CHAPTER IX

*

*A MOORSIDE COURTSHIP*

The last week of March had seen rain, snow and hail; had felt the wind shift from brisk North to snarling Southeast, and from warm, rain-weighted South to an Easterly gale such as nipped the veins in a man's body and daunted the over-hasty green of elderberry and lifted the wet from ploughed fields as speedily as if a July sun had scorched them. From day to day--nay from hour to hour--the farm men had not known whether they would shiver at the hardest work or sweat with the easiest; the moist, untimely heat of one day would plant rheumatism snugly in their joints, and the bitter coldness of the next would weld it in. Nature was dead at heart, it seemed, and whether she showed a dry eye or a tearful, her face wore the dull greyness of despair, as if her thews were too stiffened and too lean with age to rouse themselves for the old labour of bringing buds to leaf, and kine to calving.

And now on a sudden all was changed. The wind blew honest from the West, and even in shadowed corners it kept no knife in waiting for man and beast. The sun shone splendid out of a white-flecked, pearly sky. In the lower lands, blackbird and thrush, starling and wren and linnet, broke into one mighty chorus; and on the moors the grouse called less complainingly one to the other, the larks were boisterous, the eagles showed braver plumage to the sun, the very moor-tits added a twittering sort of gaiety to the day. A lusty, upstanding, joyous day, which brought old folk to their doors, to ask each other if there were not some churlish sport of March hid under all this bravery--which set the youngsters thinking of their sweethearts, and brought the sheep to lambing in many an upland pasture scarce free'd of winter snow.

But the Lean Man had no eye for the beauty of the day, as he rode through Marshcotes street with Robert, his eldest-born, on the bridle-hand of him. For old Nicholas was thinking how Shameless Wayne, the lad whom he had laughed at and despised, had lately driven the Ratcliffes to hopeless flight. Both horsemen were fully armed, with swords on thigh and pistols in their holsters; and, as they rode, they kept a sharp regard to right and left, lest any of the Waynes should be hidden in ambush. Time and time the Lean Man clapped a hand to his left ear, as if by habit, and his face was no good sight to see as he felt the rounded lump which marked where Wayne's sword-cut--a fortnight old by now--was healing tardily.

"Could we but meet the lad alone in Marshcotes street here," he muttered to his eldest-born.

"Ay, but fortune is no friend to us just now," growled Robert; "and there are those who say he'd match the two of us."

"There are those who say that hawks breed cuckoos. Art thou weakening, Robert, too, because he has won the first poor skirmish?"

"Not I. If I find him in the road, I'll have at him--but meanwhile I am free to think my own thoughts."

"Well, and what are thy thoughts, sirrah?"

"That there's witchery in his sword-arm. I saw him fight in the graveyard, and he was something 'twixt man and devil; ay, he fought as if he had the cursed Dog of Marsh to back him."

The Lean Man gave a laugh--a laugh with little surety in it. "Thou'rt a maid, Robert, to fall soft at such a baby-tale as that," he sneered.

"Yet you have heard of the Dog, sir, and now and then you own to a half belief in him," said Robert, meeting the other's glance fairly. "We have had proof of it aforetime, and--see the woman yonder," he broke off, "moving at us from the corner of the lane. What ails her?"

They had passed the Bull tavern and were nearing the spot where the lane that led to Witherlee's cottage ran into the Ling Crag highway. The Lean Man turning his head impatiently as Robert spoke and following the direction of his finger, saw that the Sexton's wife was standing at the roadside. Nanny was looking through and through him, and the smile on her dry old lips was scarcely one of welcome. At another time Nicholas would have paid no heed to her; but to-day a small thing had power to touch his spleen, and he pulled up sharp in the middle of the roadway.

"I'm called Nicholas Ratcliffe, woman, as perchance thou hast forgotten," he said, leaning toward her and half lifting his hairy fist; "and when I see folk mocking me, I am prone to ask them why."

"When I mock ye, Maister, ye're free to strike me, an' not afore," answered Nanny. Her tone was quiet almost to contemptuousness; and the smile that had lately rested on her lips was hiding now behind her shrewd black eyes.

Nicholas looked at her, a touch of approval in his glance; accustomed as he was to browbeat all who met him, this dried-up little body's unconcern in face of threats half tickled and half angered him.

"Hark to her, Robert!" he cried. "Free to strike her, am I? Gad, yes, and with no permission asked, I warrant!"

"An' as for mocking ye," went on Nanny, disregarding his interruption, "what need hev I to step 'twixt ye an' Barguest?"

The Lean Man was accounted hardier than most; yet he started at Nanny's mention of the Dog, following so abruptly on Robert's talk of a moment ago. "Barguest. What has he to do with me?" he cried.

"What hed he to do wi' your folk i' times past? Enough an' to spare, I should reckon. Do ye forget, Nicholas Ratcliffe, how one o' your breed crossed Barguest once on t' threshold of Marsh House? Do ye mind what chanced to him at after?"

Nanny's quiet assurance had in it a quality that daunted the Lean Man. Had she grown fiery in denunciation of his sins toward the Waynes--as in her hotter moments she was wont to do--had she drawn wild pictures of the doom awaiting those who crossed the Dog, Nicholas would have knocked her to the roadway and passed on. But her faith was unwavering; she had no doubt at all that the Lean Man had compassed his own end, and voice and gesture both were such as to convince a man against his will.

He stared at her, a growing terror in his face. "'Tis an old tale, woman, and one we scarce credit nowadays," he stammered.--"Robert, tell her she's a fool--a rank, stark-witted fool--and I a bigger fool to hearken to her."

