Chapter II: Part 2

'I do not care to, Kate. Sit down in that chair, and I will dress your hair. It is tossed like a haycock.'

Kate seated herself, and Honor combed and brushed her sister's hair, then put a blue riband through it; and took the kerchief from her box, and drew it over Kate's shoulders, and pinned it in place.

'Oh, Honor! What a lovely silk kerchief! Where did you get this? How long have you had it? Why have you not shown it me before?'

'It is for you, dearest Kate; I am glad you like it.'

Kate stood up, looked at herself in the glass, and then threw her arms round her sister and kissed her.

'You are a darling,' exclaimed Kate. 'Always thinking of others, never giving yourself anything. Let me remain at home--do you go instead of me.'

Honor shook her head. She was pleased to see Kate's delight, but there was an undercurrent of sadness in her soul. She was adorning her sister for Hillary.

Kate did not press Honor to go instead of her, though she was sufficiently good-hearted to have taken her sister's place without becoming ill-tempered, had Honor accepted the offer.

'Do I look very nice?' asked Kate, with the irresistible dimples coming into her cheeks. 'I wonder what Larry will say when he sees me with this blue ribbon, and this pretty kerchief.'

'And I--' said Honor slowly, not without effort, 'I also wonder.'

*CHAPTER XXIII.*

*A BRAWL.*

When Kate came to the barn, she found it decorated with green boughs. There were no windows, only the great barn door, consequently the sides were dark; but here four lanterns had been hung, diffusing a dull yellow light. The threshing-floor was in the middle, planked; on either side the barn was slated, so that the dancing was to be in the middle. Forms were placed on the slate flooring for those who rested or looked on. On a table sat the fiddler with a jug of cider near him.

The season of the year was that of Barnaby bright, when, as the old saw says, there is all day and no night. The sun did not set till past eight, and then left the north-west full of silver light. The hedgerows, as Kate passed between them, streamed forth the fragrance from the honeysuckle which was wreathed about them in masses of flower, apricot-yellow, and pink. Where the incense of the eglantine ceased to fill the air it was burdened with the sweetness of white clover that flowered thickly over the broad green patches of grass by the road-side.

Hillary was awaiting Kate to open the dance with her. He had gone to the gate to meet her; he recognised his kerchief at once; he was surprised and hurt. Why was Honor not there? Kate came with her little brother Joe holding her hand, Joe had begged permission to attend the dance. Why had Honor made over Larry's present to her sister? It was a slight, an intentional slight. Larry bit his lips and frowned; his heart beat fast with angry emotion. He approached Kate with an ungracious air, and led her to the dance without a pleasant word.

Kate was unquestionably the prettiest girl present. She held her fair head erect, in consciousness of superiority. Her hair was abundant, full of natural wave and curl, and the sky-blue ribbon in it seemed to hold it together, and to be the only restraining power that prevented it breaking loose and enveloping her from head to foot in the most beautiful gloss silk. Her complexion was that of the wild rose, heightened by her rapid walk and by excitement; her eyes were blue as the forget-me-not.

The evening sun shone in at the barn door, as yellow, but purer and brighter than the lantern light. Had there been a painter present he would have seized the occasion to paint the pretty scene--the old barn with oaken timbers, its great double doors open, from under a penthouse roof leaning forward to cover the laden wains as they were being unpacked of their corn-sheaves; the depths of the barn dark as night, illumined feebly by the pendent lanterns; and the midst, the threshing floor, crowded with dancers, who flickered in the saffron glow of the setting sun.

Kate noticed that Hillary, whilst he danced with her, observed the kerchief intently.

'Is it not pretty?' she asked innocently. 'Honor gave it me. She had kept it for me in her box ever since the Revel, and not told me that she had it; nor did I see her buy it then. Honor is so good, so kind.'

Hillary said nothing in reply, but his humour was not improved. His mind wandered from his partner.

'When is Honor coming?' he asked abruptly.

'She is not coming at all.'

'Why not?'

'Father is not home, and will want his supper when he does return.'

'Honor must do all the drudging whilst others dance,' he said peevishly.

'I offered to stay and let her come, but she would not hear of it.'

Hillary danced badly; he lost step. He excused himself; but Kate was dissatisfied with her partner, he was dull, and she was displeased to see that Sam Voaden was dancing and laughing and enjoying himself with some one else.

'You are a clumsy partner,' she said, 'and dance like old Diamond when backing against a load going down hill.'

'Honor gave you that kerchief? What did she say when she gave it you?'

'Nothing.'

He said no more, and led her to a bench in the side of the barn.

'What! tired already, Larry? I am not.'

'I am,' he answered sulkily.

Directly, Sam Voaden came to her, and was received with smiles.

'Larry Nanspian came left leg foremost out of bed this morning,' she said. 'He is as out of tune as Piper's fiddle.'

Kate was in great request that evening. The lads pressed about her, proud to circle round the floor with the graceful pretty girl; but she gave the preference to Samuel Voaden. Hillary asked her to dance with him in 'The Triumph,' but she told him sharply she would reserve her hand for him in the Dumps, and he did not ask her again.

The girls present looked at Kate with envy. They were unable to dispute her beauty; but her charm of manner and lively wit made her even more acceptable to the lads than her good looks. She was perfectly conscious of the envy and admiration she excited, and as much gratified with one as with the other.

Samuel Voaden was infatuated. He pressed his attentions, and Kate received them with pleasure. As she danced past Larry she cast him glances of contemptuous pity.

