Chapter Eighteen.
Meeting a Volcano—and a Placid Lake.
Geoffrey came swinging along the path, with his head thrown back and his chest forward, smiling at something that crossed his mind, when he stopped short, for Amos Pengelly suddenly stood in his way.
“Ah, Pengelly,” he said, heartily, “how are you, my lad?” and he stretched out his hand.
To his astonishment, the miner struck it savagely aside, closed with him, caught him by arm and waistband, and by a clever Cornish wrestling trick, and the exercise of his iron muscles, literally lifted him from the ground.
Geoffrey was powerful, and full of youth and vigour, but his antagonist’s dwarfish legs gave him another advantage, and he could have thrown the young man heavily to the ground, but in the very act of dashing him upon the rocks he relented, and let him recover himself.
“Have you gone mad, Pengelly?” cried Geoffrey, warmly. “Hang it, man, if you don’t control that confounded temper of yours you’ll be on your trial some day for murder.”
“Maybe it’ll be yours,” cried Amos, fiercely. “What have I done to you that you should serve me in this way?”
“I? Serve you?” cried Geoffrey, in astonishment, for he had resumed his unruffled manner. “What’s the matter, Amos?”
“Where have you been, master?”
“Been? Down to Gwennas Cove.”
“There, you own it,” cried Amos, with his passion rising again.
“Look here, master, there are things that make me mad. I’ve fought like men with beasts at Ephesus, as holy Paul says, and my beasts are the beasts of passion that rise up in me. I’ve fought and I’ve prayed, and I’ve mastered them again and again, but there’s one thing lets them loose, and I can’t keep them down.”
“Look here, Pengelly,” said Geoffrey, quietly, “I had hoped when the day came that I could get a good engagement to have you as one of my best men; but, hang me! if I can trust a fellow who has always got a volcano in him ready to burst out.”
“Then why do you cross me like this?”
“Cross you, my good fellow?” said Geoffrey, as he fixed the miner with his eye. “I’m not going to cross you. There, come along back to Carnac, and let’s talk about yonder mine.”
“I want no dealings with such a treacherous man,” cried Amos, fiercely. “But, look here, I warn ye. You’re well-shaped and good to look upon, while I’m only a cripple; but I can’t—there’s that in me that won’t let me—stand by and see another man take up with her as flouts me for what I am.”
“Flouts? Take up with her?” said Geoffrey, wonderingly, while the miner’s breast heaved as he seemed to be battling hard to contain himself.
Then a light burst upon Geoffrey, and he was ready to burst into a fit of laughter; but he saw that the subject was too serious for mirth, and he exclaimed, in a tone of vexation once more,—
“Are all you people mad here upon questions relating to the sexes? Why, my good fellow, where do you think I’ve been?”
“You said—to Prawle’s.”
“Yes, of course; but what for?”
“You’ve been to see her. You’ve been again and again, master, till I can bear it no more. Oh! Master Trethick,” he cried, piteously, “it may be play and trifling with you, but it’s killing me.”
“Amos Pengelly,” cried Geoffrey, laying his hand on the miner’s shoulder, “if you think I go over yonder to see Prawle’s daughter you, never made a greater mistake in your life.”
Amos drew back and looked full in his eyes, which never flinched for a moment, but frankly returned the gaze.
“Say that again,” said the miner, hoarsely.
“I won’t,” cried Geoffrey. “Hang it, man! there are bounds to every thing. It’s absurd, it’s—”
He stopped short as he saw the man’s emotion, and said kindly, as he held out his hand,—
“Pengelly, my lad, as I am a man, I never bestowed a thought on Bessie Prawle, but have been there to sit half-an-hour with her poor sick mother.”
The miner’s face changed, and he was about to speak, but he turned sharply round, and limped away with wonderful activity, disappearing amongst the rocks; and, after waiting a few minutes to see if he would return, Geoffrey gave himself a shake, and then stooped to pick up something that fell tinkling on the granite path.
“That’s one of my brace buttons gone,” he said pettishly. “Hang the fellow! he’s as strong as a horse. It was enough to break all one’s buttons. So that’s Cornish wrestling, is it? I thought myself pretty clever, but he could have thrown me like a baby.”
“Poor fellow, though,” he said to himself, as he went on, “I suppose he did feel cut up and savage with me. But what a set they are—down here, to be sure. Seems to me that they think of nothing but love-making, and that it isn’t safe to look at a woman in the place. What a blessing it is that I am so constituted that all women seem to me to be mothers and sisters—mothers and sisters—sisters—yes, sisters,” he mused, as he looked at his right hand, opening and closing the fingers gently, as he seemed to feel within it a soft, shapely white hand, and traced each tapering finger where Rhoda’s had so lately been.
