"Well, I'm 'mazin' sorry I caan't oblige 'e, for I'm sure we'd be gude friends, an' you'd cheer us all up butivul."

"But you 'm certain it caan't be managed?"

"Positive."

"Then I've done all a man can. You'll bear witness I wanted to come, won't 'e?"

"Oh yes, I'll take my oath o' that. _I_ shaan't forget 'e."

"All right. And if I'm sent here again, bimebye, I'll look out for you, and I hopes you'll be as pleasant inside as now."

"I'll promise that. Shall be awnly tu pleased to make you at home. I like you; though, to be frank, I reckon you'm tu gnat-brained a chap to make a wife happy."

"Then you reckon a d.a.m.ned impedent thing! What d' you knaw 'bout it?"

"A tidy deal. I've been married more years than you have hours, I lay."

"Age ban't everything; 't is the fashion brains in a man's head counts most."

"That's right enough. 'T is something to knaw that. Gude-bye to 'e, bwoy, an' thank you for makin' me laugh heartier than I have this month of Sundays."

"More fule you!" declared Will; but he was too elated at the turn of affairs to be anything but amiable just now. Before the other disappeared, he stopped him.

"Shake hands, will 'e? I thank you for lightenin' my mind--bein' a man of law, in a manner of speakin'. Ess, I'm obliged to 'e. Of coourse I doan't _want_ to come to prison 'zackly. That's common sense."

"Most feel same as you. No doubt you're in the wrong, though the law caan't drop on honest, straightforrard matrimony to my knowledge. Maybe circ.u.mstances is for 'e."

"Ess, they be--every jack wan of 'em!" declared Will. "An' if I doan't come here to stop, I'll call in some day and tell 'e the upshot of this coil in a friendly way."

"Do so, an' bring your missis. Shall be delighted to see the pair of 'e any time. Ax for Thomas Bates."

Will nodded and marched off, while the warder returned to his post, and when he had again made fast the door behind him, permitted the full splendor of his recent experience to tumble over his soul in a laughter perhaps louder than any heard before or since within the confines of one of Her Majesty's prisons.

CHAPTER X

THE BRINGING OF THE NEWS

Phoebe meantime returned to Chagford, withdrew herself into her chamber, and feverishly busied brains and hands with a task commended that morning by Will when she had mentioned it to him. The various trinkets and objects of value lavished of late upon her by John Grimbal she made into a neat packet, and tied up a sealskin jacket and other furs in a second and more bulky parcel. With these and a letter she presently despatched a maid to Mr. Grimbal's temporary address. Phoebe's note explained how, weak and friendless until the sudden return of Will into her life, she had been thrown upon wickedness, falsehood, and deceit to win her own salvation in the face of all about her. She told him of the deed done that day, begged him to be patient and forget her, and implored him to forgive her husband, who had fought with the only weapons at his command. It was a feeble communication, and Phoebe thought that her love for Will might have inspired words more forcible; but relief annihilated any other emotion; she felt thankful that the lying, evasion, and prevarication of the last horrible ten days were at an end. From the nightmare of that time her poor, bruised conscience emerged sorely stricken; yet she felt that the battle now before her was a healthy thing by comparison, and might serve to brace her moral senses rather than not.

At the tea-table she first met her father, and there were present also Billy Blee and Mr. Chapple. The latter had come to Monks Barton about a triumphal arch, already in course of erection at Chagford market-place, and his presence it was that precipitated her confession, and brought Phoebe's news like a thunderbolt upon the company.

Mr. Chapple, looking up suddenly from the saucer that rested upon his outspread fingers and thumb, made a discovery, and spoke with some concern.

"Faith, Missy, that's ill luck--a wisht thing to do indeed! Put un off, like a gude maid, for theer 's many a wise sayin' 'gainst it."

"What's her done?" asked Billy anxiously.

"Luke 'pon her weddin' finger. 'Tis poor speed to put un on 'fore her lard an' master do it, at the proper moment ordained by Scripture."

"If she hasn't! Take un off, Miss Phoebe, do!" begged Mr. Blee, in real trepidation; and the miller likewise commanded his daughter to remove her wedding-ring.

"An auld wife's tale, but, all the same, shouldn't be theer till you 'm a married woman," he said.

Thus challenged, the way was made smooth as possible for the young wife.

She went over to her father, walked close to him, and put her plump little hand with its shining addition upon his shoulder.

"Faither dear, I be a married woman. I had to tell lies and play false, but't was to you an' Mr. Grimbal I've been double, not to my husband that is. I was weak, and I've been punished sore, but--"

"Why, gal alive! what rigmarole 's this? Married--ay, an' so you shall be, in gude time. You 'm light-headed, la.s.s, I do b'lieve. But doan't fret, I'll have Doctor--"

"Hear me," she said, almost roughly. "I kept my word--my first sacred word--to Will. I loved him, an' none else but him; an' 'tis done--I've married him this marnin', for it had to be, an' theer's the sign an'

token of it I've brought along with me."