But Robert was in no case to bolster up his father's dreads. He turned to Nanny sharply. "Where does all this carry us?" he said. "Dost thou mean that one of us has lately crossed the Dog?"

"Ay, marry. What else should I mean?" said the little old woman.

"'Tis a child's tale--a child's tale, I say," broke in Nicholas.

"Well, ye shall try the truth of it by an' by--for ye crossed th' Dog, Nicholas Ratcliffe, when ye came down to nail your token to th' Marsh doorway. I war watching by th' dead man, an' I heard Barguest come whimper-whimper down th' lane; an' then he scratted like a wild thing at th' panels; an' after that he ligged him down on the door-stun."

Nanny paused a moment, watching how the Lean Man took it.

"Ay, and then?" said Nicholas. He would fain have sounded merry, but his voice came dry and harsh.

"Then a man came riding up o' horseback, an' leaped to ground, an' reached ower th' Brown Dog to nail a man's hand to th' door. An' _ye_ war th' horseman, Nicholas Ratcliffe."

Once only the Lean Man glanced at her; then set spurs to his great bay horse and clattered up the street, his son following close behind. At the end of half-a-mile they slackened pace, as if by joint consent; but neither sought the other's eyes.

"What ails thee, fool?" said Nicholas to his eldest-born.

"Naught, sir--'twas not I who fled from a crook-backed beldame," sneered the other.

The Lean Man turned on him, glad of an excuse for bluster. "Thou dar'st to say I fled?" he cried. "Thou, who wast sucking at the breast while I grew old in fight?--There, lad! 'Twas a madness in the blood that fell on us just now. What's Barguest that he should spoil a bonnie plan? Are we not sending Wayne to his last home to-night?"

"We have planned as much," said Robert slowly, "but----"

"Ay, but--and 'but' again in thy teeth. We have him, I tell thee--Red Ratcliffe should be somewhere hereabouts by now, learning what I have sent him out to learn."

"We can learn all that, and yet not use the knowledge right," said Robert sullenly. Even yet he could see Nanny's face, could hear her voice, and he was angered by the fear they bred in him.

"That's as may be," said Nicholas grimly--"but if he brings the news I think he will the devil keep young Wayne of Marsh, for he'll need some such sort of aid.--Who is yond lubberly farm-hind, climbing up the wall this side the road? His slouch is woundily familiar." Like his son, the Lean Man had felt the sting of Nanny's words, though he was minded to make light of it; and no better proof of his humour was needed than the quick ill-tempered eye he had for trifles.

"It looks like Hiram Hey--one of Wayne's folk, and a pesty fellow with his tongue. We've found him more than once cutting peats from the Wildwater land, and more than once we've fallen foul of him."

"Have ye?" said Nicholas quietly. "Well, he did us a service there, may be; and the more peats they coane at Marsh, the better 'twill be for us to-night.--Come, lad; 'tis gallop now, and a truce to that old wife's foolery."

Hiram Hey, meanwhile, was going his leisurely way, glancing curiously at the Lean Man as he went by, but not guessing that he was furnishing him with food for talk. He slouched along the pasture-fields stopping at every other step to watch the sport of heifers, to note a broken piece of walling, or to berate some luckless farm-lad whom he found at play.

"I wodn't call it a fair day, for we've not done wi' 't yet," he murmured. "Nay, I wodn't call it a fair day, an' that's Gospel, till I see how it behaves itseln. We mud varry weel hev snow afore it wears to neet, or else thunner--or both, likely."

He leaned over a three-barred gate and eyed the long furrows climbing to the hill-crest--sleek furrows, with dust lying grey on the sun-side of the upturned sods. And while he lazied there, a milking-song came clear and crisp from over the wall that hid the High meadow from him.

"That's Martha," he cried, brightening on the sudden. "She sings like ony bird, does th' lass. What should she be doing, I wonder, so far fro' Marsh on a working-day?"

His step had an unwonted briskness in it, his carriage was almost jaunty, as he moved along the wall-side to the stile at the corner. A milk-pail was showing now above the top step of the stile, with a cherry-ripe face and trim, short skirted figure under it. Martha halted on seeing Hiram Hey, and set two round, brown arms to the pail, and lifted it down to the wall; then leaned with one hand on it while she dropped a saucy curtsey.

"It's warm," ventured Hiram, picking up a stone from the grass and throwing it aside.

"Warm? I should reckon it is. Tha'd say so if tha'd carried this pail a-top o' thy head for a mile an' better.--But, Lord, we munnot complain, for 'tis a day i' five-score, this, an' warm as midsummer."

"Thee bide a bittock, as I telled young Maister this morn. 'Spring's come again, Hiram,' says he to me. 'Mebbe,' says I, 'but when a man's lived to my years he learns to believe owt o' th' weather--save gooid sense.' That's what I said, for sure."

"Tha'rt not so thrang as or'nary, seemingly?" said Martha, after a pause.

Hiram glanced at her, as if suspecting mockery. "Nay, I'm allus thrang," he answered, shaking his head in mournful fashion. "I've heard folk say I do nowt just because they've seen me hands-i'-pocket time an' time; but when ye're maister-hand at a farm, there's head-work to be done as weel as body-work."

"To be sure--an' 'tis fearful hard, is head-work."

"Ay, I oft say to shepherd Jose that th' humbler your station i' this life, th' fewer frets ye hev."

"I feel fair pitiful for thee, Hiram," said Martha, glancing softly at him across the pail, "when I see what worries tha hes to put up wi'."

