And now, had the devil been, indeed, following on his track, had he ridden alongside, stirrup to stirrup, and offered him his fiendish assistance, the evil spirit could not have more fully possessed the man than while he ground a savage curse between his teeth, on himself, his horse, his fellows, the brute creation, all nature, animate and inanimate, to think that he should have lost Nelly Carew, the girl he had coveted from her childhood, to an unknown stranger, the acquaintance of a day. Somebody must pay for it. There should be no mistake about that! Perhaps it was less Nelly's fault than her new friend's, this young springald, who came into the West forsooth, with his town-bred
manners and his town-made clothes, to rob honest men of their own. But town or country, the best of them should not poach on Parson Gale's moor without hearing of it. He only wished he could find out something more about him, that was all. If the devil himself offered to back him up now, he would drive no hard bargain, but pay fair market price for his help!
Cassock started violently, with a loud and prolonged snort. A more sober rider might have been both alarmed and unseated, so suddenly did the animal swerve aside from a dusky figure that rose against the sky out of its very path; but a good horseman's balance seems little influenced by unsteadiness of brain, and the Parson felt a thrill of triumph rather than fear, in the wild fancy that his awful wish had been granted, and the powers of evil had consented to afford him the assistance he required.
"Speak up!" he exclaimed, in a fierce and threatening voice, the more angrily, perhaps, that he felt his flesh creep with superstitious dread. "If you come straight from hell, I'll have a word with you before you go back. Steady, Cassock, my lad. What, you know her, do ye? and it's only the little gipsy-lass, after all!"
The figure, dim and phantom-like as it stood there beneath the moon, threw back its scarlet hood, and revealed to the Parson's excited senses, no spirit from below, but Waif's tangible beauty, pale indeed, and careworn, yet strangely attractive still, with its wild, sad eyes, and wealth of raven hair.
She laid her hand on Cassock's neck, and the horse tolerated her caress, though his restless backward-moving ear showed he was only half reassured.
"I know you!" said Waif. "I've seen you before. I watched you from our tents, and waited here to make sure Parson Gale, I can tell you something you would give ten years of your life to know."
She had waylaid him purposely at the bend of the coombe, that he could not but pass to reach the level moor, arriving by a path only accessible to an active hill-climber on foot, so that even had he come round at a gallop, she must have been here before him.
"Can you tell me my fortune, pretty lass?" returned Gale, with a forced attempt at gallantry. "Give me hold of that slender little hand, and I'll put a silver groat in it, if I have one left in the world."
He leaned over his horse's shoulder while he spoke, preserving his balance with some difficulty. Waif, keeping well out of reach, gave no encouragement to his assumed familiarity.
"Forget," she said, "for the time, that I am a gipsy, and that you are a priest. Parson Gale, I know the wish that is nearest your heart this very moment. You look for health, ease, happiness, and a good name like your neighbours, but you would give the soul out of your body for revenge!"
He started; the certainty with which she had fathomed his desire, and named its price, recalled the speculations of a few minutes back. Again some nameless fear of the supernatural crept over him, and he shuddered to think that for the compassing of his own eternal destruction, the gipsy-girl's shape and semblance might have been assumed by the Prince of Darkness, who thus accosted him face to face. He had seen a Romish priest cross himself under a similar terror. He would have liked now to make the holy sign, and wondered would it be any use?
Waif, if she understood, only despised his hesitation. "I can give you what you want," she said, "and I ask nothing of you in return." Though spoken in a low voice, almost a whisper, every syllable passed through her firm-set lips, hard, cruel, and distinct.
With returning confidence rose the coarse overbearing manner that had already lost this man so many friends. "Nothing for nothing," said he with a brutal laugh. "Come, lass, exchange is no robbery; speak what you have to say, and take a kiss from an honest fellow in return."
Her delicate face expressed a loathing that the vainest of men must have observed: but Waif had a task to perform, and she went through with it systematically, to the bitter end.
"The man you seek," she said, "is in your reach. The man who slew your brother sleeps to-night within three leagues of you, in the hamlet by Porlock Bay. When you stand face to face with John Garnet, tell him that the gipsy-girl he betrayed delivered him into your hand."
The words were hardly spoken before she disappeared behind the abrupt ridge of moor that overhung the coombe, with a rapidity that seemed, indeed, like the vanishing of a ghost. Ere the Parson could realise the startling fact, that this stranger, whom he already hated with an instinctive hatred, was the man he had sought in vain for weeks, swearing to hunt him down to death in atonement for a brother's blood—she was gone; and he rubbed his eyes in sheer amazement, almost doubting, even now, whether this had been a vision of fancy, or a creature of real flesh and blood.
