HANGMAN’S HUT
Minnie Marshall was a quiet, brown girl, with a manner very reserved. Her
parents were dead, her years, since the age of sixteen, had been spent in
service. Now marriage approached for her and, at twenty, she contemplated
without fear or mistrust a husband and a home. Of immediate relations the
girl possessed none, save an old aunt at Moreton, who kept a little shop
there. Minnie was a beauty and well experienced in the matter of suitors,
but Daniel Sweetland’s romance ran smooth and she left him not long in
doubt. That young Titus Sim had been a better match, most folks declared;
and even Daniel, from the strong position of success, often asked Minnie
why she had put him before his friend.
Now, as the lad drove his sweetheart to inspect a cottage near his work
on Dartmoor, they overtook Mr Sim returning to Middlecott Court.
“Jump up, Titus, an’ I’ll give ’e a lift to the lodge,” said Daniel.
The footman took off his hat very politely to Minnie, then he climbed
into the vacant seat at the back of the trap and the party drove forward.
Dan was full of the interview with Henry Vivian, and the two young men
both sang the praises of their old companion.
“He’s off to foreign parts in a few weeks, but he hopes to be at my
wedding,” said Dan. “He’d be very sorry not to be there. But he’ve got to
go pretty soon to look after Sir Reginald’s business, by all accounts.”
“There’s been a lot of talk about the sugar estates in the West Indies,”
explained Sim. “I overhear these things at table. Mr Henry’s going out
to look into affairs. There’s an overseer--the son of Sir Reginald’s
old overseer. But master doubts whether his figures can be trusted,
and whether things are as bad as he says they are. So Mr Henry Vivian
is going to run out without any warning. He’ll soon have the business
ship-shape and find out any crooked dealings--such a clever man as he is.”
“Awful strict sure enough,” said Dan, with a chuckle. “He’d heard I was a
bit of a free-trader in matters of sporting, an’ he was short an’ sharp,
I promise you. However, ’tis only the point of view, an’ all owing to me
being a Radical in politics. He knows that I’d not do a dirty trick,
else he wouldn’t have bought me a new gun for a wedding present. I’ll
show him some sport on Dartymoor come presently.”
Sim changed the subject.
“I hope you’ll like your home upalong, Miss Marshall,” he said.
Her lips tightened a little; she turned round and her fearless eyes met
the speaker’s.
“Thank you, Mr Sim; and I hope so too.”
Her voice was cold and indifferent.
“An’ no man will be welcomer there than you, Titus,” said Sweetland. “You
an’ me will have many a good bit of sporting upalong, I hope.”
“You’ll have something better to do than that, Dan,” said Minnie.
“Sporting be very well for a bachelor, but work an’ wages must be the
first thought come a man’s got a wife.”
“No need to tell me that. I’ll work for ’e as hard as a horse; an’ well
you know it.”
A lodge rose beside them and Daniel pulled up at the main entrance to
Middlecott. Noble gates of iron ascended here. Ancient leaden statues
ornamented the four posts of this entrance, and one of them, a Diana,
had a bullet wound under her left breast. Others among these figures
were also peppered with small shot--the folly of bygone sportsmen of the
Vivian clan. From the gates a wide avenue of Spanish chestnuts extended,
and half a mile away, rising above the heads of stately conifers, stood
Middlecott Court. Behind it, ridge on ridge, billowed the fringes of the
Moor. The gate-lodge was Daniel Sweetland’s home, and the sound of wheels
brought his mother from the door. Mrs Sweetland smiled as she saw Minnie,
and came out and kissed her.
“So you’m going up for to see the li’l house, my pretty? I do hope you’ll
like it. ’Tis small but weather-proof, an’ all very nice an’ water-sweet.”
“I shall like it very well, mother, if Dan likes it,” answered the girl.
“Us will be back by eight o’clock or earlier, an’ Minnie will stay an’
eat a bit with us,” declared Daniel.
Then he drove on and left his mother looking after them. Mr Sim had
already started upon his way to the Hall.
“Poor old Titus,” said Dan, as he walked by the trap presently to ease
the horse at a stiff hill. “However did you come to like me best, Min?”
“Who can tell?”
“I wish, all the same, you thought kinder of him. You’m awful cold to the
man.”
“He makes me cold. For my part, I wish you didn’t like him so well as you
do.”
Dan grew rather red.
“No man, nor woman neither, will ever stand between me an’ Titus Sim,” he
said.
