MEHALAH (continued 2)

'I am not going to eat,' she answered resolutely.

'You shall,' shouted Elijah, rising impetuously, and thrusting his chair back. 'You are insulting me in my own house if you refuse to eat with me.'

'I have no appetite.'

'You will not eat, I heard you say so. I know the devilry of your heart. You will not, but I will? In his rage he stamped on the trap-door that he had uncovered, when removing the chair. Instantly a prolonged, hideous howl rose from the depths and rang through the room. Mistress Sharland started back aghast. Mehalah raised her head, and the colour left her cheek.

'Oh ho!' roared Elijah. 'You will join in also, will you?' He drew the bolts passionately back.

'Look here,' he cried to Mehalah. 'Come here!'

Involuntarily she obeyed, and looked down. She saw into a vault feebly illuminated by daylight through one of the circular windows she had noticed on approaching the house. There she saw looking up, directly under the trap, a face so horrible in its dirt and madness that she recoiled.

'She won't eat, she won't bite with me,' shouted Rebow, 'then neither shall her mother eat, nor will I. You shall have the whole.' He caught up the dish, and threw down the rashers. The man below snapped, and caught like a wild beast, and uttered a growl of satisfaction.

Rebow flung the door back into its place, and rebolted it. Then he placed his chair in its former position, and looked composedly from the widow to Mehalah and seemed to draw pleasure from their fear.

'My brother,' he explained. 'Been mad from a child. A good job for me, as he was the elder. Now I have him in keeping, and the land and the house and the money are mine. What I hold, I hold fast. Amen.'

CHAPTER V.

THE DECOY.

There was commotion on the beach at Mersea City.

A man-of-war, a schooner, lay off the entrance to the Blackwater, and was signalling with bunting to the coastguard ship, permanently anchored off the island, which was replying. War had been declared with France some time, but as yet had not interfered with the smuggling trade, which was carried on with the Low Countries. Cruisers in the Channel had made it precarious work along the South Coast, and this had rather stimulated the activity of contraband traffic on the East. It was therefore with no little uneasiness that a war ship was observed standing off the Mersea flats. Why was she there? Was a man-of-war to cruise about the mouth of the Colne and Blackwater continually? What was the purport of the correspondence carried on between the schooner and the coastguard? Such were the queries put about among those gathered on the shingle.

They were not long left in doubt, for a boat manned by coastguards left the revenue vessel and ran ashore; the captain sprang out, and went up the beach to his cottage, followed by a couple of the crew. The eager islanders crowded round the remainder, and asked the news.

The captain was appointed to the command of the schooner, the 'Salamander,' which had come from the Downs under the charge of the first lieutenant, to pick him up. The destiny of the 'Salamander' was, of course, unknown.

Captain Macpherson was a keen, canny Scot, small and dapper; as he pushed through the cluster of men in fishing jerseys and wading boots he gave them a nod and a word, 'You ought to be serving your country instead of robbing her, ye loons. Why don't you volunteer like men, there's more money to be made by prizes than by running spirits.'

'That won't do, captain,' said Jim Morrell, an old fisherman. 'We know better than that. There's the oysters.'

'Oysters!' exclaimed the captain; 'there'll be no time for eating oysters now, and no money to pay for them neither. Come along with me, some of you shore crabs. I promise you better sport than sneaking about the creeks. We'll have at Johnny Crapaud with gun and cutlass.'

Then he entered his cottage, which was near the shore, to say farewell to his wife.

'If there's mischief to be done, that chap will do it,' was the general observation, when his back was turned.

Attention was all at once distracted by a young woman in a tall taxcart who was endeavouring to urge her horse along the road, but the animal, conscious of having an inexperienced hand on the rein, backed, and jibbed, and played a number of tricks, to her great dismay.

'Oh, do please some of you men lead him along. I daresay he will go if his head be turned east, but he is frightened by seeing so many of you.'

'Where are you going, Phoebe?' asked old Morrell.

'I'm only going to Waldegraves,' she answered. 'Oh, bother the creature! there he goes again!' as the horse danced impatiently, and swung round.

'De Witt!' she cried in an imploring tone, 'do hold his head. It is a shame of you men not to help a poor girl.'

George at once went to the rescue.

'Lead him on, De Witt, please, till we are away from the beach.'

The young man good-naturedly held the bit, and the horse obeyed without attempting resistance.

'There's a donkey on the lawn by Elm Tree Cottage,' said the girl; 'she brays whenever a horse passes, and I'm mortal afeared lest she scare this beast, and he runs away with me. If he do so, I can't hold him in, my wrists are so weak.'

'Why, Phoebe,' said De Witt, 'what are you driving for? Waldegraves is not more than a mile and a half off, and you might have walked the distance well enough.'

'I've sprained my ankle, and I can't walk. I must go to Waldegraves, I have a message there to my aunt, so Isaac Mead lent me the horse.'

'If you can't drive, you may do worse than sprain your ankle, you may break your neck.'

'That is what I am afraid of, George. The boy was to have driven me, but he is so excited, I suppose, about the man-of-war coming in, that he has run off. There! take care!'

'Can't you go on now?' asked De Witt, letting go the bridle. Immediately the horse began to jib and rear.

'You are lugging at his mouth fit to break his jaw, Phoebe. No wonder the beast won't go.'

'Am I, George? It is the fright. I don't understand the horse. O dear! O dear! I shall never get to Waldegraves by myself.'

'Let the horse go, but don't job his mouth in that way.'

'There he is turning round. He will go home again. O George! save me.'

'You are pulling him round, of course he will turn if you drag at the rein.'

'I don't understand horses,' burst forth Phoebe, and she threw the reins down. 'George, there's a good, dear fellow, jump in beside me. There's room for two, quite cosy. Drive me to Waldegraves. I shall never forget your goodness.' She put her two hands together, and looked piteously in the young man's face.

Phoebe Musset was a very good-looking girl, fair with bright blue eyes, and yellow hair, much more delicately made than most of the girls in the place. Moreover, she dressed above them. She was a village coquette, accustomed to being made much of, and of showing her caprices. Her father owned the store at the city where groceries and drapery were sold, and was esteemed a well-to-do man. He farmed a little land. Phoebe was his only child, and she was allowed to do pretty much as she liked. Her father and mother were hard-working people, but Phoebe's small hands were ever unsoiled, for they were ever unemployed. She neither milked the cows nor weighed the sugar. She liked indeed to be in the shop, to gossip with anyone who came in, and perhaps the only goods she condescended to sell was tobacco to the young sailors, from whom she might calculate on a word of flattery and a lovelorn look. She was always well and becomingly dressed. Now, in a chip bonnet trimmed with blue riband, and tied under the chin, with a white lace-edged kerchief over her shoulders, covering her bosom, she was irresistible. So at least De Witt found her, for he was obliged to climb the gig, seat himself beside her, and assume the reins.

'I am not much of a steersman in a craft like this,' said George laughing, 'but my hand is stronger than yours, and I can save you from wreck.'

Phoebe looked slyly round, and her great blue eyes peeped timidly up in the fisherman's face. 'Thank you so much, George. I shall never, never forget your great kindness.'

'There's nothing in it,' said the blunt fisherman; 'I'd do the same for any girl.'

'I know how polite you are,' continued Phoebe; then putting her hand on the reins, 'I don't think you need drive quite so fast, George; I don't want to get the horse hot, or Isaac will scold.'

'A jog trot like this will hurt no horse.'

'Perhaps you want to get back. I am sorry I have taken you away. Of course you have pressing business. No doubt you want to get to the Ray.' A little twinkling sly look up accompanied this speech. De Witt waxed red.

'I'm in no hurry, myself,' he said.

'How delightful, George, nor am I.'

The young man could not resist stealing a glance at the little figure beside him, so neat, so trim, so fresh. He was a humble fellow, and never dreamed himself to be on a level with such a refined damsel. Glory was the girl for him, rough and ready, who could row a boat, and wade in the mud. He loved Glory. She was a sturdy girl, a splendid girl, he said to himself. Phoebe was altogether different, she belonged to another sphere, he could but look and admire—and worship perhaps. She dazzled him, but he could not love her. She was none of his sort, he said to himself.

'A penny for your thoughts!' said Phoebe roguishly. He coloured. 'I know what you were thinking of. You were thinking of me.'

De Witt's colour deepened. 'I was sure it was so. Now I insist on knowing what you were thinking of me.'

'Why,' answered George with a clumsy effort at gallantry, 'I thought what a beauty you were.'

'Oh, George, not when compared with Mehalah.'

De Witt fidgeted in his seat.

'Mehalah is quite of another kind, you see, Miss.'

'I'm no Miss, if you please. Call me Phoebe. It is snugger.'

'She's more—' he puzzled his head for an explanation of his meaning. 'She is more boaty than you are—'

'Phoebe.'

'Than you are,' with hesitation, 'Phoebe.'

'I know;—strides about like a man, smokes and swears, and chews tobacco.'

'No, no, you mistake me, M——.'

'Phoebe.'

'You mistake me, Phoebe.'

