The Black Tor Part 6

"Sitting, and nearly hatched," said the lad. "Might wait for them, and bring them up. I dunno, though. Sing best in the trees. Wouldn't hop about the courtyard and cliffs like the young ravens. Wonder where they build?"

He went on, to stop and watch the trout and grayling, which kept darting away, as he approached the riverside, gleaming through the sunlit water, and hiding in the depths, or beneath some ma.s.s of rock or tree-root on the other side.

"Rather stupid for me, getting to be a man, to think so much about birds' nests; but I don't know: perhaps it isn't childish. Old Rayburn is always watching for them, and picking flowers, and chipping bits of stone. Why, he has books full of pressed gra.s.ses and plants; and boxes full of bits of ore and spar, and stony sh.e.l.ls out of the caves and mines.--Well now, isn't that strange?"

He stopped short, laughing to himself, as he suddenly caught sight of a droll-looking figure, standing knee-deep in the river, busy with rod and line, gently throwing a worm-baited hook into the deep black water, under the projecting rocks at the foot of the cliff.

The figure, cut off, as it were, at the knees, looked particularly short and stout, humped like a camel, by the creel swung behind to be out of the way. His dress was a rusty brown doublet, with puffed-out breeches beneath, descending half-way down the thigh, and then all was bare. A steeple-crowned, broad-brimmed hat, from beneath which hung an abundance of slightly-curling silvery hair, completed the figure at which Mark Eden gazed, unseen; for the old man was intent upon his fishing, and just then he struck, and after a little playing, drew in and unhooked a finely-spotted trout, which he was about to transfer to his basket, when he was checked by a greeting from the back.

"Morning, Master Rayburn. That's a fine one."

"Ah, Mark, boy, how are you?" said the old man, smiling. "Yes: I've got his brother in the basket, and I want two more. Better come and help me to eat them."

"Can't to-day.--Quite well?"

"Yes, thank G.o.d, boy. Well for an old man. I heard you were back from school. How's that?"

"Bad fever there. All sent home."

"That's sad. Ought to be at work, boy. Better come and read with me."

"Well, I will sometimes, sir."

"Come often, my boy; keep you out of mischief."

"Oh, I shan't get into mischief, sir."

"Of course not; idle boys never do. Not likely to get fighting, either.

I see young Ralph Darley's at home. Fine chance for you," said the old man, with a sarcastic ring in his voice, as he slipped his trout into the basket.

"Is he?" cried the lad excitedly.

"Oh yes; he's up at the Cliff. Now then, why don't you fill your pockets with big stones to throw at him, or cut a big club? Oh, I see, though. You've mounted a skewer. Pull it out, and try if the point's sharp. I suppose you're going down the river to lay wait for him and kill him."

"There, you're as bad as ever, Master Rayburn," cried the lad, flushing, and looking mortified. "Last time I saw you it was just the same: laughing at, and bantering, and sneering at me. No wonder my father gets angry with you, and doesn't ask you to the Tor."

"Yes, no wonder. Quarrels with me, boy, instead of with himself for keeping up such a mad quarrel."

"It isn't father's fault, sir," cried the lad quickly. "It's the old feud that has been going on for generations."

"Old feud! Old disgrace!" cried the fisherman, throwing away the worm he was about to impale on his hook, to see it snapped up at once by a good fish; and standing his rod in the water, like a staff to lean on, as he went on talking, with the cold water swirling about over his knees, and threatening to wet his feather-stuffed breeches. "I'm ashamed of your father and Ralph's father. Call themselves Christian gentlemen, and because a pair of old idiots of ancestors in the dark ages quarrelled, and tried to cut one another's throats, they go on as their fathers did before them, trying to seize each other's properties, and to make an end of one another, and encouraging their sons to grow up in the same vile way."

"My father is a gentleman and a knight, sir," cried Mark Eden hotly; "and I'm sure that he would never turn cut-throat or robber if he was left alone."

