p> +<p>“Look you here now. I be earnin’ eighteen shillings a week +an’ a bit awver; an’ I be sure of Morgan’s berth as +head-keeper presently; an’ I’m a man as thinks.”</p> +<p>“That’s brave talk, but what have ’e saved, lad?” +inquired Mr. Blee.</p> +<p>The lover looked round at him sharply.</p> +<p>“I thought you was out the room,” he said. “I be come to +talk to Miller, not you.”</p> +<p>“Nay, nay, Billy can stay and see I’m not tu hard ’pon +’e,” declared Mr. Lyddon. “He axed a proper question. +What’s put by to goody in the savings’ bank, Will?”</p> +<p>“Well—five pounds; and ’t will be rose to ten by +Christmas, I assure ’e.”</p> +<p>“Fi’ puns! an’ how far ’s that gwaine?”</p> +<p>“So far as us can make it, in coourse.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t you see, sonny, this ban’t a fair bargain? +I’m not a hard man—”</p> +<p>“By gor! not hard enough by a powerful deal,” said Billy.</p> +<p>“Not hard on youth; but this match, so to call it, looks like mere +moonshine. Theer ’s nought <i>to</i> it I can see—both childer, +and neither with as much sense as might sink a floatin’ +straw.”</p> +<p>“We love each other wi’ all our hearts and have done more +’n half a year. Ban’t that nothing?”</p> +<p>“I married when I was forty-two,” remarked the miller, +reflectively, looking down at his fox-head slippers, the work of +Phoebe’s fingers.</p> +<p>“An’ a purty marryin’ time tu!” declared Mr. Blee. +“Look at me,” he continued, “parlous near seventy, and a +bacherlor-man yet.”</p> +<p>“Not but Widow Comstock will have ’e if you ax her a bit +oftener. Us all knows that,” said the young lover, with great +stratagem.</p> +<p>Billy chuckled, and rubbed his wrinkles.</p> +<p>“Time enough, time enough,” he answered, “but +you—scarce out o’ clouts—why, ’t is playin’ at +a holy thing, that’s what ’t is—same as Miss Phoebe, when +she was a li’l wee cheel, played at bein’ parson in her +night-gownd, and got welted for it, tu, by her gude faither.”</p> +<p>“We ’m both in earnest anyway—me and Phoebe.”</p> +<p>“So am I,” replied the miller, sitting up and putting down his +pipe; “so am I in earnest, and wan word ’s gude as a hunderd in a +pass like this. You must hear the truth, an’ that never broke no bones. +You ’m no more fitted to have a wife than that tobacco-jar—a +hot-headed, wild-fire of a bwoy—”</p> +<p>“A right Jack-o’-Lantern, as everybody knaws,” suggested +Mr. Blee.</p> +<p>“Ess fay, ’tis truth. Shifting and oncertain as the marsh +gallopers on the moor bogs of a summer night. Awnly a youth’s faults, +you mind; but still faults. No, no, my lad, you’ve got to fight your +life’s battle and win it, ’fore you’m a mate for any gal; +an’ you’ve got to begin by fightin’ yourself, an’ +breaking an’ taming yourself, an’ getting yourself well in hand. +That’s a matter of more than months for the best of us.”</p> +<p>“And then?” said Will, “after ’tis done? though +I’m not allowin’ I’m anything but a ripe man as I stand +here afore you now.”</p> +<p>“Then I’d say, ‘I’m glad to see you grawed into a +credit to us all, Will Blanchard, and worth your place in the order o’ +things; but you doan’t marry Phoebe Lyddon—never, never, never, +not while I’m above ground.’”</p> +<p>His slow eyes looked calmly and kindly at Will, and he smiled into the +hot, young, furious face.</p> +<p>“That’s your last word then?”</p> +<p>“It is, my lad.”</p> +<p>“And you won’t give a reason?”</p> +<p>“The reason is, ‘what’s bred in the bone comes out in +the flesh.’ I knawed your faither. You’m as volatile as him +wi’out his better paarts.”</p> +<p>“Leave him wheer he lies—underground. If he’d lived +’stead of bein’ cut off from life, you’d ’a’ +bin proud to knaw him.”</p> +<p>“A gypsy-man and no better, Will,” said Mr. Blee. “Not +but what he made a gude end, I allow.”</p> +<p>“Then I’ll be up and away. I’ve spoke ’e fair, +Miller—fair an’ straight—an’ so you to me. You +won’t allow this match. Then we’ll wed wi’out your +blessin’, an’ sorry I shall be.”</p> +<p>“If that’s your tune, my young rascal, I’ll speak again! +Phoebe’s under age, remember that, and so sure as you dare take her a +yard from her awn door you’ll suffer for it. ’Tis a clink job, +you mind—a prison business; and what’s more, you ’m pleased +to speak so plain that I will tu, and tell ’e this. If you dare to lift +up your eyes to my child again, or stop her in the way, or have speech with +her, I’ll set p’liceman ’pon ’e! For a year and more +she ’m not her awn mistress; and, at the end of that time, if she +doan’t get better sense than to tinker arter a harum-scarum young +jackanapes like you, she ban’t a true Lyddon. Now be off with ’e +an’ doan’t dare to look same way Phoebe ’s walkin’, +no more, else theer’ll be trouble for ’e.”</p> +<p>“Wonnerful language, an’ in a nutshell,” commented +Billy, as, blowing rather hard, the miller made an end of his warning.</p> +<p>“Us’ll leave it theer, then, Mr. Lyddon; and you’ll live +to be sorry ever you said them words to me. Ess fay, you’ll live to +sing different; for when two ’s set ’pon a matter o’ +marryin’, ban’t fathers nor mothers, nor yet angels, be gwaine to +part ’em. Phoebe an’ me will be man an’ wife some day, sure +’s the sun ’s brighter ’n the mune. So now you knaw. Gude +night to ’e.”</p> +<p>He took up his hat and departed; Billy held up his hands in mute +amazement; but the miller showed no emotion and relighted his pipe.</p> +<p>“The rising generation do take my breath away twenty times a +day,” said Mr. Blee. “To think o’ that bwoy, in li’l +frocks awnly yesterday, standin’ theer frontin’ two aged men +wi’ such bouldacious language!”</p> +<p>“What would you do, Billy, if the gal was yourn?”</p> +<p>“Same as you, to a hair. Bid her drop the chap for gude ’n +all. But theer ’s devil’s pepper in that Blanchard. He +ain’t done with yet.”</p> +<p>“Well, well, he won’t shorten my sleep, I promise you. Near +two years is a long time to the young. Lord knaws wheer a light thing like +him will be blawed to, come two years. Time ’s on my side for certain. +And Phoebe ’s like to change also.”</p> +<p>“Why, a woman’s mind ’s no more ’n a feather in a +gale of wind at her time o’ life; though to tell her so ’s the +sure way to make her steadfast.”</p> +<p>A moment later Phoebe herself entered. She had heard Will depart and now, +in a fever of impatience, crept with bright, questioning eyes to her +father’s chair. Whereupon Mr. Blee withdrew in a violent hurry. No one +audibly desired him to do so, but a side-look from the girl was enough.</p> +<h2><a id="I_III" name="I_III"></a>CHAPTER III<br /> +EXIT WILL</h2> +<p>Phoebe’s conversation with her father occupied a space of time +extending over just two minutes. He met her eager eyes with a smile, patted +her head, pinched her ear, and by his manner awakened a delicious flutter of +hope in the girl before he spoke. When, therefore, Phoebe learned that Will +was sent about his business for ever, and must henceforth be wholly dismissed +from her mind, the shock and disappointment of such intelligence came as a +cruel blow. She stood silent and thunderstruck before Miller Lyddon, a world +of reproaches in her frightened eyes; then mutely the corners of her little +mouth sank as she turned away and departed with her first great sorrow.</p> +<p>Phoebe’s earliest frantic thought had been to fly to Will, but she +knew such a thing was impossible. There would surely be a letter from him on +the following morning hidden within their secret pillar-box between two +bricks of the mill wall. For that she must wait, and even in her misery she +was glad that with Will, not herself, lay decision as to future action. She +had expected some delay; she had believed that her father would impose stern +restrictions of time and make a variety of conditions with her sweetheart; +she had even hoped that Miller Lyddon might command lengthened patience for +the sake of her headstrong, erratic Will’s temper and character; but +that he was to be banished in this crushing and summary fashion overwhelmed +Phoebe, and that utterly. Her nature, however, was not one nourished from any +very deep wells of character. She belonged to a class who suffer bitterly +enough under sorrow, but the storm of it while tearing like a tropical +tornado over heart and soul, leaves no traces that lapse of time cannot +wholly and speedily obliterate. On them it may be said that fortune’s +sharpest strokes inflict no lasting scars; their dispositions are happily +powerless to harbour the sustained agony that burrows and gnaws, poisons +man’s estimate of all human affairs, wrecks the stores of his +experience, and stamps the cicatrix of a live, burning grief on brow and +brain for ever. They find their own misery sufficiently exalted; but their +temperament is unable to sustain a lifelong tribulation or elevate sorrow +into tragedy. And their state is the more blessed. So Phoebe watered her +couch with tears, prayed to God to hear her solemn promises of eternal +fidelity, then slept and passed into a brief dreamland beyond sorrow’s +reach.</p> +<p>Meantime young Blanchard took his stormy heart into a night of stars. The +moon had risen; the sky was clear; the silvery silence remained unbroken save +for the sound of the river, where it flowed under the shadows of great trees +and beneath aerial bridges and banners of the meadow mists. Will strode +through this scene, past his mother’s cottage, and up a hill behind it, +into the village. His mind presented in turn a dozen courses of action, and +each was built upon the abiding foundation of Phoebe’s sure +faithfulness. That she would cling to him for ever the young man knew right +well; no thought of a rival, therefore, entered into his calculations. The +sole problem was how quickest to make Mr. Lyddon change his mind; how best to +order his future that the miller should regard him as a responsible person, +and one of weight in affairs. Not that Will held himself a slight man by any +means; but he felt that he must straightway assert his individuality and +convince the world in general and Miller Lyddon in particular of faulty +judgment. He was very angry still as he retraced the recent conversation. +Then, among those various fancies and projects in his mind, the wildest and +most foolish stood out before him as both expedient and to be desired. His +purpose in Chagford was to get advice from another man; but before he reached +the village his own mind was established.</p> +<p>Slated and thatched roofs glimmered under moonlight, and already the +hamlet slept. A few cats crept like shadows through the deserted streets, +from darkness into light, from light back to darkness; and one cottage +window, before which Will Blanchard stood, still showed a candle behind a +white blind. Most quaint and ancient was this habitation—of picturesque +build, with tiny granite porch, small entrance, and venerable thatches that +hung low above the upper windows. A few tall balsams quite served to fill the +garden; indeed so small was it that from the roadway young Blanchard, by +bending over the wooden fence, could easily reach the cottage window. This he +did, tapped lightly, and then waited for the door to be opened.</p> +<p>A man presently appeared and showed some surprise at the sight of his late +visitor.</p> +<p>“Let me in, Clem,” said Will. “I knawed you’d be +up, sitting readin’ and dreamin’. ’T is no dreamin’ +time for me though, by God! I be corned straight from seeing Miller +’bout Phoebe.”</p> +<p>“Then I can very well guess what was last in your ears.”</p> +<p>Clement Hicks spoke in an educated voice. He was smaller than Will but +evidently older. Somewhat narrow of build and thin, he looked delicate, +though in reality wiry and sound. He was dark of complexion, wore his hair +long for a cottager, and kept both moustache and beard, though the latter was +very scant and showed the outline of his small chin through it. A forehead +remarkably lofty but not broad, mounted almost perpendicularly above the +man’s eyes; and these were large and dark and full of fire, though +marred by a discontented expression. His mouth was full-lipped, his other +features huddled rather meanly together under the high brow: but his face, +while admittedly plain even to ugliness, was not commonplace; for its eyes +were remarkable, and the cast of thought ennobled it as a whole.</p> +<p>Will entered the cottage kitchen and began instantly to unfold his +experiences.</p> +<p>“You knaw me—a man with a level head, as leaps after looking, +not afore. I put nothing but plain reason to him and he flouted me like you +might a cheel. An’ I be gwaine to make him eat his words—such +hard words as they was tu! Think of it! Me an’ Phoebe never to meet no +more! The folly of sayin’ such a thing! Wouldn’t ’e reckon +that grey hairs knawed better than to fancy words can keep lovers +apart?”</p> +<p>“Grey hairs cover old brains; and old brains forget what it feels +like to have a body full o’ young blood. The best memory can’t +keep the feeling of youth fresh in a man.”</p> +<p>“Well, I ban’t the hot-headed twoad Miller Lyddon thinks, or +pretends he thinks, anyway. I’ll shaw un! I can wait, an’ Phoebe +can wait, an’ now she’ll have to. I’m gwaine +away.”</p> +<p>“Going away. Why?”</p> +<p>“To shaw what ’s in me. I ban’t sorry for this for some +things. Now no man shall say that I’m a home-stayin’ gaby, +tramping up an’ down Teign Vale for a living. I’ll step out into +the wide world, same as them Grimbals done. They ’m back again made of +money, the pair of ’em.”</p> +<p>“It took them fifteen years and more, and they were marvellously +lucky.”</p> +<p>“What then? I’m as like to fare well as they. I’ve +worked out a far-reaching plan, but the first step I’ve thought on +’s terrible coorious, an’ I reckon nobody but you’d see how +it led to better things. But you ’m book-larned and wise in your way, +though I wish your wisdom had done more for yourself than it has. Anyway, you +’m tokened to Chris and will be one of the family some day perhaps when +Mother Coomstock dies, so I’ll leave my secret with you. But not a soul +else—not mother even. So you must swear you’ll never tell to man +or woman or cheel what I’ve done and wheer I be gone.”</p> +<p>“I’ll swear if you like.”</p> +<p>“By the livin’ God.”</p> +<p>“By any God you believe is alive.”</p> +<p>“Say it, then.”</p> +<p>“By the living God, I, Clement Hicks, bee-master of Chagford, Devon, +swear to keep the secret of my friend and neighbour, William Blanchard, +whatever it is.”</p> +<p>“And may He tear the life out of you if you so much as think to +tell.”</p> +<p>Hicks laughed and shook his hair from his forehead.</p> +<p>“You’re suspicious of the best friend you’ve got in the +world.”</p> +<p>“Not a spark. But I want you to see what an awful solemn thing I +reckon it.”</p> +<p>“Then may God rot me, and plague me, and let me roast in hell-fire +with the rogues for ever and a day, if I so much as whisper your news to man +or mouse! There, will that do?”</p> +<p>“No call to drag in hell fire, ’cause I knaw you doan’t +set no count on it. More doan’t I. Hell’s cold ashes now if all +what you ve said is true. But you’ve sworn all right and now I’ll +tell ’e.”</p> +<p>He bent forward and whispered in the other’s ear, whereon Hicks +started in evident amazement and showed himself much concerned.</p> +<p>“Good Heavens! Man alive, are you mad?”</p> +<p>“You doan’t ’zactly look on ahead enough, Clem,” +said Will loftily. “Ban’t the thing itself’s gwaine to make +a fortune, but what comes of it. ’Tis a tidy stepping-stone +lead-in’ to gert matters very often, as your books tell, I dare +say.”</p> +<p>“It can’t lead to anything whatever in your case but wasted +years.”</p> +<p>“I’m best judge of that. I’ve planned the road, and if I +ban’t home again inside ten year as good a man as Grimbal or any other +I’ll say I was wrong.”</p> +<p>“You’re a bigger fool than even I thought, +Blanchard.”</p> +<p>Will’s eye flashed.</p> +<p>“You ’m a tidy judge of a fule, I grant,” he said +angrily, “or should be. But you ’m awnly wan more against me. +You’ll see you ’m wrong like the rest. Anyway, you’ve got +to mind what you’ve sweared. An’ when mother an’ Chris ax +’e wheer I be, I’ll thank you to say I’m out in the world +doin’ braave, an’ no more.”</p> +<p>“As you like. It ’s idle, I know, trying to make you change +your mind.”</p> +<p>A thin voice from an upper chamber of the cottage here interrupted their +colloquy, and the mother of the bee-keeper reminded him that he was due early +on the following day at Okehampton with honey, and that he ought long since +to be asleep.</p> +<p>“If that’s Will Blanchard,” she concluded, “tell +un to be off home to bed. What ’s the wisdom o’ turning night +hours into day like this here?”</p> +<p>“All right, mother,” shouted Will. “Gude-night to +’e. I be off this moment.”</p> +<p>Then bidding his friend farewell, he departed.</p> +<p>“Doan’t think twice o’ what I said a minute since. I was +hot ’cause you couldn’t see no wisdom in my plan. But +that’s the way of folks. They belittle a chap’s best thoughts and +acts till the time comes for luck to turn an’ bring the fruit; then +them as scoffed be the first to turn round smilin’ an’ +handshaking and sayin’, ’What did us say? Didn’t us tell +’e so from the very beginning?’”</p> +<p>Away went the youthful water-keeper, inspired with the prospect of his +contemplated flight. He strode home at a rapid pace, to find all lights out +and the household in bed. Then he drank half a pint of cider, ate some bread +and cheese, and set about a letter to Phoebe.</p> +<p>A little desk on a side-table, the common property of himself, his mother, +and sister, was soon opened, and materials found. Then, in his own uncial +characters, that always tended hopefully upward, and thus left a triangle of +untouched paper at the bottom of every sheet, Will wrote a letter of two +folios, or eight complete pages. In this he repeated the points of his +conversation with Phoebe’s father, told her to be patient, and +announced that, satisfied of her unfailing love and steadfastness through +all, he was about to pass into the wider world, and carve his way to +prosperity and fortune. He hid particulars from her, but mentioned that +Clement Hicks would forward any communications. Finally he bid her keep a +stout heart and live contented in the certainty of ultimate happiness. He +also advised Phoebe to forgive her father. “I have already done it, +honor bright,” he wrote; “’t is a wise man’s part to +bear no malice, especially against an old grey body whose judgment +’pears to be gone bad for some reason.” He also assured Phoebe +that he was hers until death should separate them; in a postscript he desired +her to break his departure softly to his mother if opportunity to do so +occurred; and, finally, he was not ashamed to fill the empty triangles on +each page with kisses, represented by triangles closely packed. Bearing this +important communication, Will walked out again into the night, and soon his +letter awaited Phoebe in the usual receptacle. He felt therein himself, half +suspecting a note might await him, but there was nothing. He hesitated for a +moment, then climbed the gate into Monks Barton farmyard, went softly and +stood in the dark shadow of the mill-house. The moon shone full upon the face +of the dwelling, and its three fruit-trees looked as though painted in +profound black against the pale whitewash; while Phoebe’s dormer-window +framed the splendour of the reflected sky, and shone very brightly. The blind +was down, and the maiden behind it had been asleep an hour or two; but Will +pictured her as sobbing her heart out still. Perhaps he would never see her +again. The path he had chosen to follow might take him over seas and through +vast perils; indeed, it must do so if the success he desired was to be won. +He felt something almost like a catch in his throat as he turned away and +crossed the sleeping river. He glanced down through dreaming glades and saw +one motionless silver spot on the dark waters beneath the alders. Sentiment +was at its flood just then, and he spoke a few words under his breath. +“’Tis thicky auld Muscovy duck, roostin’ on his li’l +island; poor lone devil wi’ never a mate to fight for nor friend to +swim along with. Worse case than mine, come to think on it!” Then an +emotion, rare enough with him, vanished, and he sniffed the night air and +felt his heart beat high at thoughts of what lay ahead.</p> +<p>Will returned home, made fast the outer door, took off his boots, and went +softly up a creaking stair. Loud and steady music came from the room where +John Grimbal lay, and Blanchard smiled when he heard it. “’Tis +the snore of a happy man with money in his purse,” he thought. Then he +stood by his mother’s door, which she always kept ajar at night, and +peeped in upon her. Damaris Blanchard slumbered with one arm on the coverlet, +the other behind her head. She was a handsome woman still, and looked younger +than her eight-and-forty years in the soft ambient light. “Muneshine do +make dear mother so purty as a queen,” said Will to himself. And he +would never wish her “good-by,” perhaps never see her again. He +hastened with light, impulsive step into the room, thinking just to kiss the +hand on the bed, but his mother stirred instantly and cried, +“Who’s theer?” with sleepy voice. Then she sat up and +listened—a fair, grey-eyed woman in an old-fashioned night-cap. Her son +had vanished before her eyes were opened, and now she turned and yawned and +slept again.</p> +<p>Will entered his own chamber near at hand, doffed for ever the velveteen +uniform of water-keeper, and brought from a drawer an old suit of corduroy. +Next he counted his slight store of money, set his ‘alarum’ for +four o’clock, and, fifteen minutes later, was in bed and asleep, the +time then being a little after midnight.</p> +<h2><a id="I_IV" name="I_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /> +BY THE RIVER</h2> +<p>Clement Hicks paid an early visit to Will’s home upon the following +morning. He had already set out to Okehampton with ten pounds of honey in the +comb, and at Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage he stopped the little public +vehicle which ran on market-days to the distant town. That the son of the +house was up and away at dawn told his family nothing, for his movements were +at all times erratic, and part of his duty consisted in appearing on the +river at uncertain times and in unexpected localities. Clement Hicks often +called for a moment upon his way to market, and Chris, who now greeted her +lover, felt puzzled at the unusual gravity of his face. She turned pale when +she heard his tremendous news; but the mother was of more Spartan temperament +and received intelligence of Will’s achievement without changing colour +or ceasing from her occupation.</p> +<p>Between Damaris Blanchard and her boy had always existed a perfect harmony +of understanding, rare even in their beautiful relationship. The thoughts of +son and mother chimed; not seldom they anticipated each other’s words. +The woman saw much of her dead husband reflected in Will and felt a moral +conviction that through the storms of youth, high temper, and inexperience, +he would surely pass to good things, by reason of the strenuous honesty and +singleness of purpose that actuated him; he, on his side, admired the great +calmness and self-possession of his mother. She was so steadfast, so strong, +and wiser than any woman he had ever seen. With a fierce, volcanic affection +Will Blanchard loved her. She and Phoebe alike shared his whole heart.</p> +<p>“It is a manly way of life he has chosen, and that is all I may say. +He is ambitious and strong, and I should be the last to think he has not done +well to go into the world for a while,” said Clement.</p> +<p>“When is he coming back again?” asked Chris.</p> +<p>“He spoke of ten years or so.”</p> +<p>“Then ’twill be more or less,” declared Mrs. Blanchard, +calmly. “Maybe a month, maybe five years, or fifteen, not ten, if he +said ten. He’ll shaw the gude gold he’s made of, whether or no. +I’m happy in this and not surprised. ’Twas very like to come +arter last night, if things went crooked.”</p> +<p>“’Tis much as faither might have done,” said Chris.</p> +<p>“’Tis much what he did do. Thank you for calling, Clem Hicks. +Now best be away, else they’ll drive off to Okehampton without +’e.”</p> +<p>Clement departed, Chris wept as the full extent of her loss was impressed +upon her, and Mrs. Blanchard went up to her son’s room. There she +discovered the velveteen suit with a card upon them: “Hand over to Mr. +Morgan, Head Water-keeper, Sandypark.” She looked through his things, +and found that he had taken nothing but his money, one suit of working +clothes, and a red tie—her present to him on his birthday during the +previous month. All his other possessions remained in their usual places. +With none to see, the woman’s eye moistened; then she sat down on +Will’s bed and her heart grew weak for one brief moment as she pictured +him fighting the battle. It hurt her a little that he had told Clement Hicks +his intention and hid it from his mother. Yet as a son, at least, he had +never failed. However, all affairs of life were a matter of waiting, more or +less, she told herself; and patience was easier to Damaris Blanchard than to +most people. Under her highest uneasiness, maternal pride throbbed at thought +of the manly independence indicated by her son’s action. She returned +to the duties of the day, but found herself restless, while continually +admonishing Chris not to be so. Her thoughts drifted to Monks Barton and +Will’s meeting with his sweetheart’s father. Presently, when her +daughter went up to the village, Mrs. Blanchard put off her apron, donned the +cotton sunbonnet that she always wore from choice, and walked over to see Mr. +Lyddon. They were old friends, and presently Damaris listened sedately to the +miller without taking offence at his directness of speech. He told the story +of his decision and Will’s final reply, while she nodded and even +smiled once or twice in the course of the narrative.</p> +<p>“You was both right, I reckon,” she said placidly, looking +into Mr. Lyddon’s face. “You was wise to mistrust, not +knawin’ what’s at the root of him; and he, being as he is, was in +the right to tell ’e the race goes to the young. Wheer two hearts is +bent on joining, ’tis join they will—if both keeps of a mind long +enough.”</p> +<p>“That’s it, Damaris Blanchard; who’s gwaine to +b’lieve that a bwoy an’ gal, like Will an’ Phoebe, do knaw +theer minds? Mark me, they’ll both chaange sweethearts a score of times +yet ’fore they come to mate.”</p> +<p>“Caan’t speak for your darter, Lyddon; but I knaw my son. A +masterful bwoy, like his faither before him, wild sometimes an’ wayward +tu, but not with women-folk. His faither loved in wan plaace awnly. +He’ll be true to your cheel whatever betides, or I’m a +fule.”</p> +<p>“What’s the use of that if he ban’t true to himself? No, +no, I caan’t see a happy ending to the tale however you look at it. +Wish I could. I fear’t was a ugly star twinkled awver his birthplace, +ma’am.”</p> +<p>“’Twas all the stars of heaven, Miller,” said the +mother, frankly, “for he was born in my husband’s caravan in the +auld days. We was camped up on the Moor, drawn into one of them +roundy-poundies o’ grey granite stones set up by Phoenicians at the +beginning of the world. Ess fay, a braave shiny night, wi’ the +li’l windows thrawed open to give me air. An’ ’pon +Will’s come-of-age birthday, last month, if us didn’t all drive +up theer an’ light a fire an’ drink a dish of tea in the +identical spot! ’Tis out Newtake’ way.”</p> +<p>“Like a story-book.”</p> +<p>“’Twas Clem Hicks, his thought, being a fanciful man. But +I’ll bid you gude-marnin’ now. Awnly mind this, as between +friends and without a spark of malice: Will Blanchard means to marry your +maid, sure as you’m born, if awnly she keeps strong for him. It rests +with her, Miller, not you.”</p> +<p>“Much what your son said in sharper words. Well, you’m out +o’ reckoning for once, wise though you be most times; for if a +maiden’s happiness doan’t rest with her faither, blamed if I see +wheer it should. And to think such a man as me doan’t knaw wiser +’n two childern who caan’t number forty year between ’em is +flat fulishness, surely?”</p> +<p>“I knaw Will,” said Mrs. Blanchard, slowly and emphatically; +“I knaw un to the core, and that’s to say more than you or +anybody else can. A mother may read her son like print, but no faither can +see to the bottom of a wife-old daughter—not if he was Solomon’s +self. So us’ll wait an’ watch wi’out being worse +friends.”</p> +<p>She went home again the happier for her conversation; but any thought that +Mr. Lyddon might have been disposed to devote to her prophecy was for the +time banished by the advent of John Grimbal and his brother.</p> +<p>Like boys home from school, they dwelt in the present delight of their +return, and postponed the varied duties awaiting them, to revel again in the +old sights, sounds, and scents. To-day they were about an angling excursion, +and the fishers’ road to Fingle lying through Monks Barton, both +brothers stopped a while and waited upon their old friend of the mill, +according to John’s promise of the previous afternoon. Martin carried +the creel and the ample luncheon it contained; John smoked a strong cigar and +was only encumbered with his light fly-rod; the younger designed to accompany +his brother through Fingle Valley; then leave him there, about his sport, and +proceed alone to various places of natural and antiquarian interest. But John +meant fishing and nothing else. To him great woods were no more than cover +for fur and feathers; rivers and streams meant a vehicle for the display of a +fly to trout, and only attracted him or the reverse, according to the fish +they harboured. When the moorland waters spouted and churned, cherry red from +their springs in the peat, he deemed them a noble spectacle; when, as at +present, Teign herself had shrunk to a mere silver thread, and the fingerling +trout splashed and wriggled half out of water in the shallows, he freely +criticised its scanty volume and meagre depths.</p> +<p>Miller Lyddon welcomed the men very heartily. He had been amongst those +who dismissed them with hope to their battle against the world, and now he +reminded them of his sanguine predictions. Will Blanchard’s +disappearance amused John Grimbal and he laughed when Billy Blee appeared +red-hot with the news. Mr. Lyddon made no secret of his personal opinion of +Blanchard, and all debated the probable design of the wanderer.</p> +<p>“Maybe he’s ’listed,” said John, “an’ +a good thing too if he has. It makes a man of a young fellow. I’m for +conscription myself—always have been.”</p> +<p>“I be minded to think he’ve joined the riders,” declared +Billy. “Theer comed a circus here last month, with braave doin’s +in the way of horsemanship and Merry Andrews, and such like devilries. Us all +goes to see it from miles round every year; an’ Will was theer. Circus +folk do see the world in a way denied to most, and theer manner of life takes +’em even as far as Russia and the Indies I’ve heard.”</p> +<p>“Then there’s the gypsy blood in him—” declared +Mr. Lyddon, “that might send him roaming oversea, if nothing else +did.”</p> +<p>“Or my great doings are like to have fired him,” said John. +“How’s Phoebe?” he continued, dismissing Will. “I saw +her yesterday—a bowerly maiden she’s grown—a prize for a +better man that this wild youngster, now bolted God knaws where.”</p> +<p>“So I think,” agreed the miller, “an’ I hope +she’ll soon forget the searching grey eyes of un and his high-handed +way o’ speech. Gals like such things. Dear, dear! though he made me so +darned angry last night, I could have laughed in his faace more ’n +wance.”</p> +<p>“Missy’s under the weather this marnin’,” declared +Billy. “Who tawld her I ban’t able to say, but she knawed +he’d gone just arter feedin’ the fowls, and she went down valley +alone, so slow, wi’ her purty head that bent it looked as if her +sunbonnet might be hiding an auld gran’mother’s poll.”</p> +<p>“She’ll come round,” said Martin; “she’s +only a young girl yet.”</p> +<p>“And there ’s fish as good in the sea as ever came out, and +better,” declared his brother. “She must wait for a man who is a +man,—somebody of good sense and good standing, with property to his +name.”</p> +<p>Miller Lyddon noted with surprise and satisfaction John Grimbal’s +warmth of manner upon this question; he observed also the stout, hearty body +of him, and the handsome face that crowned it. Then the brothers proceeded +down-stream, and the master of Monks Barton looked after them and caught +himself hoping that they might meet Phoebe.</p> +<p>At a point where the river runs between a giant shoulder of heather-clad +hill on one side and the ragged expanses of Whiddon Park upon the other, John +clambered down to the streamside and began to fish, while Martin dawdled at +hand and watched the sport. A pearly clearness, caught from the clouds, +characterised earth as well as air, and proved that every world-picture +depends for atmosphere and colour upon the sky-picture extended above it. +Again there was movement and some music, for the magic of the wind in a +landscape’s nearer planes is responsible for both. The wooded valley +lay under a grey and breezy forenoon; swaying alders marked each intermittent +gust with a silver ripple of upturned foliage, and still reaches of the river +similarly answered the wind with hurrying flickers and furrows of dimpled +light. Through its transparent flood, where the waters ran in shadow and +escaped reflections, the river revealed a bed of ruddy brown and rich amber. +This harmonious colouring proceeded from the pebbly bottom, where a medley of +warm agate tones spread and shimmered, like some far-reaching mosaic beneath +the crystal. Above Teign’s shrunken current extended oak and ash, while +her banks bore splendid concourse of the wild water-loving dwellers in that +happy valley. Meadowsweet nodded creamy crests; hemlock and fool’s +parsley and seeding willow-herb crowded together beneath far-scattered +filigree of honeysuckles and brambles with berries, some ripe, some red; +while the scarlet corals of briar and white bryony gemmed every riotous +trailing thicket, dene, and dingle along the river’s brink; and in the +grassy spaces between rose little chrysoprase steeples of wood sage all set +in shining fern. Upon the boulders in midstream subaqueous mosses, now +revealed and starved by the drought, died hard, and the seeds of grasses, +figworts, and persicarias thrust up flower and foliage, flourishing in +unwonted spots from which the next freshet would rudely tear them. Insect +life did not abundantly manifest itself, for the day was sunless; but now and +again, with crisp rattle of his gauze wings, a dragon-fly flashed along the +river. Through these scenes the Teign rolled drowsily and with feeble pulses. +Upon one bank rose the confines of Whiddon; on the other, abrupt and +interspersed with gulleys of shattered shale, ascended huge slopes whereon a +whole summer of sunshine had scorched the heather to dry death. But fading +purple still gleamed here and there in points and splashes, and the lesser +furze, mingling therewith, scattered gold upon the tremendous acclivities +even to the crown of fir-trees that towered remote and very blue upon the +uplifted sky-line. Swallows, with white breasts flashing, circled over the +river, and while their elevation above the water appeared at times +tremendous, the abrupt steepness of the gorge was such that the birds almost +brushed the hillside with their wings. A sledge, laden with the timber of +barked sapling oaks, creaked and jingled over the rough road beside the +stream; a man called to his horses and a dog barked beside him; then they +disappeared and the spacious scene was again empty, save for its manifold +wild life and music.</p> +<p>John Grimbal fished, failed, and cursed the poor water and the lush wealth +of the riverside that caught his fly at every critical moment. A few small +trout he captured and returned; then, flinging down rod and net, he called to +his brother for the luncheon-basket. Together they sat in the fern beside the +river and ate heartily of the fare that Mrs. Blanchard had provided; then, as +John was about to light a pipe, his brother, with a smile, produced a little +wicker globe and handed it to him. This unexpected sight awoke sudden and +keen appetite on the elder’s face. He smacked his lips, swore a hearty +oath of rejoicing, and held out an eager hand for the thing.</p> +<p>“My God! to think I’ll suck the smoke of that again,—the +best baccy in the wide world!”</p> +<p>The little receptacle contained a rough sort of sun-dried Kaffir tobacco, +such as John and Martin had both smoked for the past fifteen years.</p> +<p>“I thought it would be a treat. I brought home a few pounds,” +said the younger, smiling again at his brother’s hungry delight. John +cut into the case, loaded his pipe, and lighted it with a contented sign. +Then he handed the rest back to its owner.</p> +<p>“No, no,” said Martin. “I’ll just have one fill, +that’s all. I brought this for you. ’T will atone for the poor +sport. The creel I shall leave with you now, for I’m away to Fingle +Bridge and Prestonbury. We’ll meet at nightfall.”</p> +<p>Thereupon he set off down the valley, his mind full of early British +encampments, while John sat and smoked and pondered upon his future. He built +no castles in the air, but a solid country house of red brick, destined to +stand in its own grounds near Chagford, and to have a snug game-cover or two +about it, with a few good acres of arable land bordering on forest. Roots +meant cover for partridges in John Grimbal’s mind; beech and oak in +autumn represented desirable food for pheasants; and corn, once garnered and +out of the way, left stubble for all manner of game.</p> +<p>Meantime, whilst he reviewed his future with his eyes on a blue cloud of +tobacco smoke, Martin passed Phoebe Lyddon farther down the valley. Him she +recognised as a stranger; but he, with his eyes engaged in no more than +unconscious guarding of his footsteps, his mind buried in the fascinating +problems of early British castramentation, did not look at her or mark a +sorrowful young face still stained with tears.</p> +<p>Into the gorge Phoebe had wandered after reading her sweetheart’s +letter. There, to the secret ear of the great Mother, instinct had drawn her +and her grief; and now the earliest shock was over; a dull, numb pain of mind +followed the first sorrow; unwonted exercise had made her weary; and physical +hunger, not to be stayed by mental suffering, forced her to turn homewards. +Red-eyed and unhappy she passed beside the river, a very picture of a woful +lover.</p> +<p>The sound of Phoebe’s steps fell on John Grimbal’s ear as he +lay upon his back with crossed knees and his hands behind his head. He partly +rose therefore, thrust his face above the fern, saw the wayfarer, and then +sprang to his feet. The cause of her tearful expression and listless +demeanour was known to him, but he ignored them and greeted her cheerily.</p> +<p>“Can’t catch anything big enough to keep, and +sha’n’t until the rain comes,” he said; “so +I’ll walk along with you, if you’re going home.”</p> +<p>He offered his hand; then, after Phoebe had shaken it, moved beside her +and put up his rod as he went.</p> +<p>“Saw your father this morning, and mighty glad I was to find him so +blooming. To my eye he looks younger than my memory picture of him. But +that’s because I’ve grown from boy to man, as you have from child +to woman.”</p> +<p>“So I have, and ’t is a pity my faither doan’t knaw +it,” answered Phoebe, smarting under her wrongs, and willing to +chronicle them in a friendly ear. “If I ban’t full woman, who is? +Yet I’m treated like a baaby, as if I’d got no ’pinions +an’ feelings, and wasn’t—wasn’t auld enough to knaw +what love meant.”</p> +<p>Grimbal’s eyes glowed at the picture of the girl’s +indignation, and he longed to put his arms round her and comfort her.</p> +<p>“You must be wise and dutiful, Phoebe,” he said. “Will +Blauchard’s a plucky fellow to go off and face the world. And perhaps +he’ll be one of the lucky ones, like I was.”</p> +<p>“He will be, for certain, and so you’d say if you knawed him +same as I do. But the cruel waitin’—years and years and +years—’t is enough to break a body’s heart.”</p> +<p>Her voice fluttered like bells in a wild wind; she trembled on the brink +of tears; and he saw by little convulsive movements and the lump in her round +throat that she could not yet regard her lot with patience. She brought out +her pocket-handkerchief again, and the man noticed it was all wet and rolled +into a ball.</p> +<p>“Life’s a blank thing at lovers’ parting,” he +said; “but time rubs the rough edges off matters that fret our minds +the worst. Days and nights, and plenty of ’em, are the best cure for +all ills.”</p> +<p>“An’ the best cure for life tu! The awnly cure. Think of years +an’ years without him. Yesterday us met up in Pixies’ Parlour +yonder, an’ I was peart an’ proud as need be; to-day he’s +gone, and I feel auld and wisht and all full of weary wonder how I’m +gwaine to fare and if I’llever see him again. ’T is +cruel—bitter cruel for me.”</p> +<p>That she could thus pity herself so soon argued a mind incapable of +harbouring great sorrow for many years; and the man at her side, without +appreciating this fact, yet, by a sort of intuition, suspected that +Phoebe’s grief, perhaps even her steadfastness of purpose, would suffer +diminution before very great lapse of time. Without knowing why, he hoped it +might be so. Her voice fell melodiously upon an ear long tuned to the whine +of native women. It came from the lungs, was full and sweet, with a shy +suddenness about it, like the cooing of wood doves. She half slipped at a +stile, and he put out his hand and touched her waist and felt his heart +throb. But Phoebe’s eyes rarely met her new friend’s. The girl +looked with troubled brows ahead into the future, while she walked beside +him; and he, upon her left hand, saw only the soft cheek, the pouting lips, +and the dimples that came and went. Sometimes she looked up, however, and +Grimbal noted how the flutter of past tears shook her round young breast, +marked the spring of her step, the freedom of her gait, and the trim turn of +her feet and ankles. After the flat-footed Kaffir girls, Phoebe’s +instep had a right noble arch in his estimation.</p> +<p>“To think that I, as never wronged faither in thought or deed, +should be treated so hard! I’ve been all the world to him since mother +died, for he’s said as much to many; yet he’s risen up an’ +done this, contrary to justice and right and Scripture, tu.”</p> +<p>“You must be patient, Phoebe, and respect his age, and let the +matter rest till the time grows ripe. I can’t advise you better than +that.”</p> +<p>“’Patient!’ My life’s empty, I tell +’e—empty, hollow, tasteless wi’out my Will.”</p> +<p>“Well, well, we’ll see. I’m going to build a big +red-brick house presently, and buy land, and make a bit of a stir in my small +way. You’ve a pretty fancy in such things, I’ll bet a dollar. You +shall give me a helping hand—eh? You must tell me best way of setting +up house. And you might help me as to furniture and suchlike if you had time +for it. Will you, for an old friend?”</p> +<p>Phoebe was slightly interested. She promised to do anything in her power +that might cause Mr. Grimbal satisfaction; and he, very wisely, assured her +that there was no salve for sorrow like unselfish labours on behalf of other +people. He left her at the farm-gate, and tramped back to the Blanchard +cottage with his mind busy enough. Presently he changed his clothes, and set +a diamond in his necktie. Then he strolled away into the village, to see the +well-remembered names above the little shop windows; to note curiously how +Chagford market-place had shrunk and the houses dwindled since last he saw +them; to call with hearty voice and rough greeting at this habitation and +that; to introduce himself again among men and women who had known him of +yore, and who, for the most part, quite failed to recognise in their bluff +and burly visitor the lad who set forth from his father’s cottage by +the church so many years before.</p> +<h2><a id="I_V" name="I_V"></a>CHAPTER V<br /> +THE INCIDENT OF MR. JOEL FORD</h2> +<p>Of Blanchard family history a little more must be said. Timothy Blanchard, +the husband of Damaris and father of Will and Chris, was in truth of the +nomads, though not a right gypsy. As a lad, and at a time when the Romany +folk enjoyed somewhat more importance and prosperity than of late years, he +joined them, and by sheer force of character and mother wit succeeded in +rising to power amongst the wanderers. The community with which he was +connected for the most part confined its peregrinations to the West; and time +saw Timothy Blanchard achieve success in his native country, acquire two +caravans, develop trade on a regular “circuit,” and steadily save +money in a small way; while his camp of some five-and-twenty souls—men, +women, and numerous children—shared in their leader’s prosperity. +These earlier stages of the man’s career embraced some strange +circumstances, chief amongst them being his marriage. Damaris Ford was the +daughter of a Moor farmer. Her girlhood had been spent in the dreary little +homestead of “Newtake,” above Chagford, within the fringe of the +great primeval wastes; and here, on his repeated journeys across the Moor, +Tim Blanchard came to know her and love her well.</p> +<p>Farmer Ford swore round oaths, and sent Blanchard and his caravans packing +when the man approached him for his daughter’s hand; but the girl +herself was already won, and week after her lover’s repulse Damaris +vanished. She journeyed with her future husband to Exeter, wedded him, and +became mistress of his house on wheels; then, for the space of four years, +she lived the gypsy life, brought a son and daughter into the world, and +tried without avail to obtain her father’s forgiveness. That, however, +she never had, though her mother communicated with her in fear and trembling; +and when, by strange chance, on Will’s advent, Damaris Blanchard was +brought to bed near her old home, and became a mother in one of the venerable +hut circles which plentifully scatter that lonely region, Mrs. Ford, apprised +of the fact in secret, actually stole to her daughter’s side by night +and wept over her grandchild. Now the farmer and his wife were dead; Newtake +at present stood without a tenant; and Mrs. Blanchard possessed no near +relations save her children and one elder brother, Joel, to whom had passed +their parent’s small savings.</p> +<p>Timothy Blanchard continued a wandering existence for the space of five +years after his marriage; then he sold his caravans, settled in Chagford, +bought the cottage by the river, rented some market-garden land, and pursued +his busy and industrious way. Thus he prospered through ten more years, +saving money, developing a variety of schemes, letting out on hire a steam +thresher, and in various other ways adding to his store. The man was on the +high road to genuine prosperity when death overtook him and put a period to +his ambitions. He was snatched from mundane affairs leaving numerous schemes +half developed and most of his money embarked in various enterprises. +Unhappily Will was too young to continue his father’s work, and though +Mrs. Blanchard’s brother, Joel Ford, administered the little estate to +the best of his power, much had to be sacrificed. In the sequel Damaris found +herself with a cottage, a garden, and an annual income of about fifty pounds +a year. Her son was then twelve years of age, her daughter eighteen months +younger. So she lived quietly and not without happiness, after the first +sorrow of her husband’s loss was in a measure softened by time.</p> +<p>Of Mr. Joel Ford it now becomes necessary to speak. Combining the duties +of attorney, house-agent, registrar of deaths, births, and marriages, and +receiver of taxes and debts, the man lived a dingy life at Newton Abbot. +Acid, cynical, and bald he was, very dry of mind and body, and but ten years +older than Mrs. Blanchard, though he looked nearer seventy than sixty. To the +Newton mind Mr. Ford was associated only with Quarter Day—that black, +recurrent cloud on the horizon of every poor man’s life. He dwelt with +an elderly housekeeper—a widow of genial disposition; and indeed the +attorney himself was not lacking in some urbanity of character, though few +guessed it, for he kept all that was best in himself hidden under an unlovely +crust. His better instincts took the shape of family affection. Damaris +Blanchard and he were the last branches of one of the innumerable families of +Ford to be found in Devon, and he had no small regard for his only living +sister. His annual holiday from business—a period of a fortnight, +sometimes extended to three weeks if the weather was more than commonly +fair—he spent habitually at Chagford; and Will on these occasions +devoted his leisure to his uncle, drove him on the Moor, and made him +welcome. Will, indeed, was a favourite with Mr. Ford, and the lad’s +high spirits, real ignorance of the world, and eternal grave assumption of +wisdom even tickled the man of business into a sort of dry cricket laughter +upon occasions. When, therefore, a fortnight after young Blanchard’s +mysterious disappearance, Joel Ford arrived at his sister’s cottage for +the annual visit, he was as much concerned as his nature had power to make +him at the news.</p> +<p>For three weeks he stayed, missing the company of his nephew not a little; +and his residence in Chagford had needed no special comment save for an +important incident resulting therefrom.</p> +<p>Phoebe Lyddon it was who in all innocence and ignorance set rolling a +pebble that finally fell in thundering avalanches; and her chance word was +uttered at her father’s table on an occasion when John and Martin +Grimbal were supping at Monks Barton.</p> +<p>The returned natives, and more especially the elder, had been much at the +mill since their reappearance. John, indeed, upon one pretext or another, +scarcely spent a day without calling. His rough kindness appealed to Phoebe, +who at first suspected no danger from it, while Mr. Lyddon encouraged the man +and made him and his brother welcome at all times.</p> +<p>John Grimbal, upon the morning that preceded the present supper party, had +at last found a property to his taste. It might, indeed, have been designed +for him. Near Whiddon it lay, in the valley of the Moreton Road, and +consisted of a farm and the ruin of a Tudor mansion. The latter had been +tenanted until the dawn of this century, but was since then fallen into +decay. The farm lands stretched beneath the crown of Cranbrook, hard by the +historic “Bloody Meadow,” a spot assigned to that skirmish +between Royalist and Parliamentary forces during 1642 which cost brilliant +young Sidney Godolphin his life. Here, or near at hand, the young man +probably fell, with a musket-bullet in his leg, and subsequently expired at +Chagford<a id="footnotetag1" name="footnotetag1">.</a><a href= +"#footnote1"><sup>1</sup></a> leaving the “misfortune of his death upon +a place which could never otherwise have had a mention to the world,” +according to caustic Chancellor Clarendon.</p> +<p>Upon the aforesaid ruins, fashioned after the form of a great E, out of +compliment to the sovereign who occupied the throne at the period of the +decayed fabric’s erection, John Grimbal proposed to build his +habitation of red brick and tile. The pertaining farm already had a tenant, +and represented four hundred acres of arable land, with possibilities of +development; snug woods wound along the boundaries of the estate and mingled +their branches with others not more stately though sprung from the nobler +domain of Whiddon; and Chagford was distant but a mile, or five +minutes’ ride.</p> +<p>Tongues wagged that evening concerning the Red House, as the ruin was +called, and a question arose as to whom John Grimbal must apply for +information respecting the property.</p> +<p>“I noted on the board two names—one in London, one handy at +Newton Abbot—a Mr. Joel Ford, of Wolborough Street.”</p> +<p>Phoebe blushed where she sat and very nearly said, “My Will’s +uncle!” but thought better of it and kept silent. Meanwhile her father +answered.</p> +<p>“Ford’s an attorney, Mrs. Blanchard’s brother, a maker +of agreements between man and man, and a dusty, dry sort of chip, from all +I’ve heard tell. His father and mine were friends forty years and more +agone. Old Ford had Newtake Farm on the Moor, and wore his fingers to the +bone that his son might have good schooling and a learned +profession.”</p> +<p>“He’s in Chagford this very minute,” said Phoebe.</p> +<p>Then Mr. Blee spoke. On the occasion of any entertainment at Monks Barton +he waited at table instead of eating with the family as usual. Now he +addressed the company from his station behind Mr. Lyddon’s chair.</p> +<p>“Joel Ford’s biding with his sister. A wonderful deep man, to +my certain knowledge, an’ wears a merchant-like coat an’ shiny +hat working days an’ Sabbaths alike. A snug man, I’ll wager, if +’t is awnly by the token of broadcloth on week-days.”</p> +<p>“He looks for all the world like a yellow, shrivelled parchment +himself. Regular gimlet eyes, too, and a very fitch for sharpness, though +younger than his appearance might make you fancy,” said the miller.</p> +<p>“Then I’ll pay him a visit and see how things stand,” +declared John. “Not that I’d employ any but my own London lawyer, +of course,” he added, “but this old chap can give me the +information I require; no doubt.”</p> +<p>“Ess fay! an’ draw you a dockyment in all the cautiousness of +the law’s language,” promised Billy Blee. “’T is a +fact makes me mazed every time I think of it,” he continued, +“that mere fleeting ink on the skin tored off a calf can be so set out +to last to the trump of doom. Theer be parchments that laugh at the +Queen’s awn Privy Council and make the Court of Parliament look a mere +fule afore ’em. But it doan’t do to be ’feared o’ +far-reachin’ oaths when you ’m signing such a matter, for +’t is in the essence of ’em that the parties should swear +deep.”</p> +<p>“I’ll mind what you say, Billy,” promised Grimbal; +“I’ll pump old Ford as dry as I can, then be off to London and +get such a good, binding deed of purchase as you suggest.”</p> +<p>And it was this determination that presently led to a violent breach +between the young man and his elder.</p> +<p>John waited upon Mr. Ford, at Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage, where he had +first lodged with his brother on their return from abroad, and found the +lawyer exceedingly pleasant when he learned the object of Grimbal’s +visit. Together they drove over to the Red House, and its intending tenant +soon heard all there was to tell respecting price and the provisions under +which the estate was to be disposed of. For this information he expressed +proper gratitude, but gave no hint of his future actions.</p> +<p>Mr. Ford heard nothing more for a fortnight. Then he ascertained that John +Grimbal was in the metropolis, that the sale of the Red House and its lands +had been conducted by the London agent, and that no penny of the handsome +commission involved would accrue to him. This position of affairs greatly +(and to some extent reasonably) angered the local man, and he did not forgive +what he considered a very flagrant slight. Extreme acerbity was bred in him, +and his mind, vindictive by nature, cherished from that hour a hearty +detestation of John Grimbal. The old man, his annual holiday ruined by the +circumstance, went home to Newton, vowing vague vengeance and little dreaming +how soon opportunity would offer to deal his enemy a return blow; while the +purchaser of the Red House laughed at Ford’s angry letters, told him to +his face that he was a greedy old rascal, and went on his way well pleased +with himself and fully occupied with his affairs.</p> +<p>Necessary preliminaries were hastened; an architect visited the crumbling +fabric of the old Red House and set about his plans. Soon, upon the ancient +foundations, a new dwelling began to rise. The ancient name was retained at +Martin’s entreaty and the surrounding property developed. A stir and +hum crept through the domain. Here was planting of young birch and larch; +here clearing of land; here mounds of manure steamed on neglected fallows. +John Grimbal took up temporary quarters in the home farm that he might be +upon the spot at all hours; and what with these great personal interests, +good news of his property in Africa, and the growing distraction of one +soft-voiced, grey-eyed girl, the man found his life a full and splendid +thing.</p> +<p>That he should admit Phoebe into his thoughts and ambitions was not +unreasonable for two reasons: he knew himself to be heartily in love with her +by this time, and he had heard from her father a definite statement upon the +subject of Will Blanchard. Indeed, the miller, from motives of worldly +wisdom, took an opportunity to let John Grimbal know the situation.</p> +<p>“No shadow of any engagement at all,” he said. “I made +it plain as a pikestaff to them both. It mustn’t be thought I +countenanced their crack-brained troth-plighting. ’T was by reason of +my final ’Nay’ that Will went off. He ’s gone out of her +life, and she ’m free as the air. I tell you this because you may have +heard different, and you mix with the countryside and can contradict any man +who gives out otherwise. And, mind you, I say it from no ill-will to the +bwoy, but out of justice to my cheel.”</p> +<p>Thus, to gain private ends, Mr. Lyddon spoke, and his information greatly +heartened the listener. John had more than once sounded Phoebe on the subject +of Will during the past few months, and was bound to confess that any chance +he might possess appeared small; but he was deeply in love and a man +accustomed to have his own way. Increasing portions of his time and thought +were devoted to this ambition, and when Phoebe’s father spoke as +recorded, Grimbal jumped at the announcement and pushed for his own hand.</p> +<p>“If a man that was a man, with a bit of land and a bit of stuff +behind him, came along and asked to court her, ’t would be different, I +suppose?” he inquired.</p> +<p>“I’d wish just such a man might come, for her sake.”</p> +<p>“Supposing I asked if I might try to win Phoebe?”</p> +<p>“I’d desire your gude speed, my son. Nothing could please, me +better.”</p> +<p>“Then I’ve got you on my side?”</p> +<p>“You really mean it? Well, well! Gert news to be sure, an’ I +be pleased as Punch to hear ’e. But take my word, for I’m richer +than you by many years in knawledge of the world, though I haven’t seen +so much of it. Go slow. Wait a while till that brown bwoy graws a bit dim in +Phoebe’s eyes. Your life ’s afore you, and the gal ’s +scarce marriageable, to my thinking. Build your house and bide your +time.”</p> +<p>“So be it; and if I don’t win her presently, I +sha’n’t deserve to.”</p> +<p>“Ess, but taake time, lad. She ’m a dutiful, gude maiden, and +I’d be sore to think my awn words won’t carry their weight when +the right moment comes for speaking ’em. Blanchard’s business +pulled down the corners of her purty mouth a bit; but young hearts +caan’t keep mournful for ever.”</p> +<p>Billy Blee then took his turn on the argument. Thus far he had listened, +and now, according to his custom, argued on the popular side and bent his +sail to the prevalent wind of opinion.</p> +<p>“You say right, Miller. ’T is out of nature that a maid should +fret her innards to fiddlestrings ’bout a green bwoy when theer’s +ripe men waitin’ for her.”</p> +<p>“Never heard better sense,” declared John Grimbal, in high +good-humour; and from the red-letter hour of that conversation he let his +love grow into a giant. A man of old-fashioned convictions, he honestly +believed the parent wise who exercised all possible control over a child; and +in this case personal interest prompted him the more strongly to that +opinion. Common sense the world over was on his side, and no man with the +facts before him had been likely to criticise Miller Lyddon on the course of +action he thought proper to pursue for his daughter’s ultimate +happiness. That he reckoned without his host naturally escaped the +father’s thought at this juncture. Will Blanchard had dwindled in his +mind to the mere memory of a headstrong youngster, now far removed from the +scene of his stupidity and without further power to trouble. That he could +advise John to wait a while until Will’s shadow grew less in +Phoebe’s thought, argued kindness and delicacy of mind in Mr. Lyddon. +Will he only saw and gauged as the rest of the world. He did not fathom all +of him, as Mrs. Blanchard had said; while concerning Phoebe’s inner +heart and the possibilities of her character, at a pinch, he could speak with +still less certainty. She was a virgin page, unturned, unscanned. No man knew +her strength or weakness; she did not know it herself.</p> +<p>Time progressed; the leaf fell and the long drought was followed by a mild +autumn of heavy rains. John Grimbal’s days were spent between the Red +House and Monks Barton. His rod was put up; but he had already made friends +and now shot many partridges. He spent long evenings in the society of Phoebe +and her father at the farm; and the miller not seldom contrived to be called +away on these occasions. Billy proved ever ready to assist, and thus the two +old men did the best in their power to aid Grimbal’s suit. In the +great, comfortable kitchen, generally at some distance from each other, +Phoebe and the squire of the new Red House would sit. She, now suspecting, +was shy and uneasy; he, his wits quickened by love, displayed a tact and +deftness of words not to have been anticipated from him. At first Phoebe took +fire when Grimbal criticised Will in anything but a spirit of utmost +friendliness; but it was vital to his own hopes that he should cloud the +picture painted on her heart if he could; so, by degrees and with all the +cleverness at his command, he dropped gall into poor Phoebe’s cup in +minute doses. He mourned the extreme improbability of Blanchard’s +success, grounding his doubt on Will’s uneven character; he pictured +Blanchard’s fight with the world and showed how probable it was that he +would make it a losing battle by his own peculiarities of temper. He declared +the remoteness of happiness for Miss Lyddon in that direction to be extreme; +he deplored the unstable nature of a young man’s affection all the +world over; and he made solid capital out of the fact that not once since his +departure had her lover communicated with Phoebe. She argued against this +that her father had forbidden it; but Mr. Grimbal overrode the objection, and +asked what man in love would allow himself to be bound by such a command. As +a matter of fact, Will had sent two messages at different times to his +sweetheart. These came through Clement Hicks, and only conveyed the +intelligence that the wanderer was well.</p> +<p>So Phoebe suffered persistent courting and her soft mould of mind sank a +little under the storm. Now, weary and weak, she hesitated; now a wave of +strength fortified her spirit. That John Grimbal should be dogged and +importunate she took as mere masculine characteristics, and the fact did not +anger her against him; but what roused her secret indignation almost as often +as they met was his half-hidden air of sanguine confidence. He was humble in +a way, always the patient lover, but in his manner she detected an +indefinable, irritating self-confidence—the demeanour of one who +already knows himself a conqueror before the battle is fought.</p> +<p>Thus the position gradually developed. As yet her father had not spoken to +Phoebe or pretended to any knowledge of what was doing; but there came a +night, at the end of November, when John Grimbal, the miller, and Billy sat +and smoked at Monks Barton after Phoebe’s departure to bed. Mr. Blee, +very well knowing what matter moved the minds of his companions, spoke +first.</p> +<p>“Missy have put on a temperate way of late days it do seem. I most +begin to think that cat-a-mountain of a bwoy ’s less in her thoughts +than he was. She ’m larnin’ wisdom, as well she may wi’ +sich a faither.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t knaw what to think,” answered Mr. Lyddon, +somewhat gloomily. “I ban’t so much in her confidence as of auld +days. Damaris Blanchard’s right, like enough. A maid ’s tu deep +even for the faither that got her, most times. A sweet, dear gal as ever was, +for all that. How fares it, John? She never names ’e to me, though I do +to her.”</p> +<p>“I’m biding my time, neighbour. I reckon ’t will be +right one day. It only makes me feel a bit mean now and again to have to say +hard things about young Blanchard. Still, while she ’s wrapped up +there, I may whistle for her.”</p> +<p>“You ’m in the right,” declared Billy. “’T +is an auld sayin’ that all manner of dealings be fair in love, +an’ true no doubt, though I’m a bachelor myself an’ no +prophet in such matters.”</p> +<p>“All’s fair for certain,” admitted John, as though he +had not before considered the position from this standpoint.</p> +<p>“Ay, an’ a darter’s welfare lies in her faither’s +hand. Thank God, I’m not a parent to my knowledge; but ’tis a +difficult calling in life, an’ a young maiden gal, purty as a picksher, +be a heavy load to a honest mind.”</p> +<p>“So I find it,” said the miller.</p> +<p>“You’ve forbid Will—lock, stock, and +barrel—therefore, of coourse, she ’s no right to think more of +him, to begin with,” continued the old man. It was a new idea.</p> +<p>“Come to think of it, she hasn’t—eh?” asked +John.</p> +<p>“No, that’s true enough,” admitted Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>“I speak, though of low position, but well thought of an’ at +Miller’s right hand, so to say,” continued Mr. Blee; “so +theer ’t is: Missy’s in a dangerous pass. Eve’s flesh be +Eve’s flesh, whether hid under flannel or silk, or shawed mother-naked +to the sun after the manner of furrin cannibals. A gal ’s a gal; +an’ if I was faither of such as your darter, I’d count it my +solemn duty to see her out of the dangers of life an’ tidily mated to a +gude man. I’d say to myself, ’Her’ll graw to bless me for +what I’ve done, come a few years.’”</p> +<p>So Billy Blee, according to his golden rule, advised men upon the road +they already desired to follow, and thus increased his reputation for sound +sense and far-reaching wisdom.</p> +<p>“It’s true, every word he says,” declared John +Grimbal.</p> +<p>“I believe it,” answered the miller; “though God forbid +any word or act of mine should bring wan tear to Phoebe’s cheek. Yet, +somehow, I doan’t knaw but you ’m right.”</p> +<p>“I am, believe me. It’s the truth. You want Phoebe’s +real happiness considered, and that now depends on—well, I’ll say +it out—on me. We have reached the point now when you must speak, as you +promised to speak, and throw the weight of your influence on my side. Then, +after you’ve had your say, I’ll have mine and put the great +question.”</p> +<p>Mr. Lyddon nodded his head and relapsed into taciturnity.</p> +<h2><a id="I_VI" name="I_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI<br /> +AN UNHAPPY POET</h2> +<p>That a man of many nerves, uncertain in temper and with no physical or +temporal qualifications, should have won for himself the handsomest girl in +Chagford caused the unreflective to marvel whenever they considered the +point. But a better knowledge of Chris Blauchard had served in some measure +to explain the wonder. Of all women, she was the least likely to do the thing +predicted by experience. She had tremendous force of character for one scarce +twenty years of age; indeed, she lived a superlative life, and the man, +woman, child, or dog that came within radius of her existence presently +formed a definite part of it, and was loved or detested according to +circumstances. Neutrality she could not understand. If her interests were +wide, her prejudices were strong. A certain unconscious high-handedness of +manner made the circle of her friends small, but those who did love her were +enthusiastic. Upon the whole, the number of those who liked her increased +with years, and avowed enemies had no very definite reasons for aversion. Of +her physical perfections none pretended two opinions; but the boys had always +gone rather in fear of Chris, and the few men who had courted her during the +past few years were all considerably her seniors. No real romance entered +into this young woman’s practical and bustling life until the advent of +Clement Hicks, though she herself was the flame of hearts not a few before +his coming.</p> +<p>Neurotic, sensual, as was Chris herself in a healthy fashion, a man of +varying moods, and perhaps the richer for faint glimmerings of the real fire, +Hicks yet found himself no better than an aimless, helpless child before the +demands of reality. Since boyhood he had lived out of touch with his +environment. As bee-keeper and sign-writer he made a naked living for himself +and his mother, and achieved success sufficient to keep a cottage roof over +their heads, but that was all. Books were his only friends; the old stones of +the Moor, the lonely wastes, the plaintive music of a solitary bird were the +companions of his happiest days. He had wit enough to torture half his waking +hours with self-analysis, and to grit his teeth at his own impotence. But +there was no strength, no virile grip to take his fate in his own hands and +mould it like a man. He only mourned his disadvantages, and sometimes blamed +destiny, sometimes a congenital infirmity of purpose, for the dreary course +of his life. Nature alone could charm his sullen moods, and that not always. +Now and again she spread over the face of his existence a transitory +contentment and a larger hope; but the first contact with facts swept it away +again. His higher aspirations were neither deep nor enduring, and yet the +man’s love of nature was lofty and just, and represented all the +religion he had. No moral principles guided him, conscience never pricked. +Nevertheless, thus far he had been a clean liver and an honest man. Vice, +because it affronted his sense of the beautiful and usually led towards +death, did not attract him. He lived too deep in the lap of Nature to be +deceived by the pseudo-realism then making its appearance in literature, and +he laughed without mirth at these pictures from city-bred pens at that time +paraded as the whole truth of the countryman’s life. The later school +was not then above the horizon; the brief and filthy spectacle of those who +dragged their necrosis, marasmus, and gangrene of body and mind across the +stage of art and literature, and shrieked Decay, had not as yet appeared to +make men sicken; the plague-spot, now near healed, had scarce showed the +faintest angry symptom of coming ill. Hicks might under no circumstances have +been drawn in that direction, for his morbidity was of a different +description. Art to this man appeared only in what was wholesome; it even +embraced a guide to conduct, for it led him directly to Nature, and Nature +emphatically taught him the value of obedience, the punishment of weakness, +the reward for excess and every form of self-indulgence. But a softness in +him shrank from these aspects of the Mother. He tried vainly and feebly to +dig some rule of life from her smiles alone, to read a sermon into her happy +hours of high summer sunshine. Beauty was his dream; he possessed natural +taste, and had cultivated the same without judgment. His intricate +disposition and extreme sensitiveness frightened him away from much effort at +self-expression; yet not a few trifling scraps and shreds of lyric poetry had +fallen from his pen in high moments. These, when the mood changed, he read +again, and found dead, and usually destroyed. He was more easily discouraged +than a child who sets out to tell its parent a story, and is all silence and +shamefaced blushes at the first whisper of laughter or semblance of a smile. +The works of poets dazed him, disheartened him, and secret ambitions toward +performance grew dimmer with every book he laid his hands on. Ambition to +create began to die; the dream scenery of his ill-controlled mental life more +and more seldom took shape of words on paper; and there came a time when +thought grew wholly wordless for him; a mere personal pleasure, selfish, +useless, unsubstantial as the glimmer of mirage over desert sands.</p> +<p>Into this futile life came Chris, like a breath of sweet air from off the +deep sea. She lifted him clean out of his subjective existence, awoke a +healthy, natural love, built on the ordinary emotions of humanity, galvanised +self-respect and ambition into some activity, and presently inspired a pluck +strong enough to propose marriage. That was two years ago; and the girl still +loved this weakly soul with all her heart, found his language unlike that of +any other man she had seen or heard, and even took some slight softening edge +of culture into herself from him. Her common sense was absolutely powerless +to probe even the crust of Clement’s nature; but she was satisfied that +his poetry must be a thing as marketable as that in printed books. Indeed, in +an elated moment he had assured her that it was so. During the earlier stages +of their attachment, she pestered him to write and sell his verses and make +money, that their happiness might be hastened; while he, on the first budding +of his love, and with the splendid assurance of its return, had promised all +manner of things, and indeed undertaken to make poems that should be sent by +post to the far-away place where they printed unknown poets, and paid them. +Chris believed in Clement as a matter of course. His honey must at least be +worth more to the world than that of his bees. Over her future husband she +began at once to exercise the control of mistress and mother; and she loved +him more dearly after they had been engaged a year than at the beginning of +the contract. By that time she knew his disposition, and instead of +displaying frantic impatience at it, as might have been predicted, her +tolerance was extreme. She bore with Clem because she loved him with the full +love proper to such a nature as her own; and, though she presently found +herself powerless to modify his character in any practical degree, his gloomy +and uneven mind never lessened the sturdy optimism of Chris herself, or her +sure confidence that the future would unite them. Through her protracted +engagement Mrs. Blanchard’s daughter maintained a lively and sanguine +cheerfulness. But seldom was it that she lost patience with the dreamer. Then +her rare, indignant outbursts of commonplace and common sense, like a +thunderstorm, sweetened the stagnant air of Clement’s thoughts and +awoke new, wholesome currents in his mind.</p> +<p>As a rule, on the occasion of their frequent country walks, Clem and Chris +found personal problems and private interests sufficient for all +conversation, but it happened that upon a Sunday in mid-December, as they +passed through the valley of the Teign, where the two main streams of that +river mingle at the foothills of the Moor, the subject of Will and Phoebe for +a time at least filled their thoughts. The hour was clear and bright, yet +somewhat cheerless. The sun had already set, from the standpoint of all life +in the valley, and darkness, hastening out of the east, merged the traceries +of a million naked boughs into a thickening network of misty grey. The river +beneath these woods churned in winter flood, while clear against its raving +one robin sang little tinkling litanies from the branch of an alder.</p> +<p>Chris stood upon Lee Bridge at the waters’ meeting and threw scraps +of wood into the river; Clem sat upon the parapet, smoked his pipe, and noted +with a lingering delight the play of his sweetheart’s lips as her +fingers strained to snap a tough twig. Then the girl spoke, continuing a +conversation already entered upon.</p> +<p>“Phoebe Lyddon’s that weak in will. How far’s such as +her gwaine in life without some person else to lean upon?”</p> +<p>“If the ivy cannot find a tree it creeps along the ground, +Chrissy.”</p> +<p>“Ess, it do; or else falls headlong awver the first bank it comes +to. Phoebe’s so helpless a maiden as ever made a picksher. I mind her +at school in the days when we was childer together. Purty as them china +figures you might buy off Cheap Jack, an’ just so tender. She’d +come up to dinky gals no bigger ’n herself an’ pull out her +li’l handkercher an’ ax ’em to be so kind as to blaw her +nose for her! Now Will’s gone, Lard knaws wheer she’ll drift +to.”</p> +<p>“To John Grimbal. Any man could see that. Her father’s set on +it.”</p> +<p>“Why don’t Will write to her and keep her heart up and give +her a little news? ’Twould be meat an’ drink to her. Doan’t +matter ’bout mother an’ me. We’ll take your word for it +that Will wants to keep his ways secret. But a sweetheart—’tis so +differ’nt. I wouldn’t stand it!”</p> +<p>“I know right well you wouldn’t. Will has his own way. We +won’t criticise him. But there’s a masterful man in the +running—a prosperous, loud-voiced, bull-necked bully of a man, and one +not accustomed to take ’no’ for his answer. I’m afraid of +John Grimbal in this matter. I’ve gone so far as to warn Will, but he +writes back that he knows Phoebe.”</p> +<p>“Jan Grimbal’s a very differ’nt fashion of man to his +brother; that I saw in a moment when they bided with us for a week, till the +’Three Crowns’ could take ’em in. I hate Jan—hate him +cruel; but I like Martin. He puts me in mind o’ you, Clem, wi’ +his nice way of speech and tender quickness for women. But it’s Phoebe +we’m speaking of. I think you should write stern to Will an’ +frighten him. It ban’t fair fightin’, that poor, dear Phoebe +’gainst the will o’ two strong men.”</p> +<p>“Well, she’s had paltry food for a lover since he went away. +He’s got certain ideas, and she’ll hear direct when—but +there, I must shut my mouth, for I swore by fantastic oaths to say +nothing.”</p> +<p>“He ought to write, whether or no. You tell Will that Jan Grimbal be +about building a braave plaace up under Whiddon, and is looking for a wife at +Monks Barton morning, noon, an’ evening. That’s like to waken +him. An’ tell him the miller’s on t’other side, and +clacking Jan Grimbal into Phoebe’s ear steadier than the noise of his +awn water-wheel.”</p> +<p>“And she will grow weak, mark me. She sees that red-brick place +rising out of the bare boughs, higher and higher, and knows that from floor +to attics all may be hers if she likes to say the word. She hears great talk +of drawing-rooms, and pictures, and pianos, and greenhouses full of rare +flowers, and all the rest—why, just think of it!”</p> +<p>“Ban’t many gals as could stand ’gainst a piano, I +daresay.”</p> +<p>“I only know one—mine.”</p> +<p>Chris looked at him curiously.</p> +<p>“You ’m right. An’ that, for some queer reason, puts me +in mind of the other wan, Martin Grimbal. He was very pleasant to +me.”</p> +<p>“He’s too late, thank God!”</p> +<p>“Ess, fay! An’ if he’d comed afore ’e, Clem, +he’d been tu early. Theer’s awnly wan man in the gert world for +me.”</p> +<p>“My gypsy!”</p> +<p>“But I didn’t mean that. He wouldn’t look at me, not +even if I was a free woman. ’T was of you I thought when I talked to +Mr. Grimbal. He’m well-to-do, and be seekin’ a house in the +higher quarter under Middledown. You an’ him have the same fancy for +the auld stones. So you might grow into friends—eh, Clem? +Couldn’t it so fall out? He might serve to help—eh? You ’m +two-and-thirty year auld next February, an’ it do look as though they +silly bees ban’t gwaine to put money enough in the bank to spell a +weddin’ for us this thirty year to come. Theer’s awnly your aunt, +Widow Coomstock, as you can look to for a penny, and that tu doubtful to +count on.”</p> +<p>“Don’t name her, Chris. Good Lord! poor drunken old thing, +with that crowd of hungry relations waiting like vultures round a dying +camel! Never think of her. Money she has, but I sha’n’t see the +colour of it, and I don’t want to.”</p> +<p>“Well, let that bide. Martin Grimbal’s the man in my +thought.”</p> +<p>“What can I do there?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t knaw, ’zactly; but things might fall out if he +got to like you, being a bookish sort of man. Anyway, he’s very willing +to be friends, for that he told me. Doan’t bear yourself like Lucifer +afore him; but take the first chance to let him knaw your fortune’s in +need of mendin’.”</p> +<p>“You say that! D’ you think self-respect is dead in me?” +he asked, half angry.</p> +<p>There was no visible life about them, so she put her arms round him.</p> +<p>“I ax for love of ’e, dearie, an’ for want of ’e. +Do ’e think waitin’ ’s sweeter for me than for +you?”</p> +<p>Then he calmed down again, sighed, returned the caress, touched her, and +stroked her breast and shoulder with sudden earthly light in his great +eyes.</p> +<p>“It ’s hard to wait.”</p> +<p>“That’s why I say doan’t lose chances that may mean a +weddin’ for us, Clem. Theer ’s so much hid in ’e, if awnly +the way to bring it out could be found.”</p> +<p>“A mine that won’t pay working,” he said bitterly, the +passion fading out of eyes and voice. “I know there ’s something +hidden; I feel there ’s a twist of brain that ought to rise above +keeping bees and take me higher than honey-combs. Yet look at hard truth. The +clods round me get enough by their sweat to keep wives and feed children. +I’m only a penniless, backboneless, hand-to-mouth wretch, living on the +work of laborious insects.”</p> +<p>“If it ban’t your awn fault, then whose be it, +Clem?”</p> +<p>“The fault of Chance—to pack my build of brains into the skull +of a pauper. This poor, unfinished abortion of a head-piece of mine only +dreams dreams that it cannot even set on paper for others to see.”</p> +<p>“You’ve given up trying whether it can or not, +seemin’ly. I never hear tell of no verses now.”</p> +<p>“What ’s the good? But only last night, so it happens, I had a +sort of a wild feeling to get something out of myself, and I scribbled for +hours and hours and found a little morsel of a rhyme.”</p> +<p>“Will ’e read it to me?”</p> +<p>He showed reluctance, but presently dragged a scrap of paper out of his, +pocket. Not a small source of trouble was his sweetheart’s criticism of +his verses.</p> +<p>“It was the common sight of a pair of lovers walking tongue-tied, +you know. I call it ‘A Devon Courting.’”</p> +<p>He read the trifle slowly, with that grand, rolling sea-beat of an accent +that Elizabeth once loved to hear on the lips of Raleigh and Drake.</p> +<p class="poem">“Birds gived awver singin’,<br /> +Flittermice was wingin’,<br /> +Mists lay on the meadows—<br /> +<span class="i2">A purty sight to see.</span><br /> +Down-long in the dimpsy, the dimpsy, the dimpsy,<br /> +<span class="i2">Down-long in the dimpsy</span><br /> +Theer went a maid wi’ me.<br /> +<br /> +“Five gude mile o’ walkin’,<br /> +Not wan word o’ talkin’,<br /> +Then I axed a question<br /> +<span class="i2">And put the same to she.</span><br /> +Up-long in the owl-light, the owl-light, the owl-light,<br /> +<span class="i2">Up-long in the owl-light,</span><br /> +Theer corned my maid wi’ me.”<br /></p> +<p class="i0">“But I wonder you write the common words, Clem—you +who be so much tu clever to use ’em.”</p> +<p>“The words are well enough. They were not common once.”</p> +<p>“Well, you knaw best. Could ’e sell such a li’l auld +funny thing as that for money?”</p> +<p>He shook his head.</p> +<p>“No; it was only the toil of making it seemed good. It is +worthless.”</p> +<p>“An’ to think how long it took ’e! If you’d awnly +put the time into big-fashioned verses full of the high words you’ve +got. But you knaw best. Did ’e hear anything of them rhymes ’bout +the auld days you sent to Lunnon?”</p> +<p>“They sent them back again. I told you ’t was wasting three +stamps. It ’s not for me, I know it. The world is full of dumb singers. +Maybe I haven’t got even a pinch of the fire that <i>must</i> break +through and show its flame, no matter what mountains the earth tumbles on it. +God knows I burn hot enough sometimes with great thoughts and wild longings +for love and for sweeter life and for you; but my fires—whether they +are soul-fires or body-fires—only burn my heart out.”</p> +<p>She sighed and squeezed his hand, understanding little enough of what he +said.</p> +<p>“We must be patient. ’T is a solid thing, patience. I’m +puttin’ by pence; but it ’s so plaguy little a gal can earn, best +o’ times and with the best will.”</p> +<p>“If I could only write the things I think! But they vanish before +pen and paper and the need of words, as the mists of the night vanish before +the hard, searching sun. I am ignorant of how to use words; and those in the +world who might help me will never know of me. As for those around about, +they reckon me three parts fool, with just a little gift of re-writing names +over their dirty shop-fronts.”</p> +<p>“Yet it ’s money. What did ’e get for that butivul fox +wi’ the goose in his mouth you painted ’pon Mr. Lamacraft’s +sign to Sticklepath?”</p> +<p>“Ten shillings.”</p> +<p>“That’s solid money.”</p> +<p>“It isn’t now. I bought a book with it—a book of +lies.”</p> +<p>Chris was going to speak, but changed her mind and sighed instead.</p> +<p>“Well, as our affairs be speeding so poorly, we’d best to do +some gude deed an’ look after this other coil. You must let Will knaw +what ’s doin’ by letter this very night. ’T is awnly fair, +you being set in trust for him.”</p> +<p>“Strange, these Grimbal brothers,” mused Clement, as the +lovers proceeded in the direction of Chagford. “They come home with +everything on God’s earth that men might desire to win happiness, and, +by the look of it, each marks his home-coming by falling in love with one he +can’t have.”</p> +<p>“Shaws the fairness of things, Clem; how the poor may chance to have +what the rich caan’t buy; so all look to stand equal.”</p> +<p>“Fairness, you call it? The damned, cynical irony of this whole +passion-driven puppet-show—that’s what it shows! The man who is +loved cannot marry the woman he loves lest they both starve; the man who can +give a woman half the world is loathed for his pains. Not that he ’s to +be pitied like the pauper, for if you can’t buy love you can buy women, +and the wise ones know how to manufacture a very lasting substitute for the +real thing.”</p> +<p>“You talk that black and bitter as though you was deep-read in all +the wickedness of the world,” said Chris; “yet I knaw no man can +say sweeter things than you sometimes.”</p> +<p>“Talk! It ’s all talk with me—all snarling and railing +and whining at hard facts, like a viper wasting its venom on steel. I’m +sick of myself—weary of the old, stale round of my thoughts. Where can +I wash and be clean? Chrissy, for God’s sake, tell me.”</p> +<p>“Put your hope in the Spring,” she said, “an’ be +busy for Will.” In reality, with the approach of Christmas, affairs +between Phoebe and the elder Grimbal had reached a point far in advance of +that which Clement and Chris were concerned with. For more than three months, +and under a steadily increasing weight of opposition, Miller Lyddon’s +daughter fought without shadow of yielding. Then came a time when the calm +but determined iteration of her father’s desires and the sledge-hammer +love-making of John Grimbal began to leave an impression. Even then her love +for Will was bright and strong, but her sense of helplessness fretted her +nerves and temper, and her sweetheart’s laconic messages, through the +medium of another man, were sorry comfort in this hour of tribulation. With +some reason she felt slighted. Neither considering Will’s +peculiarities, nor suspecting that his silence was only, the result of a whim +or project, she began to resent it. Then John Grimbal caught her in a +dangerous mood. Once she wavered, and he had the wisdom to leave her at the +moment of victory. But on the next occasion of their meeting, he took good +care to keep the advantage he had gained. Conscious of his own honest and +generous intentions, Grimbal went on his way. The subtler manifestations of +Phoebe’s real attitude towards him escaped his observation; her +reluctance he set down as resulting from the dying shadow of affection for +Will Blanchard. That she would be very happy and proud and prosperous in the +position of his wife, the lover was absolutely assured. He pursued her with +the greater determination, in that he believed he was saving her from +herself. What were some few months of vague uncertainty and girlish tears +compared with a lifetime of prosperity and solid happiness? John Grimbal made +Phoebe handsome presents of pretty and costly things after the first great +victory. He pushed his advantage with tremendous vigour. His great face +seemed reflected in Phoebe’s eyes when she slept as when she woke; his +voice was never out of her ears. Weary, hopeless, worn out, she prayed +sometimes for strength of purpose. But it was a trait denied to her character +and not to be bestowed at a breath. Her stability of defence, even as it +stood, was remarkable and beyond expectation. Then the sure climax rolled in +upon poor Phoebe. Twice she sought Clement Hicks with purpose to send an +urgent message; on each occasion accident prevented a meeting; her father was +always smiling and droning his desires into her ear; John Grimbal haunted +her. His good-nature and kindness were hard to bear; his patience made her +frantic. So the investment drew to its conclusion and the barriers crumbled, +for the forces besieged were too weak and worn to restore them; while a last +circumstance brought victory to the stronger and proclaimed the final +overthrow.</p> +<p>This culmination resulted from a visit to the spiritual head of +Phoebe’s dwelling-place. The Rev. James Shorto-Champernowne, Vicar of +Chagford, made an appointment to discuss the position with Mr. Lyddon and his +daughter. A sportsman of the old type, and a cleric of rare reputation for +good sense and fairness to high and low, was Mr. Shorto-Champernowne, but it +happened that his more tender emotions had been buried with a young wife +these forty years, and children he had none. Nevertheless, taking the +standpoint of parental discipline, he held Phoebe’s alleged engagement +a vain thing, not to be considered seriously. Moreover, he knew of +Will’s lapses in the past; and that was fatal.</p> +<p>“My child, have little doubt that both religion and duty point in +one direction and with no faltering hands,” he said, in his stately +way. “Communicate with the young man, inform him that conversation with +myself has taken place; then he can hardly maintain an attitude of doubt, +either to the exalted convictions that have led to your decision, or to the +propriety of it. And, further, do not omit an opportunity of well-doing, but +conclude your letter with a word of counsel. Pray him to seek a Guide to his +future life, the only Guide able to lead him aright. I mean his Mother +Church. No man who turns his back upon her can be either virtuous or happy. I +mourned his defection from our choir some years ago. You see I forget nobody. +My eyes are everywhere, as they ought to be. Would that he could be whipped +back to the House of God—with scorpions, if necessary! There is a +cowardice, a lack of sportsmanlike feeling, if I may so express it, in these +fallings away from the Church of our fathers. It denotes a failing of +intellect amid the centres of human activity. There is a blight of unbelief +abroad—a nebulous, pestilential rationalism. Acquaint him with these +facts; they may serve to re-establish one whose temperament must be regarded +as abnormal in the light of his great eccentricity of action. Now farewell, +and God be with you.”</p> +<p>The rotund, grey-whiskered clergyman waved his hand; Miller Lyddon and his +daughter left the vicarage; while both heard, as it seemed, his studied +phrases and sonorous voice rolling after them all the way home. But poor +Phoebe felt that the main issues as to conscience were now only too clear; +her last anchor was wrenched from its hold, and that night, through a mist of +unhappy tears, she succumbed, promised to marry John Grimbal and be queen of +the red castle now rising under Cranbrook’s distant heights.</p> +<p>That we have dealt too scantily with her tragic experiences may be +suspected; but the sequel will serve to show how these circumstances demand +no greater elaboration than has been accorded to them.</p> +<h2><a id="I_VII" name="I_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII<br /> +LIBATION TO POMONA</h2> +<p>A WINTER moon threw black shadows from stock and stone, tree and cot in +the valley of the Teign. Heavy snow had fallen, and moor-men, coming down +from the highlands, declared it to lie three feet deep in the drifts. Now +fine, sharp weather had succeeded the storm, and hard frost held both hill +and vale.</p> +<p>On Old Christmas Eve a party numbering some five-and-twenty persons +assembled in the farmyard of Monks Barton, and Billy Blee, as master of the +pending ceremonies, made them welcome. Some among them were aged, others +youthful; indeed the company consisted mostly of old men and boys, a +circumstance very easily understood when the nature of their enterprise is +considered. The ancients were about to celebrate a venerable rite and +sacrifice to a superstition, active in their boyhood, moribund at the date +with which we are concerned, and to-day probably dead altogether. The sweet +poet<a id="footnotetag2" name="footnotetag2"></a><a href= +"#footnote2"><sup>2</sup></a> of Dean Prior mentions this quaint, old-time +custom of “christening” or “wassailing” the +fruit-trees among Christmas-Eve ceremonies; and doubtless when he dwelt in +Devon the use was gloriously maintained; but an adult generation in the years +of this narrative had certainly refused it much support. It was left to their +grandfathers and their sons; and thus senility and youth preponderated in the +present company. For the boys, this midnight fun with lantern and +fowling-piece was good Christmas sport, and they came readily enough; to the +old men their ceremonial possessed solid value, and from the musty storehouse +of his memory every venerable soul amongst them could cite instances of the +sovereign virtue hid in such a procedure.</p> +<p>“A brave rally o’ neighbours, sure ’nough,” cried +Mr. Blee as he appeared amongst them. “Be Gaffer Lezzard +come?”</p> +<p>“Here, Billy.”</p> +<p>“Hast thy fire-arm, Lezzard?”</p> +<p>“Ess, ’t is here. My gran’son’s carrying of it; +but I holds the powder-flask an’ caps, so no ruin be threatened to +none.”</p> +<p>Mr. Lezzard wore a black smock-frock, across the breast of which extended +delicate and skilful needlework. His head was hidden under an old chimney-pot +hat with a pea-cock’s feather in it, and, against the cold, he had tied +a tremendous woollen muffler round his neck and about his ears. The ends of +it hung down over his coat, and the general effect of smock, comforter, +gaitered shanks, boots tied up in straw, long nose, and shining spectacles, +was that of some huge and ungainly bird, hopped from out a fairy-tale or a +nightmare.</p> +<p>“Be Maister Chappie here likewise?” inquired Billy.</p> +<p>“I’m waitin’; an’ I’ve got a fowling-piece, +tu.”</p> +<p>“That’s gude then. I be gwaine to carry the auld blunderbuss +what’s been in Miller Lyddon’s family since the years of his +ancestors, and belonged to a coach-guard in the King’s days. ’T +is well suited to apple-christenin’. The cider’s here, in three +o’ the biggest earth pitchers us’a’ got, an’ the lads +is ready to bring it along. The Maister Grimbals, as will be related to the +family presently, be comin’ to see the custom, an’ Miller wants +every man to step back-along arterwards an’ have a drop o’ the +best, ’cordin’ to his usual gracious gudeness. Now, Lezzard, me +an’ you’ll lead the way.”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee then shouldered his ancient weapon, the other veteran marched +beside him, and the rest of the company followed in the direction of Chagford +Bridge. They proceeded across the fields; and along the procession bobbed a +lantern or two, while a few boys carried flaring torches. The light from +these killed the moonbeams within a narrow radius, shot black tongues of +smoke into the clear air, and set the meadows glimmering redly where +contending radiance of moon and fire powdered the virgin snow with diamond +and ruby. Snake-like the party wound along beside the river. Dogs barked; +voices rang clear on the crystal night; now and again, with laughter and +shout, the lads raced hither and thither from their stolid elders, and here +and there jackets carried the mark of a snowball. Behind the procession a +trampled grey line stretched out under the moonlight. Then all passed like +some dim, magic pageant of a dream; the distant dark blot of naked woodlands +swallowed them up, and the voices grew faint and ceased. Only the endless +song of the river sounded, with a new note struck into it by the world of +snow.</p> +<p>For a few moments the valley was left empty, so empty that a fox, who had +been prowling unsuccessfully about Monks Barton since dusk, took the +opportunity to leave his hiding-place above the ducks’ pool, cross the +meadows, and get him home to his earth two miles distant. He slunk with +pattering foot across the snow, marking his way by little regular paw-pits +and one straight line where his brush roughened the surface. Steam puffed in +jets from his muzzle, and his empty belly made him angry with the world. At +the edge of the woods he lifted his head, and the moonlight touched his green +eyes. Then he recorded a protest against Providence in one eerie bark, and so +vanished, before the weird sound had died.</p> +<p>Phoebe Lyddon and her lover, having given the others some vantage of +ground, followed them to their destination—Mr. Lyddon’s famous +orchard in Teign valley. The girl’s dreary task of late had been to +tell herself that she would surely love John Grimbal presently—love him +as such a good man deserved to be loved. Only under the silence and in the +loneliness of long nights, only in the small hours of day, when sleep would +not come and pulses were weak, did Phoebe confess that contact with him hurt +her, that his kisses made her giddy to sickness, that all his gifts put +together were less to her than one treasure she was too weak to +destroy—the last letter Will had written. Once or twice, not to her +future husband, but to the miller, Phoebe had ventured faintly to question +still the promise of this great step; but Mr. Lyddon quickly overruled all +doubts, and assisted John Grimbal in his efforts to hasten the ceremony. Upon +this day, Old Christmas Eve, the wedding-day lay not a month distant and, +afterwards the husband designed to take his wife abroad for a trip to South +Africa. Thus he would combine business and pleasure, and return in the spring +to witness the completion of his house. Chagford highly approved the match, +congratulated Phoebe on her fortune, and felt secretly gratified that a +personage grown so important as John Grimbal should have chosen his +life’s partner from among the maidens of his native village.</p> +<p>Now the pair walked over the snow; and silent and stealthy as the vanished +fox, a grey figure followed after them. Dim as some moon-spirit against the +brightness, this shape stole forward under the rough hedge that formed a bank +and threw a shadow between meadow and stream. In repose the grey man, for a +man it was, looked far less substantial than the stationary outlines of +fences and trees; and when he moved it had needed a keen eye to see him at +all. He mingled with the moonlight and snow, and became a part of a strange +inversion of ordinary conditions; for in this white, hushed world the shadows +alone seemed solid and material in their black nakedness, in their keen +sharpness of line and limit, while things concrete and ponderable shone out a +silvery medley of snow-capped, misty traceries, vague of outline, uncertain +of shape, magically changed as to their relations by the unfamiliar carpet +now spread between them.</p> +<p>The grey figure kept Phoebe in sight, but followed a path of his own +choosing. When she entered the woods he drew a little nearer, and thus +followed, passing from shadow to shadow, scarce fifty yards behind.</p> +<p>Meanwhile the main procession approached the scene of its labours. Martin +Grimbal, attracted by the prospect of reading this page from an old Devonian +superstition, was of the company. He walked with Billy Blee and Gaffer +Lezzard; and these high priests, well pleased at their junior’s +attitude towards the ceremony, opened their hearts to him upon it.</p> +<p>“’T is an ancient rite, auld as cider—maybe auld as +Scripture, to, for anything I’ve heard to the contrary,” said Mr. +Lezzard.</p> +<p>“Ay, so ’t is,” declared Billy Blee, “an’ a +custom to little observed nowadays. But us might have better blooth in +springtime an’ braaver apples come autumn if the trees was christened +more regular. You doan’t see no gert stock of sizable apples best +o’ years now—li’l scrubbly auld things most +times.”</p> +<p>“An’ the cider from ’em—poor roapy muck, awnly fit +to make ’e thirst for better drink,” criticised Gaffer +Lezzard.</p> +<p>“’Tis this way: theer’s gert virtue in cider put to +apple-tree roots on this particular night, accordin’ to the planets and +such hidden things. Why so, I can’t tell ’e, any more ’n +anybody could tell ’e why the moon sails higher up the sky in winter +than her do in summer; but so ’t is. An’ facts be facts. Why, +theer’s the auld ‘Sam’s Crab’ tree in this very +orchard we’m walkin’ to. I knawed that tree three year ago to +give a hogshead an’ a half as near as damn it. That wan tree, mind, +with no more than a few baskets of ‘Redstreaks’ added.”</p> +<p>“An’ a shy bearer most times, tu,” added Mr. +Lezzard.</p> +<p>“Just so; then come next year, by some mischance, me being indoors, +if they didn’t forget to christen un! An’, burnish it all! theer +wasn’t fruit enough on the tree to fill your pockets!”</p> +<p>“Whether ’t is the firing into the branches, or the cider to +the roots does gude, be a matter of doubt,” continued Mr. Lezzard; but +the other authority would not admit this.</p> +<p>“They ’m like the halves of a flail, depend on it: wan no use +wi’out t’other. Then theer’s the singing of the auld song: +who’s gwaine to say that’s the least part of it?”</p> +<p>“’T is the three pious acts thrawn together in wan gude +deed,” summed up Mr. Lezzard; “an’ if they’d awnly +let apples get ripe ’fore they break ’em, an’ go back to +the straw for straining, ’stead of these tom-fule, new-fangled +hair-cloths, us might get tidy cider still.”</p> +<p>By this time the gate of the orchard was reached; Gaffer Lezzard, Billy, +and the other patriarch, Mr. Chapple,—a very fat old man,—loaded +their weapons, and the perspiring cider-carriers set down their loads.</p> +<p>“Now, you bwoys, give awver runnin’ ’bout like +rabbits,” cried out Mr. Chapple. “You ’m here to sing while +us pours cider an’ shoots in the trees; an’ not a drop +you’ll have if you doan’t give tongue proper, so I tell +’e.”</p> +<p>At this rebuke the boys assembled, and there followed a hasty gabbling, to +freshen the words in young and uncertain memories. Then a small vessel was +dipped under floating toast, that covered the cider in the great pitchers, +and the ceremony of christening the orchard began. Only the largest and most +famous apple-bearers were thus saluted, for neither cider nor gunpowder +sufficient to honour more than a fraction of the whole multitude existed in +all Chagford. The orchard, viewed from the east, stretched in long lines, +like the legions of some arboreal army; the moon set sparks and streaks of +light on every snowy fork and bough; and at the northwestern foot of each +tree a network of spidery shadow-patterns, sharp and black, extended upon the +snow.</p> +<p>Mr. Blee himself made the first libation, led the first chorus, and fired +the first shot. Steaming cider poured from his mug, vanished, sucked in at +the tree-foot, and left a black patch upon the snow at the hole of the trunk; +then he stuck a fragment of sodden toast on a twig; after which the +christening song rang out upon the night—ragged at first, but settling +into resolute swing and improved time as its music proceeded. The lusty +treble of the youngsters soon drowned the notes of their grandfathers; for +the boys took their measure at a pace beyond the power of Gaffer Lezzard and +his generation, and sang with heart and voice to keep themselves warm. The +song has variants, but this was their version—</p> +<p class="poem">“Here ’s to thee, auld apple-tree,<br /> +Be sure you bud, be sure you blaw,<br /> +And bring forth apples good enough—<br /> +Hats full, caps full, three-bushel bags full,<br /> +<span class="i2">Pockets full and all—</span><br /> +Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!<br /> +<span class="i4">Hats full, caps full, three-bushel bags full,</span><br /> +<span class="i6">Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!”</span></p> +<p>Then Billy fired his blunderbuss, and a flame leapt from its bell mouth +into the branches of the apple-tree, while surrounding high lands echoed its +report with a reverberating bellow that rose and fell, and was flung from +hill to hill, until it gradually faded upon the ear. The boys cheered again, +everybody drank a drop of the cider, and from under a cloud of blue smoke, +that hung flat as a pancake above them in the still air, all moved onward. +Presently the party separated into three groups, each having a gunner to lead +it, half a dozen boys to sing, and a dwindling jar of cider for the purposes +of the ceremony. The divided choirs clashed their music, heard from a +distance; the guns fired at intervals, each sending forth its own particular +detonation and winning back a distinctive echo; then the companies separated +widely and decreased to mere twinkling, torchlit points in the distance. +Accumulated smoke from the scattered discharges hung in a sluggish haze +between earth and moon, and a sharp smell of burnt powder tainted the +sweetness of the frosty night.</p> +<p>Upon this scene arrived John Grirnbal and his sweetheart. They stood for a +while at the open orchard gate, gazed at the remote illumination, and heard +the distant song. Then they returned to discussion of their own affairs; +while at hand, unseen, the grey watcher moved impatiently and anxiously. The +thing he desired did not come about, and he blew on his cold hands and swore +under his breath. Only an orchard hedge now separated them, and he might have +listened to Phoebe’s soft speech had he crept ten yards nearer, while +John Grimbal’s voice he could not help hearing from time to time. The +big man was just asking a question not easy to answer, when an unexpected +interruption saved Phoebe from the difficulty of any reply.</p> +<p>“Sometimes I half reckon a memory of that blessed boy still makes +you glum, my dear. Is it so? Haven’t you forgot him yet?”</p> +<p>As he spoke an explosion, differing much in sound from those which +continued to startle the night, rang suddenly out of the distance. It arose +from a spot on the confines of the orchard, and was sharp in tone—sharp +almost as the human cries which followed it. Then the distant lights hastened +towards the theatre of the catastrophe. “What has happened?” +cried Phoebe, thankful enough to snatch conversation away from herself and +her affairs.</p> +<p>“Easy to guess. That broken report means a burst gun. One of those +old fools has got excited, put too much powder into his blunderbuss and blown +his head off, likely as not. No loss either!”</p> +<p>“Please, please go and see! Oh, if ’tis Billy Blee come to +grief, faither will be lost. Do ’e run, Mr. Grimbal—Jan, I mean. +If any grave matter’s failed out, send them bwoys off red-hot for +doctor.”</p> +<p>“Stop here, then. If any ugly thing has happened, there need be no +occasion for you to see it.”</p> +<p>He departed hastily to where a distant galaxy of fiery eyes twinkled and +tangled and moved this way and that, like the dying sparks on a piece of +burnt paper.</p> +<p>Then the patient grey shadow, rewarded by chance at last, found his +opportunity, slipped into the hedge just above Grimbal’s sweetheart, +and spoke to her.</p> +<p>“Phoebe, Phoebe Lyddon!”</p> +<p>The voice, dropping out of empty air as it seemed, made Phoebe jump, and +almost fall; but there was an arm gripped round her, and a pair of hot lips +on hers before she had time to open her mouth or cry a word.</p> +<p>“Will!”</p> +<p>“Ess, so I be, alive an’ kicking. No time for anything but +business now. I’ve followed ’e for this chance. Awnly heard four +day ago ’bout the fix you’d been drove to. An’ Clem’s +made it clear ’t was all my damn silly silence to blame. I had a gert +thought in me and wasn’t gwaine to write till—but that’s +awver an’ done, an’ a purty kettle of feesh, tu. We must faace +this coil first.”</p> +<p>“Thank God, you can forgive me. I’d never have had courage to +ax ’e.”</p> +<p>“You was drove into it. I knaw there’s awnly wan man in the +world for ’e. Ban’t nothin’ to forgive. I never ought to +have left ’e—a far-seein’ man, same as me. Blast him! +I’d like to tear thicky damned fur off you, for I lay it comed from +him.”</p> +<p>“They were killing me, Will; and never a word from you.”</p> +<p>“I knaw, I knaw. What’s wan girl against a parish full, +an’ a blustering chap made o’ diamonds?”</p> +<p>“The things doan’t warm me; they make me shiver. But +now—you can forgive me—that’s all I care for. What shall I +do? How can I escape it? Oh, Will, say I can!”</p> +<p>“In coourse you can. Awnly wan way, though; an’ that’s +why I’m here. Us must be married right on end. Then he’s got no +more power over ’e than a drowned worm, nor Miller, nor any.”</p> +<p>“To think you can forgive me enough to marry me after all my +wickedness! I never dreamed theer was such a big heart in the world as +yourn.”</p> +<p>“Why, we promised, didn’t us? We’m built for each other. +I knawed I’d only got to come. An’ I have, at cost, tu, I promise +’e. Now we’ll be upsides wi’ this tramp from furrin paarts, +if awnly you do ezacally what I be gwaine to tell you. I’d meant to +write it, but I can speak it better as the chance has come.”</p> +<p>Phoebe’s heart glowed at this tremendous change in the position. She +forgot everything before sight and sound of Will. The nature of her promises +weakened to gossamer. Her first love was the only love for her, and his voice +fortified her spirit and braced her nerves. A chance for happiness yet +remained and she, who had endured enough, was strong in determination to win +it yet at any cost if a woman could.</p> +<p>“If you awnly knawed the half I’ve suffered before they forced +me, you’d forgive,” she said. His frank pardon she could hardly +realise. It seemed altogether beyond the desert of her weakness.</p> +<p>“Let that bide. It’s the future now. Clem’s told me +everything. Awnly you and him an’ Chris knaw I’m here. Chris will +serve ’e. Us must play a hidden game, an’ fight this Grimbal chap +as he fought me—behind back. Listen; to-day fortnight you an’ me +’m gwaine to be married afore the registrar to Newton Abbot. He +’m my awn Uncle Ford, as luck has it, an’ quite o’ my way +o’ thinkin’ when I told him how ’t was, an’ that Jan +Grimbal was gwaine to marry you against your will. He advised me, and +I’m biding in Newton for next two weeks, so as the thing comes out +right by law. But you’ve got to keep it still as death.”</p> +<p>“If I could awnly fly this instant moment with ’e!”</p> +<p>“You caan’t. ’T would spoil all. You must stop home, +an’ hear your banns put up with Grimbal, an’ all the rest of it. +Wish I could! Meat an’ drink ’t would be, by God! But he’ll +get his pay all right. An’ afore the day comes, you nip off to Newton, +an’ I’ll meet ’e, an’ us’ll be married in a +wink, an’ you’ll be back home again to Monks Barton ’fore +you knaw it.”</p> +<p>“Is that the awnly way? Oh, Will, how terrible!”</p> +<p>“God knaws I’ve done worse ’n that. But no man’s +gwaine to steal the maid of my choosin’ from me while I’ve got +brains and body to prevent it.”</p> +<p>“Let me look at you, lovey—just the same, just the same! +’Tis glorious to hear your voice again. But this thin coat, so butivul +in shaape, tu! You ’m a gentleman by the look of it; but ’t is +summer wear, not winter.”</p> +<p>“Ess, ’tis cold enough; an’ I’ve got to get back +to Newton to-night. An’ never breathe that man’s name no more. +I’ll shaw ’e wat ’s a man an’ what ban’t. Steal +my true love, would ’e?—God forgive un, I shaan’t—not +till we ’m man an’ wife, anyway. Then I might. Give ’e up! +Be I a chap as chaanges? Never—never yet.”</p> +<p>Phoebe wept at these words and pressed Will to her heart.</p> +<p>“’Tis strength, an’ fire, an’ racing blood in me +to hear ’e, dear, braave heart. I was that weak without ’e. Now +the world ’s a new plaace, an’ I doan’t doubt fust thought +was right, for all they said. I’ll meet ’e as you bid me, +an’ nothin’ shall ever keep me from ’e +now—nothing!”</p> +<p>“’T is well said, Phoebe; an’ doan’t let that +anointed scamp kiss ’e more ’n he must. Be braave an’ +cunnin’, an’ keep Miller from smelling a rat. I’d like to +smash that man myself now wheer he stands,—Grimbal I mean,—but us +must be wise for the present. Wipe your shiny eyes an’ keep a happy +faace to ’em, an’ never let wan of the lot dream what’s hid +in ’e. Cock your li’l nose high, an’ be peart an’ +gay. An’ let un buy you what he will,—’t is no odds; we can +send his rubbish back again arter, when he knaws you’m another +man’s wife. Gude-bye, Phoebe dearie; I’ve done what ’peared +to me a gert deed for love of ’e; but the sight of ’e brings it +down into no mighty matter.”</p> +<p>“You’ve saved my life, Will—saved all my days; an’ +while I’ve got a heart beating ’t will be yourn, an’ +I’ll work for ’e, an’ slave for ’e, an’ think +for ’e, an’ love ’e so long as I live—an’ pray +for ’e, tu, Will, my awn!”</p> +<p>He parted from her as she spoke, and she, by an inspiration, hurried +towards the approaching crowd that the trampled marks of the snow where she +had been standing might not be noted under the gleam of torches and +lanterns.</p> +<p>John Grimbal’s prophecy was happily not fulfilled in its gloomy +completeness: nobody had blown his head off; but Billy Blee’s +prodigality of ammunition proved at last too much for the blunderbuss of the +bygone coach-guard, and in its sudden annihilation a fragment had cut the +gunner across the face, and a second inflicted a pretty deep flesh-wound on +his arm. Neither injury was very serious, and the general escape, as John +Grimbal pointed out, might be considered marvellous, for not a soul save +Billy himself had been so much as scratched.</p> +<p>With Martin Grimbal on one side and Mr. Chapple upon the other, the +wounded veteran walked slowly and solemnly along. The dramatic moments of the +hour were dear to him, and while tolerably confident at the bottom of his +mind that no vital hurt had been done, he openly declared himself stricken to +death, and revelled in a display of Christian fortitude and resignation that +deceived everybody but John Grimbal. Billy gasped and gurgled, bid them see +to the bandages, and reviewed his past life with ingenuous satisfaction.</p> +<p>“Ah, sawls all! dead as a hammer in an hour. ’T is awver. I +feel the life swelling out of me.”</p> +<p>“Don’t say that, Billy,” cried Martin, in real concern. +“The blood’s stopped flowing entirely now.”</p> +<p>“For why? Theer’s no more to come. My heart be pumping wind, +lifeless wind; my lung-play’s gone, tu, an’ my sight’s come +awver that coorious. Be Gaffer Lezzard nigh?”</p> +<p>“Here, alongside ’e, Bill.”</p> +<p>“Gimme your hand then, an’ let auld scores be wiped off in +this shattering calamity. Us have differed wheer us could these twoscore +years; but theer mustn’t be no more ill-will wi’ me +tremblin’ on the lip o’ the graave.”</p> +<p>“None at all; if ’t wasn’t for Widow Coomstock,” +said Gaffer Lezzard. “You ’m tu pushing theer, an’ I say it +even now, for truth’s truth, though it be the last thing a man’s +ear holds.”</p> +<p>“Break it to her gentle,” said Billy, ignoring the +other’s criticism; “she’m on in years, and have cast a +kindly eye awver me since the early sixties. My propositions never was more +than agreeable conversation to her, but it might have come. Tell her +theer’s a world beyond marriage customs, an’ us’ll meet +theer.”</p> +<p>Old Lezzard showed a good deal of anger at this speech, but being in a +minority fell back and held his peace.</p> +<p>“Would ’e like to see passon, dear sawl?” asked Mr. +Chapple, who walked on Billy’s left with his gun reversed, as though at +a funeral.</p> +<p>“Me an’ him be out, along o’ rheumatics keeping me from +the House of God this month,” said the sufferer, “but at a solemn +death-bed hour like this here, I’d soon see un as not. Ban’t no +gert odds, for I forgive all mankind, and doan’t feel no more malice +than a bird in a tree.”</p> +<p>“You’re a silly old ass,” burst out Grimbal roughly. +“There’s nothing worth naming the matter with you, and you know +it better than we do. The Devil looks after his own, seemingly. Any other man +would have been killed ten times over.”</p> +<p>Billy whined and even wept at this harsh reproof. “Ban’t a +very fair way to speak to an auld gunpowder-blawn piece, like what I be +now,” he said; “gormed if ’t is.”</p> +<p>“Very onhandsome of ’e, Mr. Grimbal,” declared the stout +Chappie; “an’ you so young an’ in the prime of life, +tu!”</p> +<p>Here Phoebe met them, and Mr. Blee, observing the signs of tears upon her +face, supposed that anxiety for him had wet her cheeks, and comforted his +master’s child.</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e give way, missy. ’T is all wan, +an’ I ban’t ’feared of the tomb, as I’ve tawld +’em. Us must rot, every bone of us, in our season, an’ ’t +is awnly the thought of it, not the fear of it, turns the stomach. But +what’s a wamblyness of the innards, so long as a body’s sawl be +ripe for God?”</p> +<p>“A walkin’ sermon!” said Mr. Chappie.</p> +<p>Doctor Parsons was waiting for Billy at Monks Barton, and if John Grimbal +had been brusque, the practitioner proved scarcely less so. He pronounced Mr. +Blee but little hurt, bandaged his arm, plastered his head, and assured him +that a pipe and a glass of spirits was all he needed to fortify his sinking +spirit. The party ate and drank, raised a cheer for Miller Lyddon and then +went homewards. Only Mr. Chappie and Gaffer Lezzard entered the house and had +a wineglass or two of some special sloe gin. Mr. Lezzard thawed and grew +amiable over this beverage, and Mr. Chappie repeated Billy’s lofty +sentiments at the approach of death for the benefit of Miller Lyddon.</p> +<p>“’T is awnly my fearless disposition,” declared the +wounded man with great humility; “no partic’lar credit to me. I +doan’t care wan iotum for the thought of churchyard mould—not wan +iotum. I knaw the value of gude rich soil tu well; an’ a man as grudges +the rames<a id="footnotetag3" name="footnotetag3"></a><a href= +"#footnote3"><sup>3</sup></a> of hisself to the airth that’s kept un +threescore years an’ ten’s a carmudgeonly cuss, +surely.”</p> +<p>“An’ so say I; theer’s true wisdom in it,” +declared Mr. Chapple, while the miller nodded.