“You might think ’twas jealousy,” she answered quietly, “for you are sun,
an’ air, an’ life to me, Daniel. ’Tis my love quickens my heart. But
I’m not jealous. Only I can’t pretend to care for him. I’ve got nought
against him save a womanly, nameless dread. An’ why it’s in my heart I
don’t know, for I ban’t one to mislike folks without a cause.”
“Then best to get it out of your heart,” he said roughly. “You’m not used
to talk nonsense. The man’s one in a thousand--kind, honest, gentle,
an’ as good a shot as there is in the county. Straight as a line, too.
Straighter than I be myself, for that matter. He’ve behaved very game
over this, for well I know what it cost him to lose you.”
“I wish I felt to respect him like you do. ’Tis wicked not to, yet I be
asking myself questions all the time. He’m so rich, they say. How can he
be rich, Daniel? Where do the money come from?”
“From the same place as my own father’s; from gentlefolks’ pockets.
The men he waits on make no more of a five pound note than we do of a
halfpenny. Titus will die a rich man, and glad am I to think it; for he’s
been a most unlucky chap in other ways. There was his health first, as
wouldn’t let him be a keeper, though he wanted to, and then--you. An’ a
worthless beggar like me--I can do what I please an’ win you. All the
same, I don’t think no better of you for not thinking better of my best
friend.”
“I hope you’ll never find there was a reason for what I feel, Daniel.”
“I swear I never shall; an’ I’ll thank you to drop it, Minnie. I don’t
want to think my wife is a fool. Nothing on God’s earth shall come
between me an’ Sim--be sure of that.”
The girl’s lips tightened again, but she was too wise to answer. In
truth she had no just grievance against her sweetheart’s friend. Titus
had asked her to marry him a week before Daniel put the question; and
she had refused him. Two days later with passion he had implored her to
reconsider her decision; and when again she answered “No,” he had spoken
wildly and called Heaven to witness that she should be his wife sooner
or later. His white face had flamed red for once, and his smooth, steady
voice had broken. But on their next meeting Titus was himself again. He
had then begged Minnie’s pardon for his temper; and when their little
world knew that she was going to take the gamekeeper’s son, Mr Sim was
the first to give Daniel joy and congratulate Minnie.
She had no definite case against him; but a deep intuition dominated her
mind, and frankly she regretted Daniel’s affection for his old rival.
Now, however, she returned silence to her lover’s angry words, according
to her custom. Soon the climb to the Moor was accomplished, and the cold
wind lit Minnie’s eyes and calmed her sweetheart. Over the great expanse
of autumnal purple and gold they took their way, and now sank into
valleys musical with falling water, and now trotted upon great heaths,
where sheep ran, ponies galloped, and the red kine roamed. To the horizon
rose the granite peaks of the land. Eastward there billowed Hameldon’s
huge, hogged back, and to the north rolled Cosdon; but Yes Tor and High
Willhayes--the loftiest summits of the Moor--were hidden. Westerly a
mighty panorama of hills and stony pinnacles spread in a semicircle, and
the scene was bathed with the clear light that follows rain. The sun
began to sink upon his cloud pillows and heaven glowed with infinite
brilliance and purity.
“’Twill be good to live up here in this sweet air, along with you, dear
heart,” said Minnie.
“Yes, an’ it will; an’--an’ I’m sorry I spoke harsh a minute agone, my
own dear darling Min,” he cried.
“I forgived ’e afore the words was out of your mouth,” she answered.
Whereupon he dropped the reins and hugged her close and nearly upset the
trap.
Presently they passed Bennett’s Cross, where that mediæval monument
stands deep in the heather; then they came to the Warren Inn, perched on
lofty ground under Hurston Ridge in the middle of the Moor.
As Daniel drew up, a man came out of the hostelry, walked to the horse’s
nose and stroked it.
He was almost hairless. His small eyes glittered out of his round
countenance like a pig’s; his short figure was of amazing corpulence.
A smile sat on his fat face, and his voice came in a thin and piping
treble, like a bird’s.
“Here you be then?”
“Yes, Johnny, here us be. This is Minnie Marshall, who’s going to marry
me presently. Minnie, this here man is Johnny Beer--beer by name an’
barrel by nature! There’s not a better chap ’pon the Moor, and him an’
his wife will be our only neighbours for three miles round.”
Mr Beer beamed and shook Minnie’s outstretched hand.
