Frenchman's Creek runs up between overhanging woods from the southern
shore of Helford River, which flows down through an earthly paradise
and meets the sea midway between Falmouth and the dreadful Manacles--a
river of gradual golden sunsets such as Wilson painted; broad-bosomed,
holding here and there a village as in an arm maternally crook'd, but
with a brooding face of solitude. Off the main flood lie creeks where
the oaks dip their branches in the high tides, where the stars are
glassed all night long without a ripple, and where you may spend whole
days with no company but herons and sandpipers--
_Helford River, Helford River,
Blessèd may you be!
We sailed up Helford River
By Durgan from the sea...._
And about three-quarters of a mile above the ferry-crossing (where is
the best anchorage) you will find the entrance of the creek they call
Frenchman's, with a cob-built ruin beside it, and perhaps, if you come
upon it in the morning sunlight, ten or a dozen herons aligned like
statues on the dismantled walls.
Now, why they call it Frenchman's Creek no one is supposed to know,
but this story will explain. And the story I heard on the spot from an
old verderer, who had it from his grandfather, who bore no unimportant
part in it--as will be seen. Maybe you will find it out of keeping with
its scenery. In my own words you certainly would: and so I propose to
relate it just as the verderer told it to me.
I
First of all you'll let me say that a bad temper is an affliction,
whoever owns it, and shortening to life. I don't know what your opinion
may be: but my grandfather was parish constable in these parts for
forty-seven years, and you'll find it on his headstone in Manaccan
churchyard that he never had a cross word for man, woman, or child. He
took no credit for it: it ran in the family, and to this day we're all
terribly mild to handle.
Well, if ever a man was born bad in his temper, 'twas Captain
Bligh, that came from St. Tudy parish, and got himself known to all
the world over that dismal business aboard the _Bounty_. Yes, Sir,
that's the man--"Breadfruit Bligh," as they called him. They made an
Admiral of him in the end, but they never cured his cussedness: and my
grandfather, that followed his history (and good reason for why) from
the day he first set foot in this parish, used to rub his hands over
every fresh item of news. "Darn it!" he'd say, "here's that old Turk
broke loose again. Lord, if he ain't a warrior!" Seemed as if he took a
delight in the man, and kept a sort of tenderness for him till the day
of his death.
Bless you, though folks have forgotten it, that little affair of the
_Bounty_ was only the beginning of Bligh. He was a left'nant when it
happened, and the King promoted him post-captain straight away. Later
on, no doubt because of his experiences in mutinies, he was sent down
to handle the big one at the Nore. "Now, then, you dogs!"--that's how
he began with the men's delegates--"his Majesty will be graciously
pleased to hear your grievances: and afterwards I'll be graciously
pleased to hang the lot of you and rope-end every fifth man in the
Fleet. That's plain sailing, I hope!" says he. The delegates made a
rush at him, triced him up hand and foot, and in two two's would have
heaved him to the fishes with an eighteen-pound shot for ballast if
his boat's crew hadn't swarmed on board by the chains and carried him
off. After this, he commanded a ship at Camperdown, and another at
Copenhagen, and being a good fighter as well as a man of science, was
chosen for Governor of New South Wales. He hadn't been forty-eight
hours in the colony, I'm told, before the music began, and it ended
with his being clapped into irons by the military and stuck in prison
for two years to cool his heels. At last they took him out, put him on
board a ship of war and played farewell to him on a brass band: and,
by George, Sir, if he didn't fight with the captain of the ship all
the way home, making claim that as senior in the service he ought to
command her! By this time, as you may guess, there was nothing to be
done with the fellow but make him an Admiral; and so they did, and as
Admiral of the Blue he died in the year 'seventeen, only a couple of
weeks ahead of my poor grandfather, that would have set it down to the
finger of Providence if he'd only lived to hear the news.
Well, now, the time that Bligh came down to Helford was a few months
before he sailed for Australia, and that will be a hundred years ago
next summer: and I guess the reason of his coming was that the folks
at the Admiralty couldn't stand him in London, the weather just then
being sultry. So they pulled out a map and said, "This Helford looks a
nice cool far-away place; let the man go down and take soundings and
chart the place"; for Bligh, you must know, had been a pupil of Captain
Cook's, and at work of this kind there was no man cleverer in the Navy.