</p> +<p>“Theer be,” concluded Gaffer Lezzard. “I allus sez, in +my clenching way, that I doan’t care a farden damn what happens to my +bones, if my everlasting future be well thought on by passon. So long as I +catch the eye of un an’ see um beam ’pon me to church now +an’ again, I’m content with things as they are.”</p> +<p>“As a saved sawl you ’m in so braave a way as the best; but, +to say it without rudeness, as food for the land a man of your build be +nought, Gaffer,” argued Mr. Chapple, who viewed the veteran’s +withered anatomy from his own happy vantage ground of fifteen stone.</p> +<p>But Gaffer Lezzard would by no means allow this.</p> +<p>“Ban’t quantity awnly tells, my son. ’T is the aluminium +in a man’s bones that fats land—roots or grass or corn. Anybody +of larnin’, ’ll tell ’e that. Strip the belly off ’e, +an’, bone for bone, a lean man like me shaws as fair as you. No offence +offered or taken, but a gross habit’s mere clay and does more harm than +gude underground.”</p> +<p>Mr. Chapple in his turn resented this contemptuous dismissal of tissue as +matter of no agricultural significance. The old men went wrangling home; +Miller Lyddon and Billy retired to their beds; the moon departed behind the +distant moors; and all the darkened valley slept in snow and starlight.</p> +<h2><a id="I_VIII" name="I_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII<br /> +A BROTHERS’ QUARREL</h2> +<p>Though Phoebe was surprised at Will Blanchard’s mild attitude toward +her weakness, she had been less so with more knowledge. Chris Blanchard and +her lover were in some degree responsible for Will’s lenity, and +Clement’s politic letter to the wanderer, when Phoebe’s +engagement was announced, had been framed in words best calculated to shield +the Miller’s sore-driven daughter. Hicks had thrown the blame on John +Grimbal, on Mr. Lyddon, on everybody but Phoebe herself. Foremost indeed he +had censured Will, and pointed out that his own sustained silence, however +high-minded the reason of it, was a main factor in his sweetheart’s +sufferings and ultimate submission.</p> +<p>In answer to this communication Blanchard magically reappeared, announced +his determination to marry Phoebe by subterfuge, and, the deed accomplished, +take his punishment, whatever it might be, with light heart. Given time to +achieve a legal marriage, and Phoebe would at least be safe from the clutches +of millionaires in general.</p> +<p>Much had already been done by Will before he crept after the +apple-christeners and accomplished his meeting with Phoebe. A week was passed +since Clement wrote the final crushing news, and during that interval Will +had been stopping with his uncle, Joel Ford, at Newton Abbot. Fate, hard till +now, played him passing fair at last. The old Superintendent Registrar still +had a soft corner in his heart for Will, and when he learnt the boy’s +trouble, though of cynic mind in all matters pertaining to matrimony, he +chose to play the virtuous and enraged philosopher, much to his +nephew’s joy. Mr. Ford promised Will he should most certainly have the +law’s aid to checkmate his dishonourable adversary; he took a most +serious view of the case and declared that all thinking men must sympathise +with young Blanchard under such circumstances. But in private the old +gentleman rubbed his hands, for here was the very opportunity he desired as +much as a man well might—the chance to strike at one who had shamefully +wronged him. His only trouble was how best to let John Grimbal know whom he +had to thank for this tremendous reverse; for that deed he held necessary to +complete his revenge.</p> +<p>As to where Will had come from, or whither he was returning, after his +marriage Joel Ford cared not. The youngster once wedded would be satisfied; +and his uncle would be satisfied too. The procedure of marriage by license +requires that one of the parties shall have resided within the +Superintendent’s district for a space of fifteen days preceding the +giving of notice; then application in prescribed form is made to the +Registrar; and his certificate and license are usually received one clear day +later. Thus a resident in a district can be married at any time within +eight-and-forty hours of his decision. Will Blanchard had to stop with his +uncle nine or ten days more to complete the necessary fortnight, and as John +Grimbal’s marriage morning was as yet above three weeks distant, +Phoebe’s fate in no way depended upon him.</p> +<p>Mr. Ford explained the position to Will, and the lover accepted it +cheerfully.</p> +<p>“As to the marriage, that’ll be hard and fast as a bench of +bishops can make it; but wedding a woman under age, against the wish of her +legal guardian, is an offence against the law. Nobody can undo the deed +itself, but Miller Lyddon will have something to say afterwards. And +there’s that blustering blackguard, John Grimbal, to reckon with. +Unscrupulous scoundrel! Just the sort to be lawless and vindictive if what +you tell me concerning him is true.”</p> +<p>“And so he be; let un! Who cares a brass button for him? ’T is +awnly Miller I thinks of. What’s worst he can do?”</p> +<p>“Send you to prison, Will.”</p> +<p>“For how long?”</p> +<p>“That I can’t tell you exactly. Not for marrying his daughter +of course, but for abduction—that’s what he’ll bring +against you.”</p> +<p>“An’ so he shall, uncle, an’ I’ll save him all the +trouble I can. That’s no gert hardship—weeks, or months even. +I’ll go like a lark, knawin’ Phoebe’s safe.”</p> +<p>So the matter stood and the days passed. Will’s personal affairs, +and the secret of the position from which he had come was known only to +Clement Hicks. The lover talked of returning again thither after his +marriage, but he remained vague on that point, and, indeed, modified his +plans after the above recorded conversation with his uncle. Twice he wrote to +Phoebe in the period of waiting, and the letter had been forwarded on both +occasions through Clement. Two others knew what was afoot, and during that +time of trial Phoebe found Chris her salvation. The stronger girl supported +her sinking spirit and fortified her courage. Chris mightily enjoyed the +whole romance, and among those circumstances that combined to make John +Grimbal uneasy during the days of waiting was her constant presence at Monks +Barton. There she came as Phoebe’s friend, and the clear, bright eyes +she often turned on him made him angry, he knew not why. As for Mrs. +Blanchard, she had secretly learnt more than anybody suspected, for while +Will first determined to tell her nothing until afterwards, a second thought +rebuked him for hiding such a tremendous circumstance from his mother, and he +wrote to her at full length from Newton, saying nothing indeed of the past +but setting out the future in detail. Upon the subject Mrs. Blanchard kept +her own counsel.</p> +<p>Preparations for Phoebe’s wedding moved apace, and she lived in a +dim, heart-breaking dream. John Grimbal, despite her entreaties, continued to +spend money upon her; yet each new gift brought nothing but tears. Grown +desperate in his determination to win a little affection and regard before +marriage, and bitterly conscious that he could command neither, the man plied +her with what money would buy, and busied himself to bring her happiness in +spite of herself. Troubled he was, nevertheless, and constantly sought the +miller that he might listen to comforting assurances that he need be under no +concern.</p> +<p>“’T is natural in wan who’s gwaine to say gude-bye to +maidenhood so soon,” declared Mr. Lyddon. “I’ve thought +’bout her tears a deal. God knaws they hurt me more ’n they do +her, or you either; but such sad whims and cloudy hours is proper to the +time. Love for me’s got a share in her sorrow, tu. ’T will all be +well enough when she turns her back on the church-door an’ hears the +weddin’-bells a-clashing for her future joy. Doan’t you come nigh +her much during the next few weeks.”</p> +<p>“Two,” corrected Mr. Grimbal, moodily.</p> +<p>“Eh! Awnly two! Well, ’t is gert darkness for me, I promise +you—gert darkness comin’ for Monks Barton wi’out the +butivul sound an’ sight of her no more. But bide away, theer’s a +gude man; bide away these coming few days. Her last maiden hours +mustn’t be all tears. But my gifts do awnly make her cry, tu, if +that’s consolation to ’e. It’s the tenderness of her +li’l heart as brims awver at kindness.”</p> +<p>In reality, Phoebe’s misery was of a complexion wholly different. +The necessity for living thus had not appeared so tremendous until she found +herself launched into this sea of terrible deception. In operation such +sustained falsity came like to drive her mad. She could not count the lies +each day brought forth; she was frightened to pray for forgiveness, knowing +every morning must see a renewal of the tragedy. Hell seemed yawning for her, +and the possibility of any ultimate happiness, reached over this awful road +of mendacity and deceit, was more than her imagination could picture. With +loss of self-respect, self-control likewise threatened to depart. She became +physically weak, mentally hysterical. The strain told terribly on her nature; +and Chris mourned to note a darkness like storm-cloud under her grey eyes, +and unwonted pallor upon her cheek. Dr. Parsons saw Phoebe at this juncture, +prescribed soothing draughts, and ordered rest and repose; but to Chris the +invalid clung, and Mr. Lyddon was not a little puzzled that the sister of +Phoebe’s bygone sweetheart should now possess such power to ease her +mind and soothe her troubled nerves.</p> +<p>John Grimbal obeyed the injunction laid upon him and absented himself from +Monks Barton. All was prepared for the ceremony. He had left his Red House +farm and taken rooms for the present at “The Three Crowns.” +Hither came his brother to see him four nights before the weddingday. Martin +had promised to be best man, yet a shadow lay between the brothers, and John, +his mind unnaturally jealous and suspicious from the nature of affairs with +Phoebe, sulked of late in a conviction that Martin had watched his great step +with unfraternal indifference and denied him the enthusiasm and +congratulation proper to such an event.</p> +<p>The younger man found his brother scanning a new black broadcloth coat +when he entered. He praised it promptly, whereupon John flung it from him and +showed no more interest in the garment. Martin, not to be offended, lighted +his pipe, took an armchair beside the fire, and asked for some whiskey. This +mollified the other a little; he produced spirits, loaded his own pipe, and +asked the object of the visit.</p> +<p>“A not over-pleasant business, John,” returned his brother, +frankly; “but ’Least said, soonest mended.’ Only remember +this, nothing must ever lessen our common regard. What I am going to say is +inspired by my—”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes—cut that. Spit it out and have done with it. I know +there’s been trouble in you for days. You can’t hide your +thoughts. You’ve been grim as a death’s-head for a +month—ever since I was engaged, come to think of it. Now open your jaws +and have done.”</p> +<p>John’s aggressive and hectoring manner spoke volubly of his own lack +of ease. Martin nerved himself to begin, holding it his duty, but secretly +fearing the issue in the light of his brother’s hard, set face.</p> +<p>“You’ve something bothering you too, old man. I’m sure +of it. God is aware I don’t know much about women myself, +but—”</p> +<p>“Oh, dry up that rot! Don’t think I’m blind, if you are. +Don’t deceive yourself. There’s a woman-hunger in you, too, +though perhaps you haven’t found it out yet. What about that Blanchard +girl?”</p> +<p>Martin flushed like a schoolboy; his hand went up over his mouth and chin +as though to hide part of his guilt, and he looked alarmed and uneasy.</p> +<p>John laughed without mirth at the other’s ludicrous trepidation.</p> +<p>“Good heavens! I’ve done nothing surely to +suggest—?”</p> +<p>“Nothing at all—except look as if you were going to have a fit +every time you get within a mile of her. Lovers know the signs, I suppose. +Don’t pretend you’re made of different stuff to the rest of us, +that’s all.”</p> +<p>Martin removed his hand and gasped before the spectacle of what he had +revealed to other eyes. Then, after a silence of fifteen seconds, he shut his +mouth again, wiped his forehead with his hand, and spoke.</p> +<p>“I’ve been a silly fool. Only she’s so wonderfully +beautiful—don’t you think so?”</p> +<p>“A gypsy all over—if you call that beautiful.”</p> +<p>The other flushed up again, but made no retort.</p> +<p>“Never mind me or anybody else. I want to speak to you about Phoebe, +if I may, John. Who have I got to care about but you? I’m only thinking +of your happiness, for that’s dearer to me than my own; and you know in +your heart that I’m speaking the truth when I say so.”</p> +<p>“Stick to your gate-posts and old walls and cow-comforts and dead +stones. We all know you can look farther into Dartmoor granite than most men, +if that’s anything; but human beings are beyond you and always were. +You’d have come home a pauper but for me.”</p> +<p>“D’ you think I’m not grateful? No man ever had a better +brother than you, and you’ve stood between me and trouble a thousand +times. Now I want to stand between you and trouble.”</p> +<p>“What the deuce d’ you mean by naming Phoebe, then?”</p> +<p>“That is the trouble. Listen and don’t shout me down. +She’s breaking her heart—blind or not blind, I see +that—breaking her heart, not for you, but Will Blanchard. Nobody else +has found it out; but I have, and I know it’s my duty to tell you; and +I’ve done it.”</p> +<p>An ugly twist came into John Grimbal’s face. “You’ve +done it; yes. Go on.”</p> +<p>“That’s all, brother, and from your manner I don’t +believe it’s entirely news to you.”</p> +<p>“Then get you gone, damned snake in the grass! Get gone, ’fore +I lay a hand on you! You to turn and bite <i>me!</i> Me, that’s made +you! I see it all—your blasted sheep’s eyes at Chris Blanchard, +and her always at Monks Barton! Don’t lie about it,” he roared, +as Martin raised his hand to speak; “not a word more will I hear from +your traitor’s lips. Get out of my sight, you sneaking hypocrite, and +never call me ‘brother’ no more, for I’ll not own to +it!”</p> +<p>“You’ll be sorry for this, John.”</p> +<p>“And you too. You’ll smart all your life long when you think +of this dirty trick played against a brother who never did you no hurt. You +to come between me and the girl that’s promised to marry me! And for +your own ends. A manly, brotherly plot, by God!”</p> +<p>“I swear, on my sacred honour, there’s no plot against you. +I’ve never spoken to a soul about this thing, nor has a soul spoken of +it to me; that’s the truth.”</p> +<p>“Rot you, and your sacred honour too! Go, and take your lies with +you, and keep your own friends henceforth, and never cross my threshold +more—you or your sacred, stinking honour either.”</p> +<p>Martin rose from his chair dazed and bewildered. He had seen his +brother’s passion wither up many a rascal in the past; but he himself +had never suffered until now, and the savagery of this language hurled +against his own pure motives staggered him. He, of course, knew nothing about +Will Blanchard’s enterprise, and his blundering and ill-judged effort +to restrain his brother from marrying Phoebe was absolutely disinterested. It +had been a tremendous task to him to speak on this delicate theme, and regard +for John alone actuated him; now he departed without another word and went +blankly to the little new stone house he had taken and furnished on the +outskirts of Chagford under Middledown. He walked along the straight street +of whitewashed cots that led him to his home, and reflected with dismay on +this catastrophe. The conversation with his brother had scarcely occupied +five minutes; its results promised to endure a lifetime.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, and at the identical hour of this tremendous rupture, Chris +Blanchard, well knowing that the morrow would witness Phoebe’s secret +marriage to her brother, walked down to see her. It happened that a small +party filled the kitchen of Monks Barton, and the maid who answered her +summons led Chris through the passage and upstairs to Phoebe’s own +door. There the girls spoke in murmurs together, while various sounds, all +louder than their voices, proceeded from the kitchen below. There were +assembled the miller, Billy Blee, Mr. Chapple, and one Abraham Chown, the +police inspector of Chagford, a thin, black-bearded man, oppressed with the +cares of his office.</p> +<p>“They be arranging the programme of festive delights,” +explained Phoebe. “My heart sinks in me every way I turn now. All the +world seems thinking about what’s to come; an’ I knaw it never +will.”</p> +<p>“’T is a wonnerful straange thing to fall out. Never no such +happened before, I reckon. But you ’m doin’ right by the man you +love, an’ that’s a thought for ’e more comfortin’ +than gospel in a pass like this. A promise is a promise, and you’ve got +to think of all your life stretching out afore you. Will’s jonic, take +him the right way, and that you knaw how to do—a straight, true chap as +should make any wife happy. Theer’ll be waitin’ afterwards +an’ gude need for all the patience you’ve got; but wance the wife +of un, allus the wife of un; that’s a butivul thing to bear in +mind.”</p> +<p>“’T is so; ’t is everything. An’ wance we’m +wed, I’ll never tell a lie again, an’ atone for all I have told, +an’ do right towards everybody.”</p> +<p>“You caan’t say no fairer. Be any matter I can help ’e +with?”</p> +<p>“Nothing. It’s all easy. The train starts for Moreton at +half-past nine. Sam Bonus be gwaine to drive me in, and bide theer for me +till I come back from Newton. Faither’s awnly too pleased to let me go. +I said ’t was shopping.”</p> +<p>“An’ when you come home you’ll tell him—Mr. +Lyddon—straight?”</p> +<p>“Everything, an’ thank God for a clean breast +again.”</p> +<p>“An’ Will?”</p> +<p>“Caan’t say what he’ll do after. Theer’ll be no +real marryin’ for us yet a while. Faither can have the law of Will +presently,—that’s all I knaw.”</p> +<p>“Trust Will to do the right thing; and mind, come what may to him, +theer’s allus Clem Hicks and me for friends.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t likely to be many others left, come to-morrow night. +But I’ve run away from my own thoughts to think of you and him often of +late days. He’ll get money and marry you, won’t he, when his +aunt, Mrs. Coomstock, dies?”</p> +<p>“No; I thought so tu, an’ hoped it wance; but Clem says what +she’ve got won’t come his way. She’s like as not to marry, +tu—there ’m a lot of auld men tinkering after her, Billy Blee +among ’em.”</p> +<p>Sounds arose from beneath. They began with harsh and grating notes, +interrupted by a violent hawking and spitting. Then followed renewal of the +former unlovely noises. Presently, at a point in the song, for such it was, +half a dozen other voices drowned the soloist in a chorus.</p> +<p>“’T is Billy rehearsin’ moosic,” explained Phoebe, +with a sickly smile. “He haven’t singed for a score of years; but +they’ve awver-persuaded him and he’s promised to give ’em +an auld ballet on my wedding-day.”</p> +<p>“My stars! ’t is a gashly auld noise sure enough,” +criticised Phoebe’s friend frankly; “for all the world like a +stuck pig screechin’, or the hum of the threshin’ machine poor +faither used to have, heard long ways off.”</p> +<p>Quavering and quivering, with sudden painful flights into a cracked +treble, Billy’s effort came to the listeners.</p> +<p class="poem">“’Twas on a Monday marnin’<br /> +<span class="i2">Afore the break of day,</span><br /> +<span class="i2">That I tuked up my turmit-hoe</span><br /> +<span class="i2">An’ trudged dree mile away!”</span></p> +<p class="i0">Then a rollicking chorus, with rough music in it, surged to +their ears—</p> +<p class="poem">“An’ the fly, gee hoppee!<br /> +The fly, gee whoppee!<br /> +The fly be on the turmits,<br /> +For ’t is all my eye for me to try<br /> +An’ keep min off the turmits!”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee lashed his memory and slowly proceeded, while Chris, moved by a +sort of sudden mother-instinct towards pale and tearful Phoebe, strained her +to her bosom, hugged her very close, kissed her, and bid her be hopeful and +happy.</p> +<p>“Taake gude heart, for you ’m to mate the best man in all the +airth but wan!” she said; “an’, if ’t is awnly to +keep Billy from singing in public, ’t is a mercy you ban’t gwaine +to take Jan Grimbal. Doan’t ’e fear for him. There’ll be a +thunder-storm for sartain; then he’ll calm down, as better ’n him +have had to ’fore now, an’ find some other gal.”</p> +<p>With this comfort Chris caressed Phoebe once more, heartily pitying her +helplessness, and wishing it in her power to undertake the approaching ordeal +on the young bride’s behalf. Then she departed, her eyes almost as dim +as Phoebe’s. For a moment she forgot her own helpless matrimonial +projects in sorrow for her brother and his future wife. Marriage at the +registry office represented to her, as to most women, an unlovely, +uncomfortable, and unfinished ceremony. She had as easily pictured a funeral +without the assistance of the Church as a wedding without it.</p> +<h2><a id="I_IX" name="I_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX<br /> +OUTSIDE EXETER GAOL</h2> +<p>Within less than twelve hours of the time when she bid Chris farewell +Phoebe Lyddon was Phoebe Lyddon no more. Will met her at Newton; they +immediately proceeded to his uncle’s office; and the Registrar had made +them man and wife in space of time so brief that the girl could hardly +realise the terrific event was accomplished, and that henceforth she belonged +to Will alone. Mr. Ford had his little joke afterwards in the shape of a +wedding-breakfast and champagne. He was gratified at the event and rejoiced +to be so handsomely and tremendously revenged on his unfortunate enemy. The +young couple partook of the good things provided for them; but appetite was +lacking to right enjoyment of the banquet, and Will and his wife much desired +to escape and be alone.</p> +<p>Presently they returned to the station and arrived there before +Phoebe’s train departed. Her husband then briefly explained the +remarkable course of action he designed to pursue.</p> +<p>“You must be a braave gal and think none the worse of me. +But’t is this way: I’ve broke law, and a month or two, or six, +maybe, in gaol have got to be done. Your faither will see to that.”</p> +<p>“Prison! O, Will! For marryin’ me?”</p> +<p>“No, but for marryin’ you wi’out axin’ leave. +Miller Lyddon told me the upshot of taking you, if I done it; an’ I +have; an’ he’ll keep his word. So that’s it. I doan’t +want to make no more trouble; an’ bein’ a man of resource +I’m gwaine up to Exeter by first train, so soon as you’ve +started. Then all bother in the matter will be saved Miller.”</p> +<p>“O Will! Must you?”</p> +<p>“Ess fay, ’t is my duty. I’ve thought it out through +many hours. The time’ll soon slip off; an’ then I’ll come +back an’ stand to work. Here’s a empty carriage. Jump in. I can +sit along with ’e for a few minutes.”</p> +<p>“How ever shall I begin? How shall I break it to them, +dearie?”</p> +<p>“Hold up your li’l hand,” said Will with a laugh. +“Shaw ’em the gawld theer. That’ll speak for ’e. +’S truth!” he continued, with a gesture of supreme irritation, +“but it’s a hard thing to be snatched apart like this—man +an’ wife. If I was takin’ ’e home to some lew cot, all our +very awn, how differ’nt ’t would be!”</p> +<p>“You will some day.”</p> +<p>“So I will then. I’ve got ’e for all time, an’ Jan +Grimbal’s missed ’e for all time. Damned if I ban’t +a’most sorry for un!”</p> +<p>“So am I,—in a way,—as you are. My heart hurts me to +think of him. He’ll never forgive me.”</p> +<p>“Me, you mean. Well, ’t is man to man, an’ I ban’t +feared of nothing on two legs. You just tell ’em that ’t was to +be, that you never gived up lovin’ me, but was forced into lyin’ +and such-like by the cruel way they pushed ’e. Shaw ’em the copy +of the paper if they doan’t b’lieve the ring. An’ when +Miller lifts up his voice to cuss me, tell un quiet that I knawed what must +come of it, and be gone straight to Exeter Gaol to save un all further +trouble. He’ll see then I’m a thinking, calculating man, though +young in years.”</p> +<p>Phoebe was now reduced to sighs and dry sobs. Will sat by her a little +longer, patted her hands and spoke cheerfully. Then the train departed and he +jumped from it as it moved and ran along the platform with a last earnest +injunction.</p> +<p>“See mother first moment you can an’ explain how ’t is. +Mother’ll understand, for faither did similar identical, though he +wasn’t put in clink for it.”</p> +<p>He waved his hand and Phoebe passed homewards. Then the fire died out of +his eyes and he sighed and turned. But no shadow of weakness manifested +itself in his manner. His jaw hardened, he smote his leg with his stick, and, +ascertaining the time of the next train to Exeter, went back to bid Mr. Ford +farewell before setting about his business.</p> +<p>Will told his uncle nothing concerning the contemplated action; and such +silence was unfortunate, for had he spoken the old man’s knowledge must +have modified his fantastic design. Knowing that Will came mysteriously from +regular employment which he declined to discuss, and assuming that he now +designed returning to it, Mr. Ford troubled no more about him. So his nephew +thanked the Registrar right heartily for all the goodness he had displayed in +helping two people through the great crisis of their lives, and went on his +way. His worldly possessions were represented by a new suit of blue serge +which he wore, and a few trifles in a small carpet-bag.</p> +<p>It was the past rather than the present or future which troubled Will on +his journey to Exeter; and the secret of the last six months, whatever that +might be, lay heavier on his mind than the ordeal immediately ahead of him. +In this coming achievement he saw no shame; it was merely part payment for an +action lawless but necessary. He prided himself always on a great spirit of +justice, and justice demanded that henceforth he must consider the family +into which he had thus unceremoniously introduced himself. To no man in the +wide world did he feel more kindly disposed than to Miller Lyddon; and his +purpose was now to save his father-in-law all the annoyance possible.</p> +<p>Arrived at Exeter, Will walked cheerfully away to the County Gaol, a huge +red-brick pile that scarce strikes so coldly upon the eye of the spectator as +ordinary houses of detention. Grey and black echo the significance of a +prison, but warm red brick strikes through the eye to the brain, and the +colour inspires a genial train of ideas beyond reason’s power instantly +to banish. But the walls, if ruddy, were high, and the rows of small, remote +windows, black as the eye-socket of a skull, stretched away in dreary +iron-bound perspective where the sides of the main fabric rose upward to its +chastened architectural adornments. Young Blanchard grunted to himself, +gripped his stick, from one end of which was suspended his carpet-bag, and +walked to the wicket at the side of the prison’s main entrance. He rang +a bell that jangled with tremendous echoes among the naked walls within; then +there followed the rattle of locks as the sidegate opened, and a warder +looked out to ask Will his business. The man was burly and of stout build, +while his fat, bearded face, red as the gaol walls themselves, attracted +Blanchard by its pleasant expression. Will’s eyes brightened at the +aspect of this janitor; he touched his hat very civilly, wished the man +“good afternoon,” and was about to step in when the other stopped +him.</p> +<p>“Doan’t be in such a hurry, my son. What’s brought +’e, an’ who do ’e want?”</p> +<p>“My business is private, mister; I wants to see the head +man.”</p> +<p>“The Governor? Won’t nobody less do? You can’t see him +without proper appointment. But maybe a smaller man might serve your +turn?”</p> +<p>Will reflected, then laughed at the warder with that sudden magic of face +that even softened hard hearts towards him.</p> +<p>“To be plain, mate, I’m here to stop. You’ll be sure to +knaw ’bout it sooner or late, so I’ll tell ’e now. +I’ve done a thing I must pay for, and ’t is a clink job, so +I’ve comed right along.”</p> +<p>The warder grew rather sterner, and his eye instinctively roamed for a +constable.</p> +<p>“Best say no more, then. Awnly you’ve comed to the wrong +place. Police station’s what you want, I reckon.”</p> +<p>“Why for? This be County Gaol, ban’t it?”</p> +<p>“Ess, that’s so; but we doan’t take in folks for the +axin’. Tu many queer caraters about.”</p> +<p>Will saw the man’s eyes twinkle, yet he was puzzled at this +unexpected problem.</p> +<p>“Look here,” he said, “I like you, and I’ll deal +fair by you an’ tell you the rights of it. Step out here an’ +listen.”</p> +<p>“Mind, what you sez will be used against you, then.”</p> +<p>“Theer ban’t no secret in it, for that matter.”</p> +<p>The husband thereupon related his recent achievement, and concluded +thus:</p> +<p>“So, having kicked up a mort o’ trouble, I doan’t want +to make no more—see? An’ I stepped here quiet to keep it out of +the papers, an’ just take what punishment’s right an’ vitty +for marryin’ a maid wi’out so much as by your leave. Now, then, +caan’t ’e do the rest?”</p> +<p>He regarded the warder gravely and inquiringly, but as the red-faced man +slowly sucked up the humour of the situation, his mouth expanded and his eyes +almost disappeared. Then he spoke through outbursts and shakings of deep +laughter.</p> +<p>“Oh Lard! Wheerever was you born to?”</p> +<p>Will flushed deeply, frowned, and clenched his fists at this question.</p> +<p>“Shut your gert mouth!” he said angrily. “Doan’t +bellow like that, or I’ll hit ’e awver the jaw! Do’e think +I want the whole of Exeter City to knaw my errand? What’s theer to gape +an’ snigger at? Caan’t ’e treat a man civil?”</p> +<p>This reproof set the official off again, and only a furious demand from +Blanchard to go about his business and tell the Governor he wanted an +interview partially steadied him.</p> +<p>“By Gor! you’ll be the death of me. Caan’t help +it—honour bright—doan’t mean no rudeness to you. Bless your +young heart, an’ the gal’s, whoever she be. Didn’t ’e +knaw? But theer! course you didn’t, else you wouldn’t be here. +Why, ’t is purty near as hard to get in prison as out again. +You’ll have to be locked up, an’ tried by judge an’ jury, +and plead guilty, and be sentenced, an’ the Lard He knaws what beside +’fore you come here. How do the lawyers an’ p’licemen get +their living?”</p> +<p>“That’s news. I hoped to save Miller Lyddon all such +trouble.”</p> +<p>“Why not try another way, an’ see if you can get the auld +gentleman to forgive ’e?”</p> +<p>“Not him. He’ll have the law in due time.”</p> +<p>“Well, I’m ’mazin’ sorry I caan’t oblige +’e, for I’m sure we’d be gude friends, an’ +you’d cheer us all up butivul.”</p> +<p>“But you ’m certain it caan’t be managed?”</p> +<p>“Positive.”</p> +<p>“Then I’ve done all a man can. You’ll bear witness I +wanted to come, won’t ’e?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, I’ll take my oath o’ that. <i>I</i> +shaan’t forget ’e.”</p> +<p>“All right. And if I’m sent here again, bimebye, I’ll +look out for you, and I hopes you’ll be as pleasant inside as +now.”</p> +<p>“I’ll promise that. Shall be awnly tu pleased to make you at +home. I like you; though, to be frank, I reckon you’m tu gnat-brained a +chap to make a wife happy.”</p> +<p>“Then you reckon a damned impedent thing! What d’ you knaw +’bout it?”</p> +<p>“A tidy deal. I’ve been married more years than you have +hours, I lay.”</p> +<p>“Age ban’t everything; ’t is the fashion brains in a +man’s head counts most.”</p> +<p>“That’s right enough. ’T is something to knaw that. +Gude-bye to ’e, bwoy, an’ thank you for makin’ me laugh +heartier than I have this month of Sundays.”</p> +<p>“More fule you!” declared Will; but he was too elated at the +turn of affairs to be anything but amiable just now. Before the other +disappeared, he stopped him.</p> +<p>“Shake hands, will ’e? I thank you for lightenin’ my +mind—bein’ a man of law, in a manner of speakin’. Ess, +I’m obliged to ’e. Of coourse I doan’t <i>want</i> to come +to prison ’zackly. That’s common sense.”</p> +<p>“Most feel same as you. No doubt you’re in the wrong, though +the law caan’t drop on honest, straightforrard matrimony to my +knowledge. Maybe circumstances is for ’e.”</p> +<p>“Ess, they be—every jack wan of ’em!” declared +Will. “An’ if I doan’t come here to stop, I’ll call +in some day and tell ’e the upshot of this coil in a friendly +way.”</p> +<p>“Do so, an’ bring your missis. Shall be delighted to see the +pair of ’e any time. Ax for Thomas Bates.”</p> +<p>Will nodded and marched off, while the warder returned to his post, and +when he had again made fast the door behind him, permitted the full splendor +of his recent experience to tumble over his soul in a laughter perhaps louder +than any heard before or since within the confines of one of Her +Majesty’s prisons.</p> +<h2><a id="I_X" name="I_X"></a>CHAPTER X<br /> +THE BRINGING OF THE NEWS</h2> +<p>Phoebe meantime returned to Chagford, withdrew herself into her chamber, +and feverishly busied brains and hands with a task commended that morning by +Will when she had mentioned it to him. The various trinkets and objects of +value lavished of late upon her by John Grimbal she made into a neat packet, +and tied up a sealskin jacket and other furs in a second and more bulky +parcel. With these and a letter she presently despatched a maid to Mr. +Grimbal’s temporary address. Phoebe’s note explained how, weak +and friendless until the sudden return of Will into her life, she had been +thrown upon wickedness, falsehood, and deceit to win her own salvation in the +face of all about her. She told him of the deed done that day, begged him to +be patient and forget her, and implored him to forgive her husband, who had +fought with the only weapons at his command. It was a feeble communication, +and Phoebe thought that her love for Will might have inspired words more +forcible; but relief annihilated any other emotion; she felt thankful that +the lying, evasion, and prevarication of the last horrible ten days were at +an end. From the nightmare of that time her poor, bruised conscience emerged +sorely stricken; yet she felt that the battle now before her was a healthy +thing by comparison, and might serve to brace her moral senses rather than +not.</p> +<p>At the tea-table she first met her father, and there were present also +Billy Blee and Mr. Chapple. The latter had come to Monks Barton about a +triumphal arch, already in course of erection at Chagford market-place, and +his presence it was that precipitated her confession, and brought +Phoebe’s news like a thunderbolt upon the company.</p> +<p>Mr. Chapple, looking up suddenly from the saucer that rested upon his +outspread fingers and thumb, made a discovery, and spoke with some +concern.</p> +<p>“Faith, Missy, that’s ill luck—a wisht thing to do +indeed! Put un off, like a gude maid, for theer ’s many a wise +sayin’ ’gainst it.”</p> +<p>“What’s her done?” asked Billy anxiously.</p> +<p>“Luke ’pon her weddin’ finger. ’Tis poor speed to +put un on ’fore her lard an’ master do it, at the proper moment +ordained by Scripture.”</p> +<p>“If she hasn’t! Take un off, Miss Phoebe, do!” begged +Mr. Blee, in real trepidation; and the miller likewise commanded his daughter +to remove her wedding-ring.</p> +<p>“An auld wife’s tale, but, all the same, shouldn’t be +theer till you ’m a married woman,” he said.</p> +<p>Thus challenged, the way was made smooth as possible for the young wife. +She went over to her father, walked close to him, and put her plump little +hand with its shining addition upon his shoulder.</p> +<p>“Faither dear, I be a married woman. I had to tell lies and play +false, but’t was to you an’ Mr. Grimbal I’ve been double, +not to my husband that is. I was weak, and I’ve been punished sore, +but—”</p> +<p>“Why, gal alive! what rigmarole ’s this? Married—ay, +an’ so you shall be, in gude time. You ’m light-headed, lass, I +do b’lieve. But doan’t fret, I’ll have +Doctor—”</p> +<p>“Hear me,” she said, almost roughly. “I kept my +word—my first sacred word—to Will. I loved him, an’ none +else but him; an’ ’tis done—I’ve married him this +marnin’, for it had to be, an’ theer’s the sign an’ +token of it I’ve brought along with me.”</p> +<p>She drew the copy of the register from her pocket, opened it with +trembling fingers, set it before Mr. Lyddon, and waited for him to speak. But +it was some time before he found words or wind to do so. Literally the fact +had taken his breath. A curious expression, more grin than frown—an +expression beyond his control in moments of high emotion—wrinkled his +eyelids, stretched his lips, and revealed the perfect double row of his false +teeth. His hand went forward to the blue paper now lying before him, then the +fingers stopped half way and shook in the air. Twice he opened his mouth, but +only a sharp expiration, between a sigh and a bark, escaped.</p> +<p>“My God, you’ve shook the sawl of un!” cried Billy, +starting forward, but the miller with an effort recovered his +self-possession, scanned the paper, dropped it, and lifted up his voice in +lamentation.</p> +<p>“True—past altering—’t is a thing done! May God +forgive you for this wicked deed, Phoebe Lyddon—I’d never have +b’lieved it of ’e—never—not if an angel had tawld me. +My awn that was, and my awnly one! My darter, my soft-eyed gal, the crown of +my grey hairs, the last light of my life!”</p> +<p>“I pray you’ll come to forgive me in time, dear faither. I +doan’t ax ’e to yet a while. I had to do it—a faithful +promise. ’T was for pure love, faither; I lied for him—lied even +to you; an’ my heart ’s been near to breakin’ for ’e +these many days; but you’d never have listened if I’d told +’e.”</p> +<p>“Go,” he said very quietly. “I caan’t abear the +sight of’e just now. An’ that poor fule, as thrawed his money in +golden showers for ’e! Oh, my gude God, why for did ’E leave me +any childern at all? Why didn’t ’E take this cross-hearted wan +when t’ other was snatched away? Why didn’t ’E fill the cup +of my sorrer to the brim at a filling an’ not drop by drop, to let un +run awver now I be auld?”</p> +<p>Phoebe turned to him in bitter tears, but the man’s head was down on +his hands beside his plate and cup, and he, too, wept, with a pitiful +childish squeak between his sobs. Weakness so overwhelming and so +unexpected—a father’s sorrow manifested in this helpless feminine +fashion—tore the girl’s very heartstrings. She knelt beside him +and put her arms about him; but he pushed her away and with some return of +self-control and sternness again bid her depart from him. This Phoebe did, +and there was silence, while Mr. Lyddon snuffled, steadied himself, wiped his +face with a cotton handkerchief, and felt feebly for a pair of spectacles in +his pocket. Mr. Chapple, meantime, had made bold to scan the paper with round +eyes, and Billy, now seeing the miller in some part recovered, essayed to +comfort him.</p> +<p>“Theer, theer, maister, doan’t let this black +come-along-o’t quench ’e quite. That’s better! You such a +man o’ sense, tu! ’T was awver-ordained by Providence, though a +artful thing in a young gal; but women be such itemy twoads best o’ +times—stage-players by sex, they sez; an’ when love for a man be +hid in ’em, gormed if they caan’t fox the God as made +’em!”</p> +<p>“Her to do it! The unthankfulness, the cold cruelty of it! An’ +me that was mother an’ father both to her—that did rock her +cradle with these hands an’ wash the li’l year-auld body of her. +To forget all—all she owed! It cuts me that deep!”</p> +<p>“Deep as a wire into cheese, I lay. An’ well it may; but +han’t no new thing; you stablish yourself with that. The ways o’ +women ’s like—’t was a sayin’ of Solomon I +caan’t call home just this minute; but he knawed, you mind, none +better. He had his awn petticoat trouble, same as any other Christian man +given to women. What do ’e say, neighbour?”</p> +<p>Billy, of opinion that Mr. Chapple should assist him in this painful duty, +put the last question to his rotund friend, but the other, for answer, rose +and prepared to depart.</p> +<p>“I say,” he answered, “that I’d best go up-along +and stop they chaps buildin’ the triumphant arch. ’Pears +won’t be called for now. An’ theer’s a tidy deal else to do +likewise. Folks was comin’ in from the Moor half a score o’ miles +for this merry-makin’.”</p> +<p>“’T is a practical thought,” said Billy. “Them as +come from far be like to seem fules if nothin’ ’s done. You go up +the village an’ I’ll follow ’e so quick as I +can.”</p> +<p>Mr. Chapple thereupon withdrew and Billy turned to the miller. Mr. Lyddon +had wandered once and again up and down the kitchen, then fallen into his +customary chair; and there he now sat, his elbows on his knees, his hands +over his face. He was overwhelmed; his tears hurt him physically and his head +throbbed. Twenty years seemed to have piled themselves upon his brow in as +many minutes.</p> +<p>“Sure I could shed water myself to see you like this here,” +said Mr. Blee, sympathetically; “but ’t is wan of them eternal +circumstances we ’m faaced with that all the rain falled of a wet +winter won’t wash away. Theer ’s the lines. They ’m a fact, +same as the sun in heaven ’s a fact. God A’mighty’s Self +couldn’t undo it wi’out some violent invention; an’ for +that matter I doan’t see tu clear how even Him be gwaine to magic a +married woman into a spinster again; any more than He could turn a spinster +into a married woman, onless some ordinary human man came forrard. You must +faace it braave an’ strong. But that imp o’ Satan—that damn +Blanchard bwoy! Theer! I caan’t say what I think ’bout him. Arter +all that’s been done: the guests invited, the banns axed out, the +victuals bought, and me retracin’ my ballet night arter night, for ten +days, to get un to concert pitch—well, ’t is a matter tu deep for +mere speech.”</p> +<p>“The—the young devil! I shall have no pity—not a spark. +I wish to God he could hang for it!”</p> +<p>“As to that, might act worse than leave it to Jan Grimbal. +He’ll do summat ’fore you’ve done talkin’, if I knaw +un. An’ a son-in-law ’s a son-in-law, though he’ve brought +it to pass by a brigand deed same as this. ’T is a kicklish question +what a man should do to the person of his darter’s husband. You bide +quiet an’ see what chances. Grimbal’s like to take law into his +awn hands, as any man of noble nature might in this quandary.”</p> +<p>The disappointed lover’s probable actions offered dreary food for +thought, and the two old men were still conversing when a maid entered to lay +the cloth for supper. Then Billy proceeded to the village and Mr. Lyddon, +unnerved and restless, rambled aimlessly into the open air, addressed any man +or woman who passed from the adjacent cottages, and querulously announced, to +the astonishment of chance listeners, that his daughter’s match was +broken off.</p> +<p>An hour later Phoebe reappeared in the kitchen and occupied her usual +place at the supper-table. No one spoke a word, but the course of the meal +was suddenly interrupted, for there came a knock at the farmhouse door, and +without waiting to be answered, somebody lifted the latch, tramped down the +stone passage, and entered the room.</p> +<p>Now Phoebe, in the privacy of her little chamber beneath the thatch, had +reflected miserably on the spectacle of her husband far away in a prison +cell, with his curls cropped off and his shapely limbs clad convict-fashion. +When, therefore, Will, and not John Grimbal, as she expected, stood before +her, his wife was perhaps more astonished than any other body present. Young +Blanchard appeared, however. He looked weary and hungry, for he had been on +his legs during the greater part of the day and had forgotten to eat since +his pretence of wedding-breakfast ten hours earlier. Now, newly returned from +Exeter, he came straight to Monks Barton before going to his home.</p> +<p>Billy Blee was the first to find his voice before this sudden apparition. +His fork, amply laden, hung in the air as though his arm was turned to stone; +with a mighty gulp he emptied his mouth and spoke.</p> +<p>“Gormed if you ban’t the most ’mazin’ piece ever +comed out o’ Chagford!”</p> +<p>“Miller Lyddon,” said Will, not heeding Mr. Blee, “I be +here to say wan word ’fore I goes out o’ your sight. You said +you’d have law of me if I took Phoebe; an’ that I done, +’cause we was of a mind. Now we ’m man an’ wife, an’ +I’m just back from prison, wheer I went straight to save you trouble. +But theer ’s preambles an’ writs an’ what not. I shall be +to mother’s, an’ you can send Inspector Chown when you like. It +had to come ’cause we was of a mind.”</p> +<p>He looked proudly at Phoebe, but departed without speaking to her, and +silence followed his going. Mr. Lyddon stared blankly at the door through +which Will departed, then his rage broke forth.</p> +<p>“Curse the wretch! Curse him to his dying day! An’ I’ll +do more—more than that. What he can suffer he shall, and if I’ve +got to pay my last shilling to get him punishment I’ll do it—my +last shilling I’ll pay.”</p> +<p>He had not regarded his daughter or spoken to her since his words at their +first meeting; and now, still ignoring Phoebe’s presence, he began +eagerly debating with Billy Blee as to what law might have power to do. The +girl, wisely enough, kept silence, ate a little food, and then went quietly +away to her bed. She was secretly overjoyed at Will’s return and near +presence; but another visitor might be expected at any moment, and Phoebe +knew that to be in bed before the arrival of John Grimbal would save her from +the necessity of a meeting she much feared. She entered upon her +wedding-night, therefore, while the voices below droned on, now rising, now +falling; then, while she was saying her prayers with half her mind on them, +the other half feverishly intent on a certain sound, it came. She heard the +clink, clink of the gate, thrown wide open and now swinging backwards and +forwards, striking the hasp each time; then a heavy step followed it, feet +strode clanging down the passage, and the bull roar of a man’s voice +fell on her ear. Upon this she huddled under the clothes, but listened for a +second at long intervals to hear when he departed. The thing that had +happened, however, since her husband’s departure and John +Grimbal’s arrival, remained happily hidden from Phoebe until next +morning, by which time a climax in affairs was past and the outcome of tragic +circumstances fully known.</p> +<p>When Blanchard left the farm, he turned his steps very slowly homewards, +and delayed some minutes on Rushford Bridge before appearing to his mother. +For her voice he certainly yearned, and for her strong sense to throw light +upon his future actions; but she did not know everything there was to be +known and he felt that with himself, when all was said, lay decision as to +his next step. While he reflected a new notion took shape and grew defined +and seemed good to him.</p> +<p>“Why not?” he said to himself, aloud. “Why not go back? +Seeing the provocation—they might surely—?” He pursued the +idea silently and came to a determination. Yet the contemplated action was +never destined to be performed, for now an accident so trifling as the chance +glimmer of a lucifer match contributed to remodel the scheme of his life and +wholly shatter immediate resolutions. Craving a whiff of tobacco, without +which he had been since morning, Will lighted his pipe, and the twinkle of +flame as he did so showed his face to a man passing across the bridge at that +moment. He stopped in his stride, and a great bellow of wrath escaped him, +half savage, half joyful.</p> +<p>“By God! I didn’t think to meet so soon!”</p> +<p>Here was a red-hot raving Nemesis indeed; and Will, while prepared for a +speedy meeting with his enemy, neither expected nor desired an encounter just +then. But it had come, and he knew what was before him. Grimbal, just +returned from a long day’s sport, rode back to his hotel in a good +temper. He drank a brandy-and-soda at the bar, then went up to his rooms and +found Phoebe’s letter; whereupon, as he was in muddy pink, he set off +straight for Monks Barton; and now he stood face to face with the man on +earth he most desired to meet. By the light of his match Will saw a red coat, +white teeth under a great yellow moustache, and a pair of mad, flaming eyes, +hungry for something. He knew what was coming, moved quickly from the parapet +of the bridge, and flung away his pipe to free his hands. As he did so the +other was on him. Will warded one tremendous stroke from a hunting-crop; then +they came to close quarters, and Grimbal, dropping his whip, got in a heavy +half-arm blow on his enemy’s face before they gripped in holds. The +younger man, in no trim for battle, reeled and tried to break away; but the +other had him fast, picked him clean off the ground, and, getting in his +weight, used a Yankee throw, with intent to drop Will against the granite of +the bridge. But though Blanchard went down like a child before the attack, he +disappeared rather than fell; and in the pitchy night it seemed as though +some amiable deity had caught up the vanquished into air. A sudden pressure +of the low parapet against his own legs as he staggered forward, told John +Grimbal what was done and, at the same moment, a tremendous splash in the +water below indicated his enemy’s dismal position. Teign, though not in +flood at the time, ran high, and just below the bridge a deep pool opened +out. Around it were rocks upon which rose the pillars of the bridge. No sound +or cry followed Will Blanchard’s fall; no further splash of a swimmer, +or rustle on the river’s bank, indicated any effort from him. +Grimbal’s first instincts were those of regret that revenge had proved +so brief. His desire was past before he had tasted it. Then for a moment he +hesitated, and the first raving lust to kill Phoebe’s husband waned a +trifle before the sudden conviction that he had done so. He crept down to the +river, ploughed about to find the man, questioning what he should do if he +did find him. His wrath waxed as he made search, and he told himself that he +should only trample Blanchard deeper into water if he came upon him. He +kicked here and there with his heavy boots; then abandoned the search and +proceeded to Monks Barton.</p> +<p>Into the presence of the miller he thundered, and for a time said nothing +of the conflict from which he had come. The scene needs no special narration. +Vain words and wishes, oaths and curses, filled John Grimbal’s mouth. +He stamped on the floor, finding it impossible to remain motionless, roared +the others down, loaded the miller with bitter reproaches for his blindness, +silenced Mr. Blee on every occasion when he attempted to join the discussion. +The man, in fine, exhibited that furious, brute passion and rage to be +expected from such a nature suddenly faced with complete dislocation of +cherished hopes. His life had been a long record of success, and this +tremendous reverse, on his first knowledge of it, came near to unhinge John +Grimbal’s mind. Storm succeeded storm, explosion followed upon +explosion, and the thought of the vanity of such a display only rendered him +more frantic. Then chance reminded the raging maniac of that thing he had +done, and now, removed from the deed by a little time, he gloried in it.</p> +<p>“Blast the devil—short shrift he got—given straight into +my hand! I swore to kill him when I heard it; an’ I have—pitched +him over the bridge and broken his blasted neck. I’d burn in +ragin’ hell through ten lifetimes to do it again. But that’s done +once for all. And you can tell your whore of a daughter she’s a widow, +not a wife!”</p> +<p>“God be gude to us!” cried Billy, while Mr. Lyddon started in +dismay. “Is this true you’m tellin’? Blue murder? An’ +so, like’s not, his awn mother’ll find un when she goes to draw +water in the marnin’!”</p> +<p>“Let her, and his sister, too; and my God-damned brother! All in +it—every cursed one of ’em. I’d like—I’d +like—Christ—”</p> +<p>He broke off, was silent for a moment, then strode out of the room towards +the staircase. Mr. Lyddon heard him and rushed after him with Billy. They +scrambled past and stood at the stair-foot while Grimbal glanced up in the +direction of Phoebe’s room, and then glared at the two old men.</p> +<p>“Why not, you doddering fools? Can you still stand by her, cursed +jade of lies? My work’s only half done! No man’s ever betrayed me +but he’s suffered hell for it; and no woman shall.”</p> +<p>He raged, and the two with beating hearts waited for him.</p> +<p>Then suddenly laughing aloud, the man turned his back, and passed into the +night without more words.</p> +<p>“Mad, so mad as any zany!” gasped Mr. Blee. “Thank God +the whim’s took un to go. My innards was curdlin’ afore +him!”</p> +<p>The extravagance of Grimbal’s rage had affected Mr. Lyddon also. +With white and terrified face he crept after Grimbal, and watched that +tornado of a man depart.</p> +<p>“My stars! He do breathe forth threatenings and slaughters worse +’n in any Bible carater ever I read of,” said the miller, +“and if what he sez be true—”</p> +<p>“I’ll wager ’t is. Theer ’s method in him. Your +son-in-law, if I may say it, be drownded, sure ’s death. What a +world!”</p> +<p>“Get the lanterns and call Sam Bonus. He must stand to this door +an’ let no man in while we ’m away. God send the chap ban’t +dead. I don’t like for a long-cripple to suffer torture.”</p> +<p>“That’s your high religion. An’ I’ll carry the +brandy, for ’t is a liquor, when all ’s said, what ’s saved +more bodies in this world than it ’s damned sawls in the next, +an’ a thing pleasant, tu, used with sense—specially if a man can +sleep ’fore ’t is dead in un.”</p> +<p>“Hurry, hurry! Every minute may mean life or death. I’ll call +Bonus; you get the lanterns.”</p> +<p>Ten minutes later a huge labourer stood guard over Monks Barton, and the +miller, with his man, entered upon their long and fruitless search. The thaw +had come, but glimmering ridges of snow still outlined the bases of +northern-facing hedges along the river. With infinite labour and some +difficulty they explored the stream, then, wet and weary, returned by the +southern bank to their starting-point at Rushford Bridge. Here Billy found a +cloth cap by the water’s edge, and that was the only evidence of +Will’s downfall. As they clambered up from the river Mr. Lyddon noted +bright eyes shining across the night, and found that the windows of Mrs. +Blanchard’s cottage were illuminated.</p> +<p>“They ’m waitin’ for him by the looks of it,” he +said. “What ought us to do, I wonder?”</p> +<p>Billy never objected to be the bearer of news, good or ill, so that it was +sensational; but a thought struck him at seeing the lighted windows.</p> +<p>“Why, it may be he’s theer! If so, then us might find Grimbal +didn’t slay un arter all. ’T was such a miz-maze o’ crooked +words he let fly ’pon us, that perhaps us misread un.”</p> +<p>“I wish I thought so. Come. Us can ax that much.”</p> +<p>A few minutes later they stood at Mrs. Blanchard’s door and knocked. +The widow herself appeared, fully dressed, wide awake, and perfectly +collected. Her manner told Mr. Lyddon nothing.</p> +<p>“What might you want, Miller?”</p> +<p>“’T is Will. There’s bin blows struck and violence done, +I hear.”</p> +<p>“I can tell ’e the rest. The bwoy’s paid his score +an’ got full measure. He wanted to be even with you, tu, but they +wouldn’t let un.”</p> +<p>“If he ban’t dead, I’ll make him smart yet for his evil +act.”</p> +<p>“I warned ’e. He was cheated behind his back, an’ played +with the same cards what you did, and played better.”</p> +<p>“Wheer is he now? That’s what I want to knaw.”</p> +<p>“Up in the house. They met on the bridge an’ Grimbal bested +him, Will bein’ weary an’ empty-bellied. When the man flinged him +in the stream, he got under the arch behind the rocks afore he lost his head +for a time and went senseless. When he comed to he crawled up the croft and I +let un in.”</p> +<p>“Thank God he’s not dead; but punishment he shall have if +theer’s justice in the land.”</p> +<p>“Bide your time. He won’t shirk it. But he’s hurted +proper; you might let Jan Grimbal knaw, ’t will ease his +mind.”</p> +<p>“Not it,” declared Billy; “he thought he’d killed +un; cracked the neck of un.”</p> +<p>“The blow ’pon his faace scatted abroad his left nostril; the +fall brawked his arm, not his neck; an’ the spurs t’ other was +wearin’ tored his leg to the bone. Doctor’s seen un; so tell +Grimbal. Theer’s pleasure in such payment.”</p> +<p>She spoke without emotion, and showed no passion against the master of the +Red House. When Will had come to her, being once satisfied in her immediate +motherly agony that his life was not endangered, she allowed her mind a sort +of secret, fierce delight at his performance and its success in the main +issue. She was proud of him at the bottom of her heart; but before other eyes +bore herself with outward imperturbability.</p> +<p>“You’ll keep the gal, I reckon?” she said quietly; +“if you can hold hand off Will till he’m on his legs again, +I’d thank you.”</p> +<p>“I shall do what I please, when I please; an’ my poor fule of +a daughter stops with me as long as I’ve got power to make +her.”</p> +<p>“Hope you’ll live to see things might have been +worse.”</p> +<p>“That’s impossible. No worse evil could have fallen upon me. +My grey hairs a laughing-stock, and your awn brother’s hand in it. He +knawed well enough the crime he was committing.”</p> +<p>“You’ve a short memory, Miller. I lay Jan Grimbal knaws the +reason if you doan’t. The worm that can sting does, if you tread on it. +Gude-night to ’e.”</p> +<p>“An’ how do you find yourself now?” Billy inquired, as +his master and he returned to Monks Barton.</p> +<p>“Weary an’ sick, an’ filled with gall. Was it wrong to +make the match, do ’e think, seein’ ’t was all for love of +my cheel? Was I out to push so strong for it? I seem I done right, despite +this awful mischance.”</p> +<p>“An’ so you did; an’ my feelin’s be the same as +yours to a split hair, though I’ve got no language for em at this +unnatural hour of marnin’,” said Billy.</p> +<p>Then in silence, to the bobbing illumination of their lanterns, Mr. Lyddon +and his familiar dragged their weary bodies home.</p> +<h2><a id="I_XI" name="I_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI<br /> +LOVE AND GREY GRANITE</h2> +<p>The lofty central area of Devon has ever presented a subject of +fascination to geologists; and those evidences of early man which adorn +Dartmoor to-day have similarly attracted antiquarian minds for many +generations past. But the first-named student, although his researches plunge +him into periods of mundane time inconceivably more remote than that with +which the archaeologist is concerned, yet reaches conclusions more definite +and arrives at a nearer approximation to truth than any who occupy themselves +in the same area with manifold and mysterious indications of early +humanity’s sojourn. The granite upheaval during that awful revolt of +matter represented by the creation of Dartmoor has been assigned to a period +between the Carboniferous and Permian eras; but whether the womb of one +colossal volcano or the product of a thousand lesser eruptions threw forth +this granite monster, none may yet assert. Whether Dartmoor first appeared as +a mighty shield, with one uprising spike in its midst, or as a target +supporting many separate bosses cannot be declared; for the original aspect +of the region has long vanished, though our worn and weathered land of tors +still shadows, in its venerable desolation, those sublimer, more savage +glories manifested ere the eye of man or beast existed to receive an image of +them.</p> +<p>But the earliest human problems presented by Devon’s watershed admit +of no sure solution, albeit they date from a time adjacent contrasted with +that wherein the land was born. Nature’s message still endures for man +to read as his knowledge grows; but the records of our primal fellows have +grown dim and uncertain as the centuries rolled over them. There exists, +however, within the lofty, lonely kingdom of the granite, a chain of human +evidences extending from prehistoric ages to the ruined shepherd’s cot +of yesterday. At many spots a spectator may perceive in one survey the stone +ruin of the Danmonian’s habitation, and hypaethral temple or forum, the +heather-clad debris left by Elizabethan streamers of alluvial tin, the inky +peat-ridges from which a moorman has just cut his winter firing. But the +first-named objects, with kindred fragments that have similarly endured, +chiefly fire imagination. Seen grey at gloaming time, golden through sunny +dawns, partaking in those spectral transformations cast upon the moor by the +movement of clouds, by the curtains of the rain, by the silver of breaking +day, the monotone of night and the magic of the moon, these relics reveal +themselves and stand as a link between the present and the far past. Mystery +broods over them and the jealous wings of the ages hide a measure of their +secret. Thus far these lonely rings of horrent stones and the alignments +between them have concealed their story from modern man, and only in presence +of the ancient pound, the foundations of a dwelling, the monolith that marked +a stone-man’s sepulchre, the robbed cairn and naked kistvaen, may we +speak with greater certainty and, through the glimmering dawn of history and +the records of Britain’s earliest foes, burrow back to aboriginal man +on Dartmoor. Then research and imagination rebuild the eternal rings of +granite and, erecting upon them tall domes of thatch and skins on wattle +ribs, conceive the early village like a cluster of gigantic mushrooms, whose +cowls are uplifted in that rugged fastness through the night of time. We see +Palaeolithic man sink into mother earth before the superior genius of his +Neolithic successor; and we note the Damnonian shepherds flourishing in +lonely lodges and preserving their flocks from the wolf, while Egypt’s +pyramids were still of modern creation, and the stars twinkled in strange +constellations, above a world innocent as yet of the legends that would name +them. The stone-workers have vanished away, but their labour endures; their +fabricated flints still appear, brought to light from barrows and peat-ties, +from the burrows of rabbits and the mounds of the antiquary mole; the ruins +of their habitations, the theatres of their assemblies and unknown ceremonies +still stand, and probably will continue so to do as long as Dartmoor’s +bosom lies bare to the storm and stress of the ages.</p> +<p>Modern man has also fretted the wide expanse, has scratched its surface +and dropped a little sweat and blood; but his mansion and his cot and his +grave are no more; plutonic rock is the only tablet on which any human story +has been scribbled to endure. Castles and manor-houses have vanished from the +moorland confines like the cloudy palaces of a dream; the habitations of the +mining folk shall not be seen to-day, and their handiwork quickly returns to +primitive waste; fern and furze hide the robbed cairn and bury the shattered +cross; flood and lightning and tempest roam over the darkness of a region +sacred to them, and man stretches his hand for what Nature touches not; but +the menhir yet stands erect, the “sacred” circles are circles +still, and these, with like records of a dim past, present to thinking +travellers the crown and first glory of the Moor. Integral portions of the +ambient desolation are they—rude toys that infant humanity has left in +Mother Nature’s lap; and the spectacle of them twines a golden thread +of human interest into the fabric of each lonely heath, each storm-scarred +mountain-top and heron-haunted stream. Nothing is changed since skin-clad +soldiers and shepherds strode these wastes, felt their hearts quicken at +sight of women, or their hands clench over celt-headed spears before danger. +Here the babies of the stone-folk, as the boys and girls to-day, stained +their little mouths and ringers with fruit of briar and whortle; the ling +bloomed then as now; the cotton-grass danced its tattered plume; the sphagnum +mosses opened emerald-green eyes in marsh and quaking bog; and hoary granite +scattered every ravine and desert valley. About those aboriginal men the Moor +spread forth the same horizon of solemn enfolding hills, and where twinkle +the red hides of the moor-man’s heifers through upstanding fern, in +sunny coombs and hawthorn thickets, yesterday the stone-man’s cattle +roamed and the little eyes of a hidden bear followed their motions. Here, +indeed, the first that came in the flesh are the last to vanish in their +memorials; here Nature, to whom the hut-circle of granite, all clad in +Time’s lichen livery of gold and grey, is no older than the mushroom +ring shining like a necklace of pearls within it—Nature may follow what +course she will, may build as she pleases, may probe to the heart of things, +may pursue the eternal Law without let from the pigmies; and here, if +anywhere from man’s precarious standpoint, shall he perceive the +immutable and observe a presentment of himself in those ephemera that dance +above the burn at dawn, and ere twilight passes gather up their gauze wings +and perish.</p> +<p>According to individual temperament this pregnant region attracts and +fascinates the human spectator or repels him. Martin Grimbal loved Dartmoor +and, apart from ties of birth and early memories, his natural predilections +found thereon full scope and play. He was familiar with most of those +literary productions devoted to the land, and now developed an ambition to +add some result of personal observation and research to extant achievements. +He went to work with method and determination, and it was not until +respectable accumulations of notes and memoranda already appeared as the +result of his labours that the man finally—almost +reluctantly—reconciled himself to the existence of another and deeper +interest in his life than that furnished by the grey granite monuments of the +Moor. Hide it from himself he could no longer, nor yet wholly from others. As +in wild Devon it is difficult at any time to escape from the murmur of waters +unseen, so now the steady flood of this disquieting emotion made music at all +waking hours in Martin’s archaeologic mind, shattered his most subtle +theories unexpectedly, and oftentimes swept the granite clean out of his head +on the flood of a golden river.</p> +<p>After three months of this beautiful but disquieting experience, Martin +resigned himself to the conclusion that he was in love with Chris Blanchard. +He became very cautious and timid before the discovery. He feared much and +contemplated the future with the utmost distrust. Doubt racked him; he +checked himself from planning courses of conduct built on mad presumptions. +By night, as a sort of debauch, in those hours when man is awake and fancy +free, he conceived of a happy future with Chris and little children about +him; at morning light, if any shadow of that fair vision returned, he blushed +and looked round furtively, as though some thought-reader’s cold eye +must be sneering at such presumption. He despaired of finding neutral ground +from which his dry mind could make itself attractive to a girl. Now and again +he told himself that the new emotion must be crushed, in that it began to +stand between him and the work he had set himself to do for his county; but +during more sanguine moods he challenged this decision and finally, as was +proper and right, the flood of the man’s first love drowned menhir and +hut-circle fathoms deep, and demanded all his attention at the cost of mental +peace. An additional difficulty appeared in the fact that the Blanchard +family were responsible for John Grimbal’s misfortune; and Martin, +without confusing the two circumstances, felt that before him really lay the +problem of a wife or a brother. When first he heard of the event that set +Chagford tongues wagging so briskly, he rightly judged that John would hold +him one of the conspirators; and an engagement to Chris Blanchard must +certainly confirm the baffled lover’s suspicions and part the men for +ever. But before those words, as they passed through his brain, Martin +Grimbal stopped, as the peasant before a shrine. “An engagement to +Chris Blanchard!” He was too much a man and too deep merged in love to +hesitate before the possibility of such unutterable happiness.</p> +<p>For his brother he mourned deeply enough, and when the thousand rumours +bred of the battle on the bridge were hatched and fluttered over the +countryside, Martin it was who exerted all his power to stay them. Most +people were impressed with the tragic nature of the unfortunate John’s +disappointment; but his energetic measures since the event were held to pay +all scores, and it was believed the matter would end without any more trouble +from him. Clement Hicks entertained a different opinion, perhaps judging John +Grimbal from the secrets of his own character; but Will expressed a lively +faith that his rival must now cry quits, after his desperate and natural but +unsuccessful attempt to render Phoebe a widow. The shattered youth took his +broken bones very easily, and only grunted when he found that his wife was +not permitted to visit him under any pretence whatever; while as for Phoebe, +her wild sorrow gradually lessened and soon disappeared as each day brought a +better account of Will. John Grimbal vanished on the trip which was to have +witnessed his honeymoon. He pursued his original plans with the modification +that Phoebe had no part in them, and it was understood that he would return +to Chagford in the spring.</p> +<p>Thus matters stood, and when his brother was gone and Will and Phoebe had +been married a month, Martin, having suffered all that love could do +meantime, considered he might now approach the Blanchards. Ignorantly he +pursued an awkward course, for wholly unaware that Clement Hicks felt any +interest in Will and his sister beyond that of friendship, Martin sought from +him the general information he desired upon the subject of Chris, her family +and concerns.</p> +<p>Together the two men went upon various excursions to ancient relics that +interested them both, though in different measure. It was long before Martin +found courage to bring forth the words he desired to utter, but finally he +managed to do so, in the bracing conditions that obtained on Cosdon Beacon +upon the occasion of a visit to its summit. By this time he had grown +friendly with Hicks and must have learnt all and more than he desired to know +but for the bee-keeper’s curious taciturnity. For some whim Clement +never mentioned his engagement; it was a subject as absent from his +conversation as his own extreme poverty; but while the last fact Martin had +already guessed, the former remained utterly concealed from him. Neither did +any chance discover it until some time afterwards.</p> +<p>The hut-circles on Cosdon’s south-eastern flank occupied +Martin’s pencil. Clement gazed once upon the drawing, then turned away, +for no feeling or poetry inspired the work; it was merely very accurate. The +sketches made, both men ascended immense Cosdon, where its crown of cairns +frets the long summit; and here, to the sound of the wind in the dead +heather, with all the wide world of Northern Devon extended beneath his gaze +under a savage sunset, Martin found courage to speak. At first Hicks did not +hear. His eyes were on the pageant of the sky and paid tribute of sad thought +before an infinity of dying cloud splendours. But the antiquary repeated his +remark. It related to Will Blanchard, and upon Clement dropping a +monosyllabic reply his companion continued:</p> +<p>“A very handsome fellow, too. Miss Blanchard puts me in mind of +him.”</p> +<p>“They’re much alike in some things. But though Chris knows her +brother to be good to look at, you’ll never get Will to praise her. +Funny, isn’t it? Yet to his Phoebe, she’s the sun to a +star.”</p> +<p>“I think so too indeed. In fact, Miss Blanchard is the most +beautiful woman I ever saw.”</p> +<p>Clement did not answer. He was gazing through the sunset at Chris, and as +he looked he smiled, and the sadness lifted a little from off his face.</p> +<p>“Strange some lucky fellow has not won her before now,” +proceeded the other, glancing away to hide the blush that followed his +diplomacy.</p> +<p>Here, by all experience and reason, and in the natural sequence of events +Clement Hicks might have been expected to make his confession and rejoice in +his prize, but for some cause, from some queer cross-current of disposition, +he shut his mouth upon the greatest fact of his life. He answered, indeed, +but his words conveyed a false impression. What sinister twist of mind was +responsible for his silence he himself could not have explained; a mere +senseless monkey-mischief seemed to inspire it. Martin had not deceived him, +because the elder man was unused to probing a fellow-creature for facts or +obtaining information otherwise than directly. Clement noted the false +intonation and hesitation, recollected his sweetheart’s allusion to +Martin Grimbal, and read into his companion’s question something +closely akin to what in reality lay behind it. His discovery might have been +expected to hasten rather than retard the truth, and a first impulse in any +man had made the facts instantly clear; but Clement rarely acted on impulse. +His character was subtle, disingenuous, secretive. Safe in absolute +possession, the discovery of Martin’s attachment did not flutter him. +He laughed in his mind; then he pictured Chris the wife of this man, reviewed +the worldly improvement in her position such a union must effect, and laughed +no more. Finally he decided to hold his peace; but his motives for so doing +were not clear even to himself.</p> +<p>“Yes,” he answered, “but she’s not one to give her +hand without her heart.”</p> +<p>These words, from Martin’s point of view, embraced a definite +assurance that Chris was free; and, as they walked homewards, he kept silence +upon this thought for the space of half an hour. The uneasy hopes and black +fears of love circled him about. Perhaps his timorous mind, in some moods, +had been almost relieved at declaration of the girl’s engagement to +another. But now the tremendous task of storming a virgin heart lay ahead of +him, as he imagined. Torments unfelt by those of less sensitive mould also +awaited Martin Grimbal. The self-assertive sort of man, who rates himself as +not valueless, and whose love will not prevent callous calculation on the +weight of his own person and purse upon the argument, is doubtless wise in +his generation, and his sanguine temperament enables him to escape oceans of +unrest, hurricanes of torment; but self-distrust and humility have their +value, and those who are oppressed by them fall into no such pitiable extreme +as that too hopeful lover on whose sanguine ear “No” falls like a +thunderbolt from red lips that were already considered to have spoken +“Yes.” A suitor who plunges from lofty peaks of assured victory +into failure falls far indeed; but Martin Grimbal stood little chance of +suffering in that sort as his brother John had done.</p> +<p>The antiquary spoke presently, fearing he must seem too self-absorbed, but +Clement had little to say. Yet a chance meeting twisted the conversation +round to its former topic as they neared home. Upon Chagford Bridge appeared +Miller Lyddon and Mr. Blee. The latter had been whitewashing the apple-tree +stems—a course to which his master attached more importance than that +pursued on Old Christmas Eve—and through the gathering dusk the trunks +now stood out livid and wan as a regiment of ghosts.</p> +<p>“Heard from your brother since he left?” Mr. Lyddon inquired +after evening greetings.</p> +<p>“I cannot yet. I hope he may write, but you are more likely to hear +than I.”</p> +<p>“Not me. I’m nothing to un now.”</p> +<p>“Things will come right. Don’t let it prey on your mind. No +woman ever made a good wife who didn’t marry where her heart +was,” declared Martin, exhibiting some ignorance of the subject he +presumed to discuss.</p> +<p>“Ah! you was ag’in’ us, I mind,” said the miller, +drawing in. “He said as much that terrible night.”</p> +<p>“He was wrong—utterly. I only spoke for his good. I saw that +your daughter couldn’t stand the sight of him and shivered if he +touched her. It was my duty to speak. Strange you didn’t see +too.”</p> +<p>“So easy to talk afterwards! I had her spoken word, hadn’t I? +She’d never lied in all her life afore. Strange if I <i>had</i> seen, I +reckon.”</p> +<p>“You frightened her into falsehood. Any girl might have been +expected to lie in that position,” said Clement coolly; then Mr. Blee, +who had been fretting to join the conversation, burst into it unbidden.</p> +<p>“Be gormed if I ban’t like a cat on hot bricks to hear +’e! wan might think as Miller was the Devil hisself for cruelty instead +o’ bein’, as all knaws, the most muty-hearted<a id="footnotetag4" +name="footnotetag4"></a><a href="#footnote4"><sup>4</sup></a> faither in +Chagford.”</p> +<p>“As to that, I doan’t knaw, Billy,” declared Mr. Lyddon +stoutly; “I be a man as metes out to the world same measure as I get +from the world. Right is right, an’ law is law; an’ if I +doan’t have the law of Will Blanchard—”</p> +<p>“There’s little enough you can do, I believe,” said +Hicks; “and what satisfaction lies in it, I should like to know, if +it’s not a rude question?”</p> +<p>The old man answered with some bitterness, and explained his power.</p> +<p>“William Blanchard’s done abduction, according to Lawyer +Bellamy of Plymouth; an’ abduction’s felony, and that’s a +big thing, however you look ’pon it.”</p> +<p>“Long an’ short is,” cut in Billy, who much desired to +air a little of his new knowledge, “that he can get a sentence inside +the limits of two years, with or without hard labour; at mercy of judge and +jury. That’s his dose or not his dose, ’cording to the gracious +gudeness of Miller.”</p> +<p>“Will’s nearly ready to go,” said Clement. “Let +his arm once be restored, and he’ll do your hard labour with a good +heart, I promise you. He wants to please Mr. Lyddon, and will tackle two +months or two years or twenty.”</p> +<p>“Two an’ not a second less—with hard labour I’ll +wager, when all’s taken into account.”</p> +<p>“Why are you so hot, Billy Blee? You’re none the +worse.”</p> +<p>“Billy’s very jealous for me, same as Elijah was for the Lard +o’ Hosts,” said Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>Then Martin and Clement climbed the steep hill that lay between them and +Chagford, while the miller and his man pursued their way through the +valley.</p> +<h2><a id="I_XII" name="I_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII<br /> +A STORY-BOOK</h2> +<p>Despite the miller’s explicit declaration, there was yet a doubt as +to what he might do in the matter of Will Blanchard. Six weeks is a period of +time that has often served to cool dispositions more fiery, purposes more +inflexible than those of Mr. Lyddon, and his natural placidity of +temperament, despite outbreaks, had begun to reassert itself. Billy Blee, +misunderstanding his master in this, suspected that the first fires of rage +were now sunk into a conflagration, not so visible, but deeper and therefore +more dangerous to the sufferer, if not to other people. He failed to observe +that each day of waiting lessened the miller’s desire towards action, +and he continued to urge some step against Will Blanchard, as the only road +by which his master’s peace of mind might be regained. He went further, +and declared delay to be very dangerous for Mr. Lyddon’s spleen and +other physical organs. But though humanity still prevented any definite step, +Billy’s master so far adopted his advice as to see a solicitor and +learn what the law’s power might be in the matter. Now he knew, as was +recorded in the previous chapter; and still Mr. Lyddon halted between two +opinions. He usually spoke on the subject as he had spoken to Martin Grimbal +and Clement Hicks; but in reality he felt less desire in the direction of +revenge than he pretended. Undoubtedly his daughter contributed not a little +to this irresolution of mind. During the period of Will’s +convalescence, his wife conducted herself with great tact and self-restraint. +Deep love for her father not only inspired her, but also smoothed +difficulties from a road not easy. Phoebe kept much out of sight until the +miller’s first dismay and sorrow had subsided; then she crept back into +her old position and by a thousand deft deeds and proper speeches won him +again unconsciously. She anticipated his unspoken desire, brightened his +every-day life by unobtrusive actions, preserved a bright demeanour, never +mentioned Will, and never contradicted her father when he did so.</p> +<p>Thus the matter stood, and Mr. Lyddon held his hand until young Blanchard +was abroad again and seeking work. Then he acted, as shall appear. Before +that event, however, incidents befell Will’s household, the first being +an unexpected visit from Martin Grimbal; for the love-sick antiquary nerved +himself to this great task a week after his excursion to Cosdon. He desired +to see Will, and was admitted without comment by Mrs. Blanchard. The +sufferer, who sat at the kitchen fire with his arm still in a sling, received +Martin somewhat coldly, being ignorant of the visitor’s friendly +intentions. Chris was absent, and Will’s mother, after hoping that Mr. +Grimbal would not object to discuss his business in the kitchen, departed and +left the men together.</p> +<p>“Sit down,” said Will. “Be you come for your brother or +yourself?”</p> +<p>“For myself. I want to make my position clear. You must not +associate me with John in this affair. In most things our interests were the +same, and he has been a brother in a thousand to me; but concerning +Miss—Mrs. Blanchard—he erred in my opinion—greatly +erred—and I told him so. Our relations are unhappily strained, to my +sorrow. I tell you this because I desire your friendship. It would be good to +me to be friends with you and your family. I do not want to lose your esteem +by a misunderstanding.”</p> +<p>“That’s fair speech, an’ I’m glad to hear ’e +say it, for it ban’t my fault when a man quarrels wi’ me, as +anybody will tell ’e. An’ mother an’ Chris will be glad. +God knaws I never felt no anger ’gainst your brother, till he tried to +take my girl away from me. Flesh an’ blood weern’t gwaine to +suffer that.”</p> +<p>“Under the circumstances, and with all the difficulties of your +position, I never could blame you.”</p> +<p>“Nor Phoebe,” said the other warmly. “I won’t have +wan word said against her. Absolute right she done. I’m sick an’ +savage, even now, to think of all she suffered for me. I grits my teeth by +night when it comes to my mind the mort o’ grief an’ tears +an’ pain heaped up for her—just because she loved wan chap +an’ not another.”</p> +<p>“Let the past go and look forward. The future will be happy +presently.”</p> +<p>“In the long run ’t will for sure. Your brother’s got +all he wants, I reckon, an’ I doan’t begrudge him a twinge; but I +hope theer ban’t no more wheer that comed from, for his awn sake, +’cause if us met unfriendly again, t’ other might go awver the +bridge, an’ break worse ’n his arm.”</p> +<p>“No, no, Blanchard, don’t talk and think like that. Let the +past go. My brother will return a wiser man, I pray, with his great +disappointment dulled.”</p> +<p>“A gert disappointment! To be catched out stealin’, an’ +shawed up for a thief!”</p> +<p>“Well, forgive and forget. It’s a valuable art—to learn +to forget.”</p> +<p>“You wait till you ’m faaced wi’ such trouble, an’ +try to forget! But we ’m friends, by your awn shawm’, and I be +glad ’t is so. Ax mother to step in from front the house, will +’e? I’d wish her to know how we ’m +standin’.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard appeared with her daughter, and subsequent conversation +banished a haunting sense of disloyalty to his brother from Martin’s +mind. Chris never looked more splendid or more sweet than in that noon, new +come from a walk with Clement Hicks. Martin listened to her voice, stayed as +long as he dared, and then departed with many emotions breaking like a storm +upon his lonely life. He began to long for her with overwhelming desire. He +had scarcely looked at a woman till now, and this brown-eyed girl of twenty, +so full of life, so beautiful, set his very soul helplessly adrift on the sea +of love. Her sudden laugh, like Will’s, but softer and more musical, +echoed in the man’s ear as he returned to his house and, in a ferment, +tramped the empty rooms.</p> +<p>His own requirements had been amply met by three apartments, furnished +with sobriety and great poverty of invention; but now he pictured Chris +singing here, tripping about with her bright eyes and active fingers. Like +his brother before him, he fell back upon his money, and in imagination spent +many pounds for one woman’s delight. Then from this dream he tumbled +back into reality and the recollection that his goddess must be wooed and +won. No man ever yet failed to make love from ignorance how to begin, but the +extent and difficulties of his undertaking weighed very heavily on Martin +Grimbal at this juncture. To win even a measure of her friendship appeared a +task almost hopeless. Nevertheless, through sleepless nights, he nerved +himself to the tremendous attempt. There was not so much of +self-consciousness in him, but a great store of self-distrust. Martin rated +himself and his powers of pleasing very low; and unlike the tumultuous and +volcanic methods of John, his genius disposed him to a courtship of most +tardy development, most gradual ripening. To propose while a doubt existed of +the answer struck him as a proceeding almost beyond the bounds of man’s +audacity. He told himself that time would surely show what chance or hope +there might be, and that opportunity must be left to sneak from the battle at +any moment when ultimate failure became too certainly indicated. In more +sanguine moods, however, by moonlight, or alone on the high moors, greater +bravery and determination awoke in him. At such times he would decide to +purchase new clothes and take thought for externals generally. He also +planned some studies in such concerns as pleased women if he could learn what +they might be. His first deliberate if half-hearted attack relied for its +effect upon a novel. Books, indeed, are priceless weapons in the armory of +your timid lover; and let but the lady discover a little reciprocity, develop +an unsuspected delight in literature, as often happens, and the most modest +volume shall achieve a practical result as far beyond its intrinsic merit as +above the writer’s dream.</p> +<p>Martin, then, primed with a work of fiction, prayed that Chris might prove +a reader of such things, and called at Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage exactly +one fortnight after his former visit. Chance favoured him to an extent beyond +his feeble powers to profit by. Will was out for a walk, and Mrs. Blanchard +being also from home, Martin enjoyed conversation with Chris alone. He began +well enough, while she listened and smiled. Then he lost his courage and +lied, and dragging the novel from his pocket, asserted that he had bought the +tale for her brother.</p> +<p>“A story-book! I doubt Will never read no such matter in his life, +Mr. Grimbal.”</p> +<p>“But get him to try. It’s quite a new thing. There’s a +poaching adventure and so forth—all very finely done according to the +critical journals.”</p> +<p>“He’ll never sit down to that gert buke.”</p> +<p>“You read it then, and tell him if it is good.”</p> +<p>“Me! Well, I do read now and again, an’ stories tu; but Will +wouldn’t take my word. Now if Phoebe was to say ’t was braave +readin’, he’d go for it fast enough.”</p> +<p>“I may leave it, at any rate?”</p> +<p>“Leave it, an’ thank you kindly.”</p> +<p>“How is Will getting on?”</p> +<p>“Quite well again. Awnly riled ’cause Mr. Lyddon lies so low. +Clem told us what the miller can do, but us doan’t knaw yet what he +will do.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he doesn’t know himself,” suggested Martin. The +name of “Clem,” uttered thus carelessly by her, made him envious. +Then, inspired by the circumstance, a request which fairly astounded the +speaker by its valour dropped on his listener’s ear.</p> +<p>“By the way, don’t call me ‘Mr. Grimbal.’ I hope +you’ll let me be ‘Martin’ in a friendly way to you all, if +you will be so very kind and not mind my asking.”</p> +<p>The end of the sentence had its tail between its legs, but he got the +words cleanly out, and his reward was great.</p> +<p>“Why, of course, if you’d rather us did; an’ you can +call me ‘Chris’ if you mind to,” she said, laughing. +“’T is strange you took sides against your brother somehow to +me.”</p> +<p>“I haven’t—I didn’t—except in the matter of +Phoebe. He was wrong there, and I told him so,—”</p> +<p>He meant to end the sentence with the other’s name, only the word +stuck in his throat; but “Miss Blanchard” he would not say, after +her permission, so left a gap.</p> +<p>“He’ll not forgive ’e that in a hurry.”</p> +<p>“Not readily, but some day, I hope. Now I must really +go—wasting your precious time like this; and I do hope you may read the +book.”</p> +<p>“That Will may?”</p> +<p>“No—yes—both of you, in fact. And I’ll come to +know whether you liked it. Might I?”</p> +<p>“Whether Will liked it?”</p> +<p>She nodded and laughed, then the door hid her; while Martin Grimbal went +his way treading upon air. Those labourers whom he met received from him such +a “Good evening!” that the small parties, dropping back on +Chagford from their outlying toil, grinned inquiringly, they hardly knew at +what.</p> +<p>Meantime, Chris Blanchard reflected, and the laughter faded out of her +eyes, leaving them grave and a little troubled. She was sufficiently familiar +with lovers’ ways. The bold, the uncouth, the humble, and timorous were +alike within her experience. She watched this kind-faced man grow hot and +cold as he spoke to her, noted the admixture of temerity and fear that +divided his mind and appeared in his words. She had seen his lips tremble and +refuse to pronounce her name; and she rightly judged that he would possibly +repeat it aloud to himself more than once before he slept that night. Chris +was no flirt, and now heartily regretted her light and friendly banter upon +the man’s departure. “I be a silly fule, an’ wouldn’t +whisper a word of this to any but Clem,” she thought, “for it may +be nothing but the nervous way of un, an’ such a chap ’s a right +to seek a sight further ’n me for a wife; an’ yet they all +’pear the same, an’ act the same soft sort o’ style when +they ’m like it.” Then she considered that, seeing what +friendship already obtained between Clement and Martin Grimbal, it was +strange the latter still went in ignorance. “Anyways, if I’m not +wrong, the sooner he ’m told the better, for he’s a proper +fashioned man,” she thought.</p> +<p>While Chris was still revolving this matter in her mind, Mrs. Blanchard +returned with some news.</p> +<p>“Postmistress stepped out of the office wi’ this as I corned +down the village,” she said. “’T is from Mrs. Watson, I +fancy.”</p> +<p>Her daughter brought a light, and the letter was perused. “Uncle +’s took bad,” Mrs. Blanchard presently announced; +“an’ sends to say as he wants me to go along an’ help Sarah +Watson nurse un.”</p> +<p>“Him ill! I never thought he was made of stuff to be ill.”</p> +<p>“I must go, whether or no. I’ll take the coach to Moreton +to-morrow.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard mentally traversed her wardrobe as she drank tea, and had +already packed in anticipation before the meal was ended. Will, on returning, +was much perturbed at this bad news, for since his own marriage Uncle Ford +had become a hero among men to him.</p> +<p>“What’s amiss she doan’t say—Mrs. Watson—but +it’s more ’n a fleabite else he wouldn’t take his bed. But +I hopes I’ll have un to rights again in a week or so. ’Mind me to +take a bottle of last summer’s Marshmally brew, Chris. Doctors laugh at +such physic, but I knaw what I knaw.”</p> +<p>“Wonder if’t would better him to see me?” mused +Will.</p> +<p>“No, no; no call for that. You’ll be fit to stand to work by +Monday, so mind your business an’ traapse round an’ look for it. +Theer ’s plenty doin’ ’pon the land now, an’ I want +to hear you’ ve got a job ’fore I come home. Husbands must work +for two; an’ Phoebe’ll be on your hands come less than a couple +o’ years.”</p> +<p>“One year and five months and seven days ’t is.”</p> +<p>“Very well. You’ve got to mind a brace of things meantime; to +make a vitty home for her by the sweat of your body, an’ to keep your +hands off her till she ’m free to come to ’e.”</p> +<p>“Big things both, though I ban’t afeared of myself afore +’em. I’ve thought a lot in my time, an’ be allowed to have +sense an’ spirit for that matter.”</p> +<p>“Spirit, ess fay, same as your faither afore you; but not so much +sense as us can see wi’out lightin’ cannel.”</p> +<p>“Wonder if Uncle Joel be so warm a man as he’d have us think +sometimes of an evenin’ arter his hot whiskey an’ water?” +said Chris.</p> +<p>“Don’t ’e count on no come-by-chance from him. +He’s got money, that I knaw, but ban’t gwaine to pass our way, +for he tawld me so in as many words. Sarah Watson will reap what he’s +sawed; an’ who shall grumble? He ’m a just man, though not of the +accepted way o’ thinkin’.”</p> +<p>“Why for didn’t he marry her?” asked Will.</p> +<p>“Caan’t tell’e, more’n the dead. Just a whim. I +asked her same question, when I was last to Newton, an’ she said +’t was to save the price of a licence she reckoned, though in his way +of life he might have got matrimony cheap as any man. But theer ’t is. +Her ’s bin gude as a wife to un—an’ better ’n +many—this fifteen year.”</p> +<p>“A very kind woman to me while I was biding along with uncle,” +said Will. “All the same you should have some of the money.”</p> +<p>“I’m well as I be. An’ this dead-man-shoe talk’s +vain an’ giddy. I lay he’m long ways from death, an’ the +further the better. Now I be gwaine to pack my box ’fore +supper.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard withdrew, and Chris, suddenly recollecting it, mentioned +Martin Grimbal’s visit. Will laughed and read a page or two of the +story-book, then went out of doors to see Clement Hicks; and his sister, with +a spare hour before her while a rabbit roasted, sat near the spit and +occupied her mind with thought.</p> +<p>Will’s business related to himself. He was weary of waiting for Mr. +Lyddon, and though he had taken care to let Phoebe know by Chris that his arm +was well and strong enough for the worst that might be found for it to do, no +notice was taken of his message, no sign escaped the miller.</p> +<p>All interested persons had their own theories upon this silence. Mrs. +Blanchard suspected that Mr. Lyddon would do nothing at all, and Will readily +accepted this belief; but he found it impossible to wait with patience for +its verification. This indeed was the harder to him because Clement Hicks +predicted a different issue and foretold an action of most malignant sort on +the miller’s part. What ground existed for attributing any such deed to +Mr. Lyddon was not manifest, but the bee-keeper stuck to it that Will’s +father-in-law would only wait until he was in good employment and then +proceed to his confusion.</p> +<p>This conviction he now repeated.</p> +<p>“He’s going to make you smart before he’s done with you, +if human nature’s a factor to rely upon. It’s clear to +me.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t think so ill of un. An’ yet I ban’t +wishful to leave it to chance. You, an’ you awnly, knaw what lies hid +in the past behind me. The question is, should I take that into account now, +or go ahead as if it never had failed out?”</p> +<p>“Let it alone, as it has let you alone. Never rake it up again, and +forget it if you can. That’s my advice to you. Forget you +ever—”</p> +<p>“Hush!” said Will. “I’d rather not hear the word, +even ’pon your lips.”</p> +<p>They then discussed the main matter from the opposite vantage-grounds of +minds remote in every particular; but no promising procedure suggested itself +to either man, and it was not until upon his homeward way that Will, unaided, +arrived at an obvious and very simple conclusion. With some glee he welcomed +this idea.</p> +<p>“I’ll just wait till Monday night,” he said to himself, +“an’ then I’ll step right down to Miller, an’ ax un +what’s in the wind, an’ if I can help his hand. Then he must +speak if he’s a man.”</p> +<h2><a id="I_XIII" name="I_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII<br /> +THE MILLER’S OFFER</h2> +<p>Will, followed his determination and proceeded to Monks Barton on the +following Monday evening, at an hour when he knew that Mr. Lyddon would have +finished supper and be occupied about a pipe or a game of cards with Mr. +Blee. The old men occasionally passed an hour at “oaks” or +“cribbage” before retiring, but on this occasion they were +engaged in conversation, and both looked up with some surprise when Blanchard +appeared.</p> +<p>“You—you here again!” said the miller, and his mouth +remained slightly open after the words.</p> +<p>“You ’m allus setting sober hair on end—blessed if you +ain’t!” was Billy’s comment.</p> +<p>Will, for his part, made no introductory speeches, but went straight to +the point.</p> +<p>“Theer’s my arm,” he said, thrusting it out before him. +“’T is mended so neat that Doctor Parsons says no Lunnon +bone-setter could have done it better. So I’ve comed just to say +theer’s no call for longer waitin’. ’T was a sportsmanlike +thing in you, Miller Lyddon, to bide same as you did; and now, if you’d +set the law movin’ an’ get the job out o’ hand, I’d +thank you kindly. You see, if they put me in for two year, ’t will +leave mighty li’l time to get a home ready for Phoebe against the day +she comes of age.”</p> +<p>“You needn’t be at any trouble about that.”</p> +<p>“But I shall be. Do ’e think my wife’s gwaine to be any +differ’nt to lesser folks? A home she’ll have, an’ a +braave, vitty home, tu, though I’ve got to sweat blood for it. So if +you’d take your bite so soon as convenient, you’d sarve +me.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t say you ’m axin’ anything +onreasonable,” said Mr. Lyddon, thoughtfully. “An’ what +might you think o’doin, when you comes out o’ prison?”</p> +<p>“First gude work that offers.”</p> +<p>“Maybe you doan’t kuaw that chaps whose last job was on the +treadmill finds it uncommon hard to get another?”</p> +<p>“Depends what they was theer for, I should reckon, Miller”</p> +<p>“Not a bit of it. Gaol-birds is all feathered alike inside clink, +an’ honest men feathers ’em all alike when they come out,” +declared Will’s father-in-law.</p> +<p>“A sheer Cain, as no man will touch by the hand—that’s +what you’ll be,” added Billy, without apparent regret.</p> +<p>“If that’s so,” said Will, very calmly, +“you’d best to think twice ’fore you sends me. I’ve +done a high-handed deed, bein’ forced into the same by happenings here +when I went off last summer; but ’t is auld history now. I’d like +to be a credit to ’e some time, not a misery for all time. Why +not—?” He was going to suggest a course of action more favourable +to himself than that promised; but it struck him suddenly that any attitude +other than the one in which he had come savoured of snivelling for mercy. So +he stopped, left a break of silence, and proceeded with less earnestness in +his voice.</p> +<p>“You’ve had a matter of eight weeks to decide in, so I thought +I might ax’e, man to man, what’s gwaine to be done.”</p> +<p>“I have decided,” said the miller coldly; “I decided a +week ago.”</p> +<p>Billy started and his blue eyes blinked inquiringly. He sniffed his +surprise and said “Well!” under his breath.</p> +<p>“Ess, ’t is so, I didn’t tell ’e, Blee, +’cause I reckoned you’d try an’ turn me from my purpose, +which wasn’t to be done.”</p> +<p>“Never—not me. I’m allus in flat agreement with +’e, same as any wise man finds hisself all times.”</p> +<p>“Well, doan’t ’e take it ill, me keepin’ it to +myself.”</p> +<p>“No, no—awnly seem’ how—”</p> +<p>“If it ’s all the same,” interrupted Will, +“I’d like to knaw what you ’m gwaine for to do.”</p> +<p>“I’m gwaine to do nort, Will Blanchard—nort at all. God +He knaws you ’ve wronged me, an’ more ’n me, an’ +her—Phoebe—worst of all; but I’ll lift no hand +ag’in’ you. Bide free an’ go forrard your awn +way—”</p> +<p>“To the Dowl!” concluded Billy.</p> +<p>There was a silence, then Will spoke with some emotion.</p> +<p>“You ’m a big, just man, Miller Lyddon; an’ if theer was +anything could make me sorry for the past—which theer +ban’t—’t would be to knaw you’ve forgived +me.”</p> +<p>“He ain’t done no such thing!” burst out Mr. Blee. +“Tellin’ ’e to go to the Dowl ban’t forgivin’ +of ’e!”</p> +<p>“That was your word,” answered Will hotly, “an’ if +you didn’t open your ugly mouth so wide, an’ shaw such a +’mazing poor crop o’ teeth same time, me an’ Miller might +come to onderstanding. I be here to see him, not you.”</p> +<p>“Gar! you ’m a beast of a bwoy, looked at anyhow, an’ I +wouldn’t have no dealin’s with ’e for money,” snorted +the old man.</p> +<p>“Theer we’ll leave it then, Blanchard,” said Mr. Lyddon, +as Will turned his back upon the last speaker without answering him. +“Go your way an’ try to be a better man; but doan’t ax me +to forget what ’s passed—no, nor forgive it, not yet. I’ll +come to a Christian sight of it some day, God willin’; but it ’s +all I can say that I bear you no ill-will.”</p> +<p>“An’ I’m beholden enough for that. You wait an’ +keep your eye on me. I’ll shaw you what’s in me yet. I’ll +surprise ’e, I promise. Nobody in these paarts ’cept mother, +knaws what ’s in me. But, wi’out boastful words, I’ll prove +it. Because, Miller, I may assure ’e I’m a man as have thought a +lot in my time ’bout things in general.”</p> +<p>“Ess, you’m a deep thinker, I doan’t doubt. Now best to +go; an’, mind, no dealins wi’ Phoebe, for that I won’t +stand.”</p> +<p>“I’ve thought that out, tu. I’ll give ’e my word +of honour ’pon that.”</p> +<p>“Best to seek work t’other side the Moor, if you ax me. Then +you’ll be out the way.”</p> +<p>“As to that, I’d guessed maybe Martin Grimbal, as have proved +a gert friend to me an’ be quite o’ my way o’ thinking, +might offer garden work while I looked round. Theer ban’t a spark +o’ pride in me—tu much sense, I hope, for that.”</p> +<p>The miller sighed.</p> +<p>“You’ve done a far-reachin’ thing, as hits a man from +all sorts o’ plaaces, like the echo in Teign Valley. I caan’t see +no end to it yet.”</p> +<p>“Martin Grimbal’s took on Wat Widdicombe, so you needn’t +fule yourself he’ll give ’e work,” snapped Mr. Blee.</p> +<p>“Well, theer be others.”</p> +<p>And then that sudden smile, half sly, half sweet, leapt to Will’s +eyes and brightened all his grave face, as the sun gladdens a grey sky after +rain.</p> +<p>“Look now, Miller Lyddon, why for shouldn’t you, the biggest +man to Chagford, give me a bit of work? I ban’t no caddlin’<a id= +"footnotetag5" name="footnotetag5"></a><a href="#footnote5"><sup>5</sup></a> +chap, an’ for you—by God, I’d dig a mountain flat if you +axed me!”</p> +<p>“Well, I be gormed!” gasped Billy. It was a condition, though +whether physical or mental he only knew, to which Will reduced Mr. Blee upon +every occasion of their meeting.</p> +<p>“You hold your jaw an’ let me talk to Mr. Lyddon. ’Tis +like this, come to look at it: who should work for ’e same as what I +would? Who should think for my wife’s faither wi’ more of his +heart than me? I’d glory to do a bit of work for ’e—aye, I +would so, high or low; an’ do it in a way to make you rub your +eyes!”</p> +<p>Billy saw the first-formed negative die still-born on his master’s +lips. He began to cry out volubly that Monks Barton was over-manned, and that +scandal would blast every opening bud on the farm if such a thing happened. +Will glared at him, and in another moment Mr. Blee might have suffered +physically had not the miller lifted his hand and bid both be silent.</p> +<p>For a full minute no man spoke, while in Mr. Lyddon’s mind proceeded +a strange battle of ideas. Will’s audacity awakened less resentment +than might have been foreseen. The man had bent before the shock of his +daughter’s secret marriage and was now returning to his customary +mental condition. Any great altitude of love or extremity of hate was beyond +Mr. Lyddon’s calibre. Life slipped away and left his forehead smooth. +Sorrow brought no great scars, joy no particular exaltation. This temperament +he had transmitted to Phoebe; and now she came into his mind and largely +influenced him. A dozen times he opened his mind to say “No,” but +did not say it. Personal amiability could hardly have overcome natural +dislike of Blanchard at such a moment, but the unexpected usually happens +when weak natures are called upon to make sudden decisions; and though such +may change their resolve again and again at a later date and before new +aspects of the problem, their first hasty determination will often be the +last another had predicted from them.</p> +<p>A very curious result accrued from Mr. Lyddon’s mental conflict, and +it was reached by an accidental train of thought. He told himself that his +conclusion was generous to the extreme of the Christian ideal; he assured +himself that few men so placed had ever before acted with such notable +magnanimity; but under this repeated mental asseveration there spoke another +voice which he stifled to the best of his power. The utterance of this +monitor may best be judged from what followed.</p> +<p>“If I gave you work you’d stand to it, Will Blanchard?” +he asked at length.</p> +<p>“Try me!”</p> +<p>“Whatsoever it might be?”</p> +<p>“Try me. Ban’t for me to choose.”</p> +<p>“I will, then. Come to-morrow by five, an’ Billy shall show +’e what’s to do.”</p> +<p>It would be difficult to say which, of those who heard the miller’s +resolve received it with most astonishment. Will’s voice was almost +tremulous.</p> +<p>“You’ll never be sorry, never. I couldn’t have hoped +such a thing. Caan’t think how I comed to ax it. An’ +yet—but I’ll buckle to anything and everything, so help me. +I’ll think for ’e an’ labour for ’e as no hireling +that was ever born could, I will. An’ you’ve done a big, +grand-fashion thing, an’ I’m yours, body an’ bones, for it; +an’ you’ll never regret it.”</p> +<p>The young man was really moved by an issue so unexpected. He had uttered +his suggestion on the spur of the moment, as he uttered most things, and such +a reception argued a greatness of heart and generosity of spirit quite +unparalleled in his experience. So he departed wishing all good on Mr. Lyddon +and meaning all good with his whole soul and strength.</p> +<p>When he had gone the miller spoke; but contrary to custom, he did not look +into Mr. Blee’s face while so doing.</p> +<p>“You’m astonished, Billy,” he said, “an’ so +be I, come to think of it. But I’m gettin’ tu auld to fret my +life away with vain strife. I be gwaine to prove un. He’d stand to +anything, eh? ’Twas his word.”</p> +<p>“An’ well he might.”</p> +<p>“Can ’e picture Blanchard cleaning out the pigs’ +house?”</p> +<p>“No fay!”</p> +<p>“Or worse?”</p> +<p>“Ah!”</p> +<p>They consulted, and it presently appeared that Mr. Lyddon deliberately +designed to set Will about the most degrading task the farm could +furnish.</p> +<p>“’Twill sting the very life of un!” said Billy +gleefully, and he proceeded to arrange an extremely trying programme for Will +Blanchard.</p> +<p>“Doan’t think any small spite leads me to this way of dealing +with un,” explained Mr. Lyddon, who knew right well that it was so. +“But ’tis to probe the stuff he’s made of. Nothing should +be tu hard for un arter what he’ve done, eh?”</p> +<p>“You’m right. ’Tis true wisdom to chastise the man this +way if us can, an’ shake his wicked pride.”</p> +<p>Billy’s genius lent itself most happily to this scheme. He applauded +the miller’s resolution until his master himself began to believe that +the idea was not unjust; he ranged airily, like a blue-fly, from one +agglomeration of ordure to another; and he finally suggested a task, not +necessary to dwell on, but which reached the utmost height or depth of +originality in connection with such a subject. Mr. Lyddon laboured under some +shadow of doubt, but he quickly agreed when his man reminded him of the past +course of events.</p> +<p>“’Tis nothin’, when all’s said. Who’d doubt +if he’d got to choose between that or two year in gaol? He’m +lucky, and I’ll tell un so come the marnin’.”</p> +<p>Thus matters were left, and the miller retired in some secret shame, for +he had planned an act which, if great in the world’s eye, had yet a +dark side from his own inner view of it; but Mr. Blee suffered no pang from +conscience upon the question. He heartily disliked Blanchard, and he +contemplated the morrow with keen satisfaction. If his sharp tongue had power +to deepen the wound awaiting Will’s self-respect, that power would +certainly be exercised.</p> +<p>Meantime the youth himself passed homeward in a glow of admiration for Mr. +Lyddon.</p> +<p>“I’d lay down my life smilin’ for un,” he told +Chris, who was astounded at his news. “I’ll think for un, +an’ act for un, till he’ll feel I’m his very right hand. +An’ if I doan’t put a spoke in yellow Billy’s wheel, call +me a fule. Snarling auld swine! But Miller! Theer’s gude workin’ +religion in that man; he’m a shining light for sartain.”</p> +<p>They talked late upon this wondrous turn of fortune, then Will recollected +his mother and nothing would serve but that he wrote instantly to tell her of +the news.</p> +<p>“It’ll cheer up uncle, tu, I lay,” he said.</p> +<p>“A letter comed while you was out,” answered Chris; +“he’m holding his awn, but ’tis doubtful yet how things be +gwaine to fare in the upshot.”</p> +<p>“Be it as ’twill, mother can do more ’n any other living +woman could for un,” declared Will.</p> +<h2><a id="I_XIV" name="I_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV<br /> +LOGIC</h2> +<p>As Mr. Blee looked out upon a grey morning, the sallows leaping from +silver to gold, from bud to blossom, scattered brightness through the dawn, +and the lemon catkins of the hazel, the russet tassels of alders, brought +light along the river, warmth into the world. A bell beat five from Chagford +Church tower, and the notes came drowsily through morning mists. Then quick +steps followed on the last stroke of the hour and Will stood by Billy’s +side in Monks Barton farmyard. The old man raised his eyes from contemplation +of a spade and barrow, bid Blanchard “Good morning” with +simulated heartiness, and led the way to work, while Will followed, bringing +the tools. They passed into a shrubbery of syringa bushes twenty yards +distant, and the younger man, whose humour had been exceedingly amiable until +that moment, now flushed to his eyes before the spectacle of his labour.</p> +<p>“Do ’e mean that Miller’s got nothin’ for me to do +but this?”</p> +<p>“Plenty, plenty, I ’sure ’e; but that ban’t your +business, be it? Theer’s the work, an’ I’d rather +’twas yourn than mine. Light your pipe an’ go ahead. Not a purty +job, more ’tis; but beggars mustn’t be choosers in this hard +world.”</p> +<p>Billy bolted after these remarks. He heard a growl behind him, but did not +look round. Half an hour later, he crept back again by a circuitous route, +watched Will awhile unseen, then stole grinning away to milk the cows.</p> +<p>The young man, honestly thunderstruck at the task planned for him, judged +that thinking would not mend matters, and so began to work quickly without +stopping to reflect. But his thoughts could not be controlled, any more than +his disposition changed. A growing consciousness of deep and deliberate +insult surged up in him. The more he brooded the slower he worked, and +finally anger mastered determination. He flung down his spade, saluted a red +sunrise with the worst language at his command, and strode down to the river. +Here, for some time and until blue smoke began to climb from the kitchen +chimney of the farm, Will paced about; then with a remarkable effort returned +to his task. He actually started again, and might have carried the matter to +completion; but an evil demon was abroad, and Billy, spying the young man at +work anew, reappeared.</p> +<p>“You’m makin’ poor speed, my son,” he said, +viewing the other’s progress with affected displeasure.</p> +<p>It proved enough, for Will’s smouldering fires were ready to leap at +any fuel.</p> +<p>“Go to blue, blazing hell!” he cried. “You’m at +the bottom of this business, I’ll lay a pound. Get out o’ my +sight, you hookem-snivey auld devil, or I’ll rub your dirty ginger poll +in it, sure’s death!”</p> +<p>“My stars! theer’s crooked words! Do ’e try an’ +keep tighter hand on your temper, Blanchard. A man should knaw hisself +anyways ’fore he has the damn fulishness to take a wife. An’ if +you ax me—”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee’s remarks were here brutally arrested, for the contents of +Will’s spade saluted his furrowed features, and quite obliterated the +old man. He fled roaring, and the other flung his spade twenty yards away, +overturned his wheelbarrow, and again strode to the river. He was fairly +bubbling and boiling now, nor did the business of cleaning gaiters and boots, +arms and hands, restore him to peace. A black pig gazed upon him and grunted +as he came up from the water. It seemed to him a reincarnation of Billy, and +he kicked it hard. It fled screaming and limping, while Will, his rage at +full flood, proceeded through the farmyard on his way home. But here, by +unhappy chance, stood Mr. Lyddon watching his daughter feed the fowls. Her +husband ran full upon Phoebe, and she blushed in a great wave of joy until +the black scowl upon his face told her that something was amiss. His evident +anger made her start, and the involuntary action upset her bowl of grain. For +a moment she stood motionless, looking upon him in fear, while at her feet +fought and struggled a cloud of feathered things around the yellow corn.</p> +<p>“If you’ve done your job, Will, may’st come and shaake +Phoebe by the hand,” said Mr. Lyddon nervously, while he pretended not +to notice the other’s passion.</p> +<p>“I haven’t done it; and if I had, is a scavenger’s hand +fit to touch hers?” thundered Blanchard. “I thought you was a man +to swear by, and follow through thick an’ thin,” he continued, +“but you ban’t. You’m a mean, ill-minded sawl, as would +trample on your awn flesh an’ blood, if you got the chance. Do your awn +dirty work. Who be I that you should call on me to wallow in filth to please +your sour spite?”</p> +<p>“You hear him, you hear him!” cried out the miller, now angry +enough himself. “That’s how I’m sarved for returnin’ +gude to his evil. I’ve treated un as no man else on God’s airth +would have done; and this is what I gets. He’s mad, an’ +that’s to speak kind of the wretch!”</p> +<p>The young wife could only look helplessly from one to the other. That +morning had dawned very brightly for her. A rumour of what was to happen +reached her on rising, but the short-lived hope was quickly shattered, and +though she had not seen him since their wedding-day, Phoebe was stung into +bitterness against Will at this juncture. She knew nothing of particulars, +but saw him now pouring harsh reproaches on her father, and paying the +miller’s unexampled generosity with hard and cruel words. So she spoke +to her husband.</p> +<p>“Oh, Will, Will, to say such things! Do ’e love me no better +’n that? To slight dear faither arter all he’s +forgiven!”</p> +<p>“If you think I’m wrong, say it, Phoebe,” he answered +shortly. “If you’m against me, tu—”</p> +<p>“‘Against you!’ How can you speak so?”</p> +<p>“No matter what I say. Be you on his side or mine? ’Cause +I’ve a right to knaw.”</p> +<p>“Caan’t ’e see ’twas faither’s gert, braave, +generous thought to give ’e work, an’ shaw a lesson of gudeness? +An’ then we meet again—”</p> +<p>“Ess fay—happy meetin’ for wife an’ husband, me up +to the eyes in—Theer, any fule can see ’twas done a purpose to +shame me.”</p> +<p>“You’re a fule to say it! ’Tis your silly pride’s +gwaine to ruin all your life, an’ mine, tu. Who’s to help you if +you’ve allus got the black monkey on your shoulder like this +here?”</p> +<p>“You’m a overbearin’, headstrong madman,” summed +up the miller, still white with wrath; “an’ I’ve done with +’e now for all time. You’ve had your chance an’ thrawed it +away.”</p> +<p>“He put this on me because I was poor an’ without +work.”</p> +<p>“He didn’t,” cried the girl, whose emotions for a moment +took her clean from Will to her father. “He never dreamed o’ +doin’ any such thing. He couldn’t insult a beggar-man; an’ +you knaw it. ’Tis all your ugly, wicked temper!”</p> +<p>“Then I’ll take myself off, an’ my temper, tu,” +said Will, and prepared to do so; while Mr. Lyddon listened to husband and +wife, and his last hope for the future dwindled and died, as he heard them +quarrel with high voices. His daughter clung to him and supported his action, +though what it had been she did not know.</p> +<p>“Caan’t ’e see you’re breakin’ +faither’s heart all awver again just as ’twas +mendin’?” she said. “Caan’t ’e sing smaller, if +’tis awnly for thought of me? Doan’t, for God’s love, fling +away like this.”</p> +<p>“I met un man to man, an’ did his will with a gude thankful +heart, an’ comed in the dawn to faace a job as—”</p> +<p>“’Tweren’t the job, an’ you knaw it,” broke +in Mr. Lyddon. “I wanted to prove ’e an’ all your fine +promises; an’ now I knaw their worth, an’ your worth. An’ I +curse the day ever my darter was born in the world, when I think she’m +your wife, an’ no law can break it.”</p> +<p>He turned and went into the house, and Phoebe stood alone with her +husband.</p> +<p>“Theer!” cried Will. “You’ve heard un. That was in +his heart when he spoke me so fair. An’ if you think like he do, say +it. Lard knaws I doan’t want ’e no more, if you doan’t want +me!”</p> +<p>“Will! How can you! An’ us not met since our marriage-day. But +you’m cruel, cruel to poor faither.”</p> +<p>“Say so, an’ think so; an’ b’lieve all they tell +’e ’gainst your lawful husband; an’ gude-bye. If +you’m so poor-spirited as to see your man do thicky work, you choosed +wrong. Not that ’tis any gert odds. Stop along wi’ your faither +as you loves so much better ’n me. An’ doan’t you fear +I’ll ever cross his threshold again to anger un, for I’d rather +blaw my brains out than do it.”</p> +<p>He shook and stuttered with passion; his eyes glowed, his lips changed +from their natural colour to a leaden blue. He groped for the gate when he +reached it, and passed quickly out, heedless of Phoebe’s sorrowful cry +to him. He heard her light step following and only hastened his speed for +answer. Then, hurrying from her, a wave of change suddenly flowed upon his +furious mind, and he began to be very sorry. Presently he stopped and turned, +but she had stayed her progress by now, and for a moment’s space stood +and watched him, bathed in tears. At the moment when he hesitated and looked +back, however, his wife herself had turned away and moved homewards. Had she +been standing in one place, Will’s purposes would perchance have faded +to air, and his arm been round her in a moment; but now he only saw Phoebe +retreating slowly to Monks Barton; and he let her go.