The Adventures of Dick Trevanion: A Story of Eighteen Hundred and Four

The village of Polkerran lies snugly in a hollow between cliffs facing the Atlantic, at the head of a little bay that forms a natural harbour. The grey stone cottages rise from the sea-level in tiers, as in an amphitheatre, huddled together, with the narrowest and most tortuous of lanes between them. Through the midst a stream flows from the high ground behind, in summer a mere brook, in winter a swollen torrent that colours the sea far out with the soil it carries down. The bay is shaped like a horseshoe; at low tide its mouth is closed by a reef except at the northern end, where there is always a narrow fairway between the reef and the sharp point of land known as the Beal. Northward of this is another little inlet called Trevanion Bay, whence the coast winds north-east, a line of rugged, precipitous, and overhanging cliffs, unbroken until you come to St. Cuby's Cove, where they reach a height of three hundred feet, and bulge out over the sea like a penthouse roof.

One August evening, in the year 1804, a wide tubby boat lay in twelve feet of water, just outside the line of breakers beneath the cliffs, about a mile and a half from the village. The sun had been down some two hours, but there was enough of twilight to show to any one out at sea—the boat being invisible from the land—that it contained two lads, one a tall, slight, but muscular youth of seventeen or thereabouts, the other a thicker, sturdier boy, who looked older, but was, in fact, a year or more younger than his companion.

"Well, Maister Dick," said the younger boy, "I reckon we'd better go home-along; it do seem as if the water be too clear to-night."

"They're not on the feed, Sam, that's certain," replied Dick Trevanion. "But I don't like going empty-handed. I'm thinking of supper."

"It do be queer, sure enough. 'Tis a hot night, and they mostly comes in close when 'tis hot, and the biggest comes the closest. I 'spect what us do want is a bit of a tumble, to stir up the bottom and muddy the water."

Dick Trevanion had come out at sunset with his companion Sam Pollex to fish for salmon bass, which at this time of year were usually plentiful along the coast. For two hours they had had no luck. Every now and then a ripple and spirt on the smooth surface showed that fish were sporting beneath; but though they changed the bait, trying squid, pilchard, spider-crab in turn; varied the length of line and the weight of the lead; trailed the bait where they last saw the surface disturbed—though they tried every device known to them to lure the fish, they had not as yet been rewarded with a single bite. It was exasperating. Dick knew that the larder at home was bare, and had set his heart on carrying back two or three fish for supper and next morning's breakfast.

"It will be high-water in half-an-hour," he said. "We'll wait till then, and no longer."

Baiting his hook with cuttle-fish, he got Sam to row slowly up the shore towards a spot where the sea broke gently over a yard or two of half-submerged rocks. The air was very still; there was no sound save the light rustle of the waves washing the foot of the cliff. As the sky darkened and the last faint radiance vanished from the west, the stars appeared and the shade beneath the cliff became deeper. Sam rowed up and down for some minutes, Dick hauling in his line once or twice to see that the hook was not fouled with sea-weed; but still there was no sign of fish.

All at once, when he was on the point of giving up, he felt a slight tug at the line, which began immediately to slip through his fingers.

"At last!" he whispered, jumping to his feet so hastily as to set the boat rocking.

He held the line loosely until a dozen yards had run out, then tightened his grasp with a jerk. Meanwhile Sam had thrown the anchor overboard.

"He's a whopper," said Dick, letting his line run again. "See; there he goes!"

He pointed to a slight phosphorescent glow on the water about twenty yards away. The line was running out fast. It was only a hundred yards long, and he must check the rush of the fish, or he would lose line and all. Grasping the twine with both hands, he exerted a steady strain, at one moment being almost jerked out of the boat by the violent struggles of the fish. He set his feet against the gunwale and pulled again. With a suddenness that threw him backwards the tension relaxed.

"He's gone, Sam! He's torn away the hook," he cried.

"Scrounch un for a rebel!" said Sam indignantly. "Why couldn't he bide quiet!"

Dick wound up his line rapidly, feeling no resistance until he had recovered about thirty yards of it. Then once more it began to slip away.

"He's not gone yet, Sam, after all. I'll have him, sure as I'm alive."

Steadily he worked the fish in. For a few moments he would draw in the line without resistance; then there was a jerk; it swerved to right, to left; and he could merely hold his own in the desperate struggle. But gradually, fight as the fish might, it was drawn nearer and nearer to the boat. At the broken water it spent its last energies; phosphorescent flashes showed where it was dashing to and fro in the vain effort to regain its liberty. Then, its strength exhausted, it suffered itself to be dragged slowly towards the boat.

Sam was eagerly on the watch, bending over the gunwale to seize the fish as soon as it came alongside. Suddenly he flung out his hands, only to draw them back with a cry. He had pricked them against the fish's sharp dorsal fin. Once more he stooped, and as Dick hauled hard on the line, Sam got his arms beneath the fish, and with a mighty heave cast it into the bottom, where it struggled for a moment and then lay still.

"A beauty, sure enough," said Sam.

"Worth waiting for," remarked Dick. "'Tis getting late, and Mother will have given me up, so we'll go now. He's big enough to give us two meals at least."

They bent down to disengage the hook and wind up the line. So intent had they been on the capture of the bass that neither had noticed, until that moment, a smack about three-quarters of a mile out at sea, sailing rapidly across the bay towards St. Cuby's Cove. The moon was rising, faintly illuminating the vessel, but casting a deep shadow on the water immediately beneath the cliff, so that the boys were invisible from the smack. Familiar as they were with all the small craft belonging to Polkerran, they knew at the first glance, in spite of the dim light, that the smack was a stranger.

"She's not Cornish," said Dick, taking a long look at her.

"Nor even English," added Sam. "Maybe a Frenchman from Rusco, though 'tis early for the running to begin."

"They won't run a cargo at the Cove, surely. The path up the cliff is too steep, and Joe Penwarden's cottage too near. I think she's a stranger that doesn't know the coast."