Hillary was angry with Honor, angry with Kate, angry with himself. The spoiled prince was cast aside by two girls--a common carrier's daughters. He was as irritated against Kate now as he was previously against Honor. When he heard Kate laugh, he winced, suspecting that she was joking about him. His eyes followed the kerchief, and his heart grew bitter within him. He made no attempt to be amusing. He had nothing to say to any one. He let the dances go on without seeking partners. He stood lounging against the barn door, with a sprig of honeysuckle in his mouth, and his hands behind his back.

The sun was set, a cool grey light suffused the meadow, the stackyard, the barn, the groups who stood about, and the dancers within.

A dog ventured in at the door, and he kicked it out.

The dog snarled and barked, and he nearly quarrelled with young Voaden because the latter objected to his dog being kicked.

Then, all at once, his mood changed. It occurred to him that very probably Honor stayed away just for the purpose of showing him she did not care for him. If that were so, he would let her know that he was not to be put out of heart by her slights. He would not afford her the gratification of hearing through her sister that he was dispirited and unhappy. Then he dashed into the midst of the girls, snatched a partner, and thenceforth danced and laughed and was uproariously merry.

At ten o'clock the dancing was over. Country folk kept early hours then; the cider barrel was run out, the basket of cakes emptied, and the tallow lights in the lanterns burnt down to a flicker in a flood of melted grease.

The young men prepared to escort their partners home.

Hillary saw that Samuel was going with Kate. He was exasperated to the last degree. He did not care particularly for Kate, but he did care that it should not be talked of in the village that Sam Voaden had plucked her away from under his very nose. Gossip gave her to him as a sweetheart, and gossip would make merry over his discomfiture. Besides, he wanted an excuse for going to the cottage and having an explanation with Honor about the kerchief.

As Voaden's dog passed in front of him at a call from his master, Larry kicked it.

'Leave my dog alone, will you!' shouted Samuel. 'That is the second time you have kicked Punch. The dog don't hurt you, why should you hurt him?'

'I shall kick the brute if I choose,' said Hillary. 'It has no right here in the barn.'

'What harm has Punch done? And now, what is against his leaving?'

'You had no right to bring the dog here. It has been in the plantation after young game.'

'Punch is wrong whether in the barn or out of it. The guinea you got for shooting Rover has given you a set against dogs seemingly,' said young Voaden.

'The dog took your lambs at Swaddledown, and you were too much a lie-a-bed to stop it,' sneered Hillary.

'Some folk,' answered Samuel, 'have everything in such first-rate order at home they can spare time to help their neighbours.'

'No more!' exclaimed Kate; 'you shall not quarrel.'

Hillary looked round. Near him were two women who had been in the van when he returned from Tavistock with the kerchief. They, no doubt, recognised it over Kate's shoulders. They made sure it was his love-token to her, and, wearing it, she was about to affront him in their eyes. His wounded vanity made him blind to what he said or did.

'Here, Kate,' he said, thrusting himself forward, 'I am going to take you home. You cannot go with Samuel. His cursed Punch is an ill-conditioned brute, and will kill your chickens.'

'Nonsense,' laughed Kate, 'our chickens are all under cover.'

'I'll fight you,' said Hillary, turning to Samuel. 'Kate was engaged to me for the Tank,[1] and you carried her off without asking leave. I will not be insulted by you on my father's land, and under my own roof. If you are a man you will fight me.'

[1] An old country dance.

'Nonsense, Larry,' answered Samuel, good-humouredly, 'I'll not quarrel with you. It takes two to make a quarrel, as it takes two to kiss.'

'You are afraid, that is why.'

'I am not afraid of you, Larry,' said Samuel. 'You are as touchy this evening as if whipped with nettles.'

'Come with me, Kate,' exclaimed Hillary. 'You have known me longer than Voaden. If he chooses to take you, he must fight me first.'

'I will not fight you, Larry,' answered the young Swaddledown farmer; 'but I don't object to a fling with you, if you will wrestle.'

'Very well; throw off your coat.'

The young men removed their jackets, waistcoats, and the handkerchiefs from their throats. They were both fine fellows--well-built and strong. Those who had been dancing surrounded them in a ring, men and maids.

'Cornish fashion, not Devon,' said Samuel.

'Ay, ay!' shouted the bystanders, 'Cornish wrestle now.'

'Right--Cornish,' answered Hillary.

The difference between Devon and Cornish wrestling consists in this, that in a Devon wrestle kicking is admissible; but then, as a protection to their shins, the antagonists have their legs wreathed with haybands (_vulgo_ skillibegs). As the legs were on this occasion unprotected, Devon wrestling was inadmissible. Both fashions were in vogue near the Tamar, and every young man would wrestle one way or the other as decided beforehand.

The opponents fixed each other with their eyes, and stood breathless, and every voice was hushed. Instantaneously, as moved by one impulse, they sprang at each other, and were writhing, tossing, coiling in each other's embrace. Neither could make the other budge from his ground, or throw him, exerting his utmost strength and skill. The haymakers stood silent, looking on appreciatively--the girls a little frightened, the men relishingly, relishing it more than the dance. Not one of the lads at that moment had a thought to cast at his partner. Their hands twitched, their feet moved, they bent, threw themselves back, swung aside, responsive to the movements of the wrestlers.

The antagonists gasped, snorted, as with set teeth and closed lips they drew long inspirations through their nostrils. Their sweat poured in streams from their brows.