'I have often wondered, George, what attracted you to Mehalah. To be sure, it will be a very convenient thing for you to have a wife who can swab the deck, and tar the boat and calk her. But then I should have fancied a man would have liked something different from a—sort of a man-woman—a jack tar or Ben Brace in petticoats, to sit by his fireside, and to take to his heart. But of course it is not for me to speak on such matters, only I somehow can't help thinking about you, George, and it worries me so, I lie awake at nights, and wonder and wonder, whether you will be happy. She has the temper of a tom cat, I'm told. She blazes up like gunpowder.'

De Witt fidgeted yet more uneasily. He did not like this conversation.

'Then she is half a gipsy. So you mayn't be troubled with her long. She'll keep with you as long as she likes, and then up with her pack, on with her wading boots. Yo heave hoy! and away she goes.'

De Witt, in his irritation, gave the horse a stinging switch across the flank, and he started forward. A little white hand was laid, not now on the reins, but on his hand.

'I'm so sorry, George my friend; after your kindness, I have teased you unmercifully, but I can't help it. When I think of Mehalah in her wading boots and jersey and cap, it makes me laugh—and yet when I think of her and you together, I'm ashamed to say I feel as if I could cry. George!' she suddenly ejaculated.

'Yes, Miss!'

'Phoebe, not Miss, please.'

'I wasn't going to say Miss.'

'What were you going to say?'

'Why, mate, yes, mate! I get into the habit of it at sea,' he apologised.

'I like it. Call me mate. We are on a cruise together, now, you and I, and I trust myself entirely in your hands, captain.'

'What was it you fared to ask, mate, when you called "George"?'

'Oh, this. The wind is cold, and I want my cloak and hood, they are down somewhere behind the seat in the cart. If I take the reins will you lean over and get them?'

'You won't upset the trap?'

'No.' He brought up the cloak and adjusted it round Phoebe's shoulders, and drew the hood over her bonnet, she would have it to cover her head.

'Doesn't it make me a fright?' she asked, looking into his face.

'Nothing can do that,' he answered readily.

'Well, push it back again, I feel as if it made me one, and that is as bad. There now. Thank you, mate! Take the reins again.'

'Halloo! we are in the wrong road. We have turned towards the Strood.'

'Dear me! so we have. That is the horse's doing. I let him go where he liked, and he went down the turn. I did not notice it. All I thought of was holding up his head lest he should stumble.'

De Witt endeavoured to turn the horse.

'Oh don't, don't attempt it!' exclaimed Phoebe. 'The lane is so narrow, that we shall be upset. Better drive on, and round by the Barrow Farm, there is not half-a-mile difference.'

'A good mile, mate. However, if you wish it.'

'I do wish it. This is a pleasant drive, is it not, George?'

'Very pleasant,' he said, and to himself added, 'too pleasant.'

So they chatted on till they reached the farm called Waldegraves, and there Phoebe alighted.

'I shall not be long,' she said, at the door, turning and giving him a look which might mean a great deal or nothing, according to the character of the woman who cast it.

When she came up she said, 'There, George, I cut my business as short as possible. Now what do you say to showing me the Decoy? I have never seen it, but I have heard a great deal of it, and I cannot understand how it is contrived.'

'It is close here,' said De Witt.

'I know it is, the little stream in this dip feeds it. Will you show me the Decoy?'

'But your foot—Phoebe. You have sprained your ankle.'

'If I may lean on your arm I think I can limp down there. It is not very far.'

'And then what about the horse?'

'Oh! the boy here will hold it, or put it up in the stable. Run and call him, George.'

'I could drive you down there, I think, at least within a few yards of the place, and if we take the boy he can hold the horse by the gate.'

'I had rather hobble down on your arm, George.'

'Then come along, mate.'

The Decoy was a sheet of water covering perhaps an acre and a half in the midst of a wood. The clay that had been dug out for its construction had been heaped up, forming a little hill crowned by a group of willows. No one who has seen this ill-used tree in its mutilated condition, cut down to a stump which bristles with fresh withes, has any idea what a stately and beautiful tree it is when allowed to grow naturally. The old untrimmed willow is one of the noblest of our native trees. It may be seen thus in well-timbered parts of Suffolk, and occasionally in Essex. The pond was fringed with rushes, except at the horns, where the nets and screens stood for the trapping of the birds. From the mound above the distant sea was visible, through a gap in the old elm trees that stood below the pool. In that gap was visible the war-schooner, lying as near shore as possible. George De Witt stood looking at it. The sea was glittering like silver, and the hull of the vessel was dark against the shining belt. A boat with a sail was approaching her.

'That is curious,' observed George. 'I could swear to yon boat. I know her red sail. She belongs to my cousin Elijah Rebow. But he can have nought to do with the schooner.'

Phoebe was impatient with anything save herself attracting the attention of the young fisherman. She drew him from the mound, and made him explain to her the use of the rush-platted screens, the arched and funnel-shaped net, and the manner in which the decoy ducks were trained to lead the wild birds to their destruction.

'They are very silly birds to be led like that,' said she.

'They little dream whither and to what they are being drawn,' said De Witt.

'I suppose some little ducks are dreadfully enticing,' said Phoebe, with a saucy look and a twinkle of the blue eyes. 'Look here, George, my bonnet-strings are untied, and my hands are quite unable to manage a bow, unless I am before a glass. Do you think you could tie them for me?'

'Put up your chin, then,' said De Witt with a sigh. He knew he was a victim; he was going against his conscience. He tried to think of Mehalah, but could not with those blue eyes looking so confidingly into his. He put his finger under her chin and raised it. He was looking full into that sweet saucy face.

'What sort of a knot? I can tie only sailor's knots.'

'Oh George! something like a true lover's knot.'

Was it possible to resist, with those damask cheeks, those red lips, and those pleading eyes so close, so completely in his power? George did not resist. He stooped and kissed the wicked lips, and cheeks, and eyes.

Phoebe drew away her face at once, and hid it. He took her arm and led her away. She turned her head from him, and did not speak.

He felt that the little figure at his side was shaken with some hysterical movement, and felt frightened.

'I have offended you, I am very sorry. I could not help it. Your lips did tempt me so; and you looked up at me just as if you were saying, "Kiss me!" I could not help it. You are crying. I have offended you.'

'No, I am laughing. Oh, George! Oh, George!'

They walked back to the farm without speaking. De Witt was ashamed of himself, yet felt he was under a spell which he could not break. A rough fisher lad flattered by a girl he had looked on as his superior, and beyond his approach, now found himself the object of her advances; the situation was more than his rude virtue could withstand. He knew that this was a short dream of delight, which would pass, and leave no substance, but whilst under the charm of the dream, he could not cry out nor move a finger to arouse himself to real life.

Neither spoke for a few minutes. But, at last, George De Witt turned, and looking with a puzzled face at Phoebe Musset said, 'You asked me on our way to Waldegraves what I was thinking about, and offered me a penny for my thoughts. Now I wonder what you are lost in a brown study about, and I will give you four farthings for what is passing in your little golden head.'

'You must not ask me, George—dear George.'

'Oh mate, you must tell me.'

'I dare not. I shall be so ashamed.'

'Then look aside when you speak.'

'No, I can't do that. I must look you full in the face; and do you look me in the face too. George, I was thinking—Why did you not come and talk to me, before you went courting that gipsy girl, Mehalah. Are you not sorry now that you are tied to her?'

His eyes fell. He could not speak.

CHAPTER VI.

BLACK OR GOLD.

When De Witt drove up to the 'City' with Phoebe Musset, the first person he saw on the beach was the last person that, under present circumstances, he wished to see—Mehalah Sharland. Phoebe perceived her at once, and rejoiced at the opportunity that offered to profit by it.

For a long time Phoebe had been envious of the reputation as a beauty possessed by Mehalah. Her energy, determination and courage made her highly esteemed among the fishermen, and the expressions of admiration lavished on her handsome face and generous character had roused all the venom in Phoebe's nature. She desired to reign as queen paramount of beauty, and, like Elizabeth, could endure no rival. George De Witt was the best built and most pleasant faced of all the Mersea youths, and he had hitherto held aloof from her and paid his homage to the rival queen. This had awakened Phoebe's jealousy. She had no real regard, no warm affection for the young fisherman; she thought him handsome, and was glad to flirt with him, but he had made no serious impression on her heart, for Phoebe had not a heart on which any deep impression could be made. She had laid herself out to attract and entangle him from love of power, and desire to humble Mehalah. She did not know whether any actual engagement existed between George and Glory, probably she did not care. If there were, so much the better, it would render her victory more piquant and complete.

She would trifle with the young man for a few weeks or a month, till he had broken with her rival, and then she would keep him or cast him off as suited her caprice. By taking him up, she would sting other admirers into more fiery pursuit, blow the smouldering embers into flaming jealousy, and thus flatter her vanity and assure her supremacy. The social laws of rural life are the same as those in higher walks, but unglossed and undisguised. In the realm of nature it is the female who pursues and captures, not captivates, the male. As in Eden, so in this degenerate paradise, it is Eve who walks Adam, at first in wide, then in gradually contracting circles, about the forbidden tree, till she has brought him to take the unwholesome morsel. The male bird blazes in gorgeous plumage and swims alone on the glassy pool, but the sky is speckled with sombre feathered females who disturb his repose, drive him into a corner and force him to divide his worms, and drudge for them in collecting twigs and dabbing mud about their nest. The male glow-worm browses on the dewy blades by his moony lamp; it is the lack-light female that buzzes about him, coming out of obscurity, obscure herself, flattering and fettering him and extinguishing his lamp.