</p> +<p>Blanchard went home to breakfast, and though Chris discovered that +something was amiss, she knew him too well to ask any questions. He ate in +silence, the past storm still heaving in a ground-swell through his mind. +That his wife should have stood up against him was a sore thought. It +bewildered the youth utterly, and that she might be ignorant of all details +did not occur to him. Presently he told his wrongs to Chris, and grew very +hot again in the recital. She sympathised deeply, held him right to be angry, +and grew angry herself.</p> +<p>“He ’m daft,” she said, “an’ I’d think +harder of him than I do, but that he’s led by the nose. ’Twas +that auld weasel, Billy Blee, gived him the wink to set you on a task he +knawed you’d never carry through.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s truth in that,” said Will; then he recollected +his last meeting with the miller’s man, and suddenly roared with +laughter.</p> +<p>“’Struth! What a picter he was! He agged an’ agged at me +till I got fair mad, an’—well, I spiled his meal, I do +b’lieve.”</p> +<p>His merriment died away slowly in a series of long-drawn chuckles. Then he +lighted his pipe, watched Chris cleaning the cups and plates, and grew glum +again.</p> +<p>“’Twas axin’ me—a penniless chap; that was the +devil of it. If I’d been a moneyed man wi’out compulsion to work, +then I’d have been free to say ‘No,’ an’ no harm +done. De’e follow?”</p> +<p>“I’m thankful you done as you did. But wheer shall ’e +turn now?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t knaw. I’ll lay I’ll soon find +work.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s some of the upland farms might be wanting +harrowin’ an’ seed plantin’ done.”</p> +<p>“Who’s to Newtake, Gran’faither Ford’s auld +plaace, I wonder?”</p> +<p>“’Tis empty. The last folks left ’fore you went away. +Couldn’t squeeze bare life out of it. That’s the fourth party as +have tried an’ failed.”</p> +<p>“Yet gran’faither done all right.”</p> +<p>“He was a wonnerful man of business, an’ lived on a straw a +day, as mother says. But the rest—they come an’ go an’ just +bury gude money theer to no better purpose than the gawld at a rainbow +foot.”</p> +<p>“Well, I’ll go up in the village an’ look around before +Miller’s got time to say any word against me. He’ll spoil my +market if he can, I knaw.”</p> +<p>“He’d never dare!”</p> +<p>“I’d have taken my oath he wouldn’t essterday. Now I +think differ’nt. He never meant friendship; he awnly wanted for me to +smart. Clem Hicks was right.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s Mr. Grimbal might give ’e work, I think. Go +an’ ax un, an’ tell un I sent ’e.”</p> +<p>A moment later Chris was sorry she had made this remark.</p> +<p>“What be talkin’ ’bout?” Will asked bluntly. +“Tell un <i>you</i> sent me?”</p> +<p>“Martin wants to be friends.”</p> +<p>“‘Martin,’ is it?”</p> +<p>“He axed me to call un so.”</p> +<p>“Do he knaw you’m tokened to Clem?”</p> +<p>“Caan’t say. It almost ’peared as if he didn’t +last time he called.”</p> +<p>“Then sooner he do the better. Axed you to call un +’Martin’!”</p> +<p>He stopped and mused, then spoke again.</p> +<p>“Our love-makin’s a poor business, sure enough. I’ve got +what I wanted an’, arter this marnin’, could ’most find it +in me to wish my cake was dough again; an’ you—you ain’t +got what you want, an’ ban’t no gert sign you will, for +Clem’s the weakest hand at turnin’ a penny ever I met.”</p> +<p>“I’ll wait for un, whether or no,” said Chris, fiercely. +“I’ll wait, if need be, till we’m both tottling auld +mumpheads!”</p> +<p>“Ess; an’ when Martin Grimbal knaws that is so, ’twill +be time enough to ax un for work, I dare say,—not sooner. Better he +should give Clem work than me. I’d thought of him myself, for that +matter.”</p> +<p>“I’ve axed Clem to ax un long ago, but he +won’t.”</p> +<p>“I’ll go and see Clem right away. ’Tis funny he never +let the man knaw ’bout you. Should have been the first thing he tawld +un.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he thought ’twas so far off that—”</p> +<p>“Doan’t care what he thought. Weern’t plain +dealin’ to bide quiet about that, an’ I shall tell un +so.”</p> +<p>“Well, doan’t ’e quarrel with Clem. He’m +’bout the awnly friend you’ve got left now.”</p> +<p>“I’ve got mother an’ you. I’m all right. I can see +as straight as any man, an’ all my brain-work in the past ban’t +gwaine to be wasted ’cause wan auld miller fellow happens to put a mean +trick on me. I’m above caring. I just goes along and remembers that +people has their failings.”</p> +<p>“We must make allowance for other folk.”</p> +<p>“So us must; an’ I be allus doin’ it; so why the hell +doan’t they make allowance for me? That’s why I boil awver now +an’ again—damn it! I gets nought but kicks for my +halfpence—allus have; an’ I won’t stand it from mortal man +much longer!”</p> +<p>Chris kept her face, for Will’s views on conduct and man’s +whole duty to man were no new thing.</p> +<p>“Us must keep patient, Will, ’specially with the +auld.”</p> +<p>“I be patient. It ’mazes me, looking back, to see what I have +suffered in my time. But a man’s a man, not a post or a holy angel. Us +wouldn’t hear such a deal about angels’ tempers either if +they’d got to faace all us have.”</p> +<p>“That’s profanity an’ wickedness.”</p> +<p>“’Tis truth. Any fule can be a saint inside heaven; an’ +them that was born theer and have flown ’bout theer all theer time, +like birds in a wood, did ought to be even-tempered. What’s to +cross’em?”</p> +<p>“You shouldn’t say such things!”</p> +<p>Suddenly a light came into his eyes.</p> +<p>“I doan’t envy ’em anyway. Think what it must be never +to have no mother to love ’e! They ’m poor, motherless twoads, +for all their gold crowns an’ purple wings.”</p> +<p>“Will! whatever will ’e say next? Best go to Clem. An’ +forget what I spoke ’bout Martin Grimbal an’ work. You was +wiser’n me in that.”</p> +<p>“I s’pose so. If a man ban’t wiser ’n his sister, +he’s like to have poor speed in life,” said Will.</p> +<p>Then he departed, but the events of that day were still very far from an +end, and despite the warning of Chris, her brother soon stood on the verge of +another quarrel. It needed little to wake fresh storms in his breast and he +criticised Clement’s reticence on the subject of his engagement in so +dictatorial and hectoring a manner that the elder man quickly became +incensed. They wrangled for half an hour, Hicks in satirical humour, Will +loud with assurances that he would have no underhand dealings where any +member of his family was concerned. Clement presently watched the other tramp +off, and in his mind was a dim thought. Could Blanchard forget the past so +quickly? Did he recollect that he, Clement Hicks, shared knowledge of it? +“He’s a fool, whichever way you look at him,” thought the +poet; “but hardly such a fool as to forget that, or risk angering me of +all men.”</p> +<p>Later in the day Will called at a tap-room, drank half a pint of beer, and +detailed his injuries for the benefit of those in the bar. He asked what man +amongst them, situated as he had been, had acted otherwise; and a few, caring +not a straw either way, declared he had showed good pluck and was to be +commended; But the bulky Mr. Chapple—he who assisted Billy Blee in +wassailing Miller Lyddon’s apple-trees—stoutly criticised Will, +and told him that his conduct was much to blame. The younger argued against +this decision and explained, with the most luminous diction at his command, +that ’twas in the offering of such a task to a penniless man its sting +and offence appeared.</p> +<p>“He knawed I was at low ebb an’ not able to pick an’ +choose. So he gives me a starvin’ man’s job. If I’d been in +easy circumstances an’ able to say ‘Yes’ or +‘No’ at choice, I’d never have blamed un.”</p> +<p>“Nonsense and stuff!” declared Mr. Chapple. +“Theer’s not a shadow of shame in it.”</p> +<p>“You’m Miller’s friend, of coourse,” said +Will.</p> +<p>“’Tis so plain as a pike, I think!” squeaked a +hare-lipped young man of weak intellect who was also present. +“Blanchard be right for sartain.”</p> +<p>“Theer! If soft Gurney sees my drift it must be pretty plain,” +said Will, in triumph.</p> +<p>“But as ’tis awnly him that does, lad,” commented Mr. +Chapple, drily, “caan’t say you’ve got any call to be +better pleased. Go you back an’ do the job, like a wise man.”</p> +<p>“I’d clear the peat out o’ Cranmere Pool sooner!” +said Will.</p> +<p>And he turned homewards again, wretched enough, yet fiercely prodding his +temper when it flagged, and telling himself repeatedly that he had acted as +became a man of spirit and of judgment. Then, upon a day sufficiently leaden +and dreary until that moment, burst forth sudden splendours, and Will’s +life, from a standpoint of extreme sobriety in time, instantly passed to rare +brightness. Between the spot on the highway where Chris met him and his +arrival at home, the youth enjoyed half a lifetime of glorious hopes and +ambitions; but a cloud indeed shadowed all this overwhelming joy in that the +event responsible for his change of fortune was itself sad.</p> +<p>While yet twenty yards from her brother Chris cried the news to him.</p> +<p>“He’s dead—Uncle—he went quite sudden at the end; +an’ he’m to lie to Chagford wi’ gran’faither +an’ gran’mother.”</p> +<p>“Dead! My God! An’ I never seed un more! The best friend to me +ever I had—leastways I thought so till this marnin’.”</p> +<p>“You may think so still.”</p> +<p>“Ess, so I do. A kind man inside his skin. I knawed un +better’n most people—an’ he meant well when he married me, +out of pure love to us both.”</p> +<p>“He’s left nobody no money but Mrs. Watson and you.”</p> +<p>“If ’tis five pound, ’tis welcome to-day; an’ if +’tis five shillin’, I’ll thank un an’ spend it +’pon a ring to wear for un. He was a gude auld blid, an’ +I’m sorry he’s gone.”</p> +<p>“Will, Uncle’s left ’e a thousand pound!”</p> +<p>“What! You’m jokin’.”</p> +<p>“Solemn truth. ’Tis in mother’s letter.”</p> +<p>A rush of joy lighted up the young man’s face. He said not a word; +then his eyes grew moist.</p> +<p>“To think as he could have loved a daft fule like me so well as +that! Me—that never done nothin’—no, not so much as to +catch a dish of trout for un, now an’ again, when he was +here.”</p> +<p>“You couldn’t, bein’ water-keeper.”</p> +<p>“What matter for that? I ought to have poached for un, seein’ +the manner of man he was.”</p> +<p>He kept silence for a while, then burst out—</p> +<p>“I’ll buy the braavest marble stone can be cut. Nobody shall +do it but me, wi’ doves or anchors or some such thing on it, to make it +a fine sight so long as the world goes on.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s plenty room ’pon the auld slate, for that +matter,” said Chris.</p> +<p>“Damn the auld slate! The man shall have white marble carvings, I +tell ’e, if I’ve got to spend half the money buying ’em. He +b’lieved in me; he knawed I’d come to gude; an’ I’m +grateful to un.”</p> +<p>During the evening Will was unusually silent and much busied with thought. +He knew little of the value of money, and a thousand pounds to his mind +represented possibilities wholly beyond the real power of that sum to +achieve. Chris presently visited the vicarage, and after their supper, +brother and sister sat late and discussed the days to come. When the girl +retired, Will’s thoughts for a moment concerned themselves with the +immediate past rather than the future; and then it was that he caught himself +blankly before his own argument of the morning. To him the force of the +contention, now that his position was magically changed, appeared strong as +before. A little sophistry had doubtless extricated him from this dilemma, +but his nature was innocent of it, and his face grew longer as the conclusion +confronting him became more clear. From his own logic—a mysterious +abstraction, doubtless—he found it difficult to escape without loss of +self-respect. He still held that the deed, impossible to him as a pauper, +might be performed without sacrifice of dignity or importance by a man of his +present fortune. So the muddle-headed youth saw his duty straight ahead of +him; and he regretted it heartily, but did not attempt to escape from it.</p> +<p>Ten minutes later, in his working clothes, he set out to Monks Barton, +carrying an old horn lantern that had swung behind his father’s caravan +twenty years before. At the farm all lights were out save one in the kitchen; +but Will went about his business as silently as possible, and presently found +the spade where he had flung it, the barrow where he had overthrown it in the +morning. So he set to work, his pipe under his nose, his thoughts afar off in +a golden paradise built of Uncle Ford’s sovereigns.</p> +<p>Billy Blee, whose attic window faced out upon the northern side of the +farm, had gone to bed, but he was still awake, and the grunt of a wheelbarrow +quickly roused him. Gazing into the night he guessed what was doing, dragged +on his trousers, and hurried down-stairs to his master.</p> +<p>The miller sat with his head on his hand. His pipe was out and the +“night-cap” Phoebe had mixed for him long ago, remained +untasted.</p> +<p>“Guy Fawkes an ’angels! here’s a thing! If that +Jack-o’-lantern of a bwoy ban’t back again. He’m +delvin’ theer, for all the world like a hobgoblin demon, red as blood +in the flicker of the light. I fancied’t was the Dowl hisself. But +’t is Blanchard, sure. Theer’s some dark thought under it, +I’ll lay, or else he wants to come around ’e again.”</p> +<p>His master doubted not that Billy was dreaming, but he went aloft and +looked to convince himself. In silence and darkness they watched Will at +work. Then Mr. Blee asked a question as the miller turned to go.</p> +<p>“What in thunder do it mean?”</p> +<p>“God knaws, I doan’t. The man or bwoy, or whatever you call +un, beats me. I ban’t built to tackle such a piece as him. He’s +took a year off my life to-day. Go to your bed, Billy, an’ let un +bide.”</p> +<p>“Gormed if I wouldn’t like to slip down an’ scat un ower +the head for what he done to me this marnin’. Such an auld man as me, +tu! weak in the hams this ten year.”</p> +<p>“But strong in the speech. Maybe you pricked him with a bitter word, +an’—theer, theer, if I ban’t standin’ up for the chap +now! Yet if I’ve wished un dead wance, I have fifty times since I first +heard tell of un. Get to bed. I s’pose us’ll knaw his drift come +to-morrow.”</p> +<p>Mr. Lyddon and Billy retired, and both slept ere Will Blanchard’s +work was done. Upon its completion he sought the cold nocturnal waters of the +river, and then did a thing he had planned an hour before. Entering the +farmyard, he flung a small stone at Phoebe’s window in the thatch, then +another. But the first had roused his wife, for she lay above in wakefulness +and sorrow. She peeped out, saw Blanchard, knew him in the lantern light, and +opened the window.</p> +<p>“Will, my awn Will!” she said, with a throbbing voice.</p> +<p>“Ess fay, lovey! I knawed you’d sleep sweeter for +hearin’ tell I’ve done the work.”</p> +<p>“Done it?”</p> +<p>“Truth.”</p> +<p>“It was a cruel, wicked shame; an’ the blame’s Billy +Blee’s, an’ I’ve cried my eyes out since I heard what they +set you to do; an’ I’ve said what I thought; an’ I’m +sorry to bitterness about this marnin’, dear Will.”</p> +<p>“’T is all wan now. I’ve comed into a mort of money, my +Uncle Ford bein’ suddenly dead.”</p> +<p>“Oh, Will, I could a’most jump out the window!”</p> +<p>“’T would be easier for me to come up-long.”</p> +<p>“No, no; not for the world, Will!”</p> +<p>“Why for not? An’ you that lovely, twinklin’ in your +white gownd, an’ me your lawful husband, an’ a man o’ +money! Damned if I ain’t got a mind to climb up by the +pear-tree!”</p> +<p>“You mustn’t, you mustn’t! Go away, dear, sweet Will. +An’ I’m so thankful you’ve forgiven me for being so wicked, +dear heart.”</p> +<p>“Everybody’ll ax to be forgiven now, I reckon; but +you—theer ban’t nothin’ to forgive you for. You can tell +your faither I’ve forgived un to-morrow, an’ tell un I’m +rich, tu. ’T will ease his mind. Theer, an’ theer, an +theer!”</p> +<p>Will kissed his hand thrice, then vanished, and his wife shut her window +and, kneeling, prayed out thankful prayers.</p> +<p>As her husband crossed Rushford Bridge, his thought sped backward through +the storm and sunshine of past events. But chiefly he remembered the struggle +with John Grimbal and its sequel. For a moment he glanced below into the dark +water.</p> +<p>“’T is awver an’ past, awver an’ past,” he +said to himself. “I be at the tail of all my troubles now, for +theer’s nought gude money an’ gude sense caan’t do between +’em.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_I" name="II_I"></a>BOOK II<br /> +HIS ENTERPRISE<br /> +<br />CHAPTER I<br /> +SPRINGTIME</h2> +<p>Nature, waking at the song of woodland birds to find herself naked, +fashioned with flying fingers such a robe of young green and amber, hyacinth +and pearl as only she can weave or wear. A scent of the season rose from +multitudinous “buds, and bells, and stars without a name”; while +the little world of Devon, vale and forest, upland and heathery waste, +rejoiced in the new life, as it rang and rippled with music and colour even +to the granite thrones of the Moor. Down by the margin of Teign, where she +murmured through a vale of wakening leaves and reflected asphodels bending +above her brink, the valley was born again in a very pageant of golden green +that dappled all the grey woods, clothed branch and bough anew, ran +flower-footed over the meadow, hid nests of happy birds in every dell and +dingle, and spread luxuriant life above the ruin of the year that was gone. A +song of hope filled each fair noon; no wasted energy, no unfulfilled intent +as yet saddened the eye; no stunted, ruined nursling of Nature yet spoke +unsuccess; no canker-bitten bud marked the cold finger of failure; for in +that first rush of life all the earthborn host had set forth, if not equal, +at least together. The primroses twinkled true on downy coral stems and the +stars of anemone, celandine, and daisy opened perfect. Countless consummate, +lustrous things were leaping, mingling, and uncurling, aloft and below, in +the mazes of the wood, at the margins of the water. Verdant spears and blades +expanded; fair fans opened and tendrils twined; simultaneous showers of +heart-shaped, arrow-shaped, flame-shaped foliage, all pure emerald and +translucent beryl, made opulent outpouring of that new life which now pulsed +through the Mother’s million veins. Diaphanous mist wreaths and tender +showers wooed the Spring; under silver gauze of vernal rain rang wild rapture +of thrushes, laughter of woodpeckers, chime and chatter of jackdaws from the +rock, secret crooning of the cushat in the pines. From dawn till dusk the +sweet air was winnowed by busy wings; from dawn till dusk the hum and murmur +of life ceased not. Infinite possibility, infinite promise, marked the time; +and man shared a great new hope with the beasts and birds, and wild violet of +the wood. Blood and sap raced gloriously together, while a chorus of +conscious and unconscious creation sang the anthem of the Spring in solemn +strophe and antistrophe.</p> +<p>As life’s litany rises once again, and before the thunder of that +music rolling from the valleys to the hills, human reason yearly hesitates +for a moment, while hope cries out anew above the frosty lessons of +experience. For a brief hour the thinker, perhaps wisely, turns from memory, +as from a cloud that blots the present with its shadow, and spends a little +moment in this world of opal lights and azure shades. He forgets that Nature +adorned the bough for other purpose than his joy; forgets that strange +creatures, with many legs and hungry mouths, will presently tatter each +musical dome of rustling green; forgets that he gazes upon a battlefield +awaiting savage armies, which will fill high Summer with ceaseless war, to +strew the fair earth with slain. He suffers dead Winter to bury her dead, +seeks the wine of life that brims in the chalices of Spring flowers: plucks +blade and blossom, and is a child again, if Time has so dealt with him that +for a little he can thus far retrace his steps; and, lastly, he turns once +more to the Mother he has forgotten, to find that she has not forgotten him. +The whisper of her passing in a greenwood glade is the murmur of waters +invisible and of life unseen; the scent of her garment comes sweet on the +bloom of the blackthorn; high heaven and lowly forget-me-not alike mirror the +blue of her wonderful eyes; and the gleam of the sunshine on rippling rivers +and dreaming clouds reflects the gold of her hair. She moves a queen who, +passing through one fair corner of her world-wide kingdom, joys in it. She, +the sovereign of the universe, reigns here too, over the buds and the birds, +and the happy, unconsidered life of weald and wold. Each busy atom and +unfolding frond is dear to her; each warm nest and hidden burrow inspires +like measure of her care and delight; and at this time, if ever, we may think +of Nature as forgetting Death for one magic moment, as sharing the wide joy +of her wakening world, as greeting the young mother of the year’s +hopes, as pressing to her bosom the babes of Spring with many a sunny smile +and rainbowed tear.</p> +<p>Through the woods in Teign Valley passed Clement Hicks and his sweetheart +about a fortnight after Lawyer Ford had been laid to rest in Chagford +Churchyard. Chris talked about her brother and the great enterprise he had +determined upon. She supported Will and spoke with sanguine words of his +future; but Clement regarded the project differently.</p> +<p>“To lease Newtake Farm is a fool’s trick,” he said. +“Everybody knows the last experiments there. The place has been empty +for ten months, and those who touched it in recent years only broke their +hearts and wasted their substance.”</p> +<p>“Well, they weern’t such men as Will. Theer’s a fitness +about it, tu; for Will’s awn gran’faither prospered at Newtake; +an’ if he could get a living, another may. Mother do like the thought +of Will being there somehow.”</p> +<p>“I know it. The sentiment of the thing has rather blinded her +natural keen judgment. Curious that I should criticise sentiment in another +person; but it ’s like my cranky, contrary way. Only I was thinking of +Will’s thousand pounds. Newtake will suck it out of his pocket quicker +than Cranmere sucks up a Spring shower.”</p> +<p>“Well, I’m more hopeful. He knows the value of money; +an’ Phoebe will help him when she comes up. The months slip by so +quickly. By the time I’ve got the cobwebs out of the farm an’ +made the auld rooms water-sweet, I dare say theer’ll be talk of his +wife joining him.”</p> +<p>“You going up! This is the first I’ve heard of it.”</p> +<p>“I meant to tell ’e to-day. Mother is willing and I’m +awnly tu glad. A man’s a poor left-handed thing ’bout a house. +I’d do more ’n that for Will.”</p> +<p>“Pity he doesn’t think and do something for you. Surely a +little of this money—?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e touch on that, Clem. Us had a braave talk +’pon it, for he wanted to make over two hundred pound to me, but I +wouldn’t dream of it, and you wouldn’t have liked me tu. You +’m the last to envy another’s fair fortune.”</p> +<p>“I do envy any man fortune. Why should I starve, waiting for you, +and—?”</p> +<p>“Hush!” she said, as though she had spoken to a little child. +“I won’t hear no wild words to-day in all this gude gold +sunshine.”</p> +<p>“God damn everything!” he burst out. “What a poor, +impotent wretch He’s made me—a thing to bruise its useless hands +beating the door that will never open! It maddens me—especially when +all the world’s happy, like to-day—all happy but me. And you so +loyal and true! What a fool you are to stick to me and let me curse you all +your life!”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e, doan’t ’e, Clem,” said +Chris wearily. She was growing well accustomed to these ebullitions. +“Doan’t grudge Will his awn. Our turn will come, an’ +perhaps sooner than we think for. Look round ’pon the sweet fresh airth +an’ budding flowers. Spring do put heart into a body. We ’m young +yet, and I’ll wait for ’e if ’t is till the crack o’ +doom.”</p> +<p>“Life’s such a cursed short thing at best—just a stormy +day between two nights, one as long as past time, the other all eternity. +Have you seen a mole come up from the ground, wallow helplessly a moment or +two, half blind in the daylight, then sink back into the earth, leaving only +a mound? That’s our life, yours and mine; and Fate grudges that even +these few poor hours, which make the sum of it, should be spent together. +Think how long a man and woman can live side by side at best. Yet every +Sunday of your life you go to church and babble about a watchful, loving +Maker!”</p> +<p>“I doan’t know, Clem. You an’ me ban’t everybody. +You’ve told me yourself as God do play a big game, and it doan’t +become this man or that woman to reckon their-selves more important than they +truly be.”</p> +<p>“A great game, yes; but a cursed poor game—for a God. The +counters don’t matter, I know; they’ll soon be broken up and +flung away; and the sooner the better. It’s living hell to be born into +a world where there’s no justice—none for king or +tinker.”</p> +<p>“Sit alongside of me and smell the primrosen an’ watch thicky +kingfisher catching the li’l trout. I doan’t like ’e in +these bitter moods, Clem, when your talk’s all dead ashes.”</p> +<p>He sat by her and looked out over the river. It was flooded in sunlight, +fringed with uncurling green.</p> +<p>“I’m sick and weary of life without you. ‘Conscious +existence is a failure,’ and the man who found that out and said it was +wise. I wish I was a bird or beast—or nothing. All the world is mating +but you and me. Nature hates me because I survive from year to year, not +being fit to. The dumb things do her greater credit than ever I can. +The—”</p> +<p>“Now, I’ll go—on my solemn word, I’ll go—if +you grumble any more! Essterday you was so different, and said you’d +fallen in love with Miss Spring, and pretended to speak to her and make me +jealous. You didn’t do that, but you made me laugh. An’ you +promised a purty verse for me. Did ’e make it up after all? I lay +not.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I did. I wasted two or three hours over it last +night.”</p> +<p>“Might ’e get ten shillings for it, like t’ +other?”</p> +<p>“It’s not worth the paper it’s on, unless you like it. +Your praise is better than money to me. Nobody wants any thoughts of mine. +Why should they?”</p> +<p>“Not when they ’m all sour an’ poor, same as now; but +essterday you spoke like to a picture-book. Theer’s many might have +took gude from what you said then.”</p> +<p>He pulled a scrap of paper from his pocket and flung it into her lap.</p> +<p>“I call it ’Spring Rain,’” he said. +“Yesterday the world was grey, and I was happy; to-day the world is all +gold, and I’m finding life harder and heavier than usual. Read it out +slowly to me. It was meant to be read to the song of the river, and never a +prettier voice read a rhyme than yours.”</p> +<p>Chris smoothed the paper and recited her lover’s lyrics. They had +some shadow of music in them and echoed Clem’s love of beautiful +things; but they lacked inspiration or much skill.</p> +<p class="poem">“’Neath unnumbered crystal arrows—<br /> +<span class="i2">Crystal arrows from the quiver</span><br /> +<span class="i2">Of a cloud—the waters shiver</span><br /> +In the woodland’s dim domain;<br /> +And the whispering of the rain<br /> +Tinkles sweet on silver Teign—<br /> +<span class="i4">Tinkles on the river.</span><br /> +<br /> +”Through unnumbered sweet recesses—<br /> +<span class="i2">Sweet recesses soft in lining</span><br /> +<span class="i2">Of green moss with ivy twining—</span><br /> +Daffodils, a sparkling train,<br /> +Twinkle through the whispering rain,<br /> +Twinkle bright by silver Teign,<br /> +<span class="i4">With a starry shining.</span><br /> +<br /> +“’Mid unnumbered little leaf-buds—<br /> +<span class="i2">Little leaf-buds surely bringing</span><br /> +<span class="i2">Spring once more—song birds are winging;</span><br /> +And their mellow notes again<br /> +Throb across the whispering rain,<br /> +Till the banks of silver Teign<br /> +<span class="i4">Echo with their singing.”</span></p> +<p>Chris, having read, made customary cheerful comment according to her +limitations.</p> +<p>“’T is just like essterday—butivul grawing weather, but +’pears to me it’s plain facts more ’n poetry. Anybody could +come to the streamside and see it all for themselves.”</p> +<p>“Many are far away, pent in bricks and mortar, yearning deep to see +the dance of the Spring, and chained out of sight of it. This might bring one +glimpse to them.”</p> +<p>“An’ so it might, if you sold it for a bit of money. Then it +could be printed out for ’em like t’other was.”</p> +<p>“You don’t understand—you won’t +understand—even you.”</p> +<p>“I caan’t please ’e to-day. I likes the li’l +verses ever so. You do make such things seem butivul to my +ear—an’ so true as a photograph.”</p> +<p>Clem shivered and stretched his hand for the paper. Then, in a moment, he +had torn it into twenty pieces and sent the fragments afloat.</p> +<p>“There! Let her take them to the sea with her. She understands. +Maybe she’ll find a cool corner for me too before many days are +passed.”</p> +<p>Chris began to feel her patience failing.</p> +<p>“What, in God’s name, have I done to ’e you should treat +me like this?” she asked, with fire in her eyes.</p> +<p>“Been fool enough to love me,” he answered. “But +it’s never too late for a woman to change her mind. Leave a sinking +ship, or rather a ship that never got properly launched, but, sticking out of +its element, was left to rot. Why don’t you leave me, Chris?”</p> +<p>She stroked his hand, then picked it up and laid her soft cheek against +it.</p> +<p>“Not till the end of the world comes for wan of us, Clem. I’ll +love ’e always, and the better and deeper ’cause you ’m so +wisht an’ unlucky somehow. But you ’m tu wise to be miserable all +your time.”</p> +<p>“You ought to make me a man if anything could. I burn away with +hopes and hopes, and more hopes for the future, and miss the paltry thing at +hand that might save me.”</p> +<p>“Then miss it no more, love; seek closer, an’ seek sharper. +Maybe gude work an’ gude money ’s awnly waitin’ for +’e to find it. Doan’t look at the moon an’ stars so much; +think of me, an’ look lower.”</p> +<p>Slowly the beauty of the hour and the sweet-hearted girl at his elbow +threw some sunshine into Clement’s moody heart. For a little while the +melancholy and shiftless dreamer grew happier. He promised renewed activity +in the future, and undertook, as a first step towards Martin Grimbal, to +inform the antiquary of that great fact which his foolish whim had thus far +concealed.</p> +<p>“Chance might have got it to his ears through more channels than +one, you would have thought; but he’s a taciturn man, asks no +questions, and invites no confidences. I like him the better for it. Next +week, come what may, I’ll speak to him and tell him the truth, like a +plain, blunt man.”</p> +<p>“Do ’e that very thing,” urged Chris. “Say +we’m lovers these two year an’ more; an’ that you’d +be glad to wed me if your way o’ life was bettered. Ban’t +beggin’, as he knaws, for nobody doubts you’m the most +book-learned man in Chagford after parson.”</p> +<p>Together they followed the winding of the river and proceeded through the +valley, by wood, and stile, and meadow, until they reached Rushford Bridge. +Here they delayed a moment at the parapet and, while they did so, John +Grimbal passed on foot alone.</p> +<p>“His house is growing,” said Clement, as they proceeded to +Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage.</p> +<p>“Aye, and his hearth will be as cold as his heart—the wretch! +Well he may turn his hard face away from me and remember what fell out on +this identical spot! But for God’s gude grace he’d have been +hanged to Exeter ’fore now.”</p> +<p>“You can’t put yourself in his shoes, Chris; no woman can. +Think what the world looked like to him after his loss. The girl he wanted +was so near. His hands were stretched out for her; his heart was full of her. +Then to see her slip away.”</p> +<p>“An’ quite right, tu; as you was the first to say at the time. +Who’s gwaine to pity a thief who loses the purse he’s stole, or a +poacher that fires ’pon another man’s bird an’ misses +it?”</p> +<p>“All the same, I doubt he would have made a better husband for +Phoebe Lyddon than ever your brother will.”</p> +<p>His sweetheart gasped at criticism so unexpected.</p> +<p>“You—you to say that! You, Will’s awn friend!”</p> +<p>“It’s true; and you know it as well as anybody. He has so +little common sense.”</p> +<p>But Chris flamed up in an instant. Nothing the man’s cranky temper +could do had power to irritate her long. Nothing he might say concerning +himself or her annoyed her for five minutes; but, upon the subject of her +brother, not even from Clem did Chris care to hear a disparaging word or +unfavourable comment. And this criticism, of all others, levelled against +Will angered her to instant bitter answer before she had time to measure the +weight of her words.</p> +<p>“’Common sense’! Perhaps you’ll be so kind as to +give Will Blanchard a li’l of your awn—you being so rich in it. +Best look at home, and see what you can spare!”</p> +<p>So the lovers’ quarrel which had been steadily brewing under the +sunshine now bubbled over and lowered thunder-black for the moment, as such +storms will.</p> +<p>Clement Hicks, perfectly calm now that his sweetheart’s temper was +gone, marched off; and Chris, slamming the cottage door, vanished, without +taking any further leave of him than that recorded in her last utterance.</p> +<h2><a id="II_II" name="II_II"></a>CHAPTER II<br /> +NEWTAKE FARM</h2> +<p>Clement Hicks told the truth when he said that Mrs. Blanchard fell +something short of her usual sound judgment and sagacity in the matter of +Will’s enterprise. The home of childhood is often apt enough to +exercise magic, far-reaching attraction, and even influence a mind for the +most part unsentimental. To Damaris the thought of her son winning his living +where her father had done so was pleasant and in accordance with eternal +fitness. Not without emotion did she accompany Will to Newtake Farm while yet +the proposed bargain awaited completion; not without strange awakenings in +the dormant recesses of her memory did Will’s mother pass and pass +again through the scenes of her earliest days. From the three stone steps, or +“upping stock,” at the farmhouse door, whereat a thousand times +she had seen her father mount his horse, to the environment of the farmyard; +from the strange, winding staircase of solid granite that connected upper and +lower storeys, to each mean chamber in Newtake, did Mrs. Blanchard’s +eyes roam thoughtfully amid the ghosts of recollections. Her girl’s +life returned and the occasional bright days gleamed forth again, vivid by +contrast with the prevailing grey. So active became thought that to relieve +her mind she spoke to Will.</p> +<p>“The li’l chamber over the door was mine,” she said; +“an’ your poor uncle had the next. I can just mind him, allus at +his books, to his faither’s pride. Then he went away to Newton to join +some lawyer body an’ larn his business. An’ I mind the two small +maids as was my elder sisters and comed betwixt me an’ Joel. Both +died—like candles blawed out roughly by the wind. They wasn’t +made o’ the stuff to stand Dartymoor winters.”</p> +<p>She paused for a few moments, then proceeded:</p> +<p>“Theer, to west of the yard, is a croft as had corn in it wan year, +though ’tis permanent grass now, seemin’ly. Your faither corned +through theer like a snake by night more’n wance; an’ oftentimes +I crept down house, shivering wi’ fear an’ love, to meet him +under moonlight while the auld folks slept. Tim he’d grawed to a power +wi’ the gypsy people by that time; but faither was allus hard against +un. He hated wanderers in tents or ’pon wheels, or even sea-gwaine +sailor-men—he carried it that far. Then comed a peep o’ day when +Tim’s bonny yellow caravan ’peared around the corner of that +windin’ road what goes all across the Moor. At the first stirring of +light, I was ready an’ skipped out; an’, to this hour, I mind the +last thing as touched me kindly was the red tongue of the sheep-dog. He ran a +mile after the van, unhappy-like; then Tim ordered un away, an’ he +stood in the white road an’ held up his paw an’ axed a question +as plain as a human. So Tim hit un hard wi’ a gert stone, an’ he +yelped an’ gived me up for lost, an’ bolted home wi’ his +tail between his legs an’ his eye thrawed back full of sadness over his +shoulder. Ess fay! I can see the dust puffin’ up under his pads in the +grey dawn so clear as I can see you.”</p> +<p>Again she stopped, but only for breath.</p> +<p>“They never answered my writings. Faither wouldn’t an’ +mother didn’t dare. But when I was near my time, Timothy, reckoning +they’d yield then if ever, arranged to be in Chagford when I should be +brought to bed. Yet ’twas ordained differ’nt, an’ the +roundy-poundy, wheer the caravan was drawed up when the moment corned, be +just round theer on Metherill hill, as you knaws. So it happened right under +the very walls of Newtake. In the stone circle you comed; an’ by night +arterwards, sweatin’ for terror, your gran’mother, as had heard +tell of it, sneaked from Newtake to kiss me an’ press you to her body. +Faither never knawed till long arter; an’ though mother used to say she +heard un forgive me on his death-bed, ’twas her awn pious wish echoing +in her awn ears I reckon. But that’s all awver an’ +done.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard now sank into silent perambulation of the deserted +chambers. In the kitchen the whitewash was grimy, the ceiling and windows +unclean. Ashes of a peat fire still lay upon the cracked hearthstone, and a +pair of worn-out boots, left by a tramp or the last tenant, stood on the +window-sill. Dust and filth were everywhere, but no indication of dampness or +decay.</p> +<p>“A proper auld rogue’s-roost of dirt ’tis just +now,” said Will; “but a few pound spent in the right way will do +a deal for it.”</p> +<p>“An’ soap an’ water more,” declared Mrs. +Blanchard, escaping from her reverie. “What’s to be spent +landlord must spend,” she continued. “A little whitewash, and +some plaster to fill them holes wheer woodwork’s poking through the +ceiling, an’ you’ll be vitty again. ’Tis lonesome-like now, +along o’ being deserted, an’ you’ll hear the rats galloping +an’ gallyarding by night, but ’twill soon be all it was +again—a dear li’l auld plaace, sure enough!”</p> +<p>She eyed the desolation affectionately.</p> +<p>“Theer’s money in it, any way, for what wan man can do another +can.”</p> +<p>“Aye, I hope so, I b’lieve ’tis so; but you’ll +have to live hard, an’ work hard, an’ be hard, if you wants to +prosper here. Your gran’faither stood to the work like a giant, +an’ the sharpest-fashion weather hurt him no worse than if he’d +been a granite tor. Steel-built to his heart’s core, an’ needed +to be.”</p> +<p>“An’ I be a stern, far-seein’ man, same as him. +’Tis generally knawn I’m no fule; and my heart’s grawed +hard, tu of late days, along wi’ the troubles life’s +brought.”</p> +<p>She shook her head.</p> +<p>“You’m your faither’s son, not your +gran’faither’s. Tim was flesh an’ blood, same as you. +T’other was stone. Stone’s best, when you’ve got to fight +wi’ stone; but if flesh an’ blood suffers more, it joys more, tu. +I wouldn’t have ’e differ’nt—not to them as loves +’e, any way.”</p> +<p>“I sha’n’t change; an’ if I did to all the world +else, ’twouldn’t be to you, mother. You knaw that, I reckon. +I’m hopeful; I’m more; I’m ’bout as certain of fair +fortune as a man can be. Venwell rights<a id="footnotetag6" name= +"footnotetag6"></a><a href="#footnote6"><sup>6</sup></a> be mine, and +theer’s no better moorland grazing than round these paarts. The +farm-land looks a bit foul, along o’ being let go to rack, but +us’ll soon have that clean again, an’ some gude stuff into it, +tu. My awn work’ll be staring me in the faace before summer; an’ +by the time Phoebe do come to be mistress, nobody’ll knaw Newtake, I +promise ’e.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard viewed with some uneasiness the spectacle of valley-born +and valley-nurtured Phoebe taking up her abode on the high lands. For herself +she loved them well, and the Moor possessed no terrors for her; but she had +wit to guess that her daughter-in-law would think and feel differently. +Indeed, neither woman nor man might reasonably be blamed for viewing the farm +without delight when first brought within the radius of its influence.</p> +<p>Newtake stood, a squat and unlovely erection, under a tar-pitched roof of +slate. Its stone walls were coated with a stucco composition, which included +tallow as an ingredient and ensured remarkable warmth and dryness. Before its +face there stretched a winding road of white flint, that climbed from the +village, five miles distant, and soon vanished amid the undulations of the +hills; while, opposite, steep heathery slopes and grassy coombs ascended +abruptly to masses of weathered granite; and at the rear a hillside, whereon +Metherill’s scattered hut-circles made incursions even into the fields +of the farm, fell to the banks of Southern Teign where she babbled between +banks of brake-fern and heather. Swelling and sinking solemnly along the sky, +Dartmoor surrounded Newtake. At the entrance of the yard stood a broken +five-barred gate between twin masses of granite; then appeared a ragged +outbuilding or two, with roofs of lichen-covered slate; and upon one side, in +a row, grew three sycamores, bent out of all uprightness by years of western +winds, and coated as to their trunks with grey lichen. Behind a cowyard of +shattered stone pavement and cracked mud stood the farm itself, and around it +extended the fields belonging thereto. They were six or seven in number, and +embraced some five-and-fifty acres of land, mostly indifferent meadow.</p> +<p>Seen from the winding road, or from the bird’s-eye elevation of the +adjacent tor, Newtake, with its mean ship-pens and sties, outbuildings and +little crofts, all huddled together, poverty-stricken, time-fretted, +wind-worn, and sad of colour, appeared a mere forlorn fragment of +civilisation left derelict upon the savage bosom of an untamable land. It +might have represented some forsaken, night-foundered abode of men, torn by +earthquake or magic spell from a region wholly different, and dropped and +stranded here. It sulked solitary, remote, and forgotten; its black roof +frowned over its windows, and green tears, dribbling down its walls in time +past, had left their traces, as though even spring sunlight was powerless to +eradicate the black memories of winters past, or soften the bitter certainty +of others yet to come. The fields, snatched from the Moor in time long past, +now showed a desire to return to their wild mother again. The bars of +cultivation were broken and the land struggled to escape. Scabious would +presently throw a mauve pallor over more than one meadow croft; in another, +waters rose and rushes and yellow iris flourished and defied husbandry; +elsewhere stubble, left unploughed by the last defeated farmer, gleamed +silver-grey through a growth of weeds; while at every point the Moor thrust +forward hands laden with briar and heather. They surmounted the low stone +walls and fed and flourished upon the clods and peat that crowned them. +Nature waved early gold of the greater furze in the van of her oncoming, and +sent her wild winds to sprinkle croft and hay-field, ploughed land and potato +patch, with thistledown and the seeds of the knapweed and rattle and bracken +fern. These heathen things and a thousand others, in all the early vigour of +spring, rose triumphant above the meek cultivation. They trampled it, +strangled it, choked it, and maddened the agriculturist by their sturdy and +stubborn persistence. A forlorn, pathetic blot upon the land of the mist was +Newtake, seen even under conditions of sunlight and fair weather; but beheld +beneath autumnal rains, observed at seasons of deep snow or in the dead waste +of frozen winters, its apparition rendered the most heavy-hearted less sad +before the discovery that there existed a human abode more hateful, a human +outlook more oppressive, than their own.</p> +<p>To-day heavy moorland vapours wrapped Newtake in ghostly raiment, yet no +forlorn emotions clouded the survey of those who now wandered about the +lifeless farm. In the mind of one, here retracing the course of her +maidenhood, this scene, if sad, was beautiful. The sycamores, whose brown +spikes had burst into green on a low bough or two, were the trees she loved +best in the world; the naked field on the hillside, wherein a great stone +ring shone grey through the silver arms of the mist, represented the theatre +of her life’s romance. There she had stolen oftentimes to her lover, +and in another such, not far distant, had her son been born. Thoughts of +little sisters rose in the naked kitchen, with the memory of a flat-breasted, +wild-eyed mother, who did man’s work; of a father, who spoke seldom and +never twice—a father whose heavy foot upon the threshold sent his +children scuttling like rabbits to hidden lairs and dens. She remembered the +dogs; the bright gun-barrel above the chimney-piece; the steam of clothes +hung to dry after many a soaking in “soft” weather; the reek of +the peat; the brown eyes and steaming nostrils of the bullocks, that +sometimes looked through the kitchen window in icy winter twilights, as +though they would willingly change their byres for the warmth within.</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard enjoyed the thought that her son should reanimate these +scenes of her own childhood; and he, burning with energy and zeal, and not +dead to his own significance as a man of money, saw promises of prosperity on +either hand. It lay with him, he told his heart, to win smiling fatness from +this hungry region. Right well he knew how it came about that those who had +preceded him had failed, missed their opportunities, fooled themselves, and +flung away their chances. Evidences of their ignorance stared at him from the +curtains of the mist, but he knew better; he was a man who had thought a bit +in his time and had his head screwed on the right way, thank God. These facts +he poured into his mother’s ear, and she smiled thoughtfully, noted the +changes time had wrought, and indicated to him those things the landlord +might reasonably be expected to do before Will should sign and seal.</p> +<p>The survey ended, her son helped Damaris into a little market-cart, which +he had bought for her upon coming into his fortune. A staid pony, also his +purchase, completed the equipage, and presently Mrs. Blanchard drove +comfortably away; while Will, who yet proposed to tramp, for the twentieth +time, each acre of Newtake land, watched her depart, then turned to continue +his researches. A world of thought rested on his brown face. Arrived at each +little field, he licked his pencil, and made notes in a massive new +pocketbook. He strode along like a conqueror of kingdoms, frowned and +scratched his curly head as problem after problem rose, smiled when he solved +them, and entered the solution in his book. For the wide world was full of +young green, and this sanguine youth soared lark-high in soul under his happy +circumstances. Will breathed out kindness to all mankind just at present, and +now before that approaching welfare he saw writ largely in beggarly Newtake, +before the rosy dawn which Hope spread over this cemetery of other +men’s dead aspirations, he felt his heart swell to the world. Two +clouds only darkened his horizon then. One was the necessity of beginning the +new life without his life’s partner; while the other, formerly +tremendous enough, had long since shrunk to a shadow on the horizon of the +past. His secret still remained, but that circumstance was too remote to +shadow the new enterprise. It existed, however, and its recurrence wove +occasional gloomy patterns into the web of Will Blanchard’s +thought.</p> +<h2><a id="II_III" name="II_III"></a>CHAPTER III<br /> +OVER A RIDING-WHIP</h2> +<p>Will completed his survey and already saw, in his mind’s eye, a +brave masque of autumn gold spreading above the lean lands of Newtake. From +this spectacle to that of garnered harvests and great gleaming stacks +bursting with fatness the transition was natural and easy. He pictured kine +in the farmyard, many sheep upon the hills, and Phoebe with such geese, +ducks, and turkeys as should make her quite forget the poultry of Monks +Barton. Then, having built castles in the air until his imagination was +exhausted, Will shut the outer gate with the touch of possession, turned a +moment to see how Newtake looked from the roadway, found only the shadow of +it looming through the mist, and so departed, whistling and slapping his +gaiters with an ash sapling.</p> +<p>It happened that beside a gate which closed the moorland precincts to +prevent cattle from wandering, a horseman stood, and as the pedestrian passed +him in the gathering gloaming, he dropped his hunting-stock while making an +effort to open the gate without dismounting.</p> +<p>“Bide wheer you be!” said Will; “I’ll pick un up +an’ ope the gate for ’e.”</p> +<p>He did so and handed the whip back to its owner. Then each recognised the +other, and there was a moment of silence.</p> +<p>“’Tis you, Jan Grimbal, is it?” asked the younger. +“I didn’t knaw ’e in the dimpsy light.”</p> +<p>He hesitated, and his words when they came halted somewhat, but his +meaning was evident.</p> +<p>“I’m glad you’m back to home. I’ll forget all +what’s gone, if you will. ’Twas give an’ take, I +s’pose. I took my awn anyway, an’ you comed near killing me +for’t, so we’m upsides now, eh? We’m men o’ the world +likewise. So—so shall us shake hands an’ let bygones be, Jan +Grimbal?”</p> +<p>He half raised his hand, and looked up, with a smile at the corner of his +lip ready to jump into life if the rider should accept his friendship. But +Grimbal’s response was otherwise.</p> +<p>To say little goodness dwelt in this man had been untrue, but recent +events and the first shattering reverse that life brought him proved +sufficient to sour his very soul and eclipse a sun which aforetime shone with +great geniality because unclouded. Fate hits such men particularly hard when +her delayed blow falls. Existences long attuned to success and level fortune; +lives which have passed through five-and-thirty years of their allotted span +without much sorrow, without sharp thorns in the flesh, without those +carking, gnawing trials of mind and body which Time stores up for all +humanity—such feel disaster when it does reach them with a bitterness +unknown by those who have been in misery’s school from youth. Poverty +does not bite the poor as it bites him who has known riches and afterwards +fights destitution; feeble physical circumstances do not crush the congenital +invalid, but they often come near to break the heart of a man who, until +their black advent, has known nothing but rude health; great reverses in the +vital issues of life and fortune fail to obliterate one who knows their faces +of old, but the first enemy’s cannon on Time’s road must ever +bring ugly shock to him who has advanced far and happily without meeting any +such thing.</p> +<p>Grimbal’s existence had been of a rough-and-ready sort shone over by +success. Philosophy he lacked, for life had never turned his mind that way; +religion was likewise absent from him; and his recent tremendous +disappointment thus thundered upon a mind devoid of any machinery to resist +it. The possession of Phoebe Lyddon had come to be an accepted and +accomplished fact; he chose her for his own, to share the good things Fortune +had showered into his lap—to share them and be a crowning glory of +them. The overthrow of this scheme at the moment of realisation upset his +estimate of life in general and set him adrift and rudderless, in the +hurricane of his first great reverse. Of selfish temperament, and doubly so +by the accident of consistent success, the wintry wind of this calamity slew +and then swept John Grimbal’s common sense before it, like a dead leaf. +All that was worst in him rose to the top upon his trouble, and since +Will’s marriage the bad had been winning on the good and thrusting it +deeper and deeper out of sight or immediate possibility of recovery. At all +times John Grimbal’s inferior characteristics were most prominently +displayed, and superficial students of character usually rated him lower than +others really worse than himself, but who had wit to parade their best +traits. Now, however, he rode and strode the country a mere scowling ruffian, +with his uppermost emotions still stamped on his face. The calamity also bred +an unsuspected sensitiveness in him, and he smarted often under the +reflection of what others must be thinking. His capability towards +vindictiveness proved very considerable. Formerly his anger against his +fellow-men had been as a thunder-storm, tremendous but brief in duration; +now, before this bolt of his own forging, a steady, malignant activity +germinated and spread through the whole tissue of his mind.</p> +<p>Those distractions open to a man of Grimbal’s calibre presently +blunted the edge of his loss, and successful developments of business also +served to occupy him during the visit he paid to Africa; but no interests as +yet had arisen to obscure or dull his hatred of Will Blanchard. The original +blaze of rage sank to a steady, abiding fire, less obviously tremendous than +that first conflagration, but in reality hotter. In a nature unsubtle, +revenge will not flourish as a grand passion for any length of time. It must +reach its outlet quickly and attain to its ambition without overmuch delay, +else it shrivels and withers to a mere stubborn, perhaps lifelong, +enmity—a dwarfish, mulish thing, devoid of any tragic splendour. But up +to the point that John Grimbal had reached as yet, his character, though +commonplace in most affairs, had unexpectedly quickened to a condition quite +profound where his revenge was concerned.</p> +<p>He still cherished the certainty of a crushing retaliation. He was glad he +had not done Blanchard any lifelong injury; he was glad the man yet lived for +time and him to busy themselves about; he was even glad (and herein appeared +the unsuspected subtlety) that Will had prospered and come by a little show +of fortune. Half unconsciously he hoped for the boy something of his own +experiences, and had determined with himself—in a spirit very +melodramatic but perfectly sincere at present—to ruin his enemy if +patience and determination could accomplish it.</p> +<p>In this mood, with his wrongs sharpened by return to Chagford and his +purposes red-hot, John Grimbal now ran against his dearest foe, received the +horsewhip from him, and listened to his offer of peace.</p> +<p>He still kept silence and Will lowered the half-lifted arm and spoke +again.</p> +<p>“As you please. I can bide very easy without your gude +word.”</p> +<p>“That’s well, then,” said the other, in his big voice, +as his hands tightened. “We’ve met again. I’m glad I +didn’t break your neck, for your heart’s left to break, and by +the living God I’ll break it! I can wait. I’m older than you, but +young enough. Remember, I’ll run you down sooner or later. I’ve +hunted most things, and men aren’t the cleverest beasts and +you’re not the cleverest man I’ve bested in my time. You beat +me—I know it—but it would have been better for you if you +hadn’t been born. There’s the truth for your country ears, you +damned young hound. I’ll fight fair and I’ll fight to the finish. +Sport—that’s what it is. The birds and the beasts and the fish +have their close time; but there won’t be any close time for you, not +while I can think and work against you. So now you know. D’ you hear +me?”</p> +<p>“Ess,” said Will, meeting the other’s fierce eyes; +“I hear ’e, an’ so might the dead in Chagford +buryin’-ground. You hollers loud enough. I ban’t ’feared of +nothing a hatch-mouthed,<a id="footnotetag7" name="footnotetag7"></a><a href= +"#footnote7"><sup>7</sup></a> crooked-minded man, same as you be, can do. +An’ if I’m a hound, you ’m a dirty red fox, an’ +everybody knaws who comes out top when they meet. Steal my gal, would +’e? Gaw your ways, an’ mend your ways, an’ swallow your +bile. I doan’t care a flicker o’ wildfire for +’e!”</p> +<p>John Grimbal heard only the beginning of this speech, for he turned his +back on Will and rode away while the younger man still shouted after him. +Blanchard was in a rage, and would have liked to make a third trial of +strength with his enemy on the spot, but the rider vanished and Will quickly +cooled as he went down the hill to Chagford. The remembrance of this +interview, for all his scorn, chilled him when he reflected on John +Grimbal’s threats. He feared nothing indeed, but here was another +cloud, and a black one, blown violently back from below the horizon of his +life to the very zenith. Malignity of this type was strange to him and +differed widely from the petty bickerings, jealousies, and strifes of +ordinary country existence. It discouraged him to feel in his hour of +universal contentment that a strong, bitter foe would now be at hand, forever +watching to bring ruin on him at the first opportunity. As he walked home he +asked himself how he should feel and act in Grimbal’s shoes, and tried +to look at the position from his enemy’s standpoint. Of course he told +himself that he would have accepted defeat with right philosophy. It was a +just fix for a man to find himself in,—a proper punishment for a mean +act. Arguing thus, from the right side of the hedge, he forgot what wiser men +have forgotten, that there is no disputing about man’s affection for +woman, there is no transposition of the standpoint, there is no looking +through another’s eyes upon a girl. Many have loved, and many have +rendered vivid pictures of the emotion, touched with insight of genius and +universally proclaimed true to nature from general experience; but no two men +love alike, and neither you nor another man can better say how a third feels +under the yoke, estimate his thrall, or foretell his actions, despite your +own experience, than can one sufferer from gout, though it has torn him half +a hundred times, gauge the qualities of another’s torment under the +same disease. Will could not guess what John Grimbal had felt for Phoebe; he +knew nothing of the other’s disposition, because, young in knowledge of +the world and a boy still, despite his age, it was beyond him to appreciate +even remotely the mind of a man fifteen years older than himself—a man +of very different temper and one whose life had been such as we have just +described.</p> +<p>Home went Blanchard, and kept his meeting secret. His mother, returning +long before him, was already in some argument with Chris concerning the +disposal of certain articles of furniture, the pristine splendour of which +had been worn off at Newtake five-and-thirty years before. At Farmer +Ford’s death these things passed to his son, and he, not requiring +them, had made them over to Damaris.</p> +<p>“They was flam-new when first my parents married and comed to +Newtake, many a year ago; and now I want ’em to go back theer. +They’ve seed three generations, an’ I’d be well pleased +that a fourth should kick its li’l boots out against them. They +’m stout enough yet. Sweat went to building of chairs an’ tables +in them days; now it’s steam. Besides, ’twill save Will’s +pocket a tidy bit.”</p> +<p>Chris, however, though she could deny Will nothing, was divided here, for +why should her mother part from those trifles which contributed to the ample +adornment of her cottage? Certain stout horsehair furniture and a piano were +the objects Mrs. Blanchard chiefly desired should go to Newtake. The piano, +indeed, had never been there before. It was a present to Damaris from her +dead husband, who purchased the instrument second-hand for five pounds at a +farm sale. Its wiry jingle spoke of evolution from harpsichord or spinet to +the modern instrument; its yellow keys, from which the ivory in some cases +was missing, and its high back, stained silk front, and fretted veneer +indicated age; while above the keyboard a label, now growing indistinct, set +forth that one “William Harper, of Red Lion Street, Maker of +piano-fortes to his late Majesty” was responsible for the instrument +very early in the century.</p> +<p>Now Will joined the discussion, but his mother would take no denial.</p> +<p>“These chairs and sofa be yours, and the piano’s my present to +Phoebe. She’ll play to you of a Sunday afternoon belike.”</p> +<p>“An’ it’s here she’ll do it; for my +Sundays’ll be spent along with you, of coourse, ’cept when you +comes up to my farm to spend ’em. That’s what I hope’ll +fall out; an’ I want to see Miller theer, tu, after he’ve found +I’m right and he’m wrong.”</p> +<p>But the event proved that, even in his new capacity as a man of money and +a landholder, Will was not to win much ground with Mr. Lyddon. Two +circumstances contributed to the continued conflict, and just as Phoebe was +congratulating herself and others upon the increasing amity between her +father and her husband matters fell out which caused the miller to give up +all hope of Will for the hundredth time. First came the occupancy of Newtake +at a rent Mr. Lyddon considered excessive; and then followed a circumstance +that touched the miller himself, for, by the offer of two shillings more a +week than he received at Monks Barton, Will tempted into his service a +labourer held in great esteem by his father-in-law.</p> +<p>Sam Bonus appeared the incarnation of red Devon earth, built up on solid +beef and mutton. His tanned face was framed in crisp black hair that no razor +had ever touched; his eyes were deep-set and bright; his narrow brow was +wrinkled, not with thought, but as the ape’s. A remarkably tall and +powerful frame supported Sam’s little head. He laboured like a horse +and gave as little trouble, triumphed in feats of brute strength, laughed at +a day’s work, never knew ache or pain. He had always greatly admired +Blanchard, and, faced with the tempting bait of a florin a week more than his +present wage, abandoned Monks Barton and readily followed Will to the Moor. +His defection was greatly deplored, and though Will told Mr. Blee what he +intended beforehand, and made no secret of his design to secure Sam if +possible, Billy discredited the information until too late. Then the miller +heard of his loss, and, not unnaturally, took the business ill.</p> +<p>“Gormed if it ban’t open robbery!” declared Mr. Blee, as +he sat and discussed the matter with his master one evening, “an’ +the thankless, ill-convenient twoad to go to Blanchard, of all +men!”</p> +<p>“He’ll be out of work again soon enough. And he needn’t +come back to me when he is. I won’t take him on no more.”</p> +<p>“’Twould be contrary to human nature if you did.”</p> +<p>“Human nature!” snapped the miller, with extreme irritation. +“’Twould puzzle Solomon to say what’s come over human +nature of late days.”</p> +<p>“’Tis a nut wi’ a maggot in it,” mused Billy: +“three parts rotten, the rest sweet. An’ all owing to fantastic +inventions an’ new ways of believin’ in God wi’out +church-gwaine, as parson said Sunday. Such things do certainly Play hell with +human nature, in a manner o’ speakin’. I reckon the uprising men +an’ women’s wickeder than us, as sucked our mothers in quieter +times afore the railroads.”</p> +<p>“Bonus is such a fule!” said Mr. Lyddon, harking back to his +loss. “Yet I thought he belonged to the gude old-fashioned +sort.”</p> +<p>“I told un he was out in his reckoning, that he’d be left in +the cold bimebye, so sure as Blanchard was Blanchard and Newtake was Newtake; +but he awnly girned his gert, ear-wide girn, an’ said he knawed +better.”</p> +<p>“To think of more gude money bein’ buried up theer! +You’ve heard my view of all ground wi’ granite under it. Such a +deal ought to have been done wi’ that thousand pound.”</p> +<p>“Oughts are noughts, onless they’ve strokes to +’em,” declared Billy. “’Tis a poor lookout, for +he’m the sort as buys experience in the hardest market. Then, when +it’s got, he’ll be a pauper man, with what he knaws useless for +want o’ what’s spent gettin’ it. Theer’s the thought +o’ Miss Phoebe, tu,—Mrs. Blanchard, I should say. Caan’t +see her biding up to Newtake nohow, come the hard weather.”</p> +<p>“’Wedlock an’ winter tames maids an’ +beastes,’” said Mr. Lyddon bitterly. “A true saw +that.”</p> +<p>“Ess; an’ when ’tis wedlock wi’ Blanchard, +an’ winter on Dartymoor, ’twould tame the daughter of the Dowl, +if he had wan.”</p> +<p>Billy laughed at this thought. His back rounded as he sat in his chair, +his head seemed to rise off his lower jaw, and the yellow frill of hair under +his chin stood stiffly out.</p> +<p>“He’s my son-in-law; you ’pear to forget that, +Blee,” said Mr. Lyddon; “I’m sure I wish I could, if +’twas even now an’ again.”</p> +<p>Thereupon Billy straightened his face and cast both rancour and merriment +to the winds.</p> +<p>“Why, so he be; an’ grey hairs should allus make allowance for +the young youths; though I ain’t forgot that spadeful o’ muck +yet, an’ never shall. But theer’s poison in bwoy’s blood +what awnly works out of the brain come forty. I’m sure I wish nothing +but well to un. He’s got his saving graces, same as all of us, if we +could but see ’em; an’ come what may, God looks arter His awn +chosen fules, so theer’s hope even for Blanchard.” “Cold +consolation,” said Mr. Lyddon wearily; “but’t is all +we’ve got. Two nights since I dreamt I saw un starvin’ on a +dunghill. ’T was a parable, I judge, an’ meant Newtake +Farm.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_IV" name="II_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /> +DEFEATED HOPES</h2> +<p>Below Newtake Farm the river Teign wound, with many a foaming fall and +singing rapid, to confluence with her twin sister in the valley beneath. +Here, at a certain spot, above the forest and beneath the farm, stood Martin +Grimbal on a bright afternoon in May. Over his head rose a rowan, in a soft +cloud of serrated foliage, with clusters of grey-green flower buds already +foretelling the crimson to come; about his feet a silver army of uncurling +fronds brightened the earth and softened the sharp edges of the boulders +scattered down the coomb. Here the lover waited to the music of a cuckoo, and +his eyes ever turned towards a stile at the edge of the pine woods, two +hundred yards distant from him.</p> +<p>The hour was one of tremendous possibilities, because Fate had been +occupied with Martin through many days, and now he stood on the brink of +great joy or sorrow. Clement Hicks had never spoken to him. During his +quarrel with Chris, which lasted a fortnight, the bee-keeper purposely +abstained from doing her bidding, while after their reconciliation every +other matter in the world was swallowed up for a time in the delight of +renewed love-making. The girl, assuming throughout these long weeks that +Martin now knew all, had met him in frank and kindly spirit on those +occasions when he planned to enjoy her society, and this open warmth awoke +renewed heart for Grimbal, who into her genial friendship read promise and +from it recruited hope. His love now dominated his spiritual being and filled +his life. Grey granite was grey granite only, and no more. During his long +walks by pillar-stone, remote row, and lonely circle, Chris, and Chris alone, +occupied his brain. He debated the advisability of approaching Will, then +turned rather to the thought of sounding Mrs. Blanchard, and finally nerved +himself to right action and determined to address Chris. He felt this present +heart-shaking suspense must be laid at rest, for the peace of his soul, and +therefore he took his courage in his hands and faced the ordeal.</p> +<p>That day Chris was going up to Newtake. She had not yet settled there, +though her brother and Sam Bonus were already upon the ground, but the girl +came and went, busying her fingers with a hundred small matters that daily +increased the comfort of the little farm. Her way lay usually by the coomb, +and Martin, having learned that she was visiting Will on the occasion in +question, set out before her and awaited her here, beside the river, in a +lonely spot between the moorland above and the forest below. He felt +physically nervous, yet hope brightened his mind, though he tried to strangle +it. Worn and weary with his long struggle, he paced up and down, now looking +to the stile, now casting dissatisfied glances upon his own person. Shaving +with more than usual care, he had cut his chin deeply, and, though he knew it +not, the wound had bled again since he left home and ruined both his collar +and a new tie, put on for the occasion.</p> +<p>Presently he saw her. A sunbonnet bobbed at the stile and Chris appeared, +bearing a roll of chintz for Newtake blinds. In her other hand she carried +half a dozen bluebells from the woods, and she came with the free gait +acquired in keeping stride through long tramps with Will when yet her frocks +were short. Martin loved her characteristic speed in walking. So Diana +doubtless moved. The spring sunshine had found Chris and the clear, soft +brown of her cheek was the most beautiful thing in nature to the antiquary. +He knew her face so well now: the dainty poise of her head, the light of her +eyes, the dark curls that always clustered in the same places, the little +updrawing at the corner of her mouth as she smiled, the sudden gleam of her +teeth when she laughed, and the abrupt transitions of her expression from +repose to gladness, from gladness back again into repose.</p> +<p>She saw the man before she reached him, and waved her bluebells to show +that she had done so. Then he rose from his granite seat and took off his hat +and stood with it off, while his heart thundered, his eye watered, and his +mouth twitched. But he was outwardly calm by the time Chris reached him.</p> +<p>“What a surprise to find ’e here, Martin! Yet not much, +neither, for wheer the auld stones be, theer you ’m to be +expected.”</p> +<p>“How are you, Chris? But I needn’t ask. Yes, I’m fond of +the stones.”</p> +<p>“Well you may be. They talk to ’e like friends, seemingly. +An’ even I knaw a sight more ’bout ’em now. You’ve +made me feel so differ’nt to ’em, you caan’t +think.”</p> +<p>“For that matter,” he answered, leaping at the chance, +“you’ve made me feel different to them.”</p> +<p>“Why, how could I, Martin?”</p> +<p>“I’ll tell you. Would you mind sitting down here, just for a +moment? I won’t keep you. I’ve no right to ask for a minute of +your time; but there’s dry moss upon it—I mean the stone; and I +was waiting on purpose, if you’ll forgive me for waylaying you like +this. There’s a little thing—a big thing, I mean—the +biggest—too big for words almost, yet it wants words—and yet +sometimes it doesn’t—at least—I—would you sit +here?”</p> +<p>He was breathing rather hard, and his words were tripping. Managing his +voice ill, the tones of it ran away from bass to shrill treble. She saw it +all at a glance, and realised that Martin had been blundering on, in pure +ignorance and pure love, all these weary weeks. She sat down silently and her +mind moved like light along the wide gamut of fifty emotions in a second. +Anger and sorrow strove together,—anger with Clem and his callous, +cynic silence, sorrow for the panting wretch before her. Chris opened her +mouth to speak, then realised where her flying thoughts had taken her and +that, as yet, Martin Grimbal had said nothing. Her unmaidenly attitude and +the sudden reflection that she was about to refuse one before he had asked +her, awoke a hysteric inclination to laugh, then a longing to cry. But all +the anxious-visaged man before her noted was a blush that waved like auroral +light from the girl’s neck to her cheek, from her cheek to her +forehead. That he saw, and thought it was love, and thanked the Lord in his +clumsy fashion aloud.</p> +<p>“God be praised! I do think you guess—I do think you guess! +But oh, my dear, my dear, you don’t know what ’s in my heart for +you. My little pearl of a Chris, can you care for such a bear of a man? Can +you let me labour all my life long to make your days good to you? I love you +so—I do. I never thought when the moment came I should find tongue to +speak it, but I have; and now I could say it fifty thousand times. I’d +just be proud to tie your shoe-string, Chris, my dear, and be your old slave +and—Chris! my Chris! I’ve hurt you; I’ve made you cry! Was +I—was I all wrong? Don’t, don’t—I’ll +go—Oh, my darling one, God knows I wouldn’t—”</p> +<p>He broke off blankly and stood half sorrowful, half joyous. He knew he had +no right as yet to go to the comfort of the girl now sobbing beside him, but +hope was not dead. And Chris, overcome by this outpouring of love, now +suffered very deep sorrow, while she turned away from him and hid her face +and wept. The poor distracted fool still failed to guess the truth, for he +knew tint tears are the outcome of happiness as well as misery. He waited, +open-mouthed, he murmured something—God knows what—then he went +close and thought to touch her waist, but feared and laid his hand gently on +her shoulder.</p> +<p>“Don’t ’e!” she said; and he began to understand +and to struggle with himself to lessen her difficulty.</p> +<p>“Forgive me—forgive me if you can, Chris. Was I all wrong? +Then I ought to have known better—but even an old stick like +me—before you, Chris. Somehow I—but don’t cry. I +wouldn’t have brought the tears to your eyes for all the +world—dense idiot I am—”</p> +<p>“No, no, no; no such thing ’t all, Martin. ’Tis I was +cruel not to see you didn’t knaw. You’ve been treated ill, +an’ I’m cryin’ that such a gude—gude, braave, +big-hearted man as you, should be brought to this for a fule of a gal like +me. I ban’t worthy a handshake from ’e, or a kind word. +An’—an’—Clem Hicks—Clem be tokened to me these +two year an’ more. He’m the best man in the world; an’ I +hate un for not tellin’ +’e—an’—an’—”</p> +<p>Chris sobbed herself to the end of her tears; and the man took his +trial—like a man. His only thought was the sadness his blunder had +brought with it for her. To misread her blush seemed in his humility a crime. +His consistent unselfishness blinded him, for an instant at least, to his own +grief. He blamed himself and asked pardon and prepared to get away out of her +sight as soon as possible.</p> +<p>“Forgive me, Chris—I needn’t ask you twice, I +know—such a stupid thing—I didn’t understand—I never +observed: but more shame to me. I ought to have seen, of course. Anybody else +would—any man of proper feeling.”</p> +<p>“How could ’e see it with a secret chap like him? He ought to +have told ’e; I bid un speak months since; an’ I thought he had; +an’ I hate un for not doing it!”</p> +<p>“But you mustn’t. Don’t cry any more, and forget all +about it. I could almost laugh to think how blind I’ve been. +We’ll both laugh next time we meet. If you’re happy, then +I’ll laugh always. That’s all I care for. Now I know you +’re happy again, I’m happy, too, Chris—honour bright. And +I’ll be a friend still—remember that—always—to +you—to you and him.”</p> +<p>“I hate un, I say.”</p> +<p>“Why, he didn’t give me credit for being such a bat—such +a mole. Now I must be away. We’ll meet pretty soon, I expect. Just +forget this afternoon as though it had never been, even though it’s +such a jolly sunny one. And remember me as a friend—a friend still for +all my foolishness. Good-by for the present. Good-by.”</p> +<p>He nodded, making the parting a slight thing and not missing the ludicrous +in his anxiety to spare her pain. He went down the valley, leaving her +sitting alone. He assumed a jaunty air and did not look round, but hastened +off to the stile. Never in his most light-hearted moments had he walked thus +or struck right and left at the leaves and shrubs with such a clumsy +affectation of nonchalance. Thus he played the fool until out of sight; then +his head came down, and his feet dragged, and his walk and mien grew years +older than his age. He stopped presently and stood still, staring upon the +silence. Westering sunlight winnowed through the underwood, splashed into its +sombre depths and brightened the sobriety of a grey carpet dotted with dead +cones. Sweet scents floated downward upon the sad whisper that lives in every +pine forest; then came suddenly a crisp rattle of little claws and a tiny +barking, where two red squirrels made love, high aloft, amid the grey lichens +and emerald haze of a great larch that gleamed like a green lamp through the +night of the dark surrounding foliage.</p> +<p>Martin Grimbal dropped his stick and flung down his body in the hushed and +hidden dreamland of the wood. Now he knew that his hope had lied to him, that +the judgment he prided himself upon, and which had prompted him to this great +deed, was at fault. The more than common tact and delicacy of feeling he had +sometimes suspected he possessed in rare, exalted moments, were now shown +vain ideas born from his own conceit; and the event had proved him no more +subtle, clever, or far-seeing than other men. Indeed, he rated himself as an +abject blunderer and thought he saw how a great overwhelming fear, at the +bottom of his worship of Chris, had been the only true note in all that past +war of emotions. But he had refused to listen and pushed forward; and now he +stood thus. Looking back in the light of his defeat, his previous temerity +amazed him. His own ugliness, awkwardness, and general unfitness to be the +husband of Chris were ideas now thrust upward in all honesty to the top of +his mind. No mock modesty or simulated delicacy inspired them, for after +defeat a man is frank with himself. Whatever he may have pretended before he +puts his love to the test, however he may have blinded himself as to his real +feelings and beliefs before he offers his heart, after the event has ended +unfavourably his real soul stands naked before him and, according to his +character, he decides whether himself or the girl is the fool. Grimbal +criticised his own audacity with scanty compassion now; and the thought of +the tears of Chris made him clench one hand and smash it hard again and again +into the palm of the other. No passionate protest rose in his mind against +the selfish silence of Clement Hicks; he only saw his own blindness and +magnified it into an absolute offence against Chris. Presently, as the +sunlight sank lower, and the straight stems of the pines glimmered red-gold +against the deepening gloom, Martin retraced the scene that was past and +recalled her words and actions, her tears, the trembling of her mouth, and +that gesture when the wild flowers dropped from her hand and her fingers went +up to cover her eyes. Then a sudden desire mastered him: to possess the +purple of her bluebell bouquet. He knew she would not pick it up again when +he was gone; so he returned, stood in that theatre of Fate beneath the rowan, +saw where her body had pressed the grass, and found the fading flowers.</p> +<p>Then he turned to tramp home, with the truth gnawing his heart at last. +The excitement was over, all flutter of hope and fear at rest. Only that +bitter fact of failure remained, with the knowledge that one, but yesterday +so essential and so near, had now vanished like a rainbow beyond his +reach.</p> +<p>Martin’s eyes were opened in the light of this experience. John came +into his mind, and estimating his brother’s sufferings by his own, the +stricken man found room in his sad heart for pity.</p> +<h2><a id="II_V" name="II_V"></a>CHAPTER V<br /> +THE ZEAL OF SAM BONUS</h2> +<p>Under conditions of spring and summer Newtake Farm flattered Will’s +hopes not a little. He worked like a giant, appropriated some of that credit +belonging to fine weather, and viewed the future with very considerable +tranquillity. Of beasts he purchased wisely, being guided in that matter by +Mr. Lyddon; but for the rest he was content to take his own advice. Already +his ambition extended beyond the present limits of his domain; already he +contemplated the possibility of reclaiming some of the outlying waste and +enlarging his borders. If the Duchy might spread greedy fingers and inclose +“newtakes,” why not the Venville tenants? Many besides Will asked +themselves that question; the position was indeed fruitful of disputes in +various districts, especially on certain questions involving cattle; and no +moorland Quarter breathed forth greater discontent against the powers than +that of which Chagford was the central parish.</p> +<p>Sam Bonus, inspired by his master’s sanguine survey of life, toiled +amain, believed all that Will predicted, and approved each enterprise he +planned; while as for Chris, in due time she settled at Newtake and undertook +woman’s work there with her customary thoroughness and energy. To her +lot fell the poultry, the pair of fox-hound puppies that Will undertook to +keep for the neighbouring hunt, and all the interior economy and control of +the little household.</p> +<p>On Sundays Phoebe heard of the splendid doings at Newtake; upon which she +envied Chris her labours, and longed to be at Will’s right hand. For +the present, however, Miller Lyddon refused his daughter permission even to +visit the farm; and she obeyed, despite her husband’s indignant +protests.</p> +<p>Thus matters stood while the sun shone brightly from summer skies. Will, +when he visited Chagford market, talked to the grizzled farmers, elaborated +his experience, shook his head or nodded it knowingly as they, in their turn, +discussed the business of life, paid due respect to their wisdom, and offered +a little of his own in exchange for it. That the older men lacked pluck was +his secret conviction. The valley folk were braver; but the upland +agriculturists, all save himself, went in fear. Their eyes were careworn, +their caution extreme; behind the summer they saw another shadow forever +moving; and the annual struggle with those ice-bound or water-logged months +of the early year, while as yet the Moor had nothing for their stock, left +them wearied and spiritless when the splendour of the summer came. They +farmed furtively, snatching at such good as appeared, distrusting their own +husbandry, fattening the land with reluctance, cowering under the shadow of +withered hopes and disappointments too numerous to count. Will pitied this +mean spirit and, unfamiliar with wet autumns and hard winters on the high +land, laughed at his fellow-countrymen. But they were kind and bid him be +cautious and keep his little nest-egg snug.</p> +<p>“Tie it up in stout leather, my son,” said a farmer from +Gidleigh. “Ay, an’ fasten the bag wi’ a knot as’ll +take ’e half an hour to undo; an’ remember, the less you open it, +the better for your peace of mind.”</p> +<p>All of which good counsel Blanchard received with expressions of +gratitude, yet secretly held to be but the croaking of a past generation, +stranded far behind that wave of progress on which he himself was advancing +crest-high.</p> +<p>It happened one evening, when Clement Hicks visited Newtake to go for a +walk under the full moon with Chris, that he learnt she was away for a few +days. This fact had been mentioned to Clement; but he forgot it, and now +found himself here, with only Will and Sam Bonus for company. He accepted the +young farmer’s invitation to supper, and the result proved unlucky in +more directions than one. During this meal Clem railed in surly vein against +the whole order of things as it affected himself, and made egotistical +complaint as to the hardness of life; then, when his host began to offer +advice, he grew savage and taunted Will with his own unearned good fortune. +Blanchard, weary after a day of tremendous physical exertion, made sharp +answer. He felt his old admiration for Clem Hicks much lessened of late, and +it nettled him not a little that his friend should thus attribute his present +position to the mere accident of a windfall. He was heartily sick of the +other’s endless complaints, and now spoke roughly and to the point.</p> +<p>“What the devil’s the gude of this eternal bleat? You’m +allus snarlin’ an’ gnashin’ your teeth ’gainst God, +like a rat bitin’ the stick that’s killin’ it.”</p> +<p>“And why should God kill me? You’ve grown so wise of late, +perhaps you know.”</p> +<p>“Why shouldn’t He? Why shouldn’t He kill you, or any +other man, if He wants the room of un for a better? Not that I believe +parson’s stuff more ’n you; but grizzlin’ your guts to +fiddlestrings won’t mend your fortune. Best to put your time into work, +’stead o’ talk—same as me an’ Bonus. And as for my +money, you knaw right well if theer’d been two thousand ’stead of +wan, I’d have shared it with Chris.”</p> +<p>“Easy to say! If there had been two, you would have said, ’If +it was only four’! That’s human nature.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t my nature, anyway, to tell a lie!” burst out +Will.</p> +<p>“Perhaps it’s your nature to do worse. What were you about +last Christmas?”</p> +<p>Blanchard set down knife and fork and looked the other in the face. None +had heard this, for Bonus, his meal ended, went off to the little tallet over +a cattle-byre which was his private apartment.</p> +<p>“You’d rip that up again—you, who swore never to +open’ your mouth upon it?”</p> +<p>“You’re frightened now.”</p> +<p>“Not of you, anyway. But you’d best not to come up here no +more. I’m weary of you; I don’t fear you worse than a blind worm; +but such as you are, you’ve grawed against me since my luck comed. I +wish Chris would drop you as easy as I can, for you’m teachin’ +her to waste her life, same as you waste yours.”</p> +<p>“Very well, I’ll go. We’re enemies henceforth, since you +wish it so.”</p> +<p>“Blamed if you ban’t enough to weary Job! +’Enemies’! It’s like a child talkin’. +’Enemies’! D’you think I care a damn wan way or +t’other? You’m so bad as Jan Grimbal wi’ his big +play-actin’ talk. He’m gwaine to cut my tether some day. +P’r’aps you’ll go an’ help un to do it! The past is +done, an’ no man who weern’t devil all through would go back on +such a oath as you sweared to me. An’ you won’t. As to +what’s to come, you can’t hurt a straight plain-dealer, same as +me, though you’m free an’ welcome to try if you please +to.”</p> +<p>“The future may take care of itself; and for your straight speaking +I’ll give you mine. Go your way and I’ll go my way; but until you +beg my forgiveness for this night’s talk I’ll never cross your +threshold again, or speak to you, or think of you.”</p> +<p>Clement rose from his unfinished food, picked up his hat, and vanished, +and Will, dismissing the matter with a toss of his head and a contemptuous +expiration of breath, gave the poet’s plate of cold potato and bacon to +a sheep-dog and lighted his pipe.</p> +<p>Not ten hours later, while yet some irritation at the beekeeper’s +spleen troubled Blanchard’s thoughts as he laboured upon his land, a +voice saluted him from the highway and he saw a friend.</p> +<p>“An’ gude-marnin’ to you, Martin. Another braave day, +sure ’nough. Climb awver the hedge. You’m movin’ early. +Ban’t eight o’clock.”</p> +<p>“I’m off to the ‘Grey Wethers,’ those old ruined +circles under Sittaford Tor, you know. But I meant a visit to you as well. +Bonus was in the farmyard and brought me with him.”</p> +<p>“Ess fay, us works, I tell ’e. We’m fightin’ the +rabbits now. The li’l varmints have had it all theer way tu long; but +this wire netting’ll keep ’em out the corn next year an’ +the turnips come autumn. How be you fearin’? I aint seen ’e this +longful time.”</p> +<p>“Well, thank you; and as busy as you in my way. I’m going to +write a book about the Dartmoor stones.”</p> +<p>“’S truth! Be you? Who’ll read it?”</p> +<p>“Don’t know yet. And, after all, I have found out little that +sharper eyes haven’t discovered already. Still, it fills my time. And +it is that I’m here about.”</p> +<p>“You can go down awver my land to the hut-circles an’ welcome +whenever you mind to.”</p> +<p>“Sure of it, and thank you; but it’s another thing just +now—your brother-in-law to be. I think perhaps, if he has leisure, he +might be useful to me. A very clever fellow, Hicks.”</p> +<p>But Will was in no humour to hear Clement praised just then, or suggest +schemes for his advancement.</p> +<p>“He’m a weak sapling of a man, if you ax me. Allus +grumblin’, an’ soft wi’ it—as I knaw—none +better,” said Blanchard, watching Bonus struggle with the rabbit +netting.</p> +<p>“He’s out of his element, I think—a student—a +bookish man, like myself.”</p> +<p>“As like you as chalk’s like cheese—no more. His temper, +tu! A bull in spring’s a fule to him. I’m weary of him an’ +his cleverness.”</p> +<p>“You see, if I may venture to say so, Chris—”</p> +<p>“I knaw all ’bout that. ’Tis like your gudeness to try +an’ put a li’l money in his pocket wi’out stepping on his +corns. They ’m tokened. Young people ’s so muddle-headed. Bees +indeed! Nice things to keep a wife an’ bring up a fam’ly on! +An’ he do nothin’ but write rhymes, an’ tear ’em up +again, an’ cuss his luck, wi’out tryin’ to mend it. I +thought something of un wance, when I was no more ’n a bwoy, but as I +get up in years I see the emptiness of un.”</p> +<p>“He would grow happy and sweeter-hearted if he could marry your +sister.”</p> +<p>“Not him! Of course, if it’s got to be, it will be. I +ban’t gwaine to see Chris graw into an auld maid. An’ come +bimebye, when I’ve saved a few hunderd, I shall set ’em up +myself. But she’s makin’ a big mistake, an’, to a friend, I +doan’t mind tellin’ ’e ’tis so.”</p> +<p>“I hope you’re wrong. They’ll be happy together. They +have great love each for the other. But, of course, that’s nothing to +do with me. I merely want Hicks to undertake some clerical work for me, as a +matter of business, and I thought you might tell me the best way to tackle +him without hurting his feelings. He’s a proud man, I fancy.”</p> +<p>“Ess; an’ pride’s a purty fulish coat for poverty, +ban’t it? I’ve gived that man as gude advice as ever I gived any +man; but what’s well-thought-out wisdom to the likes of him? Get un a +job if you mind to. I shouldn’t—not till he shaws better metal +and grips the facts o’ life wi’ a tighter hand.”</p> +<p>“I’ll sound him as delicately as I can. It may be that his +self-respect would strengthen if he found his talents appreciated and able to +command a little money. He wants something of that sort—eh?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t knaw but what a hiding wouldn’t be so gude for +un as anything,” mused Will. There was no animosity in the reflection. +His ill-temper had long since vanished, and he considered Clement as he might +have considered a young, wayward dog which had erred and brought itself +within reach of the lash.</p> +<p>“I was welted in my time hard an’ often, an’ be none the +worse,” he continued.</p> +<p>Martin smiled and shook his head.</p> +<p>“Might have served him once; too late now for that remedy, I +fear.”</p> +<p>There was a brief pause, then Will changed the conversation abruptly.</p> +<p>“How’s your brother Jan?” he asked.</p> +<p>“He’s furnishing his new house and busy about the formation of +a volunteer corps. I met him not long since in Fingle Gorge.”</p> +<p>“Be you friends now, if I may ax?”</p> +<p>“I tried to be. We live and learn. Things happened to me a while ago +that taught me what I didn’t know. I spoke to him and reminded him of +the long years in Africa. Blood’s thicker than water, +Blanchard.”</p> +<p>“So ’tis. What did he make of it?”</p> +<p>“He looked up and hesitated. Then he shook his head and set his face +against me, and said he would not have my friendship as a gift.”</p> +<p>“He’s a gude hater.”</p> +<p>“Time will bring the best of him to the top again some day. I +understand him, I think. We possess more in common than people suppose. We +feel deeply and haven’t a grain of philosophy between us.”</p> +<p>“Well, I reckon I’ve allus been inclined to deep ways of +thought myself; and work up here, wi’ nothing to break your thoughts +but the sight of a hawk or the twinkle of a rabbit’s scut, be very +ripening to the mind. If awnly Phoebe was here! Sometimes I’m in a mood +to ramp down-long an’ hale her home, whether or no. But I sweats the +longing out o’ me wi’ work.”</p> +<p>“The day will soon come. Time drags with me just now, somehow, but +it races with you, I’ll warrant. I must get on with my book, and see +Hicks and try and persuade him to help me.”</p> +<p>“’Tis like your big nature to put it that way. You’rn tu +soft-hearted a man to dwell in a house all alone. Let the dead stones bide, +Martin, an’ look round for a wife. Theer’s more gude advice. +Blamed if I doan’t advise everybody nowadays! Us must all come to it. +Look round about an’ try to love a woman. ’T will surprise +’e an’ spoil sleep if you can bring yourself to it. But the +cuddlin’ of a soft gal doan’t weaken man’s thews and sinews +neither. It hardens ’em, I reckon, an’ puts fight in the most +poor-spirited twoad as ever failed in love. ’Tis a manly thing, +an’ ’boldens the heart like; an’, arter she’s said +‘Yes’ to ’e, you’ll find a wonnerful change come +awver life. ’Tis all her, then. The most awnself<a id="footnotetag8" +name="footnotetag8"></a><a href="#footnote8"><sup>8</sup></a> man feels it +more or less, an’ gets shook out of his shell. You’ll knaw some +day. Of course I speaks as wan auld in love an’ married into the +bargain.”</p> +<p>“You speak from experience, I know. And is Phoebe as wise as you, +Will?”</p> +<p>“Waitin’ be harder for a wummon. They’ve less to busy +the mind, an’ less mind to busy, for that matter.”</p> +<p>“That’s ungallant.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t knaw. ’Tis true, anyway. I shouldn’t +have failed in love wi’ her if she’d been cleverer’n +me.”</p> +<p>“Or she with you, perhaps?”</p> +<p>“P’r’aps not. Anyway as it stands we’m halves of a +whole: made for man and wife. I reckon I weern’t wan to miss my way in +love like some poor fules, as wastes it wheer they might see’t +wasn’t wanted if they’d got eyes in their heads.”</p> +<p>“What it is to be so wise!”</p> +<p>Will laughed joyously in his wisdom.</p> +<p>“Very gude of ’e to say that. ’Tis a happy thing to have +sense enough. Not but we larn an’ larn.”</p> +<p>“So we should. Well, I must be off now. I’m safe on the Moor +to-day!”</p> +<p>“Ess, by the looks of it. Theer’ll likely come some mist after +noon, but shouldn’t be very thick.”</p> +<p>So they parted, Blanchard having unconsciously sown the seed of an ugly +crop that would take long in reaping. His remarks concerning Clement Hicks +were safe enough with Martin, but another had heard them as he worked within +earshot of his master. Bonus, though his judgment was scanty, entertained a +profound admiration for Will; and thus it came about, that a few days later, +when in Chagford, he called at the “Green Man” and made some +grave mischief while he sang his master’s praises. He extolled the +glorious promise of Newtake, and the great improvements already visible +thereon; he reflected not a little of Will’s own flamboyant manner to +the secret entertainment of those gathered in the bar, and presently he drew +down upon himself some censure.</p> +<p>Abraham Chown, the police inspector, first shook his head and prophesied +speedy destruction of all these hopes; and then Gaffer Lezzard criticised +still more forcibly.</p> +<p>“All this big-mouthed talk’s cracklin’ of thorns under a +potsherd,” hesaid. “You an’ him be just two childern +playin’ at shop in the gutter, an’ the gutter’s wheer +you’ll find yourselves ’fore you think to. What do the man +<i>knaw?</i> Nothin’.”</p> +<p>“Blanchard’s a far-seein’ chap,” answered Sam +Bonus stoutly. “An’ a gude master; an’ us’ll stick +together, fair or foul.”</p> +<p>“You may think it, but wait,” said a small man in the corner. +Charles Coomstock, nephew of the widow of that name already mentioned, was a +wheelwright by trade and went lame, owing to an accident with hot iron in +youth.</p> +<p>“Ax Clem,” continued Mr. Coomstock. “For all his cranky +ways he knaws Blanchard better’n most of us, an’ I heard un size +up the chap t’other day in a word. He said he hadn’t wit enough +to keep his brains sweet.”</p> +<p>“He’m a braave wan to talk,” fired back Bonus. +“Him! A poor luny as caan’t scrape brass to keep a wife on. +Blanchard, or me either, could crack un in half like a dead stick.”</p> +<p>“Not that that’s anything for or against,” declared +Gaffer Lezzard. “Power of hand’s nought against brain.”</p> +<p>“It gaws a tidy long way ’pon Dartymoor, however,” +declared Bonus. “An’ Blanchard doan’t set no +’mazin’ store on Hicks neither, if it comes to words. I heard un +say awnly t’other forenoon that the man was a weak saplin’, allus +grumblin’, an’ might be better for a gude hiding.”</p> +<p>Now Charles Coomstock did not love his cousin Clement. Indeed, none of +those who had, or imagined they had, any shadow of right to a place in Mary +Coomstock’s will cared much for others similarly situated; but the +little wheelwright was by nature a spreader of rumours and reports—an +intelligencer, malignant from choice. He treasured this assertion, therefore, +together with one or two others. Sam, now at his third glass, felt his heart +warm to Will. He would have fought with tongue or fist on his behalf, and +presently added to the mischief he had already done.</p> +<p>“To shaw ’e, neighbours, just the man he is, I may tell +’e that a larned piece like Martin Grimbal ackshually comed all the way +to Newtake not long since to ax advice of un. An’ ’twas on the +identical matter of this same Hicks. Mr. Grimbal wanted to give un some work +to do, ’bout a book or some such item; an’ Will he ups and sez, +‘Doan’t,’ just short an’ straight like that theer. +‘Doan’t,’ he sez. ‘Let un shaw what’s in un +first’; an’ t’other nodded when he said it.”</p> +<p>Having now attested his regard for the master of Newtake, Sam jogged off. +He was pleased with himself, proud of having silenced more than one +detractor, and as his little brain turned the matter over, his lips parted in +a grin.</p> +<p>Coomstock meanwhile had limped into the cottage where Clement lived with +his mother. He did not garble his news, for it needed no artistic touch; and, +with nice sense of his perfect and effective instrument, he realised the +weapon was amply sharp enough without whetting, and employed the story as it +came into his hand. But Mr. Coomstock was a little surprised and disappointed +at his cousin’s reserve and self-restraint. He had hoped for a hearty +outburst of wrath and the assurance of wide-spreading animosity, yet no such +thing happened, and the talebearer presently departed in some surprise. Mrs. +Hicks, indeed, had shrilled forth a torrent of indignation upon the sole +subject equal to raising such an emotion in her breast, for Clem was her only +son. The man, however, took it calmly, or appeared to do so; and even when +Charles Coomstock was gone he refused to discuss the matter more.</p> +<p>But had his cousin, with Asmodeus-flight, beheld Clement during the +subsequent hours which he spent alone, it is possible that the wheelwright +had felt amply repaid for his trouble. Not until dawn stole grey along the +village street; not until sparrows in the thatch above him began their +salutation to the morning; not until Chagford rookery had sent forth a +harmonious multitude to the hills and valleys did Clement’s aching eyes +find sleep. For hours he tossed and turned, now trembling with rage, now +prompted by some golden thread in the tangled mazes of his mind to discredit +the thing reported. Blanchard, as it seemed, had come deliberately and +maliciously between him and an opportunity to win work. He burnt to know what +he should do; and, like a flame of forked light against the sombre background +of his passion, came the thought of another who hated Blanchard too. +Will’s secret glowed and gleamed like the writing on the wall; looking +out, Hicks saw it stamped on the dark earth and across the starry night; and +he wished to God that the letters might so remain to be read by the world +when it wakened. Finally he slept and dreamed that he had been to the Red +House, that he had spoken to John Grimbal, and returned home again with a bag +of gold.</p> +<p>When his mother came to call him he was lying half uncovered in a wild +confusion of scattered bed-clothes; and his arms and body were jerking as a +dog’s that dreams. She saw a sort of convulsion pinch and pucker his +face; then he made some inarticulate sounds—as it were a frantic +negation; and then the noise of his own cry awakened him. He looked wildly +round and lifted his hands as though he expected to find them full.</p> +<p>“Where is it? Where is it? The bag of money? I won’t—I +can’t—Where is it, I say?”</p> +<p>“I wish I knawed, lovey. Dream-gawld, I’m afeared. +You’ve bin lying cold, an’ that do allus breed bad thoughts in +sleep. ’Tis late; I done breakfast an hour ago. An’ Okehampton +day, tu. Coach’ll be along in twenty minutes.”</p> +<p>He sighed and dragged the clothes over himself.</p> +<p>“You’d best go to-day, mother. The ride will do you good, and +I have plenty to fill my time at home.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Hicks brightened perceptibly before this prospect. She was a little, +faded woman, with a brown face and red-rimmed, weak eyes, washed by many +years of sorrow to the palest nondescript colour. She crept through the world +with no ambition but to die out of the poorhouse, no prayer but a petition +that the parish might not bury her at the end, no joy save in her son. Life +at best was a dreary business for her, and an occasional trip to Okehampton +represented about the only brightness that ever crept into it. Now she +bustled off full of excitement to get the honey, and, having put on a +withered bonnet and black shawl, presently stood and waited for the +omnibus.</p> +<p>Her son dwelt with his thoughts that day, and for him there was no peace +or pleasure. Full twenty times he determined to visit Newtake at once and +have it out with Will; but his infirmity of purpose acted like a drag upon +this resolution, and his pride also contributed a force against it. Once he +actually started, and climbed up Middledown to reach the Moor beyond; then he +changed his mind again as new fires of enmity swept through it. His wrongs +rankled black and bitter; and, faint under them, he presently turned and went +home shivering though the day was hot.</p> +<h2><a id="II_VI" name="II_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI<br /> +A SWARM OF BEES</h2> +<p>Above Chagford rise those lofty outposts of Dartmoor, named respectively +Nattadown and Middledown. The first lies nearer to the village, and upon its +side, beneath a fir wood which crowns one spur, spread steep wastes of fern +and furze. This spot was a favourite one with Clement Hicks, and a fortnight +after the incidents last related he sat there smoking his pipe, while his +eyes roved upon the scene subtended before him. The hill fell abruptly away, +and near the bottom glimmered whitewashed cots along a winding road. Still +lower down extended marshy common land, laced with twinkling watercourses and +dotted with geese; while beyond, in many a rise and fall and verdant +undulation, the country rolled onwards through Teign valley and upwards +towards the Moor. The expanse seen from this lofty standpoint extended like a +mighty map, here revealing a patchwork of multicoloured fields, here +exhibiting tracts of wild waste and wood, here beautifully indicating by a +misty line, seen across ascending planes of forest, the course of the distant +river, here revealing the glitter of remote waters damaskeened with gold. +Little farms and outlying habitations were scattered upon the land; and +beyond them, rising steadily to the sky-line, the regions of the Moor +revealed their larger attributes, wider expanses, more savage and abrupt +configurations of barren heath and weathered tor. The day passed gradually +from gloom to brightness, and the distance, already bathed in light, gleamed +out of a more sombre setting, where the foreground still reflected the +shadows of departing clouds, like a picture of great sunshine framed in +darkness. But the last vapours quickly vanished; the day grew very hot and, +as the sky indicated noon, all things beneath Clement’s eyes were +soaked in a splendour of June sunlight. He watched a black thread lying +across a meadow five miles away. First it stretched barely visible athwart +the distance green; in half an hour it thickened without apparent means; +within an hour it had absorbed an eighth part at least of the entire space. +Though the time was very unusual for tilling of land, Hicks knew that the +combined operations of three horses, a man, and a plough were responsible for +this apparition, and he speculated as to how many tremendous physical and +spiritual affairs of life are thus wrought by agents not visible to the +beholder. Thus were his own thoughts twisted back to those speculations which +now perpetually haunted them like the incubus of a dream. What would Will +Blanchard say if he woke some morning to find his secret in John +Grimbal’s keeping? And, did any such thing happen, there must certainly +be a mystery about it; for Blanchard could no more prove how his enemy came +to learn his secret than might some urban stranger guess how the dark line +grew without visible means on the arable ground under Gidleigh.</p> +<p>From these dangerous thoughts he was roused by the sight of a woman +struggling up the steep hill towards him. The figure came slowly on, and +moved with some difficulty. This much Hicks noted, and then suddenly realised +that he beheld his mother. She knew his haunt and doubtless sought him now. +Rising, therefore, he hastened to meet her and shorten her arduous climb. +Mrs. Hicks was breathless when Clement reached her, and paused a while, with +her hand pressed to her side, before she could speak. At length she addressed +him, still panting between the syllables.</p> +<p>“My heart’s a pit-pat! Hurry, hurry, for the Lard’s +sake! The bees be playin’<a id="footnotetag9" name= +"footnotetag9"></a><a href="#footnote9"><sup>9</sup></a> an’ +they’ll call Johnson if you ban’t theer directly +minute!”</p> +<p>Johnson, a thatcher, was the only other man in Chagford who shared any +knowledge of apiarian lore with Clement.</p> +<p>“Sorry you should have had the journey only for that, mother. +’Twas so unlikely a morning, I never thought to hear of a swarm to-day. +I’ll start at once, and you go home quietly. You’re sadly out of +breath. Where is it?”</p> +<p>“To the Red House—Mr. Grimbal’s. It may lead to the +handlin’ of his hives for all us can say, if you do the job vitty, as +you ’m bound to.”</p> +<p>“John Grimbal’s!”</p> +<p>Hicks stood still as though this announcement had turned him into +stone.</p> +<p>“Ess fay! Why do ’e stand glazin’ like that? A chap rode +out for ’e ’pon horseback; an’ a bit o’ time be lost +a’ready. They ’m swarmin’ in the orchard, an’ nobody +knaws more ’n the dead what to be at.”</p> +<p>“I won’t go. Let them get Johnson.”</p> +<p>“‘Won’t go’! An’ five shillin’ +hangin’ to it, an’ Lard knaws what more in time to come! +‘Won’t go’! An’ my poor legs throbbin’ +something cruel with climbin’ for ’e!”</p> +<p>“I—I’m not going there—not to that man. I have +reason.”</p> +<p>“O my gude God!” burst out the old woman, “what’ll +’e do next? An’ me—as worked so hard to find +’e—an’ so auld as I am! Please, please, Clem, for your +mother—please. Theer’s bin so little money in the house of late +days, an’ less to come. Doan’t, if you love me, as I knaws well +you do, turn your back ’pon the scant work as falls in best o’ +times.”</p> +<p>The man reflected with troubled eyes, and his mother took his arm and +tried to pull him down the hill.</p> +<p>“Is John Grimbal at home?” he asked.</p> +<p>“How shude I knaw? An’ what matter if he is? Your business is +with the bees, not him. An’ you’ve got no quarrel with him +because that Blanchard have. After what Will done against you, you +needn’t be so squeamish as to make his enemies yourn.”</p> +<p>“My business is with the bees—as you say, mother,” he +answered slowly, repeating her words.</p> +<p>“Coourse ’tis! Who knaws a half of what you knaw ’bout +’em? That’s my awn braave Clem! Why, there might be a mort +o’ gude money for a man like you at the Red House!”</p> +<p>“I’ll go. My business is with the bees. You walk along slowly, +or sit down a while and get your breath again. I’ll hurry.”</p> +<p>She praised him and blessed him, crying after him as he +departed,—“You’ll find all set out for ’e—veil, +an’ gloves, an’ a couple of bee-butts to your hand.”</p> +<p>The man did not reply, but soon stumbled down the steep hill and vanished; +then five-and-twenty minutes later, with the implements of his trade, he +stood at the gate of the Red House, entered, and hastened along the newly +planted avenue.</p> +<p>John Grimbal had not yet gone into residence, but he dwelt at present in +his home farm hard by; and from this direction he now appeared to meet the +bee-keeper. The spectacle of Grimbal, stern, grave, and older of manner than +formerly, impressed Hicks not a little. In silence, after the first +salutation, they proceeded towards an adjacent orchard; and from here as they +approached arose an extravagant and savage din, as though a dozen baited +dogs, each with a tin kettle at his tail, were madly galloping down some +stone-paved street, and hurtling one against the other as they ran.</p> +<p>“They can stop that row,” said Hicks. “’Tis an +old-fashioned notion that it hurries swarming, but I never found it do +so.”</p> +<p>“You know best, though beating on tin pots and cans at such a +time’s a custom as old as the hills.”</p> +<p>“And vain as many others equally old. I have a different method to +hurry swarming.”</p> +<p>Now they passed over the snows of a million fallen petals, while yet good +store of flowers hung upon the trees. June basked in the heart of the orchard +and a delicious green sweetness and freshness marked the moment. Crimson and +cream, all splashed with sunlight, here bloomed against a sky of summer blue, +here took a shade from the new-born leaves and a shadow from branch and +bough. To the eye, a mottled, dimpled glory of apple-blossom spread above +grey trunks and twisted branches, shone through deep vistas of the orchard, +brightened all the distance; while upon the ear, now growing and deepening, +arose one sustained and musical susurration of innumerable wings.</p> +<p>“You will be wise to stay here,” said Hicks. He himself +stopped a moment, opened his bag, put on his veil and gloves, and tucked his +trousers inside his stockings.</p> +<p>“Not I. I wish to see the hiving.”</p> +<p>Twenty yards distant a play of light and glint and twinkle of many frantic +bees converged upon one spot, as stars numerically increase towards the heart +of a cluster. The sky was full of flying insects, and their wings sparkled +brightly in the sun; though aloft, with only the blue for background, they +appeared as mere dark points filling the air in every direction. The swarm +hung at the very heart of a little glade. Here two ancient apple-trees stood +apart, and from one low bough, stretched at right angles to the parent stem, +and not devoid of leaves and blossoms, there depended a grey-brown mass from +which a twinkling, flashing fire leaped forth as from gems bedded in the +matrix. Each transparent wing added to the dazzle under direct sunlight; the +whole agglomeration of life was in form like a bunch of grapes, and where it +thinned away to a point the bees dropped off by their own weight into the +grass below, then rose again and either flew aloft in wide and circling +flight or rushed headlong upon the swarm once more. Across the iridescent +cluster passed a gleam and glow of peacock and iris, opal and +mother-of-pearl; while from its heart ascended a deep murmur, telling of +tremendous and accumulated energy suddenly launched into this peaceful glade +of apple-blossom and ambient green. The frenzy of the moment held all that +little laborious people. There was none of the concerted action to be +observed at warping, or simultaneous motion of birds in air and fishes in +water; but each unit of the shining army dashed on its own erratic orbit, +flying and circling, rushing hither and thither, and sooner or later +returning to join the queen upon the bough.</p> +<p>The glory of the moment dominated one and all. It was their hour—a +brief, mad ecstasy in short lives of ceaseless toil. To-day they desisted +from their labours, and the wild-flowers of the waste places, and the +old-world flowers in cottage gardens were alike forgotten. Yet their year had +already seen much work and would see more. Sweet pollen from many a bluebell +and anemone was stored and sealed for a generation unborn; the asphodels and +violets, the velvet wallflower and yellow crocuses had already yielded +treasure; and now new honey jewels were trembling in the trumpets of the +honeysuckle, at the heart of the wild rose, within the deep cups of the +candid and orange lilies, amid the fairy caps of columbines, and the petals +of clove-pinks. There the bees now living laboured, and those that followed +would find their sweets in the clover,—scarlet and purple and +white,—in the foxgloves, in the upland deserts of the heather with +their oases of euphrasy and sweet wild thyme.</p> +<p>“Is it a true swarm or a cast?” inquired John Grimbal.</p> +<p>“A swarm, without much question, though it dawned an unlikely day +for an old queen to leave the hive. Still, the weather came over splendid +enough by noon, and they knew it was going to. Where are your butts? You see, +young maiden queens go further afield than old ones. The latter take but a +short flight for choice.”</p> +<p>“There they are,” said Grimbal, pointing to a row of thatched +hives not far off. “So that should be an old queen, by your showing. Is +she there?”</p> +<p>“I fancy so by the look of them. If the queen doesn’t join, +the bees break up, of course, and go back to the butt. But I’ve brought +a couple of queens with me.”</p> +<p>“I’ve seen a good few drones about the board +lately.”</p> +<p>“Sure sign of swarming at this season. Inside, if you could look, +you’d find plenty of queen cells, and some capped over. You’d +come across a murder or two as well. The old queens make short work of the +young ones sometimes.”</p> +<p>“Woman-like.”</p> +<p>Hicks admitted the criticism was just. Then, being now upon his own +ground, he continued to talk, and talk well, until he won a surly compliment +from his employer.</p> +<p>“You’re a bee-master, in truth! Nobody’ll deny you +that.”</p> +<p>Clement laughed rather bitterly.</p> +<p>“Yes, a king of bees. Not a great kingdom for man to +rule.”</p> +<p>The other studied his dark, unhappy face. Trouble had quickened +Grimbal’s own perceptions, and made him a more accurate judge of sorrow +when he saw it than of yore.</p> +<p>“You’ve tried to do greater things and failed, perhaps,” +he said.</p> +<p>“Why, perhaps I have. A man’s a hive himself, I’ve +thought sometimes—a hive of swarming, seething thoughts and experiences +and passions, that come and go as easily as any bees, and store the heart and +brain.”</p> +<p>“Not with honey, I’ll swear.”</p> +<p>“No—gall mostly.”</p> +<p>“And every hive’s got a queen bee too, for that matter,” +said Grimbal, rather pleased at his wit responsible for the image.</p> +<p>“Yes; and the queens take each other’s places quick enough, +for we’re fickle brutes.”</p> +<p>“A strange swarm we hive in our hearts, God knows.”</p> +<p>“And it eats out our hearts for our pains.”</p> +<p>“You’ve found out that, have you?” asked John +curiously.</p> +<p>“Long ago.”</p> +<p>“Everybody does, sooner or later.”</p> +<p>There was a pause. Overhead the multitude dwindled while the great +glimmering cluster on the tree correspondingly increased, and the fierce +humming of the bees was like the sound of a fire. Clement feared nothing, but +he had seen few face a hiving without some distrust. The man beside him, +however, stood with his hands in his pockets, indifferent and quite +unprotected.</p> +<p>“You will be wiser to stand farther away, Mr. Grimbal. You’re +unlikely to come off scot-free if you keep so close.”</p> +<p>“What do I care? I’ve been stung by worse than +insects.”</p> +<p>“And I also,” answered Clement, with such evident passion that +the other grew a little interested. He had evidently pricked a sore point in +this moody creature.</p> +<p>“Was it a woman stung you?”</p> +<p>“No, no; don’t heed me.”</p> +<p>Clement was on guard over himself again. “Your business is with +bees”—his mother’s words echoed in his mind to the pulsing +monotone of the swarm. He tried to change the subject, sent for a pail of +water, and drew a large syringe from his bag, though the circumstances really +rendered this unnecessary. But John Grimbal, always finding a sort of +pleasure in his own torment, took occasion to cross-question Clement.</p> +<p>“I suppose I’m laughed at still in Chagford, am I not? Not +that it matters to me.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think so; an object of envy, rather, for good wives +are easier to get than great riches.”</p> +<p>“That’s your opinion, is it? I’m not so sure. Are you +married?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Going to be, I’ll wager, if you think good wives can be +picked off blackberry bushes.”</p> +<p>“I don’t say that at all. But I am going to be married +certainly. I’m fortunate and unfortunate. I’ve won a prize, +but—well, honey’s cheap. I must wait.”</p> +<p>“D’ you trust her? Is waiting so easy?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I trust her, as I trust the sun to swing up out of the east +to-morrow, to set in the west to-night. She’s the only being of my own +breed I do trust. As for the other question, no—waiting isn’t +easy.”</p> +<p>“Nor yet wise. I shouldn’t wait. Tell me who she is. Women +interest me, and the taking of ’em in marriage.”</p> +<p>Hicks hesitated. Here he was drifting helpless under this man’s hard +eyes—helpless and yet not unwilling. He told himself that he was safe +enough and could put a stop on his mouth when he pleased. Besides, John +Grimbal was not only unaware that the bee-keeper knew anything against +Blanchard, but had yet to learn that anybody else did,—that there even +existed facts unfavourable to him. Something, however, told Hicks that +mention of the common enemy would result from this present meeting, and the +other’s last word brought the danger, if danger it might be, a step +nearer. Clement hesitated before replying to the question; then he answered +it.</p> +<p>“Chris Blanchard,” he said shortly, “though that +won’t interest you.”</p> +<p>“But it does—a good deal. I’ve wondered, some time, why +I didn’t hear my own brother was going to marry her. He got struck all +of a heap there, to my certain knowledge. However, he ’s escaped. The +Lord be good to you, and I take my advice to marry back again. Think twice, +if she’s made of the same stuff as her brother.”</p> +<p>“No, by God! Is the moon made of the same stuff as the marsh +lights?”