Simultaneously, moved by one impulse, they let go their hold, and stood quivering and wiping their brows, with labouring breasts; then, with a shout, closed again.

'Ho!' a general exclamation. In the first grapple Hillary had slipped, and gone down on one knee. Immediately Samuel let go.

'There!' said he, holding out his hand. 'We have had enough. Strike palms, old boy.'

'No,' gasped Hillary, blazing with anger and shame. 'I was not flung. I slipped on the dockleaf there. I will not allow myself beaten. Come on again.'

'I will not do so,' answered Samuel. 'If you have not had enough, I have.'

'You shall go on. You are a coward to sneak out now when an accident gave you advantage.'

'Very well, then,' said Samuel; 'but you have lost your temper, and I'll have no more than this round with you.'

The young men were very equally matched. They grappled once more, twisted, doubled, gasped; the ground was torn up under their feet. As the feet twirled and flew, it was hard to say how many were on the ground at once, and whose they were.

Samuel suddenly caught his antagonist over the arms, and pushed them to his side.

'He'll have Larry down! he will, by George!' shouted several. 'Well done, Samuel! Go it, Samuel Voaden!'

'Ha!' shouted Sam, starting back. 'Who goes against rules? You kicked.'

'You lie! I did not,'

'You did! you did, Larry,' shouted three or four of the spectators. It was true; in his excitement Larry had forgotten that he and his opponent were without skillibegs and wrestling in Cornish fashion, and he had kicked; but in good faith he had denied doing it, for he was unconscious of his actions, so blinded and bemuzzed was he with anger, disappointment, and shame.

'I'll not wrestle any more,' said Samuel, 'if you don't wrestle fair. No--I won't at all. You are in a white fury. So--if it's unfair in you to kick, it is unfair in me to take advantage of your temper.'

'It is not done. One or other must go down.'

Then Kate pushed forward. 'Neither of you shall attend me home,' she said; 'I am going with little Joe only.'

Whether this would have ended the affray is doubtful. Another interruption was more successful. Suddenly a loud blast of a horn, then a yelping as of dogs, then another blast--and through the yard before the barn, breaking the ring, sweeping between the combatants, passed a strange figure--a man wearing a black bull's hide, with long brown paper ears on his head; the hide was fastened about his waist, and the tail trailed behind. He was followed by a dozen boys barking, baying, yelping, and after them hobbled Tom Crout blowing aorn.

'It's no good,' said the lame fellow, halting in the broken ring; 'I can't follow the hare, Mr. Larry Nanspian; the hunt is waiting for you. On wi' a green coat, and mount your piebald, and take my horn. I wish I could follow; but it's un-possible. Whew! you hare! Heigh! Piper, stay, will you, and start fair.'

'I'll have nothing to do with it,' said Hillary, still panting.

'That is right, Larry,' said Kate in his ear, 'You oughtn't. Honor said as much, and that she hoped you would keep out of it.'

'Did she!' said Hillary, angrily; 'then I'll go in for it.'

'Larry, old chap,' exclaimed Voaden, patting him on the shoulder, 'I wasn't the better man, nor was you. You slipped on the dockleaf, and that don't reckon as a fall. We'll have another bout some other day, if you wish it. Now let us have the lark of the Hare Hunt.'

Hillary considered a moment, and wiped his face. He had fallen in the general estimation. He had been sulky, he had provoked Sam, and the wrestle had not turned to his credit. Here was a chance offered of taking the lead once more. If he did not act the huntsman, Sam would.

'All right, Crout,' said he, 'give me the horn; I'll have my horse round directly, and the green coat on.'

'Do not, do not, Larry,' entreated Kate.

'Tell Honor I'm not pinned to her apron,' answered the young man, and ran into the house.

*CHAPTER XXIV.*

*THE HAND OF GLORY.*

The reader may have been puzzled by the hints made by Larry to Honor, and by Charles to Mrs. Veale, of a threatened hare hunt, and he may have wondered why such a threat should have disturbed Honor and angered the housekeeper. There are plenty of hares on Broadbury Moor; there have been hare hunts there as long as men could remember; frequently, all through the winter. An ordinary hare hunt would not have stirred much feeling in women's bosoms. The menaced hare hunt was something very different. A stag and a hare hunt are the rude means employed by a village community for maintaining either its standard of morals or expressing its disapprobation of petticoat rule. The stag hunt is by no means an institution of the past, it flourishes to the present day; and where the magistrates have interfered, this interference has stimulated it to larger proportions. The hare hunt, now extinct, was intended to ridicule the man who submitted to a rough woman's tongue.

The stag hunt takes place either on the wedding-night of a man who has married a girl of light character, or when a wife is suspected of having played her husband false. The hare hunt more properly satirised the relations between Taverner Langford and Mrs. Veale. In not a few cases, especially with a stag hunt, there is gross injustice done. It cannot be otherwise: the Vehm-Gericht is self-constituted, sits in the tavern, and passes its sentence without summons and hearing of the accused. There is no defence and no appeal from the court. The infliction of the sentence confers an indelible stain, and generally drives those who have been thus branded out of the neighbourhood. Petty spite and private grudges are sometimes so revenged; and a marriage in a well-conducted family, which has held itself above the rest in a parish, is made an occasion for one of these outrages, whereby the envy of the unsuccessful and disreputable finds a vent.

There probably would have been no hare hunt near Langford had not the quarrel between Langford and Nanspian agitated the whole parish, and given occasion for a frolic which would not have been adventured had the brothers-in-law been combined.