Where culture prevails, the sexes change their habits with ostentation, but remain the same in proclivities behind disguise. The male is supposed to pursue the female he seeks as his mate, to hover round her; and she is supposed to coyly retire, and start from his advances. But her modesty is as unreal as the nolo episcopari of a simoniacal bishop-elect. Bashfulness is a product of education, a mask made by art. The cultured damsel hunts not openly, but like a poacher, in the dark. Eve put off modesty when she put on fig-leaves; in the simplicity of the country, her daughters walk without either. The female gives chase to the male as a matter of course, as systematically and unblushingly in rustic life, as in the other grades of brute existence. The mother adorns her daughter for the war-path with paint and feathers, and sends her forth with a blessing and a smile to fulfil the first duty of woman, and the meed of praise is hers when she returns with a masculine heart, yet hot and mangled, at her belt.

The Early Church set apart one day in seven for rest; the Christian pagans set it apart for the exercise of the man hunt. The Stuart bishops published a book on Sunday amusements, and allowed of Sabbath hunting. They followed, and did not lead opinion. It is the coursing day of days when marriage-wanting maids are in full cry and scent of all marriageable men.

A village girl who does not walk about her boy is an outlaw to the commonwealth, a renegade to her sex. A lover is held to be of as much necessity as an umbrella, a maiden must not go out without either. If she cannot attract one by her charms, she must retain him with a fee. Rural morality moreover allows her to change the beau on her arm as often as the riband in her cap, but not to be seen about, at least on Sunday, devoid of either.

Phoebe Musset intended some day to marry, but had not made up her mind whom to choose, and when to alter her condition. She would have liked a well-to-do young farmer, but there happened to be no man of this kind available. There were, indeed, at Peldon four bachelor brothers of the name of Marriage, but they were grown grey in celibacy and not disposed to change their lot. One of the principal Mersea farmers was named Wise, and had a son of age, but he was an idiot. The rest were afflicted with only daughters—afflicted from Phoebe's point of view, blessed from their own. There was a widower, but to take a widower was like buying a broken-kneed horse.

George was comfortably off. He owned some oyster pans and gardens, and had a fishing smack.

But he was not a catch. There were, however, no catches to be angled, trawled or dredged for. Phoebe did not trouble herself greatly about the future. Her father and mother would, perhaps, not be best pleased were she to marry off the land, but the wishes of her parents were of no weight with Phoebe, who was determined to suit her own fancy.

As she approached the 'City,' she saw Glory surrounded by young boatmen, eager to get a word from her lips or a glance from her eyes. Phoebe's heart contracted with spite, but next moment swelled with triumph at the thought that it lay in her power to wound her rival and exhibit her own superiority, before the eyes of all assembled on the beach.

'There is the boy from the Leather Bottle, George,' said she, 'he shall take the horse.'

De Witt descended and helped her to alight, then directly, to her great indignation, made his way to Mehalah. Glory put out both hands to him and smiled. Her smile, which was rare, was sweet; it lighted up and transformed a face somewhat stern and dark.

'Where have you been, George?'

'I have been driving that girl yonder, what's-her-name, to Waldegraves.'

'What, Phoebe Musset? I did not know you could drive.'

'I can do more than row a boat and catch crabs, Glory.'

'What induced you to drive her?'

'I could not help myself, I was driven into doing so. You see, Glory, a fellow is not always his own master. Circumstances are sometimes stronger than his best purposes, and like a mass of seaweed arrest his oar and perhaps upset his boat.'

'Why, bless the boy!' exclaimed Mehalah. 'What are all these excuses for? I am not jealous.'

'But I am,' said Phoebe who had come up. 'George, you are very ungallant to desert me. You have forgotten your promise, moreover.'

'What promise?'

'There! what promise you say, as if your head were a riddle and everything put in except clots of clay and pebbles fell through. Mehalah has stuck in the wires, and poor little I have been sifted out.'

'But what did I promise?'

'To show me the hull in which you and your mother live, the "Pandora" I think you call her.'

'Did I promise?'

'Yes, you did, when we were together at the Decoy under the willows. I told you I wished greatly to be introduced to the interior and see how you lived.' Turning to Mehalah, 'George and I have been to the Decoy. He was most good-natured, and explained the whole contrivance to me, and—and illustrated it. We had a very pleasant little trot together, had we not, George?'

'Oh! this is what's-her-name, is it?' said Mehalah in a low tone with an amused look. She was neither angry nor jealous, she despised Phoebe too heartily to be either, though with feminine instinct she perceived what the girl was about, and saw through all her affectation.

'If I made the promise, I must of course keep it,' said George, 'but it is strange I should not remember having made it.'

'I dare say you forget a great many things that were said and done at the Decoy, but,' with a little affected sigh, 'I do not, I never shall, I fear.'

George De Witt looked uncomfortable and awkward. 'Will not another day do as well?'

'No, it will not, George,' said Phoebe petulantly. 'I know you have no engagement, you said so when you volunteered to drive me to Waldegraves.'

De Witt turned to Mehalah, and said, 'Come along with us, Glory! my mother will be glad to see you.'

'Oh! don't trouble yourself, Miss Sharland—or Master Sharland, which is it?'—staring first at the short petticoats, and then at the cap and jersey.

'Come, Glory,' repeated De Witt, and looked so uncomfortable that Mehalah readily complied with his request.

'I can give you oysters and ale, natives, you have never tasted better.'

'No ale for me, George,' said Phoebe. 'It is getting on for five o'clock when I take a dish of tea.'

'Tea!' echoed De Witt, 'I have no such dainty on board. But I can give you rum or brandy, if you prefer either to ale. Mother always has a glass of grog about this time; the cockles of her heart require it, she says.'

'You must give me your arm, George, you know I have sprained my ankle. I really cannot walk unsupported.'

De Witt looked at Mehalah and then at Phoebe, who gave him such a tender, entreating glance that he was unable to refuse his arm. She leaned heavily on it, and drew very close to his side; then, turning her head over her shoulder, with a toss of the chin, she said, 'Come along, Mehalah!'

Glory's brow began to darken. She was displeased. George also turned and nodded to the girl, who walked in the rear with her head down. He signed to her to join him.

'Do you know, Glory, what mother did the other night when I failed to turn up—that night you fetched me concerning the money that was stolen? She was vexed at my being out late, and not abed at eleven. As you know, I could not be so. I left the Ray as soon as all was settled, and as you put me across to the Fresh Marsh, I got home across the pasture and the fields as quickly as I could, but was not here till after eleven. Mother was angry, she had pulled up the ladder, but before that she tarred the vessel all round, and she stuck a pail of sea water atop of the place where the ladder goes. Well, then, I came home and found the ladder gone, so I laid hold of the rope that hangs there, and then souse over me came the water. I saw mother was vexed, and wanted to serve me out for being late; however, I would not be beat, so I tried to climb the side, and got covered with tar.'

'You got in, however?'

'No, I did not, I went to the public-house, and laid the night there.'

'I would have gone through tar, water, and fire,' said Glory vehemently. 'I would not have been beat.'

'I have no doubt about it, you would,' observed George, 'but you forget there might be worse things behind. An old woman after a stiff glass of grog, when her monkey is up, is better left to sleep off her liquor and her displeasure before encountered.'

'I would not tell the story,' said Mehalah; 'it does you no credit.'

'This is too bad of you, Glory! You ran me foul of her, and now reproach me for my steering.'

'You will run into plenty of messes if you go after Mehalah at night,' put in Phoebe with a saucy laugh.

'Glory!' said De Witt, 'come on the other side of Phoebe and give her your arm. She is lame. She has hurt her foot, and we are coming now to the mud.'

'Oh, I cannot think of troubling Mehalah,' said Phoebe sharply; 'you do not mind my leaning my whole weight on you, I know, George. You did not mind it at the Decoy.'

'Here is the ladder,' said De Witt; 'step on my foot and then you will not dirty your shoe-leather in the mud. Don't think you will hurt me. A light feather like you will be unfelt.'

'Do you keep the ladder down day and night?' asked Glory.

'No. It is always hauled up directly I come home. Only that one night did mother draw it up without me. We are as safe in the "Pandora" as you are at the Ray.'

'And there is this in the situation which is like,' said Phoebe, pertly, 'that neither can entice robbers, and need securing, as neither has anything to lose.'

'I beg your pardon,' answered George, 'there are my savings on board. My mother sleeps soundly, so she will not turn in till the ladder is up. That is the same as locking the door on land. If you have money in the till——'

'There always is money there, plenty of it too.'

'I have no doubt about it, Phoebe. Under these circumstances you do not go to bed and leave your door open.'

'I should think not. You go first up the ladder, I will follow. Mehalah can stop and paddle in her native mud, or come after us as suits her best.' Turning her head to Glory she said, 'Two are company, three are none.' Then to the young man, 'George, give me your hand to help me on deck, you forget your manners. I fear the Decoy is where you have left and lost them.'

She jumped on deck. Mehalah followed without asking for or expecting assistance.

