A MOONLIGHT INTRODUCTION.
"Well?" growled Mother Strangeways, as her grandson pushed his way in
between the rickety doorposts of Sorrowstones Spring.
"Well, it's ower an' done wi', for sartin sure. Kate's gone off wi'
Griff Lummax."
The old hag toasted her claws at the red peat ashes and chuckled.
"Gone wi' him, didst 'a say? Afore iver yon lawyer chap hed sent 'em
his bits o' paper? They mun ha' getten it on their minds, an' proper,
not to bide till th' law set 'em free."
Joe shuffled uneasily towards the hearth.
"I misdoubt it, mother; ay, I misdoubt it. Sure as there's a fooil
aboon ground, it's young Lummax. He meäns to wed her, an' she'll live
off th' fat o' th' land. It war just what they wanted, it war."
"Tha'rt a bonny un, Joe, wi' thy dog i' th' manger ways," croaked the
grandmother. "Tha'll be shut o' thy wife for gooid an' all, an' here
tha'rt come whining 'cos Kate's made thee a free man."
"But it war just what they wanted, it war," persisted Joe, doggedly.
"Without ever a 'by your leave' comes Lummax to Teewit yester morn, an'
cuddles an' kisses Kate, an' away they wend to Marshcotes Manor, same
as if a man's wife war fair ony fowks's belonging but hisn what wedded
her. Ay, an' th' mother took 'em in, too."
"Joe, tha's been lang i' coming. Why didn't 'a slip across th' moor
yestreen to tell a body?"
"'Cos I war ower drunk, if tha wants to know." A long-tried sense of
the efficacy of this excuse had made it almost a formula with Joe.
She looked at him with a grin of good fellowship; yet under the grin
was a touch of wistfulness, a weird, abortive echo of the yearning
which had once centred itself round Joe's mother.
"It taks a lot to bring thee to thy grandam, lad. Tha willun't wend a
step out o' thy way to clap een on her, without tha's harder set to
't nor or'nary. Tha mud ha' getten drunk here, Joe, if tha'd fashed
thyseln to come for 't," she finished, in a plaintive key.
Joe's face cleared perceptibly.
"Hast 'a getten owt to sup, mother?"
Mother Strangeways scrambled to the cupboard, and took out a black
bottle.
"Rum, begow!" muttered the son. "Fetch us a mug, mother, an' let's be
making a start."
He did make a start, in good earnest, and the old witch joined him.
There was but one pewter-pot in the cottage, and this they passed
freely from one to the other. The glowing peat lit up their faces,
as they sat on either side of the hearth. A little soughing wind was
creeping round the chimney-stack.
"It's fine an' lonely up here," said Mother Strangeways at last. "Canst
'a hear th' wind a-sobbing i' th' chimbley, lad? Oh ay, it's easy to
mak free wi' th' devil, come storm or calm.' She hugged the bottle
to her breast, waiting till Joe should have finished the last of the
mugful.
"Doan't! Nay, doan't," he pleaded, with a shiver. "I war niver so
fearful fond o' th' devil, an' he flairs me."
"Flairs thee, tha sawny? He's a better mak of a stay-by, let me tell
thee, than this God 'at th' pious folk prate on. He made th' marsh, I
tak it, what grows a herb to cure all ills. He made th' snaw an' th'
frost--ay, th' snaw an' th' frost, what taks th' gentlefolk off now an'
again."
She paused to chew the cud of some tasty reminiscence. Then she
glanced furtively towards the grandfather's clock that stood in the
corner. Whatever the size of the cottage, and mean as its every other
appointment might be, there was always a brave old eight-day clock to
be seen in the dwellings on Marshcotes Moor.
The beldame pointed one hand at the clock, while the fingers of the
other went scrabbling up and down her ragged skirt.
"Sitha, lad! It wobbles summat fearful, does th' owd clock. First
to right, then to left, it wobbles reg'lar. _Tick-tack, tick-tack_,
goes th' inside--an' _tick-tack, tick-tack_ goes th' outside, keeping
time. It's a sign, Joe; I'm noan long for this world, now that th'
owd clock hes ta'en to wobbling. Five an' eighty year we've bided
together--_tick-tack, tick-tack_, me an' th' clock--an' now it's
started to dither. Tha'll noan hev a grandam sooin, Joe."
"Tha'rt drunk," muttered Strangeways, succinctly.
She set her hands on her hips, and grinned into Joe's face.
