"Come back if it pleases you, Mr. Stark. But not to me. Worthless thing that I am, another already claims my love."
He released her hand reverently, then rose.
"'Twas an insult to you not to know that without being told. I did right to say that I was mad."
"You'll never speak of this," she whispered; "your own act forced it from me. I am proud to think that you could love me; but you will keep my secret?"
"Trust me for that. As you'll keep my confession, so I shall cherish yours. God knows how I can go on living any more. Yet I'll even curse the end of the war that sets me free now, for free in truth I'll never be again."
"Then I shall feel sad to think I have a slave against my will. I shall suffer to remember that."
"Remember me no more at all. Only remember that you have lifted me up and made my existence good and precious. You saved my life and led me into a paradise. Now I must depart again. Twice conquered by England am I; and blessed in being conquered."
"You are generous and I do greatly esteem you, sir," faltered Grace. "You have brought happiness and interest and knowledge into my ignorant days. More knowledge than you think for! I thank you for all your goodness, and I mourn to know you are so ill-paid. Had it not been—at least—I shall never forget you."
"May God bless and keep you and the man you love," he said earnestly. "You have been light in darkness to me; I shall always love and worship you. And he who has won you has my admiration and respect for ever. A king of men must he be!"
Annabel Malherb entered at this moment, and she came the bearer of stern news for Stark. Yesterday her intelligence had sunk him into the depths of tribulation; to-day he welcomed it. Henceforth his prison was not of stone and iron, but built in memory. To breathe the same air with Grace Malherb would be his sole remaining privilege now, since closer common interest he could never claim.
Maurice Malherb sent a courteous inquiry as to whether his guest's convenience would be suited by early departure on the following morning.
"If so," said Annabel, "my husband proposes that you and he should ride together after breakfast to—to Prince Town, dear Mr. Stark."
The sailor declared that he was ready.
"And to thank you, madam, would be a vain, impossible task," he said. "Your daughter saved my life; you and your husband nursed me back to health, bore with me in my weakness and ill humours, sympathised with my sorrows, treated me with a consideration and kindness beyond belief. I shall never while I live forget your goodness, nor forget to be grateful for it."
Upon the following morning Cecil Stark departed, and it was a secret joy to Grace amid all her secret grief, that he rode upon 'Cæsar.' She steeled herself to the farewell, for now she knew, indeed, that she loved him; now she found her desire towards him a live, gigantic and ponderable passion, not the gauzy and delicate understanding that she had maintained with John Lee. Love took her by the heart-strings, shook her, banished sleep, killed appetite, wrote care within her young eyes and revealed it upon her looking-glass at dawn. Her future life, from a vague shadow, half shunned, half spied upon, as in the past, now came close and stared at her. She found the time to come hideous and wished that she might die to escape from it. She looked ill when she bade the American prisoner "good-bye"; and he observed it and felt it hard to keep his voice steady.
Then Grace watched him ride away with her father, and behind them trotted John Lee. He passed where she stood at a wall on the farm boundaries and touched his hat to her, for he could be seen by all. But only Grace was within reach of his voice.
"At last, my darling dear! At last I shall kiss your sweet lips again! Such news—such brave news, my Gracie! I've found the hiding-place of the amphora!"
He passed on, and the girl, returning to her chamber, locked the door of it and wept as she had not wept since childhood.
"Three—three men," she sobbed to herself. "Three grown men can all love this wretched thing. And I hate one; and I—I—love one; and good John Lee, handsome, humble, kind, faithful John Lee; I would rather die a thousand deaths than break my troth to you!"
In his own estimation Maurice Malherb had long since mastered the mysteries of Dartmoor, and was now familiar with its difficulties and dangers by night or day. But heavy snow presented new problems; progress toward Prince Town proved very difficult; many detours had to be made, and a chill gloaming, lighted by the purity of the earth, already sank upon the travellers before Siward's Cross was reached.
As they approached Lovey's cottage, Malherb called up his groom and bade him ride ahead. Until the present John had kept behind, for his master objected to take advice or profit by the lad's local experience.
"Get you forward to your grandmother and order a brew of hot drink, John Lee. A draught of milk with something from my spirit-flask will not be amiss."
John cantered forward and Stark, as many a man had done before him, admired the rider's perfect skill.
"How magnificently that fellow sits his horse," he said.
"Well enough; but it was not I who taught him—a natural gift," confessed Mr. Malherb.
When they reached Mrs. Lee's hut, both dismounted and entered the squalid den, to find a pan of milk already steaming upon a great peat fire. Malherb showed by no word or sign the nature of his last meeting with Lovey Lee, and the American was similarly cautious. As for the miser, she treated them both with equal indifference.
Cecil Stark gazed round him to see the salvation he had fought to find in the storm. With better knowledge of the Moor, his amazement grew at his own recent escape; and yet a thing not less remarkable had fallen out on the same tremendous night.
When Lovey Lee handed a cup to the prisoner, Malherb proposed to add spirits from his flask, but the old woman objected.
"Put nothing in, young sir. There's a drop of cordial there already. Think you I don't know what cold men need to warm their vitals?"
Stark laughed but read the look in her eyes and took the cup quickly. Then he saw that a hollow hazel-nut floated in the milk and, familiar with Lovey's expedients, drank at once. The nut he kept within his cheek and presently transferred to his pocket.
Anon they went their way refreshed, and, commenting upon the grim and starved object who had ministered to them, Stark listened to new sentiments from Maurice Malherb, and saw a little deeper into the gulf that separated their convictions.
"The peasant's mind has ever been my close study, and I have endeavoured to supply his requirements all my life," declared the older man. "His path is narrow, but well marked. To attempt to draw him from it would be madness. Poverty is no hardship in itself, and to teach a peasant to be other than poor is no part of a wise man's work."
"But education——"
"Endangers the tranquillity of the community at large. It unsettles their minds, loosens the bonds that holds them to their native soil, provokes all manner of outrage. Think of the Tories, the Peep-o'-Day Boys, the Hearts of Steel and other ruffianly hordes of banditti that disturbed Ireland before the rebellion."
"But education is the watchword of civilisation," exclaimed Stark.
"You think so; but like every half-truth, the idea is abominably dangerous. What do you do? Under the name of Liberty, you invite to your naked shores the German, the Frenchman, or any other needy and worthless adventurer who goes a-wandering. You announce that the feudal services required by the great from the humble in Europe are banished from your country. You tell the new-come immigrants that lie—you, who keep your heel upon the black and fill your pockets with the proceeds of his misery! A race of slave-dealers to trumpet Liberty!"
Stark flushed and felt the hit.
"I grant some truth there. Please God, we'll live to see that plague-spot healed. But our constitution is sound; we shall throw our ailments off. To deny knowledge to your own people—that is a worse disease. Consider the epidemic you will breed!"
"You are ignorant of history, Mr. Cecil Stark. We have centuries of experience on which to base our judgment. What think you fostered the naval rebellion of fifteen years agone? As a sailor that will interest you. Why, the pen-and-ink gentry aboard His Majesty's ships of war! They made a mutiny with their devilish doctrines scratched on paper and spread in secret from vessel to vessel. How shall we suppress concerted action in the multitude, if every Jack among 'em learns to read and write? Consider the sedition that must spring from such an abandoned state. No, let the poor work, not think. These people are only too ready to believe that their penury is the result of our oppression, and grows incompatible with the rights of man. Then what follows?"
"They'll do as we did and cast off their chains for ever," declared the sailor.
"You would support anarchy then?"
"And yet you yourself, sir, give your own workers more than the usual wage, and pay the women as women were never paid elsewhere—so Kekewich informed me."
Malherb shook his head impatiently.
"They will be talking, damn them, instead of doing their work. Don't argue from a particular case. I've my own private opinion—especially as to women's labour on the land. That's neither here nor there. I'm possibly wrong. Education takes the poor to the devil. Enlarge their views and you distort their views. They institute uncomfortable and improper comparisons; they begin to confuse the rights of property; the sanctity of birth is forgotten; the interests of the country are threatened: the State totters and falls."
"Surely the sooner it falls, the better for England. A State built on foundations of ignorance——"
"So you echo your specious people. Ignorance is the solid and everlasting rock on which the prosperity of every State must exist. If you believe your Bible, you will see from Genesis that the Creator made happiness depend on ignorance. The Tree of Knowledge is a very statesmanlike conceit. Preserve a fundamental ignorance at any cost. Your own life depends upon it. Once let knowledge in—'tis like the foul air in a mine—death follows. The Church battens on that golden rule; so does the State. The security of both lie therein. But our spiritual and temporal lords are far too wise openly to proclaim what I tell you."
"Then God help your country," answered the younger man; "for a policy more cynical, more vile, was never uttered. I go to prison now, but 'tis you who are in prison. I am free. This State's a prison—a prison not made with hands, but with heads—a prison of cruel prejudices, narrow distinctions, distrusts, hatreds, and lies. But your prosperous errors shall not always prevail against unpopular truths. Your time will come."
"I wish you had been better brought up," said Malherb. "You feel deeply; there is character in you; but unfortunately it has been poisoned at the source."
"And I wish that I could open your prison doors, sir, before mine shut upon me. Stone and iron are only dust; they will not endure; but the pride of Lucifer, the blind prejudice of the Dark Ages, and such a damnable policy as you have this moment uttered, make a prison-house for the spirit of man that it will need a revolution to shatter."
"It is such windy nonsense that has led you there!" answered Malherb.
He pointed where the grey walls of Prince Town, set in snow, rose ashy against the twilight, and Stark's enthusiasm chilled a little at sight of them.
They fell into silence; then the American shook his host's hand and bade him a grateful farewell. A moment later he had dismounted from 'Cæsar' and entered the War Prison.
Two surprises awaited the sailor. Within Lovey's hazel-nut was a scrap of paper that told how, by miraculous chance, James Knapps had escaped the blizzard, and, while turning from the full force of it, in reality corrected his way and made a straight journey to the hut by Siward's Cross. Thus wonderfully he saved his life; and his eyes, at a crack in the boards of Lovey's ceiling, had watched Cecil Stark beneath. Through Lovey, Knapps now made urgent appeal to his friends, and the paper in the nutshell called for money to pay the miser and for instructions as to the future conduct of Mr. Knapps himself.
Heartened by this circumstance, Cecil Stark presently went before the authorities; and then another sensation greeted him. During his absence Captain Cottrell had been superseded, and a new commandant now reigned over the prisoners.
On a day when the storm had sunk to a grim memory, when cold winds blustered and more snow fell through the dark and sunless weeks before spring-time, did Harvey Woodman and Richard Beer hold converse with ancient Kekewich. For once the pessimist had those of the household with him; but no sooner were the labouring men reduced to a condition of absolute hopelessness before the picture he painted, when Kekewich changed sides, according to his wont, took up his master's part and foretold fair things out of contradiction.
"Ban't our business," declared Woodman, "an' yet even a common man have eyes; an' touching the potatoes, a fool could see he's wrong."
"Actually feeding the stock on 'em, an' grumbling when my wife goes to fill a sack for the house!" said Beer. "Ban't good husbandry or good sense to feed beastes on such human food. Lord knows they potatoes cost enough to fetch up out o' the airth. 'Twould be better far to face the trouble an' buy fodder in a big spirit."
"No method to him, if a man may say so without disrespect," answered Woodman. "Of course you wants to look forward more 'pon Dartymoor."
"He fights the Moor same as he fights life," explained Kekewich. "The masterfulness of un be so tremendous that us might almost look to see Nature go down afore him."
"Nature don't go down; 'tis us that do," replied Beer; "an' if the storm haven't taught him that, nothing won't. 'Tis no sense your telling that sort o' rummage, Kek, an' very well you know it."
"Not but the gentleman have his black moments," continued Woodman. "I've seed him pass by me many a time wi' a cloud on's face, an' a puzzled look in his eyes, as if he was trying to read in a book an' couldn't catch the meaning. Essterday he stood in the opeway an' stared out afore him so grim as a ghost, as if he might have been waiting a message from the sky."
"He'll get a message as he won't like the taste of afore long," foretold Beer.
"He don't go about the right way to larn, I'm sure—to say it without offence," added Woodman.
"He won't larn nought from you dumpheads, that's sartain," said Kekewich. "But he'm far off a fool, an' his heart's got eyes if his head haven't. When all's said, 'tis for his lady an' his darter he thinks an' plans. He lies waking o' nights for the honour an' glory of the family. Things will fall out right yet, an us shall live to see it."
"'Tis very well, though you'm the first to holler 'ruin' yourself most days," retorted Beer, rather indignant that Kekewich should thus take up a position so unusual. "Us all knows the man do mean well as an angel, yet it looks a very unhandsome thing to thrust his maiden into matrimony with a chap she hates like sin."
"So it do," assented Woodman. "You'm right, Richard. He'll take his stand behind his darter's welfare an' put a husband she hates upon her. Wise it may be; Christian it ban't. But everything's cut and dried now, and Mordecai Cockey, the journeyman tailor, be coming in six weeks to make the clothes, so my wife tells me."
"The maiden's Malherb, faither or no faither," said Beer, "and Dinah, as understands such affairs, have marked by many a foretoken that she won't wed out of her heart—not for fifty faithers."
"Matters be coming to a climax then," declared Harvey Woodman solemnly. "My wife dreamed o' blood t'other night; an' for my part I've seen Childe's tomb in my dreams, wi' Childe hisself rising up like a ragged foreign bear. I do hate for things to come in a heap this way. Ban't natural we should be called upon to suffer more ills than one to a time. There's the whole Book of Lamentations bearing down on Fox Tor Farm in my opinion, an' I'd so soon be away as not."
"He've got money, however," argued Beer. "Money will stem a good few mortal ills, let them as haven't got none say what they please."
"As to that, my Mary heard him tell Missis something about a canal somewheres that's gone scat; an' the lady turned white as curds an' went in her chamber for to get over it unseen," answered Woodman. "If you ax me, I reckon he'm driven for money. When I spoke to un of half a dozen more drashels,[*] as wouldn't have cost half-a-crown, he got so touchy as proud-flesh, an' told me to run out of his sight, an' said us was a lot o' lazy good-for-nothing hirelings as never thought of his pocket. Of course he was round next day as usual with a cheerful word an' the money; but I tented un to the quick when I axed for it first."
[*]Drashels: Flails.
"An' that's why Miss Grace have got to marry Mr. Norcot, no doubt," declared Beer. "'Tis so much for her father's good as her own belike."
He nodded to where Grace rode past the barn. She was clad in a snug, short habit of purple Totnes serge; and upon her hands were a pair of gloves made from the skin of a wild cat that had been captured after prodigious exertions by Thomas Putt. Behind Grace rode John Lee, and their enterprise was secret, for it had to do with the young man's recent great discovery. Now Grace, despite the languor of these days and the anti-climax that followed upon Cecil Stark's departure, found herself awake and much alive. Darkness shadowed her life and her home. She knew that trouble slept with her parents and haunted her father in all his goings; she suffered for them; yet she believed that no such sorrow as her own private sorrow had ever crushed into a human life before; that no such tragic experience as this mistake of emotion for passion, had until now tortured an unhappy young heart. Yet to fight upon her father's side seemed good. She desired dangers and difficulties to lift her from her personal tribulations. She herself had planned the present expedition, and Lee was in some concern, for though undertaken by daylight, it lacked not danger. John had at last discovered Lovey's hiding-place, and now he was taking his mistress to see it.
"Your star-bright eyes will find this wondrous treasure if 'tis there," he said. "For myself I could light on nothing but money-bags. They had gold in 'em and were ranged on stone ledges as high as I could reach. For the rest, there was a pitcher under trickling water that runs in a corner of the place; a basin, with mouldy bread and cheese in it; and a great stone upon which stood half a dozen rush-lights. And as I first climbed down, 'twas like the story of Arabia that you told me, for the walls of the hole all shone as though they were plastered with pure gold. A light in darkness they made. 'Tis a shining moss that glitters there on the damp rocks. I'm right glad to have found the place; an' yet my mind misgives me that more evil than good will come out of it."
"The only evil that can come out is Lovey Lee. If she caught us!"
"No—that won't happen. She's safe for to-day. You'll laugh, but you know there's force in the old charms for all your laughing. They work, though wiseacres may know better."
"John, John!"
"A maiden nail has power, I tell you, despite all scoffing."
"A maiden nail! And what is that?"
"A nail fresh made from bar iron—one that has never touched ground. Drive such in the threshold of a witch's door and for a day and night she cannot hurt a fly."
"Really, John Lee, I could blush for you—here at the beginning of the nineteenth century, in these dazzling days of enlightenment!"
"I got 'em from Noah Newcombe, hot off his anvil," said John, "and I've driven them home into the dern of grandmother's door. Believe it or not, I very well know she's harmless to all mankind this day."
"I wish I had such faith in men as you have in nails, John," said the girl thoughtfully. Then silence fell between them, and Grace reflected upon her sweetheart's credulity. She had never realised the extent of it until recent events and the intercourse with the American prisoner. Peter Norcot's manifold ingenuities and petty cleverness of quips and cranks had but served to make John Lee's simplicity shine bright by contrast; but the light that Stark cast over thought was a white light, and smote pitiless upon both the others.
"You have faith in one man sure?" said John presently. He had thought of her words long before replying to them.
"In two—in two," she answered hastily; but more she would not say.
"'Tis old Kekewich and me," he mused aloud. "A very strange thing, my lady dear, that two such men should get to be trusted by your sweet spirit, afore all the rest of the world."
But she could not let him remain in ignorance.
"I meant Mr. Stark, not Kek," she answered.
He nodded and looked away.
"I know you meant him. 'Twas only to see if you'd tell me, that I pretended you meant Kek. A sly thing to do, but somehow I was tempted."
She did not answer, nor did he speak again until they reached the ruin in Hangman's Hollow.
"Here we are at last—a queer sort of place. 'Twould call for little fancy to see my grandmother meeting the Devil himself here after dark. 'Pon that rowan above the gravel-pit a man hanged himself a little while back, 'cause he found he'd been cheated over a horse. Here, under our feet, is granny's den. We'll dismount, tether up; an' then you follow me down this blind alley-way to the top of the mound. By the wall-side at the end, is a stone that will turn when we set foot upon it, and open a hole down the blowing-house chimney into a great chamber underground."
Grace dismounted; John fastened up their horses and soon led the way whither Lovey Lee had vanished.
"But 'twas no miracle after all, you see. There—the stone twists on a regular pivot. 'Tis balanced beneath like a logan."
He showed where a large piece of granite slowly yielded under his weight. Then he retained it in position with a stick and made it firm. A black, perpendicular pit appeared, and upon the side of it rough stones protruded irregularly and formed a ladder.
"I'll go down," said Lee, "and light a candle. 'Tis day-proof and air-proof nearly; but you'll soon see and breathe when you're used to it."
He disappeared, and from beneath Grace heard him strike flint and steel, then saw the gleam of candlelight, and prepared to descend. The way proved easy enough to one of her activity, and soon she found herself beside John Lee, ten feet beneath the earth, in a large irregular chamber. The place was half natural, and half built of masonry now ruinous. A shaft of daylight from above revealed the steps, and the walls of the grotto diffused a glimmering and golden radiance, so that it seemed to Grace that she had, indeed, descended into some storehouse of fabulous treasure. The shining moss[*] encrusted the cavern with its phosphorescent light, and water tinkled drop by drop unseen. Lee held above his head a candle that he had brought with him, and slowly details stole out of the gloom as their eyes focussed them.
[*]The shining moss: Schistostega Osmundacea.
For some time they found nothing more than John had already recorded. Then the desiccated remains of a dog in a corner made Grace exclaim with sorrow. The beast was fastened by its neck to a staple in the wall, and had clearly perished of starvation there. Close scrutiny revealed nine or ten money-bags perched aloft in nooks of the granite and holes of the broken building. Grace opened three, and all contained the same amount—one hundred pounds in gold. They restored every bag to its proper hiding-place, and continued their search. Yet the girl grew listless, and John Lee felt it by his senses, although he could not see her face.
Presently he hit his shins against a square box corded up with ropes, and his companion's heart throbbed as she thought that within an hour the Malherb amphora would be restored to its owner's hand. Then, while yet their new discovery remained unproved, a dull indifference again invaded her spirit; and John stood amazed to find her in no way disappointed when the box was found to contain nothing more precious than silver plate, sundry fine French snuff-boxes, watches and other trinkets.
"How brave you are!" he said. "Yet this is something worth discovering, for I'll wager my grandmother stole what is here from your family in times past."
"Be just to her. These French things perchance came from the prisoners. Tie them up carefully, and put them where you found them. Lovey must never guess that we have seen her secrets."
The man obeyed, and for half an hour they continued to make laborious and unrewarded search.
"'Tis a rogue's roost of a hole!" cried Lee. "You shall stop in it no longer, else you'll faint for lack of sweet air. 'Twill take much time and patience to exhaust all these crannies and clefts. My candle wanes."
"Let us depart then and visit the place again presently when time allows it."
"But you've lost your old eagerness," he said shortly.
"Not so. I care very much. Why, it is life or death almost—for father. I know him to be sore driven for money."
"For your father. And is it nothing that it means life or death for Jack Lee? Have you forgotten what you yourself proposed? Oh, Grace, I'm afraid you have. I was to go to the wars——"
"The wars are like to be soon over now, dear John."
He made no answer, but lighted her to the steps and helped her to ascend them. Things recently suspected, like clouds lifting their furrowed foreheads above a remote horizon, grew daily nearer, and this experience within the treasure house had brought alarm to the very zenith of John Lee's mind. He was quick to see and to read each mood and humour of Grace Malherb. A hesitation before a kiss, a wayward breaking off in mid-speech, sudden ardours to atone for periods of coldness—all these shadows and half-shades of change, and of a sense of honour at war with overmastering love, had made themselves manifest in the girl; and Lee had read them while she was ignorant of their visible existence. At first such apparitions from her inner self merely mystified him, and the memory of them vanished with the mood that displayed them; but now more clearly he began to perceive that her highest graciousness followed upon coolness; that she was kindest after being least kind; that her outbursts of wild affection sprang not from love, but remorse. He battled against the belief; but it grew into a conviction, bitter and sure.
To-day, as he restored the cover-stone of the cave, he felt that another nail was struck into hope's coffin; and the thought wakened no indignation against Grace, but rather a mighty, melancholy anger with himself, that he had proved a man too feeble to hold his pearl against all comers.
"We must seek and seek and never despair," said Grace as they turned to ride homeward. "I feel positive that the amphora is there. If necessary you will have to hide in the den of the tigress yourself, John, and mark her when she supposes herself alone. Yet I should tremble for you. 'Twill be an awful day for that old woman when she loses the amphora. It is her god."
"If I got it, I could almost find it in my heart to break it."
"John Lee!"
"Why, I spoke as I felt. I'm beginning to see terrible things beyond your strength to hide, Gracie. You would hide them if you could; you think in your heart that they are hidden; but they peep out and scourge me for my awful folly."
"What—what can you mean?"
"Don't think to deceive me, for you deceive yourself, dearest heart, if you do. I'm sensible in flashes, though mostly blind with you. I've read the riddle ever since he went away; now I've read the answer too."
"You wrong me to speak so. I have not changed to you, John; and to him I am nothing in the world."
"Be angry; be angry; I could rage, too; I could tear up the earth and—and—but I haven't the heart. I wouldn't hurt him excepting as man to man. I'd pray to Heaven to bring us face to face in war. I'd seek him out on land or sea—I'd——" He broke off, dropped his rein, and pressed his hands to his face. Then Grace rode close to him and touched his arm.
"You are unhappy, and I have made you so. This must not be, dear John. 'Tis life and death between—between lovers, to speak pure honesty at all times. Listen. He grew to love me. 'Twas the loneliness and friendlessness of his life. His eyes had seen no woman for years; therefore he made more of me than I deserved. He—he asked me to marry him some day; and I told him that I belonged to another. Then he went out of my life and blessed the unknown man who had been more fortunate than himself. That is the truth; and if I've been half-hearted and my wits a wool-gathering, forgive me, for the thought of Master Stark's sorrow has made me sad. I have much desired the war to end that he might go home to those who love him; and—and—don't look at me like that, John, for God knows I speak the truth to you. I hoped for his sake that the war might cease; for yours that it might not cease. Then I settled it by praying for peace with America—for his sake, and war with France—for yours. I'm only a fool, John, but I'm a truthful fool. There's nothing else in my silly heart but that."
"But there is—looking out of your eyes when you forget to shut them and hide it. My pretty darling—oh, God, to give you up! I cannot. I never will. A thousand heroes shall not take you——"
"Give me up—what do you mean?" she cried, and her heart beat fiercely.
"Why, 'tis true there must be no secrets betwixt us," he said in a gentle voice, "not so long as we are what we are to one another. 'Pure honesty' was your word. You tell me he asked you to marry him. And you tell me what you answered. I know all that right well without your telling me. But I've got to know more; I've got to know what you felt as well as said."
"Sorry for him—most truly sorry for him, dear John. Ididlike him. I'll own to that."
"Don't speak in a tone so light, sweetheart. 'Sweetheart' still a little longer. You women do think a tone of voice makes truth less true and falsehood less false. You say the same words in different voices and mean different by them. And a man must grow skilled in your sounds, like a hunter grows clever in the sounds of wild things, not counting the weight of the words. You say you liked him as you might like such a one that held your stirrup or opened a gate; but you and me are at a place now where you've got to speak sacred truth—solemn, slow, each word forged to last till doom. Did you love that man?"
"What is it to love a man?"
He bowed his head.
"I'm answered," he said. "Oh, Gracie dear—once mine, never mine—you know what 'tis to love a man; but you never did afore you saw him."
She marvelled that one who had yesterday driven maiden nails into a doorpost could see so deep. She remembered that it was she who had taught him to read. Tears came to her eyes and shining drops fell glittering on her horse's neck.
"You break my heart," she said.
"Please God, never! You didn't know; you mistook—what? you mistook something else for love. We were a boy and a girl; and I couldn't choose but worship—you were so lovely in soul and body—so gentle to me—so——"
"John," she declared solemnly, "I shall marry you or no man."
"You mean it with your whole heart, Gracie? Right well I know you do, and I love to hear you say it, and to see you think it while your beautiful, steadfast eyes fright the tears away."
"I love you, I love you indeed, John."
"I am content to be loved so," he answered slowly. "And maybe the time that's coming will show the colour of my love for you, since 'tis all too big for words. 'Twill take deeds to set it forth. It calls for deeds to show the pattern of a man's life, and love for you be all that's left of life for me henceforward."
A fortnight after the visit to the old blowing-house, Mr. Peter Norcot arrived from Chagford to stay a while at Fox Tor Farm, and with him he brought more snow. This fact by no means troubled his level temper. He was neither more plain-spoken nor less poetical than usual as he walked out with Grace after noon, and reminded her of Maurice Malherb's intention that she should marry during the coming summer.
"Do not think, my dear girl, that Peter is blind. He knows all about Endymion. But positively John Lee as a husband!"
"'Tis not the first time I have bade you mind your own business, Peter. You have no right or reason to say these things to me. 'Tis worse than your rhymes. If you were half the man he is!"
"Hard words cannot break bones, or kill love. Do what you please; say what you like,"
"'A very sandal I would beTo tread on—if trod on by thee.'
I can even rise superior to the necessity of being loved back. I love on and suffer on.
"'It is not for our good in ease to rest;Man, like to cassia, when bruised is best.'"
"I will never love you, nor marry you. Is not that enough?"
"Too much—more than I could bear, if I believed it. But you are very young, Grace. I am often relieved to remember that you are too young to know your own mind."
She was going to deny it indignantly; but stopped, vividly conscious that he had come near the mark. Therefore sadness followed anger in her face and cooled her cheek.
"I do most seriously believe that before next year you will find me a continual joy," declared Peter. "'Tis high time the world should see what a husband awaits the making in me. Too long I've pined alone.
"'Life's a short summer—man a flower,He dies—alas! how soon he dies.'"
"'He lives—alas! how long he lives!' So has many an unhappy wife breathed to her soul; and so should I."
"You might, indeed, if, like certain foolish but authentic virgins, you married out of your status. Now John Lee——"
"Have done, or I'll never speak to you more!" cried Grace passionately. "I had rather a thousand times marry John Lee than you; and if I please, I will."
"Frankly, my poppet, you are something too much of a child to marry anybody yet. 'Winter and wedlock tame maids and beasts.' A true West Country proverb that. But I'd be your lover still, not your master. Vile word! In sober honesty, however, you can be very provoking, mistress."
"Never less than now. Walk quicker and save your breath; more snow is coming."
The transient gleam of sun that had drawn them out on to the Moor departed, and snow began to fall again.
"I've wanted that to happen," said Mr. Norcot. "Now you shall hear a charming thing—not my own, I regret to say, but from Petronius Afranius—translated by one Smart. For its perfection you must make a snowball and hurl it at me."
"I'm in no mood for fooling."
"I beg; I implore. 'Twill be worth your pains."
She bent and picked up some snow.
"Don't miss my manly bosom, or you'll spoil all," he said.
"There—I would it could cool your heart and freeze every thought of me out of your head!"
Grace flung the snow, and, letting it melt upon his coat, Mr. Norcot struck an attitude while he recited another rhyme. His eyes were full of the snow light and seemed harder and brighter than usual as he gazed at her.
"'When, wanton fair, the snowy orb you throw,I feel a fire before unknown in snow,E'en coldest ice I find has pow'r to warmy breast, when flung by Gracie's lovely arm!'"
He swept off his hat and bowed; whereon she laughed outright.
"You should have been a player, for you are a most unreal man—for ever feigning to be something else than you are."
"Then marry me and find the kernel in the nut."
"How can I marry one I do not know?"
"Even such you should choose if you are wise; for the following sufficient reasons."
He prattled on, and presently Maurice Malherb joined them. The master had been that day in Prince Town upon various business, and he returned with news of a sort to interest his daughter. Now her eyes asked him a question and he answered it.
"I paid my respects to Commandant Short at the Prison. He is a gentleman, but I think the business of that place will tax his authority. A saint would grow impatient with the knaves."
"And your visitor?" inquired Mr. Norcot. "'Twas a wonderful Providence that sent him here."
"The rascal! And yet Stark was one worthy of respect, had he been properly educated. He listened to me, as a young man should listen to his elders and betters. I could have found it in my heart to like him, but for his soaring nonsense and his disinclination to call treachery and revolt by their true names. Doubtless his ideas are the common property of his country. He suffered but a week's detention in the cachot and is now with his friends again."
Peter Norcot from under amber eyelashes studied Grace and found further material for interest.
"Another!" he said to himself. "An inflammable wench truly! Quick to catch fire from every torch but mine. Well, well—may war last until we are wedded. I ask no more."
"There's further news of a parochial sort," continued Malherb. "What think you, Grace? The old hag on the hill is off! She's left Siward's Cross and gone to a hovel near the Prison, where a few acres of land were to be let. She represented to the High Bailiff, the Duchy's man, that I'd robbed her of her best cattle lairs when I raised my boundaries! The old liar has money too—ay, and more than money."
"A wonderful creature. I mind her eyes that sparkled with gorgonian fire; her starved abode, and her penury. It called to my recollection Lucilius—his miser and his mouse:—
"'"You greedy rogue, what brings you to my house?"Quoth an old miser to a little mouse;"Friend," says the vermin, "you need have no fear,I only lodge with you; I dine elsewhere."'
Ha-ha-ha! She feeds on snails and berries. Such was Sycorax."
"She's worth above twenty thousand pounds, nevertheless," declared Malherb.
"Impossible!"
"True and not true. She has stolen my amphora. She confessed it when we were without witnesses."
"Now here's a matter indeed! Can you be sure that she is not deceiving you?"
"She has it. It is her very life."
"Then we'll be innocent murderers and deprive her of life at the first opportunity. Nothing shall become her life like the leaving of it."
Malherb turned and addressed Peter out of Grace's hearing Indeed, the girl's heart beat fast at this conversation, and she was busy with many private thoughts.
"You speak unselfishly, for the jewel will be my son's—that is, Grace's son's. It must remain under a Malherb's roof for ever, not under yours, Peter."
"Most just. The amphora is an heirloom."
Norcot glanced at Grace and marked her profound indifference. A wave of real indignation made his forehead hot and much astonished him. It was a revelation of himself. Then his mind chanced to roam towards Prince Town; he thought upon Cecil Stark and speculated whether the American could be of any service. While he thought clear prose he continued to utter epigrams for Grace's amusement.
"'The wanton snowflakes to her breastFlew down, like birds into their nest,And, vanquished by the whiteness there,For grief they thawed into a tear.'"
Then he turned to Malherb again.
"The amphora must be recovered at any cost. I need not ask whether you have plans. Do you seek assistance, or undertake the affair single-handed?"
"I work alone. Bow Street runners would not run far on Dartmoor. Lovey Lee may well be left to my mercies. It shall never be said that an old and ignorant woman outwitted Maurice Malherb."
"Spoken well! I'll wager the amphora will grace dear Annabel's cabinet before wool-shearing. To think of that priceless fragment of glass in the keeping of such a bag of bones!"
"And to know that she gets joy of it," said Grace, "that is the amazing matter. She, who eats vermin and wears old sacks, to find her greatest earthly pleasure in the plump Cupids upon that antique!"
"Human nature is full of these tricks," answered her father. "I have studied such freakish traits in mankind so long that nothing now has power to surprise me."
"Not even yourself? Now I, though so near to forty, can yet astonish myself. I have done so within this hour," confessed Peter. "As to Lovey," he continued, "she'll clothe herself with ashes as well as sackcloth when she loses her treasure."
"Well, well, the snow increases. Hasten home, the pair of you," answered Malherb; then he left them together, and turned to an outlying shed where two men worked.
"What a fate!" murmured Norcot when he had gone off; "what a pleasing fate, Grace, to be imprisoned here, even as Cecil Stark was imprisoned! How gladly I'd make exchange with him—the rough with the smooth."
She made no answer, and he continued—
"Talking of Loves, 'twas a pretty thing that Antonius Tebaltius wrote, and Thompson paraphrased, and Norcot improved—
"'Venus whipt Cupid t'other day,For having lost his bow and quiver;The which he'd given both awayTo Gracie by a Dartmoor river."Mamma! you wrong me while you strike,"Cried weeping Cupid, "for 'tis trueThat you and she are so alike,I thought that I had given 'em you!"'"
"You've missed the gate while you chattered," said Grace; "now we must climb over the wall."
"I generally do miss the gate with you," he answered. "Don't these beautiful pearls that I utter move even a spark of pity?"
"Of pity—yes."
"'Tis akin to love."
"As often akin to contempt."
"In mean natures; never in yours."
He helped her over the wall, then spoke again as they hurried on with heads bent to the snow.
"'Twas that young American then? Why so silent about it? Why ashamed to tell frankly who 'tis you really do love? I blazon my emotions to the world and do it proudly. Can you not be as open?"
"I hate everybody; and it's all your fault."
"Well, well; mend your pace; we shall be frozen. And if you hate me, change every garment that you wear. I much fear that you are wet and cold."
This practical thought touched the woman in Grace and softened her a little.
"I wish I could love you, Peter, for it would be better for me and happier for us all if I did. But I never, never shall."
"Well, try to tolerate me—fitfully. Even a fitful toleration is something, and perhaps more beautiful than a fixed and steady flame—just as moonlit clouds are lovelier than the moon herself."
They talked awhile longer, then reached the house. Grace retired immediately to don dry clothes, while Mrs. Malherb spoke with Peter.
"Lord! what a poet was marred when you commenced wool merchant," said she, while he drank a jorum of hot spirits and held his coat to the fire.
"Nay, nay, Annabel, the same man can serve both mistresses. Thus, if I might but come at it, I would weave wool shorn off the sheep in paradise for Grace's tender limbs; and I would clothe her mind also with a robe spun of the best and the most beautiful thoughts to be gleaned from books. But she'll none of me nor my stock-in-trade. 'Tis the weather, not my prayers, that makes her wear flannel next her skin. Yet I told her that I'd gladly be the wether that furnished the wool."
"And what said she?" inquired the lady.
"I will be honest with you," answered Peter. "I will conceal nothing. She replied in one word, 'Baa!' Believe me, Annabel, that never since this mundane egg was hatched did such a maddening maiden appear to torment honest men."
The reign of the new Commandant opened auspiciously at Prince Town, for Captain Short came to his work with understanding and sympathy. He was still young, and his heart had not grown callous before the spectacle of human misery. Compassion filled him at the sufferings of those half-naked hordes who wandered through the War Prison; he countermanded many of his predecessor's egregious enactments, and stated in feeling terms to the Board of Transport the conditions that he discovered. The zeal of a reformer first marked his achievements; then he grew discouraged, erred, lost heart, and fell from his own ideals.
Cecil Stark served a term of imprisonment in the cachot, after which he returned to his compatriots and found familiar faces missing. Some among his acquaintance were exchanged; not a few had passed away. Caleb Carberry perished soon after his punishment; Burnham had also suffered as a result of that awful penance in ice and granite; but he was now restored to health. Of the Seven, two were dead, and James Knapps remained hidden with Lovey Lee.
Now, even as the lowest note of their sad hearts had sounded, came light upon the darkness of the Americans. While they hung their heads and mourned as men forgotten of their country; while hundreds daily threatened Mr. Blazey with letters and vowed to transfer allegiance to Britain if he did not better their case, good news arrived, and the first written communication ever received from their representative reached the prisoners.
Cecil Stark read Blazey's message aloud in the exercise yard of No. 4, and jubilant crowds gave ear to it.
"Fellow Citizens," wrote the Agent, "I am authorised by the Government of the United States to allow you one penny half-penny per day for the purpose of procuring you tobacco and soap, which will commence being paid from the first day of last January, and I earnestly hope it will tend towards a great relief in your present circumstances."
A roar of delight greeted the announcement. Men cheered and wept flung their red caps into the air, fell upon each other's necks, embraced, danced wildly, sang and laughed.
"Not forgotten! Not forgotten!" was the burden of their cry. A great emotion of thankfulness animated the mass and woke fire in the meanest spirit amongst them. The actual blessing of this pittance seemed less to that forlorn gathering than the thought that had inspired it. A link, sorely tested, stood firm. Now all again gloried in their sonship with the mother country; for Congress had remembered. Every man viewed the news through the glass of his own nature; but pride in their nation glowed upon each face, and trust renewed uplifted their sinking hearts. From the powder-monkeys and negroes to the Committee of six leading men now appointed to administer the moneys all rejoiced and blessed their native land. Their trustful natures shone out of them, and Congress received many a cheer; Captain Short was also saluted; and even the sluggard Blazey won his meed.
"Burn the old country; it ha'n't thrown us over after all," said David Leverett to a companion. "I guess my first dollop of money will go in drink, for we've done so long without soap that we can easy keep dirty a while more. We've come out of a tarnation tight snarl at last, and nobody's better pleased than me."
"Such a swipe ob money, gem'men!" cried Cuffee. "De Lord Him send back Marse Stark; den he send free cents a day. Our own mudders won't know us, nebber no more."
"We-alls shall be eating money presently," laughed Leverett's friend. "Things is on the bounce for sartin. We've got our monkey up agin; and if we can't follow that chap's lead—Stark I mean—and hev another try to quit this place, 'tis pity."
"No smouch him," admitted Leverett. "If there's any hanky-panky in the wind, we'll do well ter let him boss it. 'Tis the differ between a man well aggicated and you and me. We'd be as good as him if we'd had his luck and his money."
"Maybe we should, maybe we should not," answered the other. "Anyway, if we pull together and let him lead I lay he'll hit on a contrapsion ter get every doodle of us clear of this."
Something prophetic marked the sailor's speech, for within two months of that conversation Cecil Stark, Burnham, one Ira Anson and other leaders in No. 4, were maturing their historic scheme to liberate the whole of the American prisoners at one stroke. Enthusiasm, like a subterranean fire, burnt in every man when the project was whispered abroad, and each entered upon his part with determination and courage. Until this enterprise, defections, while rare, were yet regularly recorded. Nearly a hundred Americans had entered British service rather than endure the plagues of longer durance; but henceforth none could be persuaded, despite well-directed efforts to win them.
We are now concerned with an extraordinary undertaking. The Seven were separated by death and other accidents, but James Knapps was free; and henceforth the boatswain of theMarbleheadenjoyed an importance beyond his ambitions. In connection with Lovey Lee, Knapps was able greatly to assist his countrymen in their endeavour; and first, he proved by the fact of his personal safety that Mrs. Lee remained, after all, faithful to the cause of the prisoners. It was agreed, therefore, that Lovey might be further trusted, and she immediately received a gift of ten guineas; while within a fortnight, and upon payment of a much greater sum, she accepted Stark's proposals and prepared to alter her manner of life accordingly.
The markets reopened when the weather broke, and a brisk correspondence with the miser and James Knapps was established from inside the Prison. Thus Lovey learned that her co-operation must be secured at closer quarters than Siward's Cross. She was bidden to establish herself as near the War Prison as possible, and chance enabled her to take up the identical position desired. Mention has already been made of a ruinous cottage immediately without the Prison walls. Some acres of rough land went along with this deserted "newtake," and the authorities were well content to let the worthless place to a tenant. Instantly grasping the significance of the manoeuvre, and alive to the importance of blinding all official eyes, Lovey, for the first time in her life, spent the prodigious sum of twenty pounds in a week. She had the old cottage thatched and rendered storm-proof; she ploughed up a part of the land and fenced all in. She continued to traffic among the Americans, and no question of her integrity had ever arisen. Her stock increased and she became one of the most important among the small merchants. She sold tobacco and potatoes; she also smuggled many prohibited articles, such as candles, alcohol, oil. She paid private taxes upon these things to the turnkeys, but nobody in high authority ever heard of the matter. Lovey even made the Commandant a friend, and regularly provided his table with poultry. She deceived him by her independent manners; and he fell into the common error of supposing that one who is laconic, businesslike and dour, must of necessity be honest.
A general escape having been planned in every detail, conventions were ordered, the plot revealed, and the Americans sworn to secrecy. Such liberty did these prisoners of war enjoy within their own confines, that their assemblies were never interrupted nor their meetings for entertainment opposed. On this occasion, however, special guards were set by the captives themselves and every precaution taken to prevent surprise.
Then Stark addressed his fellows, for by common consent the ringleaders appointed him their spokesman.
"Gentlemen," he said, "as honest Americans, born under the Flag of Freedom, it becomes us to attempt escape. Our condition of late has been much bettered, and I, for one, owe no grudge against our present guards or their Commandant, Captain Short. He is honourable, and does what he may to lessen our tribulations; he is also generous; he has increased our privileges, and by throwing open the new yards and admitting us to larger quarters for exercise and the amusement of games, he has earned universal blessings. Our bill of health is greatly improved, thanks to him; he has, indeed, put fresh life into us. Yet are we prisoners, and, upon careful study of the journals smuggled to us, it is clear that no immediate hope of peace or of further exchange can be held out. Our country is suffering a period of sea losses, and it is not in the moment of these reverses that she will tune her ear to peace. Our circumstances have, therefore, prompted us to plan a scheme of escape, and we now submit it to your opinions. Immediately the pending changes in our disposal are made, and we have wider fields to work in, we mean to dig under these walls a tunnel, that must be two hundred and eighty feet long. It is planned and calculated most fully. It will be sunk in Prison No. 6, and, concerning the exit of it on to the Moor, no more need yet be said than that we have stout friends outside who will look to that. Our numbers, as you know, increase very rapidly, because our ships have fallen upon a bout of ill-luck; but ever recollect that these relays of our countrymen from Plymouth and elsewhere only represent American mishaps. Our successes are hidden from us; yet our hearts tell us that they exist and occur. Many English doubtless languish in American prisons. So thus it stands. I speak to two thousand men, and I ask them all to swear secrecy before Almighty God."
A dozen Bibles were circulated, and there arose a strange and solemn murmur throughout the company as every man swore to his neighbour that he would maintain absolute silence concerning this matter, and that neither by word nor pen, by look nor gesture, would he divulge the secret to any among those set in authority.
"To break this oath is death," said Stark. "You have now sworn to keep the secret; and we, your leaders, have also sworn that the man who gives one hint of this business to those whose duty it is to stop it, will be cut off. He shall not escape. In ancient Sparta there was a society called Crypteia who slew by night. The Helots perished at their hands, but none knew who struck the blow. They only left corpses behind them. So will it be with us. Eyes are upon every one of us, and he that watches has eyes upon him also. A traitor will most surely fall. He will vanish from amongst us; his place will be empty, and none will ever know where his dust lies rotting. I who speak to you have been once betrayed with others whom death has since freed. Woe to that man! Let him tremble yet while he hears me, for his hour will surely come."
The meeting disbanded, and a small sub-committee sat to select five-and-twenty trustworthy persons who should fulfil the important office of spies upon the majority. Many refused this unpleasant work, until it was explained to them that they incurred no shame. Among those finally chosen were Leverett and Samuel Cuffee. The negro had work apportioned him with his kindred, while it was the duty of Leverett and others to keep in touch with the general throng, glean public opinion and report upon any sign of unrest, disaffection, or other danger. A martial system marked the plot. Every sentry and turnkey was under close surveillance; the digging parties were chosen for their strength and sobriety; while the work itself had been so planned that it proceeded night and day without intermission. A pit was first sunk perpendicularly to the depth of twenty feet, and then pursued upon a horizontal plane. This tunnel, if extended for ninety yards, would clear the foundations of the outer wall and reach beneath Lovey Lee's cottage.
While Stark and his companions cautiously opened their enterprise in Prison No. 6, to which they were now admitted, James Knapps, snugly hidden with Mrs. Lee, was engaged upon a similar task. Here, when Lovey kept watch, the boatswain laboured; and if she went abroad: to the prison, or upon other business, he hid himself closely and smoked his pipe in a hole under the roof of the cottage.
As for Cecil Stark, a passionate zest marked his attitude to the plot, and for mingled reasons he permitted it to fill his mind. But greater than patriotic ardour or personal thirst for freedom, was the desire to escape his own thoughts. He believed that liberty could never more be anything but a word to him, for his soul was for ever fast bound. One girl's face haunted him; one voice rang musical upon his ear by day and night. He suffered enough; but no man guessed it.
To move her household goods from the hut by Siward's Cross was no great matter for Lovey Lee. A donkey carried all and found the burden light. The things about which her life's interest centred were buried deep in Hangman's Hollow, and her only hesitation, when the great enterprise at the War Prison was broken to her, arose out of the knowledge that she must now abide three miles further from her treasure-house. To this fact, however, the old woman grew reconciled, when she considered the nature of the promised reward. She settled down beneath the Prison walls; and now not the least of her grievances was the enormous appetite of Mr. James Knapps. He worked exceedingly hard and insisted upon having wholesome food and plenty of it.
"We're not all built like you, ma'am, ter do our stint of work on ditch-water and shell-snails," he explained. "Victuals and drink I'll have; else I must grumble ter them over the wall. I can't dig my best on offal."
There fell a morning when John Lee visited his grandmother, and she saw by his face that a climax had come in his fortunes. He was gloomy and sad, yet of his own affairs he said nothing until Lovey mentioned them.
"I'm on a private errand," he said, "and since 'tis too early yet to see the prisoners, I thought I'd drop in and learn how you're faring."
She suspected that he was sent to spy by his master.
"I keep body and soul together, an' that's all I ever shall do," she answered, little thinking that John Lee had counted her guineas but a few weeks before. "Even so I have to thank they Yankees to the Prison."
He marvelled at her cunning.
"Do you hear anything of that fine gentleman, Master Cecil Stark?" he inquired.
"Ah, you was all in love with him to Fox Farm, I hear. I wish there was more like him."
John did not answer, and his grandmother jeered.
"I see how 'tis! Your nose be out of joint. What did I tell you, Jack? Broken hearts—broken fiddlesticks! Ban't the wench's heart as have broke, anyhow. So her throwed you over for a properer man?"
"No, by God! But——"
"You'm minded to let her off her bargain? Then the bigger fool you!"
She hit the truth in her brutal fashion. Lee had not trusted himself to pursue the matter of his attachment; yet, as time progressed, he saw more clearly what Grace strove with might and main to conceal. The accesses of her affection, the thousand little kindly thoughts for him—all wrote truth in letters of fire upon his aching heart. True love had acted differently—had claimed as well as given; and he knew, despite her assurance oftentimes repeated, that her attitude was founded on another impulse. Now, after grief and pain, his thoughts moved slowly to Cecil Stark. In turn he was attracted by and repulsed from the prospect of speech with the young prisoner. Finally he braced himself to the ordeal; yet he knew not what he would say when they stood face to face. He felt as a man in a dream at this period. A most unreal and monstrous task lay before him. Deliberately he was turning his back upon all that made life precious; consciously he was hastening out of day into eternal night. He chafed against the noble impulse that drove him onward; for a season he resisted it; then Grace Malherb's own steadfast purposes warmed his inspiration. Her delicacy, her gentleness, her courage cried to him. Must he prove less brave and more selfish than she?
It was indeed sheer suffering that supported the girl now; but her strength rose superior to it, and only one who knew and loved her as this man knew and loved, had guessed at the things hidden in her heart. The torture simulated Grace to a surface brilliance, as a bird will sing out of pure misery in sight of his robbed nest. Her eyes were ever bright, but unshed tears made them so; her plots and plans were ceaseless and sanguine; but he knew that she rushed into them to escape from her heart. Love, indeed, had found her at last, but she struggled fiercely to shut him out since he had come too late. She never wearied of plans concerning the Malherb amphora, and of the future for John Lee when he should discover it. And he humoured her and himself a little longer, so that she scarcely realised that he had grasped the truth, despite his first sure guess thereat.
Now the story was told. He had wandered through the last autumnal glade of his fool's paradise; he had witnessed the red sunset of his dying romance; and he stood patient and strong under the cold starlight at the end.
John Lee was come to speak with Stark, for at certain times in the War Prison visitors were permitted to enter and have conversation or transact business with the captives. A tall grille of iron alone separated them, but to this grating all men might approach on certain days and traffic with the imprisoned for those trifles which they wrought and sold to any purchaser. Work-boxes, dinner mats, hand-screens, bone toys and ornaments they manufactured; and many persons came from Plymouth and other towns to see the spectacle of the great moorland limbo and carry from it some memento of the sufferers there. Nefarious and doubtful trades were also practised in the secret fastnesses of this gaol. Exceeding good imitations of the eighteenpenny and three-shilling pieces then current passed into the world from Prince Town, and forged bank notes also circulated. Venal soldiery helped the prisoners in the business of uttering base money; but such simple and honest trash as passed to the visitors between the bars of the grille, was openly sold.
Hither from his grandmother's cottage came Lee, and soon he noted the tall form of Stark standing with Burnham and Ira Anson. They had nothing to sell, but watched the visitors with interest. Then Cecil caught sight of John Lee, hastened to the barrier and shook hands heartily through the bars.
"Well met, well met," he said. "I'm right glad to see you, Jack. Would that I could give you such a welcome as your master gave to me!"
"I hope you are well and strong again, Mr. Stark."
"Well enough——"
The American looked at Lee with intense scrutiny and wondered how much or little he might know concerning the affairs of his mistress.
"All are happy at Fox Tor Farm, I trust?"
"Well enough," answered the other, as Stark had answered him.
"That means not absolutely well," replied Cecil quickly. "Miss Malherb—all at least is well with her? Yet—Mr. Norcot. 'Tis intolerable, you know, Jack Lee, that I should speak of that man except to bless him for his goodness. Nevertheless—Miss Malherb—but this is none of your business I doubt?"
"It won't be much longer; for the present it is," said John. "I know she hates Mr. Peter Norcot. She's bound to hate him in self-defence. But, nevertheless, 'tis intended she shall marry him within six months."
"Yet there's a man she—she loves. It's too terrible! She suffers—she must suffer horribly. And this other—why doesn't he come forward and sweep Norcot out of her path? What clay is this creature made of that he holds back?"
"The man?"
"Do you know him?"
"I do."
"Then tell him from me—but what's the use of bellowing like a pent-up bull? Can't you, at least, assure him from yourself that he must be up and doing? You're in your lady's good graces—therefore justify her trust. Seek this laggard and explain how the land lies. Maybe 'tis her tyrant father he fears."
"The man knows everything. He can't help her."
"Cannot! What's the matter with him? Has he no arms, nor legs, nor courage? Is he made of gingerbread? Oh, if I—— But perhaps I speak ignorant of facts. Maybe he's chained fast, too."
"Yes, he's fast enough."
"Then 'tis your duty to do what a man may, Jack. You, at least, are free as well as faithful; and in love with Miss Malherb also, I'll wager. You must love her if you're a man."
"I do love her."
"And can see her and speak to her every day of your blessed life! Oh, if I might but help you; if I might come between her and trouble——"
He broke off and ended his aspirations to himself. Then Lee spoke.
"Could you escape from this place again?"
Stark started and looked round about him.
"For that cause—yes."
"There may be good reason why you should presently—not yet. The first thing——"
Here Cecil interrupted.
"'Good reason—good reason'? You know so much that you must know more. And you must tell me more."
"I'll tell you this. We are at cross purposes. I let you talk because—because it amused me in a strange sort of painful way. But the truth——"
He hesitated, and the full, fatal significance of the next few words impressed itself vividly upon his soul. There was no blinking it. The fact stared pitiless. He stood at the cross roads of fortune, and with his next word to Cecil Stark, his own path would be chosen, his own desire renounced, for ever.
The American saw that great emotions fought in this man's mind, and waited for him to speak.
"The truth is that Miss Malherb is a free woman—so far as love is concerned."
"She told me when I——" began Stark; then he looked guilty and held his peace.
But Lee understood.
"When you asked her to marry you? I know. She could not say otherwise then. Bide bold and patient; the time will come when she may answer differently."
The other was terribly moved. A great expiration burst from him, half an oath of astonishment, half a hallelujah.
"In God's name what are you that dare to speak these great things?" he asked under his breath, as though he apostrophised a sexless spirit.
"Her servant—her slave. At least I tell truth. Thus it stands—that other—he will not marry her."
"And she still loves him? This is damnable! Let me but meet that man!"