Part 5

Herring was convinced that the old man was repeating by rote a lesson that had been taught him. However much he was questioned and cross-questioned he returned to the same story, in the same words. Herring gave up the hope of getting anything more in this quarter. Cobbledick had degenerated into a beggar--a wretched, canting beggar, accommodating his whine to the craze of the persons who visited Ophir.

But Herring was not going to abandon the clue of the shekel because he could find out nothing from Grizzly. He went to the Giant's Table to catechise Joyce, but she was not there.

Joyce was now nearly well. The splints had been taken off her arms, and she could use her hands, and do light work; but the hands were stiff, and long inaction had weakened her arms.

Herring could not spare the time to wait for her return; he did not know where she was, and he was due at the Oxenham Arms for the final settlement of the arrangement between Trecarrel and Trampleasure, in which he was a party.

On the morrow, Captain Trecarrel left. In the evening Herring went in quest of Joyce and found her hoeing in the little field. He called, and she ran to him as a dog to its master, and with as marked demonstrations of delight at seeing him.

'Joyce. I came here yesterday to find you, and you were away.'

'Oh dear, oh dear, though!' she exclaimed; 'I were wiring a rabbit.'

'Joyce, I want a word with you.'

'You can have scores; as many as you wants.'

'I know. A woman is free of her words. You must tell me the truth now, my little maid, for a good deal depends on it.'

'Did I ever tell'y a lie, now?' asked Joyce, offended. 'You may cut me in pieces afore I'll say other than what be true to you.'

'What I want to know, Joyce, is, where did your father get that shekel?'

'I don't know what that be.'

'A silver coin. He says he found three or four here under one of the stones of the Table. There is a branch on one side, and on the other a cup with a flame rising out of it.'

'I never seed nothing of the sort, nowhere.'

'Your father says that he gave them to you, and that you lost all, except one which he retained and sold to Mr. Flamank.'

Joyce shook her head.

'You have never seen anything of the kind?'

'It be just one o' vaither's pack o' lies,' answered the candid Joyce; 'vaither hev been lying finely since Ophir began. He never showed me nothing like that; he never gived me no silver money. He never had none to give till Ophir began.'

'You are very positive.'

'If you doubt, I'll say, Blast me blue----'

'That will do,' interrupted Herring; 'your word will suffice without the blue blazes to colour it.'

The old man had lied about the shekel. He had not given it to the girl, he had therefore probably not found it at all, but it had been given him by those who had put the story into his mouth.

'I'll ax vaither if you likes,' said Joyce; 'he'll tell me, all right.'

'I do not think he will. That is all I wanted to know, my dear girl.'

'I say,' said Joyce, 'doant'y go off now right on end. Sit you down a mite here in the sun and have a chat. I never see nothing of you now, not as it used to be when I were ill and scatt to bits. I a'most wish my airms was broke again, that you could come and see me ivery day. That were beautiful.'

'Very well, Joyce, by all means. I have nothing particular to do, so I am quite at your service.' He sat down by the girl under the lee of the great stones. It was warm there and pleasant, leaning against the grey blocks of hoar antiquity and unknown use, stained orange and silvery white with lichen, and with white frosty moss like antlers of elfin deer filling the nooks in the stones. The ants were crawling over the moss in the sun; they were migrating and wore their wings for that one day. Turf was heaped up at the side of the cromlech, forming a rude bench. On this the two sat. As he took his place the thought came into Herring's head that far away in the dim prehistoric age, some such a savage as that which sat beside him had assisted when it was reared.

'It be lew (sheltered) here,' said Joyce; 'vaither hev took to sitting here mostly on a Sunday when he ain't wanted to the mine.'

'He leaves you very much alone now.'

'That he does. Vaither be much changed o' late. The vokes there ha' taught 'n to smoke, and they give 'n a bit o' backie now and then, and when he haven't got no backie, then he flips off this here moss, this black sort o' trade on the moorstones, and he smokes that.'

'A new sort of life for him,' said Herring.

'It amuses he,' answered the girl. 'He says he didn't know as Gorolmity had so many vules in the world. He says they be as plenty as stones on Dartmoor.'

'I dare say they are, and certainly those are fools who congregate about Ophir.'