They watched the smack until she rounded the headland between them and the Cove, and then began to row in the opposite direction. They had just reached the end of the promontory bounding Trevanion Bay on the north, and had swung round landward, when, their faces now being toward the open sea, they saw something that caused them to pause in mid-stroke. Perhaps a mile in the offing like a phantom barque in the quivering radiance of the moonlight, lay a large three-masted vessel with sails aback. Through the still air came the sound of creaking tackle, and the boys, resting on their oars, saw a boat lowered, and then another, which pulled off in the same direction as the smack.

"This be some jiggery, Maister Dick," said Sam. "Do 'ee think, now, it be Boney come spying for a place to land?"

Those were the days when the imminence of a French invasion kept the people of the southern counties in a constant state of alarm.

"Boney wouldn't come to this coast," replied Dick. "He wouldn't risk his flat boats round the Lizard. No; he'll make some lonely quiet spot on the south coast; Boney won't trouble us."

"Well, daze me if I can make head or tail o't," said Sam.

"Pull in a bit, so that we can see without being seen."

From the shadowed headland they watched in silence. The boats had scarcely gone a third of a mile across the bay when a shrill whistle cleft the air. They at once put about, returned to the larger vessel, and were hoisted in, whereupon the ship made sail, and in the course of ten or fifteen minutes disappeared into the darkness.

"There be queer things a-doing, I b'lieve," said Sam, while the vessel was still in sight.

"Maybe," rejoined Dick, "but we don't know. Don't speak a word of it till I give you leave, Sam. 'Tis a matter for Mr. Mildmay if any one."

"Zackly. I can keep a still tongue with any man; and now seems to I we'd best go home-along."

He dipped the oars, and pulled, not towards the Beal, beyond which lay the village, but towards the head of Trevanion Bay. It was now high-water. Below the cliff only a narrow stretch of white sand was visible. Within ten yards of this beach Sam shipped oars, and the boat was carried along until its nose stuck in the sand. Both the boys then sprang out, and dragged their craft up to the base of the cliff beyond high-water mark.

"'Tis lucky tide be high," said Sam, wiping his brow with the back of his hand, "for 'tis a hot night, and old boat be desp'rate heavy."

"True, she's both heavy and old," said Dick, as he secured her to a post driven deep into the sand. "She's a good deal older than you or I, Sam."

"Ay, true, and Feyther have give her more knocks than he've give me. You can see his marks on her, but you can't see 'em on me—hee! hee!"

Dick laughed. Many a time had the planks been repaired by old Reuben Pollex, the signs of whose rough and ready handiwork were easily discoverable.

Carrying his tackle, Dick ordered Sam to bring the bass, and led the way along a steep path that zigzagged up the face of the cliff, being soon hidden from the sea by knobs and corners of rock. It was a toilsome climb; the cliff was two hundred feet high, but the windings made the path three times as long. When they reached the top, Sam found it necessary once more to wipe his brow; then followed his young master across a stretch of coarse bent towards a large building, mistily lit by the moonbeams, about a hundred yards distant.

The Towers, at one time a manor house of no little importance, was now in the stage of decrepitude. It had been for centuries in the possession of the Trevanions, who, in the time of King Charles I., had been a family of great wealth and influence, owning estates, it was said, in three counties. But the squire of that time had sold part of his property to provide money for the King, whose cause he espoused with unselfish loyalty, and from that time the family fortunes had gradually declined, partly through the recklessness of certain of the owners, partly through sheer ill-luck. For many years wealth had been drawn from tin and copper mines beneath the surface, parts of whose apparatus, in the shape of ruined sheds, scaffoldings, pipes, conduits, broken chains, strewed the ground in desolate abandonment. In the early manhood of the present squire, Dick's father, the lodes had shown signs of exhaustion, and Mr. Trevanion, wishing to keep the mines going as much for the sake of the miners as for his own interest, had spent large sums on opening up new workings, which proved unprofitable. He had mortgaged acre after acre in this fierce struggle with misfortune, having more than his share of the doggedness of his race; but all his efforts were fruitless; the mines were closed and the men dismissed; and the Squire himself at last had no property unencumbered except the land on which the Towers stood, and the barren cliff between the house and the end of the promontory, almost worthless save for the little grazing it afforded.

To this he had clung with grim tenacity. He was often hard put to it to pay the interest on his mortgages as it became due; his little household, consisting now only of himself, his wife and son, and the two Pollexes, often had barely enough to eat; many a time he was tempted to raise money on the little remnant of his property; but for long years, as often as the temptation came, he had resisted it. Though he would not admit the fact, even to himself, superstition had a good deal to do with his determination. He scoffed at the country folks' belief in omens and witches, and professed to think nothing of an old motto which had attached to his family for near a hundred and fifty years. In the reign of Charles II., when the Trevanions owned estates not only in Cornwall, but the adjoining counties, the spendthrift whose extravagance had been a partial cause of their ruin had, at some crisis in his affairs, consulted a wise woman who lived alone in a little cottage on the moor. He brought nothing from his interview with her but the couplet:

Trevanion, whate'er thy fortune be,

Hold fast the rock by the western sea.

Like his forefathers, Roger Trevanion derided the witch's counsel, but, like them, too, he had "held fast" until, a year before the opening of our story, he had been forced to relax his grip. Now every rood of the land, to the uttermost extremity of the Beal, was in the hands of mortgagees, and the dread of foreclosure weighed on the Squire like a nightmare.

The Towers had been allowed to fall into decay. Only one wing was now inhabited; the remainder was ruinous, and for the most part roofless. In the south wing lived the Squire, now past fifty years of age, his wife, a few years younger, and Dick, their only son. Their sole attendants were Reuben Pollex, a widower, who had grown up from boyhood with the Squire, and steadily refused to leave him, and his boy Sam. These two did all the household work, grew vegetables, bred poultry and pigs, the sale of which, together with the small sums obtained by letting to neighbouring farmers the grazing rights of the cliff, was all that kept the family from abject poverty. Dick himself was, to a large extent, the family provider. With Sam's help he snared rabbits, shot wild fowl, and fished along the coast. His bronzed skin and hard flesh bespoke an active life in the open air, and as he went about in his jersey, rough breeches, and long boots, he would scarcely have been distinguishable from the fisher lads of the village but for a certain springiness of gait and a look of refinement and thoughtfulness.