'Well, Mr. Charles,' said Mrs. Veale, 'what have you done with the five-pound note I let you have? Is it all spent?'

'I gave it to my father and sister,' answered Charles. 'I've occasioned them some expense, and I thought I'd make it up to them whilst I could.'

'That was mighty liberal of you,' sneered Mrs. Veale.

'I am liberal, pretty free-handed with my money. It comes of my blood.'

'Ah!' said the housekeeper, 'and I reckon now you'll be wanting more.'

'I could do with more,' replied young Luxmore, 'but I will not trouble you.'

'Oh! it's no trouble,' said Mrs. Veale, 'I know very well that lending to you is safe as putting into the Bank of England. You must have your own some day, and when you're squire you won't see me want.'

'Rely on me, I will deal most generously with you. I shall not forget your kindness, Mrs. Veale.'

'But,' said the woman slyly, eyeing him, 'I can't find you as much as you require. You can't spin more out of me than my own weight, as the silkworm said. I've put aside my little savings. But as you see, the master don't pay freely. He gives you only ninepence, and me----' she shrugged her shoulders.

'If I were in your place,' she went on, after a pause, 'I should be tempted to borrow a hundred or so, and go to Physick the lawyer with it, and say, help me to Coombe Park, and when I've that, I'll give you a hundred more.'

'Who'd lend me the money? You have not so much.'

'No, I have not so much.'

'What other person would trust me?'

'The money might be had.'

'Others don't see my prospects as you do.'

'I'd be inclined to borrow wi'out asking,' said the housekeeper cautiously. She was as one feeling her way; she kept her eyes on Charles as she talked. Charles started. He knew her meaning.

'How dare you suggest such a thing!' he said in a low tone, looking at her uneasily. 'Curse you! Don't wink at me with your white lashes that way, you make me uneasy.'

'I only suggested it,' said Mrs. Veale, turning her head aside. 'I reckon no harm would be done. The master don't know how much he has in his box. We had it out t'other day between us, and counted. There be over a thousand pounds there. Do y' think he counts it every week? Not he. Who'd know? The money would be put back, and wi' interest, six, seven, ten per cent., if you liked, when you'd got Coombe Park.'

'Have done,' said Luxmore with nervous irritation; 'I'm no thief, and never could become one.'

'Who asked you to be one? Not I. I said as how you might become his banker for a hundred pounds. The bank gives but three per cent., and you would give nine. Who'd be the loser? Not master. He'd gain nine pounds without knowing it--and wouldn't he crow!'

Charles Luxmore caught his hat and stood up.

'Where be you going to?' asked Mrs. Veale.

'I cannot stand this,' he said in an agitated voice. 'You torment me. You put notions into me that won't let me sleep, that make me miserable. I shall go.'

'Whither? To the Ring o' Bells. There be no one there to-night, all be away to Chimsworthy at the Haysel. You sit down again, and I will give you some cherry cordial.'

He obeyed sulkily.

'You can't go to dance at Chimsworthy, because you be here at Langford, and there's no dancing and merry-making here. But wait till you're at Coombe Park, and then you'll have junketings and harvest-homes and dances when you will. That'll be a rare life.'

He said nothing, but thrust his hands into his pockets, and looked moodily before him.

'Shall I tell you now who'll find you the money?'

He did not speak.

'Wellon will.'

'What?' he looked up in surprise.

'Ay! old Wellon as was gibbeted, he will.'

Charles laughed contemptuously. 'You are talking folly. I always thought you mad.'

'Did you ever hear of the Hand of Glory?'

'No, never.'

'I wonder what became of Wellon's hand--the hand that throttled Mary Rundle, and stuck the knife into the heart of Jane, and brought down their aunt wi' a blow of the fist. That hand was a mighty hand.'

'Wellon was hung in chains, and fell to dust.'

'But not the hand. Such a hand as that was too precious. Did you never hear it was cut off, and the body swung for years without it?'

'No, I did not.'

'It was so.'

'What good was it to anyone?'

'It was worth pounds and pounds.'

'As a curiosity?'

'No, as a Hand of Glory. It were washed in mother's milk to a child base-born, and smoked in the reek of gallows-wood, and then laid with tamarisk from the sea, and vervain, and rue, and bog-bean.'

'Well, what then?'

'Why, then, sure it's a Hand of Glory.' She paused, then struck her hand across her forehead, 'and grass off the graves of them as it killed--I forgot to say that was added.'

'What can such a hand do?'

'Everything. If I had it here and set it up on the mantelshelf, and set a light to the fingers, all would flame blue, and then every soul in the house would sleep except us two, and we might ransack the whole place and none would stir or hinder or see. And if we let the hand flame on, they would lie asleep till we were far away beyond their reach.'

'If you had this Hand of Glory, I wouldn't help you to use it,' said Charles, writhing on his seat.

'That is not all,' Mrs. Veale went on, standing by a little tea-table with her hand on it, the other against her side. 'That hand has wonderful powers of itself. It is as a thing alive, though dead and dry as leather. If you say certain words it begins to run about on its fingers like a rat. Maybe you're sitting over the fire of nights, and hear something stirring, and see a brown thing scuttling over the floor and you think it is a rat. It is not. It is the dead man's hand. Perhaps you hear a scratching on the wall, and look round, and see a great black spider--a monstrous spider going about, running over and over the wainscot, and touching and twitching at the bell wires. It is not a spider, it is the murderer's hand. It hasn't eyes, it goes by the feel, till it comes to gold, and then, at the touch the dark skin becomes light and shines as the tail of a glowworm, and it picks and gathers by its own light. I reckon, if that hand o' Wellon's were in the oven behind the parlour-grate, it would make such a light that you'd see what was on every guinea, whether the man and horse or the spade, and you could read every note as well as if you had the daylight. Then the ring-finger and the little finger close over what money the hand has been bidden fetch, and it runs away on the thumb and other two--and then, if you will, it's spiderlike with a bag behind.'