None the less did he resolve to take advantage of her communication, and riding homeward across the moor, completely sobered by this mysterious interview, determined to lose no time in setting about the destruction of his enemy.
But Waif, traversing aimlessly up and down, wandered through the woods till the moon set, regardless of cold, discomfort, or fatigue, callous even to the weight of misery that benumbed her brain, causing her to move unconsciously, here and there, with smooth mechanical gait, like one who walks abroad, having mind and senses fettered in the thraldom of a dream.
Lady Bellinger at least was pleased. When her lord, reflecting that the robbery he had sustained would render abortive his journey to the West, ordered the horses' heads to be turned for London, his wife accepted this alteration in their plans with a fervour of gratitude that sufficiently indicated her dread of a prolonged tête-à-tête with her husband. Nor was his lordship unwilling to resume the dissipations of the town, though entertaining shrewd misgivings as to the reception he was likely to meet with from the sovereign and his ministers. In war, in politics, or in love—in public affairs, as in private, there is no excuse for failure! Success does not necessarily imply merit; but merit, in the eyes of mankind, is a less valuable quality than success. There have been shrewd and prosperous managers of the world's most important matters, who have gone so far as to lay down this practical rule: "Never employ an unlucky man!"
Lady Bellinger was not obliged to have recourse to her drops more than half-a-dozen times between Hounslow and London on the return journey. She contradicted my lord hardly twice as often, and was good enough to express a qualified approval of the scenery, the weather, even the roads, which last were execrable. Mistress Rachel, too, seemed pleased to think she was on her way back to civilized life, fresh from an adventure that made her a heroine in her own eyes. The champion with the blunderbuss was already reinstated in her favour; the other servants, by dint of frequent excuses for their poltroonery, and by talking the matter over till they had multiplied a hundred-fold the number and weapons of their assailants, were persuaded they had shown a fair amount of courage; and the whole party, with the exception of its chief, drove back in the highest spirits through the leafy glades of Kensington, to their town residence in Leicester Square. But Lord Bellinger's heart sank as he approached his home. Even for a man of pleasure there is something exceedingly fascinating in a political career, and here had he failed the very first time he was put to trial! It is hard to fall and break one's neck from the very lowest round of the ladder! Had he managed his business discreetly and well, no doubt his name would have been entered on that mysterious roll which prime ministers are supposed to keep, for the advancement of their friends and supporters, apportioning rewards for service, as an animal's food is regulated by its work. To support in many divisions, a baronetcy; to expenditure in a few elections, a peerage; for one timely change of opinion, an earldom; and so on. But it seemed to Lord Bellinger that he had played his stake in the great game—and lost!
No sooner did he arrive at home, than, sending for a modish barber to powder and arrange his hair, he dressed with exceeding splendour—a ceremony his lordship never neglected, and to which he owed much of his social success, assumed cane, sword, and snuff-box, called a chair, and caused himself to be carried straightway to the Cocoa Tree Club and Coffee-house. It was early in the afternoon, and several gentlemen were absent at their country-seats, yet this resort of loungers and idlers seemed sufficiently full. With the self-consciousness of human nature, an instinct, that years of worldly training cannot wholly eradicate, Lord Bellinger believed that his recent failure had made him a marked man; and observing a knot of members congregated in the room, one of whom held the scanty sheet of the North Briton in his hand, felt persuaded they must be engaged in discussing his politics, his shortcomings, his inefficiency as a lord-lieutenant, and even his character as a gentleman. There was something of disappointment mingled with a sense of relief to observe that his arrival caused no break in their conversation, created no more sensation than if one of the waiters had entered and withdrawn. It is unpleasant, no doubt, to occupy public attention only to be abused; but it is more unpleasant still to be ignored entirely, and to find that when we thought the world was talking about us, our name has never been mentioned at all.
"I'll be judged by Bellinger!" exclaimed the gentleman who held the paper, looking at the new-comer over the others' heads. "Bellinger knows; Bellinger shall decide; Bellinger never leaves town even for a day. Five guineas, Bellinger gives it in my favour!"
"Done!" said a little man in a plum-coloured suit, with enormous ruffles at his wrists, offering his snuff-box to the referee, who looked from one to the other in vague surprise.
"The fact is this," said the little man; "our friend Sir Alexander, there, has been reading an account in the North Briton of a fellow who lives somewhere near Covent Garden, and keeps a kind of prophesy shop, where half the ladies in town go to learn each other's secrets, and tell their own. The newspaper affirms that he has been driving this trade for years; and though all the while the prophet, or whatever he calls himself, is a spy from over the water, that our ministry never found it out! Sir Alexander vows it's impossible, and appeals to you, my lord, as knowing more of the town and its wicked ways than any man in this room. What say you, Bellinger? I have only five guineas on it; but if I had five hundred, I would abide by your award!"
