the evening of the day that jeffray rode to break his betrothal with miss hardacre, isaac grimshaw came limping across from his cottage to find dan plastering new tiles on the roof of his small byre. isaac stood at the foot of the ladder, squinting up at his son against the evening sunlight, his white hair shining under his hat.
dan pressed a tile home upon its bed of plaster, and, laying his trowel on the roof, looked down at his father.
“what be ye a-wanting?” he asked, scratching his beard with a black thumb nail.
isaac was frowning and looking fierce and out of humor.
“come down, lad, i ain’t going to bellow at ye.”
dan climbed down and stood with one hand on the ladder, staring inquisitively into his father’s face. it was not often that isaac’s complacency was ruffled by a grievance. his arbitrary nature found few foul winds to trouble him in pevensel.
“what’s amiss, dad?”
“that damned old she-dog ursula’s in a pet.”
dan grunted sympathetically.
“she be growing daft fast,” he said.
“so i say, lad, but the old fool has a tongue, and a meddlesome tongue, too, bad blood to her. she might be doing us a deal of harm unless we quiet her silly old soul.”
“what be ursula whining for?”
“guineas, lad; she be as sweet on the gold dirt as solomon on his liquor.”
isaac leaned against the wall of the byre and explained the nature of the old woman’s grievance. the gist of it was that isaac had never given her the eighty guineas that he had promised her on bess’s marriage. ursula grimshaw was slipping into her dotage, and, like many an old creature in that maudlin december of life, she had waxed querulous and testy, jealous of her rights and greedy of her due. her love of gold had increased with the waning of her intellect, and she was forever bemoaning bess’s absence and grumbling at her brother for cheating her of her rights. isaac, who was never eager to disburse gold, and had kept the real secret of their wealth from all save ursula and dan, his son, had met the old woman’s complaints with banter, and chuckled at her demand for the guineas he had promised. ursula, however, had flown at last into a fit of senile rage, spread her claws, and spluttered like a cat. she would have the money, or isaac should repent of cheating her because she was old and feeble. had not dan given bess the brooch of emeralds? the girl should hear the whole truth unless the money was forthcoming. with dramatic spite, ursula had tottered up out of her chair, shaken her stick at isaac, and cackled out threats that had made her brother change his tone.
“we must fetch another bag out of the chest, lad,” isaac said, at the end of the recital, “unless you are for giving up the guineas i gave ye.”
dan scratched his head and frowned at the suggestion.
“drat the old hussy,” he retorted, “i’ll give her none of my guineas. i be wanting a new wagon and new gear, and the girl’ll be wasting a powerful lot of money.”
isaac’s face suggested the thought that a tap with an axe on the old lady’s crown would have solved the difficulty as clearly as possible. he suppressed the temptation towards violence, however, and bade dan call at his cottage that night after it was dark. they would go to the monk’s grave and bring back the gold that should keep old ursula quiet.
bess had been vexing her ingenuity to discover how she might charm from dan the secret of the brooch. this golden bauble starred with its emerald eyes seemed to her the one talisman that could break the silence of the past. she had tried to charm some confession from old ursula, but the dame would tell bess nothing, despite her grievance against isaac. thus when dan, surly and morose, came in to bess at supper-time, and told her curtly that he would be out with his gun that night, the girl grew keen and alert as a deer that scents peril on the wind.
had not dan given her the brooch on the morning after his last night out with his gun in pevensel? she remembered that he had brought no birds back with him in the morning, and the more bess pondered it, the more suspicious she grew of her husband’s honesty. to be sure dan would be out in the forest at night now and again, and she more than suspected that he was in league with the land smugglers who worked from the sea up through pevensel. thorney chapel was notorious in the neighborhood, and it was whispered that the parson had once locked a hard-pressed cargo in the vestry. bess assured herself that there was some secret to be discovered. she made up her mind to follow dan, and to see where he went that night in pevensel.
after supper, looking meek and innocent, she took her candle, bade dan good-night, and went up to bed. bolting the door after her, she sat down on the chest to listen, after throwing a gray cloak over her shoulders and buckling on her shoes ready for the adventure. half an hour passed before she heard dan stumping to and fro in the kitchen beneath. she heard him take his gun down from the beam, call to his black spaniel, and unlatch the door. swift and sure-footed she was out of the bedroom, and down the creaking stairs into the kitchen. the wood fire was burning brightly on the irons, the light twinkling on the pewter, and playing with the shadows in the dark corners of the room. she tried the door softly—found that dan had locked it and taken the key. with a feeling of tense excitement, bess unlatched the casement, climbed out on to the ledge, and slipped down into the garden. she stood listening a moment, cowering under the shadow of the wall, and looking out into the dark. she could see a light twinkling behind the kitchen window of isaac’s cottage and hear voices coming gruffly out of the gloom. stooping, and gliding under cover of the rose-bushes and the pea-sticks to the garden gate, she slipped out and passed along under the shadows of the apple-trees.