"Drunk, babby, sayst 'a? Me drunk while tha's sober, tha kittling? Nay,
it taks a bottle or two to come it ower Mother Strangeways. I tell thee
it wobbles, does th' eight-day clock. Lad, tha mud do thy grandam a
sarvice." Her eyes grew bright with a sudden earnestness. "Bring a two
or three screw-nails wi' thee th' next time tha comes, an' fasten th'
clock to th' wall; it'll happen keep me a while longer."
"Tha'rt feared o' th' grave, seemingly, if tha'rt noan feared o' th'
devil," sneered the man.
She was quiet for awhile; then she kicked the smouldering peat into a
whirr of angry sparks.
"Ay, that I am, till I've settled old scores wi' them Lummaxes. It's
little rest there'd be for Rachel Strangeways, ligging i' her grave,
if Griff an' his mother war laughing aboon sod. An' all to be done
by myseln," she added reflectively; "me eighty an' more, wi' only a
misbegotten fooil of a man to help me--an' him sitting, stark-witted,
wi' his clumsy hands i' his pockets. Joe, durst 'a kill young Griff, if
tha'd getten him safe to grund, nobbut wanting a stamp o' thy foot to
finish him?"
"I durst that; thee bide till I've getten th' chance; thee bide a bit."
"I've bided ower long a'ready."
They fell into a moody silence. A gleam of triumph shot into Rachel's
skinny face.
"Lad, it's th' best news I've heärd for mony a long day, this o' young
Lummax's wedding Kate. Let 'em be, an' Griff 'ull find his mistake out;
she's noan his sort, an' he's noan hers--they'll fratch, an' proper,
after a two or three week. Teed by th' tail, teed by th' tail; lad,
they'll scrat each other's een out!"
The bottle was finished, and Joe felt no further inducement to stay.
"Good neet, mother. I'm wishing tha'd talk a bit less an' do a bit
more."
Rachel gave vent to her tongue at that, and rated him till her face
went purple. But she changed her key just as Joe was shutting the door
behind him.
"Joe, lad!" she called.
He pushed his head round the corner.
"Hast a' nearly done wi' thy foulness, or how like?" he demanded.
"Ay, I've done. Tha willun't forget th' screw-nails, wilt 'a? Day in
an' day out th' owd clock wobbles summat fearful."
"I'll noan forget." And he shuffled off into the moonlight.
About the time that Mother Strangeways was cursing her grandson by
every epithet known to the brisk upland vocabulary, Lomax and Kate were
talking together in the cosy Manor parlour.
"Don't plead against me, Kate," he was saying. "You know I oughtn't to
stay here till we are free to marry."
"But that will be months yet, you say--a whole six months at the
soonest. Griff, I shall want you to death before the waiting is over."
His arms went round her at that; but he had made up his mind, and
nothing could turn him aside.
"We must give ourselves a chance," he said gruffly, setting her away
from him. "What can folk help but think, if you and I live here while
the case is pending? You might help me a little, Kate; it is not too
easy for me."
She gripped his arm with quick, passionate strength.
"You shan't go back to London, if I have to hang round your neck like
a millstone. They are too fond of you there; you'll go to your fine
ladies, and you'll talk and laugh and flirt, and they will make me look
silly in your thoughts. You shan't go there, I tell you!"
Griff laughed mightily; and "Wife," said he--she quickened to the
premature tenderness of the word--"wife, I was never sure till this
moment that you loved me; but now I know it. What! you're jealous."
"Jealous or not," she retorted--but the softness was gaining in her
cheeks--"it will break my heart if you go to London."
"Then I won't! There, does that satisfy you?"
With a woman's swift returning on her own paces, "Griff," she
whispered, "do you want to go? I'm foolish, and if you really want----"
"It's the last place I should think of, child. I shall go only as far
as the other end of Yorkshire, where I shall be within hail if you
really want me. You'll write every day?"
She lowered her eyes shamefacedly.
"I write a poor letter, Griff. They'd only shame you."
Again he laughed, a frank, untroubled laugh.
"We shall see about that, wife. Every day you will write to me, and
every day I'll write to you. God! how long those months will be!"
Mrs. Lomax decided at this juncture that they had had quite enough time
together, and she entered abruptly.
"Off with you to bed, Kate," she said. "Griff is sadly dependent on the
look of a woman's face, and if you spoil yours by late hours, I won't
be answerable for the consequences."