To do him justice, Bligh never complained of work. So off he packed
and started from London by coach in the early days of June; and with
him there travelled down a friend of his, a retired naval officer by
the name of Sharl, that was bound for Falmouth to take passage in the
Lisbon packet; but whether on business or a pleasure trip is more than
I can tell you.
So far as I know, nothing went wrong with them until they came to
Torpoint Ferry: and there, on the Cornish side of the water, stood the
Highflyer coach, the inside of it crammed full of parcels belonging
to our Vicar's wife, Mrs. Polwhele, that always visited Plymouth once
a year for a week's shopping. Having all these parcels to bring home,
Mrs. Polwhele had crossed over by a waterman's boat two hours before,
packed the coach as full as it would hold, and stepped into the Ferry
Inn for a dish of tea. "And glad I am to be across the river in good
time," she told the landlady; "for by the look of the sky there's a
thunderstorm coming."
Sure enough there was, and it broke over the Hamoaze with a bang just
as Captain Bligh and his friend put across in the ferry-boat. The
lightning whizzed and the rain came down like the floods of Deva, and
in five minutes' time the streets and gutters of Torpoint were pouring
on to the quay like so many shutes, and turning all the inshore water
to the colour of pea-soup. Another twenty minutes and 'twas over; blue
sky above and the birds singing, and the roof and trees all a-twinkle
in the sun; and out steps Mrs. Polwhele very gingerly in the landlady's
pattens, to find the Highflyer ready to start, the guard unlashing the
tarpaulin that he'd drawn over the outside luggage, the horses steaming
and anxious to be off, and on the box-seat a couple of gentlemen wet to
the skin, and one of them looking as ugly as a chained dog in a street
fight. This was Bligh, of course. His friend, Mr. Sharl, sat alongside,
talking low and trying to coax him back to a good temper: but Mrs.
Polwhele missed taking notice of this. She hadn't seen the gentlemen
arrive, by reason that, being timid of thunder, at the very first peal
she'd run upstair, and crawled under one of the bed-ties: and there she
bided until the chambermaid brought word that the sky was clear and the
coach waiting.
If ever you've had to do with timmersome folks I daresay you've noted
how talkative they get as soon as danger's over. Mrs. Polwhele took a
glance at the inside of the coach to make sure that her belongings were
safe, and then, turning to the ladder that the Boots was holding for
her to mount, up she trips to her outside place behind the box-seat,
all in a fluff and commotion, and chattering so fast that the words
hitched in each other like beer in a narrow-necked bottle.
"Give you good morning, gentlemen!" said Mrs. Polwhele, "and I do hope
and trust I haven't kept you waiting; but thunder makes me _that_
nervous! 'Twas always the same with me from a girl; and la! what a
storm while it lasted! I declare the first drops looked to me a'most
so big as crown-pieces. Most unfortunate it should come on when you
were crossing--most unfortunate, I vow! There's nothing so unpleasant
as sitting in damp clothes, especially if you're not accustomed to it.
My husband, now--if he puts on a shirt that hasn't been double-aired
I always know what's going to happen: it'll be lumbago next day to a
certainty. But maybe, as travellers, you're not so susceptible. I find
hotel-keepers so careless with their damp sheets! May I ask, gentlemen,
if you've come from far? You'll be bound for Falmouth, as I guess: and
so am I. You'll find much on the way to admire. But perhaps this is not
your first visit to Cornwall?"
In this fashion she was rattling away, good soul--settling her wraps
about her and scarcely drawing breath--when Bligh slewed himself around
in his seat, and for answer treated her to a long stare.
Now, Bligh wasn't a beauty at the best of times, and he carried a scar
on his cheek that didn't improve matters by turning white when his face
was red, and red when his face was white. They say the King stepped
up to him at Court once and asked him how he came by it and in what
action. Bligh had to tell the truth--that he'd got it in the orchard at
home: he and his father were trying to catch a horse there: the old man
flung a hatchet to turn the horse and hit his boy in the face, marking
him for life. Hastiness, you see, in the family.
Well, the sight of his face, glowering back on her over his shoulder,
was enough to dry up the speech in Mrs. Polwhele or any woman. But
Bligh, it seems, couldn't be content with this. After withering the
poor soul for ten seconds or so, he takes his eyes off her, turns to
his friend again in a lazy, insolent way, and begins to talk loud to
him in French.