'I don't believe a word of it,' said Charles, but his words were more confident than his tone.

'You see,' Mrs. Veale went on, 'there is this about it, you tell the hand to go and fetch the money, but you don't say whither it is to go, and you do not know. You get the money and can swear you have robbed no one. I reckon, mostly the money is found by the hand in old cairns and ruins. I've been told there's a table of gold in Broadbury Castle that only comes to the top on Midsummer night for an hour, and then sinks again. Folks far away see a great light on Broadbury, and say we be swaling (burning gorse) up here; but it is no such thing; it is the gold table coming up, and shining like fire, and the clouds above reflecting its light.'

'Pity the hand don't break off bits of the gold table,' said Charles sarcastically; but his face was mottled with fear; Mrs. Veale's stories frightened him.

'Yes, 'tis a pity,' she said. 'Maybe it will some day.'

'Pray what do you say to the hand to make it run your errands?'

'Ah!' she continued, without answering his question. 'There be other things the Hand of Glory can do. It will go if you send it to some person--bolts and locks will not keep it out, and it will catch the end of the bedclothes, and scramble up, and pass itself over the eyes of the sleeper, and make him sleep like a dead man, and it will dive under the clothes and lay its fingers on the heart; then there will come aches and spasms there, or it will creep down the thighs and pinch and pat, and that brings rheumatic pains. I've heard of one hand thus sent as went down under the bedclothes to the bottom of the sleeper's foot, and there it closed up all the fingers but one, and with that it bored and bored, working itself about like a gimblet, and then gangrene set in, and the man touched thus was dead in three days.'

'It is a mighty fortunate thing you've not the hand of old Wellon,' growled Charles.

'I have got it,' answered Mrs. Veale.

Charles looked at her with staring eyes.

'You shall see it,' she said.

'I do not want to. I will not!' he exclaimed, shuddering.

'Wellon's hand will fetch you a hundred pounds, and we will not ask whence it comes,' said Mrs. Veale.

'I will not have it, I will not touch it!' He spoke in a hoarse, horrified whisper.

'You shall come with me, and I will show you where I keep it, and perhaps you will find the hand closed; and when I say, Hand of Glory! open! Hand of Glory! give up! then you will see the fingers unclose, and the glittering gold coins will be in the brown palm.'

'I will not touch them.'

'No harm in your looking at them. Come with me.'

She stood before him with her firm mouth set, and her blinking eyes on him. He tried to resist. He settled himself more comfortably into his seat. But his efforts to oppose her will were in vain. He uttered a curse, drew his hands out of his pocket, put his hat on his head.

'Go on,' he said surlily; 'but I tell y' I won't go without the lantern. Where is it?'

'In Wellon's Cairn.'

'I will not go,' said Charles, drawing back, and all colour leaving his cheek.

'Then I'll send the hand after you. Come.'

'I'll take the lantern.'

'As you like, but hide the light till we get to the hill. There it don't matter if folks see a flame dancing about the mound. They will keep their distance--Come on, after me.'

*CHAPTER XXV.*

*THE HARE HUNT.*

Directly Mrs. Veale, followed by Charles, came outside the house the former turned and said, with a chuckle, 'You want a lantern, do y', a summer night such as this?'

The sky was full of twilight, every thorn tree and holly bush was visible on the hedges, every pebble in the yard.

'I'm not going to Wellon's Cairn without,' said Luxmore, sulkily. 'I don't want to go at all; and I won't go _there_ without light.'

'Very well. I will wait at the gate for you.'

He went into the stable, where was a horn-sided tin lantern, and took it down from its crook, then went back into the kitchen and lighted the candle at the fire.

'I've a mind not to go,' he muttered. 'What does the woman want with me, pulling me, driving me, this way and that? If I'd been told I was to be subjected to this sort of persecution, I wouldn't have come here. It's not to be endured for ninepence. Ninepence! It would be bad at eighteen pence. I wish I was in Afghanistan. Cawbul, Ghuznee, Candahar don't astonish her. She ain't open-mouthed at them, but sets my hair on end with her Hand of Glory, and talks of how money is to be got. I know what she is after; she wants me to run away with her and the cash box. I won't do it--not with her, for certain; not with the cash box if I can help it. I don't believe a word about a Hand of Glory. I'm curious to know how she'll get out of it, now she's promised to show it me.'

He started, and swore.

'Gorr!' he said; 'it's only a rat behind the wainscot; I thought it was the hand creeping after me. I suppose I must go. For certain, Mrs. Veale is a bad un. But; what is that? The shadow of my own hand on the wall, naught else.'

He threw over him a cloak he wore in wet weather, and hid the lantern under it.

'For sure,' he said, 'folks would think it queer if they saw me going out such a summer night as this with a lantern; but I won't go to Wellon's Cairn without, that is certain.'

'Well,' said Mrs. Veale; 'so you have come at last!'

'Yes, I have come. Where is the master? I've not seen him about.'

'He never said nothing to no one, and went off to Holsworthy to-day.'

'When will he be back?'

