The Vicar's People Part 81

"Yon's the mine," he said, looking at Geoffrey curiously, as the young man took so tremendous a tug at his oar that the boat was pulled slightly round.

"Easy, my lad; easy," said old Prawle. "Don't you like the look of the mine?"

Geoffrey did not answer, but pulled away, though with less violence; and so they rowed on till suddenly old Prawle exclaimed, as they were lying now well under the promontory,--

"You'd best give me the other oar."

Without a word Geoffrey obeyed, and watched him curiously as, after taking both sculls now, he turned the boat's head towards the rocks, and waiting his time, as he pulled gently on, he paused till a good wave came in, and then, balancing the little boat on the top, allowed it to be carried right in between a couple of ma.s.ses of rock, barely wide enough apart to admit of its pa.s.sing. Then, pulling one oar sharply, he turned round by another ma.s.s of rock, and Geoffrey found that they were in smooth water, floating in under a rough arch, so low that they had to bend right down in the boat for a minute; after which the ceiling rose, and he found that they were in a rugged cavern, whose light only came from the low opening through which they had pa.s.sed. It was a gloomy, weird-looking place, in which the waves plashed, and sucked, and sounded hollow, echoing, and strange, each wave that came softly rolling in, carrying them forward as it pa.s.sed under them, and then seemed to continue its journey into the darkness ahead.

"Mouth's covered at high water," said old Prawle, as he laid the oars in the boat.

"Then how shall we get out?" said Geoffrey, to whom the idea of being caught by the tide and drowned in such a place as this had, in spite of his troubles, no attraction.

"Same as we got in," growled old Prawle. "'Fraid?"

"No," said Geoffrey, st.u.r.dily. "I don't want to be caught though."

"I've been several times," said the old man, with a hoa.r.s.e chuckle. "It scared me the first time, but I soon found there was plenty of room."

"Bit of smuggling?" said Geoffrey.

"Iss, my son," said the old man, with a laugh. "I don't believe there's a soul ever been in this zorn besides me."

"But you don't smuggle now?" said Geoffrey.

"No, not unless I want a drop of brandy or Hollands gin."

"Then why have you come here?"

"Ha, ha, ha! I'll show you," said the old man, laughing. "I haven't lived here for nothing. Wait till I've lit the lantern, and we'll see."

He took the matches, and as he struck one the roof and sides of the cave seemed to flash with metallic green, but Geoffrey saw that it was only the bright, wet moss that he had found in the adit of the old mine, and he sat there watching the old man, as he lit and closed the lantern, set it down on the thwart, and then proceeded to guide the boat forward along the narrow channel of water, over which the granite roof spread in a low arch, sometimes rising ten or twenty feet, but more often coming down as if to crush them.

They must have gone several hundred yards, and still they went on, though it grew much more narrow, till there was little more than room enough for the boat to go along, but the water seemed deep beneath her keel, and the cavern or rift still wound on.

"What have you got in here, Father Prawle?" said Geoffrey, at length, after sitting for some time watching the strange effects of light and shadow, as the old man forced the boat along by thrusting the boat-hook against the roof or sides.

"Nothing," said the old man, laconically.

"Then why have we come?"

"Wait and see."

"All right," said Geoffrey, and, leaning back, he began to think of Rhoda, and of the news he had heard, wondering the while whether she would ever be brave enough to do him justice, and frankly own that she was wrong.

Then he thought of her being poor, and, looking at it in one light, he did not feel very sorry, though he felt a kind of pang to think that she would miss so many of the old refinements of life.

"Which--_vide_ self--any one can very well do without," he said, half aloud.

"What?" growled his guide.

"I was only muttering, Father Prawle. How much farther are we going?"

"Not far."

The old man forced the boat along for quite another hundred yards, and then, taking hold of the painter, he leaped upon a rock and secured the rope.

"Jump out, and bring the lamp and the compa.s.s, my lad," said the old fellow, in his rough, grim way; and on Geoffrey landing he said to the old man, sharply,--

"Is there ore in here?"

"Nothing but some poor tin," was the reply. "But look there, my lad.

The boat won't go up that narrow bit, but that runs on at least a hundred fathom, for I've waded as far as that."

"What, up that narrow hole?" said Geoffrey, as he peered along a place that looked a mere crack in the rock floored with water.

"Yes, up that narrow place. Now what do you say?"

"I don't say any thing," replied Geoffrey. "Why have we come here?"

"Bah! Take your compa.s.s, lad. Which way does that bit of a cut run?"

"Nor-east by east," said Geoffrey, holding the compa.s.s flat.

"Well, suppose you drive right through that nat'ral adit, as you may call it, for thirty or forty, or p'r'aps fifty fathom, what would you hit?"

"I see your meaning now," cried Geoffrey, excitedly. "Of course, yes, we must strike one of the galleries in Wheal Carnac which run under the promontory from the other side."

"And if you do drive through, what then?" chuckled the old man.

"Why, you'll have an adit that will clear the water off as fast as it comes in."

"To be sure you will," said Prawle.

"But only to a certain level," said Geoffrey, despondently. "It is of no use, Prawle; the tin would be fathoms below."

"d.a.m.n the tin, boy," cried the old man, excitedly; and, as they stood on a narrow shelf of rock there, he gripped Geoffrey fiercely by the arm.

"Look here, you, Master Trethick, no man ever did me an ill turn but what I paid him off, and no man ever did me a good turn but I paid him off."

"I never did you an ill turn," said Geoffrey.

"No," said the old man, "but you did me a good one, and I wouldn't have minded now if you'd have had my Bessie; but that's nayther here nor there. If she likes lame Amos Pengelly better o' the two, why she must have him; but you helped her when she was hard put to it, and now look here, I'm going to do you a good turn, and myself too."

"How? I tell you that your adit would be good for nothing," cried Geoffrey.

"Tchah! Look here," cried the old man, pulling a sale bill out of his pocket. "Here it all is--Wheal Carnac."

"Put the thing away; it makes me feel half-mad to see it. I tore one down," cried Geoffrey.