"But I will!" cried Lomax, gaily.
"You have arranged it all?" asked the mother, when they were left
alone.
"Yes; I am to leave to-morrow, to return when--we are free."
"Well, Griff?"
"You are a brick! To treat Kate as you have done----"
"Be quiet, boy! You are either the wisest man in the world, or the
veriest fool. I love Kate; so do you. We can only wait and see how it
all turns out. Are you coming to bed, too?"
"Not just yet. I must have a mouthful of fresh air before I turn in."
He held open the door for her, and they walked upstairs together, his
arm threaded through hers.
"Good night, mother," he said, as they gained the landing; "don't worry
about things, will you?"
"Not too much, Griff; I am a woman of sound common sense. Good night."
He went downstairs again, picked up a cap from the hall table, and
went out. He was restless to the point of fever, and nothing but the
sharp night air and the free use of his limbs could give him a wink of
sleep that night. Swinging off into the Marshcotes Moor, he speedily
found himself at the farm that fronted Hazel Dene; then, bethinking
him of that parsley-field which had so mystified Miller Rotherson, and
remembering, as a natural corollary, certain of the poaching fraternity
of Ling Crag, he turned up the Dene. A light was burning in Greta's
room as he passed the mill, and he glanced up at it with a warm splash
of feeling at his heart.
"Poor lassie!" he muttered. "I wonder how soon that witless preacher
will get at a pretty woman's meaning?"
He paused, with a poacher's instinct, as he neared the gate that opened
into the parsley-field. The moon was scarcely past full, and every
bent and clump of bracken stood out clear in the bluish light. In the
middle of the field a hare was squatting--a big fellow, with a body
as still as sleep, and a head that shifted warily this way and that,
to learn if there were any danger abroad. The night air crawled into
Griff's throat, and he could not keep back one little gasp of a cough.
Straight as a die the hare made for a point in one of the boundary
walls; there was a succession of sharp cries, like the cries of a
teething baby, and after that a silence.
"There's one of the boys over there; I'll have a word with him,"
thought Griff.
He crossed the field quietly, and skimmed over the wall through which
the hare had disappeared. A surly "Who's there?" greeted him as he
dropped on to the grass, almost into the arms of a burly, grizzled
five-feet-ten of iniquity, standing with the dead body of a hare in his
hands.
"You ought to know me by this time, Will Reddiough," laughed Griff,
softly.
"It's ye, sir, is 't? That shapes things different, like." A genial
grin overspread Will's knotty features as he recognized the intruder.
"What luck?"
"Nobbut a couple, an' I've carred two hour under th' wall for 'em."
"Well, it's poor sport, netting, at the best of times. First, you have
to slink round here in the daytime, and see which way the hares take
home again; then you've to wait under a wall till the frost nips you;
and at the end of it all you have precious little to show. I say, Will,
what fools these hares are always to go through the same hole!"
"No more fooils nor men-folk, what allus taks th' same stile through a
field. An' if they war sharper, sir, what 'ud be th' use o' setting a
net?" Will smiled at the transparency of his own reasoning; he could
not conceive a scheme of the universe in which poaching-nets played no
part.
"But look here, Will," said Lomax, after a pause of rumination, "if my
training goes for anything, I know that a hare never starts home from
its feed till the day is breaking, unless some one disturbs it."
"Rarely, sir, not _never_. To speak plain, I war main stalled o'
ligging on th' kitchen settle, so I like as I thowt I'd try a bit o'
sport for myseln. It's a matter o' chance, so to say. I've getten two
to-neet just by carring an' biding; another neet I mud ha' hed to bide
till morn, an' niver cotch an odd 'un."
"Why didn't you bring Dan o' Smick's or some of the others along with
you?"
Will Reddiough drew his lips in, and thrust his cheeks out; he
gave forth a low whistle of disgust, tempered with charity for a
fellow-mortal's failings.
"Dan's a-coorting, an' he wouldn't stir till latter on. Ye'll be
knowing what a sight o' folly a wench can pump into a decent man's
body. Then Jack o' Ling Crag, he couldn't come afore his public shut,
an' so wi' th' rest. So I like as I thowt----"
"Till later on," echoed Griff, softly. "Does that mean there is fun on
hand?"
"Well, sir, I willun't deny there's a mak on a party, like, what's due
to meet i' Cringle Wood for a bit o' pheasant-shooiting, soon as th'
mooin gets ower Cranshaw Kirk."