The vessel was an old collier, which George's father had bought when no longer seaworthy for a few pounds. He had run her up on the Hard, dismasted her, and converted her into a dwelling. In it George had been born and reared. 'There is one advantage in living in a house such as this,' said De Witt; 'we pay neither tax, nor tithe, nor rate.'

'Is that you?' asked a loud hard voice, and a head enveloped in a huge mob cap appeared from the companion ladder. 'What are you doing there, gallivanting with girls all day? Come down to me and let's have it out.'

'Mother is touchy,' said George in a subdued voice; 'she gets a little rough and knotty at times, but she is a rare woman for melting and untying speedily.'

'Come here, George!' cried the rare woman.

'I am coming, mother.' He showed the two girls the ladder; Mrs. De Witt had disappeared. 'Go down into the fore cabin, then straight on. Turn your face to the ladder as you descend.' Phoebe hesitated. She was awestruck by the voice and appearance of Mrs. De Witt. However, at a sign from George she went down, and was followed by Mehalah. Bending her head, she passed through the small fore-cabin where was George's bunk, into the main cabin, which served as kitchen, parlour, and bedroom to Mrs. De Witt. A table occupied the centre, and at the end was an iron cooking stove. Everything was clean, tidy, and comfortable. On a shelf at the side stood the chairs. Mrs. De Witt whisked one down.

'Your servant,' said she to Phoebe, with more amiability than the girl anticipated. 'Yours too, Glory,' curtly to Mehalah.

Mrs. De Witt was not favourable to her son's attachment to Glory. She was an imperious, strong-minded woman, a despot in her own house, and she had no wish to see that house invaded by a daughter-in-law as strong of will and iron-headed as herself. She wished to see George mated to a girl whom she could browbeat and manage as she browbeat and managed her son. George's indecision of character was due in measure to his bringing up by such a mother. He had been cuffed and yelled at from infancy. His intimacy with the maternal lap had been contracted head downwards, and was connected with a stinging sensation at the rear. Self-assertion had been beat or bawled out of him. She was not a bad, but a despotic woman. She liked to have her own way, and she obtained it, first with her husband, and then with her son, and the ease with which she had mastered and maintained the sovereignty had done her as much harm as them.

If a beggar be put on horseback he will ride to the devil, and a woman in command will proceed to unsex herself. She was a good-hearted woman at bottom, but then that bottom where the good heart lay was never to be found with an anchor, but lay across the course as a shoal where deep water was desired. Her son knew perfectly where it was not, but never where it was. Mrs. De Witt in face somewhat resembled her nephew, Elijah Rebow, but she was his senior by ten years. She had the same hawk-like nose and dark eyes, but was without the wolfish jaw. Nor had she the eager intelligence that spoke out of Elijah's features. Hers were hard and coarse and unillumined with mind.

When she saw Phoebe enter her cabin she was both surprised and gratified. A fair, feeble, bread-and-butter Miss, such as she held the girl to be, was just the daughter she fancied. Were she to come to the 'Pandora' with whims and graces, the month of honey with George would assume the taste of vinegar with her, and would end in the new daughter's absolute submission. She would be able to convert such a girl very speedily into a domestic drudge and a recipient of her abuse. Men make themselves, but women are made, and the making of women, thought Mrs. De Witt, should be in the hands of women; men botched them, because they let them take their own way.

Mrs. De Witt never forgave her parents for having bequeathed her no money; she could not excuse Elijah for having taken all they left, without considering her. She found a satisfaction in discharging her wrongs on others. She was a saving woman, and spent little money on her personal adornment. 'What coin I drop,' she was wont to say, 'I drop in rum, and smuggled rum is cheap.'

But though an article is cheap, a great consumption of it may cause the item to be a serious one; and it was so with Mrs. De Witt.

The vessel to which she acted as captain, steward, and cook, was named the 'Pandora.' The vicar was wont to remark that it was a 'Pandora's' box full of all gusts, but minus gentle Zephyr.

'Will you take a chair?' she said obsequiously to Phoebe, placing the chair for h er, after having first breathed on the seat and wiped it with her sleeve. Then turning to Mehalah, she asked roughly, 'Well, Glory! how is that old fool, your mother?'

'Better than your manners,' replied Mehalah.

'I am glad you are come, Glory,' said Mrs. De Witt, 'I want to have it out with you. What do you mean by coming here of a night, and carrying off my son when he ought to be under his blankets in his bunk? I won't have it. He shall keep proper hours. Such conduct is not decent. What do you think of that?' she asked, seating herself on the other side of the table, and addressing Phoebe, but leaving Mehalah standing. 'What do you think of a girl coming here after nightfall, and asking my lad to go off for a row with her all in the dark, and the devil knows whither they went, and the mischief they were after. It is not respectable, is it?'

'George should not have gone when she asked him,' said the girl.

'Dear Sackalive! she twists him round her little finger. He no more dare deny her anything than he dare defy me. But I will have my boy respectable, I can promise you. I combed his head well for him when he came home, I did by cock! He shall not do the thing again.'

'Look here, mother,' remonstrated George; 'wash our dirty linen in private.'

'Indeed!' exclaimed Mrs. De Witt. 'That is strange doctrine! Why, who would know we wore any linen at all next our skin, unless we exposed it when washed over the side of the wessel? Now you come here. I have a bone to pick along with you, George!'

To be on a level with her son, and stare him full in the eyes, a way she had with everyone she assailed, she sat on the table, and put her feet on the chair.

'What has become of the money? I have been to the box, and there are twenty pounds gone out of it, all in gold. I haven't took it, so you must have. Now I want to know what you have done with it. I will have it out. I endure no evasions. Where is the money? Fork it out, or I will turn all your pockets inside out, and find and retake it. You want no money, not you. I provide you with tobacco. Where is the money? Twenty pounds, and all in gold. I was like a shrimp in scalding water when I went to the box to-day and found the money gone. I turned that red you might have said it was erysipelas. I shruck out that they might have heard me at the City. Turn your pockets out at once.'

George looked abashed; he was cowed by his mother.

'I'll take the carving knife to you!' said the woman, 'if you do not hand me over the cash at once.'

'Oh don't, pray don't hurt him!' cried Phoebe, interposing her arm, and beginning to cry.

'Dear Sackalive!' exclaimed Mrs. De Witt, 'I am not aiming at his witals, but at his pockets. Where is the money?'

'I have had it,' said Mehalah, stepping forward and standing between De Witt and his mother. 'George has behaved generously, nobly by us. You have heard how we were robbed of our money. We could not have paid our rent for the Ray had not George let us have twenty pounds. He shall not lose it.'

'You had it, you!—you!' cried Mrs. De Witt in wild and fierce astonishment. 'Give it up to me at once.'

'I cannot do so. The greater part is gone. I paid the money to-day to Rebow, our landlord.'

'Elijah has it! Elijah gets everything. My father left me without a shilling, and now he gets my hard-won earnings also.'

'It seems to me, mistress, that the earnings belong to George, and surely he has a right to do with them what he will,' said Mehalah coldly.

'That is your opinion, is it? It is not mine.' Then she mused: 'Twenty pounds is a fortune. One may do a great deal with such a sum as that, Mehalah; twenty pounds is twenty pounds whatever you may say; and it must be repaid.'

'It shall be.'

'When?'

'As soon as I can earn the money.'

Mrs. De Witt's eyes now rested on Phoebe, and she assumed a milder manner. Her mood was variable as the colour of the sea; 'I'm obliged to be peremptory at times,' she said; 'I have to maintain order in the wessel. You will stay and have something to eat?'

'Thank you; your son has already promised us some oysters,—that is, promised me.'

'Come on deck,' said George. 'We will have them there, and mother shall brew the liquor below.'

The mother grunted a surly acquiescence.

When the three had re-ascended the ladder, the sun was setting. The mouth of the Blackwater glittered like gold leaf fluttered by the breath. The tide had begun to flow, and already the water had surrounded the 'Pandora.' Phoebe and Mehalah would have to return by boat, or be carried by De Witt.

The two girls stood side by side. The contrast between them was striking, and the young man noticed it. Mehalah was tall, lithe, and firm as a young pine, erect in her bearing, with every muscle well developed, firm of flesh, her skin a rich ripe apricot, and her eyes, now that the sun was in them, like volcanic craters, gloomy, but full of fire. Her hair, rich to profusion, was black, yet with coppery hues in it when seen with a side light. It was simply done up in a knot, neatly not elaborately. Her navy-blue jersey and skirt, the scarlet of her cap and kerchief, and of a petticoat that appeared below the skirt, made her a rich combination of colour, suitable to a sunny clime rather than to the misty bleak east coast. Phoebe was colourless beside her, a faded picture, faint in outline. Her complexion was delicate as the rose, her frame slender, her contour undulating and weak. She was the pattern of a trim English village maiden, with the beauty of youth, and the sweetness of ripening womanhood, sans sense, sans passion, sans character, sans everything—pretty vacuity. She seemed to feel her own inferiority beside the gorgeous Mehalah, and to be angry at it. She took off her bonnet, and the wind played with her yellow curls, and the setting sun spun them into a halo of gold about her delicate face.

'Loose your hair, Mehalah,' said the spiteful girl.

'What for?'

'I want to see how it will look in the sun.'

'Do so, Glory!' begged George. 'How shining Phoebe's locks are. One might melt and coin them into guineas.'