'Not to-morrow; there's a fair there; the day after, perhaps.'

A heavy black cloud hung in the sky, stretching apparently above Broadbury. Below it the silvery light flowed from behind the horizon. To the east, although it was night, the range of Dartmoor was visible, bathed in the soft reflection from the north-western sky. The tumulus upon which Wellon had been executed was not far out on the heath. Mrs. Veale led the way with firm tread; Charles followed with growing reluctance. A great white owl whisked by. The glowworms were shining mysteriously under tufts of grass. As they pushed through the heather they disturbed large moths. A rabbit dashed past.

'Hush!' whispered Charles. 'I'm sure I heard a horn.'

'Ah!' answered Mrs. Veale, 'Squire Arscott rides the downs at night, they say, and has this hundred years.'

'I don't care to go any further,' said the young man.

'You shall come on. I am going to show you the Hand of Glory.'

He was powerless to resist. As his father had fallen under the authority of Honor, so the strong over-mastering will of this woman domineered Charles, and made him do what she would. He felt his subjection, his powerlessness. He saw the precipice to which she was leading him, and knew that he could not escape.

'I wish I had never come to Langford,' he muttered to himself. 'It's Honor's doing. If I go wrong, she is to blame. She sent me here, and all for ninepence.' Then, stepping forward beside the housekeeper, 'I say, Mrs. Veale, how do you manage to stow anything away in a mound?'

'Easy, if the mound be not solid,' she replied. 'There is a sort of stone coffin in the middle, made of pieces of granite set on end, and others laid on top. When the treasure-seekers dug into the hill, they came as far as one of the stones, and they stove it in, but found nothing, or, if they found aught, they carried it away. Then, I reckon, they put the stone back, or the earth fell down and covered all up, and the heather bushes grew over it all. But I looked one day about there for a place where I could hide things. I thought as the master had his secret place, I'd have mine too; and I knew no place could be safer than where old Wellon hung, as folk don't like to come too near it--leastways in the dark. Well, then, I found a little hole, as might have been made by a rabbit, and I cleared it out; and there I found the gap and the stone coffin. I crept in, it were not over big, but wi' a light I could see about. I thought at first I'd come on Wellon's bones, but no bones were there, nothing at all but a rabbit nest, and some white snail shells. After that I made up the entrance again, just as it was, and no one would know it was there. But I can find it; there is a bunch of heath by it, and some rushes, and how rushes came to grow there beats me.'

'So you keep Wellon's hand in there, do you?'

'Yes, I do.'

'How did you manage to get it?'

'I will not tell you.'

'I do not believe you have it; I don't believe but what you told me a parcel of lies about the Hand of Glory. I've been to Afghanistan, and Cabul, and the Bombay Presidency, and never heard of such a thing. It is not in reason. If a dead hand can move, why has not my finger that was cut off in battle come back to me?'

'Shall I send the Hand after it?'

The suggestion made Charles uneasy. He looked about him, as afraid to see the black hand running on the grass, leaping the tufts of furze, carrying his dead finger, to drop it at his feet.

'What are you muttering?' asked he, sharply.

'I'm only repeating, Hand of Glory! Hand of Light! Fetch, fetch! Run and bring----'

'I'll strike you down if you go on with your devilry, you hag,' said Charles, angrily.

'We are at the place.'

They entered the cutting made by the treasure-seekers, the gap in which Honor had often sat in the sun, unconscious of the stone kistvaen hidden behind her, indifferent to the terrors of the haunted hill, whilst the sun blazed on it.

'The night is much darker than it was,' said Charles uneasily, as he looked about him.

It was as he said. The black mass of cloud had spread and covered the sky, cutting off the light except from the horizon.

'I don't like the looks of the cloud,' said Charles. 'There will be rain before long, and there's thunder aloft for certain.'

'What is that to you? Are you afraid of a shower? You have your cloak. Bring out the lantern. It matters not who sees the light now. If anyone does see it, he'll say it's a corpse-candle on its travels.'

'What is a corpse-candle?'

'Don't you know?' She gave a short, dry laugh. 'It's a light that travels by night along a road, and comes to the door of the house out of which a corpse will be brought in a day or two.'

'Does no one carry the candle?'

'It travels by itself.' Then she said, 'Give me the light.'

'I will not let it out of my hand,' answered Charles, looking about him timorously. 'I don't think anyone will see the light, down in this hole.'

'Hold the lantern where I show you--there.'

He did as required. It gave a poor, sickly light, but sufficient to show where the woman wanted to work. She began to scratch away the earth with her hands, and Charles, watching her, thought she worked as a rabbit or hare might with its front paws. Presently she said:

'There is the hole, look in.'

He saw a dark opening, but had no desire to peer into it. Indeed, he drew back.

'How can I see, if you take away the lantern?' asked Mrs. Veale. 'Put your arm in and you will find the hand.'

He drew still further away. 'I will not. I have seen enough. I know of this hiding-place. That suffices. I will go home.'

The horror came over him lest she should force him to put his hand into the stone coffin, and that there, in the blackness and mystery of the Interior, the dead hand of the murderer would make a leap and clasp his.

'I have had enough of this,' he said, and a shiver ran through him, 'I will go home. Curse me! I'm not going to be mixed up with all this devilry and witchery if I can help it.'

'Perhaps the hand is gone,' said Mrs. Veale.

'Oh! I hope so.'

'I sent it after your finger.'

