"He called Mrs. Penruddock 'Mother'," added Merle, "but he doesn't look the least bit like her son. Is he or not?"
"Yes and no," said Jessop, wielding her dish-cloth as she talked. "Mrs. Penruddock has been a good mother to him for a matter of over fourteen years now, but his own mother lies in Chagmouth churchyard. She must have been a handsome woman from all accounts, though I never saw her myself. It was my cousin, Mary, who was barmaid at the 'King's Arms' at the time, who told me. It's a long story. There are many in Chagmouth besides you who've asked themselves if Bevis isn't a gentleman born. But nobody has ever been able to answer the question."
"Why? Oh, do tell us!"
"We want so immensely to know."
Jessop wrung out her dish-cloth with rather irritating slowness, then hung it to dry on a nail. She seemed turning matters over in her mind, and her mental processes were apparently no swifter than her actions.
"I don't see why I shouldn't. There's nothing you oughtn't to hear," she replied at last, as if coming to a conclusion. "Everybody in Chagmouth knows about Bevis, and if I don't tell you somebody else will. It's nothing to the lad's discredit, I'm sure. I always say I've a soft corner for Bevis. Such a fine boy he always was, and he'll make a fine man yet—he's worth two of young Williams at The Warren in my opinion. But some folks are born with silver spoons in their mouths and others aren't. Bevis isn't one of the lucky ones, poor lad! Providence always seems to be taking him up and throwing him down again. What'll be the end of him goodness only knows!"
The story which Jessop told to the girls, while she polished the silver in the pantry, was lengthy and interspersed with many comments and reflections of her own, and many quotations from what other people had said, but the main facts of the case, as related to Mavis and Merle, were briefly as follows.
Rather more than fourteen years ago, on a stormy afternoon in late autumn, such inhabitants of Chagmouth as happened to be standing on their doorsteps, or looking out of their windows, noticed a closed conveyance from Kilvan station drive along the main street. The occurrence was sufficiently unusual to arouse comment. Except in the summer season tourists rarely came to Chagmouth, and if any stranger made his appearance during the quiet months of the year the villagers were naturally inquisitive as to his errand. In a small place every item of news is of interest, and those who saw the conveyance pass at once began to speculate whether the Rector's sister had come to pay him a visit, or whether old Mrs. Greaves's sailor son had returned home on leave. The bystanders near the market square had the opportunity of satisfying their curiosity, for the carriage stopped at the King's Arms Hotel, and from it stepped a lady, young, handsome, and well-dressed, and carrying a little child in her arms. She interrogated the landlord, who had come to the door at the sound of wheels, paid and dismissed the driver, gave one hasty glance round the square, then entered the hotel.
Those inhabitants of Chagmouth who witnessed her arrival agreed afterwards that she was "a dark-eyed, smart-looking sort of person, with an air of London fashions about her", but their glimpse was a brief one, for next moment she and her child and her travelling-bag had disappeared inside the doorway of the little hotel, and the conveyance was toiling up the hill on its way back to Kilvan station.
Inside the "King's Arms" the lady gave her name as Mrs. Hunter, and engaged a private sitting-room and a bedroom, explaining that she had heard of the mild climate of Chagmouth and wished to try the benefit of its sea air. With the help of the chambermaid she bathed her little boy and put him to bed. Later she was served with dinner. At about nine o'clock she rang the bell violently, and the servant, who came in response to her summons, found her huddled in an armchair, half fainting and fighting for breath.