'Vaither likes to hear mun talk, and go sifting and cradling and washing for the gold. It makes 'n laugh, it do.'

'Why, Joyce?'

'Why, because there bain't none of 'em knows where the gold comes from, and there bain't one of 'em as don't think himself as wise as Cosdon is big.'

'Where does the gold come from?' asked Herring, eagerly, so eagerly that Joyce turned sharply round and looked him hard in the face.

'Don't'y know neither?'

'Indeed I do not.'

'Vaither said as you didn't and nobody didn't. And larned and skolards as the volk be, vaither be too much for mun.'

'Joyce, if you can tell me where the gold comes from I shall indeed be thankful.'

'Do you wish very much to know?'

Joyce was silent. She looked straight before her. Something was working in her mind.

'Well, Joyce?' asked Herring; he laid his hand on hers. 'If you will tell me this, you will repay me for all the little trouble I took to make your poor hands sound and strong again.

'Then I'll tell you, come what may. It is just this that made me doubt to say. Vaither 'd kill me sure as vuzz blooms all the year, if he knowed as I had told you. Look here,' said Joyce; 'do'y see thicky ant there. Well, he took up a great moorstone, and sez he, "You, Joyce, be that ant, and I'll treat you the same," and down with the stone.'

'Yes,' said Herring, his blood curdling, 'I understand you.'

'And after that he sed, Glory rallaluley.'

'Joyce, your father shall never know that you told me.'

'Whether he knows or not I'll tell, because you wish it. If he does kill me, it don't matter much.' Then she looked him steadily in the eyes, and said: 'This be the way in which it be done. Vaither puts the gold dust in. When the bell rings, that's the signal for he to be ready up at the head o' the launder' (wooden channel) 'where the water runs along to go to the washing pans, and he just slips in some of the gold into the water. So the stream carries it down into the washing places where the pounded stone is ready to be washed.'

Herring almost laughed. The solution of the puzzle was simplicity itself--so simple that it had escaped every one. Every eye had watched the stone, no one had thought that the water might be salted.

'I'll show you some of it,' said Joyce. 'There is a little bag hid away under the table. You understand vaither don't put none in when there be no vules to find it. Old Tramplara pulls a cord, and that lets the water on; and when the water is let on, vaither sprinkles the gold in it. He don't do it when there be no vules there, for Tramplara sez he ha'n't got much of the gold to waste. Then, after it has been washed and sorted out, he gives it back to vaither, and in it goes again for more vules to find. I've done it once or twice myself for vaither, when he couldn't go hisself. That be how I came to know about it.'

'I am lastingly indebted to you, Joyce, for telling me this.'

'You won't bring vaither to no harm because of this, will'y now? That 'ud be too cruel onkind o' you. But no--you'll never do no hurt to me nor vaither, I be sure.'

'Indeed I will not, dear Joyce. I shall never forget what I owe to you for having told me this; and I promise you your father shall not suffer for it.'

*CHAPTER XXVII.*

*COBBLEDICK'S RHEUMATICS.*

John Herring did not go at once to Mr. Battishill with the account of what he had heard. He waited till he had himself witnessed the transaction. Some time before the public were admitted to the mine, he went in that direction, making however a wide circuit, and secreted himself behind some of the rocks that commanded the head of the 'launder.' There he remained till Old Grizzly arrived, and, after having looked about him, lay down beside the stream close to the sluice that let the water into the wooden conduit for the washing floors.

Herring saw him strew the dust in the stream as it was admitted; he remained at his post of observation till some time after Cobbledick had departed, and then he went direct to West Wyke.

He told Mr. Battishill what he had learned from Joyce, and how he had verified the account with his own eyes. It was true he had not arrested Grizzly's hand and taken the gold dust out of it; but he had seen some of the gold supplied to the old man by Tramplara, and which he kept secreted under the Giant's Table, and there was no moral doubt that what the old man had strewn in the water was that gold powder which Tramplara intended should be found in the pans.

The revelation of the fraud made Mr. Battishill excited and angry.

'What,' he exclaimed, helpless in his agitation--'what is to be done? Good heavens! what can be done?'

'That is what I have been considering. You are a justice of the peace, and you must sign a warrant for the arrest of Mr. Tramplara and his son. There can be no question that young Sampson is involved in the swindle equally with his father, who is the originator and mainspring of the whole concern.'

