"Who's findin' fault, Mister Dubble?" asked Peke soothingly. "I on'y said 'twas powerful warm."

"An' no one but a sawny 'xpects it to be powerful cold in July," growled Dubble—"though some there is an' some there be what cries fur snow in August, but I aint one on 'em."

"No, 'e aint one on 'em," commented a burly farmer, blowing away the foam from the brim of a tankard of ale which was set on the table in front of him. "'E alluz takes just what cooms along easy loike, do Mizter Dubble!"

There followed a silence. It was instinctively felt that the discussion was hardly important enough to be continued. Moreover, every man in the room was conscious of a stranger's presence, and each one cast a furtive glance at Helmsley, who, imitating Peke's example, had taken off his hat, and now sat quietly under the flickering light of the oil lamp which was suspended from the middle of the ceiling. He himself was intensely interested in the turn his wanderings had taken. There was a certain excitement in his present position,—he was experiencing the "new sensation" he had longed for,—and he realised it with the fullest sense of enjoyment. To be one of the richest men in the world, and yet to seem so miserably poor and helpless as to be regarded with suspicion by such a class of fellows as those among whom he was now seated, was decidedly a novel way of acquiring an additional relish for the varying chances and changes of life.

"Brought yer father along wi' ye, Matt?" suddenly asked a wizened little man of about sixty, with a questioning grin on his hard weather-beaten features.

"I aint up to 'awkin' dead bodies out o' their graves yet, Bill Bush," answered Peke. "Unless my old dad's corpsy's turned to yerbs, which is more'n likely, I aint got 'im. This 'ere's a friend o' mine,—Mister David—e's out o' work through the Lord's speshul dispensation an' rule o' natur—gettin' old!"

A laugh went round, but a more favourable impression towards Peke's companion was at once created by this introduction.

"Sorry for ye!" said the individual called Bill Bush, nodding encouragingly to Helmsley. "I'm a bit that way myself."

He winked, and again the company laughed. Bill was known as one of the most daring and desperate poachers in all the countryside, but as yet he had never been caught in the act, and he was one of Miss Tranter's "respectable" customers. But, truth to tell, Miss Tranter had some very odd ideas of her own. One was that rabbits were vermin, and that it was of no consequence how or by whom they were killed. Another was that "wild game" belonged to everybody, poor and rich. Vainly was it explained to her that rich landowners spent no end of money on breeding and preserving pheasants, grouse, and the like,—she would hear none of it.

"Stuff and nonsense," she said sharply. "The birds breed by themselves quite fast enough if let alone,—and the Lord intended them so to do for every one's use and eating, not for a few mean and selfish money-grubs who'd shoot and sell their own babies if they could get game prices for them!"

And she had a certain sympathy with Bill Bush and his nefarious proceedings. As long as he succeeded in evading the police, so long would he be welcome at the "Trusty Man," but if once he were to be clapped into jail the door of his favourite "public" would be closed to him. Not that Miss Tranter was a woman who "went back," as the saying is, on her friends, but she had to think of her licence, and could not afford to run counter to those authorities who had the power to take it away from her.

"I'm a-shrivellin' away for want o' suthin' to do," proceeded Bill. "My legs aint no show at all to what they once was."

And he looked down at those members complacently. They were encased in brown velveteens much the worse for wear, and in shape resembled a couple of sticks with a crook at the knees.

"I lost my sitiwation as gamekeeper to 'is Royal 'Ighness the Dook o' Duncy through bein' too 'onest," he went on with another wink. "'Orful pertikler, the Dook was,—nobuddy was 'llowed to be 'onest wheer 'e was but 'imself! Lord love ye! It don't do to be straight an' square in this world!"

Helmsley listened to this bantering talk, saying nothing. He was pale, and sat very still, thus giving the impression of being too tired to notice what was going on around him. Peke took up the conversation.

"Stow yer gab, Bill!" he said. "When you gits straight an' square, it'll be a round 'ole ye'll 'ave to drop into, mark my wurrd! An' no Dook o' Duncy 'ull pull ye out! This 'ere old friend o' mine don't unnerstand ye wi' yer fustian an' yer galligaskins. 'E's kinder eddicated—got a bit o' larnin' as I 'aves myself."

"Eddicated!" echoed Bill. "Eddication's a fine thing, aint it, if it brings an old gaffer like 'im to trampin' the road! Seems to me the more people's eddicated the less they's able to make a livin'."

"That's true! that's dorned true!" said the man named Dubble, bringing his great fist down on the table with a force that made the tankards jump. "My darter, she's larned to play the pianner, an' I'm dorned if she kin do anythin' else! Just a gillflurt she is, an' as sassy as a magpie. That's what eddication 'as made of 'er an' be dorned to 't!"

"'Scuse me," and Bill Bush now addressed himself immediately to Helmsley, "ef I may be so bold as to arsk you wheer ye comes from, meanin' no 'arm, an' what's yer purfession?"

Helmsley looked up with a friendly smile.

"I've no profession now," he answered at once. "But in my time—before I got too old—I did a good deal of office work."

"Office work! In a 'ouse of business, ye means? Readin', 'ritin', 'rithmetic, an' mebbe sweepin' the floor at odd times an' runnin' errands?"

"That's it!" answered Helmsley, still smiling.

"An' they won't 'ave ye no more?"

"I am too old," he answered quietly.

Here Dubble turned slowly round and surveyed him.

"How old be ye?"

"Seventy."

Silence ensued. The men glanced at one another. It was plain that the "one touch of nature which makes the whole world kin" was moving them all to kindly and compassionate feeling for the age and frail appearance of their new companion. What are called "rough" and "coarse" types of humanity are seldom without a sense of reverence and even affection for old persons. It is only among ultra-selfish and callous communities where over-luxurious living has blunted all the finer emotions, that age is considered a crime, or what by some individuals is declared worse than a crime, a "bore."

At that moment a short girl, with a very red face and round beady eyes, came into the room carrying on a tray two quaint old pewter tureens full of steaming soup, which emitted very savoury and appetising odours. Setting these down before Matt Peke and Helmsley, with two goodly slices of bread beside them, she held out her podgy hand.

"Threepence each, please!"

They paid her, Peke adding a halfpenny to his threepence for the girl herself, and Helmsley, who judged it safest to imitate Peke's behaviour, doing the same. She giggled.

"'Ope you aint deprivin' yourselves!" she said pertly.

"No, my dear, we aint!" retorted Peke. "We can afford to treat ye like the gentlemen doos! Buy yerself a ribbin to tie up yer bonnie brown 'air!"

She giggled again, and waited to see them begin their meal, then, with a comprehensive roll of her round eyes upon all the company assembled, she retired. The soup she had brought was certainly excellent,—strong, invigorating, and tasty enough to have done credit to a rich man's table, and Peke nodded over it with mingled surprise and appreciation.

"Miss Tranter knows what's good, she do!" he remarked to Helmsley in a low tone. "She's cooked this up speshul! This 'ere broth aint flavoured for me,—it's for you! Glory be good to me if she aint taken a fancy ter yer!—shouldn't wonder if ye 'ad the best in the 'ouse!"

Helmsley shook his head demurringly, but said nothing. He knew that in the particular position in which he had placed himself, silence was safer than speech.

Meanwhile, the short beady-eyed handmaiden returned to her mistress in the kitchen, and found that lady gazing abstractedly into the fire.

"They've got their soup," she announced, "an' they're eatin' of it up!"

"Is the old man taking it?" asked Miss Tranter.

"Yes'm. An' 'e seems to want it 'orful bad, 'orful bad 'e do, on'y 'e swallers it slower an' more soft like than Matt Peke swallers."

Miss Tranter ceased to stare at the fire, and stared at her domestic instead.

"Prue," she said solemnly, "that old man is a gentleman!"

Prue's round eyes opened a little more roundly.

"Lor', Mis' Tranter!"

"He's a gentleman," repeated the hostess of the "Trusty Man" with emphasis and decision; "and he's fallen on bad times. He may have to beg his bread along the road or earn a shilling here and there as best he can, but nothing"—and here Miss Tranter shook her forefinger defiantly in the air—"nothing will alter the fact that he's a gentleman!"

Prue squeezed her fat red hands together, breathed hard, and not knowing exactly what else to do, grinned. Her mistress looked at her severely.

"You grin like a Cheshire cat," she remarked. "I wish you wouldn't."

Prue at once pursed in her wide mouth to a more serious double line.

"How much did they give you?" pursued Miss Tranter.

"'Apenny each," answered Prue.

"How much have you made for yourself to-day all round!"

"Sevenpence three fardin's," confessed Prue, with an appealing look.

"You know I don't allow you to take tips from my customers," went on Miss Tranter. "You must put those three farthings in my poor-box."

"Yes'm!" sighed Prue meekly.

"And then you may keep the sevenpence."

"Oh thank y' 'm! Thank y', Mis' Tranter!" And Prue hugged herself ecstatically. "You'se 'orful good to me, you is, Mis' Tranter!"

Miss Tranter stood a moment, an upright inflexible figure, surveying her.

"Do you say your prayers every night and morning as I told you to do?"

Prue became abnormally solemn.

"Yes, I allus do, Mis' Tranter, wish I may die right 'ere if I don't!"

"What did I teach you to say to God for the poor travellers who stop at the 'Trusty Man'?"

"'That it may please Thee to succour, help and comfort all that are in danger, necessity and tribulation, we beseech Thee to hear us Good Lord!'" gabbled Prue, shutting her eyes and opening them again with great rapidity.

"That's right!" And Miss Tranter bent her head graciously. "I'm glad you remember it so well! Be sure you say it to-night. And now you may go, Prue."

Prue went accordingly, and Miss Tranter, resuming her knitting, returned to the bar, and took up her watchful position opposite the clock, there to remain patiently till closing time.



