In the Roar of the Sea Part 50

Coppinger looked at Judith.

"Not to-day. It is not possible. She is ill--faint. To-morrow. Neither she nor I nor the witnesses will run away. We will come to you to-morrow."

Uncle Zachie offered to a.s.sist Judith from the church.

"No," said Cruel, peremptorily, "she is mine now."

She was able with a.s.sistance to walk, she seemed to recover for a moment in the air outside, but again lapsed into faintness on being placed in the chaise.

"To Pentyre Glaze," ordered Coppinger; "our home."

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

A BREAKFAST.

"She has been over-exerted, over-excited," said Miss Trevisa. "Leave her to recover; in a few days she will be herself again. Remember, her father died of heart complaint, and though Judith resembles her mother rather than a Trevisa, she may have inherited from my brother just that one thing she had better have let him carry to his grave with him."

So Judith was given the little room that adjoined her aunt's, and Miss Trevisa postponed for a week her migration to Oth.e.l.lo Cottage.

Aunt Dionysia was uneasy about her niece; perhaps her conscience did suffer from some qualms when she saw how Judith shrank from the union she had driven her into for her own selfish convenience. She treated her in the wisest manner, now she had brought her to the Glaze, for she placed her in her old room next her own, and left her there to herself. Judith could hear her aunt walking about and muttering in the adjoining chamber, and was content to be left alone to recover her composure and strength.

Uncle Zachie and Jump were, however, in sore distress; they had made the trim cottage ready, had prepared a wedding breakfast, engaged a helping hand or two, and no one had come to partake. Nor was Mr.

Desiderius Mules in a cheerful mood. He had been invited to the breakfast, and was hungry and cold. He had to wait while Mr. Menaida ran up to Pentyre to know whether any one was going to honor his board. While he was away the rector stamped about the parlor, growling that he believed he was about to be "choused out of his breakfast.

There was really no knowing what these people in this out-of-the-world corner might do." Then he pulled off his boots and shook the sand out, rang for Jump, and asked at what hour precisely the breakfast was to be eaten, and whether it was put on table to be looked at only.

From Pentyre Glaze Mr. Menaida was not greatly successful in obtaining guests. He found some wild-looking men there in converse with Coppinger, men whom he knew by rumor to belong to a cla.s.s that had no ostensible profession and means of living.

Mr. Menaida had ordered in clotted cream, which would not keep sweet many days. It ought to be eaten at once. He wanted to know whether Coppinger, the bride, Miss Trevisa, anyone was coming to his house to consume the clotted cream. As Jamie was drifting about purposeless, and he alone seemed disposed to accompany Uncle Zachie, the old gentleman carried him off.

"I s'pose I can't on the spur of the moment go in and ask over St.

Minver parson?" asked Menaida, dubiously, of the St. Enodoc parson.

"You see I daresay he's hurt not to have had the coupling of 'em himself."

"Most certainly not," said Mr. Mules; "an appet.i.te is likely to go into faintness unless attended to at once. I know that the coats of my stomach are honeycombed with gastric juice. Shall I say grace? Another half-hour of delay will finish me."

Consequently but three persons sat down to a plentiful meal; but some goose, cold, had hardly been served, when in came Mr. Scantlebray, the agent, with a cheery salutation of "Hulloa, Menaida, old man! What, eating and drinking? I'll handle a knife and fork with you, unasked.

Beg pardon, Mr. Mules. I'm a rough man, and an old acquaintance of our good friend here. Hope I see you in the enjoyment of robust health, sir. Oh, Menaida, old man! I didn't expect such a thing as this. Now I begin to see daylight, and understand why I was turned out of the valuers.h.i.+p, and why my brother lost this promising young pupil. Ah, ha! my man, you have been deprived of fun, such fun, roaring fun, by not being with my brother Scanty. Well, sir," to Mr. Mules, "what was the figure of the valuation? You had a queer man on your side. I pity you. A man I wouldn't trust myself. I name no names. Now tell me, what did you get?"