the voices came from the direction of isaac’s cottage. bess recognized the old man’s impatient treble, dan answering him curtly in his gruff bass. the candle went out of a sudden, and she heard the yelp of a dog and the closing and locking of a door. two dim figures showed in the murk before her. they moved away towards the woods. bess, running forward on the edge of the orchard, reached isaac’s cottage and crouched under the window, listening. she caught the whimpering of a dog, and knew that dan had left the spaniel locked in the cottage. it would be safer for her to follow them now that they were alone.
brushing past the spreading bracken, halting, listening, peering from behind the great trunks, bess followed the voices that led her through the forest. the scent of pines drifted through the warm darkness, while here and there a ghostly may-tree shed fragrance from its white dome. soon bess saw a light gleam out and go jigging and waving through the darkness. isaac had lit his lantern. bess blessed him for it, knowing that it would help her in the chase. she walked warily, her arched feet a-tingle with a sense of peril and adventure, her eyes watching the light that flashed and fled beyond the trees.
it was a mile before isaac and his son came to the glade where a white-trunked fir grew on the monk’s knoll. they set the lantern down on the grass. dan handling the spade, while isaac squatted on the trunk of a fallen tree.
bess, seeing that the light had become stationary among the trees, drew near slowly, slipping from trunk to trunk. fearful of treading on dead wood and hearing it snap in the deathly stillness of the forest, she felt the ground with her foot each time before putting her weight upon it. at the edge of the glade bracken and white chervil and goutweed were growing. bess, going down on her hands and knees, crawled slowly to where a low bush stood, and, drawing her hood forward over her face, looked out over the glade.
the lantern threw a vague circle of light over the grass barred with the black shadows cast by its frame. bess could see old isaac sitting hunched on the dead tree. he had lit his pipe, and a faint glow showed above the brown bowl, the smoke wreathing upward into the dark. the light from the lantern fell upon dan, who had thrown off his coat and was working in his shirt. the bull neck and the hairy chest were showing, though the level of the light hardly reached his face.
bess, crouching under the bush, which was a thorn, and holding her breath, saw dan thrust his spade into the pile of earth beside the hole, catch something that isaac threw to him, and bend his broad shoulders over the pit. the light from the lantern fell on his black and frowsy head and the swelling curves of his hairy forearms. bess heard the click of a shooting lock. dan reached deep into the hole and swung something that jingled on to the grass. then he stood up, wiping his forehead with his forearm, and staring round into the darkness of the woods.
isaac had reached for the bag of money when bess, who was drawing back into the deeper shadow, set her hand on a dead thorn-bough. the spikes stabbed her palm. with the sudden pain of it she drew her breath in through her teeth with a slight and sibilant sound. she crouched down behind the thorn-bush, but both dan and isaac had heard her. the elder man was peering right and left like an old hawk, dan stooping a little and staring straight to where bess lay hid. he picked up the lantern and came striding round the edge of the glade, looking fiercely into the dark. isaac had snatched up the gun and cocked it.
bess, crouching behind the thorn-bush, trembled like a frightened hare. dan was only twenty paces away, the lantern darting out arms of light into the forest. he would certainly see her if he passed the place, and with the swift instinct of the moment she chose the instant fortune of flight. starting up like a wild thing from cover, she scurried back among the trees and took the winding path by which they had come.
dan, giving a snort like a startled horse, dropped the lantern, flung up one arm, and plunged after her. he had seen the dark figure flit in among the trees, and could hear the crackling of twigs under her hurrying feet. with his mouth open and his hands clawing the air, he ran, rolling clumsily at the hips like a fat ketch in a heavy sea. bess had twenty yards start of him and no more, and, quick and strong as she was, her skirts and cloak hindered her.
bess heard him thudding in her wake, breathing hard like an angry bull. the trees sped by, solemn and untroubled, the winding path seemed to have no ending. plod, plod, plod, came the heavy foot-falls at her heels till she felt like a child chased by an ogre. strain as she would she could not outpace the man, and she knew enough of dan’s doggedness to guess the end.
after all, why should she run from her own husband? she had merely caught him uncovering money in the forest, and there was no reason why he should suspect her. halting suddenly and struggling for her breath, with her hands to her bosom, she stood in the middle of the path and laughed a shrill, breathless laugh as the man came up with her.
“ha, dan, i have led you a dance, hey!”
dan stopped dead with a great oath, then came close to her, panting, and glaring in her face.
“what be you doing in the forest, you she-dog?”
“i may follow my husband when he goes hunting.”
dan, with a curse, lifted up his great fist, struck her in the face, and bent over her as she lay half-stunned by the blow.