CHAPTER VII

The minutes wore on, and though some of the company at the "Trusty Man" went away in due course, others came in to replace them, so that even when it was nearing ten o'clock the common room was still fairly full. Matt Peke was evidently hail-fellow-well-met with many of the loafers of the district, and his desultory talk, with its quaint leaning towards a kind of rustic philosophy intermingled with an assumption of profound scientific wisdom, appeared to exercise considerable fascination over those who had the patience and inclination to listen to it. Helmsley accepted a pipe of tobacco offered to him by the surly-looking Dubble and smoked peacefully, leaning back in his chair and half closing his eyes with a drowsy air, though in truth his senses had never been more alert, or his interest more keenly awakened. He gathered from the general conversation that Bill Bush was an accustomed night lodger at the "Trusty Man," that Dubble had a cottage not far distant, with a scolding wife and an uppish daughter, and that it was because she knew of his home discomforts that Miss Tranter allowed him to pass many of his evenings at her inn, smoking and sipping a mild ale, which without fuddling his brains, assisted him in part to forget for a time his domestic worries. And he also found out that the sturdy farmer sedately sucking his pipe in a corner, and now and then throwing in an unexpected and random comment on whatever happened to be the topic of conversation, was known as "Feathery" Joltram, though why "Feathery" did not seem very clear, unless the term was, as it appeared to be, an adaptation of "father" or "feyther" Joltram. Matt Peke explained that old "Feathery" was a highly respected character in the "Quantocks," and not only rented a large farm, but thoroughly understood the farming business. Moreover, that he had succeeded in making himself somewhat of a terror to certain timorous time-servers, on account of his heterodox and obstinate principles. For example, he had sent his children to school because Government compelled him to do so, but when their schooldays were over, he had informed them that the sooner they forgot all they had ever learned during that period and took to "clean an' 'olesome livin'," the better he should be pleased.

"For it's all rort an' rubbish," he declared, in his broad, soft dialect. "I dozn't keer a tinker's baad 'apenny whether tha knaw 'ow to 'rite tha mizchief or to read it, or whether king o' England is eatin' 'umble pie to the U-nited States top man, or noa,—I keerz nawt aboot it, noben way or t'other. My boys 'as got to laarn draawin' crops out o' fields,—an' my gels must put 'and to milkin' and skimmin' cream an' makin' foinest butter as iver went to market. An' time comin' to wed, the boys 'ull take strong dairy wives, an' the gels 'ull pick men as can thraw through men's wurrk, or they'ze nay gels nor boys o' mine. Tarlk o' Great Britain! Heart alive! Wheer would th' owd country be if 'twere left to pulin' booky clerks what thinks they're gemmen, an' what weds niminy-piminy shop gels, an' breeds nowt but ricketty babes fit for workus' burial! Noa, by the Lord! No school larnin' for me nor mine, thank-ee! Why, the marster of the Board School 'ere doant know more practical business o' life than a suckin' calf! With a bit o' garden ground to 'is cot, e' doant reckon 'ow io till it, an' that's the rakelness o' book larnin'. Noa, noa! Th' owd way o' wurrk's the best way,—brain, 'ands, feet an' good ztrong body all zet on't, an' no meanderin' aff it! Take my wurrd the Lord A'mighty doant 'elp corn to grow if there's a whinin' zany ahint the plough!"

With these distinctly "out-of-date" notions, "Feathery" Joltram had also set himself doggedly against church-going and church people generally. Few dared mention a clergyman in his presence, for his open and successful warfare with the minister of his own parish had been going on for years and had become well-nigh traditional. Looking at him, however, as he sat in his favourite corner of the "Trusty Man's" common room, no one would have given him credit for any particular individuality. His round red face expressed nothing,—his dull fish-like eyes betrayed no intelligence,—he appeared to be nothing more than a particularly large, heavy man, wedged in his chair rather than seated in it, and absorbed in smoking a long pipe after the fashion of an infant sucking a feeding-bottle, with infinite relish that almost suggested gluttony.

The hum of voices grew louder as the hour grew later, and one or two rather noisy disputations brought Miss Tranter to the door. A look of hers was sufficient to silence all contention, and having bent the warning flash of her eyes impressively upon her customers, she retired as promptly and silently as she had appeared. Helmsley was just thinking that he would slip away and get to bed, when, a firm tread sounded in the outer passage, and a tall man, black-haired, black-eyed, and of herculean build, suddenly looked in upon the tavern company with a familiar nod and smile.

"Hullo, my hearties!" he exclaimed. "Is all tankards drained, or is a drop to spare?"

A shout of welcome greeted him:—"Tom!" "Tom o' the Gleam!" "Come in, Tom!" "Drinks all round!"—and there followed a general hustle and scraping of chairs on the floor,—every one seemed eager to make room for the newcomer. Helmsley, startled in a manner by his appearance, looked at him with involuntary and undisguised admiration. Such a picturesque figure of a man he had seldom or never seen, yet the fellow was clad in the roughest, raggedest homespun, the only striking and curious note of colour about him being a knitted crimson waistcoat, which instead of being buttoned was tied together with two or three tags of green ribbon. He stood for a moment watching the men pushing up against one another in order to give him a seat at the table, and a smile, half-amused, half-ironical, lighted up his sun-browned, handsome face.

"Don't put yourselves out, mates!" he said carelessly. "Mind Feathery's toes!—if you tread on his corns there'll be the devil to pay! Hullo, Matt Peke! How are you?"

Matt rose and shook hands.

"All the better for seein' ye again, Tom," he answered, "Wheer d'ye hail from this very present minit?"

"From the caves of Cornwall!" laughed the man. "From picking up drift on the shore and tracking seals to their lair in the hollows of the rocks!" He laughed again, and his great eyes flashed wildly. "All sport, Matt! I live like a gentleman born, keeping or killing at my pleasure!"

Here "Feathery" Joltram looked up and dumbly pointed with the stem of his pipe to a chair left vacant near the middle of the table. Tom o' the Gleam, by which name he seemed to be known to every one present, sat down, and in response to the calls of the company, a wiry pot-boy in shirt-sleeves made his appearance with several fresh tankards of ale, it now being past the hour for the attendance of that coy handmaiden of the "Trusty Man," Miss Prue.

"Any fresh tales to tell, Tom?" inquired Matt Peke then—"Any more harum-scarum pranks o' yours on the road?"

Tom drank off a mug of ale before replying, and took a comprehensive glance around the room.

"You have a stranger here," he said suddenly, in his deep, thrilling voice, "One who is not of our breed,—one who is unfamiliar with our ways. Friend or foe?"

"Friend!" declared Peke emphatically, while Bill Bush and one or two of the men exchanged significant looks and nudged each other. "Now, Tom, none of yer gypsy tantrums! I knows all yer Romany gibberish, an' I ain't takin' any. Ye've got a good 'art enough, so don't work yer dander up with this 'ere old chap what's a-trampin' it to try and find out all that's left o's fam'ly an' friends 'fore turnin' up 'is toes to the daisies. 'Is name is David, an' 'e's been kickt out o' office work through bein' too old. That's 'is ticket!"

Tom o' the Gleam listened to this explanation in silence, playing absently with the green tags of ribbon at his waistcoat. Then slowly lifting his eyes he fixed them full on Helmsley, who, despite himself, felt an instant's confusion at the searching intensity of the man's bold bright gaze.

"Old and poor!" he ejaculated. "That's a bad lookout in this world! Aren't you tired of living!"

"Nearly," answered Helmsley quietly—"but not quite."

Their looks met, and Tom's dark features relaxed into a smile.

"You're fairly patient!" he said, "for it's hard enough to be poor, but it's harder still to be old. If I thought I should live to be as old as you are, I'd drown myself in the sea! There's no use in life without body's strength and heart's love."

"Ah, tha be graat on the love business, Tom!" chuckled "Feathery" Joltram, lifting his massive body with a shake out of the depths of his comfortable chair. "Zeems to me tha's zummat like the burd what cozies a new mate ivery zummer!"

Tom o' the Gleam laughed, his strong even white teeth shining like a row of pearls between his black moustaches and short-cropped beard.

"You're a steady-going man, Feathery," he said, "and I'm a wastrel. But I'm ne'er as fickle as you think. I've but one love in the world that's left me—my kiddie."

"Ay, an' 'ow's the kiddie?" asked Matt Peke—"Thrivin' as iver?"

"Fine! As strong a little chap as you'll see between Quantocks and Land's End. He'll be four come Martinmas."

"Zo agein' quick as that!" commented Joltram with a broad grin. "For zure 'e be a man grow'd! Tha'll be puttin' the breechez on 'im an' zendin' 'im to the school——"

"Never!" interrupted Tom defiantly. "They'll never catch my kiddie if I know it! I want him for myself,—others shall have no part in him. He shall grow up wild like a flower of the fields—wild as his mother was—wild as the wild roses growing over her grave——"

He broke off suddenly with an impatient gesture.

"Psha! Why do you drag me over the old rough ground talking of Kiddie!" he exclaimed, almost angrily. "The child's all right. He's safe in camp with the women."

"Anywheres nigh?" asked Bill Bush.

Tom o' the Gleam made no answer, but the fierce look in his eyes showed that he was not disposed to be communicative on this point. Just then the sound of voices raised in some dispute on the threshold of the "Trusty Man," caused all the customers in the common room to pause in their talking and drinking, and to glance expressively at one another. Miss Tranter's emphatic accents rang out sharply on the silence.

"It wants ten minutes to ten, and I never close till half-past ten," she said decisively. "The law does not compel me to do so till eleven, and I resent private interference."

"I am aware that you resent any advice offered for your good," was the reply, delivered in harsh masculine tones. "You are a singularly obstinate woman. But I have my duty to perform, and as minister of this parish I shall perform it."

"Mind your own business first!" said Miss Tranter, with evident vehemence.

"My business is my duty, and my duty is my business,"—and here the male voice grew more rasping and raucous. "I have as much right to use this tavern as any one of the misled men who spend their hard earnings here and neglect their homes and families for the sake of drink. And as you do not close till half-past ten, it is not too late for me to enter."

During this little altercation, the party round the table in the common room sat listening intently. Then Dubble, rousing himself from a pleasant ale-warm lethargy, broke the spell.

"Dorned if it aint old Arbroath!" he said.

"Ay, ay, 'tis old Arbroath zartin zure!" responded "Feathery" Joltram placidly. "Let 'un coom in! Let 'un coom in!"