Dick and his companion hastened towards the south wing, where an unusually bright light in one of the lower rooms proclaimed that the Squire had company. While Sam took the fish, which turned out to be a fine fourteen-pounder, into the kitchen, Dick changed his boots, washed his hands, and entered the living-room. His father sat at the head of the table, his mother at the foot; between them was a man of about the Squire's age, dressed in a blue coat with brass buttons, with "seaman" written on every inch of him. The table was covered with a spotless but much-darned cloth; the only viands were a loaf of bread and half a cheese. A large brown jug contained ale brewed in the family brew-house by old Pollex.

"Why, Dick, how late you are!" said his mother. "We are just going to begin supper."

"Better put it off for a few minutes, Mother. I've brought home a fine bass. How d'ye do, Mr. Mildmay?"

"Ah, Dick, glad to see you, my boy! Good fishing to-night, eh?"

"One catch after two hours, sir," replied Dick. "The weather's too fine, I suppose."

"Shall we wait, Mr. Mildmay?" asked his hostess.

"As you please, ma'am."

Mr. Mildmay, a naval lieutenant, now in command of a revenue cutter, knew very well by the expression of the lady's face that the postponement of the meal was welcome to her. He was an old friend of the Squire's—a messmate indeed, for Mr. Trevanion had served for a few years in the Navy; and his acquaintance with the penury of the household had neither diminished his friendship nor damped the cordiality of the Squire's welcome. In these days there were few visitors to the Towers, and those who came knew what they had to expect in the way of entertainment. Such as might have looked merely for the satisfaction of the inner man had long since ceased to call. Mr. Mildmay could have supped contentedly on bread and cheese. The meagreness of the fare would have troubled Mrs. Trevanion the most, and the look upon her face told Dick how welcome was his addition to it.

Dick went into the kitchen to see how Sam was getting on, and soon returned with a portion of the fish broiled and garnished with herbs.

"As fine a bit of fish as I've tasted," said Mr. Mildmay, "and well cooked, upon my word."

"I am glad you like it," said Mrs. Trevanion, giving Dick privately an approving smile.

"You'll soon be hard at work, I suppose, sir," said Dick to the lieutenant.

"Yes, no doubt I shall have a merry winter. But I wish the Commissioners would make better arrangements on land. What can I do, with miles of coast to keep an eye on? One riding-officer and a few old excisemen here and there! I can't be everywhere."

"Why don't they, sir?" asked Dick.

"Because every man of muscle is snapped up by the press-gang or the recruiters. Upon my word, I wish Boney would come, if he is coming. When he has had his walloping there'll be a little time to attend to our proper concerns. As it is, with this eternal war going on, the free-traders play ducks and drakes with law and ordinances."

The Squire said nothing. His attitude to smuggling was one of neutrality. His training in the Navy made him in general adverse to the contraband trade; but there was a time, not very long since, when the owners of the Towers were actively engaged in it, or at least accessory to it, and the landowners along the coast regarded it with sympathy, open or secret. Indeed, it is probable that the cask of brandy in Mr. Trevanion's own cellar had never paid duty to the Crown, and old Reuben Pollex, who loved his "dish of tay," would certainly not have been able to enjoy it in that time of high prices unless he had known a little back room in Polkerran where it was easy to slip in and out secretly, and without the knowledge of the exciseman.

"The smugglers are getting bolder and bolder, confound 'em," Mr. Mildmay went on. "With the land force so weak, what's the result? If I'm called to a spot, ten to one by a trick, I must leave the rest of the coast unguarded. As you know, the only man permanently in this neighbourhood is old Penwarden, who is zealous enough, but not so active as a younger man would be."

"No, poor man," said Mrs. Trevanion. "He has often said to me that he fears the Government will replace him. He will cling to his duty as long as he can for the sake of his old sister. You know he supports her, in Truro, Mr. Mildmay."

"I know it, and I'm not the man to put him out of a job, though one of these days a Commissioner of Customs will make his appearance, and then I'll get a wigging."

All this while Dick had been considering whether he ought to tell the lieutenant about the strange vessels he had seen. He knew that smuggling was the only matter on which there was a certain constraint between his father and Mr. Mildmay. It was tacitly understood between them that the Squire would not round on the smugglers. On the other hand, the revenue officer knew that anything he told the Squire would be perfectly safe with him. He therefore discussed the subject quite openly with his old messmate, though, like a wise general, he never spoke about any plans that he had in view.

Dick made up his mind to say nothing. The lieutenant's cutter was lying in the little harbour, and if he mentioned what he had seen, Mr. Mildmay would certainly hurry away and sail in chase of the stranger. What the Squire would not do, his son could not. But he had scarcely come to this decision when matters took an unexpected turn.

"By the way, Squire," said the lieutenant, "I've just heard from Plymouth that the Aimable Vertu—precious fine name for a rascally privateer—is showing herself very active in the Channel. She made two captures last week, and was sighted two days ago off Falmouth, where a barque only just managed to escape her. She's said to be a vessel of extraordinary speed. The Government would give a good deal to catch her and hang her captain, that daredevil Frenchman, Delarousse; but it's with privateers as it is with smugglers: we can't be everywhere at once, and while we're fighting the French on the high seas, I suppose our home waters must be left to the enemy."

This led to an exchange of reminiscences of privateer-hunting during the American war, when both were young in the service. Meanwhile Dick felt uncomfortable. What if the larger vessel he had lately seen was this very privateer, the Aimable Vertu? In that case it was no question of smuggling, but of piracy. He felt that he ought at least to mention the matter, yet hesitated to speak without consulting his father. By-and-by there came an opportunity of speaking to him privately. While Mr. Mildmay was conversing with Mrs. Trevanion, Dick slipped to the Squire's side and told him in a sentence or two what he had seen.