'Twas a terrible unmannerly thing to do for a fellow supposed to be a
gentleman. I've naught to say against modern languages: but when I see
it on the newspaper nowadays that naval officers ought to give what's
called "increased attention" to French and German, I hope that they'll
use it better than Bligh, that's all! Why, Sir, my eldest daughter
threw up a situation as parlourmaid in London because her master and
mistress pitched to parleyvooing whenever they wanted to talk secrets
at table. "If you please, Ma'am," she told the lady, "you're mistaking
me for the governess, and I never could abide compliments." She gave a
month's warning then and there, and I commend the girl's spirit.
But the awkward thing for Bligh, as it turned out, was that Mrs.
Polwhele didn't understand his insolence. Being a woman that wouldn't
hurt a fly if she could help it, and coming from a parish where every
man, her husband included, took pleasure in treating her respectfully,
she never dreamed that an affront was meant. From the moment she heard
Bligh's lingo, she firmly believed that here were two Frenchies on the
coach; and first she went white to the lips and shivered all over, and
then she caught at the seat to steady herself, and then she flung back
a look at Jim the Guard, to make sure he had his blunderbuss handy. She
couldn't speak to Sammy Hosking, the coachman, or touch him by the arm
without reaching across Bligh: and by this time the horses were at the
top of the hill and settling into a gallop. She thought of the many
times she'd sat up in bed at home in a fright that the Frenchmen had
landed and were marching up to burn Manaccan Vicarage: and how often
she had warned her husband against abusing Boney from the pulpit--'twas
dangerous, she always maintained, for a man living so nigh the
seashore. The very shawl beside her was scarlet, same as the women-folk
wore about the fields in those days in hopes that the invaders, if any
came, would mistake them for red-coats. And here she was, perched up
behind two of her country's enemies--one of them as ugly as Old Nick or
Boney himself--and bowling down towards her peaceful home at anything
from sixteen to eighteen miles an hour.
I daresay, too, the thunderstorm had given her nerves a shaking; at any
rate, Jim the Guard came crawling over the coach-roof after a while,
and, said he, "Why, Mrs. Polwhele, whatever is the matter? I han't
heard you speak six words since we started."
And with that, just as he settled himself down for a comfortable chat
with her, after his custom, the poor lady points to the two strangers,
flings up both hands, and tumbles upon him in a fit of hysterics.
"Stop the hosses!" yells Jim; but already Sammy Hosking was pulling up
for dear life at the sound of her screams.
"What in thunder's wrong with the female?" asks Bligh.
"Female yourself," answers up Sammy in a pretty passion. "Mrs.
Polwhele's a lady, and I reckon your cussed rudeness upset her. I say
nothing of your face, for that you can't help."
Bligh started up in a fury, but Mr. Sharl pulled him down on the seat,
and then Jim the Guard took a turn.
"Pitch a lady's luggage into the road, would you?" for this, you must
know, was the reason of Bligh's sulkiness at starting. He had come up
soaking from Torpoint Ferry, walked straight to the coach, and pulled
the door open to jump inside, when down on his head came rolling a
couple of Dutch cheeses that Mrs. Polwhele had crammed on the top of
her belongings. This raised his temper, and he began to drag parcel
after parcel out and fling them in the mud, shouting that no passenger
had a right to fill up the inside of a coach in that fashion. Thereupon
Jim sent an ostler running to the landlady that owned the Highflyer,
and she told Bligh that he hadn't booked his seat yet: that the inside
was reserved for Mrs. Polwhele: and that he could either take an
outside place and behave himself, or be left behind to learn manners.
For a while he showed fight: but Mr. Sharl managed to talk sense into
him, and the parcels were stowed again and the door shut but a minute
before Mrs. Polwhele came downstairs and took her seat as innocent as a
lamb.
"Pitch a lady's luggage into the road, would you?" struck in Jim the
Guard, making himself heard above the pillaloo. "Carry on as if the
coach belonged to ye, hey? Come down and take your coat off, like a
man, and don't sit there making fool faces at me!"
"My friend is not making faces," began Mr. Sharl, very gentle-like,
trying to keep the peace.
"Call yourself his friend!" Jim snapped him up. "Get off, the pair of
you. Friend indeed! Go and buy him a veil."
But 'twas easily seen that Mrs. Polwhele couldn't be carried further.