Lord Bellinger's presence of mind rarely deserted him; and although with the topic thus broached, the possibility of Katerfelto's treachery flashed across his brain, he answered quietly: "You do me too much honour, my lord; I cannot give an opinion. I have been in the country more than a week."
"The country!" repeated half-a-dozen voices, in tones of surprise and incredulity. "Bellinger in the country! What, in the name of all that is innocent, should take you to the country? You who have never slept a night out of town since you came of age. Think of the risks! You might have caught milk-fever or chicken-pox! We must believe it, my lord, because your lordship says so."
"It only shows how little a fellow is missed!" replied Lord Bellinger, not too well pleased to find his absence had been unnoticed by those among whom he considered himself a man of mark. "Did you never hear of my coach being robbed; money and papers carried off; myself, my lady, and my servants made prisoners on parole by a band of gipsies, and a highwayman riding a grey horse? On my honour, gentlemen, I believe not one of you cares a brass farthing for any earthly thing that takes place beyond ten miles from London or two from Newmarket!"
He spoke bitterly, and with an energy so unlike his usual careless manner, that the man in the plum-coloured coat gazed at him in undisguised astonishment.
"A grey horse!" repeated this nobleman, tapping his snuff-box. "The best-actioned horse I ever saw in my life was a grey, and belonged to a highwayman—a fellow they called Galloping Jack. It must have been the very man!"
"Two to one against him!" interrupted a bystander. "Ten guineas to five, my lord, that no gentleman of the road would show such bad taste as to rob Bellinger, or such deplorable ignorance as to suppose his purse was worth taking."
"I'll go you halves," said a tall youth. "I remember the grey horse, and the man in the mask who rode him; what became of the horse I never heard, but the man was hanged at Tyburn last November!"
In the confusion of tongues created by this statement, offering, as it did, a wide field for speculation, and originating many wagers on the personal identity of the robber in the mask, Bellinger felt an arm thrust under his own to withdraw him from the noisy circle into the recess of a bay-window fronting the street, while a friendly voice whispered in his ear: "Welcome back, my lord. I knew you had left the town, if no one else did. I wish from my soul these gipsies and robbers, and other scoundrels had turned you back before you reached Kensington!"
It was Harry St. Leger who spoke, his comrade and associate in many a scene of pleasure and dissipation little removed from vice, yet a staunch friend nevertheless—not to be detached by misfortune, nor daunted by disgrace. Such cases are less rare than those who hold by the laws of ethics might suppose. The growth of the bog-myrtle is fresh and fair, its fibres are tough and clinging, though it takes root in the blackest and miriest of swamps. Harry St. Leger would have offered him his last guinea ungrudgingly, and with no less flippant a jest, than he would have shed his last drop of blood in a duel, to share his friend's quarrel, as principal or second, or anything he pleased.
"Why so, Harry?" asked Lord Bellinger. "Have you seen the minister? What have you heard?"
"They're in a devil of a stew down there," answered the other, intimating with a jerk of his head the locality in which his Majesty's Council conducted their deliberations. "They've had an enemy in the camp, it seems, ever since the late king's death. Our Gracious himself has been sitting on a powder-barrel, only he does not believe it; and would care very little if he did. They've plenty of courage, that family, I must admit; we can't say as much for the others. Well, the Scotchman is in a fearful state! The only thief-taker in the town who knows a thief when he sees one, or how to take him, or can be persuaded to try, was with the minister more than two hours yesterday. The other side will put up somebody to ask a question directly Parliament meets. The House is very ticklish about treachery. There's no saying how things might go; and he dare not—no, he dare not risk a general election. The 'man in the street' says it's all your doing. Fred, mind I know nothing for certain."
Lord Bellinger pondered. "Has anybody confessed anything?" he asked, after some consideration.
"Nobody who had anything to confess!" answered his friend with a smile. "The only man who could have told them what they wanted to know wisely took himself out of the way. That idiotic newspaper which Sir Alexander has been flourishing over his empty head made a better shot than usual. There has been a spy among us, no doubt, and rumour mentions one or two names, I dare not. The fortune-teller, I can well believe, had a finger in the pie; and people go so far as to say that meetings were held in his house between staunch Hanoverian friends of yours and mine, and other friends of ours who are supposed to be over the water and unable to come back. Also, that arms were found in his cellar, and gunpowder under his bed! All this goes in at one ear and out at the other; but there's an ugly story about some royal warrants that were never served; and I can tell you for certain, a very great man holds your lordship to blame."