'Indeed, may it be long on its travels.' He was reassured. It was not pleasant to think of so close proximity to the murderer's embalmed, still active hand. He suspected that Mrs. Veale was attempting to wriggle out of her undertaking. 'Indeed--I thought I was to see the hand, and now the hand is not here.'

'I cannot say. Anyhow, the money is here.'

'What money?'

'That for which you asked.'

'I asked for none.'

'You desired a hundred pounds for the purpose of getting back Coombe Park. Put in your hand and take it.'

'I will not.'

His courage was returning, as he thought he saw evasion of her promise in the woman.

'For the matter of that, if this Hand of Glory can fetch money, it might as well fetch more than that.'

'How much?'

'A hundred is not over much. Two hundred--a thousand.'

'Say a thousand.'

'So I do.'

'Put in your hand. It is there.'

'Hark!'

'Put in your hand.'

'I will not.'

'Then you fool! you coward! I must take it for you!' she hissed in her husky voice. She stooped, and thrust both her hands and arms deep into the kistvaen.

'Hush!' whispered Charles, as he laid his hand on her shoulder, and covered the light with a flap of his mantle. She remained still for a minute with her arms buried in the crave. There was certainly a sound, a tramp of many feet, and the fall of horses' hoofs, heard, then not heard, as they went over road or turf.

'There,' whispered Mrs. Veale, and drew a box from the hole and placed it on Charles's lap. As she did so, the mantleflap fell from the lantern, and the light shone over the box. Charles at once recognised Taverner Langford's cash box, with the letter padlock.

'Ebal,' whispered Mrs. Veale. 'A thousand pounds are yours.'

At that instant, loud and startling, close to the cairn sounded the blast of a horn, instantly responded to by the baying and yelping of dogs, by shouts, and screams, and cheers, and a tramp of rushing feet, and a crack of whips.

The suddenness of the uproar, its unexpectedness, its weirdness, coming on Charles's overwrought nerves, at the same moment that he saw himself unwillingly involved in a robbery, completely overcame him; he uttered a cry of horror, sprang to his feet, upset the money box, and leaped out of the cutting, swinging the lantern, with his wide mantle flapping about him. His foot tripped and he fell; he picked himself up and bounded into the road against a horse with rider, who was in the act of blowing a horn.

Charles was too frightened and bewildered to remember anything about the hare hunt. He did not know where he was, what he was doing, against whom he had flung himself. The horse plunged, bounded aside, and cast his rider from his back. Charles stood with one hand to his head looking vacantly at the road and the prostrate figure in it. In another moment Mrs. Veale was at his elbow. 'What have you done?' she gasped, 'You fool! what have you done?'

Charles had sufficiently recovered himself to understand what had taken place.

'It is the hare hunt,' he said. 'Do you hear them? The dogs! This is--my God! it is Larry Nanspian. He is dead. I said I would break his neck, and I have done it. But I did not mean it. I did not intend to frighten the horse. I--I'--and he burst into tears.

'You are a fool,' said Mrs. Veale angrily. 'What do you mean staying here?' She took the horn from the prostrate Larry and blew it. 'Don't let them turn and find you here by his dead body. If you will not go, I must, though I had no hand in killing him.' She snatched the lantern from his hand and extinguished it. 'That ever I had to do with such an one as you! Be off, as you value your neck; do not stay. Be off! If you threatened Larry and have fulfilled your threat, who will believe that this was accident?'

Charles, who had been overcome by weakness for a moment, was nerved again by fear.

'Take his head,' said Mrs. Veale, 'lay him on the turf, among the dark gorse, where he mayn't be seen all at once, and that will give you more time to get off.'

'I cannot take his head,' said Charles, trembling.

'Then take his heels. Do as I bid,' ordered the housekeeper. She bent and raised Larry.

'Sure enough,' she said, 'his neck is broken. He'll never speak another word.'

Charles let go his hold of the feet. 'I will not touch him,' he said. 'I will not stay. I wish I'd never come to Langford. It was all Honor's fault forcing me. I must go.'

'Yes, go,' said Mrs. Veale, 'and go along Broadbury, where you will meet no man, and no footmarks will be left by which you may be traced.' Mrs. Veale, unassisted, dragged the senseless body out of the rough road over the turf.

'Is he dead? is he really dead?' asked Charles.

'Go!' said Mrs. Veale, 'or I shall have the chance of your hand to make into a better Hand of Glory than that of Wellon.'

*CHAPTER XXVI.*

*BITTER MEDICINE.*

The hare and hounds ran some distance before they perceived that they were not pursued by the huntsman and that the horn had ceased to cheer them on. Then little Piper, the cattle-jobber, clothed in the black ox-hide, stopped panting, turned, and said, 'Where be the hunter to? I don't hear his horse nor his horn.' The dogs halted. They were boys and young men with blackened faces. Piper's face was also covered with soot. His appearance was diabolical, with the long ears on his head, his white eyes peering about from under them, a bladder under his chin, and the black hide enveloping him. According to the traditional usage on such occasions, the hunt ends with the stag or hare, one or the other, being fagged out, and thrown at the door of the house whose inmates' conduct has occasioned the stag or hare hunt. Then the hunter stands astride over the animal, if a stag, and with a knife slits the bladder that is distended with bullock's blood, and which is thus poured out before the offender's door. If, however, the hunt be that of a hare the pretence is--or was--made of knocking it on the head. It may seem incredible to our readers that such savage proceedings should still survive in our midst, yet it is so, and they will not be readily abolished.[1]

[1] The author once tore down with his own hands the following bill affixed to a wall at four cross roads:--

'NOTICE!--ON THURSDAY NIGHT THE RED HUNTER'S PACK OF STAG HOUNDS WILL MEET AT ... INN, AND WILL RUN TO GROUND A FAMOUS STAG. GENTLEMEN ARE REQUESTED TO ATTEND.'