</p> +<p>Concentrated bitterness rang in the words, and a man much less acute than +Grimbal had guessed he stood before an enemy of Will. John saw the bee-keeper +start at this crucial moment; he observed that Hicks had said a thing he much +regretted and uttered what he now wished unspoken. But the confession was +torn bare and laid out naked under Grimbal’s eyes, and he knew that +another man besides himself hated Will. The discovery made his face grow +redder than usual. He pulled at his great moustache and thrust it between his +teeth and gnawed it. But he contrived to hide the emotion in his mind from +Clement Hicks, and the other did not suspect, though he regretted his own +passion. Grimbals next words further disarmed him. He appeared to know +nothing whatever about Will, though his successful rival interested him +still.</p> +<p>“They call the man Jack-o’-Lantern, don’t they? +Why?”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell you. It may be, though, that he is erratic and +uncertain in his ways. You cannot predict what he will do next.”</p> +<p>“That’s nothing against him. He’s farming on the Moor +now, isn’t he?”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“Where did he come from when he dropped out of the clouds to marry +Phoebe Lyddon?”</p> +<p>The question was not asked with the least idea of its enormous +significance. Grimbal had no notion that any mystery hung over that autumn +time during which he made love to Phoebe and Will was absent from Chagford. +He doubted not that for the asking he could learn how Will had occupied +himself; but the subject did not interest him, and he never dreamed the +period held a secret. The sudden consternation bred in Hicks by this question +astounded him not a little. Indeed, each man amazed the other, Grimbal by his +question, Hicks by the attitude which he assumed before it.</p> +<p>“I’m sure I haven’t the least idea,” he answered; +but his voice and manner had already told Grimbal all he cared to learn at +the moment; and that was more than his wildest hopes had even risen to. He +saw in the other’s face a hidden thing, and by his demeanour that it +was an important one. Indeed, the bee-keeper’s hesitation and evident +alarm before this chance question proclaimed the secret vital. For the +present, and before Clement’s evident alarm, Grimbal dismissed the +matter lightly; but he chose to say a few more words upon it, for the express +purpose of setting Hicks again at his ease.</p> +<p>“You don’t like your future brother-in-law?”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes, I do. We’ve been friends all our lives—all +our lives. I like him well, and am going to marry his sister—only I see +his faults, and he sees mine—that’s all.”</p> +<p>“Take my advice and shut your eyes to his faults. That’s the +best way if you are marrying into his family. I’ve got cause to think +ill enough of the scamp, as you know and everybody knows; but life’s +too short for remembering ill turns.”</p> +<p>A weight rolled off Clement’s heart. For a moment he had feared that +the man knew something; but now he began to suspect Grimbal’s question +to be what in reality it was—casual interrogation, without any shadow +of knowledge behind it. Hicks therefore breathed again and trusted that his +own emotion had not been very apparent. Then, taking the water, he shot a +thin shower into the air, an operation often employed to hasten swarming, and +possibly calculated to alarm the bees into apprehension of rain.</p> +<p>“Do wasps ever get into the hives?” asked Mr. Grimbal +abruptly.</p> +<p>“Aye, they do; and wax-moths and ants, and even mice. These things +eat the honey and riddle and ruin the comb. Then birds eat the bees, and +spiders catch them. Honey-bees do nothing but good that I can see, yet Nature +’s pleased to fill the world with their enemies. Queen and drone and +the poor unsexed workers—all have their troubles; and so has the little +world of the hive. Yet during the few weeks of a bee’s life he does an +amount of work beyond imagination to guess at.”</p> +<p>“And still finds time to steal from the hives of his +fellows?”</p> +<p>“Why, yes, if the sweets are exposed and can be tasted for nothing. +Most of us might turn robbers on the same terms. Now I can take them, and a +splendid swarm, too—finest I’ve seen this year.”</p> +<p>The business of getting the glittering bunch of bees into a hive was then +proceeded with, and soon Clement had shaken the mass into a big straw butt, +his performance being completely successful. In less than half an hour all +was done, and Hicks began to remove his veil and shake a bee or two off the +rim of his hat.</p> +<p>John Grimbal rubbed his cheek, where a bee had stung him under the eye, +and regarded Hicks thoughtfully.</p> +<p>“If you happen to want work at any time, it might be within my power +to find you some here,” he said, handing the bee-master five shillings. +Clement thanked his employer and declared he would not forget the offer; he +then departed, and John Grimbal returned to his farm.</p> +<h2><a id="II_VII" name="II_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII<br /> +AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE</h2> +<p>Billy Blee, who has appeared thus far as a disinterested spectator of +other people’s affairs, had yet his own active and personal interests +in life. Them he pursued, at odd times, and in odd ways, with admirable +pertinacity; and as a crisis is now upon him and chance knits the outcome of +it into the main fabric of this narrative, Billy and his actions command +attention.</p> +<p>Allusion has already been made, and that frequently, to one Widow +Coomstock, whose attractions of income, and the ancillary circumstance of an +ample though elderly person, had won for her certain admirers more ancient +than herself. Once butt-woman, or sextoness, of Chagford Church, the lady had +dwelt alone, as Miss Mary Reed, for fifty-five years—not because +opportunity to change her state was denied her, but owing to the fact that +experience of life rendered her averse to all family responsibilities. Mary +Reed had seen her sister, the present Mrs. Hicks, take a husband, had watched +the result of that step; and this, with a hundred parallel instances of +misery following on matrimony, had determined her against it. But when old +Benjamin Coomstock, the timber merchant and coal-dealer, became a widower, +this ripe maiden, long known to him, was approached before his wife’s +grave became ready for a stone. To Chagford’s amazement he so far +bemeaned himself as to offer the sextoness his hand, and she accepted it. +Then, left a widow after two years with her husband, Mary Coomstock +languished a while, and changed her methods of life somewhat. The roomy +dwelling-house of her late partner became her property and a sufficient +income went with it. Mr. Coomstock’s business had been sold in his +lifetime; the money was invested, and its amount no man knew, though rumour, +which usually magnifies such matters, spoke of a very handsome figure; and +Mrs. Coomstock’s lavish manner of life lent confirmation to the report. +But though mundane affairs had thus progressed with her, the woman’s +marriage was responsible for very grave mental and moral deterioration. +Prosperity, and the sudden exchange of a somewhat laborious life for the ease +and comfort of independence, played havoc with Widow Coomstock. She grew lax, +gross in habit and mind, self-indulgent, and ill-tempered. When her husband +died her old friends lost sight of her, while only those who had reason to +hope for a reward still kept in touch with her, and indeed forced themselves +upon her notice. Everybody predicted she would take another husband; but, +though it was now nearly eight years since Mr. Coomstock’s death, his +widow still remained one. Gaffer Lezzard and Billy Blee had long pursued her +with varying advantage, and the latter, though his proposals were declined, +yet saw in each refusal an indication to encourage future hope.</p> +<p>Now, urged thereto by whispers that Mr. Lezzard had grown the richer by +three hundred pounds on the death of a younger brother in Australia, Billy +determined upon another attack. He also was worth something—less indeed +than three hundred pounds; though, seeing that he had been earning reasonably +good wages for half a century, the fact argued but poor thrift in Mr. Blee. +Of course Gaffer Lezzard’s alleged legacy could hardly be a sum to +count with Mrs. Coomstock, he told himself; yet his rival was a man of wide +experience and an oily tongue: while, apart from any question of opposition, +he felt that another offer of marriage might now be made with decorum, seeing +that it was a full year since the last. Mr. Blee therefore begged for a +half-holiday, put on his broadcloth, blacked his boots, anointed his +lion-monkey fringe and scanty locks with pomatum, and set forth. Mrs. +Coomstock’s house stood on the hill rising into the village from +Chagford Bridge. A kitchen garden spread behind it; in front pale purple +poppies had the ill-kept garden to themselves.</p> +<p>As he approached, Mr. Blee felt a leaden weight about his newly polished +boots, and a distinct flutter at the heart, or in a less poetical portion of +his frame.</p> +<p>“Same auld feeling,” he reflected. “Gormed if I +ban’t gettin’ sweaty ’fore the plaace comes in sight! +’Tis just the sinkin’ at the navel, like what I had when I smoked +my first pipe, five-and-forty years agone!”</p> +<p>The approach of another man steadied Billy, and on recognising him Mr. +Blee forgot all about his former emotions and gasped in the clutch of a new +one. It was Mr. Lezzard, evidently under some impulse of genial exhilaration. +There hung an air of aggression about him, but, though he moved like a +conqueror, his gait was unsteady and his progress slow. He had wit to guess +Billy’s errand, however, for he grinned, and leaning against the hedge +waved his stick in the air above his head.</p> +<p>“Aw, Jimmery! if it ban’t Blee; an’ prinked out for a +weddin’, tu, by the looks of it!”</p> +<p>“Not yourn, anyway,” snapped back the suitor.</p> +<p>“Well, us caan’t say ’zactly—world ’s full +o’ novelties.”</p> +<p>“Best pull yourself together, Gaffer, or bad-hearted folks might say +you was bosky-eyed.<a id="footnotetag10" name="footnotetag10"></a><a href= +"#footnote10"><sup>10</sup></a> That ban’t no novelty anyway, but +’t is early yet to be drunk—just three o’clock by the +church.”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee marched on without waiting for a reply. He knew Lezzard to be +more than seventy years old and usually regarded the ancient man’s +rivalry with contempt; but he felt uneasy for a few moments, until the front +door of Mrs. Coomstock’s dwelling was opened to him by the lady +herself.</p> +<p>“My stars! You? What a terrible coorious thing!” she said.</p> +<p>“Why for?”</p> +<p>“Come in the parlour. Theer! coorious ban’t the +word!”</p> +<p>She laughed, a silly laugh and loud. Then she shambled before him to the +sitting-room, and Billy, familiar enough with the apartment, noticed a bottle +of gin in an unusual position upon the table. The liquor stood, with two +glasses and a jug of water, between the Coomstock family Bible, on its green +worsted mat, and a glass shade containing the stuffed carcass of a +fox-terrier. The animal was moth-eaten and its eyes had fallen out. It could +be considered in no sense decorative; but sentiment allowed the corpse this +central position in a sorry scheme of adornment, for the late timber merchant +had loved it. Upon Mrs. Coomstock’s parlour walls hung Biblical German +prints in frames of sickly yellow wood; along the window-ledge geraniums and +begonias flourished, though gardeners had wondered to see their luxuriance, +for the windows were seldom opened.</p> +<p>“’It never rains but it pours,’” said Widow +Coomstock. She giggled again and looked at Billy. She was very fat, and the +red of her face deepened to purple unevenly about the sides of her nose. Her +eyes were bright and black. She had opened a button or two at the top of her +dress, and her general appearance, from her grey hair to her slattern heels, +was disordered. Her cap had fallen off on to the ground, and Mr. Blee noticed +that her parting was as a broad turnpike road much tramped upon by Time. The +room smelt stuffy beyond its wont and reeked not only of spirits but tobacco. +This Billy sniffed inquiringly, and Mrs. Coomstock observed the action. +“’Twas Lezzard,” she said. “I like to see a man in +comfort. You can smoke if you mind to. Coomstock always done it, and a +man’s no man without, though a dirty habit wheer they doan’t use +a spittoon.”</p> +<p>She smiled, but to herself, and was lost in thought a moment. He saw her +eyes very bright and her head wagging. Then she looked at him and laughed +again.</p> +<p>“You’m a fine figure of a man, tu,” she said, apropos of +nothing in particular. But the newcomer understood. He rumpled his hair and +snorted and frowned at the empty glasses.</p> +<p>“Have a drop?” suggested Mrs. Coomstock; but Billy, of opinion +that his love had already enjoyed refreshment sufficient for the time, +refused and answered her former remark.</p> +<p>“A fine figure?—yes, Mary Coomstock, though not so fine for a +man as you for a woman. Still, a warm-blooded chap an’ younger than my +years.”</p> +<p>“I’ve got my share o’ warm blood, tu, Billy.”</p> +<p>It was apparent. Mrs. Coomstock’s plump neck bulged in creases over +the dirty scrap of white linen that represented a collar, while her massive +bust seemed bursting through her apparel.</p> +<p>“Coourse,” said Mr. Blee, “an’ your share, +an’ more ’n your share o’ brains, tu. He had bad +luck—Coomstock—the worse fortune as ever fell to a Chaggyford +man, I reckon.”</p> +<p>“How do ’e come at that, then?”</p> +<p>“To get ’e, an’ lose ’e again inside two year. +That’s ill luck if ever I seen it. Death’s a envious twoad. Two +short year of you; an’ then up comes a tumour on his neck unbeknawnst, +an’ off he goes, like a spring lamb.”</p> +<p>“An’ so he did. I waked from sleep an’ bid un rise, but +theer weern’t no more risin’ for him till the +Judgment.”</p> +<p>“Death’s no courtier. He’ll let a day-labourer go so +peaceful an’ butivul as a child full o’ milk goes to sleep; while +he’ll take a gert lord or dook, wi’ lands an’ moneys, +an’ strangle un by inches, an’ give un the hell of a +twistin’. You caan’t buy a easy death seemin’ly.”</p> +<p>“A gude husband he was, but jealous,” said Mrs. Coomstock, her +thoughts busy among past years; and Billy immediately fell in with this +view.</p> +<p>“Then you’m well rid of un. Theer’s as gude in the world +alive any minute as ever was afore or will be again.”</p> +<p>“Let ’em stop in the world then. I doan’t want +’em.”</p> +<p>This sentiment amused the widow herself more than Billy. She laughed +uproariously, raised her glass to her lips unconsciously, found it empty, +grew instantly grave upon the discovery, set it down again, and sighed.</p> +<p>“It’s a wicked world,” she said. “Sure as +men’s in a plaace they brings trouble an’ wickedness. An’ +yet I’ve heard theer’s more women than men on the airth when +all’s said.”</p> +<p>“God A’mighty likes ’em best, I reckon,” declared +Mr. Blee.</p> +<p>“Not but what ’t would be a lonesome plaace wi’out the +lords of creation,” conceded the widow.</p> +<p>“Ess fay, you ’m right theer; but the beauty of things is that +none need n’t be lonely, placed same as you be.”</p> +<p>“‘Once bit twice shy,’” said Mrs. Coomstock. Then +she laughed again. “I said them very words to Lezzard not an hour +since.”</p> +<p>“An’ what might he have answered?” inquired Billy +without, however, showing particular interest to know.</p> +<p>“He said he wasn’t bit. His wife was a proper +creature.”</p> +<p>“Bah! second-hand gudes—that’s what Lezzard be—a +widow-man an’ eighty if a day. A poor, coffin-ripe auld blid, wi’ +wan leg in the graave any time this twenty year.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Coomstock’s frame heaved at this tremendous criticism. She +gurgled and gazed at Billy with her eyes watering and her mouth open.</p> +<p>“You say that! Eighty an’ coffin-ripe!”</p> +<p>“Ban’t no ontruth, neither. A man ’s allus ready for his +elm overcoat arter threescore an’ ten. I heard the noise of his +breathin’ paarts when he had brown kitty in the fall three years ago, +an’ awnly thrawed it off thanks to the gracious gudeness of Miller +Lyddon, who sent rich stock for soup by my hand. But to hear un, you might +have thought theer was a wapsies’ nest in the man’s +lungs.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t want to be nuss to a chap at my time of life, in +coourse.”</p> +<p>“No fay; ’t is the man’s paart to look arter his wife, +if you ax me. I be a plain bachelor as never thought of a female serious +’fore I seed you. An’ I’ve got a heart in me, tu. +Ban’t no auld, rubbishy, worn-out thing, neither, but a tough, +love-tight heart—at least so ’t was till I seed you in your weeds +eight year agone.”</p> +<p>“Eight year a widow! An’ so I have been. Well, Blee, +you’ve got a powerful command of words, anyways. That I’ll grant +you.”</p> +<p>“’T is the gert subject, Mary.”</p> +<p>He moved nearer and put down his hat and stick; she exhibited trepidation, +not wholly assumed. Then she helped herself to more spirits.</p> +<p>“A drop I must have to steady me. You men make a woman’s heart +go flutterin’ all over her buzzom, like a flea under +her—”</p> +<p>She stopped and laughed, then drank. Presently setting down the glass +again, she leered in a manner frankly animal at Mr. Blee, and told him to say +what he might have to say and be quick about it. He fired a little at this +invitation, licked his lips, cleared his throat, and cast a nervous glance or +two at the window. But nobody appeared; no thunder-visaged Lezzard frowned +over the geraniums. Gaffer indeed was sound asleep, half a mile off, upon one +of those seats set in the open air for the pleasure and convenience of +wayfarers about the village. So Billy rose, crossed to the large sofa whereon +Mrs. Coomstock sat, plumped down boldly beside her and endeavoured to get his +arm round the wide central circumference of her person. She suffered this +courageous attempt without objection. Then Billy gently squeezed her, and she +wriggled and opened her mouth and shut her eyes.</p> +<p>“Say the word and do a wise thing,” he urged. “Say the +word, Mary, an’ think o’ me here as master, a-keeping all your +damn relations off by word of command.”</p> +<p>She laughed.</p> +<p>“When I be gone you’ll see some sour looks, I +reckon.”</p> +<p>“Nothing doan’t matter then; ’t is while you ’m +here I’d protect ’e ’gainst ’em. Look, see! +ban’t often I goes down on my knees, ’cause a man risin’ in +years, same as me, can pray to God more dignified sittin’; but now I +will.” He slid gingerly down, and only a tremor showed the stab his +gallantry cost him.</p> +<p>“You ’m a masterful auld shaver, sure ’nough!” +said Mrs. Coomstock, regarding Billy with a look half fish like, half +affectionate.</p> +<p>“Rise me up, then,” he said. “Rise me up, an’ do +it quick. If you love me, as I see you do by the faace of you, rise me up, +Mary, an’ say the word wance for all time. I’ll be a gude husband +to ’e an’ you’ll bless the day you took me, though I sez it +as shouldn’t.”</p> +<p>She allowed her fat left hand, with the late Mr. Coomstock’s +wedding-ring almost buried in her third finger, to remain with Billy’s; +and by the aid of it and the sofa he now got on his legs again. Then he sat +down beside her once more and courageously set his yellow muzzle against her +red cheek. The widow remained passive under this caress, and Mr. Blee, having +kissed her thrice, rubbed his mouth and spoke.</p> +<p>“Theer! ’T is signed and sealed, an’ I’ll have no +drawin’ back now.”</p> +<p>“But—but—Lezzard, Billy. I do like ’e—I +caan’t hide it from ’e, try as I will—but +him—”</p> +<p>“I knawed he was t’other. I tell you, forget un. His +marryin’ days be awver. Dammy, the man’s ’most chuckle +headed wi’ age! Let un go his way an’ say his prayers +’gainst the trump o’ God. An’ it’ll take un his time +to pass Peter when all ’s done—a bad auld chap in his day. Not +that I’d soil your ears with it.”</p> +<p>“He said much the same ’bout you. When you was at +Drewsteignton, twenty year agone—”</p> +<p>“A lie—a wicked, strammin’, gert lie, with no more truth +to it than a auld song! He ’m a venomous beast to call home such a +thing arter all these years.”</p> +<p>“If I did take ’e, you’d be a gude an’ faithful +husband, Billy, not a gad-about?”</p> +<p>“Cut my legs off if I go gaddin’ further than to do your +errands.”</p> +<p>“An’ you’ll keep these here buzzin’ parties off +me? Cuss ’em! They make my life a burden.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t fear that. I’ll larn ’em!”</p> +<p>“Theer ’s awnly wan I can bide of the whole +lot—an’ that’s my awn nephew, Clem Hicks. He’ll drink +his drop o’ liquor an’ keep his mouth shut, an’ listen to +me a-talkin’ as a young man should. T’others are allus +yelpin’ out how fond they be of me, and how they’d go to the +world’s end for me. I hate the sight of ’em.”</p> +<p>“A time-servin’ crew, Mary; an’ Clement Hicks no better +’n the rest, mark my word, though your sister’s son. ’T is +cupboard love wi’ all. But money ban’t nothin’ to me. +I’ve been well contented with enough all my life, though ’t is +few can say with truth that enough satisfies ’em.”</p> +<p>“Lezzard said money was nothin’ to him neither, having plenty +of his awn. ’T was my pusson, not my pocket, as he’d falled in +love with.”</p> +<p>“Burnish it all! Theer ’s a shameful speech! ‘Your +pusson’! Him! I’ll tell you what Lezzard is—just a damn +evil disposition kep’ in by skin an’ bones—that’s +Lezzard. ‘Your pusson’!”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid I’ve encouraged him a little. You’ve +been so backward in mentioning the subject of late. But I’m sure I +didn’t knaw as he’d got a evil disposition.”</p> +<p>“Well, ’t is so. An’ ’t is awnly your bigness of +heart, as wouldn’t hurt a beetle, makes you speak kind of the boozy +auld sweep. I’ll soon shaw un wheer he’s out if he thinks you +’m tinkering arter him!”</p> +<p>“He couldn’t bring an action for breach, or anything o’ +that, could he?”</p> +<p>“At his time of life! What Justice would give ear to un? An’ +the shame of it!”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he misunderstood. You men jump so at a +conclusion.”</p> +<p>“Leave that to me. I’ll clear his brains double-quick; aye, +an’ make un jump for somethin’!”</p> +<p>“Then I suppose it’s got to be. I’m yourn, Billy, +an’ theer needn’t be any long waitin’ neither. To think of +another weddin’ an’ another husband! Just a drop or I shall cry. +It’s such a supporting thing to a lone female.”</p> +<p>Whether Mrs. Coomstock meant marriage or Plymouth gin, Billy did not stop +to inquire. He helped her, filled Lezzard’s empty glass for himself, +and then, finding his future wife thick of speech, bleared of eye, and +evidently disposed to slumber, he departed and left her to sleep off her +varied emotions.</p> +<p>“I’ll mighty soon change all that,” thought Mr. Blee. +“To note a fine woman in liquor ’s the frightfullest sight in all +nature, so to say. Not but what with Lezzard a-pawin’ of her ’t +was enough to drive her to it.”</p> +<p>That night the lover announced his triumph, whereon Phoebe congratulated +him and Miller Lyddon shook his head.</p> +<p>“’T is an awful experiment, Billy, at your age,” he +declared.</p> +<p>“Why, so ’t is; but I’ve weighed the subject in my mind +for years and years, an ’t wasn’t till Mary Coomstock comed to be +widowed that I thought I’d found the woman at last. ’T was +lookin’ tremendous high, I knaw, but theer ’t is; she’ll +have me. She ’m no young giglet neither, as would lead me a +devil’s dance, but a pusson in full blooth with ripe mind.”</p> +<p>“She drinks. I doan’t want to hurt your feelings; but +everybody says it is so,” declared the miller.</p> +<p>“What everybody sez, nobody did ought to believe,” returned +Mr. Blee stoutly. “She ’m a gude, lonely sawl, as wants a man +round the house to keep off her relations, same as us has a dog to keep down +varmints in general. Theer ’s the Hickses, an’ Chowns, an’ +Coomstocks all a-stickin’ up theer tails an’ a-purrin’ +an’ a-rubbin’ theerselves against the door-posts of the plaace +like cats what smells feesh. I won’t have none of it. I’ll dwell +along wi’ she an’ play a husband’s part, an’ comfort +the decline of her like a man, I warn ’e.”</p> +<p>“Why, Mrs. Coomstock ’s not so auld as all that, Billy,” +said Phoebe. “Chris has often told me she’s only sixty-two or +three.”</p> +<p>But he shook his head.</p> +<p>“Ban’t a subject for a loving man to say much on, awnly truth +’s truth. I seed it written in the Coomstock Bible wan day. Fifty-five +she were when she married first. Well, ban’t in reason she twald the +naked truth ’bout it, an’ who’d blame her on such a +delicate point? No, I’d judge her as near my awn age as possible; +an’ to speak truth, not so well preserved as what I be.”</p> +<p>“How’s Monks Barton gwaine to fare without ’e, +Blee?” whined the miller.</p> +<p>“As to that, be gormed if I knaw how I’ll fare wi’out +the farm. But love—well, theer ’t is. Theer ’s money to it, +I knaw, but what do that signify? Nothin’ to me. You’ll see me +frequent as I ride here an’ theer—horse, saddle, stirrups, +an’ all complete; though God He knaws wheer my knees’ll go when +my boots be fixed in stirrups. But a man must use ’em if theer ’s +the dignity of money to be kept up. ’T is just wan of them +oncomfortable things riches brings with it.”</p> +<p>While Miller Lyddon still argued with Billy against the step he now +designed, there arrived from Chagford the stout Mr. Chappie, with his mouth +full of news.</p> +<p>“More weddin’s,” he said. “I comed down-long to +tell ’e, lest you shouldn’t knaw till to-morrow an’ so fall +behind the times. Widow Coomstock ’s thrawed up the sponge and gived +herself to that importuneous auld Lezzard. To think o’ such a +Methuselah as him—aulder than the century—fillin’ the eye +o’ that full-bodied—”</p> +<p>“It’s a black lie—blacker ’n hell—an’ +if’t was anybody but you brought the news I’d hit un awver the +jaw!” burst out Mr. Blee, in a fury.</p> +<p>“He tawld me hisself. He’s tellin’ everybody hisself. It +comed to a climax to-day. The auld bird’s hoppin’ all awver the +village so proud as a jackdaw as have stole a shiny button. He’m +bustin’ wi’ it in fact.”</p> +<p>“I’ll bust un! An’ his news, tu. An’ you can say, +when you’m axed, ’t is the foulest lie ever falled out of wicked +lips.”</p> +<p>Billy now took his hat and stick from their corner and marched to the door +without more words.</p> +<p>“No violence, mind now, no violence,” begged Mr. Lyddon. +“This love-making ’s like to wreck the end of my life, wan way or +another, yet. ’T is bad enough with the young; but when it comes to +auld, bald-headed fules like you an’ Lezzard—”</p> +<p>“As to violence, I wouldn’t touch un wi’ the end of a +dung-fork—I wouldn’t. But I’m gwaine to lay his lie wance +an’ for all. I be off to parson this instant moment. An’ when my +banns of marriage be hollered out next Sunday marnin’, then us’ll +knaw who ’m gwaine to marry Mother Coomstock an’ who ban’t. +I can work out my awn salvation wi’ fear an’ tremblin’ so +well as any other man; an’ you’ll see what that God-forsaken auld +piece looks like come Sunday when he hears what’s done an’ +caan’t do nought but just swallow his gall an’ chew ’pon +it.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_VIII" name="II_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII<br /> +MR. BLEE FORGETS HIMSELF</h2> +<p>The Rev. James Shorto-Champernowne made no difficulty about Billy’s +banns of marriage, although he doubtless held a private opinion upon the +wisdom of such a step, and also knew that Mrs. Coomstock was now a very +different woman from the sextoness of former days. He expressed a hope, +however, that Mr. Blee would make his future wife become a regular +church-goer again after the ceremony; and Billy took it upon himself to +promise as much for her. There the matter ended until the following Sunday, +when a sensation, unparalleled in the archives of St. Michael’s, +awaited the morning worshippers.</p> +<p>Under chiming of bells the customary congregation arrived, and a +perceptible wave of sensation swept from pew to pew at the appearance of more +than one unfamiliar face. Of regular attendants we may note Mrs. Blanchard +and Chris, Martin Grimbal, Mr. Lyddon, and his daughter. Mr. Blee usually sat +towards the back of the church at a point immediately behind those benches +devoted to the boys. Here he kept perfect order among the lads, and had done +so for many years. Occasionally it became necessary to turn a youngster out +of church, and Billy’s procedure at such a time was masterly; but of +opinion to-day that he was a public character, he chose a more conspicuous +position, and accepted Mr. Lyddon’s invitation to take a seat in the +miller’s own pew. He felt he owed this prominence, not only to himself, +but to Mrs. Coomstock. She, good soul, had been somewhat evasive and +indefinite in her manner since accepting Billy, and her condition of nerves +on Sunday morning proved such that she found herself quite unable to attend +the house of prayer, although she had promised to do so. She sent her two +servants, however, and, spending the time in private between spirtual and +spirituous consolations of Bible and bottle, the widow soon passed into a +temporary exaltation ending in unconsciousness. Thus her maids found her on +returning from church.</p> +<p>Excitement within the holy edifice reached fever-heat when a most unwonted +worshipper appeared in the venerable shape of Mr. Lezzard. He was supported +by his married daughter and his grandson. They sought and found a very +prominent position under the lectern, and it was immediately apparent that no +mere conventional attendance for the purpose of praising their Maker had +drawn Mr. Lezzard and his relations. Indeed he had long been of the Baptist +party, though it derived but little lustre from him. Much whispering passed +among the trio. Then his daughter, having found the place she sought in a +prayer-book, handed it to Mr. Lezzard, and he made a big cross in pencil upon +the page and bent the volume backwards so that its binding cracked very +audibly. Gaffer then looked about him with a boldness he was far from +feeling; but the spectacle of Mr. Blee, hard by, fortified his spirit. He +glared across the aisle and Billy glared back.</p> +<p>Then the bells stopped, the organ droned, and there came a clatter of iron +nails on the tiled floor. Boys and men proceeded to the choir stalls and Mr. +Shorto-Champernowne fluttered behind, with his sermon in his hand. Like a +stately galleon of the olden time he swept along the aisle, then reached his +place, cast one keen glance over the assembled congregation, and slowly +sinking upon his hassock enveloped his face and whiskers in snowy lawn and +prayed a while.</p> +<p>The service began and that critical moment after the second lesson was +reached with dreadful celerity. Doctor Parsons, having read a chapter from +the New Testament, which he emerged from the congregation to do, and which he +did ill, though he prided himself upon his elocution, returned to his seat as +the Vicar rose, adjusted his double eyeglasses and gave out a notice as +follows:</p> +<p>“I publish the banns of marriage between William Blee, Bachelor, and +Mary Coomstock, Widow, both of this parish. If any of you know cause, or just +impediment, why these two persons should not be joined together in holy +matrimony, ye are to declare it. This is for the first time of +asking.”</p> +<p>There was a momentary pause. Then, nudged by his daughter, who had grown +very pale, Gaffer Lezzard rose. His head shook and he presented the +appearance of a man upon the verge of palsy. He held up his hand, struggled +with his vocal organs and at last exploded these words, sudden, tremulous, +and shrill:</p> +<p>“I deny it an’ I defy it! The wummon be mine!”</p> +<p>Mr. Lezzard succumbed instantly after this effort. Indeed, he went down as +though shot through the head. He wagged and gasped and whispered to his +grandson,—</p> +<p>“Wheer’s the brandy to?”</p> +<p>Whereupon this boy produced a medicine bottle half full of spirits, and +his grandfather, with shaking fingers, removed the cork and drank the +contents. Meantime the Vicar had begun to speak; but he suffered another +interruption. Billy, tearing himself from the miller’s restraining +hand, leapt to his feet, literally shaking with rage. He was dead to his +position, oblivious of every fact save that his banns of marriage had been +forbidden before the assembled Christians of Chagford. He had waited to find +a wife until he was sixty years old—for this!</p> +<p>“You—<i>you</i> to do it! You to get up afore this rally +o’ gentlefolks an’ forbid my holy banns, you wrinkled, crinkled, +baggering auld lizard! Gormed if I doan’t wring your—”</p> +<p>“Silence in the house of God!” thundered Mr. +Shorto-Champernowne, with tones so resonant that they woke rafter echoes the +organ itself had never roused. “Silence, and cease this sacrilegious +brawling, or the consequences will be unutterably serious! Let those +involved,” he concluded more calmly, “appear before me in the +vestry after divine service is at an end.”</p> +<p>Having frowned, in a very tragic manner, both on Mr. Blee and Mr. Lezzard, +the Vicar proceeded with the service; but though Gaffer remained in his place +Billy did not. He rose, jammed on his hat, glared at everybody, and assumed +an expression curiously similar to that of a stone demon which grinned from +the groining of two arches immediately above him. He then departed, growling +to himself and shaking his fists, in another awful silence; for the Vicar +ceased when he rose, and not until Billy disappeared and his footfall was +heard no more did the angry clergyman proceed.</p> +<p>A buzz and hubbub, mostly of laughter, ascended when presently Mr. +Shorto-Champernowne’s parishioners returned to the air; and any chance +spectator beholding them had certainly judged he stood before an audience now +dismissed from a theatre rather than the congregation of a church.</p> +<p>“Glad Will weern’t theer, I’m sure,” said Mrs. +Blanchard. “He’d ’a’ laughed out loud an’ made +bad worse. Chris did as ’t was, awnly parson’s roarin’ +luckily drowned it. And Mr. Martin Grimbal, whose eye I catched, was put to +it to help smilin’.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t often he laughs, anyway,” said Phoebe, who walked +homewards with her father and the Blanchards; whereon Chris, from being in a +boisterous vein of merriment, grew grave. Together all returned to the +valley. Will was due in half an hour from Newtake, and Phoebe, as a special +favour, had been permitted to dine at Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage with her +husband and his family. Clement Hicks had also promised to be of the party; +but that was before the trouble of the previous week, and Chris knew he would +not come.</p> +<p>Meantime, Gaffer Lezzard, supported by two generations of his family, +explained his reasons for objecting to Mr. Blee’s proposed +marriage.</p> +<p>“Mrs. Coomstock be engaged, right and reg’lar, to me,” +he declared. “She’d gived me her word ’fore ever Blee axed +her. I seed her essterday, to hear final ’pon the subjec’, +an’ she tawld me straight, bein’ sober as you at the time, as +’t was <i>me</i> she wanted an’ meant for to have. She was +excited t’ other day an’ not mistress of herself ezacally; +an’ the crafty twoad took advantage of it, an’ jawed, an’ +made her drink an’ drink till her didn’t knaw what her was +sayin’ or doin’. But she’m mine, an’ she’ll +tell ’e same as what I do; so theer’s an end on +’t.”</p> +<p>“I’ll see Mrs. Coomstock,” said the Vicar. “I, +myself will visit her to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“Canst punish this man for tryin’ to taake her from +me?”</p> +<p>“Permit yourself no mean desires in the direction of revenge. For +the present I decline to say more upon the subject. If it were possible to +punish, and I am not prepared to say it is not, it would be for brawling in +the house of God. After an experience extending over forty years, I may +declare that I never saw any such disreputable and horrifying +spectacle.”</p> +<p>So the Lezzard family withdrew and, on the following day, Mrs. Coomstock +passed through most painful experiences.</p> +<p>To the clergyman, with many sighs and tears, she explained that Mr. +Lezzard’s character had been maligned by Mr. Blee, that before the +younger veteran she had almost feared for her life, and been driven to accept +him out of sheer terror at his importunity. But when facts came to her ears +afterwards, she found that Mr. Lezzard was in reality all he had declared +himself to be, and therefore returned to him, threw over Mr. Blee, and begged +the other to forbid the banns, if as she secretly learnt, though not from +Billy himself, they were to be called on that Sunday. The poor woman’s +ears tingled under Mr. Shorto-Champernowne’s sonorous reproof; but he +departed at last, and by the time that Billy called, during the same day, she +had imbibed Dutch courage sufficient to face him and tell him she had changed +her mind. She had erred—she confessed it. She had been far from well at +the time and, upon reconsideration of the proposal, had felt she would never +be able to make Mr. Blee happy, or enjoy happiness with him.</p> +<p>As a matter of fact, Mrs. Coomstock had accepted both suitors on one and +the same afternoon. First Gaffer, who had made repeated but rather vague +allusion to a sum of three hundred pounds in ready money, was taken +definitely; while upon his departure, the widow, only dimly conscious of what +was settled with her former admirer, said, “Yes” to Billy in his +turn. Had a third suitor called on that event-ful afternoon, it is quite +possible Mrs. Coomstock would have accepted him also.</p> +<p>The conversation with Mr. Blee was of short duration, and ended by Billy +calling down a comprehensive curse on the faithless one and returning to +Monks Barton. He had attached little importance to Lezzard’s public +protest, upon subsequent consideration and after the first shock of hearing +it; but there was no possibility of doubting what he now learned from Mrs. +Coomstock’s own lips. That she had in reality changed her mind appeared +only too certain.</p> +<p>So he went home again in the last extremity of fury, and Phoebe, who was +alone at the time, found herself swept by the hurricane of his wrath. He +entered snorting and puffing, flung his hat on the settle, his stick into the +corner; then, dropping into a seat by the fire, he began taking off his +gaiters with much snuffling and mumbling and repeated inarticulate explosions +of breath. This cat-like splutter always indicated deep feeling in Mr. Blee, +and Phoebe asked with concern what was the matter now.</p> +<p>“Matter? Tchut—Tchut—Theer ban’t no +God—that’s what’s the matter!”</p> +<p>“Billy! How can you?”</p> +<p>“She’m gwaine to marry t’other, arter all! From her awn +lips I’ve heard it! That’s what I get for being a church member +from the womb! That’s my reward! God, indeed! Be them the ways o’ +a plain-dealin’ God, who knaws what’s doin’ in human +hearts? No fay! Bunkum an’ rot! I’ll never lift my voice in hymn +nor psalm no more, nor pray a line o’ prayer again. Who be I to be +treated like that? Drunken auld cat! I cussed her—I cussed her! +Wouldn’t marry her now if she axed wi’ her mouth in the dirt. +Wheer’s justice to? Tell me that. Me in church, keepin’ order +’mong the damn boys generation arter generation, and him never inside +the door since he buried his wife. An’ parson siding wi’ un, +I’ll wager. Mother Coomstock ’ll give un hell’s delights, +that’s wan gude thought. A precious pair of ’em! Tchut! +Gar!”</p> +<p>“I doan’t really think you could have loved Mrs. Coomstock +overmuch, Billy, if you can talk so ugly an’ crooked ’bout +her,” said Phoebe.</p> +<p>“I did, I tell ’e—for years an’ years. I went down +on my knees to the bitch—I wish I hadn’t; I’ll be sorry for +that to my dying day. I kissed her, tu,—s’ elp me, I did. You +mightn’t think it, but I did—a faace like a frost-bitten +beetroot, as ’t is!”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e, please, say such horrible things. You must +be wise about it. You see, they say Mr. Lezzard has more money than you. At +least, so Mrs. Coomstock told her nephew, Clement Hicks. Every one of her +relations is savage about it.”</p> +<p>“Well they may be. Why doan’t they lock her up? If she +ban’t mad, nobody ever was. ’Money’! Lezzard! Lying +auld—auld—Tchut! Not money enough to pay for a graave to hide his +rotten bones, I lay. Oh, ’t is enough to—theer, what ’s the +use of talkin’? Tchut—Tchut!”</p> +<p>At this point Phoebe, fearing even greater extravagances in Mr. +Blee’s language, left him to consider his misfortunes alone. Long he +continued in the profoundest indignation, and it was not until Miller Lyddon +returned, heard the news, and heartily congratulated Billy on a merciful +escape, that the old man grew a little calmer under his disappointment, and +moderated the bitterness and profanity of his remarks.</p> +<h2><a id="II_IX" name="II_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX<br /> +A DIFFERENCE WITH THE DUCHY</h2> +<p>Newtake Farm, by reason of Will’s recent occupancy, could offer no +very considerable return during his first year as tenant; but that he +understood and accepted, and the tribulation which now fell upon him was of +his own making. To begin with, Sam Bonus vanished from the scene. On +learning, soon after the event, that Bonus had discussed Hicks and himself at +Chagford, and detailed his private conversation with Martin Grimbal, +Blanchard, in a fury, swept off to the loft where his man slept, roused him +from rest, threw down the balance of his wages, and dismissed him on the +spot. He would hear no word in explanation, and having administered a +passionate rebuke, departed as he had come, like a whirlwind. Sam, smarting +under this injustice, found the devil wake in him through that sleepless +night, and had there stood rick or stack within reach of revenge, he might +have dealt his master a return blow before morning. As usual, after the lapse +of hours, Will cooled down, modified his first fiery indignation, and +determined, yet without changing his mind, to give Bonus an opportunity of +explaining the thing he had done. Chris had brought the news from Clement +himself, and Will, knowing that his personal relations with Clement were +already strained, felt that in justice to his servant he must be heard upon +the question. But, when he sought Sam Bonus, though still the dawn was only +grey, he found the world fuller for him by another enemy, for the man had +taken him at his word and departed. During that day and the next Will made +some effort to see Bonus, but nothing came of it, so, dismissing the matter +from his mind, he hired a new labourer—one Teddy Chown, son of Abraham +Chown, the Inspector of Police—and pursued his way.</p> +<p>Then his unbounded energy led him into difficulties of a graver sort. Will +had long cast covetous eyes on a tract of moorland immediately adjoining +Newtake, and there being little to do at the moment, he conceived the +adventurous design of reclaiming it. The patch was an acre and a half in +extent—a beggarly, barren region, where the heather thinned away and +the black earth shone with water and disintegrated granite. Quartz particles +glimmered over it; at the centre black pools of stagnant water marked an +abandoned peat cutting; any spot less calculated to attract an agricultural +eye would have been hard to imagine; but Blanchard set to work, began to fill +the greedy quag in the midst with tons of soil, and soon caused the place to +look business-like—at least in his own estimation. As for the Duchy, he +did not trouble himself. The Duchy itself was always reclaiming land without +considering the rights and wrongs of the discontented Venville tenants, and +Will knew of many a “newtake” besides this he contemplated. +Indeed, had not the whole farm, of which he was now master, been rescued from +the Moor in time past? He worked hard, therefore, and his new assistant, +though not a Bonus, proved stout and active. Chris, who still dwelt with her +brother, was sworn to secrecy respecting Will’s venture; and so lonely +a region did the farm occupy that not until he had put a good month of work +into the adjacent waste were any of those in authority aware of the young +farmer’s performance.</p> +<p>A day came when the new land was cleaned, partly ploughed, and wholly +surrounded by a fence of split stumps, presently to be connected by wires. At +these Chown was working, while Will had just arrived with a load of earth to +add to the many tons already poured upon that hungry central patch. He held +the tailboard of the cart in his hand and was about to remove it; when, +looking up, his heart fluttered a moment despite his sturdy consciousness of +right. On the moor above him rode grey old Vogwell, the Duchy’s man. +His long beard fluttered in the wind, and Will heard the thud of his +horse’s hoofs as he cantered quickly to the scene, passed between two +of the stakes, and drew up alongside Blanchard.</p> +<p>“Marnin’, Mr. Vogwell! Fine weather, to be sure, an’ +gude for the peat next month; but bad for roots, an’ no mistake. Will +’e have a drink?”</p> +<p>Mr. Vogwell gazed sternly about him, then fixed his little bright eyes on +the culprit.</p> +<p>“What do this mean, Will Blanchard?”</p> +<p>“Well, why not? Duchy steals all the gude land from Venwell men; why +for shouldn’t us taake a little of the bad? This here weern’t no +gude to man or mouse. Ban’t ’nough green stuff for a rabbit +’pon it. So I just thought I’d give it a lick an’ a promise +o’ more later on.”</p> +<p>“‘A lick an’ a promise’! You’ve wasted a +month’s work on it, to the least.”</p> +<p>“Well, p’raps I have—though ban’t wasted. Do +’e think, Mr. Vogwell, as the Duchy might be disposed to give me a +hand?”</p> +<p>Will generally tackled difficulties in this audacious fashion, and a laugh +already began to brighten his eye; but the other quenched it.</p> +<p>“You fool! You knawed you was doin’ wrong better’n I can +tell you—an’ such a plaace! A babe could see you ’m +workin’ awver living springs. You caan’t fill un even now in the +drouth, an’ come autumn an’ rain ’t will all be bog +again.”</p> +<p>“Nothing of the sort,” flamed out Will, quite forgetting his +recent assertion as to the poverty of the place. “Do ’e think, +you, as awnly rides awver the Moor, knaws more about soil than I as works on +it? ’Twill be gude proofy land bimebye—so good as any Princetown +way, wheer the prison men reclaim, an’ wheer theer’s grass this +minute as carries a bullock to the acre. First I’ll plant rye, then +swedes, then maybe more swedes, then barley; an’, with the barley, +I’ll sow the permanent grass to follow. That’s gude rotation of +crops for Dartymoor, as I knaw an’ you doan’t; an’ if the +Duchy encloses the best to rob our things<a id="footnotetag11" name= +"footnotetag11"></a><a href="#footnote11"><sup>11</sup></a>, why for +shouldn’t we—”</p> +<p>“That’ll do. I caan’t bide here listenin’ to your +child’s-talk all the marnin’. What Duchy does an’ +doan’t do is for higher ’n you or me to decide. If this was any +man’s work but yours I’d tell Duchy this night; but bein’ +you, I’ll keep mute. Awnly mind, when I comes this way a fortnight +hence, let me see these postes gone an’ your plough an’ cart +t’ other side that wall. An’ you’ll thank me, when +you’ve come to more sense, for stoppin’ this wild-goose chase. +Now I’ll have a drop o’ cider, if it’s all the same to +you.”</p> +<p>Will opened a stone jar which lay under his coat at hand, and answered as +he poured cider into a horn mug for Mr. Vogwell—</p> +<p>“Here’s your drink; but I won’t take your orders, so I +tell ’e. Damn the Duchy, as steals moor an’ common wheer it +pleases an’ then grudges a man his toil.”</p> +<p>“That’s the spirit as’ll land ’e in the poorhouse, +Will Blanchard,” said Mr. Vogwell calmly; “and that’s such +a job as might send ’e to the County Asylum,” he added, pointing +to the operations around him. “As to damning Duchy,” he +continued, “you might as well damn the sun or moon. They’d care +as little. Theer ’m some varmints so small that, though they bite +’e with all their might, you never knaw it; an’ so ’t is +wi’ you an’ Duchy. Mind now, a fortnight. Thank ’e—so +gude cider as ever I tasted; an’ doan’t ’e tear an’ +rage, my son. What’s the use?”</p> +<p>“’Twould be use, though, if us all raged together.”</p> +<p>“But you won’t get none to follow. ’Tis all talk. Duchy +haven’t got no bones to break or sawl to lose; an’ moormen +haven’t got brains enough to do aught in the matter but jaw.”</p> +<p>“An’ all for a royal prince, as doan’t knaw difference +between yether an’ fuzz, I lay,” growled Will. “Small blame +to moormen for being radical-minded these days. Who wouldn’t, treated +same as us?”</p> +<p>“Best not talk on such high subjects, Will Blanchard, or you might +get in trouble. A fortnight, mind. Gude marnin’ to ’e.”</p> +<p>The Duchy’s man rode off and Will stood angry and irresolute. Then, +seeing Mr. Vogwell was still observing him, he ostentatiously turned to the +cart and tipped up his load of earth. But when the representative of power +had disappeared—his horse and himself apparently sinking into rather +than behind a heather ridge—Will’s energy died and his mood +changed. He had fooled himself about this enterprise until the present, but +he could no longer do so. Now he sat down on the earth he had brought, let +his horse drag the cart after it, as it wandered in search of some green +thing, and suffered a storm of futile indignation to darken his spirit.</p> +<p>Blanchard’s unseasoned mind had, in truth, scarcely reached the +second milestone upon the road of man’s experience. Some arrive early +at the mental standpoint where the five senses meet and merge in that sixth +or common sense, which may be defined as an integral of the others, and which +is manifested by those who possess it in a just application of all the +experience won from life. But of common sense Will had none. He could +understand laziness and wickedness being made to suffer; he could read +Nature’s more self-evident lessons blazoned across every meadow, +displayed in every living organism—that error is instantly punished, +that poor food starves the best seed, that too much water is as bad as too +little, that the race is to the strong, and so forth; but he could not +understand why hard work should go unrewarded, why good intentions should +breed bad results, why the effect of energy, self-denial, right ambitions, +and other excellent qualities is governed by chance; why the prizes in the +great lottery fall to the wise, not to the well-meaning. He knew himself for +a hard worker and a man who accomplished, in all honesty, the best within his +power. What his hand found to do he did with his might; and the fact that his +head, as often as not, prompted his hand to the wrong thing escaped him. He +regarded his life as exemplary, felt that he was doing all that might in +reason be demanded, and confidently looked towards Providence to do the rest. +To find Providence unwilling to help him brought a wave of riotous +indignation through his mind on each occasion of making that discovery. These +waves, sweeping at irregular intervals over Will, left the mark of their high +tides, and his mind, now swinging like a pendulum before this last buffet +dealt by Fate in semblance of the Duchy’s man, plunged him into a huge +discontent with all things. He was ripe for mischief and would have +quarrelled with his shadow; but he did worse—he quarrelled with his +mother.</p> +<p>She visited him that afternoon, viewed his shattered scheme, and listened +as Will poured the great outrage upon her ear. Coming up at his express +invitation to learn the secret, which he had kept from her that her joy might +be the greater, Mrs. Blanchard only arrived in time to see his +disappointment. She knew the Duchy for a bad enemy, and perhaps at the bottom +of her conservative heart felt no particular delight at the spectacle of +Newtake enlarging its borders. She therefore held that everything was for the +best, and counselled patience; whereupon her son, with a month’s wasted +toil staring him in the face, rebelled and took her unconcerned demeanour +ill. Damaris also brought a letter from Phoebe, and this added fuel to the +flame. Will dwelt upon his wife’s absence bitterly.</p> +<p>“Job’s self never suffered that, for I read ’bout what +he went through awnly last night, for somethin’ to kill an hour in the +evenin’. An’ I won’t suffer it. It’s contrary to +nature, an’ if Phoebe ban’t here come winter I’ll go down +an’ bring her, willy-nilly.”</p> +<p>“Time’ll pass soon enough, my son. Next summer will be here +quick. Then her’ll have grawin’ corn to look at and fine crops +risin’, an’ more things feedin’ on the Moor in sight of her +eyes. You see, upland farms do look a little thin to them who have lived all +their time in the fatness of the valleys.”</p> +<p>“If I was bidin’ in one of them stone roundy-poundies, with +nothin’ but a dog-kennel for a home, she ought to be shoulder to +shoulder wi’ me. Did you leave my faither cause other people +didn’t love un?”</p> +<p>“That was differ’nt. Theer s Miller Lyddon. I could much wish +you seed more of him an’ let un come by a better ’pinion of +’e. ’T s awnly worldly wisdom, true; but—”</p> +<p>“I’m sick to death o’ worldly wisdom! What’s it +done for me? I stand to work nine an’ ten hour a day, an’ not +wi’out my share o’ worldly wisdom, neither. Then I’m played +with an’ left to whistle, I ban’t gwaine to think so much, I tell +’e. It awnly hurts a man’s head, an’ keeps him wakin’ +o’ nights. Life’s guess-work, by the looks of it, an’ a +fule’s so like to draw a prize as the wisest.”</p> +<p>“That’s not the talk as’ll make Newtake pay, Will. You +’m worse than poor Blee to Monks Barton. He’s gwaine round +givin’ out theer ban’t no God ’t all, ’cause Mrs. +Coomstock took auld Lezzard ’stead of him.”</p> +<p>“You may laugh if you like, mother. ’Tis the fashion to laugh +at me seemin’ly. But I doan’t care. Awnly you’ll be sorry +some day, so sure as you sit in thicky chair. Now, as you’ve +nothin’ but blame, best to go back home. I’ll put your pony in +the shafts. ’Twas a pity you corned so far for so little.”</p> +<p>He went off, his breast heaving, while the woman followed him with her +eyes and smiled when he was out of sight. She knew him so well, and already +pictured her repentant son next Sunday. Then Will would be at his +mother’s cottage, and cut the bit of beef at dinner, and fuss over her +comfort according to his custom.</p> +<p>She went into the farmyard and took the pony from him and led it back into +the stall. Then she returned to him and put her arm through his and +spoke.</p> +<p>“Light your pipe, lovey, an’ walk a li’l way along down +to the stones on the hill, wheer you was born. Your auld mother wants to talk +to ’e.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_X" name="II_X"></a>CHAPTER X<br /> +CONNECTING LINKS</h2> +<p>Spaces of time extending over rather more than a year may now be dismissed +in a chapter.</p> +<p>Chris Blanchard, distracted between Will and her lover, stayed on at +Newtake after the estrangement, with a hope that she might succeed in healing +the breach between them; but her importunity failed of its good object, and +there came an August night when she found her own position at her +brother’s farm grow no longer tenable.</p> +<p>The blinds were up, and rays from the lamp shot a broad band of light into +the farmyard, while now and again great white moths struck soft blows against +the closed window, then vanished again into the night. Will smoked and Chris +pleaded until a point, beyond which her brother’s patience could not +go, was reached. Irritation grew and grew before her ceaseless entreaty on +Clement’s behalf; for the thousandth time she begged him to write a +letter of apology and explanation of the trouble bred by Sam Bonus; and he, +suddenly rising, smashed down his clay pipe and swore by all his gods he +would hear the name of Hicks mentioned in his house no more. Thus challenged +to choose between her lover and her brother, the girl did not hesitate. +Something of Will’s own spirit informed her; she took him at his word +and returned home next morning, leaving him to manage his own household +affairs henceforth as best he might.</p> +<p>Upon the way to Chagford Chris chanced to meet with Martin Grimbal, and, +having long since accepted his offer of friendship, she did not hesitate to +tell him of her present sorrow and invite his sympathy. From ignorance rather +than selfishness did Chris take Martin literally when he had hoped in the +past they might remain friends, and their intercourse was always maintained +by her when chance put one in the other’s way—at a cost to the +man beyond her power to guess.</p> +<p>Now he walked beside her, and she explained how only a word was wanting +between Will and Clement which neither would speak. Hicks had forgiven Will, +but he refused to visit Newtake until he received an apology from the master +of it; and Blanchard bore no ill-will to Clement, but declined to apologise +for the past. These facts Martin listened to, while the blood beat like a +tide within his temples, and a mist dimmed his eyes as the girl laid her +brown hand upon his arm now and again, to accentuate a point. At such moments +the truth tightened upon his soul and much distressed him.</p> +<p>The antiquary had abandoned any attempt to forget Chris, or cease from +worshipping her with all his heart and soul; but the emotion now muzzled and +chained out of sight he held of nobler composition than that earlier love +which yearned for possession. Those dreary months that dragged between the +present and his first disappointment had served as foundations for new +developments of character in the man. He existed through a period of +unutterable despair and loneliness; then the fruits of bygone battles fought +and won came to his aid, and long-past years of self-denial and self-control +fortified his spirit. The reasonableness of Martin Grimbal lifted him slowly +but steadily from the ashes of disappointment; even his natural humility +helped him, and he told himself he had no more than his desert. Presently, +with efforts the very vigour of which served as tonic to character, he began +to wrestle at the granite again and resume his archaeologic studies. Speaking +in general terms, his mind was notably sweetened and widened by his +experience; and, resulting from his own failure to reach happiness, there +awoke in him a charity and sympathy for others, a fellow-feeling with +humanity, remarkable in one whose enthusiasm for human nature was not large, +whose ruling passion, until the circumstance of love tinctured it, had led +him by ways which the bulk of men had pronounced arid and unsatisfying. Now +this larger insight was making a finer character of him and planting, even at +the core of his professional pursuits, something deeper than is generally to +be found there. His experience, in fact, was telling upon his work, and he +began slowly to combine with the labour of the yard-measure and the pencil, +the spade and the camera, just thoughts on the subject of those human +generations who ruled the Moor aforetime, who lived and loved and laboured +there full many a day before Saxon keel first grated on British shingle.</p> +<p>To Chris did Martin listen attentively. Until the present time he had +taken Will’s advice and made no offer of work to Clement; but now he +determined to do so, although he knew this action must mean speedy marriage +for Chris. Love, that often enough can shake a lifetime of morality, that can +set ethics and right conduct and duty playing a devil’s dance in the +victim’s soul, that can change the practised customs of a man’s +life and send cherished opinions, accepted beliefs, and approved dogmas +spinning into chaos before its fiery onslaught—love did not thus +overpower Martin Grimbal. His old-fashioned mind was no armour against it, +and in that the passion proved true; religion appeared similarly powerless to +influence him; yet now his extreme humility, his natural sense of justice and +the dimensions of his passion itself combined to lead him by a lofty road. +Chris desired another man, and Martin Grimbal, loving her to that point where +her perfect happiness dominated and, indeed, became his own, determined that +his love should bear fruit worthy of its object.</p> +<p>This kindly design was frustrated, however, and the antiquary himself +denied power to achieve the good action that he proposed, for on visiting +Clement in person and inviting his aid in the clerical portions of a +considerable work on moorland antiquities, the poet refused to assist.</p> +<p>“You come too late,” he said coldly. “I would not help +you now if I could, Martin Grimbal. Don’t imagine pride or any such +motive keeps me from doing so. The true reason you may guess.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! I can do nothing of the sort. What reason is there against +your accepting an offer to do remunerative and intellectual work in your +leisure hours—work that may last ten years for all I can see to the +contrary?”</p> +<p>“The reason is that you invited another man’s judgment upon +me, instead of taking your own. Better follow Will Blanchard’s advice +still. Don’t think I’m blind. It is Chris who has made you do +this.”</p> +<p>“You’re a very difficult man to deal with, really. Consider my +suggestion, Hicks, and all it might mean. I desire nothing but your +welfare.”</p> +<p>“Which is only to say you are offering me charity.”</p> +<p>Martin looked at the other quietly, then took his hat and departed. At the +door he said a last word.</p> +<p>“I don’t want to think this is final. You would be very useful +to me, or I should not have asked you to aid my labour. Let me hear from you +within a week.”</p> +<p>But Clement was firm in his folly; while, although they met on more than +one occasion, and John Grimbal repeated his offer of regular work, the +bee-keeper refused that proposal, also. He made some small sums out of the +Red House hives, but would not undertake any regular daily labour there. +Clement’s refusal of Martin resulted from his own weak pride and +self-conscious stupidity; but a more subtle tangle of conflicting motives was +responsible for his action in respect of the elder Grimbal’s +invitation. Some loyalty to the man whom he so cordially disliked still +inhabited his mind, and with it a very considerable distrust of himself. He +partly suspected the reason of John Grimbal’s offer of work, and the +possibility of sudden temptation provoking from him utterance of words best +left unsaid could not be ignored after his former experience at the hiving of +the swarm.</p> +<p>So he went his way and told nobody—not even Chris—of these +opportunities and his action concerning them. Such reticence made two women +sad. Chris, after her conversation with Martin, doubted not but that he would +make some effort, and, hearing nothing as time passed, assumed he had changed +his mind; while Mrs. Hicks, who had greatly hoped that Clement’s visit +to the Red House might result in regular employment, felt disappointed when +no such thing occurred.</p> +<p>The union of Mr. Lezzard and Mrs. Coomstock was duly accomplished to a +chorus of frantic expostulation on the part of those interested in the +widow’s fortune. Mr. Shorto-Champernowne, having convinced himself that +the old woman was in earnest, could find no sufficient reason for doing +otherwise than he was asked, and finally united the couple. To Newton Abbot +they went for their honeymoon, and tribulation haunted them from the first. +Mrs. Lezzard refused her husband permission to inquire any particulars of her +affairs from her lawyer—a young man who had succeeded Mr. Joel +Ford—while the Gaffer, on his side, parried all his lady’s +endeavours to learn more of the small fortune concerning which he had spoken +not seldom before marriage. Presently they returned to Chagford, and life +resolved itself into an unlovely thing for both of them. Time brought no +better understanding or mutual confidence; on the contrary, they never ceased +from wrangling over money and Mrs. Lezzard’s increasing propensity +towards drink. The old man suffered most, and as his alleged three hundred +pounds did not appear, being, indeed, a mere lover’s effort of +imagination, his wife bitterly resented marriage under such false pretences, +and was never weary of protesting. Of her own affairs she refused to tell her +husband anything, but as Mr. Lezzard was found to possess no money at all, it +became necessary to provide him with a bare competence for the credit of the +family. He did his best to win a little more regard and consideration, in the +hope that when his wife passed away the reward of devotion might be reaped; +but she never forgave him, expressed the conviction that she would outlive +him by many years, and exhausted her ingenuity to make the old man rue his +bargain. Only one experience, and that repeated as surely as Mr. Blee met Mr. +Lezzard, was more trying to the latter than all the accumulated misfortune of +his sorry state—Gaffer’s own miseries appeared absolutely trivial +by comparison with Mr. Blee’s comments upon them.</p> +<p>With another year Blanchard and Hicks became in some sort reconciled, +though the former friendship was never renewed. The winter proved a severe +one, and Will experienced a steady drain on his capital, but he comforted +himself in thoughts of the spring, watched his wheat dapple the dark ground +with green, and also foretold exceptional crops of hay when summer should +return. The great event of his wife’s advent at Newtake occupied most +of his reflections; while as for Phoebe herself the matter was never out of +her mind. She lived for the day in June that should see her by her +husband’s side; but Miller Lyddon showed no knowledge of the +significance of Phoebe’s twenty-first birthday; and when Will brought +up the matter, upon an occasion of meeting with his father-in-law, the miller +deprecated any haste.</p> +<p>“Time enough—time enough,” he said. “You +doan’t want no wife to Newtake these years to come, while I <i>do</i> +want a darter to home.”</p> +<p>So Phoebe, albeit the course of operations was fully planned, forbore to +tell her father anything, and suffered the day to drift nearer and nearer +without expressly indicating the event it was to witness.</p> +<h2><a id="II_XI" name="II_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI<br /> +TOGETHER</h2> +<p>Though not free from various temporal problems that daily demanded +solution, Will very readily allowed his mind a holiday from all affairs of +business during the fortnight that preceded his wife’s arrival at +Newtake. What whitewash could do was done; a carpet, long since purchased but +not laid down till now, adorned the miniature parlour; while out of doors, +becoming suddenly conscious that not a blossom would greet Phoebe’s +eyes, Will set about the manufacture of a flower-bed under the kitchen +window, bound the plat with neat red tiles, and planted therein half a dozen +larkspurs—Phoebe’s favourite flower—with other happy +beauties of early summer. The effort looked raw and unhappy, however, and as +ill luck would have it, these various plants did not take kindly to their +changed life, and greeted Phoebe with hanging heads.</p> +<p>But the great morning came at last, and Will, rising, with the curious +thought that he would never sleep in the middle of his bed again, donned his +best dark-brown velveteens and a new pair of leathern gaiters, then walked +out into the air, where Chown was milking the cows. The day dawned as +brightly as the events it heralded, and Will, knowing that his mother and +Chris would be early at Newtake, strolled out to meet them. Over against the +farm rose moorland crowned by stone, and from off their granite couches grey +mists blushing to red now rose with lazy deliberation and vanished under the +sun’s kiss. A vast, sweet, diamond-twinkling freshness filled the Moor; +blue shadows lay in the dewy coombs, and sun-fires gleamed along the heather +ridges. No heath-bell as yet had budded, but the flame of the whins splashed +many undulations, and the tender foliage of the whortleberry, where it grew +on exposed granite, was nearly scarlet and flashed jewel-bright in the rich +texture of the waste. Will saw his cattle pass to their haunts, sniffed the +savour of them on the wind, and enjoyed the thought of being their possessor; +then his eyes turned to the valley and the road which wound upwards from it +under great light. A speck at length appeared three parts of a mile distant +and away started Blauchard, springing down the hillside to intercept it. His +heart sang within him; here was a glorious day that could never come again, +and he meant to live it gloriously.</p> +<p>“Marnin’, mother! Marnin’, Chris! Let me get in between +’e. Breakfast will be most ready by time we’m home. I knawed you +d keep your word such a rare fashion day!”</p> +<p>Will soon sat between the two women, while Mrs. Blanchard’s pony +regulated its own pace and three tongues chattered behind it. A dozen brown +paper parcels occupied the body of the little cart, for Damaris had insisted +that the wedding feast should be of her providing. It was proposed that Chris +and her mother should spend the day at Newtake and depart after drinking tea; +while Phoebe was to arrive in a fly at one o’clock.</p> +<p>After breakfast Chris busied herself indoors and occupied her quick +fingers in putting a dozen finishing touches; while Mrs. Blanchard walked +round the farm beside Will, viewed with outspoken approval or secret distrust +those evidences of success and failure spread about her, and passed the +abandoned attempt to reclaim land without a word or sign that she remembered. +Will crowed like a happy child; his mother poured advice into his unheeding +ears; and then a cart lumbered up with a great surprise in it. True to her +intention Mrs. Blanchard had chosen the day of Phoebe ’s arrival to +send the old piano to Newtake, and now it was triumphantly trundled into the +parlour, while Will protested and admired. It added not a little to the solid +splendour of the apartment, and Mrs. Blanchard viewed it with placid but +genuine satisfaction. Its tarnished veneer and red face looked like an old +honest friend, so Will declared, and he doubted not that his wife would +rejoice as he did.</p> +<p>Presently the cart destined to bring Phoebe’s boxes started for +Chagford under Ted Chown’s direction. It was a new cart, and the owner +hoped that sight of it, with “William Blanchard, Newtake,” nobly +displayed on the tail-board, would please his father-in-law.</p> +<p>Meantime, at Monks Barton the great day had likewise dawned, but Phoebe, +from cowardice rather than philosophy, did not mention what was to happen +until the appearance of Chown made it necessary to do so.</p> +<p>Mr. Blee was the first to stand bewildered before Ted’s blunt +announcement that he had come for Mrs. Blanchard’s luggage.</p> +<p>“What luggage? What the douce be talkin’ ’bout?” +he asked.</p> +<p>“Why, everything, I s’pose. She ’m comin’ home +to-day—that’s knawn, ban’t it?”</p> +<p>“Gormed if ’tis! Not by me, anyways—nor Miller, +neither.”</p> +<p>Then Phoebe appeared and Billy heard the truth.</p> +<p>“My! An’ to keep it that quiet! Theer’ll be a tidy +upstore when Miller comes to hear tell—”</p> +<p>But Mr. Lyddon was at the door and Phoebe answered his questioning +eyes.</p> +<p>“My birthday, dear faither. You must remember—why, you was the +first to give me joy of it! Twenty-one to-day, an’ I must go—I +must—’tis my duty afore everything.”</p> +<p>The old man’s jaw fell and he looked the picture of sorrowful +surprise.</p> +<p>“But—but to spring it like this! Why to-day? Why to-day? +It’s madness and it’s cruelty to fly from your home the first +living moment you’ve got the power. I’d counted on a merry +evenin,’ tu, an’ axed more ’n wan to drink your gude +health.”</p> +<p>“Many’s the merry evenings us’ll have, dear faither, +please God; but a husband’s a husband. He’ve been that wonnerful +patient, tu, for such as him. ’T was my fault for not remindin’ +you. An’ yet I did, now an’ again, but you wouldn’t see it. +Yet you knawed in your heart, an’ I didn’t like to pain ’e +dwellin’ on it overmuch.”</p> +<p>“How did I knaw? I didn’t knaw nothin’ ’t all +’bout it. How should I? Me grawin’ aulder an’ aulder, +an’ leanin’ more an’ more ’pon ’e at every +turn. An’ him no friend to me—he ’s never sought to win +me—he ’s—”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e taake on ’bout Will, dearie; +you’ll come to knaw un better bimebye. I ban’t gwaine so far +arter all; an’ it’s got to be.”</p> +<p>Then the miller worked himself into a passion, dared Chown to take his +daughter’s boxes, and made a scene very painful to witness and quite +futile in its effect. Phoebe could be strong at times, and a life’s +knowledge of her father helped her now. She told Chown to get the boxes and +bade Billy help him; she then followed Mr. Lyddon, who was rambling away, +according to his custom at moments of great sorrow, to pour his troubles into +any ear that would listen. She put her arm through his, drew him to the +riverside and spoke words that showed she had developed mentally of late. She +was a woman with her father, cooed pleasantly to him, foretold good things, +and implored him to have greater care of his health and her love than to +court illness by this display of passion. Such treatment had sufficed to calm +the miller in many of his moods, for she possessed great power to soothe him, +and Mr. Lyddon now set increased store upon his daughter’s judgment; +but to-day, before this dreadful calamity, every word and affectionate device +was fruitless and only made the matter worse. He stormed on, and +Phoebe’s superior manner vanished as he did so, for she could only play +such a part if quite unopposed in it. Now her father silenced her, frightened +her, and dared her to leave him; but his tragic temper changed when they +returned to the farm and he found his daughter’s goods were really +gone. Then the old man grew very silent, for the inexorable certainty of the +thing about to happen was brought home to him at last.</p> +<p>Before a closed hackney carriage from the hotel arrived to carry Phoebe to +Newtake, Miller Lyddon passed through a variety of moods, and another +outburst succeeded his sentimental silence. When the vehicle was at the gate, +however, his daughter found tears in his eyes upon entering the kitchen +suddenly to wish him “good-by.” But he brushed them away at sight +of her, and spoke roughly and told her to be gone and find the difference +between a good father and a bad husband.</p> +<p>“Go to the misery of your awn choosin’; go to him an’ +the rubbish-heap he calls a farm! Thankless an’ +ontrue,—go,—an’ look to me in the future to keep you out of +the poorhouse and no more. An’ that for your mother’s +sake—not yourn.”</p> +<p>“Oh, Faither!” she cried, “doan’t let them be the +last words I hear ’pon your lips. ’T is cruel, for sure +I’ve been a gude darter to ’e, or tried to +be—an’—an’—please, dear faither, just say you +wish us well—me an’ my husband. Please say that much. I +doan’t ax more.”</p> +<p>But he rose and left her without any answer. It was then Phoebe’s +turn to weep, and blinded with tears she slipped and hurt her knee getting +into the coach. Billy thereupon offered his aid, helped her, handed her +little white fox terrier m after her, and saw that the door was properly +closed.</p> +<p>“Be o’ good cheer,” he said, “though I +caan’t offer ’e much prospects of easy life in double harness +wi’ Will Blanchard. But, as I used to say in my church-gwaine days, +‘God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.’ Be it as ’twill, +I dare say theer ’s many peaceful years o’ calm, +black-wearin’ widowhood afore ’e yet, for chaps like him do +shorten theer days a deal by such a tearin’, high-coloured, passionate +way of life.”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee opened the gate, the maids waved their handkerchiefs and wept, +and not far distant, as he heard the vehicle containing his daughter depart, +Mr. Lyddon would have given half that he had to recall the spoken word. +Phoebe once gone, his anger vanished and his love for her won on him like +sunshine after storm. Angry, indeed, he still was, but with himself.</p> +<p>For Phoebe, curiosity and love dried her tears as she passed upward +towards the Moor. Then, the wild land reached, she put her head out of the +window and saw Newtake beech trees in the distance. Already the foliage of +them seemed a little tattered and thin, and their meagreness of vesture and +solitary appearance depressed the spectator again before she arrived at +them.</p> +<p>But the gate, thrown widely open, was reached at last, and there stood +Will and Mrs. Blanchard, Chris, Ted Chown, and the great bobtailed sheep-dog, +“Ship,” to welcome her. With much emotion poor Phoebe alighted, +tottered and fell into the bear-hug of her husband, while the women also +kissed her and murmured over her in their sweet, broad Devon tongue. Then +something made Will laugh, and his merriment struck the right note; but Ship +fell foul of Phoebe’s little terrier and there was a growl, then a yelp +and a scuffling, dusty battle amid frightened fowls, whose protests added to +the tumult. Upon this conflict descended Will’s sapling with sounding +thuds administered impartially, and from the skirmish the smaller beast +emerged lame and crying, while the sheep-dog licked the blood off his nose +and went to heel with a red light glimmering through his pale blue eyes.</p> +<p>Happiness returned indoors and Phoebe, all blushes and praises, inspected +her new home and the preparations made within it for her pleasure. Perhaps +she simulated more joy than the moment brought, for such a day, dreamed of +through years, was sure in its realisation to prove something of an +anti-climax after the cruel nature of all such events. Despite Chris and her +ceaseless efforts to keep joy at the flood, a listlessness stole over the +little party as the day wore on. Phoebe found her voice not to be relied upon +and felt herself drifting into that state between laughter and tears which +craves solitude for its exhibition. The cows came home to be milked, and +there seemed but few of them after the great procession at Monks Barton. Yet +Will demanded her separate praises for each beast. In the little garden he +had made, budding flowers, untimely transplanted, hung their heads. But she +admired with extravagant adjectives, and picked a blossom and set it in her +dress. Anon the sun set, with no soft lights and shadows amidst the valley +trees she knew, when sunset and twilight played hide-and-seek beside the +river, but slowly, solemnly, in hard, clean, illimitable glory upon horizons +of granite and heather. The peat glowed as though it were red-hot, and night +brooded on the eastern face of every hill. Only a jangling bell broke the +startling stillness then, and, through long weeks afterwards the girl yearned +for the song of the river, as one who has long slept by another’s side +sadly yearns for the sound of their breathing by night, when they are taken +away. Phoebe had little imagination, but she guessed already that the life +before her must differ widely from that spent under her father’s roof. +Despite the sunshine of the time and the real joy of being united to her +husband at last, she saw on every side more evidences of practical life than +she had before anticipated. But these braced her rather than not, and she +told herself truly that the sadness at bottom of her heart just then was +wholly begotten of the past and her departure from home. Deep unrest came +upon her as she walked with her husband and listened to his glad voice. She +longed greatly to be alone with him that her heart might be relieved. She +wanted his arms round her; she wanted to cry and let him kiss the tears +away.</p> +<p>Damaris Blanchard very fully understood much that was passing through her +daugher-in-law’s mind, and she hastened her departure after an early +cup of tea. She took a last look at all the good things she had provided for +the wedding supper—a meal she declared must not be shared with Will and +Phoebe—and so made ready to depart. It was then her turn, and her bosom +throbbed with just one dumb, fleeting shadow of fear that found words before +her second thought had time to suppress them.</p> +<p>“You won’t love me no less, eh, Will?” she whispered, +holding his hand between hers; and he saw her grey eyes almost frightened in +the gloaming.</p> +<p>“My God, no! No, mother; a man must have a dirty li’l heart in +un if it ban’t big enough to hold mother an’ wife.”</p> +<p>She gripped his hand tighter.</p> +<p>“Ess fay, I knaw, I knaw; but doan’t ’e put your mother +first now,—ban’t nature. God bless an’ keep the both of +’e. ’Twill allus be my prayer.”</p> +<p>The cart rattled away, Chris driving, and such silence as Phoebe had never +known held the darkening land. She noted a yellow star against the sombre +ridge of the world, felt Will’s arm round her and turned to him, +seeking that comfort and support her nature cried out for.</p> +<p>Infinitely tender and loving was her husband then, and jubilant, too, at +first; but a little later, when Chown had been packed off to his own +apartment, with not a few delicacies he had never bargained for, the +conversation flagged and the banquet also.</p> +<p>The table was laden with two capons, a ham, a great sugared cake, a whole +Dutch cheese, an old-fashioned cut-glass decanter containing brown sherry, +and two green wine-glasses for its reception; yet these luxuries tempted +neither husband nor wife to much enjoyment of them. Indeed Phoebe’s +obvious lowness of spirits presently found its echo in Will. The silences +grew longer and longer; then the husband set down his knife and fork, and +leaving the head of the table went round to his wife’s side and took +her hand and squeezed it, but did not speak. She turned to him and he saw her +shut her eyes and give a little shiver. Then a tear flashed upon her lashes +and twinkled boldly down, followed by another.</p> +<p>“Phoebe! My awn li’l wummon! This be a wisht +home-comin’! What the plague’s the matter wi’ +us?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e mind, dear heart. I’m happy as a bird +under these silly tears. But ’twas the leavin’ o’ faither, +an’ him so hard, an’ me lovin’ him so dear, +an’—an’—”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e break your heart ’bout him. He’ll +come round right enough. ’Twas awnly the pang o’ your gwaine +away, like the drawin’ of a tooth.”</p> +<p>“Everybody else in the world knaws I ought to be here,” sobbed +Phoebe, “but faither, he won’t see it. An’ I caan’t +get un out of my mind to-night, sitting that mournfui an’ desolate, +wi’ his ear deaf to Billy’s noise an’ his thoughts up +here.”</p> +<p>“If he won’t onderstand the ways of marriage, blessed if I see +how we can make him. Surely to God, ’twas time I had my awn?”</p> +<p>“Ess, dear Will, but coming to-day, ’pon top of my gert joy, +faither’s sorrow seemed so terrible-like.”</p> +<p>“He’ll get awver it, an’ so will you, bless you. Drink +up some of this braave stuff mother left. Sherry ’t is, real wine, as +will comfort ’e, my li’l love. ’Tis I be gwaine to make +your happiness henceforward, mind; an’ as for Miller, he belongs to an +auld-fashioned generation of mankind, and it’s our place to make +allowances. Auld folk doan’t knaw an’ won’t larn. But +he’ll come to knaw wan solid thing, if no more; an’ that is as +his darter’ll have so gude a husband as she’ve got faither, +though I sez it.”</p> +<p>“’Tis just what he said I shouldn’t, Will.”</p> +<p>“Nevermind, forgive un, an’ drink up your wine; ’twill +hearten ’e.”</p> +<p>A dog barked, a gate clinked, and there came the sound of a horse’s +hoofs, then of a man dismounting.</p> +<p>Will told the rest of the story afterwards to Mrs. Blanchard.</p> +<p>“‘’Tis faither,’ cries Phoebe, an’ turns so +pale as a whitewashed wall in moonlight. ‘Never!’ I sez. But she +knawed the step of un, an’ twinkled up from off her chair, an’ +’fore ever the auld man reached the door, ’t was awpen. In he +comed, like a lamb o’ gentleness, an’ said never a word for a +bit, then fetched out a little purse wi’ twenty gawld sovereigns in it. +An’ us all had some fine talk for more’n an hour, an’ he +was proper faither to me, if you’ll credit it; an’ he drinked a +glass o’ your wine, mother, an’ said he never tasted none better +and not much so gude. Then us seed un off, an’ Phoebe cried again, poor +twoad, but for sheer happiness this time. So now the future’s clear as +sunlight, an’ we’m all friends—’cept here an’ +theer.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_XII" name="II_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII<br /> +THROUGH ONE GREAT DAY</h2> +<p>Just within the woods of Teign Valley, at a point not far distant from +that where Will Blanchard met John Grimbal for the first time, and wrestled +with him beside the river, there rises a tall bank, covered with fern, +shadowed by oak trees. A mossy bridle-path winds below, while beyond it, seen +through a screen of wych-elms and hazel, extend the outlying meadows of Monks +Barton.</p> +<p>Upon this bank, making “sunshine in a shady place,” reclined +Chris, beneath a harmony of many greens, where the single, double, and triple +shadows of the manifold leaves above her created a complex play of light and +shade all splashed and gemmed with little sun discs. Drowsy noon-day peace +marked the hour; Chris had some work in her hand, but was not engaged upon +it; and Clement, who lolled beside her, likewise did nothing. His eyes were +upon a mare and foal in the meadow below. The matron proceeded slowly, +grazing as she went, while her lanky youngster nibbled at this or that +inviting tuft, then raced joyously in wide circles and, returning, sought his +mother’s milk with the selfish roughness of youth.</p> +<p>“Happy as birds, they be,” said Chris, referring to the young +pair at Newtake. “It do make me long for us to be man an’ wife, +Clem, when I see ’em.”</p> +<p>“We’re that now, save for the hocus-pocus of the parsons you +set such store by.”</p> +<p>“No, I’ll never believe it makes no difference.”</p> +<p>“A cumbrous, stupid, human contrivance like marriage! Was ever man +and woman happier for being bound that way? Can free things feel their hearts +beat closer because they are chained to one another by an effete +dogma?”</p> +<p>“I doan’t onderstand all that talk, sweetheart, an’ you +knaw I don’t; but till some wise body invents a better-fashion way of +joining man an’ maid than marriage, us must taake it as +’tis.”</p> +<p>“There is a better way—Nature’s.”</p> +<p>She shook her head.</p> +<p>“If us could dwell in a hole at a tree-root, an’ eat roots +an’ berries; but we’m thinking creatures in a Christian +land.”</p> +<p>She stretched herself out comfortably and smiled up at him where he sat +with his chin in his hands. Then, looking down, he saw the delicious outline +of her and his eyes grew hot.</p> +<p>“God’s love! How long must it be?” he cried; then, +before she could speak, he clipped her passionately to him and hugged her +closely.</p> +<p>“Dearie, you’m squeezin’ my breath out o’ +me!” cried Chris, well used to these sudden storms and not averse to +them. “We must bide patient an’ hold in our hearts,” she +said, lying in his arms with her face close to his. “’Twill be +all the more butivul when we’m mated. Ess fay! I love ’e allus, +but I love ’e better in this fiery mood than on the ice-cold days when +you won’t so much as hold my hand.”</p> +<p>“The cold mood’s the better notwithstanding, and colder yet +would be better yet, and clay-cold best of all.”</p> +<p>But he held her still, and pressed his beard against her brown neck. Then +the sound of a trotting horse reached his ears, he started up, looked below, +and saw John Grimbal passing by. Their eyes met, for the horseman chanced to +glance up as Clement thrust his head above the fern; but Chris was invisible +and remained so.</p> +<p>Grimbal stopped and greeted the bee-keeper.</p> +<p>“Have you forgotten your undertaking to see my hives once a +month?”</p> +<p>“No, I meant coming next week.”</p> +<p>“Well, as it happens I want to speak with you, and the present +time’s as good as another. I suppose you were only lying there +dreaming?”</p> +<p>“That’s all. I’ll come and walk along beside your +horse.”</p> +<p>He squeezed his sweetheart’s hand, whispered a promise to return +immediately, then rose and stumbled down the bank, leaving Chris throned +aloft in the fern. For a considerable time John Grimbal said nothing, then he +began suddenly,—</p> +<p>“I suppose you know the Applebirds are leaving my farm?”</p> +<p>“Yes, Mrs. Applebird told my mother. Going to +Sticklepath.”</p> +<p>“Not easy to get a tenant to take their place.”</p> +<p>“Is it not? Such a farm as yours? I should have thought there need +be no difficulty.”</p> +<p>“There are tenants and tenants. How would you like it—you and +your mother? Then you could marry and be comfortable. No doubt Chris +Blanchard would make a splendid farmer’s wife.”</p> +<p>“It would be like walking into paradise for me; +but—”</p> +<p>“The rent needn’t bother you. My first care is a good tenant. +Besides, rent may take other shapes than pounds, shillings, and +pence.”</p> +<p>Hicks started.</p> +<p>“I see,” he said; “you can’t forget the chance +word I spoke in anger so long ago.”</p> +<p>“I can’t, because it happened to be just the word I wanted to +hear. My quarrel with Will Blanchard’s no business of yours. The +man’s your enemy too; and you’re a fool to stand in your own +light, You know something that I don’t know, concerning those weeks +during which he disappeared. Well, tell me. You can only live your life once. +Why let it run to rot when the Red House Farm wants a tenant? A man you +despise, too.”</p> +<p>“No. I promised. Besides, you wouldn’t be contented with the +knowledge; you’d act on it.”</p> +<p>Grimbal showed a lightning-quick perception of this admission; and Hicks, +too late, saw that the other had realised its force. Then he made an effort +to modify his assertion.</p> +<p>“When I say ‘you’d act on it,’ I mean that you +might try to, though I much doubt really if anything I could tell you would +damage Blanchard.”</p> +<p>“If you think that, then there can be no conscientious objection to +telling me. Besides, I don’t say I should act on the knowledge. I +don’t say I shall or I shall not. All you ve got to do is to say +whether you’ll take the Red House Farm at a nominal rent from +Michaelmas.”</p> +<p>“No, man, no. You’ve met me in a bad moment, too, if you only +knew. But think of it—brother and sister; and I, in order to marry the +woman, betray the man. That’s what it comes to. Such things don’t +happen.”</p> +<p>“You re speaking plainly, at any rate. We ought to understand each +other to-day, if ever. I’ll make you the same offer for less return. +Tell me where he was during those weeks—that’s all. You +needn’t tell what he was doing.”</p> +<p>“If you knew one, you’d find out the other. Once and for all, +I’ll tell you nothing. By an accidental question you discovered that I +knew something. That was not my fault. But more you never will know from +me—farm or no farm.”</p> +<p>“You’re a fool for your pains. And the end will be the same. +The information must reach me. You’re a coward at heart, for it’s +fear, not any tomfoolery of morals, that keeps your mouth shut. Don’t +deceive yourself. I’ve often talked with you before to-day, and I know +you think as I do.”</p> +<p>“What’s that to do with it?”</p> +<p>“Everything. ‘Good’ and ‘evil’ are only two +words, and what is man’s good and what is man’s evil takes +something cleverer than man to know. It’s no nonsense of +‘right’ and ‘wrong’ that’s keeping you from a +happy home and a wife. What is it then?”</p> +<p>Hicks was silent a moment, then made answer.</p> +<p>“I don’t know. I don’t know any more than you do. +Something has come over me; I can’t tell you what. I’m more +surprised than you are at my silence; but there it is. Why the devil I +don’t speak I don’t know. I only know I’m not going to. Our +characters are beyond our own power to understand.”</p> +<p>“If you don’t know, I’ll tell you. You’re +frightened that he will find out. You’re afraid of him.”</p> +<p>“It’s vain trying to anger me into speaking,” answered +the other, showing not a little anger the while; “I’m dumb +henceforward.”</p> +<p>“I hope you’ll let your brain influence you towards reason. +’Tis a fool’s trick to turn your back on the chance of a +lifetime. Better think twice. And second thoughts are like to prove best +worth following. You know where to find me at any rate. I’ll give you +six weeks to decide about it.”</p> +<p>John Grimbal waited, hoping that Hicks might yet change his mind before he +took his leave; but the bee-keeper made no answer. His companion therefore +broke into a sharp trot and left him. Whereupon Clement stood still a moment, +then he turned back and, forgetting all about Chris, proceeded slowly +homewards to Chagford, deep in thought and heartily astonished at himself. No +one could have prompted his enemy to a more critical moment for this great +attack; no demon could have sent the master of the Red House with a more +tempting proposal; and yet Hicks found himself resisting the lure without any +particular effort or struggle. On the one side this man had offered him all +the things his blood and brain craved; on the other his life still stretched +drearily forward, and nothing in it indicated he was nearer his ambition by a +hair’s-breadth than a year before. Yet he refused to pay the price. It +amazed him to find his determination so fixed against betrayal of Will. He +honestly wondered at himself. The decision was bred from a curious condition +of mind quite beyond his power to comprehend. He certainly recoiled from +exposure of Blanchard’s secret, yet coldly asked himself what +unsuspected strand of character held him back. It was not fear and it was not +regard for his sweetheart’s brother; he did not know what it was. He +scoffed at the ideas of honour or conscience. These abstractions had +possessed weight in earlier years, but not now. And yet, while he assured +himself that no tie of temporal or eternal interest kept him silent, the +temptation to tell seemed much less on this occasion than in the past when he +took a swarm of John Grimbal’s bees. Then, indeed, his mind was aflame +with bitter provocation. He affected a cynical attitude to the position and +laughed without mirth at a theory that suddenly appeared in his mind. +Perchance this steadfastness of purpose resulted, after all, from that +artificial thing, “conscience,” which men catch at the +impressionable age when they have infantile ailments and pray at a +mother’s knee. If so, surely reason must banish such folly before +another dawn and send him hot-foot at daybreak to the Red House. He would +wait and watch himself and see.</p> +<p>His reflections were here cut short, for a shrill voice broke in upon +them, and Clement, now within a hundred yards of his own cottage door, saw +Mr. Lezzard before him.</p> +<p>“At last I’ve found ’e! Been huntin’ this longful +time, tu. The Missis wants ’e—your aunt I should say.”</p> +<p>“Wants me?”</p> +<p>“Ess. ’T is wan o’ her bad days, wi’ her liver +an’ lights a bitin’ at her like savage creatures. She’m set +on seein’ you, an’ if I go home-along without ’e, +she’ll awnly cuss.”</p> +<p>“What can she want me for?”</p> +<p>“She ’s sick ’n’ taken a turn for the wuss, last +few days. Doctor Parsons doan’t reckon she can hold out much longer. +’Tis the drink—she’m soaked in it, like a +sponge.”</p> +<p>“I’ll come,” said Hicks, and half an hour later he +approached his aunt’s dwelling and entered it.</p> +<p>Mrs. Lezzard was now sunk into a condition of chronic crapulence which +could only end in one way. Her husband had been ordered again and again to +keep all liquor from her, but, truth to tell, he made no very sustained +effort to do so. The old man was sufficiently oppressed by his own physical +troubles, and as the only happiness earth now held for him must depend on the +departure of his wife, he watched her drinking herself to death without +concern and even smiled in secret at the possibility of some happy, quiet, +and affluent years when she was gone.</p> +<p>Mrs. Lezzard lay on the sofa in her parlour, and a great peony-coloured +face with coal-black eyes in it greeted Clement. She gave him her hand and +bid her husband be gone. Then, when Gaffer had vanished, his wife turned to +her nephew.</p> +<p>“I’ve sent for you, Clem Hicks, for more reasons than wan. I +be gwaine down the hill fast, along o’ marryin’ this cursed +mommet<a id="footnotetag12" name="footnotetag12"></a><a href= +"#footnote12"><sup>12</sup></a> of a man, Lezzard. He lied about his +money—him a pauper all the time; and now he waits and watches me +o’ nights, when he thinks I’m drunk or dreamin’ an’ I +ban’t neither. He watches, wi’ his auld, mangy poll +shakin’, an’ the night-lamp flingin’ the black shadow of un +’gainst the bed curtain an’ shawin’ wheer his wan front +tooth sticks up like a yellow stone in a charred field. Blast un to hell! +He’m waitin’ for my money, an’ I’ve told un +he’s to have it. But ’twas only to make the sting bite deeper +when the time comes. Not a penny—not a farthing—him or any of +’em.”</p> +<p>“Don’t get angry with him. He’s not worth it. Tell me if +I can help you and how. You’ll be up and about again soon, I +hope.” “Never. Not me. Doctor Parsons be to blame. I hate that +man. He knawed it was weakness of heart that called for drink after +Coonistock died; an’ he let me go on an’ on—just to gain +his own dark ends. You’ll see, you’ll see. But that reminds me. +Of all my relations you an’ your mother’s all I care for; because +you’m of my awn blood an’ you’ve let me bide, an’ +haven’t been allus watchin’ an’ waitin’ an’ +divin’ me to the bottle. An’ the man I was fule enough to take in +his dotage be worst of all.”</p> +<p>“Forget about these things. Anger’s bad for you.”</p> +<p>“Forget! Well, so I will forget, when I ve told ’e. I had the +young man what does my business, since old Ford died, awver here last week, +an’ what there is will be yourn—every stiver yourn. Not the +business, of course; that was sold when Coonistock died; but what I could +leave I have. You expected nothin,’ an’ by God! you shall have +all!”</p> +<p>She saw his face and hastened to lessen the force of the announcement in +some degree.</p> +<p>“Ban’t much, mind, far less than you might think for—far +less. Theer’s things I was driven to do—a lone woman wi’out +a soul to care. An’ wan was—but you’ll hear in gude time, +you’ll hear. It concerns Doctor Parsons.”</p> +<p>“I can’t believe my senses. If you only knew what happened to +me this morning. And if you only knew what absolute paupers we +are—mother and I. Not that I would confess it to any living soul but +you. And how can I thank you? Words are such vain things.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t no call to thank me. ’Tis more from hatred of +t’ others than love of you, when all’s said. An’ it +ban’t no gert gold mine. But I’d like to be laid along wi’ +Coomstock; an’ doan’t, for God’s love, bury Lezzard +wi’ me; an’ I want them words on auld George Mundy’s graave +set ’pon mine—not just writ, but cut in a slate or some such +lasting thing. ’Tis a tidy tomb he’ve got, wi’ a cherub +angel, an’ I’d like the same. You’ll find a copy o’ +the words in the desk there. My maid took it down last Sunday. I minded the +general meaning, but couldn’t call home the rhymes. Read it out, will +’e?”</p> +<p>Clement opened the desk, and found and read the paper. It contained a +verse not uncommon upon the tombstones of the last rural generation in +Devon:</p> +<p class="poem">“Ye standers-by, the thread is spun;<br /> +All pomp and pride I e’er did shun;<br /> +Rich and poor alike must die;<br /> +Peasants and kings in dust must lie;<br /> +The best physicians cannot save<br /> +Themselves or patients from the Grave.”</p> +<p>“Them’s the words, an’ I’ve chose ’em so as +Doctor Parsons shall have a smack in the faace when I’m gone. Not that +he’s wan o’ the ’best physicians’ by a mighty long +way; but he’ll knaw I was thinking of him, an’ gnash his teeth, I +hope, every time he sees the stone. I owe him that—an’ more +’n that, as you’ll see when I’m gone.”</p> +<p>“You mustn’t talk of going, aunt—not for many a day. +You’re a young woman for these parts. You must take +care—that’s all.”</p> +<p>But he saw death in her face while he spoke, and could scarcely hide the +frantic jubilation her promise had awakened in him. The news swept him along +on a flood of novel thoughts. Coming as it did immediately upon his refusal +to betray Will Blanchard, the circumstance looked, even in the eyes of Hicks, +like a reward, an interposition of Providence on his behalf. He doubted not +but that the bulk of mankind would so regard it. There arose within him +old-fashioned ideas concerning right and wrong—clear notions that +brought a current of air through his mind and blew away much rotting foliage +and evil fruit. This sun-dawn of prosperity transformed the man for a moment, +even awoke some just ethical thoughts in him.</p> +<p>His reverie was interrupted, for, on the way from Mrs. Lezzard’s +home, Clement met Doctor Parsons himself and asked concerning his +aunt’s true condition.</p> +<p>“She gave you the facts as they are,” declared the medical +man. “Nothing can save her. She’s had <i>delirium tremens</i> +Lord knows how often. A fortnight to a month—that’s all. Nature +loves these forlorn hopes and tinkers away at them in a manner that often +causes me to rub my eyes. But you can’t make bricks without straw. +Nature will find the game ’s up in a few days; then she’ll waste +no more time, and your aunt will be gone.”</p> +<p>Home went Clement Hicks, placed his mother in a whirl of mental rejoicing +at this tremendous news, then set out for Chris. Their compact of the +morning—that she should await his return in the woods—he quite +forgot; but Mrs. Blanchard reminded him and added that Chris had returned in +no very good humour, then trudged up to Newtake to see Phoebe. Cool and calm +the widow stood before Clement’s announcement, expressed her +gratification, and gave him joy of the promised change in his life.</p> +<p>“Glad enough am I to hear tell of this. But you’ll act +just—eh? You won’t forget that poor auld blid, Lezzard? If +she’m gwaine to leave un out the account altogether, he’ll be +worse off than the foxes. His son’s gone to foreign paarts an’ +his darter’s lyin’-in—not that her husband would spare a +crust o’ bread for auld Lezzard, best o’ times.”</p> +<p>“Trust me to do what’s right. Now I’ll go and see after +Chris.”</p> +<p>“An’ make it up with Will while sun shines on ’e. +It’s so easy, come gude fortune, to feel your heart swellin’ out +to others.”</p> +<p>“We are good friends now.”</p> +<p>“Do’e think I doan’t knaw better? Your quarrel’s +patched for the sake of us women. Have a real make-up, I mean.”</p> +<p>“I will, then. I’ll be what I was to him, if he’ll let +me. I’ll forgive everything that’s past—everything and +every body.”</p> +<p>“So do. An’ doan’t ’e tell no more of them hard +sayings ’gainst powers an’ principalities an’ Providence. +Us be all looked arter, ’cording to the unknawn planning of God. +How’s Mrs. Lezzard?”</p> +<p>“She’ll be dead in a fortnight—perhaps less. As likely +as not I might marry Chris before the next new moon.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t think ’pon that yet. Be cool, an’ keep +your heart in bounds. ’T is allus the way wi’ such as you, who +never hope nothing. Theer comes a matter as takes ’em out of +themselves, then they get drunk with hope, all of a sudden, an’ flies +higher than the most sanguine folks, an’ builds castles ’pon +clouds. Theer’s the diggin’ of a graave between you and Chris +yet. Doan’t forget that.”</p> +<p>“You can’t evade solid facts.”</p> +<p>“No, but solid facts, seen close, often put on a differ’nt +faace to what they did far-ways off.”</p> +<p>“You won’t dishearten me, mother; I’m a happy man for +once.”</p> +<p>“Be you? God forbid I should cloud ’e then; awnly keep wise as +well as happy, an’ doan’t fill Chris with tu gert a shaw of pomps +an’ splendours. Put it away till it comes. Our dreams ’bout the +future ’s allus a long sight better or worse than the future +itself.”</p> +<p>“Don’t forbid dreaming. That’s the sole happiness +I’ve ever had until now.”</p> +<p>“Happiness, you call it? ’T is awnly a painted tinsel o’ +the mind, and coming from it into reality is like waking arter tu much drink. +So I’ve heard my husband say scores o’ times—him +bein’ a man much given to overhopefulness in his younger +days—same as Will is now.”</p> +<p>Clement departed, and presently found himself with the cooler breezes of +the high lands upon his hot forehead. They put him in mind of Mrs. Blanchard +again, and their tendency, as hers had been, was to moderate his ardour; but +that seemed impossible just now. Magnificent sunshine spread over the great +wastes of the Moor; and through it, long before he reached Newtake, Clement +saw his sweetheart returning. For a little time he seemed intoxicated and no +longer his own master. The fires of the morning woke in him again at sight of +her. They met and kissed, and he promised her some terrific news, but did not +tell it then. He lived in the butterfly fever of the moment, and presently +imparted the fever to her. They left the road and got away into the lonely +heather; then he told her that they would be man and wife within a +fortnight.</p> +<p>They sat close together, far from every eye, in the shade of a thorn bush +that rose beside a lonely stone.</p> +<p>“Within the very shadow of marriage, and you are frightened of me +still! Frightened to let me pick an apple over the orchard wall when I am +going through the gate for my own the next moment! Listen! I hear our wedding +bells!”</p> +<p>Only the little lizard and the hovering hawk with gold eyes saw them.</p> +<p>“Our wedding bells!” said Chris. Towards set of sun Hicks saw +his sweetheart to her mother’s cottage. His ecstatic joys were sobered +now, and his gratitude a little lessened.</p> +<p>“To think what marvels o’ happiness be in store for us, Clem, +my awn!”</p> +<p>“Yes—not more than we deserve, either. God knows, if there +’s any justice, it was your turn and mine to come by a little of the +happiness that falls to the lot of men and women.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t see how highest heaven’s gwaine to be better +than our married life, so long as you love me.”</p> +<p>“Heaven! Don’t compare them. What’s eternity if +you’re half a ghost, half a bird? That’s the bribe thrown +out,—to be a cold-blooded, perfect thing, and passionless as a musical +box. Give me hot blood that flows and throbs; give me love, and a +woman’s breast to lean on. One great day on earth, such as this has +been, is better than a million ages of sexless perfection in heaven. A vain +reward it was that Christ offered. It seemed highest perfection to Him, +doubtless; but He judged the world by Himself. The Camel-driver was wiser. He +promised actual, healthy flesh in paradise—flesh that should never know +an ache or pain—eternal flesh, and the joys of it. We can understand +that, but where’s the joy of being a spirit? I cling to the flesh I +have, for I know that Nature will very soon want back the dust she has lent +me.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_XIII" name="II_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII<br /> +THE WILL</h2> +<p>Agreeably to the prediction of Doctor Parsons, Mrs. Lezzard’s +journey was ended in less than three weeks of her conversation with Clement +Hicks. Then came a night when she made an ugly end; and with morning a group +of gossips stood about the drawn blinds, licked their lips over the details, +and generally derived that satisfaction from death common to their class. +Indeed, this ghoulish gusto is not restricted to humble folk alone. The +instinct lies somewhere at the root of human nature, together with many +another morbid vein and trait not readily to be analysed or understood. Only +educated persons conceal it.</p> +<p>“She had deliriums just at the end,” said Martha, her maid. +“She called out in a voice as I never heard afore, an’ mistook +her husband for the Dowl.”</p> +<p>“Poor sawl! Death’s such a struggle at the finish for the +full-blooded kind. Doctor tawld me that if she’d had the leastest bit +o’liver left, he could ’a’ saved her; but ’twas all +soaked up by neat brandy, leaving nought but a vacuum or some such fatal +thing.”</p> +<p>“Her hadn’t the use of her innards for a full fortnight! Think +o’ that! Aw. dallybuttons! It do make me cream all awver to hear tell +of!”</p> +<p>So they piled horror upon horror; then came Clement Hicks, as one having +authority, and bade them begone. The ill-omened fowls hopped off; relations +began to collect; there was an atmosphere of suppressed electricity about the +place, and certain women openly criticised the prominent attitude Hicks saw +fit to assume. This, however, did not trouble him. He wrote to the lawyer at +Newton, fixed a day for the funeral, and then turned his attention to Mr. +Lezzard. The ancient resented Clement’s interference not a little, but +Hicks speedily convinced him that his animosity mattered nothing. The +bee-keeper found this little taste of power not unpleasant. He knew that +everything was his own property, and he enjoyed the hate and suspicion in the +eyes of those about him. The hungry crowd haunted him, but he refused it any +information. Mr. Lezzard picked a quarrel, but he speedily silenced the old +man, and told him frankly that upon his good behaviour must depend his future +position. Crushed and mystified, the widower whispered to those interested +with himself in his wife’s estate; and so, before the reading of the +will, there slowly grew a very deep suspicion and hearty hatred of Clement +Hicks. None had considered him in connection with Mrs. Lezzard’s +fortune, for he always kept aloof from her; but women cannot easily shut +their lips over such tremendous matters of news, and so it came about that +some whisper from Chris or dark utterance from old Mrs. Hicks got wind, and a +rumour grew that the bee-keeper was the dead woman’s heir.</p> +<p>Facts contributed colour to the suspicion, for it was known that Clement +had of late given Chris one or two pretty presents, and a ring that cost +gold. His savings were suspected to justify 110 such luxuries; yet that a +speedy change in his manner of life might be expected was also manifest from +the fact that he had been looking into the question of a new stone cottage, +on the edge of the Moor, where the heather in high summer would ripple to the +very doors of his beehives.</p> +<p>The distrust created by these facts was quickly set at rest, for Mrs. +Lezzard sank under ground within four days of her dissolution; then, after +the eating of funeral baked meats, those interested assembled in the parlour +to hear the will. The crowd whispered and growled, and looked gloomily across +at Hicks and the little figure of his mother who had come in rusty black to +witness his triumph. Then a young lawyer from Newton adjusted his spectacles, +rustled his papers, and poured himself out a glass of grocer’s port +before proceeding. But his task involved no strain upon him, and was indeed +completed within five minutes. Black disappointment, dismay, and despair were +the seeds sown by that unimpassioned voice; and at his conclusion a silence +as blank as any that reigned in the ears of the dead fell upon those who +listened—on those who had hoped so much and were confronted with so +little.</p> +<p>“The will is remarkably concise. Mrs. Lezzard makes sundry bitter +statements which I think none will blame me for not repeating, though all may +see them here who desire so to do; she then constitutes Mr. Clement Hicks, +her nephew, sole residuary legatee. There is no condition, no codicil; but I +have regretfully to add that Mr. Hicks wins little but this barren expression +of good-will from the testatrix; for the sufficient reason that she had +nothing to leave. She laboured under various delusions, among others that her +financial position was very different from what is the case. Upon her first +husband’s death, Mrs. Coomstock, as she was then, made an arrangement +with my late senior partner, Mr. Joel Ford, and purchased an annuity. This +absorbed nearly all her capital; the rest she lost in an undesirable +speculation of her own choosing. I am amazed at the present extent of her +obligations. This dwelling-house, for instance, is mortgaged to her medical +man, Doctor Parsons, of Chagford. There is barely money to meet the debts. +Some fifty or sixty pounds in my hands will be absorbed by the calls of the +estate. Mrs. Lezzard’s tastes—I sorrow to say it—were +expensive in some directions. There is an item of ten pounds twelve shillings +for—for brandy, if I may be pardoned for speaking plainly. The funeral +also appears to have been conducted on a scale more lavish than circumstances +warranted. However, there should be sufficient to defray the cost, and I am +sure nobody will blame Mr. Hicks for showing this last respect to an amiable +if eccentric woman. There is nothing to add except that I shall be delighted +to answer any questions—any questions at all.”</p> +<p>A few moments later, the lawyer mounted his dog-cart and rattled off to +enjoy a pleasant drive homeward.</p> +<p>Then the company spoke its mind, and Mary Lezzard’s clay might well +have turned under that bitter hornet-buzz of vituperation. Some said little, +but had not strength or self-command to hide tears; some cursed and swore. +Mr. Lezzard wept unheeded; Mrs. Hicks likewise wept. Clement sat staring into +the flushed faces and angry eyes, neither seeing the rage manifested before +him, nor hearing the coarse volleys of reproach. Then in his turn he +attracted attention; and hard words, wasted on the dead, hurtled like hail +round his ears, with acid laughter, and bitter sneers at his own tremendous +awakening. Stung to the quick, the lame wheelwright, Charles Coomstock, +gloated on the spectacle of Clement’s dark hour, and heaped abuse upon +his round-eyed, miserable mother. The raw of his own wound found a sort of +salve in this attack; and all the other poor, coarse creatures similarly +found comfort in their disappointment from a sight of more terrific +mortification than their own. Venomous utterances fell about Clement Hicks, +but he neither heard nor heeded: his mind was far away with Chris, and the +small shot of the Coomstocks and the thunder of the Chowns alike flew +harmlessly past him. He saw his sweetheart’s sorrow, and her grief, as +yet unborn, was the only fact that much hurt him now. The gall in his own +soul only began to sicken him when his eye rested on his mother. Then he rose +and departed to his home, while the little, snuffling woman ran at his heels, +like a dog.</p> +<p>Not until he had escaped the tempest of voices, and was hidden from the +world, did the bee-keeper allow his own cruel disappointment to appear. Then, +while his mother wept, he lifted up his voice and cursed God. As his +relations had won comfort by swearing at him, so now he soothed his soul +unconsciously in blasphemies. Then followed a silence, and his mother dared +to blame him and remind him of an error.</p> +<p>“You wouldn’t turn the bee-butts when she died, though I +begged and prayed of ’e. Oh, if you’d awnly done what an auld +woman, an’ she your mother, had told ’e! Not so much as a piece +of crape would ’e suffer me to tie ’pon ’em. An’ I +knawed all the while the hidden power o’ bees.”</p> +<p>Presently he left her, and went to tell Chris. She greeted him eagerly, +then turned pale and even terrified as she saw the black news in his +face.</p> +<p>“Just a gull and laughing-stock for the gods again, that’s +all, Chris. How easily they fool us from their thrones, don’t they? And +our pitiful hopes and ambitions and poor pathetic little plans for happiness +shrivel and die, and strew their stinking corpses along the road that was +going to be so gorgeous. The time to spill the cup is when the lip begins to +tremble and water for it—not sooner—the gods know! And now +all’s changed—excepting only the memory of things done that had +better been left undone.”</p> +<p>“But—but we shall be married at once, Clem?”</p> +<p>He shook his head.</p> +<p>“How can you ask it? My poor little all—twenty pounds—is +gone on twopenny-halfpenny presents during the past week or two. It seemed so +little compared to the fortune that was coming. It’s all over. The +great day is further off by twenty pounds than it was before that poor +drunken old fool lied to me. Yet she didn’t lie either; she only +forgot; you can’t swim in brandy for nothing.”</p> +<p>Fear, not disappointment, dominated the woman before him as she heard. +Sheer terror made her grip his arm and scream to him hysterically. Then she +wept wild, savage tears and called to God to kill her quickly. For a time she +parried every question, but an outburst so strangely unlike Chris Blanchard +had its roots deeper than the crushing temporary disaster which he had +brought with him. Clement, suspecting, importuned for the truth, gathered it +from her, then passed away into the dusk, faced with the greatest problem +that existence had as yet set him. Crushed, and crushed unutterably, he +returned home oppressed with a biting sense of his own damnable fate. He +moved as one distracted, incoherent, savage, alone. The glorious palace he +had raised for his happiness crumbled into vast ruins; hope was dead and +putrid; and only the results of wild actions, achieved on false assumptions, +faced him. Now, rising out of his brief midsummer madness, the man saw a +ghost; and he greeted it with groan as bitter as ever wrung human heart.</p> +<p>Miller Lyddon sat that night alone until Mr. Blee returned to supper.</p> +<p>“Gert news! Gert news!” he shouted, while yet in the passage; +“sweatin’ for joy an’ haste, I be!”</p> +<p>His eyes sparkled, his face shone, his words tripped each other up by the +heels.</p> +<p>“Be gormed if ban’t a ’mazin’ world! She’ve +left nought—dammy—less than nought, for the house be mortgaged +sea-deep to Doctor, an’ theer’s other debts. Not a penny for +nobody—nothin’ but empty bottles—an’ to think as I +thought so poor o’ God as to say theer weern’t none! What a +ramshackle plaace the world is!”</p> +<p>“No money at all? Mrs. Lezzard—it can’t be!” +declared Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>“But it is, by gum! A braave tantara ’mongst the fam’ly, +I tell ’e. Not a stiver—all ate up in a ’nuity, an’ +her—artful limb!—just died on the last penny o’ the +quarter’s payment. An’ Lezzard left at the work’us +door—poor auld zawk! An’ him fourscore an’ never been +eggicated an’ never larned nothin’!”</p> +<p>“To think it might have been your trouble, Blee!”