"The old lot--Dan o' Smicks, Jack o' Ling Crag, you and Ned Kershaw?"
"Ay, th' owd lot. Jack war for sending word to ye, but Ned Kershaw, he
up and said----"
"Said what?"
"Well, 'at ye'd getten your hands full a'ready. Ned allus war one for
making a crack," added Reddiough, apologetically.
Griff cursed a little under his breath, then laughed.
"As it happens, I am as free as can be till the daylight comes. Gad,
Will, I feel the old stuff working in me! Do you care to take me with
you?"
"Ay, and proud to do it, sir! Just like thy father--just," he muttered
approvingly, as he bundled his net together and took the hares in his
left hand. "It'll be close on th' time, I'm thinking. Let's get a
squint at Cranshaw."
Will scrambled to the top of an adjacent knoll, used the church as a
guide to other matters than that for which it was primarily intended,
and intimated that they might as well be setting off. Cringle Wood
lay half a mile west of Wynyates--a steep-sided crack in the moor
face, sparsely set with oak and birch, and a favourite haunt of such
pheasants as had grown tired of the preserves further down the valley.
Kershaw and Dan o' Smick's were there before them, and Jack o' Ling
Crag was not long in putting in an appearance. Jack's face, when
he espied Lomax, left no doubt as to his satisfaction touching the
addition to their little shooting-party. It was a marvellous night;
just a touch of frost, but not enough to whiten the masses of ruddy
brown bracken that grew between the dotted tree-stems; here and there
a fat old pheasant-father, standing out clear against the sky as he
perched on his branch of oak. _Pop-pop_ went the guns. Griff did not
trouble about the fact that he was unarmed; the mere potting at sitting
birds was dull sport in itself, and the adventure was all that he cared
about.
"The keepers have been pretty quiet lately, haven't they?" said Griff
to Jack o' Ling Crag, as the latter picked up a bird.
"Oh, ay, sir, quiet as church mice. There's noan so mony pheasants i'
Cringle Wood as there war, an' they've enough to do to look after th'
regular preserves down below. 'Tain't worth while, th' Squire thinks,
to meddle wi' Cringle Wood. It warn't allus so, though, by a long
chalk, as you an' me mind, I'll warrant. Dost recall that neet----"
He stopped. Five shouts came from five different quarters of the wood.
Dan o' Smicks and Ned Kershaw came running downhill to join their
comrades, and five men converged towards them at a steady run.
"No shooiting, lads!" cried Jack, getting the hang of the situation in
a moment. "At 'em wi' th' butt-end, but doan't shooit. Fair fight, an'
a race for home after ye've settled 'em. Blazes! but there's Squire
hisseln!"
His last item of information was lost to all but Lomax, who was nearest
him. They were all at close quarters now, and the tussle began in
earnest. As luck had it, the four keepers and Griff's three allies
were well to one side when the fight was fairly started. Griff was
aware of a big, rough-hewn man fronting him; his face showed knotty in
the moonlight, and he laughed a great, hearty laugh from his belly
upwards. It was the Squire of Saxilton.
"You've no gun!" cried old Roger Daneholme.
"No; but I've got the fists that God gave me. Drop your gun, and come
on."
The Squire chucked his weapon into the bracken, and they ran together
like steel to magnet. In and out darted the blows; Roger Daneholme
took a crack on the mouth that rattled his teeth in their sockets, and
Griff lost the aid of his left eye for the time being. It was neck or
nothing with Griff. In among the stress, he found time to wonder how he
could have been fool enough to mix himself up with a poaching affray,
now that Kate had made things matter so much more; it was all very well
in his bachelor days, but he should have had more sense now. Suppose
he were collared and run in, along with these jolly boon companions of
his? He pondered a trifle too long on that aspect of the case, for the
Squire got in a body-blow, that came dangerously near to taking his
adversary's wind. All the while the tussle of four against four was
running a brisk course on the left; curses and blows thwacked through
the frosty air with cheery impartiality; but Jack o' Ling Crag was
laughing, and Griff gathered that the three were having the best of
it--though his notions of everything outside the radius of the Squire's
fists were of necessity in the shadowy background of his mind. At last
Griff got his chance, and took it. Old Roger again aimed a bit too
high for his wind, and he responded with a clean-cut drive from his
left that got the Squire full between the eyes, planting him squarely
in the bracken. He showed no disposition to come up to scratch again,
and Griff looked to see if he were needed elsewhere. But the keepers
had had the worst of the tussle; they had been driven back towards the
wood-bottom, and the poachers four were making the best of their way
towards Wynyates. Jack o' Ling Crag stopped at the top of the wood to
see how it fared with Lomax; the others were well ahead of him, and did
not notice the stoppage, their guiding rule on these occasions being to
take a bee-line for home.
