The two words were not forthcoming, but Will dropped his stick and shot forward straight and strong as an angry dog. He closed before the stranger could dispose of his rod, gripped him with a strong wrestling hold, and cross-buttocked him heavily in the twinkling of an eye. The big man happily fell without hurt upon soft sand at the river’s brink; but the indignity of this defeat roused his temper effectually. He grinned nevertheless as he rose again, shook the sand off his face, and licked his hands.
“Good Devon, sure enough, my son; now I’ll teach you something you never heard tell of, and break your damned fool’s neck for you into the bargain!”
But Phoebe, who had wandered slowly on, returned quickly at the sound of the scuffle and high words. Now she fluttered between the combatants and rendered any further encounter for the time impossible. They could not close again with the girl between them, and the stranger, his anger holding its breath, glanced at her with sudden interest, stayed his angry growl, suffered rage to wane out of his eyes and frank admiration to appear in them.
“Doan’t be fighting!” cried Phoebe. “Whatever’s the mischief, Will? Do bate your speed of hand! You’ve thrawed the gentleman down, seemin’ly.”
“Wheer ’s his ticket to then?”
“Why, it isn’t Miller Lyddon’s young maid, surely!” burst out the fisherman; “not Phoebe grown to woman!”
A Devon accent marked the speech, suddenly dragged from him by surprise.
“Ess, I be Phoebe Lyddon; but don’t ’e fall ’pon each other again, for the Lard’s sake,” she said.
“The boy ’s as tetchy in temper as a broody hen. I was only joking all the time, and see how he made me pay for my joke. But to think I should remember you! Grown from bud to pretty blossom, by God! And I danced you on my knee last time I saw you!”
“Then you ’m wan of they two Grimbal brothers as was to be home again in Chagford to-day!” exclaimed Will.