Tom o' the Gleam gave vent to a loud laugh, and throwing himself back in his chair, crossed his long legs and administered a ferocious twirl to his moustache, humming carelessly under his breath:—

"'And they called the parson to marry them, But devil a bit would he— For they were but a pair of dandy prats As couldn't pay devil's fee!'"

Helmsley's curiosity was excited. There was a marked stir of expectation among the guests of the "Trusty Man"; they all appeared to be waiting for something about to happen of exceptional interest. He glanced inquiringly at Peke, who returned the glance by one of warning.

"Best sit quiet a while longer," he said. "They won't break up till closin' hour, an' m'appen there'll be a bit o' fun."

"Ay, sit quiet!" said Tom o' the Gleam, catching these words, and turning towards Helmsley with a smile—"There's more than enough time for tramping. Come! Show me if you can smoke that!" "That" was a choice Havana cigar which he took out of the pocket of his crimson wool waistcoat. "You've smoked one before now, I'll warrant!"

Helmsley met his flashing eyes without wavering.

"I will not say I have not," he answered quietly, accepting and lighting the fragrant weed, "but it was long ago!"

"Ay, away in the Long, long ago!" said Tom, still regarding him fixedly, but kindly—"where we have all buried such a number of beautiful things,—loves and hopes and beliefs, and dreams and fortunes!—all, all tucked away under the graveyard grass of the Long Ago!"

Here Miss Tranter's voice was heard again outside, saying acidly:—

"It's clear out and lock up at half-past ten, business or no business, duty or no duty. Please remember that!"

"'Ware, mates!" exclaimed Tom,—"Here comes our reverend!"

The door was pushed open as he spoke, and a short, dark man in clerical costume walked in with a would-be imposing air of dignity.

"Good-evening, my friends!" he said, without lifting his hat.

There was no response.

He smiled sourly, and surveyed the assembled company with a curious air of mingled authority and contempt. He looked more like a petty officer of dragoons than a minister of the Christian religion,—one of those exacting small military martinets accustomed to brow-beating and bullying every subordinate without reason or justice.

"So you're there, are you, Bush!" he continued, with a frowning glance levied in the direction of the always suspected but never proved poacher,—"I wonder you're not in jail by this time!"

Bill Bush took up his pewter tankard, and affected to drain it to the last dregs, but made no reply.

"Is that Mr. Dubble!" pursued the clergyman, shading his eyes with one hand from the flickering light of the lamp, and feigning to be doubtful of the actual personality of the individual he questioned. "Surely not! I should be very much surprised and very sorry to see Mr. Dubble here at such a late hour!"

"Would ye now!" said Dubble. "Wal, I'm allus glad to give ye both a sorrer an' a surprise together, Mr. Arbroath—darned if I aint!"

"You must be keeping your good wife and daughter up waiting for you," proceeded Arbroath, his iron-grey eyebrows drawing together in an ugly line over the bridge of his nose. "Late hours are a mistake, Dubble!"

"So they be, so they be, Mr. Arbroath!" agreed Dubble. "Ef I was oop till midnight naggin' away at my good wife an' darter as they nags away at me, I'd say my keepin' o' late 'ours was a dorned whoppin' mistake an' no doubt o't. But seein' as 'taint arf-past ten yet, an' I aint naggin' nobody nor interferin' with my neighbours nohow, I reckon I'm on the right side o' the night so fur."

A murmur of approving laughter from all the men about him ratified this speech. The Reverend Mr. Arbroath gave a gesture of disdain, and bent his lowering looks on Tom o' the Gleam.

"Aren't you wanted by the police?" he suggested sarcastically.

The handsome gypsy glanced him over indifferently.

"I shouldn't wonder!" he retorted. "Perhaps the police want me as much as the devil wants you!"

Arbroath flushed a dark red, and his lips tightened over his teeth vindictively.

"There's a zummat for tha thinkin' on, Pazon Arbroath!" said "Feathery" Joltram, suddenly rising from his chair and showing himself in all his great height and burly build. "Zummat for a zermon on owd Nick, when tha're wantin' to scare the zhoolboys o' Zundays!"

Mr. Arbroath's countenance changed from red to pale.

"I was not aware of your presence, Mr. Joltram," he said stiffly.

"Noa, noa, Pazon, m'appen not, but tha's aweer on it now. Nowt o' me's zo zmall as can thraw to heaven through tha straight and narrer way. I'd 'ave to squeeze for 't!"

He laughed,—a big, slow laugh, husky with good living and good humour. Arbroath shrugged his shoulders.

"I prefer not to speak to you at all, Mr. Joltram," he said. "When people are bound to disagree, as we have disagreed for years, it is best to avoid conversation."

"Zed like the Church all over, Pazon!" chuckled the imperturbable Joltram. "Zeems as if I 'erd the 'Glory be'! But if tha don't want any talk, why does tha coom in 'ere wheer we'se all a-drinkin' steady and talkin' 'arty, an' no quarrellin' nor backbitin' of our neighbours? Tha wants us to go 'ome,—why doezn't tha go 'ome thysen? Tha's a wife a zettin' oop there, an' m'appen she's waitin' with as fine a zermon as iver was preached from a temperance cart in a wasterne field!"

He laughed again; Arbroath turned his back upon him in disgust, and strode up to the shadowed corner where Helmsley sat watching the little scene.

"Now, my man, who are you?" demanded the clergyman imperiously. "Where do you come from?"

Matt Peke would have spoken, but Helmsley silenced him by a look and rose to his feet, standing humbly with bent head before his arrogant interlocutor. There were the elements of comedy in the situation, and he was inclined to play his part thoroughly.

"From Bristol," he replied.

"What are you doing here?"

"Getting rest, food, and a night's lodging."

"Why do you leave out drink in the list?" sneered Arbroath. "For, of course, it's your special craving! Where are you going?"

"To Cornwall."

"Tramping it?"

"Yes."

"Begging, I suppose?"

"Sometimes."

"Disgraceful!" And the reverend gentleman snorted offence like a walrus rising from deep waters. "Why don't you work?"

"I'm too old."

"Too old! Too lazy you mean! How old are you?"

"Seventy."

Mr. Arbroath paused, slightly disconcerted. He had entered the "Trusty Man" in the hope of discovering some or even all of its customers in a state of drunkenness. To his disappointment he had found them perfectly sober. He had pounced on the stray man whom he saw was a stranger, in the expectation of proving him, at least, to be intoxicated. Here again he was mistaken. Helmsley's simple straight answers left him no opening for attack.

"You'd better make for the nearest workhouse," he said, at last. "Tramps are not encouraged on these roads."

"Evidently not!" And Helmsley raised his calm eyes and fixed them on the clergyman's lowering countenance with a faintly satiric smile.

"You're not too old to be impudent, I see!" retorted Arbroath, with an unpleasant contortion of his features. "I warn you not to come cadging about anywhere in this neighbourhood, for if you do I shall give you in charge. I have four parishes under my control, and I make it a rule to hand all beggars over to the police."

"That's not very good Christianity, is it?" asked Helmsley quietly.

Matt Peke chuckled. The Reverend Mr. Arbroath started indignantly, and stared so hard that his rat-brown eyes visibly projected from his head.

"Not very good Christianity!" he echoed. "What—what do you mean? How dare you speak to me about Christianity!"

"Ay, 'tis a bit aff!" drawled "Feathery" Joltram, thrusting his great hands deep into his capacious trouser-pockets. "'Tis a bit aff to taalk to Christian parzon 'bout Christianity, zeein' 'tis the one thing i' this warld 'e knaws nawt on!"

Arbroath grew livid, but his inward rage held him speechless.

"That's true!" cried Tom o' the Gleam excitedly—"That's as true as there's a God in heaven! I've read all about the Man that was born a carpenter in Galilee, and so far as I can understand it, He never had a rough word for the worst creatures that crawled, and the worse they were, and the more despised and down-trodden, the gentler He was with them. That's not the way of the men that call themselves His ministers!"

"I 'eerd once," said Mr. Dubble, rising slowly and laying down his pipe, "of a little chap what was makin' a posy for 'is mother's birthday, an' passin' the garden o' the rector o' the parish, 'e spied a bunch o' pink chestnut bloom 'angin' careless over the 'edge, ready to blow to bits wi' the next puff o' wind. The little raskill pulled it down an' put it wi' the rest o' the flowers 'e'd got for 'is mother, but the good an' lovin' rector seed 'im at it, an' 'ad 'im nabbed as a common thief an' sent to prison. 'E wornt but a ten-year-old lad, an' that prison spoilt 'im for life. 'E wor a fust-class Lord's man as did that for a babby boy, an' the hull neighbourhood's powerful obleeged to 'im. So don't ye,"—and here he turned his stolid gaze on Helmsley,—"don't ye, for all that ye're old, an' poor, an' 'elpless, go cadgin' round this 'ere reverend gemmen's property, cos 'e's got a real pityin' Christian 'art o's own, an' ye'd be sent to bed wi' the turnkey." Here he paused with a comprehensive smile round at the company,—then taking up his hat, he put it on. "There's one too many 'ere for pleasantness, an' I'm goin'. Good-den, Tom! Good-den, all!"

And out he strode, whistling as he went. With his departure every one began to move,—the more quickly as the clock in the bar had struck ten a minute or two since. The Reverend Mr. Arbroath stood irresolute for a moment, wishing his chief enemy, "Feathery" Joltram, would go. But Joltram remained where he was, standing erect, and surveying the scene like a heavily caparisoned charger scenting battle.

"Tha's heerd Mizter Dubble's tale afore now, Pazon, hazn't tha?" he inquired. "M'appen tha knaw'd the little chap as Christ's man zent to prizon thysen?"

Arbroath lifted his head haughtily.

"A theft is a theft," he said, "whether it is committed by a young person or an old one, and whether it is for a penny or a hundred pounds makes no difference. Thieves of all classes and all ages should be punished as such. Those are my opinions."

"They were nowt o' the Lord's opinions," said Joltram, "for He told the thief as 'ung beside Him, 'This day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise,' but He didn't say nowt o' the man as got the thief punished!"