'I have not acted for many years. I had rather not.'

'But, sir, I think it most important that you should take this matter up. Remember, this fraud has been carried out on your property, under a lease granted by you, and that you come out of it without the loss of a penny. I think it possible--I only say possible--that some inconsiderate persons may cast reflections on you. Fortunately, your name is not on the list of directors, so that you will not be involved in the ruin this discovery will bring on many; but your abstention from becoming one may be commented on unfavourably, unless you cut the occasion away. If you issue a warrant for the apprehension of the wretched swindlers, and become the main instrument of the break-up of the company and the exposure of the dishonest trick that has been played, no one can wag his tongue against you.'

'You are right,' said the old man. He held out his hand to Herring, and the tears came into his eyes. 'John, I cannot thank you sufficiently for having protected me against myself. I confess to you that old Tramplara had talked my suspicions down, and had raised in my breast the demon of cupidity. No, I will not say cupidity, but speculation. I do not care for money in itself, but I do delight in making it, or, what is the same thing, in scheming how to make it. I suspect I have been too overweening in my esteem of my own powers, and now you have given that conceit a fatal fall. Do you remember the wrestle in "As You Like it?" "Sir," I say with Rosalind, "you have wrestled well, and overthrown more than" Tramplara. I trust my self-esteem is dead as Charles. I shall never again venture to have an opinion contrary to yours.'

'But, Mr. Battishill, is not this a little wandering from the point? I want a warrant for the apprehension of father and son.'

'It is no wandering at all. I am explaining to you the reason of my submission. I tell you that you have but to propose a measure, and I carry it out as best I may. Go to Okehampton, and get a clerk to make out a warrant, and I will sign it.'

'One thing more. I do not wish old Cobbledick to be arrested. He is too stupid and too ignorant to know what he has been doing, and it must be managed that he is allowed to escape. I have passed my word to Joyce that he shall not be brought into trouble. Poor Joyce is in terror of her life of him, and if he were to suspect that she had betrayed the secret it would go hard with her.'

'Oh no,' said Mr. Battishill, hastily; 'Cobbledick is my tenant, that is, a squatter on my land, and I must protect him if I can.'

'It can be managed,' said Herring. 'I will go to him, and tell him plainly what I saw to-day, and threaten that I will have him apprehended, unless he absents himself to-morrow, and gets the Tramplaras to appoint a substitute. After that I will communicate with the constable, and we shall succeed in arresting gold-handed the fellow who salts the water.'

'Poor Cobbledick! I should be very sorry for trouble to come on him. He is a beast, not a man, and these Tramplaras have put him in shafts and driven him where they chose to go.'

'One thing more,' pursued Herring. 'Directly we have caught the man in the act, I must ride to Launceston at full speed. Old Tramplara is not here. He has gone home because his daughter is about to be married; by the way, the marriage is to take place this week, I believe. If the news were to reach him before he is arrested, he would draw every penny of the shareholders' money from the bank, and make a bolt with it. Before we knew whether he were gone to Plymouth or Falmouth, he would be on the high seas, and those who have invested in Ophir would lose everything.'

'You are right, John, right again. You take every one's interests under your protection. I suspect there will be wailing and wringing of hands when this scandal breaks on the religio-speculative world.'

Herring did not see Cobbledick till next morning. After the interview with Mr. Battishill, he rode into Okehampton and obtained the warrant. He did not wish to speak to Grizzly long before he dealt the stroke, lest he should give the alarm. When he did speak, he was straightforward with him.

'Cobbledick,' he said, 'I have long entertained suspicions of Ophir. I knew it was a swindle, but how the swindling was managed I did not know till yesterday. I had gone through every process of the mine attentively, except one, and I was satisfied that the trickery was not committed under my eyes in the mine itself. There was only one process I had not studied, and that was one which took place above the workings. I allude to the letting on of the water that washes the gozzen. Yesterday I watched that, hiding under a rock, and I saw you steal to the head of the launder, and I observed you salting the water with gold-dust. Now I know exactly how the fraud is carried out. Are you aware of the consequences? I have only to apply to a magistrate for a warrant, and you are arrested and committed to gaol, and there you will probably lie for many months.'