Hiram came a step nearer. "Tha mud weel pity me, lass. 'Tis grand to be sich chaps as Jose--all body, i' a way o' speaking, an' no head-piece worth naming to come 'twixt victuals an' their appetites.--Martha, lass, I've oft wondered how tha came to be born a wench."

"Would'st hev hed me born a lad?"

"Nay, begow! but tha's getten so mich sense; that's what I mean. It fair caps me--as if I'd fund apples growing on a thistle-top."

Martha had a keen answer on her tongue-tip, but she held it back; for the lads were beginning to pass her by, and it was time she had a goodman. "It's a lot for thee to say, Hiram, is that," she murmured, dropping her eyes. "I iver thowt there war maid i' Marshcotes could come nigh to what _tha_ looks for i' a wench."

"Nor I nawther," said Hiram gravely. "I've said to myseln time an' agen that if I war to keep good company till th' end o' my days, I'd hev to live wi' myseln."

"It wod take a good un to be mate to thee."

Hiram half lifted his foot to the bottom step of the stile, then withdrew it. "Go slow, lad," he murmured. "If tha taks it at this flairsome speed, where wilt be by to-morn?"

"I wod tak a varry good un," repeated Martha.

But Hiram had taken fright on the sudden. "I seed th' Lean Man go through Marshcotes a while back," he said, with would-be carelessness.

"Oh, ay? Th' Ratcliffes seem to be up an' about this morn, for I passed Red Ratcliffe i' th' meadow not five minites sin'. Sakes, but he's an ill-favoured un, is Red Ratcliffe! He war for gi'eing me a kiss an' a hug just now, but I let him feel th' wrong side o' my hand i'stead.--An' what did th' Lean Man look like, Hiram, after his fighting o' t' other day?"

"Nay, I niver stopped to axe; but I noticed he looked queerish where he took yond sword-cut a two-week come yesterday. I'm none for praising th' young Maister, not I, seeing he's shameless by name an' shameless by natur--but I take it kindly of him that he sliced th' Lean Man's ear off clean as a tummit-top. There's none i' th' moorside but wishes his head had followed."

"Now whisht, Hiram!" cried Martha. "It's a two-week come yesterday sin' they fought i' th' kirkyard, but I'm sick yet wheniver I call to mind how they came home to Marsh that morn. Th' burial-board war all spread, an' I war agate wi' drawing a jug of October when Nanny Witherlee comes running into th' pantry, as white as a hailstone, an' 'Martha,' say she, 'there'll be a sorry mess on th' hall-floor--an' us to have spent so mich beeswax on't,' says she. 'Why, what's agate?' I says. 'Th' Waynes is back for th' burying-feast,' says Nanny, 'an' they've brought some gaping wounds, my sakes, to sit at meat wi' 'em.'"

"I warrant they did," assented Hiram, "for I see'd 'em myseln."

"Well, I runs a-tip-toe then to th' hall door, an' I screamed out to see th' Waynes standing there. A score or so there mud be, all drinking as if they'd sweated like brocks at grasscutting; an' there war a queer silence among 'em; an' some war binding arms an' legs, an' th' floor, I tell thee, war more slippy under a body's feet nor ony beeswax warranted."

"Th' Maister went through it without a scratch, for all that, though they say he fought twice for ivery one o' t' others. Ay, his father war like that when th' owd quarrel war agate--allus i' th' front, yet niver taking so mich as a skin-prick till th' time came for him to dee."

"How long ago war that, Hiram? I've heard tell o' th' owd feud, but it mun hev been a long while back."

"Longer nor ye can call to mind, lass. 'Twas a sight o' years back, afore tha wert born or thought of."

Another soft glance from Martha. "I shouldn't hev thought _tha'd_ hev remembered it so weel, Hiram," she murmured. "Tha talks as if tha wert owd enough to be a girt-grandfather to sich a little un as me."

Hiram saw his error. "Nay, I'm youngish still, Martha," he put in hastily, with a tell-tale pulling of his hat over the widening patch of forehead that showed beneath the brim. "'Tis hard thinking that thins a body's thatch, an' when I call to mind what a power o' sense I've learned sin' being a lad, I wonder I'm not as bald as a moor-tit's egg. Well, tha mud find younger men nor me, but----"

"I set no store by youngness, Hiram. I allus did say a wise head war th' best thing a man could hev."

"Begow, but tha'rt a shrewd un, Martha, as weel as a bonnie un!" cried Hiram, and checked himself. "Yond's a tidy slice o' land," he said, nodding at the dusty furrows in front of them.

But Martha knew her own mind. "I'd liefer talk about thee, Hiram, that I wod," she said. "Land's theer ony day we want to look at it!"

"Well, now, there's summat i' that," he answered, with a shade of uneasiness in his voice. "Where hast been, like, for th' milk, lass? 'Tisn't every day I find thee stirring so far fro' Marsh."

"I've been to th' High Farm, for sure. What wi' milk for th' new-weaned calves, an' for churning, an' what not, we shouldn't hev hed a sup i' th' house down at Marsh if I hadn't come a-borrowing."

"There's waste somewhere, I'm thinking," said Hiram sadly. "Th' roan cow war niver fuller i' milk nor now, an' yond little dappled beast I bought off Tom o' Dick's o' Windytop is yielding grandly. Nay, nay, there's waste at Marsh! I said how 'twould be when young Maister took hod o' th' reins."