"You twist the Bible to suit your own ends, Mr. Joltram," retorted Arbroath contemptuously. "It is the common habit of atheists and blasphemers generally."

"Then, by the Lord!" exclaimed the irrepressible "Feathery," "All th' atheists an' blasphemers must be a-gathered in the fold o' the Church, for if the pazons doan't twist the Bible to suit their own ends, I'm blest if I knaw whaat else they does for a decent livin'!"

Just then a puff of fine odour from the Havana cigar which Helmsley was enjoying floated under the nostrils of Mr. Arbroath, and added a fresh touch of irritation to his temper. He turned at once upon the offending smoker.

"So! You pretend to be poor!" he snarled, "And yet you can smoke a cigar that must have cost a shilling!"

"It was given to me," replied Helmsley gently.

"Given to you! Bah! Who would give an old tramp a cigar like that?"

"I would!" And Tom o' the Gleam sprang lightly up from his chair, his black eyes sparkling with mingled defiance and laughter—"And I did! Here!—will you take another?" And he drew out and opened a handsome case full of the cigars in question.

"Thank you!" and Arbroath's pallid lips trembled with rage. "I decline to share in stolen plunder!"

"Ha—ha—ha! Ha—ha!" laughed Tom hilariously. "Stolen plunder! That's good! D'ye think I'd steal when I can buy! Reverend sir, Tom o' the Gleam is particular as to what he smokes, and he hasn't travelled all over the world for nothing:

'Qu'en dictes-vous? Faut-il a ce musier, Il n'est tresor que de vivre a son aise!'"

Helmsley listened in wonderment. Here was a vagrant of the highroads and woods, quoting the refrain of Villon's Contreditz de Franc-Gontier, and pronouncing the French language with as soft and pure an accent as ever came out of Provence. Meanwhile, Mr. Arbroath, paying no attention whatever to Tom's outburst, looked at his watch.

"It is now a quarter-past ten," he announced dictatorially; "I should advise you all to be going."

"By the law we needn't go till eleven, though Miss Tranter does halve it," said Bill Bush sulkily—"and perhaps we won't!"

Mr. Arbroath fixed him with a stern glance.

"Do you know that I am here in the cause of Temperance?" he said.

"Oh, are ye? Then why don't ye call on Squire Evans, as is the brewer wi' the big 'ouse yonder?" queried Bill defiantly. "'E's the man to go to! Arsk 'im to shut up 'is brewery an' sell no more ale wi' pizon in't to the poor! That'll do more for Temp'rance than the early closin' o' the 'Trusty Man.'"

"Ye're right enough," said Matt Peke, who had refrained from taking any part in the conversation, save by now and then whispering a side comment to Helmsley. "There's stuff put i' the beer what the brewers brew, as is enough to knock the strongest man silly. I'm just fair tired o' hearin' o' Temp'rance this an' Temp'rance that, while 'arf the men as goes to Parl'ment takes their livin' out o' the brewin' o' beer an' spiritus liquors. An' they bribes their poor silly voters wi' their drink till they'se like a flock o' sheep runnin' into wotever field o' politics their shepherds drives 'em. The best way to make the temp'rance cause pop'lar is to stop big brewin'. Let every ale'ouse 'ave its own pertikler brew, an' m'appen we'll git some o' the old-fashioned malt an' 'ops agin. That'll be good for the small trader, an' the big brewin' companies can take to somethin' 'onester than the pizonin' bizness."

"You are a would-be wise man, and you talk too much, Matthew Peke!" observed the Reverend Mr. Arbroath, smiling darkly, and still glancing askew at his watch. "I know you of old!"

"Ye knows me an' I knows you," responded Peke placidly. "Yer can't interfere wi' me nohow, an' I dessay it riles ye a bit, for ye loves interferin' with ivery sort o' folk, as all the parsons do. I b'longs to no parish, an' aint under you no more than Tom o' the Gleam be, an' we both thanks the Lord for't! An' I'm earnin' a livin' my own way an' bein' a benefit to the sick an' sorry, which aint so far from proper Christianity. Lor', Parson Arbroath! I wonder ye aint more 'uman like, seein' as yer fav'rite gel in the village was arskin' me t'other day if I 'adn't any yerb for to make a love-charm. 'Love-charm!' sez I—'what does ye want that for, my gel?' An' she up an' she sez—'I'd like to make Parson Arbroath eat it!' Hor—er—hor—er—hor—er! 'I'd like to make Parson Arbroath eat it!' sez she. An' she's a foine strappin' wench, too!—'Ullo, Parson! Goin'?"

The door slammed furiously,—Arbroath had suddenly lost his dignity and temper together. Peke's raillery proved too much for him, and amid the loud guffaws of "Feathery" Joltram, Bill Bush and the rest, he beat a hasty retreat, and they heard his heavy footsteps go hurriedly across the passage of the "Trusty Man," and pass out into the road beyond. Roars of laughter accompanied his departure, and Peke looked round with a smile of triumph.

"It's just like a witch-spell!" he declared. "There's nowt to do but whisper, 'Parson's fav'rite!'—an' Parson hisself melts away like a mist o' the mornin' or a weasel runnin' into its 'ole! Hor—er, hor—er, hor—er!"

And again the laughter pealed out long and loud, "Feathery" Joltram bending himself double with merriment, and slapping the sides of his huge legs in ecstasy. Miss Tranter hearing the continuous uproar, looked in warningly, but there was a glimmering smile on her face.

"We'se goin', Miss Tranter!" announced Bill Bush, his wizened face all one broad grin. "We aint the sort to keep you up, never fear! Your worst customer's just cleared out!"

"So I see!" replied Miss Tranter calmly,—then, nodding towards Helmsley, she said—"Your room's ready."

Helmsley took the hint. He rose from his chair, and held out his hand to Peke.

"Good-night!" he said. "You've been very kind to me, and I shan't forget it!"

The herb-gatherer looked for a moment at the thin, refined white hand extended to him before grasping it in his own horny palm. Then—

"Good-night, old chap!" he responded heartily. "Ef I don't see ye i' the mornin' I'll leave ye a bottle o' yerb wine to take along wi' ye trampin', for the more ye drinks o't the soberer ye'll be an' the better ye'll like it. But ye should give up the idee o' footin' it to Cornwall; ye'll never git there without a liftin'."

"I'll have a good try, anyway," rejoined Helmsley. "Good-night!"

He turned towards Tom o' the Gleam.

"Good-night!"

"Good-night!" And Tom's dark eyes glowed upon him with a sombre intentness. "You know the old proverb which says, 'It's a long lane which has never a turning'?"

Helmsley nodded with a faint smile.

"Your turning's near at hand," said Tom. "Take my word for it!"

"Will it be a pleasant turning?" asked Helmsley, still smiling.

"Pleasant? Ay, and peaceful!" And Tom's mellow voice sank into a softer tone. "Peaceful as the strong love of a pure woman, and as sweet with contentment as is the summer when the harvest is full! Good-night!"

Helmsley looked at him thoughtfully; there was something poetic and fascinating about the man.

"I should like to meet you again," he said impulsively.

"Would you?" Tom o' the Gleam smiled. "So you will, as sure as God's in heaven! But how or when, who can tell!" His handsome face clouded suddenly,—some dark shadow of pain or perplexity contracted his brows,—then he seemed to throw the feeling, whatever it was, aside, and his features cleared. "You are bound to meet me," he continued. "I am as much a part of this country as the woods and hills,—the Quantocks and Brendons know me as well as Exmoor and the Valley of Rocks. But you are safe from me and mine! Not one of our tribe will harm you,—you can pursue your way in peace—and if any one of us can give you help at any time, we will."

"You speak of a community?"

"I speak of a Republic!" answered Tom proudly. "There are thousands of men and women in these islands whom no king governs and no law controls,—free as the air and independent as the birds! They ask nothing at any man's hands—they take and they keep!"

"Like the millionaires!" suggested Bill Bush, with a grin.

"Right you are, Bill!—like the millionaires! None take more than they do, and none keep their takings closer!"

"And very miserable they must surely be sometimes, on both their takings and their keepings," said Helmsley.

"No doubt of it! There'd be no justice in the mind of God if millionaires weren't miserable," declared Tom o' the Gleam. "They've more money than they ought to have,—it's only fair they should have less happiness. Compensation's a natural law that there's no getting away from,—that's why a gypsy's merrier than a king!"

Helmsley smiled assent, and with another friendly good-night all round, left the room. Miss Tranter awaited him, candle in hand, and preceding him up a short flight of ancient and crooked oaken stairs, showed him a small attic room with one narrow bed in it, scrupulously neat and clean.

"You'll be all right here," she said. "There's no lock to your door, but you're out of the truck of house work, and no one will come nigh you."

"Thank you, madam,"—and Helmsley bent his head gently, almost humbly,—"You are very good to me. I am most grateful!"

"Nonsense!" said Miss Tranter, affecting snappishness. "You pay for a bed, and here it is. The lodgers here generally share one room between them, but you are an old man and need rest. It's better you should get your sleep without any chance of disturbance. Good-night!"

"Good-night!"

She set down the candle by his bedside with a "Mind you put it out!" final warning, and descended the stairs to see the rest of her customers cleared off the premises, with the exception of Bill Bush, Matt Peke, and Tom o' the Gleam, who were her frequent night lodgers. She found Tom o' the Gleam standing up and delivering a kind of extemporary oration, while his rough cap, under the pilotage of Bill Bush, was being passed round the table in the fashion of a collecting plate.

"The smallest contribution thankfully received!" he laughed, as he looked and saw her. "Miss Tranter, we're doing a mission! We're Salvationists! Now's your chance! Give us a sixpence!"

"What for?" And setting her arms akimbo, the hostess of the "Trusty Man" surveyed all her lingering guests with a severe face. "What games are you up to now? It's time to clear!"

"So it is, and all the good little boys are going to bed," said Tom. "Don't be cross, Mammy! We want to close our subscription list—that's all! We've raised a few pennies for the old grandfather upstairs. He'll never get to Cornwall, poor chap! He's as white as paper. Office work doesn't fit a man of his age for tramping the road. We've collected two shillings for him among us,—you give sixpence, and there's half-a-crown all told. God bless the total!"