"Because my cowardly servants wouldn't back me up, and I couldn't fight a score of men single-handed!" exclaimed Lord Bellinger indignantly. "Those were the very warrants that gaol-bird took out of my coach. I see the whole thing now, and how cleverly it was done! I'm in a false position, Harry, to say the least of it. The treason I don't so much mind; but I cannot bear to think I should have been so 'bit.' Harry! Harry! I shall be the laugh of the town!"
"'Faith, when the town comes to learn it, I think you will!" replied his friend. "But, in the meantime, 'tis as much a secret as anything can be that is known to half-a-dozen people. I'm the only man in this room who has heard a word of it, you may see that for yourself. The conjuror, or whatever he is, has departed without beat of drum. I need hardly observe, that when they sent to arrest him he had eight-and-forty hours' start. The house was shut up, and they were forced to break in the door. I am told, when they did search it, they found an empty bottle on the table, an empty chair at the fire-place, and an empty skull on the chimney-piece. There were no directions left where the owner was to be found; but I understand many very respectable people want him sadly now he's gone!"
"That's another difficulty," mused Lord Bellinger. "We shall never get money at such short notice from anybody else. If you paid enough for it, you could take it away with you then and there. He was a most useful person, and I shall miss him prodigiously for one. However, that is not the question. Harry, you have a head on your shoulders; what would you do in my place?"
"Get into my chair, and wait on the minister at once," answered his friend. "When a man knows he is in the wrong, he should always take the bull by the horns. The Scotchman believes you have been tampering with the other side, and thinking it more formidable than it is, will scarce venture to break with your lordship, once for all. It is but a game of brag, Fred, and the boldest player wins. We will sup here together at nine o'-the-clock, and you shall tell me how you came off."
So Lord Bellinger, taking his friend's advice, mounted gravely into his chair, and caused himself to be set down without delay at the minister's official residence, where he found the great man holding a levee, composed of the many who came to ask for something, and the few who returned to give thanks.
It chafed his lordship in no slight degree to be kept waiting in the ante-room, while meaner men, not half so well-dressed, were admitted to the presence of the minister. His own equals in rank and position nodded to him as they passed in and out, but their greetings at such a time were necessarily short and formal, so that he was unable to gather from their manner how widely his failure had become known, or how deeply he was supposed to be disgraced. It was not till the mayor of a country town, a doctor of divinity, and a poor author who had helped to line many a trunk, were admitted before him, that his patience utterly failed. He was in the act of desiring his chair to be called, when a grave man, addressing him in broad Scotch, held open the door of the inner chamber, with an austere bow.
There were some half-score persons present, bearing the proudest names, holding the highest offices in the country. Lord Bellinger's quick eye did not fail to mark how each looked eagerly from the new-comer to the minister, as though to observe the nature of his reception.
More erect than usual, for his blood was up, but with the graceful bearing that never deserted him, his lordship stepped across the room and made a low bow, almost defiant in the excess of courtesy which it seemed to affect. The minister, who was engaged with a paper in his hand, did not return the salutation for more than a minute. Lord Bellinger ground his teeth, and the bystanders glanced in each other's faces.
Presently the great man raised his head, stared coldly at his visitor, and returned his obeisance without a word.
The bystanders breathed freely; there was no more doubt, then, of their chief's displeasure, and they believed the interest of the scene was past. But, as they told each other afterwards, "Bellinger was a very awkward fellow to set down!"
"My lord," said he, "I have waited on your lordship in self-defence."
"My lord," was the answer, "your lordship's explanations must be made in public, and reserved for another place."
Then the minister turned on him a broad, ungainly back; and he knew that in the Game of Brag, concerning which Harry St. Leger spoke so hopefully, he had come off second best.
But he did not fail to keep his appointment at the Cocoa Tree, arriving there, indeed, somewhat earlier than the hour agreed on, and with an appetite no whit impaired by the contrarieties he had experienced. "It's the country air, I suppose," he observed lightly to his friend. "'Faith, Harry, should I be forced to retire into the country altogether it won't break my heart, if I'm always to be as hungry as now. Waiter! what can we have for supper?"
"Aitch-bone of beef, my lord," was the answer. "Beg pardon, my lord, his grace has finished the aitch-bone; his grace never eats anything else. Cold game-pie, cold chicken and tongue, cold partridges, wild duck or teal, cold shoulder of mutton."
