"Yes, happy thoughts!" she said, with a sneering smile. "Granny!" she cried, turning back to the gloom of the little room, and raising her hand above her head. "Granny, granny! I wish you were here to help me! and, who knows, perhaps you are! There was no love lost between you and Nani Price!"
Almost as she spoke the last words Ivor Parry returned.
"I am as hungry as a hound," he said.
"Supper then directly; and here comes mother," she said.
And as the three sat at their supper of barley bread and fresh butter, with the addition, of course, of a bowl of cawl,[[7]] no one who looked in through that little window would have guessed that such stormy passions had, a few minutes ago, filled the heart of one of the party.
Next day the large doors of the sailmaker's shed stood wide open, letting in a flood of sunshine and a refreshing breeze, which bore on its wings the scent of the seaweed lying strewn on the shore below. Inside the air was full of merry talk and laughter, while the call of the seagulls and the plash of the waves on the shore came in with the wind. The Mishteer was busily engaged with his foreman arranging the sails which had been ordered from Aberython, occasionally going to the doorway to look up the hill for the waggon which was to carry them away.
He was about forty years of age, broad-shouldered and firmly built, his head, covered with closely curling jet black hair, was perfect in pose and shape; exposure to all weathers had browned a naturally dark skin. His black beard and moustache were trimly and carefully kept. His teeth were unusually white and even, the eyes which he was shading from the glare of the morning sun were black as night, but had in their depths such a bright sparkle, that they suggested the idea of black diamonds. His open shirt and upturned sleeves disclosed a brawny chest and muscular arms. Everything about him betokened firmness and strength; and as he turned round to address his workmen, his voice, though pleasant, and even musical, made itself heard clearly above the loud talking and laughing.
"Here, somebody!" and instantly there was a hush in the hubbub, while two or three men and women came forward to show their alacrity. "That knot of boys down the valley! I believe they are ill-treating some helpless creature in the stream!"
Before he had finished his orders, one of the workmen had clapped his hat on, and, running down to the river, was soon dispersing the little crowd of evil-doers.
"The Mishteer has seen you!" was all he said; but this was quite enough to make the dirty little brown hands loosen their hold on the stones, and the sun-burnt heads droop with shame, while they stared with round, repentant eyes at the half-drowned dog which they had been pelting with stones, and which the messenger was carrying gently away.