So Sammy Hosking pulled up at a farmhouse a mile beyond St. Germans:
and there she was unloaded, with her traps, and put straight to
bed: and a farm-boy sent back to Torpoint to fetch a chaise for her
as soon as she recovered. And the Highflyer--that had been delayed
three-quarters of an hour--rattled off at a gallop, with all on board
in the worst of tempers.
When they reached Falmouth--which was not till after ten o'clock at
night--and drew up at the Crown and Anchor, the first man to hail them
was old Parson Polwhele, standing there under the lamp in the entry and
taking snuff to keep himself awake.
"Well, my love," says he, stepping forward to help his wife down and
give her a kiss. "And how have you enjoyed the journey?"
But instead of his wife 'twas a bull-necked-looking man that swung
himself off the coach-roof, knocking the Parson aside, and bounced into
the inn without so much as a "beg your pardon."
Parson Polwhele was taken aback for the moment by reason that he'd
pretty nigh kissed the fellow by accident; and before he could recover,
Jim the Guard leans out over the darkness, and, says he, speaking down:
"Very sorry, Parson, but your missus was taken ill t'other side of St.
Germans, and we've been forced to leave her 'pon the road."
Now, the Parson doted on his wife, as well he might. He was a very
learned man, you must know, and wrote a thundering great history of
Cornwall: but outside of book-learning his head rambled terribly,
and Mrs. Polwhele managed him in all the little business of life.
"'Tis like looking after a museum," she used to declare. "I don't
understand the contents, I'm thankful to say; but, please God, I can
keep 'em dusted." A better-suited couple you couldn't find, nor a more
affectionate; and whenever Mrs. Polwhele tripped it to Plymouth, the
Parson would be at Falmouth to welcome her back, and they'd sleep the
night at the Crown and Anchor and drive home to Manaccan next morning.
"Taken ill?" cries the Parson. "Oh, my poor Mary--my poor, dear Mary!"
"'Tisn' so bad as all that," says Jim, as soothing as he could; but he
thought it best to tell nothing about the rumpus.
"If 'tis on the wings of an eagle, I must fly to her!" cries the
Parson, and he hurried indoors and called out for a chaise and pair.
He had some trouble in persuading a post-boy to turn out at such an
hour, but before midnight the poor man was launched and rattling away
eastward, chafing at the hills and singing out that he'd pay for speed,
whatever it cost. And at Grampound in the grey of the morning he almost
ran slap into a chaise and pair proceeding westward, and likewise as if
its postilion wanted to break his neck.
Parson Polwhele stood up in his vehicle and looked out ahead. The two
chaises had narrowly missed doubling each other into a cocked hat; in
fact, the boys had pulled up within a dozen yards of smash, and there
stood the horses face to face and steaming.
"Why, 'tis my Mary!" cries the Parson, and takes a leap out of the
chaise.
"Oh, Richard! Richard!" sobs Mrs. Polwhele. "But you can't possibly
come in here, my love," she went on, drying her eyes.
"Why not, my angel?"
"Because of the parcels, dearest. And Heaven only knows what's
underneath me at this moment, but it feels like a flat-iron. Besides,"
says she, like the prudent woman she was, "we've paid for two chaises.
But 'twas good of you to come in search of me, and I'll say what I've
said a thousand times, that I've the best husband in the world."
The Parson grumbled a bit; but, indeed, the woman was piled about with
packages up to the neck. So, very sad-like, he went back to his own
chaise--that was now slewed about for Falmouth--and off the procession
started at an easy trot, the good man bouncing up in his seat from time
to time to blow back a kiss.
But after awhile he shouted to the post-boy to pull up again.
"What's the matter, love?" sings out Mrs. Polwhele, overtaking him and
coming to a stand likewise.
"Why, it occurs to me, my angel, that _you_ might get into _my_ chaise,
if you're not too tightly wedged."
"There's no saying what will happen when I once begin to move," said
Mrs. Polwhele: "but I'll risk it. For I don't mind telling you that
one of my legs went to sleep somewhere near St. Austell, and 'tis
dreadfully uncomfortable."
So out she was fetched and climbed in beside her husband.
"But what was it that upset you?" he asked, as they started again.
Mrs. Polwhele laid her cheek to his shoulder and sobbed aloud; and so
by degrees let out her story.