"Waste, is there? I'd like thee to hev a week or two at managing, Hiram; tha'd see how far a score quarts o' milk 'ull go, wi' four growing lads an' th' Maister, an' all ye lubbering farm-folk to feed. But theer! Men niver can thoyle to see owt go i' housekeeping; an' I'll be bidding thee good-day, Hiram, as tha's getten no likelier sort o' talk nor that."

She made pretence to lift her pail from the top of the stile, and Hiram so far forgot his caution as to put a hand on her dimpled arm.

"Sakes, lass, I wodn't hev thee go!" he cried.

"Then don't thee talk about waste and sich-like foolishness; I thowt tha'd more sense, Hiram, that I did. Nawther is young Maister what tha thinks him, let me tell thee; he's stiffening like a good un an' there's them as says he's getten th' whip-hand o' Hiram Hey already."

"Stiffening, is he?" cried Hiram, whom the jibe stung more keenly because he could not but admit the truth of it. "Well, there's room an' to spare, for he hes as slack a back as iver I clapped een on. But if tha thinks he can best Hiram Hey, Sunday or week-day----"

He stopped and shaded his eyes with both hands as he looked more keenly up the fields. Two figures had topped the crest--one a girl's, the other a man's, loose-built and of a swinging carriage.

"Nay, _I_ niver said I thowt as mich," said Martha demurely, not heeding the direction of Hiram's glance. "'Twas shepherd Jose said it yestereen when he stepped down to th' house wi' th' week's lamb."

"What, Jose!" cried the other, with an angry cackle. "He niver had a mind aboon sheep, hedn't Jose, an' sheep is poor wastrels when all's said. So tha lets an owd chap like yond come whispering i' thy ear, dost 'a, Martha?"

"An' who's to say nay to me, I should like to know?" Her voice was combative, but she leaned a little toward Hiram as she spoke, and he all but took the last dire step of all.

Very foolish showed Hiram, as he stood looking at the maid, with caution in one eye and in the other a frank admiration of the comeliness which showed so wholesome and so fresh amid the greenery of field and hedgerow. And all the while he was murmuring, "Go slow, lad, go slow, I tell thee," and his lips were moving shiftlessly to the refrain.

"Thou'rt tongue-tied, Hiram. Who's to say nay to me, I axed thee?" laughed Martha.

Hiram rocked the milk pail gently with one hand, and stared up the new-ploughed furrows of the field ahead of him. "Thy own good sense, lass, should say thee nay," he answered guardedly. "Them as tends sheep, an' nowt but sheep, gets witless as an owd bell-wether; an' if I war a lass I'd as lief wed a turnip on a besom-stick as shepherd Jose."

"If tha wert a lass, Hiram, tha'd die i' spinsterhood, I'm thinking."

Martha's attack was spirited, but she sighed a little as she noted Hiram's far-away regard; his thoughts were with the land, she fancied, when she fain would have brought them nearer home. Yet, as it chanced Hiram Hey was not thinking of farm-matters at the moment; Martha had her back to the ploughed field, and she could not see that the two figures which had lately topped the rise were coming down the field-side toward the stile. And it was plain now to Hiram that one was Janet Ratcliffe, the other Wayne of Marsh.

"It's queer, is th' way o' things," said Martha presently, loth to go her ways, yet too impatient and too womanly to stand there with no word spoken.

"Oh, ay? Well, things war niver owt but queer," answered Hiram, startled out of his abstraction.

"I war thinking o' th' bloody fight i' th' kirkyard. No more nor a two-week back it war, Hiram, an' here we all are, cooking an' weshing an' churning i' th' owd way, when we'd looked for fearsome doings all up an' down th' moorside."

"A wench would look for 'em; but I could hev telled thee different if tha'd axed me," said Hiram complacently. "Look at yond puffs o' dust that come ivery two-three minutes over th' furrows--dost think even Shameless Wayne could let a seed-time sich as this go by, while he war agate wi' fighting? Nay, nor th' Ratcliffes nawther. We mun all live by th' land, gentle an' simple, an' afore awther Wayne or Ratcliffes can afford to marlake, they'll hev to addle belly-timber."

"There'll nowt o' more come on 't then? Th' Lean Man has been fearful quiet of late, an' there's them as thinks th' fight i' th' graveyard has daunted him for good an' all."

"Daunted him, has it?" rejoined Hiram grimly. "Thee bide till th' oats is sown, an' th' hay won in, an' then tha'll see summat. Th' Lean Man is quiet like, tha says? Well, I've known him quiet afore, an' I've known him busy--an' of th' two I'd liefer see him thrang."

"Tha'r a good un to flair folk, Hiram! Why would'st liefer see him thrang?"

"Why? Because when a Ratcliffe says nowt to nobody, but wends abroad wi' a smug face an' watchful een, same as I've seen 'em do lately, ye may be varry sure he's fashioning slier devil's tricks nor iver.--Red Ratcliffe met thee just now, did he, Martha?"

"I telled thee as mich--he warn't so slow as some folk, Hiram, for he'd no sooner clapped een on me nor he had an arm about my waist."

Again Hiram wavered, and again whispered caution to himself. "He showed some mak o' sense there, Martha--but that's not what I war axing thee. What war he doing, like, when tha first comed up wi' him?"

"Nowt, nobbut mooning up an' down, as if i' search o' somebody."

"Well, he war on Wayne land to start wi', an' that wears a queerish look."

"Sakes, young Maister is nowhere near, I'm hoping!" cried Martha. "Red Ratcliffe carried his pistols, an' a shot from behind a wall wod suit him better nor a stand-up fight."