And somehow it fell about that Jack, the old reprobate, grew so keen on
the mighty battle going on below him that he forgot all about his own
safety. The keepers rallied, just as Griff put in his farewell smack
at his opponent; two went to tackle Lomax, and two made up the hill
towards Jack o' Ling Crag.
"Come on!" shouted Jack. "Run for your life, ye fool! What are ye
stopping for?"
To tell the truth, Griff had characteristically lost sight of prudence;
how could he leave the Squire, stretched stark before him, without
at least a passing attempt to bring him round? He looked towards the
stream that tumbled through Cringle Wood, and was setting off to fetch
water in his cap when a pair of lusty arms gripped him from behind. His
next clear conception of outward things was, that he was lying on his
back, looking up at the Milky Way.
"The game's up at last," he groaned. "Dad would never have been such a
dolt--and how will it strike Kate?"
"Much as you struck Squire," put in one of the keepers,
facetiously--"straight atween the eyes."
Griff bit his lip; he had not known that he was talking aloud.
Then, to make matters worse, down came the other pair of the Squire's
party, with Jack o' Ling Crag between them. Old Roger Daneholme opened
his eyes presently; they doused him with cold water, and before long he
was on his feet again.
"We've got two of 'em, Squire," said a keeper.
"Eh? Got what?" he muttered, still dazed.
"Two of the poaching wastrels."
The Squire looked at Griff and grinned.
"_Wastrels_, say you? Well, if you feel that way, I'll watch while any
one of you four have a go at our friend there. You don't seem anxious.
Let him free, then, you fools, and don't sit on his chest as if he was
a damned armchair."
Griff, freed from constraint, leaped to his feet; he began to think
that there was hope for him yet if he had to deal with Roger Daneholme.
"What's your name?" queried the Squire, taking a long pull at his flask.
"Griff Lomax."
"What, Joshua Lomax's son? Gad, I wish he'd been alive to see you
fight! I knew him well; we were lads together, and many a night he's
helped me to take my father's game. That's it, you see. The light's
a bit queer down in the wood here, and I thought you were Walter, my
son. Time and again I've tried to spot him at the old game--runs in the
family, you'll observe--and I wanted to see if I was a match for him
yet. You're about his build and height--but, by hell, you've a better
notion of your fists! I never knew a cleaner shot than that you felled
me with--not that I saw it very clearly--but it was such a devilish
kingdom-come blow for me. Lomax, I'm proud to meet you."
The keepers stared open-eyed at this last freak of the Squire's. They
fancied they knew the ins-and-outs of their master pretty well by this
time, but they were not prepared for this. Jack o' Ling Crag swore a
soft oath, and decided that old Roger was a likelier man than he'd
thought him. The Squire turned sharply.
"Who's that? Why, it's Jack o' Ling Crag, if I'm not mistaken. So we've
got you at last, Jack, have we? Well, you've had a fair run."
"You're not going to run him in?" said Griff, quickly.
"Why not? He's the rankest poacher in the county."
"So am I, then."
"Oh, that's another matter! You do it for fun, God bless you! you're a
sportsman--but Jack here does it by profession. I never could stand a
man who does things by profession."
"All right, Squire," responded Griff; "we'll go together, Jack and I."
Old Roger looked hard at him, and saw that he meant it. He stamped up
and down for a while; then--
"I'm a precious fool to do it, but, if you put it that way, Jack shall
have a bit longer run. Off you go, the pair of you. I say, Lomax, by
the way, you'd better come and dine with me."
"I can't, I'm sorry to say--I leave here to-morrow."
"For good?"
"For six months or so."
"Why couldn't you say so? Ride over to Saxilton when you come
back--send a line to Plover Court, you know. Men mostly can't fight
nowadays; they're rare birds, not to be missed."
"Well, I'm blowed!" muttered Jack, as he and Griff picked their way
homewards.
"Exactly," answered Lomax. And never a word besides did they utter till
they parted at the door of the Dog and Grouse.