He seized his cap as it was handed back to him, and shook it, to show that it was lined with jingling halfpence, and his eyes sparkled like those of a child enjoying a bit of mischief.

"Come, Miss Tranter! Help the Gospel mission!"

Her features relaxed into a smile, and feeling in her apron pocket, she produced the requested coin.

"There you are!" she said.—"And now you've got it, how are you going to give him the money?"

"Never you mind!" and Tom swept all the coins together, and screwed them up in a piece of newspaper. "We'll surprise the old man as the angels surprise the children!"

Miss Tranter said nothing more, but withdrawing to the passage, stood and watched her customers go out of the door of the "Trusty Man," one by one. Each great hulking fellow doffed his cap to her and bade her a respectful "Good-night" as he passed, "Feathery" Joltram pausing a moment to utter an "aside" in her ear.

"'A fixed oop owd Arbroath for zartin zure!"—and here, with a sly wink, he gave a forcible nudge to her arm,—"An owd larrupin' fox 'e be!—an' Matt Peke giv' 'im the finish wi's fav'rite! Ha—ha—ha! 'A can't abide a wurrd o' that long-legged wench! Ha—ha—ha! An' look y'ere, Miss Tranter! I'd 'a given a shillin' in Tom's 'at when it went round, but I'm thinkin' as zummat in the face o' the owd gaffer up in bed ain't zet on beggin', an' m'appen a charity'd 'urt 'is feelin's like the poor-'ouse do. But if 'e's wantin' to 'arn a mossel o' victual, I'll find 'im a lightsome job on the farm if he'll reckon to walk oop to me afore noon to-morrer. Tell 'im' that from farmer Joltram, an' good-night t'ye!"

He strode out, and before eleven had struck, the old-fashioned iron bar clamped down across the portal, and the inn was closed. Then Miss Tranter turned into the bar, and before shutting it up paused, and surveyed her three lodgers critically.

"So you pretend to be all miserably poor, and yet you actually collect what you call a 'fund' for the old tramp upstairs who's a perfect stranger to you!" she said—"Rascals that you are!"

Bill Bush looked sheepish.

"Only halfpence, Miss," he explained. "Poor we be as church mice, an' ye knows that, doesn't ye? But we aint gone broken yet, an' Tom 'e started the idee o' doin' a good turn for th' old gaffer, for say what ye like 'e do look a bit feeble for trampin' it."

Miss Tranter sniffed the atmosphere of the bar with a very good assumption of lofty indifference.

"You started the idea, did you?" she went on, looking at Tom o' the Gleam. "You're a nice sort of ruffian to start any idea at all, aren't you? I thought you always took, and never gave!"

He smiled, leaning his handsome head back against the white-washed wall of the little entry where he stood, but said nothing. Matt Peke then took up the parable.

"Th' old man be mortal weak an' faint for sure," he said. "I come upon 'im lyin' under a tree wi' a mossel book aside 'im, an' I takes an' looks at the book, an' 'twas all portry an' simpleton stuff like, an' 'e looked old enough to be my dad, an' tired enough to be fast goin' where my dad's gone, so I just took 'im along wi' me, an' giv' 'im my name an' purfession, an' 'e did the same, a-tellin' me as 'ow 'is name was D. David, an' 'ow 'e 'd lost 'is office work through bein' too old an' shaky. 'E's all right,—an office man aint much good on the road, weak on 'is pins an' failin' in 'is sight. M'appen the 'arf-crown we've got 'im 'ull 'elp 'im to a ride part o' the way 'e's goin'."

"Well, don't you men bother about him any more," said Miss Tranter decisively. "You get off early in the morning, as usual. I'll look after him!"

"Will ye now?" and Peke's rugged features visibly brightened—"That's just like ye, Miss! Aint it, Tom? Aint it, Bill?"

Both individuals appealed to agreed that it was "Miss Tranter all over."

"Now off to bed with you!" proceeded that lady peremptorily. "And leave your collected 'fund' with me—I'll give it to him."

But Tom o' the Gleam would not hear of this.

"No, Miss Tranter!—with every respect for you, no!" he said gaily. "It's not every night we can play angels! I play angel to my kiddie sometimes, putting a fairing in his little hammock where he sleeps like a bird among the trees all night, but I've never had the chance to do it to an old grandad before! Let me have my way!"

And so it chanced that at about half-past eleven, Helmsley, having lain down with a deep sense of relief and repose on his clean comfortable little bed, was startled out of his first doze by hearing stealthy steps approaching his door. His heart began to beat quickly,—a certain vague misgiving troubled him,—after all, he thought, had he not been very rash to trust himself to the shelter of this strange and lonely inn among the wild moors and hills, among unknown men, who, at any rate by their rough and uncouth appearance, might be members of a gang of thieves? The steps came nearer, and a hand fumbled gently with the door handle. In that tense moment of strained listening he was glad to remember that when undressing, he had carefully placed his vest, lined with the banknotes he carried, under the sheet on which he lay, so that in the event of any one coming to search his clothes, nothing would be found but a few loose coins in his coat pocket. The fumbling at his door continued, and presently it slowly opened, letting in a pale stream of moonlight from a lattice window outside. He just saw the massive figure of Tom o' the Gleam standing on the threshold, clad in shirt and trousers only, and behind him there seemed to be the shadowy outline of Matt Peke's broad shoulders and Bill Bush's bullet head. Uncertain what to expect, he determined to show no sign of consciousness, and half closing his eyes, he breathed heavily and regularly, feigning to be in a sound slumber. But a cold chill ran through his veins as Tom o' the Gleam slowly and cautiously approached the bed, holding something in his right hand, while Matt Peke and Bill Bush tiptoed gently after him half-way into the room.

"Poor old gaffer!" he heard Tom whisper—"Looks all ready laid out and waiting for the winding!"

And the hand that held the something stole gently and ever gentlier towards the pillow. By a supreme effort Helmsley kept quite still. How he controlled his nerves he never knew, for to see through his almost shut eyelids the dark herculean form of the gypsy bending over him with the two other men behind, moved him to a horrible fear. Were they going to murder him? If so, what for? To them he was but an old tramp,—unless—unless somebody had tracked him from London!—unless somebody knew who he really was, and had pointed him out as likely to have money about him. These thoughts ran like lightning through his brain, making his blood burn and his pulses, tingle almost to the verge of a start and cry, when the creeping hand he dreaded quietly laid something on his pillow and withdrew itself with delicate precaution.

"He'll be pleased when he wakes," said Tom o' the Gleam, in the mildest of whispers, retreating softly from the bedside—"Won't he?"

"Ay, that he will!" responded Peke, under his breath;, "aint 'e sleepin' sound?"

"Sound as a babe!"

Slowly and noiselessly they stepped backward,—slowly and noiselessly they closed the door, and the faint echo of their stealthy footsteps creeping away along the outer passage to another part of the house, was hushed at last into silence. After a long pause of intense stillness, some clock below stairs struck midnight with a mellow clang, and Helmsley opening his eyes, lay waiting till the excited beating of his heart subsided, and his quickened breath grew calm. Blaming himself for his nervous terrors, he presently rose from his bed, and struck a match from the box which Miss Tranter had thoughtfully left beside him, and lit his candle. Something had been placed on his pillow, and curiosity moved him to examine it. He looked,—but saw nothing save a mere screw of soiled newspaper. He took it up wonderingly. It was heavy,—and opening it he found it full of pennies, halfpennies, and one odd sixpence. A scrap of writing accompanied this collection, roughly pencilled thus:—"To help you along the road. From friends at the Trusty Man. Good luck!"

For a moment he stood inert, fingering the humble coins,—for a moment he could hardly realise that these rough men of doubtful character and calling, with whom he had passed one evening, were actually humane enough to feel pity for his age, and sympathy for his seeming loneliness and poverty, and that they had sufficient heart and generosity to deprive themselves of money in order to help one whom they judged to be in greater need;—then the pure intention and honest kindness of the little "surprise" gift came upon him all at once, and he was not ashamed to feel his eyes full of tears.

"God forgive me!" he murmured—"God forgive me that I ever judged the poor by the rich!"

With an almost reverential tenderness, he folded the paper and coins together, and put the little packet carefully away, determining never to part with it.

"For its value outweighs every banknote I ever handled!" he said—"And I am prouder of it than of all my millions!"



CHAPTER VIII

The light of the next day's sun, beaming with all the heat and effulgence of full morning, bathed moor and upland in a wide shower of gold, when Miss Tranter, standing on the threshold of her dwelling, and shading her eyes with one hand from the dazzling radiance of the skies, watched a man's tall figure disappear down the rough and precipitous road which led from the higher hills to the seashore. All her night's lodgers had left her save one—and he was still soundly sleeping. Bill Bush had risen as early as five and stolen away,—Matt Peke had broken his fast with a cup of hot milk and a hunch of dry bread, and shouldering his basket, had started for Crowcombe, where he had several customers for his herbal wares.

"Take care o' the old gaffer I brought along wi' me," had been his parting recommendation to the hostess of the "Trusty Man." "Tell 'im I've left a bottle o' yerb wine in the bar for 'im. M'appen ye might find an odd job or two about th' 'ouse an' garden for 'im, just for lettin' 'im rest a while."

Miss Tranter had nodded curtly in response to this suggestion, but had promised nothing.

The last to depart from the inn was Tom o' the Gleam. Tom had risen in what he called his "dark mood." He had eaten no breakfast, and he scarcely spoke at all as he took up his stout ash stick and prepared to fare forth upon his way. Miss Tranter was not inquisitive, but she had rather a liking for Tom, and his melancholy surliness was not lost upon her.

"What's the matter with you?" she asked sharply. "You're like a bear with a sore head this morning!"

He looked at her with sombre eyes in which the flame of strongly restrained passions feverishly smouldered.

"I don't know what's the matter with me," he answered slowly. "Last night I was happy. This morning I am wretched!"

"For no cause?"