"Mildmay," cried the Squire, "hark to this. Dick tells me that an hour or more ago he saw a strange three-master in the bay. She lowered a couple of boats, but recalled 'em, and sailed away westward. D'ye think she's the privateer?"

"Dash my bones, Dick," cried the lieutenant, starting up, "why on earth didn't you speak before? Oh! I see—I see; I won't reproach you; but I'll be as mad as a hatter if 'tis the rascal and she gets away. Good night to you all; you'll excuse me, Mrs. Trevanion. Oh, you young dog!"

He shook his fist at Dick, and hurried from the room.

CHAPTER THE SECOND

John Trevanion Returns Home

About half-an-hour before Mr. Mildmay left the Squire's supper-table so hurriedly, a man laboured up the last few feet of the winding path leading from the beach of St. Cuby's Cove to the cliff-top, which he gained at a point rather more than half-a-mile from the spot where Dick and Sam had previously ascended. He was a tall man, his build and figure indicating a capacity for lithe and rapid movement, so that the heaviness of his gait was probably due solely to the size and weight of the leathern trunk he carried. Like Sam Pollex, he paused for a moment on reaching the top to recover his breath and mop his brow; then, shouldering his trunk, he struck into a narrow footpath that led over the cliff. It branched into two after a few yards, the right-hand branch going direct to the Towers, the left-hand running away from the sea to join a rough, ill-made road which led past the gate of the Towers to the village.

On reaching the fork the pedestrian did not hesitate, as a stranger might have done, but took the left-hand path. After proceeding a few steps along it, however, he made a sudden half-turn, and stopped, looking across the open ground towards the Towers, where one room on the ground floor made a patch of light against the dark background of sky and sea. The man stood but a moment, then resumed his march along the path in the same direction as before. A smile wreathed his lips, and he muttered to himself. He went on at a smart pace over the level ground, turned to the right when he came to the road, passed the Towers' gates, which he observed were broken, and walked for another quarter of a mile before he again halted. Then he set his burden down by the roadside, sat upon it, and wiped his heated face, where the smile had been replaced by a frown.

"I daresay I'm a fool," he muttered in a growling undertone. "Why did I chafe and gall myself with carrying this plaguey trunk? However, maybe 'tis best."

While he was still resting, he heard footsteps upon his right hand, and looked round quickly. The moon was up, and he saw a young fisherman rolling along a path that ran into the road a few paces distant.

"Ahoy, there!" cried the traveller in a deep and mellow voice.

The fisherman, who had not as yet perceived him, came to a sudden stop as the silence of the night was broken thus unexpectedly and so near at hand; then, catching sight of the figure on the trunk, he slipped off the path on to the grass and began to run.

"Ahoy, there! What ails you?" cried the man. "D'you want to earn a groat?"

Reassured, apparently, at the mention of so material a thing as a groat, the fisherman turned and came slowly towards the speaker.

"Did you think I was a ghost?" the stranger went on with a laugh. "I want you to carry this trunk to the village, and I'll give you a groat for your pains."

"I'll do it, maister," replied the fisher, shouldering the trunk. "But ye give me a fright, that ye did."

"Why, you never saw a ghost with a brown face, and a black hat, and a blue coat, not to speak of brown breeches and long boots, did you?"

"I won't say I did, but the neighbours do say there be ghosteses up-along by St. Cuby's Well. Maybe yer a furriner, maister?"

"No, no; I'm good Cornish like yourself," replied the man, who knew that to Cornishmen all who lived beyond the borders of the duchy were accounted foreigners.

"Well, I can see plain ye be a high person, and jown me if I know why ye carry yer own bag and traipse afoot, instead o' coming a-horseback, or in a po'chay."

The traveller shot a glance at the lad. He saw a rugged profile, a brow on which thought had carved no furrows, a half-open mouth: the physiognomy of a simple countryman. Then, after a scarcely perceptible pause, he said:

"Well, I hate close folks who make a secret of everything, so I'll tell you. I got a lift in a travelling wagon from Newquay, but the wretch that drove it was bound for Truro, and point-blank refused to bring me farther than the cross-roads a couple of miles back. So now you know, my man, and I daresay you could tell a stranger what I've told you."

"Sure and sartin. You be come from Newquay in a wagon, and when ye got to cross-roads driver said he'd be jowned if he'd carr' 'ee a step furder."

"You have it pat; and now step out; 'tis getting latish."

They proceeded along the silent road at a good pace toward the village, the traveller dropping a remark now and then from which the fisherman understood that he was not a complete stranger to the district. Just as they reached a spot where the road dipped somewhat steeply, there were sounds of rapid footsteps behind them, and in a few moments two men came up, one Mr. Mildmay, the revenue officer, the other an old weather-beaten fellow in seaman's clothes. He wore a black shade over his right eye, and the unnaturally short distance between his nose and the tip of his chin showed that he had lost his teeth. This was Joe Penwarden, the veteran exciseman who had been mentioned at Squire Trevanion's supper-table. On leaving the Towers, Mr. Mildmay had gone first to the right, and fetched Penwarden from his little cottage on the cliff, and then retraced his steps through the Squire's grounds. Had he been a few minutes earlier, he could hardly have failed to see the pedestrian trudging with his trunk on his shoulder along the path that ran a score of yards from Penwarden's cottage.

"Halt, in the King's name!" cried Mr. Mildmay, as he overtook the two men who had preceded him along the road.

"'HALT, IN THE KING'S NAME!' CRIED MR. MILDMAY"

"I'll halt if 'ee bid me in the King's name," said the fisher, recognising the revenue officer, whom he, like the population of Polkerran generally, held in detestation mingled with unwilling respect, "but I bean't doin' nowt agen the law, I tell 'ee, carr'in' a genel'um's traps for a groat."

"A gentleman, is it?" said Mr. Mildmay, turning to the traveller. "I must ask you to tell me your business."

"And you shall have an answer. I come from Newquay, and am going to seek a night's lodging at the Five Pilchards, if you have no objection, captain."