"Anything but that, you knave!" replied his lordship, with a laugh. "No, no, Harry; I've had enough cold shoulder to-day to last me the rest of my life!"
"Thee be'est a drunken old twoad!" exclaimed a buxom countrywoman, apple-faced and dark-haired, to her laughing mate, not the least in tones of conjugal reproof, but rather as a delighted damsel of the present time might say to her degenerate admirer; "how can you be so silly!" while the strapping fellow's sides shook, and his honest face grinned from ear to ear at such homely jests and simple sights as both had trudged half-a-score of miles into Dulverton to enjoy. It was an hour or so after noon, and the Revel seemed at its height. Two or three booths offered the indispensable refreshment of cheese, cold meat, and cider. On the floor of a waggon, which formed his primitive stage, a jack-pudding, as he was called, performed certain antics, affording inexhaustible amusement to the spectators, who were never tired of watching him inflate his cheeks, loll out his tongue, eat lighted candle-ends, or feign to pull straws out of his eye. A fat lady, a giant, and a dwarf were respectively portrayed on the sides of a van, in which all three were supposed to be domiciled; while a drum, fiddle, and brass instrument played appropriate airs without ceasing and cruelly out of time. The rustics, many of them stout moorland men from the wilds of Brendon and Dunkerry, or borderers of North Devon and West Somerset, with here and there a swarthy, broad-shouldered visitor all the way from Cornwall, strolled about, gaping, grinning, and drinking, in a high state of contentment and delight, each with a ruddy-faced damsel at his elbow, to whom, as occasion served, he offered his boisterous jest or rude and hearty salute. These gallants were mostly fine specimens of manhood, tall, straight, and well-limbed, with a frank, fearless air about them, as though equally ready for a feast and a fray. The women, while of lower stature in proportion, were exceedingly comely, some even beautiful, dark-haired, dark-eyed, delicate of features, and with the bloom of health mantling in their cheeks. One and all wore garments of bright colours and daring contrasts. One and all drank freely of cider and other liquors. One and all seemed resolved thoroughly to enjoy the present, and make the most of Dulverton Revel, seeing that it came but once a year.
The band had just concluded a flourish of more than ordinary discord, when a new arrival enhanced the excitement of the scene, causing a rush from all quarters to encircle the strange vehicle, partly van, partly cart, from which a pair of piebald horses, adorned with bells, were unharnessed and turned loose to graze. With a dexterity that supplied the want of screws, bolts, and such mechanical appliances, its occupant quickly converted his carriage into a stage, on which articles of dress, perfumery, and domestic use were exposed for sale; while he moved nimbly about, flourishing over his head and displaying in turn laces, threads, scissors, thimbles, a mousetrap, a gridiron, and a warming-pan, to the intense delight of the bystanders. He was a meagre, active-looking man, who might have been any age above fifty, wearing large green spectacles to adorn a pale face and red nose, dressed in a blue coat bedizened with gold lace, a red waistcoat, bright yellow breeches, silk stockings, and an outrageously large cocked hat. Though his gestures were ludicrous, and his jokes received with peals of laughter, his voice was grave, even sad, and he never smiled; yet he had not occupied his post ten minutes before every other attraction of the Revel was deserted in his favour. The jack-pudding ceased his contortions, and embraced the opportunity to swallow a mouthful of real brandy instead of artificial fire. The giant, dwarf, and stout lady remained unsolicited in the retirement from which they had not yet emerged; and even the strains of the band died away into empty air without eliciting a single protest of disapproval or regret. Dulverton Revel congregated itself round the stranger, and the stranger seemed in all respects equal to the position.
"Haste thee, wench!" said every Jack to his Gill, accompanying the hint with a dig in his lady's ribs; "Thic' be the vun o' the vair, I tell 'ee! Do 'ee lose never a morsel. Gie I a buss, that's a good wench, and I'll warrant I'll vind thee a fairing!" After which elegant address, and a struggle for the salute thus purchased in advance, the rustic pair elbowed their way into the circle round the cart in a high state of glee and delight.
The proprietor addressed his audience with the utmost volubility, offering them, one after another, the different wares exposed for sale, and making appropriate remarks on each. An ointment for sore eyes, that would enable the purchaser to see through a brick wall; a salve for sore lips, that would cause the opposite sex to imprint kisses whenever they came within reach; a pocket mirror that, looked into by sunrise on May-day, would reflect the future sweetheart's face; a mousetrap that rid the house of vermin from the moment it was set on the kitchen floor; a warming-pan, that retained conjugal love and discovered conjugal infidelity; lastly, a pair of female garters, the only pair left in stock, manufactured expressly for the Queen of Egypt, and possessing the miraculous power of rendering their wearer invisible in the dark!
