Since the night on which Jonathan's arrival had plunged the party
assembled at Zebedee Pascal's into such dismay a week had passed
by--seven days and nights of terror and confusion.
The determined manner in which the government authorities traced out
each clew and tracked every scent struck terror into the stoutest
hearts, and men who had never before shrunk from danger in any open form
now feared to show their faces, dared not sleep in their own houses,
nor, except by stealth, visit their own families. At dead of night, as
well as in the blaze of day, stealthy descents would be made upon the
place, the houses surrounded and strict search made. One hour the
streets would be deserted, the next every corner bristled with rude
soldiery, flinging insults and imprecations on the feeble old men and
defenceless women, who, panic-stricken, stood about vainly endeavoring
to seem at their ease and keep up a show of indifference.
One of the first acts had been to seize the Lottery, and orders had been
issued to arrest all or any of her crew, wherever they might be found;
but as yet no trace of them had been discovered. Jerrem and Uncle
Zebedee still lay concealed within the house, and Adam at the mill,
crouched beneath corn-bins, lay covered by sacks and grain, while the
tramp of the soldiers sounded in his ears or the ring of their voices
set his stout heart quaking with fear of discovery. To men whose lives
had been spent out of doors, with the free air of heaven and the fresh
salt breeze of the sea constantly sweeping over them, toil and hardship
were pastimes compared to this inactivity; and it was little to be
wondered at that for one and all the single solace left seemed drink.
Drink deadened their restlessness, benumbed their energies, made them
forget their dangers, sleep through their durance. So that even Adam
could not always hold out against a solace which helped to shorten the
frightful monotony of those weary days, dragged out for the most time in
solitude and darkness. With no occupation, no resources, no companion,
ever dwelling on self and viewing each action, past and present, by the
light of an exaggerated (often a distorted) vision, Adam grew irritable,
morose, suspicious.
Why hadn't Joan come? Surely there couldn't be anything to keep Eve
away? And if so, might they not send a letter, a message or some token
to show him that he was still in their thoughts? In vain did Mrs. Tucker
urge the necessity of a caution hitherto unknown: in vain did she repeat
the stories brought of footsteps dogged, and houses watched so that
their inmates dare not run the smallest risk for fear of its leading to
detection. Adam turned a deaf ear to all she said, sinking at last down
to the conclusion that he could endure such suspense no longer, and,
come what might, must the next day steal back home and satisfy himself
how things were going on. The only concession to her better judgment
which Mrs. Tucker could gain was his promise to wait until she had been
in to Polperro to reconnoitre; for though, from having seen a party of
soldiers pass that morning, they knew some of the troop had left, it was
impossible to say how many remained behind nor whether they had received
fresh strength from the opposite direction.
"I sha'n't give no more o' they than I sees the wisdom of," reflected
Mrs. Tucker as, primed with questions to ask Joan and messages to give
to Eve, she securely fastened the doors preparatory to her departure.
"If I was to tell up such talk to Eve her'd be piping off here next
minit or else sendin' back a pack o' silly speeches that 'ud make Adam
mazed to go to she. 'Tis wonderful how took up he is with a maid he
knows so little of. But there! 'tis the same with all the men, I
b'lieve--tickle their eye and good-bye to their judgment." And giving
the outer gate a shake to assure herself that it could not be opened
without a preparatory warning to those within, Mrs. Tucker turned away
and out into the road.
A natural tendency to be engrossed by personal interests, together with
a life of narrowed circumstances, had somewhat blunted the acuteness of
Mrs. Tucker's impressionable sensibilities, yet she could not but be
struck at the change these last two weeks had wrought in the aspect of
the place. The houses, wont to stand open so that friendly greetings
might be exchanged, were now closed and shut; the blinds of most of the
windows were drawn down; the streets, usually thronged with idlers, were
all but deserted; the few shops empty of wares and of customers. Calling
to her recollection the frequent prophetic warnings she had indulged in
about these evil days to come, Mrs. Tucker's heart smote her. Surely
Providence had never taken her at her word and really brought a judgment
on the place? If so, seeing her own kith and kin would be amongst the
most to suffer, it had read a very wrong meaning in her words; for it
stood to reason when folks talked serious-like they didn't always stop
to measure what they said, and if a text or two o' Scripture sounded
seemly, 'twas fitted in to help their speech out with, not to be pulled
abroad to seek the downright meanin' o' each word.
