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Lancelot wandered down the street, half amused at the simple test which had just been applied to him, and yet sickened with disappointment; for he had cherished a mysterious fancy that with this strange being all his hopes of future activity were bound up. Tregarva's month was nearly over, and yet no tidings of him had come.
He was always a good boy till he got along with them poachers. 'Listen, he said, 'listen! There's bells a-ringing ringing in my head. Come you here, Paul Tregarva. He pulled Tregarva's face down to his own, and whispered, 'Them's the bells a-ringing for Miss Honor's wedding. Paul started and drew back.
'Tregarva, said Lancelot, as they were landing the next trout, 'where will that Crawy go, when he dies? 'God knows, sir, said Tregarva. Lancelot went thoughtful home, and sat down not to answer Luke's letter for he knew no answer but Tregarva's, and that, alas! he could not give, for he did not believe it, but only longed to believe it. So he turned off the subject by a question
After all, this visit came to Lancelot timely. It had roused him to hope, and turned off his feelings from the startling news he had just heard. He stepped along arm in arm with Luke, cheerful, and fate-defiant, and as he thought of Tregarva's complaints, 'The beautiful? he said to himself, 'they shall have it! At least they shall be awakened to feel their need of it, their right to it.
At least it opened a new field of amusement and knowledge; it promised him new studies of human life; and as he lay on his sofa and let his thoughts flow, Tregarva's dark revelations began to mix themselves with dreams about the regeneration of the Whitford poor, and those again with dreams about the heiress of Whitford; and many a luscious scene and noble plan rose brightly detailed in his exuberant imagination.
This answer was received with a murmur of applause; and a fellow in a scarlet merino neckerchief, three waistcoats, and a fancy shooting-jacket, who had been eyeing Lancelot for some time, sidled up behind them, and whispered in Tregarva's ear, 'Perhaps you'd like an engagement in our line, young man, and your friend there, he seems a sporting gent too. We could show him very pretty shooting.
At least he wanted to test at once Tregarva's knowledge and his logic. As for his 'faith, alas! he had not so much reverence for it as to care what effect Luke's arguments might have there. 'The whole man, quoth Lancelot to himself, 'is a novel phenomenon; and all phenomena, however magnificent, are surely fair subjects for experiment.
Tregarva's meditations must have been running in a very different channel, for he suddenly burst out, after a long silence 'It's a pity these fairs can't be put down. They do a lot of harm; ruin all the young girls round, the Dissenters' children especially, for they run utterly wild; their parents have no hold on them at all. 'They tell them that they are children of the devil, said Lancelot.
My husband, he be gone out to see one o' Squire Tregarva's hounds as was took ill last night. So if you want to see the old church, sir, you'll have to be content with an old woman to show you, sir." "I shall be quite content, I assure you," I answered. "Will you go and get the key?" "I have the key in my pocket, sir; for I thought that would be what you'd be after, sir.
Next morning Lancelot and the colonel started out to Tregarva's cottage, on a mission of inquiry. They found the giant propped up in bed with pillows, his magnificent features looking in their paleness more than ever like a granite Memnon. Before him lay an open Pilgrim's Progress, and a drawer filled with feathers and furs, which he was busily manufacturing into trout flies, reading as he worked.
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