A Perilous Secret Part 30

"Oh, Leonard," said she, "G.o.d bless you! Now I see you mean no ill to me and mine. _You don't love me enough to be angry with me_. But it all comes back to _me_. A woman can't forget her first. Now promise me one thing; don't give way to revenge or avarice. You are so wise when you are cool, but no man can give way to his pa.s.sions and be wise. Why run any more risks? He is liberal to me, and I'm not extravagant. I can allow you more than I said, and wrong n.o.body."

Monckton interrupted her, thus: "There, old girl, you are a good sort; you always were. But not bleed that skunk Bartley, and not be revenged on that villain Hope? I'd rather die where I stand, for they have turned my blood to gall, and lighted h.e.l.l in my heart this many a year of misery."

He held out his hand to her; it was cold. She grasped it in her warm, soft palm, and gave him one strange, searching look with her glorious eyes; and so they parted.

Next day, at dusk, there arrived at the Dun Cow an elderly man with a large carpet-bag and a strapped bundle of patterns--tweed, kersey, velveteen, and corduroys. He had a short gray mustache and beard, very neat; and appeared to be a commercial traveller.

In the evening he asked for brandy, old rum, lemons, powdered sugar, a kettle, and a punch-bowl. A huge one, relic of a past age, was produced.

He mixed delicious punch, and begged the landlady to sit down and taste it. She complied, and p.r.o.nounced it first-rate. He enticed her into conversation.

She was a rattling gossip, and told him first her own grievances. Here was the village enlarging, and yet no more custom coming to her because of the beer-house. The very mention of this obnoxious inst.i.tution moved her bile directly. "A pretty gentleman," said she, "to brew his own beer and undersell a poor widow that have been here all her days and her father before her! But the Colonel won't let me be driven out altogether, no more will Mr. Walter: he do manage for the old gentleman now."

Monckton sipped and waited for the name of Hope, but it did not come.

The good lady deluged him with the things that interested her. She was to have a bit of a farm added on to the Dun Cow. It was to be gra.s.s land, and not much labor wanted. She couldn't undertake that; was it likely? But for milking of cows and making b.u.t.ter or cheese, that she was as good at as here and there one; and if she could have the custom of the miners for her milk. "But, la, sir," said she, "I'll go bail as that there Bartley will take and set up a dairy against me, as he have a beer shop."

"Bartley?" said Monckton, inquiringly.

"Ay, sir; him as owns the mine, and the beer shop, and all, worse luck for me."

"Bartley? Who is he?"

"Oh, one of those chaps that rise from nothing nowadays. Came here to farm; but that was a blind, the Colonel says. Sunk a mine, he did, and built a pit village, and turns everything into bra.s.s [money]. But there, you are a stranger, sir; what is all this to you?"

"Why, it is very interesting," said Monckton. "Mistress, I always like to hear the whole history of every place I stop at, especially from a sensible woman like you, that sees to the bottom of things. Do have another gla.s.s. Why, I should be as dull as ditch-water, now, if I had not your company."

"La, sir, I'm sure you are welcome to my company in a civil way; and for the matter of that you are right; life is life, and there's plenty to be learned in a public--do but open your eyes and ears."

"Have another gla.s.s with me. I am praised for my punch."

"You deserve it, sir. Better was never brewed."

She sipped and sipped, and smacked her lips, till it was all gone.

This gla.s.s colored her cheeks, brightened her eyes, and even loosened her tongue, though that was pretty well oiled by nature.

"Well, sir," said she, "you are a bird of pa.s.sage, here to-day and gone to-morrow, and it don't matter much what I tell you, so long as I don't tell no lies. _There will be a row in this village_."

Having delivered this formidable prophecy, the coy dame pushed her gla.s.s to her companion for more, and leaning back cozily in the old-fas.h.i.+oned high-backed chair, observed the effect of her thunder-bolt.

Monckton rubbed his hands. "I'm glad of it," said he, genially; "that is to say, provided my good hostess does not suffer by it."

"I'm much beholden to you, sir," said the lady. "You are the civilest-spoken gentleman I have entertained this many a day. Here's your health, and wis.h.i.+ng you luck in your business, and many happy days well spent. My service to you, sir."

"The same to you, ma'am."

"Well, sir, in regard to a row between the gentlefolks--not that I call that there Bartley one--judge for yourself. You are a man of the world and a man of business, and an elderly man apparently."

"At all events, I am older than you, madam."

"That is as may be," said Mrs. Dawson, dryly. "We hain't got the parish register here, and all the better for me. So once more I say, judge for yourself."

"Well, madam," said Monckton, "I will try, if you will oblige me with the facts."

"That is reasonable," said Mrs. Dawson, loftily, but after some little consideration. "The facts I will declare, and not a lie among 'em."

"That will be a novelty," thought her cynical hearer, but he held his tongue, and looked respectfully attentive.

