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СКАЧАТЬ he could not keep a man who was too lame to work . . . and, yes, I suppose Thompson might find something to do at Solva,” she added reflectively. “I wonder indeed that having been a sailor he did not go to Solva in the first instance.”

      “Oh, he had been a sailor, had he, miss?” inquired Mrs. Griffiths with interest. Nest bit her lip to think that part of the secret which she was keeping even from Papa should have escaped her. However, it was not a very vital part—not, at any rate, in the hands of Mrs. Griffiths now that Thompson had left Tan-y-bach.

      “Yes, or so he said,” she answered negligently. “But I really know nothing about him; only, seeing that it was my dog who bit him . . .”

      “Yes, yes, indeed, Miss Nest! And I am sorry that Griffiths should have been obliged to dismiss the man. . . . Must you be going now, Miss Nesta? I hope his Reverence do keep his health, and Miss Jane, and the lovely babe, as I do hear it is?”

      “I suppose,” said Nest just as she was turning away, “that the man will have gone to Llanunwas by the road, because he might have got a lift that way?”

      “No, no, he did go by the cliffs, because he thought he might ask for work at the mill down yonder in Caerbwdy; but I am sure he ’ould not get it, and he will be nearly to Llanunwas by this time.”

      But will he? thought Nest when the door was shut. Mrs. Griffiths seems to reckon without his lameness, and as she probably has not stirred off the farm for years, save in her husband’s gig, has forgotten how steep is the path just here down to Caerbwdy and up the other side, and how much steeper and longer is that down to Porth-y-Rhaw. Shall I . . . shall I?

      But if she went after him, what could she do? Nothing, absolutely nothing, except to say how sorry she was, and give him what money she had with her.

      Besides, what an extraordinary, and, had he been of her own station, an unbefitting thing to do—pursue a young man who must very little desire to see her, along three miles or so of cliff! What would Jane, what would Papa say?

      Nest stood hesitating there in the sunshine, while the dogs fawned upon her. Then she deliberately turned her back on the direction of St. David’s, and crossed the remainder of the field towards the descent into the first little valley running down to the sea which had to be traversed. As she went down the winding path between the bracken every foxglove among it nodded at her, but whether in approval or warning it was impossible to say. A bramble caught her thin yellow frock, flounced and flowered, which took a great deal of careful disentangling; it was evident that the blackberry bush at least did not favour the pursuit. And Nest herself thought, What shall I feel like when I come upon him, if I do; and what shall I say? . . . I shall pretend, of course, that I was just taking a walk along the cliffs, and be very much surprised to see him, and ask him what he is doing there . . .

      So she planned as she went down into the combe where the small stream tinkled along almost hidden in wild mint, and was so shy that when it reached the shore it burrowed under the pebbles, and met the sea only as half a score of dispersed trickles. Down here stood the little water-mill; should she inquire whether a man from the farm above had asked for work there, or had even been seen passing? But a glance showed that the wheel was idle; the mill for some reason or other was not working to-day. So she continued along the stream until she could most conveniently cross it on the bank of pebbles at its mouth. Mounting again the other side, she was on a long stretch of turfy grass, and could see, away to the right, the sea breaking white round the bases of the humpy, close-pressed islets at the end of Ramsey Island; fifteen miles away, the shape of Grassholm dim in the haze; and in front and on her left hand the whole sickle-sweep of St. Bride’s Bay. Last time she had been here, in June, the grassy bank which accompanied her had been one long nodding line of pink thrift; but now it was clothed in some places with the gold of lady’s bedstraw, in others with the heaven-blue of the smaller scabious; and the ground at its foot was carpeted with the purple of the wild thyme. No wonder that the air was scented!

      Nest walked on; the fields receded further from the edge. Still there was no sign of Mark Thompson; yet she had hardly come far enough for that. Soon she began to approach a lesser dip, Ogof-y-Ffôs, where the ancient stone dyke, of purpose unknown, which started miles away on the other coast, came to an end. Here there was no shore, for the stream, a very small affair indeed, did not visibly meet the tide, but fell, or rather trickled, when it reached the edge of the green trough, a good thirty or forty feet into the sea below. And it was here, near this outgoing, with his back to her, that a man was half sitting, half lying on the sloping turf, staring, apparently, at the Cradle, that strange jumble of rocks projecting into the sea about a mile away, between him and the invisible entrance to Solva harbour. He wore a very shabby hat; beside him lay a staff and a bundle tied up in a handkerchief. Nest recognised the clothes; the dirty white waistcoat and the faded blue trousers. It was undoubtedly Mark Thompson.

      She stopped. He had not seen her, and owing to his position and the fact that the track which crossed the depression did not follow the verge but cut across the middle of the dip, he might not recognise her even when she got down. She was thus faced with a position of some delicacy, for if she were obliged deliberately to attract his attention she could not very easily feign surprise at seeing him. Fortunately, perhaps, a couple of stones slipped from the path, and the rattle carried to the ex-privateersman’s ears. He turned his head in an uninterested manner; turned still further round, and then scrambled slowly to his feet, removing his hat.

      Nest was by this time on much the same level, but a good ten yards lay between them. This distance the young man made no effort to lessen. He simply remained where he was, whether remembering that formerly his close proximity had alarmed Miss Meredith, or conscious that there was no reason for attributing to her any desire for further speech with him. So that Nest, after a moment’s hesitation, was obliged to advance towards her quarry; and somehow all her design of affecting surprise at seeing him went by the board.

      “I have just come from Tan-y-bach, Mr. Thompson,” she began, and the trouble in her voice was evident. “I was extremely sorry to learn there that Mr. Griffiths had discharged you on account of . . . on account of your being lame.”

      He looked at her with a certain astonishment showing in his long-lashed grey eyes, cast them down, and fumbling with the ragged brim of his hat replied, “ ’Tis very good of you to give the matter a thought, miss—very good indeed!”

      “But of course I have given it a thought,” returned Nest with vivacity, “seeing that it is, I fear, my dog’s fault that you are lame. I am . . . I am much concerned about it.”

      The ex-haymaker shook his head. “Your dog only did his duty, miss. I don’t wonder at his distrusting . . . a man in these clothes.”

      There was a kind of dull yet amused bitterness in his voice. Now that she was nearer to him Nest thought that he looked rather ill. Thin in the face he had been before—she had noticed that in the lane—but not, surely, pale with that curious effect of pallor beneath tan, as now.

      “Mr. Thompson,” she said after a moment, “have you had any treatment for that bite?”

      “I have washed the place, miss.”

      “But that, evidently, is not sufficient. If you are so lame it must be that it is worse—and painful, too, I am afraid?”

      “I’ve no doubt, miss, that it will heal in time,” said he.

      “Yes, but meanwhile . . . and you have lost your employment on account of it. Mr. Thompson, you must go to a medical man. Dr. Walters——”

      “That’s impossible,” he cut in shortly.

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