"For no cause that I know of,"—and he heaved a sudden sigh. "It is the dark spirit—the warning of an evil hour!"

"Stuff and nonsense!" said Miss Tranter.

He was silent. His mouth compressed itself into a petulant line, like that of a chidden child ready to cry.

"I shall be all right when I have kissed the kiddie," he said.

Miss Tranter sniffed and tossed her head.

"You're just a fool over that kiddie," she declared with emphasis,—"You make too much of him."

"How can I make too much of my all?" he asked.

Her face softened.

"Well, it's a pity you look at it in that way," she said. "You shouldn't set your heart on anything in this world."

"Why not?" he demanded. "Is God a friend that He should grudge us love?"

Her lips trembled a little, but she made no reply.

"What am I to set my heart on?" he continued—"If not on anything in this world, what have I got in the next?"

A faint tinge of colour warmed Miss Tranter's sallow cheeks.

"Your wife's in the next," she answered, quietly.

His face changed—his eyes lightened.

"My wife!" he echoed. "Good woman that you are, you know she was never my wife! No parson ever mocked us wild birds with his blessing! She was my love—my love!—so much more than wife! By Heaven! If prayer and fasting would bring me to the world where she is, I'd fast and pray till I turned this body of mine to dust and ashes! But my kiddie is all I have that's left of her; and shall I not love him, nay, worship him for her sake?"

Miss Tranter tried to look severe, but could not,—the strong vehemence of the man shook her self-possession.

"Love him, yes!—but don't worship him," she said. "It's a mistake, Tom! He's only a child, after all, and he might be taken from you."

"Don't say that!" and Tom suddenly gripped her by the arm. "For God's sake don't say that! Don't send me away this morning with those words buzzing in my ears!"

Great tears flashed into his eyes,—his face paled and contracted as with acutest agony.

"I'm sorry, Tom," faltered Miss Tranter, herself quite overcome by his fierce emotion—"I didn't mean——"

"Yes—yes!—that's right! Say you didn't mean it!" muttered Tom, with a pained smile—"You didn't——?"

"I didn't mean it!" declared Miss Tranter earnestly. "Upon my word I didn't, Tom!"

He loosened his hold of her arm.

"Thank you! God bless you!" and a shudder ran through his massive frame. "But it's all one with the dark hour!—all one with the wicked tongue of a dream that whispers to me of a coming storm!"

He pulled his rough cap over his brows, and strode forward a step or two. Then he suddenly wheeled round again, and doffed the cap to Miss Tranter.

"It's unlucky to turn back," he said, "yet I'm doing it, because—because—I wouldn't have you think me sullen or ill-tempered with you! Nor ungrateful. You're a good woman, for all that you're a bit rough sometimes. If you want to know where we are, we've camped down by Cleeve, and we're on the way to Dunster. I take the short cuts that no one else dare venture by—over the cliffs and through the cave-holes of the sea. When the old man comes down, tell him I'll have a care of him if he passes my way. I like his face! I think he's something more than he seems."

"So do I!" agreed Miss Tranter. "I'd almost swear that he's a gentleman, fallen on hard times."

"A gentleman!" Tom o' the Gleam laughed disdainfully—"What's that? Only a robber grown richer than his neighbours! Better be a plain Man any day than your up-to-date 'gentleman'!"

With another laugh he swung away, and Miss Tranter remained, as already stated, at the door of the inn for many minutes, watching his easy stride over the rough stones and clods of the "by-road" winding down to the sea. His figure, though so powerfully built, was singularly graceful in movement, and commanded the landscape much as that of some chieftain of old might have commanded it in that far back period of time when mountain thieves and marauders were the progenitors of all the British kings and their attendant nobility.

"I wish I knew that man's real history!" she mused, as he at last disappeared from her sight. "The folks about here, such as Mr. Joltram, for instance, say he was never born to the gypsy life,—he speaks too well, and knows too much. Yet he's wild enough—and—yes!—I'm afraid he's bad enough—sometimes—to be anything!"

Her meditations were here interrupted by a touch on her arm, and turning, she beheld her round-eyed handmaiden Prue.

"The old man you sez is a gentleman is down, Mis' Tranter!"

Miss Tranter at once stepped indoors and confronted Helmsley, who, amazed to find it nearly ten o'clock, now proffered humble excuses to his hostess for his late rising. She waived these aside with a good-humoured nod and smile.

"That's all right!" she said. "I wanted you to have a good long rest, and I'm glad you got it. Were you disturbed at all?"

"Only by kindness," answered Helmsley in a rather tremulous voice. "Some one came into my room while I was asleep—and—and—I found a 'surprise packet' on my pillow——"

"Yes, I know all about it," interrupted Miss Tranter, with a touch of embarrassment—"Tom o' the Gleam did that. He's just gone. He's a rough chap, but he's got a heart. He thinks you're not strong enough to tramp it to Cornwall. And all those great babies of men put their heads together last night after you'd gone upstairs, and clubbed up enough among them to give you a ride part of the way——"

"They're very good!" murmured Helmsley. "Why should they trouble about an old fellow like me?"

"Oh well!" said Miss Tranter cheerfully, "it's just because you are an old fellow, I suppose! You see you might walk to a station to-day, and take the train as far as Minehead before starting on the road again. Anyhow you've time to think it over. If you'll step into the room yonder, I'll send Prue with your breakfast."

She turned her back upon him, and with a shrill call of "Prue! Prue!" affected to be too busy to continue the conversation. Helmsley, therefore, went as she bade him into the common room, which at this hour was quite empty. A neat white cloth was spread at one end of the table, and on this was set a brown loaf, a pat of butter, a jug of new milk, a basin of sugar, and a brightly polished china cup and saucer. The window was open, and the inflow of the pure fresh morning air had done much to disperse the odours of stale tobacco and beer that subtly clung to the walls as reminders of the drink and smoke of the previous evening.

Just outside, a tangle of climbing roses hung like a delicate pink curtain between Helmsley's eyes and the sunshine, while the busy humming of bees in and out the fragrant hearts of the flowers, made a musical monotony of soothing sound. He sat down and surveyed the simple scene with a quiet sense of pleasure. He contrasted it in his memory with the weary sameness of the breakfasts served to him in his own palatial London residence, when the velvet-footed butler creeping obsequiously round the table, uttered his perpetual "Tea or coffee, sir? 'Am or tongue? Fish or heggs?" in soft sepulchral tones, as though these comestibles had something to do with poison rather than nourishment. With disgust at the luxury which engendered such domestic appurtenances, he thought of the two tall footmen, whose chief duty towards the serving of breakfast appeared to be the taking of covers off dishes and the putting them on again, as if six-footed able-bodied manhood were not equipped for more muscular work than that!

"We do great wrong," he said to himself—"We who are richer than what are called the rich, do infinite wrong to our kind by tolerating so much needless waste and useless extravagance. We merely generate mischief for ourselves and others. The poor are happier, and far kindlier to each other than the moneyed classes, simply because they cannot demand so much self-indulgence. The lazy habits of wealthy men and women who insist on getting an unnecessary number of paid persons to do for them what they could very well do for themselves, are chiefly to blame for all our tiresome and ostentatious social conditions. Servants must, of course, be had in every well-ordered household—but too many of them constitute a veritable hive of discord and worry. Why have huge houses at all? Why have enormous domestic retinues? A small house is always cosiest, and often prettiest, and the fewer servants, the less trouble. Here again comes in the crucial question—Why do we spend all our best years of youth, life, and sentiment in making money, when, so far as the sweetest and highest things are concerned, money can give so little!"

At that moment, Prue entered with a brightly shining old brown "lustre" teapot, and a couple of boiled eggs.

"Mis' Tranter sez you're to eat the eggs cos' they'se new-laid an' incloodid in the bill," she announced glibly—"An' 'opes you've got all ye want."

Helmsley looked at her kindly.

"You're a smart little girl!" he said. "Beginning to earn your own living already, eh?"

"Lor', that aint much!" retorted Prue, putting a knife by the brown loaf, and setting the breakfast things even more straightly on the table than they originally were. "I lives on nothin' scarcely, though I'm turned fifteen an' likes a bit o' fresh pork now an' agen. But I've got a brother as is on'y ten, an' when 'e aint at school 'e's earnin' a bit by gatherin' mussels on the beach, an' 'e do collect a goodish bit too, though 'taint reg'lar biziness, an' 'e gets hisself into such a pickle o' salt water as never was. But he brings mother a shillin' or two."

"And who is your mother?" asked Helmsley, drawing up his chair to the table and sitting down.

"Misses Clodder, up at Blue-bell Cottage, two miles from 'ere across the moor," replied Prue. "She goes out a-charing, but it's 'ard for 'er to be doin' chars now—she's gettin' old an' fat—orful fat she be gettin'. Dunno what we'll do if she goes on fattenin'."

It was difficult not to laugh at this statement, Prue's eyes were so round, her cheeks were so red, and she breathed so spasmodically as she spoke. David Helmsley bit his lips to hide a broad smile, and poured out his tea.

"Have you no father?"

"No, never 'ad," declared Prue, quite jubilantly. "'E droonk 'isself to death an' tumbled over a cliff near 'ere one dark night an' was drowned!" This, with the most thrilling emphasis.

"That's very sad! But you can't say you never had a father," persisted Helmsley. "You had him before he was drowned?"

"No, I 'adn't," said Prue. "'E never comed 'ome at all. When 'e seed me 'e didn't know me, 'e was that blind droonk. When my little brother was born 'e was 'owlin' wild down Watchet way, an' screechin' to all the folks as 'ow the baby wasn't his'n!"

This was a doubtful subject,—a "delicate and burning question," as reviewers for the press say when they want to praise some personal friend's indecent novel and pass it into decent households,—and Helmsley let it drop. He devoted himself to the consideration of his breakfast, which was excellent, and found that he had an appetite to enjoy it thoroughly.

Prue watched him for a minute or two in silence.

"Ye likes yer food?" she demanded, presently.

"Very much!"

"Thought yer did! I'll tell Mis' Tranter."

With that she retired, and shutting the door behind her left Helmsley to himself.

