United States or Marshall Islands ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Lyddon laboured under some shadow of doubt, but he quickly agreed when his man reminded him of the past course of events. "'Tis nothin', when all's said. Who'd doubt if he'd got to choose between that or two year in gaol? He'm lucky, and I'll tell un so come the marnin'."
"Wheer 's his ticket to then?" "Why, it isn't Miller Lyddon's young maid, surely!" burst out the fisherman; "not Phoebe grown to woman!" A Devon accent marked the speech, suddenly dragged from him by surprise. "Ess, I be Phoebe Lyddon; but don't 'e fall 'pon each other again, for the Lard's sake," she said. "The boy 's as tetchy in temper as a broody hen.
Then, forgetting what had taken him out of doors, and upon what matter he was engaged, Will turned back in a tempest, and hastened to his mother's cottage. At Monks Barton Mr. Lyddon and his daughter had many and long conversations upon the subject of Blanchard's difficulties.
Nor was the white face of the dwelling-house amiss. Only one cold, crude eye stared out from this time-tinctured scene; only one raw pentroof of corrugated iron blotted it, made poets sigh, artists swear, and Miller Lyddon contemplate more of the same upon his land.
"I knawed right well wheer you'd come from," he said gloomily, "an' I'd 'a' cut my right hand off rather than you should have done it. You did n't ought, Faither; for I'll have no living man come between me an' him." "I made it clear I was on my awn paart," explained Mr. Lyddon; but that night Will wrote a letter to his enemy and despatched it by a lad before breakfast on the following morning.
"He was fighting a losing battle in a manly sort of way it seemed to me when last I saw him." "So he was, and is. I give him eighteen month or thereabout then'll come the end of it." "The 'end'! What end? You won't let them starve? Your daughter and the little children?" "You mind your awn business, Martin," said Mr. Lyddon, with nods and winks.
Her thoughts drifted to Monks Barton and Will's meeting with his sweetheart's father. Presently, when her daughter went up to the village, Mrs. Blanchard put off her apron, donned the cotton sunbonnet that she always wore from choice, and walked over to see Mr. Lyddon. They were old friends, and presently Damaris listened sedately to the miller without taking offence at his directness of speech.
Phoebe used subtlety in her answer, and invited him to view the position from her standpoint rather than his own. "Think o' me, then, an' t' others. 'T is plain selfishness, this talk, if you looks to the bottom of it." "As to that, I doan't say so," began Mr. Lyddon, slowly stuffing his pipe. "No.
I tell you this because you may have heard different, and you mix with the countryside and can contradict any man who gives out otherwise. And, mind you, I say it from no ill-will to the bwoy, but out of justice to my cheel." Thus, to gain private ends, Mr. Lyddon spoke, and his information greatly heartened the listener.
"My God, you've shook the sawl of un!" cried Billy, starting forward, but the miller with an effort recovered his self-possession, scanned the paper, dropped it, and lifted up his voice in lamentation. "True past altering 't is a thing done! May God forgive you for this wicked deed, Phoebe Lyddon I'd never have b'lieved it of 'e never not if an angel had tawld me.
Word Of The Day