She still had her back to the ploughed field, and Hiram smiled in sour fashion to think how very near the master was, and what company he was keeping at the moment.

"Thou'rt fearful jealous for th' young Maister," he said. "I'm thinking there's truth i' what they say i' Marshcotes--that Shameless Wayne allus gets th' soft side of a maid."

"An' should do, seeing he's what he is!"

"Well, I wodn't be a bit surprised if he _war_ i' th' fields this morn. He's farmed for a week, hes th' Maister, an' he knows so mich about it now that he mun be here, theer an' iverywhere, watching that us younger hands do matters right."

"Tha can mock as tha likes, Hiram Hey, but he'll teach thee summat afore he's done wi' thee. Poor lad, though, I'm fair pitiful for him! He niver rests save when he's abed, an' not oft then, for I can hear him stirring mony a neet at after he'd earned his sleep."

"Thinking of his sins, I reckon," growled Hiram.

"Well, there's some I know that hasn't mouse-pluck enough for sinning. Besides, that's owered wi'. He's stiffening right enough--yet mony's the time I wish him back to th' owd careless days. He niver hes a gay word for us wenches now, an' to see him wi' his brothers ye mud weel think he war a score year older nor he's ony call to be."

Hiram had waited for this moment, chuckling at the overthrow in store for Martha's championship of the master. "Stiffening, is he?" he said, pointing up the field and drawing his lips into a thin curve. "He may be--but he's framing badly for a start."

Martha, turning sharp about, saw the two figures come slowly down the wall-side toward the stile. Wayne's head was bent low to Mistress Janet's, as if he were pleading some urgent cause, and neither seemed to guess that they were watched.

"Well?" said Martha defiantly. "There's nowt wrong i' that, is there? I've known he war soft on Mistress Ratcliffe iver sin' last spring."

Hiram stared at her, aghast that she could look so lightly on a grievous matter; and when he spoke there was honest anger in his voice, distinct from his usual carping tone.

"Nowt wrong?" he said slowly. "What, when a Wayne goes courting a Ratcliffe? I can't picture owt wronger, ony way, seeing what has come between 'em lately an' aforetime."

"Hoity-toity! That's been Mistress Nell's way o' looking at it--but 'tisn't mine. Look at 'em, Hiram, an' say if they don't mak a bonnie couple."

"What's bonniness to do wi' 't? They're a bad stock, root an' branch, is th' Ratcliffes, an' it 'ull be a sore day for Marsh when th' Maister brings sich as yond to th' owd house. Besides, he has sworn to kill her folk."

"Well, ye cannot cut young hearts i' two wi' kinship, an' that's what I'm telling thee. Mistress Ratcliffe hes nawther father nor brother living, an' them she dwells wi' up at Wildwater are nowt so near to her but what a good lad's love is nearer."

"Hod thy whisht, lass!" cried Hiram on the sudden. "Th' Maister is looking this way at last. Begow, but he mun hev had summat deep to say to her, or he'd have seen us afore this."

Shameless Wayne reddened on seeing the occupants of the stile, and whispered to Janet, and the two of them turned quickly about, taking a cross-line back toward the moor.

"Flaired to be spoken to by honest folk," said Hiram.

"Flaired o' thy sour face, more like," snapped Martha.

Hiram was about to make one of his slow, exasperating responses when he clutched Martha by the arm and again pointed over the stile--not up the ploughed field this time, but across the pasture-land abutting on it.

"We shall know by an' by what Red Ratcliffe has in mind," he muttered; "dost see him yonder, Martha, crossing th' pasture? Ay, an' now he's following 'em up th' wallside."

"So he is. There's no mistaking that red thatch o' hisn--'twill set th' sun afire one bonnie day, I'm thinking. Does he mean to do th' Maister a hurt, think ye, Hiram?"

Hiram stretched himself with the air of a man who has work to do. "He's too far off yet for a pistol-shot; but he's quickening pace a bit, an' Lord knows what he's bent on. I reckon I'll just clamber ower th' wall here, Martha, an' wend down t' other side, and get a word wi' him as if 'twar chance like."

"Tak care o' thyseln, Hiram. There are some of us wod ill like to see harm come to thee."

But Hiram was deaf to blandishments. He had gone far enough for one morning, and, all else apart, he was no whit sorry to slip out of temptation's way.

"There's no telling when a Ratcliffe is about," he said, putting one leg over the low wall, "an' th' Maister is so throttle-deep i' foolishness just now that he's ripe-ready to fall into ony snare that's laid for him. Begow, Martha, but I don't know what th' world wod come to if there war no Hiram Hey to straighten it now and again!"

Martha sighed for the interrupted wooing as she lifted her pail from the stile. Hiram Hey moved surely, it might be, but life seemed short for such masterly painstaking slowness.

"It's war nor driving pigs to market, is getting Hiram to speak plain," she said to herself, setting off for home.--"Tha'll be back to thy dinner, Hiram?" she added over her shoulder.

"For sure I will. There's more nor dinner to tempt me down to Marsh," he cried, his rashness gaining on him now that he stood on the far side of the wall.

On no point save wedlock, however, did Hiram fail to know his purpose. He might have much to say about the young Master, but he had no mind to see harm come to him; and so he moved with a steady swing across the field, then turned sharp and crossed to the wall behind which Red Ratcliffe was creeping at a point some ten-score yards from the stile. He stopped then and leaned a pair of careless arms over the wall and looked everywhere but at the object of his manoeuvres, whose progress he had guessed to a nicety.