Many and conflicting were the thoughts that chased one another through his brain during the quiet half-hour he gave to his morning meal,—a whole fund of new suggestions and ideas were being generated in him by the various episodes in which he was taking an active yet seemingly passive part. He had voluntarily entered into his present circumstances, and so far, he had nothing to complain of. He had met with friendliness and sympathy from persons who, judged by the world's conventions, were of no social account whatever, and he had seen for himself men in a condition of extreme poverty, who were nevertheless apparently contented with their lot. Of course, as a well-known millionaire, his secretaries had always had to deal with endless cases of real or assumed distress, more often the latter,—and shoals of begging letters from people representing themselves as starving and friendless, formed a large part of the daily correspondence with which his house and office were besieged,—but he had never come into personal contact with these shameless sort of correspondents, shrewdly judging them to be undeserving simply by the very fact that they wrote begging letters. He knew that no really honest or plucky-spirited man or woman would waste so much as a stamp in asking money from a stranger, even if such a stranger were twenty times a millionaire. He had given huge sums away to charitable institutions anonymously; and he remembered with a thrill of pain the "Christian kindness" of some good "Church" people, who, when the news accidentally slipped out that he was the donor of a particularly munificent gift to a certain hospital, remarked that "no doubt Mr. Helmsley had given it anonymously at first, in order that it might be made public more effectively afterwards, by way of a personal advertisement!" Such spiteful comment often repeated, had effectually checked the outflow of his naturally warm and generous spirit, nevertheless he was always ready to relieve any pressing cases of want which were proved genuine, and many a wretched family in the East End of London had cause to bless him for his timely and ungrudging aid. But this present kind of life,—the life of the tramp, the poacher, the gypsy, who is content to be "on the road" rather than submit to the trammels of custom and ordinance, was new to him and full of charm. He took a peculiar pleasure in reflecting as to what he could do to make these men, with whom he had casually foregathered, happier? Did it lie in his power to give them any greater satisfaction than that which they already possessed? He doubted whether a present of money to Matt Peke, for instance, would not offend that rustic philosopher, more than it would gratify him;—while, as for Tom o' the Gleam, that handsome ruffian was more likely to rob a man of gold than accept it as a gift from him. Then involuntarily, his thoughts reverted to the "kiddie." He recalled the look in Tom's wild eyes, and the almost womanish tremble of tenderness in his rough voice, when he had spoken of this little child of his on whom he openly admitted he had set all his love.

"I should like," mused Helmsley, "to see that kiddie! Not that I believe in the apparent promise of a child's life,—for my own sons taught me the folly of indulging in any hopes on that score—and Lucy Sorrel has completed the painful lesson. Who would have ever thought that she,—the little angel creature who seemed too lovely and innocent for this world at ten,—could at twenty have become the extremely commonplace and practical woman she is,—practical enough to wish to marry an old man for his money! But that talk among the men last night about the 'kiddie' touched me somehow,—I fancy it must be a sturdy little lad, with a bright face and a will of its own. I might possibly do something for the child if,—if its father would let me! And that's very doubtful! Besides, should I not be interfering with the wiser and healthier dispensations of nature? The 'kiddie' is no doubt perfectly happy in its wild state of life,—free to roam the woods and fields, with every chance of building up a strong and vigorous constitution in the simple open-air existence to which it has been born and bred. All the riches in the world could not make health or freedom for it,—and thus again I confront myself with my own weary problem—Why have I toiled all my life to make money, merely to find money so useless and comfortless at the end?"

With a sigh he rose from the table. His simple breakfast was finished, and he went to the window to look at the roses that pushed their pretty pink faces up to the sun through a lattice-work of green leaves. There was a small yard outside, roughly paved with cobbles, but clean, and bordered here and there with bright clusters of flowers, and in one particularly sunny corner where the warmth from the skies had made the cobbles quite hot, a tiny white kitten rolled on its back, making the most absurd efforts to catch its own tail between its forepaws,—and a promising brood of fowls were clucking contentedly round some scattered grain lately flung out from the window of the "Trusty Man's" wash-house for their delectation. There was nothing in the scene at all of a character to excite envy in the most morbid and dissatisfied mind;—it was full of the tamest domesticity, and yet—it was a picture such as some thoughtful Dutch artist would have liked to paint as a suggestion of rural simplicity and peace.

"But if one only knew the ins and outs of the life here, it might not prove so inviting," he thought. "I daresay all the little towns and villages in this neighbourhood are full of petty discords, jealousies, envyings and spites,—even Prue's mother, Mrs. Clodder, may have, and probably has, a neighbour whom she hates, and wishes to get the better of, in some way or other, for there is really no such thing as actual peace anywhere except—in the grave! And who knows whether we shall even find it there! Nothing dies which does not immediately begin to live—in another fashion. And every community, whether of insects, birds, wild animals, or men and women, is bound to fight for existence,—therefore those who cry: 'Peace, peace!' only clamour for a vain thing. The very stones and rocks and mountains maintain a perpetual war with destroying elements,—they appear immutable things to our short lives, but they change in their turn even as we do—they die to live again in other forms, even as we do. And what is it all for? What is the sum and substance of so much striving—if merest Nothingness is the end?"

He was disturbed from his reverie by the entrance of Miss Tranter. He turned round and smiled at her.

"Well!" she said—"Enjoyed your breakfast?"

"Very much indeed, thanks to your kindness!" he replied. "I hardly thought I had such a good appetite left to me. I feel quite strong and hearty this morning."

"You look twice the man you were last night, certainly,"—and she eyed him thoughtfully—"Would you like a job here?"

A flush rose to his brows. He hesitated before replying.

"You'd rather not!" snapped out Miss Tranter—"I can see 'No' in your face. Well, please yourself!"

He looked at her. Her lips were compressed in a thin line, and she wore a decidedly vexed expression.

"Ah, you think I don't want to work!" he said—"There you're wrong! But I haven't many years of life in me,—there's not much time left to do what I have to do,—and I must get on."

"Get on, where?"

"To Cornwall."

"Whereabouts in Cornwall?"

"Down by Penzance way."

"You want to start off on the tramp again at once?"

"Yes."

"All right, you must do as you like, I suppose,"—and Miss Tranter sniffed whole volumes of meaning in one sniff—"But Farmer Joltram told me to say that if you wanted a light job up on his place,—that's about a mile from here,—- he wouldn't mind giving you a chance. You'd get good victuals there, for he feeds his men well. And I don't mind trusting you with a bit of gardening—you could make a shilling a day easy—so don't say you can't get work. That's the usual whine—but if you say it——"

"I shall be a liar!" said Helmsley, his sunken eyes lighting up with a twinkle of merriment—"And don't you fear, Miss Tranter,—I won't say it! I'm grateful to Mr. Joltram—but I've only one object left to me in life, and that is—to get on, and find the person I'm looking for—if I can!"

"Oh, you're looking for a person, are you?" queried Miss Tranter, more amicably—"Some long-lost relative?"

"No,—not a relative, only—a friend."

"I see!" Miss Tranter smoothed down her neatly fitting plain cotton gown with both hands reflectively—"And you'll be all right if you find this friend?"

"I shall never want anything any more," he answered, with an unconsciously pathetic tremor in his voice—"My dearest wish will be granted, and I shall be quite content to die!"

"Well, content or no content, you've got to do it," commented Miss Tranter—"And so have I—and so have all of us. Which I think is a pity. I shouldn't mind living for ever and ever in this world. It's a very comfortable world, though some folks say it isn't. That's mostly liver with them though. People who don't over-eat or over-drink themselves, and who get plenty of fresh air, are generally fairly pleased with the world as they find it. I suppose the friend you're looking for will be glad to see you?"

"The friend I'm looking for will certainly be glad to see me," said Helmsley, gently—"Glad to see me—glad to help me—glad above all things to love me! If this were not so, I should not trouble to search for my friend at all."

Miss Tranter fixed her eyes full upon him while he thus spoke. They were sharp eyes, and just now they were visibly inquisitive.

"You've not been very long used to tramping," she observed.

"No."

"I expect you've seen better days?"

"Some few, perhaps,"—and he smiled gravely—"But it comes harder to a man who has once known comfort to find himself comfortless in his old age."

"That's very true! Well!"—and Miss Tranter gave a short sigh—"I'm sorry you won't stay on here a bit to pick up your strength—but a wilful man must have his way! I hope you'll find your friend!"

"I hope I shall!" said Helmsley earnestly. "And believe me I'm most grateful to you——"

"Tut!" and Miss Tranter tossed her head. "What do you want to be grateful to me for! You've had food and lodging, and you've paid me for it. I've offered you work and you won't take it. That's the long and short of it between us."

And thereupon she marched out of the room, her head very high, her shoulders very square, and her back very straight. Helmsley watched her dignified exit with a curious sense of half-amused contrition.

"What odd creatures some women are!" he thought. "Here's this sharp-tongued, warm-hearted hostess of a roadside inn quite angry because, apparently, an old tramp won't stay and do incompetent work for her! She knows that I should make a mere boggle of her garden,—she is equally aware that I could be no use in any way on 'Feathery' Joltram's farm—and yet she is thoroughly annoyed and disappointed because I won't try to do what she is perfectly confident I can't do, in order that I shall rest well and be fed well for one or two days! Really the kindness of the poor to one another outvalues all the gifts of the rich to the charities they help to support. It is so much more than ordinary 'charity,' for it goes hand in hand with a touch of personal feeling. And that is what few rich men ever get,—except when their pretended 'friends' think they can make something for themselves out of their assumed 'friendship'!"

He put on his hat, and plucked one of the roses clambering in at the window to take with him as a remembrance of the "Trusty Man,"—a place which he felt would henceforward be a kind of landmark for the rest of his life to save him from drowning in utter cynicism, because within its walls he had found unselfish compassion for his age and loneliness, and disinterested sympathy for his seeming need. Then he went to say good-bye to Miss Tranter. She was, as usual, in the bar, standing very erect. She had taken up her knitting, and her needles clicked and glittered busily.

"Matt Peke left a bottle of his herb wine for you," she said. "There it is."