Mr. Mildmay looked suspiciously at the speaker, whose accent was that of an educated man. He was not the type of person to meet afoot with his trunk on the high road. Old Penwarden's single eye also was fixed on the stranger's swarthy, bearded face.

"No more objection, my dear sir, than you will have to my taking a look at the inside of that trunk of yours. In the King's name!"

"With all the pleasure in life. Amos, or whatever your name is, set down the trunk for the inspection of this exceedingly zealous officer of His Majesty's."

The trunk was opened, and Penwarden turned over its contents, Mr. Mildmay looking on. He found articles of apparel, a sword, some bundles of papers, a bag of money, a large leather-bound book, a brace of pistols, and sundry insignificant articles, none of which was chargeable with duty.

"Thank you, sir," said Mr. Mildmay, when the inspection was concluded. "I am sorry to have detained you, but in these times——"

"Quite so, captain," interrupted the other. "In these times one cannot be too particular. I bid you good-night, and better luck at your next examination."

Mr. Mildmay hurried on with Penwarden, and was soon lost to sight.

"Who's that popinjay?" said the traveller, when the lieutenant was out of hearing.

"That be Maister Mildmay, the preventive officer, and a dratted furriner," replied the fisher. "He've been in these parts two years now, and a meddlesome feller he be too. Hee! hee! He got nowt for his pains this time, maister, and if there's one thing I do like to see, 'tis the preventives fooled. Hee! hee!"

"Old Penwarden looks the same as ever, except for the shade over his eye."

"Do 'ee know him, maister?"

"I used to, years ago."

"Iss, old Joe be a decent good soul of his trade, and we was vexed, trewly, when 'a got his eye put out in a fight by Lunnan Cove. But there, he shouldn' meddle with honest free-traders. Lawk-a-massy! I be speakin' free."

"Oh, you're quite safe with me. I'm a bit of a free-trader myself, in my way."

They went on, and in a few minutes came to an inn at the lower end of the village near the beach. This was the Five Pilchards. The village boasted another inn, a hundred yards away, called the Three Jolly Mariners; but it belied its name, being frequented mainly by farm labourers.

The traveller paid and dismissed the fisher, and rapped at the closed door. It was opened by the innkeeper himself, a podgy, red-nosed, blear-eyed fellow, with an underhung lip, and a chin like a dewlap. A small candle-lamp hung above in the doorway, showing a dim yellow ray upon the smiling face of the visitor. The innkeeper started back.

"I startled you, eh?" said the visitor. "Yes, it is I myself—John Trevanion come home again. I am getting on in years, Doubledick, and I felt I should like to die among my friends."

"Ha, ha! Ho, ho!" laughed the innkeeper. "'Tis Maister John, for sure, come home with his little jokes. Come along in, maister, come in; daze me if I bean't as pleased as pigs to see 'ee."

"Take me to a room, Doubledick, and get some clean sheets, will you? And send me up something passable to eat and drink; I'll sup alone."

"Iss, sure. I'll give 'ee the best I've got in the house. What do 'ee say, now, to collops and fried taties, or a nice bit o' bass, or a dish o' pickled pilchurs, and some real old—you know what, Maister John? Hee, hee!"

"Whatever you like, Doubledick, only be quick about it."

The innkeeper led his visitor along a passage past the open door of the bar-parlour. John Trevanion glanced in as he went by. A number of rough fishermen in various garments sat drinking on settles along the wall. The most noticeable among them was a man of vast breadth, brawny and muscular, his strong features tanned copper-colour by years of sea-faring, his thick hair and beard the hue of ebony. The sleeves of his scarlet jersey were turned up, revealing brown and hairy forearms that would have befitted a Hercules.

"Tonkin is still flourishing, I see," said Trevanion in an undertone to the innkeeper as he passed.

"Iss, Zacky Tonkin be as great a man as ever he wer, and a tarrible plague o' life to the preventives. Mr. Curgenven—ye mind of him, Maister John?—died two year back, and they sent a furrin feller, Mildmay by name, to look arter us mortals—hee! hee! He be a good feller at his job, a sight better than Curgenven, who loved an easy life, as 'ee could remember; but Zacky do know how to deal wi' un, he do so. Oh, 'tis a rare deceivin' game he plays wi' un. He's up-along and down-along, and this Mildmay feller atraipsin' arter un, by sea and land, 'tis all one to Zacky. Here's yer room, Maister John. Do 'ee set yerself down and I'll bring 'ee up a supper fit for a lord in no time."

He looked at his visitor doubtfully for a moment.

"I'd axe 'ee one thing," he said. "Be I to let 'em know down below as you be in house?"

"To be sure, Doubledick, there's nothing to conceal. You might remember to say that I've come from London—no, hang me, I am forgetting; from Newquay directly, from London ultimately. You understand?"

"Iss, I understand. No matter where 'ee come from, if 'twere from old Nick hisself, they'll be glad to see 'ee, that they will."

John Trevanion kept to his room until the morning. At nine o'clock he left the inn and made his way through the village by back lanes, to escape the notice of such fishermen as might remember him, and proceeded at a quick pace along the road to the Towers. He was dressed this morning in a black hat turned up at one side with a rosette, a bottle-green frock coat, white kerseymere breeches, and long boots. "He looks summat older and nearer graveyard, as must we all," remarked Doubledick to a crony as he watched him depart, "but he's a fine figure of a man still."

Arriving at the Towers, John Trevanion lifted the latch of the door leading to the inhabited portion, and entered with the freedom of one of the family. The Squire was at breakfast with his wife and son.

"Come in," he shouted, in answer to a tap on the door, and rose from his chair as the well-dressed visitor entered, thinking, as might have been gathered from his manner, that it was one of the few friends who had the freedom of the house. But at a second glance his demeanour altered.

"You have made a mistake, I think," he said stiffly, resting both hands on the table. His fine face was flushed, and Dick, looking on in wonderment, noticed that the riband that bound his queue of grey hair was quivering.