* * * * *
"But, my love, the thing's impossible," cried Parson Polwhele. "There's
no Frenchman in Cornwall at this moment, unless maybe 'tis the Guernsey
merchant[3] or some poor wretch of a prisoner escaped from the hulks in
the Hamoaze."
[Footnote 3: Euphemistic for "smugglers' agent."]
"Then, that's what these men were, you may be sure," said Mrs. Polwhele.
"Tut-tut-tut! You've just told me that they came across the ferry, like
any ordinary passengers."
"Did I? Then I told more than I know; for I never saw them cross."
"A couple of escaped prisoners wouldn't travel by coach in broad
daylight, and talk French in everyone's hearing."
"We live in the midst of mysteries," said Mrs. Polwhele. "There's my
parcels, now--I packed 'em in the Highflyer most careful, and I'm sure
Jim the Guard would be equally careful in handing them out--you know
the sort of man he is: and yet I find a good dozen of them plastered
in mud, and my new Moldavia cap, that I gave twenty-three shillings
for only last Tuesday, pounded to a jelly, quite as if someone had
flung it on the road and danced on it!"
The poor soul burst out into fresh tears, and there against her
husband's shoulder cried herself fairly asleep, being tired out with
travelling all night. By-and-by the Parson, that wanted a nap just as
badly, dozed off beside her: and in this fashion they were brought back
through Falmouth streets and into the yard of the Crown and Anchor,
where Mrs. Polwhele woke up with a scream, crying out: "Prisoners or no
prisoners, those men were up to no good: and I'll say it if I live to
be a hundred!"
* * * * *
That same afternoon they transhipped the parcels into a cart, and drove
ahead themselves in a light gig, and so came down, a little before
sunset, to the Passage Inn yonder. There, of course, they had to unload
again and wait for the ferry to bring them across to their own parish.
It surprised the Parson a bit to find the ferry-boat lying ready by the
shore and my grandfather standing there head to head with old Arch'laus
Spry, that was constable of Mawnan parish.
"Hullo, Calvin!" the Parson sings out. "This looks bad--Mawnan and
Manaccan putting their heads together. I hope there's nothing gone
wrong since I've been away?"
"Aw, Parson dear," says my grandfather, "I'm glad you've come--yea,
glad sure 'nuff. We've a-been enjoying a terrible time!"
"Then something _has_ gone wrong?" says the Parson.
"As for that," my grandfather answers, "I only wish I could say yes
or no: for 'twould be a relief even to know the worst." He beckoned
very mysterious-like and led the Parson a couple of hundred yards up
the foreshore, with Arch'laus Spry following. And there they came to
a halt, all three, before a rock that someone had been daubing with
whitewash. On the top of the cliff, right above, was planted a stick
with a little white flag.
"Now, Sir, as a Justice of the Peace, what d'ee think of it?"
Parson Polwhele stared from the rock to the stick and couldn't say.
So he turns to Arch'laus Spry and asks: "Any person taken ill in your
parish?"
"No, Sir."
"You're sure Billy Johns hasn't been drinking again?" Billy Johns
was the landlord of the Passage Inn, a very ordinary man by rule,
but given to breaking loose among his own liquors. "He seemed all
right yesterday when I hired the trap off him; but he does the most
unaccountable things when he's taken bad."
"He never did anything so far out of nature as this here; and I can
mind him in six outbreaks," answered my grandfather. "Besides, 'tis not
Billy Johns nor anyone like him."
"Then you know who did it?"
"I do and I don't, Sir. But take a look round, if you please."
The Parson looked up and down and across the river; and, sure enough,
whichever way he turned, his eyes fell on splashes of whitewash and
little flags fluttering. They seemed to stretch right away from
Porthnavas down to the river's mouth; and though he couldn't see it
from where he stood, even Mawnan church-tower had been given a lick of
the brush.
"But," said the Parson, fairly puzzled, "all this can only have
happened in broad daylight, and you must have caught the fellow at it,
whoever he is."
"I wouldn't go so far as to say I caught him," answered my grandfather,
modest-like; "but I came upon him a little above Bosahan in the act of
setting up one of his flags, and I asked him, in the King's name, what
he meant by it."
"And what did he answer?"
My grandfather looked over his shoulder. "I couldn't, Sir, not for a
pocketful of crowns, and your good lady, so to speak, within hearing."