Mehalah pulled out a pin, and let her hair fall, a flood of warm black with red gleams in it. It reached her waist, and the wind scattered it about her like a veil.

If Phoebe's hair resembled a spring fleecy cloud gilded by the sun, buoyant in the soft warm air, that of Mehalah was like an angry thunder shower with a promise of sunshine gleaming through the rain.

'Black or gold, which do you most admire, George?' asked the saucy girl.

'That is not a fair question to put to me,' said De Witt in reply; but he put his fingers through the dark tresses of Mehalah, and raised them to his lips. Phoebe bit her tongue.

'George,' she said sharply. 'See the sun is in my hair. I am in glory. That is better than being so only in name.'

'But your glory is short-lived, Phoebe; the sun will be set in a minute, and then it is no more.'

'And hers,' she said spitefully, 'hers—you imply—endures eternally. I will go home.'

'Do not be angry, Phoebe, there cannot be thunder in such a golden cloud. There can be nothing worse than a rainbow.'

'What have you got there about your neck, George?' she asked, pacified by the compliment.

'A riband.'

'Yes, and something at the end of it—a locket containing a tuft of black horsehair.'

'No, there is not.'

'Call me "mate," as you did when we were at the Decoy. How happy we were there, but then we were alone, that makes all the difference.'

George did not answer. Mehalah's hot blood began to fire her dark cheek.

'Tell me what you have got attached to that riband; if you love me, tell me, George. We girls are always inquisitive.'

'A keepsake, Phoebe.'

'A keepsake! Then I must see it.' She snatched at the riband where it showed above De Witt's blue jersey.

'I noticed it before, when you were so attentive at the Decoy.'

Mehalah interposed her arm, and placing her open hand on George's breast, thrust him out of the reach of the insolent flirt.

'For shame of you, how dare you behave thus!' she exclaimed.

'Oh dear!' cried Phoebe, 'I see it all. Your keepsake. How sentimental! Oh, George! I shall die of laughing.'

She went into pretended convulsions of merriment. 'I cannot help it, this is really too ridiculous.'

Mehalah was trembling with anger. Her gipsy blood was in flame. There is a flagrant spirit in such veins which soon bursts into an explosion of fire.

Phoebe stepped up to her, and holding her delicate fingers beside the strong hand of Mehalah, whispered, 'Look at these little fingers. They will pluck your love out of your rude clutch.' She saw that she was stinging her rival past endurance. She went on aloud, casting a saucy side glance at De Witt, 'I should like to add my contribution to the trifle that is collecting for you since you lost your money. I suppose there is a brief. Off with the red cap and pass it round. Here is a crown.'

The insult was unendurable. Mehalah's passion overpowered her. In a moment she had caught up the girl, and without considering what she was doing, she flung her into the sea. Then she staggered back and panted for breath.

A cry of dismay from De Witt. He rushed to the side.

'Stay!' said Mehalah, restraining him with one hand and pressing the other to her heart. 'She will not drown.'

The water was not deep. Several fisherlads had already sprung to the rescue, and Phoebe was drawn limp and dripping towards the shore. Mehalah stooped, picked up the girl's straw hat, and slung it after her.

A low laugh burst from someone riding in a boat under the side of the vessel.

'Well done, Glory! You served the pretty vixen right. I love you for it.'

She knew the voice. It was that of Rebow. He must have heard, perhaps seen all.

CHAPTER VII.

LIKE A BAD PENNY.

'For shame, Glory!' exclaimed De Witt when he had recovered from his surprise but not from his dismay. 'How could you do such a wicked and unwomanly act?'

'For shame, George!' answered Mehalah, gasping for breath. 'You stood by all the while, and listened whilst that jay snapped and screamed at me, and tormented me to madness, without interposing a word.'

'I am angry. Your behaviour has been that of a savage!' pursued George, thoroughly roused. 'I love you, Glory, you know I do. But this is beyond endurance.'

'If you are not prepared, or willing to right me, I must defend myself,' said Mehalah; 'and I will do it. I bore as long as I could bear, expecting every moment that you would silence her, and speak out, and say, "Glory is mine, and I will not allow her to be affronted." But not a step did you take, not a finger did you lift; and then, at last, the fire in my heart burst forth and sent up a smoke that darkened my eyes and bewildered my brain. I could not see, I could not think. I did not know, till all was over, what I had done. George! I know I am rough and violent, when these rages come over me, I am not to be trifled with.'

'I hope they never may come over you when you have to do with me,' said De Witt sulkily.

'I hope not, George. Do not trifle with me, do not provoke me. I have the gipsy in me, but under control. All at once the old nature bursts loose, and then I do I know not what. I cannot waste my energy in words like some, and I cannot contend with such a girl as that with the tongue.'

'What will folks say of this?'

'I do not care. They may talk. But now, George, let me warn you. That girl has been trifling with you, and you have been too blind and foolish to see her game and keep her at arm's length.'

'You are jealous because I speak to another girl besides you.'

'No, I am not. I am not one to harbour jealousy. Whom I trust I trust with my whole heart. Whom I believe I believe with my entire soul. I know you too well to be jealous. I know as well that you could not be false to me in thought or in act as I know my truth to you. I cannot doubt you, for had I thought it possible that you would give me occasion to doubt, I could not have loved you.'

'Sheer off!' exclaimed George, looking over his shoulder. 'Here comes the old woman.'

The old woman appeared, scrambling on deck, her cap-frills bristling about her ears, like the feathers of an angry white cockatoo.

'What is all this? By jaggers! where is Phoebe Musset? What have you done with her? Where have you put her? What were those screams about?'

'Sheer off while you may,' whispered De Witt; 'the old woman is not to be faced when wexed no more than a hurricane. Strike sail, and run before the wind.'

'What have you done with the young woman? Where is she? Produce the corpse. I heard her as she shruck out.'

'She insulted me,' said Mehalah, still agitated by passion, 'and I flung her overboard.'

Mrs. De Witt rushed to the bulwarks, and saw the dripping damsel being carried—she could not walk—from the Strand to her father's house.

'You chucked her overboard!' exclaimed the old woman, and she caught up a swabbing-mop. 'How dare you? She was my visitor; she came to sip my grog and eat my natives at my hospitable board, and you chucked her into the sea as though she were a picked cockleshell!'

'She insulted me,' said Mehalah angrily.

'I will teach you to play the dog-fish among my herrings, to turn this blessed peaceful "Pandora" into a cage of bears!' cried Mrs. De Witt, charging with her mop.

Mehalah struck the weapon down, and put her foot on it.

'Take care!' she exclaimed, her voice trembling with passion. 'In another moment you will have raised the devil in me again.'

'He don't take much raising,' vociferated Mrs. De Witt. 'I will teach you to assault a genteel young female who comes a wisiting of me and my son in our own wessel. Do you think you are already mistress here? Does the "Pandora" belong to you? Am I to be chucked overboard along with every lass that wexes you? Am I of no account any more in the eyes of my son, that I suckled from my maternal bottle, and fed with egg and pap out of my own spoon?'

'For heaven's sake,' interrupted George, 'sheer off, Mehalah. Mother is the dearest old lady in the world when she is sober. She is a Pacific Ocean when not vexed with storms. She will pacify presently.'

'I will go, George,' said Mehalah, panting with anger, her veins swollen, her eye sparkling, and her lip quivering; 'I will go, and I will never set foot in this boat again, till you and your mother have asked my pardon for this conduct; she for this outrage, you for having allowed me to receive insult, white-livered coward that you are.'

She flung herself down the ladder, and waded ashore.

Mrs. De Witt's temper abated as speedily as it rose. She retired to her grog. She set feet downwards on the scene; the last of her stalwart form to disappear was the glowing countenance set in white rays.

George was left to his own reflections. He saw Mehalah get into her boat and row away. He waved his cap to her, but she did not return the salute. She was offended grievously. George was placed in a difficult situation. The girl to whom he was betrothed was angry, and had declared her determination not to tread the planks of the 'Pandora' again, and the girl who had made advances to him, and whom his mother would have favoured, had been ejected unceremoniously from it, and perhaps injured, at all events irretrievably offended.

It was incumbent on him to go to the house of the Mussets and enquire for Phoebe. He could do no less; so he descended the ladder and took his way thither.

Phoebe was not hurt, she was only frightened. She had been wet through, and was at once put to bed. She cried a great deal, and old Musset vowed he would take out a summons against the aggressor. Mrs. Musset wept in sympathy with her daughter, and then fell on De Witt for having permitted the assault to take place unopposed.

'How could I interfere?' he asked, desperate with his difficulties. 'It was up and over with her before I was aware.'

'My girl is not accustomed to associate with cannibals,' said Mrs. Musset, drawing herself out like a telescope.

As George returned much crestfallen to the beach, now deserted, for the night had come on, he was accosted by Elijah Rebow.

'George!' said the owner of Red Hall, laying a hand on his cousin's shoulder, 'you ought not to be here.'

'Where ought I to be, Elijah? It seems to me that I have been everywhere to-day where I ought not to be. I am left in a hopeless muddle.'

'You ought not to allow Glory to part from you in anger.'

'How can I help it? I am sorry enough for the quarrel, but you must allow her conduct was trying to the temper.'