"Why, is't ye, Maister Ratcliffe?" he cried, letting his eyes fall at last on the tall, lean figure that stood not two yards away on the far side of the wall.

Ratcliffe glanced at him, but could not guess whether Hiram's stolid face hid any deeper thought than an idle wish to chatter. "'Tis I, plain enough," he growled.

"Nay, doan't fly at me--on a grand day like this, an' all. I thowt mebbe ye'd stepped on to th' Marsh land just to pick up a two-three wrinkles about farming. 'Tis not oft we're favoured wi' a sight o' ye down here."

"Dost think I need come here to learn any point of tillage?" laughed the other angrily.

"Well, I thowt it showed good sense i' ye. We're a tidy lot at Marsh, so folk say, an' I'm none blaming ye at Wildwater, ye understand for knawing a bit less about farming nor us. Your land's high, for one thing, an' lean as a scraped flint--I warrant it does your een good to see sich lovesome furrows as them, ye're walking ower."

"If speech can earn thee a cracked crown, thou'lt not long go whole of head," snapped Ratcliffe, beginning to move forward.

"Theer, theer! Th' gentry's allus so hot when a plain man strives to talk pleasant like to 'em. But it's live an' let live, I allus did say, an' sich fair spring weather as this hes a trick o' setting my tongue wagging." A sly glance at the other's back told him that Red Ratcliffe must be fetched up sharp if he were to be prevented from following Wayne of Marsh and Janet. "It sets other folk's tongues agate, too, seemingly," he added, glancing toward the hill-crest over which his Master and the girl were disappearing; "they mak a fine couple, doan't they, Maister, him an' Mistress Ratcliffe?"

Ratcliffe faced about. "Palsy take thee!" he cried. "Art thou a fool, only, Hiram Hey, or dost think to jest with thy betters?"

"Nay, I'm nobbut a fool, I reckon," said Hiram, shaking his head mournfully. "I can't say owt to please ye, 'twould seem, choose what, so I'd better hod my whisht. When I see a bonnie lass, an' th' finest lad i' th' moorside beside her--why, I thowt it could do no harm just to speak on 't, like."

"The finest lad in the moorside?" sneered Ratcliffe. "Since when did Wayne the Shameless earn his new title?"

"What, ye've not heard his praises then? I may hev my own opinion--ivery man hes a right to that--but Marshcotes an' Ling Crag can find nowt too good to say about him nowadays. Oh, ay, they all grant 'at th' Wayne land is th' best on th' moor, an' ots Maister th' handiest chap wi' sword or farming-tools. 'Tis sad, for sure, that there's such bad blood 'twixt ye an' th' Waynes; but this courtship 'ull mebbe cure it.--Nay, now, doan't be so hasty! I speak according to my lights; they may be poor uns, as Blind Tom o' Trawdon says, but they're all I've getten to go by."

Not a muscle of Hiram's face told how he was enjoying this skirmish with his enemy; only an added watchfulness of eye told that he half expected the other to strike him. His Master was out of sight now, and there was so much gained, whatever chanced to himself. But Ratcliffe lost his anger on the sudden, and turned to Hiram with something near to good-nature in his tone.

"Well, thou'rt dry, Hiram, with a shrewd wit of thy own, but I warn thee for thy own sake not to couple any Wayne with Mistress Ratcliffe in thy gossip.--Ay, and that calls another thing to mind; they say ye Wayne folk cut peats on the Wildwater land last summer, and ever since I've been seeking a chance to tell thee we'll have no more of that."

Hiram, wondering what lay under this change of front, answered slowly. "We're no thiefs, Maister; an' if our peat beds lie foot-to-heel wi' yourn, is that to say we'd ower-step th' boundary? Besides, we've no call to; our side o' th' bed yields better peats----"

"Well, I judge by what I'm told, and our farm-folk told us further that ye had carted some of their own peats as they lay up-ended for the drying."

"Begow, that's a likely tale!" cried Hiram, roused at last. "When we worked noon an' neet for a week, cutting an' drying an' carting, to be telled we----"

"There! Thou'rt honest, Hiram, and I'll take thy word for it," laughed Ratcliffe. "So the peats have lasted, have they? Ours are all but done after this cursed winter."

"Now, what's he at?" muttered Hiram. "When th' Ratcliffe breed hatches a civil word, they allus want stiff payment for 't.--Our peats are lasting fine, an' thankee," he said. "'Tis all a matter o' forethought, an' some fowk hesn't mich o' that. Oh, ay, we've getten a shed-full next to th' mistals, let alone th' stack at th' far-side o' th' yard; an' it's April now, so I reckon we shall see th' winter through. Ye niver catch us tripping down at Marsh."

"Not oft," said Ratcliffe, with a crafty smile.--"Faith, though, thy boasting would move better if it had less to carry, Hiram. We're all at fault once in a while, and I warrant that, if the peats will last, your bedding--bracken and the like,--has fallen short."

"Then ye'll warrant to little purpose," put in Hiram, with triumph, "they lig side by side, th' peats an' th' bedding--an' if ye'll step down an' tak a look at Marsh ye'll find a fairish heap o' both sorts."

He laughed at the humour of the invitation, and Red Ratcliffe followed suit as he turned on his heel.

"Another day, Hiram, and meanwhile I'll take word back to Wildwater, that we've all to learn yet from the wise men who dwell at Marsh."

"Scoff as ye will, ye're varry right there," muttered Hiram, as he too, went his way. "But I'd like to know what made ye frame to speak so civil all at once."