"Of course; and that's what Sir Morton Darley would say, or his son either; and still the old feud is kept up. Look here, boy; suppose you were to run against young Ralph now, what would happen?"

"There'd be a fight," cried the lad, flushing up; and he drew in his breath with a hiss.

"Of course!" sneered the old man.

"Well, he never sees me without insulting me."

"And you never see him without doing the same."

"But--"

"But! Bah! I haven't patience with you all. Six of one; half a dozen of the other. Both your families well off in this world's goods, and yet miserable, Fathers, two Ahabs, longing for the other's land to make a garden of herbs; and if they got it, a nice garden of herbs it would be! Why, Mark Eden, as I'm a scholar and a gentleman, my income is fifty pounds a year. My cottage is my own, and I'm a happier man than either of your fathers. Look about you, boy--here, at the great G.o.d's handiwork; wherever your eyes rest, you see beauty. Look at this silvery flashing river, the lovely great trees, the beautiful cliffs, and up yonder in the distance at the soft blues of the mountains, melting into the bluer skies. Did you ever see anything more glorious than this dale?"

"Never," cried the lad enthusiastically.

"Good, boy! That came from the heart. That heart's young and soft, and true, as I know. Don't let it get crusted over with the hard sh.e.l.l of a feud. Life's too great and grand to be wasted over a miserable quarrel, and in efforts to make others wretched. And it's so idiotic, Mark, for you can't hurt other people without hurting yourself more. Look here, next time you, spring boy, meet the other spring boy, act at once; don't wait till you are summer men, or autumn men. When you get to be a winter man as I am, it will be too late. Begin now, while it is early with you. Hold out your hand and shake his, and become fast friends.

Teach your fathers what they ought to have done when they were young.

Come, promise me that."

"I can't, sir," said the boy, frowning. "And if I could, Ralph Darley would laugh in my face."

"Bah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the old man, stamping the b.u.t.t of his rod in the water. "There, I've done with you both. You are a pair of young ravens, sons of the old ravens, who have their nests up on the stony cliffs, and you'll both grow up to be as bad and bitter as your fathers, and take to punching out the young lambs' eyes with your beaks. I've done with you both."

"No, you haven't, Master Rayburn," said the lad softly. "I was coming to see you this evening, to ask you to go with me for a day, hunting for minerals and those stones you showed me in the old cavern, where the hot spring is."

"Done with you, quite," said the old man fiercely, as he began to bait his hook with another worm.

"And I say, Master Rayburn, I want to come and read with you."

"An untoward generation," said the old man. "There, be off! I'm wasting time, and I want my trout, and _thymallus_, my grayling, for man must eat, and it's very nice to eat trout and grayling, boy. Be off!

I've quite done with you." And the old man turned his back, and waded a few steps upstream.

"I say, Master Rayburn," continued the lad, "when you said `Bah!' in that sharp way, it was just like the bark of one of the great black birds."

"What, sir!" snapped the old man; "compare me to a raven?"

"You compared me and my father, and the Darleys, all to ravens, sir."

"Humph! Yes, so I did," muttered the old fisherman.

"I didn't mean to be rude. But you reminded me: I saw one of them fly over just before I met you, sir. Do you know where they are nesting this year?"

"Eh?" cried the fisherman, turning sharply, with a look of interest in his handsome old face. "Well, not for certain, Mark, but I've seen them several times lately--mischievous, murderous wretches. They kill a great many lambs. They're somewhere below, near the High Cliffs. I shouldn't at all wonder, if you got below there and hid among the bushes, you'd see where they came. It's sure to be in the rock face."

"I should like to get the young ones," said the lad.

"Yes, do, my boy; and if you find an addled egg or two, save them for me. Bring then on, and we'll blow them."

"I will," said the lad, smiling.--"Don't be hard on me, Master Rayburn."

"Eh? No, no, my boy; but I can't help being a bit put out sometimes.

Coming down this evening, were you? Do. I'll save you a couple of grayling for supper--if I catch any," he added, with a smile.

"May I come?"