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"Mother has not got over her fear of that man Miles Gaffin, and sends Jacob to watch that he does not run off with me, as she used to fancy he would do when I was a little girl," she said to herself. The old dame assured her that she was much better for the stuff Miss Jane had sent, when May, as she wished her good-bye, looked back once more, but Jacob had disappeared.
"People here will know you are my son, so just get a good name for yourself, and whatever they may think, they cannot say you are not a fit match for the old fisherman's foster-daughter," and Gaffin gave way to a laugh such as he rarely indulged in. "I will come down here again and have a talk with you after you have seen the girl.
As he was ready to give a better rent than the steward expected to receive, he was glad to let it. Miles Gaffin had occupied the mill for about a year, when, leaving it in charge of his man, he disappeared for a time and returned with a wife and three boys, whom he placed in a neat cottage at some little distance from the mill.
He hurried home determined to communicate with Mr Shallard the next morning, and to obtain a sufficient guard at once for Texford, in case Gaffin should really venture to attack it. Each morning May rose with the hopes that a letter would come from Harry, and not till the postman had passed did her fond heart grow sick again with hope deferred.
"Take yourself off, Master Gaffin, and your money too," exclaimed Susan, indignantly, putting her hands behind her back. "Do you fancy we don't know you with all your pretended French airs and gibberish. Let me advise you not to show your face inside those gates again." Miles sneaked off without attempting to reply.
He could not stop to ascertain whether he was dead or alive. The smugglers still held their ground not two hundred yards off. Harry recognised Miles Gaffin, who, by his actions, was evidently endeavouring to induce his followers to advance to the encounter. As the well disciplined little band drew near them, the ruffian's courage gave way. The men on foot rushed off on either side.
Little Jacky Gaffin was pinned down under the wreckage, and while the nurse had her hands full with the goat Hyacinth was laying into Jacky's legs with his belt like a small fury." "I'm not defending him," said Matilda, "but they must have done something to annoy him."
"Miles Gaffin," cried Mad Sal, "the bloodthirsty and wretched man shall not live out half his days; yet, as the sea refused to keep him, we must not be more cruel." Gaffin made no answer, but continued to glare wildly at the faces bent over him. He occasionally groaned and muttered a few unintelligible words. "He seems to have lost his senses," whispered Adam to Jacob.
From time to time a still larger quantity of earth was observed, and it was whispered by one or two of his more sagacious neighbours that Miles Gaffin must be excavating a vault beneath his mill, possibly for the purpose of forming a granary in which to store corn purchased by him when prices were low.
I am more than afraid that Gaffin will knock him on the head, and heave him overboard with a shot to his feet, if he finds that he is hard-pressed, and then he will deny ever having had the poor fellow on board."
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