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Lezzard was found to possess no money at all, it became necessary to provide him with a bare competence for the credit of the family.
To Newton Abbot they went for their honeymoon, and tribulation haunted them from the first. Mrs. Lezzard refused her husband permission to inquire any particulars of her affairs from her lawyer a young man who had succeeded Mr. Joel Ford while the Gaffer, on his side, parried all his lady's endeavours to learn more of the small fortune concerning which he had spoken not seldom before marriage.
Having frowned, in a very tragic manner, both on Mr. Blee and Mr. Lezzard, the Vicar proceeded with the service; but though Gaffer remained in his place Billy did not. He rose, jammed on his hat, glared at everybody, and assumed an expression curiously similar to that of a stone demon which grinned from the groining of two arches immediately above him.
He knew Lezzard to be more than seventy years old and usually regarded the ancient man's rivalry with contempt; but he felt uneasy for a few moments, until the front door of Mrs. Coomstock's dwelling was opened to him by the lady herself. "My stars! You? What a terrible coorious thing!" she said. "Why for?" "Come in the parlour. Theer! coorious ban't the word!"
Then the company spoke its mind, and Mary Lezzard's clay might well have turned under that bitter hornet-buzz of vituperation. Some said little, but had not strength or self-command to hide tears; some cursed and swore. Mr. Lezzard wept unheeded; Mrs. Hicks likewise wept.
'Tis more from hatred of t' others than love of you, when all's said. An' it ban't no gert gold mine. But I'd like to be laid along wi' Coomstock; an' doan't, for God's love, bury Lezzard wi' me; an' I want them words on auld George Mundy's graave set 'pon mine not just writ, but cut in a slate or some such lasting thing. 'Tis a tidy tomb he've got, wi' a cherub angel, an' I'd like the same.
Blee but little hurt, bandaged his arm, plastered his head, and assured him that a pipe and a glass of spirits was all he needed to fortify his sinking spirit. The party ate and drank, raised a cheer for Miller Lyddon and then went homewards. Only Mr. Chappie and Gaffer Lezzard entered the house and had a wineglass or two of some special sloe gin. Mr.
'Tis the drink she'm soaked in it, like a sponge." "I'll come," said Hicks, and half an hour later he approached his aunt's dwelling and entered it. Mrs. Lezzard was now sunk into a condition of chronic crapulence which could only end in one way. Her husband had been ordered again and again to keep all liquor from her, but, truth to tell, he made no very sustained effort to do so.
If she'm gwaine to leave un out the account altogether, he'll be worse off than the foxes. His son's gone to foreign paarts an' his darter's lyin'-in not that her husband would spare a crust o' bread for auld Lezzard, best o' times." "Trust me to do what's right. Now I'll go and see after Chris." "An' make it up with Will while sun shines on 'e.
While Miller Lyddon still argued with Billy against the step he now designed, there arrived from Chagford the stout Mr. Chappie, with his mouth full of news. "More weddin's," he said. "I comed down-long to tell 'e, lest you shouldn't knaw till to-morrow an' so fall behind the times. Widow Coomstock 's thrawed up the sponge and gived herself to that importuneous auld Lezzard.
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