Lying Prophets - Eden Phillpotts

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and mournful over the land, sadder to Barron's ear than fall of earth-clod on coffin-lid. And, upon the sound, a responsive shiver and uneasy tremor ran through trunk and bough to topmost twig of the elm—a sudden sense, as it seemed, of awful evil and ruin undreamed of, but now imminent. Then the monster staggered and the midget struck his last blow and removed himself and his rheumatism. Whereupon began that magnificent descent. Slowly, with infinitely solemn sweep, the elm's vast height swung away from its place, described a wide aerial arc, and so, with the jolting crash and rattle of close thunder, roared headlong to the earth, casting up a cloud of dust, plowing the grass with splintered limbs, then lying very still. From glorious tree to battered log it sank. No man ever saw more instant wreck and ruin fall lightning-like on a fair thing. The mass was crushed flat and shapeless by its own vast weight, and the larger boughs, which did not touch the earth, were snapped short off by the concussion of their fall.

      Billy Jago held his back and whined while Barron spoke, as much to himself as the woodman.

      "Dear God!" he said, "to think that this glory of the hedge-row—this kingdom of song birds—should come to the making of pauper coffins and lodging-house furniture!"

      "Squire must have money; an' folks must have coffins," said Billy. "You can sleep your last sleep so sound in ellum as you can in oak, for that matter."

      Feeling the truth of the assertion, Barron admitted it, then turned his back on the fallen king and pursued his way with thoughts reverting to the proposed picture. There was nothing to alarm Joan Tregenza about him; which seemed well, as he meant to approach the girl herself at the first opportunity, and not her parents. Barron did not carry "artist" stamped upon him. He was plainly attired in a thick tweed suit and wore a cap of the same material. The man appeared insignificantly small. He was clean-shaved and looked younger than his five-and-thirty years seen a short distance off, but older when you stood beside him. He strolled now onward toward the sea, and his cheeks took some color from the fine air. He walked with a stick and carried a pair of field-glasses in a case slung over his shoulder. The field-glasses had become a habit with him, but he rarely used them, for his small slate-colored eyes were keen.

      Once and again John Barron turned to look at St. Michael's Mount, seen afar across the bay. The magic of morning made it beautiful and the great pile towered grandly through a sunny haze. No detail disturbed the eye under this effect of light, and the mount stood vast, dim, golden, magnified and glorified into a fairy palace of romance built by immortal things in a night. Seen thus, it even challenged the beholder's admiration, of which he was at all times sparing. Until that hour, he had found nothing but laughter for this same mount, likening the spectacle of it, with its castle and cottages, now to a senile monarch with moth-eaten ermine about his toes and a lop-sided crown on his head, now to a monstrous sea-snail creeping shoreward.

      Barron, having walked down the hill to Mouse-hole, breasted slowly the steep acclivity which leads therefrom toward the west. Presently he turned, where a plateau of grass sloped above the cliffs into a little theater of banks ablaze with gorse. And here his thoughts and the image they were concerned with perished before reality. Framed in a halo of golden furze, her hands making a little penthouse above her brow, and in her blue eyes the mingled hue of sea and sky, stood a girl looking out at the horizon. The bud of a wondrous fair woman she was, and Barron saw her slim yet vigorous figure accentuated under its drab-brown draperies by a kindly breeze. He noted the sweet, childish freshness of her face, her plump arms filling the sleeves of rusty black, and her feet in shoes too big for them. Her hair was hidden under a linen sun-bonnet, but one lock had escaped, and he noted that it was the color of wheat ripe for the reaping. He regretted it had not been darker, but observed that it chimed well enough with the flaming flowers behind it. And then he frankly praised Nature in his heart for sending her servant such a splendid harmony in gold and brown. There stood his picture in front of him. He gazed a brief second only, and then his quick mind worked to find what human interest had brought Joan Tregenza to this place and turned her eyes to the sea. It might be that herein existed the possibility of the introduction he desired. He felt that victory probably depended on the events of the next two or three minutes. He owed a supreme effort of skill and tact to Fate, which had thus befriended him, and he rose to the occasion.

      The girl looked up as he came suddenly upon her, but his eyes were already away and fixed upon the horizon before she turned. Observing that he was not regarding her, she put up her hands again and continued to scan the remote sea-line where a thin trail of dark smoke told of a steamer, itself apparently invisible. Barron took his glasses from their case, and seeing that the girl made no movement of departure, acted deliberately, and presently began to watch a fleet of brown sails and black hulls putting forth from the little harbor below. Then, without looking at her or taking his eyes from the glasses, he spoke.

      "Would you kindly tell me what those small vessels are below there just setting out to sea?" he asked.

      The girl started, looked round, and, realizing that he had addressed her, made answer:

      "They'm Mouzle [Footnote: Mouzle—Mousehole.] luggers, sir."

      "Luggers, are they? Thank you. And where are they sailing to? Do you know?"

      "Away down-long, south'ard o' the Scillies mostly, arter mackerl. Theer's a power o' mackerl bein' catched just now—thousands an' thousands—but some o' they booats be laskin'—that's just fishin' off shore."

      "Ah, a busy time for the fishermen."

      "Iss, 'tis."

      "Thank you. Good-morning."

      "Good-marnin', sir."

      He started as though to continue his walk along the cliffs beyond the plateau and the gorse; then he stopped suddenly, actuated, as it seemed, by a chance thought, and turned back to the girl. She was looking out to sea again.

      "By the way," he said, unconcernedly, and with no suggestion that anything in particular was responsible for his politeness. "I see you are on the lookout there for something. You may have my glass a moment, if you like, before I go on. They bring the ships very close."

      The girl flushed with shy pleasure and seemed a little uncertain what to answer. Barron, meanwhile, showed no trace of a smile, but looked bored if anything, and, with a serious face, handed her the glass, then walked a little way off. He was grave and courteous, but made no attempt at friendship. He had noticed when Joan smiled that her teeth were fine, and that her full face, though sweet enough, was a shade too plump.

      "Thank 'e kindly, sir," she said, taking the glass. "You see theer's a gert ship passin' down Channel, an'—an' my Joe's aboard 'er, an' they'm bound for furrin' paarts, an' I promised as I'd come to this here horny-winky [Footnote: Horny-winky—Lonely. Fit place for horny-winks.] plaace to get a last sight o' the vessel if I could." He made no answer, and, after a pause, she spoke again.

      "I caan't see naught, but that's my fault, p'raps, not bein' used to sich things."

      "Let me try and find the ship," he said, taking the glass, which he had put out of focus purposely. Then, while scanning the horizon where he had noted the smoke-trail, he spoke, his head turned from her.

      "Who's Joe, if I may ask? Your brother, I daresay?"

      "No, sir; Joe'm my sweetheart."

      "There's a big three-masted ship being taken down the Channel by a small steamer."

      "Ah! then I reckon that's the 'Anna,' 'cause Joe said 'twas tolerable certain they'd be in tow of a tug."

      "You can see the smoke on the edge of the sea. Look below it."

      He handed the glasses to her again and heard a little laugh of delight break from her lips. The surprise of the suddenly-magnified spectacle, visible only as a shadow to the naked eye, brought laughter; and Barron, now that the girl's attention was occupied, had leisure to look at her. She was more than a pretty cottage maid, and possessed some distinction and charm. There was a delicacy about her too—a sweet turn of lip, a purity of skin, a set of limb—which gave the lie to her rough speech. She was all Saxon to look at, with nothing of the Celt about her excepting her name and the old Cornish words upon

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