After brisk competition these desirable appendages were knocked down to a demure and blushing damsel, who was forthwith requested, in a stentorian voice, to "try them on at once, and see how they fit."
Ere the laugh, elicited by this audacious suggestion, could die out, the vendor's eye, travelling round that circle of grinning faces, had recognised two acquaintances in the crowd. Also, and this seemed of greater moment, he suspected they recognised him in return. Of these the first was a square, thick-set man, in clerical attire, being indeed none other than Parson Gale. The second, tall, slender, swarthy, supple of limb, and graceful of gesture, was Fin Cooper, the gipsy. Each attended Dulverton Revel less for pleasure than business. The Parson, sore of heart, and brooding over his wrongs, was yet so far hampered by the necessities of domestic life that he had been obliged to ride down from the moor to this festivity for the purpose of engaging a kitchen wench, and his establishment bearing no high character for regularity and decorum, there appeared some difficulty in filling the situation.
In those convivial times, no affair, even of the most private nature, could be conducted without a great deal to drink, and the Parson, pledging one honest farmer after another in hard cider, dashed with villainous brandy, had arrived at a very morose and uncomfortable state, sober enough in head, but fierce, bitter, and sullenly despondent at heart.
Not so Fin Cooper. That worthy, who was indeed a temperate fellow by preference, whose frame had been toughened from childhood by continuous exercise, and who never slept under a roof in his life, possessed a constitution on which no stimulant less powerful than raw spirit seemed to produce the slightest effect. On the present occasion he had reasons of his own for keeping his wits at their brightest. Dulverton Revels, like all other gatherings of the Gorgios, afforded to every true Romany many opportunities for gain and peculation. There was jewellery to be exchanged with ardent suitors and the objects of their admiration. There were games to be played at cards with yokels patient of loss. There were horses to be sold, swapped, or even stolen, when occasion offered. There were a thousand ways and means, all more or less profitable, by which the gipsy could take advantage of his natural prey.
But Fin Cooper had yet another object, causing the dark eye to glance from face to face in restless search, the tawny hand to steal unconsciously under the wide sash that swathed his waist towards the handle of his knife. His suspicions that the girl he loved had set her heart on a ruffling Gorgio, confirmed themselves day by day. Dulverton feast would be a convenient place of meeting, and he had told Thyra that he himself meant to be twenty miles off. If she held an assignation here with her Gentile lover, he might be a witness to their interview, might verify her bitterest fears, and satisfy himself of the worst! Fin Cooper's face was evil to contemplate while he revolved this contingency, and the salesman, delivering the garters to his blushing customer, did not fail to draw his own conclusions from its scowl.
As for Parson Gale, he stood before the cart for several minutes in mute astonishment. Then he rubbed his eyes, stared, and exclaimed, "Katerfelto! as I'm a living sinner!" while he brought his broad hands together with a vigorous smack.
His exclamation was not lost on its object. The latter glanced stealthily round, bowed profoundly to his auditors, made them a little speech, in which, with many jocose allusions, he informed them he was about to shut up shop that he might eat his "bit of dinner," with a promise to re-open again at three o'clock, and in a very few minutes the cart had resumed its usual appearance and the proprietor had disappeared.
Half-an-hour later, behind a canvas screen, on the outskirts of the Fair, a priest and a gipsy might have been seen in earnest conversation, pacing to and fro, while they glanced about them as if loth to be overheard, though a donkey rolling on its back, and a horse tugging at a truss of hay, were the only eaves-droppers they had to fear. The gipsy's air was respectful, even deferential, while he listened to his companion. The latter seemed annoyed and distrustful. In his cunning, clever face might be read an expression of disappointment and something amounting to self-reproach.
"How long is it since I dwelt with your people in their tents and did my best to withhold the old Petulengro from the journey that grows easier at every step; it must be more than seven years?" asked the priest.
"Seven years and seven months, oh' my father!" replied Fin Cooper, "and you promised to teach me how to read the stars aright the night before you went away."
"Yet you knew me to-day, Fin! knew me dressed up like a jack-pudding who tumbles to amuse a score of clowns in a fair?"
"I would know you, father, if you were buried and dug up again. I would know you in another life, if there is another life. Some things the gipsy never forgets. Father, I am your servant; all I have is yours. It is not much. Only a quick eye, a ready hand, and a sharp knife. Do you not wish to be known?"
There was no mistaking his meaning. Katerfelto, notwithstanding his perturbation, felt a thrill of triumph thus to have imposed on the credulity of this rude yet keen-sighted nature. There is professional vanity in every calling, even in that of the professional impostor.