"A hundred and twenty-seven pounds four and ninepence farthing.

Monstrous--a chouse."

"As you say, monstrous. Why that chancel, show me the builder who will contract to do that alone at a hundred and twenty-seven pounds?

And the repairs of the vestry--are they to be reckoned at four and ninepence farthing? It is a swindle. I'd appeal. I'd refuse. You made a mistake, sir, let me tell you, in falling into certain hands.

Yes--I'll have some goose, thank you."

Mr. Scantlebray ate heartily, so did the Reverend Desiderius, who had the honeycomb cells of his stomach coats to fill.

Both, moreover, did justice to Mr. Menaida's wine, they did not spare it; why should they? Those for whom the board was spread had not troubled to come to it, and they must make amends for their neglect.

"Horrible weather," said the rector. "I suppose this detestable sort of stuff of which the atmosphere is composed is the prevailing abomination one has to inhale throughout three-quarters of the year.

One cannot see three yards before one."

"It's bad for some and good for others," answered Scantlebray.

"There'll be wrecks, certainly, after this, especially if we get, as we are pretty sure to get, a wind ash.o.r.e."

"Wrecks!" exclaimed the Rector, "and pray who pays the fees for drowned men I may be expected to bury?"

"The parish," answered Uncle Zachie.

"Oh, half-a-crown a head," said Mr. Mules, contemptuously.

"There are other things to be had besides burial fees out of a wreck,"

said Scantlebray; "but you must be down early before the coast-guard are there. Have you donkeys?"

"Donkeys! What for?"

"I have one, a gray beauty," exclaimed Jamie; "Captain Coppinger gave her to me."

"Well, young man, then you pick up what you can, when you have the chance, and lade her with your findings. You'll pick up something better than corpses, and make something more than burial half-crowns."

"But why do you suppose there will be wrecks?" inquired the rector of St. Enodoc. "There is no storm."

"No storm, certainly, but there is fog, and in the fog vessels coming up the Channel to Bristol get lost as to their bearings, get near our cliffs without knowing it, and then--if a wind from the west spring up and blows rough--they are done for, they can't escape to the open.

That's it, old man. I beg your Reverence's pardon, I mean, sir. When I said that such weather was bad for some and good for others you can understand me now--bad for the wrecked, good for the wreckers."

"But surely you have no wreckers here?"

Mr. Scantlebray laughed. "Go and tell the bridegroom that you think so. I'll let you into the knowledge of one thing"--he winked over his gla.s.s--"there's a fine merchantman on her way to Bristol."

"How do you know?"

"Know! Because she was sighted off St. Ives, and the tidings has run up the coast like fire among heather. I don't doubt it that it has reached Hartland by this; and with a thick fog like to-day there are a thousand hearts beating with expectation. Who can say? She may be laden with gold-dust from Africa, or with tin from Barca, or with port from Oporto."

"My boy Oliver is coming home," said Mr. Menaida.

"Then let's hope he is not in this vessel, for, old man, she stands a bad chance in such weather as this. There is Porth-quin, and there is Hayle Bay ready to receive her, or Doom Bar on which she may run, all handy for our people. Are you anything of a sportsman, sir?"

"A little--but I don't fancy there is much in this precious country--no cover."

"What is fox-hunting when you come to consider--or going after a snipe or a partridge? A fox! it's naught, the brush stinks, and a snipe is but a mouthful. My dear sir, if you come to live among us, you must seek your sport not on the land but at sea. You'll find the sport worth something when you get a haul of a barrel of first-rate sherry, or a load of silver ingots. Why, that's how Penwarden bought his farm.

He got the money after a storm--found it on the sh.o.r.e out of the pocket of a dead man. Do you know why the bells of St. Enodoc are so sweet? Because, so folks say, melted into them are ingots of Peruvian silver from a s.h.i.+p wrecked on Doom Bar."

"I should like to get some silver or gold," said Jamie.

"I daresay you would, and so perhaps you may if you look out for it.