"Nonsense, man! She's not within a hundred yards."
"Well, then, Sir, he up and hoped the devil would fly away with me,
and from that he went on to say----" But here my grandfather came to a
dead halt. "No, Sir, I can't; and as a minister of the Gospel, you'll
never insist on it. He made such horrible statements that I had to go
straight home and read over my old mother's marriage lines. It fairly
dazed me to hear him talk so confident, and she in her grave, poor
soul!"
"You ought to have demanded his name."
"I did, Sir; naturally I did. And he told me to go to the naughty place
for it."
"Well, but what like is he?"
"Oh, as to that, Sir, a man of ordinary shape, like yourself, in a
plain blue coat and a wig shorter than ordinary; nothing about him to
prepare you for the language he lets fly."
"And," put in Arch'laus Spry, "he's taken lodgings down to Durgan with
the Widow Polkinghorne, and eaten his dinner--a fowl and a jug of
cider with it. After dinner he hired Robin's boat and went for a row.
I thought it my duty, as he was pushing off, to sidle up in a friendly
way. I said to him, 'The weather, Sir, looks nice and settled': that is
what I said, neither more nor less, but using those very words. What
d'ee think he answered? He said, 'That's capital, my man: now go along
and annoy somebody else.' Wasn't that a disconnected way of talking?
If you ask my opinion, putting two and two together, I say he's most
likely some poor wandering loonatic."
The evening was dusking down by this time, and Parson Polwhele, though
a good bit puzzled, called to mind that his wife would be getting
anxious to cross the ferry and reach home before dark: so he determined
that nothing could be done before morning, when he promised Arch'laus
Spry to look into the matter. My grandfather he took across in the boat
with him, to look after the parcels and help them up to the Vicarage:
and on the way they talked about a grave that my grandfather had been
digging--he being sexton and parish clerk, as well as constable and the
Parson's right-hand man, as you might call it, in all public matters.
While they discoursed, Mrs. Polwhele was taking a look about her to
make sure the country hadn't altered while she was away at Plymouth.
And by-and-by she cries out--
"Why, my love, whatever are these dabs o' white stuck up and down the
foreshore?"
The Parson takes a look at my grandfather before answering: "My angel,
to tell you the truth, that's more than we know."
"Richard, you're concealing something from me," said Mrs. Polwhele. "If
the French have landed and I'm going home to be burnt in my bed, it
shall be with my eyes open."
"My dear Mary," the Parson argued, "you've a-got the French on your
brain. If the French landed they wouldn't begin by sticking dabs of
whitewash all over the parish; now, would they?"
"How in the world should I know what a lot of Papists would do or not
do?" she answered. "'Tis no more foolish to my mind than eating frogs
or kissing a man's toe."
Well, say what the Parson would, the notion had fixed itself in the
poor lady's head. Three times that night she woke in the bed with her
curl-papers crackling for very fright; and the fourth time 'twas at
the sound of a real dido below stairs. Some person was down by the
back-door knocking and rattling upon it with all his might.
The sun had been up for maybe an hour--the time of year, as I told
you, being near about midsummer--and the Parson, that never wanted for
pluck, jumped out and into his breeches in a twinkling, while his wife
pulled the counterpane over her head. Down along the passage he skipped
to a little window opening over the back porch.
"Who's there!" he called, and out from the porch stepped my
grandfather, that had risen early and gone to the churchyard to finish
digging the grave before breakfast. "Why, what on the earth is wrong
with ye? I made sure the French had landed, at the least."
"Couldn't be much worse if they had," said my grandfather. "Some
person've a-stole my shovel, pick, and biddicks."
"Nonsense!" said the Parson.
"The corpse won't find it nonsense, Sir, if I don't get 'em back
in time. I left 'em lying, all three, at the bottom of the grave
overnight."
"And now they're missing?"
"Not a trace of 'em to be seen."
"Someone has been playing you a practical joke, Calvin. Here, stop a
moment----" The Parson ran back to his room, fetched a key, and flung
it out into the yard. "That'll unlock the tool-shed in the garden. Get
what you want, and we'll talk about the theft after breakfast. How soon
will the grave be ready?"
"I can't say sooner than ten o'clock after what has happened."
"Say ten o'clock, then. This is Saturday, and I've my sermon to prepare
after breakfast. At ten o'clock I'll join you in the churchyard."