"My life is in danger, Fin," answered the Charlatan gravely, "so far as it may be threatened by any casualty of this lower world. Worse than that, I might lose my liberty, if I could be identified here, for the sage and philosopher, who always made it his boast that he is the gipsy's friend. Therefore I came to the West in the disguise you saw me wear an hour ago. Therefore I speak to you now, dressed as one of those Jesuit priests whom your people have so often sheltered at their need; therefore will I appeal to them for a refuge till I can steal down to the coast and put the blue sea between the gipsy's friend and those who would do him harm. Shoon tu, dost thou listen, my son? Said I well?"
"Tatchipen si, Meero Dado! You speak truth, oh! my father," answered the other. "And you will lodge with us to-night on the moor. The fullest platter shall smoke, and the softest blanket be spread, for the gipsy's friend!"
Katerfelto shook his head. "If I came to your tent and claimed my own, Fin," he asked, "would your welcome be so hearty and free?"
The gipsy's face fell. "I love her," he said. "She was given to me long before you bought her from our people. You told me I should have her back at some future time, father, the morning you took her away. I reminded her of it only yesterday."
The other glanced sharply at him from under his bushy eyebrows. This was scarcely as he expected. Judging from all he knew, he calculated that Waif must have accompanied John Garnet into the West, and had vowed from the moment he discovered her flight, that he would be revenged on both, while he supposed they were in hiding together. He now saw that she must either have required the assistance of her tribe or found it impossible to elude their observation. He knew quite enough of the girl to be sure that even while with her own people she would find opportunities to meet her lover, and from that lover, lately his own emissary, he was still inclined to exact the penalty, that all paid, sooner or later, who ran counter to the designs of Katerfelto.
"Keep her in your tents, Fin," said he with a smile, "and fear no hindrance from me. But remember, though she is of a wandering nature, and comes of a wandering race, a Romany lass may wander too free and too far."
Fin's dark face turned black as night. "I understand you, father," he muttered. "You mean, you mean, that she has a Gorgio lover!"
The veins in his handsome throat swelled while he spoke, and his voice came so thick it was hardly intelligible. "I mean," answered Katerfelto coolly, "that he whom the Gorgios call John Garnet is better out of the way, both for you and for me and for Waif. He knows too much, and he dares too much. Your eyes are as keen as a hawk's, Fin. Can you not see that as he cozened me out of my horse, he would cozen you out of your bride?"
The gipsy's low, smothered laugh seemed the very reverse of mirth.
"There is no better sheath for a Romany's blade," he answered, "than the bowels of a pampered Gorgio."
"My son," replied the other, "wisdom is the child of experience. Let King George take the trouble off your hands, and pay you besides a purse of gold for your forbearance. John Garnet's is a hanging matter, and a reward of one hundred guineas is offered for his apprehension. Set the bloodhounds on him at once, and the thing is done. Better by far keep that long knife of yours for cutting your bread and cheese!"
"I helped him," said Fin thoughtfully, "helped him, because Thyra bade me, as frankly as if he had really been poor Galloping Jack come down from Tyburn-tree. The bloodhounds might turn round and lay hold of the informer. Counsel me, father. I can right myself so easily with three inches of steel!"
The other shook his head. No man alive had fewer scruples of mercy or forbearance, but it was Katerfelto's nature to plot rather than execute. While he would have felt no qualms in concocting or administering a subtle poison, he shrank from the very idea of personal contest and shedding of blood. "A hundred guineas of red gold," he answered; "think of that, Fin, and then talk about a hand's breadth of bare steel! You cannot compare them. Be advised by me, my son, and you will rid yourself of a rival, win a bride, and gain a wedding-portion all in one sentence. That Exmoor Parson. I saw him here to-day. I would venture a wager he is drinking in one of the booths now. Watch for him riding home. He is a magistrate; never fear him for that. Lay your hand on his horse's mane and say to him in the king's name, 'I can show you the man you want—follow me!'"
"But would he not ask for the hundred guineas and get them himself?" argued the gipsy, who, with all his strong passions, had a keen eye to the main chance. "There is no justice nor fair dealing on either side between the Romany and the Gorgio."
For the first time during their interview Katerfelto laughed outright.
"My son," he said, "I think I can trust you to look after your own interests without assistance from me. When you have delivered John Garnet into the hands of Abner Gale you will have accomplished your object and mine. For my own part I will not return into the Fair. I need hardly ask, Fin, if you are here alone?"
"We are like the hooded crows, my father," answered Fin. "When you see one of us you may be sure there are others not far off. We must needs hang together, or the Romany would soon be swept from the face of the earth."