"Surely, Cousin Roger, you'll let bygones be bygones," said John Trevanion suavely. "'Tis now—I don't know how many years ago."

"When I last saw you, sir, I bade you never enter my door again. I do not call back my words, and see no reason to do so. You will oblige me by relieving me of your presence."

The words came sternly from his trembling lips. Dick felt himself go hot and cold.

"Is there no word repentance in your dictionary, Roger Trevanion?" said his cousin bitterly. "You're a good Christian, I suppose—go to church and say the Commandments, 'love your neighbour,' and all that; but you'll harden your heart against one of your own kin that had the ill-luck to offend you——"

"Stop!" thundered the Squire. "The offence to me I make nothing of; you have shamed your name and put yourself beyond the pale of honest men. 'Ill-luck,' you call it! 'Twas no ill-luck—though we Trevanions have enough of that, God knows!—but the act and nature of a scoundrel. I am ashamed you bear my name. I disown you. Take yourself out of my sight."

His wife laid a gentle hand on his arm.

"A pretty welcome, on my soul, for a man who has lived down the faults of his youth," said John Trevanion. "I tell you, Roger Trevanion, I will not put up with such usage—I will not! I don't want your forgiveness; a fig for your friendship! But I demand decent treatment from you, and——"

"By the Lord that made me," cried the Squire, "if you do not instantly remove yourself from this house I will have you thrown out. Do you hear me, sir?"

John Trevanion's eyes glittered as he returned his cousin's wrathful look. He half opened his mouth, closed it with a snap; then an inscrutable smile stole upon his face. He shrugged, turned on his heel, and went silently from the room.

The Squire sank into his chair. The flush had vanished from his face, leaving it ashy pale. His hands trembled with excess of indignation.

"My dear, calm yourself," said his wife soothingly. "He is gone."

He made no reply. Dick sat silent, every nerve tingling with excitement. In a minute his father rose, leaving his coffee half finished, and strode heavily from the room.

"Mother, what does it mean?" asked Dick breathlessly. "Was that cousin John?"

"Yes, my dear. Do not name him to your father. I will go to him; I fear he will be ill. Finish your breakfast, Dick, and go to the Parsonage. You had better stay there all day; Mr. Carlyon will give you some dinner."

She followed her husband, leaving Dick to his breakfast and his wondering thoughts. He faintly remembered his cousin John Trevanion, who ten years before had lived in the now empty Dower House, between the Towers and the village, as his father had done before him. John Trevanion had then been a gay, careless, happy-go-lucky young man of thirty, who lived on the Squire's bounty, riding his horse among the county yeomanry, hunting with his neighbours, roistering it with the most rakish young blades of the adjacent manors, joining in daredevil escapades with the smugglers. His antics and riotings became a byword in the country-side, and Dick remembered how, when a young boy, he had witnessed several violent scenes between his father and John after some particularly outrageous exploit. Old Pollex had told him that the Squire had threatened many times that unless John reformed he would no longer be allowed to occupy the Dower House, and had forgiven him over and over again. At last a day came when John disappeared. Dick had never learnt the true reason; the Squire never mentioned his cousin; Pollex, when questioned, shook his head and pursed up his lips, and said that John Trevanion was a villain; and Dick had formed the conclusion from stray hints that the ne'er-do-well cousin had been driven out of the country by some criminal act. For ten years he had not been heard of, and he had wholly slipped from Dick's thoughts.

Having finished his breakfast, Dick took his cap and set off for his two-mile walk to the Parsonage, where he went daily to receive lessons in classics and literature from Mr. Carlyon, the vicar. He had never been to school, his father's resources being incapable of bearing the expense. A few years before this time the Squire had been seriously disturbed about his son's education. He was himself a sufficiently competent tutor in mathematics, but what classics he ever had had wholly left him, and he was miserable in the thought that the boy was growing up without the elements of the education of a gentleman. At this point the vicar stepped in with a proposal. He was a liberal-minded, genial man, a fellow of his college, a student of his county's antiquities, and in his 'varsity days had been a notable athlete. Now, though well on in years, he would often, on a Sunday afternoon after church, lend his countenance to wrestling bouts and games of baseball among the village youths. He rode to hounds, and judged at coursing matches, these and similar avocations probably accounting for the fact that a history of the parish, which he had commenced twenty years before, was still unfinished. One day he suggested to the Squire that he should give Dick lessons in Latin and Greek, to keep himself from rusting, as the worthy man delicately put it, but really to make good the deficiency due to his friend's straitened means. Mr. Trevanion gladly accepted the offer, and Dick had now been for five years under the parson's capable tuition.

When Dick returned home in the evening he was met by Sam Pollex in a state of considerable excitement.

"I say, Maister Dick," he said, "this be a fine mossel o' news. Yer cousin John—a rare bad 'un he be—have come home-along."

"I know," replied Dick. "I've seen him."

"Have 'ee, for sure? I hain't seed un, but I heerd tell on un in village. Ike Pendry were goin' along road last night when up comes my genel'um and axed un to carr' his bundle for a groat. He wer traipsin' along from St. Cuby's Cove way, about an hour, it do seem, arter we come up from fishin'."

"Where had he come from?"

"Newquay, 'a said; but 'tis my belief he come out o' the smack we seed, and clomb the cliff, same as we."

"That's nonsense. He wouldn't come in a smack, and if he did he wouldn't land at the Cove. He has made no secret of his return, and there's no reason why he shouldn't land at the jetty."

"Ah, well, things be as they be; but I reckon he come in the smack, all the same."

"What is he doing in the village?"

"He bean't there no longer. This arternoon he packed up his traps and rid off on one of Doubledick's hosses to Trura. Feyther seed un go. 'A called to un as he rid by. 'Hoy, Reuben!' says he, ''tis a cold country, this!' That just 'mazed Feyther, 'cos it was a frizzlin' day. 'Spect he've been in furrin parts, wheer what's bilin' to we is nawthin' but chill-off to they. So 'tis, to be sure."

