"I--I have told ye once, d.i.c.k. I have--"
"A lie. You have told me that, and nought else."
"d.i.c.k, d.i.c.k, mind, it"s your father you are putting the lie on," said the old man, kindling up so fiercely that his stooping figure rose erect, and his eyes shone beneath their heavy brows like water under a bank thick with rushes.
"What took you up yonder, I say?" was the curt answer. "I want the truth, and mean to have it out of you before we go a stride farther.
Do you understand, now?"
"I went to ask after the young maister," was the sullen reply.
"The truth! I will have the truth--so out with it, before I do you a harm!"
"Before ye do your old father a harm! Nay, nay, lad, it has no come to that."
d.i.c.k bent the sapling almost double, and let it recoil with a vicious snap, a significant answer that kindled the old man"s wrath so fiercely that he seized upon the offending stick, placed one end under his foot, and twisted it apart with a degree of fury that startled the son out of his sneering insolence.
"Now what hast got to say to your father, d.i.c.k? Speak out; but remember that I am that, and shall be till you get to be the strongest man."
The thin features of Richard Storms turned white, and his eyes shone.
He had depended too much, it seemed, on the withering influence his insolent overbearance had produced on the old man, whose will and strength had at last been aroused by the audacious threat wielded in that sapling. Whether he really would have degraded the old farmer with a blow or not, is uncertain; but, once aroused, the stout old man was more than a match for his son, and the force of habit came back upon him so powerfully, that he began to roll up the cuffs of his fustian jacket, as if preparing for an onset.
"Say out what there is in you, and do it gingerly, or you"ll soon find out who is maister here," the old man said, with all the rough authority of former times.
The young man looked into his father"s face with a glance made keen by surprise. Then his features relaxed, and he burst into a hoa.r.s.e laugh.
"Why, father, did you think I was about doing you a harm with that bit of ash? It was for a goad to the cattle I was smoothing it off."
"Ah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the old man.
"But you have twisted it to a wisp now."
"That I have, and rare glad I am of it."
"It don"t matter," said the son. "I can find plenty more about here.
But the thing we were talking of. Did Sir Noel kick in the traces when ye came down upon him about the lease?"
A gleam of the young man"s own cunning crept into the father"s eyes.
"The lease, d.i.c.k? Haven"t I said it was the young maister"s health that took me to "The Rest?""
Richard made a gesture that convulsed his whole frame, and, jerking one hand forward, exclaimed, "It was for your own good, father, that I asked; so I don"t see why you keep things so close."
"An" I don"t know why a child of mine should ask questions of his own father like a schoolmaster, or as if he were ready for a bout at fisticuffs," answered the old man.
"It"s a way one gets among the grooms and gamekeepers; but it means nothing," was the pacific answer. "I was only afraid you might have dropped a word about what I told you of, and that would have done mischief."
"Ah!"
"Just now, father, half a word might spoil everything."
"Half a word! Well, well, there was nought said that could do harm.
Just a hint about the lease, nothing more. There, now, ye have it all.
A fair question at the first would ha" saved all this bother."
"Are you sure this was all?" asked the young man, eying his father closely.
"Aye. Sure."
"Hush! One of the gamekeepers is coming."
"Aye, aye."
Old Storms moved forward, as the intruder came up with a pair of birds in his hands, which he was carrying to "The Rest."
Richard remained behind, for the man met him with a broad grin, as if some good joke were on his mind.
"Good-morrow to ye," he said, dropping the birds upon a bed of gra.s.s, as if preparing for a long gossip.
"Dost know I came a nigh peppering thee a bit yon night, thinking it war some poachers after the birds; but I soon found out it was a bit of sweethearting on the sly? Oh, d.i.c.k, d.i.c.k! thou"lt get shot some night."
"Sweethearting! I don"t know what you mean, Jacob."
"Ye don"t know that there was a pretty doe roving about the wilderness one night this week, just at the time ye pa.s.sed through it?"
"Me, me?"
"Aye. No mistake. I saw ye with my own eyes in the moonlight."
"In the moonlight? Where?"
"Oh, in the upper path, nearest thy own home."
Richard drew a deep breath.
"Ah, that! I thought you said by the lake."
"Nay, it was the la.s.s I saw, taking covert there."
"What la.s.s? I saw none!"
"Ha, ha!" laughed the gamekeeper, placing a hand on each knee, and stooping down to look into his companion"s eyes. "What war she there for, then? Tell me that."
"How should I know?"
"And what wert thou doing in the wilderness?"
"What, I? Pa.s.sing through it like an honest Christian, on my way home from the village."
"Well, now, that is strange! Dost know, I got half a look at the doe"s face, and dang me! if I didn"t think it was Jessup"s la.s.s."