'She had great provocation. I wonder she did not kill that girl. She has a temper, has Mehalah, that does not stick at trifles; but she is generous and forgiving.'

'She is so angry with me that I doubt I shall not be able to bring her back to good humour.'

'I doubt so, too, unless you go the right way to work with her; and that is not what you are doing now.'

'Why, what ought I to do, Elijah?'

'Do you want to break with her, George? Do you want to be off with Glory and on with milk-face?'

'No, I do not.'

'You are set on Glory still? You will cleave to her till naught but death shall you part, eh?'

'Naught else.'

'George! That other girl has good looks and money. Give up Mehalah, and hitch on to Phoebe. I know your mother will be best pleased if you do, and it will suit your interests well. Glory has not a penny, Phoebe has her pockets lined. Take my word for it you can have milk-face for the asking, and now is your opportunity for breaking with Glory if you have a mind to do so.'

'But I have not, Elijah.'

'What can Glory be to you, or you to Glory? She with her great heart, her stubborn will, her strong soul, and you—you—bah!'

'Elijah, say what you like, but I will hold to Glory till death us do part.'

'Your hand on it. You swear that.'

'Yes, I do. I want a wife who can row a boat, a splendid girl, the sight of whom lights up the whole heart.'

'I tell you Glory is not one for you. See how passionate she is, she blazes up in a moment, and then she is one to shiver you if you offend her. No, she needs a man of other stamp than you to manage her.'

'She shall be mine,' said George: 'I want no other.'

'This is your fixed resolve?'

'My fixed resolve.'

'For better for worse?'

'For better for worse, till death us do part.'

'Till death you do part,' Elijah jerked out a laugh. 'George, if you are not the biggest fool I have set eyes on for many a day, I am much mistaken.'

'Why so?'

'Because you are acting contrary to your interests. You are unfit for Glory, you do not now, you never will, understand her.'

'What do you mean?'

'You let the girl row away, offended, angry, eating out her heart, and you show no sign that you desire reconciliation.'

'I have though. I waved my hat to her, but she took no notice.'

'Waved your hat!' repeated Rebow, with suppressed scorn. 'You never will read that girl's heart, and understand her moods. Oh, you fool! you fool! straining your arms after the unapproachable, unattainable, star! If she were mine——' he stamped and clenched his fists.

'But she is not going to be yours, Elijah,' said George with a careless laugh.

'No, of course not,' said Elijah, joining in the laugh. 'She is yours till death you do part.'

'Tell me, what have I done wrong?' asked De Witt.

'There—you come to me, after all, to interpret the writing for you. It is there, written in letters of fire, Mene, mene, tekel, Upharsin! Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting, and this night shall thy kingdom be taken from thee and given to——'

'Elijah, I do not understand this language. What ought I to do to regain Mehalah's favour?'

'You must go after her. Do you not feel it in every fibre, that you must, you mud-blood? Go after her at once. She is now at home, sitting alone, brooding over the offence, sore at your suffering her to be insulted without making remonstrance. Her wrong will grow into a mountain in her heart unless it be rooted up to-night. Her pride will flame up as her passion dies away, and she will not let you speak to her another tender word. She will hate and despise you. The little crack will split into a wide chasm. I heard her call you a white-livered coward.'

'She did; you need not repeat it. She will be sorry when she is cool.'

'That is just it, George. As soon as passion abates, her generous heart will turn to self-reproach, and she will be angry with herself for what she has done. She will accuse herself with having been violent, with having acted unworthily of her dignity, with having grown in too great a heat about a worthless doll. She will be vexed with herself, ashamed of herself, unable in the twilight of her temper to excuse herself. Perhaps she is now in tears. But this mood will not last. To-morrow her pride will have returned in strength, she will think over her wrongs and harden herself in stubbornness; she will know that the world condemns her, and she will retire into herself in defiance of the world. Look up at the sky. Do you see, there is Charles' Wain, and there is Cassiopæa's Chair. There the Serpent and there the Swan. I can see every figure plain, but your landsman rarely can. So I can see every constellation in the dark heaven of Mehalah's soul, but you cannot. You would be wrecked if you were to sail by it. Now, George, take Glory while she is between two moods, or lose her for ever. Go after her at once, George, ask her forgiveness, blame yourself and your mother, blame that figure-head miss, and she will forgive you frankly, at once. She will fall on your neck and ask your pardon for what she has done.'

'I believe you are right,' said De Witt, musing.

'I know I am. As I have been working in my forge, I have watched the flame on the hearth dance and waver to the clinking of the hammer. There was something in the flame, I know not what, which made it wince or flare, as the blows fell hard or soft. So there are things in Nature respond to each other without your knowing why it is, and in what their sympathy consists. So I know all that passes in Mehalah's mind. I feel my own soul dance and taper to her pulses. If you had not been a fool, George, you would already have been after her. What are you staying for now?'

'My mother; what will she say?'

'Do you care for her more than for Glory? If you think of her now, you lose Glory for ever. Once more I ask you, do you waver? Are you inclined to forsake Mehalah for milk-face?'

'I am not,' said De Witt impatiently; 'why do you go on with this? I have said already that Glory is mine.'

'Unless death you do part.'

'Till death us do part, is what I said.'

'Then make haste. An hour hence the Ray house will be closed, and the girl and her mother in bed.'

'I will get my boat and row thither at once.'

'You need not do that. I have my boat here, jump in. We will each take an oar, and I will land you on the Ray.'

'You take a great interest in my affairs.'

'I take a very great interest in them,' said Rebow dryly.

'Lead the way, then.'

'Follow me.'

Rebow walked forward, over the shingle towards his boat, then suddenly turned, and asked in a suppressed voice, 'Do you know whither you are going?'

'To the Ray.'

'To the Ray, of course. Is there anyone on the Hard?'

'Not a soul. Had I not better go to my mother before I start and say that I am going with you?'

'On no account. She will not allow you to go to the Ray. You know she will not.'

De Witt was not disposed to dispute this.

'You are sure,' asked Rebow again, 'that there is no one on the Hard. No one sees you enter my boat. No one sees you push off with me. No one sees whither we go.'

'Not a soul.'

'Then here goes!' Elijah Rebow thrust the boat out till she floated, sprang in and took his oar. De Witt was already oar in hand on his seat.

'The red curtain is over the window at the Leather Bottle,' said George. 'No signalling to-night, the schooner is in the offing.'

'A red signal. It may mean more than you understand.'

They rowed on.

'Is there a hand on that crimson pane,' asked Rebow in a low tone, 'with the fingers dipped in fire, writing?'

'Not that I can see.'

'Nor do you see the writing, Mene, mene, tekel, Upharsin.'

'You jest, Elijah!'

'A strange jest. Perhaps the writing is in the vulgar tongue, thou art weighed and found wanting, feeble fool, and thy kingdom is taken from thee, and given to ME.'

Mehalah sat by the hearth, on the floor, in the farmhouse at the Ray. Her mother was abed and asleep. The girl had cast aside the cap and thrown off her jersey. Her bare arms were folded on her lap; and the last flicker of the red embers fell on her exposed and heaving bosom.

Elijah Rebow on the Hard at Mersea had read accurately the workings and transitions in the girl's heart. Precisely that was taking place which he had described. The tempest of passion had roared by, and now a tide of self-reproach rose and overflowed her soul. She was aware that she had acted wrongly, that without adequate cause she had given way to an outburst of blind fury. Phoebe was altogether too worthless a creature for her jealousy, too weak to have been subjected to such treatment. Her anger against George had expired. He did well to be indignant with her. It was true he had not rebuked Phoebe nor restrained his mother, but the reason was clear. He was too forbearing with women to offend them, however frivolous and intemperate they might be. He had relied on the greatness of his Glory's heart to stand above and disregard these petty storms.

She had thrown off her boots and stockings, and sat with her bare feet on the hearth. The feet moved nervously in rhythm to her thoughts. She could not keep them still. Her trouble was great. Tears were not on her cheeks; in this alone was Elijah mistaken. Her dark eyes were fixed dreamily on the dying fire—they were like the marsh-pools with the will-o'-the-wisp in each. They did not see the embers, they looked through the iron fireback, and the brick wall, over the saltings, over the water, into infinity.

She loved George. Her love for him was the one absorbing passion of her life. She loved her mother, but no one else—only her and George. She had no one else to love. She was without relations. She had been brought up without playfellows on that almost inaccessible islet, only occasionally visiting Mersea, and then only for an hour. She had seen and known nothing of the world save the world of morass. She had mixed with no life, save the life of the flocks on the Ray, of the fishes and the seabirds. Her mind hungered for something more than the little space of the Ray could supply. Her soul had wings and sought to spread them and soar away, whither, however, she did not know. She had a dim prevision of something better than the sordid round of common cares which made up the life she knew.

With a heart large and full of generous impulses, she had spent her girlhood without a recognition of its powers. She felt that there was a voice within which talked in a tongue other from that which struck her ears each day, but what that language was, and what the meaning of that voice, she did not know. She had met with De Witt. Indeed they had known each other, so far as meeting at rare intervals went, for many years; she had not seen enough of him to know him as he really was, she therefore loved him as she idealised him. The great cretaceous sea was full of dissolved silex penetrating the waters, seeking to condense and solidify. But there was nothing in the ocean then save twigs of weed and chips of shells, and about them that hardest of all elements drew together and grew to adamant. The soul of Mehalah was some such vague sea full of ununderstood, unestimated elements, seeking their several centres for precipitation, and for want of better, condensing about straws. To her, George De Witt was the ideal of all that was true and manly. She was noble herself, and her ideal was the perfection of nobility. She was rude indeed, and the image of her worship was rough hewn, but still with the outline and carriage of a hero. She could not, she would not, suppose that George De Witt was less great than her fancy pictured.