At this piece of news Dick felt much relieved. He hoped that Polkerran had seen the last of John Trevanion. But it turned out that the return of the native was only the first scene in a series of strange happenings that were to be long remembered in the village, and were vitally to affect the fortunes of the family at the Towers.

CHAPTER THE THIRD

The Blow Falls

For some days after the event just related, life at Polkerran and the neighbourhood flowed on its customary sluggish tide. The fishermen were idle, waiting for pilchards to appear off the coast. The harvest had been gathered in from the fields. There was little for the village folk to do except to gossip. Men gathered in knots on the jetty and at the inn-doors, chatting about the return of John Trevanion, the strange vessels that had been seen, and the revenue cutter's failure to catch them, the appearance of a ghost at St. Cuby's Well, the prospects of the fishing season, the chances of making good "runs," and besting Mr. Mildmay and the excisemen. At the Towers there was nothing to show that anything had happened to disturb the placid surface of existence, except that the Squire was more silent than usual, and went about with a pale face and a preoccupied and troubled look.

One afternoon, after the lapse of about a week, Dick, leaving the Parsonage after his daily lessons, was surprised to see his father approaching across the glebe. The Squire was on foot: his last horse had been sold long ago.

"Ha, Dick!" he said, as he met his son, "you have finished with Greeks and Romans for the day, then. I have come for a word with the parson. Shall be home to supper."

Dick went on, and his father entered the house.

"Ah, Trevanion, I am glad to see you," said Mr. Carlyon, cordially, his keen eyes not failing to note a certain gravity in his old friend's expression.

"I want your advice, Carlyon," said Mr. Trevanion abruptly.

"And you shall have the best I can give, as you know well. Come into the garden and smoke a pipe with me. Good, honest tobacco, even if 'tis contraband—and I can't swear to that—will do no harm to you or me."

When they were seated side by side in wide wicker chairs beneath the shade of an elm-tree, the Squire drew from his pocket a folded paper which had been sealed at the edges.

"Read that," he said, handing it to the vicar.

Mr. Carlyon carefully rubbed his spectacles, set them on his nose with deliberation, and slowly opened the paper.

"H'm! God bless my soul! Poor old Trevanion!" he murmured, as he read, unconscious that his words were audible. "This is bad news, Trevanion," he said, aloud, looking over the rims of his spectacles with grave concern.

"It is. It is the very worst," said the Squire, gloomily. "It is the end of things for me."

"No, no; don't say that. Every cloud has a silver lining."

"A musty proverb, Carlyon. You don't see the silver lining in a thunderstorm, and it doesn't keep your skin dry. This spells ruin, ruin irretrievable."

The parson pressed his lips together, and read the document again. It was a brief intimation from a Truro attorney of his client's intention to foreclose on the mortgages he held upon certain parcels of land, if the sums advanced on them were not repaid within a month from that date.

"This is not your own man?" said the parson.

"No. I never heard of him before."

"What is the extent of the obligation?"

"Two thousand pounds. I can't muster as many shillings. I am in arrear with the interest. Within a month we shall be in the poor-house—a noble end for Trevanion of the Towers!"

"Tut, tut! You take too black a view of things. 'I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.'"

"But I have, and so have you, Carlyon. I see things as they are. 'Tis no surprise to me; these many months I have felt the blow might fall at any moment; but the condemned man hopes to the last for a reprieve, and I have gone from day to day, like a weakling and simpleton, refusing to face the facts. Not that I could have done anything; I am bankrupt; there's no way out of it."

"Who holds the mortgages?"

"Sir Bevil Portharvan. I have nothing to say against him. He has been very patient. A man of business would have foreclosed long ago, though he would have got little by it, for the mines are worked out, the Towers is a ruin, and the land will grow next to nothing but thistles and burdock. 'Twas to be."

"But he can't take the Towers from you. Do you not hold fast to that?"

"I did till a year ago, but there's a small bond on that now—a paltry hundred pounds; I could raise no more on it and the cliff. Sir Bevil does not hold that, however; 'tis my own lawyer."

The parson sawed the air with his hand, a trick of his when perplexed.

"Well, old friend," he said, "I am sorry for you, from the bottom of my heart. If I had the money, I would gladly lend it you, but 'passing rich on forty pound a year,' you know——"

"I know well. 'Tis not for that I come to you. Give me your advice. What can I do? I must leave the Towers; what can I do for a livelihood? Like the man in the Book, 'I cannot dig; to beg I am ashamed.' What a miserable fool I was to throw up the sea when I came into the property! And yet I don't know. Look at Mildmay; a year or two younger, 'tis true, but still a lieutenant, and thought fit for nothing better than to chase luggers and circumvent the trade. I've no interest with the Admiralty; they've enough to do to provide for the seamen invalided from the wars. What can an old fool past fifty do to earn his salt? Years ago I had my dreams of paying off the burdens and reviving the Trevanion fortunes; but they have long since vanished into thin air; the task needed a better head than mine. And what little chance I might have had was doomed by the misdeeds of that scoundrel cousin of mine——"

"I heard that he reappeared the other day. I hoped it was not true."

"'Twas true. He had the boldness, the effrontery, to come to me with his 'let bygones be bygones,' and sneering at my Christianity. You know the facts, Carlyon. You know how, but that I impoverished myself, he would to this day be in the hulks or slaving in the plantations. I was too tender, I was indeed. I ought to have let the law take its course, and put my pride in my pocket. 'Twas a weakness, I own it; and now 'tis time to take my payment."

"No, my good friend, you did right to keep your name unstained. But I wonder, indeed I do, that John Trevanion has dared to show his face here again."

"Oh, 'tis no wonder," said the Squire bitterly. "No one knew of his crime but three, you and I and John Hammond; only Hammond had proof of it, and he is dead. My worthless cousin learnt of his death, I warrant you; the Devil has quick couriers for such as he; and he comes back, relying on my weakness and your holiness. But I'll speak no more of him; he is gone, and I hope I shall never see him again. There's my boy Dick: what is to become of him? He is seventeen; he ought to be making his way in the world. I can't put him to a profession; I keep him at home drudging for us; and but for your kindness, Carlyon, he would be as ignorant and raw as the meanest farm-hind. 'Tis not right; 'tis cruelty to the lad; and he will live to curse the day he was born a Trevanion."