“A bowerly maiden, sure enough,” he said frankly. “I hope you’ll like
the cot, my dear. ’Tis lonesome to a town-bred mind, but very pleasant
you will find. And wi’ a husband handy, you’ll have all you want. An’
my missis for your friend, I hope. She’m not a beauty, but she wears
something wonderful, an’ she’ve a heart so wide as a church-door, though
fretful where the poultry’s concerned. Everybody to Postbridge will tell
you of her qualities. Of course it ban’t my place. But never was a one
like she in all the blessed West Countree.”
“Bring a pint of liquor an’ the key of the cottage, Johnny,” said young
Sweetland; “an’ then after a drink, us’ll walk down, an’ Minnie can make
up her mind.”
“There’s only one thing against the place, an’ that is the name,”
declared Mr Beer. “Though for my part I don’t see why you shouldn’t
change the name. It can be done without any fuss or documents, I believe.
’Tis called ‘Hangman’s Hut,’ because the first person as lived there
killed himself, being tired of having the world against him. With an old
peat knife, he took his life. But if I was you, I should just change that
an’ call it by some pretty name, like ‘Moor View Villa,’ or what not.”
“Never,” declared Daniel. “I’m above a small thing like that--so’s my
girl. ‘Hangman’s Hut’ be a good, grim name--not easy to forget. Shall be
left so--eh, Minnie?”
“The name’s nought if the place is weather-tight, an’ healthy, an’ clean.
Call it what you please, Daniel.”
Sweetland turned triumphantly to the innkeeper.
“That’s the sort she is,” he said.
“Ah--strong-minded, without a doubt,” admitted Mr Beer. “Wish my Jane
was. Wish I was too. ’Tis a very good gift on Dartymoor; but we’m soft in
heart as well as body. We live by yielding. I couldn’t bide in a place by
that name. It’s owing to the poetry in me. ’Twill out. I must be rhyming.
So sure as there comes a Bank Holiday, or the first snow, or an extra
good run with hounds, then verses flow out of me, like feathers off a
goose.”
The lovers drank a pint of beer between them turn and turn about; but
Minnie’s share was trifling. Then they walked off to Hangman’s Hut, where
it stood alone in a dimple of the hillside half a mile from the high road.
The cottage looked east and was approached by a rough track over the
moor. High ground shielded it from the prevalent riot of the west wind;
and nearly two miles distant, in the midst of a chaos of broken land and
hillocks of _débris_, a great waterwheel stood out from the waste and a
chimney rose above Vitifer Mine.
Minnie gravely examined the cottage and directed Daniel where to take
measurements. The place was in good repair, and had only been vacant two
months. It was not the last tenant who had destroyed himself, but an
unhappy water-bailiff many years previously.
“The golden plover nearly always come this way when they first arrive in
winter. Many’s the pretty bird I’ll shoot ’e, Min.”
She nodded. Her thoughts were on the kitchen range at the time.
“You’ll often see hounds in full cry--’tis a noble sight.”
But Minnie was examining the larder.
She spent an hour in the cottage, and no experienced housewife could have
shown more judgment and care. Then, much to Daniel’s satisfaction, his
sweetheart decided for Hangman’s Hut.
“But I wish you could get it for five shillings a week, instead of six,
Dan.”
“No, no, I can’t beat Beer down. He’m too good a neighbour, an’ ’twould
never do to begin with a difference of opinion. Six ban’t too much. An’
I’m to get twenty shillings wages after Christmas. You always forget
that. There’ll be tons of money.”
Mrs Beer greeted them on their return to the Warren Inn. She was a plain,
careworn soul who let her poultry get upon her nerves and take the place
of children as a source of anxiety. In her sleep she often cried out
about laying hens and foxes; but everybody knew her for the best creature
on Dartmoor. The women talked together and the men drank. Then Daniel
prepared to start, and soon he and Minnie were jogging home under the
dusk of night. Dartmoor stretched vast and formless round about them,
and Minnie discussed second-hand furniture. She held that carpets were a
luxury not to be named; but Daniel insisted upon one in the parlour.
“For our bedroom,” he said, “I’ve got six jolly fine mats made of skins.
One’s a badger’s, an’ one’s a foxhound’s, an’ three be made out of a
horse’s skin, an’ one’s that old collie as I used to have. There was a
touch of Gordon setter in him; an’ a very pretty mat for your little feet
he’ll make. An’ proud he’d be if he knowed it, poor old devil.”
“They’ll do very nice if the moth don’t get in them,” said Minnie.
Then, weary of sordid details, Dan let his girl take the whip and reins;
and while she drove he cuddled her.