Cobbledick's face became livid.

'I do not want to throw you into prison, partly because I believe you have acted in ignorance of what you were doing, but chiefly because I wish to fix the noose round the right throats.'

'Cap'n[1] Tramplara set me on it,' said Cobbledick; 'he sed, if I didn't do 'zackly as he wanted, he'd tear down the Giant's Table, and be altogether the ruin o' me. He'd got that hold on Squire Battishill that he couldn't help me. And I did it to save myself.'

[1] The head of a mine bears the title of captain.

'I am quite aware that Mr. Tramplara made you his tool, and I do not want you to suffer, if it can be avoided, because you have been an ignorant and unwilling tool.'

'Unwilling,' echoed Grizzly, 'I'll swear; glory rallaluley.'

'I repeat that I wish to spare you because you were an ignorant tool, and also, and that especially, because of poor Joyce, who would be heart-broken were anything to happen to you, unnatural father though you be.'

'Ah! sure-ly it 'ud kill Joyce. Her be that tooked up wi' me, her can't abide as no harm should come to I. What 'ud her do without me, I'd like to know? Where'd her get meat, and clothes, and fire? If I were tooked and put in the lock-up, her'd die right on end wi' fright and hunger.'

The mean old man enforced this view of the case, thinking to deepen Herring's reluctance to compromise him.

'There may be two opinions about that,' said Herring: 'suffice it, however, that for the sake of Joyce I would spare you. Now the only way this can be done is for you to decline salting the water to-morrow, when I and other witnesses will be there to see the thing done, and I shall be prepared to arrest the doer.'

'If I don't do it, then it be Joyce who does.'

'But Joyce must not do it. Who is in charge of the mine this week?'

'Young Sampson Tramplara.'

'Very well; tell him that you can't be there.'

'Ow!' yelped the old man, 'I be took already cruel wi' the rheumatics. I reckon in another half a wink I shan't be able to stir neither voot nor hand.'

'So let it be. Your rheumatism incapacitates you from attending to your work, and Joyce is sent far off, on an errand. Then Mr. Sampson will employ another man.'

'He'll do it hisself. He don't let no one else into the dodge except me and Joyce.'

'So much the better. Then we shall catch the prime culprit in the act. Now, Cobbledick, you understand. Not one word of this must be repeated. If you let out what I have told you, then your chance of escape is gone. I shall have you arrested this evening, and you will spend the night in the lock-up. You comprehend this?'

The old man put his dirty finger to his eye and winked. 'My grandfer wasn't Jonadab the son o' Rechab. I arn't a vule, it be them as goes to Ophir as be the vules.'

Herring left him. Then Cobbledick's face changed. He was fairly frightened. He sought Joyce at once; no suspicion crossed him that she had betrayed the secret.

'Joyce,' he said in a hoarse whisper, 'the thing's a' busted blazes high.'

'What be, vaither?'

'Hophir, as they calls it. The young maister hev a found out all about 'n.'

Joyce was alarmed; she looked uneasily at her father, but there was no anger in his face.

'Joyce,' he went on, 'that old Cap'n Tramplara hev never gived me what he've a promised.'

'What hev he a promised'y?'

'He sed he'd a give me as many pounds o' backie as I worked days for he, a salting o' the water. He arn't paid me not these three weeks. See here, I ha' notched it on thicky stone. Now he don't know nothing o' this here bust-up. And when he do hear, then he'll not give me no backie more. And, I reckon, he won't pay me that he already owes me. So you cut along to Lanson so vast as your legs can carry you.'

'Vaither, I know nothing o' the road.'

'You cut right on end after the tip o' your nose,' he said, 'and you cut so vast as you can. You cannot miss 'n. And mind, you must get there afore the news of the bust-up do come to the Cap'n, and you tell 'n this: "Give me the backie in pounds"--that's just so many pounds as you've fingers and toes on your body, and one over for your head. Now don't you be a jackass and forget that one over. A head is every mite as much consekance to a human cretur as his little toe. And you say to 'n: "Give me as much backie in pounds as I've fingers and toes, and a head;" and you hold 'n out all straight afor 'n that he may count mun hisself. And you mind you don't forget to reckon your head in. Then you go on and say, "I'll tell'y something mighty partickler about Ophir." Say as vaither sent me lopping all the way, so hard as I could lop. And if he gives you the backie, then you can tell 'n all--how the young maister hev found out all about 'n, and be agoing to lock up him and the young Cap'n Sampson in gaol. But if he don't give'y the backie, then you can just please yourself and tell 'n nothing. There now, don't'y bide about, but cut away.'

