CHAPTER III.

A Search.

"HOW late father is of coming back," cried Joe, as he entered the cottage, flushed and heated, after a long ramble with his brother. Sunburned little peasants were they, clad in coarse garments which, with their rough wear, gave plenty of work to Amy's thin fingers.

"You've been a-clamberin' and scrambling about," observed little May. "Joe, your smock is torn right down the side, and, David, the brim is nigh off your straw hat—a bit o' yer hair is sticking through."

"You'll give a stitch or two, and make the old thing hold together!" cried David, tossing the hat to Amy. "It ain't fit for a scarecrow. That rich old Mytton, as father talks on, he'd ha' stared could he ha' seen what his grand-grand-children would ha' come to!"

"Oh! That old Mytton, I think he was the man in the moon!" laughed Joe. "I don't believe a word about that big carriage and six grey horses. But I say, what's become of father, I thought he'd ha' been back afore now."

"I hope father's sold the wood, or won't he be in a way, and won't we catch it!" cried May.

"He was going not only to sell but to buy at the town," observed Amy. "Father promised to get a nice new bit of print for you, May, for I told him I'd mended and patched that frock of yours as long as I could, but that now it's all coming to pieces, let me do what I will, it's so old."

"I don't think as how it ever was new!" cried Joe. "You wore it at first yourself as long back as I can remember, Amy."

"Ah! There's father coming! I can see him over the common!" exclaimed May eagerly, for the purchase of a new frock was a great event to the child.

"And there's no wood left in the cart, I'm glad of that," observed David. "But sure Dobbin must be lame, he's a-going so slow. There's father a-whacking him well; but he don't go much the faster."

The sound of Mytton's blows on the back of the patient, plodding creature always gave pain to Amy's kindly heart. She would never have willingly inflicted pain on any of God's creatures, least of all upon one that had long and faithfully served her.

The children went out to meet their father, all but Amy, who was so feeble that to rise unaided from the chair upon which she was seated was an effort almost beyond her strength. The poor girl could tell from the tone of Mytton's voice before he entered the cottage that he was out of temper, and inclined to quarrel with all the world.

"Take the beast out of the cart, boys; he's not worth the thistles that he crops! I don't believe I could get five shillings for the lazy brute if I sold him to-morrow. And there was Sir Marmaduke, with his two spanking bays," continued Mytton, as he crossed the threshold of his humble little dwelling, "whirling along the highway, covering me with his dust, and nigh driving over cart, donkey, and all; a fellow whose grandfather was a manufacturer, and spun all his money out of sheep's wool!" Mytton threw himself down on a seat, pulled off his felt cap, and wiped his heated brow with his hand; a handkerchief was a thing of which he did not boast the possession.

"Did you buy the print for me, father?" cried May, who had followed Mytton into the cottage.

"No," the man answered sharply.

"Oh! You forgot it!" exclaimed May, in a tone of disappointment.

"I didn't forget it, I was in the shop, the fellow behind the counter was just going to serve me, when a fine open carriage pulls up at the door, and Sir Marmaduke flings the horses' reins to his liveried lackey and gets out. Of course, I had to stand back to let the fine gentleman pass, I whose ancestor kept a coach-and-six, when he, maybe, was a-running barefoot behind it!" Mytton looked unutterable scorn as he spoke. "He'd come to ask after the yellow satin he'd ordered for his drawing-room curtains; yellow satin, forsooth! Every yard of it costing as much as I'd earn in a week by my labour! I didn't choose to stand there waiting till a sneak of a shopman had done bowing and fawning and smiling to the great man, whose fortune had sprung up like a mushroom, so I turned on my heel and went out. I'm as good a man as Sir Marmaduke any day, for all his swaggering pride!"

Any one who had seen the sneer on the lip of the peasant might have guessed, and would have guessed truly, that there was more of pride under his blue smock, than swelled the heart of the wealthiest peer in the land. In a savage spirit of discontent, Mytton cut a thick hunch of bread from the loaf which Amy had spread ready for him, and a slice from the piece of stale cheese. There was no grace said before dinner by Mytton, indeed thanksgiving would have keen a mockery from one who looked upon himself as wronged, because he had been born in a station as lowly as that which the Lord of Heaven, when He came to visit earth, had chosen for His own.