“She would have been a very sweet sister to a man. Full of firmness, and ready to advise and help a fellow in his troubles. It must be very nice to have a sister—such a one as she.”
He walked on very slowly, growing moment by moment more thoughtful, and somehow his thoughts were of Rhoda Penwynn; but they were all chased away by the sight of the Reverend Edward Lee coming along the track.
“Ah, Mr Lee!” he cried, holding out his hand, “how are you getting along?”
The young clergyman started and looked confused. There was a shrinking manner about him as he unwillingly put out his hand to be heartily pressed; but somehow Geoffrey Trethick’s will seemed always to master his, and he replied nervously to his inquiries.
“I’ve been going to call upon you over and over again,” said Geoffrey. “Coming for advice, and that sort of thing; but I suppose you are terribly busy over your new cure?”
“I am—very busy,” said the other, with a half sigh, as he recalled some of the difficulties of his task; and he looked nervously in Geoffrey’s eyes, and felt constrained to say that he would be very glad to see him.
“That’s right,” said Geoffrey, “I shall come. One has not too many cultivated acquaintances down here. And I’m a parishioner, you know.”
The Reverend Edward Lee grew bolder for this suggested duty.
“And I have not called upon you,” he said. “I have been remiss.”
“Ah, well, you’ll make up for that,” said Geoffrey.
“Is—is that why I have not seen you at church?” he said.
“Oh, no!” said Geoffrey. “That’s because I have been remiss and—ah, here’s Miss Penwynn.”
His companion started, and a slight colour came into his pale cheeks as Rhoda came round one of the rocky buttresses of the cliff, and, in spite of himself, as his keen eyes detected the change, Geoffrey felt a suspicion coming upon him that the Reverend Edward Lee had had some idea that Rhoda was walking in this direction, and had turned his steps that way so as to meet her.
“Why, she’s blushing, too!” said Geoffrey to himself, as Rhoda came up and shook hands with Mr Lee.
“I need not shake hands with you again, Mr Trethick,” she said. “By the way, it is very kind of you to call and talk to that poor Mrs Prawle.”
The vicar darted a quick glance from one to the other, and then, without making any pretence of going further, he turned round, and walked back beside Rhoda towards Carnac, Geoffrey coming behind, for the path did not admit of three abreast. The consequence was that he only came in for a stray word here and there, and told himself that being the third party he was de trop.
All the same, though, he found himself taking note of Rhoda’s figure, the carriage of her head, and her free, firm step on the rugged path. This path seemed to trouble the young vicar, who, being short-sighted, more than once caught the toes of his thin boots against some irregularity in the granite, as he talked on in his smooth, easy-flowing way, only interrupted by Rhoda turning her head occasionally to point out some place of interest in the distance.
“Parson’s like the rest!” said Geoffrey to himself, as he turned off to the cottage. “He’s touched. I wonder whether she knew that he was coming to meet her, for that he went on purpose, I’ll swear. I wonder whether any thing could be made of Wheal Carnac? What a nice sister she would make! Hallo! Pengelly, you here again? No, no; stand off, my lad: I’ve no more brace buttons to spare. One of your hugs is enough for a day. What?”
“I beg your pardon, Master Trethick,” said the miner, humbly; and he stood with his hat off in the track, “I beg your pardon humbly, sir; I do indeed.”
“Oh, tut—tut, man, that’s all past,” said Geoffrey, heartily.
“No, sir, it arn’t,” said Amos. “I feel that shamed o’ myself that I haven’t got words to speak it. Only please say that you forgive me, and won’t think of it any more.”
“Forgive you! Yes, Pengelly, of course; but next time you suspect one of any thing wrong, just bark out aloud before you bite, will you?—it will give a fellow a chance to get out of your way.”
“Ah, sir, you don’t know how foolish I feel.”
“Do you? Then don’t feel so any more. And now look here, my lad, I want to have a few words with you again about Wheal Carnac.”
“Yes, sir—when?”
“Oh, soon—say to-morrow morning. I’ll meet you there at your own time.”
“Say six, sir. I’m not on at the mine till nine,” said Amos, with his face lighting up; and they parted, for Geoffrey to become aware, as he entered the gate, that Madge Mullion was at the window ready to smile at him as he went in, and a shrewd suspicion smote him that she had been watching for his return.