The Wizard of West Penwith: A Tale of the Land's-End. Forfar William Bentinck

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СКАЧАТЬ and you must take one too; so mix them, if you please, and come and tell me all the news."

      "Polly! come and get the hot water and sugar for the gentleman," said the landlord, calling to the maid, who was upstairs, as he went towards the bar to get the two brandies. "Come, Poll! Poll! Polly!" But as Polly did not come, he was obliged to bustle about himself; for he received no help from his wife, although he called to her several times from the bar. At length all things were placed on the little table, and the stranger began to ask about "The Conjuror."

      "The what!" exclaimed Mrs. Brown, dropping her needles, and looking up in surprise and alarm, – while poor Mr. Brown stopped short in the act of putting his glass to his lips.

      "Hallo!" exclaimed the stranger; "you look as if you had heard some fellow talking treason against His Most Gracious Majesty the King – God bless him!" – and the stranger lifted his hat, which he had kept on out of compliment to his host and hostess. "I mean Mr. Freeman, then," he said, correcting himself; "I have heard such wonderful accounts of him, that I should like to know what he can really do."

      "He would shaw you what he could do, very soon, ef he heard you speak that word, I reckon," replied Mrs. Brown, getting up from her seat and going to the door of the kitchen, and looking into the passage and closing the front door.

      "He doesn't like being called a 'conjuror,' then," said the stranger.

      "Like it?" said Mrs. Brown, drawing her chair nearer to the chimney-corner; "iss, – just as much as you would like to be called 'no conjuror!'"

      "That's very well," said Mr. Brown, venturing on a laugh, now that his courage was being wound up by the brandy and water.

      At this moment there came a clatter down the road, as of a horse at full gallop.

      "Drat the boy!" exclaimed Mr. Brown, rising in great excitement; "he can't be come a'ready, can aw? To ride the mare like that es too bad! too bad! I'll kill 'n ef 'tes he. Iss fie! tes; for she's stopped at the stable-door. Dear lor'! Polly! Polly!"

      When Mr. Brown went out, followed by the stranger and Mrs. Brown, there was the mare sure enough, standing at the stable-door without a rider, trembling from head to foot, and covered with foam and mud, with scarcely a dry hair on her body.

      "Drat the boy!" exclaimed Mr. Brown; "he's killed – that's a sure thing – and the mare is ruined. Wo! ho! my darling; wo! ho!" And he took the mare's nose into his arms, and caressed it as if it had been a favourite daughter, while the stranger examined her all over, but could find no wound or injury whatever. She had evidently been frightened, for she was trembling still. They led her into the stable, and then began to think of the boy.

      "I'd go and search for him," said the stranger, "but I don't know which way he went."

      "No, nor yet I," said Mrs. Brown; "there's no knowing where that boy do go, when he's out; he's mighty fond of taking the narrow roads and bye lanes instead of the high road. There's two or three ways of going to Tol-pedn-Penwith from here; and like enough he went the way that nobody else would go ('cept 'The Maister')." This latter sentence she spoke almost in a whisper.

      "While we are talking here, the boy may die," said the stranger, "if he's thrown and seriously hurt."

      "The mare is all right," said Mr. Brown, coming out of the stable; "and now, if missus will get Polly to make a 'warm mash,' and give it to her at once, you and I'll go, sir, and see what can be done for the poor boy."

      CHAPTER VI.

      THE FAMILY PARTY

      The two young officers had been invited to dine at Pendrea-house on that day, at two o'clock – the squire's usual dinner-hour. Lieut. Fowler had some writing work to do – rather an unusual occupation for him. However, as it was a report to be sent to head-quarters, which he had put off from day to day, he said to his friend in the morning, during breakfast, "The writing be blowed! but 'needs must when the devil drives!' so you go out, old fellow, and take a stroll, and leave me here to kick my heels under the table for a few hours. Two o'clock sharp, mind, and then we'll put our legs under the squire's mahogany, and tuck into his old port like trumps. That's an amusement which suits me a devilish deal better than quill-driving, if I must tell the honest truth for once in my life."

      Two o'clock arrived, but Morley did not make his appearance. "The deuce take the fellow," soliloquised the lieutenant; "he'll lose his dinner and get out of the squire's good books. By Jove! though, perhaps he went in to have a lark with the girls in the morning, and so he did not think it worth while to come back. I'll just wash the ink off my paws, and toddle down as quick as I can; the squire won't like being kept waiting. 'Tis devilish lucky the old chap doesn't require a fellow to dress for dinner every time he tucks his legs under his mahogany; – I don't like getting into harness very often, unless duty calls – and then we must obey."

      While the jovial officer is washing his hands, we will just look round his little "cabin," as he called it.

      The little dwelling in which the commander of the signal-station resided, was certainly fitted up more to resemble a cabin on board ship, than the habitation of a landsman. On the ground floor there was a small room, or lobby, into which you entered at once from the front door. Opposite this door there was a door leading into the sitting-room, and beyond that another door led from the sitting-room into the kitchen. On the right, as you entered the lobby, were the stairs, leading to the two bedrooms, which led one into the other, like the rooms below. And in the ceilings were fixed iron rings, to which the hammocks were slung at night, and unshipped by day, the same as on board ship, so that these rooms might also be used as sitting-rooms, if required, in the daytime.

      There were three men kept at each of these stations, besides the officer, and they had a separate cabin appropriated to them, adjoining the principal one. Their duty was to attend upon the officer; hoist signals of flags and balls, to give notice of the approach of an enemy's ship; or to signal to English ships orders from head-quarters. And these signals could be communicated to and from London in a very short time, – although not so quickly, nor so accurately, as by the telegraph of the present day.

      It was not long after two when Lieut. Fowler got down to Pendrea-house, where he found the squire with his watch in his hand.

      "Half-an-hour is soon lost, my boy," said the old gentleman, as the lieutenant entered the drawing-room; "but where is your friend?"

      "Hasn't Morley been here, sir?" asked Fowler, in some surprise.

      "No," replied the squire, "I haven't seen him, – have you, girls?"

      This last question was addressed to two young ladies, whom Lieut. Fowler now approached, and greeted as old acquaintances. They had seen nothing of Mr. Morley, they said, since the day before, when they had all walked to Lamorna Cove together.

      "That's queer," said the squire; "but he's a stranger, and may have missed his way, – so we'll give him a quarter-of-an-hour's grace."

      And during this quarter-of-an-hour – the most awkward one in the whole twenty-four hours – we will introduce the reader more formally than we have hitherto done, to Squire Pendray and his family, the present owner and occupiers of Pendrea-house.

      The squire was a purse-proud man, who had made a good deal of money, no one knew how, and purchased Pendrea estate many years before. He wished to rank among the ancient aristocracy of the county, – and his wealth enabled him to mix with them, and to be on a seeming equality; but in those days ancestral pride was very strong, and those who could boast of an ancient aristocratic pedigree, however limited their means might be, looked down with contempt on the man of a day, who had nothing but СКАЧАТЬ