"We'm well. You doan't ax me after the fust cheel Phoebe had."

"I knaw. I put some violets theer that very night. We were camped just above Chagford, not far from here."

"Theer's a li'l gal now, an' a bwoy as I'll tell'e about bimebye. A sheer miracle't was that falled out the identical day I buried my w.i.l.l.y.

No natural fashion of words can explain it. But that'll keep. Now let me look at'e. Fuller in the body seemin'ly, an' gypsy-brown, by G.o.d! So brown as me, every bit. Well, well, I caan't say nothin'. I'm carried off my legs wi' wonder, an' joy, tu, for that matter. Next to Phoebe an'

mother I allus loved 'e best. Gimme a kiss. What a woman, to be sure!

Like a thief in the night you went; same way you've comed back. Why couldn't 'e wait till marnin'?"

"The childer--they grawed to love me that dear--also the men an' women.

They've been gude to me beyond power o' words for faither's sake. They knawed I was gwaine, an' I left 'em asleep. 'T was how they found me when I runned away. I falled asleep from weariness on the Moor, an' they woke me, an' I thrawed in my lot with them from the day I left that pencil-written word for 'e on the window-ledge."

"Me bein' in the valley lookin' for your drowned body the while! Women 'mazes me more the wiser I graw. Come this way, to the linhay. There's a sweet bed o' dry fern in the loft, and you must keep out o' sight till mother's told cunning. I'll hit upon a way to break it to her so soon as she's rose. An' if I caan't, Phoebe will. Come along quiet. An' I be gwaine to lock 'e in, Chris, if't is all the same to you. For why?

Because you might fancy the van folks was callin' to 'e, an' grow hungry for the rovin' life again."

She made no objection, and asked one more question as they went to the building.

"How be Mrs. Hicks, my Clem's mother?"

"Alive; that's all. A poor auld bed-lier now; just fading away quiet.

But weak in the head as a baaby. Mother sees her now an' again. She never talks of nothin' but snuff. 'T is the awnly brightness in her life. She's forgot everythin' 'bout the past, an' if you went to see her, she'd hold out her hand an' say, 'Got a little bit o' snuff for a auld body, dearie? 'an' that's all."

They talked a little longer, while Will shook down a cool bed of dry fern--not ill-suited to the sultry night; then Chris kissed him again, and he locked her in and returned to Phoebe.

Though the wanderer presently slept peacefully enough, there was little more repose that night for her brother or his wife. Phoebe herself became much affected by the tremendous news. Then they talked into the early dawn before any promising mode of presenting Chris to her mother occurred to them. At breakfast Will followed a suggestion of Phoebe's, and sensibly lessened the shock of his announcement.

"A 'mazin' wonnerful dream I had last night," he began abruptly. "I thought I was roused long arter midnight by a gert knocking, an' I went down house an' found a woman at the door. 'Who be you?' I sez. 'Why, I be Chris, brother Will,' she speaks back, 'Chris, come home-along to mother an' you.' Then I seed it was her sure enough, an' she telled me all about herself, an' how she'd dwelt wi' gypsy people. Natural as life it weer, I a.s.sure 'e."

This parable moved Mrs. Blanchard more strongly than Will expected. She dropped her piece of bread and dripping, grew pale, and regarded her son with frightened eyes. Then she spoke.

"Tell me true, Will; don't 'e play with a mother 'bout a life-an'-death thing like her cheel. I heard voices in the night, an' thought 't was a dream--but--oh, bwoy, not Chris, not our awn Chris!--'t would 'most kill me for pure joy, I reckon."

"Listen to me, mother, an' eat your food. Us won't have no waste here, as you knaw very well. I haven't tawld 'e the end of the story. Chris, 'pearin' to be back again, I thinks, 'this will give mother palpitations, though 't is quite a usual thing for a darter to come back to her mother,' so I takes her away to the linhay for the night an'

locks her in; an' if 't was true, she might be theer now, an' if it weer n't--"

Damaris rose, and held the table as she did so, for her knees were weak under her.

"I be strong--strong to meet my awn darter. Gimme the key, quick--the key, Will--do 'e hear me, child?"

"I'll come along with 'e."

"No, I say. What! Ban't I a young woman still? 'T was awnly essterday Chris corned in the world. You just bide with Phoebe, an' do what I tell 'e."

Will handed over the key at this order, and Mrs. Blanchard, grasping it without a word, pa.s.sed unsteadily across the farmyard. She fumbled at the lock, and dropped the key once, but picked it up quickly before Will could reach her, then she unfastened the door and entered.

CHAPTER II

HOPE RENEWED

Jon Grimbal's desires toward Blanchard lay dormant, and the usual interests of life filled his mind. The att.i.tude he now a.s.sumed was one of sustained patience and observation; and it may best be described in words of his own employment.

Visiting Drewsteignton, about a month after the return of Chris Blanchard to her own, the man determined to extend his ride and return by devious ways. He pa.s.sed, therefore, where the unique Devonian cromlech stands hard by Bradmere pool. A lane separates this granite antiquity from the lake below, and as John Grimbal rode between them, his head high enough to look over the hedge, he observed a ladder raised against the Spinsters' Rock, as the cromlech is called, and a man with a tape-measure sitting on the cover stone.

It was the industrious Martin, home once again. After his difference with Blanchard, the antiquary left Devon for another tour in connection with his work, and had devoted the past six months to study of prehistoric remains in Guernsey, Herm, and other of the Channel Islands.

Before departing, he had finally regained his brother's friendship, though the close fraternal amity of the past appeared unlikely to return between them. Now John recognised Martin, and his first impulse produced pleasure, while his second was one of irritation. He felt glad to see his brother; he experienced annoyance that Martin should thus return to Chagford and not call immediately at the Red House.

"Hullo! Home again! I suppose you forgot you had a brother?"

"John, by all that's surprising! Forget? Was it probable? Have I so many flesh-and-blood friends to remember? I arrived yesterday and called on you this morning, only to find you were at Drewsteignton; so I came to verify some figures at the cromlech, hoping we might meet the sooner."

He was beside his brother by this time, and they shook hands over the hedge.

"I'll leave the ladder and walk by you and have a chat."

"It's too hot to ride at a walk. Come you here to Bradmere Pool. We can lie down in the shade by the water, and I'll tether my horse for half an hour."

Five minutes later the brothers sat under the shadow of oaks and beeches at the edge of a little tarn set in fine foliage.

"Pleasant to see you," said Martin. "And looking younger I do think.

It's the open air. I'll wager you don't get slimmer in the waist-belt though."

"Yes, I'm all right."

"What's the main interest of life for you now?"

John reflected before answering.

"Not quite sure. Depends on my mood. Just been buying a greyhound b.i.t.c.h at Drewsteignton. I'm going coursing presently. A kennel will amuse me.

I spend most of my time with dogs. They never change. I turn to them naturally. But they overrate humanity."

"Our interests are so different. Yet both belong to the fresh air and the wild places remote from towns. My book is nearly finished. I shall publish it in a year's time, or even less."

"Have you come back to stop?"

"Yes, for good and all now."

"You have found no wife in your wanderings?"

"No, John. I shall never marry. That was a dark spot in my life, as it was in yours. We both broke our shins over that."

"I broke nothing--but another man's bones."

He was silent for a moment, then proceeded abruptly on this theme.