Perlycross: A Tale of the Western Hills. R. D. Blackmore
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your foes; or else run away. And upon the whole, as you don't belong here, but up the country—as we call it—and your father wants your attention, the wisest thing you can do is, to bolt."
"Would you do that, if it were your own case?" Fox had not much knowledge of Squire Mockham, except as a visitor at his father's house; and whether he should respect, or despise him, depended upon the answer.
"I would see them all d——d first;" the Magistrate replied, looking as if he would be glad to do it; "but that is because I am a Devonshire man. You are over the border; and not to be blamed."
"Well, there are some things one cannot get over," Dr. Jemmy answered, with a pleasant smile; "and the worst of them all is, to be born outside of Devon. If I had been of true Devonshire birth, I believe you would never have held me guilty."
"Others may take that view; but I do not;" said the Magistrate very magnanimously. "It would have been better for you, no doubt. But we are not narrow-minded. And your mother was a Devonshire woman, connected with our oldest families. No, no, the question is now of evidence; and the law does not recognise the difference. The point is—to prove that you were really away."
"Outside the holy county, where this outrage was committed? Foxden is thirty miles from Perlycross, even by the shortest cuts, and nearer thirty-five, to all who are particular about good roads. I was at my father's bed-side, some minutes before ten o'clock, on Saturday morning."
"That is not enough to show. We all know in common sense, that the ride would have taken at least four hours. Probably more, over those bad roads, in the darkness of a November morning. The simplest thing will be for you to tell me the whole of your movements, on the night of this affair."
"That I will, as nearly as I can remember; though I had no reason then, for keeping any special record. To begin with—I was at the funeral of course, and saw you there, but did not cross over to speak to you. Then I walked home to the Old Barn where I live, which stands as you know at the foot of Hagdon Hill. It was nearly dark then, perhaps half-past five; and I felt out of spirits, and sadly cut up, for I was very fond of Sir Thomas. I sat thinking of him for an hour or so; and then I changed my clothes for riding togs, and had a morsel of cold beef and a pipe, and went to look for the boy that brings my letters; for old Walker, the postman, never comes near the Barn. There was no sign of the boy, so I saddled Old Rock—for my man was 'keeping funeral' still, as they express it—and I rode to North-end, the furthest corner of the parish, to see to a little girl, who has had a dangerous attack of croup. Then I crossed Maiden Down by the gravel-pits, to see an old stager at Old Bait, who abuses me every time, and expects a shilling. Then homewards through Priestwell, and knocked at Gronow's door, having a general permission to come in at night. But he was not at home, or did not want to be disturbed; so I lost very little time by that. It must have been now at least nine o'clock, with the moon in the south-west, and getting very cold; but I had managed to leave my watch on the drawers, when I pulled my mourning clothes off.
"From Priestwell, I came back to Perlycross, and was going straight home to see about my letters—for I knew that my father had been slightly out of sorts, when I saw a man waiting at the cross-roads for me, to say that I was wanted at the Whetstone-pits; for a man had tumbled down a hole, and broken both his legs. Without asking the name, I put spurs to Old Rock, and set off at a spanking pace for the Whetstone-pits, expecting to find the foreman there, to show me where it was. It is a long roundabout way from our village, at least, for any one on horseback, though not more than three miles perhaps in a straight line, because you have to go all round the butt of Hagdon Hill, which no one would think of riding over in the dark. I should say it must be five miles at least, from our cross-roads."
"Every yard of that distance," says the Magistrate, who was following the doctor's tale intently, and making notes in his pocket-book; "five miles at least, and road out of repair. Your parish ought to be indicted."
"Very well. Old Rock was getting rather tired. A better horse never looked through a bridle; but he can't be less than sixteen years of age. My father had him eight years, and I have had him three; and even for a man with both legs broken, I could not drive a willing horse to death. However, we let no grass grow beneath our feet; and dark as the lanes were, and wonderfully rough, even for this favoured county, I got to the pit at the corner of the hill, as soon as a man could get there, without breaking his neck."
"In that case he never would get there at all."
"Perhaps not. Or at least, not in working condition. Well, you know what a queer sort of place it is. I had been there before, about a year ago. But then it was daylight; and that makes all the difference. I am not so very fidgetty where I go, when I know that a man is in agony; but how to get along there in the dark, with the white grit up to my horse's knees, and black pines barring out the moonshine, was—I don't mind confessing it—a thing beyond me. And the strangest thing of all was, that nobody came near me. I had the whole place to myself; so far as I could see—and I did not want it.
"I sat on Old Rock; and I had to sit close; for the old beauty's spirit was up, in spite of all his weariness. His hunting days came to his memory perhaps; and you should have seen how he jumped about. At the risk of his dear old bones of course; but a horse is much pluckier than we are. What got into his old head, who shall say? But I failed to see the fun of it, as he did. There was all the white stuff, that comes out of the pits, like a great cascade of diamonds, glittering in the level moonlight, with broad bars of black thrown across it by the pines, all trembling, and sparkling, and seeming to move.
"Those things tell upon a man somehow, and he seems to have no right to disturb them. But I felt that I was not brought here for nothing, and began to get vexed at seeing nobody. So I set up a shout, with a hand to my mouth, and then a shrill whistle between my nails. The echo came back, very punctually; but nothing else, except a little gliding of the shale, and shivering of black branches. Then I jumped off my horse, and made him fast to a tree, and scrambled along the rough bottom of the hill.
"There are eight pits on the south side, and seven upon the north, besides the three big ones at the west end of the hill, which are pretty well worked out, according to report. Their mouths are pretty nearly at a level, about a hundred and fifty feet below the chine of hill. But the tumbledown—I forget what the proper name is—the excavated waste, that comes down, like a great beard, to the foot where the pine-trees stop it—"
"Brekkles is their name for it;" interrupted Mr. Mockham; "brekkles, or brokkles—I am not sure which. You know they are a colony of Cornishmen."
"Yes, and a strange outlandish lot, having nothing to do with the people around, whenever they can help it. It is useless for any man to seek work there. They push him down the brekkles—if that is what they call them. However, they did not push me down, although I made my way up to the top, when I had shouted in vain along the bottom. I could not get up the stuff itself; I knew better than to make the trial. But I circumvented them at the further end; and there I found a sort of terrace, where a cart could get along from one pit-mouth to another. And from mouth to mouth, I passed along this rough and stony gallery, under the furzy crest of hill, without discovering a sign of life, while the low moon across the broad western plains seemed to look up, rather than down at me. Into every black pit-mouth, broad or narrow, bratticed with timber or arched with flint, I sent a loud shout, but the only reply was like the dead murmuring of a shell. And yet all the time, I felt somehow, as if I were watched by invisible eyes, as a man upon a cliff is observed from the sea.
"This increased my anger, which was rising at the thought that some one had made a great fool of me; and forgetting all the ludicrous side of the thing—as a man out of temper is apt to do—I mounted the most conspicuous pile at the end of the hill, and threw up my arms, and shouted to the moon, 'Is this the way to treat a doctor?'
"The distant echoes answered—'Doctor! Doctor!' as if they were conferring a degree upon me; and that made me laugh, and grow rational again, and resolved to have one more try, instead of giving in. So I climbed upon a ridge, where I could see along the chine, through patches of white among the blackness of the furze; and in the distance there seemed to be a low fire smouldering. For a moment I doubted