</p> +<p>“That’s it, that’s it! That’s what I be full of! +Awnly for the watchin’ Lard, I’d been fixed in the hole myself. +Just picture it! Me a-cussin’ o’ Christ to blazes an’ +lettin’ on theer wasn’t no such Pusson; an’ Him, wide +awake, a-keepin’ me out o’ harm’s way, even arter the banns +was called! Theer’s a God for ’e! Watchin’ day an’ +night to see as I comed by no harm! That’s what ’t is to have +laid by a tidy mort o’ righteousness ’gainst a evil +hour!”</p> +<p>“You ’m well out of it, sure enough.”</p> +<p>“Ess, ’t is so. I misjudged the Lard shocking, an’ +I’m man enough to up and say it, thank God. He was right an’ I +was wrong; an’ lookin’ back, I sees it. So I’ll come back +to the fold, like the piece of silver what was lost; an’ theer’ll +be joy in heaven, as well theer may be. Burnish it all! I’ll go along +to church ’fore all men’s eyes next Lard’s Day ever +is.”</p> +<p>“A gude thought, tu. Religion’s a sort of benefit society, if +you look at it, an’ the church be the bank wheer us pays in +subscriptions Sundays.”</p> +<p>“An’ blamed gude interest us gets for the money,” +declared Mr. Blee. “Not but what I’ve drawed a bit heavy on my +draft of late, along o’ pretendin’ to heathen ways an’ +thoughts what I never really held with; but ’t is all wan now an’ +I lay I’ll soon set the account right, wi’ a balance in my +favour, tu. Seein’ how shameful I was used, ban’t likely no gert +things will be laid against me.”</p> +<p>“And auld Lezzard will go to the Union?”</p> +<p>“A very fittin’ plaace for un, come to think on ’t. +Awver-balanced for sheer greed of gawld he was. My! what a wild-goose chase! +An the things he’ve said to me! Not that I’d allow +myself—awuly from common humanity I must see un an’ let un knaw I +bear no more malice than a bird on a bough.”</p> +<p>They drank, Billy deeper than usual. He was marvellously excited and +cheerful. He greeted God like an old friend returned to him from a journey; +and that night before retiring he stood stiffly beside his bed and covered +his face in his hands and prayed a prayer familiar among his generation.</p> +<p class="poem">“Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,<br /> +Bless the bed that I lie on,<br /> +Four cornders to my bed,<br /> +Four angels overspread<br /> +Two tu foot an’ two tu head,<br /> +An’ all to carry me when I’m dead.<br /> +An’ when I’m dead an’ in my graave,<br /> +<span class="i2">An’ all my bones be rotten.</span><br /> +The greedy worms my flaish shall ate,<br /> +<span class="i2">An’ I shall be forgotten;</span><br /> +<span class="i4">For Christ’s sake. Amen.”</span></p> +<p>Having sucked from repetition of this ancient twaddle exactly that sort of +satisfaction the French or Roman peasant wins from a babble of a dead +language over beads, Billy retired with many a grunt and sigh of +satisfaction.</p> +<p>“It do hearten the spirit to come direct to the Throne,” he +reflected; “an’ the wonder is how ever I could fare for near two +year wi’out my prayers. Yet, though I got my monkey up an’ let +Jehovah slide, He knawed of my past gudeness, all set down in the Book +o’ Life. An’ now I’ve owned up as I was wrong; which is all +even the saints can do; ’cause Judgment Day, for the very best of us, +will awnly be a matter o’ owning up.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_XIV" name="II_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV<br /> +A HUNDRED POUNDS</h2> +<p>The maddening recollection of things done wrought upon Clement Hicks until +it bred in him a distracted frenzy and blinded his judgment. He lost all +sense of proportion in his endeavour to come at a right course of action, and +a mind long inclined towards one road now readily drifted upon it. To recover +the position had been quite possible, and there were not wanting those ready +and eager to assist him; but at this crisis in his fortune the man lost all +power of reflection or self-control. The necessity for instant action +clamoured to him through daylight and darkness; delay drove him hourly into a +hysterical condition approaching frenzy, and every road to escape save one +appeared bolted and barred against him. But, try as he might, his miseries +could not be hidden, and Will Blanchard, among others, sympathised very +heartily with the great disappointment that had now fallen upon Chris and her +sweetheart. His sister’s attitude had astonished both him and his +mother. They fancied that Blanchards were made of sterner stuff; but Chris +went down before the blow in a manner very unexpected. She seemed dazed and +unable to recover from it. Her old elastic spirit was crushed, and a great +sorrow looked from her eyes.</p> +<p>Neither Will nor her mother could rouse her, and so it came about that +thinking how best he could play a brother’s part, the master of Newtake +decided on a notable deed and held that the hour for it must be delayed no +longer. He debated the circumstance from every point of view, examined his +accounts, inspected the exact figures represented by the remainder of his +uncle’s legacy and then broke the matter to Phoebe. To his mother he +had already spoken concerning the intention, and she approved it, though +without knowing particulars. Phoebe, however, happened to be quite as +familiar with Will’s affairs as Will himself, and while his +determination to give Clement and Chris a hundred pounds was easily come at +and most cheering to his heart, the necessity of breaking the news to his +wife appeared not so easy or pleasant. Indeed, Will approached the task with +some trepidation, for a recent event made it doubly difficult. They sat +together one night, after six weeks of married life, and he plunged into the +matter.</p> +<p>“’Tis sad them two being kept apart like this,” he said +abruptly.</p> +<p>“’Tis so. Nobody feels it more’n me. Matters was hard +with us, and now they ’m all smooth and the future seems fairly bright, +tu.”</p> +<p>“Very bright,” he said stoutly. “The hay’s best +ever come off my ground, thanks to the manure from Monks Barton; and look at +the wurzels! Miller hisself said he’ve never seed a more promising +crop, high or low. An’ the things be in prime kelter, tu; an’ +better than four hunderd pound of uncle’s money still left.”</p> +<p>“Long may it be left, I’m sure. ’Tis terrible work +dipping into it, an’ I looks at both sides of a halfpenny ’fore I +spend it. Wish you would. You’m tu generous, Will. But accounts are +that difficult.”</p> +<p>This was not the spirit of the hour, however.</p> +<p>“I was gwaine to say that out of all our happiness an’ fortune +we might let a little bubble awver for Chris—eh? She’m such a +gude gal, an’ you love her so dearly as what I do +a’most.”</p> +<p>Phoebe read the project in a flash, but yet invited her husband to +explain.</p> +<p>“What d’you mean?” she asked distrustfully and +coldly.</p> +<p>“I can see in your face you knaw well enough. That four-hunderd-odd +pound. I’ve sometimes thought I should have given Chris a bit of the +windfall when first it comed. But now—well, theer’s this cruel +coil failed on ’em. You knaw the hardness of waiting. ’Twould be +a butivul thing to let ’em marry an’ feel’t was thanks to +us.”</p> +<p>“You want to go giving them money?”</p> +<p>“Not ’give’ ’zactly. Us’ll call it a loan, +till the time they see their way clearer.”</p> +<p>Phoebe sighed and was silent for a while.</p> +<p>“Poor dears,” she said at length. “I feel for ’em +in my heart, same as you do; yet somehow it doan’t look +right.”</p> +<p>“Not right, Phoebe?”</p> +<p>“Not wise, then. Remember what you say the winters be up +here—such dreary months with no money coming in and all gwaine out to +keep life in the things.”</p> +<p>“’Tis a black, bitin’ business on the high +farms—caan’t deny that.”</p> +<p>“Money flies so.”</p> +<p>“Then let some fly to a gude end. You knaw I’m a hard, keen +man where other people be concerned, most times.”</p> +<p>His wife laughed frankly, and he grew red.</p> +<p>“Damn it, Phoebe, doan’t you take me like that else +you’ll get the rough edge of my tongue. ’Tis for you to agree +with what I’m pleased to say, not contradict it. I <i>be</i> a hard, +keen man, and knaws the value of money as well as another. But Chris is my +awn sister, an’ the long an’ the short is, I’m gwaine to +give Clem Hicks a hunderd pound.”</p> +<p>“Will! It’s not reasonable, it’s not fair—us +working so hard an’—an’—”</p> +<p>“They ’m to have it, anyway.”</p> +<p>Her breath caught in a little, helpless gasp. Without a word she picked up +the material in her hands, huddled it up, and thrust it across the table +towards him. Then the passion faded out of his face, his eyes softened and +grew dreamy, he smiled, and rubbed his brown cheek with the flannel.</p> +<p>“My awn, li’l clever woman, as have set about the fashioning +of a bairn so soon! God bless ’e, an’ bless ’e an’ be +gude to ’e, an’ the wee thing coming!”</p> +<p>He put his arm round her and patted her hair and purred softly to her; +whereupon she relented and kissed him.</p> +<p>“You knaw best, Will, dearie; you nearly allus knaw best; but your +heart’s bigger ’n your pocket—an’ a li’l child +do call so loud for the spendin’ o’ money.”</p> +<p>“Aye, I knaw, I knaw; ’tis a parent’s plaace to stand up +for his offspring through fire an’ water; an’ I reckon I +won’t be the worst faither as ever was, either. I can mind the time +when I was young myself. Stern but kind’s the right rule. Us’ll +bring un up in the proper way, an’ teach un to use his +onderstandin’ an’ allus knuckle down ’fore his elders. To +tell ’e truth, Phoebe, I’ve a notion I might train up a cheel +better’n some men.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Will, I think so, tu. But ’tis food an’ clothes +an’ li’l boots an’ such-like comes first. A hunderd pounds +be such a mort o’ money.”</p> +<p>“’Twill set ’em up in a fair way.”</p> +<p>“Fifty wouldn’t hardly do, p’r’aps?”</p> +<p>“Hardly. I like to carry a job through clean an’ vitty while +I’m on it.”</p> +<p>“You’ve got such a big spirit.”</p> +<p>“As to that, money so spent ban’t lost—’tis all in +the fam’ly.”</p> +<p>“Of course ’tis a gude advertisement for you. Folk’ll +think you’m prosperin’ an’ look up to you more.”</p> +<p>“Well, some might, though I doan’t ’zactly mean it like +that. Yet the putting out o’ three figures o’ money must make +neighbours ope their eyes. Not that I want anybody to knaw either.”</p> +<p>So, against her judgment, Phoebe was won over, and presently she and her +husband made merry at prospect of the great thing contemplated. Will imitated +Clement’s short, glum, and graceless manner before the gift; Phoebe +began to spend the money and plan the bee-keeper’s cottage when Chris +should enter it as a bride; and thus, having enjoyed an hour of delight the +most pure and perfect that can fall to human lot, the young couple +retired.</p> +<p>Elsewhere defeat and desolation marked the efforts of the luckless poet to +improve his position. All thoughts drifted towards the Red House, and when, +struggling from this dark temptation, he turned to Martin Grimbal rather than +his brother, Fate crushed this hope also. The antiquary was not in Chagford, +and Clement recollected that Martin had told him he designed some visits to +the doom rings of Iceland, and other contemporary remains of primeval man in +Brittany and in Ireland. To find him at present was impossible, for he had +left no address, and his housekeeper only knew that he would be out of +England until the autumn.</p> +<p>Now the necessity for action gained gigantically upon Hicks, and spun a +net of subtle sophistry that soon had the poor wretch enmeshed beyond +possibility of escape. He assured himself that the problem was reduced to a +mere question of justice to a woman. A sacrifice must be made between one +whom he loved better than anything in the world, and one for whom he cared +not at all. That these two persons chanced to be brother and sister was an +unfortunate accident, but could not be held a circumstance strong enough to +modify his determination. He had, indeed, solemnly sworn to Will to keep his +secret, but what mattered that before this more crushing, urgent duty to +Chris? His manhood cried out to him to protect her. Nothing else signified in +the least; the future—the best that he could hope for—might be +ashy and hopeless now; but it was with the immediate present and his duty +that he found himself concerned. There remained but one grim way; and, +through such overwhelming, shattering storm and stress as falls to the lot of +few, he finally took it. To marry at any cost and starve afterwards if +necessary, had been the more simple plan; and that course of action must +first have occurred to any other man but this; to him, however, it did not +occur. The crying, shrieking need for money was the thing that stunned him +and petrified him. Shattered and tossed to the brink of aberration, stretched +at frightful mental tension for a fortnight, he finally succumbed, and told +himself that his defeat was victory.</p> +<p>He wrote to John Grimbal, explained that he desired to see him on the +morrow, and the master of the Red House, familiar with recent affairs, +rightly guessed that Hicks had changed his mind. Excited beyond measure, the +victor fixed a place for their conversation, and it was a strange one.</p> +<p>“Meet me at Oke Tor,” he wrote. “By an accident I shall +be in the Taw Marshes to-morrow, and will ride to you some time in the +afternoon.—J.G.”</p> +<p>Thus, upon a day when Will Blanchard called at Mrs. Hicks’s cottage, +Clement had already started for his remote destination on the Moor. With some +unconscious patronage Will saluted Mrs. Hicks and called for Clement. Then he +slapped down a flat envelope under the widow’s eyes.</p> +<p>“Us have thought a lot about this trouble, mother, an’ +Phoebe’s hit on as braave a notion as need be. You see, Clem’s my +close friend again now, an’ Chris be my sister; so what’s more +fittin’ than that I should set up the young people? An’ so I +shall, an’ here’s a matter of Bank of England notes as will repay +the countin’. Give ’em to Clem wi’ my respects.”</p> +<p>Then Will suffered a surprise. The little woman before him swelled and +expanded, her narrow bosom rose, her thin lips tightened, and into her dim +eyes there came pride and brightness. It was her hour of triumph, and she +felt a giantess as she stood regarding the envelope and Will. Him she had +never liked since his difference with her son concerning Martin Grimbal, and +now, richer for certain news of that morning, she gloried to throw the gift +back.</p> +<p>“Take your money again, bwoy. No Hicks ever wanted charity yet, +least of all from a Blanchard. Pick it up; and it’s lucky Clement +ban’t home, for he’d have said some harsh words, I’m +thinking. Keep it ’gainst the rainy days up to Newtake. And it may +surprise ’e to knaw that my son’s worth be getting found out at +last. It won’t be so long ’fore he takes awver Squire +Grimbal’s farm to the Red House. What do ’e think o’ that? +He’ve gone to see un this very day ’bout it.”</p> +<p>“Well, well! This be news, and no mistake—gude news, tu, I +s’pose. Jan Grimbal! An’ what Clem doan’t knaw ’bout +farmin’, I’ll be mighty pleased to teach un, I’m +sure.”</p> +<p>“No call to worry yourself; Clem doan’t want no other right +arm than his awn.”</p> +<p>“Chris shall have the money, then; an’ gude luck to ’em +both, say I.”</p> +<p>He departed, with great astonishment the main emotion of his mind. Nothing +could well have happened to surprise him more, and now he felt that he should +rejoice, but found it difficult to do so.</p> +<p>“Braave news, no doubt,” he reflected, “an’ yet, +come to think on it, I’d so soon the devil had given him a job as +Grimbal. Besides, to choose him! What do Clement knaw ’bout +farmin’? Just so much as I knaw ’bout verse-writin’, +an’ no more.”</p> +<h2><a id="II_XV" name="II_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV<br /> +“THE ANGEL OF THE DARKER DRINK”</h2> +<p>Patches of mist all full of silver light moved like lonely living things +on the face of the high Moor. Here they dispersed and scattered, here they +approached and mingled together, here they stretched forth pearly fingers +above the shining granite, and changed their shapes at the whim of every +passing breeze; but the tendency of each shining, protean mass was to rise to +the sun, and presently each valley and coomb lay clear, while the cool +vapours wound in luminous and downy undulations along the highest points of +the land before vanishing into air.</p> +<p>A solitary figure passed over the great waste. He took his way northward +and moved across Scorhill, leaving Wattern Tor to the left. Beneath its +ragged ridges, in a vast granite amphitheatre, twinkled the cool +birth-springs of the little Wallabrook, and the water here looked leaden +under shade, here sparkled with silver at the margin of a cloud shadow, here +shone golden bright amid the dancing heads of the cotton-grass under +unclouded sunlight. The mist wreaths had wholly departed before noon, and +only a few vast mountains of summer gold moved lazily along the upper +chambers of the air. A huge and solitary shadow overtook the man and spread +itself directly about him, then swept onwards; infinite silence encompassed +him; once from a distant hillside a voice cried to him, where women and +children moved like drab specks and gathered the ripe whortleberries that now +wove purple patterns into the fabric of the Moor; but he heeded not the cry; +and other sound there was none save the occasional and mournful note of some +lonely yellowhammer perched upon a whin. Into the prevalent olive-brown of +the heath there had now stolen an indication of a magic change at hand, for +into the sober monotone crept a gauzy shadow, a tremor of wakening +flower-life, half pearl, half palest pink, yet more than either. Upon the +immediate foreground it rippled into defined points of blossom, which already +twinkled through all the dull foliage; in the middle distance it faded; afar +off it trembled as a palpable haze of light under the impalpable reeling of +the summer air. A week or less would see the annual miracle peformed again +and witness that spacious and solemn region in all the amethystine glories of +the ling. Fiercely hot grew the day, and the distances, so distinct through +mist rifts and wreaths in the clearness of early morning, now +retreated—mountain upon mountain, wide waste on waste—as the sun +climbed to the zenith. Detail vanished, the Moor stretched shimmering to the +horizon; only now and again from some lofty point of his pilgrimage did the +traveller discover chance cultivation through a dip in the untamed region he +traversed. Then to the far east and north, the map of fertile Devon billowed +and rolled in one enormous misty mosaic,—billowed and rolled all +opalescent under the dancing atmosphere and July haze, rolled and swept to +the sky-line, where, huddled by perspective into the appearance of density, +hung long silver tangles of infinitely remote and dazzling cloud against the +blue.</p> +<p>From that distant sponge in the central waste, from Cranmere, mother of +moorland rivers, the man presently noted wrinkles of pure gold trickling down +a hillside two miles off. Here sunshine touched the river Taw, still an +infant thing not far advanced on the journey from its fount; but the play of +light upon the stream, invisible save for this finger of the sun, indicated +to the solitary that he approached his destination. Presently he stood on the +side of lofty Steeperton and surveyed that vast valley known as Taw Marsh, +which lies between the western foothills of Cosdon Beacon and the Belstone +Tors to the north. The ragged manes of the latter hills wind through the +valley in one lengthy ridge, and extend to a tremendous castellated mass of +stone, by name Oke Tor.</p> +<p>This erection, with its battlements and embrasures, outlying scarps and +counterscarps, remarkably suggests the deliberate and calculated creation of +man. It stands upon a little solitary hill at the head of Taw Marsh, and wins +its name from the East Okement River which runs through the valley on its +western flank. Above wide fen and marsh it rises, yet seen from +Steeperton’s vaster altitude, Oke Tor looks no greater than some +fantastic child-castle built by a Brobding-nagian baby with granite bricks. +Below it on this July day the waste of bog-land was puckered with brown +tracts of naked soil, and seamed and scarred with peat-cuttings. Here and +there drying turfs were propped in pairs and dotted the hillsides; emerald +patches of moss jewelled the prevailing sobriety of the valley, a single +curlew, with rising and falling crescendos of sound, flew here and there +under needless anxiety, and far away on White Hill and the enormous breast of +Cosdon glimmered grey stone ghosts from the past,—track-lines and +circles and pounds,—the work of those children of the mist who laboured +here when the world was younger, whose duty now lay under the new-born light +of the budding heath. White specks dotted the undulations where flocks roamed +free; in the marsh, red cattle sought pasture, and now was heard the +jingle-jangle of a sheep-bell, and now the cry of bellowing kine.</p> +<p>Like a dark incarnation of suffering over this expansive scene passed +Clement Hicks to the meeting with John Grimbal. His unrest was accentuated by +the extreme sunlit peace of the Moor, and as he sat on Steeperton and gazed +with dark eyes into the marshes below, there appeared in his face the +battlefield of past struggles, the graves of past hopes. A dead apathy of +mind and muscle succeeded his mental exertion and passion of thought. +Increased age marked him, as though Time, thrusting all at once upon him +bitter experiences usually spread over many years of a man’s life, had +weighed him down, humped his back, thinned his hair, and furrowed his +forehead under the load. Within his eyes, behind the reflected blue of the +sky, as he raised them to it, sat mad misery; and an almost tetanic movement +of limb, which rendered it impossible for him to keep motionless even in his +present recumbent position, denoted the unnatural excitation of his nerves. +The throb and spasm of the past still beat against his heart. Like a circular +storm in mid-ocean, he told himself that the tempest had not wholly ended, +but might reawaken, overwhelm him, and sweep him back into the turmoil again. +As he thought, and his eye roved for a rider on a brown horse, the poor +wretch was fighting still. Yesterday fixed determination marked his +movements, and his mind was made up; to-day, after a night not devoid of +sleep, it seemed that everything that was best in him had awakened refreshed, +and that each mile of the long tramp across Dartmoor had represented another +battle fought with his fate. Justice, Justice for himself and the woman he +loved, was the cry raised more than once aloud in sharp agony on that great +silence. And only the drone of the shining-winged things and the dry rustle +of the grasshoppers answered him.</p> +<p>Like the rest of the sore-smitten and wounded world, he screamed to the +sky for Justice, and, like the rest of the world, forgot or did not know that +Justice is only a part of Truth, and therefore as far beyond man’s +reach as Truth itself. Justice can only be conceived by humanity, and that +man should even imagine any abstraction so glorious is wonderful, and to his +credit. But Justice lies not only beyond our power to mete to our fellows; it +forms no part of the Creator’s methods with us or this particular mote +in the beam of the Universe. Man has never received Justice, as he +understands it, and never will; and his own poor, flagrant, fallible travesty +of it, erected to save him from himself, and called Law, more nearly +approximates to Justice than the treatment which has ever been apportioned to +humanity. Before this eternal spectacle of illogical austerity, therefore, +man, in self-defence and to comfort his craving and his weakness, has clung +to the cheerful conceit of immortality; has pathetically credited the First +Cause with a grand ultimate intention concerning each suffering atom; has +assured himself that eternity shall wipe away all tears and blood, shall +reward the actors in this puppet-show with golden crowns and nobler parts in +a nobler playhouse. Human dreams of justice are responsible for this yearning +towards another life, not the dogmas of religion; and the conviction +undoubtedly has to be thanked for much individual right conduct. But it +happens that an increasing number of intellects can find solace in these +theories no longer; it happens that the liberty of free thought (which is the +only liberty man may claim) will not longer be bound with these puny chains. +Many detect no just argument for a future life; they admit that adequate +estimate of abstract Justice is beyond them; they suspect that Justice is a +human conceit; and they see no cause why its attributes should be credited to +the Creator in His dealings with the created, for the sufficient reason that +Justice has never been consistently exhibited by Him. The natural conclusion +of such thought need not be pursued here. Suffice it that, taking their stand +on pure reason, such thinkers deny the least evidence of any life beyond the +grave; to them, therefore, this ephemeral progression is the beginning and +the end, and they live every precious moment with a yearning zest beyond the +power of conventional intellects to conceive.</p> +<p>Of such was Clement Hicks. And yet in this dark hour he cried for Justice, +not knowing to whom or to what he cried. Right judgment was dead at last. He +rose and shook his head in mute answer to the voices still clamouring to his +consciousness. They moaned and reverberated and mingled with the distant +music of the bellwether, but his mind was made up irrevocably now; he had +determined to do the thing he had come to do. He told himself nothing much +mattered any more; he laughed as he rose and wiped the sweat off his face, +and passed down Steeperton through debris of granite. “Life’s +only a breath and then—Nothing,” he thought; “but it will +be interesting to see how much more bitterness and agony those that pull the +strings can cram into my days. I shall watch from the outside now. A man is +never happy so long as he takes a personal interest in life. Henceforth +I’ll stand outside and care no more, and laugh and laugh on through the +years. We’re greater than the Devil that made us; for we can laugh at +all his cursed cruelty—we can laugh, and we can die laughing, and we +can die when we please. Yes, that’s one thing he can’t +do—torment us an hour more than we choose.”</p> +<p>Suicide was always a familiar thought with this man, but it had never been +farther from his mind than of late. Cowardly in himself, his love for Chris +Blanchard was too great to suffer even the shadow of self-slaughter to tempt +him at the present moment. What might happen in the future, he could not +tell; but while her happiness was threatened and her life’s welfare +hung in the balance, his place was by her side. Then he looked into Will +Blanchard’s future and asked himself what was the worst that could +result from his pending treachery. He did not know and wished time had +permitted him to make inquiries. But his soul was too weary to care. He only +looked for the ordeal to be ended; his aching eyes, now bent on his temporal +environment, ranged widely for the spectacle of a rider on a brown horse.</p> +<p>A red flag flapped from a lofty pole at the foot of Steeperton, but Hicks, +to whom the object and its significance were familiar, paid no heed and +passed on towards Oke Tor. On one side the mass rose gradually up by steps +and turrets; on the other, the granite beetled into a low cliff springing +abruptly from the turf. Within its clefts and crannies there grew ferns, and +to the north-east, sheltered under ledges from the hot sun, cattle and ponies +usually stood or reclined upon such a summer day as this, and waited for the +oncoming cool of evening before returning to pasture. On the present +occasion, however, no stamp of hoof, snort of nostril, whisk of tail, and hum +of flies denoted the presence of beasts. For some reason they had been driven +elsewhere. Clement climbed the Tor, then stood upon its highest point, and +turning his back to the sun, scanned the wide rolling distances over which he +had tramped, and sought fruitlessly for an approaching horseman. But no +particular hour had been specified, and he knew not and cared not how long he +might have to wait.</p> +<p>In a direction quite contrary to that on which the eyes of Hicks were set, +sat John Grimbal upon his horse and talked with another man. They occupied a +position at the lower-most end of Taw Marsh, beneath the Belstones; and they +watched some seventy artillerymen busily preparing for certain operations of +a nature to specially interest the master of the Red House. Indeed the +pending proceedings had usually occupied his mind, to total exclusion of all +other affairs; but to-day even more momentous events awaited him in the +immediate future, and he looked from his companion along the great valley to +where Oke Tor appeared, shrunk to a mere grey stone at the farther end. Of +John Grimbal’s life, it may now be said that it drifted into a +confirmed and bitter misogyny. He saw no women, spoke of the sex with +disrespect, and chose his few friends among men whose sporting and warlike +instincts chimed with his own. Sport he pursued with dogged pertinacity, but +the greater part of his leisure was devoted to the formation of a yeomanry +corps at Chagford, and in this design he had made good progress. He still +kept his wrongs sternly before his mind, and when the old bitterness began to +grow blunted, deliberately sharpened it again, strangling alike the good work +of time and all emotions of rising contentment and returning peace. Where was +the wife whose musical voice and bright eyes should welcome his daily +home-coming? Where were the laughing and pattering-footed little ones? Of +these priceless treasures the man on the Moor had robbed him. His great house +was empty and cheerless. Thus he could always blow the smouldering fires into +active flame by a little musing on the past; but how long it might be +possible to sustain his passion for revenge under this artificial stimulation +of memory remained to be seen. As yet, at any rate, the contemplation of Will +Blanchard’s ruin was good to Grimbal, and the accident of his discovery +that Clement Hicks knew some secret facts to his enemy’s disadvantage +served vastly to quicken the lust for a great revenge. From the first he had +determined to drag Clement’s secret out of him sooner or later, and +had, until his recent offer of the Red House Farm, practised remarkable +patience. Since then, however, a flicker of apparent prosperity which +overtook the bee-keeper appeared to diminish Grimbal’s chances +perceptibly; but with the sudden downfall of Clement’s hopes the +other’s ends grew nearer again, and at the last it had scarcely +surprised him to receive the proposal of Hicks. So now he stood within an +hour or two of the desired knowledge, and his mind was consequently a little +abstracted from the matter in hand.</p> +<p>The battery, consisting of four field-guns, was brought into action in the +direction of the upper end of the valley, while Major Tremayne, its +commanding officer and John Grimbal’s acquaintance, explained to the +amateur all that he did not know. During the previous week the master of the +Red House and other officers of the local yeomanry interested in military +matters had dined at the mess of those artillery officers then encamped at +Okehampton for the annual practice on Dartmoor; and the outcome of that +entertainment was an invitation to witness some shooting during the +forthcoming week.</p> +<p>The gunners in their dark blue uniforms swarmed busily round four shining +sixteen-pounders, while Major Tremayne conversed with his friend. He was a +handsome, large-limbed man, with kindly eyes.</p> +<p>“Where’s your target?” asked Grimbal, as he scanned the +deep distance of the valley.</p> +<p>“Away there under that grey mass of rock. We’ve got to guess +at the range as you know; then find it. I should judge the distance at about +two miles—an extreme limit. Take my glass and you’ll note a line +of earthworks thrown up on this side of the stone. That is intended to +represent a redoubt and we’re going to shell it and slay the dummy men +posted inside.”</p> +<p>“I can see without the glass. The rock is called Oke Tor, and +I’m going to meet a man there this afternoon.”</p> +<p>“Good; then you’ll be able to observe the results at close +quarters. They’ll surprise you. Now we are going to begin. Is your +horse all right? He looks shifty, and the guns make a devil of a +row.”</p> +<p>“Steady as time. He’s smelt powder before to-day.”</p> +<p>Major Tremayne now adjusted his field-glasses, and carefully inspected +distant earthworks stretched below the northern buttresses of Oke Tor. He +estimated the range, which he communicated to the battery; then after a +slight delay came the roar and bellow of the guns as they were fired in slow +succession.</p> +<p>But the Major’s estimate proved too liberal, for the ranging rounds +fell far beyond the target, and dropped into the lofty side of +Steeperton.</p> +<p>The elevation of the guns was accordingly reduced, and Grimbal noted the +profound silence in the battery as each busy soldier performed his appointed +task.</p> +<p>At the next round shells burst a little too short of the earthworks, and +again a slight modification in the range was made. Now missiles began to +descend in and around the distant redoubt, and each as it exploded dealt out +shattering destruction to the dummy men which represented an enemy. One +projectile smashed against the side of Oke Tor, and sent back the ringing +sound of its tremendous impact.</p> +<p>Subsequent practice, now that the range was found, produced results above +the average in accuracy, and Major Tremayne’s good-humour +increased.</p> +<p>“Five running plump into the redoubt! That’s what we can do +when we try,” he said to Grimbal, while the amateur awarded his meed of +praise and admiration.</p> +<p>Anon the business was at an end; the battery limbered up; the guns, each +drawn by six stout horses, disappeared with many a jolt over the uneven +ground, as the soldiers clinked and clashed away to their camp on the high +land above Okehamptou.</p> +<p>Under the raw smell of burnt powder Major Tremayne took leave of Grimbal +and the rest; each man went his way; and John, pursuing a bridle-path through +the marshes of the Taw, proceeded slowly to his appointment.</p> +<p>An unexpected spring retarded Grimbal’s progress and made a +considerable detour necessary. At length, however, he approached Oke Tor, +marked the tremendous havoc of the firing, and noted a great grey splash upon +the granite, where one shell had abraded its weathered face.</p> +<p>John Grimbal dismounted, tied up his horse, then climbed to the top of the +Tor, and searched for an approaching pedestrian. Nobody was visible save one +man only; amounted soldier riding round to strike the red warning flags +posted widely about the ranges. Grimbal descended and approached the southern +side, there to sit on the fine intermingled turf and moss and smoke a cigar +until his man should arrive. But rounding the point of the low cliff, he +found that Hicks was already there.</p> +<p>Clement, his hat off, reclined upon his back with his face lifted to the +sky. Where his head rested, the wild thyme grew, and one great, black +bumble-bee boomed at a deaf ear as it clumsily struggled in the purple +blossoms. He lay almost naturally, but some distortion of his neck and a film +upon his open eyes proclaimed that the man neither woke nor slept.</p> +<p>His lonely death was on this wise. Standing at the edge of the highest +point of Oke Tor, with his back to the distant guns, he had crowned the +artillerymen’s target, himself invisible. At that moment firing began, +and the first shell, suddenly shrieking scarcely twenty yards above his head, +had caused Hicks to start and turn abruptly. With this action he lost his +balance; then a projection of the granite struck his back as he fell and +brought him heavily to the earth upon his head.</p> +<p>Now the sun, creeping westerly, already threw a ruddiness over the Moor, +and this warm light touching the dead man’s cheek brought thither a hue +never visible in life, and imparted to the features a placidity very +startling by contrast with the circumstances of his sudden and violent +end.</p> +<h2><a id="II_XVI" name="II_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI<br /> +BEFORE THE DAWN</h2> +<p>It proclaims the attitude of John Grimbal to his enemy that thus suddenly +confronted with the corpse of a man whom he believed in life, his first +emotion should have betokened bitter disappointment and even anger. Will +Blanchard’s secret, great or small, was safe enough for the present; +and the hand stretched eagerly for revenge clutched air.</p> +<p>Convincing himself that Hicks was dead, Grimbal galloped off towards +Belstone village, the nearest centre of civilisation. There he reported the +facts, directed police and labourers where to find the body and where to +carry it, and subsequently rode swiftly back to Chagford. Arrived at the +market-place, he acquainted Abraham Chown, the representative of the Devon +constabulary, with his news, and finally writing a brief statement at the +police station before leaving it, Grimbal returned home.</p> +<p>Not until after dark was the impatient mother made aware of her +son’s end, and she had scarcely received the intelligence before he +came home to her—with no triumphant news of the Red House Farm, but +dead, on a sheep-hurdle. Like summer lightning Clement’s fate leapt +through the length and breadth of Chagford. It penetrated to the vicarage; it +reached outlying farms; it arrived at Monks Barton, was whispered near Mrs. +Blanchard’s cottage by the Teign, and, in the early morning of the +following day, reached Newtake.</p> +<p>Then Will, galloping to the village while dawn was yet grey, met Doctor +Parsons, and heard the truth of these uncertain rumours which had reached +him.</p> +<p>“It seems clear enough when Grimbal’s statement comes to be +read,” explained the medical man. “He had arranged a meeting with +poor Hicks on Oke Tor, and, when he went to keep his appointment, found the +unfortunate man lying under the rocks quite dead. The spot, I must tell you, +was near a target of the soldiers at Okehampton, and John Grimbal first +suspected that Hicks, heedless of the red warning flags, had wandered into +the line of fire and been actually slain by a projectile. But nothing of that +sort happened. I have seen him. The unfortunate man evidently slipped and +fell from some considerable height upon his head. His neck is dislocated and +the base of the skull badly fractured.”</p> +<p>“Have you seen my poor sister?”</p> +<p>“I was called last night while at Mrs. Hicks’s cottage, and +went almost at once. It’s very terrible—very. She’ll get +brain fever if we’re not careful. Such a shock! She was walking alone, +down in the croft by the river—all in a tremendously heavy dew too. She +was dry-eyed and raved, poor girl. I may say she was insane at that sad +moment. ‘Weep for yourself!’ she said to me. ‘Let this +place weep for itself, for there’s a great man has died. He was here +and lived here and nobody knew—nobody but his mother and I knew what he +was. He had to beg his bread almost, and God let him; but the sin of it is on +those around him—you and the rest.’ So she spoke, poor child. +These are not exactly her words, but something like them. I got her indoors +to her mother and sent her a draught. I’ve just come from confining +Mrs. Woods, and I’ll walk down and see your sister now before I go home +if you like. I hope she may be sleeping.”</p> +<p>Will readily agreed to this suggestion; and together the two men proceeded +to the valley.</p> +<p>But many things had happened since the night. When Doctor Parsons left +Mrs. Blanchard, she had prevailed upon Chris to go to bed, and then herself +departed to the village and sat with Mrs. Hicks for an hour. Returning, she +found her daughter apparently asleep, and, rather than wake her, left the +doctor’s draught unopened; yet Chris had only simulated slumber, and as +soon as her mother retreated to her own bed, she rose, dressed, crept from +the house, and hastened through the night to where her lover lay.</p> +<p>The first awful stroke had fallen, but the elasticity of the human mind +which at first throws off and off such terrible shocks, and only after the +length of many hours finally accepts them as fact, saved Chris Blanchard from +going mad. Happily she could not thus soon realise the truth. It recurred, +like the blows of a sledge, upon her brain, but between these cruel reminders +of the catastrophe, the knowledge of Clement’s death escaped her memory +entirely, and more than once, while roaming the dew alone, she asked herself +suddenly what she was doing and why she was there. Then the mournful answer +knelled to her heart, and the recurrent spasms of that first agony slowly, +surely settled into one dead pain, as the truth was seared into her +knowledge. A frenzied burst of anger succeeded, and under its influence she +spoke to Doctor Parsons, who approached her beside the river and with tact +and patience at length prevailed upon her to enter her home. She cursed the +land that had borne him, the hamlet wherein he had dwelt; and her mother, not +amazed at her fierce grief, found each convulsive ebullition of sorrow +natural to the dark hour, and soothed her as best she could. Then the elder +woman departed a while, not knowing the truth and feeling such a course +embraced the deeper wisdom.</p> +<p>Left alone, her future rose before Chris, as she sat upon her bed and saw +the time to come glimmer out of the night in colours more ashy than the +moonbeams on the cotton blind. Yet, as she looked her face burned, and one +flame, vivid enough, flickered through all the future; the light on her own +cheeks. Her position as it faced her from various points of view acted upon +her physical being—suffocated her and brought a scream to her lips. +There was nobody to hear it, nobody to see the girl tear her hair, rise from +her couch, fall quivering, face downward, on the little strip of carpet +beside her bed. Who could know even a little of what this meant to her? Women +had often lost the men they loved, but never, never like this. So she assured +herself. Past sorrows and fears dwindled to mere shadows now; for the awful +future—the crushing months to come, rose grim and horrible on the +horizon of Time, laden with greater terrors than she could face and live.</p> +<p>Alone, Chris told herself she might have withstood the oncoming +tribulation—struggled through the storms of suffering and kept her +broken heart company as other women had done before and must again; but she +would not be alone. A little hand was stretching out of the loneliness she +yearned for; a little voice was crying out of the solitude she craved. The +shadows that might have sheltered her were full of hard eyes; the secret +places would only echo a world’s cruel laughter now—that world +which had let her loved one die uncared for, that world so pitiless to such +as she. Her thoughts were alternately defiant and fearful; then, before the +picture of her mother and Will, her emotions dwindled from the tragic and +became of a sort that weeping could relieve. Tears, now mercifully released +from their fountains, softened her bruised soul for a time and moderated the +physical strain of her agony. She lay long, half-naked, sobbing her heart +out. Then came the mad desire to be back with Clement at any cost, and +profound pity for him overwhelmed her mind to the exclusion of further sorrow +for herself. She forgot herself wholly in grief that he was gone. She would +never hear him speak or laugh again; never again kiss the trouble from his +eyes; never feel the warm breath of him, the hand-grip of him. He was dead; +and she saw him lying straight and cold in a padded coffin, with his hands +crossed and cerecloth stiffly tying up his jaws. He would sink into the +silence that dwelt under the roots of the green grass; while she must go on +and fight the world, and in fighting it, bring down upon his grave bitter +words and sharp censures from the lips of those who did not understand.</p> +<p>Before which reflection Death came closer and looked kind; and the thought +of his hand was cool and comforting, as the hand of a grey moor mist sweeping +over the heath after fiery days of cloudless sun. Death stood very near and +beckoned at the dark portals of her thought. Behind him there shone a great +light, and in the light stood Clem; but the Shadow filled all the foreground. +To go to her loved one, to die quickly and take their mutual secret with her, +seemed a right and a precious thought just then; to go, to die, while yet he +lay above the earth, was a determination that had even a little power to +solace her agony. She thought of meeting him standing alone, strange, +friendless on the other side of the grave; she told herself that actual duty, +if not the vast love she bore him, pointed along the unknown road he had so +recently followed. It was but justice to him. Then she could laugh at Time +and Fate and the juggling unseen Controller who had played with him and her, +had wrecked their little lives, forced their little passions under a sham +security, then snapped the thread on which she hung for everything, killed +the better part of herself, and left her all alone without a hand to shield +or a heart to pity. In the darkness, as the moon stole away and her chamber +window blackened, she sounded all sorrow’s wide and solemn diapason; +and the living sank into shadows before her mind’s accentuated and +vivid picture of the dead. Future life loomed along one desolate pathway that +led to pain and shame and griefs as yet untasted. The rocks beside the way +hid shadowy shapes of the unfriendly; for no mother’s kindly hand would +support her, no brother’s stout arm would be lifted for her when they +knew. No pure, noble, fellow-creature might be asked for aid, not one might +be expected to succour and cherish in the great strait sweeping towards her. +Some indeed there were to look to for the moment, but their voices and their +eyes would harden presently, when they knew.</p> +<p>She told herself they must never know; and the solution to the problem of +how to keep her secret appeared upon the threshold of the unknown road her +lover had already travelled. Now, at the echo of the lowest notes, while she +lay with uneven pulses and shaking limbs, it seemed that she was faced with +the parting of the ways and must make instant choice. Time would not wait for +her and cared nothing whether she chose life or death for her road. She +struggled with red thoughts, and fever burnt her lips and stabbed her +forehead. Clement was gone. In this supreme hour no fellow-creature could +fortify her courage or direct her tottering judgment. Once she thought of +prayer and turned from it shuddering with a passionate determination to pray +no more. Then the vision of Death shadowed her and she felt his brief sting +would be nothing beside the endless torment of living. Dangerous thoughts +developed quickly in her and grew to giants. Something clamoured to her and +cried that delay, even of hours, was impossible and must be fatal to secrecy. +A feverish yearning to get it over, and that quickly, mastered her, and she +began huddling on some clothes.</p> +<p>Then it was that the sudden sound of the cottage door being shut and +bolted reached her ear. Mrs. Blanchard had returned and knowing that she +would approach in a moment, Chris flung herself on the bed and pretended to +be sleeping soundly. It was not until her mother withdrew and herself +slumbered half an hour later that the distracted woman arose, dressed +herself, and silently left the house as we have said.</p> +<p>She heard the river calling to her, and through its murmur sounded the +voice of her loved one from afar. The moon shone clear and the valley was +full of vapoury gauze. A wild longing to see him once more in the flesh +before she followed him in the spirit gained upon Chris, and she moved slowly +up the hill to the village. Then, as she went, born of the mists upon the +meadows, and the great light and the moony gossamers diamonded with dew, +there rose his dear shape and moved with her along the way. But his face was +hidden, and he vanished at the first outposts of the hamlet as she passed +into Chagford alone. The cottage shadows fell velvety black in a shining +silence; their thatches were streaked, their slates meshed with silver; their +whitewashed walls looked strangely awake and alert and surrounded the woman +with a sort of blind, hushed stare. One solitary patch of light peered like a +weary eye from that side of the street which lay in shadow, and Chris, +passing through the unbolted cottage door, walked up the narrow passage +within and softly entered.</p> +<p>Condolence and tears and buzz of sorrowful friends had passed away with +the stroke of midnight. Now Mrs. Hicks sat alone with her dead and gazed upon +his calm features and vaguely wondered how, after a life of such +disappointment and failure and bitter discontent, he could look so peaceful. +She knew every line that thought and trouble had ruled upon his face; she +remembered their coming; and now, between her fits of grief, she scanned him +close and saw that Death had wiped away the furrows here and there, and +smoothed his forehead and rolled back the years from off him until his face +reminded her of the strange, wayward child who was wont to live a life apart +from his fellows, like some wild wood creature, and who had passed almost +friendless through his boyhood. Fully he had filled her widowed life, and +been at least a loving child, a good son. On him her withered hopes had +depended, and, even in their darkest hours, he had laughed at her dread of +the workhouse, and assured her that while head and hands remained to him she +need not fear, but should enjoy the independence of a home. Now this sole +prop and stay was gone—gone, just as the black cloud had broken and +Fate relented.</p> +<p>The old woman sat beside him stricken, shrivelled, almost reptilian in her +red-eyed, motionless misery. Only her eyes moved in her wrinkled, brown face, +and reflected the candle standing on the mantelpiece above his head. She sat +with her hands crooked over one another in her lap, like some image wrought +of ebony and dark oak. Once a large house-spider suddenly and silently +appeared upon the sheet that covered the breast of the dead. It flashed along +for a foot or two, then sat motionless; and she, whose inclination was to +loathe such things unutterably, put forth her hand and caught it without a +tremor and crushed it while its hairy legs wriggled between her fingers.</p> +<p>To the robbed mother came Chris, silent as a ghost. Only the old +woman’s eyes moved as the girl entered, fell down by the bier, and +buried her face in the pillow that supported her lover’s head. Thus, in +profound silence, both remained awhile, until Chris lifted herself and looked +in the dead face and almost started to see the strange content stamped on +it.</p> +<p>Then Mrs. Hicks began to speak in a high-pitched voice which broke now and +again as her bosom heaved after past tears.</p> +<p>“The awnly son of his mother, an’ she a widow wummon; +an’ theer ’s no Christ now to work for the love of the poor. I be +shattered wi’ many groans an’ tears, Chris Blanchard, same as you +be. You knawed him—awnly you an’ me; but you ’m young yet, +an’ memory’s so weak in young brains that you’ll outlive it +all an’ forget.”</p> +<p>“Never, never, mother! Theer ’s no more life for me—not +here. He’s callin’ to me—callin’ an’ +callin’ from yonder.”</p> +<p>“You’ll outlive an’ forget,” repeated the other. +“I cannot, bein’ as I am. An’, mind this, when you pray to +Heaven, ax for gold an’ diamonds, ax for houses an’ lands, ax for +the fat of the airth; an’ ax loud. No harm in axin’. Awnly +doan’t pitch your prayers tu dirt low, for ban’t the hardness of +a thing stops God. You ’m as likely or onlikely to get a big answer as +a little. See the blessin’ flowin’ in streams for some folks! +They do live braave an’ happy, with gude health, an’ gude wives, +an’ money, an’ the fruits of the land; they do get butivul +childer, as graws up like the corners of the temple; an’ when they come +to die, they shut their eyes ’pon kind faaces an’ lie in lead +an’ oak under polished marble. All that be theers; an’ what was +his—my son’s?”</p> +<p>“God forgot him,” sobbed Chris, “an’ the world +forgot him—all but you an’ me.”</p> +<p>The old woman shifted her hands wearily.</p> +<p>“Theer’s a mort for God to bear in mind, but ’t is hard, +here an’ there, wheer He slips awver some lowly party an’ misses +a humble whisper. Clamour if you want to be heard; doan’t go with bated +breath same as I done. ’T was awnly a li’l thing I axed, +an’ axed it twice a day on my knees, ever since my man died +twenty-three year agone. An’ often as not thrice Sundays, so you may +count up the number of times I axed if you mind to. Awnly a li’l +rubbishy thing you might have thought: just to bring his fair share o’ +prosperity to Clem an’ keep my bones out the poorhouse at the end. But +my bwoy ’s brawk his neck by a cruel death, an’ I must wear the +blue cotton.”</p> +<p>“No, no, mother.”</p> +<p>“Ess. Not that it looks so hard as it did. This makes it +easy—” and she put her hand on her son’s forehead and left +it there a moment.</p> +<p>Presently she continued:</p> +<p>“I axed Clem to turn the bee-butts at my sister’s +passing—Mrs. Lezzard. But he wouldn’t; an’ now +they’ll be turned for him. Wise though the man was, he set no store on +the dark, hidden meaning of honey-bees at times of death. Now the creatures +be masterless, same as you an’ me; an’ they’ll knaw it; +an’ you’ll see many an’ many a-murmuring on his graave +’fore the grass graws green theer; for they see more ’n what we +can.”</p> +<p>She relapsed into motionless silence and, herself now wholly tearless, +watched the tears of Chris, who had sunk down on the floor between the mother +and son.</p> +<p>“Why for do <i>you</i> cry an’ wring your hands so +hard?” she asked suddenly. “You’m awnly a girl +yet—young an’ soft-cheeked wi’ braave bonny eyes. +Theer’ll be many a man’s breast for you to comfort your head on. +But me! Think o’ what’s tearin’ my auld heart to +tatters—me, so bleared an’ ugly an’ lonely. God knaws +God’s self couldn’t bring no balm to me—none, till I huddle +under the airth arter un; but you—your wound won’t show by time +the snaw comes again.”</p> +<p>“You forget when you loved a man first if you says such a thing as +that.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s no eternal, lasting fashion o’ love but a +mother’s to her awn male childer,” croaked the other. +“Sweethearts’ love is a thing o’ the blood—a trick +o’ Nature to tickle us poor human things into breeding ’gainst +our better wisdom; but what a mother feels doan’t hang on no such +broken reed. It’s deeper down; it’s hell an’ heaven both to +wance; it’s life; an’ to lose it is death. See! Essterday +I’d ’a’ fought an’ screamed an’ took on like a +gude un to be fetched away to the Union; but come they put him in the ground, +I’ll go so quiet as a lamb.”</p> +<p>Another silence followed; then the aged widow pursued her theme, at first +in the same dreary, cracked monotone, then deepening to passion.</p> +<p>“I tell you a gude wife will do ’most anything for a husband +an’ give her body an’ soul to un; but she expects summat in +return. She wants his love an’ worship for hers; but a mother do give +all—all—all—an’ never axes nothin’ for it. Just +a kiss maybe, an’ a brightening eye, or a kind word. That’s her +pay, an’ better’n gawld, tu. She’m purty nigh satisfied +wi’ what would satisfy a dog, come to think on it. ’T is her joy +to fret an’ fume an’ pine o’ nights for un, an’ tire +the A’mighty’s ear wi’ plans an’ suggestions for un; +aye, think an’ sweat an’ starve for un all times. ’T is her +joy, I tell ’e, to smooth his road, an’ catch the brambles by his +way an’ let ’em bury their thorns in her flesh so he +shaa’n’t feel ’em; ’t is her joy to hear him babble +of all his hopes an’ delights; an’ when the time comes +she’ll taake the maid of his heart to her awn, though maybe ’t is +breakin’ wi’ fear that he’ll forget her in the light of the +young eyes. Ax your awn mother if what I sez ban’t God’s truth. +We as got the bwoys be content wi’ that little. We awnly want to help +theer young shoulders wi’ our auld wans, to fight for ’em to the +last. We’ll let theer wives have the love, we will, an’ ax no +questions an’—an’ we’ll break our hearts when the +cheel ’s took out o’ his turn—break our hearts by +inches—same as I be doin’ now.”</p> +<p>“An’ doan’t I love, tu? Weern’t he all the world +to me, tu? Isn’t my heart broken so well as yours?” sobbed +Chris.</p> +<p>“Hear this, you wummon as talks of a broken heart,” answered +the elder almost harshly. “Wait—wait till you ’m the mother +of a li’l man-cheel, an’ see the shining eyes of un +a-lookin’ into yourn while your nipple’s bein’ squeezed by +his naked gums, an’ you laugh at what you suffered for un, an’ +hug un to you. Wait till he’m grawed from baby to bwoy, from bwoy to +man; wait till he’m all you’ve got left in the cold, starved +winter of a sorrowful life; an’ wait till he’m brought home to +’e like this here, while you’ve been sittin’ laughin’ +to yourself an’ countin’ dream gawld. Then turn about to find the +tears that’ll comfort ’e, an’ the prayers that’ll +soothe ’e, and the God that’ll lift ’e up; but you +won’t find ’em, Chris Blanchard.”</p> +<p>The girl listened to this utterance, and it filled her with a sort of +weird wonder as at a revelation of heredity. Mrs. Hicks had ever been +taciturn before her, and now this rapid outpouring of thoughts and phrases +echoed like the very speech of the dead. Thus had Clement talked, and the +girl dimly marvelled without understanding. The impression passed, and there +awoke in Chris a sudden determination to whisper to this bereaved woman what +she could not even tell her own mother. A second thought had probably changed +her intention, but she did not wait for any second thought. She acted on +impulse, rose, put her arms round the widow, and murmured her secret. The +other started violently and broke her motionless posture before this +intelligence.</p> +<p>“Christ! And he knawed—my son?”</p> +<p>“He knawed.”</p> +<p>“Then you needn’t whisper it. There’s awnly us three +here.”</p> +<p>“An’ no others must knaw. You’ll never tell—never? +You swear that?”</p> +<p>“Me tell! No, no. To think! Then theer’s real sorrow for you, +tu, poor soul—real, grawin’ sorrow tu. Differ’nt from mine, +but real enough. Yet—”</p> +<p>She relapsed into a stone-like repose. No facial muscle moved, but the +expression of her mind appeared in her eyes and there gradually grew a hungry +look in them—as of a starving thing confronted with food. The +realisation of these new facts took a long time. No action accompanied it; no +wrinkle deepened; no line of the dejected figure lifted; but when she spoke +again her voice had greatly changed and become softer and very tremulous.</p> +<p>“O my dear God! ’t will be a bit of Clement! Had ’e +thought o’ that?”</p> +<p>Then she rose suddenly to her feet and expression came to her face—a +very wonderful expression wherein were blended fear, awe, and something of +vague but violent joy—as though one suddenly beheld a loved ghost from +the dead.</p> +<p>“’T is as if all of un weern’t quite lost! A li’l +left—a cheel of his! Wummon! You’m a holy thing to me—a +holy thing evermore! You’m bearin’ sunshine for your summertime +and my winter—if God so wills!”</p> +<p>Then she lifted up her voice and cried to Chris with a strange cry, and +knelt down at her feet and kissed her hands and stroked them.</p> +<p>“Go to un,” she said, leaping up; “go to Clem, an’ +tell un, in his ear, that I knaw. It’ll reach him if you whisper it. +His soul ban’t so very far aways yet. Tell un I knaw, tu—you +an’ me. He’d glory that I knawed. An’ pray henceforrard, as +I shall, for a bwoy. Ax God for a bwoy—ax wi’out ceasin’ +for a son full o’ Clem. Our sorrows might win to the Everlasting Ear +this wance. But, for Christ’s sake, ax like wan who has a right to, not +fawning an’ humble.”</p> +<p>The woman was transfigured as the significance of this news filled her +mind. She wept before a splendid possibility. It fired her eyes and +straightened her shrivelled stature. For a while her frantic utterances +almost inspired Chris with the shadow of similar emotions; but another side +of the picture knew no dawn. This the widow ignored—indeed it had not +entered her head since her first comment on the confession. Now, however, the +girl reminded her,—</p> +<p>“You forget a little what this must be to me, mother.”</p> +<p>“Light in darkness.”</p> +<p>“I hadn’t thought that; an the gert world won’t pity me, +as you did when I first told you.”</p> +<p>“You ban’t feared o’ the world, be you? The world forgot +un. ’T was your awn word. What’s the world to you, knawin’ +what you knaw? Do ’e want to be treated soft by what was allus +hell-hard to him? Four-and-thirty short years he lived, then the world +beginned to ope its eyes to his paarts, an’ awnly then—tu late, +when the thread of his days was spun. What’s the world to you and why +should you care for its word, Chris Blanchard?”</p> +<p>“Because I am Chris Blanchard,” she said. “I was gwaine +to kill myself, but thought to see his dear face wance more before I done it. +Now—”</p> +<p>“Kill yourself! God’s mercy! ’T will be killing Clem +again if you do! You caan’t; you wouldn’t dare; theer’s +black damnation in it an’ flat murder now. Hear me, for Christ’s +sake, if that’s the awful thought in you: you’m God’s +chosen tool in this—chosen to suffer an’ bring a bwoy in the +world—Clem’s bwoy. Doan’t you see how’t is? +’Kill yourself’! How can ’e dream it? You’ve got to +bring a bwoy, I tell ’e, to keep us from both gwaine stark mad. +’T was foreordained he should leave his holy likeness. God’s +truth! You should be proud ’stead o’ fearful—such a man as +he was. Hold your head high an’ pray when none’s lookin’, +pray through every wakin’ hour an’ watch yourself as you’d +watch the case of a golden jewel. What wise brain will think hard of you for +followin’ the chosen path? What odds if a babe’s got ringless +under the stars or in a lawful four-post bed? Who married Adam an’ Eve? +You was the wife of un ’cordin’ to the first plan o’ the +livin’ God; an’ if He changed His lofty mind when’t was tu +late, blame doan’t fall on you or the dead. Think of a baaby—his +baaby—under your breast! Think of meetin’ him in time to come, +wi’ another soul got in sheer love! Better to faace the people +an’ let the bairn come to fulness o’ life than fly them an’ +cut your days short an’ go into the next world empty-handed. +Caan’t you see it? What would Clem say? He’d judge you +hard—such a lover o’ li’l childer as him. ’T is the +first framework of an immortal soul you’ve got unfoldin’, like a +rosebud hid in the green, an’ ban’t for you to nip that life for +your awn whim an’ let the angels in heaven be fewer by wan. You must +live. An’ the bwoy’ll graw into a tower of strength for +’e—a tower of strength an’ a glass belike wheer +you’ll see Clem rose again.”</p> +<p>“The shame of it. My mother and Will—Will who’s a hard +judge, an’ such a clean man.”</p> +<p>“‘Clean’! Christ A’mighty! You’d madden a +saint of heaven! Weern’t Clem clean, tu? If God sends fire-fire breaks +out—sweet, livin’ fire. You must go through with it—aye, +an’ call the bwoy Clem, tu. Be you shamed of him as he lies here? Be +you feared of anything the airth can do to you when you look at him? Do +’e think Heaven’s allus hard? No, I tell ’e, not to the +young—not to the young. The wind’s mostly tempered to the shorn +lamb, though the auld ewe do oftentimes sting for it, an’ get the seeds +o’ death arter shearing. Wait, and be strong, till you feel +Clem’s baaby in your arms. That’ll be reward enough, an’ +you won’t care no more for the world then. His son, mind; who be you to +take life, an’ break the buds of Clem’s plantin’? Worse +than to go in another’s garden an’ tear down green +fruit.”</p> +<p>So she pleaded volubly, with an electric increase of vitality, and +continued to pour out a torrent of words, until Chris solemnly promised, +before God and the dead, that she would not take her life. Having done so, +some new design informed her.</p> +<p>“I must go,” she said; “the moon has set and dawn is +near. Dying be so easy; living so hard. But live I will; I swear it, though +theer’s awnly my poor mad brain to shaw how.”</p> +<p>“Clem’s son, mind. An’ let me be the first to see it, +for I feel’t will be the gude pleasure of God I should.”</p> +<p>“An’ you promise to say no word, whatever betides, an’ +whatever you hear?”</p> +<p>“Dumb I’ll be, as him theer—dumb, countin’ the +weeks an’ months.”</p> +<p>“Day’s broke, an’ I must go home-along,” said +Chris. She repeated the words mechanically, then moved away without any +formal farewell. At the door she turned, hastened back, kissed the dead +man’s face again, and then departed, while the other woman looked at +her but spoke no more.</p> +<p>Alone, with the struggle over and her object won, the mother shrank and +dwindled again and grew older momentarily. Then she relapsed into the same +posture as before, and anon, tears bred of new thoughts began to trickle +painfully from their parched fountains. She did not move, but let them roll +unwiped away. Presently her head sank back, her cap fell off and white hair +dropped about her face.</p> +<p>Fingers of light seemed lifting the edges of the blind. They gained +strength as the candle waned, and presently at cock-crow, when unnumbered +clarions proclaimed morning, grey dawn with golden eyes brightened upon a +dead man and an ancient woman fast asleep beside him.</p> +<h2><a id="II_XVII" name="II_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII<br /> +MISSING</h2> +<p>John Grimbal, actuated by some whim, or else conscious that under the +circumstances decorum demanded his attendance, was present at the funeral of +Clement Hicks. Some cynic interest he derived from the spectacle of young +Blanchard among the bearers; and indeed, as may be supposed, few had felt +this tragic termination of his friend’s life more than Will. Very +genuine remorse darkened his days, and he blamed himself bitterly enough for +all past differences with the dead. It was in a mood at once contrite and +sorrowful that he listened to the echo of falling clod, and during that +solemn sound mentally traversed the whole course of his relations with his +sister’s lover. Of himself he thought not at all, and no shadowy +suspicion of relief crossed his mind upon the reflection that the knowledge +of those fateful weeks long past was now unshared. In all his quarrels with +Clement, no possibility of the man breaking his oath once troubled +Will’s mind; and now profound sorrow at his friend’s death and +deep sympathy with Chris were the emotions that entirely filled the young +farmer’s heart.</p> +<p>Grimbal watched his enemy as the service beside the grave proceeded. Once +a malignant thought darkened his face, and he mused on what the result might +be if he hinted to Blanchard the nature of his frustrated business with Hicks +at Oke Tor. All Chagford had heard was that the master of the Red House +intended to accept Clement Hicks as tenant of his home farm. The fact +surprised many, but none looked behind it for any mystery, and Will least of +all. Grimbal’s thoughts developed upon his first idea; and he asked +himself the consequence if, instead of telling Blanchard that he had gone to +learn his secret, he should pretend that it was already in his possession. +The notion shone for a moment only, then went out. First it showed itself +absolutely futile, for he could do no more than threaten, and the other must +speedily discover that in reality he knew nothing; and secondly, some shadow +of feeling made Grimbal hesitate. His desire for revenge was now developing +on new lines, and while his purpose remained unshaken, his last defeat had +taught him patience. Partly from motives of policy, partly, strange as it may +seem, from his instincts as a sportsman, he determined to let the matter of +Hicks lie buried. For the dead man’s good name he cared nothing, +however, and victory over Will was only the more desired for this +postponement. His black tenacity of purpose won strength from the repulse, +but the problem for the time being was removed from its former sphere of +active hatred towards his foe. How long this attitude would last, and what +idiosyncrasy of character led to it, matters little. The fact remained that +Grimbal’s mental posture towards Blanchard now more nearly resembled +that which he wore to his other interests in life. The circumstance still +stood first, but partook of the nature of his emotions towards matters of +sport. When a heavy trout had beaten him more than once, Grimbal would repair +again and again to its particular haunt and leave no legitimate plan for its +destruction untried. But any unsportsmanlike method of capturing or slaying +bird, beast, or fish enraged him. So he left the churchyard with a sullen +determination to pursue his sinister purpose straightforwardly.</p> +<p>All interested in Clement Hicks attended the funeral, including his mother +and Chris. The last had yielded to Mrs. Blanchard’s desire and promised +to stop at home; but she changed her mind and conducted herself at the +ceremony with a stoic fortitude. This she achieved only by an effort of will +which separated her consciousness entirely from her environment and alike +blinded her eyes and deafened her ears to the mournful sights and sounds +around her. With her own future every fibre of her mind was occupied; and as +they lowered her lover’s coffin into the earth a line of action leapt +into her brain.</p> +<p>Less than four-and-twenty hours later it seemed that the last act of the +tragedy had begun. Then, hoarse as the raven that croaked Duncan’s +coming, Mr. Blee returned to Monks Barton from an early visit to the village. +Phoebe was staying with her father for a fortnight, and it was she who met +the old man as he paddled breathlessly home.</p> +<p>“More gert news!” he gasped; “if it ban’t too much +for wan in your way o’ health.”</p> +<p>“Nothing wrong at Newtake?” cried Phoebe, turning pale.</p> +<p>“No, no; but family news for all that.”</p> +<p>The girl raised her hand to her heart, and Miller Lyddon, attracted by +Billy’s excited voice, hastened to his daughter and put his arm round +her.</p> +<p>“Out with it,” he said. “I see news in ’e. +What’s the worst or best?”</p> +<p>“Bad, bad as heart can wish. A peck o’ trouble, by the looks +of it. Chris Blanchard be gone—vanished like a dream! Mother Blanchard +called her this marnin’, an’ found her bed not so much as +creased. She’ve flown, an’ there’s a braave upstore +’bout it, for every Blanchard’s wrong in the head more or less, +beggin’ your pardon, missis, as be awnly wan by marriage.”</p> +<p>“But no sign? No word or anything left?”</p> +<p>“Nothing; an’ theer’s a purty strong faith she’m +in the river, poor lamb. Theer’s draggin’ gwaine to be done in +the ugly bits. I heard tell of it to the village, wheer I’d just +stepped up to see auld Lezzard moved to the work’ouse. A wonnerful +coorious, rackety world, sure ’nough! Do make me giddy.”</p> +<p>“Does Will know?” asked Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>“His mother’s sent post-haste for un. I doubt he ’m to +the cottage by now. Such a gude, purty gal as she was, tu! An’ so mute +as a twoad at the buryin’, wi’ never a tear to soften the graave +dust. For why? She knawed she’d be alongside her man again ’fore +the moon waned. An’ I hope she may be. But ’t was cross-roads +an’ a hawthorn stake in my young days. Them barbarous ancient fashions +be awver, thank God, though whether us lives in more religious times is a +question, when you see the things what happens every hour on the +twenty-four.”</p> +<p>“I must go to them,” cried Phoebe.</p> +<p>“I’ll go; you stop at home quietly, and don’t fret your +mind,” answered her father.</p> +<p>“Us must all do what us can—every manjack. I be gwaine +corpse-searchin’ down valley wi’ Chapple, an’ that +’mazin’ water-dog of hisn; an’ if ’t is my hand +brings her out the Teign, ’t will be done in a kind, Christian manner, +for she’s in God’s image yet, same as us; an’ ugly though a +drownin’ be, it won’t turn me from my duty.”</p> +<h2><a id="III_I" name="III_I"></a>BOOK III<br /> +HIS GRANITE CROSS<br /> +<br />CHAPTER I<br /> +BABY</h2> +<p>Succeeding upon the tumultuous incidents of Clement’s death and +Chris Blanchard’s disappearance, there followed a period of calm in the +lives of those from whom this narrative is gleaned. Such transient peace +proved the greater in so far as Damaris and her son were concerned, by reason +of an incident which befell Will on the evening of his sister’s +departure. Dead she certainly was not, nor did she mean to die; for, upon +returning to Newtake after hours of fruitless searching, Blanchard found a +communication awaiting him there, though no shadow of evidence was +forthcoming to show how it had reached the farm. Upon the ledge of the window +he discovered it when he returned, and read the message at a glance:</p> +<p>“Don’t you nor mother fear nothing for me, nor seek me out, +for it would be vain. I’m well, and I’m so happy as ever I shall +be, and perhaps I’ll come home-along some day.—CHRIS.”</p> +<p>On this challenge Will acted, ignored his sister’s entreaty to +attempt no such thing, and set out upon a resolute search of nearly two +months’ duration. He toiled amain into the late autumn, but no hint or +shadow of her rewarded the quest, and sustained failure in an enterprise +where his heart was set, for his mother’s sake and his own, acted upon +the man’s character, and indeed wrought marked changes in him. Despite +the letter of Chris, hope died in Will, and he openly held his sister dead; +but Mrs. Blanchard, while sufficiently distressed before her daughter’s +flight, never feared for her life, and doubted not that she would return in +such time as it pleased her to do so.</p> +<p>“Her nature be same as yours an’ your faither’s afore +you. When he’d got the black monkey on his shoulder he’d +oftentimes leave the vans for a week and tramp the very heart o’ the +Moor alone. Fatigue of body often salves a sore mind. He loved thunder +o’ dark nights—my husband did—and was better for it +seemin’ly. Chris be safe, I do think, though it’s a heart-deep +stroke this for me, ’cause I judge she caan’t ’zactly love +me as I thought, or else she’d never have left me. Still, the cold +world, what she knaws so little ’bout, will drive her back to them as +love her, come presently.”</p> +<p>So, with greater philosophy than her son could muster, Damaris practised +patience; while Will, after a perambulation of the country from north to +south, from west to east, after weeks on the lonely heaths and hiding-places +of the ultimate Moor, after visits to remote hamlets and inquiries at a +hundred separate farmhouses, returned to Newtake, worn, disappointed, and +gloomy to a degree beyond the experience of those who knew him. Neither did +the cloud speedily evaporate, as was most usual with his transient phases of +depression. Circumstances combined to deepen it, and as the winter crowded +down more quickly than usual, its leaden months of scanty daylight and cold +rains left their mark on Will as time had never done before.</p> +<p>During those few and sombre days which represented the epact of the dying +year, Martin Grimbal returned to Chagford. He had extended his investigations +beyond the time originally allotted to them, and now came back to his home +with plenty of fresh material, and even one or two new theories for his book. +He had received no communications during his absence, and the news of the +bee-keeper’s death and his sweetheart’s disappearance, suddenly +delivered by his housekeeper, went far to overwhelm him. It danced joy up +again through the grey granite. For a brief hour splendid vistas of happiness +reopened, and his laborious life swept suddenly into a bright region that he +had gazed into longingly aforetime and lost for ever. He fought with himself +to keep down this rosy-fledged hope; but it leapt in him, a young giant born +at a word. The significance of the freedom of Chris staggered him. To find +her was the cry of his heart, and, as Will had done before him, he +straightway set out upon a systematic attempt to discover the missing girl. +Of such uncertain temper was Blanchard’s mind at this season, however, +that he picked a quarrel out of Martin’s design, and questioned the +antiquary’s right to busy himself upon an undertaking which the brother +of Chris had already failed to accomplish.</p> +<p>“She belonged to me, not to you,” he said, “an’ I +done all a man could do to find her. See her again we sha’n’t, +that’s my feelin’, despite what she wrote to me and left so +mysterious on the window. Madness comed awver her, I reckon, an’ +she’ve taken her life, an’ theer ban’t no call for you or +any other man to rip up the matter again. Let it bide as ’t is. Such +black doin’s be best set to rest.”</p> +<p>But, while Martin did not seek or desire Will’s advice in the +matter, he was surprised at the young farmer’s attitude, and it +extracted something in the nature of a confession from him, for there was +little, he told himself, that need longer be hidden from the woman’s +brother.</p> +<p>“I can speak now, at least to you, Will,” he said. “I +can tell you, at any rate. Chris was all the world to me—all the world, +and accident kept me from knowing she belonged to another man until too late. +Now that he has gone, poor fellow, she almost seems within reach again. You +know what it is to love. I can’t and won’t believe she has taken +her life. Something tells me she lives, and I am not going to take any +man’s word about it. I must satisfy myself.”</p> +<p>Thereupon Blanchard became more reasonable, withdrew his objections and +expressed a very heartfelt hope that Martin might succeed where he had +failed. The lover entered methodically upon his quest and conducted the +inquiry with a rigorous closeness and scrupulous patience quite beyond +Will’s power despite his equally earnest intentions. For six months +Martin pursued his hope, and few saw or heard anything of him during that +period.</p> +<p>Once, during the early summer, Will chanced upon John Grimbal at the first +meeting of the otter hounds in Teign Vale; but though the younger purposely +edged near his enemy where he stood, and hoped that some word might fall to +indicate their ancient enmity dead, John said nothing, and his blue eyes were +hard and as devoid of all emotion as turquoise beads when they met the +farmer’s face for one fraction of time.</p> +<p>Before this incident, however, there had arisen upon Will’s life the +splendour of paternity. A time came when, through one endless night and +silver April morning, he had tramped his kitchen floor as a tiger its cage, +and left a scratched pathway on the stones. Then his mother hasted from aloft +and reported the arrival of a rare baby boy.</p> +<p>“Phoebe ’s doin’ braave, an’ she prays of ’e +to go downlong fust thing an’ tell Miller all ’s well. Doctor +Parsons hisself says ’t is a ’mazing fine cheel, so it +ban’t any mere word of mine as wouldn’t weigh, me bein’ the +gran’mother.”</p> +<p>They talked a little while of the newcomer, then, thankful for an +opportunity to be active after his long suspense, the father hurried away, +mounted a horse, and soon rattled down the valleys into Chagford, at a pace +which found his beast dead lame on the following day. Mighty was the +exhilaration of that wild gallop as he sped past cot and farm under morning +sunshine with his great news. Labouring men and chance wayfarers were +overtaken from time to time. Some Will knew, some he had never seen, but to +the ear of each and all without discrimination he shouted his intelligence. +Not a few waved their hats and nodded and remembered the great day in their +own lives; one laughed and cried “Bravo!” sundry, who knew him +not, marvelled and took him for a lunatic.</p> +<p>Arrived at Chagford, familiar forms greeted Will in the market-place, and +again he bawled his information without dismounting.</p> +<p>“A son ’tis, Chapple—comed an hour ago—a brave +li’l bwoy, so they tell!”</p> +<p>“Gude luck to it, then! An’ now you’m a parent, you +must—”</p> +<p>But Will was out of earshot, and Mr. Chapple wasted no more breath.</p> +<p>Into Monks Barton the farmer presently clattered, threw himself off his +horse, tramped indoors, and shouted for his father-in-law in tones that made +the oak beams ring. Then the miller, with Mr. Blee behind him, hastened to +hear what Will had come to tell.</p> +<p>“All right, all right with Phoebe?” were Mr. Lyddon’s +first words, and he was white and shaking as he put the question.</p> +<p>“Right as ninepence, faither—gran’faither, I should say. +A butivul li’l man she’ve got—out o’ the common fine, +Parsons says, as ought to knaw—fat as a slug wi’ +’mazin’ dark curls on his wee head, though my mother says +’tis awnly a sort o’ catch-crop, an’ not the lasting hair +as’ll come arter.”</p> +<p>“A bwoy! Glory be!” said Mr. Blee. “If theer’s +awnly a bit o’ the gracious gudeness of his gran’faither in un, +’twill prove a prosperous infant.”</p> +<p>“Thank God for a happy end to all my prayers,” said Mr. +Lyddon. “Billy, get Will something to eat an’ drink. I guess +he’s hungry an’ starved.”</p> +<p>“Caan’t eat, Miller; but I’ll have a drop of the best, +if it’s all the same to you. Us must drink their healths, both of +’em. As for me ’tis a gert thing to be the faither of a cheel +as’ll graw into a man some day, an’ may even be a historical +character, awnly give un time.”</p> +<p>“So ’tis a gert thing. Sit down; doan’t tramp about. I +lay you’ve been on your feet enough these late hours.”</p> +<p>Will obeyed, but proceeded with his theme, and though his feet were still +his hands were not.</p> +<p>“Us be faced wi’ the upbringing an’ edication of un. I +mean him to be brought up to a power o’ knowledge, for theer’s +nothin’ like it. Doan’t you think I be gwaine to shirk +doin’ the right thing by un’, Miller, ’cause it aint so. If +’twas my last fi’-pun’ note was called up for larnin’ +him, he’d have it.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s no gert hurry yet,” declared Billy. +“Awnly you’m right to look in the future and weigh the debt every +man owes to the cheel he gets. He’ll never cost you less thought or +halfpence than he do to-day, an’, wi’out croakin’ at such a +gay time, I will say he’ll graw into a greater care an’ trouble, +every breath he draws.”</p> +<p>“Not him! Not the way I’m gwaine to bring un up. Stern +an’ strict an’ no nonsense, I promise ’e”</p> +<p>“That’s right. Tame un from the breast. I’d like for my +paart to think as the very sapling be grawin’ now as’ll give his +li’l behind its fust lesson in the ways o’ duty,” declared +Mr. Blee. “Theer ’s certain things you must be flint-hard about, +an’ fust comes lying. Doan’t let un lie; flog it out of un; +an’ mind, ’tis better for your arm to ache than for his soul to +burn.”</p> +<p>“You leave me to do right by un. You caan’t teach me, Billy, +not bein’ a parent; though I allow what you say is true +enough.”</p> +<p>“An’ set un to work early; get un into ways o’ work so +soon as he’s able to wear corduroys. An’ doan’t never let +un be cruel to beastes; an’ doan’t let un—”</p> +<p>“Theer, theer!” cried Mr. Lyddon. “Have done with +’e! You speak as fules both, settin’ out rules o’ life for +an hour-old babe. You talk to his mother about taming of un an’ grawing +saplings for his better bringing-up. She’ll tell ’e a thing or +two. Just mind the slowness o’ growth in the human young. ’T will +be years before theer’s enough of un to beat.”</p> +<p>“They do come very gradual to fulness o’ body an’ +reason,” admitted Billy; “and ’t is gude it should be so; +’t is well all men an’ women ’s got to be childer fust, for +they brings brightness an’ joy ’pon the earth as babies, though +’t is mostly changed when they ’m grawed up. If us could awnly +foretell the turnin’ out o’ childern, an’ knaw which +’t was best to drown an’ which to save in tender youth, what a +differ’nt world this would be!”</p> +<p>“They ’m poor li’l twoads at fust, no doubt,” said +Will to his father-in-law.</p> +<p>“Ess, indeed they be. ’T is a coorious circumstance, but +generally allowed, that humans are the awnly creatures o’ God wi’ +understandin’, an’ yet they comes into the world more helpless +an’ brainless, an’ bides longer helpless an’ brainless than +any other beast knawn.”</p> +<p>“Shouldn’t call ’em ‘beastes’ ’zactly, +seem’ they’ve got the Holy Ghost from the church font ever +after,” objected Billy. “’T is the differ’nce between +a babe an’ a pup or a kitten. The wan gets God into un at +christenin’, t’ other wouldn’t have no Holy Ghost in un if +you baptised un over a hunderd times. For why? They ’m not built in the +Image.”</p> +<p>“When all’s said, you caan’t look tu far ahead or be tu +forehanded wi’ bwoys,” resumed Will. “Gallopin’ +down-long I said to myself, ‘Theer’s things he may do an’ +things he may not do. He shall choose his awn road in reason, but he must be +guided by me in the choice.’ I won’t let un go for a +sailor—never. I’ll cut un off wi’ a shillin’ if he +thinks of it.”</p> +<p>“Time enough when he can walk an’ talk, I reckon,” said +Billy, who, seeing how his master viewed the matter, now caught Mr. +Lyddon’s manner.</p> +<p>“Ess, that’s very well,” continued Will, “but time +flies that fast wi’ childer. Then I thought, ‘He’ll come to +marry some day, sure’s Fate.’ Myself, I believe in tolerable +early marryin’s.”</p> +<p>“By God! I knaw it!” retorted Mr. Lyddon, with an expression +wherein appeared mingled feelings not a few; “Ess, fay! You’m +right theer. I should take Time by the forelock if I was you, an’ see +if you can find a maiden as’ll suit un while you go back-along through +the village.”</p> +<p>“Awnly, as ’tis better for the man to number more years than +the wummon,” added Billy, “it might be wise to bide a week or +two, so’s he shall have a bit start of his lady.”</p> +<p>“Now, you’m fulin me! An’ I caan’t stay no more +whether or no, ’cause I was promised to see Phoebe an’ my son in +the arternoon. Us be gwaine to call un Vincent William Blanchard, arter you +an’ me, Miller; an’ if it had been a gal, us meant to call un +arter mother; an’ I do thank God ’bout the wee bwoy in all solemn +soberness, ’cause ’tis the fust real gude thing as have falled to +us since the gwaine of poor Chris. ’Twill be a joy to my mother +an’ a gude gran’son to you, I hope.”</p> +<p>“Go home, go home,” said Mr. Lyddon. “Get along with +’e this minute, an’ tell your wife I’m greatly pleased, +an’ shall come to see her mighty soon. Let us knaw every day how she +fares—an’—an’—I’m glad as you called the +laddie arter me. ’Twas a seemly thought.”</p> +<p>Will departed, and his mind roamed over various splendid futures for his +baby. Already he saw it a tall, straight, splendid man, not a hair shorter +than his own six feet two inches. He hoped that it would possess his natural +wisdom, augmented by Phoebe’s marvellous management of figures and +accounts. He also desired for it a measure of his mother’s calm and +stately self-possession before the problems of life, and he had no objection +that his son should reflect Miller Lyddon’s many and amiable +virtues.</p> +<p>He returned home, and his mother presently bid him come to see Phoebe. +Then a sudden nervousness overtook Will, tough though he was. The door shut, +and husband and wife were alone together, for Damaris disappeared. But where +were all those great and splendid pictures of the future? Vanished, vanished +in a mist. Will’s breast heaved; he saw Phoebe’s star-bright eyes +peeping at him, and he touched the treasure beside her—oh, so small it +was!</p> +<p>He bent his head low over them, kissed his wife shyly, and peeped with +proper timidity under the flannel.</p> +<p>“Look, look, Will, dearie! Did ’e ever see aught like un? +An’ come evenin’, he ’m gwaine to have his fust li’l +drink!”</p> +<h2><a id="III_II" name="III_II"></a>CHAPTER II<br /> +THE KNIGHT OF FORLORN HOPES</h2> +<p>The child brought all a child should bring to Newtake, though it could not +hide the fact that Will Blanchard drifted daily a little nearer to the end of +his resources. But occasional success still flattered his ambition, and he +worked hard and honestly. In this respect at least the man proved various +fears unfounded, yet the result of his work rarely took shape of sovereigns. +He marvelled at the extraordinary steadiness with which ill-fortune clung to +Newtake and cursed when, on two quarter-days out of the annual four, another +dip had to be made into the dwindling residue of his uncle’s bequest. +Some three hundred pounds yet remained when young Blanchard entered upon a +further stage of his career,—that most fitly recorded as happening +within the shadow of a granite cross.</p> +<p>After long months of absence from home, Martin Grimbal returned, silent, +unsuccessful, and sad. Upon the foundations of facts he had built many +tentative dwelling-places for hope; but all had crumbled, failure crowned his +labours, and as far from the reach of his discovery seemed the secret of +Chris as the secrets of the sacred circles, stone avenues, and empty, +hypaethral chambers of the Moor. Spiritless and bitterly discouraged, he +returned after such labours as Will had dreamed not of; and his life, +succeeding upon this deep disappointment, seemed far advanced towards its end +in Martin’s eyes—a journey whose brightest incidents, happiest +places of rest, most precious companions were all left behind. This second +death of hope aged the man in truth and sowed his hair with grey. Now only a +melancholy memory of one very beautiful and very sad remained to him. Chris +indeed promised to return, but he told himself that such a woman had never +left an unhappy mother for such period of time if power to come home still +belonged to her. Then, surveying the past, he taxed himself heavily with a +deliberate and cruel share in it. Why had he taken the advice of Blanchard +and delayed his offer of work to Hicks? He told himself that it was because +he knew such a step would definitely deprive him of Chris for ever; and +therein he charged himself with offences that his nature was above +committing. Then he burst into bitter blame of Will, and at a weak +moment—for nothing is weaker than the rare weakness of a strong +man—he childishly upbraided the farmer with that fateful advice +concerning Clement, and called down upon his head deep censure for the +subsequent catastrophe. Will, as may be imagined, proved not slow to resent +such an attack with heart and voice. A great heat of vain recrimination +followed, and the men broke into open strife.</p> +<p>Sick with himself at this pitiable lapse, shaken in his self-respect, +desolate, unsettled, and uncertain of the very foundations on which he had +hitherto planted his life, the elder man existed through a black month, then +braced himself again, looked out into the world, set his dusty desk in order, +and sought once more amidst the relics of the past for comfort and +consolation. He threw himself upon his book and told himself that it must +surely reward his pains; he toiled mightily at his lonely task, and added a +little to man’s knowledge.</p> +<p>Once it happened that the Rev. Shorto-Champernowne met Martin. Riding over +the Moor after a visit to his clerical colleague of Gidleigh, the clergyman +trotted through Scorhill Circle, above northern Teign, and seeing a +well-known parishioner, drew up a while.</p> +<p>“How prosper your profound studies?” he inquired. “Do +these evidences of aboriginal races lead you to any conclusions of note? For +my part, I am not wholly devoid of suspicion that a man might better employ +his time, though I should not presume to make any such suggestion to +you.”</p> +<p>“You may be right; but one is generally unwise to stamp on his +ruling passion if it takes him along an intellectual road. These cryptic +stones are my life. I want to get the secret of them or find at least a +little of it. What are these lonely rings? Where are we standing now? In a +place of worship, where men prayed to the thunder and the sun and stars? Or a +council chamber? Or a court of justice, that has seen many a doom pronounced, +much red blood flow? Or is it a grave? ’T is the fashion to reject the +notion that they represent any religious purpose; yet I cannot see any +argument against the theory. I go on peeping and prying after a spark of +truth. I probe here, and in the fallen circle yonder towards Cosdon; I follow +the stone rows to Fernworthy; I trudge again and again to the Grey +Wethers—that shattered double ring on Sittaford Tor. I eat them up with +my eyes and repeople the heath with those who raised them. Some clay a gleam +of light may come. And if it does, it will reach me through deep study on +those stone men of old. It is along the human side of my investigations I +shall learn, if I learn anything at all.”</p> +<p>“I hope you may achieve your purpose, though the memoranda and data +are scanty. Your name is mentioned in the <i>Western Morning News</i> as a +painstaking inquirer.”</p> +<p>“Yet when theories demand proof—that’s the +rub!”</p> +<p>“Yes, indeed. You are a knight of forlorn hopes, Grimbal,” +answered the Vicar, alluding to Martin’s past search for Chris as much +as to his present archaeologic ambitions. Then he trotted on over the river, +and the pedestrian remained as before seated upon a recumbent stone in the +midst of the circle of Scorhill. Silent he sat and gazed into the lichens of +grey and gold that crowned each rude pillar of the lonely ring. These, as it +seemed, were the very eyes of the granite, but to Martin they represented but +the cloak of yesterday, beneath which centuries of secrets were hidden. Only +the stones and the eternal west wind, that had seen them set up and still +blew over them, could tell him anything he sought to know.</p> +<p>“A Knight of Forlorn Hopes,” mused the man. “So it is, +so it is. The grasshopper, rattling his little kettledrum there, knows nearly +as much of this hoary secret as I do; and the bird, that prunes his wing on +the porphyry, and is gone again. Not till some Damnonian spirit rises from +the barrow, not till some chieftain of these vanished hosts shall take shape +out of the mists and speak, may we glean a grain of this buried knowledge. +And who to-day would believe ten thousand Damnonian ghosts, if they stirred +here once again and thronged the Moor and the moss and the ruined stone +villages with their moonbeam shapes?</p> +<p>“Gone for ever; and she—my Chris—my dear—is she to +dwell in the darkness for all time, too? O God, I would rather hear one +whisper of her voice, feel one touch of her brown hand, than learn the primal +truth of every dumb stone wonder in the world!”</p> +<h2><a id="III_III" name="III_III"></a>CHAPTER III<br /> +CONCERNING THE GATE-POST</h2> +<p>So that good store of roots and hay continue for the cattle during those +months of early spring while yet the Moor is barren; so that the potato-patch +prospers and the oats ripen well; so that neither pony nor bullock is lost in +the shaking bogs, and late summer is dry enough to allow of ample +peat-storing—when all these conditions prevail, your moorman counts his +year a fat one. The upland farmers of Devon are in great measure armed +against the bolts of chance by the nature of their lives, the grey character +of even their most cheerful experiences and the poverty of their highest +ambitions. Their aspirations, becoming speedily cowed by ill-requited toil +and eternal hardship, quickly dwarf and shrink, until even the most sanguine +seldom extend hope much beyond necessity.</p> +<p>Will grumbled, growled, and fought on, while Phoebe, who knew how nobly +the valleys repaid husbandry, mourned in secret that his energetic labours +here could but produce such meagre results. Very gradually their environment +stamped its frosty seal on man and woman; and by the time that little Will +was two years old his parents viewed life, its good and its evil, much as +other Moor folks contemplated it. Phoebe’s heart was still sweet +enough, but she grew more selfish for herself and her own, more self-centred +in great Will and little Will. They filled her existence to the gradual +exclusion of wider sympathies. Miller Lyddon had given his grandson a silver +mug on the day he was baptised, though since that time the old man held more +aloof from the life of Newtake than Phoebe understood. Sometimes she wondered +that he had never offered to assist her husband practically, but Will much +resented the suggestion when Phoebe submitted it to him. There was no need +for any such thing, he declared. As for him, transitory ambitions and hopes +gleamed up in his career as formerly, though less often. So man and wife +found their larger natures somewhat crushed by the various immediate problems +that each day brought along with it. Beyond the narrow horizon of their own +concerns they rarely looked, and Chagford people, noting the change, declared +that life at Newtake was tying their tongues and lining their foreheads. Will +certainly grew more taciturn, less free of advice, perhaps less frank than +formerly. A sort of strangeness shadowed him, and only his mother or his son +could dispel it. The latter soon learnt to understand his father’s many +moods, and would laugh or cry, show joy or fear, according to the tune of the +man’s voice.</p> +<p>There came an evening in mid-September when Will sat at the open hearth +and smoked, with his eyes fixed on a fire of scads.<a id="footnotetag13" +name="footnotetag13"></a><a href="#footnote13"><sup>13</sup></a> He remained +very silent, and Phoebe, busy about a small coat of red cloth, to keep the +cold from her little son’s bones during the coming winter, knew that it +was not one of her husband’s happiest evenings. His eyes were looking +through the fire and the wall behind it, through the wastes and wildernesses +beyond, through the granite hills to the far-away edge of the world, where +Fate sat spinning the threads of the lives of his loved ones. Threads they +looked, in his gloomy survey of that night, much deformed with knot and +tangle, for the Spinner cared nothing at all about them. She suffered each to +wind heedlessly away; she minded not that they were ugly; she spared no +strand of gold or silver from her skein of human happiness to brighten the +grey fabric of them. So it seemed to Will, and his temper chimed with the +rough night. The wind howled and growled down the chimney, uttered many a +sudden yell and ghostly moan, struck with claws invisible at the glowing +heart of the peat fire, and sent red sparks dancing from a corona of faint +blue flame.</p> +<p>“Winter’s comin’ quick,” said Phoebe, biting her +thread.</p> +<p>“Ess, winter’s allus comin’ up here. The fight begins +again so soon as ever ’t is awver—again and again and again, +’cordin’ to the workin’ years of a man’s life. Then +he turns on his back for gude an’ all, an’ takes his rest, wheer +theer’s no more seasons, nor frost, nor sunshine, in the world +under.”</p> +<p>“You’m glumpy, dear heart. What’s amiss? What’s +crossed ’e? Tell me, an’ I lay I’ll find a word to smooth +it away. Nothin’ contrary happened to market?”</p> +<p>“No, no—awnly my nature. When the wind’s spelling winter +in the chimbley, an’ the yether’s dead again, ’t is wisht +lookin’ forrard. The airth ’s allus dyin’, an’ the +life of her be that short, an’ grubbing of bare food an’ rent out +of her is sour work after many years. Thank God I’m a hopeful, +far-seem’ chap, an’ sound as a bell; but I doan’t make +money for all my sweat, that’s the mystery.”</p> +<p>“You will some day. Luck be gwaine to turn ’fore long, I hope. +An’ us have got what’s better ’n money, what caan’t +be bought.”</p> +<p>“The li’l bwoy?”</p> +<p>“Aye; if us hadn’t nothin’ but him, theer’s many +would envy our lot.”</p> +<p>“Childer’s no such gert blessin’, neither.”</p> +<p>“Will! How can you say it?”</p> +<p>“I do say it. We ’m awnly used to keep up the breed, then +thrawed o’ wan side. I’m sick o’ men an’ women folks. +Theer’s too many of ’em.”</p> +<p>“But childer—our li’l Will. The moosic of un be sweeter +than song o’ birds all times, an’ you’d be fust to say so +if you wasn’t out of yourself.”</p> +<p>“He ’m a braave, small lad enough; but theer again! Why should +he have been pitched into this here home? He might have been put in a palace +just as easy, an’ born of a royal queen mother, ’stead o’ +you; he might have opened his eyes ’pon marble walls an’ jewels +an’ precious stones, ’stead of whitewash an’ a peat fire. +Be that baaby gwaine to thank us for bringing him in the world, come he graw +up? Not him! Why should he?”</p> +<p>“But he will. We ’m his faither an’ mother. Do ’e +love your mother less for bearin’ you in a gypsy van? Li’l +Will’s to pay us noble for all our toil some day, an’ be a joy to +our grey hairs an’ a prop to our auld age, please God.”</p> +<p>“Ha, ha!—story-books! Gi’ me a cup o’ milk; then +us’ll go to bed.”</p> +<p>She obeyed; he piled turf upon the hearth, to keep the fire alight until +morning, then took up the candle and followed Phoebe through another chamber, +half-scullery, half-storehouse, into which descended the staircase from +above. Here hung the pale carcase of a newly slain pig, suspended by its hind +legs from a loop in the ceiling; and Phoebe, many of whose little delicacies +of manner had vanished of late, patted the carcase lovingly, like the good +farmer’s wife she was.</p> +<p>“Wish theer was more so big in the sties,” she said.</p> +<p>Arrived at her bedside, the woman prayed before sinking to rest within +reach of her child’s cot; while Will, troubling Heaven with no petition +or thanksgiving, was in bed five minutes sooner than his wife.</p> +<p>“Gude-night, lad,” said Phoebe, as she put the candle out, but +her husband only returned an inarticulate grunt for answer, being already +within the portal of sleep.</p> +<p>A fair morning followed on the tempestuous night, and Winter, who had +surely whispered her coming under the darkness, vanished again at dawn. The +Moor still provided forage, but all light was gone out of the heather, though +the standing fern shone yellow under the sun, and the recumbent bracken shed +a rich russet in broad patches over the dewy green where Will had chopped it +down and left it to dry for winter fodder. He was very late this year in +stacking the fern, and designed that labour for his morning’s +occupation.</p> +<p>Ted Chown chanced to be away for a week’s holiday, so Will entered +his farmyard early. The variable weather of his mind rarely stood for long at +storm, but, unlike the morning, he had awakened in no happy mood.</p> +<p>A child’s voice served for a time to smooth his brow, now clouded +from survey of a broken spring in his market-cart; then came the lesser Will +with a small china mug for his morning drink. Phoebe watched him sturdily +tramp across the yard, and the greater Will laughed to see his son’s +alarm before the sudden stampede of a belated heifer, which now hastened +through the open gate to join its companions on the hillside.</p> +<p>“Cooshey, cooshey won’t hurt ’e, my li’l +bud!” cried Phoebe, as Ship jumped and barked at the lumbering beast. +Then the child doubled round a dung-heap and fled to his father’s arms. +From the byre a cow with a full udder softly lowed, and now small Will had a +cup of warm milk; then, with his red mouth like a rosebud in mist and his +father’s smile magically and laughably reproduced upon his little face, +he trotted back to his mother.</p> +<p>A moment later Will, still milking, heard himself loudly called from the +gate. The voice he knew well enough, but it was pitched unusually high, and +denoted a condition of excitement and impatience very seldom to be met with +in its possessor. Martin Grimbal, for it was he, did not observe Blanchard, +as the farmer emerged from the byre. His eye was bent in startled and +critical scrutiny of a granite post, to which the front gate of Newtake +latched, and he continued shouting aloud until Will stood beside him. Then he +appeared on his hands and knees beside the gate-post. He had flung down his +stick and satchel; his mouth was slightly open; his cap rested on the side of +his head; his face seemed transfigured before some overwhelming +discovery.</p> +<p>Relations were still strained between these men; and Will did not forget +the fact, though it had evidently escaped Martin in his present +excitement.</p> +<p>“What the deuce be doin’ now?” asked Blanchard +abruptly.</p> +<p>“Man alive! A marvel! Look here—to think I have passed this +stone a hundred times and never noticed!”</p> +<p>He rose, brushed his muddy knees, still gazing at the gate-post, then took +a trowel from his bag and began to cut away the turf about the base of +it.</p> +<p>“Let that bide!” called out the master sharply. “What be +’bout, delving theer?”</p> +<p>“I forgot you didn’t know. I was coming to see you on my way +to the Moor. I wanted a drink and a handshake. We mustn’t be enemies, +and I’m heartily sorry for what I said—heartily. But here’s +a fitting object to build new friendship on. I just caught sight of the +incisions through a fortunate gleam of early morning light. Come this side +and see for yourself. To think you had what a moorman would reckon good +fortune at your gate and never guessed it!”</p> +<p>“Fortune at my gate? Wheer to? I aint heard nothin’ of +it.”</p> +<p>“Here, man, here! D’ you see this post?”</p> +<p>“Not bein’ blind, I do.”</p> +<p>“Yet you were blind, and so was I. There ’s excuse for +you—none for me. It’s a cross! Yes, a priceless old Christian +cross, buried here head downward by some profane soul in the distant past, +who found it of size and shape to make a gate-post. They are common enough in +Cornwall, but very rare in Devon. It’s a great—a remarkable +discovery in fact, and I’m right glad I found it on your threshold; for +we may be friends again beside this symbol fittingly enough—eh, +Will?”</p> +<p>“Bother your rot,” answered the other coldly, and quite +unimpassioned before Martin’s eloquence. “You doubted my judgment +not long since and said hard things and bad things; now I take leave to doubt +yours. How do ’e knaw this here ’s a cross any more than t’ +other post the gate hangs on?”</p> +<p>Martin, recalled to reality and the presence of a man till then +unfriendly, blushed and shrank into himself a little. His voice showed that +he suffered pain.</p> +<p>“I read granite as you read sheep and soil and a crop ripening above +ground or below—it’s my business,” he explained, not +without constraint, while the enthusiasm died away out of his voice and the +fire from his face. “See now, Will, try and follow me. Note these very +faint lines, where the green moss takes the place of the lichen. These are +fretted grooves—you can trace them to the earth, and on a +‘rubbing,’ as we call it, they would be plainer still. They +indicate to me incisions down the sides of a cross-shaft. They are all that +many years of weathering have left. Look at the shape too: the stone grows +slightly thinner every way towards the ground. What is hidden we can’t +say yet, but I pray that the arms may be at least still indicated. You see it +is the base sticking into the air, and more’s the pity, a part has +gone, for I can trace the incisions to the top. God knows the past history of +it, but—”</p> +<p>“Perhaps He do and perhaps He doan’t,” interrupted the +farmer. “Perhaps it weer a cross an’ perhaps it weern’t; +anyway it’s my gate-post now, an’ as to diggin’ it up, you +may be surprised to knaw it, Martin Grimbal, but I’ll see you damned +fust! I’m weary of all this bunkum ’bout auld stones an’ +circles an’ the rest; I’m sick an’ tired o’ +leavin’ my work a hunderd times in summer months to shaw gaping fules +from Lunnon an’ Lard knaws wheer, them roundy-poundies ’pon my +land. ’Tis all rot, as every moorman knaws; yet you an’ such as +you screams if us dares to put a finger to the stone nowadays. Ban’t +the granite ours under Venwell? You knaw it is; an’ because +dead-an’-gone folk, half-monkeys belike, fashioned their homes +an’ holes out of it, be that any cause why it shouldn’t be +handled to-day? They’ve had their use of it; now ’tis our turn; +an ’tis awnly such as you be, as comes here in shining summer, when the +land puts on a lying faace, as though it didn’t knaw weather an’ +winter—’tis awnly such as you must cry out against us of the soil +if we dares to set wan stone ’pon another to make a wall or to keep the +blasted rabbits out the young wheat.”</p> +<p>“Your attitude is one-sided, Will,” said Martin Grimbal +gently; “besides, remember this is a cross. We’re dealing with a +relic of our faith, take my word for it.”</p> +<p>“Faith be damned! What’s a cross to me? ’Tisdoin’ +more gude wheer’t is than ever it done afore, I’ll +swear.”</p> +<p>“I hope you’ll live to see you’re wrong, Blanchard. +I’ve met you in an evil hour it seems. You’re not yourself. Think +about it. There’s no hurry. You pride yourself on your common sense as +a rule. I’m sure it will come to your rescue. Granted this discovery is +nothing to you, yet think what it means to me. If I’d found a diamond +mine I couldn’t be better pleased—not half so pleased as +now.”</p> +<p>Will reflected a moment; but the other had not knowledge of character to +observe or realise that he was slowly becoming reasonable.</p> +<p>“So I do pride myself on my common sense, an’ I’ve some +right to. A cross is a cross—I allow that—and whatever I may +think, I ban’t so small-minded as to fall foul of them as think +differ’nt. My awn mother be a church-goer for that matter, an’ +you’ll look far ways for her equal. But of coourse I knaw what I knaw. +Me an’ Hicks talked out matters of religion so dry as chaff.”</p> +<p>“Yet a cross means much to many, and always will while the land +continues to call itself Christian.”</p> +<p>“I knaw, I knaw. ’Twill call itself Christian long arter your +time an’ mine; as to bein’ Christian—that’s another +story. Clem Hicks lightened such matters to me—fule though he was in +the ordering of his awn life. But s’pose you digs the post up, for +argeyment’s sake. What about me, as have to go out ’pon the Moor +an’ blast another new wan out the virgin granite wi’ gunpowder? +Do’e think I’ve nothin’ better to do with my time than +that?”</p> +<p>Here, in his supreme anxiety and eagerness, forgetting the manner of man +he argued with, Martin made a fatal mistake.</p> +<p>“That’s reasonable and business-like,” he said. “I +wouldn’t have you suffer for lost time, which is part of your living. +I’ll give you ten pounds for the stone, Will, and that should more than +pay for your time and for the new post.”</p> +<p>He glanced into the other’s face and instantly saw his error. The +farmer’s countenance clouded and his features darkened until he looked +like an angry Redskin. His eyes glinted steel-bright under a ferocious frown; +the squareness of his jaw became much marked.</p> +<p>“You dare to say that, do’e? An’ me as good a man, +an’ better, than you or your brother either! Money—you remind me +I’m—Theer! You can go to blue, blazin’ hell for your +granite crosses—that’s wheer you can go—you or any other +poking, prying pelican! Offer money to me, would ’e? Who be you, or any +other man, to offer me money for wasted time? As if I was a road scavenger or +another man’s servant! God’s truth! you forget who you’m +talkin’ to!”</p> +<p>“This is to purposely misunderstand me, Blanchard. I never, never, +meant any such thing. Am I one to gratuitously insult or offend another? +Typical this! Your cursed temper it is that keeps you back in the world and +makes a failure of you,” answered the student of stones, his own temper +nearly lost under exceptional provocation.</p> +<p>“Who says I be a failure?” roared Will in return. “What +do you know, you grey, dreamin’ fule, as to whether I’m +successful or not so? Get you gone off my land or—”</p> +<p>“I’ll go, and readily enough. I believe you’re mad. +That’s the conclusion I’m reluctantly driven to—mad. But +don’t for an instant imagine your lunatic stupidity is going to stand +between the world and this discovery, because it isn’t.”</p> +<p>He strapped on his satchel, picked up his stick, put his hat on straight, +and prepared to depart, breathing hard.</p> +<p>“Go,” snorted Will; “go to your auld stones—they +’m the awnly fit comp’ny for ’e. Bruise your silly shins +against ’em, an’ ax ’em if a moorman’s in the right +or wrong to paart wi’ his gate-post to the fust fule as wants +it!”</p> +<p>Martin Grimbal strode off without replying, and Will, in a sort of grim +good-humour at this victory, returned to milking his cows. The encounter, for +some obscure reason, restored him to amiability. He reviewed his own dismal +part in it with considerable satisfaction, and, after going indoors and +eating a remarkably good breakfast, he lighted his pipe and, in the most +benignant of moods, went out with a horse and cart to gather withered +fern.</p> +<h2><a id="III_IV" name="III_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /> +MARTIN’S RAID</h2> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard now dwelt alone, and all her remaining interests in life +were clustered about Will. She perceived that his enterprise by no means +promised to fulfil the hopes of those who loved him, and realised too late +that the qualities which enabled her father to wrest a living from the +moorland farm were lacking in her son. He, of course, explained it otherwise, +and pointed to the changes of the times and an universal fall in the price of +agricultural produce. His mother cast about in secret how to help him, but no +means appeared until, upon an evening some ten days after Blanchard’s +quarrel with Grimbal over the gate-post, she suddenly determined to visit +Monks Barton and discuss the position with Miller Lyddon.</p> +<p>“I want to have a bit of a tell with ’e,” she said, +“’pon a matter so near to your heart as mine. Awnly you’ve +got power an’ I haven’t.”</p> +<p>“I knaw what you’m come about before you speak,” +answered the other.“ Sit you down an’ us’ll have a gude +airing of ideas. But I’m sorry we won’t get the value o’ +Billy Blee’s thoughts ’pon the point, for he’s away +to-night.”</p> +<p>Damaris rather rejoiced than sorrowed in this circumstance, but she was +too wise to say so.</p> +<p>“A far-thinkin’ man, no doubt,” she admitted.</p> +<p>“He is; an’ ’t is straange your comin’ just this +night, for Blee’s away on a matter touching Will more or less, +an’ doan’t reckon to be home ’fore light.”</p> +<p>“What coorious-fashion job be that then?”</p> +<p>“Caan’t tell ’e the facts. I’m under a promise not +to open my mouth, but theer’s no gert harm. Martin Grimbal’s +foremost in the thing so you may judge it ban’t no wrong act, and he +axed Billy to help him at my advice. You see it’s necessary to force +your son’s hand sometimes. He’m that stubborn when his +mind’s fixed.”</p> +<p>“A firm man, an’ loves his mother out the common well. A gude +son, a gude husband, a gude faither, a hard worker. How many men’s all +that to wance, Miller?”</p> +<p>“He is so—all—an’ yet—the man have got his +faults, speaking generally.”</p> +<p>“That’s awnly to say he be a man; an’ if you +caan’t find words for the faults, ’t is clear they ban’t +worth namin’.”</p> +<p>“I can find words easy enough, I assure ’e; but a man’s +a fule to waste breath criticising the ways of a son to his mother—if +so be he’s a gude son.”</p> +<p>“What fault theer is belongs to me. I was set on his gwaine to +Newtake as master, like his gran’faither afore him. I urged the step +hot, and I liked the thought of it.”</p> +<p>“So did he—else he wouldn’t have gone.”</p> +<p>“You caan’t say that. He might have done different but for +love of me. ’T is I as have stood in his way in this thing.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t fret yourself with such a thought, Mrs. Blanchard; +Will’s the sort as steers his awn ship. Theer’s no blame +’pon you. An’ for that matter, if your faither saved gude money +at Newtake, why caan’t Will?”</p> +<p>“Times be changed. You’ve got to make two blades o’ +grass graw wheer wan did use, if you wants to live nowadays.”</p> +<p>“Hard work won’t hurt him.”</p> +<p>“But it will if he reckons’t is all wasted work. What’s +more bitter than toiling to no account, an’ <i>knawin</i> all the while +you be?”</p> +<p>“Not all wasted work, surely?”</p> +<p>“They wouldn’t allow it for the world. He’s that gay +afore me, an’ Phoebe keeps a stiff upper lip, tu; but I go up +unexpected now an’ again an’ pop in unawares an’ sees the +truth. You with your letter or message aforehand, doan’t find out +nothing, an’ won’t.”</p> +<p>“He’m out o’ luck, I allow. What’s the exact +reason?”</p> +<p>“You’ll find it in the Book, same as I done. I knaw you set +gert store ’pon the Word. Well, then, ’them the Lard loveth He +chasteneth.’ That’s why Will’s languishin’ like. +’T won’t last for ever.”</p> +<p>“Ah! But theer’s other texts to other purpose. Not that I want +’e to dream my Phoebe’s less to me than your son to you. +I’ve got my eye on ’em, an’ that’s the truth; +an’ on my li’l grandson, tu.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s gert things buddin’ in that bwoy.”</p> +<p>“I hope so. I set much store on him. Doan’t you worrit, +mother, for the party to Newtake be bound up very close wi’ my +happiness, an’ if they was wisht, ban’t me as would long be +merry. I be gwaine to give Master Will rope enough to hang himself, having a +grudge or two against him yet; then, when the job’s done, an’ +he’s learnt the hard lesson to the dregs, I’ll cut un down in +gude time an’ preach a sarmon to him while he’s in a mood to larn +wisdom. He’s picking up plenty of information, you be sure—things +that will be useful bimebye: the value of money, the shortness o’ the +distance it travels, the hardness o’ Moor ground, an’ men’s +hearts, an’ such-like branches of larning. Let him bide, an’ +trust me.”</p> +<p>The mother was rendered at once uneasy and elated by this speech. That, if +only for his wife and son’s sake, Will would never be allowed to fail +entirely seemed good to know; but she feared, and, before the patronising +manner of the old man, felt alarm for the future. She well knew how Will +would receive any offer of assistance tendered in this spirit.</p> +<p>“Like your gude self so to promise; but remember he ’m of a +lofty mind and fiery.”</p> +<p>“Stiff-necked he be, for certain; but he may graw quiet ’fore +you think it. Nothing tames a man so quick as to see his woman and childer +folk hungry—eh? An’ specially if ’t is thanks to his awn +mistakes.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard flushed and felt a wave of anger surging through her +breast. But she choked it down.</p> +<p>“You ’m hard in the grain, Lyddon—so them often be +who’ve lived over long as widow men. Theer ’s a power o’ +gude in my Will, an’ your eyes will be opened to see it some day. He +’m young an’ hopeful by nature; an’ such as him, as allus +looks up to gert things, feels a come down worse than others who be content +to crawl. He ’m changing, an’ I knaw it, an’ I’ve +shed more ’n wan tear awver it, bein’ on the edge of age myself +now, an’ not so strong-minded as I was ’fore Chris went. He +’m changing, an’ the gert Moor have made his blood beat slower, I +reckon, an’ froze his young hope a bit.”