'But you, vaither! Will you get into trouble?'

'I--I'm about to be took cruel bad wi' rheumatics, and what they calls the loinbagey. Now, afore you goes to Lanson, just you cut down to Ophir, and tell Cap'n Sampson I wants to see 'n mighty partickler here to the Table.'

An hour later, young Sampson Tramplara was at the cromlech. As he approached, he heard moaning and cries issuing from the interior.

'What the devil is the matter here?' he asked, looking in. 'Who is that howling and groaning?'

'Oh, Cap'n, it be me; I be took cruel bad wi' rheumatics and the loinbagey.'

'Well, I'm not your doctor.'

'I sent to tell'y that I couldn't fulfil my duty to-day there to Ophir.'

'Then your daughter can do it.'

'Her's off to Lanson.'

'What the devil is she gone there for?'

'Sure, after my backie. Your vaither he promised me a pound a day for the work I did, and he arn't paid me for a long while. Look'y there, I ha' notched it all on the stone. There be as many days as you have fingers and toes, and your head chucked in as well.'

'You fool!' exclaimed young Tramplara, 'why did you not apply to me, instead of sending all the way to Launceston for it?'

'Cos, if I'd ha' axed you, you'd ha' throwed a curse at me instead o' a pound o' backie.'

'You damned blockhead,' swore the young man, angrily.

'There--I sed as much. I'd rather hev the backie, though 'tother don't hurt, it only tickles.'

'Curse it,' exclaimed Sampson, in a violent rage; 'there is a particular reason to-day why I want the water well salted. Damn your rheumatism; you _must_ be at your post.'

'I can't and I won't,' said Grizzly, sulkily.

'It is. You won't, not you can't,' blustered Sampson; then he gathered his stick short in his hand, and catching the old man by the ragged collar of his coat, he beat him well, pouring forth at the same time a volley of curses.

'This is all sham; I don't believe in your rheumatism. This is idleness. You are a good-for-nothing scoundrel. I'll give you occasion to moan and cry out.'

'You leave me alone, Cap'n,' yelled Cobbledick. 'You forget, I reckon, that I hev got the hanging of'y in my hands.'

'It may be so, but you forget that if I swing you swing also; one rope will do for both of us,' said Sampson. 'And for that reason I do not fear you in the least. Now then, will you do your work again to-day?'

'I can't.'

'I'll give you five pounds of backie.'

'I say what I sez; I can't do it.'

'Then,' said young Sampson, 'there is no help for it; I must manage the job myself.'

'You'd better,' assented Grizzly; 'if I was you, I wouldn't trust nobody else.'

'I don't mean to,' answered Sampson. He was panting after the thrashing he had administered, and as he cooled he began to question his discretion in giving way to his brutality. 'I say, Cobbledick, you mind this; you and I and my father are all in the same box, and you in the worst compartment of it, for it is you who have put the dust in. My father and I can always put on the look of innocence and throw the blame on you. You, if the rope has to be tasted, you will have the first bite.'

'I understand,' said the old man, putting his finger to his eye. 'Jonadab the son of Rechab weren't my father. I ain't a vule; it be they as goes to Ophir be the vules.'

'You won't take it ill that I thrashed you. You put me out, and I am naturally of a quick temper.'

'I say, Cap'n; I wouldn't let none else do the job to-day. I'd do it myself if I was you.'

'I intend to. I told you I did.'

'That be right. Do it yourself.'

Then young Sampson left the den. As he was turning away, he thought he heard loud laughter from within. He was of a suspicious nature, and he turned back.

'What are you laughing at, Cobbledick?'

'I bain't laughing; I be screeching wi' pain. What wi' the rheumatics, and the loinbagey, and the licking I ha' had, I hev cause to, I reckon; and I sez glory rallaluley between the twinges by way of easement.'

*CHAPTER XXVIII.*

*CAUGHT IN THE ACT.*