The police were communicated with, but were unable to interfere as no breach of the peace was committed.

Not suspecting anything, the hare and the pack turned and ran back along the road they had traversed, yelping, shouting, hooting, blowing through their half-closed hands, leaping, some lads riding on the backs of others, one in a white female ragged gown running about and before the hare, flapping the arms and hooting like an owl.

Would Taverner Langford come forth, worked to fury by the insult? Several were armed with sticks in the event of an affray with him and his men. Would he hide behind a hedge and fire at them out of his trumpet-mouthed blunderbuss that hung over the kitchen mantel-piece in Langford? If he did that, they had legs and could run beyond range. They did not know that he was away at Holsworthy.

The road to that town lay over the back of Broadbury and passed not another house in the parish.

The wild chase swept over the moor, past Wellon's Cairn, past Langford, then turned and went back again.

'I'll tell you what it be,' said Piper, halting and confronting his pursuers. 'Larry Nanspian have thought better of it, and gone home. T'es his uncle, you know, we'm making same of, and p'raps he's 'shamed to go on in it.'

'He should have thought of that before,' said one of the dogs. 'Us ain't a going to have our hunt spoiled for the lack of a hunter.'

'Why didn't he say so in proper time?' argued a second.

'Heigh! there's his horse!' shouted a third, and ran over the moor towards the piebald, which, having recovered from its alarm, was quietly browsing on the sweet, fine moor grass.

'Sure eneaf it be,' said Piper; 'then Larry can't be far off.'

Another shout.

'He's been thrown. He is lying here by the roadside.'

Then there was a rush of the pack to the spot indicated, and in a moment the insensible lad was in the arms of Piper, surrounded by an eager throng.

'Get along, you fellows,' shouted the hare. 'you'll give him no breathing room.'

'Ah! and where'll he think himself, I wonder, when he opens his eyes and sees he is in the hands of one with black face and long ears, and tail and hairy body? I reckon he won't suppose he's in Abraham's bosom.'

'What'll he take you for either, in your black faces?' retorted Piper. 'Not angels of light, sure-ly.' Then old Crout hobbled up. He had followed far in the rear, as best he could with his lame leg and stick.

'What be the matter, now?' he asked. 'What, Larry Nanspian throwed? Some o' you lads run for a gate. Us mun' carry 'n home on that. There may be bones abroke, mussy knows.'

'I reckon we can't take 'n into Langford,' suggested Sam Voaden.

'Likely, eh?' sneered Piper. 'You Sam, get a gate for the lad. He must be carried home at once, and send for a doctor.'

He was obeyed; and in a few minutes a procession was formed, conveying Larry from the moor.

'He groaned as we lifted 'n,' said Sam Voaden.

'So he's got life in him yet.'

'His hand ain't cold, what I may call dead cold,' said another.

'You go for'ard, Piper,' said Tom Crout. 'that he mayn't see you and be frightened if he do open his eyes.'

Then the cattle-jobber walked first, holding the long cow's tail over his arm, lest those who followed should tread on it and be tripped up. Sam Voaden and three other young men raised the gate on their shoulders, and walked easily under it. Behind came the hounds, careful not to present their blackened faces to the opening eyes of their unconscious friend; and, lastly, Tom Crout mounted on the piebald. One of the boys had found the horn, and unable to resist the temptation to try his breath on it, blew a faint blast.

'Shut up, will you?' shouted Piper, turning. 'Who is that braying? You'll be making Larry fancy he hears the last trump, and he'll jump off the gate and hurt himself again.'

Larry Nanspian had not broken his neck nor fractured his skull. He was much bruised, strained, and his right arm and collar-bone were broken. His insensibility proceeded from concussion of the brain; but even this was not serious, for he gradually recovered his consciousness as he was being carried homewards. Too dazed at first to know where he was, what had happened, and how he came to be out and lying on a gate, he did not speak or stir. Indeed, he felt unwilling to make an effort, a sense of exhaustion overmastered him, and every movement caused him pain. He lay with his face to the night sky, watching the dark cloud, listening to the voices of his bearers, and picking with the fingers of his left hand at a mossy gate bar under him. At first he did not hear what words were passing about him, he was aware only of voices speaking: the first connected sentence he was able to follow was this:--

''Twould be a bad job if Larry were killed.'

'Bad job for him, yes,' was the reply.

'What do y' mean by that?' asked Sam Voaden. He recognised Sam's voice at once, and he felt the movement of Sam's shoulder tilting the fore end of the gate as he turned his head to ask the question.

'O, I mean naught but what everyone says. A bad job for any chap to die; but I don't reckon the loss would be great to Chimsworthy. Some chance, then, of the farm going to proper hands. Larry ain't much, and never will be, but for larks and big talk. I say that Chimsworthy is a disgrace to the parish; and what is more there is sure to be a smash there unless there comes an alteration. Alteration there would never be under Larry.'

'I've heard tell that the old man has borrowed a sight of money from Taverner Langford, and now he's bound to pay it off, and can't do it.'

'Not like to, the way he's gone on; sowing brag brings brambles.'

'You see,' said Voaden, 'they always reckoned on getting Langford, some day, when the old fellow died.'