She indicated by a jerk of her head a flat oblong quart flask, neatly corked and tied with string, which lay on the counter. It was of a conveniently portable shape, and Helmsley slipped it into one of his coat pockets with ease.

"Shall you be seeing Peke soon again, Miss Tranter?" he asked.

"I don't know. Maybe so, and maybe not. He's gone on to Crowcombe. I daresay he'll come back this way before the end of the month. He's a pretty regular customer."

"Then, will you thank him for me, and say that I shall never forget his kindness?"

"Never forget is a long time," said Miss Tranter. "Most folks forget their friends directly their backs are turned."

"That's true," said Helmsley, gently; "but I shall not. Good-bye!"

"Good-bye!" Miss Tranter paused in her knitting. "Which road are you going from here?"

Helmsley thought a moment.

"Perhaps," he said at last, "one of the main roads would be best. I'd rather not risk any chance of losing my way."

Miss Tranter stepped out of the bar and came to the open doorway of the inn.

"Take that path across the moor," and she pointed with one of her bright knitting needles to a narrow beaten track between the tufted grass, whitened here and there by clusters of tall daisies, "and follow it as straight as you can. It will bring you out on the highroad to Williton and Watchett. It's a goodish bit of tramping on a hot day like this, but if you keep to it steady you'll be sure to get a lift or so in waggons going along to Dunster. And there are plenty of publics about where I daresay you'd get a night's sixpenny shelter, though whether any of them are as comfortable as the 'Trusty Man,' is open to question."

"I should doubt it very much," said Helmsley, his rare kind smile lighting up his whole face. "The 'Trusty Man' thoroughly deserves trust; and, if I may say so, its kind hostess commands respect."

He raised his cap with the deferential easy grace which was habitual to him, and Miss Tranter's pale cheeks reddened suddenly and violently.

"Oh, I'm only a rough sort!" she said hastily. "But the men like me because I don't give them away. I hold that the poor must get a bit of attention as well as the rich."

"The poor deserve it more," rejoined Helmsley. "The rich get far too much of everything in these days,—they are too much pampered and too much flattered. Yet, with it all, I daresay they are often miserable."

"It must be pretty hard to be miserable on twenty or thirty thousand a year!" said Miss Tranter.

"You think so? Now, I should say it was very easy. For when one has everything, one wants nothing."

"Well, isn't it all right to want nothing?" she queried, looking at him inquisitively.

"All right? No!—rather all wrong! For want stimulates the mind and body to work, and work generates health and energy,—and energy is the pulse of life. Without that pulse, one is a mere husk of a man—as I am!" He doffed his cap again. "Thank you for all your friendliness. Good-bye!"

"Good-bye! Perhaps I shall see you again some time this way?"

"Perhaps—but——"

"With your friend?" she suggested.

"Ay—if I find my friend—then possibly I may return. Meanwhile, all good be with you!"

He turned away, and began to ascend the path indicated across the moor. Once he looked back and waved his hand. Miss Tranter, in response, waved her piece of knitting. Then she went on clicking her needles rapidly through a perfect labyrinth of stitches, her eyes fixed all the while on the tall, thin, frail figure which, with the assistance of a stout stick, moved slowly along between the nodding daisies.

"He's what they call a mystery," she said to herself. "He's as true-born a gentleman as ever lived—with a gentleman's ways, a gentleman's voice, and a gentleman's hands, and yet he's 'on the road' like a tramp! Well! there's many ups and downs in life, certainly, and those that's rich to-day may be poor to-morrow. It's a queer world—and God who made it only knows what it was made for!"

With that, having seen the last of Helmsley's retreating figure, she went indoors, and relieved her feelings by putting Prue through her domestic paces in a fashion that considerably flurried that small damsel and caused her to wonder, "what 'ad come over Miss Tranter suddint, she was that beside 'erself with work and temper!"



CHAPTER IX

It was pleasant walking across the moor. The July sun was powerful, but to ageing men the warmth and vital influences of the orb of day are welcome, precious, and salutary. An English summer is seldom or never too warm for those who are conscious that but few such summers are left to them, and David Helmsley was moved by a devout sense of gratitude that on this fair and tranquil morning he was yet able to enjoy the lovely and loving beneficence of all beautiful and natural things. The scent of the wild thyme growing in prolific patches at his feet,—the more pungent odour of the tall daisies which were of a hardy, free-flowering kind,—the "strong sea-daisies that feast on the sun,"—and the indescribable salty perfume that swept upwards on the faint wind from the unseen ocean, just now hidden by projecting shelves of broken ground fringed with trees,—all combined together to refresh the air and to make the mere act of breathing a delight. After about twenty minutes' walking Helmsley's step grew easier and more springy,—almost he felt young,—almost he pictured himself living for another ten years in health and active mental power. The lassitude and ennui inseparable from a life spent for the most part in the business centres of London, had rolled away like a noxious mist from his mind, and he was well-nigh ready to "begin life again," as he told himself, with a smile at his own folly.

"No wonder that the old-world philosophers and scientists sought for the elixir vitae!" he thought. "No wonder they felt that the usual tenure is too short for all that a man might accomplish, did he live well and wisely enough to do justice to all the powers with which nature has endowed him. I am myself inclined to think that the 'Tree of Life' exists,—perhaps its leaves are the 'leaves of the Daura,' for which that excellent fellow Matt Peke is looking. Or it may be the 'Secta Croa'!"

He smiled,—and having arrived at the end of the path which he had followed from the door of the "Trusty Man," he saw before him a descending bank, which sloped into the highroad, a wide track white with thick dust stretching straight away for about a mile and then dipping round a broad curve of land, overarched with trees. He sat down for a few minutes on the warm grass, giving himself up to the idle pleasure of watching the birds skimming through the clear blue sky,—the bees bouncing in and out of the buttercups,—the varicoloured butterflies floating like blown flower-petals on the breeze,—and he heard a distant bell striking the half-hour after eleven. He had noted the time when leaving the "Trusty Man," otherwise he would not have known it so exactly, having left his watch locked up at home in his private desk with other personal trinkets which would have been superfluous and troublesome to him on his self-imposed journey. When the echo of the bell's one stroke had died away it left a great stillness in the air. The heat was increasing as the day veered towards noon, and he decided that it would be as well to get on further down the road and under the shadow of the trees, which were not so very far off, and which looked invitingly cool in their spreading dark soft greenness. So, rising from his brief rest, he started again "on the tramp," and soon felt the full glare of the sun, and the hot sensation of the dust about his feet; but he went on steadily, determining to make light of all the inconveniences and difficulties, to which he was entirely unaccustomed, but to which he had voluntarily exposed himself. For a considerable time he met no living creature; the highroad seemed to be as much his own as though it were part of a private park or landed estate belonging to him only; and it was not till he had nearly accomplished the distance which lay between him and the shelter of the trees, that he met a horse and cart slowly jogging along towards the direction from whence he had come. The man who drove the vehicle was half-asleep, stupefied, no doubt, by the effect of the hot sun following on a possible "glass" at a public-house, but Helmsley called to him just for company's sake.

"Hi! Am I going right for Watchett?"

The man opened his drowsing eyes and yawned expansively.

"Watchett? Ay! Williton comes fust."

"Is it far?"

"Nowt's far to your kind!" said the man, flicking his whip. "An' ye'll meet a bobby or so on the road!"

On he went, and Helmsley without further parley resumed his tramp. Presently, reaching the clump of trees he had seen in the distance, he moved into their refreshing shade. They were broad-branched elms, luxuriantly full of foliage, and the avenue they formed extended for about a quarter of a mile. Cool dells and dingles of mossy green sloped down on one side of the road, breaking into what are sometimes called "coombs" running precipitously towards the sea-coast, and slackening his pace a little he paused, looking through a tangle of shrubs and bracken at the pale suggestion of a glimmer of blue which he realised was the shining of the sunlit ocean. While he thus stood, he fancied he heard a little plaintive whine as of an animal in pain. He listened attentively. The sound was repeated, and, descending the shelving bank a few steps he sought to discover the whereabouts of this piteous cry for help. All at once he spied two bright sparkling eyes and a small silvery grey head perking up at him through the leaves,—the head of a tiny Yorkshire "toy" terrier. It looked at him with eloquent anxiety, and as he approached it, it made an effort to move, but fell back again with a faint moan. Gently he picked it up,—it was a rare and beautiful little creature, but one of its silky forepaws had evidently been caught in some trap, for it was badly mangled and bleeding. Round its neck was a small golden collar, something like a lady's bracelet, bearing the inscription: "I am Charlie. Take care of me!" There was no owner's name or address, and the entreaty "Take care of me!" had certainly not been complied with, or so valuable a pet would not have been left wounded on the highroad. While Helmsley was examining it, it ceased whining, and gently licked his hand. Seeing a trickling stream of water making its way through the moss and ferns close by, he bathed the little dog's wounded paw carefully and tied it up with a strip of material torn from his own coat sleeve.

"So you want to be taken care of, do you, Charlie!" he said, patting the tiny head. "That's what a good many of us want, when we feel hurt and broken by the hard ways of the world!" Charlie blinked a dark eye, cocked a small soft ear, and ventured on another caress of the kind human hand with his warm little tongue. "Well, I won't leave you to starve in the woods, or trust you to the tender mercies of the police,—you shall come along with me! And if I see any advertisement of your loss I'll perhaps take you back to your owner. But in the meantime we'll stay together."

Charlie evidently agreed to this proposition, for when Helmsley tucked him cosily under his arm, he settled down comfortably as though well accustomed to the position. He was certainly nothing of a weight to carry, and his new owner was conscious of a certain pleasure in feeling the warm, silky little body nestling against his breast. He was not quite alone any more,—this little creature was a companion,—a something to talk to, to caress and to protect. He ascended the bank, and regaining the highroad resumed his vagrant way. Noon was now at the full, and the sun's heat seemed to create a silence that was both oppressive and stifling. He walked slowly, and began to feel that perhaps after all he had miscalculated his staying powers, and that the burden of old age would, in the end, take vengeance upon him for running risks of fatigue and exhaustion which, in his case, were wholly unnecessary.