Children of the Mist Part 60

"No, dear love, not now. Give it to us all arter breakfast in the marnin'."

"So I will then; an' take it right away to the auctioneer the minute after."

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.

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 advertis.e.m.e.nt appeared in print, it looked mean and filled but a paltry s.p.a.ce. 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 s.h.i.+llings.

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.

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.

The day of the sale dawned fine and at the appointed hour a thin stream of market carts and foot pa.s.sengers 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 advertis.e.m.e.nt. 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.

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.

Presently a brown figure crept through Newtake gate, hesitated a while, then began to climb the hill and approach Blanchard. s.h.i.+p 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.

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."

Blanchard took it without thanks, waited until the labourer had departed, then opened the letter with some slight curiosity.

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.

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.

"Powder fust, jam arter, by G.o.d!" 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.

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 s.h.i.+llings a week at Monks Barton, with the only stipulation that himself, his wife, and the children should dwell at the farm.

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 pa.s.sed quicker than thought to an opposite condition of mind.

"'Tis a fairy story--awnly true!" he said to himself as he swept along.

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. s.h.i.+p, 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, s.h.i.+llings rather than pounds changed hands and many a poor lot found no purchaser.

Pa.s.sing 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 pa.s.sed, 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.

"Marnin' to 'e, Jan Grimbal! Glad to hear tell as your greyhound winned the cup down to Newton coursing."

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 vanis.h.i.+ng figure with evident amazement, then spoke.

"By Jove! Tom Newcombe, by all that's wonderful," he said.

CHAPTER VI

THE SECRET OUT

NOW many different persons in various places were simultaneously concerned with Will Blanchard and his affairs.

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 rect.i.tude 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 a.s.sist 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 a.s.sociated John's a.s.sertion 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.

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.

"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."

"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.

"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."

They followed him in a breathless procession, as he hurried across the farmyard.

"Rap to the door quick, dear heart," said Phoebe, "or I'll be cryin'

again."

"No more rappin' after thicky butivul letter," answered Will. "Us'll gaw straight in."

"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."

"Cheer up, Phoebe," cried Will. "Trouble's blawed awver for gude an' all now by the look of it. 'Tis plain sailing hencefarrard, thank G.o.d, that is, if a pair o' strong arms, working morning an' night for Miller, can bring it about."

So they went together, where Mr. Lyddon waited nervously within; and Damaris and Chris walked beside the river.

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.

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 friends.h.i.+p with John Grimbal had ripened.

"By Jove! Tom Newcombe, by all that's wonderful!" he exclaimed, as Will swung past him down the hill to happiness.

"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 c.o.c.k-a-hoop about. Up the hill they're selling every stick he's got at auction. He's ruined."

"He might be ruined, indeed, if I liked. 'Tom Newcombe' he called himself when he was with us."