Mytton ate his bread and cheese in gloomy silence, which his daughters were afraid to break; the two boys were lingering outside with the donkey. Presently Joe thrust in his flaxen poll at the door, and said, "There be a yellow post chaise coming 'cross the common."

And May ran out to look at it, either because any kind of conveyance was a rarity in that place, or because the presence of one stern irritable man made the cottage uncomfortable.

The thoughts of Amy had wandered far-away from the scene before her, when they were suddenly recalled to earth by an exclamation from her father, who was seated opposite to the open door.

"Why—the chariot is stopping here!" cried Mytton.

A bald-headed gentleman put his head out of the carriage window.

"Can you tell me, little girl, if any one of the name of Mytton lives in this neighbourhood?" said he, addressing himself to May, who stood with her chubby finger in her mouth, staring at instead of answering the stranger.

"That be my father," said Joe, grinning with wonder that any one coming in a yellow chariot should wish to see him.

"Is any one wanting me?" asked Silas, rising and going forth from his cottage, for in that quiet spot every word spoken had been heard in the dwelling.

Instead of replying, the gentleman opened the door of the chaise and got out.

"I thought, from the description given me, that this must be the place, Sharp," said he to a younger man who directly followed him.

Mytton looked a little surly, like an Englishman who feels that his cottage is his castle, and wishes to know on what errand strangers come, before he welcomes or admits them.

"Have you any business with me, sir?" he inquired.

"I have a little business, my good man, which can best be transacted within doors. My name is Garway—I am from London. Can I have a little talk with you?" asked the gentleman.

And, taking Mytton's silence for consent, he and his companion entered the cottage, followed by Silas and the wondering group of his children.

"Pray don't disturb yourself—an invalid, I fear," said Mr. Garway, motioning courteously to Amy, who had attempted to rise on his entrance to offer one of the strangers her chair.

The lawyers, for such they were, then seated themselves on high wooden stools which Mytton had made himself, and the younger man produced, to the surprise of the children, not only a large pocket-book, but an ink-bottle and steel pen, and pushing aside the fragments of bread and cheese on the table, placed his writing materials upon it, evidently preparing to take notes. This looked like business indeed.

"Can you inform me," said Mr. Garway to Silas, "whether you are in any way, however remotely, connected with the ancient family of the Myttons of Oaklands, in Shropshire."

The question brought the blood to the swarthy cheek of the hewer of wood.

"My grandfather's grandfather was the owner of the finest place in that county," said he.

The children glanced curiously at the strangers, half expecting them to laugh at such a boast from so poor a man as their father; but they both looked perfectly grave, and Mr. Sharp dipped his pen, and wrote something in his book.

"From what source do you derive your information—I mean, how do you know the fact which you assert?" inquired Mr. Garway.

"I have heard my grandfather speak about it often, when I was a boy," answered Silas; "he died afore I was ten years old."

Mr. Sharp set down the reply.

"But have you only oral—I mean, do you only draw upon your own memory?" asked the lawyer. "Can you trace up the family links which connect you with Hugh Mytton, who lived in the reign of Queen Anne? Have you any proofs to give that you are descended from him?"

"May I be bold, sir, to ask why you put these questions?" asked Mytton, the strong brawny fist which he was resting on the table actually trembling with nervous excitement.

"It may be of consequence to you, my good friend, that I should know all that you can tell me. I put these questions in no spirit of idle curiosity. The fact is, that the last inheritor of Oaklands, in the direct line, has died, and there is considerable difficulty in tracing out to whom the succession legally belongs."

The little rustics stared at each other; they could not understand the lawyer's long words, but they could see that they powerfully excited their father. The veins in his forehead swelled, his hand trembled more than before. A dim idea dawned on the minds of the young Myttons that the fairy tale of the coach and six horses might turn out to be true after all!

"Now, let me ask you again," continued Mr. Garway. "Have you any means of proving your descent from Hugh Mytton of Oaklands?"

"I remember my grandfather telling me all about him forty years ago, as well as if it were yesterday," stammered forth Mytton.

