The Squire's Daughter Part 62

Ruth, who had risen to her feet on William's sudden appearance, now ran out of the room to hide her tears.

Ralph seized the lawyer's letter and read it slowly and carefully from beginning to end. Then he dropped into a chair and read it a second time. William stood and watched him, with a bright, eager smile lighting up his face.

"It seems all right," Ralph said at length.

"Ay, it's right enough, but I wish we had known earlier."

"It would have saved us a good many anxious and painful hours."

"Never mind. All's well that ends well."

"Oh, we haven't got to the end yet," Ralph said, with a laugh. "If that lode turns out a frost, we shall wish that somebody else had got the place."

"Never!" William said, almost vehemently.

"No?"

"I shall never regret we've got it, or rather that you have, though there isn't an ounce of tin in the whole place."

"Why not?"

"I don't know. One cannot give a reason for everything. But I have a feeling that this opens up a fresh page in the life of both of us."

"That's true enough, but everything depends on the kind of page it will be."

"I'm not worried about that. The thing that interests me is, the powers that be are not going to shunt us as they hoped. Lord St. Goram meant to drive me out of the parish, but I'm not going----"

"Nor I," Ralph interposed, with a laugh; and he shut up the portmanteau, and pushed it against the wall.

"We shall have to keep dark, however, till the deeds are signed,"

William said. "We must give Sir John no excuse for going back on his bargain. I'd wager my Sunday coat, if I were a betting man, that he hasn't the remotest idea we are the purchasers."

"Won't he look blue when he discovers? You know how he hates me."

"Ay, he has made no secret of that. It is rumoured, however, that he is going to live out of the country, and so he may not get to know for some time. However, we must walk warily till the thing is finally and absolutely settled. Also"--and William lowered his voice to a whisper--"you'd better say nothing yet to your sister."

"Oh, but she knows," Ralph replied.

William looked blank.

"I told her on Sat.u.r.day what we had been trying to do. I thought she might as well know when the thing, as we thought, had come to an end.

Besides, she heard what you said when you came in."

"I forgot all about her for the moment," William said absently.

"Perhaps, after all, it is as well she knows. I hope, however, she will not feel in any way obligated to me."

"My dear fellow, what are you talking about?" Ralph said, with a smile.

"Why, we owe nearly everything to you."

"No, no. I couldn't have done less, and so far I have received far more than I gave. But I must be getting back, or things will have got tied into a knot," and putting on his hat, he hurried away.

Ruth came back into the room as soon as William had disappeared. Her eyes were still red and her lashes wet with tears, but there was a bright, happy smile on her lips.

"Oh, Ralph," she said, "isn't it almost too good to be true?"

"It may not be so good as it looks," he said, in a tone of banter.

"Oh, it must be, Ralph; for, of course, we shall go back again to Hillside to live."

"But we can't live on nothing, you know, and the whole thing may turn out a frost."

"But you are quite sure it won't, or you and William Menire would not be so elated at getting it."

"Are we elated?"

"You are. You can hardly contain yourself at this moment. You would like to get on the top of the house and shout."

"Which would be a very unwise thing to do. We must not breathe a word to anyone till the thing is absolutely settled."

"And what will you do then?"

"Begin prospecting. If I can get as much out of the place as father sunk in it I shall be quite content."

During the next few weeks William Menire and the Penlogans saw a good deal of each other. Nearly every evening after his shutters had been put up William stole away to St. Ivel. He and Ralph had so many plans to discuss and so many schemes to mature. Ruth was allowed to listen to all the debates, and frequently she was asked to give advice.

It was in some respects a very trying time for William. The more he saw of Ruth the more he admired her. She seemed to grow bonnier every day.

The sound of her voice stirred his heart like music, her smile was like summer sunshine. Moreover, she treated him with increasing courtesy, and even tenderness, so much so that it became a positive pain to him to hide his affection. And yet he wanted to be perfectly loyal to his Cousin Sam. Sam had proposed to her, Sam was waiting for an answer, if he had not already received it, and it would be a very uncousinly act to put the smallest obstacle in the way.

Not that William supposed for a moment that he could ever be a rival to Sam in any true sense of the word. On the other hand, he knew that Ruth was of so generous and grateful a nature that she might be tempted to accept him out of pure grat.i.tude if he were bold enough and base enough to propose to her.

So William held himself in check with a firm hand and made no sign, but what the effort cost him no one knew. To sit in the same room with her evening after evening, to watch the play of her features and see the light sparkle in her soft brown eyes, and yet never by word or look betray the pa.s.sion that was consuming him, was an experience not given to many men.

He was too loyal to his ideals ever to dream of marriage for any cause less than love. Possession was not everything, nor even the greatest thing. If he could have persuaded himself that there was even the remotest possibility of Ruth loving him, he would have gone on his knees to her every day in the week, and would have gladly waited any time she might name.

But he had persuaded himself of the very opposite. He was a dozen years her senior. While she was in the very morning of her youth, he was rapidly nearing youth's eventide. That she could ever care for him, except in a friendly or sisterly fashion, seemed an utter impossibility.

The thought never occurred to him but he attempted to strangle it at once.

So the days wore away, and lengthened into weeks, and then the news leaked out in St. Goram that William and Ralph had gone into partnership and had purchased Hillside Farm. For several days little else was talked about. What could it mean? What object could they have in view? For agricultural purposes the place was scarcely worth buying; besides, William Menire knew absolutely nothing about farming, while most people knew that Ralph's tastes did not lie in that direction.

A few people blamed Ralph for "fooling William out of his money," for they rightly surmised that it was chiefly William's money that had purchased the estate. Others whispered maliciously that William had befriended Ralph simply that he might win favour with Ruth; but the majority of people said that William was much too 'cute a business man to be influenced by anybody, whether man or woman, and that if he had invested his money in Hillside Farm he had very good reasons for doing it. The only sensible att.i.tude, therefore, was to wait and see what time would bring forth.

One of the first things Ralph did as soon as the deeds were signed was to send for Jim Brewer. He had heard that the young miner was out of work, and in sore need. He had heard also that Jim had never forgiven himself for not confessing at the outset that it was he who shot the squire by mistake.

Ralph had never seen the young fellow since he came out of prison, and had never desired to see him. He had no love for cowards, and was keenly resentful of the part Brewer had played. Time, however, had softened his feelings. The memory of those dark and bitter months was slowly fading from his mind. Moreover, poor Brewer had suffered enough already for the wrong he had done. He had been boycotted and shunned by almost all who knew him.

Ralph heard by accident one day of the straits to which Brewer had been driven, and his resentment was changed as if by magic into pity. It was easy to blame, easy to fling the word "coward" into the teeth of a weaker brother; but if he had been placed in Jim Brewer's circ.u.mstances, would he have acted a n.o.bler part? It was Brewer's care for his mother and the children that led him to hide the truth. Moreover, if he had been wholly a coward, he would never have confessed at all.

Ralph told Ruth what he intended to do, and her eyes filled in a moment.