Dick o' the Fens Part 59

"No, my boy, no. You are getting old enough now to think seriously; and this draining business will be more for you than for myself--better for your children than for you. Mr Marston has some more ugly news about the work."

"Ugly news, father?"

"Yes, d.i.c.k," said Mr Marston; "that was no accident this afternoon, but a wilful attempt made by some miserably prejudiced person to destroy our work."

"But it did no harm, Mr Marston."

"No, my boy; but the ignorant person who thrust open that gate hoped it would. If it had been a high-tide and a storm, instead of stopping our work for a few hours he might have stopped it for a few weeks."

"And who do you think it was?" asked d.i.c.k.

"Someone who hates the idea of the drain being made. I have seen the constable, Mr Winthorpe," continued Marston.

"Well, and what does he say?"

"That he thinks he knows who is at the bottom of all these attacks."

"And whom does he suspect?" cried d.i.c.k excitedly.

"He will not say," replied the engineer. "He only wants time, and then he is going to lay his hand upon the offender."

"Or offenders," said the squire drily.

"Yes, of course," said the engineer; "but the mischief is doubtless started by one brain; those who carry it out are only the tools."

Mr Marston had come with the intention of staying for the night at the Toft; and after a ramble round the old orchard and garden, and some talk of a fis.h.i.+ng expedition into the wilder parts of the fen "some day when he was not so busy," supper was eaten, and in due time d.i.c.k went to bed, to stand at his window listening to the sounds which floated off the mere, and at last to throw himself upon his bed feeling hot and feverish with his thoughts.

"I wish Tom was here to talk to," he said to himself. "But if I did talk to him about it he'd only laugh. That constable thinks I'm at the bottom of it all, and that I set the people to do these things, and he's trying to make Mr Marston believe it, and it's too bad!"

He turned over upon one side, but it was no more comfortable than the other; so he tried his back, but the bed, stuffed as it was with the softest feathers from the geese grown at the farm, felt hard and th.o.r.n.y; there was a singing and humming noise made by the gnats, and the animals about the place were so uneasy that they suggested the idea of something wrong once more.

Then at last a drowsy sensation full of restfulness began to come over the weary lad, and he was fast dropping off to sleep, when--_c.o.c.k-a-doodle-doo_!

A shrill and sonorous challenge came from one of the lodges, which made d.i.c.k start and throw one leg out of bed, sit up, and throw himself down again.

"Ugh! you stupid!" he cried angrily. "I don't believe I've been asleep yet."

He seized his pillow, gave it a few savage punches, and lay down again, but only to find himself more wakeful than ever, with the unpleasant feeling that he was suspected of fighting against his father's plans; and after turning the matter over and over, and asking himself whether he should go straight to his father in the morning and tell him, or whether he should make Mr Marston his confidant, he came to the conclusion that he should not like to, for it might make them suspicious, and think that he really was concerned in the case.

Then he resolved to tell Hickathrift and ask his advice, or Dave, or John Warren.

Lastly, he resolved to tell his mother; and as he thought of how she would take his hand and listen to him attentively, and give him the best of counsel, he asked himself why he had not thought of her before.

But he grew more hot and uncomfortable, thinking till his troubled brain seemed to get everything in a knot, and he had just come to the conclusion that he would say nothing to anybody, for the constable's suspicions were not worth notice, when there was a sharp rap on the floor as if something had fallen, and he lay listening with every sense on the strain.

He had not long to wait, for from beneath his window came a low familiar whistle.

"Why, it's Tom!" he thought, starting up in bed; and as he was in the act of gliding out, a second thought troubled him--Tom there in the middle of the night! And if the squire heard him he would believe they were engaged in some scheme.

"Tom!" he whispered, as he leaned out of the open window.

"Yes. May I come up?"

"No, don't. What do you want? Why have you come over?"

"n.o.body knows I've come. I got out of the bed-room window and ran across."

"What for?"

"I can't tell you down here, d.i.c.k; I must come up."

He ran away softly over the gra.s.s, and came back in a few minutes with one of the short ladders, of whose whereabouts he knew as well as d.i.c.k, and planting it against the window-sill, he ran up and thrust in his head.

"I say, d.i.c.k," he whispered, "I couldn't sleep to-night, and I went to the window and looked out."

"So did I. Well, what of that? Here, be quick and go, or father will hear you, and we shall get into trouble."

"There's going to be something done to-night."

"What! the horses again, or a fire?"

"I don't know, only I'm sure I saw two men creep along on their hands and knees down to the water."

"Pigs," said d.i.c.k, contemptuously.

"They weren't. Think I can't tell a man from a pig!"

"Not in the dark."

"I tell you they were men."

"Pigs!"

"Men! and they went down to the water."

"To drink, stupid! They were pigs! They look just like men crawling in the dark!"

"Pigs don't get in punts and pole themselves along the mere!"

"You didn't see two men get in a punt and pole themselves along!"

"No, but I heard them quite plain."

"Well, and suppose you did, what then?"

"I don't know. Only I couldn't sleep, and I was obliged to come over to you."

"And wake me out of a beautiful sleep! What was that you threw in?"