"Then let one of your people drive my cart to Exeter," continued Katerfelto. "He will know where to leave it with no questions asked. As for me, my son, I must make my way to your tents without losing an hour. I have changed my disguise once to-day. I can change it a score of times, if necessary; yet I would not that roystering Parson had recognised me but now in the Fair."
"I shall be alone with him on the moor presently," said Fin Cooper, in a tone of meaning. "My father, do you desire that he should tell no tales? Shall I silence him once for all?"
Katerfelto pondered. "Not at present, Fin," he answered, after a pause. "It will be better to make use of him when we want him, and put him on the right scent. If a hound runs counter, the farther he goes the farther he is left behind!"
Meantime John Garnet, enjoying the golden hours at Porlock with the carelessness of his nature, thought no more of the toils that surrounded him than the wild deer of the forest thought of the many preparations made for its capture; of the good horses stabled, the staunch hounds fed, the distances travelled by lords and ladies, the laced coats tarnished, the bright spurs reddened, the jingling of bit and bridle, the gathering of horsemen and varlets, the energy expended in a chase that must be followed with so much pomp and circumstance for its especial downfall. Large and stately, gliding from field to field, it passed through the twilight, like some majestic ghost, to crop the yet unharvested grain, or tear the juicy turnips from the earth, with appetite unimpaired by misgivings of to-morrow, rejoicing in its pride of strength, trusting implicitly in those fleet, shapely limbs that bore it lightly over its native moor, as the wild-bird's pinions waft her through the air.
How many centuries have elapsed since the fatal morning that saw the Red King mount for his last ride through the stately stems of Bolderwood! How many since that woful hunting in Chevy Chase which began in joyous notes of hound and horn, to end in the battle-cry of the Percy, the sword strokes of the Douglas, and the pouring out like water of the bravest, noblest, gentlest blood two countries could afford! Yet has the pursuit of the wild animal by the instinct of the tame continued to be the favourite sport of Englishmen from those rude times to our own, while now, as then, many a bold, adventurous nature, panting for an outlet to its energies, finds engrossing occupation in the pleasures of the chase.
Taken in good sense and moderation, as each man's discretion teaches him to judge, the draught thus offered by a bountiful providence, which provides for our mental health the sweet no less freely than the bitter, is exhilarating in the extreme. It rouses our manly qualities of mind and body, excites our intellectual faculties and our muscular powers, braces the nervous system, stimulates to healthy effort the vital force of arm and heart and brain. Many of the most distinguished men in every time have been "fond of hunting." Few men "fond of hunting" but are frank of nature, kindly, generous, unselfish, and good fellows, to say the least!
If such a position be granted, it follows that all hunting, conducted in a spirit of humanity and fair play, is more or less to be esteemed. The stout sexagenarian who halts his steady cob on a hill, and from that point of vantage watches in the valley below his ten couple of beagles unwinding and puzzling out the line of a hare that has just crossed under his pony's nose, without assisting them by so much as a whisper, is a sportsman to the back-bone. No music on this lower earth can ravish his ears like the tuneful cry of his little darlings, who are indeed nothing loth to hear their own voices, and refuse to hunt a yard without assuring each other that it is all right. No triumph can afford him greater pleasure than his ride home to dinner with a hare dangling across his saddle, honestly killed by the patience and perseverance of that tedious pursuit which has fairly wearied her to death! and when he lays his head on his pillow, before his closing eyes passes a vision of Challenger opening in the turnips, of Rock-wood and Reveller feathering with scarce a whimper up the stony lane.
Surely his enjoyment is undeniable as that of his converse, the scarlet-coated hero in vigorous manhood, who bestrides three hundred guineas' worth of blood and symmetry, while he watches a gorse covert shaking under the researches of twenty couple of high-bred fox hounds, wild with eagerness to push up their game and dash after him over the sea of grass that lies spread around, like falcons on the wing. A physiologist might study to advantage the countenance of the rider; an artist would long to portray on canvas the attitude of the horse.
These two friends, loving each other dearly, are moved by a common sympathy. Simultaneously the eyes of each brighten, and their hearts beat fast. A crash of music from two score merry voices proclaims that a fox has been found, a hat held up against the sky-line, and, after a discreet interval, one long, ringing holloa announce that he is away! That joyous excitement for which some men are content to live, and even in a few sad cases to die, has begun in good earnest now, and trifling, puerile as it may seem, I doubt whether any pursuit in life affords for the moment such intense gratification as "a quick thing over a grass country, strongly enclosed, in a good place, and only half-a-dozen men with the hounds!"