</p> +<p>“He ’s grawiug aulder, that’s all. ’T is right as +he should chatter less an’ think more.”</p> +<p>“I suppose so; yet a mother feels a cold cloud come awver her heart +to watch a cheel fighting the battle an’ not winning it. Specially when +she can awnly look on an’ do nothin’.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t you fear. You ’m low in spirit, else you’d +never have spoke so open; but I thank you for tellin’ me that things be +tighter to Newtake than I guessed. You leave the rest to me. I knaw how far +to let ’em go; an’ if we doan’t agree ’pon that +question, you must credit me with the best judgment, an’ not think no +worse of me for helpin’ in my awn way an’ awn time.”</p> +<p>With which promise Mrs. Blanchard was contented. Surveying the position in +the solitude of her home, she felt there was much to be thankful for. Yet she +puzzled her heart and head to find schemes by which the miller’s +charity might be escaped. She considered her own means, and pictured her few +possessions sold at auction; she had already offered to go and dwell at +Newtake and dispose of her cottage. But Will exploded so violently when the +suggestion reached his ears that she never repeated it.</p> +<p>While the widow thus bent her thoughts upon her son, and gradually sank to +sleep with the problems of the moment unsolved, a remarkable series of +incidents made the night strange at Newtake Farm.</p> +<p>Roused suddenly a little after twelve o’clock by an unusual sound, +Phoebe woke with a start and cried to her husband:</p> +<p>“Will—Will, do hark to Ship! He ’m barkin’ that +savage!”</p> +<p>Will turned and growled sleepily that it was nothing, but the bark +continued, so he left his bed and looked out of the window. A waning moon had +just thrust one glimmering point above the sombre flank of the hill. It +ascended as he watched, dispensed a sinister illumination, and like some +remote bale-fire hung above the bosom of the nocturnal Moor. His dog still +barked, and in the silence Will could hear a clink and thud as it leapt to +the limit of its chain. Then out of the night a lantern danced at Newtake +gate, and Blanchard, his eyes now trained to the gloom, discovered several +figures moving about it.</p> +<p>“Baggered if it bau’t that damned Grimbal come arter my +gate-post,” he gasped, launched instantly to high wakefulness by the +suspicion. Then, dragging on his trousers, and thrusting the tail of his +nightshirt inside them, he tumbled down-stairs, with passion truly +formidable, and hastened naked footed through the farmyard.</p> +<p>Four men blankly awaited him. Ignoring their leader—none other than +Martin himself—he turned upon Mr. Blee, who chanced to be nearest, and +struck from his hand a pick.</p> +<p>“What be these blasted hookem-snivey dealings, then?” Will +thundered out, “an’ who be you, you auld twisted thorn, to come +here stealin’ my stone in the dead o’ night?”</p> +<p>Billy’s little eyes danced in the lantern fire, and he answered +hastily before Martin had time to speak.</p> +<p>“Well, to be plain, the moon and the dog’s played us false, +an’ you’d best to knaw the truth fust as last. Mr. +Grimbal’s writ you two straight, fair letters ’bout this job, so +he’ve explained to me, an’ you never so much as answered neither; +so, seem’ this here’s a right Christian cross, ban’t decent +it should bide head down’ards for all time. An’ Mr. Grimbal have +brought up a flam-new granite post, hasp an’ all +complete—’t is in the cart theer—an’ he called on me +as a discreet, aged man to help un, an’ so I did; an’ Peter +Bassett an’ Sam Bonus here corned likewise, by my engagement, to do the +heavy work an’ aid in a gude deed.”</p> +<p>“Dig an inch, wan of ’e, and I’ll shaw what’s a +gude deed! I doan’t want no talk with you or them hulking gert fules. +’T is you I’d ax, Martin Grimbal, by what right you’m +here.”</p> +<p>“You wouldn’t answer my letters, and I couldn’t find it +in my heart to leave an important matter like this. I know I wasn’t +wise, but you don’t understand what a priceless thing this is. I +thought you’d find the new one in the morning and laugh at it. For +God’s sake be reasonable and sensible, Blanchard, and let me take it +away. There’s a new post I’ll have set up. It’s here +waiting. I can’t do more.”</p> +<p>“But you’ll do a darned sight less. Right’s right, +an’ stealin’s stealin’. You wasn’t wise, as you +say—far from it. You’m in the wrong now, an’ you knaw it, +whatever you was before. A nice bobbery! Why doan’t he take my plough +or wan of the bullocks? Damned thieves, the lot of’e!”</p> +<p>“Doan’t cock your nose so high, Farmer,” said Bonus, who +had never spoken to Will since he left Newtake; “’t is very +onhandsome of ’e to be tellin’ like this to +gentle-folks.”</p> +<p>“Gentlefolks! Gentlefolks would ax your help, wouldn’t they? +You, as be no better than a common poacher since I turned ’e off! You +shut your mouth and go home-long, an’ mind your awn business, an’ +keep out o’ the game preserves. Law’s law, as you’m like to +find sooner’n most folks.”</p> +<p>This pointed allusion to certain rumours concerning the labourer’s +present way of life angered Bonus not a little, but it also silenced him.</p> +<p>“Law’s law, as you truly say, Will Blanchard,” answered +Mr. Blee, “an’ theer it do lie in a nutshell. A man’s +gate-post is his awn as a common, natural gate-post; but bein’ a +sainted cross o’ the Lard sticked in the airth upsy-down by some +ancient devilry, ’t is no gate-post, nor yet every-day moor-stone, but +just the common property of all Christian souls.”</p> +<p>“You’m out o’ bias to harden your heart, Mr. Blanchard, +when this gentleman sez ’t is what ’t is,” ventured the man +Peter Bassett, slowly.</p> +<p>“An’ so you be, Blanchard, an’ ’t is a awful deed +every ways, an’ you’ll larn it some day. You did ought to be +merry an’ glad to hear such a thing ’s been found ’pon +Newtake. Think o’ the fortune a cross o’ Christ brings to +’e!”</p> +<p>“An’ how much has it brought, you auld fule?”</p> +<p>“Gude or bad, you’ll be a sight wuss off it you leave it wheer +’t is, now you knaw. Theer’ll be hell to pay if it’s let +bide now, sure as eggs is eggs an’ winter, winter. You’ll rue it; +you’ll gnash awver it; ’t will turn against ’e an’ +rot the root an’ blight the ear an’ starve the things an’ +break your heart. Mark me, you’m doin’ a cutthroat deed an’ +killin’ all your awn luck by leavin’ it here an hour +longer.”</p> +<p>But Will showed no alarm at Mr. Blee’s predictions.</p> +<p>“Be it as ’t will, you doan’t touch my stone—cross +or no cross. Damn the cross! An’ you tu, every wan of ’e, dirty +night birds!”</p> +<p>Then Martin, who had waited, half hoping that Billy’s argument might +carry weight, spoke and ended the scene.</p> +<p>“We’ll talk no more and we’ll do no more,” he +said. “You’re wrong in a hundred ways to leave this precious +stone to shut a gate and keep in cows, Blanchard. But if you wouldn’t +heed my letters, I suppose you won’t heed my voice.”</p> +<p>“Why the devil should I heed your letters? I told ’e wance for +all, didn’t I? Be I a man as changes my mind like a cheel?”</p> +<p>“Crooked words won’t help ’e, Farmer,” said the +stolid Bassett. “You ’m wrong, an’ you knaw right well you +’m wrong, an’ theer’ll come a day of reckoning for +’e, sure ’s we ’m in a Christian land.”</p> +<p>“Let it come, an’ leave me to meet it. An’ now, clear +out o’ this, every wan, or I’ll loose the dog ’pon +’e!”</p> +<p>He turned hurriedly as he spoke and fetched the bobtailed sheep-dog on its +chain. This he fastened to the stone, then watched the defeated raiders +depart. Grimbal had already walked away alone, after directing that a post +which he had brought to supersede the cross, should be left at the side of +the road. Now, having obeyed his command, Mr. Blee, Bonus, and Bassett +climbed into the cart and slowly passed away homewards. The moon had risen +clear of earth and threw light sufficient to show Bassett’s white smock +still gleaming through the night as Will beheld his enemies depart.</p> +<p>Ten minutes later, while he washed his feet, the farmer told Phoebe of the +whole matter, including his earlier meeting with Martin, and the +antiquary’s offer of money. Upon this subject his wife found herself in +complete disagreement with Blanchard, and did not hesitate to say so.</p> +<p>“Martin Grimbal ’s so gude a friend as any man could have, +an’ you did n’t ought to have bullyragged him that way,” +she declared.</p> +<p>“You say that! Ban’t a man to speak his mind to thieves +an’ robbers?”</p> +<p>“No such thing. ’T is a sacred stone an’ not your +property at all. To refuse ten pound for it!”</p> +<p>“Hold your noise, then, an’ let me mind my business my awn +way,” he answered roughly, getting back to bed; but Phoebe was roused +and had no intention of speaking less than her mind.</p> +<p>“You ’m a knaw-nought gert fule,” she said, +“an’ so full of silly pride as a turkey-cock. What ’s the +stone to you if Grimbal wants it? An’ him taking such a mint of trouble +to come by it. What right have you to fling away ten pounds like that, +an’ what ’s the harm to earn gude money honest? Wonder you +ban’t shamed to sell anything. ’T is enough these times for a +body to say wan thing for you to say t’other.”</p> +<p>This rebuke from a tongue that scarcely ever uttered a harsh word startled +Will not a little. He was silent for half a minute, then made reply.</p> +<p>“You can speak like that—you, my awn wife—you, as ought +to be heart an’ soul with me in everything I do? An’ the husband +I am to ’e. Then I should reckon I be fairly alone in the world, +an’ no mistake—’cept for mother.”</p> +<p>Phoebe did not answer him. Her spark of anger was gone and she was passing +quickly from temper to tears.</p> +<p>“’T is queer to me how short of friends I ’pear to be +gettin’,” confessed Will gloomily. “I must be +differ’nt to what I fancied for I allus felt I could do with a +waggon-load of friends. Yet they ’m droppin’ off. Coourse I knaw +why well enough, tu. They’ve had wind o’ tight times to Newtake, +though how they should I caan’t say, for the farm ’s got a +prosperous look to my eye, an’ them as drops in dinnertime most often +finds meat on the table. Straange a man what takes such level views as me +should fall out wi’ his elders so much.”</p> +<p>“’T is theer fault as often as yours; an’ you’ve +got me as well as your mother, Will; an’ you’ve got your son. +Childern knaw the gude from the bad, same as dogs, in a way hid from grawn +folks. Look how the li’l thing do run to ’e ’fore anybody +in the world.”</p> +<p>“So he do; an’ if you ’m wise enough to see that, you +ought to be wise enough to see I’m right ’bout the gate-post. Who +’s Martin Grimbal to offer me money? A self-made man, same as me. Yet +he might have had it, an’ welcome if he’d axed proper.”</p> +<p>“Of course, if you put it so, Will.”</p> +<p>“Theer ’s no ways else to put it as I can see.”</p> +<p>“But for your awn peace of mind it might be wisest to dig the cross +up. I listened by the window an’ heard Billy Blee tellin’ of +awful cusses, an’ he ’s wise wi’out knawin’ it +sometimes.”</p> +<p>“That’s all witchcraft an’ stuff an’ nonsense, +an’ you ought to knaw better, Phoebe. ’T is as bad as setting +store on the flight o’ magpies, or gettin’ a dead tooth from the +churchyard to cure toothache, an’ such-like folly.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t folly allus, Will; theer ’s auld tried wisdom in +some ancient sayings.”</p> +<p>“Well, you guide your road by my light if you want to be happy. +’T is for you I uses all my thinking brain day an’ +night—for your gude an’ the li’l man’s.”</p> +<p>“I knaw—I knaw right well ’t is so, dear Will, an’ +I’m sorry I spoke so quick.”</p> +<p>“I’ll forgive ’e before you axes me, sweetheart. Awnly +you must larn to trust me, an’ theer ’s no call for you to fear. +Us must speak out sometimes, an’ I did just now, an’ ’t is +odds but some of them chaps, Grimbal included, may have got a penn’orth +o’ wisdom from me.”</p> +<p>“So ’t is, then,” she said, cuddling to him; +“an’ you’ll do well to sleep now; an’—an’ +never tell again, Will, you’ve got nobody but your mother while +I’m above ground, ’cause it’s against justice an’ +truth an’ very terrible for me to hear.”</p> +<p>“’T was a thoughtless speech,” admitted Will, +“an’ I’m sorry I spake it. ’T was a hasty word +an’ not to be took serious.”</p> +<p>They slept, while the moon wove wan harmonies of ebony and silver into +Newtake. A wind woke, proclaiming morning, as yet invisible; and when it +rustled dead leaves or turned a chimney-cowl, the dog at the gate stirred and +growled and grated his chain against the granite cross.</p> +<h2><a id="III_V" name="III_V"></a>CHAPTER V<br /> +WINTER</h2> +<p>As Christmas again approached, adverse conditions of weather brought like +anxieties to a hundred moormen besides Will Blanchard, but the widespread +nature of the trouble by no means diminished his individual concern. A summer +of unusual splendour had passed unblessed away, for the sustained drought +represented scanty hay and an aftermath of meagre description. Cereals were +poor, with very little straw, and the heavy rains of November arrived too +late to save acres of starved roots on high grounds. Thus the year became +responsible for one prosperous product alone: rarely was it possible to dry +so well those stores gathered from the peat beds. Huge fires, indeed, glowed +upon many a hearth, but the glory of them served only to illumine anxious +faces. A hard winter was threatened, and the succeeding spring already +appeared as no vision to welcome, but a hungry spectre to dread.</p> +<p>Then, with the last week of the old year, winter swept westerly on +hyperborean winds, and when these were passed a tremendous frost won upon the +world. Day followed day of weak, clear sunshine and low temperature. The sun, +upon his shortest journeys, showed a fiery face as he sulked along the stony +ridges of the Moor, and gazed over the ice-chained wilderness, the frozen +waters, and the dark mosses that never froze, but lowered black, like wounds +on a white skin. Dartmoor slept insensible under granite and ice; no +sheep-bell made music; no flocks wandered at will; only the wind moaned in +the dead bells of the heather; only the foxes slunk round cot and farm; only +the shaggy ponies stamped and snorted under the lee of the tors and thrust +their smoking muzzles into sheltered clefts and crannies for the withered +green stuff that kept life in them. Snow presently softened the outlines of +the hills, set silver caps on the granite, and brought the distant horizon +nearer to the eye under crystal-clear atmosphere. Many a wanderer, thus +deceived, plodded hopefully forward at sight of smoke above a roof-tree, only +to find his bourne, that seemed so near, still weary miles away. The high +Moors were a throne for death. Cold below freezing-point endured throughout +the hours of light and grew into a giant when the sun and his winter glory +had huddled below the hills.</p> +<p>Newtake squatted like a toad upon this weary waste. Its crofts were bare +and frozen two feet deep; its sycamores were naked save for snow in the +larger forks, and one shivering concourse of dead leaves, where a bough had +been broken untimely, and thus held the foliage. Suffering almost animate +peered from its leaded windows; the building scowled; cattle lowed through +the hours of day, and a steam arose from their red hides as they crowded +together for warmth. Often it gleamed mistily in the light of Will’s +lantern when at the dead icy hour before dawn he went out to his beasts. Then +he would rub their noses, and speak to them cheerfully, and note their +congealed vapours where these had ascended and frozen in shining spidery +hands of ice upon the walls and rafters of the byre. Fowls, silver-spangled +and black, scratched at the earth from habit, fought for the daily grain with +a ferocity the summer never saw, stalked spiritless in puffed plumage about +the farmyard and collected with subdued clucking upon their roosts in a barn +above the farmyard carts as soon as the sun had dipped behind the hills. +Ducks complained vocally, and as they slipped on the glassy pond they quacked +out a mournful protest against the times.</p> +<p>The snow which fell did not melt, but shone under the red sunshine, +powdered into dust beneath hoof and heel; every cart-rut was full of thin +white ice, like ground window-glass, that cracked drily and split and tinkled +to hobnails or iron-shod wheel. The snow from the house-top, thawed by the +warmth within, ran dribbling from the eaves and froze into icicles as thick +as a man’s arm. These glittered almost to the ground and refracted the +sunshine in their prisms.</p> +<p>Warm-blooded life suffered for the most part silently, but the inanimate +fabric of the farm complained with many a creak and crack and groan in the +night watches, while Time’s servant the frost gnawed busily at old +timbers and thrust steel fingers into brick and mortar. Only the hut-circles, +grey glimmering through the snow on Metherill, laughed at those cruel nights, +as the Neolithic men who built them may have laughed at the desperate weather +of their day; and the cross beside Blanchard’s gate, though an infant +in age beside them, being fashioned of like material, similarly endured. Of +more lasting substance was this stone than an iron tongue stuck into it to +latch the gate, for the metal fretted fast and shed rust in an orange streak +upon the granite.</p> +<p>Where first this relic had risen, when yet its craftsman’s work was +perfect and before the centuries had diminished its just proportions, no +living man might say. Martin Grimbal suspected that it had marked a +meeting-place, indicated some Cistercian way, commemorated a notable deed, or +served to direct the moorland pilgrim upon his road to that trinity of great +monasteries which flourished aforetime at Plympton, at Tavistock, and at +Buckland of the Monks; but between its first uprising and its last, a +duration of many years doubtless extended.</p> +<p>The antiquary’s purpose had been to rescue the relic, judge, by +close study of the hidden part, to what date it might be assigned, then +investigate the history of Newtake Farm, and endeavour to trace the cross if +possible. After his second repulse, however, and following upon a +conversation with Phoebe, whom he met at Chagford, Martin permitted the +matter to remain in abeyance. Now he set about regaining Will’s +friendship’in a gradual and natural manner. That done, he trusted to +disinter the coveted granite at some future date and set it up on sanctified +ground in Chagford churchyard, if the true nature of the relic justified that +course. For the present, however, he designed no step, for his purpose was to +visit the Channel Islands early in the new year, that he might study their +testimony to prehistoric times.</p> +<p>A winter, to cite whose parallel men looked back full twenty years, still +held the land, though February had nearly run. Blanchard daily debated the +utmost possibility of his resources with Phoebe, and fought the inclement +weather for his early lambs. Such light as came into life at Newtake was +furnished by little Will, who danced merrily through ice and snow, like a +scarlet flower in his brilliant coat. The cold pleased him; he trod the +slippery duck pond in triumph, his bread-and-milk never failed. To Phoebe her +maternal right in the infant seemed recompense sufficient for all those +tribulations existence just now brought with it; from which conviction +resulted her steady courage and cheerfulness. Her husband’s nebulous +rationalism clouded Phoebe’s religious views not at all. She daily +prayed to Christ for her child’s welfare, and went to church whenever +she could, at the express command of her father. A flash of folly from Will +had combined with hard weather to keep the miller from any visit to Newtake. +Mr. Lyddon, on the beginning of the great frost, had sent two pairs of thick +blankets from the Monks Barton stores to Phoebe, and Will, opening the parcel +during his wife’s absence, resented the gift exceedingly, and returned +it by the bearer with a curt message of thanks and the information that he +did not need them. Much hurt, the donor turned his face from Newtake for six +weeks after this incident, and Phoebe, who knew nothing of the matter, +marvelled at her father’s lengthy and unusual silence.</p> +<p>As for Will, during these black days, the steadfast good temper of his +wife almost irritated him; but he saw the prime source of her courage, and +himself loved their small son dearly. Once a stray journal fell into his +hands, and upon an article dealing with emigration he built secret castles in +the air, and grew more happy for the space of a week. His mother ailed a +little through the winter, and he often visited her. But in her presence he +resolutely put off gloom, spoke with sanguine tongue of the prosperity he +foresaw during the coming spring, and always foretold the frost must break +within four-and-twenty-hours. Damaris Blanchard was therefore deceived in +some measure, and when Will spent five shillings upon a photograph of his +son, she felt that the Newtake prospects must at least be more favourable +than she feared, and let the circumstance of the picture be generally +known.</p> +<p>Not until the middle of March came a thaw, and then unchained waters and +melted snows roared and tumbled from the hills through every coomb and +valley. Each gorge, each declivity contributed an unwonted torrent; the +quaking bogs shivered as though beneath them monsters turned in sleep or +writhed in agony; the hoarse cry of Teign betokened new tribulations to the +ears of those who understood; and over the Moor there rolled and crowded down +a sodden mantle of mist, within whose chilly heart every elevation of note +vanished for days together. Wrapped in impenetrable folds were the high +lands, and the gigantic vapour stretched a million dripping tentacles over +forests and wastes into the valleys beneath. Now it crept even to the heart +of the woods; now it stealthily dislimned in lonely places; now it redoubled +its density and dominated all things. The soil steamed and exuded vapour as a +soaked sponge, and upon its surcharged surface splashes and streaks and +sheets of water shone pallid and ash-coloured, like blind eyes, under the +eternal mists and rains. These accumulations threw back the last glimmer of +twilight and caught the first grey signal of approaching dawn; while the +land, contrariwise, had welcomed night while yet wan sunsets struggled with +the rain, and continued to cherish darkness long after morning was in the +sky. Every rut and hollow, every scooped cup on the tors was brimming now; +springs unnumbered and unknown had burst their secret places; the water +floods tumbled and thundered until their rough laughter rang like a knell in +the ears of the husbandmen; and beneath crocketed pinnacles of half a hundred +church towers rose the mournful murmur of prayer for fair weather.</p> +<p>There came an afternoon in late March when Mr. Blee returned to Monks +Barton from Chagford, stamped the mud off his boots and leggings, shook his +brown umbrella, and entered the kitchen to find his master reading the +Bible.</p> +<p>“’Tis all set down, Blee,” exclaimed Mr. Lyddon with the +triumphant voice of a discoverer. “These latter rains be displayed in +the Book, according to my theory that everything ’s theer!”</p> +<p>“Pity you didn’t find ’em out afore they comed; then us +might have bought the tarpaulins cheap in autumn, ’stead of +payin’ through the nose for ’em last month. Now ’t is fancy +figures for everything built to keep out rain. Rabbit that umberella! +It’s springed a leak, an’ the water’s got down my +neck.”</p> +<p>“Have some hot spirits, then, an’ listen to this—all set +out in Isaiah forty-one—eighteen: ‘I will open rivers in high +places and fountains in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness +a pool of water and the dry land springs of water.’ Theer! If that +ban’t a picter of the present plague o’ rain, what should +be?”</p> +<p>“So ’t is; an’ the fountains in the midst of the valleys +be the awfullest part. Burnish it all! The high land had the worst of the +winter, but we in the low coombs be gwaine to get the worst o’ the +spring—safe as water allus runs down-long.”</p> +<p>“’T will find its awn level, which the prophet +knawed.”</p> +<p>“I wish he knawed how soon.”</p> +<p>“’T is in the Word, I’ll wager. I may come upon it +yet.”</p> +<p>“The airth be damn near drowned, an’ the air’s thick +like a washin’-day everywheers, an’ a terrible braave sight +o’ rain unshed in the elements yet.”</p> +<p>“’T will pass, sure as Noah seed a rainbow.”</p> +<p>“Ess, ’t will pass; but Monks Barton’s like to be washed +to Fingle Bridge fust. Oceans o’ work waitin’, but what can us be +at? Theer ban’t a bit o’ land you couldn’t most swim +across.”</p> +<p>“Widespread trouble, sure ’nough—all awver the South +Hams, high an’ low.”</p> +<p>“By the same token, I met Will Blanchard an hour agone. Gwaine in +the dispensary, he was. The li’l bwoy’s queer—no gert ill, +but a bit of a tisseck on the lungs. He got playin’ ’bout, busy +as a rook, in the dirt, and catched cold.”</p> +<p>Miller Lyddon was much concerned at this bad news.</p> +<p>“Oh, my gude God!” he exclaimed, “that’s worse +hearin’ than all or any you could have fetched down. What do Doctor +say?”</p> +<p>“Wasn’t worth while to call un up, so Will thought. +Ban’t nothin’ to kill a beetle, or I lay the mother of un would +have Doctor mighty soon. Will reckoned to get un a dose of +physic—an’ a few sweeties. Nature’s all for the young buds. +He won’t come to no hurt.”</p> +<p>“Fust thing morning send a lad riding to Newtake,” ordered Mr. +Lyddon. “Theer’s no sleep for me to-night, no, nor any more at +all till I hear tell the dear tibby-lamb’s well again. ’Pon my +soul, I wonder that headstrong man doan’t doctor the cheel +hisself.”</p> +<p>“Maybe he will. Ban’t nothin ’s beyond him.”</p> +<p>“I’ll go silly now. If awnly Mrs. Blanchard was up theer +wi’ Phoebe.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t you grizzle about it. The bwoy be gwaine to make auld +bones yet—hard as a nut he be. Give un years an’ he’ll help +carry you to the graave in the fulness of time, I promise ’e,” +said Billy, in his comforting way.</p> +<h2><a id="III_VI" name="III_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI<br /> +THE CROSS UPREARED</h2> +<p>Mr. Blee had but reported Will correctly, and it was not until some hours +later that the child at Newtake caused his parents any alarm. Then he awoke +in evident suffering, and Will, at Phoebe’s frantic entreaty, arose and +was soon galloping down through the night for Doctor Parsons.</p> +<p>His thundering knock fell upon the physician’s door, and a moment +later a window above him was opened.</p> +<p>“Why can’t you ring the bell instead of making that fiendish +noise, and waking the whole house? Who is it?”</p> +<p>“Blanchard, from Newtake.”</p> +<p>“What’s wrong?”</p> +<p>“’T is my bwoy. He’ve got something amiss with his +breathing parts by the looks of it.”</p> +<p>“Ah.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t delay. Gert fear comed to his mother under the +darkness, ’cause he seemed nicely when he went to sleep, then woke up +worse. So I felt us had better not wait till morning.”</p> +<p>“I’ll be with you in five minutes.”</p> +<p>Soon the Doctor appeared down a lane from the rear of the house. He was +leading his horse by the bridle.</p> +<p>“I’m better mounted than you,” he said, “so +I’ll push forward. Every minute saved is gained.”</p> +<p>Will thanked him, and Doctor Parsons disappeared. When the father reached +home, it was to hear that his child was seriously ill, though nothing of a +final nature could be done to combat the sickness until it assumed a more +definite form.</p> +<p>“It’s a grave case,” said the physician, drearily in the +dawn, as he pulled on his gloves and discussed the matter with Will before +departing. “I’ll be up again to-night. We mustn’t overlook +the proverbial vitality of the young, but if you are wise you will school +your mind and your wife’s to be resigned. You understand.”</p> +<p>He stroked his peaked naval beard, shook his head, then mounted his horse +and was gone.</p> +<p>From that day forward life stood still at Newtake, in so far as it is +possible for life to do so, and a long-drawn weariness of many words dragged +dully of a hundred pages would be necessary to reflect that tale of noctural +terrors and daylight respites, of intermittent fears, of nerve-shattering +suspense, and of the ebb and flow of hope through a fortnight of time. +Overtaxed and overwrought, Phoebe ceased to be of much service in the +sick-room after a week without sleep; Will did all that he could, which was +little enough; but his mother took her place in the house unquestioned at +this juncture, and ruled under Doctor Parsons. The struggle seemed to make +her younger again, to rub off the slow-gathering rust of age and charm up all +her stores of sense and energy.</p> +<p>So they battled for that young life. More than once a shriek from Phoebe +would echo to the farm that little Will was gone; and yet he lived; many a +time the child’s father in his strength surveyed the perishing atom, +and prayed to take the burden, all too heavy for a baby’s shoulders. In +one mood he supplicated, in another cursed Heaven for its cruelty.</p> +<p>There came a morning in early April when their physician, visiting Newtake +before noon, broke it to husband and wife that the child could scarcely +survive another day. He promised to return in the evening, and left them to +their despair. Mrs. Blanchard, however, refused to credit this assurance, and +cried to them to be hopeful still.</p> +<p>In the afternoon Mr. Blee rode up from Monks Barton. Daily a messenger +visited Newtake for Mr. Lyddon’s satisfaction, but it was not often +that Billy came. Now he arrived, however, entered the kitchen, and set down a +basket laden with good things. The apartment lacked its old polish and +cleanliness. The whitewash was very dirty; the little eight-day clock on the +mantelpiece had run down; the begonias in pots on the window-ledge were at +death’s door for water. Between two of them a lean cat stretched in the +sun and licked its paws; beside the fire lay Ship with his nose on the +ground; and Will sat close by, a fortnight’s beard upon his chin. He +looked listlessly up as Mr. Blee entered and nodded but did not speak.</p> +<p>“Well, what ’s the best news? I’ve brought ’e +fair-fashioned weather at any rate. The air ’s so soft as milk, even up +here, an’ you can see the green things grawin’ to make up for +lost time. Sun was proper hot on my face as I travelled along. How be the +poor little lad?”</p> +<p>“Alive, that’s all. Doctor’s thrawed un awver +now.”</p> +<p>“Never! Yet I’ve knawed even Parsons to make mistakes. +I’ve brought ’e a braave bunch o’ berries, got by the +gracious gudeness of Miller from Newton Abbot; also a jelly; also a bottle +o’ brandy—the auld stuff from down cellar—I brushed the +Dartmoor dew, as ’t is called, off the bottle myself; also a fowl for +the missis.”</p> +<p>“No call to have come. ’T is all awver bar the end.”</p> +<p>“Never say it while the child’s livin’! They ’m +magical li’l twoads for givin’ a doctor the lie. You ’m +wisht an’ weary along o’ night watchings.”</p> +<p>“Us must faace it. Ban’t no oncommon thing. Hope’s dead +in me these many days; an’ dying now in Phoebe—dying cruel by +inches. She caan’t bring herself to say ‘gude-by’ to the +li’l darling bwoy.”</p> +<p>“What mother could? What do Mrs. Blanchard the elder say?”</p> +<p>“She plucks up ’bout it. She ’m awver +hopeful.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t say so! A very wise woman her.”</p> +<p>Phoebe entered at this moment, and Mr. Blee turned from where he was +standing by his basket.</p> +<p>“I be cheerin’ your gude man up,” he said.</p> +<p>She sighed, and sat down wearily near Will.</p> +<p>“I’ve brought ’e a chick for your awn eatin’ +an’—”</p> +<p>Here a scuffle and snarling and spitting interrupted Billy. The hungry +cat, finding a fowl almost under its nose, had leapt to the ground with it, +and the dog observed the action. Might is right in hungry communities; Ship +asserted himself, and almost before the visitor realised what had happened, +poor Phoebe’s chicken was gone.</p> +<p>“Out on the blamed thieves!” cried Billy, astounded at such +manners. He was going to strike the dog, but Will stopped him.</p> +<p>“Let un bide,” he said. “He didn’t take it, +an’ since it weern’t for Phoebe, better him had it than the cat. +He works for his livin’, she doan’t.”</p> +<p>“Such gwaines-on ’mongst dumb beasts o’ the field I +never seen!” protested Billy; “an’ chickens worth what they +be this spring!”</p> +<p>Presently conversation drifted into a channel that enabled the desperate, +powerless man to use his brains and employ his muscles; while for the mother +it furnished a fresh gleam of hope built upon faith. Billy it was who brought +about this consummation. Led by Phoebe he ascended to the sick-room and bid +Mrs. Blanchard “good-day.” She sat with the insensible child on +her lap by the fire, where a long-spouted kettle sent forth jets of +steam.</p> +<p>“This here jelly what I’ve brought would put life in a corpse +I do b’lieve; an’ them butivul grapes, tu,—they’ll +cool his fever to rights, I should judge.”</p> +<p>“He ’m past all that,” said Phoebe.</p> +<p>“Never!” cried the other woman. “He’m a bit easier +to my thinkin’.”</p> +<p>“Let me take un then,” said the mother. “You’m +most blind for sleep.”</p> +<p>“Not a bit of it. I’ll have forty winks later, after +Doctor’s been again.”</p> +<p>Will here entered, sat down by his mother, and stroked the child’s +little limp hand.</p> +<p>“He ban’t fightin’ so hard, by the looks of it,” +he said.</p> +<p>“No more he is. Come he sleep like this till dark, I lay he’ll +do braave.”</p> +<p>Nobody spoke for some minutes, then Billy, having pondered the point in +silence, suddenly relieved his mind and attacked Will, to the astonishment of +all present.</p> +<p>“’Tis a black thought for you to knaw this trouble’s of +your awn wicked hatching, Farmer,” he said abruptly; “though it +ban’t a very likely time to say so, perhaps. Yet theer’s life +still, so I speak.”</p> +<p>Will glared speechless; but Billy knew himself too puny and too venerable +to fear rough handling. He regarded the angry man before him without fear, +and explained his allusion.</p> +<p>“You may glaze ’pon me, an’ stick your savage eyes out +your head; but that doan’t alter truth. ’T ’as awnly a bit +ago in the fall as I told un what would awvertake un,” he continued, +turning to the women. “He left the cross what Mr. Grimbal found +upsy-down in the airth; he stood up afore the company an’ damned the +glory of all Christian men. Ess fay, he done that fearful thing, an’ if +’t weern’t enough to turn the Lard’s hand from un, what +was? Snug an’ vitty he weer afore that, so far as anybody knawed; +an’ since—why, troubles have tumbled ’pon each +other’s tails like apple-dranes out of a nest.”</p> +<p>The face of Phoebe was lighted with some eagerness, some deep anxiety, and +not a little passion as she listened to this harangue.</p> +<p>“You mean that gate-stone brought this upon us?” she +asked.</p> +<p>“No, no, never,” declared Damaris; “’t is contrary +to all reason.”</p> +<p>“’T is true, whether or no; an’ any fule, let alone a +man as knaws like I do, would tell ’e the same. ’T is common +sense if you axes me. Your man was told ’t was a blessed cross, +an’ he flouted the lot of us an’ left it wheer ’t was. +’T is a challenge, if you come to think of it, a scoffin’ of the +A’mighty to the very face of Un. I wouldn’t stand it myself if I +was Him.”</p> +<p>“Will, do ’e hear Mr. Blee?” asked Phoebe.</p> +<p>“I hear un. ’T is tu late now, even if what he said was true, +which it ban’t.”</p> +<p>“Never tu late to do a gude deed,” declared Billy; +“an’ you’ll have to come to it, or you’ll get the +skin cussed off your back afore you ’m done with. Gormed if ever I seed +sich a man as you! Theer be some gude points about ’e, as everything +must have from God A’mighty’s workshop, down to poisonous +varmints. But certain sure am I that you don’t ought to think twice +’pon this job.”</p> +<p>“Do ’e mean it might even make the differ’nee between +life an’ death to the bwoy?” asked Phoebe breathlessly.</p> +<p>“I do. Just all that.”</p> +<p>“Will—for God’s love, Will!”</p> +<p>“What do ’e say, mother?”</p> +<p>“It may be truth. Strange things fall out. Yet it never hurted my +parents in the past.”</p> +<p>“For why?” asked Billy. “’Cause they didn’t +knaw ’t was theer, so allowance was made by the Watching Eye. Now +’t is differ’nt, an’ His rage be waxing.”</p> +<p>“Your blessed God ’s got no common sense, then—an’ +that’s all I’ve got to say ’bout it. What would you have me +do?”</p> +<p>Will put the question to Mr. Blee, but his wife it was who answered, being +now worked up to a pitch of frenzy at the delay.</p> +<p>“Go! Dig—dig as you never digged afore! Dig the holy stone out +the ground direckly minute! Now, now, Will, ’fore the life’s out +of his li’l flutterin’ body. Lay bare the cross, an’ drag +un out for God in heaven to see! Doan’t stand clackin’ theer, +when every moment’s worth more’n gawld.”</p> +<p>“So like’s not He’ll forgive ’e if ’e +do,” argued Mr. Blee. “Allowed the Lard o’ Hosts graws a +bit short in His temper now an’ again, as with them gormed Israelites, +an’ sich like, an’ small blame to Him; but He’s all for +mercy at heart, ’cordin’ to the opinion of these times, so +you’d best to dig.”</p> +<p>“Why doan’t he strike me down if I’ve angered +Him—not this innocent cheel?”</p> +<p>“The sins of the fathers be visited—” began Mr. Blee +glibly, when Mrs. Blanchard interrupted.</p> +<p>“Ban’t the time to argue, Will. Do it, an’ do it sharp, +if’t will add wan grain o’ hope to the baaby’s +chance.”</p> +<p>The younger woman’s sufferings rose to a frantic half-hushed scream +at the protracted delay.</p> +<p>“O Christ, why for do ’e hold back? Ban’t anything worth +tryin’ for your awn son? I’d scratch the stone out wi’ my +raw, bleedin’ finger-bones if I was a man. Do ’e want to send me +mad? Do ’e want to make me hate the sight of ’e? Go—go for +love of your mother, if not of me!”</p> +<p>“An’ I’ll help,” said Billy, “an’ that +chap messin’ about in the yard can lend a hand likewise. I be a cracked +vessel myself for strength, an’ past heavy work, but my best is yours +to call ’pon in this pass.”</p> +<p>Will turned and left the sick-room without more words, while Billy +followed him.</p> +<p>The farmer fetched two picks and a shovel, called Ted Chown and a minute +later had struck the first blow towards restoration of his granite cross. All +laboured with their utmost power, and Will, who had flung off his coat and +waistcoat, bared his arms, tightened his belt, and did the work of two men. +The manual labour sweetened his mind a little, and scoured it of some +bitterness. While Mr. Blee, with many a grunt and groan, removed the soil as +the others broke it away, Blanchard, during these moments of enforced +idleness, looked hungrily at the little window of the upper chamber where all +his hopes and interests were centred. Then he swung his pick again.</p> +<p>Presently a ray of sunlight brightened Newtake, and contributed to soothe +the toiling father. He read promise into it, and when three feet below the +surface indications of cross-arms appeared upon the stone, Will felt still +more heartened. Grimbal’s prediction was now verified; and it remained +only to prove Billy’s prophecy also true. His tremendous physical +exertions, the bright setting sunshine, and the discovery of the cross +affected Will strangely. His mind swung round from frank irreligion, to a +sort of superstitious credulity, awestricken yet joyful, that made him cling +to the saving virtue of the stone. Because Martin had been right in his +assertion concerning the gate-post, Blanchard felt a hazy conviction that +Blee’s estimate of the stone’s virtue must also prove correct. He +saw his wife at the window, and waved to her, and cried aloud that the cross +was uncovered.</p> +<p>“A poor thing in holy relics, sure ’nough,” said Billy, +wiping his forehead.</p> +<p>“But a cross—a clear cross? Keep workin’, Chown, will +’e? You still think ’twill serve, doan’t ’e, +Blee?”</p> +<p>“No room for doubt, though woful out o’ repair,” +answered Billy, occupied with the ancient monument. “Just the stumps +o’ the arms left, but more’n enough to swear by.”</p> +<p>All laboured on; then the stone suddenly subsided and fell in such a +manner that with some sloping of one side of the excavated pit they were able +to drag it out.</p> +<p>“Something’s talking to me as us have done the wan thing +needful,” murmured Will, in a subdued voice, but with more light than +the sunset on his face. “Something’s hurting me bad that I said +what I said in the chamber, an’ thought what I thought. God’s +nigher than us might think, minding what small creatures we be. I hope +He’ll forgive them words.”</p> +<p>“He’s a peacock for eyes, as be well knawn,” declared +Mr. Blee. “An’ He’ve got His various manners an’ +customs o’ handlin’ the human race. Some He softens wi’ +gude things an’ gude fortune till they be bound to turn to Him for +sheer shame; others He breaks ’pon the rocks of His wrath till they +falls on their knees an’ squeals for forgiveness. I’ve seed it +both ways scores o’ times; an’ if your little lad ’s spared +to ’e, you’ll be brought to the Lard by a easier way than you +deserve, Blanchard.”</p> +<p>“I knaw, I knaw, Mr. Blee. He ’m surely gwaine to let us keep +li’l Willy, an’ win us to heaven for all time.”</p> +<p>The cross now lay at their feet, and Billy was about to return to the +house and see how matters prospered, when Will bade him stay a little +longer.</p> +<p>“Not yet,” he said.</p> +<p>“What more’s to do?”</p> +<p>“I feel a kind o’ message like to set it plumb-true under the +sky. Us caan’t lift it, but if I pull a plank or two out o’ the +pig’s house an’ put a harrow chain round ’em, we could get +the cross on an’ let a horse pull un up theer to the hill, and set un +up. Then us would have done all man can.”</p> +<p>He pointed to the bosom of the adjacent hill, now glowing in great sunset +light.</p> +<p>“Starve me! but you ’m wise. Us’ll set the thing up +under the A’mighty’s eye. ’Twill serve—mark my words. +’Twill turn the purpose of the Lard o’ Hosts, or I’m no +prophet.”</p> +<p>“’Tis in my head you ’m right. I be lifted up in a way I +never was.”</p> +<p>“The Lard ’s found ’e by the looks of it,” said +Billy critically, “either that, or you ’m light-headed for want +of sleep. But truly I think He’ve called ’e. Now ’t is for +you to answer.”</p> +<p>They cleaned the cross with a bucket or two of water, then dragged it +half-way up the hill, and, where a rabbit burrow lessened labour, raised +their venerable monument under the afterglow.</p> +<p>“It do look as if it had been part o’ the view for all +time,” declared Ted Chown, as the party retreated a few paces; and, +indeed, the stone rose harmoniously upon its new site, and might have stood +an immemorial feature of the scene.</p> +<p>Blanchard stayed not a moment when the work was done but strode to Newtake +like a jubilant giant, while Mr. Blee and Chown, with the horse, tools, and +rough sledge, followed more slowly.</p> +<p>The father proceeded homewards at tremendous speed; a glorious hope filled +his heart, sharing the same with sorrow and repentance. He mumbled shamefaced +prayers as he went, speaking half to himself, half to Heaven. He rambled on +from a petition for forgiveness into a broken thanksgiving for the mercy he +already regarded as granted. His labours, the glamour of the present +achievement, and the previous long strain upon his mind and body, united to +smother reason for one feverish hour. Will walked blindly forward, now with +his eyes upon the window under Newtake’s dark roof below him, now +turning to catch sight of the grey cross uplifted on the hill above. A great +sweeping sea of change was tumbling through his intellect, and old +convictions with scraps of assured wisdom suffered shipwreck in it. His mind +was exalted before the certainty of unutterable blessing; his soul clung to +the splendid assurance of a Personal God who had wrought actively upon his +behalf, and received his belated atonement.</p> +<p>Far behind, Mr. Blee was improving the occasion for benefit of young Ted +Chown.</p> +<p>“See how he do stride the hill wi’ his head held high, same as +Moses when he went down-long from the Mount. Look at un an’ do +likewise, Teddy; for theer goes a man as have grasped God! ’Tis a gert, +gay day in human life when it comes.”</p> +<p>Will Blanchard hurried through the farm gate, where it swung idly with its +sacred support gone forever; then he drew a great breath and glanced upwards +before proceeding into the darkness of the unlighted house. As he did so +wheels grated at the entrance, and he knew that Doctor Parsons must be just +behind him. Above stairs the sick-room was still unlighted, the long-necked +kettle still puffed steam, but the fire had shrunk, and Will’s first +word was a protest that it had been allowed to sink so low. Then he looked +round, and the rainbow in his heart faded and died. Damaris sat like a stone +woman by the window; Phoebe lay upon the bed and hugged a little body in a +blanket. Her hair had fallen down; out of the great shadows he saw the white +blur on her face, and heard her voice sound strange as she cried +monotonously, in a tone from which the first passion had vanished through an +hour of iteration.</p> +<p>“O God, give un back to me; O God, spare un; O kind God, give my +li’l bwoy back.”</p> +<h2><a id="III_VII" name="III_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII<br /> +GREY TWILIGHT</h2> +<p>In the soft earth they laid him, “the little child whose heart had +fallen asleep,” and from piling of a miniature mound, from a small +brown tumulus, now quite hid under primroses, violets, and the white anemones +of the woods, Will Blanchard and his mother slowly returned to Newtake. He +wore his black coat; she was also dressed in black; the solitary mourning +coach dragged slowly up the hill to the Moor, and elsewhere another like it +conveyed Mr. Lyddon homeward.</p> +<p>Neither mother nor son had any heart to speak. The man’s soul was up +in arms; he had rebelled against his life, and since the death of his boy, +while Phoebe remained inert in her desolation and languished under a mental +and bodily paralysis wherein she had starved to death but for those about +her, he, on the contrary, found muscle and mind clamouring for heroic +movement. He was feverishly busy upon the farm, and ranged in thought with a +savage activity among the great concerns of men. His ill-regulated mind, +smarting under the blows of Chance, whirled from that past transient wave of +superstitious emotion into an opposite extreme. Now he was ashamed of his +weakness, and suffered convictions proper to the narrowness of an immature +intellect to overwhelm him. He assured himself that his tribulations were not +compatible with the existence of a Supreme Being. Like poor humanity the wide +world over, his judgment became vitiated, his views distorted under the +stroke of personal sorrow, and, beneath the pressure of that gigantic egotism +which ever palsies the mind of man at sudden loss of what he holds dearest +upon earth, poor Blanchard cried in his heart there was no God.</p> +<p>Here we are faced with a curious parallel, offered within the limits of +this narrative. As the old labourer, Blee, had arrived at the same +conclusion, then modified it and returned to a creed in the light of +subsequent events, so now Will had found himself, on the evening of his +child’s funeral, with fresh interests aroused and recent convictions +shaken. An incipient negation of Deity, built upon the trumpery basis of his +personal misfortunes, was almost shattered within the week that saw its first +existence. A mystery developed in his path, and startling incidents awoke a +new train of credulity akin to that already manifested over the ancient +cross. The man’s uneven mind was tossed from one extreme of opinion to +the other, and that element of superstition, from which no untutored +intellect in the lap of Nature is free, now found fresh food and put forth a +strong root within him.</p> +<p>Returning home, Will approached Phoebe with a purpose to detail the sad, +short scene in Chagford churchyard, but his voice rendered her hysterical, so +he left her with his mother, put on his working clothes, and wandered out +into the farmyard. Presently he found himself idly regarding a new gate-post: +that which Martin Grimbal formerly brought and left hard by the farm. Ted +Chown had occupied himself in erecting it during the morning.</p> +<p>The spectacle reminded Will of another, and he lifted his eyes to the +cross on the undulation spread before him. As he did so some object appeared +to flutter out of sight not far above it, among the rocks and loose +‘clatters’ beneath the summit of the tor. This incident did not +hold Will’s mind, but, prompted to motion, restless, and in the power +of dark thoughts, he wandered up the Moor, tramped through the heather, and +unwittingly passed within a yard of the monument he had raised upon the hill. +He stood a moment and looked at the cross, then cursed and spat upon it. The +action spoke definitely of a mental chaos unexampled in one who, until that +time, had never lacked abundant self-respect. His deed done, it struck Will +Blanchard like a blow; he marvelled bitterly at himself, he knew such an act +was pitiful, and remembered that the brain responsible for it was his own. +Then he clenched his hands and turned away, and stood and stared out over the +world.</p> +<p>A wild, south-west wind blew, and fitful rain-storms sped separately +across the waste. Over the horizon clouds massed darkly, and the wildernesses +spread beneath them were of an inflamed purple. The seat of the sun was +heavily obscured at this moment, and the highest illumination cast from sky +to earth broke from the north. The effect thus imparted to the scene, though +in reality no more than usual, affected the mind as unnatural, and even +sinister in its operation of unwonted chiaro-oscuro. Presently the sullen +clearness of the distance was swept and softened by a storm. Another, falling +some miles nearer, became superimposed upon it. Immediately the darkness of +the horizon lifted and light generally increased, though every outline of the +hills themselves vanished under falling rain. The turmoil of the clouds +proceeded, and after another squall had passed there followed an aerial +battle amid towers and pinnacles and tottering precipices of sheer gloom. The +centre of illumination wheeled swiftly round to the sun as the storm +travelled north, then a few huge silver spokes of wan sunshine turned +irregularly upon the stone-strewn desert.</p> +<p>Will watched this elemental unrest, and it served to soothe that greater +storm of sorrows and self-condemnation then raging within him. His nature +found consolation here, the cool hand of the Mother touched his forehead as +she passed in her robe of rain, and for the first time since childhood the +man hid his face and wept.</p> +<p>Presently he moved forward again, walked to the valleys and wandered +towards southern Teign, unconsciously calmed by his own random movements and +the river’s song. Anon, he entered the lands of Metherill, and soon +afterwards, without deliberate intention, moved through that Damnonian +village which lies there. A moment later and he stood in the hut-circle where +he himself had been born. Its double stone courses spread around him, hiding +the burrows of the rabbits; and sprung from between two granite blocks, brave +in spring verdure, with the rain twinkling in little nests of flower buds as +yet invisible, there rose a hawthorn. Within the stones a ewe stood and +suckled its young, but there was no other sign of life. Then Blanchard, +sitting here to rest and turning his eyes whither he had come, again noticed +some sudden movement, but, looking intently at the spot, he saw nothing and +returned to his own thoughts. Sitting motionless Will retraced the brief +course of his career through long hours of thought; and though his spirit +bubbled to white heat more than once during the survey, yet subdued currents +of sense wound amid his later reflections. Crushed for a moment under the +heavy load of life and its lessons, he presented a picture familiar enough, +desirable enough, necessary enough to all humanity, yet pathetic as +exemplified in the young and unintelligent and hopeful. It was the picture of +the dawn of patience—a patience sprung from no religious inspiration, +but representing Will’s tacit acknowledgment of defeat in his earlier +battles with the world. The emotion did not banish his present rebellion +against Fate and evil fortune undeserved; but it caused him to look upon life +from a man’s standpoint rather than a child’s, and did him a +priceless service by shaking to their foundations his self-confidence and +self-esteem. Selfish at least he was not from a masculine standard, and now +his thoughts returned to Phoebe in her misery, and he rose and retraced his +steps with a purpose to comfort her if he could.</p> +<p>The day began to draw in. Unshed rains massed on the high tors, but +towards the west one great band of primrose sky rolled out above the vanished +sun and lighted a million little amber lamps in the hanging crystals of the +rain. They twinkled on thorns and briars, on the grass, the silver crosiers +of uncurling ferns, and all the rusty-red young heather.</p> +<p>Then it was that rising from his meditations and turning homeward, the man +distinctly heard himself called from some distance. A voice repeated his name +twice—in clear tones that might have belonged to a boy or a woman.</p> +<p>“Will! Will!”</p> +<p>Turning sharply upon a challenge thus ringing through absolute loneliness +and silence, Blanchard endeavoured, without success, to ascertain from whence +the summons came. He thought of his mother, then of his wife, yet neither was +visible, and nobody appeared. Only the old time village spread about him with +its hoary granite peering from under caps of heather and furze, ivy and +upspringing thorn. And each stock and stone seemed listening with him for the +repetition of a voice. The sheep had moved elsewhere, and he stood +companionless in that theatre of vanished life. Trackways and circles wound +grey around him, and the spring vegetation above which they rose all swam +into one dim shade, yet moved with shadows under oncoming darkness. +Attributing the voice to his own unsettled spirit, Blanchard proceeded upon +his road to where the skeleton of a dead horse stared through the gloaming +beside a quaking bog. Its bones were scattered by ravens, and Will used the +bleached skull as a stepping stone. Presently he thought of the flame-tongues +that here were wont to dance through warm summer nights. This memory recalled +his own nickname in +Chagford—“Jack-o’-Lantern”—and, for the first +time in his life, he began to appreciate its significance. Then, being a +hundred yards from his starting-place in the hut-circle, he heard the hidden +voice again. Clear and low, it stole over the intervening wilderness, and +between two utterances was an interval of some seconds.</p> +<p>“Will! Will!”</p> +<p>For one instant the crepitation of fear passed over Blanchard’s +scalp and skin. He made an involuntary stride away from the voice; then he +shook himself free of all alarm, and, not desirous to lose more self-respect +that day, turned resolutely and shouted back,—</p> +<p>“I hear ’e. What’s the business? I be comin’ to +’e if you’ll bide wheer you be.”</p> +<p>That some eyes were watching him out of the gathering darkness he did not +doubt, and soon pushing back, he stood once more in the ruined citadel of old +stones, mounted one, steadied himself by a young ash that rose beside it, and +raised his voice again,—</p> +<p>“Now, then! I be here. What’s to do? Who’s callin’ +me?”</p> +<p>An answer came, but of a sort widely different from what he expected. +There arose, within twenty yards of him, a sound that might have been the cry +of a child or the scream of a trapped animal. Assuming it to be the latter, +Will again hesitated. Often enough he had laughed at the folk-tales of witch +hares as among the most fantastic fables of the old; yet at this present +moment mystic legends won point from the circumstances in which he found +himself. He hurried forward to the edge of a circle from which the sound +proceeded. Then, looking before him, he started violently, sank to his knees +behind a rock, and so remained, glaring into the ring of stones.</p> +<p class="thoughtBreak">In less than half an hour Blanchard, with his coat wrapped round some +object that he carried, returned to Newtake and summoned assistance with a +loud voice.</p> +<p>Presently his wife and mother entered the kitchen, whereupon Will +discovered his burden and revealed a young child. Phoebe fainted dead away at +sight of it, and while her husband looked to her Mrs. Blanchard tended the +baby, which was hungry but by no means alarmed. As for Will, his altered +voice and most unusual excitement of manner indicated something of the shock +he had received. Having described the voice which called him, he proceeded +after this fashion to detail what followed:</p> +<p>“I looked in the very hut-circle I was born, an’ I shivered +all over, for I thought ’twas the li’l ghost of our wee +bwoy—by God, I did! It sat theer all alone, an’ I stared +an’ froze while I stared. Then it hollered like a gude un, an’ +stretched out its arms, an’ I seed ’twas livin’ an’ +never thought how it comed theer. He ’in somethin’ smaller than +our purty darling, yet like him in a way, onless I’m +forgetting.”</p> +<p>“’Tis like,” said Damaris, dandling the child and making +it happy. “’Tis a li’l bwoy, two year old or more, I should +guess. It keeps crying ’Mam, mam,’ for its mother. God forgive +the woman.”</p> +<p>“A gypsy’s baby, I reckon,” said Phoebe languidly.</p> +<p>“I doan’t think it,” answered her husband; +“I’m most feared to guess what ’tis. Wan thing’s +sure; I was called loud an’ clear or I’d never have turned back; +an’ yet, second time I was called, my flesh crept.”</p> +<p>“The little flannels an’ frock be thick an’ gude, but +they doan’t shaw nought.”</p> +<p>“The thing’s most as easy to think a miracle as not. He looked +up in my eyes as I brought un away, an’ after he’d got used to me +he was quiet as a mouse an’ snuggled to me.”</p> +<p>“They’d have said ’twas a fairy changeling in my young +days,” mused Mrs. Blanchard, “but us knaws better now. ’Tis +a li’l gypsy, I’ll warn ’e, an’ some wicked +mother’s dropped un under your nose to ease her conscience.”</p> +<p>“What will you do? Take un to the poorhouse?” asked +Phoebe.</p> +<p>“‘Poorhouse’! Never! This be mine, tu. Mine! I was +called to it, weern’t I? By a human voice or another, God knaws. +Theer’s more to this than us can see.”</p> +<p>His women regarded him with blank amazement, and he showed considerable +impatience tinder their eyes. It was clear he desired that they should dwell +on no purely materialistic or natural explanation of the incident.</p> +<p>“Baan’t a gypsy baaby,” he said; “’tis awnly +the legs an’ arms of un as be brown. His body’s as white as +curds, an’ his hair’s no darker than our awn Willy’s +was.”</p> +<p>“If it ban’t a gypsy’s, whose be it?” said Phoebe, +turning to the infant for the first time.</p> +<p>“Mine now,” answered Will stoutly. “’Twas sent +an’ give into my awn hand by one what knawed who ’twas they +called. My heart warmed to un as he lay in my arms, an’ he’m mine +hencefarrard.”</p> +<p>“What do ’e say, Phoebe?” asked Mrs. Blanchard, somewhat +apprehensively. She knew full well how any such project must have struck her +if placed in the bereaved mother’s position. Phoebe, however, made no +immediate answer. Her sorrowful eyes were fixed on the child, now sitting +happily on the elder woman’s lap.</p> +<p>“A nice li’l thing, wi’ a wunnerful curly head—eh, +Phoebe? Seems more ’n chance to me, comin’ as it have on this +night-black day. An’ like our li’l angel, tu, in a way?” +asked Will.</p> +<p>“Like him—in a way, but more like you,” she answered; +“more like you than your awn was—terrible straange that—the +living daps o’ Will! Ban’t it?”</p> +<p>Damaris regarded her son and then the child.</p> +<p>“He be like—very,” she admitted. “I see him +strong. An’ to think he found the bwoy ’pon that identical spot +wheer he fust drawed breath himself!”</p> +<p>“’Tis a thing of hidden meaning,” declared Will. +“An’ he looked at me kindly fust he seed me; ’twas awnly +hunger made un shout—not no fear o’ me. My heart warmed to un as +I told ’e. An’ to come this day!”</p> +<p>Phoebe had taken the child, and was looking over its body in a half-dazed +fashion for the baby marks she knew. Silently she completed the survey, but +there was neither caress in her fingers nor softness in her eyes. Presently +she put the child back on Mrs. Blanchard’s lap and spoke, still +regarding it with a sort of dull, almost vindictive astonishment.</p> +<p>“Terrible coorious! Ban’t no child as ever I seed or heard +tell of; an’ nothin’ of my dead lamb ’bout it, now I scans +closer. But so like to Will! God! I can see un lookin’ out o’ its +baaby eyes!”</p> +<h2><a id="IV_I" name="IV_I"></a>BOOK IV<br /> +HIS SECRET<br /> +<br />CHAPTER I<br /> +A WANDERER RETURNS</h2> +<p>Ripe hay swelled in many a silver-russet billow, all brightened by the +warm red of sorrel under sunshine. When the wind blew, ripples raced over the +bending grasses, and from their midst shone out mauve scabious and flashed +occasional poppies. The hot July air trembled agleam with shining insects, +and drowsily over the hayfield, punctuated by stridulation of innumerable +grasshoppers, there throbbed one sustained murmur, like the remote and mellow +music of wood and strings. A lark still sang, and the swallows, whose +full-fledged young thrust open beaks from the nests under Newtake eaves, +skimmed and twittered above the grass lands, or sometimes dipped a purple +wing in the still water where the irises grew.</p> +<p>Blanchard and young Ted Chown had set about their annual labour of saving +the hay, and now a rhythmic breathing of two scythes and merry clink of +whetstones against steel sounded afar on the sleepy summer air. The familiar +music came to Phoebe’s ear where she sat at an open kitchen window of +Newtake. Her custom was at times of hay harvest to assist in the drying of +the grass, and few women handled a fork better; but there had recently +reached the farm an infant girl, and the mother had plenty to do without +seeking beyond her cradle.</p> +<p>Phoebe made no demur about receiving Will’s little foundling of the +hut-circle. His heart’s desire was usually her amibition also, and +though Timothy, as the child had been called, could boast no mother’s +love, yet Phoebe proved a kind nurse, and only abated her attention upon the +arrival of her own daughter. Then, as time softened the little mound in +Chagford churchyard with young green, so before another baby did the +mother’s bereavement soften, sink deeper into memory, revive at longer +intervals to conjure tears. Her character, as has been indicated, admitted of +no supreme sustained sorrow. Suffer she did, and fiery was her agony; but +another child brought occupation and new love; while her husband, after the +first sentimental outburst of affection over the infant he had found at +Metherill, settled into an enduring regard for him, associated him, by some +mental process impossible of explanation, with his own lost one, and took an +interest, blended of many curious emotions, in the child.</p> +<p>Drying hay soon filled the air with a pleasant savour, and stretched out +grey-green ribbons along the emerald of the shorn meadows. Chown snuffled and +sweated and sneezed, for the pollen always gave him hay fever; his master +daily worked like a giant from dawn till the owl-light, drank gallons of +cider, and performed wonders with the scythe. A great hay crop gladdened the +moormen, and Will, always intoxicated by a little fair fortune, talked much +of his husbandry, already calculated the value of the aftermath, and reckoned +what number of beasts he might feed next winter.</p> +<p>“’Most looks as if I’d got a special gift wi’ +hay,” he said to his mother on one occasion. She had let her cottage to +holiday folk, and was spending a month on the Moor.</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard surveyed the scene from under her sunbonnet and nodded.</p> +<p>“Spare no trouble, no trouble, an’ have it stacked come +Saturday. Theer’ll be thunder an’ gert rains after this heat. Be +the rushes ready for thatchin’ of it?”</p> +<p>“Not yet; but that’s not to say I’ve forgot.”</p> +<p>“I’ll cut some for ’e myself come the cool of the +evenin’. An’ you can send Ted with the cart to gather ’em +up.”</p> +<p>“No, no, mother. I’ll make time to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“’Twill be gude to me, an’ like auld days, when I was a +li’l maid. You sharp the sickle an’ fetch the skeiner out, tu, +for I was a quick hand at bindin’ ropes o’ rushes, an’ have +made many a yard of ’em in my time.”</p> +<p>Then she withdrew from the tremendous sunshine, and Will, now handling a +rake, proceeded with his task.</p> +<p>Two days later a rick began to rise majestically at the corner of +Blanchard’s largest field, while round about it was gathered the human +life of the farm. Phoebe, with her baby, sat on an old sheepskin rug in the +shadow of the growing pile; little Tim rollicked unheeded with Ship in the +sweet grass, and clamoured from time to time for milk from a glass bottle; +Will stood up aloft and received the hay from Chown’s fork, while Mrs. +Blanchard, busy with the “skeiner” stuck into the side of the +rick, wound stout ropes of rushes for the thatching.</p> +<p>Then it was that Will, glancing out upon the Moor, observed a string of +gypsy folk making slow progress towards Chagford. Among the various Romany +cavalcades which thus passed Newtake in summer time this appeared not the +least strange. Two ordinary caravans headed the procession. A man conducted +each, a naked-footed child or two trotted beside them, and an elder boy led +along three goats. The travelling homes were encumbered with osier-and +cane-work, and following them came a little broken-down, open vehicle. This +was drawn by two donkeys, harnessed tandem-fashion, and the chariot had been +painted bright blue. A woman drove the concern, and in it appeared a +knife-grinding machine and a basket of cackling poultry, while some +tent-poles stuck out behind. Will laughed at this spectacle, and called his +wife’s attention to it, whereon Phoebe and Damaris went as far as the +gate of the hayfield to win a nearer view. The gypsies, however, had already +passed, but Mrs. Blanchard found time to observe the sky-blue carriage and +shake her head at it.</p> +<p>“What gwaines-on! Theer’s no master minds ’mongst them +people nowadays,” she said. “Your faither wouldn’t have let +his folk make a show of themselves like that.”</p> +<p>“They ’m mostly chicken stealers nowadays,” declared +Will; “an’ so surly as dogs if you tell ’em to go +’bout theer business.”</p> +<p>“Not to none o’ your name—never,” declared his +mother. “No gypsy’s gwaine to forget my husband in his +son’s time. Many gude qualities have they got, chiefly along o’ +living so much in the awpen air.”</p> +<p>“An’ gude appetites for the same cause! Go after Tim, wan of +’e. He’ve trotted down the road half a mile, an’ be +runnin’ arter that blue concern as if’t was a circus. Theer! +Blamed if that damned gal in the thing ban’t stoppin’ to let un +catch up! Now he’m feared, an’ have turned tail an’ be +coming back. ’Tis all right; Ship be wi’ un.”</p> +<p>Presently the greater of Will’s two ricks approached completion, and +all the business of thatch and spar gads and rush ropes began. At his +mother’s desire he wasted no time, and toiled on, long after his party +had returned to Newtake; but with the dusk he made an end for that day, stood +up, rested his back, and scanned the darkening scene before descending.</p> +<p>At eveningtide there had spread over the jagged western outlines of the +Moor an orange-tawny sunset, whereon the solid masses of the hills burnt into +hazy gold, all fairy-bright, unreal, unsubstantial as a cloud-island above +them, whose solitary and striated shore shone purple through molten fire.</p> +<p>Detail vanished from the Moor; dim and dimensionless it spread to the +transparent splendour of the horizon, and its eternal attributes of great +vastness, great loneliness, great silence reigned together unfretted by +particulars. Gathering gloom diminished the wide glory of the sky, and slowly +robbed the pageant of its colour. Then rose each hill and undulation in a +different shade of night, and every altitude mingled into the outlines of its +neighbour. Nocturnal mists, taking grey substance against the darkness of the +lower lands, wound along the rivers, and defined the depths and ridges of the +valleys. Moving waters, laden with a last waning gleam, glided from beneath +these vapoury exhalations, and even trifling rivulets, now invisible save for +chance splashes of light, lacked not mystery as they moved from darkness into +darkness with a song. Stars twinkled above the dewy sleep of the earth, and +there brooded over all things a prodigious peace, broken only by batrachian +croakings from afar.</p> +<p>These phenomena Will Blanchard observed; then yellow candle fires twinkled +from the dark mass of the farmhouse, and he descended in splendid weariness +and strode to supper and to bed.</p> +<p>Yet not much sleep awaited the farmer, for soon after midnight a gentle +patter of small stones at his window awakened him. Leaping from his bed and +looking into the darkness he saw a vague figure that raised its hand and +beckoned without words. Fear for the hay was Will’s first emotion, but +no indication of trouble appeared. Once he spoke, and as he did so the figure +beckoned again, then approached the door. Blanchard went down to find a woman +waiting for him, and her first whispered word made him start violently and +drop the candle and matches that he carried. His ears were opened and he knew +Chris without seeing her face.</p> +<p>“I be come back—back home-along, brother Will,” she +said, very quietly. “I looked for mother to home, but found she +weern’t theer. An’ I be sorry to the heart for all the sorrow +I’ve brought ’e both. But it had to be. Strange thoughts +an’ voices was in me when Clem went, an’ I had to hide myself or +drown myself—so I went.”</p> +<p>“God’s gudeness! Lucky I be made o’ strong stuff, else I +might have thought ’e a ghost an’ no less. Come in out the night, +an’ I’ll light a candle. But speak soft. Us must break this very +gentle to mother.”</p> +<p>“Say you’ll forgive me, will ’e? Can ’e do it? If +you knawed half you’d say ‘yes.’ I’m grawed a auld, +cold-hearted woman, wi’ a grey hair here an’ theer +a’ready.”</p> +<p>“So’ve I got wan an’ another, tu, along o’ worse +sorrow than yours. Leastways as bad as yourn. Forgive ’e? A thousand +times, an’ thank Heaven you’m livin’! Wheer ever have +’e bided? An’ me an’ Grimbal searched the South Hams, +an’ North, tu, inside out for ’e, an’ he put notices in the +papers—dozens of ’em.”</p> +<p>“Along with the gypsy folk for more ’n three year now. +’Twas the movin’ an’ rovin’, and the opening my eyes +on new things that saved me from gwaine daft. Sometimes us coined through +Chagford, an’ then I’d shut my eyes tight an’ lie in the +van, so’s not to see the things his eyes had seen—so’s not +to knaw when us passed the cottage he lived in. But now I’ve got to +feel I could come back again.”</p> +<p>“You might have writ to say how you was faring.”</p> +<p>“I didn’t dare. You’d bin sure to find me, an’ I +didn’t want ’e to then. ’Tis awver an’ done, +an’ ’twas for the best.”</p> +<p>“You’m a woman, an’ can say them silly words, an’ +think ’em true in your heart, I s’pose. ‘For the +best!’ I caan’t see much that happens for the best under my eyes. +Will ’e have bite or sup?”</p> +<p>“No, nothin’. You get back to your bed. Us’ll talk in +the marnin’. I’ll bide here. You an’ Phoebe be well, +an’—an’ dear mother?”</p> +<p>“We’m well. You doan’t ax me after the fust cheel Phoebe +had.”</p> +<p>“I knaw. I put some violets theer that very night. We were camped +just above Chagford, not far from here.”</p> +<p>“Theer’s a li’l gal now, an’ a bwoy as I’ll +tell’e about bimebye. A sheer miracle’t was that falled out the +identical day I buried my Willy. No natural fashion of words can explain it. +But that’ll keep. Now let me look at’e. Fuller in the body +seemin’ly, an’ gypsy-brown, by God! So brown as me, every bit. +Well, well, I caan’t say nothin’. I’m carried off my legs +wi’ wonder, an’ joy, tu, for that matter. Next to Phoebe +an’ mother I allus loved ’e best. Gimme a kiss. What a woman, to +be sure! Like a thief in the night you went; same way you’ve comed +back. Why couldn’t ’e wait till marnin’?”</p> +<p>“The childer—they grawed to love me that dear—also the +men an’ women. They’ve been gude to me beyond power o’ +words for faither’s sake. They knawed I was gwaine, an’ I left +’em asleep. ’T was how they found me when I runned away. I falled +asleep from weariness on the Moor, an’ they woke me, an’ I +thrawed in my lot with them from the day I left that pencil-written word for +’e on the window-ledge.”</p> +<p>“Me bein’ in the valley lookin’ for your drowned body +the while! Women ’mazes me more the wiser I graw. Come this way, to the +linhay. There’s a sweet bed o’ dry fern in the loft, and you must +keep out o’ sight till mother’s told cunning. I’ll hit upon +a way to break it to her so soon as she’s rose. An’ if I +caan’t, Phoebe will. Come along quiet. An’ I be gwaine to lock +’e in, Chris, if’t is all the same to you. For why? Because you +might fancy the van folks was callin’ to ’e, an’ grow +hungry for the rovin’ life again.”</p> +<p>She made no objection, and asked one more question as they went to the +building.</p> +<p>“How be Mrs. Hicks, my Clem’s mother?”</p> +<p>“Alive; that’s all. A poor auld bed-lier now; just fading away +quiet. But weak in the head as a baaby. Mother sees her now an’ again. +She never talks of nothin’ but snuff. ’T is the awnly brightness +in her life. She’s forgot everythin’ ’bout the past, +an’ if you went to see her, she’d hold out her hand an’ +say, ’Got a little bit o’ snuff for a auld body, dearie? +’an’ that’s all.”</p> +<p>They talked a little longer, while Will shook down a cool bed of dry +fern—not ill-suited to the sultry night; then Chris kissed him again, +and he locked her in and returned to Phoebe.</p> +<p>Though the wanderer presently slept peacefully enough, there was little +more repose that night for her brother or his wife. Phoebe herself became +much affected by the tremendous news. Then they talked into the early dawn +before any promising mode of presenting Chris to her mother occurred to them. +At breakfast Will followed a suggestion of Phoebe’s, and sensibly +lessened the shock of his announcement.</p> +<p>“A ’mazin’ wonnerful dream I had last night,” he +began abruptly. “I thought I was roused long arter midnight by a gert +knocking, an’ I went down house an’ found a woman at the door. +‘Who be you?’ I sez. ‘Why, I be Chris, brother Will,’ +she speaks back, ‘Chris, come home-along to mother an’ +you.’ Then I seed it was her sure enough, an’ she telled me all +about herself, an’ how she’d dwelt wi’ gypsy people. +Natural as life it weer, I assure ’e.”</p> +<p>This parable moved Mrs. Blanchard more strongly than Will expected. She +dropped her piece of bread and dripping, grew pale, and regarded her son with +frightened eyes. Then she spoke.</p> +<p>“Tell me true, Will; don’t ’e play with a mother +’bout a life-an’-death thing like her cheel. I heard voices in +the night, an’ thought ’t was a dream—but—oh, bwoy, +not Chris, not our awn Chris!—’t would ’most kill me for +pure joy, I reckon.”</p> +<p>“Listen to me, mother, an’ eat your food. Us won’t have +no waste here, as you knaw very well. I haven’t tawld ’e the end +of the story. Chris, ’pearin’ to be back again, I thinks, +‘this will give mother palpitations, though ’t is quite a usual +thing for a darter to come back to her mother,’ so I takes her away to +the linhay for the night an’ locks her in; an’ if ’t was +true, she might be theer now, an’ if it weer +n’t—”</p> +<p>Damaris rose, and held the table as she did so, for her knees were weak +under her.</p> +<p>“I be strong—strong to meet my awn darter. Gimme the key, +quick—the key, Will—do ’e hear me, child?”</p> +<p>“I’ll come along with ’e.”</p> +<p>“No, I say. What! Ban’t I a young woman still? ’T was +awnly essterday Chris corned in the world. You just bide with Phoebe, +an’ do what I tell ’e.”</p> +<p>Will handed over the key at this order, and Mrs. Blanchard, grasping it +without a word, passed unsteadily across the farmyard. She fumbled at the +lock, and dropped the key once, but picked it up quickly before Will could +reach her, then she unfastened the door and entered.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_II" name="IV_II"></a>CHAPTER II<br /> +HOPE RENEWED</h2> +<p>Jon Grimbal’s desires toward Blanchard lay dormant, and the usual +interests of life filled his mind. The attitude he now assumed was one of +sustained patience and observation; and it may best be described in words of +his own employment.</p> +<p>Visiting Drewsteignton, about a month after the return of Chris Blanchard +to her own, the man determined to extend his ride and return by devious ways. +He passed, therefore, where the unique Devonian cromlech stands hard by +Bradmere pool. A lane separates this granite antiquity from the lake below, +and as John Grimbal rode between them, his head high enough to look over the +hedge, he observed a ladder raised against the Spinsters’ Rock, as the +cromlech is called, and a man with a tape-measure sitting on the cover +stone.</p> +<p>It was the industrious Martin, home once again. After his difference with +Blanchard, the antiquary left Devon for another tour in connection with his +work, and had devoted the past six months to study of prehistoric remains in +Guernsey, Herm, and other of the Channel Islands.</p> +<p>Before departing, he had finally regained his brother’s friendship, +though the close fraternal amity of the past appeared unlikely to return +between them. Now John recognised Martin, and his first impulse produced +pleasure, while his second was one of irritation. He felt glad to see his +brother; he experienced annoyance that Martin should thus return to Chagford +and not call immediately at the Red House.</p> +<p>“Hullo! Home again! I suppose you forgot you had a +brother?”</p> +<p>“John, by all that’s surprising! Forget? Was it probable? Have +I so many flesh-and-blood friends to remember? I arrived yesterday and called +on you this morning, only to find you were at Drewsteignton; so I came to +verify some figures at the cromlech, hoping we might meet the +sooner.”</p> +<p>He was beside his brother by this time, and they shook hands over the +hedge.</p> +<p>“I’ll leave the ladder and walk by you and have a +chat.”</p> +<p>“It’s too hot to ride at a walk. Come you here to Bradmere +Pool. We can lie down in the shade by the water, and I’ll tether my +horse for half an hour.”</p> +<p>Five minutes later the brothers sat under the shadow of oaks and beeches +at the edge of a little tarn set in fine foliage.</p> +<p>“Pleasant to see you,” said Martin. “And looking younger +I do think. It’s the open air. I’ll wager you don’t get +slimmer in the waist-belt though.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I’m all right.”</p> +<p>“What’s the main interest of life for you now?”</p> +<p>John reflected before answering.</p> +<p>“Not quite sure. Depends on my mood. Just been buying a greyhound +bitch at Drewsteignton. I’m going coursing presently. A kennel will +amuse me. I spend most of my time with dogs. They never change. I turn to +them naturally. But they overrate humanity.”</p> +<p>“Our interests are so different. Yet both belong to the fresh air +and the wild places remote from towns. My book is nearly finished. I shall +publish it in a year’s time, or even less.”</p> +<p>“Have you come back to stop?”</p> +<p>“Yes, for good and all now.”</p> +<p>“You have found no wife in your wanderings?”</p> +<p>“No, John. I shall never marry. That was a dark spot in my life, as +it was in yours. We both broke our shins over that.”</p> +<p>“I broke nothing—but another man’s bones.”</p> +<p>He was silent for a moment, then proceeded abruptly on this theme.</p> +<p>“The old feeling is pretty well dead though. I look on and watch the +man ruining himself; I see his wife getting hard-faced and thin, and I wonder +what magic was in her, and am quite content. I wouldn’t kick him a yard +quicker to the devil if I could. I watch him drift there.”</p> +<p>“Don’t talk like that, dear old chap. You ’re not the +man you pretend to be, and pretend to think yourself. Don’t sour your +nature so. Let the past lie and go into the world and end this lonely +existence.”</p> +<p>“Why don’t you?”</p> +<p>“The circumstances are different. I am not a man for a wife. You +are, if ever there was one.”</p> +<p>“I had him within a hair’s-breadth once,” resumed the +other inconsequently. “Blanchard, I mean. There ’s a secret +against him. You didn’t know that, but there is. Some black devilry for +all I can tell. But I missed it. Perhaps if I knew it would quicken up my +spirit and remind me of all the brute made me endure.”</p> +<p>“Yet you say the old feeling is dead!”</p> +<p>“So it is—starved. Hicks knew. He broke his neck an hour too +soon. It was like a dream of a magnificent banquet I had some time ago. I +woke with my mouth watering, just as the food was uncovered, and I felt so +damned savage at being done out of the grub that I got up and went +down-stairs and had half a pint of champagne and half a cold roast partridge! +I watch Blanchard go down the hill—that’s all. If this knowledge +had come to me when I was boiling, I should have used it to his utmost harm, +of course. Now I sometimes doubt, even if I could hang the man, whether I +should take the trouble to do it.”</p> +<p>“Get away from him and all thought of him.”</p> +<p>“I do. He never crosses my mind unless he crosses my eyes. I ride +past Newtake occasionally, and see him sweating and slaving and fighting the +Moor. Then I laugh, as you laugh at a child building sand castles against an +oncoming tide. Poor fool!”</p> +<p>“If you pity, you might find it in your heart to forgive.”</p> +<p>“My attitude is assured. We will call it one of mere indifference. +You made up that row over the gate-post when his first child died, +didn’t you?”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes. We shall be friendly—we must be, if only for the +sake of the memory of Chris. You and I are frank to-day. But you saw long ago +what I tried to hide, so it is no news to you. You will understand. When +Hicks died I thought perhaps after years—but that’s over now. She +’s gone.”</p> +<p>“Didn’t you know? She ’s back again.”</p> +<p>“Back! Good God!”</p> +<p>John laughed at his brother’s profound agitation.</p> +<p>“Like as not you’d see her if you went over Rushford Bridge. +She ’s back with her mother. Queer devils, all of them; but I suppose +you can have her for the asking now if you couldn’t before. Damnably +like her brother she is. She passed me two days ago, and looked at me as if I +was transparent, or a mere shadow hiding something else.”</p> +<p>A rush of feeling overwhelmed Martin before this tremendous news. He could +not trust himself to speak. Then a great hope wrestled with him and +conquered. In his own exaltation he desired to see all whom he loved equally +lifted up towards happiness.</p> +<p>“I wish to Heaven you would open your eyes and raise them from your +dogs and find a wife, John.”</p> +<p>“Ah! We all want the world to be a pretty fairy tale for our +friends. You scent your own luck ahead, and wish me to be lucky too. I ought +to thank you for that; but, instead, I’ll give you some advice. +Don’t bother yourself with the welfare of others; to do that is to ruin +your own peace of mind and court more trouble than your share. Every +big-hearted man is infernally miserable—he can’t help it. The +only philosopher’s stone is a stone heart; that is what the world +’s taught me.”</p> +<p>“Never! You ’re echoing somebody else, not yourself, +I’ll swear. I know you better. We must see much of each other in the +future. I shall buy a little trap that I may drive often to the Red House. +And I should like to dedicate my book to you, if you would take it as a +compliment.”</p> +<p>“No, no; give it to somebody who may be able to serve you. I’m +a fool in such things and know no more about the old stones than the foxes +and rabbits that burrow among them. Come, I must get home. I’m glad you +have returned, though I hated you when you supported them against me; but +then love of family ’s a mere ghost against love of women. Besides, how +seldom it is that a man’s best friend is one of his own +blood.”</p> +<p>They rose and departed. John trotted away through Sandypark, having first +made Martin promise to sup with him that night, and the pedestrian proceeded +by the nearest road to Rushford Bridge.</p> +<p>Chris he did not see, but it happened that Mr. Lyddon met him just outside +Monks Barton, and though Martin desired no such thing at the time, nothing +would please the miller but that his friend should return to the farm for +some conversation.</p> +<p>“Home again, an’ come to glasses, tu! Well, they clear the +sight, an’ we must all wear ’em sooner or late. ’T is a +longful time since I seed ’e, to be sure.”</p> +<p>“All well, I hope?”</p> +<p>“Nothing to grumble at. Billy an’ me go down the hill as +gradual an’ easy as any man ’s a right to expect. But he’s +gettin’ so bald as a coot; an’ now the shape of his head comes to +be knawed, theer ’s wonnerful bumps ’pon it. Then your +brother’s all for sport an’ war. A Justice of the Peace +they’ve made un, tu. He’s got his volunteer chaps to a smart +pitch, theer’s no gainsaying. A gert man for wild diversions he is. +Gwaine coursin’ wi’ long-dogs come winter, they tell +me.”</p> +<p>“And how are Phoebe and her husband?”</p> +<p>“A little under the weather just now; but I’m watchin’ +’em unbeknawnst. Theer’s a glimmer of hope in the dark if +you’ll believe it, for Will ackshally comed to me esster-night to ax my +advice—<i>my</i> advice—on a matter of stock! What do ’e +think of that?”</p> +<p>“He was fighting a losing battle in a manly sort of way it seemed to +me when last I saw him.”</p> +<p>“So he was, and is. I give him eighteen month or +thereabout—then’ll come the end of it.”</p> +<p>“The ‘end’! What end? You won’t let them starve? +Your daughter and the little children?”</p> +<p>“You mind your awn business, Martin,” said Mr. Lyddon, with +nods and winks. “No, they ban’t gwaine to starve, but my +readin’ of Will’s carater has got to be worked out. +Tribulation’s what he needs to sweeten him, same as winter sweetens +sloes; an’ ’t is tribulation I mean him to have. If +Phoebe’s self caan’t change me or hurry me ’t is odds you +won’t. Theer’s a darter for ’e! My Phoebe. She’ll +often put in a whole week along o’ me still. You mind this: if +it’s grawn true an’ thrawn true from the plantin’, a +darter’s love for a faither lasts longer ’n any mortal love at +all as I can hear tell of. It don’t wear out wi’ marriage, +neither, as I’ve found, thank God. Phoebe rises above auld age and the +ugliness an’ weakness an’ bad temper of auld age. Even a poor, +doddering ancient such as I shall be in a few years won’t weary her; +she’ll look back’ards with butivul clear eyes, an’ +won’t forget. She’ll see—not awnly a cracked, shrivelled +auld man grizzling an’ grumbling in the chimbley corner, but what the +man was wance—a faither, strong an’ lusty, as dandled her, +an’ worked for, an’ loved her with all his heart in the days of +his bygone manhood. Ess, my Phoebe’s all that; an’ she comes here +wi’ the child; an’ it pleases me, for rightly onderstood, +childern be a gert keeper-off of age.”</p> +<p>“I’m sure she’s a good daughter to you, Miller. And +Will?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t you fret. We’ve worked it out in our +minds—me an’ Billy; an’ if two auld blids like us +can’t hatch a bit o’ wisdom, what brains is worth anything? +We’m gwaine to purify the awdacious young chap ’so as by +fire,’ in holy phrase.”</p> +<p>“You’re dealing with a curious temperament.”</p> +<p>“I’m dealing with a damned fule,” said Mr. Lyddon +frankly; “but theer’s fules an’ fules, an’ this +partickler wan’s grawed dear to me in some ways despite myself. +’T is Phoebe’s done it at bottom I s’pose. The man’s +so full o’ life an’ hope. Enough energy in un for ten men; +an’ enough folly for twenty. Yet he’ve a gude heart an’ +never lied in’s life to my knawledge.”</p> +<p>“That’s to give him praise, and high praise. How’s his +sister? I hear she’s returned after all.”</p> +<p>“Ess—naughty twoad of a gal—runned arter the gypsies! +But she’m sobered now. Funny to think her mother, as seemed like a +woman robbed of her right hand when Chris went, an’ beginned to graw +into the sere onusual quick for a widow, took new life as soon as her gal +comed back. Just shaws what strength lies in a darter, as I tell +’e.”</p> +<p>The old man’s garrulity gained upon him, and though Martin much +desired to be gone, he had not the heart to hasten.</p> +<p>“A darter’s the thing an’—but’t is a secret +yet—awnly you’ll see what you’ll see. Coourse Billy’s +very well for gathered wisdom and high conversation ’bout the world to +come; but he ban’t like a woman round the house, an’ for all his +ripe larnin’ he’ll strike fire sometimes—mostly when I +gives him a bad beating at ‘Oaks’ of a evenin’. Then +he’m so acid as auld rhubarb, an’ dots off to his bed +wi’out a ‘gude-night.’”</p> +<p>For another ten minutes Mr. Lyddon chattered, but at the end of that time +Martin escaped and proceeded homewards. His head throbbed and his mind was +much excited by the intelligence of the day. The yellow stubbles, the green +meadows, the ploughed lands similarly spun before him and whirled up to meet +the sky. As he re-entered the village a butcher’s cart nearly knocked +him down. Hope rose in a glorious new sunrise—the hope that he had +believed was set for ever. Then, passing that former home of Clement Hicks +and his mother, did Grimbal feel great fear and misgiving. The recollection +of Chris and her love for the dead man chilled him. He remembered his own +love for Chris when he thought she must be dead. He told himself that he must +hope nothing; he repeated to himself how fulfilment of his desire, now +revived after long sleep, might still be as remote as when Chris Blanchard +said him nay in the spring wastes under Newtake five years and more ago. His +head dinned this upon his heart; but his heart would not believe and +responded with a sanguine song of great promise.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_III" name="IV_III"></a>CHAPTER III<br /> +ANSWERED</h2> +<p>At a spot in the woods some distance below Newtake, Martin Grimbal sat and +waited, knowing she whom he sought must pass that way. He had called at the +farm and been welcomed by Phoebe. Will was on the peat beds, and, asking +after Chris, he learnt that she had gone into the valley to pick blackberries +and dewberries, where they already began to ripen in the coombs.</p> +<p>Under aisles of woodland shadows he sat, where the river murmured down +mossy stairs of granite in a deep dingle. Above him, the varying foliage of +oak and ash and silver birch was already touched with autumn, and trembled +into golden points where bosses of pristine granite, crowned with the +rowan’s scarlet harvest, arose above their luxuriance. The mellow +splendour of these forests extended to the river’s brink, along which +towered noble masses of giant osmunda, capped by seed spears of tawny red. +Here and there gilded lances splashed into the stream or dotted its still +pools with scattered sequins of sunshine, where light winnowed through the +dome of the leaves; and at one spot, on a wrinkled root that wound crookedly +from the alder into the river, there glimmered a halcyon, like an opal on a +miser’s bony finger. From above the tree-tops there sounded cynic +bird-laughter, and gazing upwards Martin saw a magpie flaunt his black and +white plumage across the valley; while at hand the more musical merriment of +a woodpecker answered him.</p> +<p>Then a little child’s laugh came to his ear, rippling along with the +note of the babbling water, and one moment later a small, sturdy boy +appeared. A woman accompanied him. She had slipped a foot into the river, and +thus awakened the amusement of her companion.</p> +<p>Chris steadied herself after the mishap, balanced her basket more +carefully, then stooped down to pick some of the berries that had scattered +from it on the bank. When she rose a man with a brown face and soft grey eyes +gleaming through gold-rimmed spectacles appeared immediately before.</p> +<p>“Thank God I see you alive again. Thank God!” he said with +intense feeling, as he took her hand and shook it warmly. “The best +news that ever made my heart glad, Chris.”</p> +<p>She welcomed him, and he, looking into her eyes, saw new knowledge there, +a shadow of sobriety, less of the old dance and sparkle. But he remembered +the little tremulous updrawing of her lip when a smile was born, and her +voice rang fuller and sweeter than any music he had ever heard since last she +spoke to him. A smile of welcome she gave him, indeed, and a pressure of his +hand that sent magic messages with it to the very core of him. He felt his +blood leap and over his glasses came a dimness.</p> +<p>“I was gwaine to write first moment I heard ’e was home. +An’ I wish I had, for I caan’t tell ’e what I feel. To +think of ’e searchin’ the wide world for such a good-for-nought! +I thank you for your generous gudeness, Martin. I’ll never forget +it—never. But I wasn’t worth no such care.”</p> +<p>“Not worth it! It proved the greatest, bitterest grief of all my +life—but one—that I couldn’t find you. We grew by cruel +stages to think—to think you were dead. The agony of that for us! But, +thank God, it was not so. All at least is well with you now?”</p> +<p>“All ban’t never well with men an’ women. But I’m +more fortunate than I deserve to be, and can make myself of use. I’ve +lived a score of years since we met. An I’ve comed back to find’t +is a difficult world for those I love best, unfortunately.”</p> +<p>Thus, in somewhat disjointed fashion, Chris made answer.</p> +<p>“Sit a while and speak to me,” replied Martin. “The +laddie can play about. Look at him marching along with that great branch of +king fern over his shoulder!”</p> +<p>“’T is an elfin cheel some ways. Wonnerful eyes he’ve +got. They burn me if I look at’em close,” said Chris. She +regarded Timothy without sentiment and her eyes were bright and hard.</p> +<p>“I hope he will turn out well. Will spoke of him the other day. He +is very fond of the child. It is singularly like him, too—a sort of +little pocket edition of him.”</p> +<p>“So I’ve heard others say. Caan’t see it at all myself. +Look at the eyes of un.”</p> +<p>“Will believes the boy has got very unusual intelligence and may go +far.”</p> +<p>“May go so far as the workhouse,” she answered, with a laugh. +Then, observing that her reply pained Martin, Chris snatched up small Tim as +he passed by and pressed him to her breast and kissed him.</p> +<p>“You like him better than you think, Chris—poor little +motherless thing.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps I do. I wonder if his mother ever looks hungry towards +Newtake when she passes by?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps others took him and told the mother that he was +dead.”</p> +<p>“She’s dead herself more like. Else the thing wouldn’t +have falled out.”</p> +<p>There was a pause, then Martin talked of various matters. But he could not +fight for long against the desire of his heart and presently plunged, as he +had done five years before, into a proposal.</p> +<p>“He being gone—poor Clem—do you think—? Have you +thought, I mean? Has it made a difference, Chris? ’T is so hard to put +it into words without sounding brutal and callous. Only men are selfish when +they love.”</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” she asked.</p> +<p>A sudden inspiration prompted his reply. He said nothing for a moment, but +with a hand that shook somewhat, drew forth his pocketbook, opened it, +fumbled within, and then handed over to Chris the brown ruins of flowers long +dead.</p> +<p>“You picked them,” he said slowly; “you picked them long +ago and flung them away from you when you said ‘No’ to +me—said it so kindly in the past. Take them in your hand +again.”</p> +<p>“Dead bluebells,” she answered. “Ess, I can call home +the time. To think you gathered them up!” She looked at him with +something not unlike love in her eyes and fingered the flowers gently. +“You’m a gude man, Martin —the husband for a gude lass. +Best to find one if you can. Wish I could help’e.”</p> +<p>“Oh, Chris, there’s only one woman in the world for me. Could +you—even now? Could you let me stand between you and the world? Could +you, Chris? If you only knew what I cannot put into words. I’d try so +hard to make you happy.”</p> +<p>“I knaw, I knaw. But theer’s no human life so long as the road +to happiness, Martin. And yet—”</p> +<p>He took her hand and for a moment she did not resist him. Then little +Tim’s voice chimed out merrily at the stream margin, and the music had +instant effect upon Chris Blanchard.</p> +<p>She drew her hand from Martin and the next moment he saw his dead +bluebells hurrying away and parting company for ever on the dancing water. +Chris watched them until they vanished; then she turned and looked at him, to +find that he grew very pale and agitated. Even his humility had hardly +foreseen this decisive answer after the yielding attitude Chris first assumed +when she suffered him to hold her hand. He looked into her face inquiring and +frightened. The silence that followed was broken by continued laughter and +shouting from Timothy. Then Martin tried to connect the child’s first +merriment with the simultaneous change in the mood of the woman he +worshipped, but failed to do so.</p> +<p>At that moment Chris spoke. She made utterance under the weight of great +emotion and with evident desire to escape the necessity of a direct negative, +while yet leaving her refusal of Martin’s offer implicit and +distinct.</p> +<p>“I mind when a scatter of paper twinkled down this river just like +them dead blossoms. Clem thrawed them, an’ they floated away to the +sea, past daffadowndillies an’ budding lady-ferns an’ such-like. +’T was a li’l bit of poetry he’d made up to please +me—and I, fule as I was, didn’t say the right thing when he axed +me what I thought; so Clem tore the rhymes in pieces an’ sent them +away. He said the river would onderstand. An’ the river onderstands why +I dropped them dead blossoms in, tu. A wise, ancient stream, I doubt. +An’ you ’m wise, tu; an’ can take my answer wi’out +any more words, as will awnly make both our hearts ache.”</p> +<p>“Not even if I wait patiently? You couldn’t marry me, dear +Chris? You couldn’t get to love me?”</p> +<p>“I couldn’t marry you. I’m a widow in heart for all +time. But I thank God for the gude-will of such a man as you. I cherish it +and ’t will be dear to me all my life. But I caan’t come to +’e, so doan’t ax it.”</p> +<p>“Yet you’re young to live for a memory, Chris.”</p> +<p>“Better ’n nothing. And listen; I’ll tell you this, if +’t will make my ‘No’ sound less hard to your ear. I loves +you—I loves you better ’n any living man ’cept Will, +an’ not less than I love even him. I wish I could bring ’e a +spark of joy by marryin’ you, for you was allus very gude, an’ +thought kindly of Clem when but few did. I’d marry you if ’t was +awnly for that; yet it caan’t never be, along o’ many reasons. +You must take that cold comfort, Martin.”</p> +<p>He sighed, then spoke.</p> +<p>“So be it, dear one. I shall never ask again. God knows what holds +you back if you can even love me a little.”</p> +<p>“Ess, God knaws—everything.”</p> +<p>“I must not cry out against that. Yet it makes it all the harder. To +think that you will dedicate all your beautiful life to a memory! it only +makes my loss the greater, and shows the depths of you to me.”</p> +<p>She uttered a little scream and her cheek paled, and she put up her hands +with the palms outward as though warding away his words.</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e say things like that or give me any praise, +for God’s sake. I caan’t bear it. I be weak, weak flesh an’ +blood, weaker ’n water. If you could only see down in my heart, +you’d be cured of your silly love for all time.”</p> +<p>He did not answer, but picked up her basket and proceeded with her out of +the valley. Chris gave a hand to the child, and save for Tim’s prattle +there was no speaking.</p> +<p>At length they reached Newtake, when Martin yielded up the basket and bade +Chris “good-night.” He had already turned, when she called him +back in a strange voice.</p> +<p>“Kiss the li’l bwoy, will ’e? I want ’e to. +I’m that fond of un. An’ he ’peared to take to ’e; +an’ he said ‘By-by’ twice to ’e, but you didn’t +hear un.”</p> +<p>Then the man kissed Tim on a small, purple-stained mouth, and saw his eyes +very lustrous with sleep, for the day was done.</p> +<p>Woman and child disappeared; the sacking nailed along the bottom of +Newtake Gate to keep the young chicks in the farmyard rustled over the +ground, and Martin, turning his face away, moved homewards.</p> +<p>But the veil was not lifted for him; he did not understand. A secret, +transparent enough to any who regarded Chris Blanchard and her circumstances +from a point without the theatre of action, still remained concealed from all +who loved her.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_IV" name="IV_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV<br /> +THE END OF THE FIGHT</h2> +<p>Will Blanchard was of the sort who fight a losing battle,</p> +<p class="poem">“Still puffing in the dark at one poor coal,<br /> +Held on by hope till the last spark is out.”</p> +<p>But the extinction of his ambitions, the final failure of his enterprise +happened somewhat sooner than Miller Lyddon had predicted. There dawned a +year when, just as the worst of the winter was past and hope began to revive +for another season, a crushing catastrophe terminated the struggle.</p> +<p>Mr. Blee it was who brought the ill news to Monks Barton, having first +dropped it at Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage and announced it promiscuously +about the village. Like a dog with a bone he licked the intelligence over +and, by his delay in imparting the same, reduced his master to a very fever +of irritation.</p> +<p>“Such a gashly thing! Of all fules! The last straw I do think. +He’s got something to grumble at now, poor twoad. Your son-in-law; but +now—theer—gormed if I knaw how to tell ’e!”</p> +<p>Alarmed at this prelude, with its dark hints of unutterable woe, Mr. +Lyddon took off his spectacles in some agitation, and prayed to know the +worst without any long-drawn introduction.</p> +<p>“I’ll come to it fast enough, I warn ’e. To think after +years an’ years he didn’t knaw the duffer’nce ’twixt +a bullock an’ a sheep! Well—well! Of coourse us knawed times was +tight, but Jack-o’-Lantern be to the end of his dance now. ’T is +all awver.”</p> +<p>“What’s the matter? Come to it, caan’t +’e?”</p> +<p>“No ill of the body—not to him or the fam’ly. An’ +you must let me tell it out my awn way. Well, things bein’ same as they +are, the bwoy caan’t hide it. Dammy! Theer’s patches in the coat +of un now—neat sewed, I’ll grant ’e, but a patch is a +patch; an’ when half a horse’s harness is odds an’ ends +o’ rope, then you knaw wi’out tellin’ wheer a man be +driving to. ’T is ’cordin’ to the poetry!—</p> +<p class="poem">“‘Out to elbows,<br /> +<span class="i2">Out to toes,</span><br /> +Out o’ money,<br /> +<span class="i2">Out o’ clothes.’</span><br /></p> +<p>But—”</p> +<p>“Caan’t ’e say what’s happened, you +chitterin’ auld magpie? I’ll go up village for the news in a +minute. I lay ’tis knawn theer.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t I tellin’ of ’e? ’Tis like this. Will +Blanchard’s been mixin’ a bit of chopped fuzz with the +sheep’s meal these hard times, like his betters. But now I’ve +seed hisself today, lookin’ so auld as Cosdon ’bout it. He was +gwaine to the horse doctor to Moreton. An’ he tawld me to keep my mouth +shut, which I’ve done for the most paart.”</p> +<p>“A little fuzz chopped fine doan’t hurt sheep.”</p> +<p>“Just so. ’Cause why? They aint got no ‘bibles’ in +their innards; but he’ve gone an’ given it same way to the +bullocks.”</p> +<p>“Gude God!”</p> +<p>“’Tis death to beasts wi’ ‘bibles.’ +An’ death it is. The things caan’t eat such stuff’ cause it +sticketh an’ brings inflammation. I seed same fule’s trick done +wance thirty year ago; an’ when the animals weer cut awpen, theer +‘bibles’ was hell-hot wi’ the awfulest inflammation ever +you heard tell of.”</p> +<p>“How many’s down? ’Twas all he had to count +upon.”</p> +<p>“Awnly eight standin’ when he left. I could have cried +’bout it when he tawld me. He ’m clay in the Potter’s hand +for sartain. Theer’s nought squenches a chap like havin’ the +bailiffs in.”</p> +<p>“Cruel luck! I’d meant to let him be sold out for his +gude—but now.”</p> +<p>“Do what you meant to. Doan’t go back on it. ’Tis for +his gude. ’Twas his awn mistake. He tawld me the blame was his. Let un +get on the bed rock. Then he’ll be meek as a worm.”</p> +<p>“I doubt it. A sale of his goods will break his heart.”</p> +<p>“Not it! He haven’t got much as’ll be hard to paart +from. Stern measures—stern measures for his everlastin’ welfare. +Think of the wild-fire sawl of un! Never yet did a sawl want steadin’ +worse’n his. Keep you to the fust plan, and he’ll thank’e +yet.”</p> +<p>Elsewhere two women—his wife and sister—failed utterly in +well-meaning efforts to comfort the stricken farmer. Presently, before +nightfall, Mrs. Blanchard also arrived at Newtake, and Will listened dully +with smouldering eyes as his mother talked. The veterinary surgeon from +Moreton had come, but his efforts were vain. Only two beasts out of +five-and-twenty still lived.</p> +<p>“Send for butcher,” he said. “He’ll be more use +than I can be. The thing is done and can’t be undone.”</p> +<p>Chris entered most closely into her brother’s feelings and spared +him the expressions of sorrow and sympathy which stung him, even from his +mother’s lips, uttered at this crisis. She set about preparing supper, +which weeping Phoebe had forgotten.</p> +<p>“You’ll weather it yet, bwoy,” Mrs. Blanchard said.</p> +<p>“Theer’s a little bit as I’ve got stowed away +for’e; an’ come the hay—”</p> +<p>“Doan’t talk that way. ’Tis done with now. I’m +quite cool’pon it. We must go as we’m driven. No more +gropin’ an’ fightin’ on this blasted wilderness for me, +that’s all. I be gwaine to turn my back ’pon it—fog +an’ filthy weather an’ ice an’ snow. You wants angels from +heaven to help ’e, if you’re to do any gude here; an’ +heaven’s long tired o’ me an’ mine. So I’ll make +shift to do wi’out. An’ never tell me no more lies ’bout +God helpin’ them as helps themselves, ’cause I’ve proved it +ban’t so. I be gwaine to furrin’ lands to dig for gawld or +di’monds. The right build o’ man for gawld-seekin’, me; +’cause I’ve larned patience an’ caan’t be choked off +a job tu easy.”</p> +<p>“Think twice. Bad luck doan’t dog a man for ever. An’ +Phoebe an’ the childer.”</p> +<p>“My mind’s made up. I figured it out comin’ home from +Moreton. I’m away in six weeks or less. A chap what’s got to dig +for a livin’ may just as well handle his tools where theer’s +summat worth findin’ hid in the land, as here, on this black, damned +airth, wheer your pick strikes fire out o’ stone twenty times a day. +The Moor’s the Moor. Everybody knaws the way of it. Scratch its faace +an’ it picks your pocket an’ breaks your heart—not as +I’ve got a heart can be broken.”</p> +<p>“If ’e could awnly put more trust in the God of your faithers, +my son. He done for them, why shouldn’t He do for you?”</p> +<p>“Better ax Him. Tired of the fam’ly, I reckon.”</p> +<p>“You hurt your mother, Will, tellin’ so wicked as +that.”</p> +<p>“An’ faither so cruel,” sobbed Phoebe. “I +doan’t knaw what ever us have done to set him an’ God against us +so. I’ve tried that hard; an’ you’ve toiled till the +muscles shawed through your skin; an’ the li’l bwoy took just as +he beginned to string words that butivul; an’ no sign of another +though’t is my endless prayer.”</p> +<p>“The ways of Providence—” began Mrs. Blanchard drearily; +but Will stopped her, as she knew he would.</p> +<p>“Doan’t mother—I caan’t stand no more on that head +today. I’ll dare anybody to name Providence more in my house, so long +as ’tis mine. Theer’s the facts to shout out ’gainst that +rot. A honest, just, plain-dealin’ man—an’ look at +me.”</p> +<p>“Meantime we’re ruined an’ faither doan’t hold out +a finger.”</p> +<p>“Take it stern an’ hard like me. ’Tis all chance +drawin’ of prize or blank in gawld diggin’. The ‘new +chums,’ as they call ’em, often finds the best gawld, +’cause they doan’t knaw wheer to look for it, an’ goes +pokin’ about wheer a skilled man wouldn’t. That’s the +crooked way things happen in this poor world.”</p> +<p>“You wouldn’t go—not while I lived, sure? I +couldn’t draw breath comfortable wi’out knawin’ you was +breathin’ the same air, my son.”</p> +<p>“You’ll live to knaw I was in the right. If fortune +doan’t come to you, you must go to it, I reckon. Anyways, I ban’t +gwaine to bide here a laughing-stock to Chagford; an’ you’m the +last to ax me to.”</p> +<p>“Miller would never let Phoebe go.”</p> +<p>“I shouldn’t say ’by your leave’ to him, I +promise’e. He can look on an’ see the coat rottin’ off my +back in this desert an’ watch his darter gwaine thin as a lath along +o’ taking so much thought. He can look on at us, hisself so comfortable +as a maggot in a pear, an’ see. Not that I’d take help—not +a penny from any man. I’m not gwaine to fail. I’ll be a snug chap +yet.”</p> +<p>The stolid Chown entered at this moment.</p> +<p>“Butcher’ll be up bimebye. An’ the last of em’s +failed down,” he said.</p> +<p>“So be it. Now us’ll taake our supper,” answered his +master.</p> +<p>The meal was ready and presently Blanchard, whose present bitter humour +prompted him to simulate a large indifference, made show of enjoying his +food. He brought out the brandy for his mother, who drank a little with her +supper, and helped himself liberally twice or thrice until the bottle was +half emptied. The glamour of the spirit made him optimistic, and he spoke +with the pseudo-philosophy that alcohol begets.</p> +<p>“Might have been worse, come to think of it. If the things +weren’t choked, I doubt they’d been near starved. ’Most all +the hay’s done, an’ half what’s left—a load or +so—I’d promised to a chap out Manaton way. But theer’t +is—my hand be forced, that’s all. So time’s saved, if you +look at it from a right point.”</p> +<p>“You’m hard an’ braave, an’ you’ve got a way +with you ’mong men. Faace life, same as faither did, an’ +us’ll look arter Phoebe an’ the childer,” said Chris.</p> +<p>“I couldn’t leave un,” declared Will’s wife. +“’T is my duty to keep along wi’un for better or +worse.”</p> +<p>“Us’ll talk ’bout all that later. I be gwaine to act +prompt an’ sell every stick, an’ then away, a free +man.”</p> +<p>“All our furniture an’ property!” moaned Phoebe, looking +round her in dismay.</p> +<p>“All—to the leastest bit o’ cracked cloam.”</p> +<p>“A forced sale brings nought,” sighed Damaris.</p> +<p>“Theer’s hunderds o’ pounds o’ gude chattels here, +an’ they doan’t go for a penny less than they ’m worth. +Because I’m down, ban’t no reason for others to try to rob me. If +I doan’t get fair money I’ll make a fire wi’ the stuff +an’ burn every stick of it.”</p> +<p>“The valuer man, Mr. Bambridge, must be seen, an’ bills +printed out an’ sticked ’pon barn doors an’ such-like, same +as when Mrs. Lezzard died,” said Phoebe. “What’ll faither +think then?”</p> +<p>Will laughed bitterly.</p> +<p>“I’ll see a few’s dabbed up on his awn damned outer +walls, if I’ve got to put ’em theer myself. An’ as to the +lists, I’ll make ’em this very night. Ban’t my way to let +the dust fall upon a job marked for doin’. To-night I’ll draw the +items.”</p> +<p>“Us was gwaine to stay along with ’e, Will,” said his +mother.</p> +<p>“Very gude—as you please. Make shake-downs in the parlour, +an’ I’ll write in the kitchen when you’m gone to bed. Set +the ink an’ pen an’ paper out arter you’ve cleared away. +I’m allowed to be peart enough in matters o’ business anyway, +though no farmer o’ course, arter this.”</p> +<p>“None will dare to say any such thing,” declared Phoebe. +“You can’t do miracles more than others.”</p> +<p>“I mind when Ellis, to Two Streams Farm, lost a mort o’ +bullocks very same way,” said Mrs. Blanchard.</p> +<p>“’Tis that as they’ll bring against me an’ say, +wi’ such a tale in my knawledge, I ought to been wiser. But I never +heard tell of it before, though God knows I’ve heard the story often +enough to-day.”</p> +<p>It was now dark, and Will, lighting a lantern, rose and went out into the +yard. From the kitchen window his women watched him moving here and there; +while, as he passed, the light revealed great motionless, rufous shapes on +every hand. The corpses of the beasts hove up into the illumination and then +vanished again as the narrow circle of lantern light bobbed on, jerking to +the beat of Will’s footsteps. From the window Damaris observed her son +make a complete perambulation of his trouble without comment. Then a little +emotion trembled on her tongue.</p> +<p>“God’s hand be lifted ’gainst the bwoy, same as ’t +was ’gainst the patriarch Job seemin’ly. Awnly he bent to the rod +and Will—”</p> +<p>“He’m noble an’ grand under his sorrows. Who should knaw +but me?” cried Phoebe. “A man in ten thousand, he is, an’ +never yields to no rod. He’ll win his way yet; an’ I be gwaine to +cleave to un if he travels to the other end o’ the airth.”</p> +<p>“I doan’t judge un, gal. God knaws he’s been the world +to me since his faither died. He’m my dear son. But if he’d awnly +bend afore the A’mighty breaks him.”</p> +<p>“He’s got me.”</p> +<p>“Ess, an’ he’m mouldin’ you to his awn vain pride +an’ wrong ways o’ thinking. If you could lead un right, ’t +would be a better wife’s paart.”</p> +<p>“He’m wiser’n me, an’ stronger. Ban’t my +place to think against him. Us’ll go our ways, childern tu, an’ +turn our backs ’pon this desert. I hate the plaace now, same as +Will.”</p> +<p>Chris here interrupted Phoebe and called her from the other room.</p> +<p>“Wheer’s the paper an’ ink to? I be setting out the +things against Will comes in. He axed for ’em to be ready, ’cause +theer’s a deal o’ penmanship afore him to-night. An’ +wheer’s that li’l dictionary what I gived un years ago? I lay +he’ll want it.”</p> +<h2><a id="IV_V" name="IV_V"></a>CHAPTER V<br /> +TWO MIGHTY SURPRISES</h2> +<p>Will returned from survey of his tribulation. Hope was dead for the +moment, and death of hope in a man of Blanchard’s character proved +painful. The writing materials distracted his mind. Beginning without +interest, his composition speedily absorbed him; and before the task was half +completed, he already pictured it set out in great black or red print upon +conspicuous places.</p> +<p>“I reckon it’ll make some of ’em stare to see the +scholar I am, anyways,” he reflected.</p> +<p>Through the hours of night he wrote and re-wrote. His pen scratched along, +echoed by an exactly similar sound from the wainscots, where mice nibbled in +the silence. Anon, from the debris of his composition, a complete work took +shape; and when Phoebe awoke at three o’clock, discovered her husband +was still absent, and sought him hurriedly, she found the inventory completed +and Will just fastening its pages together with a piece of string. He was +wide awake and in a particularly happy humour.</p> +<p>“Ban’t you never comin’ to bed? ’T is most +marnin’,” she said.</p> +<p>“Just comin’. What a job! Look here—twelve pages. I be +surprised myself to think how blamed well I’ve got through wi’ +it. You doan’t knaw what you can do till you try. I used to wonder at +Clem’s cleverness wi’ a pen; but I be purty near so handy myself +an’ never guessed it!”</p> +<p>“I’m sure you’ve made a braave job of it. I’ll +read it fust thing to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“You shall hear it now.”</p> +<p>“Not now, Will; ’t is so late an’ I’m three paarts +asleep. Come to bed, dearie.”</p> +<p>“Oh—if you doan’t care—if it’s nought to you +that I’ve sit up all night slavin’ for our gude—”</p> +<p>“Then I’ll hear it now. Coourse I knaw ’t is fine +readin’. Awnly I thought you’d be weary.”</p> +<p>“Sit here an’ put your toes to the heat.”</p> +<p>He set Phoebe in the chimney corner, wrapped his coat round her, and threw +more turf on the fire.</p> +<p>“Now you’m vitty; an’ if theer’s anything left +out, tell me.”</p> +<p>“I lay, wi’ your memory, you’ve forgot little +enough.”</p> +<p>“I lay I haven’t. All’s here; an’ ’t is a +gert wonder what a lot o’ gude things us have got. They did ought to +fetch a couple o’ hunderd pound at least, if the sale’s carried +out proper.”</p> +<p>“They didn’t cost so much as that.”</p> +<p>“By Gor! Didn’t they? Well, set out in full, like this here, +they do sound as if they ought to be worth it. Now, I’ll read ’em +to see how it all sounds in spoken words.”</p> +<p>He cleared his throat and began:</p> +<p>“‘Sale this day to Newtake Farm, near Chagford, Dartmoor, +Devonshire. Mr. William Blanchard, being about to leave England for foreign +parts, desires to sell at auction his farm property, household goods, cloam, +and effects, etc., etc., as per items below, to the best bidder. Many things +so good as new.’ How do ’e like that, Phoebe?”</p> +<p>“Butivul; but do ’e mean in all solemn seriousness to go out +England? ’T is a awful thought, come you look at it close.”</p> +<p>“Ess, ’t is a gert, bold thing to do; but I doan’t fear +it. I be gettin’ into a business-like way o’ lookin’ +’pon life of late; an’ I counts the cost an’ moves arter, +as is the right order. Listen to these items set out here. If they ’m +printed big, wan under t’other, same as I’ve wrote ’em, +they’ll fill a barn door purty nigh!”</p> +<p>Then he turned to his papers.</p> +<p>“‘The said goods and chattels are as follows, +namely,’—reg’lar lawyer’s English, you see, though +how I comed to get it so pat I caan’t tell. Yet theer +’tis—‘namely, 2 washing trays; 3 zinc buckets; 1 meat +preserve; 1 lantern; 2 bird-cages; carving knife and steel (Sheffield +make)—’”</p> +<p>“Do’e judge that’s the best order, Will?”</p> +<p>“Coourse ’t is! I thought that out specially. Doan’t go +thrawin’ me from my stride in the middle. Arter ‘Sheffield +make,’ ‘half-dozen knives and forks; sundry ditto, not so good; +hand saw; 2 hammers; 1 cleaver; salting trendle; 3 +wheelbarrows—’”</p> +<p>“Doan’t forget you lent wan of ’em to Farmer +Thackwell.”