The Ship of Stars Part 31

She opened the pages, but, seeing his outstretched hand, gave it obediently to Taffy, who took it to the window.

"Almost two hundred pounds." He knit his brows and began to drum with his fingers on the window-pane. "And we must put the interest at five per cent. . . . With my first in Moderations I might find some post as an usher in a small school. . . . There's an agency which puts you in the way of such things: I must look up the address. . . .

We will leave this house, of course."

"Must we?"

"Why of course we must. We are living here by _her_ favour.

A cottage will do--only it must have four rooms, because of grandmother. . . . I will step over and talk with Mendarva.

He may be able to give me a job. It will keep me going, at any rate, until I hear from the agency."

"You forget that I have over forty pounds a year--or, rather, mother has. The capital came from the sale of her farm, years ago."

"Did it?" said Taffy grimly. "You forget that I have never been told. Well, that's good, so far as it goes. But now I'll step over and see Mendarva. If only I could catch this cowardly lie somewhere on my way!"

He kissed his mother, caught up his cap, and flung out of the house.

The sea breeze came humming across the sandhills. He opened his lungs to it, and it was wine to his blood; he felt strong enough to slay dragons. "But who could the liar be? Not Lizzie herself, surely! Not--"

He pulled up short in a hollow of the towans.

"Not--George?"

Treachery is a hideous thing; and to youth so incomprehensibly hideous that it darkens the sun. Yet every trusting man must be betrayed. That was one of the lessons of Christ's life on earth.

It is the last and severest test; it kills many, morally, and no man who has once met and looked it in the face departs the same man, though he may be a stronger one.

"_Not George?_"

Taffy stood there so still that the rabbits crept out and, catching sight of him, paused in the mouths of their burrows. When at length he moved on it was to take, not the path which wound inland to Mendarva's, but the one which led straight over the higher moors to Carwithiel.

It was between one and two o'clock when he reached the house and asked to see Mr. and Mrs. George Vyell, They were not at home, the footman said; had left for Falmouth the evening before to join some friends on a yachting cruise. Sir Harry was at home; was, indeed, lunching at that moment; but would no doubt be pleased to see Mr.

Raymond.

Sir Harry had finished his lunch, and sat sipping his claret and tossing sc.r.a.ps of biscuits to the dogs.

"Hullo, Raymond!--thought you were in Oxford. Sit down, my boy; delighted to see you. Thomas, a knife and fork for Mr. Raymond.

The cutlets are cold, I'm afraid; but I can recommend the cold saddle, and the ham--it's a York ham. Go to the sideboard and forage for yourself. I wanted company. My boy and Honoria are at Falmouth yachting, and have left me alone. What, you won't eat? A gla.s.s of claret, then, at any rate."

"To tell the truth, Sir Harry," Taffy began awkwardly. "I've come on a disagreeable business."

Sir Harry's face fell. He hated disagreeable business. He flipped a piece of biscuit at his spaniel's nose and sat back, crossing his legs.

"Won't it keep?"

"To me it's important."

"Oh, fire away then: only help yourself to the claret first."

"A girl--Lizzie Pezzack, living over at Langona--has had a child born--"

"Stop a moment. Do I know her?--Ah, to be sure--daughter of old Pezzack, the light-keeper--a brown-coloured girl with her hair over her eyes. Well, I'm not surprised. Wants money, I suppose?

Who's the father?"

"I don't know."

"Well, but--d.a.m.n it all!--somebody knows." Sir Harry reached for the bottle and refilled his gla.s.s.

"The one thing I know is that Honoria--Mrs. George, I mean--has heard about it, and suspects me."

Sir Harry lifted his gla.s.s and glanced at him over the rim.

"That's the devil. Does she, now?" He sipped. "She hasn't been herself for a day or two--this explains it. I thought it was change of air she wanted. She's in the deuce of a rage, you bet."

"She is," said Taffy grimly.

"There's no prude like your young married woman. But it'll blow over, my boy. My advice to you is to keep out of the way for a while."

"But--but it's a lie!" broke in the indignant Taffy. "As far as I am concerned there's not a grain of truth in it!"

"Oh--I beg your pardon, I'm sure." Here Honoria's terrier (the one which George had bought for her at Plymouth) interrupted by begging for a biscuit, and Sir Harry balanced one carefully on its nose.

"On trust--good dog! What does the girl say herself?"

"I don't know. I've not seen her."

"Then, my dear fellow--it's awkward, I admit--but I'm dashed if I see what you expect me to do." The baronet pulled out a handkerchief and began flicking the crumbs off his knees.

Taffy watched him for a minute in silence. He was asking himself why he had come. Well, he had come in a hot fit of indignation, meaning to face Honoria and force her to take back the insult of her suspicion. But after all--suppose George were at the bottom of it?

Clearly Sir Henry knew nothing, and in any case could not be asked to expose his own son. And Honoria? Let be that she would never believe--that he had no proof, no evidence even--this were a pretty way of beginning to discharge his debt to her! The terrier thrust a cold muzzle against his hand. The room was very still. Sir Harry poured out another gla.s.sful and held out the decanter. "Come, you must drink; I insist!"

Taffy looked up. "Thank you, I will."

He could now and with a clear conscience. In those quiet moments he had taken the great resolution. The debt should be paid back, and with interest; not at five per cent., but at a rate beyond the creditor's power of reckoning. For the interest to be guarded for her should be her continued belief in the man she loved. Yes, _but if George were innocent?_ Why, then the sacrifice would be idle; that was all.

He swallowed the wine, and stood up.

"Must you be going? I wanted a chat with you about Oxford," grumbled Sir Harry; but noting the lad's face, how white and drawn it was, he relented, and put a hand on his shoulder. "Don't take it too seriously, my boy. It'll blow over--it'll blow over. Honoria likes you, I know. We'll see what the trollop says: and if I get a chance of putting in a good word, you may depend on me."

He walked with Taffy to the door--good, easy man--and waved a hand from the porch. On the whole, he was rather glad than not to see his young friend's back.

From his smithy window Mendarva spied Taffy coming along the road, and stepped out on the green to shake hands with him.

"Pleased to see your face, my son! You'll excuse my not asking 'ee inside; but the fact is"--he jerked his thumb towards the smithy--"

we've a-got our troubles in there."

It came on our youth with something of a shock that the world had room for any trouble beside his own.

"'Tis the Dane. He went over to Truro yesterday to the wrastlin', an' got thrawed. I tell'n there's no call to be shamed. 'Twas Luke the Wendron fella did it--in the treble play--inside lock backward, and as pretty a chip as ever I see." Mendarva began to ill.u.s.trate it with foot and ankle, but checked himself, and glanced nervously over his shoulder. "Isn' lookin', I hope? He's in a terrible pore about it. Won't trust hissel' to spake, and don't want to see n.o.body.

But, as I tell'n, there's no call to be shamed; the fella took the belt in the las' round, and turned his man over like a tab. He's a proper angletwitch, that Wendron fella. Stank 'pon en both ends, and he'll rise up in the middle and look at 'ee. There was no one a patch on en but the Dane; and I'll back the Dane next time they clinch. 'Tis a nuisance, though, to have'n like this--with a big job coming on, too, over to the light-house."

Taffy looked steadily at the smith. "What's doing at the light-house?"