Subdued and oppressed by these and like reflections, Mrs. Tucker reached
Uncle Zebedee's house, inside which the change wrought was in keeping
with the external sadness. Both girls looked harassed and
careworn--Joan, now that there was no further occasion for that display
of spirit and bravado which before the soldiers she had successfully
contrived to maintain, utterly broken down and apathetically dejected;
Eve, unable to enter into all the difficulties or sympathize in the
universal danger, ill at ease with herself and irritable with all around
her. In her anxiety to hear about Adam--what message he had sent and
whether she could not go to see him--she had barely patience to listen
to Mrs. Tucker's roundabout details and lugubrious lamentations, and,
choosing a very inopportune moment, she broke out with, "What message
has Adam sent, Mrs. Tucker? He's sent a message to me, I'm sure: I know
he must have."
"Awh, well, if you knaws, you don't want to be told, then," snorted Mrs.
Tucker, ill pleased at having her demands upon sympathy put to such
sudden flight. "Though don't you think, Eve, that Adam hasn't got
somethin' else to think of than sendin' love-messages and nonsense o'
that sort? He's a good deal too much took up 'bout the trouble we'm all
in for that.--He hoped you was all well, and keepin' yer spirits up,
Joan."
"Poor sawl!" sighed Joan: "I 'spects he finds that's more than he can
do."
"Ah, you may well say that," replied Mrs. Tucker, casting a troubled
look toward her daughter's altered face. "Adam's doin' purtty much the
same as you be, Joan--frettin' his insides out."
"He's fretting, then?" gasped Eve, managing to get the words past the
great lump which seemed to choke her further utterance.
"Frettin'," repeated Mrs. Tucker with severity. "But there! why should
I?" she added, as if blaming her sense of injury. "I keeps forgettin'
that, compared with Joan, Eve, you'm nothin' but a stranger, as you may
say; and, though I dare say I sha'n't get your thanks for saying it,
still Adam could tell 'ee so well as me that fresh faces is all very
well in fair weather, but in times of trouble they counts for very
little aside o' they who's bin brought up from the same cradle, you may
say."
Eve's swelling heart could bear no more. This sense of being set aside
and looked on as a stranger was a gall which of late she had been
frequently called upon to endure, but to have it hinted at that Adam
could share in this feeling toward her--oh, it was too much, and rising
hastily she turned to run up stairs.
"Now, there's no call to fly off in no tantrums, Eve," said Mrs. Tucker;
"so just sit down now and listen to what else I've got to say."
But Eve's outraged love could hide itself no longer: to answer Joan's
mother with anything like temper was impossible, and, knowing this, her
only refuge was in flight. "I don't want to hear any more you may have
to say, Mrs. Tucker;" and though Eve managed to keep under the sharpness
of her voice, she could not control the indignant expression of her
face, which Mrs. Tucker fully appreciating, she speeded her departure by
the inspiriting prediction that if Eve didn't sup sorrow by the spoonful
before her hair was gray her name wasn't Ann Tucker.
"Awh, don't 'ee say that," said Joan. "You'm over-crabbit with her,
mother, and her only wantin' to hear some word that Adam had sent to her
ownself."
"But, mercy 'pon us! her must give me time to fetch my breath,"
exclaimed Mrs. Tucker indignantly, "and I foaced to fly off as I did for
fear that Adam should forestall me and go doin' somethin' foolish!"
"He ain't wantin' to come home?" said Joan hurriedly.
"Iss, but he is, though. And when us see they sodgers go past I thought
no other than he'd a set off then and there. As I said to un, ''Tis true
you knows o' they that's gone, but how can 'ee tell how many's left
behind?'"