Red Ratcliffe was already moving across the field, with a light step and a face that was full of cunning glee; nor did he slacken pace until, half toward Wildwater, he saw Shameless Wayne parting from Janet at the corner of the crossroads. His face darkened for a moment, then cleared as he watched Shameless Wayne pass down the road to Marsh.

"I've learned two things worth the knowing to-day," he murmured, striding after his cousin, "and both should cut solid ground from under Wayne's feet. God, though, they did not part like lovers! Has Janet's needle-tongue proved over-sharp for Shameless Wayne? Ay, it must be so--and now she's full of sorrow for the quarrel, all in a maid's way, and droops like any wayside flower."

Janet turned as his step sounded close behind her; she glanced at the road which Wayne had taken, and then at Red Ratcliffe, but his manner was so open and free of its wonted subtlety that she told herself, with a quick breath of relief, that her secret was safe enough as yet.

"Would'st have company on the road, cousin?" he said lightly.

"I had better company before thou cam'st," she answered lifting her dainty brows.

He stared at her, thinking that she meant, at the bidding of one of her wilder moods, to make frank avowal of her meeting with Shameless Wayne. "Better company? Whose was't?" he snapped.

"Why, sir, my own." There was trouble deep-seated in her eyes, but her tone was light; for she had learned by hard experience to know that only mockery could keep Red Ratcliffe's surly heat of passion in any sort of check.

"Art something less than civil, Janet, to one who loves thee."

"Well, then, why fret thyself with such a thankless Mistress? I'm weary of hearing thee play the lover, and I tell thee so again--for the third time, I think, since yesterday."

"Thou'lt be wearier still before I've done with wooing thee. Hark, Janet; 'tis no light fancy, this----"

"Light or heavy, sir, 'tis all one to me. My thoughts lie off from wedlock."

He stopped and gripped her hands with sudden fury. "By God, if thy love turns to any but me," he cried, "I'll cut the heart out of the man who wins thee."

She pulled her hands away and stepped back a pace or two; and amid all his spleen he could not but admire the fine aloofness of her carriage. Not like a maid at all was she; heaving breast, and bright, watchful eye, and back-thrown head, seemed rather those of some wild thing of the moors, pursued and driven to bay among the wastes where hitherto she had lived out of sight and touch of men.

"So it comes to this, Red Ratcliffe?" she said slowly. "The sorriest fool at Wildwater dares to use force when I refuse him love?"

"'Twas the thought thou might'st love elsewhere that stung me," he muttered, cowed by her fury.

Again a passing doubt crossed her mind--a doubt lest he had reached the cross-roads in time to see her bid farewell to Shameless Wayne. "How should I love elsewhere?" she faltered.

Red Ratcliffe paused, wondering if he should loose his shaft at once, but he thought better of it. Janet was safe under hand at Wildwater for the nonce, and if he bided his time until her mood has less gustiness in it, he might use his knowledge to better purpose.

"Nay, I trust thy pride far enough, and thy fear of the Lean Man, to know thou'lt not wed worse blood than ours," he said softly; "but I'm not the only one at Wildwater that hungers for thee, and there are the Ryecollar Ratcliffes besides."

"And fifty more belike. What then, sir?"

"This--that I'll have thee, girl, if every Ratcliffe of them all says nay," he muttered savagely.

She glanced at him, then turned her back and moved to the far side of the road. "Art a man sometimes in thy words," she said, over her shoulder. "If only thou could'st show deeds to back them--why, I think I'd forgive thee the folly of thy love for its passion's sake. There, cousin! I'm weary o the talk, and my steps will not keep pace with thine to Wildwater."

"Thou askest deeds? Well, thou shalt have them before the week is out," he said, and struck across the moor. At another time he would not have accepted such easiful dismissal; but he knew the game was his now, and there was nothing to be gained by matching his wit with hers through two long miles.

"What ailed me to walk so openly with Wayne of Marsh?" mused Janet, following at her leisure. "I had as lief we were seen by grandfather himself as by yonder spiteful rogue-- And all to what end? Wayne is against me, too, though his face cannot hide"--she stopped, and her trouble melted into a low laugh--"cannot hide what I would see there."

Red Ratcliffe did not go straight into the hall as he reached Wildwater. Some dark instinct, begotten of fight and plot and brute passion barely held in check, drew him to the pool that underlay the house. The look of the sullen water, the old stories that were buried in its nether slime, touched a kindred chord in him, and he gleaned a sombre joy from standing at the edge and counting again the dead which tradition gave the pool. He was roused by a touch on his shoulder, and looking round he saw old Nicholas watching him with a grim air of approval.

"It has a speech of its own, eh, lad? And wiser counsel under its speech than most I hear," said Nicholas, pointing to the water.

"Ay, it has hid a Wayne or two aforetime, and it seems to crave more such goodly food. Yet 'tis strange, sir, that Barguest is said to lie here o' nights. 'Tis he, they say, that kills the fish and keeps the moor-fowl from nesting on the banks. What should the guardian of Marsh House do sleeping cheek by jowl with us?"

The Lean Man quailed for a moment, as he had quailed when Nanny Witherlee told him how he had crossed Barguest on the Marsh threshold. But the disquiet passed. "Tush, lad!" he cried. "Leave Waynes to their own old wives' tales, and come to a story with more marrow in 't. Didst learn what I sent thee out to learn?"

Red Ratcliffe lost his brief touch of superstition. "Ay--and that without going nearer than half a league to Marsh. As I was on my way there I chanced on Hiram Hey, and the wry old fool told me all I asked with never a guess at my meaning."

"There's enough, is there?"