</p> +<p>“No, I gived it to un, him bein’ pushed for need of wan. It +slipped my memory. ‘2 wheelbarrows.’ Then I goes on, ‘pig +stock; pig trough; 2 young breeding sows; 4 garden tools; 2 peat cutters; 2 +carts; 1 market trap; 1 empty cask; 1 Dutch oven; 1 funnel; 2 firkins and a +cider jib; small sieve; 3 pairs new Bedford harrows; 1 chain harrow (out of +repair).’ You see all’s straight enough, which it ban’t in +some sales. No man shall say he’s got less than full value.”</p> +<p>“You’m the last to think of such a thing.”</p> +<p>“I am. It goes on like this: ‘5 mattocks; 4 digging picks; 4 +head chains; 1 axe; sledge and wedges; also hooks, eyes, and hasps for hard +wood.’ Never used ’em all the time us been here. ‘2 sets of +trap harness, much worn.’ I ban’t gwaine to sell the +dogs—eh? Us won’t sell Ship or your li’l terrier. What do +’e say?”</p> +<p>“No. Nobody would buy two auld dogs, for that matter.”</p> +<p>“Though how a upland dog like Ship be gwaine to faace the fiery +sunshine on furrin gawld diggings, I caan’t answer. Here goes again: +‘1 sofa; 1 armchair; 4 fine chairs with green cloth seats; 1 bedstead; +2 cots; 1 cradle; feather beds and palliasses and bolster pillows to match; +wash-stands and sets of crockery, mostly complete; 2 swing glasses; 3 bedroom +chairs; 1 set of breeching harness—’”</p> +<p>“Hadn’t ’e better put that away from the +furniture?”</p> +<p>“No gert odds. ‘Also 1 set leading harness; 2 tressels and +ironing board; 2 fenders; fire-irons and fire-dogs; 1 old oak chest; 1 +wardrobe; 1 Brussels carpet (worn in 1 spot only)—’”</p> +<p>“Ban’t worn worth namin’.”</p> +<p>“Ess fay, ’tis wheer I sit Sundays—’9 feet by 11; +3 four-prong dung forks.’ I’ll move them. They doan’t come +in none tu well theer, I allow. ‘5 cane-seated chairs, 1 specimen of +wax fruit under glass.’”</p> +<p>“I caan’t paart wi’ that, lovey. Faither gived it to me; +an’ ’twas mother’s wance on a time.”</p> +<p>“Well, bein’ a forced sale it ought to go. An’ +seein’ how Miller’s left us to sail our awn boat to +hell—but still, if you’m set on it.”</p> +<p>He crossed it out, then suddenly laughed until the walls rang.</p> +<p>“Hush! You’ll wake everybody. What do ’e find to be +happy about?”</p> +<p>“I was thinkin’ that down in them furrin, fiery paarts +we’m gwaine to, as your wax plums an’ pears’ll damned soon +run away. They’ll melt for sartin!”</p> +<p>“Caan’t be so hot as that! The li’l gal will never stand +it. Read on now. Theer ban’t much left, surely?”</p> +<p>“Scores o’ things! ‘1 stuffed kingfisher in good case +with painted picture at back; 1 fox mask; 1 mahogany 2-lap table; 1 +warming-pan; Britannia metal teapot and 6 spoons ditto metal; 5 +spoons—smaller—ditto metal.’”</p> +<p>“I found the one us lost.”</p> +<p>“Then ’tis ‘6 spoons—smaller—ditto +metal.’ Then, ‘ironing stove; 5 irons; washing boiler; 4 fry +pans; 2 chimney crooks; 6 saucepans; pestle and mortar; chimney ornaments; 4 +coloured almanacs—one with picture of the +Queen—’”</p> +<p>“They won’t fetch nothin’.”</p> +<p>“They might. ‘Knife sharper; screen; pot plants; 1 towel-rail; +1 runner; 2 forms; kitchen table; scales and weights and beam; 1 set of +casters; 4 farm horses, aged; 3 ploughs; 1 hay wain; 1 stack of dry fern; +1-1/2 tons good manure; old iron and other sundries, including poultry, +ducks, geese, and fowls.’ That’s all.”</p> +<p>“Not quite; but I caan’t call to mind much you’ve left +out ’cept all the china an’ linen.”</p> +<p>“Ah! that’s your job. An’ I just sit here an’ +brought the things to my memory, wan by wan! An’ that bit at the top +came easy as cutting a stick!”</p> +<p>“’Tis a wonnerful piece o’ work! An’ the piano, +Will?”</p> +<p>“I hadn’t forgot that. Must take it along wi’ us, or +else send it down to mother. Couldn’t look her in the faace if I sold +that.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t worth much.”</p> +<p>“Caan’t say. Cost faither five pound, though that was long +ago. Anyway I be gwaine to buy it in.”</p> +<p>Silence then fell upon them. Phoebe sighed and shivered. A cock crew and +his note came muffled from the hen-roost. A dim grey dawn just served to +indicate the recumbent carcasses without.</p> +<p>“Come to bed now an’ take a little rest ’fore +marnin’, dearie. You’ve worked hard an’ done +wonders.”</p> +<p>“Ban’t you surprised I could turn it out?”</p> +<p>“That I be. I’d never have thought ’twas in ’e. So +forehanded, tu! A’most afore them poor things be cold.”</p> +<p>“’Tis the forehandedness I prides myself ’pon. Some of +us doan’t know all that’s in me yet. But they’ll live to +see it.”</p> +<p>“I knaw right well they will.”</p> +<p>“This’ll ’maze mother to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“’Twill, sure ’nough.”</p> +<p>“Would ’e like me to read it just wance more wi’out +stoppin’, Phoebe?”</p> +<p>“No, dear love, not now. Give it to us all arter breakfast in the +marnin’.”</p> +<p>“So I will then; an’ take it right away to the auctioneer the +minute after.”</p> +<p>He put his papers away in the drawer of the kitchen table and retired. +Uneasy sleep presently overtook him and long he tossed and turned, murmuring +of his astonishment at his own powers with a pen.</p> +<p>His impetuosity carried the ruined man forward with sufficient speed over +the dark bitterness of failure confessed, failure advertised, failure +proclaimed in print throughout the confines of his little world. He suffered +much, and the wide-spread sympathy of friends and acquaintance proved no +anodyne but rather the reverse. He hated to see eyes grow grave and mouths +serious upon his entry; he yearned to turn his back against Chagford and +resume the process of living in a new environment. Temporary troubles vexed +him more than the supreme disaster of his failure. Mr. Bambridge made +considerable alterations in his cherished lucubration; and when the +advertisement appeared in print, it looked mean and filled but a paltry +space. People came up before the sale to examine the goods, and Phoebe, after +two days of whispered colloquies upon her cherished property, could bear it +no longer, and left Newtake with her own little daughter and little Timothy. +The Rev. Shorto-Champernowne himself called, stung Will into sheer madness, +which he happily restrained, then purchased an old oak coffer for two pounds +and ten shillings.</p> +<p>Miller Lyddon made no sign, and hard things were muttered against him and +Billy Blee in the village. Virtuous indignation got hold upon the Chagford +quidnuncs and with one consent they declared Mr. Lyddon to blame. Where was +his Christian charity—that charity which should begin at home and so +seldom does? This interest in others’ affairs took shape on the night +before the Newtake sale. Then certain of the baser sort displayed their anger +in a practical form, and Mr. Blee was hustled one dark evening, had his hat +knocked off, and suffered from a dead cat thrown by unseen hands. The reason +for this outrage also reached him. Then, chattering with indignation and +alarm, he hurried home and acquainted Mr. Lyddon with the wild spirit +abroad.</p> +<p>As for Blanchard, he roamed moodily about the scene of his lost battle. In +his pockets were journals setting forth the innumerable advantages of certain +foreign regions that other men desired to people for their private ends. But +Will was undecided, because all the prospects presented appeared to lead +directly to fortune.</p> +<p>The day of the sale dawned fine and at the appointed hour a thin stream of +market carts and foot passengers wound towards Newtake from the village +beneath and from a few outlying farms. Blanchard had gone up the adjacent +hill; and lying there, not far distant from the granite cross, he reclined +with his dog and watched the people. Him they did not see; but them he +counted and found some sixty souls had been attracted by his advertisement. +Men laughed and joked, and smoked; women shrugged their shoulders, peeped +about and disparaged the goods. Here and there a purchaser took up his +station beside a coveted lot. Some noticed that none of those most involved +were present; others spread a rumour that Miller Lyddon designed to stop the +sale at the last moment and buy in everything. But no such incident broke the +course of proceedings.</p> +<p>Will, from his hiding-place in the heather, saw Mr. Bambridge drive up, +noted the crowd follow him about the farm, like black flies, and felt himself +a man at his own funeral. The hour was dark enough. In the ear of his mind he +listened to the auctioneer’s hammer, like a death-bell, beating away +all that he possessed. He had worked and slaved through long years for +this,—for the sympathy of Chagford, for the privilege of spending a +thousand pounds, for barely enough money to carry himself abroad. A few more +figures dotted the white road and turned into the open gate at Newtake. One +shape, though too remote to recognise with certainty, put him in mind of +Martin Grimbal, another might have been Sam Bonus. He mused upon the two men, +so dissimilar, and his mind dwelt chiefly with the former. He found himself +thinking how good it would be if Martin proposed to Chris again; that the +antiquary had done so was the last idea in his thoughts.</p> +<p>Presently a brown figure crept through Newtake gate, hesitated a while, +then began to climb the hill and approach Blanchard. Ship recognised it +before Will’s eyes enabled him to do so, and the dog rose from a long +rest, stretched, sniffed the air, then trotted off to the approaching +newcomer.</p> +<p>It was Ted Chown; and in five minutes he reached his master with a letter. +“’Tis from Miller Lyddon,” he said. “It comed by the +auctioneer. I thought you was up here.”</p> +<p>Blanchard took it without thanks, waited until the labourer had departed, +then opened the letter with some slight curiosity.</p> +<p>He read a page of scriptural quotations and admonitions, then tore the +communication in half with a curse and flung it from him. But presently his +anger waned; he rose, picked up his father-in-law’s note, and plodded +through it to the end.</p> +<p>His first emotion was one of profound thanksgiving that he had done so. +Here, at the very end of the letter, was the practical significance of +it.</p> +<p>“Powder fust, jam arter, by God!” cried Will aloud. Then a +burst of riotous delight overwhelmed him. Once again in his darkest hour had +Fortune turned the wheel. He shouted, put the letter into his breast pocket, +rose up and strode off to Chagford as fast as his legs would carry him. He +thought what his mother and wife would feel upon such news. Then he swore +heartily—swore down blessings innumerable on Miller Lyddon, whistled to +his dog, and so journeyed on.</p> +<p>The master of Monks Barton had reproved Will through long pages, cited +Scripture at him, displayed his errors in a grim procession, then praised him +for his prompt and manly conduct under the present catastrophe, declared that +his character had much developed of recent years, and concluded by offering +him five-and-thirty shillings a week at Monks Barton, with the only +stipulation that himself, his wife, and the children should dwell at the +farm.</p> +<p>Praise, of which he had received little enough for many years, was pure +honey to Will. From the extremity of gloom and from a dark and settled enmity +towards Mr. Lyddon, he passed quicker than thought to an opposite condition +of mind.</p> +<p>“’Tis a fairy story—awnly true!” he said to +himself as he swept along.</p> +<p>Will came near choking when he thought of the miller. Here was a man that +believed in him! Newtake tumbled clean out of his mind before this revelation +of Mr. Lyddon’s trust and confidence. He was full to the brainpan with +Monks Barton. The name rang in his ears. Before he reached Chagford he had +planned innumerable schemes for developing the valley farm, for improving, +saving, increasing possibilities in a hundred directions. He pictured himself +putting money into the miller’s pocket. He determined to bring that +about if he had to work four-and-twenty hours a day to do it. He almost +wished some profound peril would threaten his father-in-law, that he, at the +cost of half his life, if need be, might rescue him and so pay a little of +this great debt. Ship, taking the cue from his master, as a dog will, leapt +and barked before him. In the valley below, Phoebe wept on Mrs. +Blanchard’s bosom, and Chris said hard things of those in authority at +Monks Barton; up aloft at Newtake, shillings rather than pounds changed hands +and many a poor lot found no purchaser.</p> +<p>Passing by a gate beneath the great hill of Middledown, Will saw two +sportsmen with a keeper and a brace of terriers, emerge from the wild land +above. They were come from rabbit shooting, as the attendant’s heavy +bag testified. They faced him as he passed, and, recognising John Grimbal, +Will did not look at his companion. At rest with the world just then, happy +and contented to a degree he had not reached for years, the young farmer was +in such amiable mood that he had given the devil “good day” on +slightest provocation. Now he was carried out of himself, and spoke upon a +joyous inclination of the moment.</p> +<p>“Marnin’ to ’e, Jan Grimbal! Glad to hear tell as your +greyhound winned the cup down to Newton coursing.”</p> +<p>The other was surprised into a sort of grunt; then, as Will moved rapidly +out of earshot, Grimbal’s companion addressed him. It was Major +Tremayne; and now the soldier regarded Blanchard’s vanishing figure +with evident amazement, then spoke.</p> +<p>“By Jove! Tom Newcombe, by all that’s wonderful,” he +said.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_VI" name="IV_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI<br /> +THE SECRET OUT</h2> +<p>NOW many different persons in various places were simultaneously concerned +with Will Blanchard and his affairs.</p> +<p>At Newtake, Martin Grimbal was quietly buying a few lots—and those +worth the most money. He designed these as a gift for Phoebe; and his object +was not wholly disinterested. The antiquary could by no means bring himself +to accept his last dismissal from Chris. Seeing the vague nature of those +terms in which she had couched her refusal, and remembering her frank +admission that she could love him, he still hoped. All his soul was wrapped +up in the winning of Chris, and her face came between him and the +proof-sheets of his book; the first thoughts of his wakening mind turned to +the same problem; the last reflections of a brain sinking to rest were +likewise occupied with it. How could he win her? Sometimes his yearning +desires clamoured for any possible road to the precious goal, and he +remembered his brother’s hint that a secret existed in Will’s +life. At such times he wished that he knew it, and wondered vaguely if the +knowledge were of a nature to further his own ambition. Then he blushed and +thought ill of himself But this personal accusation was unjust, for it is the +property of a strong intellect engaged about affairs of supreme importance, +to suggest every possible action and present every possible point of view by +the mere mechanical processes of thinking. The larger a brain, the more +alternative courses are offered, the more facets gleam with thought, the more +numerous the roads submitted to judgment. It is a question of intellect, not +ethics. Right actions and crooked are alike remorselessly presented, and the +Council of Perfection, which holds that to think amiss is sin, must convict +every saint of unnumbered offences. As reasonably might we blame him who +dreams murder. Departure from rectitude can only begin where evil thought is +converted into evil action, for thought alone of all man’s possessions +and antecedents is free, and a lifetime of self-control and high thinking +will not shut the door against ideas. That Martin—a man of luminous if +limited intellect—should have considered every possible line of action +which might assist him to come at the highest good life could offer was +inevitable; but he missed the reason of certain sinister notions and accused +himself of baseness in giving birth to them. Nevertheless, the idea recurred +and took shape. He associated John’s assertion of a secret with another +rumour that had spread much farther afield. This concerned the parentage of +little Timothy the foundling, for it was whispered widely of late that the +child belonged to Blanchard. Of course many people knew all the facts, were +delighted to retail them, and could give the mother’s name. Only those +most vitally concerned had heard nothing as yet.</p> +<p>These various matters were weighing not lightly on Martin’s mind +during the hours of the Newtake sale; and meantime Will thundered into his +mother’s cottage and roared the news. He would hear of no objection to +his wish, that one and all should straightway proceed to Monks Barton, and he +poured forth the miller’s praises, while Phoebe was reduced to tears by +perusal of her father’s letter to Will.</p> +<p>“Thank Heaven the mystery’s read now, an’ us can see how +Miller had his eyes ’pon ’e both all along an’ just waited +for the critical stroke,” said Mrs. Blanchard. “Sure I’ve +knawed him these many years an’ never could onderstand his hard way in +this; but now all’s clear.”</p> +<p>“He might have saved us a world of trouble and a sea o’ tears +if he’d awnly spoken sooner, whether or no,” murmured Chris, but +Will would tolerate no unfriendly criticism.</p> +<p>“He’m a gert man, wi’ his awn way o’ doin’ +things, like all gert men,” he burst out; “an’ ban’t +for any man to call un in question. He knawed the hard stuff I was made of +and let me bide accordin’. An’ now get your bonnets on, the lot +of ’e, for I’m gwaine this instant moment to Monks +Barton.”</p> +<p>They followed him in a breathless procession, as he hurried across the +farmyard.</p> +<p>“Rap to the door quick, dear heart,” said Phoebe, “or +I’ll be cryin’ again.”</p> +<p>“No more rappin’ after thicky butivul letter,” answered +Will. “Us’ll gaw straight in.”</p> +<p>“You walk fust, Phoebe—’tis right you should,” +declared Mrs. Blanchard. “Then Will can follow ’e; an’ me +an’ Chris—us’ll walk ’bout for a bit, till you +beckons from window.”</p> +<p>“Cheer up, Phoebe,” cried Will. “Trouble’s blawed +awver for gude an’ all now by the look of it. ’Tis plain sailing +hencefarrard, thank God, that is, if a pair o’ strong arms, working +morning an’ night for Miller, can bring it about.”</p> +<p>So they went together, where Mr. Lyddon waited nervously within; and +Damaris and Chris walked beside the river.</p> +<p>Upon his island sat the anchorite Muscovy duck as of yore. He was getting +old. He still lived apart and thought deeply about affairs; but his +conclusions he never divulged.</p> +<p>Yet another had been surprised into unutterable excitement during that +afternoon. John Grimbal found the fruit of long desire tumble into his hand +at last, as Major Tremayne made his announcement. The officer was spending a +fortnight at the Red House, for his previous friendship with John Grimbal had +ripened.</p> +<p>“By Jove! Tom Newcombe, by all that’s wonderful!” he +exclaimed, as Will swung past him down the hill to happiness.</p> +<p>“That’s not his name. It’s Blanchard. He’s a young +fool of a farmer, and Lord knows what he’s got to be so cock-a-hoop +about. Up the hill they’re selling every stick he’s got at +auction. He’s ruined.”</p> +<p>“He might be ruined, indeed, if I liked. ‘Tom Newcombe’ +he called himself when he was with us.”</p> +<p>“A soldier!”</p> +<p>“He certainly was, and my servant; about the most decent, +straightforward, childlike chap that ever I saw.”</p> +<p>“God!”</p> +<p>“You’re surprised. But it’s a fact. That’s +Newcombe all right. You couldn’t forget a face and a laugh like his. +The handsomest man I’ve ever seen, bar none. He borrowed a suit of my +clothes, the beggar, when he vanished. But a week later I had the things back +with a letter. He trusted me that far. I tried to trace him, of course, but +was not sorry I failed.”</p> +<p>“A letter!”</p> +<p>“Yes, giving a reason for his desertion. Some chap was running after +his girl and had got her in a corner and bullied her into saying +‘Yes,’ though she hated the sight of him. I’d have done +anything for Tom. But he took the law into his own hands. He +disappeared—we were at Shorncliffe then if I remember rightly. The chap +had joined to get abroad, and he told me all his harum-scarum ambitions once. +I hope the poor devil was in time to rescue his sweetheart, +anyway.”</p> +<p>“Yes, he was in time for that.”</p> +<p>“I’m glad.”</p> +<p>“Should you see him again, Tremayne, I would advise your pretending +not to know him. Unless, of course, you consider it your duty to proclaim +him.”</p> +<p>“Bless your life, I don’t know him from Adam,” declared +the Major. “I’m not going to move after all these years. I wish +he’d come back to me again, all the same. A good servant.”</p> +<p>“Poor brute! What’s the procedure with a deserter? Do you send +soldiers for him or the police?”</p> +<p>“A pair of handcuffs and the local bobby, that’s all. Then the +man’s handed over to the military authorities and +court-martialled.”</p> +<p>“What would he get?”</p> +<p>“Depends on circumstances and character. Tom might probably have six +months, as he didn’t give himself up. I should have thought, knowing +the manner of man, that he would have done his business, married the girl, +then come back and surrendered. In that case, being peace time, he would only +have forfeited his service, which didn’t amount to much.”</p> +<p>So John Grimbal learned the secret of his enemy at last; but, to pursue a +former simile, the fruit had remained so long out of reach that now it was +not only overripe, but rotten. There began a painful resuscitation of desires +towards revenge—desires long moribund. To flog into life a passion near +dead of inanition was Grimbal’s disgusting task. For days and nights +the thing was as Frankenstein’s creation of grisly shreds and patches; +then it moved spasmodically,—or he fancied that it moved.</p> +<p>He fooled himself with reiterated assurances that he was glorying in the +discovery; he told himself that he was not made of the human stuff that can +forgive bitter wrongs or forget them until cancelled. He painted in lurid +colours his past griefs; through a ghastly morass of revenge grown stale, of +memories deadened by time, he tried to struggle back to his original +starting-point in vanished years, and feel as he felt when he flung Will +Blanchard over Rushford Bridge.</p> +<p>Once he wished to God the truth had never reached him; then he urged +himself to use it instantly and plague his mind no more. A mental exhaustion +and nausea overtook him. Upon the night of his discovery he retired to sleep +wishing that Blanchard would be as good as his rumoured word and get out of +England. But this thought took a shape of reality in the tattered medley of +dreams, and Grimbal, waking, leapt on to the floor in frantic fear that his +enemy had escaped him.</p> +<p>As yet he knew nothing of Will’s good fortune, and when it came to +his ears it unexpectedly failed to reawaken resentment or strengthen his +animosity. For, as he retraced the story of the past years, it was with him +as with a man reading the narrative of another’s wrongs. He could not +yet absorb himself anew in the strife; he could not revive the personal +element.</p> +<p>Sometimes he looked at himself in the glass as he shaved; and the sight of +the grey hair thickening on the sides of his head, the spectacle of the deep +lines upon his forehead and the stamp of many a shadowy crow’s-foot +about his blue eyes—these indications served more than all his thoughts +to sting him into deeds and to rekindle an active malignancy.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_VII" name="IV_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII<br /> +SMALL TIMOTHY</h2> +<p>A year and more than a year passed by, during which time some pure +sunshine brightened the life of Blanchard. Chagford laughed at his sustained +good fortune, declared him to have as many lives as a cat, and secretly +regretted its outspoken criticism of Miller Lyddon before the event of his +generosity. Life at Monks Barton was at least wholly happy for Will himself. +No whisper or rumour of renewed tribulation reached his ear; early and late +he worked, with whole-hearted energy; he differed from Mr. Blee as seldom as +possible; he wearied the miller with new designs, tremendous enterprises, +particulars concerning novel machinery, and much information relating to +nitrates. Newtake had vanished out of his life, like an old coat put off for +the last time. He never mentioned the place and there was now but one farm in +all Devon for him.</p> +<p>Meantime a strange cloud increased above him, though as yet he had not +discerned so much as the shadow of it. This circumstance possessed no +connection with John Grimbal. Time passed and still he did not take action, +though he continued to nurse his wrongs through winter, spring, and summer, +as a child nurses a sick animal. The matter tainted his life but did not +dominate it. His existence continued to be soured and discoloured, yet not +entirely spoiled. Now a new stone of stumbling lay ahead and Grimbal’s +interest had shifted a little.</p> +<p>Like the rest of Chagford he heard the rumour of little Timothy’s +parentage—a rumour that grew as the resemblance ripened between +Blanchard and the child. Interested by this thought and its significance, he +devoted some time to it; and then, upon an early October morning, chance +hurried the man into action. On the spur of an opportunity he played the +coward, as many another man has done, only to mourn his weakness too +late.</p> +<p>There came a misty autumn sunrise beside the river and Grimbal, hastening +through the valley of Teign, suddenly found himself face to face with Phoebe. +She had been upon the meadows since grey dawn, where many mushrooms set in +silvery dew glimmered like pearls through the mist; and now, with a full +basket, she was returning to Monks Barton for breakfast. As she rested for a +moment at a stile between two fields, Grimbal loomed large from the foggy +atmosphere and stood beside her. She moved her basket for him to pass and her +pulses quickened but slightly, for she had met him on numerous occasions +during past years and they were now as strangers. To Phoebe he had long been +nothing, and any slight emotion he might awaken was in the nature of +resentment that the man could still harden his heart against her husband and +remain thus stubborn and obdurate after such lapse of time. When, therefore, +John Grimbal, moved thereto by some sudden prompting, addressed Will’s +wife, she started in astonishment and a blush of warm blood leapt to her +face. He himself was surprised at his own voice; for it sounded unfamiliar, +as though some intelligent thing had suddenly possessed him and was using his +vocal organs for its own ends.</p> +<p>“Don’t move. Why, ’t is a year since we met alone, I +think. So you are back at Monks Barton. Does it bring thoughts? Is it all +sweet? By your face I should judge not.”</p> +<p>She stared and her mouth trembled, but she did not answer.</p> +<p>“You needn’t tell me you’re happy,” he continued, +with hurried words. “Nobody is, for that matter. But you might have +been. Looking at your ruined life and my own, I can find it in my heart to be +sorry for us both.”</p> +<p>“Who dares to say my life is ruined?” she flashed out. +“D’ you think I would change Will for the noblest in the land? He +<i>is</i> the noblest. I want no pity—least of all yourn. I’ve +been a very lucky woman—and—everybody knaws it whatever they may +say here an’ theer.”</p> +<p>She was strong before him now; her temper appeared in her voice and she +took her basket and rose to leave him.</p> +<p>“Wait one moment. Chance threw us here, and I’ll never speak +to you again if you resent it. But, meeting you like this, something seemed +to tell me to say a word and let you know. I’m sorry you are so +wretched—honestly.”</p> +<p>“I ban’t wretched! Never was a happier wife.”</p> +<p>“Never was a better one, I know; but happy? Think. I was fond of you +once and I can read between the lines—the little thin lines on your +forehead. They are newcomers. I’m not deceived. Nor is it hidden. That +the man has proved faithless is common knowledge now. Facts are hard things +and you’ve got the fact under your eyes. The child’s his living +image.”</p> +<p>“Who told you, and how dare you foul my ears and thoughts with such +lies?” she asked, her bosom heaving. “You’m a coward, as +you always was, but never more a coward than this minute.”</p> +<p>“D’ you pretend that nobody has told you this? Aren’t +your own eyes bright enough to see it?”</p> +<p>The man was in a pitiful mood, and now he grew hot and forgot himself +wholly before her stinging contempt. She did not reply to his question and he +continued,—</p> +<p>“Your silence is an answer. You know well enough. Who’s the +mother? Perhaps you know that, too. Is she more to him than you +are?”</p> +<p>Phoebe made a great effort to keep herself from screaming. Then she moved +hastily away, but Grimbal stopped her and dared her to proceed.</p> +<p>“Wait. I’ll have this out. Why don’t you face him with +it and make him tell you the truth? Any plucky woman would. The scandal grows +into a disgrace and your father’s a fool to stand it. You can tell him +so from me.”</p> +<p>“Mind your awn business an’ let me pass, you hulking, gert, +venomous wretch!” she cried. Then a blackguard inspiration came to the +man, and, suffering under a growing irritation with himself as much as with +Phoebe, he conceived an idea by which his secret might after all be made a +bitter weapon. He assured himself, even while he hated the sight of her, that +justice to Phoebe must be done. She had dwelt in ignorance long enough. He +determined to tell her that she was the wife of a deserter. The end gained +was the real idea in his mind, though he tried to delude himself. The sudden +idea that he might inform Blanchard through Phoebe of his knowledge really +actuated him.</p> +<p>“You may turn your head away as if I was dirt, you little fool, and +you may call me what names you please; but I’m raising this question +for your good, not my own. What do I care? Only it’s a man’s part +to step in when he sees a woman being trampled on.”</p> +<p>“A man!” she said. “You’m not in our lives any +more, an’ we doan’t want ’e in ’em. More like to a +meddlin’ auld woman than a man, if you ax me.”</p> +<p>“You can say that? Then we’ll put you out of the question. I, +at least, shall do my duty.”</p> +<p>“Is it part of your duty to bully me here alone? Why doan’t +’e faace the man, like a man, ’stead of blusterin’ to me +’bout it? Out on you! Let me pass, I tell ’e.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t make that noise. Just listen and stand still. +I’m in earnest. It pleases me to know the true history of this child, +and I mean to. As a Justice of the Peace I mean to.”</p> +<p>“Ax Will Blanchard then an’ let him answer. Maybe you’ll +be sorry you spoke arter.”</p> +<p>“You can tell him I want to see him; you can say I order him to come +to the Red House between eight and nine next Monday.”</p> +<p>“Be you a fule? Who’s he, to come at your bidding?”</p> +<p>“He’s a—well, no matter. You’ve got enough to +trouble you. But I think he will come. Tell him that I know where he was +during the autumn and winter of the year that I returned home from Africa. +Tell him I know where he came from to marry you. Tell him the grey suit of +clothes reached the owner safely—remember, the grey suit of clothes. +That will refresh his memory. Then I think he will come fast enough and let +me have the truth concerning this brat. If he refuses, I shall take steps to +see justice done.”</p> +<p>“I lay he’s never put himself in the power of a black-hearted, +cruel beast like you,” blazed out the woman, furious and frightened at +once.</p> +<p>“Has he not? Ask him. You don’t know where he was during those +months? I thought you didn’t. I do. Perhaps this child—perhaps +the other woman’s the married one—”</p> +<p>Phoebe dropped her basket and her face grew very pale before the horrors +thus coarsely spread before her. She staggered and felt sick at the +man’s last speech. Then, with one great sob of breath, she turned her +back on him, nerved herself to use her shaking legs, and set off at her best +speed, as one running from some dangerous beast of the field.</p> +<p>Grimbal made no attempt to follow, but watched her fade into the mist, +then turned and pursued his way through the dripping woodlands. Sunrise fires +gleamed along the upper layers of the fading vapours and gilded +autumn’s handiwork. Ripe seeds fell tapping through the gold of the +horse-chestnuts, and many acorns also pattered down upon a growing carpet of +leaves. Webs and gossamers twinkled in the sunlight, and the flaming foliage +made a pageant of colour through waning mists where red leaves and yellow +fell at every breath along the thinning woods. Beneath trees and hedgerows +the ripe mosses gleamed, and coral and amber fungi, with amanita and other +hooded folk. In companies and clusters they sprang or arose misshapen, +sinister, and alone. Some were orange and orange-tawny; others white and +purple; not a few peered forth livid, blotched, and speckled, as with venom +spattered from some reptile’s jaws. On the wreck of the year they +flourished, sucked strange life from rotten stick and hollow tree, opened +gills on lofty branch and bough, shone in the green grass rings of the +meadows, thrust cup and cowl from the concourse of the dead leaves in +ditches, clustered like the uprising roof-trees of a fairy village in dingle +and in dene.</p> +<p>At the edge of the woods John Grimbal stood, and the hour was very dark +for him and he cursed at the loss of his manhood. His heart turned to gall +before the thought of the thing he had done, as he blankly marvelled what +unsuspected base instinct had thus disgraced him. He had plumbed a +possibility unknown within his own character, and before his shattered +self-respect he stood half passionate, half amazed. Chance had thus wrecked +him; an impulse had altered the whole face of the problem; and he gritted his +teeth as he thought of Blanchard’s feelings when Phoebe should tell her +story. As for her, she at least had respected him during the past years; but +what must henceforth be her estimate of him? He heaped bitter contempt upon +himself for this brutality to a woman; he raged, as he pursued long chains of +consequences begot of this single lapse of self-control. His eye was cleared +from passion; he saw the base nature of his action and judged himself as +others would judge him. This spectacle produced a definite mental issue and +aroused long-stagnant emotions from their troubled slumbers. He discovered +that a frank hatred of Will Blanchard awoke and lived. He told himself this +man was to blame for all, and not content with poisoning his life, now +ravaged his soul also and blighted every outlook of his being. Like a speck +upon an eyeball, which blots the survey of the whole eye, so this wretch had +fastened upon him, ruined his ambitions, wrecked his life, and now dragged +his honour and his very manhood into the dust. John Grimbal found himself +near choked by a raging fit of passion at last. He burnt into sheer frenzy +against Blanchard; and the fuel of the fire was the consciousness of his own +craven performance of that morning. Flying from self-contemplation, he sought +distraction and even oblivion at any source where his mind could win it; and +now he laid all blame on his enemy and suffered the passion of his own shame +and remorse to rise, as it had been a red mist, against this man who was +playing havoc with his body and soul. He trembled under the loneliness of the +woods in a debauch of mere brute rage that exhausted him and left a mark on +the rest of his life. Even his present powers appeared trifling and their +exercise a deed unsatisfying before this frenzy. What happiness could be +achieved by flinging Blanchard into prison for a few months at most? What +salve could be won from thought of this man’s disgrace and social ruin? +The spectacle sank into pettiness now. His blood was surging through his +veins and crying for action. Primitive passion gripped him and craved +primitive outlet. At that hour, in his own deepest degradation, the man came +near madness, and every savage voice in him shouted for blood and blows and +batterings in the flesh.</p> +<p>Phoebe Blauchard hastened home, meanwhile, and kept her own counsel upon +the subject of the dawn’s sensational incidents. Her first instinct was +to tell her husband everything at the earliest opportunity, but Will had +departed to his work before she reached the farm, and on second thoughts she +hesitated to speak or give John Grimbal’s message. She feared to +precipitate the inevitable. In her own heart what mystery revolved about +Will’s past performances undoubtedly embraced the child fashioned in +his likeness; and though she had long fought against the rumour and deceived +herself by pretending to believe Chris, whose opinion differed from that of +most people, yet at her heart she felt truth must lie hidden somewhere in the +tangle. Will and Mr. Lyddon alone knew nothing of the report, and Phoebe +hesitated to break it to her husband. He was happy—perhaps in the +consciousness that nobody realised the truth; and yet at his very gates a +bitter foe guessed at part of his secret and knew the rest. Still Phoebe +could not bring herself to speak immediately. A day of mental stress and +strain ended, and she retired and lay beside Will very sad. Under darkness of +night the threats of the enemy grew into an imminent disaster of terrific +dimensions, and with haunting fear she finally slept, to waken in a +nightmare.</p> +<p>Will, wholly ignorant of the facts, soothed Phoebe’s alarm and +calmed her as she clung to him in hysterical tears.</p> +<p>“No ill shall come to ’e while I live,” she sobbed: +“not if all the airth speaks evil of ’e. I’ll cleave to +’e, and fight for ’e, an’ be a gude wife, tu,—a +better wife than you’ve been husband.”</p> +<p>“Bide easy, an’ doan’t cry no more. My arm’s round +’e, dearie. Theer, give awver, do! You’ve been dreamin’ +ugly along o’ the poor supper you made, I reckon. Doan’t ’e +think nobody’s hand against me now, for ban’t so. Folks begin to +see the manner of man I am; an’ Miller knaws, which is all I care +about. He’ve got a strong right arm workin’ for him an’ a +tidy set o’ brains, though I sez it; an’ you might have a worse +husband, tu, Phoebe; but theer—shut your purty eyes—I knaw they +’m awpen still, for I can hear your lashes against the sheet. An’ +doan’t ’e go out in the early dews mushrooming no more, for +’t is cold work, an’ you’ve got to be strong these next +months.”</p> +<p>She thought for a moment of telling him boldly concerning the legend +spreading on every side; but, like others less near and dear to him, she +feared to do so.</p> +<p>Knowing Will Blanchard, not a man among the backbiters had cared to risk a +broken head by hinting openly at the startling likeness between the child and +himself; and Phoebe felt her own courage unequal to the task just then. She +racked her brains with his dangers long after he was himself asleep, and +finally she determined to seek Chris next morning and hear her opinion before +taking any definite step.</p> +<p>On the same night another pair of eyes were open, and trouble of a sort +only less deep than that of the wife kept her father awake. Billy had taken +an opportunity to tell his master of the general report and spread before him +the facts as he knew them.</p> +<p>The younger members of the household had retired early, and when Miller +Lyddon took the cards from the mantelpiece and made ready for their customary +game, Mr. Blee shook his head and refused to play.</p> +<p>“Got no heart for cards to-night,” he said.</p> +<p>“What’s amiss, then? Thank God I’ve heard little to call +ill news for a month or two. Not but what I’ve fancied a shadow on my +gal’s face more’n wance.”</p> +<p>“If not on hers, wheer should ’e see it?” asked Mr. Blee +eagerly.“ I’ve seed it, tu, an’ for that matter +theer’s sour looks an’ sighs elsewheer. People ban’t blind, +worse luck. ’Tis grawed to be common talk, an’ I’ve fired +myself to tell you, ’cause ’tis fitting an’ right, +an’ it might come more grievous from less careful lips.”</p> +<p>“Go on then; an’ doan’t rack me longer’n you can +help. Use few words.”</p> +<p>“Many words must go to it, I reckon. ’Tis well knawn I unfolds +a bit o’ news like the flower of the field—gradual and sure. You +might have noticed that love-cheel by the name of Timothy ’bout the +plaace? Him as be just of age to harry the ducks an’ +such-like.”</p> +<p>“A nice li’l bwoy, tu, an’ fond of me; an’ you +caan’t say he’m a love-cheel, knawin’ nothin’ +’bout him.”</p> +<p>“Love-cheel or changeling, ’tis all wan. Have’e ever +thought ’twas coorious the way Blanchard comed by un?”</p> +<p>“Certainly ’twas—terrible coorious.”</p> +<p>“You never doubted it?”</p> +<p>“Why for should I? Will’s truthful as light, whatever else he +may be.”</p> +<p>“You believe as he went ’pon the Moor an’ found that +bwoy in a roundy-poundy under the gloamin’?”</p> +<p>“Ess, I do.”</p> +<p>“Have’e ever looked at the laddie close?”</p> +<p>“Oftentimes—so like Will as two peas.”</p> +<p>“Theer ’tis! The picter of Will! How do’e read +that?”</p> +<p>“Never tried to. An accident, no more.”</p> +<p>“A damn queer accident, if you ax me. Burnish it all! You +doan’t see yet, such a genius of a man as you tu! Why, Will +Blanchard’s the faither of the li’l twoad! You’ve awnly got +to know the laws of nature an’ such-like to swear to it. The way he +walks an’ holds his head, his curls, his fashion of lording it awver +the birds an’ beasts, the sudden laugh of un—he’s +Will’s son, for a thousand pound, an’ his mother’s alive, +like as not.”</p> +<p>“No mother would have gived up a child that way.”</p> +<p>“’Zactly so! Onless she gived it to the faither!” said +Billy triumphantly.</p> +<p>Mr. Lyddon reflected and showed an evident disposition to scoff at the +whole story.</p> +<p>“’Tis stuff an’ rubbish!” he said. “You +might as well find a mare’s nest t’other side an’ say +’twas Will’s sister’s child. ’Tis almost so like her +as him, an’ got her brown eyes in the bargain.”</p> +<p>“God forbid!” answered Billy, in horror. “That’s +flat libel, an’ I’d be the last to voice any such thing for +money. If a man gets a cheel wrong side the blanket ’tis just a passing +sarcumstance, an’ not to be took too serious. Half-a-crown a week is +its awn punishment like. But if a gal do, ’tis destruction to the end +of the chapter, an’ shame everlasting in the world to come, by all +accounts. You didn’t ought to think o’ such things, +Miller,—takin’ a pure, gude maiden’s carater like that. +Surprised at ’e!”</p> +<p>“’Tis just as mad a thought wan way as t’other, and if +you’m surprised so be I. To be a tale-bearer at your time o’ +life!”</p> +<p>“That gormed Blanchard’s bewitched ’e from fust to +last!” burst out Billy. “If a angel from heaven comed down-long +and tawld ’e the truth ’bout un, you wouldn’t +b’lieve. God stiffen it! You make me mad! You’d stand ’pon +your head an’ waggle your auld legs in the air for un if he axed +’e.”</p> +<p>“I’ll speak to him straight an’ take his word for it. If +it’s true, he ’m wickedly to blame, I knaw that.”</p> +<p>“I was thinkin’ of your darter. ’Tis black thoughts have +kept her waking since this reached her ears.”</p> +<p>“Did you tell her what people were sayin’? I warrant you +did!”</p> +<p>“You’m wrong then. No such thing. I may have just heaved a +sigh when I seed the bwoy playin’ in front of her, an’ looked at +Blanchard, an’ shook my head, or some such gentle hint as that. But no +more.”</p> +<p>“Well, I doan’t believe a word of it; an’ I’ll +tell you this for your bettering,—’tis poor religion in you, +Blee, to root into other people’s troubles, like a pig in a trough; +an’ auld though you be, you ’m not tu auld to mind what it felt +like when the blood was hot an’ quick to race at the sight of a +maid.”</p> +<p>“I practice same as I preach, whether or no,” said Billy +stoutly, “an’ I can’t lay claim to creating nothing lawful +or unlawful in my Maker’s image. ’Tis something to say that, in +these godless days. I’ve allus kept my foot on the world, the flesh, +an’ the Devil so tight as the best Christian in company; an’ if +that ban’t a record for a stone, p’raps you’ll tell me a +better. Your two-edged tongue do make me feel sometimes as though I did ought +to go right away from ’e, though God knaws—God, He +knaws—”</p> +<p>Billy hid his face and began to weep, while Mr. Lyddon watched the +candle-light converge to a shining point upon his bald skull.</p> +<p>“Doan’t go against a word in season, my dear sawl. ’Tis +our duty to set each other right. That’s what we’m put here for, +I doubt. Many’s the time you’ve given me gude advice, an’ +I’ve thanked ’e an’ took it.”</p> +<p>Then he went for the spirits and mixed Mr. Blee a dose of more than usual +strength.</p> +<p>“You’m the most biting user of language in Chagford, when you +mind to speak sour,” declared Billy. “If I thought you meant all +you said, I’d go an’ hang myself in the barn this instant moment. +But you doan’t.”</p> +<p>He snuffled and dried his scanty tears on a red handkerchief, then cheered +up and drank his liquor.</p> +<p>“It do take all sorts to make a world, an’ a man must act +accordin’ as he’m built,” continued Mr. Lyddon. +“Ban’t no more use bein’ angered wi’ a chap given to +women than ’tis bein’ angered wi’ a fule, because +he’s a fule. What do ’e expect from a fule but folly, or a crab +tree but useless fruit, or hot blood but the ways of it? This ban’t to +speak of Will Blanchard, though. ’Pon him we’ll say no more till +he’ve heard what’s on folks’ tongues. A maddening +bwoy—I’ll allow you that—an’ he’ve took a year +or two off my life wan time an’ another. ’Pears I ban’t +never to graw to love un as I would; an’ yet I caan’t quite help +it when I sees his whole-hearted ferment to put money into my pocket; or when +I hears him talk of nitrates an’ the ways o’ the world; or +watches un playin’ make-believe wi’ the childer—himself the +biggest cheel as ever laughed at fulishness or wanted spankin’ +an’ putting in the corner.”</p> +<h2><a id="IV_VIII" name="IV_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII<br /> +FLIGHT</h2> +<p>On the following morning Miller Lyddon arose late, looked from his window +and immediately observed the twain with whom his night thoughts had been +concerned. Will stood at the gate smoking; small Timothy, and another lad, of +slightly riper years, appeared close by. The children were fighting tooth and +nail upon the ownership of a frog, and this reptile itself, fastened by the +leg to a stick, listlessly watched the progress of the battle. Will likewise +surveyed the scene with genial attention, and encouraged the particular +little angry animal who had most claim upon his interest. Timothy kicked and +struck out pretty straight, but fought in silence; the bigger boy screamed +and howled and scratched.</p> +<p>“Vang into un, man, an’ knock his ugly head off!” said +Will encouragingly, and the babe to whom he spoke made renewed efforts as +both combatants tumbled into the road, the devil in their little bright eyes, +each puny muscle straining. Tim had his foe by the hair, and the elder was +trying to bite his enemy’s leg, when Martin Grimbal and Chris Blanchard +approached from Rushford Bridge. They had met by chance, and Chris was coming +to the farm while the antiquary had business elsewhere. Now a scuffle in a +cloud of dust arrested them and the woman, uninfluenced by considerations of +sportsmanship, pounced upon Timothy, dragged him from his operations, and, +turning to Will, spoke as Martin Grimbal had never heard her speak +before.</p> +<p>“You, a grawed man, to stand theer an’ see that gert wild +beast of a bwoy tear this li’l wan like a savage tiger! Look at his +sclowed faace all streaming wi’ blood! ’S truth! I’d like +to sarve you the same, an’ I would for two pins! I’m ashamed of +’e!”</p> +<p>“He hit wi’ his fistes like a gude un,” said Will, +grinning; “an’ he’m made o’ the right stuff, +I’ll swear. Couldn’t have done better if he was my awn son. I be +gwaine to give un a braave toy bimebye. You see t’other kid’s +faace come to-morrow!”</p> +<p>Martin Grimbal watched Chris fondle the gasping Timothy, clean his wounds, +calm his panting heart; then, as though a superhuman voice whispered in his +ear, her secret stood solved, and the truth of Timothy’s parentage +confronted him in a lightning flash of the soul. He looked at Chris as a man +might gaze upon a spectre; he stared at her and through her into her past; he +pieced each part of the puzzle to its kindred parts until all stood complete; +he read “mother” in her voice, in her caressing hands and +gleaming eyes as surely as man reads morning in the first light of dawn; and +he marvelled that a thing so clear and naked had been left to his discovery. +The revelation shook him not a little, for he was familiar with the rumours +concerning Tim’s paternity, and had been disposed to believe them; but +from the moment of the new thought’s inception it gripped him, for he +felt that the thing was true. As lamps, so ordered that the light of each may +fall on the fringe of darkness where its fellow fades, and thus complete a +chain of illumination, so the present discovery, duly considered, was but one +point of truth revealing others. It made clear much that had not been easy to +understand, and the tremendous fact rose in his mind as a link in such a +perfect sequence of evidence that doubt actually vanished before he had lost +sight of Chris and passed dumfounded upon his way. Her lover’s sudden +death, her own disappearance, the child’s advent at Newtake, and the +woman’s subsequent return—these main incidents connected a +thousand others and explained what little mystery still obscured the +position. He pursued his road and marvelled as he went how a tragedy so +thinly veiled had thus escaped every eye. Within the story that Chris had +told, this other story might be intercalated without convicting her of any +spoken falsehood. Now he guessed at the reason why Timothy’s mother had +refused to marry him on his last proposal; then, thinking of the child, he +knew Tim’s father.</p> +<p>So he stood before the truth; and it filled his heart with some agony and +some light. Examining his love in this revelation, he discovered strange +things; and first, that it was love only that had opened his eyes and enabled +him to solve the secret at all. Nobody had made the discovery but himself, +and he, of all men the least likely to come at any concern others desired to +hide from him, had fathomed this great fact, had won it from the heart of +unconscious Chris. His love widened and deepened into profound pity as he +thought of all that her secret and the preservation of it must have meant; +and tears dimmed his eyes as he pictured her life since her lover’s +passing.</p> +<p>To him the discovery hurt Chris so little that for a time he underrated +the effect of it upon other people. His affection rose clean above the +unhappy fact, and it was some time before he began to appreciate the +spectacle of Chris under the world’s eye with the truth no longer +hidden. Then a sense of his own helplessness overmastered him; he walked +slowly, drew up at a gate and stood motionless, leaning over it. So silent +did he stand, and so long, that a stoat hopped across the road within two +yards of him.</p> +<p>He realised to the full that he was absolutely powerless. Chris alone must +disperse the rumours fastening on her brother if they were to be dispersed. +He knew that she would not suffer any great cloud of unjust censure to rest +upon Will, and he saw what a bitter problem must be overwhelming her. Nobody +could help her and he, who knew, was as powerless as the rest. Then he asked +himself if that last conviction was true. He probed the secret places of his +mind to find an idea; he prayed for some chance spark or flash of genius to +aid him before this trial; he mourned his own simple brains, so weak to aid +him in this vital pass. But of all living men the accidental discovery was +most safe with him. His heart went out to the secret mother, and he told +himself that he would guard her mystery like gold.</p> +<p>It was strange in a nature so timorous that not once did a suspicion he +had erred overtake him, and presently he wondered to observe how ancient this +discovery of the motherhood of Chris had grown within his mind. It appeared +as venerable as his own love for her. He yearned for power to aid; without +conscious direction of his course he proceeded and strode along for hours. +Then he ate a meal of bread and cheese at an inn and tramped forward once +more upon a winding road towards the village of Zeal.</p> +<p>Through his uncertainty, athwart the deep perplexity of his mind, moved +hope and a shadowed joy. Within him arose again the vision of happiness once +pictured and prayed for, once revived, never quite banished to the grey limbo +of ambitions beyond fulfilment. Now realities saddened the thought of it and +brought ambition within a new environment less splendid than the old. But, +despite clouds, hope shone fairly forth at last. So a planet, that the eye +has followed at twilight and then lost a while, beams anew at dawn after +lapse of days, and wheels in wide mazes upon some new background of the +unchanging stars.</p> +<p>Elsewhere Mr. Lyddon braced himself to a painful duty, and had private +speech with his son-in-law. Like a thunderbolt the circling suspicions fell +on Will, and for a moment smothered his customary characteristics under sheer +surprise.</p> +<p>The miller spoke nervously, and walked up and down with his eyes +averted.</p> +<p>“Ban’t no gert matter, I hope, an’ I won’t keep +’e from your work five minutes. You’ve awnly got to say +‘No,’ an’ theer’s an end of it so far as I’m +concerned. ’Tis this: have ’e noticed heads close together now +an’ again when you passed by of late?”</p> +<p>“Not me. Tu much business on my hands, I assure ’e. Coourse +theer’s envious whisperings; allus is when a man gets a high place, +same as what I have, thanks to his awn gude sense an’ the wisdom of +others as knaws what he’s made of. But you trusted me wi’ all +your heart, an’ you’ll never live to mourn it.”</p> +<p>“I never want to. You’m grawing to be much to me by slow +stages. Yet these here tales. This child Timothy. Who’s his faither, +Will, an’ who’s his mother?”</p> +<p>“How the flaming hell should I knaw? I found him same as you finds a +berry on a briar. That’s auld history, surely?”</p> +<p>“The child graws so ’mazing like you, that even dim eyes such +as mine can see it.”</p> +<p>A sudden flash of light came into Blanchard’s face. Then the fire +died as quickly as it had been kindled, and he grew calm.</p> +<p>“God A’mighty!” he said, in a voice hushed and awed. +“They think that! I lay that’s why your darter’s cried +o’ nights, then, an’ Chris have grawed sad an’ wisht in her +ways, an’ mother have pet the bwoy wan moment an’ been short +wi’ un the next.”</p> +<p>He remained marvellously quiet under this attack, but amazement chiefly +marked his attitude. Miller Lyddon, encouraged by this unexpected +reasonableness, spoke again more sternly.</p> +<p>“The thing looks bad to a wife an’ mother, an’ +’tis my duty to ax ’e for a plain, straightforward answer +’pon it. Human nature’s got a ugly trick of repeatin’ +itself in this matter, as we all knaws. But I’ll say nought an’ +think nought till you answers me. Be the bwoy yourn or not? Tell me true, +with your hand on this.”</p> +<p>He took his Bible from the mantelpiece, while Will, apparently cowed by +the gravity of the situation, placed both palms upon it, then fixed his eyes +solemnly upon Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>“As God in heaven’s my judge, he ban’t no cheel of mine, +and I knaw nothing about him—no, nor yet his faither nor mother nor +plaace of birth. I found un wheer I said, and if I’ve lied by a +fraction, may God choke me as I stand here afore you.”</p> +<p>“An’ I believe you to the bottom!” declared his +father-in-law. “I believe you as I hopes to be believed myself, when I +stands afore the Open Books an’ says I’ve tried to do my duty. +You’ve got me on your side, an’ that’s to say you’ll +have Phoebe an’ your mother, tu, for certain.”</p> +<p>Then Blanchard’s mood changed, and there came a tremendous rebound +from the tension of the last few minutes. In the anti-climax following upon +his oath, passion, chained a while by astonishment, broke loose in a +whirlwind.</p> +<p>“Let ’em believe or disbelieve, who cares?” he thundered +out. “Not me—not a curse for you or anybody, my awn blood or not +my awn blood. To harbour lies against me! But women loves to believe bad most +times.”</p> +<p>“Who said they believed it, Will? Doan’t go mad, now +’tis awver and done.”</p> +<p>“They <i>did</i> believe it; I knaw, I seed it in theer faaces, come +to think of it. ’Tis the auld song. I caan’t do no right. Course +I’ve got childer an’ ruined maids in every parish of the Moor! +God damn theer lying, poisonous tongues, the lot of ’em! I’m sick +of this rotten, lie-breeding hole, an’ of purty near every sawl in it +but mother. She never would think against me. An’ me, so true to Phoebe +as the honey-bee to his awn butt! I’ll go—I’ll get out of +it—so help me, I will—to a clean land, ’mongst +clean-thinking folk, wheer men deal fair and judge a chap by his works. For a +thought I’d wring the neck of the blasted child, by God I +would!”</p> +<p>“He’ve done no wrong.”</p> +<p>“Nor me neither. I had no more hand in his getting than he had +himself. Poor li’l brat; I’m sorry I spoke harsh of him. He was +give me—he was give me—an’ I wish to God he <i>was</i> +mine. Anyways he shaa’n’t come to no harm. I’ll fight the +lot of ’e for un, till he ’s auld enough to fight for +hisself.”</p> +<p>Then Will burst out of Monks Barton and vanished. He passed far from the +confines of the farm, roamed on to the high Moor, and nothing further was +seen of him until the following day.</p> +<p>Those most concerned assembled after his departure and heard the result of +the interview.</p> +<p>“Solemn as a minister he swore,” explained Mr. Lyddon; +“an’ then, a’most before his hands was off the Book, he +burst out like a screeching, ravin’ hurricane. I half felt the oath was +vain then, an’ ’t was his real nature bubblin’ up +like.”</p> +<p>They discussed the matter, all save Chris, who sat apart, silent and +abstracted. Presently she rose and left them, and faced her own trouble +single-handed, as she had similarly confronted greater sorrows in the +past.</p> +<p>She was fully determined to conceal her cherished secret still; yet not +for the superficial reason that had occurred to any mind. Vast mental +alterations had transformed Chris Blanchard since the death of Clement. Her +family she scarcely considered now; no power of logic would have convinced +her that she had wronged them or darkened their fame. In the past, indeed, +not the least motive of her flight had centred in the fear of Will; but now +she feared nobody, and her own misfortune held no shadow of sin or shame for +her, looking back upon it. Those who would have denied themselves her society +or friendship upon this knowledge it would have given her no pang to lose. +She could feel fiercely still, as she looked back to the birth of her son and +traced the long course of her sufferings; and she yet experienced occasional +thrills of satisfaction in her weaker moments, when she lowered the mask and +reflected, not without pride, on the strength and determination that had +enabled her to keep her secret. But to reveal the truth now was a prospect +altogether hateful in the eyes of Chris, and she knew the reason. More than +once had she been upon the brink of disclosure, since recent unhappy +suspicions had darkened Phoebe’s life; but she had postponed the +necessary step again and again, at one thought. Her fortitude, her apathy, +her stoic indifference, broke down and left her all woman before one +necessity of confession; her heart stood still when she remembered that +Martin Grimbal must know and judge. His verdict she did, indeed, dread with +all her soul, and his only; for him she had grown to love, and the thought of +his respect and regard was precious to her. Everybody must know, everybody or +nobody. For long she could conceive of no action clearing Will in the eyes of +the wider circle who would not be content to take his word, and yet leaving +herself uninvolved. Then the solution came. She would depart once more with +the child. Such a flight was implicit confession, and could not be +misunderstood. Martin must, indeed, know, but she would never see him after +he knew. To face him after the truth had reached his ear seemed to Chris a +circumstance too terrible to dwell upon. Her action, of course, would +proclaim the parentage of Timothy, and free Will from further slanderings; +while for herself, through tears she saw the kind faces of the gypsy people +and her life henceforth devoted to her little one.</p> +<p>To accentuate the significance of the act she determined to carry out her +intention that same day, and during the afternoon opportunity offered. Her +son, playing alone in the farmyard, came readily enough for a walk, and +before three o’clock they had set out. The boy’s face was badly +scratched from his morning battle, but pain had ceased, and his injuries only +served as an object of great interest to Timothy. Where water in ditch or +puddle made a looking-glass he would stop to survey himself.</p> +<p>A spectator, aware of certain facts, had viewed the progress of Chris with +some slight interest. Three ways were open to her, three main thoroughfares +leading out of Chagford to places of parallel or greater importance. Upon the +Moor road Will wandered in deep perturbation; on that to Okehampton walked +another man, concerned with the same problem from a different aspect; the +third highway led to Moreton; and thither Chris might have proceeded +unchallenged. But a little public vehicle would be returning just then from +the railway station. That the runaway knew, and therefore selected another +path.</p> +<p>In her pocket was all the money that she had; in her heart was a sort of +alloyed sorrow. Two thoughts shared her mind after she had decided upon a +course of action. She wondered how quickly Tim would learn to call her +“mother,” for that was the only sweet word life still held; yet +of the child’s father she did not think, for her mind, without special +act of volition, turned and turned again to him upon whom the Indian summer +of her love had descended.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_IX" name="IV_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX<br /> +UNDER COSDON BEACON</h2> +<p>Beneath a region where the “newtakes” straggle up +Cosdon’s eastern flank and mark a struggle between man and the giant +beacon, Chris Blanchard rested a while upon the grass by the highway. Tim, +wrapped in a shawl, slept soundly beside his mother, and she sat with her +elbows on her knees and one hand under her chin. It was already dusk; dark +mist wreaths moved upon the Moor, and oncoming night winds sighed of rain. +Then a moment before her intended departure from this most solitary spot she +heard footsteps upon the road. Not interested to learn anything of the +passer-by, Chris remained with her eyes upon the ground, but the footsteps +stopped suddenly before her, whereupon she looked up and saw Martin +Grimbal.</p> +<p>After a perambulation of twenty miles he had now set his face homewards, +and thus the meeting was accomplished. Utmost constraint at first marked the +expression of both man and woman, and it was left for Martin to break the +silence, for Chris only started at seeing him, but said nothing. Her mind, +however, ranged actively upon the reason of Grimbal’s sudden +appearance, and she did not at first believe it accidental.</p> +<p>“Why, my dear, what is this? You have wandered far +afield!”</p> +<p>He addressed her in unnatural tones, for surprise and emotion sent his +voice up into his head, and it came thin and tremulous as a woman’s. +Even as he spoke Martin feared. From the knowledge gleaned by him that +morning he suspected the meaning of this action, and thought that Chris was +running away.</p> +<p>And she, at the same moment, divined that he guessed the truth in so far +as the present position was concerned. Still she did not speak, and he grew +calmer and took her silence as an admission.</p> +<p>“You’re going away from Chagford? Is it wise?”</p> +<p>“Ess, Martin, ’tis best so. You see this poor child be +breedin’ trouble, an’ bringing bad talk against Will. He +ban’t wanted—little Timothy—an’ I ban’t wanted +overmuch, so it comed to me I’d—I’d just slip away out of +the turmoil an’ taake Tim. Then—”</p> +<p>She stopped, for her heart was beating so fast that she could speak no +more. She remembered her own arguments in the recent past,—that this +flight must tell all who cared to reflect that the child was her own. Now she +looked up at Martin to see if he had guessed it. But he exhibited extreme +self-control and she was reassured.</p> +<p>“Just like your thoughtful self to try and save others from sorrow. +Where are you going to, Chris? Don’t tell me more than you please; but +I may be useful to you on this, the first stage of the journey.”</p> +<p>“To Okehampton to-night. To-morrow—but I’d rather not +say any more. I don’t care so long as you think I’m +right.”</p> +<p>“I haven’t said that yet. But I’ll go as far as Zeal +with you. Then we’ll get a covered cab or something. We may reach the +village before rain.”</p> +<p>“No call for your coming. ’Tis awnly a short mile.”</p> +<p>“But I must. I’ll carry the laddie. Poor little man! Hard to +be the cause of such a bother.”</p> +<p>He picked Timothy up so gently that the child did not wake.</p> +<p>“Now,” he said, “come along. You must be tired +already.”</p> +<p>“How gude you be!” she said wearily. “I’m glad you +doan’t scold or fall into a rage wi’ me, for I knaw I’m +right. The bwoy’s better away, and I’m small use to any now. But +I can be busy with this little wan. I might do worse than give up my life to +un—eh, Martin?”</p> +<p>Then some power put words in his mouth. He trembled when he had spoken +them, but he would not have recalled them.</p> +<p>“You couldn’t do better. It’s a duty staring you in the +face.”</p> +<p>She started violently, and her dark skin flamed under the night.</p> +<p>“Why d’you say that?” she asked, with loud, harsh voice, +and stopping still as she did so. “Why d’you say +‘duty’?”</p> +<p>He, too, stood and looked at her.</p> +<p>“My dear,” he answered, “love’s a quick, subtle +thing. It can make even such a man as I am less stupid than Nature built him. +It fires dull brains; it adds sight to dim eyes; it shows the bookworm how to +find out secrets hidden from keener spirits; it lifts a veil from the loved +one and lets the lover see more than anybody else can. Be patient with me. I +spoke because I love you still with all my heart and soul, Chris; I spoke, +because what I feel for you is lifelong, and cannot change. Had I not still +worshipped the earth under your feet I would have died rather than tell you. +But love makes me bold. I have watched you so long and prayed for you so +often. I have seen little differences in you that nobody else saw. And to-day +I know. I knew when you picked up Timothy and flew at Will. Since then +I’ve wandered Heaven can tell where, just thinking and thinking and +wondering and seeing no way. And all the time God meant me to come and find +you and tell you.”</p> +<p>She understood; she gave one bitter cry that started an echo from ruined +mine-workings hard at hand; then she turned from him, and, in a moment of +sheer hopeless misery, flung herself and her wrecked ambitions upon the +ground by the wayside.</p> +<p>For a moment the man stood scared by this desperate answer to his words. +Then he put his burden down, approached Chris, knelt beside her, and tried to +raise her. She sat up at last with panting breast and eyes in which some +terror sat.</p> +<p>“You!” she said. “You to knaw! Wasn’t my cup full +enough before but that my wan hope should be cut away, tu? My God, I +’mauld in sorrow now—very auld. But ’t is awver at last. +You knaw, an’ I had to hear it from your awn lips! Theer ’s +nought worse in the world for me now.”</p> +<p>Her hands were pressed against her bosom, and as he unconsciously moved a +little towards her she shrank backwards, then rose to her feet. Timothy woke +and cried, upon which she turned to him and picked him up.</p> +<p>“Go!” she cried suddenly. “If ever you loved me, get out +of my sight now, or you’ll make me want to kill myself +again.”</p> +<p>He saw the time was come for strong self-assertion, and spoke.</p> +<p>“Listen!” he said. “You don’t understand, but you +must. I’m the only man in the world who knows—the only one, and +I’ve told you because it was stamped into my brain to tell you, and +because I love you perhaps better than one creature has any right to love +another.”</p> +<p>“You knaw. Isn’t it enough? Who else did I care for? Who else +mattered to me? Mother or brother or other folk? I pray you to go an’ +leave me. God knaws how hard it was to hide it, but I hugged it an’ +suffered more ’n any but a mother could fathom ’cause things weer +as they weer. Then came this trouble, an’ still none seed. But ’t +was meant you should, an’ the rest doan’t matter. I’d so +soon go back now as not.”</p> +<p>“So you shall,” he answered calmly; “only hear this +first. Last time I spoke about what was in my heart, Chris, you told me you +could love me, but that you would not marry me, and I said I would never ask +you again. I shall keep my word, sweetheart. I shall not ask; I shall take +without asking. You love me; that is all I care for. The little boy came +between last time; now nothing does.”</p> +<p>He took the woman in his arms and kissed her, but the next moment he was +flying to where water lay in a ditch, for his unexpected attitude had +overpowered Chris. She raised her hands to his shoulders, uttered a faint +cry, then slipped heavily out of his arms in a faint. The man rushed this way +and that, the child sat and howled noisily, the woman remained long +unconscious, and heavy rain began to fall out of the darkness; yet, to his +dying day that desolate spot of earth brought light to Martin’s eyes as +often as he passed it.</p> +<p>Chris presently recovered her senses, and spoke words that made her +lover’s heart leap. She uttered them in a sad, low voice, but her hand +was in his, pressing it close the while.</p> +<p>“Awften an’ awften I’ve axed the A’mighty to give +me wan little glint o’ knawledge as how ’twould all end. If +I’d knawed! But I never guessed how big your sawl was, Martin. I never +thought you was the manner of man to love a woman arter that.”</p> +<p>“God knows what’s in my heart, Chris.”</p> +<p>“I’ll tell ’e everything some day. Lookin’ back it +doan’t ’pear no ways wicked, though it may seem so in cold +daylight to cold hearts.”</p> +<p>“Come, come with me, for the rain grows harder. I know where I can +hire a covered carriage at an inn. ’Tis only five minutes farther on, +and poor Tim’s unhappy.”</p> +<p>“He’m hungry. You won’t be hard ’pon my li’l +bwoy if I come to ’e, Martin?”</p> +<p>“You know as well as I can tell you. There’s one other thing. +About Chagford, Chris? Are you afraid of it? I’ll turn my back on it if +you like. I’ll take you to Okehampton now if you would rather go +there.”</p> +<p>“Never! ’Tis for you to care, not me. So you knaw an’ +forgive—what’s the rest? Shadows. But let me hold your hand +an’ keep my tongue still. I’m sick an’ fainty wi’ +this gert turn o’ the wheel. ’T is tu deep for any +words.”</p> +<p>He felt not less uplifted, but his joy was a man’s. It rolled and +tumbled over his being like the riotous west wind. Under such stress his mind +could find no worthy thing to say, and yet he was intoxicated and had to +speak. He was very unlike himself. He uttered platitudes; then the weight of +Timothy upon his arm reminded him that the child existed.</p> +<p>“He shall go to a good school, Chris.”</p> +<p>She sighed.</p> +<p>“I wish I could die quick here by the roadside, dear Martin, for +living along with you won’t be no happier than I am this moment. My +thoughts do all run back, not forward. I’ve lived long enough, I +reckon. If I’d told ’e! But I’d rather been skinned alive +than do it. I’d have let the rest knaw years agone but for +you.”</p> +<p>Driving homewards half an hour later, Chris Blanchard told Martin that +part of her story which concerned her life after the birth of Timothy.</p> +<p>“The travellin’ people was pure gawld to me,” she said. +“And theer’s much to say of theer gert gudeness. But I can tell +’e that another time. It chanced the very day Will’s li’l +wan was buried we was to Chagford, an’ the sad falling-out quickened my +awn mind as to a thought ’bout my cheel. It comed awver me to leave un +at Newtake. I left the vans wheer they was camped that afternoon, an’ +hid ’pon the hill wi’ the baaby. Then Will comed out hisself, +an’ I chaanged my thought an’ followed un wheer he roamed, +knawin’ the colour of his mind through them black hours as if +’twas my awn. ’Twas arter he’d left the roundy-poundy wheer +he was born that I put my child in it, then called tu un loud an’ +clear. He never knawed the voice, which was the awnly thing I feared. But a +voice long silent be soon forgot. I bided at hand till I saw the bwoy in +brother Will’s arms. An’ then I knawed ’twas well an’ +that mother would come to see it. Arterwards I suffered very terrible +wi’out un. But I fought wi’ myself an’ kept away up to the +time I’d fixed in my mind. That was so as nobody should link me with +the li’l wan in theer thoughts. Waitin’ was the hard deed, and +seein’ my bwoy for the first time when I went to Newtake was hard tu. +But ’tis all wan now.”</p> +<p>She remained silent until the lengthy ride was ended and her +mother’s cottage reached. Then, as that home she had thought to enter +no more appeared again, the nature of the woman awoke for one second, and she +flung herself on Martin’s heart.</p> +<p>“May God make me half you think me, for I love you true, an’ +you’m the best man He ever fashioned,” she said. “An’ +to-morrow’s Sunday,” she added inconsequently, “an’ +I’ll kneel in church an’ call down lifelong blessings on +’e.”</p> +<p>“Don’t go to-morrow, my darling. And yet—but no, +we’ll not go, either of us. I couldn’t hear my own banns read out +for the world, and I don’t think you could; yet read they’ll be +as sure as the service is held.”</p> +<p>She said nothing, but he knew that she felt; then mother and child were +gone, and Martin, dismissing his vehicle, proceeded to Monks Barton with the +news that all was well.</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard heard her daughter’s story and its sequel. She +exhibited some emotion, but no grief. The sorrow she may have suffered was +never revealed to any eye by word or tear.</p> +<p>“I reckoned of late days theer was Blanchard blood to the +child,” she said, “an’ I won’t hide from you I +thought more’n wance you was so like to be the mother as Will the +faither of un. Go to bed now, if you caan’t eat, an’ taake the +bwoy, an’ thank God for lining your dark cloud with this silver. If He +forgives ’e, an’ this here gude grey Martin forgives ’e, +who be I to fret? Worse’n you’ve been forgived at fust hand by +the Lard when He travelled on flesh-an’-blood feet ’mong men; +an’ folks have short memories for dates, an’ them as sniggers now +will be dust or dotards ’fore Tim’s grawed. When you’ve +been a lawful wife ten year an’ more, who’s gwaine to mind this? +Not little Tim’s fellow bwoys an’ gals, anyway. His awn +generation won’t trouble him, an’ he’ll find a wise +guardian in Martin, an’ a lovin’ gran’mother in me. Dry +your eyes an’ be a Blanchard. God A’mighty sends sawls in the +world His awn way, an’ chooses the faithers an’ mothers for +’em; an’ He’s never taught Nature to go second to parson +yet, worse luck. ’Tis done, an’ to grumble at a dead man’s +doin’s—specially if you caan’t mend ’em—be +vain.”</p> +<p>“My share was half, an’ not less,” said Chris.</p> +<p>“Aye, you say so, but ’tis a deed wheer the blame ban’t +awften divided equal,” answered Mrs. Blanchard. “Wheer’s +the maiden as caan’t wait for her weddin’ bells?”</p> +<p>The use of the last two words magically swept Chris back into the past. +The coincidence was curious, and she remembered when a man, destined never to +listen to such melody, declared impatiently that he heard it in the hidden +heart of a summer day long past. She did not reply to her mother, but arose +and took her child and went to rest.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_X" name="IV_X"></a>CHAPTER X<br /> +BAD NEWS FOR BLANCHARD</h2> +<p>On the morning that saw the wedding of Chris and Martin, Phoebe Blanchard +found heart and tongue to speak to her husband of the thing she still kept +locked within her mind. Since the meeting with John Grimbal she had suffered +much in secret, but still kept silence; and now, after a quiet service before +breakfast on a morning in mid-December, most of those who had been present as +spectators returned to the valley, and Phoebe spoke to Will as they walked +apart from the rest. A sight of the enemy it was that loosed her lips, for, +much to the surprise of all present, John Grimbal had attended his +brother’s wedding. As the little gathering streamed away after the +ceremony, he had galloped off again with a groom behind him, and the incident +now led to greater things.</p> +<p>“Chill-fashion weddin’,” said Will, as he walked +homewards, “but it ’pears to me all Blanchards be fated to wed +coorious. Well, ’t is a gude matter out o’ hand. I knaw I raged +somethin’ terrible come I fust heard it, but I think differ’nt +now, specially when I mind what Chris must have felt those times she seed me +welting her child an’ heard un yell, yet set her teeth an’ never +shawed a sign.”</p> +<p>“Did ’e note Jan Grimbal theer?”</p> +<p>“I seed un, an’ I catched un wi’ his eye on you more +’n wance. He ’s grawed to look nowadays as if his mouth allus had +a sour plum in it.”</p> +<p>“His brain’s got sour stuff hid in it if his mouth +haven’t. Be you ever feared of un?”</p> +<p>“Not me. Why for should I be? He’ll be wan of the fam’ly +like, now. He caan’t keep his passion alive for ever. We ’m +likely to meet when Martin do come home again from honeymooning.”</p> +<p>“Will, I must tell you something—something gert an’ +terrible. I should have told ’e ’fore now but I was +frightened.”</p> +<p>“Not feared to speak to me?”</p> +<p>“Ess, seeing the thing I had to say. I’ve waited weeks in fear +an’ tremblin’, expecting something to happen, an’ all +weighed down with fright an’ dread. Now, what wi’ the cheel +that’s comin’, I caan’t carry this any more.”</p> +<p>Being already lachrymose, after the manner of women at a wedding, Phoebe +now shed a tear or two. Will thereupon spoke words of comfort, and blamed her +for hiding any matter from him.</p> +<p>“More trouble?” he said. “Yet I doan’t think +it,—not now,—just as I be right every way. I guess ’t is +your state makes you queer an’ glumpy.”</p> +<p>“I hope ’t was vain talk an’ not true anyway.”</p> +<p>“More talk ’bout me? You’d think Chagford was most tired +o’ my name, wouldn’t ’e? Who was it now?”</p> +<p>“Him—Jan Grimbal. I met him ’mong the mushrooms. He +burst out an’ said wicked, awful things, but his talk touched the +li’l bwoy. He thought Tim was yourn an’ he was gwaine to do +mischief against you.”</p> +<p>“Damn his black mind! I wonder he haven’t rotted away +wi’ his awn bile ’fore now.”</p> +<p>“But that weern’t all. He talked an’ talked, an’ +threatened if you didn’t go an’ see him, as he’d tell +’bout you in the past, when you was away that autumn-time ’fore +us was married.”</p> +<p>“Did he, by God! Doan’t he wish he knawed!”</p> +<p>“He does knaw, Will—least he said he did.”</p> +<p>“Never dream it, Phoebe. ’T is a lie. For why? ’Cause if +he did knaw I shouldn’t—but theer, I’ve never tawld +’e, an’ I ban’t gwaine to now. Awnly I’ll say +this,—if Grimbal really knawed he’d have—but he can’t +knaw, and theer ’s an end of it.”</p> +<p>“To think I should have been frighted by such a story all these +weeks! An’ not true. Oh! I wish I’d told ’e when he sent +the message. ’T would have saved me so much.”</p> +<p>“Ess, never keep nothin’ from me, Phoebe. Theer ’s +troubles that might crush wan heart as comes a light load divided between +two. What message?”</p> +<p>“Some silly auld story ’bout a suit of grey clothes. He said I +was to tell ’e the things was received by the awner.”</p> +<p>Will Blanchard stood still so suddenly that it seemed as though magic had +turned him into stone. He stood, and his hands unclasped, and Phoebe’s +church service which he carried fell with a thud into the road. His wife +watched him change colour, and noted in his face an expression she had never +before seen there.</p> +<p>“Christ A’mighty!” he whispered, with his eyes +reflecting a world of sheer amazement and even terror; “he <i>does</i> +knaw!”</p> +<p>“What? Knaw what, Will? For the Lard’s sake doan’t +’e look at me like that; you’ll frighten my heart into my +mouth.”</p> +<p>“To think he knawed an’ watched an’ waited all these +years! The spider patience o’ that man! I see how ’t was. He let +the world have its way an’ thought to see me broken wi’out any +trouble from him. Then, when I conquered, an’ got to Miller’s +right hand, an’ beat the world at its awn game, he—an’ been +nursing this against me! The heart of un!”</p> +<p>He spoke to himself aloud, gazing straight before him at nothing.</p> +<p>“Will, tell me what ’t is. Caan’t your awn true wife +help ’e now or never?”</p> +<p>Recalled by her words he came to himself, picked up her book, and walked +on. She spoke again and then he answered,—</p> +<p>“No, ’t is a coil wheer you caan’t do nought—nor +nobody. The black power o’ waitin’—’t is that I never +heard tell of. I thought I knawed what was in men to the core—me, +thirty years of age, an’ a ripe man if ever theer was wan. But this +malice! ’T is enough to make ’e believe in the devil.”</p> +<p>“What have you done?” she cried aloud. “Tell me the +worst of it, an’ how gert a thing he’ve got against +you.”</p> +<p>“Bide quiet,” he answered. “I’ll tell ’e, +but not on the public road. Not but he’ll take gude care every ear has +it presently. Shut your mouth now an’ come up to our chamber arter +breakfast an’ I’ll tell ’e the rights of it. An’ that +dog knawed an’ could keep it close all these years!”</p> +<p>“He’s dangerous, an’ terrible, an’ strong. I see +it in your faace, Will.”</p> +<p>“So he is, then; ban’t no foxin’ you ’bout it now. +’T is an awful power of waitin’ he’ve got; an’ he +haven’t bided his time these years an’ years for nothin’. A +feast to him, I lay. He’ve licked his damned lips many a score o’ +times to think of the food he’d fat his vengeance with +bimebye.”</p> +<p>“Can he taake you from me? If not I’ll bear it.”</p> +<p>“Ess fay, I’m done for; credit, fortune, all gone. It might +have been death if us had been to war at the time.”</p> +<p>She clung to him and her head swam.</p> +<p>“Death! God’s mercy! you’ve never killed nobody, +Will?”</p> +<p>“Not as I knaws on, but p’r’aps ban’t tu late to +mend it. It freezes me—it freezes my blood to think what his thoughts +have been. No, no, ban’t death or anything like that. But ’t is +prison for sure if—”</p> +<p>He broke off and his face was very dark.</p> +<p>“What, Will? If what? Oh, comfort me, comfort me, Will, for +God’s sake! An’ another li’l wan comin’!”</p> +<p>“Doan’t take on,” he said. “Ban’t my way to +squeal till I’m hurt. Let it bide, an’ be bright an’ cheery +come eating, for mother ’s down in the mouth at losin’ Chris, +though she doan’t shaw it.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard, with little Timothy, joined the breakfast party at Monks +Barton, and a certain gloom hanging over the party, Mr. Blee commented upon +it in his usual critical spirit.</p> +<p>“This here givin’ in marriage do allus make a looker-on down +in the mouth if he ’s a sober-minded sort o’ man. ’T is the +contrast between the courageousness of the two poor sawls jumpin’ into +the state, an’ the solid fact of bein’ a man’s wife or a +woman’s husband for all time. The vows they swear! An’ that +Martin’s voice so strong an’ cheerful! A teeming cause o’ +broken oaths the marriage sarvice; yet each new pair comes along like sheep +to the slaughter.”</p> +<p>“You talk like a bachelor man,” said Damaris.</p> +<p>“Not so, Mrs. Blanchard, I assure ’e! Lookers-on see most of +the game. Ban’t the mite as lives in a cheese what can tell e’ +’bout the flavour of un. Look at a married man at a +weddin’—all broadcloth an’ cheerfulness, like the fox as +have lost his tail an’ girns to see another chap in the same +pickle.”</p> +<p>“Yet you tried blamed hard to lose your tail an’ get a wife, +for all your talk,” said Will, who, although his mind was full enough, +yet could generally find a sharp word for Mr. Blee.</p> +<p>“Bah to you!” answered the old man angrily. “<i>That</i> +for you! ’T is allus your way to bring personal talk into high +conversation. I was improvin’ the hour with general thoughts; but the +vulgar tone you give to a discourse would muzzle the wisdom o’ +Solomon.”</p> +<p>Miller Lyddon here made an effort to re-establish peace and soon +afterwards the meal came to an end.</p> +<p>Half an hour later Phoebe heard from her husband the story of his brief +military career: of how he had enlisted as a preliminary to going abroad and +making his fortune, how he had become servant to one Captain Tremayne, how +upon the news of Phoebe’s engagement he had deserted, and how his +intention to return and make a clean breast of it had been twice changed by +the circumstances that followed his marriage. Long he took in detailing every +incident and circumstance.</p> +<p>“Coming to think,” he said, “of coourse ’t is +clear as Grimbal must knaw my auld master. I seed his name raised to a Major +in the <i>Western Morning News</i> a few year agone, an’ he was to +Okehampton with a battalion when Hicks come by his death. So that’s +how’t is; an’ I ban’t gwaine to bide Grimbal’s time +to be ruined, you may be very sure of that. Now I knaw, I act.”</p> +<p>“He may be quite content you should knaw. That’s meat +an’ drink enough for him, to think of you gwaine in fear day an’ +night.”</p> +<p>“Ess, but that’s not my way. I ban’t wan to wait an +enemy’s pleasure.”</p> +<p>“You won’t go to him, Will?”</p> +<p>“Go to un? Ess fay—’fore the day’s done, +tu.”</p> +<p>“That’s awnly to hasten the end.”</p> +<p>“The sooner the better.”</p> +<p>He tramped up and down the bedroom with his eyes on the ground, his hands +in his pockets.</p> +<p>“A tremendous thing to tumble up on the surface arter all these +years; an’ a tremendous time for it to come. ’T was a crime +’gainst the Queen for my awn gude ends. I had to choose ’tween +her an’ you; I’d do the same to-morrow. The fault weern’t +theer. It lay in not gwaine back.”</p> +<p>“You couldn’t; your arm was broke.”</p> +<p>“I ought to have gone back arter ’t was well. Then time had +passed, an’ uncle’s money corned, an’ they never found me. +But theer it lies ahead now, sure enough.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps for sheer shame he’ll bide quiet ’bout it. A +man caan’t hate another man for ever.”</p> +<p>“I thought not, same as you, but Grimbal shaws we ’m +wrong.”</p> +<p>“Let us go, then; let us do what you thought to do ’fore +faither comed forward so kind. Let us go away to furrin paarts, even +now.”</p> +<p>“I doubt if he’d let me go. ’T is mouse an’ cat +for the minute. Leastways so he’s thought since he talked to ’e. +But he’ll knaw differ’nt ’fore he lies in his bed to-night. +Must be cut an’ dried an’ settled.”</p> +<p>“Be slow to act, Will, an’—”</p> +<p>“Theer! theer!” he said, “doan’t ’e offer me +no advice, theer’s a gude gal, ’cause I couldn’t stand it +even from you, just this minute. God knaws I’m not above takin’ +it in a general way, for the best tried man can larn from babes an’ +sucklings sometimes; but this is a thing calling for nothin’ but shut +lips. ’T is my job an’ I’ve got to see it through my own +way.”</p> +<p>“You’ll be patient, Will? ’T isn’t like other +times when you was right an’ him wrong. He’s got the whip-hand of +’e, so you mustn’t dictate.”</p> +<p>“Not me. I can be reasonable an’ just as any man. I never hid +from myself I was doin’ wrong at the time. But, when all’s said, +this auld history’s got two sides to it—’specially if you +remember that ’t was through John Grimbal’s awn act I had to do +wan wrong thing to save you doin’ a worse wan. He’ll have to be +reasonable likewise. ’T is man to man.”</p> +<p>Will’s conversation lasted another hour, but Phoebe could not shake +his determination, and after dinner Blanchard departed to the Red House, his +destination being known to his wife only.</p> +<p>But while Will marched upon this errand, the man he desired to see had +just left his own front door, struck through leafless coppices of larch and +silver beech that approached the house, and then proceeded to where bigger +timber stood about a little plateau of marshy land, surrounded by tall flags. +The woodlands had paid their debt to Nature in good gold, and all the trees +were naked. An east wind lent a hard, clean clearness to the country. In the +foreground two little lakes spread their waters steel-grey in a cup of lead; +the distance was clear and cold and compact of all sober colours save only +where, through a grey and interlacing nakedness of many boughs, the roof of +the Red House rose.</p> +<p>John Grimbal sat upon a felled tree beside the pools, and while he +remained motionless, his pipe unlighted, his gun beside him, a spaniel worked +below in the sere sedges at the water’s margin. Presently the dog +barked, a moor-hen splashed, half flying, half swimming, across the larger +lake, and a snipe got up and jerked crookedly away on the wind. The dog stood +with one fore-paw lifted and the water dripping along his belly. He waited +for a crack and puff of smoke and the thud of a bird falling into the water +or the underwood. But his master did not fire; he did not even see the +flushing of the snipe; so the dog came up and remonstrated with his eyes. +Grimbal patted the beast’s head, then rose from his seat on the felled +tree, stretched his arms, sat down again and lighted his pipe.</p> +<p>The event of the morning had turned his thoughts in the old direction, and +now they were wholly occupied with Will Blanchard. Since his fit of futile +spleen and fury after the meeting with Phoebe, John had slowly sunk back into +the former nerveless attitude. From this an occasional wonder roused +him—a wonder as to whether the woman had ever given her husband his +message at all. His recent active hatred seemed a little softened, though why +it should be so he could not have explained. Now he sometimes assured himself +that he should not proceed to extremities, but hang his sword over +Will’s head a while and possibly end by pardoning him altogether.</p> +<p>Thus he paltered with his better part and presented a spectacle of one +mentally sick unto death by reason of shattered purpose. His unity of design +was gone. He had believed the last conversation with Phoebe in itself +sufficient to waken his pristine passion, but anger against himself had been +a great factor of that storm, apart from which circumstance he made the +mistake of supposing that his passion slept, whereas in reality it was dead. +Now, if Grimbal was to be stung into activity, it must be along another line +and upon a fresh count.</p> +<p>Then, as he reflected by the little tarns, there approached Will Blanchard +himself; and Grimbal, looking up, saw him standing among white tussocks of +dead grass by the water-side and rubbing the mud off his boots upon them. For +a moment his breath quickened, but he was not surprised; and yet, before Will +reached him, he had time to wonder at himself that he was not.</p> +<p>Blanchard, calling at the Red House ten minutes after the master’s +departure, had been informed by old Lawrence Vallack, John’s factotum, +that he had come too late. It transpired, however, that Grimbal had taken his +gun and a dog, so Will, knowing the estate, made a guess at the +sportsman’s destination, and was helped on his way when he came within +earshot of the barking spaniel.</p> +<p>Now that animal resented his intrusion, and for a moment it appeared that +the brute’s master did also. Will had already seen Grimbal where he +sat, and came swiftly towards him.</p> +<p>“What are you doing here, William Blanchard? You’re +trespassing and you know it,” said the landowner loudly. “You can +have no business here.”</p> +<p>“Haven’t I? Then why for do’e send me +messages?”</p> +<p>Will stood straight and stern in front of his foe. His face was more +gloomy than the sombre afternoon; his jaw stood out very square; his grey +eyes were hard as the glint of the east wind. He might have been accuser, and +John Grimbal accused. The sportsman did not move from his seat upon the log. +But he felt a flush of blood pulse through him at the other’s voice, as +though his heart, long stagnant, was being sluiced.</p> +<p>“That? I’d forgotten all about it. You’ve taken your +time in obeying me.”</p> +<p>“This marnin’, an’ not sooner, I heard what you telled +her when you catched Phoebe alone.”</p> +<p>“Ah! now I understand the delay. Say what you’ve got to say, +please, and then get out of my sight.”</p> +<p>“’T is for you to speak, not me. What be you gwaine to do, +an’ when be you gwaine to do it? I allow you’ve bested me, God +knaws how; but you’ve got me down. So the sooner you say what your next +step is, the better.”</p> +<p>The older man laughed.</p> +<p>“’T isn’t the beaten party makes the terms as a +rule.”</p> +<p>“I want no terms; I wouldn’t make terms with you for a sure +plaace in heaven. Tell me what you be gwaine to do against me. I’ve a +right to knaw.”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell you.”</p> +<p>“You mean as you won’t tell me?”</p> +<p>“I mean I can’t—not yet. After speaking to your wife I +forgot all about it. It doesn’t interest me.”</p> +<p>“Be you gwaine to give me up?”</p> +<p>“Probably I shall—as a matter of duty. I’m a bit of a +soldier myself. It’s such a dirty coward’s trick to desert. Yes, +I think I shall make an example of you.”</p> +<p>Will looked at him steadily.</p> +<p>“You want to wake the devil in me—I see that. But you +won’t. I’m aulder an’ wiser now. So you ’m to give me +up? I knawed it wi’out axin’.”</p> +<p>“And that doesn’t wake you?”</p> +<p>“No. Seein’ why I deserted an’ mindin’ your share +in drivin’ me.”</p> +<p>Grimbal did not answer, and Will asked him to name a date.</p> +<p>“I tell you I shall suit myself, not you. When you will like it +least, be sure of that. I needn’t pretend what I don’t feel. I +hate the sight of you still, and the closer you come the more I hate you. It +rolls years off me to see your damned brown face so near and hear your voice +in my ear,—years and years; and I’m glad it does. You’ve +ruined my life, and I’ll ruin yours yet.”</p> +<p>There was a pause; Blanchard stared cold and hard into Grimbal’s +eyes; then John continued, and his flicker of passion cooled a little as he +did so,—</p> +<p>“At least that’s what I said to myself when first I heard this +little bit of news—that I’d ruin you; now I’m not +sure.”</p> +<p>“At least I’ll thank you to make up your mind. ’T is +turn an’ turn about. You be uppermost just this minute. As to ruining +me, that’s as may be.”</p> +<p>“Well, I shall decide presently. I suppose you won’t run away. +And it ’s no great matter if you do, for a fool can’t hide +himself under his folly.”</p> +<p>“I sha’n’t run. I want to get through with this and have +it behind me.”</p> +<p>“You ’re in a hurry now.”</p> +<p>“It ’s just an’ right. I knaw that. An’ +ban’t no gert odds who ’s informer. But I want to have it behind +me—an’ you in front. Do ’e see? This out o’ hand, +then it ’s my turn again. Keepin’ me waitin’ ’pon +such a point be tu small an’ womanish for a fight between men. ’T +is your turn to hit, Jan Grimbal, an’ theer ’s no guard +’gainst the stroke, so if you ’re a man, hit an’ have done +with it.”</p> +<p>“Ah! you don’t like the thought of waiting!”</p> +<p>“No, I do not. I haven’t got your snake’s patience. Let +me have what I’ve got to have, an’ suffer it, an’ make +an’ end of it.”</p> +<p>“You ’re in a hurry for a dish that won’t be pleasant +eating, I assure you.”</p> +<p>“It’s just an’ right I tell ’e; an’ I knaw +it is, though all these years cover it. Your paart ’s differ’nt. +I lay you ’m in a worse hell than me, even now.”</p> +<p>“A moralist! How d’ you like the thought of a damned good +flogging—fifty lashes laid on hot and strong?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t you wish you had the job? Thrashing of a man wi’ +his legs an’ hands tied would just suit your sort of +courage.”</p> +<p>“As to that, they won’t flog you really; and I fancy I could +thrash you still without any help. Your memory ’s short. Never mind. +Get you gone now; and never speak to me again as long as you live, or I shall +probably hit you across the mouth with my riding-whip. As to giving you up, +you ’re in my hands and must wait my time for that.”</p> +<p>“Must I, by God? Hark to a fule talkin’! Why should I wait +your pleasure, an’ me wi’ a tongue in my head? You’ve jawed +long enough. Now you can listen. I’ll give <i>myself</i> up, so theer! +I’ll tell the truth, an’ what drove me to desert, an’ what +you be anyway—as goes ridin’ out wi’ the yeomanry so braave +in black an’ silver with your sword drawed! That’ll spoil your +market for pluck an’ valour, anyways. An’ when I’ve done +all court-martial gives me, I’ll come back!”</p> +<p>He swung away as he spoke; and the other sat on motionless for an hour +after Will had departed.</p> +<p>John Grimbal’s pipe went out; his dog, weary of waiting, crept to +his feet and fell asleep there; live fur and feathers peeped about and +scanned his bent figure, immobile as a tree-trunk that supported it; and the +gun, lying at hand, drew down a white light from a gathering gloaming.</p> +<p>One great desire was in the sportsman’s mind,—he already found +himself hungry for another meeting with Blanchard.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XI" name="IV_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI<br /> +PHOEBE TAKES THOUGHT</h2> +<p>That night Will sat and smoked in his bedroom and talked to Phoebe, who +had already gone to rest. She looked over her knees at him with round, sad +eyes; while beside her in a cot slept her small daughter. A candle burned on +the mantelpiece and served to illuminate one or two faded pictures; a +daguerreotype of Phoebe as a child sitting on a donkey, and an ancient +silhouette of Miller Lyddon, cut for him on his visit to the Great +Exhibition. In a frame beneath these appeared the photograph of little Will +who had died at Newtake.</p> +<p>“He thinks he be gwaine to bide his time an’ let me stew +an’ sweat for it,” said the man moodily.</p> +<p>“Awnly a born devil could tell such wickedness. Ban’t theer no +ways o’ meetin’ him, now you knaw? If you’d speak to +faither—”</p> +<p>“What ’s the use bringing sorrow on his grey hairs?”</p> +<p>“Well, it’s got to come; you knaw that. Grimbal isn’t +the man to forgive.”</p> +<p>“Forgive! That would be worst of all. If he forgived me now +I’d go mad. Wait till I’ve had soldier law, then us’ll talk +’bout forgiving arter.”</p> +<p>Phoebe shivered and began to cry helplessly, drying her eyes upon the +sheet.</p> +<p>“Theer—theer,” he said; “doan’t be a cheel. +We ’m made o’ stern stuff, you an’ me. ’T is awnly a +matter of years, I s’pose, an’ the reason I went may lessen the +sentence a bit. Mother won’t never turn against me, an’ so long +as your faither can forgive, the rest of the world’s welcome to look so +black as it pleases.”</p> +<p>“Faither’ll forgive ’e.”</p> +<p>“He might—just wance more. He’ve got to onderstand my +points better late days.”</p> +<p>“Come an’ sleep then, an’ fret no more till +marnin’ light anyway.”</p> +<p>“’Tis the thing hidden, hanging over my head, biding behind +every corner. I caan’t stand it; I caan’t wait for it. I’ll +grow sheer devil if I’ve got to wait; an’, so like as not, +I’ll meet un faace to faace some day an’ send un wheer neither +his bark nor bite will harm me. Ess fay—solemn truth. I won’t +answer for it. I can put so tight a hand ’pon myself as any man since +Job, but to sit down under this—”</p> +<p>“Theer’s nought else you can do,” said Phoebe. She +yawned as she spoke, but Will’s reply strangled the yawn and +effectually woke her up.</p> +<p>“So Jan Grimbal said, an’ I blamed soon shawed un he was out. +Theer’s a thing I can do an’ shall do. ’T will sweep the +ground from under un; ’t will blaw off his vengeance harmless as a gun +fired in the air; ’t will turn his malice so sour as beer after +thunder. I be gwaine to give myself up—then us’ll see who’s +the fule!”</p> +<p>Phoebe was out of bed with her arms round her husband in a moment.</p> +<p>“No, no—never. You couldn’t, Will; you +daren’t—’tis against nature. You ban’t free to do no +such wild thing. You forget me, an’ the li’l maid, an’ +t’ other comin’!”</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e choke me,” he said; “an’ +doan’t ’e look so terrified. Your small hands caan’t keep +off what’s ahead o’ me; an’ I wouldn’t let ’em +if they could. ’T is in this world that a chap’s got to pay for +his sins most times, an’ damn short credit, tu, so far as I can see. So +what they want to bleat ’bout hell-fire for I’ve never +onderstood, seeing you get your change here. Anyway, so sure as I do a trick +that ban’t ’zactly wise, the whip ’s allus behind +it—the whip—”</p> +<p>He repeated the word in a changed voice, for it reminded him of what +Grimbal had threatened. He did not know whether there might be truth in it. +His pride winced and gasped. He thought of Phoebe seeing his bare back +perhaps years afterwards. A tempest of rage blackened his face and he spoke +in a voice hoarse and harsh.</p> +<p>“Get up an’ go to bed. Doan’t whine, for God’s +sake, or you’ll drive me daft. I’ve paid afore, an’ +I’ll pay again; an’ may the Lard help him who ever owes me ought. +No mercy have I ever had from living man,—’cept +Miller,—none will I ever shaw.”</p> +<p>“Not to-morrow, Will—not this week. Promise that, an’ +I’ll get into bed an’ bide quiet. For your love o’ me, just +leave it till arter Christmas time. Promise that, else you’ll kill me. +No, no, no—you shaa’n’t shout me down ’pon this. +I’ll cry to ’e while I’ve got life left. Promise not till +Christmas be past.”</p> +<p>“I’ll promise nothing. I must think in the peace o’ +night. Go to sleep an ’bide quiet, else you’ll wake the +li’l gal.”</p> +<p>“I won’t—I won’t—I’ll never sleep +again. Caan’ t’e think o’ me so well as yourself—you +as be allus thinking o’ me? Ban’t I to count in an awful pass +like this? I’m no fair-weather wife, as you knaws by now. If you gives +yourself up, I’ll kill myself. You think I couldn’t, but I could. +What’s my days away from you?”</p> +<p>“Hush, hush!” he said. “Be you mad? ’T is a matter +tu small for such talk as that.”</p> +<p>“Promise, then, promise you’ll be dumb till arter +Christmas.”</p> +<p>“So I will, if you ’m that set on it; but if you knawed what +waitin’ meant to the likes o’ me, you wouldn’t ax. +You’ve got my word, now keep quiet, theer ’s a dear love, +an’ dry your eyes.”</p> +<p>He put her into bed, and soon stretched himself beside her. Then she clung +to him as though powers were already dragging him away for ever. Will, bored +and weary, was sorry for his wife with all his soul, and kept grunting words +of good cheer and comfort as he sank to sleep. She still begged and prayed +for delay, and by her importunity made him promise at last that he would take +no step until after New Year’s Day. Then, finding she could win no more +in that direction, Phoebe turned to another aspect of the problem, and began +to argue with unexpected if sophistic skill. Her tears were now dry, her eyes +very bright beneath the darkness; she talked and talked with feverish +volubility, and her voice faded into a long-drawn murmur as Will’s +hearing weakened on the verge of unconsciousness.</p> +<p>“Why for d’ you say you was wrong in what you done? Why +d’ you harp an’ harp ’pon that, knawin’ right well +you’d do the same again to-morrow? You wasn’t wrong, an’ +the Queen’s self would say the same if she knawed. ’T was to save +a helpless woman you runned; an’ her—Queen +Victoria—wi’ her big heart as can sigh for the sorrow of even +such small folks as us—she’d be the last to blame +’e.”</p> +<p>“She’ll never knaw nothin’ ’bout it, gude or bad. +They doan’t vex her ears wi’ trifles. I deserted, an’ +that’s a crime.”</p> +<p>“I say ’t weern’t no such thing. You had to choose +between that an’ letting me die. You saved my life; an’ the facts +would be judged the same by any as was wife an’ mother, high or low. +God A’mighty ’s best an’ awnly judge how much you was +wrong; an’ you knaw He doan’t blame ’e, else your heart +would have been sore for it these years an’ years. You never blamed +yourself till now.”</p> +<p>“Ess, awften an’ awften I did. It comed an’ went, +an’ comed an’ went again, like winter frosts. True as I’m +living it comed an’ went like that.”</p> +<p>Thus he spoke, half incoherently, his voice all blurred and vague with +sleep.</p> +<p>“You awnly think ’t was so. You’d never have sat down +under it else. It ban’t meant you should give yourself up now, anyways. +God would have sent the sojers to find ’e when you runned away if +He’d wanted ’em to find ’e. You didn’t hide. You +looked the world in the faace bold as a lion, didn’t ’e? Coourse +you did; an’ ’t is gwaine against God’s will an’ wish +for you to give yourself up now. So you mustn’t speak an’ you +must tell no one—not even faither. I was wrong to ax ’e to tell +him. Nobody at all must knaw. Be dumb, an’ trust me to be dumb. +’T is buried an’ forgot. I’ll fight for ’e, my +dearie, same as you’ve fought for me many a time; an’ ’t +will all fall out right for ’e, for men ’s come through worse +passes than this wi’ fewer friends than what you’ve +got.”</p> +<p>She stopped to win breath and, in the silence, heard Will’s regular +respiration and knew that he slept. How much he had heard of her speech +Phoebe could not say, but she felt glad to think that some hours at least of +rest and peace now awaited him. For herself she had never been more widely +awake, and her brains were very busy through the hours of darkness. A hundred +thoughts and schemes presented themselves. She gradually eliminated everybody +from the main issue but Will, John Grimbal, and herself; and, pursuing the +argument, began to suspect that she alone had power to right the wrong. In +one direction only could such an opinion lead—a direction tremendous to +her. Yet she did not shrink from the necessity ahead; she strung herself up +to face it; she longed for an opportunity and resolved to make one at the +earliest moment.</p> +<p>Now that night was the longest in the whole year; and yet to Phoebe it +passed with magic celerity.</p> +<p>Will awakened about half-past five, rose immediately according to his +custom, lighted a candle, and started to dress himself. He began the day in +splendid spirits, begotten of good sleep and good health; but his wife saw +the lightness of heart, the bustling activity of body, sink into apathy and +inertia as remembrance overtook his wakening hour. It was like a brief and +splendid dawn crushed by storm-clouds at the very rise of the sun.</p> +<p>Phoebe presently dressed her little daughter and, as soon as the child had +gone down-stairs, Will resumed the problems of his position.</p> +<p>“I be in two minds this marnin’,” he said. +“I’ve a thought to tell mother of this matter. She ’m that +wise, I’ve knawed her put me on the right track ’fore now, +an’ never guess she’d done it. Not but what I allus awn up to +taking advice, if I follow it, an’ no man ’s readier to profit by +the wisdom of his betters than me. That’s how I’ve done all I +have done in my time. T’ other thought was to take your counsel +an’ see Miller ’pon it.”</p> +<p>“I was wrong, Will—quite wrong. I’ve been thinking, tu. +He mustn’t knaw, nor yet mother, nor nobody. Quite enough knaws as +’t is.”</p> +<p>“What’s the wisdom o’ talkin’ like that? Who +’s gwaine to hide the thing, even if they wanted to? God knaws I +ban’t. I’d like, so well as not, to go up Chagford next +market-day an’ shout out the business afore the world.”</p> +<p>“You can’t now. You must wait. You promised. I thought about +it with every inch of my brain last night, an’ I got a sort of +feeling—I caan’t explain, but wait. I’ve trusted you all my +life long an’ allus shall; now ’t is your turn to trust me, just +this wance. I’ve got great thoughts. I see the way; I may do much +myself. You see, Jan Grimbal—”</p> +<p>Will stood still with his chin half shorn.</p> +<p>“You dare to do that,” he said, “an’ I’ll +raise Cain in this plaace; I’ll—”</p> +<p>He broke off and laughed at himself.</p> +<p>“Here be I blusterin’ like a gert bully now! Doan’t be +feared, Phoebe. Forgive my noise. You mean so well, but you caan’t hide +your secrets, fortunately. Bless your purty eyes—tu gude for me, +an’ allus was, braave li’l woman!</p> +<p>“But no more of that—no seekin’ him, an’ no speech +with him, if that’s the way your poor, silly thought was. My bones +smart to think of you bearin’ any of it. But doan’t you put no +oar into this troubled water, else the bwoat’ll capsize, sure as death. +I’ve promised ’e not to say a word till arter New Year; now you +must promise me never, so help you, to speak to that man, or look at un, or +listen to a word from un. Fly him like you would the devil; an’ a gude +second to the devil he is—if ’t is awnly in the matter o’ +patience. Promise now.”</p> +<p>“You ’m so hasty, Will. You doan’t onderstand a +woman’s cleverness in such matters. ’T is just the fashion thing +as shaws what we ’m made of.”</p> +<p>“Promise!” he thundered angrily. “Now, this instant +moment, in wan word.”</p> +<p>She gave him a single defiant glance. Then the boldness of her eyes faded +and her lips drooped at the corners.</p> +<p>“I promise, then.”</p> +<p>“I should think you did.”</p> +<p>A few minutes later Will was gone, and Phoebe dabbed her moist eyes and +blamed herself for so clumsily revealing her great intention,—to see +John Grimbal and plead with him. This secret ambition was now swept away, and +she knew not where to turn or how to act for her husband.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XII" name="IV_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII<br /> +NEW YEAR’S EVE AND NEW YEAR’S DAY</h2> +<p>From this point in his career Will Blanchard, who lacked all power of +hiding his inner heart, soon made it superficially apparent that new troubles +had overtaken him. No word concerning his intolerable anxieties escaped him, +but a great cloud of tribulation encompassed every hour, and was revealed to +others by increased petulance and shortness of temper. This mental friction +quickly appeared on the young man’s face, and his habitual expression +of sulkiness which formerly belied him, now increased and more nearly +reflected the reigning temperament of Blanchard’s mind. His nerves were +on the rack and he grew sullen and fretful. A dreary expression gained upon +his features, an expression sad as a winter twilight brushed with rain. To +Phoebe he seldom spoke of the matter, and she soon abandoned further attempts +to intrude upon his heart though her own was breaking for him. Billy Blee and +the farm hands were Will’s safety-valve. One moment he showered hard +and bitter words; the next, at sight of some ploughboy’s tears or older +man’s reasonable anger, Will instantly relented and expressed his +sorrow. The dullest among them grew in time to discern matters were amiss +with him, for his tormented mind began to affect his actions and disorder the +progress of his life. At times he worked laboriously and did much with his +own hands that might have been left to others; but his energy was displayed +in a manner fitful and spasmodic; occasionally he would vanish altogether for +four-and-twenty hours or more; and none knew when he might appear or +disappear.</p> +<p>It happened on New Year’s Eve that a varied company assembled at the +“Green Man” according to ancient custom. Here were Inspector +Chown, Mr. Chapple, Mr. Blee, Charles Coomstock, with many others; and the +assembly was further enriched by the presence of the bell-ringers. Their +services would be demanded presently to toll out the old year, to welcome +with joyful peal the new; and they assembled here until closing time that +they might enjoy a pint of the extra strong liquor a prosperous publican +provided for his customers at this season.</p> +<p>The talk was of Blanchard, and Mr. Blee, provided with a theme which +always challenged his most forcible diction, discussed Will freely and +without prejudice.</p> +<p>“I ’most goes in fear of my life, I tell ’e; but thank +God ’t is the beginning of the end. He’ll spread his wings afore +spring and be off again, or I doan’t knaw un. Ess fay, he’ll +depart wi’ his fiery nature an’ horrible ideas ’pon +manuring of land; an’ a gude riddance for Monks Barton, I +say.”</p> +<p>“’Mazing ’t is,” declared Mr. Coomstock, +“that he should look so black all times, seeing the gude fortune as +turns up for un when most he wants it.”</p> +<p>“So ’t is,” admitted Billy. “The faace of un weer +allus sulky, like to the faace of a auld ram cat, as may have a gude heart in +un for all his glowerin’ eyes. But him! Theer ban’t no +pleasin’ un. What do he want? Surely never no man ’s failed on +his feet awftener.”</p> +<p>“’T is that what ’s spoilin’ un, I reckon,” +said Mr. Chappie. “A li’l ill-fortune he wants now, same as a +salad o’ green stuff wants some bite to it. He’d grumble in +heaven, by the looks of un. An’ yet it do shaw the patience of God +wi’ human sawls.”</p> +<p>“Ess, it do,” answered Mr. Blee; “but patience +ban’t a virtue, pushed tu far. Justice is justice, as I’ve said +more ’n wance to Miller an’ Blanchard, tu, an’ a man of my +years can see wheer justice lies so clear as God can. For why? Because theer +ban’t room for two opinions. I’ve give my Maker best scores +an’ scores o’ times, as we all must; but truth caan’t +alter, an’ having put thinking paarts into our heads, ’t is more +’n God A’mighty’s Self can do to keep us from usin’ +of’em.”</p> +<p>“A tremenjous thought,” said Mr. Chapple.</p> +<p>“So ’t is. An’ what I want to knaw is, why should +Blanchard have his fling, an’ treat me like dirt, an’ ride +rough-shod awver his betters, an’ scowl at the sky all times, an’ +nothin’ said?”</p> +<p>“Providence doan’t answer a question just ’cause we +’m pleased to ax wan,” said Abraham Chown. “What happens +happens, because ’t is foreordained, an’ you caan’t judge +the right an’ wrong of a man’s life from wan year or two or ten, +more ’n you can judge a glass o’ ale by a tea-spoon of it. Many +has a long rope awnly to hang themselves in the end, by the wonnerful +foresight of God.”</p> +<p>“All the same, theer’d be hell an’ Tommy to pay mighty +quick, if you an’ me did the things that bwoy does, an’ carried +on that onreligious,” replied Mr. Blee, with gloomy conviction. +“Ban’t fair to other people, an’ if ’t was Doomsday +I’d up an’ say so. What gude deeds have he done to have life +smoothed out, an’ the hills levelled an’ the valleys filled up? +An’ nought but sour looks for it.”</p> +<p>“But be you sure he ’m happy?” inquired Mr. Chapple. +“He ’m not the man to walk ’bout wi’ a fiddle-faace +if ’t was fair weather wi’ un. He’ve got his troubles same +as us, depend upon it.”</p> +<p>Blanchard himself entered at this moment. It wanted but half an hour to +closing time when he did so, and he glanced round the bar, snorted at the +thick atmosphere of alcohol and smoke, then pulled out his pipe and took a +vacant chair.</p> +<p>“Gude evenin’, Will,” said Mr. Chapple.</p> +<p>“A happy New Year, Blanchard,” added the landlord.</p> +<p>“Evening, sawls all,” answered Will, nodding round him. +“Auld year’s like to die o’ frost by the looks of +it—a stinger, I tell ’e. Anybody seen Farmer Endicott? I’ve +been looking for un since noon wi’ a message from my +faither-in-law.”</p> +<p>“I gived thicky message this marnin’,” cried Billy.</p> +<p>“Ess, I knaw you did; that’s my trouble. You gived it wrong. +I’ll just have a pint of the treble X then. ’T is the night for +’t.”</p> +<p>Will’s demeanour belied the recent conversation respecting him. He +appeared to be in great spirits, joked with the men, exchanged shafts with +Billy, and was the first to roar with laughter when Mr. Blee got the better +of him in a brisk battle of repartee. Truth to tell, the young man’s +heart felt somewhat lighter, and with reason. To-morrow his promise to Phoebe +held him no longer, and his carking, maddening trial of patience was to end. +The load would drop from his shoulders at daylight. His letter to Mr. Lyddon +had been written; in the morning the miller must read it before breakfast, +and learn that his son-in-law had started for Plymouth to give himself up for +the crime of the past. John Grimbal had made no sign, and the act of +surrender would now be voluntary—a thought which lightened +Blanchard’s heart and induced a turn of temper almost jovial. He joined +a chorus, laughed with the loudest, and contrived before closing time to +drink a pint and a half of the famous special brew. Then the bell-ringers +departed to their duties, and Mr. Chapple with Mr. Blee, Will, and one or two +other favoured spirits spent a further half-hour in their host’s +private parlour, and there consumed a little sloe gin, to steady the humming +ale.</p> +<p>“You an’ me must see wan another home,” said Will when +he and Mr. Blee departed into the frosty night.</p> +<p>“Fust time as ever you give me an arm,” murmured Billy.</p> +<p>“Won’t be the last, I’m sure,” declared Will.</p> +<p>“I’ve allus had a gude word for ’e ever since I knawed +’e,” answered Billy.</p> +<p>“An’ why for shouldn’t ’e?” asked Will.</p> +<p>“Beginning of New Year ’s a solemn sarcumstance,” +proceeded Billy, as a solitary bell began to toll. “Theer ’s the +death-rattle of eighteen hunderd an’ eighty-six! Well, well, we must +all die—men an’ mice.”</p> +<p>“An’ the devil take the hindmost.”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee chuckled.</p> +<p>“Let ’s go round this way,” he said.</p> +<p>“Why? Ban’t your auld bones ready for bed yet? Theer ’s +nought theer but starlight an’ frost.”</p> +<p>“Be gormed to the frost! I laugh at it. Ban’t that. ’T +is the Union workhouse, wheer auld Lezzard lies. I likes to pass, an’ +nod to un as he sits on the lew side o’ the wall in his white coat, +chumping his thoughts between his gums.”</p> +<p>“He ’m happier ’n me or you, I lay.”</p> +<p>“Not him! You should see un glower ’pon me when I gives un +’gude day.’ I tawld un wance as the Poor Rates was up +somethin’ cruel since he’d gone in the House, an’ he looked +as though he’d ’a’ liked to do me violence. No, he +ban’t happy, I warn ’e.”</p> +<p>“Well, you won’t see un sitting under the stars in his white +coat, poor auld blid. He ’m asleep under the blankets, I +lay.”