"Come, come, this is not like you, Squire," said Mr. Carlyon warmly. "The lad is doing very well. He lives an open, honest life, and a useful one. What if his hands are horny? He makes good progress with his books, too, and will be fit in a year or two to win a sizarship at Oxford, and he will do well there, take orders, or maybe become secretary to some great person. You need fear nothing for Dick. No; 'tis for yourself and your good wife we must think. And now let us put our heads together. What say you to visiting Sir Bevil, and seeking further grace? I will myself undertake the office."

"Never!" cried the Squire firmly. "I will have no man supplicating and beseeching on my behalf. No; let what must come, come; never will I whine and grovel for mercy."

"You are an obstinate old fool, Roger Trevanion," said the parson, laying a friendly hand on the other's arm. "But I own I sympathise with your feeling. Well, then, my counsel is—and you may scorn it—do nothing."

"Nothing!"

"Simply wait. The foreclosure must come, I see that; but the other mortgagee has not moved; you will still have a roof above you; you make no profit of the mortgaged lands, and so will be not a whit worse off than you are now, save in the one point of pride. That pride of yours has been your snare, Trevanion."

"Well I know it!"

"I don't preach, except on Sundays, but I believe in my heart that this trouble will turn out for your good. Hold fast your rock, old friend; 'twas sound advice, even though it came from a witch. No man can give you better, and I am superstitious enough to believe that while you follow it the Trevanions will not come to beggary."

The two friends sat talking for some time longer. When the Squire rose to go away, he said—

"I thank you, Carlyon. You have done me good. I see nothing but darkness ahead, but I'll take your advice; I'll stick to the ship, and keep my colours flying, and who knows?—perhaps I shall weather it out after all."

They shook hands and parted, and the parson returned to his study to read over an ode of Horace in readiness for Dick's lesson next day.

After his conversation with Mr. Carlyon the Squire recovered his wonted serenity. So cheerful was he when he told his wife and son what was going to happen, that they refrained from giving utterance in his presence to their own feelings on the matter, for fear of bringing back his gloom. He rode over one day in the carrier's cart to Truro to pay the interest on the Towers mortgage with the proceeds of a fine litter of pigs, and showed his lawyer the letter he had received from his professional brother.

"An excellent practitioner, sharp as a needle," said the lawyer. "He came to me a while ago wanting to purchase the little bond I myself hold; but I refused him point-blank, and went so far as to express my surprise at Sir Bevil. He grinned at me, Mr. Trevanion—yes, grinned at me in the most unseemly way. 'Twas not Sir Bevil's doing: that is one comfort."

"Who bought up the bonds, then?"

"That I cannot tell you: I do not know. No doubt a stranger, who has more money than judgment. I am sorry for this; I am indeed; and if there were any chance of getting metal out of the earth I could have transferred your mortgages with the greatest ease. As it is—but there, I won't talk of it. As for my own little bond on the Towers, that may remain till Doomsday so far as I am concerned. It would cut me to the heart to see the old place in the hands of any one but a Trevanion."

"You're a good fellow, Trevenick," said the Squire, "and I'm grateful to you."

"Not at all, not at all, my dear sir. I am perfectly satisfied with my investment."

And the Squire returned home more cheerful than ever, convinced that lawyers were not all as dry as their parchments.

The allotted month sped away. One afternoon, when Dick was at the parson's, Sam Pollex ran at headlong speed up the road from the village, dashed into the house, and forgetting his manners, burst into the Squire's room without knocking or wiping his boots, as he had been strictly enjoined always to do.

"If 'ee please, sir," he panted, "there be a wagon full of females pulled up at the door o' the Dower House yonder."

"Indeed!" said the Squire. "Have you never seen females before, Sam?"

"Iss I have, sometimes, in the village; but these be furriners, sir."

"Well, maybe they'll buy your eggs, and that'll save you three-quarters of your walk to the village."

Sam went out, looking very much puzzled. What had brought foreign females to his master's house, he wondered? Within half an hour he was back again, this time a little less eager, though equally excited. He rapped on the door, and being bidden to enter, said, less breathlessly than before:

"If 'ee please, sir, I seed a man on a hoss ride up to Dower House, and he went inside, sir, and 'twas Maister John."

"Who? John who?" The questions came like pistol-shots.

"His other name be Trevanion, it do seem," said the boy.

The Squire got up in great agitation.

"Are you sure, boy?" he asked.

"No, sir, I bean't sure, 'cos I never seed un afore; but I axed Tom Penny, who was standing by, who 'twas, and he said, 'Why, ninny-watch, doan't 'ee know yer own maister's born cousin? 'Tis the same fine genel'um that give Ike Pendry a groat for carr'n his portmantel.'"

Then something happened that scared Sam out of his wits and sent him scampering to the kitchen for his father.

"Feyther, Feyther," he cried, "come quick! Squire's took bad. 'A went all gashly white and wambled about, sighin' and groanin' that terrible! He's dyin', I b'lieve."

Old Reuben was lame, but he caught up a jug of water and hobbled with it as fast as he could to the Squire's room, sending Sam to fetch the mistress. He found the Squire seated in his chair, with a stony look upon his ashen face.

"What ails thee, maister?" cried the terrified servant.

"Nothing, nothing, Reuben," replied Mr. Trevanion. "Don't be afraid, and don't alarm your mistress."

Here Mrs. Trevanion came hastily in, Sam hanging behind as if afraid to approach too near.

"I am sorry they called you, my dear," said the Squire. "There is nothing wrong. Leave us, Reuben."

The old man hobbled away. Mrs. Trevanion stood by her husband's chair.

"I was overcome for a moment, but it has passed," said the Squire. "John Trevanion is the master of my lands."

"It cannot be, Roger!"