She drew the copy of the register from her pocket, opened it with trembling fingers, set it before Mr. Lyddon, and waited for him to speak. But it was some time before he found words or wind to do so.

Literally the fact had taken his breath. A curious expression, more grin than frown--an expression beyond his control in moments of high emotion--wrinkled his eyelids, stretched his lips, and revealed the perfect double row of his false teeth. His hand went forward to the blue paper now lying before him, then the fingers stopped half way and shook in the air. Twice he opened his mouth, but only a sharp expiration, between a sigh and a bark, escaped.

"My G.o.d, you've shook the sawl of un!" cried Billy, starting forward, but the miller with an effort recovered his self-possession, scanned the paper, dropped it, and lifted up his voice in lamentation.

"True--past altering--'t is a thing done! May G.o.d forgive you for this wicked deed, Phoebe Lyddon--I'd never have b'lieved it of 'e--never--not if an angel had tawld me. My awn that was, and my awnly one! My darter, my soft-eyed gal, the crown of my grey hairs, the last light of my life!"

"I pray you'll come to forgive me in time, dear faither. I doan't ax 'e to yet a while. I had to do it--a faithful promise. 'T was for pure love, faither; I lied for him--lied even to you; an' my heart 's been near to breakin' for 'e these many days; but you'd never have listened if I'd told 'e."

"Go," he said very quietly. "I caan't abear the sight of'e just now. An'

that poor fule, as thrawed his money in golden showers for 'e! Oh, my gude G.o.d, why for did 'E leave me any childern at all? Why didn't 'E take this cross-hearted wan when t' other was s.n.a.t.c.hed away? Why didn't 'E fill the cup of my sorrer to the brim at a filling an' not drop by drop, to let un run awver now I be auld?"

Phoebe turned to him in bitter tears, but the man's head was down on his hands beside his plate and cup, and he, too, wept, with a pitiful childish squeak between his sobs. Weakness so overwhelming and so unexpected--a father's sorrow manifested in this helpless feminine fashion--tore the girl's very heartstrings. She knelt beside him and put her arms about him; but he pushed her away and with some return of self-control and sternness again bid her depart from him. This Phoebe did, and there was silence, while Mr. Lyddon snuffled, steadied himself, wiped his face with a cotton handkerchief, and felt feebly for a pair of spectacles in his pocket. Mr. Chapple, meantime, had made bold to scan the paper with round eyes, and Billy, now seeing the miller in some part recovered, essayed to comfort him.

"Theer, theer, maister, doan't let this black come-along-o't quench 'e quite. That's better! You such a man o' sense, tu! 'T was awver-ordained by Providence, though a artful thing in a young gal; but women be such itemy twoads best o' times--stage-players by s.e.x, they sez; an' when love for a man be hid in 'em, gormed if they caan't fox the G.o.d as made 'em!"

"Her to do it! The unthankfulness, the cold cruelty of it! An' me that was mother an' father both to her--that did rock her cradle with these hands an' wash the li'l year-auld body of her. To forget all--all she owed! It cuts me that deep!"

"Deep as a wire into cheese, I lay. An' well it may; but han't no new thing; you stablish yourself with that. The ways o' women 's like--'t was a sayin' of Solomon I caan't call home just this minute; but he knawed, you mind, none better. He had his awn petticoat trouble, same as any other Christian man given to women. What do 'e say, neighbour?"

Billy, of opinion that Mr. Chapple should a.s.sist him in this painful duty, put the last question to his rotund friend, but the other, for answer, rose and prepared to depart.

"I say," he answered, "that I'd best go up-along and stop they chaps buildin' the triumphant arch. 'Pears won't be called for now. An'

theer's a tidy deal else to do likewise. Folks was comin' in from the Moor half a score o' miles for this merry-makin'."

"'T is a practical thought," said Billy. "Them as come from far be like to seem fules if nothin' 's done. You go up the village an' I'll follow 'e so quick as I can."

Mr. Chapple thereupon withdrew and Billy turned to the miller. Mr.

Lyddon had wandered once and again up and down the kitchen, then fallen into his customary chair; and there he now sat, his elbows on his knees, his hands over his face. He was overwhelmed; his tears hurt him physically and his head throbbed. Twenty years seemed to have piled themselves upon his brow in as many minutes.

"Sure I could shed water myself to see you like this here," said Mr.

Blee, sympathetically; "but 't is wan of them eternal circ.u.mstances we 'm faaced with that all the rain falled of a wet winter won't wash away.