his great teeth. 'It's Michaelmas, but I have no goose. I keep plenty on the marshes. They do well here, and they pay well too.'
'I will have a witness that I have paid the rent,' said Mehalah. 'Call one of your men.'
'Go and call one yourself. I am going to fry the rashers.'
'That guinea is still on the floor,' said Mehalah.
'I have refused it. Pick it up, and give me another.'
'I will not pick it up; and I will not give you another till you have convinced me that the coin is bad.'
'Then let it lie.'
'Where are your men?'
'I don't know, go and find them. They're at their dinner now. I dare say near the pump.'
Mehalah left the house, but before she descended the steps, she looked over the flat. There was a sort of shed for cattle half a mile off, and she thought she saw some one moving there. She went at once in that direction.
Scarce was she gone when Elijah beckoned the widow to draw over a chair to the fire.
'You cook the wittles,' said he; 'I'm my own cook in general, but when a woman is here, why, I'm fain to let her take the job off my hands.'
The old woman obeyed with as much activity as she was mistress of. Whilst thus engaged, Elijah walked to the door, opened it, and looked out.
'She's going as straight as a wild duck,' he said, and laughed; 'she is a damned fine girl. Listen to me, mistress, that daughter of yours, Glory, is too good-looking to be mewed up on the Ray. You should marry her, and then settle yourself comfortably down for the rest of your days in your son-in-law's house.'
'Ah! Master Rebow, she is poor, she is, and now young men look out for money.'
'You don't want a very young man for such as she. Why, she is as wild as a gipsy, and needs a firm hand to keep her. He that has hold of her should hold fast.'
The widow shook her head. 'We don't see many folks on the Ray. She will have to marry a fellow on the water.'
'No, she won't,' said Rebow angrily. 'Damn her, she shall marry a farmer, who owns land and marshes, and saltings, and housen, and takes rents, and don't mind to drop some eight hundred pound on a bit of a farm that takes his fancy.'
'Such men are not easy to be got.'
'No, there you are right, mistress; but when you find one, why——' he drew his pipe over the inscription on the fireplace. 'I'm the man, and now you hold me, hold fast.'
'You, master!'
'Aye, I. I like the girl. By God! I will have Glory. She was born for me. There is not another girl I have seen that I would give an oystershell for, but she—she—she makes my blood run like melted lead, and my heart here gnaws and burns in my breast like a fiery rat. I tell you I will have her. I will.'
'If it only rested with me,' moaned the widow.
'Look here,' said Rebow. 'Lay that pan on one side and follow me. I'll show you over the house.' He caught her by the wrist, and dragged her from room to room, and up the stairs. When he had brought her back to the principal apartment in which they had been sitting, he chuckled with pride. 'Ain't it a good house? It's twenty times better than the Ray. It is more comfortable, and there are more rooms. And all these marshes and meadows are mine, and I have also some cornfields in Virley, on the mainland. And then the Ray is mine, with the saltings and all thereon;—I bought it for eight hundred pounds.'
'We are very much honoured,' said the widow, 'but you do not consider how poor Mehalah is; she has nothing.'
Elijah laughed. 'Not so very poor neither, I fancy. You lost the price of your sheep, and yet you had money in store wherewith to pay the rent.'
'Indeed, indeed we had not.'
'Where then did you get the money?'
'It was lent us.'
'Lent you, who by?' asked Elijah sharply.
'George De Witt was so good——'
Elijah uttered a horrible curse.
'Tell me,' he said furiously, coming up close to the old woman and scowling at her—into her eyes. 'Answer me without a lie; why, by what right did De Witt lend, or give you, the money? What claim had you on him?'
'Well, Elijah, I must tell you. Mehalah——'
'Here I am,' said the girl throwing open the door. 'Why am I the subject of your talk?' A couple of shepherds followed her.
'Look here,' she said, counting the coin; 'there is a guinea on the floor. Pick it up and try it, if it be good.'
'That's all right,' said one of the men, ringing the coin and then trying it between his teeth.
'This is the sum due for our half-year's rent,' she went on. 'Is it not so, Master Rebow? Is not this the sum in full?'
He sullenly gave an affirmative.
'You see that I pay this over to him. I don't want a written receipt. I pay before witnesses.'
Rebow signed to the men to leave, and then with knitted brow collected the money and put it in his pocket. The widow went on with the frying of the bacon.
'Come along with me, mother, to the boat. We cannot stay to eat.'
'You shall eat with me. You have come for the first time under my roof to-day, and you shall not go from under it without a bite.'
'I have no appetite.'
'But I have,' said the widow testily. 'I don't see why you are in such a hurry, Mehalah; and what is more, I don't see why you should behave so unpolitely to Master Rebow when he fares to be so civil.'
'Eat then, if you will, mother,' said Mehalah; 'but I cannot. I have no hunger,' after a pause, firmly, 'I will not.'
'Oh, you have a will indeed,' remarked Rebow with a growl. 'A will it would be a pleasure to break, and I'll do it.'
The bacon was fried, and the widow proceeded to dish it up. There was a rack in the next room, as Elijah told her, with plates in it, and there were knives and forks in the drawer.
Whilst the old woman was getting the necessary articles, Rebow was silent, seated in his leather chair, his elbows on his knees, with the pipe in one hand, and his head turned on one side, watching Mehalah out of his fierce, crafty eyes. The girl had seated herself on a chair against the wall, as far away from him as possible. Her arms were folded over her breast, and her head was bent, to avoid encountering his glance. She was angry with her mother for staying to eat with the man whom she hated.
During this quiet—neither speaking—a curious grating noise reached her ear, and then a clank like that of a chain. She could not quite make out whence the noise came. It was some little while before it sufficiently attracted her attention to make her consider about it; and before she had formed any conclusion, her mother returned, and spread the table, and placed the meat on a dish.
'I'll go and fetch the liquor,' said Rebow, and went away. Whilst he was absent, again the sound met the girl's ears. Neither she nor her mother had spoken, but now she said, 'Listen, mother, what is that sound?'
The old woman stood still for a moment, and then proceeded with her task.
'It is nothing,' she said indifferently, 'the sound comes up from below the floor. I reckon Master Rebow has cows fastened there.'
'By a chain,' added Mehalah, and dismissed the matter from her mind; the explanation satisfied her.
Rebow returned the next moment with a bottle.
'This is prime spirit, this is,' said he. 'You can't drink water here, it gives the fever. You must add spirits to it to make it harmless.'
'You have no beautiful spring here, as we have on the Ray,' observed the widow.
'Not likely to