"Can"t--can"t I carry him, uncle?" said Sage, naively.
"Pish! what nonsense, girl. I don"t think I could carry him myself.
Let"s try."
He placed his arms round Cyril"s chest, and raised him into a sitting posture, the act rousing Cyril from his swoon.
"That"s better. How do you feel now?" cried the Churchwarden. "He"ll be able to walk, and it will do him good. Come, Master Cyril, how do you feel?"
"Sick--faint," he replied. "Cowardly a.s.sault on a fellow."
He clung to the Churchwarden, for his head swam, but the sickness pa.s.sed off in a few minutes, and then, leaning heavily upon the Churchwarden"s strong arm, the injured man walked slowly across the field to where Mrs Portlock was standing at the open door, Sage feeling sick and faint herself, as she followed close behind, bearing both Cyril"s and Luke Ross"s hats, that of the latter having been picked up by her without any knowledge of what she had done.
"What is it? What is the matter?" cried Mrs Portlock.
"Help with thy hands, wife, and let thy tongue rest," said the Churchwarden, sharply; and in answer to the rebuke, Mrs Portlock did help by drawing forward the great couch near the fire, and sending Sage for some pillows, after which the latter supported Cyril, while Mrs Portlock, with a good deal of notable quickness, bathed the cut at the back of the injured man"s head, afterwards cutting away a little of the hair, and strapping it up with diachylon in quite a business-like way.
"Mother"s good as a doctor over a job like this," said the Churchwarden, cheerily. "So am I. Here"s your physic, squire. Sip that down."
The medicine was a good gla.s.s of brandy and water, of which Cyril partook heartily; and then, in obedience to the tender request of Sage, he lay down on the pillows, and half closed his eyes.
"Now, then," said the Churchwarden, bluffly, "what do you say? Shall I send over and tell them at the rectory you"ve had a tumble and cracked your crown, or will you have a cup of tea with us and then walk up? You don"t want a doctor."
Cyril opened his eyes languidly, and gazed at the Churchwarden. Then he let them rest on Mrs Portlock with a pitiful gaze, finally turning them upon Sage, who was kneeling by him holding one hand.
Cyril Mallow"s thoughts were that he should prefer to stay where he was, tended by the women, and he said, faintly--
"Doctor--please."
"Nonsense, man," cried Portlock, bluffly. "Why, wheres your heart?
Pluck up a bit. You don"t want a doctor for a bit of a crack like that."
"Oh, uncle, you are cruel!" cried Sage. "I am sure he is very much hurt."
Her hand received a tender squeeze in response to this, and, in spite of her present misery, Sage felt her heart begin to glow.
"Not I, my la.s.s," said the Churchwarden, in his bluff way. "Perhaps some one else thinks that you are."
Sage sank lower, and hid her face upon Cyril"s hand.
"Let us send one of the lads," said Mrs Portlock.
"All right," said the Churchwarden, good-humouredly. "Send word up to the rectory that Mr Cyril has had a bit of an accident--mustn"t say you"ve been fighting, eh?"
Cyril moaned softly, but did not speak.
"Say that he has had a bit of an accident, and that he won"t be home for an hour or two. Would you like him to come round by the town and tell Vinnicombe to come up?"
"Oh, yes, yes, uncle," cried Sage, pitifully; and the messenger was sent off.
The doctor and the Rector arrived almost together about an hour later, during which interval Portlock had made himself acquainted with the circ.u.mstances of the struggle.
"And was Luke Ross hurt?" he asked.
"I--I think not, uncle," said Sage, colouring deeply, and then turning pale.
"Humph! Poor fellow!" said the Churchwarden. "Sage, my la.s.s, you"ve behaved very badly to that young chap, and no good will come of it, you"ll see."
Mr Vinnicombe did not consider that there was much the matter, that was evident; but he apparently did not care to tell his patient that this was the case, and consequently it was arranged that Cyril should stop at the farm, the best bed-room being appointed to his use; and he amended so slowly that he quite fulfilled a prophecy enunciated by the Churchwarden.
"Strikes me, mother," he said, "that yon chap will be so unwell that he won"t go away for a fortnight; and if you let Sage nurse him he"ll stop a month."
Sage, to Cyril"s great disgust, was not allowed to nurse him; but he stayed for a month all the same, fate having apparently arranged that, if Luke Ross"s cause was not hopeless before, it was now wrecked beyond the slightest chance of being saved.
PART ONE, CHAPTER THIRTY NINE.
FULLERTON"S PROPHECY.
In a place like Lawford, where every one knew more of his or her neighbours affairs than the individual could possibly know for him or herself, the encounter near Kilby Farm soon had its place as the chief item of news, and was dressed and garnished according to the taste of those who related it.
The princ.i.p.al version was that, stung by a letter sent by Sage Portlock, Luke Ross had come down from town and purposely left the coach at Cross-lane, so that he could waylay and murder Cyril Mallow with a huge hedge-stake which was picked up afterwards near the place.
For a short time the gossips were at fault for a reason, but they only had to wait patiently for a while, and then it was known throughout the place that Cyril Mallow was engaged to marry Sage--a matter so out of all reason to the muddled intellect of Humphrey Bone, the old schoolmaster, that he said it was enough to make widow Marly turn in her grave.
Why, he did not explain. It could not have been from jealous disappointment, for widow Marly had had a very fair share of matrimonial life, having married at the early age of sixteen, and being led twice afterwards to the hymeneal altar before dying at a very good old age.
"But it"s a wrong thing," he said, at the King"s Head, during a course of potations--"a wrong thing; and no good will come. Two sorts, oil and water, and they won"t mix. Tell parson I say so, some of you, if you like. It"s his doing to get the girl"s money, and it"s a wrong thing."
In the midst of the many discussions in Lawford it was asked why Luke Ross was not to be prosecuted for a.s.saulting the parson"s son.
"Nice sort of fellow," said Fullerton; "goes to learn to be a lawyer, and comes down here and breaks the law."
"Ah! it"s been a strange bad case," said Smithson, the tailor.
"Anybody seen owt of him since?" ventured Warton, the saddler.
There was silence for a few moments, and then Tomlinson spoke.
"I haven"t seen him down," he said. "In fact, I know he has not been, for old Michael Ross has been up to see him and hear the rights of the case."
"Yes?" said two or three, eagerly.
"Ah! he don"t say anything about the rights and wrongs; only that he doesn"t think Joseph Portlock"s girl behaved well to him."
"Oh! I don"t know," said Fullerton. "What call had a girl like that to consider herself bound to a wandering man who couldn"t settle down like a Christian? I think she did quite right to give him up."
"And marry young Mallow?"