</p> +<p>“Thin wans! Thin blankets an’ not many of ’em. An’ +all his awn doin’. Patent justice, if ever I seed it.”</p> +<p>“Tramp along! You can travel faster ’n that. Ess fay! Justice +is the battle-cry o’ God against men most times. Maybe they ’m +strong on it in heaven, but theer ’s damned little filters down here. +Theer go the bells! Another New Year come. Years o’ the Lard they call +’em! Years o’ the devil most times, if you ax me. What do +’e want the New Year to bring to you, Billy?”</p> +<p>“A contented ’eart,” said Mr. Blee, “an’ +perhaps just half-a-crown more a week, if ’t was seemly. Brains be paid +higher ’n sweat in this world, an’ I’m mostly brain now in +my dealin’s wi’ Miller. A brain be like a nut, as ripens all the +year through an’ awnly comes to be gude for gathering when the tree +’s in the sere. ’T is in the autumn of life a man’s brain +be worth plucking like—eh?”</p> +<p>“Doan’t knaw. They ’m maggoty mostly at your +age!”</p> +<p>“An’ they ’m milky mostly at yourn!”</p> +<p>“Listen to the bells an’ give awver chattering,” said +Will.</p> +<p>“After gude store o’ drinks, a sad thing like holy bells +ringing in the dark afar off do sting my nose an’ bring a drop to my +eye,” confessed Mr. Blee. “An’ you—why, theer +’s a baaby hid away in the New Year for you—a human creature as +may do gert wonders in the land an’ turn out into Antichrist, for all +you can say positive. Theer ’s a braave thought for +’e!”</p> +<p>This remark sobered Blanchard and his mind travelled into the future, to +Phoebe, to the child coming in June.</p> +<p>Billy babbled on, and presently they reached Mrs. Blanchard’s +cottage. Damaris herself, with a shawl over her head, stood and listened to +the bells, and Will, taking leave of Mr. Blee, hastened to wish his mother +all happiness in the year now newly dawned. He walked once or twice up and +down the little garden beside her, and with a tongue loosened by liquor came +near to telling her of his approaching action, but did not do so. Meantime +Mr. Blee steered himself with all caution over Rushford Bridge to Monks +Barton.</p> +<p>Presently the veteran appeared before his master and Phoebe, who had +waited for the advent of the New Year before retiring. Miller Lyddon was +about to suggest a night-cap for Billy, but changed his mind.</p> +<p>“Enough ’s as gude as a feast,” he said. “Canst +get up-stairs wi’out help?”</p> +<p>“Coourse I can! But the chap to the ‘Green Man’s’ +that perfuse wi’ his liquor at seasons of rejoicing. More went down +than was chalked up; I allow that. If you’ll light my chamber cannel, +I’ll thank ’e, missis; an’ a Happy New Year to +all.”</p> +<p>Phoebe obeyed, launched Mr. Blee in the direction of his chamber, then +turned to receive Will’s caress as he came home and locked the door +behind him.</p> +<p>The night air still carried the music of the bells. For an hour they +pealed on; then the chime died slowly, a bell at a time, until two clanged +each against the other. Presently one stopped and the last, weakening softly, +beat a few strokes more, then ceased to fret the frosty birth-hour of another +year.</p> +<p>The darkness slipped away, and Blanchard who had long learned to rise +without awakening his wife, was up and dressed again soon after five +o’clock. He descended silently, placed a letter on the mantelpiece in +the kitchen, abstracted a leg of goose and a hunch of bread from the larder, +then set out upon a chilly walk of five miles to Moreton Hampstead. From +there he designed to take train and proceed to Plymouth as directly and +speedily as possible.</p> +<p>Some two hours later Will’s letter found itself in Mr. +Lyddon’s hand, and his father-in-law learnt the secret. Phoebe was +almost as amazed as the miller himself when this knowledge came to her ear; +for Will had not breathed his intention to her, and no suspicion had crossed +his wife’s mind that he intended to act with such instant promptitude +on the expiration of their contract.</p> +<p>“I doubted I knawed him through an’ through at last, but +’t is awnly to-day, an’ after this, that I can say as I +do,” mused Mr. Lyddon over an untasted breakfast. “To think he +runned them awful risks to make you fast to him! To think he corned all +across England in the past to make you his wife against the danger on wan +side, an’ the power o’ Jan Grimbal an’ me drawed up +’pon the other!”</p> +<p>Pursuing this strain to Phoebe’s heartfelt relief, the miller +neither assumed an attitude of great indignation at Will’s action nor +affected despair of his future. He was much bewildered, however.</p> +<p>“He’ll keep me ’mazed so long as I live, ’pears to +me. But he ’m gone for the present, an’ I doan’t say +I’m sorry, knawin’ what was behind. No call for you to sob +yourself into a fever. Please God, he’ll be back long ’fore you +want him. Us’ll make the least we can of it, an’ bide patient +until we hear tell of him. He’ve gone to Plymouth—that’s +all Chagford needs to knaw at present.”</p> +<p>“Theer ’s newspapers an’ Jan Grimbal,” sobbed +Phoebe.</p> +<p>“A dark man wi’ fixed purposes, sure enough,” admitted +her father, for Will’s long letter had placed all the facts before him. +“What he’ll do us caan’t say, though, seein’ +Will’s act, theer ’s nothin’ more left for un. Why has the +man been silent so long if he meant to strike in the end? Now I must go +an’ tell Mrs. Blanchard. Will begs an’ prays of me to do that so +soon as he shall be gone; an’ he ’m right. She ought to knaw; but +’t is a job calling for careful choice of words an’ a light hand. +Wonder is to me he didn’t tell her hisself. But he never does what +you’d count ’pon his doing.”</p> +<p>“You won’t tell Billy, faither, will ’e? Ban’t no +call for that.”</p> +<p>“I won’t tell him, certainly not; but Blee ’s a ferret +when a thing ’s hid. A detective mind theer is to Billy. How would it +do to tell un right away an’ put un ’pon his honour to say +nothing?”</p> +<p>“He mustn’t knaw; he mustn’t knaw. He couldn’t +keep a secret like that if you gived un fifty pounds to keep it. So soon tell +a town-crier as him.”</p> +<p>“Then us won’t,” promised Mr. Lyddon, and ten minutes +after he proceeded to Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage with the news. His first +hasty survey of the position had not been wholly unfavourable to Will, but he +was a man of unstable mind in his estimates of human character, and now he +chiefly occupied his thoughts with the offence of desertion from the army. +The disgrace of such an action magnified itself as he reflected upon +Will’s unhappy deed.</p> +<p>Phoebe, meantime, succumbed and found herself a helpless prey of terrors +vague and innumerable. Will’s fate she could not guess at; but she felt +it must be severe; she doubted not that his sentence would extend over long +years. In her dejection and misery she mourned for herself and wondered what +manner of babe would this be that now took substance through a season of such +gloom and accumulated sorrows. The thought begat pity for the coming little +one,—utmost commiseration that set Phoebe’s tears flowing +anew,—and when the miller returned he found his daughter stricken +beyond measure and incoherent under her grief. But Mr. Lyddon came back with +a companion, and it was her husband, not her father, who dried Phoebe’s +eyes and cheered her lonely heart. Will, indeed, appeared and stood by her +suddenly; and she heard his voice and cried a loud thanksgiving and clasped +him close.</p> +<p>Yet no occasion for rejoicing had brought about this unexpected +reappearance. Indeed, more ill-fortune was responsible for it. When Mr. +Lyddon arrived at Mrs. Blanchard’s gate, he found both Will and Doctor +Parsons standing there, then learnt the incident that had prevented his +son-in-law’s proposed action.</p> +<p>Passing that way himself some hours earlier, Will had been suddenly +surprised to see blue smoke rising from a chimney of the house. It was a very +considerable time before such event might reasonably be expected and a second +look alarmed Blanchard’s heart, for on the little chimney-stack he knew +each pot, and it was not the kitchen chimney but that of his mother’s +bedroom which now sent evidence of a newly lighted fire into the morning.</p> +<p>In a second Will’s plans and purposes were swept away before this +spectacle. A fire in a bedroom represented a circumstance almost outside his +experience. At least it indicated sickness unto death. He was in the house a +moment later, for the latch lifted at his touch; and when he knocked at his +mother’s door and cried his name, she bade him come in.</p> +<p>“What’s this? What’s amiss with ’e, mother? +Doan’t say ’t is anything very bad. I seed the smoke an’ my +heart stood still.”</p> +<p>She smiled and assured him her illness was of no account.</p> +<p>“Ban’t nothing. Just a shivering an’ stabbing in the +chest. My awn fulishness to be out listening to they bells in the frost. But +no call to fear. I awnly axed my li’l servant to get me a cup o’ +tea, an’ she comed an’ would light the fire, an’ would go +for doctor, though theer ban’t no ’casion at all.”</p> +<p>“Every occasion, an’ the gal was right, an’ it shawed +gude sense in such a dinky maid as her. Nothin’ like taaking a cold in +gude time. Do ’e catch heat from the fire?”</p> +<p>Mrs. Blanchard’s eyes were dull, and her breathing a little +disordered. Will instantly began to bustle about. He added fuel to the flame, +set on a kettle, dragged blankets out of cupboards and piled them upon his +mother. Then he found a pillow-case, aired it until the thing scorched, +inserted a pillow, and placed it beneath the patient’s head. His +subsequent step was to rummage dried marshmallows out of a drawer, concoct a +sort of dismal brew, and inflict a cup upon the sick woman. Doctor Parsons +still tarrying, Will went out of doors, knocked a brick from the fowl-house +wall, brought it in, made it nearly red hot, then wrapped it up in an old rug +and applied it to his parent’s feet,—all of which things the sick +woman patiently endured.</p> +<p>“You ’m doin’ me a power o’ gude, dearie,” +she said, as her discomfort and suffering increased.</p> +<p>Presently Doctor Parsons arrived, checked Will in fantastic experiments +with a poultice, and gave him occupation in a commission to the +physician’s surgery. When he returned, he heard that his mother was +suffering from a severe chill, but that any definite declaration upon the +case was as yet impossible.</p> +<p>“No cause to be ’feared?” he asked.</p> +<p>“’T is idle to be too sanguine. You know my philosophy. +I’ve seen a scratched finger kill a man; I’ve known puny babes +wriggle out of Death’s hand when I could have sworn it had closed upon +them for good and all. Where there ’s life there ’s +hope.”</p> +<p>“Ess, I knaw you,” answered Will gloomily; “an’ I +knaw when you say that you allus mean there ban’t no hope at +all.”</p> +<p>“No, no. A strong, hale woman like your mother need not give us any +fear at present. Sleep and rest, cheerful faces round her, and no amateur +physic. I’ll see her to-night and send in a nurse from the Cottage +Hospital at once.”</p> +<p>Then it was that Miller Lyddon arrived, and presently Will returned home. +He wholly mistook Phoebe’s frantic reception, and assumed that her +tears must be flowing for Mrs. Blanchard.</p> +<p>“She’ll weather it,” he said. “Keep a gude heart. +The gal from the hospital ban’t coming ’cause theer ’s +danger, but ’cause she ’m smart an’ vitty ’bout a +sick room, an’ cheerful as a canary an’ knaws her business. Quick +of hand an’ light of foot for sartin. Mother’ll be all right; I +feel it deep in me she will.”</p> +<p>Presently conversation passed to Will himself, and Phoebe expressed a hope +this sad event would turn him from his determination for some time at +least.</p> +<p>“What determination?” he asked. “What be talkin’ +about?”</p> +<p>“The letter you left for faither, and the thing you started to +do,” she answered.</p> +<p>“’S truth! So I did; an’ if the sight o’ the smoke +an’ then hearin’ o’ mother’s trouble didn’t +blaw the whole business out of my brain!”</p> +<p>He stood amazed at his own complete forgetfulness.</p> +<p>“Queer, to be sure! But coourse theer weern’t room in my mind +for anything but mother arter I seed her stricken down.”</p> +<p>During the evening, after final reports from Mrs. Blanchard’s +sick-room spoke of soothing sleep, Miller Lyddon sent Billy upon an errand, +and discussed Will’s position.</p> +<p>“Jan Grimbal ’s waited so long,” he said, “that +maybe he’ll wait longer still an’ end by doin’ +nothin’ at all.”</p> +<p>“Not him! You judge the man by yourself,” declared Will. +“But he ’s made of very different metal. I lay he’s +bidin’ till the edge of this be sharp and sure to cut deepest. So like +’s not, when he hears tell mother ’s took bad he’ll choose +that instant moment to have me marched away.”</p> +<p>There was a moment’s silence, then Blanchard burst out into a fury +bred of sudden thought, and struck the table heavily with his fist.</p> +<p>“God blast it! I be allus waitin’ now for some wan’s +vengeance! I caan’t stand this life no more. I caan’t an’ I +won’t—’t is enough to soften any man’s +wits.”</p> +<p>“Quiet! quiet, caan’t ’e?” said the miller, as +though he told a dog to lie down. “Theer now! You’ve been +an’ gived me palpitations with your noise. Banging tables won’t +mend it, nor bad words neither. This thing hasn’t come by chance. You +’m ripening in mind an’ larnin’ every day. You mark my +word; theer ’s a mort o’ matters to pick out of this new trouble. +An’ fust, patience.”</p> +<p>“Patience! If a patient, long-suffering man walks this airth, I be +him, I should reckon. I caan’t wait the gude pleasure of that dog, not +even for you, Miller.”</p> +<p>“’T is discipline, an’ sent for the strengthening of +your fibre. Providence barred the road to-day, else you’d be in prison +now. Ban’t meant you should give yourself up—that’s how I +read it.”</p> +<p>“’T is cowardly, waitin’ an’ playin’ into +his hands; an’ if you awnly knawed how this has fouled my mind +wi’ evil, an’ soured the very taste of what I eat, an’ +dulled the faace of life, an’ blunted the right feeling in me even for +them I love best, you’d never bid me bide on under it. ’T is +rotting me—body an’ sawl—that’s what ’t is +doin’. An’ now I be come to such a pass that if I met un +to-morrow an’ he swore on his dying oath he’d never tell, I +shouldn’t be contented even wi’ that.”</p> +<p>“No such gude fortune,” sighed Phoebe.</p> +<p>“’T wouldn’t be gude fortune,” answered her +husband. “I’m like a dirty chamber coated wi’ cobwebs +an’ them ghostly auld spiders as hangs dead in unsecured corners. +Plaaces so left gets worse. My mind ’s all in a ferment, an’ +’t wouldn’t be none the better now if Jan Grimbal broke his +damned neck to-morrow an’ took my secret with him. I caan’t +breathe for it; it ’s suffocating me.”</p> +<p>Phoebe used subtlety in her answer, and invited him to view the position +from her standpoint rather than his own.</p> +<p>“Think o’ me, then, an’ t’ others. ’T is +plain selfishness, this talk, if you looks to the bottom of it.”</p> +<p>“As to that, I doan’t say so,” began Mr. Lyddon, slowly +stuffing his pipe. “No. When a man goes so deep into his heart as what +Will have before me this minute, doan’t become no man to judge un, or +tell ’bout selfishness. Us have got to save our awn sawls, an’ us +must even leave wife, an’ mother, and childer if theer ’s no +other way to do it. Ban’t no right living—ban’t no fair +travelling in double harness wi’ conscience, onless you’ve got a +clean mind. An’ yet waitin’ ’pears the only way o’ +wisdom just here. You’ve never got room in that head o’ yourn for +more ’n wan thought to a time; an’ I doan’t blame ’e +theer neither, for a chap wi’ wan idea, if he sticks to it, goes +further ’n him as drives a team of thoughts half broken in. I mean you +’m forgettin’ your mother for the moment. I should say, wait for +her mendin’ ’fore you do anything.”</p> +<p>Back came Blanchard’s mind to his mother with a whole-hearted +swing.</p> +<p>“Ess,” he said, “you ’m right theer. My plaace is +handy to her till she ’m movin’; an’ if he tries to take me +before she ’m down-house again, by God! I’ll—”</p> +<p>“Let it bide that way then. Put t’ other matter out o’ +your mind so far as you can. Fill your pipe an’ suck deep at it. I +haven’t seen ’e smoke this longful time; an’ in my view +theer ’s no better servant than tobacco to a mind puzzled at wan +o’ life’s cross-roads.”</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XIII" name="IV_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII<br /> +MR. LYDDON’S TACTICS</h2> +<p>In the morning Mrs. Blanchard was worse, and some few days later lay in +danger of her life. Her son spent half his time in the sick-room, walked +about bootless to make no sound, and fretted with impatience at thought of +the length of days which must elapse before Chris could return to Chagford. +Telegrams had been sent to Martin Grimbal, who was spending his honeymoon out +of England; but on the most sanguine computation he and his wife would +scarcely be home again in less than ten days or a fortnight.</p> +<p>Hope and gloom succeeded each other swiftly within Will Blanchard’s +mind, and at first he discounted the consistent pessimism of Doctor Parsons +somewhat more liberally than the issue justified. When, therefore, he was +informed of the truth and stood face to face with his mother’s danger, +hope sank, and his unstable spirit was swept from an altitude of secret +confidence to the opposite depth of despair.</p> +<p>Through long silences, while she slept or seemed to do so, the young man +traced back his life and hers; and he began to see what a good mother means. +Then he accused himself of many faults and made impetuous confession to his +wife and her father. On these occasions Phoebe softened his self-blame, but +Mr. Lyddon let Will talk, and told him for his consolation that every +mother’s son must be accused of like offences.</p> +<p>“Best of childer falls far short,” he assured Will; +“best brings tu many tears, if ’t is awnly for wantonness; +an’ him as thinks he’ve been all he should be to his mother lies +to himself; an’ him as says he has, lies to other people.”</p> +<p>Will’s wild-hawk nature was subdued before this grave crisis in his +parent’s life; he sat through long nights and tended the fire with +quiet fingers; he learnt from the nurse how to move a pillow tenderly, how to +shut a door without any sound. He wearied Doctor Parsons with futile +propositions, but the physician’s simulated cynicism often broke down +in secret before this spectacle of the son’s dog-like pertinacity. +Blanchard much desired to have a vein opened for his mother, nor was all the +practitioner’s eloquence equal to convincing him such a course could +not be pursued.</p> +<p>“She ’m gone that gashly white along o’ want o’ +blood,” declared Will; “an’ I be busting wi’ gude red +blood, an’ why for shouldn’t you put in a pipe an’ draw off +a quart or so for her betterment? I’ll swear ’t would strengthen +the heart of her.”</p> +<p>Time passed, and it happened on one occasion, while walking abroad between +his vigils, that Blanchard met John Grimbal. Will had reflected curiously of +late days into what ghostly proportions his affair with the master of the Red +House now dwindled before this greater calamity of his mother’s +sickness; but sudden sight of the enemy roused passion and threw back the +man’s mind to that occasion of their last conversation in the +woods.</p> +<p>Yet the first words that now passed were to John Grimbal’s credit. +He made an astonishing and unexpected utterance. Indeed, the spoken word +surprised him as much as his listener, and he swore at himself for a fool +when Will’s retort reached his ear.</p> +<p>They were passing at close quarters,—Blanchard on foot, John upon +horseback,—when the latter said,—</p> +<p>“How ’s Mrs. Blanchard to-day?”</p> +<p>“Mind your awn business an’ keep our name off your +lips!” answered the pedestrian, who misunderstood the question, as he +did most questions where possible, and now supposed that Grimbal meant +Phoebe.</p> +<p>His harsh words woke instant wrath.</p> +<p>“What a snarling, cross-bred cur you are! I should judge your own +family will be the first to thank me for putting you under lock and key. Hell +to live with, you must be.”</p> +<p>“God rot your dirty heart! Do it—do it; doan’t +jaw—do it! But if you lay a finger ’pon me while my mother +’s bad or have me took before she ’m stirring again, I’ll +kill you when I come out. God ’s my judge if I doan’t!”</p> +<p>Then, forgetting what had taken him out of doors, and upon what matter he +was engaged, Will turned back in a tempest, and hastened to his +mother’s cottage.</p> +<p>At Monks Barton Mr. Lyddon and his daughter had many and long +conversations upon the subject of Blanchard’s difficulties. Both +trembled to think what might be the issue if his mother died; both began to +realise that there could be no more happiness for Will until a definite +extrication from his present position was forthcoming. At his +daughter’s entreaty the miller finally determined on a strong step. He +made up his mind to visit Grimbal at the Red House, and win from him, if +possible, some undertaking which would enable him to relieve his son-in-law +of the present uncertainty.</p> +<p>Phoebe pleaded for silence, and prayed her father to get a promise at any +cost in that direction.</p> +<p>“Let him awnly promise ’e never to tell of his free will, +an’ the door against danger ’s shut,” she said. “When +Will knaws Grimbal ’s gwaine to be dumb, he’ll rage a while, then +calm down an’ be hisself again. ’T is the doubt that drove him +frantic.”</p> +<p>“I’ll see the man, then; but not a word to Will’s ear. +All the fat would be in the fire if he so much as dreamed I was about any +such business. As to a promise, if I can get it I will. An’ +’twixt me an’ you, Phoebe, I’m hopeful of it. He ’s +kept quiet so long that theer caan’t be any fiery hunger ’gainst +Will in un just now. I’ll soothe un down an’ get his word of +honour if it ’s to be got. Then your husband can do as he +pleases.”</p> +<p>“Leave the rest to me, Faither.”</p> +<p>A fortnight later the cautious miller, after great and exhaustive +reflection, set out to carry into practice his intention. An appointment was +made on the day that Will drove to Moreton to meet his sister and Martin +Grimbal. This removed him out of the way, while Billy had been despatched to +Okehampton for some harness, and Mr. Lyddon’s daughter, alone in the +secret, was spending the afternoon with her mother-in-law.</p> +<p>So Miller walked over to the Red House and soon found himself waiting for +John Grimbal in a cheerless but handsome dining-room. The apartment suggested +little occupation. A desk stood in the window, and upon it were half a dozen +documents under a paper-weight made from a horse’s hoof. A fire burned +in the broad grate; a row of chairs, upholstered in dark red leather, stood +stiffly round; a dozen indifferent oil-paintings of dogs and horses filled +large gold frames upon the walls; and upon a massive sideboard of black oak a +few silver cups, won by Grimbal’s dogs at various shows and coursing +meetings, were displayed.</p> +<p>Mr. Lyddon found himself kept waiting about ten minutes; then John +entered, bade him a cold “good afternoon” without shaking hands, +and placed an easy-chair for him beside the fire.</p> +<p>“Would you object to me lighting my pipe, Jan Grimbal?” asked +the miller humbly; and by way of answer the other took a box of matches from +his pocket and handed it to the visitor.</p> +<p>“Thank you, thank you; I’m obliged to you. Let me get a light, +then I’ll talk to ’e.”</p> +<p>He puffed for a minute or two, while Grimbal waited in silence for his +guest to begin.</p> +<p>“Now, wi’out any beatin’ of the bush or waste of time, +I’ll speak. I be come ’bout Blanchard, as I dare say you guessed. +The news of what he done nine or ten years ago comed to me just a month +since. A month ’t was, or might be three weeks. Like a bolt from the +blue it falled ’pon me an’ that’s a fact. An’ I heard +how you knawed the thing—you as had such gude cause to hate un +wance.”</p> +<p>“‘Once?’”</p> +<p>“Well, no man’s hate can outlive his reason, surely? I was +with ’e, tu, then; but a man what lets himself suffer lifelong trouble +from a fule be a fule himself. Not that Blanchard ’s all fule—far +from it. He’ve ripened a little of late years—though slowly as +fruit in a wet summer. Granted he bested you in the past an’ your +natural hope an’ prayer was to be upsides wi’ un some day. Well, +that’s all dead an’ buried, ban’t it? I hated the shadow of +un in them days so bad as ever you did; but you gets to see more of the +world, an’ the men that walks in it when you ’m moved away from +things by the distance of a few years. Then you find how wan deed bears upon +t’ other. Will done no more than you’d ’a’ done if +the cases was altered. In fact, you ’m alike at some points, come to +think of it.”</p> +<p>“Is that what you’ve walked over here to tell me?”</p> +<p>“No; I’m here to ax ’e frank an’ plain, as a +sportsman an’ a straight man wi’ a gude heart most times, to tell +me what you ’m gwaine to do ’bout this job. I’m auld, +an’ I assure ’e you’ll hate yourself if you give un up. +’T would be outside your carater to do it.”</p> +<p>“You say that! Would you harbour a convict from Princetown if you +found him hiding on your farm?”</p> +<p>“Ban’t a like case. Theer ’s the personal point of view, +if you onderstand me. A man deserts from the army ten years ago, an’ +you, a sort o’ amateur soldier, feels ’t is your duty to give un +to justice.”</p> +<p>“Well, isn’t that what has happened?”</p> +<p>“No fay! Nothing of the sort. If ’t was your duty, why +didn’t you do it fust minute you found it out? If you’d writ to +the authorities an’ gived the man up fust moment, I might have said +’t was a hard deed, but I’d never have dared to say ’t +weern’t just. Awnly you done no such thing. You nursed the power +an’ sucked the thought, same as furriners suck at poppy poison. You +played with the picture of revenge against a man you hated, an’ let the +idea of what you’d do fill your brain; an’ then, when you wanted +bigger doses, you told Phoebe what you knawed—reckoning as she’d +tell Will bimebye. That’s bad, Jan Grimbal—worse than poisoning +foxes, by God! An’ you knaw it.”</p> +<p>“Who are you, to judge me and my motives?”</p> +<p>“An auld man, an’ wan as be deeply interested in this +business. Time was when we thought alike touching the bwoy; now we +doan’t; ’cause your knowledge of un hasn’t grawed past the +point wheer he downed us, an’ mine has.”</p> +<p>“You ’re a fool to say so. D’ you think I haven’t +watched the young brute these many years? Self-sufficient, ignorant, +hot-headed, always in the wrong. What d’ you find to praise in the +clown? Look at his life. Failure! failure! failure! and making of enemies at +every turn. Where would he be to-day but for you?”</p> +<p>“Theer ’s a rare gert singleness of purpose ’bout +un.”</p> +<p>“A grand success he is, no doubt. I suppose you couldn’t get +on without him now. Yet you cursed the cub freely enough once.”</p> +<p>“Bitter speeches won’t serve ’e, Grimbal; but they show +me mighty clear what’s hid in you. Your sawl ’s torn every way by +this thing, an’ you turn an’ turn again to it, like a dog to his +vomit, yet the gude in ’e drags ’e away.”</p> +<p>“Better cut all that. You won’t tell me what you’ve come +for, so I’ll tell you. You want me to promise not to move in this +matter,—is that so?”</p> +<p>“Why, not ezackly. I want more ’n that. I never thought for a +minute you would do it, now you’ve let the time pass so far. I knaw +you’ll never act so ugly a paart now; but Will doan ’t, an’ +he’ll never b’lieve me if I told un.”</p> +<p>The other made a sound, half growl, half mirthless laugh.</p> +<p>“You’ve taken it all for granted, then—you, who know +more about what ’s in my mind than I do myself? You ’re a fond +old man; and if you’d wanted to screw me up to the pitch of taking the +necessary trouble, you couldn’t have gone a better way. I’ve been +too busy to bother about the young rascal of late or he’d lie in gaol +now.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t say no such vain things! D’ you think I +caan’t read what your face speaks so plain? A man’s eyes tell the +truth awftener than what his tongue does, for they ’m harder to break +into lying. ’Tu busy’! You be foul to the very brainpan wi’ +this job an’ you knaw it.”</p> +<p>“Is the hatred all on my side, d’ you suppose? Curse the brute +to hell! And you’d have me eat humble-pie to the man who ’s +wrecked my life?”</p> +<p>“No such thing at all. All the hatred be on your side. He’d +forgived ’e clean. Even now, though you ’m fretting his guts to +fiddlestrings because of waiting for ’e, he feels no malice—no +more than the caged rat feels ’gainst the man as be carrying him, +anyway.”</p> +<p>“You ’re wrong there. He’d kill me to-morrow. He let me +know it. In a weak moment I asked him the other day how his mother was; and +he turned upon me like a mad dog, and told me to keep his name off my lips, +and said he’d have my life if I gave him up.”</p> +<p>“That’s coorious then, for he ’s hungry to give himself +up, so soon as the auld woman ’s well again.”</p> +<p>“Talk! I suppose he sent you to whine for him?”</p> +<p>“Not so. He’d have blocked my road if he’d +guessed.”</p> +<p>“Well, I’m honest when I say I don’t care a curse what +he does or does not. Let him go his way. And as to proclaiming him, I shall +do so when it pleases me. An odious crime that,—a traitor to his +country.”</p> +<p>“Doan’t become you nor me to dwell ’pon that, seeing how +things was.”</p> +<p>Grimbal rose.</p> +<p>“You think he ’s a noble fellow, and that your daughter had a +merciful escape. It isn’t for me to suggest you are mistaken. Now +I’ve no more time to spare, I’m afraid.”</p> +<p>The miller also rose, and as he prepared to depart he spoke a final +word.</p> +<p>“You ’m terrible pushed for time, by the looks of it. I knaw +’t is hard in this life to find time to do right, though every man can +make a ’mazing mort o’ leisure for t’ other thing. But hear +me: you ’m ruinin’ yourself, body an’ sawl, along o’ +this job—body an’ sawl, like apples in a barrel rots each other. +You ’m in a bad way, Jan Grimbal, an’ I’m sorry for +’e—brick house an’ horses an’ dogs notwithstanding. +Have a spring cleaning in that sulky brain o’ yourn, my son, an’ +be a man wi’ yourself, same as you be a man wi’ the +world.”</p> +<p>The other sneered.</p> +<p>“Don’t get hot. The air is cold. And as you’ve given so +much good advice, take some, too. Mind your own business, and let your +son-in-law mind his.”</p> +<p>Mr. Lyddon shook his head.</p> +<p>“Such words do only prove me right. Look in your heart an’ see +how ’t is with you that you can speak to an auld man so. ’T is +common metal shawing up in ’e, an’ I’m sorry to find +it.”</p> +<p>He set off home without more words and, as chance ordered the incident, +emerged from the avenue gates of the Red House while a covered vehicle passed +by on the way from Moreton Hampstead. Its roof was piled with luggage, and +inside sat Chris, her husband, and Will. They spied Mr. Lyddon and made room +for him; but later on in the evening Will taxed the miller with his +action.</p> +<p>“I knawed right well wheer you’d come from,” he said +gloomily, “an’ I’d ’a’ cut my right hand off +rather than you should have done it. You did n’t ought, Faither; for +I’ll have no living man come between me an’ him.”</p> +<p>“I made it clear I was on my awn paart,” explained Mr. Lyddon; +but that night Will wrote a letter to his enemy and despatched it by a lad +before breakfast on the following morning.</p> + +<blockquote> <p>“Sir,” he said, “ Miller seen +you yesterday out of his own head, and if I had knowed he was coming I would +have took good care to prevent it.</p> +<p>“W. BLANCHARD.”</p></blockquote> +<h2><a id="IV_XIV" name="IV_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV<br /> +ACTION</h2> +<p>Time passed, and Mrs. Blanchard made a slow return to health. Her daughter +assumed control of the sick-room, and Martin Grimbal was denied the +satisfaction of seeing Chris settled in her future home for a period of +nearly two months. Then, when the invalid became sufficiently restored to +leave Chagford for change of air, both Martin and Chris accompanied her and +spent a few weeks by the sea.</p> +<p>Will, meantime, revolved upon his own affairs and suffered torments long +drawn out. For these protracted troubles those of his own house were +responsible, and both Phoebe and the miller greatly erred in their treatment +of him at this season. For the woman there were indeed excuses, but Mr. +Lyddon might have been expected to show more wisdom and better knowledge of a +character at all times transparent enough. Phoebe, nearing maternal +tribulation, threw a new obstacle in her husband’s way, and implored +him by all holy things, now that he had desisted from confession thus far, to +keep his secret yet a little longer and wait for the birth of the child. She +used every possible expedient to win this new undertaking from Will, and her +father added his voice to hers. The miller’s expressed wish, strongly +urged, frequently repeated, at last triumphed, and against his own desire and +mental promptings, Blanchard, at terrible cost to himself, had promised +patience until June.</p> +<p>Life, thus clouded and choked, wrought havoc with the man. His natural +safety-valves were blocked, his nerves shattered, his temper poisoned. +Primitive characteristics appeared as a result of this position, and he +exhibited the ferocity of an over-driven tame beast, or a hunted wild one. In +days long removed from this crisis he looked back with chill of body and +shudder of mind to that nightmare springtime; and he never willingly +permitted even those dearest to him to retrace the period.</p> +<p>The struggle lasted long, but his nature beat Blanchard before the end, +burst its bonds, shattered promises and undertakings, weakened marital love +for a while, and set him free by one tremendous explosion and victory of +natural force. There had come into his head of late a new sensation, as of +busy fingers weaving threads within his skull and iron hands moulding the +matter of his brain into new patterns. The demon things responsible for his +torment only slept when he slept, or when, as had happened once or twice, he +drank himself indifferent to all mundane matters. Yet he could not still them +for long, and even Phoebe had heard mutterings and threats of the +thread-spinners who were driving her husband mad.</p> +<p>On an evening in late May she became seriously alarmed for his reason. +Circumstances suddenly combined to strangle the last flickering breath of +patience in Will, and the slender barriers were swept away in such a storm as +even Phoebe’s wide experience of him had never parallelled. Miller +Lyddon was out, at a meeting in the village convened to determine after what +fashion Chagford should celebrate the Sovereign’s Jubilee; Billy also +departed about private concerns, and Will and his wife had Monks Barton much +to themselves. Even she irritated the suffering man at this season, and her +sunken face and chatter about her own condition and future hopes of a son +often worried him into sheer frenzy. His promise once exacted she rarely +touched upon that matter, believing the less said the better, but he +misunderstood her reticence and held it selfish. Indeed, Blanchard fretted +and chafed alone now; for John Grimbal’s sustained silence had long ago +convinced Mr. Lyddon that the master of the Red House meant no active harm, +and Phoebe readily grasped at the same conclusion.</p> +<p>This night, however, the flood-gates crumbled, and Will, before a futile +assertion from Phoebe touching the happy promise of the time to come and the +cheerful spring weather, dashed down his pipe with an oath, clenched his +hands, then leapt to his feet, shook his head, and strode about like a +maniac.</p> +<p>“Will! You’ve brawk un to shivers—the butivul wood pipe +wi’ amber that I gived ’e last birthday!”</p> +<p>“Damn my birthday—a wisht day for me ’t was! I’ve +lived tu long—tu long by all my years, an’ nobody cares wan salt +tear that I be roastin’ in hell-fire afore my time. I caan’t +stand it no more—no more at all—not for you or your faither or +angels in heaven or ten million babies to be born into this blasted +world—not if I was faither to ’em all. I must live my life free, +or else I’ll go in a madhouse. Free—do ’e hear me? +I’ve suffered enough and waited more ’n enough. Ban’t +months nor weeks neither—’t is a long, long lifetime. You talk +o’ time dragging! If you knawed—if you knawed! An’ these +devil-spinners allus knotting an’ twisting. I could do things—I +could—things man never dreamed. An’ I will—for they +’m grawing and grawing, an’ they’ll burst my skull if I let +’em bide in it. Months ago I’ve sat on a fence unbeknawnst wheer +men was shooting, an’ whistled for death. So help me, ’t is true. +Me to do that! Theer ’s a cur for ’e; an’ yet ban’t +me neither, but the spinners in my head. Death ’s a party easily +called, mind you. A knife, or a pinch o’ powder, or a drop o’ +deep water—they ’ll bring un to your elbow in a moment. Awnly, if +I done that, I’d go in company. Nobody should bide to laugh. Them as +would cry might cry, but him as would laugh should come along o’ +me—he should, by God!”</p> +<p>“Will, Will! It isn’t my Will talking so?”</p> +<p>“It be me, an’ it ban’t me. But I’m in earnest at +last, an’ speakin’ truth. The spinners knaw, an’ they +’m right. I’m sick to sheer hate o’ my life; and +you’ve helped to make me so—you and your faither likewise. This +thing doan’t tear your heart out of you an’ grind your nerves to +pulp as it should do if you was a true wife.”</p> +<p>“Oh, my dear, my lovey, how can ’e say or think it? You knaw +what it has been to me.”</p> +<p>“I knaw you’ve thought all wrong ’pon it when +you’ve thought at all. An’ Miller, tu. You’ve prevailed +wi’ me to go on livin’ a coward’s life for countless ages +o’ time—me—me—creepin’ on the earth wi’ +my tail between my legs an’ knawin’ I never set eyes on a man as +ban’t braver than myself. An’ him—Grimbal—laughing, +like the devil he is, to think on what my life must be!”</p> +<p>“I caan’t be no quicker. The cheel’s movin’ +an’ bracin’ itself up an’ makin’ ready to come in the +world, ban’t it? I’ve told ’e so fifty times. It’s +little longer to wait.”</p> +<p>“It’s no longer. It’s nearer than sleep or food or +drink. It’s comin’ ’fore the moon sets. ’T is that or +the madhouse—nothin’ else. If you’d felt the fire as have +been eatin’ my thinking paarts o’ late days you’d knaw. +Ban’t no use your cryin’, for ’t isn’t love of me +makes you. Rivers o’ tears doan’t turn me no more. I’m +steel now—fust time for a month—an’ while I’m steel +I’ll act like steel an’ strike like steel. I’ve had shaky +nights an’ silly nights an’ haunted nights, but my head ’s +clear for wance, an’ I’ll use it while ’tis.”</p> +<p>“Not to do no rash thing, Will? For Christ’s sake, you +won’t hurt yourself or any other?”</p> +<p>“I must meet him wance for all.”</p> +<p>“He ’m at the council ’bout Jubilee wi’ faither +an’ parson an’ the rest.”</p> +<p>“But he’ll go home arter. An’ I’ll have +’Yes’ or ’No’ to-night—I will, if I’ve +got to shake the word out of his sawl. I ban’t gwaine to be driven +lunatic for him or you or any. Death’s a sight better than a soft head +an’ a lifetime o’ dirt an’ drivelling an’ babbling, +like the brainless beasts they feed an’ fatten in asylums. That’s +worse cruelty than any I be gwaine to suffer at human hands—to be mewed +in wan of them gashly mad-holes wi’ the rack an’ ruins o’ +empty flesh grinning an’ gibbering ’pon me from all the corners +o’ the airth. I be sane now—sane enough to knaw I’m gwaine +mad fast—an’ I won’t suffer it another hour. It’s +come crying and howling upon my mind like a storm this night, an’ this +night I’ll end it.”</p> +<p>“Wait at least until the morning. See him then.”</p> +<p>“Go to bed, an’ doan’t goad me to more waiting, if you +ever loved me. Get to bed—out of my sight! I’ve had enough of +’e and of all human things this many days. An’ that’s as +near madness as I’m gwaine. What I do, I do to-night.”</p> +<p>She rose from her chair in sudden anger at his strange harshness, for the +wife who has never heard an unkind word resents with passionate protest the +sting of the first when it falls. Now genuine indignation inflamed Phoebe, +and she spoke bitterly.</p> +<p>“’Enough of me’! Ess fay! Like enough you have—a +poor, patient creature sweatin’ for ’e, an’ thinkin’ +for ’e, an’ blotting her eyes with tears for ’e, an’ +bearin’ your childer an’ your troubles, tu! ’Enough of +me.’ Ess, I’ll get gone to my bed an’ stiffen my joints +wi’ kneelin’ in prayer for ’e, an’ weary God’s +ear for a fule!”</p> +<p>His answer was an action, and before she had done speaking he stretched +above him and took his gun from its place on an old beam that extended across +the ceiling.</p> +<p>“What in God’s name be that for? You +wouldn’t—?”</p> +<p>“Shoot a fox? Why not? I’m a farmer now, and I’d kill +best auld red Moor fox as ever gave a field forty minutes an’ beat it. +You was whinin’ ’bout the chicks awnly this marnin’. +I’ll sit under the woodstack a bit an’ think ’fore I +starts. Ban’t no gude gwaine yet.”</p> +<p>Will’s explanation of his deed was the true one, but Phoebe realised +in some dim fashion that she stood within the shadow of a critical night and +that action was called upon from her. Her anger waned a little, and her heart +began to beat fast, but she acted with courage and promptitude.</p> +<p>“Let un be to-night—auld fox, I mean. Theer ’m more +chicks than young foxes, come to think of it; an’ he ’m awnly +doin’ what you forget to do—fighting for his vixen an’ +cubs.”</p> +<p>She looked straight into Will’s eyes, took the gun out of his hands, +climbed on to a chair, and hung the weapon up again in its place.</p> +<p>He laughed curiously, and helped his wife to the ground again.</p> +<p>“Thank you,” she said. “Now go an’ do what you +want to do, an’ doan’t forget the future happiness of women +an’ childer lies upon it.” Her anger was nearly gone, as he spoke +again.</p> +<p>“How little you onderstand me arter all these years—an’ +never will—nobody never will but mother. What did ’e fear? That +I’d draw trigger on the man from behind a tree, +p’r’aps?”</p> +<p>“No—not that, but that you might be driven to kill yourself +along o’ having such a bad wife.”</p> +<p>“Now we ’m both on the mad road,” he said bitterly. Then +he picked up his stick and, a moment later, went out into the night.</p> +<p>Phoebe watched his tall figure pass over the river, and saw him +silhouetted against dead silver of moonlit waters as he crossed the +stepping-stones. Then she climbed for the gun again, hid it, and presently +prepared for her father’s return.</p> +<p>“What butivul peace an quiet theer be in ministerin’ to a gude +faither,” she thought, “as compared wi’ servin’ a +stormy husband!” Then sorrow changed to active fear, and that, in its +turn, sank into a desolate weariness and indifference. She detected no +semblance of justice in her husband’s outburst; she failed to see how +circumstances must sooner or late have precipitated his revolt; and she felt +herself very cruelly misjudged, very gravely wronged.</p> +<p>Meantime Blanchard passed through a hurricane of rage against his enemy +much akin to that formerly recorded of John Grimbal himself, when the brute +won to the top of him and he yearned for physical conflict. That night Will +was resolved to get a definite response or come to some conclusion by force +of arms. His thoughts carried him far, and before he took up his station +within the grounds of the Red House, at a point from which the avenue +approach might be controlled, he had already fallen into a frantic hunger for +fight and a hope that his enemy would prove of like mind. He itched for +assault and battery, and his heart clamoured to be clean in his breast +again.</p> +<p>Whatever might happen, he was determined to give himself up on the +following day. He had done all he could for those he loved, but he was +powerless to suffer more. He longed now to trample his foe into the dust, +and, that accomplished, he would depart, well satisfied, and receive what +punishment was due. His accumulated wrongs must be paid at last, and he fully +determined, an hour before John Grimbal came homewards, that the payment +should be such as he himself had received long years before on Rushford +Bridge. His muscles throbbed for action as he sat and waited at the top of a +sloping bank dotted with hawthorns that extended upwards from the edge of the +avenue and terminated on the fringe of young coverts.</p> +<p>And now, by a chance not uncommon, two separate series of circumstances +were about to clash, while the shock engendered was destined to precipitate +the climax of Will Blanchard’s fortunes, in so far as this record is +concerned. On the night that he thus raged and suffered the gall bred of long +inaction to overflow, John Grimbal likewise came to a sudden conclusion with +himself, and committed a deed of nature definite so far as it went.</p> +<p>In connection with the approaching Jubilee rejoicings a spirit in some +sense martial filled the air, and Grimbal with his yeomanry was destined to +play a part. A transient comet-blaze of militarism often sparkles over +fighting nations at any season of universal joy, and that more especially if +the keystone of the land’s constitution be a crown. This fire found +material inflammable enough in the hearts of many Devonshire men, and before +its warm impulse John Grimbal, inspired by a particular occasion, compounded +with his soul at last. Rumoured on long tongues from the village ale-house, +there had come to his ears the report of certain ill-considered utterances +made by his enemy upon the events of the hour. They were only a hot-headed +and very miserable man’s foolish comments upon things in general and +the approaching festival in particular, and they served but to illustrate the +fact that no ill-educated and passionate soul can tolerate universal +rejoicings, itself wretched; but Grimbal clutched at this proven disloyalty +of an old deserter, and told himself that personal questions must weigh with +him no more.</p> +<p>“The sort of discontented brute that drifts into Socialism and all +manner of wickedness,” he thought. “The rascal must be muzzled +once for all, and as a friend to the community I shall act, not as an enemy +to him.”</p> +<p>This conclusion he came to on the evening of the day which saw +Blanchard’s final eruption, and he was amazed to find how +straightforward and simple his course appeared when viewed from the +impersonal standpoint of duty. His brother was due to dine with John Grimbal +in half an hour, for both men were serving on a committee to meet that night +upon the question of the local celebrations at Chagford, and they were going +together. Time, however, remained for John to put his decision into action. +He turned to his desk, therefore, and wrote. The words to be employed he knew +by heart, for he had composed his letter many months before, and it was with +him always; yet now, seen thus set out upon paper for the first time, it +looked strange.</p> +<blockquote><p> “RED HOUSE, CHAGFORD, DEVON.</p> +<p>“<i>To the Commandant, Royal Artillery, Plymouth.</i></p> +<p>“SIR,—It has come to my knowledge that the man, William +Blanchard, who enlisted in the Royal Artillery under the name of Tom Newcombe +and deserted from his battery when it was stationed at Shorncliffe some ten +years ago, now resides at this place on the farm of Monks Barton, Chagford. +My duty demands that I should lodge this information, and I can, of course, +substantiate it, though I have reason to believe the deserter will not +attempt to evade his just punishment if apprehended. I have the honour to +be,</p> +<p>“Your obedient servant,</p> +<p>“JOHN GRIMBAL,</p> +<p>“Capt. Dev. Yeomanry.”</p></blockquote> +<p>He had just completed this communication when Martin arrived, and as his +brother entered he instinctively pushed the letter out of sight. But a moment +later he rebelled against himself for the act, knowing the ugly tacit +admission represented by it. He dragged forth the letter, therefore, and +greeted his brother by thrusting the note before him.</p> +<p>“Read that,” he said darkly; “it will surprise you, I +think. I want to do nothing underhand, and as you ’re linked to these +people for life now, it is just that you should hear what is going to happen. +There’s the knowledge I once hinted to you that I possessed concerning +William Blanchard. I have waited and given him rope enough. Now he’s +hanged himself, as I knew he would, and I must act. A few days ago he spoke +disrespectfully of the Queen before a dozen other loafers in a public-house. +That’s a sin I hold far greater than his sin against me. Read what I +have just written.”</p> +<p>Martin gazed with mildness upon John’s savage and defiant face. His +brother’s expression and demeanour by no means chimed with the judicial +moderation of his speech. Then the antiquary perused the letter, and there +fell no sound upon the silence, except that of a spluttering pen as John +Grimbal addressed an envelope.</p> +<p>Presently Martin dropped the letter on the desk before him, and his face +was very white, his voice tremulous as he spoke.</p> +<p>“This thing happened more than ten years ago.”</p> +<p>“It did; but don’t imagine I have known it ten +years.”</p> +<p>“God forbid! I think better of you. Yet, if only for my sake, +reflect before you send this letter. Once done, you have ruined a life. I +have seen Will several times since I came home, and now I understand the +terrific change in him. He must have known that you know this. It was the +last straw. He seems quite broken on the wheel of the world, and no wonder. +To one of his nature, the past, since you discovered this terrible secret, +must have been sheer torment.”</p> +<p>John Grimbal doubled up the letter and thrust it into the envelope, while +Martin continued:</p> +<p>“What do you reap? You’re not a man to do an action of this +sort and live afterwards as though you had not done it. I warn you, you +intend a terribly dangerous thing. This may be the wreck of another soul +besides Blanchard’s. I know your real nature, though you’ve +hidden it so close of late years. Post that letter, and your life’s +bitter for all time. Look into your heart, and don’t pretend to deceive +yourself.”</p> +<p>His brother lighted a match, burnt red wax, and sealed the letter with a +signet ring.</p> +<p>“Duty is duty,” he said.</p> +<p>“Yes, yes; right shall be done and this extraordinary thing made +known in the right quarter. But don’t let it come out through you; +don’t darken your future by such an act. Your personal relations with +the man, John,—it’s impossible you should do this after all these +years.”</p> +<p>The other affixed a stamp to his letter.</p> +<p>“Don’t imagine personal considerations influence me. I’m +a soldier, and I know what becomes a soldier. If I find a traitor to his +Queen and country am I to pass upon the other side of the road and not do my +duty because the individual happens to be a private enemy? You rate me low +and misjudge me rather cruelly if you imagine that I am so weak.”</p> +<p>Martin gasped at this view of the position, instantly believed himself +mistaken, and took John at his word. Thereon he came near blushing to think +that he should have read such baseness into a brother’s character.</p> +<p>“I beg your pardon,” he said. “I ought to be ashamed to +have misunderstood you so. I could not escape the personal factor in this +terrible business, but you, I see, have duly weighed it. I wronged you. Yes, +I wronged you, as you say. The writing of that letter was a very courageous +action, under the circumstances—as plucky a thing as ever man did, +perhaps. Forgive me for taking so mean a view of it, and forgive me for even +doubting your motives.”</p> +<p>“I want justice, and if I am misunderstood for doing my +duty—why, that is no new thing. I can face that, as better men have +done before me.”</p> +<p>There was a moment or two of silence; then Martin spoke, almost +joyfully.</p> +<p>“Thank God, I see a way out! It seldom happens that I am quick in +any question of human actions, but for once, I detect a road by which right +may be done and you still spared this terrible task. I do, indeed, because I +know Blanchard better than you do. I can guess what he has been enduring of +late, and I will show him how he may end the torture himself by doing the +right thing even now.”</p> +<p>“It’s fear of me scorching the man, not shame of his own +crime.”</p> +<p>“Then, as the stronger, as a soldier, put him out of his misery and +set your mind at ease. Believe me, you may do it without any reflection on +yourself. Tell him you have decided to take no step in the affair, and leave +the rest to me. I will wager I can prevail upon him to give himself up. I am +singularly confident that I can bring it about. Then, if I fail, do what you +consider to be right; but first give me leave to try and save you from this +painful necessity.”</p> +<p>There followed a long silence. John Grimbal saw how much easier it was to +deceive another than himself, and, before the spectacle of his deluded +brother, felt that he appreciated his own real motives and incentives at +their true worth. The more completely was Martin hoodwinked, the more +apparent did the truth grow within John’s mind. What was in reality +responsible for his intended action never looked clearer than then, and as +Martin spoke in all innocence of the courage that must be necessary to +perform such a deed, Grimbal passed through the flash of a white light and +caught a glimpse of his recent mental processes magnified by many degrees in +the blinding ray. The spectacle sickened him a little, weakened him, touched +the depths of him, stirred his nature. He answered presently in a voice +harsh, abrupt, and deep.</p> +<p>“I’ve lied often enough in my life,” he said, “and +may again, but I think never to you till to-day. You’re such a +clean-minded, big-hearted man that you don’t understand a mind of my +build—a mind that can’t forgive, that can’t forget, +that’s fed full for years on the thought of revenging that frightful +blow in the past. What you feared and hinted just now was partly the truth, +and I know it well enough. But that is only to say my motives in this matter +mixed.”</p> +<p>“None but a brave man would admit so mucn, but now you wrong +yourself, as I wronged you. We are alike. I, too, have sometimes in dark +moments blamed myself for evil thoughts and evil deeds beyond my real +deserts. So you. I know nothing but your sense of duty would make you post +that letter.”</p> +<p>“We’ve wrecked each other’s lives, he and I; only +he’s a boy, and his life’s before him; I’m a man, and my +life is lived, for I’m the sort that grows old early, and he’s +helped Time more than anybody knows but myself.”</p> +<p>“Don’t say that. Happiness never comes when you are hungering +most for it; sorrow never when you believe yourself best tuned to bear it. +Once I thought as you do now. I waited long for my good fortune, and said +’good-by’ to all my hope of earthly delight.”</p> +<p>“You were easier to satisfy than I should have been. Yet you were +constant, too,—constant as I was. We’re built that way. +More’s the pity.”</p> +<p>“I have absolutely priceless blessings; my cup of happiness is full. +Sometimes I ask myself how it comes about that one so little deserving has +received so much; sometimes I waken in the very extremity of fear, for joy +like mine seems greater than any living thing has a right to.”</p> +<p>“I’m glad one of us is happy.”</p> +<p>“I shall live to see you equally blessed.”</p> +<p>“It is impossible.”</p> +<p>There was a pause, then a gong rumbled in the hall, and the brothers went +to dinner. Their conversation now ranged upon varied local topics, and it was +not until the cloth had been removed according to old-fashioned custom, and +fruit and wine set upon a shining table, that John returned to the crucial +subject of the moment.</p> +<p>He poured out a glass of port for Martin, and pushed the cigars towards +him, then spoke,—</p> +<p>“Drink. It’s very good. And try one of those. I shall not post +that letter.”</p> +<p>“Man, I knew it! I knew it well, without hearing so from you. +Destroy the thing, dear fellow, and so take the first step to a peace I fear +you have not known for many days. All this suffering will vanish quicker than +a dream then. Justice is great, but mercy is greater. Yours is the privilege +of mercy, and yet justice shall not suffer either—not if I know Will +Blanchard.”</p> +<p>They talked long and drank more than usual, while the elder man’s +grim and moody spirit lightened a little before his determination and his +wine. The reek of past passions, the wreckage of dead things, seemed to be +sweeping out of his mind. He forgot the hour and their engagement until the +time fixed for that conference was past. Then he looked at his watch, rose +from the table, and hurried to the hall.</p> +<p>“Let us not go,” urged Martin. “They will do very well +without us, I am sure.”</p> +<p>But John’s only answer was to pull on his driving gloves. He +anticipated some satisfaction from the committee meeting; he suspected, +indeed, that he would be asked to take the chair at it, and, like most men, +he was not averse to the exercise of a little power in a small corner.</p> +<p>“We must go,” he said. “I have important suggestions to +make, especially concerning the volunteers. A sham fight on Scorhill would be +a happy thought. We’ll drive fast, and only be twenty minutes +late.”</p> +<p>A dog-cart had been waiting half an hour, and soon the brothers quickly +whirled down Red House avenue. A groom dropped from behind and opened the +gate; then it was all his agility could accomplish to scramble into his seat +again as a fine horse, swinging along at twenty miles an hour, trotted +towards Chagford.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XV" name="IV_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV<br /> +A BATTLE</h2> +<p>Silent and motionless sat Blanchard, on the fringe of a bank at the +coppice edge. He watched the stars move onward and the shadows cast by +moonlight creep from west to north, from north to east. Hawthorn scented the +night and stood like masses of virgin silver under the moon; from the Red +House ’owl tree’—a pollarded elm, sacred to the wise +bird—came mewing of brown owls; and once a white one struck, swift as a +streak of feathered moonlight, on the copse edge, and passed so near to +Blanchard that he saw the wretched shrew-mouse in its talons. +“’Tis for the young birds somewheers,” he thought; +“an’ so they’ll thrive an’ turn out braave owlets +come bimebye; but the li’l, squeakin’, blind shrews, +what’ll they do when no mother comes home-along to +’em?”</p> +<p>He mused drearily upon this theme, but suddenly started, for there came +the echo of slow steps in the underwood behind him. They sank into silence +and set Will wondering as to what they might mean. Then another sound, that +of a galloping horse and the crisp ring of wheels, reached him, and, +believing that John Grimbal was come, he strung himself to the matter in +hand. But the vehicle did not stop. A flash of yellow light leapt through the +distance as a mail-cart rattled past upon its way to Moreton. This +circumstance told Will the hour and he knew that his vigil could not be much +longer protracted.</p> +<p>Then death stalked abroad again, but this time in a form that awoke the +watcher’s deep-rooted instincts, took him clean out of himself, and +angered him to passion, not in his own cause but another’s. There came +the sudden scream of a trapped hare,—that sound where terror and agony +mingle in a cry half human,—and so still was the hour that Blanchard +heard the beast’s struggles though it was fifty yards distant. A hare +in a trap at any season meant a poacher—a hated enemy of society in +Blanchard’s mind; and his instant thought was to bring the rascal to +justice if he could. Now the recent footfall was explained and Will doubted +not that the cruel cry which had scattered his reveries would quickly attract +some hidden man responsible for it. The hare was caught by a wire set in a +run at the edge of the wood, and now Blanchard crawled along on his stomach +to within ten yards of the tragedy, and there waited under the shadow of a +white-thorn at the edge of the woods. Within two minutes the bushes parted +and, where the foliage of a young silver birch showered above lesser +brushwood, a man with a small head and huge shoulders appeared. Seeing no +danger he crept into the open, lifted his head to the moon, and revealed the +person and features of Sam Bonus, the labourer with whom Will had quarrelled +in times long past. Here, then, right ahead of him, appeared such a battle as +Blanchard had desired, but with another foe than he anticipated. That +accident mattered nothing, however. Will only saw a poacher, and to settle +the business of such an one out of hand if possible was, in his judgment, a +definite duty to be undertaken by every true man at any moment when +opportunity offered.</p> +<p>He walked suddenly from shadow and stood within three yards of the robber +as Bonus raised the butt of his gun to kill the shrieking beast at his +feet.</p> +<p>“You! An’ red-handed, by God! I knawed ’t was no lies +they told of ’e.”</p> +<p>The other started and turned and saw who stood against him.</p> +<p>“Blanchard, is it? An’ what be you doin’ here? Come for +same reason, p’r’aps?”</p> +<p>“I’d make you pay, if ’t was awnly for sayin’ +that! I’m a man to steal others’ fur out of season, ban’t +I? But I doan’t have no words wi’ the likes o’ you. +I’ve took you fair an’ square, anyways, an’ will just ax if +you be comin’ wi’out a fuss, or am I to make ’e?”</p> +<p>The other snarled.</p> +<p>“You—you come a yard nearer an’ I’ll blaw your +damned head—”</p> +<p>But the threat was left unfinished, and its execution failed, for Will had +been taught to take an armed man in his early days on the river, and had seen +an old hand capture more than one desperate character. He knew that +instantaneous action might get him within the muzzle of the gun and out of +danger, and while Bonus spoke, he flew straight upon him with such unexpected +celerity that Sam had no time to accomplish his purpose. He came down heavily +with Blanchard on top of him, and his weapon fell from his hand. But the +poacher was not done with. As they lay struggling, he found his foot clear +and managed to kick Will twice on the leg above the knee. Then Blanchard, +hanging like a dog to his foe, freed an arm, and hit hard more than once into +Sam’s face. A blow on the nose brought red blood that spurted over both +men black as ink under the moonlight.</p> +<p>It was not long before they broke away and rose from their first struggle +on the ground, but Bonus finally got to his knees, then to his feet, and +Will, as he did the same, knew by a sudden twinge in his leg that if the +poacher made off it must now be beyond his power to follow.</p> +<p>“No odds,” he gasped, answering his thought aloud, while they +wrestled. “If you’ve brawk me somewheers ’t is no matter, +for you ’m marked all right, an’ them squinting eyes of +yourn’ll be blacker ’n sloes come marnin’.”</p> +<p>This obvious truth infuriated Bonus. He did not attempt to depart, but, +catching sight of his gun, made a tremendous effort to reach it. The other +saw this aim and exerted his strength in an opposite direction. They fought +in silence awhile—growled and cursed, sweated and swayed, stamped and +slipped and dripped blood under the dewy and hawthorn-scented night. Bonus +used all his strength to reach the gun; Will sacrificed everything to his +hold. He suffered the greater punishment for a while, because Sam fought with +all his limbs, like a beast; but presently Blanchard threw the poacher +heavily, and again they came down together, this time almost on the wretched +beast that still struggled, held by the wire at hand. It had dragged the fur +off its leg, and white nerve fibres, torn bare, glimmered in the red flesh +under the moon.</p> +<p>Both fighters were now growing weaker, and each knew that a few minutes +more must decide the fortune of the battle. Bonus still fought for the gun, +and now his weight began to tell. Then, as he got within reach, and stretched +hand to grasp it, Blanchard, instead of dragging against him, threw all his +force in the same direction, and Sam was shot clean over the gun. This time +they twisted and Will fell underneath. Both simultaneously thrust a hand for +the weapon; both gripped it, and then exerted their strength for possession. +Will meant using it as a club if fate was kind; the other man, rating his own +life at nothing, and, believing that he bore Blanchard the grudge of his own +ruin, intended, at that red-hot moment, to keep his word and blow the +other’s brains out if he got a chance to do so.</p> +<p>Then, unheard by the combatants, a distant gate was thrown open, two +brilliant yellow discs of fire shone along the avenue below, and John Grimbal +returned to his home. Suddenly, seeing figures fighting furiously on the edge +of the hill not fifty yards away, he pulled up, and a din of conflict sounded +in his ears as the rattle of hoof and wheel and harness ceased. Leaping down +he ran to the scene of the conflict as fast as possible, but it was ended +before he arrived. A gun suddenly exploded and flashed a red-hot tongue of +flame across the night. A hundred echoes caught the detonation and as the +discharge reverberated along the stony hills to Fingle Gorge, Will Blanchard +staggered backwards and fell in a heap, while the poacher reeled, then +steadied himself, and vanished under the woods.</p> +<p>“Bring a lamp,” shouted Grimbal, and a moment later his groom +obeyed; but the fallen man was sitting up by the time John reached him, and +the gun that had exploded was at his feet.</p> +<p>“You ’m tu late by half a second,” he gasped. “I +fired myself when I seed the muzzle clear. Poachin’ he was, but the man +’s marked all right. Send p’liceman for Sam Bonus to-morrer, +an’ I lay you’ll find a picter.”</p> +<p>“Blanchard!”</p> +<p>“Ess fay, an’ no harm done ’cept a stiff leg. Best to +knock thicky poor twoad on the head. I heard the scream of un and comed along +an’ waited an’ catched my gen’leman in the act.”</p> +<p>The groom held a light to the mangled hare.</p> +<p>“Scat it on the head,” said Will, “then give me a +hand.”</p> +<p>He was helped to his feet; the servant went on before with the lamp, and +Blanchard, finding himself able to walk without difficulty, proceeded, slowly +supporting himself by the poacher’s gun.</p> +<p>Grimbal waited for him to speak and presently he did so.</p> +<p>“Things falls out so different in this maze of a world from what man +may count on.”</p> +<p>“How came it that you were here?”</p> +<p>“Blamed if I can tell ’e till I gather my wits together. +’Pears half a century or so since I comed; yet ban’t above two +hour agone.”</p> +<p>“You didn’t come to see Sam Bonus, I suppose?”</p> +<p>“No fay! Never a man farther from my thought than him when I seed un +poke up his carrot head under the moon. I was ’pon my awn affairs +an’ comed to see you. I wanted straight speech an’ straight +hitting; an’ I got ’em, for that matter. An’ fightin’ +’s gude for the blood, I reckon—anyway for my fashion +blood.”</p> +<p>“You came to fight me, then?”</p> +<p>“I did—if I could make ’e fight.”</p> +<p>“With that gun?”</p> +<p>“With nought but a savage heart an’ my two fistes. The gun +belongs to Sam Bonus. Leastways it did, but ’t is mine now—or +yours, as the party most wronged.”</p> +<p>“Come this way and drink a drop of brandy before you go home. Glad +you had some fighting as you wanted it so bad. I know what it feels like to +be that way, too. But there wouldn’t have been blows between us. My +mind was made up. I wrote to Plymouth this afternoon. I wrote, and an hour +later decided not to post the letter. I’ve changed my intentions +altogether, because the point begins to appear in a new light. I’m +sorry for a good few things that have happened of late years.”</p> +<p>Will breathed hard a moment; then he spoke slowly and not without more +emotion than his words indicated.</p> +<p>“That’s straight speech—if you mean it. I never knawed +how ’t was that a sportsman, same as you be, could keep rakin’ +awver a job an’ drive a plain chap o’ the soil like me into hell +for what I done ten year agone.”</p> +<p>“Let the past go. Forget it; banish it for all time as far as you +have the power. Blame must be buried both sides. Here’s the letter upon +my desk. I’ll burn it, and I’ll try to burn the memory often +years with it. Your road’s clear for me.”</p> +<p>“Thank you,” said Blanchard, very slowly. “I lay +I’ll never hear no better news than that on this airth. Now I’m +free—free to do how I please, free to do it undriven.”</p> +<p>There was a long silence. Grimbal poured out half a tumbler of brandy, +added soda water, then handed the stimulant to Will; and Blauchard, after +drinking, sat in comfort a while, rubbed his swollen jaw, and scraped the +dried blood of Bonus off his hands.</p> +<p>“Why for did you chaange so sudden?” he asked, as Grimbal +turned to his desk.</p> +<p>“I could tell you, but it doesn’t matter. A letter in the mind +looks different to one on paper; and duty often changes its appearance, too, +when a man is honest with himself. To be honest with yourself is the hardest +sort of honesty. I’ve had speech with others about this—my +brother more particularly.”</p> +<p>“I wish to God us could have settled it without no help from +outside.”</p> +<p>Grimbal rang the bell, then answered.</p> +<p>“As to settling it, I know nothing about that. I’ve settled +with my own conscience—such as it is.”</p> +<p>“I’d come for ‘Yes’ or +‘No.’”</p> +<p>“Now you have a definite answer.”</p> +<p>“An’ thank you. Then what ’s it to be between us, when I +come back? May I ax that? Them as ban’t enemies no more might grow to +be friends—eh?”</p> +<p>What response Grimbal would have made is doubtful. He did not reply, for +his servant, Lawrence Vallack, entered at the moment, and he turned abruptly +upon the old man.</p> +<p>“Where ’s the letter I left upon my desk? It was directed to +Plymouth.”</p> +<p>“All right, sir, all right; don’t worrit. I’ve eyes in +my head for my betters still, thank God. I seed un when I come to shut the +shutters an’ sent Joe post-haste to the box. ’T was in plenty of +time for the mail.”</p> +<p>John emptied his lungs in a great respiration, half-sigh, half-groan. He +could not speak. Only his fingers closed and he half lifted his hand as +though to crush the smirking ancient. Then he dropped his arm and looked at +Blanchard, asking the question with his eyes that he could find no words +for.</p> +<p>“I heard the mail go just ’fore the hare squealed,” said +Will stolidly, “an’ the letter with it for certain.”</p> +<p>Grimbal started up and rushed to the hall while the other limped after +him.</p> +<p>“Doan’t ’e do nothin’ fulish. I believe you never +meant to post un. Ess, I’ll take your solemn word for that. An’ +if you didn’t mean to send letter, ’t is as if you hadn’t +sent un. For my mind weer fixed, whatever you might do.”</p> +<p>“Don’t jaw, now! There ’s time to stop the mail yet. I +can get to Moreton as soon or sooner than that crawling cart if I ride. I +won’t be fooled like this!”</p> +<p>He ran to the stables, called to the groom, clapped a saddle on the horse +that had just brought him home, and in about three minutes was riding down +the avenue, while his lad reached the gate and swung it open just in time. +Then Grimbal galloped into the night, with heart and soul fixed upon his +letter. He meant to recover it at any reasonable cost. The white road +streaked away beneath him, and a breeze created by his own rapid progress +steadied him as he hastened on. Presently at a hill-foot, he saw how to save +a mile or more by short cuts over meadow-land, so left the highway, rode +through a hayfield, and dashed from it by a gap into a second. Then he +grunted and the sound was one of satisfaction, for his tremendous rate of +progress had served its object and already, creeping on the main road far +ahead, he saw the vehicle which held the mail.</p> +<p>Meanwhile Blanchard and the man-servant stood and watched John +Grimbal’s furious departure.</p> +<p>“Pity,” said Will. “No call to do it. I’ve took +his word, an’ the end ’s the same, letter or no letter. Now let +me finish that theer brandy, then I’ll go home.”</p> +<p>But Mr. Vallack heard nothing. He was gazing out into the night and +shaking with fear.</p> +<p>“High treason ’gainst the law of the land to lay a finger on +the mail. A letter posted be like a stone flinged or a word spoken—out +of our keeping for all time. An’ me to blame for it. I’m a ruined +man along o’ taking tu much ’pon myself an’ being tu eager +for others. He’ll fling me out, sure ’s death. ’T is all up +wi’ me.”</p> +<p>“As to that, I reckon many a dog gets a kick wheer he thinks he +’s earned a pat,” said Will; “that’s life, that is. +An’ maybe theer’s sore hearts in dumb beasts, tu, sometimes, for +a dog loves praise like a woman. He won’t sack ’e. You done what +’peared your duty.”</p> +<p>Blanchard then left the house, slowly proceeded along the avenue and +presently passed out on to the highroad. As he walked the pain of his leg +diminished, but he put no strain upon it and proceeded very leisurely towards +home. Great happiness broke into his mind, undimmed by aching bones and +bruises. The reflection that he was reconciled to John Grimbal crowded out +lesser thoughts. He knew the other had spoken truth, and accepted his +headlong flight to arrest the mail as sufficient proof of it. Then he thought +of the possibility of giving himself up before Grimbal’s letter should +come to be read.</p> +<p>At home Phoebe was lying awake in misery waiting for him. She had brought +up to their bedroom a great plate of cold bacon with vegetables and a pint of +beer; and as Will slowly appeared she uttered a cry and embraced him with +thanksgivings. Upon Blanchard’s mind the return to his wife impressed +various strange thoughts. He soothed her, comforted her, and assured her of +his safety. But to him it seemed that he spoke with a stranger, for half a +century of experience appeared to stretch between the present and his +departure from Monks Barton about three hours before. His wife experienced +similar sensations. That this cheerful, battered, hungry man could be the +same who had stormed from her into the night a few short hours before, +appeared impossible.</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XVI" name="IV_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI<br /> +A PAIR OF HANDCUFFS</h2> +<p>Mr. Blee, to do him justice, was usually the first afoot at Monks Barton, +both winter and summer. The maids who slept near him needed no alarum, for +his step on the stair and his high-pitched summons, “Now then, you lazy +gals, what be snorin’ theer for, an’ the day broke?” was +always sufficient to ensure their wakening.</p> +<p>At an early hour of the morning that dawned upon Will’s nocturnal +adventures, Billy stood in the farmyard and surveyed the shining river to an +accompaniment of many musical sounds. On Monks Barton thatches the pigeons +cooed and bowed and gurgled to their ladies, cows lowed from the byres, cocks +crew, and the mill-wheel, already launched upon the business of the day, +panted from its dark habitation of dripping moss and fern.</p> +<p>Billy sniffed the morning, then proceeded to a pig’s sty, opened a +door within it, and chuckled at the spectacle that greeted him.</p> +<p>“Burnish it all! auld sow ’s farrowed at last, then. Busy +night for her, sure ’nough! An’ so fine a litter as ever I seed, +by the looks of it.”</p> +<p>He bustled off to get refreshment for the gaunt, new-made mother, and as +he did so met Ted Chown, who now worked at Mr. Lyddon’s, and had just +arrived from his home in Chagford.</p> +<p>“Marnin’, sir; have ’e heard the news? Gert tidings +up-long I ’sure ’e.”</p> +<p>“Not so gert as what I’ve got, I’ll lay. Butivul litter +’t is. Come an’ give me a hand.”</p> +<p>“Bonus was catched poachin’ last night to the Red House. +An’ he’ve had his faace smashed in, nose broke, an’ all. He +escaped arter; but he went to Doctor fust thing to-day an’ got hisself +plastered; an’ then, knawin’ ’t weern’t no use to +hide, comed right along an’ gived hisself up to faither.”</p> +<p>“My stars! An’ no more’n what he desarved, that’s +certain.”</p> +<p>“But that ban’t all, even. Maister Jan Grimbal’s +missing! He rode off last night, Laard knaws wheer, an’ never a sign of +un seed since. They’ve sent to the station ’bout it +a’ready; an’ they ’m scourin’ the airth for un. +An’ ’t was Maister Blanchard as fought wi’ Bonus, for Sam +said so.”</p> +<p>“Guy Fawkes an’ angels! Here, you mix this. I must tell Miller +an’ run about a bit. Gwaine to be a gert day, by the looks of +it!”</p> +<p>He hurried into the house, met his master and began with breathless +haste,—</p> +<p>“Awful doin’s! Awful doin’s, Miller. Such a +sweet-smellin’ marnin’, tu! Bear yourself stiff against it, for +us caan’t say what remains to be told.”</p> +<p>“What’s wrong now? Doan’t choke yourself. You ’m +grawin’ tu auld for all the excitements of modern life, Billy. +Wheer’s Will?”</p> +<p>“You may well ax. Sleepin’ still, I reckon, for he comed in +long arter midnight. I was stirrin’ at the time an’ heard un. +Sleepin’ arter black deeds, if all they tell be true.”</p> +<p>“Black deeds!”</p> +<p>“The bwoy Ted’s just comed wi’ it. ’T is this way: +Bonus be at death’s door wi’ a smashed nose, an’ Blanchard +done it; an’ Jan Grimbal’s vanished off the faace o’ the +airth. Not a sign of un seed arter he drove away last night from the Jubilee +gathering. An’ if ’t is murder, you’ll be in the +witness-box, knawin’ the parties same as you do; an’ the sow +’s got a braave litter, though what’s that arter such +news?”</p> +<p>“Guess you ’m dreamin’, Blee,” said Mr. Lyddon, as +he took his hat and walked into the farmyard.</p> +<p>Billy was hurt.</p> +<p>“Dreamin’, be I? I’m a man as dreams blue murders, of +coourse! Tu auld to be relied on now, I s’pose. Theer! Theer!” he +changed his voice and it ran into a cracked scream of excitement. +“Theer! P’r’aps I’m dreamin’, as Inspector +Chown an’ Constable Lamacraft be walkin’ in the gate this instant +moment!”</p> +<p>But there was no mistaking this fact. Abraham Chown entered, marched +solemnly to the party at the door, cried “Halt!” to his +subordinate, then turned to Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>“Good-day to you, Miller,” he said, “though ’t is +a bad day, I’m fearin’. I be here for Will Blanchard, +<i>alias</i> Tom Newcombe.”</p> +<p>“If you mean my son-in-law, he ’s not out of bed to my +knawledge.”</p> +<p>“Dear sawls! Doan’t ’e say ’t is blue +murder—doan’t ’e say that!” implored Mr. Blee. His +head shook and his tongue revolved round his lips.</p> +<p>“Not as I knaws. We ’m actin’ on instructions from the +military to Plymouth.”</p> +<p>“Theer ’s allus wickedness hid under a alias +notwithstanding,” declared Billy, rather disappointed; “have +’e found Jan Grimbal?”</p> +<p>“They be searchin’ for un. Jim Luke, Inspector to Moreton, +an’ his men be out beatin’ the country. But I’m here, +wi’ my staff, for William Blanchard. March!”</p> +<p>Lamacraft, thus addressed, proceeded a pace or two until stopped by Mr. +Lyddon.</p> +<p>“No call to go in. He’ll come down. But I’m sore puzzled +to knaw what this means, for awnly last night I heard tell from Jan +Grimbal’s awn lips that he’d chaanged his mind about a private +matter bearin’ on this.”</p> +<p>“I want the man, anyways, an’ I be gwaine to have un,” +declared Inspector Chown. He brought a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and +gave them to the constable.</p> +<p>“Put up them gashly things, Abraham Chown,” said the miller +sternly. “Doan’t ’e knaw Blanchard better ’n +that?”</p> +<p>“Handcuffed he’ll be, whether he likes it or not,” +answered the other; “an’ if theer’s trouble, I bid all +present an’ any able-bodied men ’pon the premises to help me take +him in the Queen’s name.”</p> +<p>Billy hobbled round the corner, thrust two fingers into his mouth, and +blew a quavering whistle; whereupon two labourers, working a few hundred +yards off, immediately dropped their tools and joined him.</p> +<p>“Run you here,” he cried. “P’lice be corned to +taake Will Blanchard, an’ us must all give the Law a hand, for +theer’ll be blows struck if I knaw un.”</p> +<p>“Will Blanchard! What have he done?”</p> +<p>“Been under a alias—that’s the least of it, +but—God, He knaws—it may rise to murder. ’T is our bounden +duty to help Chown against un.”</p> +<p>“Be danged if I do!” said one of the men.</p> +<p>“Nor me,” declared the other. “Let Chown do his job +hisself—an’ get his jaw broke for his trouble.”</p> +<p>But they followed Mr. Blee to where the miller still argued against +Lamacraft’s entrance.</p> +<p>“Why didn’t they send soldiers for un? That’s what he +reckoned on,” said Mr. Lyddon.</p> +<p>“’T is my job fust.”</p> +<p>“I’m sorry you’ve come in this high spirit. You knaw the +man and ought to taake his word he’d go quiet and my guarantee for +it.”</p> +<p>“I knaw my duty, an’ doan’t want no teachin’ from +you.”</p> +<p>“You’re a fule!” said Miller, in some anger. +“An’ ’t will take more ’n you an’ that +moon-faced lout to put them things on the man, or I’m much +mistaken.”</p> +<p>He went indoors while the labourers laughed, and the younger constable +blushed at the insult.</p> +<p>“How do ’e like that, Peter Lamacraft?” asked a +labourer.</p> +<p>“No odds to me,” answered the policeman, licking his hands +nervously and looking at the door. “I ban’t feared of nought said +or done if I’ve got the Law behind me. An’ you’m liable +yourself if you doan’t help.”</p> +<p>“Caan’t wait no more,” declared Mr. Chown. “If +he’s in bed, us’ll take un in bed. Come on, you!”</p> +<p>Thus ordered to proceed, Lamacraft set his face resolutely forward and was +just entering the farm when Phoebe appeared. Her tears were dry, though her +voice was unsteady and her eyelids red.</p> +<p>“Gude mornin’, Mr. Chown,” she said.</p> +<p>“Marnin’, ma’am. Let us pass, if you please.”</p> +<p>“Are you coming in? Why?”</p> +<p>“Us caan’t bide no more, an’ us caan’t give no +more reasons. The Law ban’t ’spected to give reasons for its +deeds, an’ us won’t be bamboozled an’ put off a minute +longer,” answered Chown grimly. “March, I tell ’e, Peter +Lamacraft.”</p> +<p>“You caan’t see my husband.”</p> +<p>“But we’m gwaine to see un. He’ve got to see me, +an’ come along wi’ me, tu. An’ if he’s wise, +he’ll come quiet an’ keep his mouth shut. That much I’ll +tell un for his gude.”</p> +<p>“If you’ll listen, I might make you onderstand how ’tis +you caan’t see Will,” said Phoebe quietly. “You must knaw +he runned away an’ went soldiering before he married me. Then he comed +back for love of me wi’out axin’ any man’s +leave.”</p> +<p>“So much the worse, ma’am; he’m a desarter!”</p> +<p>“The dark wickedness!” gasped Mr. Blee; “an’ him +dumb as a newt ’bout it all these years an’ years! The conscience +of un!”</p> +<p>“Well, you needn’t trouble any more,” continued Phoebe +to the policemen. “My husband be gwaine to take this matter into his +awn hands now.”</p> +<p>Inspector Chown laughed.</p> +<p>“That’s gude, that is!—now he ’m blawn +upon!”</p> +<p>“He ’s gwaine to give himself up—he caan’t do +more,” said Phoebe, turning to her father who now reappeared.</p> +<p>“Coourse he caan’t do more. What more do ’e want?” +the miller inquired.</p> +<p>“Him,” answered Mr. Chown. “No more an’ no less; +an’ everything said will be used against him.”</p> +<p>“You glumpy auld Dowl!” growled a labouring man.</p> +<p>“All right, all right. You just wait, all of ’e! Wheer’s +the man? How much longer be I to bide his pleasure? March! Damn it all! be +the Law a laughing-stock?” The Inspector was growing very hot and +excited.</p> +<p>“He’s gone,” said Phoebe, as Mr. Lamacraft entered the +farm, put one foot on the bottom step of the stairs, then turned for further +orders. “He’s gone, before light. He rested two hours or so, then +us harnessed the trap an’ he drove away to Moreton to take fust train +to Plymouth by way o’ Newton Abbot. An’ he said as Ted Chown was +to go in arter breakfast an’ drive the trap home.”</p> +<p>“Couldn’t tell me nothin’ as had pleased me +better,” said the miller. “’T is a weight off +me—an’ off him I reckon. Now you ’m answered, my son; you +can telegraph back as you corned wi’ your auld handcuffs tu late by +hours, an’ that the man’s on his way to give hisself +up.”</p> +<p>“I’ve only got your word for it.”</p> +<p>“An’ what better word should ’e have?” piped +Billy, who in the space of half a minute had ranged himself alongside his +master. “You to question the word o’ Miller Lyddon, you +crooked-hearted raven! Who was it spoke for ’e fifteen year ago +an’ got ’em to make ’e p’liceman ’cause you was +tu big a fule to larn any other trade? Gert, thankless twoad! An’ who +was it let ’em keep the ’Green Man’ awpen two nights in wan +week arter closin’ time, ’cause he wanted another drop +hisself?”</p> +<p>“Come you away,” said the Inspector to his constable. +“Ban’t for the likes of we to have any talk wi’ the likes +o’ they. But they’ll hear more of this; an’ if +theer’s been any hookem-snivey dealin’s with the Law, +they’ll live to be sorry. An’ you follow me likewise,” he +added to his son, who stood hard by. “You come wi’ me, Ted, for +you doan’t do no more work for runaway soldiers, nor yet bald-headed +auld antics like this here!”</p> +<p>He pointed to Mr. Blee, then turned to depart.</p> +<p>“Get off honest man’s land, you black-bearded beast!” +screamed Billy. “You ’m most like of any wan ever I heard tell of +to do murder yourself; an’ auld as I be, I’d crawl on my hands +an’ knees to see you scragged for ’t, if ’t was so far as +the sun in heaven!”</p> +<p>“That’s libel,” answered Mr. Chown, with cold and +haughty authority; “an’ you’ve put yourself in the grip of +the Law by sayin’ it, as you’ll knaw before you ’m much +aulder.”</p> +<p>Then, with this trifling advantage, he retreated, while Lamacraft and Ted +brought up the rear.</p> +<p>“So theer’s an end of that. Now us’ll fall to wi’ +no worse appetites,” declared Miller. “An’ as to +Will,” he added, “’fore you chaps go, just mind an’ +judge no man till you knaw what’s proved against him. Onless +theer’s worse behind than I’ve larned so far, I’m gwaine to +stand by un.”</p> +<p>“An’ me, tu!” said Mr. Blee, with a fine disregard for +his recent utterances. “I’ve teached the chap purty nigh all he +knaws an’ I ban’t gwaine to turn on un now, onless ’t is +proved blue murder. An’ that Chown ’s a disgrace to his cloth; +an’ I’d pull his ugly bat’s ears on my awn behalf if I was +a younger an’ spryer man.”</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XVII" name="IV_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII<br /> +SUSPENSE</h2> +<p>The fate of John Grimbal was learned within an hour or two of Inspector +Chown’s departure from Monks Barton; and by the time that Martin +Grimbal had been apprised of the matter his brother already lay at the Red +House.</p> +<p>John had been found at daybreak upon the grass-land where he rode +overnight on his journey to intercept the mail. A moment after he descried +the distant cart, his horse had set foot in a hole; and upon the accident +being discovered, the beast was found lying with a broken leg within twenty +yards of its insensible master. His horse was shot, John Grimbal carried home +with all despatch, and Doctor Parsons arrived as quickly as possible, to do +all that might be done for the sufferer until an abler physician than himself +reached the scene.</p> +<p>Three dreary days saw Grimbal at the door of death, then a brief interval +of consciousness rewarded unceasing care, and a rumour spread that he might +yet survive. Martin, when immediate fear for his brother’s life was +relieved, busied himself about Blanchard, and went to Plymouth. There he saw +Will, learned all facts concerning the letter, and did his best to win +information of the prisoner’s probable punishment. Fears, magnified +rumours, expressed opinions, mostly erroneous, buzzed in the ears of the +anxious party at Monks Barton. Then Martin Grimbal returned to Chagford and +there came an evening when those most interested met after supper at the farm +to hear all he could tell them.</p> +<p>Long faces grouped round Martin as he made his statement in a grey June +twilight. Mr. Blee and the miller smoked, Mrs. Blanchard sat with her hand in +her daughter’s, and Phoebe occupied a comfortable arm-chair by the wood +fire. Between intervals of long silence came loud, juicy, sounds from +Billy’s pipe, and when light waned they still talked on until Chris +stirred herself and sought the lamp.</p> +<p>“They tell me,” began Martin, “that a deserting soldier +is punished according to his character and with regard to the fact whether he +surrenders himself or is apprehended. Of course we know Will gave himself up, +but then they will find out that he knew poor John’s unfortunate letter +had reached its destination—or at any rate started for it; and they may +argue, not knowing the truth, that it was the fact of the information being +finally despatched made Will surrender. They will say, I am afraid, as they +said to me: ’Why did he wait until now if he meant to do the right +thing? Why did he not give himself up long ago?’”</p> +<p>“That’s easy answered: to please others,” explained Mr. +Lyddon. “Fust theer was his promise to Phoebe, then his mother’s +illness, then his other promise, to bide till his wife was brought to bed. +Looking back I see we was wrong to use our power against his awn wish; but so +it stands.”</p> +<p>“I ought to go; I ought to be alongside un,” moaned Phoebe; +“I was at the bottom of everything from fust to last. For me he run +away; for me he stopped away. Mine’s the blame, an’ them as judge +him should knaw it an’ hear me say so.”</p> +<p>“Caan’t do no such vain thing as that,” declared Mr. +Blee. “’T was never allowed as a wife should be heard ’pon +the doin’s of her awn husband. ’Cause why? She’d be +one-sided—either plump for un through thick an’ thin, or else all +against un, as the case might stand.”</p> +<p>“As to the sentence,” continued Martin, “if a man with a +good character deserts and thinks better of it and goes back to his regiment, +he is not as a rule tried by court-martial at all. Instead, he loses all his +former service and has to begin to reckon his period of engagement—six +or seven years perhaps—all over again. But a notoriously bad character +is tried by court-martial in any case, whether he gives himself up or not; +and he gets a punishment according to the badness of his past record. Such a +man would have from eighty-four days’ imprisonment, with hard labour, +up to six months, or even a year, if he had deserted more than once. Then the +out-and-out rascals are sentenced to be ‘dismissed her Majesty’s +service.’”</p> +<p>“But the real gude men,” pleaded Phoebe—“them as +had no whisper ’gainst ’em, same as Will? They couldn’t be +hard ’pon them, ’specially if they knawed all?”</p> +<p>“I should hope not; I’m sure not. You see the case is so +unusual, as an officer explained to me, and such a great length of time has +elapsed between the action and the judgment upon it. That is in Will’s +favour. A good soldier with a clean record who deserts and is apprehended +does not get more than three months with hard labour and sometimes less. +That’s the worst that can happen, I hope.”</p> +<p>“What’s hard labour to him?” murmured Billy, whose tact +on occasions of universal sorrow was sometimes faulty. “’Tis the +rankle of bein’ in every blackguard’s mouth that’ll cut +Will to the quick.”</p> +<p>“What blackguards say and think ban’t no odds,” declared +Mrs. Blanchard. “’Tis better—far better he should do what +he must do. The disgrace is in the minds of them that lick theer lips upon +his sorrow. Let him pay for a wrong deed done, for the evil he did that gude +might come of it. I see the right hand o’ God holding’ the +li’l strings of my son’s life, an’ I knaw better’n +any of ’e what’ll be in the bwoy’s heart now.”</p> +<p>“Yet, when all’s said, ’tis a mournful sarcumstance +an’ sent for our chastening,” contended Mr. Blee stoutly. +“Us mustn’t argue away the torment of it an’ pretend +’tis nought. Ban’t a pleasing thing, ’specially at such a +time when all the airth s gwaine daft wi’ joy for the gracious gudeness +o’ God to the Queen o’ England. In plain speech, ’t is a +damn dismal come-along-of-it, an’ I’ve cried by night, auld +though I am, to think o’ the man’s babes grawin’ up +wi’ this round theer necks. An’ wan to be born while he ’m +put away! Theer ’s a black picksher for ’e! Him doin’ hard +labour as the Law directs, an’ his wife doin’ hard labour, +tu—in her lonely bed! Why, gormed if I—”</p> +<p>“For God’s sake shut your mouth, you horrible old man!” +burst out Martin, as Phoebe hurried away in tears and Chris followed her. +“You’re a disgrace to humanity and I don’t hesitate—I +don’t hesitate at all to say you have no proper feeling in +you!”</p> +<p>“Martin’s right, Billy,” declared Mr. Lyddon without +emotion. “You ’m a thought tu quick to meet other people’s +troubles half way, as I’ve told ’e before to-night. Ban’t a +comely trait in ’e. You’ve made her run off sobbing her poor, +bruised heart out. As if she hadn’t wept enough o’ late. Do +’e think us caan’t see what it all means an’ the wisht +cloud that’s awver all our heads, lookin’ darker by contrast +wi’ the happiness of the land, owing to the Jubilee of a gert Queen? +Coourse we knaw. But’t is poor wisdom to talk ’bout the blackness +of a cloud to them as be tryin’ to find its silver lining. If you +caan’t lighten trouble, best to hold your peace.”</p> +<p>“What’s the use of cryin’ ‘peace’ when us +knaws in our hearts ’tis war? Us must look inside an’ outside, +an’ count the cost same as I be doin’ now,” declared Mr. +Blee. “Then to be catched up so harsh ’mong friends! Well, well, +gude-night, all; I’ll go to my rest. Hard words doan’t break, +though they may bruise. But I’ll do my duty, whether or no.”</p> +<p>He rose and shuffled to the door, then looked round and opened his mouth +to speak again. But he changed his mind, shook his head, snorted +expressively, and disappeared.</p> +<p>“A straange-fashioned chap,” commented Mrs. Blanchard, +“wi’ sometimes a wise word stuck in his sour speech, like a gude +currant in a bad dumpling.”</p> +<h2><a id="IV_XVIII" name="IV_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII<br /> +THE NIGHT OF JUBILEE</h2> +<p>Unnumbered joy fires were writing the nation’s thanksgiving across +the starry darkness of a night in June. Throughout the confines of +Britain—on knolls arising beside populous towns, above the wild cliffs +of our coasts, in low-lying lands, upon the banks of rivers, at the fringes +of forests and over a thousand barren heaths, lonely wastes, and stony +pinnacles of untamed hills, like some mundane galaxy of stars or many-tongued +outbreak of conflagration, the bonfires glimmered. And their golden seed was +sown so thickly, that from no pile of those hundreds then brightening the +hours of darkness had it been possible to gaze into the night and see no +other.</p> +<p>Upon the shaggy fastnesses of Devon’s central waste, within the +bounds, metes, and precincts of Dartmoor Forest, there shone a whole +constellation of little suns, and a wanderer in air might have counted a +hundred without difficulty, whilst, for the beholders perched upon Yes Tor, +High Wilhays, or the bosom of Cosdon during the fairness and clearness of +that memorable night, fully threescore beacons flamed. All those granite +giants within the field of man’s activities, all the monsters whose +enormous shades fell at dawn or evening time upon the hamlets and villages of +the Moor, now carried on their lofty crowns the flames of rejoicing. Bonfires +of varying size, according to the energy and importance of the communities +responsible for them, dotted the circumference of the lonely region in a +vast, irregular figure, but thinned and ceased towards the unpeopled heart of +the waste. On Wattern, at Cranmere, upon Fur Tor, and under the hoary, +haunted woods of Wistman, no glad beacons blazed or voices rang. There +Nature, ignorant of epochs and heeding neither olympiad nor lustrum, cycle +nor century, ruled alone; there, all self-centred, self-contained, unwitting +of conscious existence and its little joys, her perfection above praise and +more enduring than any chronicle of it, asking for no earthborn acclamations +of her eternal reign, demanding only obedience from all on penalty of death, +the Mother swayed her sceptre unseen. Seed and stone, blade and berry, hot +blood and cold, did her bidding and slept or stirred at her ordinance. A +nightjar harshly whirred beneath her footstool; wan tongues of flame rose and +fell upon her quaking altars; a mountain fox, pattering quick-footed to the +rabbit warren, caught light from those exhalations in his round, green eyes +and barked.</p> +<p>Humanity thronged and made merry around numberless crackling piles of +fire. Men and women, boys and girls, most noisily rejoiced, and from each +flaming centre of festivity a thin sound of human shouting and laughter +streamed starward with the smoke.</p> +<p>Removed by brief distance in space, the onlooker, without overmuch strain +or imagination, might stride a pace or two backward in time and conceive +himself for a moment as in the presence of those who similarly tended beacons +on these granite heights of old. Then, truly, the object and occasion were +widely different; then, perchance, in answer to evil rumour moving zigzag on +black bat-wings through nights of fear, many a bale-fire had shot upwards, +upon the keystone of Cosdon’s solemn arch, beckoned like a bloody hand +towards north and south, and cried danger to a thousand British warriors +lurking in moor, and fen, and forest. Answering flames had leapt from Hay +Tor, from Buckland Beacon, from Great Mis Tor in the west; and their warning, +caught up elsewhere, would quickly penetrate to the heart of the South Hams, +to the outlying ramparts of the Cornish wastes, to Exmoor and the coast-line +of the north. But no laughter echoed about those old-time fires. Their lurid +light smeared wolfskins, splashed on metal and untanned hide, illumined +barbaric adornments, fierce faces, wild locks, and savage eyes. Anxious +Celtic mothers and maidens stood beside their men, while fear and rage leapt +along from woman’s face to woman’s face, as some gasping wretch, +with twoscore miles of wilderness behind him, told of high-beaked monsters +moving under banks of oars, of dire peril, of death and ruin, suddenly sprung +in a night from behind the rim of the sea.</p> +<p>Since then the peaks of the Moor have smiled or scowled under countless +human fires, have flashed glad tidings or flamed ill news to many +generations. And now, perched upon one enormous mass of stone, there towered +upward a beacon of blazing furze and pine. In its heart were tar barrels and +the monster bred heat enough to remind the granite beneath it of those fires +that first moulded its elvan ingredients to a concrete whole and hurled them +hither.</p> +<p>About this eye of flame crowded those who had built it, and the roaring +mass of red-hot timber and seething pitch represented the consummation of +Chagford’s festivities on the night of Jubilee. The flames, obedient to +such light airs as were blowing, bent in unison with the black billows of +smoke that wound above them. Great, trembling tongues separated from the mass +and soared upward, gleaming as they vanished; sparks and jets, streams and +stars of light, shot from the pile to illuminate the rolling depths of the +smoke cloud, to fret its curtain with spangles and jewels of gold atid ruby, +to weave strange, lurid lights into the very fabric of its volume. Far away, +as the breezes drew them, fell a red glimmer of fire, where those charred +fragments caught in the rush and hurled aloft, returned again to earth; and +the whole incandescent structure, perched as it was upon the apex of Yes Tor, +suggested at a brief distance a fiery top-knot of streaming flame on some +vast and demoniac head thrust upward from the nether world.</p> +<p>Great splendour of light gleamed upon a ring of human beings. Adventurous +spirits leapt forth, fed the flames with faggots and furze and risked their +hairy faces within the range of the bonfire’s scorching breath. +Alternate gleam and glow played fantastically upon the spectators, and, +though for the most part they moved but little while their joy fire was at +its height, the conflagration caused a sheer devil’s dance of impish +light and shadow to race over every face and form in the assemblage. The +fantastic magician of the fire threw humps on to straight backs, flattened +good round breasts, wrote wrinkles on smooth faces, turned eyes and lips into +shining gems, made white teeth yellow, cast a grotesque spell of the unreal +on young shapes, of the horrible upon old ones. A sort of monkey coarseness +crept into the red, upturned faces; their proportions were distorted, their +delicacy destroyed. Essential lines of figures were concealed by the inky +shadows; unimportant features were thrown into a violent prominence; the +clean fire impinged abruptly on a night of black shade, as sunrise on the +moon. There was no atmosphere. Human noses poked weirdly out of nothing, +human hands waved without arms, human heads moved without bodies, bodies +bobbed along without legs. The heart-beat and furnace roar of the fire was +tremendous, but the shouts of men, the shriller laughter of women, and the +screams and yells of children could be heard through it, together with the +pistol-like explosion of sap turned to steam, and rending its way from green +wood. Other sounds also fretted the air, for a hundred yards distant—in +a hut-circle—the Chagford drum-and-fife band lent its throb and squeak +to the hour, and struggled amain to increase universal joy. So the fire +flourished, and the plutonian rock-mass of the tor arose, the centre of a +scene itself plutonian.</p> +<p>Removed by many yards from the ring of human spectators, and scattered in +wide order upon the flanks of the hill, stood tame beasts. Sheep huddled +there and bleated amazement, their fleeces touched by the flicker of the +distant fire; red heifers and steers also faced the flame and chewed the cud +upon a spectacle outside all former experience; while inquisitive ponies drew +up in a wide radius, snorted and sniffed with delicate, dilated nostrils at +the unfamiliar smell of the breeze, threw up their little heads, fetched a +compass at top speed and so returned; then crowded flank to flank, shoulder +to shoulder, and again blankly gazed at the fire which reflected itself in +the whites of their shifty eyes.</p> +<p>Fitting the freakish antics of the red light, a carnival spirit, hard to +rouse in northern hearts, awakened within this crowd of Devon men and women, +old men and children. There was in their exhilaration some inspiration from +the joyous circumstance they celebrated; and something, too, from the barrel. +Dancing began and games, feeble by day but not lacking devil when pursued +under cover of darkness. There were hugging and kissing, and yells of +laughter when amorous couples who believed themselves safe were suddenly +revealed lip to lip and heart to heart by an unkind flash of fire. Some, as +their nature was, danced and screamed that flaming hour away; some sat +blankly and smoked and gazed with less interest than the outer audience of +dumb animals; some laboured amain to keep the bonfire at blaze. These last +worked from habit and forgot their broadcloth. None bade them, but it was +their life to be toiling; it came naturally to mind and muscle, and they +laughed while they laboured and sweated. A dozen staid groups witnessed the +scene from surrounding eminences, but did not join the merrymakers. Mr. +Shorto-Champernowne, Doctor Parsons, and the ladies of their houses stood +with their feet on a tumulus apart; and elsewhere Mr. Chapple, Charles +Coomstock, Mr. Blee, and others, mostly ancient, sat on the granite, +inspected the pandemonium spread before them, and criticised as experts who +had seen bonfires lighted before the greater part of the present gathering +was out of its cradle. But no cynic praising of past time to the +disparagement of the present marked their opinions. Mr. Chapple indeed +pronounced the fire brilliantly successful, and did not hesitate to declare +that it capped all his experience in this direction.</p> +<p>“A braave blaze,” he said, “a blaze as gives the +thoughtful eye an’ nose a tidy guess at what the Pit’s like to +be. Ess, indeed, a religious fire, so to say; an’ I warrant the prophet +sat along just such another when he said man was born to trouble sure as the +sparks fly up’ard.”</p> +<p>Somewhat earlier on the same night, under the northern ramparts of +Dartmoor, and upon the long, creeping hill that rises aloft from Okehampton, +then dips again, passes beneath the Belstones, and winds by Sticklepath and +Zeal under Cosdon, there rattled a trap holding two men. From their +conversation it appeared that one was a traveller who now returned southward +from a journey.</p> +<p>“Gert, gay, fanciful doin’s to-night,” said the driver, +looking aloft where Cosdon Beacon swelled. “You can see the light from +the blaze up-long, an’ now an’ again you can note a sign in the +night like a red-hot wire drawed up out the airth. They ’m sky-rockets, +I judge.”</p> +<p>“’T is a joyful night, sure ’nough.”</p> +<p>The driver illustrated a political ignorance quite common in rural +districts ten years ago and not conspicuously rare to-day. He laboured under +uneasy suspicions that the support of monarchy was a direct and dismal tax +upon the pockets of the poor.</p> +<p>“Pity all the fuss ban’t about a better job,” he said. +“Wan auld, elderly lady ’s so gude as another, come to think of +it. Why shouldn’t my mother have a jubilee?”</p> +<p>“What for? ’Cause she’ve borne a damned fule?” +asked the other man angrily. “If that’s your way o’ +thought, best keep it in your thoughts. Anyhow, I’ll knock your silly +head off if I hears another word to that tune, so now you knaw.”</p> +<p>The speaker was above medium height and breadth, the man who drove him +happened to be unusually small.</p> +<p>“Well, well, no offence,” said the latter.</p> +<p>“There is offence; an’ it I heard a lord o’ the land +talk that way to-night, I’d make un swallow every dirty word of it. To +hell wi’ your treason!”</p> +<p>The driver changed the subject.</p> +<p>“Now you can see a gude few new fires,” he said. +“That’s the Throwleigh blaze; an’ that, long ways off, +be—”</p> +<p>“Yes Tor by the look of it. All Chagford’s traapsed up-long, I +warn ’e, to-night.”</p> +<p>They were now approaching a turning of the ways and the traveller suddenly +changed his destination.</p> +<p>“Come to think of it, I’ll go straight on,” he said. +“That’ll save you a matter o’ ten miles, tu. Drive ahead a +bit Berry Down way. Theer I’ll leave ’e an’ you’ll be +back home in time to have some fun yet.”</p> +<p>The driver, rejoicing at this unhoped diminution of his labours, soon +reached the foot of a rough by-road that ascends to the Moor between the +homesteads of Berry Down and Creber.</p> +<p>Yes Tor now arose on the left under its cap of flame, and the wayfarer, +who carried no luggage, paid his fare, bid the other +“good-night,” and then vanished into the darkness.</p> +<p>He passed between the sleeping farms, and only watch-dogs barked out of +the silence, for Gidleigh folks were all abroad that night. Pressing onwards, +the native hurried to Scorhill, then crossed the Teign below Batworthy Farm, +passed through the farmyard, and so proceeded to the common beneath Yes Tor. +He whistled as he went, then stopped a moment to listen. The first drone of +music and remote laughter reached his ear. He hurried onwards until a gleam +lighted his face; then he passed through the ring of beasts, still glaring +fascinated around the fire; and finally he pushed among the people.</p> +<p>He stood revealed and there arose a sudden whisper among some who knew +him, but whom he knew not. One or two uttered startled cries at this +apparition, for all associated the newcomer with events and occurrences +widely remote from the joy of the hour. How he came among them now, and what +event made it possible for him to stand in their midst a free man, not the +wisest could guess.</p> +<p>A name was carried from mouth to mouth, then shouted aloud, then greeted +with a little cheer. It fell upon Mr. Blee’s ear as he prepared to +start homewards; and scarcely had the sound of it set him gasping when a big +man grew out of the flame and shadow and stood before him with extended +hand.</p> +<p>“Burnish it all! You! Be it Blanchard or the ghost of un?”</p> +<p>“The man hisself—so big as bull’s beef, an’ so +free as thicky fire!” said Will.</p> +<p>Riotous joy sprang and bubbled in his voice. He gripped Billy’s hand +till the old man jumped and wriggled.</p> +<p>“Free! Gude God! Doan’t tell me you’ve brawke +loose—doan’t ’e say that! Christ! if you haven’t +squashed my hand till theer’s no feeling in it! Doan’t ’e +say you’ve runned away?”</p> +<p>“No such thing,” answered Will, now the centre of a little +crowd. “I’ll tell ’e, sawls all, if you mind to hear. +’Tis this way: Queen Victoria, as have given of the best she’ve +got wi’ both hands to the high men of the land, so they tell me, +caan’t forget nought, even at such a time as this here. She’ve +made gert additions to all manner o’ men; an’ to me, an’ +the likes o’ me she’ve given what’s more precious than +bein’ lords or dukes. I’m free—me an’ all as runned +from the ranks. The Sovereign Queen’s let deserters go free, if you can +credit it; an’ that’s how I stand here this minute.”</p> +<p>A buzz and hum with cheers and some laughter and congratulations followed +Will’s announcement. Then the people scattered to spread his story, and +Mr. Blee spoke.</p> +<p>“Come you down home to wance. Ban’t none up here as cares a +rush ’bout ’e but me. But theer ’s a many anxious folks +below. I comed up for auld sake’s sake an’ because ban’t in +reason to suppose I’ll ever see another joy fire ’pon Yes Tor +rock, at my time o’ life. But us’ll go an’ carry this rare +news to Chagford an’ the Barton.”</p> +<p>They faded from the red radius of the fire and left it slowly dying. Will +helped Billy off rough ground to the road. Then he set off at a speed +altogether beyond the old man’s power, so Mr. Blee resorted to +stratagem.</p> +<p>“’Bate your pace; ’bate your pace; I caan’t travel +that gait an’ talk same time. Yet theer’s a power o’ fine +things I might tell ’e if you’d listen.”</p> +<p>“’T is hard to walk slow towards a mother an’ wife like +what mine be, after near a month from ’em; but let’s have your +news, Billy, an’ doan’t croak, for God’s sake. Say +all’s well wi’ all.”</p> +<p>“I ban’t no croaker, as you knaws. Happy, are +’e?—happy for wance? I suppose you’ll say now, as +you’ve said plenty times a’ready, that you ’m to the tail +of your troubles for gude an’ all—just in your auld, silly +fashion?”</p> +<p>“Not me, auld chap, never no more—so long as you ’m +alive! Ha, ha, ha—that’s wan for you! Theer! if ’t +isn’t gude to laugh again!”</p> +<p>“I be main glad as I’ve got no news to make ’e do +anything else, though ban’t often us can be prophets of gude nowadays. +But if you’ve grawed a streak wiser of late, then theer’s hope, +even for a scatterbrain like you, the Lard bein’ all-powerful. Not that +jokes against such as me would please Him the better.”</p> +<p>“I’ve thought a lot in my time, Billy; an’ I +haven’t done thinking yet. I’ve comed to reckon as I caan’t +do very well wi’out the world, though the world would fare easy enough +wi’out me.”</p> +<p>Billy nodded.</p> +<p>“That’s sense so far as it goes,” he admitted. +“Obedience be hard to the young; to the auld it comes natural; to me +allus was easy as dirt from my youth up. Obedience to betters in heaven +an’ airth. But you—you with your born luck—never heard tell +of nothin’ like it ’t all. What’s a fix to you? You goes in +wan end an’ walks out t’ other, like a rabbit through a hedge. +Theer you was—in such a tight pass as you might say neither God nor +angels could get ’e free wi’out a Bible miracle, when, burnish it +all! if the Jubilee Queen o’ England doan’t busy herself +’bout ’e!”</p> +<p>“’T is true as I’m walkin’ by your side. I’d +give a year o’ my wages to knaw how I could shaw what I think about +it.”</p> +<p>“You might thank her. ’T is all as humble folks can do most +times when Queens or Squires or the A’mighty Hisself spares a thought +to better us. Us can awnly say ’thank you.’”</p> +<p>There was a silence of some duration; then Billy again bid his companion +moderate his pace.</p> +<p>“I’m forgetting all I’ve got to tell ’e, though +I’ve news enough for a buke,” he said.</p> +<p>“How’s Jan Grimbal, fust plaace?”</p> +<p>“On his legs again an’ out o’ danger if the Lunnon +doctor knaws anything. A hunderd guineas they say that chap have had! Your +name was danced to a mad tune ’pon Grimbal’s lips ’fore his +senses corned back to un. Why for I caan’t tell ’e. He’ve +shook hands wi’ Death for sartain while you was away.”</p> +<p>“An’ mother, an’ wife, an’ Miller?”</p> +<p>“Your mother be well—a steadfast woman her be. Joy +doan’t lift her up, an’ sorrow doan’t crush her. +Theer’s gert wisdom in her way of life. ’T is my awn, for that +matter. Then Miller—well, he ’m grawin’ auld an’ +doan’t rate me quite so high as formerly—not that I judge anybody +but myself. An’ your missis—theer, if I haven’t kept it for +the last! ’Tis news four-an-twenty hour old now an’ they wrote to +’e essterday, but I lay you missed the letter awin’ to +me—”</p> +<p>“Get on!”</p> +<p>“Well, she’ve brought ’e a bwoy—so now +you’ve got both sorts—bwoy an’ cheel. An’ all +doin’ well as can be, though wisht work for her, thinkin’ +’pon you the while.”</p> +<p>Will stood still and uttered a triumphant but inarticulate +sound—half-laugh, half-sob, half-thanksgiving. Then the man spoke, slow +and deep,—</p> +<p>“He shall go for a soldier!”</p> +<p>“Theer! Now I knaw ’t is Blanchard back an’ no other! +Hear me, will ’e; doan’t plan no such uneven way of life for +un.”</p> +<p>“By God, he shall!”</p> +<p>The words came back over Will Blanchard’s shoulder, for he was fast +vanishing.</p> +<p>“Might have knawed he wouldn’t walk along wi’ me arter +that,” thought Billy. Then he lifted up his voice and bawled to the +diminishing figure, already no more than a darker blot on the darkness of +night.</p> +<p>“For the Lard’s love go in quiet an’ gradual, or +you’ll scare the life out of ’em all.”</p> +<p>And the answer came back,—</p> +<p>“I knaw, I knaw; I ban’t the man to do a rash deed!”</p> +<p>Mr. Blee chuckled and plodded on through the night while Will strode far +ahead.</p> +<p>Presently he stood beside the wicket of Mrs. Blanchard’s cottage and +hesitated between two women. Despite circumstances, there came no uncertain +answer from the deepest well-springs of him. He could not pass that gate just +then. And so he stopped and turned and entered; and she, his mother, sitting +in thought alone, heard a footfall upon the great nightly silence—a +sudden, familiar footfall that echoed to her heart the music it loved +best.</p> +<h2>THE END.</h2> +<hr class="full" /> +<h2>Footnotes:</h2> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote1" name="footnote1"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 1:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag1">(return)</a> +<p><i>At Chagford.</i> The place of the poet’s passing is believed to +have been an ancient dwelling-house adjacent to St. Michael’s Church. +At that date it was a private residence of the Whiddon family; but during +later times it became known as the “Black Swan Inn,” or tavern (a +black swan being the crest of Sir John Whiddon, Judge of Queen’s Bench +in the first Mary’s reign); while to-day this restored Mansion appears +as the hostelry of the “Three Crowns.”</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote2" name="footnote2"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 2:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag2">(return)</a> +<p><i>The sweet poet.</i></p> +<p class="poem">“Wassaile the trees, that they may beare<br /> +You many a Plum, and many a Peare;<br /> +For more or lesse fruites they will bring,<br /> +As you doe give them Wassailing.”</p> +<p class="signed"><i>Hesperides.</i></p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote3" name="footnote3"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 3:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag3">(return)</a> +<p><i>Rames</i> = skeleton; remains.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote4" name="footnote4"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 4:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag4">(return)</a> +<p><i>Muty-hearted</i> = soft-hearted.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote5" name="footnote5"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 5:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag5">(return)</a> +<p><i>Caddling</i> = loafing, idling.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote6" name="footnote6"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 6:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag6">(return)</a> +<p><i>Venwell rights</i> = Venville rights.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote7" name="footnote7"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 7:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag7">(return)</a> +<p><i>Hatch-mouthed</i> = foul mouthed; profane.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote8" name="footnote8"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 8:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag8">(return)</a> +<p><i>Awnself</i>=selfish.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote9" name="footnote9"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 9:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag9">(return)</a> +<p><i>Playing</i> = swarming.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote10" name="footnote10"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 10:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag10">(return)</a> +<p><i>Bosky-eyed</i> = intoxicated.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote11" name="footnote11"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 11:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag11">(return)</a> +<p><i>Things</i> = beasts; sheep and cattle.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote12" name="footnote12"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 12:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag12">(return)</a> +<p><i>Mommet</i> = scarecrow.</p> +</blockquote> +<blockquote class="footnote"><a id="footnote13" name="footnote13"></a> +<span class='fnheader'>Footnote 13:</span> <a href= +"#footnotetag13">(return)</a> +<p><i>Scad</i> = the outer rind of the peat, with ling and grass still +adhering to it.</p> +</blockquote> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14527 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |