course I do not question your honour and your intention to discharge
what you propose. But speculation, above all, speculation in mines,
superlatively such a speculation as Ophir, is risky. I do not wish to
risk my chance of getting that five thousand pounds (and connubial
felicity) on the continuance of the Ophirian gold yield.'
'You don't suppose I will pay you down the money now, before you are
married.'
'No, I do not, and I do not want to run the chance of getting married,
only to discover that the five thousand pounds has been sunk in Ophir,
and is only available in the shape of paper on Ophir, or only to
discover that Ophir has collapsed like a pricked bladder the day
before.'
'What, then, do you want?' asked Trampleasure, very angrily, rubbing his
knuckles with the palm of his hand in his irritation and impatience.
'What I want is, that you should lodge the money now in the hands of a
third party, say of Mr. John Herring. If I fail to fulfil my part of
the contract within a given time, say on the day already fixed for the
wedding, or seven days after, I forfeit it and it returns to you. When
I am married to Orange, then Herring is empowered to hand the money over
to me.'
'Upon my word. Captain Trecarrel, of all audacious and exacting men I
ever came across. you are the most audacious and exacting. And what if I
refuse this condition also?'
'Then I remain in bed.'
'What is the advantage of that?'
'I am engaged to be married on the eighth. If I am ill, my illness
serves as an excuse for my absence from the hymeneal altar when expected
there. The world can say nothing against that; and I am bound to
maintain my character as a _chevalier sans reproche_.'
'Pray how long will this farce continue?'
'What farce?'
'Your lying in bed.'
'You will find a looking-glass yonder, father-in-law anticipative.
Examine your countenance in it, and see if the expression is that of a
spectator at a farce. It looks deuced more like that of a witness at a
melodrama.'
'How long do you soak here?' exclaimed Trampleasure, sulkily.
'I shall await events from this commanding position. Ophir will blow up
before long. It cannot continue, and will send you and yours head over
heels into space, and where you will drop, heaven only knows. Then, of
course, I shall be free.'
Trampleasure paced the room, his face blazing. He was very angry, he was
also greatly perplexed. He was particularly anxious to get Orange
married to the Captain. Presently he turned round, and said in a sullen
tone, and with an angry lower on his brows, 'I will give you an answer
shortly.'
'All right, I am in no hurry. The bed is not uncomfortable. Herring is
coming here this evening to smoke a pipe with me, and I will ask him to
hold the stakes.'
The next visitor was young Sampson. He came in fuming, and asked the
Captain his intentions. He was Orange's brother. It was his duty to
see that she was treated fairly, and, by God, he would do his duty. He
was not going to let a militia captain play fast and loose with the poor
girl's affections, and possibly blight her entire future by his
heartless desertion. Trecarrel listened to him with the utmost
coolness. He had expected this visit, and knew what its character would
be.
'Sampson the little and weak,' he said, 'your father has sent you here
to try what bluster will effect. May I trouble you to convey to him a
message from me, and say that the effects are nil?'
'Are you going to desert Orange? If you are, I'll shoot you.'
'No, you won't,' said the Captain. 'In the first place, I am not going
to desert Orange; and in the second place, if I were, the utmost you
would do would be to try to get money compensation out of me, and that
would be like squeezing a stone for milk. In one particular I am like
Ophir. If you want to extract gold out of me, you must first put it
into me.'
Sampson's face became mottled, and his eyes, with a startled expression
in them, turned to the Captain, but, seeing his eyes fixed inquiringly
on him, his fell. Trecarrel chuckled, and drew the sheets over his
head. Presently he looked out again. Sampson was at the window killing
flies. He had his back turned to the bed, and was stabbing at the flies
with the pin of his stock.
'I have placed two alternatives before your father,' said the Captain:
'I will marry Orange to-morrow if he will comply with either. Either
let him give me a fair chance of testing the ore of Ophir, and satisfy
myself that the mine is genuine, or let him pay five thousand pounds
into the hands of a third party, to be held till the marriage is
concluded.'
'I refuse--I refuse each alternative, in his name and my own,' said
young Sampson, stabbing at a fly with such fury that he broke a pane in
the window.
'There goes eighteen pence,' said the Captain, 'beside letting a current
of cold air in on me. Leave the room. I need repose. My indisposition
gains upon me.'
The next to visit Captain Trecarrel was John Herring. Herring was not
very willing to undertake the obligation the Captain was desirous of
forcing upon him: however, he was good-natured, that is, easily imposed
on, and in the end he consented to act as the third party, and receive
the money into his keeping till the marriage took place.
On the morrow old Tramplara came back; he remained some time, and
attempted to coax Trecarrel into good humour and the surrender of his
ultimatum. Trecarrel especially urged the former of his alternatives,
as he perceived that it was eminently distasteful to both the old man
and his son. Tramplara went away, refusing both alternatives.
On the third day Tramplara did not come at all, but Trecarrel heard
through the hostess that young Sampson had been there to inquire whether
he was still confined to his bed.
On the fourth day the old man came, very sulky and rude, and gave
way--not to the first alternative, but to the second. Herring was sent
for, and the transaction was arranged to the satisfaction of the
Captain.
'Now then,' said Trecarrel, 'my indisposition is better. Ring for
shaving water. Clear every one out of the room. I am going to rise.'
*CHAPTER XXVI.*
*THE SHEKEL.*
'Miss Cicely,' said John Herring.
'Yes, Mr. John,' answered Cicely, with a smile.
'Well--Cicely--if you wish it.'
'I do wish it; I dislike formality. You have stayed with us so long,
and have been so good to us, and helped us so greatly, that I suspect a
cousinship between us, if the respective Battishill and Herring
pedigrees were worked. The West of England families are all united by
marriage.'
'My family boasts of no dignity or antiquity,' said Herring. 'We have
been humble yeomen down to my father, and never dreamed of calling
ourselves gentlemen, certainly not of tacking an esquire after our
names.'
'If your ancestors were humble yeomen, ours were very humble gentlemen.
Do look at West Wyke. Did you ever see a gentleman's house elsewhere so
small, and yet so full of self-consciousness? An embattled gateway in a
wall that a boy could overleap, guarding a garden of hollyhocks. A
front door with a huge beam to close it, running back into the wall, to
protect the family plate, which consists of one silver caudle cup, and a
whalebone-handled punch-ladle with a Queen Anne's shilling in the bowl.
I believe our family stood barely above high water mark, the line where
the yeoman ended and the gentleman began; but so barely above it, that
we were always liable to be submerged, and never able to lift ourselves
wholly into a more exalted and secure position.'
'I dare say,' observed John Herring, 'that the smallness of your house
has been the salvation of your family. You have not been expected to
keep a large establishment; to entertain much, and to have a stable and
furniture and a cellar.'
'I dare say you are right. By the way, how is the sick gentleman at the
Oxenham Arms?'
'There is not much change in his condition. He is still indisposed.'
'Who is he?'
'A Cornish squire, Trecarrel by name, who is engaged to the daughter of
Mr. Trampleasure.'
'No doubt Miss Mirelle will have had some of her airs taken out of her
in the Trampleasure household.'
This was the first time that Cicely had voluntarily, and of her own
prompting, spoken of Mirelle. Herring had mentioned her occasionally,
but Cicely showed plainly that she retained no pleasant recollection of
the Countess, and was uninterested in what had become of her. There was
a spice of vindictiveness in her tone as she spoke. She was rejoicing
that Mirelle should have her airs taken out of her.
'The poor Countess,' said Herring, 'has suffered much annoyance among
those wretched people----'
'I have no patience with her,' interrupted Cicely, 'giving herself airs,
and calling herself a Countess. Why, her father was only a merchant,
and I cannot see how she can inherit her mother's title. The wife of an
Earl is a Countess, and the daughters are Ladies, not Countesses.'
'It is different abroad.'
'You ought not to have humoured her. However, as you see no more of her
now, no harm has been done by your falling in with her fancy. The
Tramplaras are the last persons in the world to feed her vanity, and so
by this time, it is to be hoped, she has learned to stand on the same
level as those she is called to associate with.'
'Do you not think it must be intolerable for one so refined and
sensitive?'
'Oh, there, there!' interrupted Cicely, again laughing. 'We have had
enough of Mirelle; let us banish her from our conversation. The very
thought of her gives me a shiver.'
'Cicely, tell me, has old Tramplara been pretty frequently to West Wyke
of late?'
'He has been to see my father now and then.'
'Do you know that he has put down your father on his list as one of the
directors of Ophir? His name is not yet printed, but Tramplara is
counting on him.'
'Why should he require my father's name?'
'To give respectability to the concern.'
'I hope my father will not consent.'
'He _must_ not. I am persuaded that Ophir is a fraud, and your father
must be saved from being involved in what will cover with disgrace, and
involve in ruin, all who are connected with it.'
'Good heavens! Do you think my father has already given his consent?
Oh, please go in and see him, and stop him. I know he is becoming
excited about Ophir. He laughed at it at first, but he has changed his
tone of late.'
'I will go at once.'
Herring stepped into the hall to Mr. Battishill.
'Well, Herring!' exclaimed the old man, brightening up; 'back from Zeal!
How goes the sick man--Captain Trecarrel? Dear me! he represents a fine
old family, de Esse, alias Trecarrel, argent two chevronels sable, with
a mullet for a difference. A Devonshire family--the Esse of Ashe, and
the elder branch, died out in an heiress who carried Ashe to the Drakes;
but the second son, a long way back, married the heiress of Trecarrel,
and dropped the patronymic for the place name. How is the last limb of
a splendid tree?'
'There is nothing more serious the matter with him than that he is going
to marry the daughter of old Tramplara.'
'Good Lord! what a mesalliance! The Trampleasures are mushrooms--I had
almost said toadstools. I suppose it is a case of money; the needy
gentleman with centuries behind him takes the daughter of the wealthy
founder of Ophir for the sake of the mountain of gold she brings. How
is it that Trampleasure has not secured Trecarrel as a director? His
name would carry weight.'
'Exactly,' answered Herring; 'that is what Tramplara wants--he has not
got a name of importance on his list. Do you know anything of Arundell
Golitho, Esq. of Trevorgan?'
'Never heard his name before.'
'Nor have I, nor has any one else.'
'He must be some one of importance, or Tramplara would not have put him
on the board?'
'I do not believe in his existence. You were asking why Captain
Trecarrel has not become a director. For the best of reasons. He does
not care to cover an honourable name with disgrace.'
Mr. Battishill's face changed colour.
'That is a strong expression, Herring, and ought to be justified.'
'Dear Mr. Battishill, you know what Polpluggan did for you.'
'Polpluggan was a disastrous venture, certainly.'
'You told me yourself it was a swindle.'
'Well, well, the word was too strong. I thought so at the time; but
Tramplara has been frank with me about it. Since he has been here so
much, engaged on Ophir, I have seen his books; he showed them me in the
most open manner possible, he insists on my going over them myself.
Polpluggan was a failure, not a swindle. I withdraw the expression.'
'And Ophir, I believe, is nothing less than a swindle, and will cover
every one who has to do with it with infamy. That is why Captain
Trecarrel will not lend his name to the concern.'
'Why then does he marry the daughter of Ophir?'
'That is another affair. He has been engaged to her for some time, and
cannot with honour break away.'
'What leads him to suppose that Ophir is a--a----'
'A swindle! Because he has been in Exeter consulting those who are
likely to know; because he knows the antecedents of the man who has
started it. I trust, sir, you have not given Tramplara grounds to hope
that you will become a director?'
'Well, he has been pressing, very pressing, I may say, and I have not
positively said I will not. You see, my dear Herring, the mine is sure
to be a success. The applications for shares increase instead of
falling off; that is a pretty good proof of public confidence.'
'That proves nothing, except that there are many fools in the world
ready to part with their money.'
'They would hardly take shares unless they had convinced themselves that
the speculation was sound. Nothing, I understand, can be more above
board than the proceedings of Mr. Trampleasure. The gold ore is crushed
and washed before the eyes of the public. I cannot see where the fraud
can be.'
'There is roguery somewhere, I am convinced.'
'My dear Herring, that is your opinion. Others equally capable of
forming opinions think differently. The mine is on my property, it is
only reasonable that I should be a director and benefit by it. As Mr.
Trampleasure put it to me--the world asks, Why is not the lord of the
manor on the board of directors? The absence of his name from it
damages the prospects of the mine. Other men of position and property
hold back because I do not sanction the venture. It is necessary that I
should lend my name.'
'You must on no account lend your name, sir,' said Herring, earnestly.
'You are very peremptory, Mr. Herring,' said the old man, nettled. 'The
lead mine halts; nothing is being done there, no lead turned out, no
machinery set up, no company got together to work it. And hard by is
the auriferous quartz vein of Ophir----'
'Excuse my interrupting you,' said Herring, 'but may I know whether you
believe in Upaver having ever been Ophir?'
'That is a matter into which I do not enter. I put all these
antiquarian theories aside. I look at the plain facts. Is gold found
there, or is it not?'
'Gold is certainly washed there. How it comes there I do not pretend to
say.'
'You mean to insinuate that it is not dug out of the mine.'
'I doubt it, because I mistrust old Tramplara, and I think the way in
which the affair has been got up is suspicious. Did you ever hear the
old people call Upaver Ophir?'
'No, but there is a similarity in the names. However, as I told you, I
put all these antiquarian conceits on one side.'
'Mr. Battishill, we must consider them as an integral part of the
swindle, if swindle it be. You do not, I presume, believe in the Jews
and Phoenicians having worked this mine in remote ages?'
'I tell you I do not think of this at all; I am not qualified to enter
into and examine this question. But when it comes to gravel containing
gold dust, why, bless my soul! my eyes are the best judges. As for the
Jews and Phoenicians, there is, at all events, this to be said for the
theory of their having been here, that they dropped a shekel--a silver
shekel--I saw it with my own eyes. I have an impression of it in my
desk. Thus where a Jewish coin has been found, there in all probability
a Jew has been to drop it.'
'Who found the coin?'
'The Reverend Israel Flamank bought it of Grizzly Cobbledick, who had
picked it up in his garden, or somewhere near the Giant's Table.'
'I beg you, sir, I entreat you, as you love your home and respect the
name you bear, not to have anything to do with Ophir till I have
followed this shekel up to its origin. It may serve as a clue by which
the mystery will be unravelled. I will go and see Grizzly himself, and
ascertain from his own lips where he found it, or rather, whether he
found it at all.'
'You are a sceptic,' said Mr. Battishill, 'steeped in the spirit of the
age.'
'Well,' asked Cicely, when Herring came out, 'what is the result?' She
noticed that he was looking excited.
'Your father is bitten with Ophir,' he answered. 'He and I have nearly
come to hard words. It is the first time we have had any difference,
and we have been warm on both sides. I must find out about Ophir, if
only to save him; for Tramplara has woven his web round him, and has so
dusted his eyes with gold that he can neither free himself nor see
clearly where he is. He will infallibly be brought to ruin again by
that wretched old man, unless I get to the bottom of the mystery of this
accursed Ophir.'
'Oh, Mr. Herring!' pleaded Cicely, putting her hands together; 'do--do
help us.'
'Yes, _Miss_ Cicely.'
'I beg your pardon,' she said, and the clouds cleared from her pleasant
face. 'Cousin John, what should we--what should I do without you?'
'I have done nothing as yet. But I am determined to expose Ophir, and
by so doing to save your father.'
'How will you set about it?'
'I have a clue--a shekel.'
John Herring went in search of Grizzly. The old savage was now generally
to be found near Ophir. The mine exercised a strange attraction on the
wild old man. The visitors spoke to him, and asked him questions about
the Giant's Table, and the Jews, and the gold, and then made him
presents. Some of the more intemperate among the Temperates had serious
thought of setting him up as a representative of Jonadab the son of
Rechab, and put leading questions to him, to elicit from him traditions
of such descent. But further inquiries into the habits and
peculiarities of his parent stock at Nymet damped their enthusiasm. The
Nymet savages, even if temperate, which was doubtful, were not shining
moral lights to hold up as examples in other particulars. Grizzly had
become somewhat civilised by association with human beings. When he was
tired of being questioned, he rambled off upon the moors, and
disappeared up the stream in the direction of Rayborough Pool, but not
for long. The stir of Ophir drew him back. He liked watching the
stampers, and to stand on the bank above the washing floors, chuckling
and sniggering at the people examining the sediment and picking out the
glittering grains.
There Herring found him. He at once attacked him on the subject of the
shekel.
'I found 'n in the airth just below the great stone to the head o' the
Giant's Table. I found 'n about six foot vour inches below the surfass
o' the ground. There was dree or vour more, all alike, but Loramussy!
I didn't give mun (them) no heed. I thought they warn't worth nothing,
and I gived mun to my little maid to play wi'. But her, I reckon, ha'
lost the lot, all but thicky as I sold to the Reverend Israelite
Flamank, and he sed it were an Israelitish shekel. I've a-heard the old
volks used to call the Giant's Table a Gilgal, but they don't do that no
more; and I can mind how this were always called Hophir, but the folks
as is skollards took to naming 'n Upaver, and that be all I've a got to
say. I can't say nothing about Jonadab the son o' Rechab, as were my
great-granfer, cos a died when I was a baby. I'll thankee to remember a
poor man as is nigh vour-score years old, and 'ud die afore he'd let a
drop o' other liker down his throat but pure water, glory rallaluley,
harmen.' And he held out his hand. 'Oh! I beg pardon; didn't think
'twere the young Squire. No offence.'
'Cobbledick,' said Herring, 'have you ever found any more silver shekels
about the Table?'
'No, never; only once for all.'
'How deep down did you say they were?'
'What did I say? I found 'n in the airth just below the big stone to
the head o' the Giant's Table. I found 'n about six foot vour inches
below the surfass o' the ground.'
'I have heard that already, word for word. Can you give me any idea of
the depth, not in words, but by showing me about the depth that you call
six foot four inches?'
Cobbledick looked blankly at him.
'What do you take your own height to be?'
Grizzly was posed.
'I suppose it took a deal of sinking to reach the depth where--you found
the shekels?'
'Loramussy, maister!' exclaimed the old wretch, 'weeks and weeks; that
shaft yonder were nothing to it.'
'That will do, Grizzly.'
Herring was convinced that the old man was repeating by rote a lesson
that had been taught him. However much he was questioned and
cross-questioned he returned to the same story, in the same words.
Herring gave up the hope of getting anything more in this quarter.
Cobbledick had degenerated into a beggar--a wretched, canting beggar,
accommodating his whine to the craze of the persons who visited Ophir.
But Herring was not going to abandon the clue of the shekel because he
could find out nothing from Grizzly. He went to the Giant's Table to
catechise Joyce, but she was not there.
Joyce was now nearly well. The splints had been taken off her arms, and
she could use her hands, and do light work; but the hands were stiff,
and long inaction had weakened her arms.
Herring could not spare the time to wait for her return; he did not know
where she was, and he was due at the Oxenham Arms for the final
settlement of the arrangement between Trecarrel and Trampleasure, in
which he was a party.
On the morrow, Captain Trecarrel left. In the evening Herring went in
quest of Joyce and found her hoeing in the little field. He called, and
she ran to him as a dog to its master, and with as marked demonstrations
of delight at seeing him.
'Joyce. I came here yesterday to find you, and you were away.'
'Oh dear, oh dear, though!' she exclaimed; 'I were wiring a rabbit.'
'Joyce, I want a word with you.'
'You can have scores; as many as you wants.'
'I know. A woman is free of her words. You must tell me the truth now,
my little maid, for a good deal depends on it.'
'Did I ever tell'y a lie, now?' asked Joyce, offended. 'You may cut me
in pieces afore I'll say other than what be true to you.'
'What I want to know, Joyce, is, where did your father get that shekel?'
'I don't know what that be.'
'A silver coin. He says he found three or four here under one of the
stones of the Table. There is a branch on one side, and on the other a
cup with a flame rising out of it.'
'I never seed nothing of the sort, nowhere.'
'Your father says that he gave them to you, and that you lost all,
except one which he retained and sold to Mr. Flamank.'
Joyce shook her head.
'You have never seen anything of the kind?'
'It be just one o' vaither's pack o' lies,' answered the candid Joyce;
'vaither hev been lying finely since Ophir began. He never showed me
nothing like that; he never gived me no silver money. He never had none
to give till Ophir began.'
'You are very positive.'
'If you doubt, I'll say, Blast me blue----'
'That will do,' interrupted Herring; 'your word will suffice without the
blue blazes to colour it.'
The old man had lied about the shekel. He had not given it to the girl,
he had therefore probably not found it at all, but it had been given him
by those who had put the story into his mouth.
'I'll ax vaither if you likes,' said Joyce; 'he'll tell me, all right.'
'I do not think he will. That is all I wanted to know, my dear girl.'
'I say,' said Joyce, 'doant'y go off now right on end. Sit you down a
mite here in the sun and have a chat. I never see nothing of you now,
not as it used to be when I were ill and scatt to bits. I a'most wish
my airms was broke again, that you could come and see me ivery day.
That were beautiful.'