"And to spare. I've seen to the hemlock, too, and one of the lads is to go----"

"Hold thy peace!" cried Nicholas, chiding him roughly. "Here's Janet, and she must guess naught of this; 'twould only fright her."

Red Ratcliffe moved away as his cousin came up, for he had no wish to make further sport for her yet awhile. "Fright her, poor lambling, would it?" he muttered. "The Lean Man's care for her is wondrous--but what if he knew that I had learned more to-day than ever he sent me out in search of?"

"Come here, Janet," said Nicholas, as the girl halted, doubtful whether he wanted speech of her. "There has been somewhat on my tongue this long while past, and every time I see thee come in from these fond walks of thine, I read two things more clearly."

"And what are they, grandfather?" she said, slipping a coaxing hand into his.

"That the wind gives thee beauty enough to tempt any man--and that there's danger in it so long as we're at feud with the Waynes."

"But that is an old tale, sir," she pouted, "and--and no harm has come to me as yet."

"The more cause to fear it then, to-morrow, or the next day after. See, lass, I would not deal hardly with thee, but I'll not give way on this one point, plead as thou wilt. There are Ratcliffes in plenty who want thee in wedlock, and 'tis time thou hadst a strong arm about thee. Thou'lt wander less abroad, I warrant, soon as thou hast a goodman."

"But, grandfather, I do not want to----"

"Be quiet, child! And let an older head take better care of thee than thou wilt ever take of thyself. Besides, they are so hot for thee, one and another, that there's danger of a feud among ourselves if the matter is not settled one way or the other. Red Ratcliffe asked me for thee only yesternight."

"If the world held him and me, sir, I would go to the far side of it and leave him the other half," she cried, with childish vehemence.

"Well, well, there are others. I gave him free leave to win thee if he could, and he must do his own pleading now."

They stood by the water-side awhile in silence, the girl in sore fear of what this new mood of her grandfather's might bring, and Nicholas returning to the foolish scrap of goblin-lore with which Red Ratcliffe had just now disquieted him. Do as he would, the Lean Man could not hide from himself that a dread the more potent for its vagueness, had been creeping in on him ever since he learned what had lain on the Marsh doorway when he went to nail his token on the oak. Broad noon as it was now, the light lay heavy on the water, and Nicholas could not keep his eyes from it, nor his mind from the legend that named it the Brown Dog's lair.

"Janet," he said, looking up at her with a light in his keen eyes which she had never yet seen there, "there's a weak link, they say, in every man's chain of life, and it has taken me three-score years to find out mine. This Barguest that they talk of? Dost credit him, lass?"

She glanced quickly at him, puzzled by the vague terror in his voice. "I have lived with the voices of the moor," she answered gravely, "till I can doubt plain flesh and blood more easily than Barguest, and the Sorrowful Woman, and----"

"Pest!" he broke in impatiently. "'Tis fitting a maid should let her fancies stray. But a grown man, Janet? There! The pool breeds more than the one sort of vapour, and we'll stay no longer by it.--Think well, lass, on what I said of wedlock, for thou'lt have to make early choice."

Hiram Hey, meanwhile was sitting beside the kitchen hearth at Marsh, watching Martha clear the board after dinner; for he always dined at the house, thought he slept and took his other meals at the Low Farm. The rest of the serving-folk had gone to this or that occupation, and Hiram was minded to take up his wooing again at the exact spot where he had left it an hour or two earlier.

"I've been thinking o' things, Martha, sin' I saw thee looking so bonnie-like this morn," he said.

"What sort o' things?" she asked, demurely sweeping the table free of crumbs.

Hiram ruffled the frill of hair under his chin, and smiled with wintry foolishness. "Well, what's wrang for a young un like th' Maister is right enough for a seasoned chap like me. I'm rather backard i' coming forrard, tha sees, but it cam ower me t' other day that I mud varry weel look round an' about me; an' if I could find a wench 'at war all I looked for i' a wench----"

"Ay, what then, Hiram?"

He paused, and shuffled his feet among the heap of farmyard mud which had already fallen from his boots. "Why, there's niver no telling--niver no telling at all," he said, with an air of deep wisdom.

"Sakes, he's a slow un to move, is Hiram," muttered the girl, losing patience at last.

"Well, I mun be seeing after things, I reckon, or there'll be summat getting out o' gear," said Hiram, rising and stretching himself in very leisurely fashion.

"Ay, tha'rt famous thrang," flashed Martha. "Comes moaning an' groaning, does Hiram, at after he'd done his day, an' swears th' wark goes nigh to kill him. An' this is what it comes to most days, I reckon--loitering by stiles, an' talking foolishness to wenches 'at are ower busy to hearken----"

"Nay, lass, nay! I wod liefer we didn't part fratching."

"Well, hast getten owt to say?" she asked, facing him abruptly.

"Say? Well, now, I'm backard i' coming forrard, as I telled thee--but tha'rt as snod-set-up a wench as iver----"

"Thanks for nowt. Good-day, Hiram. Tha'rt backard i' most things, I'm thinking," said Martha, flouncing out into the yard.

Hiram looked after her awhile, then shook his head. "I war right to go slow," he murmured. "Women's allus so hasty, as if they war bahn to dee to-morn, an' all to get done afore their burial.--Well, I mun see to yond tummit seeds, I reckon; but I wod like to know what Red Ratcliffe war up to; summat he'd getten at th' back on his mind, but what it war beats me."

And something Red Ratcliffe had in mind; but what it was, and how nearly it touched those at Marsh, Hiram was not to learn this side the dawn.

*