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Updated: June 28, 2025
To give some idea of the ravages of the epidemic, and as a proof that the calamity was not exaggerated, a list of some of the worst cases was given, with names and particulars. It was gloomy enough. George Harness, a blacksmith, lost his wife and four children. Master Abel Lake, windmiller of the Tower Mill, lost all his children, five in number, between the fifth and the fifteenth of the month.
Like many another householder, the poor windmiller was now ready enough to look to his drains, and so forth; but it may be doubted if the general stirring up of dirty places at this moment did not do as much harm as good. It was hot, terribly hot. Day after day passed without a breeze to cool the burning skins of the sick, and yet it was not sunshiny.
After an uneasy glance over his shoulder, to make sure that the long dark shadow which stretched from his own heels, and shifted with the draught in which the candle flared, was not the windmiller creeping up behind him, he took a letter out of the book and held it to the light as if to read it. But he never turned the page, and at last replaced it with a sigh.
It was a little farther to go, but the Windmiller took custom when it came to him, gave honest measure, and added civil words gratis. The other Miller was ruined. "All you can do now is to leave the mill while you can pay the rent, and try another trade," said his friends. "I won't," said the Miller. "Shall I be turned out of the house where I was born, because the country-folk are fools?"
If the windmiller came towards one of these dames, she would say, "Aal right, Master Lake, I be in no manners of hurry, Jan'll do for me." And, when Jan came, his business-like method justified her confidence. "Good day, mother," he would say. "Will ye pay, or toll it?" "Bless ye, dear love, how should I pay?" the old woman would reply. "I'll toll it, Jan, and thank ye kindly."
The windmiller ate a hearty supper and washed it well down with home-made ale, under the satisfactory feeling that he could pay for more when he wanted it. And as he began to plug his pipe with tobacco, and his wife rocked the new-comer at her breast, he said thoughtfully, "Do 'ee think, missus, that woman 'ud be the mother of un?" "Mother!" cried his wife, scornfully.
Just above the press-bed a candle was stuck in the wall, and the dim light falling through the gloom upon the children made a scene worthy of the pencil of Rembrandt, that great son of a windmiller. When Mrs. Lake found time to come to the corner where the old press- bed stood, the kitten was asleep, and Jan very nearly so; and by them sat Abel, watching every breath that his foster-brother drew.
His constant habit of observation made all the experiences of life an education for him; he had often watched his foster-mother prepare the family meals, and he prepared them now, for Abel and the windmiller could not, and she was with the sick children. Before the second child died, two more fell ill on the same day. Only Abel and Jan were still "about."
And unpardonable as George's conduct was, if the tale were true, the words in which he couched his self-defence were so much more grateful to the ears of the windmiller than the somewhat free and independent style in which the other man expressed his opinion of George's conduct and qualities, that the master took his servant's part, and snubbed the informer for his pains.
"What is yours?" he asked, with a sharp look of his dark eyes. "Lake Abel," said the windmiller. "It is his also, henceforth," said the stranger, waving his hand, as if to close the subject, "Jan Lake. Drive on, will you?" The horse started forward, and they whirled away down the wet, gray road. And before the miller had regained his mill, the carriage was a distant speck upon the storm.
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