The thought of life with him filled her with exultation. She could leap up, like the whooper swan, spread her silver wings, and shout her song of rapture and of defiance, like a trumpet. He would open to her the gates into that mysterious world into which she now only peeped, he would solve for her the perplexities of her troubled soul, he would lead her to the light which would illumine her eager mind.

Nevertheless she was ready to wait patiently the realisation of her dream. She was in no hurry. She knew that she could not live in the same house or boat with George's mother. She could not leave her own ailing mother, wholly dependent on herself. Mehalah contentedly tarried for what the future would unfold, with that steady confidence in the future that youth so generally enjoys.

The last embers went out, and all was dark within. No sound was audible, save the ticking of the clock, and the sigh of the wind about the eaves and in the thorntrees. Mehalah did not stir. She dreamed on with her eyes open, still gazing into space, but now with no marsh fires in the dark orbs. The grey night sky and the stars looked in at the window at her.

Suddenly, as she thus sat, an inexpressible distress came over her, a feeling as though George were in danger, and were crying to her for help. She raised herself on the floor, and drew her feet under her, and leaning her chin on her fingers listened. The wind moaned under the door; everything else was hushed.

Her fear came over her like an ague fit. She wiped, her forehead, there were cold drops beading it. She turned faint at heart; her pulse stood still. Her soul seemed straining, drawn as by invisible attraction, and agonised because the gross body restrained it. She felt assured that she was wanted. She must not remain there. She sprang to her feet and sped to the door, unbolted it and went forth. The sky was cloudless, thick strewn with stars. Jupiter glowed over Mersea Isle. A red gleam was visible, far away at the 'City.' It shone from the tavern window, a coloured star set in ebony. She went within again. The fire was out. Perhaps this was the vulgar cause of the strange sensation. She must shake it off. She went to her room and threw herself on the bed. Again, as though an icy wave washed over her, lying on a frozen shore, came that awful fear, and then, again, that tension of her soul to be free, to fly somewhere, away from the Ray, but whither she could not tell.

Where was George? Was he at home? Was he safe? She tried in vain to comfort herself with the thought that he ran no danger, that he was protected by her talisman. She felt that without an answer to these questions she could not rest, that her night would be a fever dream.

She hastily drew on her jersey and boots; she slipped out of the house, unloosed her punt, and shot over the water to Mersea. The fleet was silent, but as she flew into the open channel she could hear the distant throb of oars on rowlocks, away in the dark, out seaward. She heard the screech of an owl about the stacks of a farm near the waterside. She caught as she sped past the Leather Bottle muffled catches of the nautical songs trolled by the topers within.

She met no boat, she saw no one. She ran her punt on the beach and walked to the 'Pandora,' now far above the water. The ladder was still down; therefore George was not within. 'Who goes there?' asked the voice of Mrs. De Witt. 'Is that you, George? Are you coming home at last? Where have you been all this while?'

Mehalah drew back. George was not only not there, but his mother knew not where he was.

The cool air and the exercise had in the mean time dissipated Mehalah's fear. She argued with herself that George was in the tavern, behind the red curtain, remaining away from his mother's abusive tongue as long as he might. His boat lay on the Hard. She saw it, with the oars in it. He was therefore not on the water; he was on land, and on land he was safe. He wore the medal about his neck, against his heart.

How glad and thankful she was that she had given him the precious charm that guarded from all danger save drowning.

She rowed back to the Ray, more easy in her mind, and anchored her punt. She returned cautiously over the saltings, picking her way by the starlight, leaping or avoiding the runnels and pools, now devoid of water, but deep in mud most adhesive and unfathomable.

She felt a little uneasy lest her mother should have awoke during her absence, and missed her daughter. She entered the house softly; the door was without a lock, and merely hasped, and stole to her mother's room. The old woman was wrapt in sleep, and breathing peacefully.

Mehalah drew off her boots, and seated herself again by the hearth. She was not sleepy. She would reason with herself, and account for the sensation that had affected her.

Hark! she heard some one speak. She listened attentively with a flutter at her heart. It was her mother. She stole back on tiptoe to her. The old woman was dreaming, and talking in her sleep. She had her hands out of bed together and parted them, and waved them, 'No, Mehalah, no! Not George! not George!' she gave emphasis with her hand, then suddenly grasped her daughter's wrist, 'But Elijah!' Next moment her grasp relaxed, and she slept calmly, apparently dreamlessly again.

Mehalah went back.

It was strange. No sooner was she in her place by the hearth again than the same distress came over her. It was as though a black cloud had swept over her sky and blotted out every light, so that neither sun, nor moon, nor star appeared, as though she were left drifting without a rudder and without a compass in an unknown sea, under murky night with only the phosphorescent flash of the waves about, not illumining the way but intensifying its horror. It was as though she found herself suddenly in some vault, in utter, rayless blackness, knowing neither how she came there nor whether there was a way out.

Oppressed by this horror, she lifted her eyes to the window, to see a star, to see a little light of any sort. What she there saw turned her to stone.

At the window, obscuring the star's rays, was the black figure of a man. She could not see the face, she saw only the shape of the head, and arms, and hands spread out against the panes. The figure stood looking in and at her.

Her eyes filmed over, and her head swam.

She heard the casement struck, and the tear of the lead and tinkle of broken glass on the brick floor, and then something fell at her feet with a metallic click.

When she recovered herself, the figure was gone, but the wind piped and blew chill through the rent lattice.

How many minutes passed before she recovered herself sufficiently to rise and light a candle she never knew, nor did it matter. When she had obtained a light she stooped with it, and groped upon the floor.

* * * * * *

Mrs. Sharland was awakened by a piercing scream.

She sprang from her bed and rushed into the adjoining room. There stood Mehalah, in the light of the broken candle lying melting and flaring on the floor, her hair fallen about her shoulders, her face the hue of death, her lips bloodless, her eyes distended with terror, gazing on the medal of Paracelsus, which she held in her hand, the sea-water dripping from the wet riband wound about her fingers.

'Mother! Mother! He is drowned. I have seen him. He came and returned me this.'

Then she fell senseless on the floor, with the medal held to her heart.

CHAPTER VIII.

WHERE IS HE?

If there had been excitement on the Hard at Mersea on the preceding day when the schooner anchored off it, there was more this morning. The war-vessel had departed no one knew whither, and nobody cared. The bay was full of whiting; the waters were alive with them, and the gulls were flickering over the surface watching, seeing, plunging. The fishermen were getting their boats afloat, and all appliances ready for making harvest of that fish which is most delicious when fresh from the water, most flat when out of it a few hours.

Down the side of the 'Pandora' tumbled Mrs. De Witt, her nose sharper than usual, but her cap more flabby. She wore a soldier's jacket, bought second-hand at Colchester. Her face was of a warm complexion, tinctured with rum and wrath. She charged into the midst of the fishermen, asking in a loud imperative tone for her son.

To think that after the lesson delivered him last week, the boy should have played truant again! The world was coming to a pretty pass. The last trumpet might sound for aught Mrs. De Witt cared, and involve mankind in ruin, for mankind was past 'worriting' about.

George had defied her, and the nautical population of the 'City' had aided and abetted him in his revolt.

'This is what comes of galiwanting,' said Mrs. De Witt; 'first he galiwants Mehalah, and then Phoebe. No good ever came of it. I'd pass a law, were I king, against it, but that smuggling in love would go on as free under it as smuggling in spirits. Young folks now-a-days is grown that wexing and wicious—— Where is my George?' suddenly laying hold of Jim Morell.

The old sailor jumped as if he had been caught by a revenue officer.

'Bless my life, Mistress! You did give me a turn. What is it you want? A pinch of snuff?'

'I want my George,' said the excited mother. 'Where is he skulking to?'

'How should I know?' asked Morell, 'he is big enough to look after himself.'

'He is among you,' said Mrs. De Witt; 'I know you have had him along with a party of you at the Leather Bottle yonder. You men get together, and goad the young on into rebellion against their parents.'

'I know nothing about George. I have not even seen him.'

'I've knitted his guernseys and patched his breeches these twenty years, and now he turns about and deserts me.'

'Tom!' shouted Morell to a young fisherman, 'have you seen George De Witt this morning?'

'No, I have not, Jim.'

'Oh, you young fellows!' exclaimed the old lady, loosing her hold on the elder sailor, and charging among and scattering the young boatmen. 'Where is my boy? What have you done with him that he did not come home last night, and is nowhere wisible?'

'He went to the Mussets' last evening, Mistress. We have not set eyes on him since.'

'Oh! he went there, did he? Galiwanting again!' She turned about and rushed over the shingle towards the grocery, hardware, drapery, and general store.

Before entering that realm of respectability, Mrs. De Witt assumed an air of consequence and gravity.