Joan shook her head. "They'm all off," she said: "every man of 'em's
gone; but, for all that, Adam mustn't come anighst us or show his face
in the place. 'Tis held everywhere that this move is nothin' but a decoy
to get the men out o' hidin', and that done, back they'll all come and
drop down on 'em."
"Well, then, I'd best go back to wanst," cried Mrs. Tucker, starting up,
"and try and put a stop to his comin', tho' whether he'll pay any heed
to what I say is more than I'll answer for."
"Tell un," said Joan, "that for all our sakes he mustn't come, and say
that I've had word that Jonathan's lurkin' nigh about here some place,
so I reckon there's somethin' up; and what it is he shall know so soon
as I can send word to un. Say _that_ ought to tell un 'tisn't safe to
stir, 'cos he knows that Jonathan would sooner have gone to he than to
either wan here."
"Well, I'll tell un all you tells me to," said Mrs. Tucker with a
somewhat hopeless expression; "but you knaw what Adam is, Joan, when he
fixes his mind on anythin'; and I've had the works o' the warld to keep
un from comin' already: he takes such fancies about 'ee all as you never
did. I declare if I didn't knaw that p'r'aps he's a had more liquor than
he's used to take o' times I should ha' fancied un light-headed like."
"And so he'll be if you gives much sperrit to un, mother," said Joan
anxiously: "'tis sure to stir his temper up. But there!" she added
despondingly, "what can anybody do? 'Tis all they ha' got to fly to.
There's Jerrem at it fro' mornin' to night; and as for uncle, dear sawl!
he's as happy as a clam at high watter."
"Iss, I reckon," said Mrs. Tucker: "it don't never matter much what goes
wrong, so long as uncle gets his fill o' drink. I've said scores o'
times uncle's joy 'ud never run dry so long as liquor lasted."
"Awh, well," said Joan, "I don't knaw what us should ha' done if there'd
ha' bin no drink to give 'em: they'd ha' bin more than Eve and me could
manage, I can tell 'ee. Nobody but our ownselves, mother, will ever
knaw what us two maidens have had to go through."
"You've often had my thoughts with 'ee, Joan," said Mrs. Tucker, her
eyes dimmed by a rush of motherly sympathy for all the girls must have
suffered; "and you can tell Eve (for her'll take it better from you than
from me) that Adam's allays a-thinkin' of her, and begged and prayed
that she wudn't forget un."
"No fear o' that," said Joan, anxious that her mother should depart;
"and mind now you say, no matter what time 'tis, directly I'se seen
Jonathan and knaws 'tis safe for we somebody shall bring un word to come
back, for Eve and me's longin' to have a sight of un."
Charged with these messages, Mrs. Tucker hastened back to the mill,
where all had gone well since her departure, and where she found Adam
more tractable and reasonable than she had had reason to anticipate. He
listened to all Joan's messages, agreed with her suspicions and seemed
contented to abide by her decision. The plain, unvarnished statement
which Mrs. Tucker gave of the misery and gloom spread over the place
affected him visibly, and her account of the two girls, and the
alteration she had seen in them, did not tend to dispel his emotion.
"As for Joan," she said, letting a tear escape and trickle down her
cheek, "'tis heart-breakin' to look at her. Her's terrible wrapped up in
you, Adam, is Joan--more than, as her mother, I cares for her to awn to,
seein' how you'm situated with Eve."
"Oh, Eve never made no difference 'twixt us two," said Adam. Then, after
a pause, he asked, "Didn't Eve give you no word to give to me?"
"Well, no," said Mrs. Tucker: then, with the determination to deal
fairly, she added quickly, "but her was full o' questions about 'ee, and
that 'fore I'd time to draw breath inside the place." Adam was silent,
and Mrs. Tucker, considering the necessity for further explanation
removed by the compromise she had made, continued: "You see, what with
Jerrem and uncle, and the drink that goes on, they two poor maidens is
kept pretty much on the go; and Eve, never bein' used to no such ways,
seems terrible harried by it all."
"Harried?" repeated Adam, with ill-suppressed bitterness, "and well she
may be; still, I should ha' thought she might have managed to send, if
'twas no more than a word, back to me."