"Ah—you remember, but that's not quite enough. Can you tell me the names of your grandfather's parents, when they lived, and at what church they were married?"

Silas rubbed his brow, passed his fingers through his hair—looked first to the right, and then to the left—but could make no reply to the question. It was very clear that his memory could not go beyond his grandfather, and the tales which the old man had told. He was unable to declare, with certainty, even where his own parents had been married. Mytton could give no distinct evidence on any point, except as to his having heard in his childhood of the great property in Shropshire, owned by one of his ancestors, who used to go up to London once a year in a coach drawn by six fine grey horses.

"But have you no documents, no certificates, no family papers of any kind?" asked Mr. Sharp, upon whose steel pen the ink had dried, while his companion was vainly trying to draw information from Mytton.

Mytton caught at the lawyer's suggestion, as a drowning man might at a rope.

"There was a box holding papers somewhere," cried he.

"Yes, in our room," said Joe.

"Fetch it—bring it at once!" cried both the lawyers and Mytton, speaking together.

"Can't, it's a hen-coop now," muttered the boy, shrinking back, alarmed at the fierce expression on the face of his father.

"You little dog—" began the enraged man, but Mr. Garway stopped his explosion of rage with a gesture of the hand.

"Softly, friend, let me question the boy," he said. "If the box has been made into a hen-coop, what have you done, let me ask, with the papers it contained?"

"I han't done nothin' with 'em," faltered Joe, giving a timid sidelong glance at his father.

"Yes, you patched the window-pane," said little May, pointing to the casement in which more than one pane held more of paper than of glass.

Mr. Sharp instantly rose, went up to the window, and carefully examined the paper; then shook his head, and returned to his seat.

"It, is desirable that every fragment of old papers which the box contained should, if possible, be recovered," observed Mr. Garway. "I would have the strictest search made for them at once."

Off started Joe and David, almost before the sentence was finished; they were only too glad to make their escape from the room, and their ambitious hopes were awakened by the gentlemen evidently setting great value upon what had seemed worthless to them.

"I has," began May, and stopt short in fear.

"You have what, little woman?" asked Sharp.

"Bits in my bag," whispered the child.

Mytton eagerly snatched the bag from her arm, and emptied its contents on the table; turning-the bag inside out, to make sure that no scrap should escape his notice. He turned over the soiled printed leaves with evident disappointment.

"Only bits of an old Bible, no use at all," he muttered.

"I beg your pardon, my good man," said Mr. Garway; "it by no means follows that an old family Bible, of which these leaves appear to have formed a part, should be of no use to us in our search. Many persons keep family records of births and marriages in the blank page of their Bibles, and if this—"

"Ha! Look here!" interrupted Mr. Sharp, catching up a yellow three-cornered morsel of paper with writing upon it, which had got mixed up with the printed portions. "Here is '—ried June 1, 1714,' doubtless this is part of an old record of marriage."

"If we could only discover the rest of the page from which that was torn," cried Mr. Garway. "I should not wonder if we found that we had got hold of the right clue at last."

Diligent search was made amongst the papers which May had put into her bag, but not another scrap could be found to match that three-cornered bit. The whole cottage—upstairs and downstairs—was searched;—the shed, the yard, the dust-hole, the hen-coop, every likely and unlikely spot was hunted over for paper, and papers were found, but the lawyers, after examination, shook their heads at them all.

The Mytton family were in a state of violent excitement, all except one pallid girl who sat by the window, almost unnoticed, because too feeble to join in the search. The extreme anxiety to find a page taken from a family Bible, a page which might possibly help to prove a right to an earthly inheritance, sadly contrasted with the utter indifference felt as regarded the heavenly inheritance to which God's Word skews the believer's claim. But that indifference was not shared by Amy: the scene of bustle around her suggested holy thoughts to her mind. While Silas and the lawyers were eagerly peering over fragments of papers brought by the younger Myttons, the words of a hymn, like soft, low, music, were breathing peace into Amy's soul.

"When I can read my title clear To mansions in the skies, I'll bid farewell to every fear. And wipe my weeping eyes."