She reduced her temper under control, and with an effort called up an urbane smile on her hard features when saluting Mrs. Musset, who stood behind the counter.

'Can I serve you with anything, ma'am?' asked the mother of Phoebe, with cold self-possession.

'I want my George.'

'We don't keep him in stock.'

'He was here last night.'

'Do you suppose we kept him here the night? Are you determined to insult us, madam? You have been drinking, and have forgot yourself and where you are. We wish to see no more of your son. My Phoebe is not accustomed to demean herself by association with cannibals. It is unfortunate that she should have stepped beyond her sphere yesterday, but she has learned a lesson by it which will be invaluable for the future. I do not know, I do not care, whether the misconduct was that of your son or of your daughter-in-law. Birds of a feather flock together, and lambs don't consort with wolves. I beg, madam, that it be an understood matter between the families that, except in the way of business, as tobacco, sugar, currants, or calico, intimacy must cease.'

'Oh indeed!' exclaimed Mrs. De Witt, the colour mottling her cheek. 'You mean to insinuate that our social grades are so wery different.'

'Providence, madam, has made distinctions in human beings as in currants. Some are all fruit, and some half gravel.'

'You forget,' said Mrs. De Witt, 'that I was a Rebow—a Rebow of Red Hall. It was thence I inherit the blood in my weins and the bridge of my nose.'

'And that was pretty much all you did inherit from them,' observed Mrs. Musset. 'Much value they must be to you, as you have nothing else to boast of.'

'Oh, indeed, Mistress Musset!'

'Indeed, Mistress De Witt!' with a profound curtsey.

Mrs. De Witt attempted an imitation, but having been uninstructed in deportment as a child, and inexperienced in riper years, she got her limbs entangled, and when she had arrived at a sitting posture was unable to extricate herself with ease.

In attempting to recover her erect position she precipitated herself against a treacle barrel and upset it. A gush of black saccharine matter spread over the floor.

'Where is my son?' shouted Mrs. De Witt, her temper having broken control.

'You shall pay for the golden syrup,' said Mrs. Musset.

'Golden syrup!' jeered Mrs. De Witt, 'common treacle, the cleanings of the niggers' feet that tread out the sugar-cane.'

'It shall be put down to you!' cried the mistress of the store, defying her customer across the black river. 'I will have a summons out against you for the syrup.'

'And I will have a search-warrant for my son.'

'I have not got him. I should be ashamed to keep him under my respectable roof.'

'What is this disturbance about?' asked Mr. Musset, coming into the shop with his pipe.

'I want my son,' cried the incensed mother. 'He has not been seen since he came here last night. What have you done to him?'

'He is not here, Mistress. He only remained a few minutes to enquire after Phoebe, and then he left. We have not seen him since. Go to the Leather Bottle; you will probably find him there.'

The advice was reasonable; and having discharged a parting shot at Mrs. Musset, the bereaved mother departed and took her way to the quaint old inn by the waterside, entitled the Leather Bottle.

Mrs. De Witt pushed the door open and strode in. No one was there save the host, Isaac Mead. He knew nothing of George's whereabouts. He had not seen him or heard him spoken of. Mrs. De Witt having entered, felt it incumbent on her to take something for the good of the house.

The host sat opposite her at the table.

'Where can he be?' asked Mrs. De Witt. 'The boy cannot be lost.'

'Have you searched everywhere?'

'I have asked the lads; they either know nothing, or won't tell. I have been to the Musset's. They pretend they have not seen him since last night.'

'Perhaps he rowed off somewhere.'

'His boat is on the Hard.'

'Do not bother your head about him,' said the host with confidence, 'he will turn up. Mark my words. I say he will certainly turn up, perhaps not when you want him, or where you expect him, but he assuredly will reappear. I have had seven sons, and they got scattered all over the world, but they have all turned up one after another, and,' he added sententiously, 'the world is bigger than Mersea. It is nothing to be away for twelve or fourteen hours. Lads take no account of time, they do not walue it any more than they walue good looks. We older folks do; we hold to that which is slipping from us. When we was children, we thought we could deal with time as with the sprats. We draw in all and throw what we can't consume away. At last we find we have spoiled our fishing, and we must use larger meshes in our net. I will tell you another thing, Mistress,' continued the host, who delighted to moralise, 'time is like a clock, when young it goes slow, and when old it gallops. When you and I was little, we thought a day as long as now we find a year. As we grew older years went faster; and the older we wax the greater the speed with which time spins by; till at last it passes with a whisk and a flash, and that is eternity.'

'He cannot be drowned,' said Mrs. De Witt. 'That would be too ridiculous.'

'It would, just about.' After a moment's consideration Isaac added, 'I heard that Elijah Rebow was on the Hard last night, maybe your George is gone off with him.'

'Not likely, Isaac. I and Elijah are not on good terms. My father left me nothing. Elijah took all after his parents, and I did not get a penny.'

'You know we have war with foreigners,' observed the publican. 'Now I observe that everything in this world goes by contraries. When there's peace abroad, there is strife at home, and vice versâ. There was a man-of-war in the bay yesterday. I should not wonder if that put it into George's head to be a man-of-peace on land. When you want to estimate a person's opinions, first ask what other folks are saying round him, and take the clean contrary, and you hit the bull's-eye. If you see anything like to draw a man in one direction, look the opposite way, and you will find him. There was pretty strong intimation of war yesterday with the foreigners, then you may be dead certain he took a peaceful turn in his perwerse vein, and went to patch up old quarrels with Elijah.'

'It is possible,' said Mrs. De Witt. 'I will row to Red Hall and find out.'

'Have another glass before you go,' said the landlord. 'Never hurry about anything. If George be at his cousin's he will turn up in time. There is more got by waiting than by worrying.'

'But perhaps he is not there.'

'Then he is elsewhere.'

'He may be drowned.'

'He will turn up. Drowned or not, he will turn up. I never knew boys to fail. If he were a girl it would be different. You see it is so when they drown. A boy floats face upwards, and a girl with her face down. It is so also in life. If a girl strays from home, she goes to the bottom like a plummet, but a boy on the contrary goes up like a cork.'

Mrs. De Witt so far took Isaac Mead's advice that she waited at her home till afternoon. But as George did not return, she became seriously uneasy, not so much for him as for herself. She did not for a moment allow that any harm had befallen him, but she imagined this absence to be a formal defiance of her authority. Such a revolt was not to be overlooked. In Mrs. De Witt's opinion no man was able to stand alone, he must fall under female government or go to the dogs. Deliberate bachelors were, in her estimation, God-forsaken beings, always in scrapes, past redemption. She had ruled her husband, and he had submitted with a meekness that ought to have inherited the earth. George had been always docile. She had bored docility into him with her tongue, and hammered it into him with her fist.

The idea came suddenly on her,—What if he had gone to the war schooner and enlisted? but was dismissed as speedily as impossible. Tales of ill-treatment in the Navy were rife among the shoremen. The pay was too small to entice a youth who owned a vessel, a billyboy, and oyster pans. He might do well in his trade, he must fare miserably in the Navy. Captain MacPherson had indeed invited George and others to follow him, but not one had volunteered.

She determined at last, in her impatience, to visit Red Hall, and for that purpose she got into the boat. Mrs. De Witt was able to row as well as a man. She did not start for Red Hall without reluctance. She had not been there since her marriage, kept away by her resentment. Elijah had made no overtures to her for reconciliation, had never invited her to revisit her native place, and her pride prevented her from making first advances. She had been cut off by her father, the family had kept aloof from her, and this had rankled in her heart. True, Elijah's father and mother were dead, and he was not mixed up in the first contentions; but he had inherited money which she considered ought to have fallen to her.

She was, however, anxious to see the old place again. Her young life there had not been happy; quite the reverse, for her father had been brutal, and her mother Calvinistic and sour. Yet Red Hall was, after all, her old home; its marshes were the first landscape on which her eyes had opened, its daisies had made her first necklaces, its bulrushes her first whips, its sea-wall the boundary of her childish world. It was a yearning for a wider, less level world, which had driven her in a rash moment into the arms of Moses De Witt.

The tide was out, so Mrs. De Witt was obliged to land at the point near the windmill. She walked thence on the sea-wall. She knew that wall well, fragrant with sovereign wood in summer, and rank with sea spinach. The aster blooming time was past, and the violet petals had fallen off, leaving only the yellow centres.

There, before her, like a stranded ark, was the old red house, unaltered, lonely, without a bush or tree to screen it.

The cattle stood browsing in the pasture as of old. In the marsh was a pond, a flight of wild fowl was wheeling round it, as in the autumns long ago. There was the little creek where her punt had lain, the punt in which she had been sometimes sent to Mersea to buy groceries for her mother.

The hard crust about the heart of Mrs. De Witt began to break, and the warm feeling within to ooze through. Gentler sentiments began to prevail. She would not take her son by the ears and bang his head, if she should find him at Red Hall. She would forgive him in a Christian spirit, and grant his dismissal with an innocuous curse.

She walked straight into the house. Elijah was crouched in his leather chair, with his head on one side, asleep. She stood over him and contemplated his unattractive face in silence, till he suddenly started, and exclaimed, 'Who is here? Who is this?'

Next moment he had recognised his visitor.

'So you are come, Aunt. You have not honoured me before. Will you have some whisky?'