"Colonel Clifford," said Mrs. Dawson, "hates Bartley like poison, and Bartley him. The Colonel vows he will have him off the land and out of the bowels of the earth, and he have sent him a lawyer's letter; for everything leaks out in this village, along of the servants'

chattering. Bartley he don't value a lawyer's letter no more than that. He defies the Colonel, and they'll go at it hammer and tongs at the 'Sizes, and spend a mint of money in law. That's one side of the question. But there's another. Master Walter is deep in love with Miss Mary."

"Who is she?"

"Who is she? Why, Bartley's daughter, to be sure; not as I'd believe it if I hadn't known her mother, for she is no more like him in her looks or her ways than a tulip is to a dandelion. She is the loveliest girl in the county, and better than she's bonny. You don't catch _her_ drawing bridle at her papa's beer-house, and she never pa.s.ses my picture. It's 'Oh, Mrs.

Dawson, I _am_ so thirsty, a gla.s.s of your good cider, please, and a little hay and water for Deersfoot.' That's her way, bless your silly heart! _She_ ain't dry; and Deersfoot, he's full of beans, and his coat's like satin; but that's Miss Mary's way of letting me know that she's my customer, and n.o.body else's in the town. G.o.d bless her, and send her many happy days with the man of her heart, and that is Walter Clifford, for she is just as fond of him as he is of her. I seen it all from the first day. 'Twas love at first sight, and still a-growing to this day. Them old fogies may tear each other to pieces, but they won't part such lovers as those. There's not a girl in the village that doesn't run to look at them, and admire them, and wish them joy. Ay, and you mark my words, they are young, but they have got a spirit, both of them. Miss Mary, she looks you in the face like a lion and a dove all in one. They may lead her, but they won't drive her. And Walter, he's a Clifford from top to toe.

Nothing but death will part them two. Them's the facts, sir, without a lie, which now I'm a-waiting for judgment."

"Mrs. Dawson," said Monckton, solemnly, "since you do me the honor to ask my opinion, I say that out of these facts a row will certainly arise, and a deadly one."

"It must, sir; and Will Hope will have to take a side. 'Tis no use his trying to be everybody's friend this time, though that's his natural character, poor chap."

Monckton's eyes flashed fire, but he suppressed all appearance of excitement, and asked who Mr. Hope was.

Mrs. Dawson brightened at the very name of her favorite, and said, "Who is Will Hope? Why, the cleverest man in Derbys.h.i.+re, for one thing; but he is that Bartley's right-hand man, worse luck. He is inspector of the mine and factotum. He is the handiest man in England. He invents machines, and makes fiddles and plays 'em, and mends all their clocks and watches and wheel-barrows, and charges 'em naught. He makes hisself too common. I often tell him so. Says I, 'Why dost let 'em all put on thee so? Serve thee right if I was to send thee my pots and pans to mend.' 'And so do,'

says he, directly. 'There's no art in it, if you can make the sawder, and I can do that, by the d.i.c.k and Harry!' And one day I said to him, 'Do take a look at this fine new cow of mine as cost me twenty-five good s.h.i.+llings and a quart of ale. What ever is the matter with her? She looks like the skin of a cow flattened against the board.' So says he, 'Nay, she's better drawn than nine in ten; but she wants light and shade. Send her to my workshop.' 'Ay, ay,' says I; 'thy workshop is like the church-yard; we be all bound to go there one day or t'other.' Well, sir, if you believe me, when they brought her home and hung her again she almost knocked my eye out. There was three or four more women looking on, and I mind all on us skreeked a bit, and our hands went up in the air as if one string had pulled the lot; and says Bet Morgan, the carter's wife, 'Lord sake, gie me a bucket somebody, and let me milk her!' 'Nay, but thou shalt milk me,' said I, and a pint of fourpenny I gave her, then and there, for complimenting of my cow. Will Hope, he's everybody's friend.

He made the Colonel a crutch with his own hands, which the Colonel can use no other now. Walter swears by him. Miss Mary dotes on him: he saved her life in the river when she was a girl. The very miners give him a good word, though he is very strict with them; and as for Bartley, it's my belief he owes all his good luck to Will Hope. And to think he was born in this village, and left it a poor lad; ay, and he came back here one day as poor as Job, seems but t'other day, with his bundle on his back and his poor little girl in his hand. I dare say I fed them both with whatever was going, poor bodies."

"What was she like?"

"A poor little wizened thing. She had beautiful golden hair, though."

"Like Miss Bartley's?"

"Something, but lighter."

"Have you ever seen her since?"

"No; and I never shall."

"Who knows?"

"Nay, sir. I asked him after her one day when he came home for good. He never answered me, and he turned away as if I had stung him. She has followed her mother, no doubt. And so now she is gone he's well-to-do; and that is the way of it, sir. G.o.d sends mouths where there is no meat, and meat where there's no mouths. But He knows best, and sees both worlds at once. We can only see this one--that's full of trouble."

Monckton now began to yawn, for he wanted to be alone and think over the schemes that floated before him now.

"You are sleepy, sir," said Mrs. Dawson. "I'll go and see your bed is all right."

He thanked her and filled her gla.s.s. She tossed it off like a man this time, and left him to doze in his chair.