His impetuosity carried the ruined man forward with sufficient speed over the dark bitterness of failure confessed, failure advertised, failure proclaimed in print throughout the confines of his little world. He suffered much, and the wide-spread sympathy of friends and acquaintance proved no anodyne but rather the reverse. He hated to see eyes grow grave and mouths serious upon his entry; he yearned to turn his back against Chagford and resume the process of living in a new environment. Temporary troubles vexed him more than the supreme disaster of his failure. Mr. Bambridge made considerable alterations in his cherished lucubration; and when the advertisement appeared in print, it looked mean and filled but a paltry space. People came up before the sale to examine the goods, and Phoebe, after two days of whispered colloquies upon her cherished property, could bear it no longer, and left Newtake with her own little daughter and little Timothy. The Rev. Shorto-Champernowne himself called, stung Will into sheer madness, which he happily restrained, then purchased an old oak coffer for two pounds and ten shillings.
Miller Lyddon made no sign, and hard things were muttered against him and Billy Blee in the village. Virtuous indignation got hold upon the Chagford quidnuncs and with one consent they declared Mr. Lyddon to blame. Where was his Christian charity—that charity which should begin at home and so seldom does? This interest in others’ affairs took shape on the night before the Newtake sale. Then certain of the baser sort displayed their anger in a practical form, and Mr. Blee was hustled one dark evening, had his hat knocked off, and suffered from a dead cat thrown by unseen hands. The reason for this outrage also reached him. Then, chattering with indignation and alarm, he hurried home and acquainted Mr. Lyddon with the wild spirit abroad.
As for Blanchard, he roamed moodily about the scene of his lost battle. In his pockets were journals setting forth the innumerable advantages of certain foreign regions that other men desired to people for their private ends. But Will was undecided, because all the prospects presented appeared to lead directly to fortune.
The day of the sale dawned fine and at the appointed hour a thin stream of market carts and foot passengers wound towards Newtake from the village beneath and from a few outlying farms. Blanchard had gone up the adjacent hill; and lying there, not far distant from the granite cross, he reclined with his dog and watched the people. Him they did not see; but them he counted and found some sixty souls had been attracted by his advertisement. Men laughed and joked, and smoked; women shrugged their shoulders, peeped about and disparaged the goods. Here and there a purchaser took up his station beside a coveted lot. Some noticed that none of those most involved were present; others spread a rumour that Miller Lyddon designed to stop the sale at the last moment and buy in everything. But no such incident broke the course of proceedings.
Will, from his hiding-place in the heather, saw Mr. Bambridge drive up, noted the crowd follow him about the farm, like black flies, and felt himself a man at his own funeral. The hour was dark enough. In the ear of his mind he listened to the auctioneer’s hammer, like a death-bell, beating away all that he possessed. He had worked and slaved through long years for this,—for the sympathy of Chagford, for the privilege of spending a thousand pounds, for barely enough money to carry himself abroad. A few more figures dotted the white road and turned into the open gate at Newtake. One shape, though too remote to recognise with certainty, put him in mind of Martin Grimbal, another might have been Sam Bonus. He mused upon the two men, so dissimilar, and his mind dwelt chiefly with the former. He found himself thinking how good it would be if Martin proposed to Chris again; that the antiquary had done so was the last idea in his thoughts.
Presently a brown figure crept through Newtake gate, hesitated a while, then began to climb the hill and approach Blanchard. Ship recognised it before Will’s eyes enabled him to do so, and the dog rose from a long rest, stretched, sniffed the air, then trotted off to the approaching newcomer.
It was Ted Chown; and in five minutes he reached his master with a letter. “’Tis from Miller Lyddon,” he said. “It comed by the auctioneer. I thought you was up here.”
Blanchard took it without thanks, waited until the labourer had departed, then opened the letter with some slight curiosity.
He read a page of scriptural quotations and admonitions, then tore the communication in half with a curse and flung it from him. But presently his anger waned; he rose, picked up his father-in-law’s note, and plodded through it to the end.
His first emotion was one of profound thanksgiving that he had done so. Here, at the very end of the letter, was the practical significance of it.