His mother trembled before the long-anticipated truth and knew the first place in his heart was gone at last.
“As purty as a pictur in truth,” she said, “but something too taffety [16] for the wife of a day labourer.”
“Not so,” answered the man. “She’m an angel out o’ heaven, an’ she’ll come to be the awnly wife worth namin’ on Dartymoor. For that matter she ban’t feared of a day’s work herself, an’ have awftentimes earned a fourpenny piece ’pon the land.”
CHAPTER II
Throughout the week Samson Belworthy, the father of Sarah, swung a sledge and followed a blacksmith’s calling at Postbridge; upon the day of rest his labours were of a more delicate sort, for he played the bass viol and pulled as good a bow as any musician around about the Moor. This man accepted John as a suitor to his daughter with certain reservations. He had no mind to dismiss Sally into poverty, and bargained for delay until Aggett had saved money, obtained regular occupation, instead of his present casual trade, and arrived at a worldly position in which he could command a cottage and thus offer his wife a home worthy of her.
From desultory application to the business of his dead father—a sort of work in which he had never much distinguished himself—John now turned his face upon the problems of life in earnest, and sought employment under a responsible master. His ambition was to win a place as gamekeeper or assistant keeper on the estates of the manor lord; but he lacked the necessary qualifications in the opinion of those who knew him; being indeed strong enough, courageous enough, and familiar enough with the duties of such a calling, but having an uncertain temper, by nature fiery as his own freckled skin in summer-time. Finally, his physical strength obtained for him daily work and weekly wage at Farmer Chave’s. Into the establishment of Believer Barton he entered, and, as cowman, began a new chapter of his life.
All proceeded prosperously during the autumnal progress of his romance. John gave every satisfaction, was said to have forgotten his way to the sign of the “Green Man” at Postbridge, and certainly developed unsuspected capabilities in the direction of patience and self-control. He toiled amain, attracted his master’s regard and won the red-hot friendship of his master’s son.
This youth, by name Timothy, returning from his apprenticeship to a brewer at Plymouth after futile endeavours to master that profitable business, decided to follow in his father’s footsteps, much to the elder’s disappointment. Timothy Chave elected to be a farmer, however, and coming home a fortnight before Christmas, he devoted his days and nights to the pleasure of sport as a preliminary to the tremendous application he promised when the new year should come. He was two years younger than John Aggett and a youth of higher intelligence and finer clay; but he found in John an ideal follower by flood and field. There came a day, one week before the Christmas festival, when for particular reasons Tim desired a heavy bag. John was therefore begged off his farm duties, and the young men, rising by starlight, trod the high land and pressed forward before dawn toward Aggett’s familiar haunts.
Young Chave, a lad of good repute and handsome exterior, had learned his lessons at Blundell’s School, was accounted a very clever youth, and held in much esteem as a traveller and a scholar amidst the natives of Postbridge. His mother spoiled him and fooled him to the top of his bent; his father had been proud of him until the lad’s recent determination to soar no higher than the life of a countryman.
This present excursion bore reference to a special event, as has been said. There were coming from North Devon to Believer Barton, for the holiday season, sundry poor cousins of the Chaves. On Christmas Eve they would arrive, and, as a certain pretty damsel of seventeen was to accompany her elders, Timothy’s generous heart determined that moorland delicacies must await her, if his right arm, long fowling-piece and liver-coloured spaniel could secure them. With this excuse he had won John Aggett away from the cow-byres, and together, as day broke, they passed southward to Dartmeet, held on by Combestone Tor and presently tramped into the lonely and desolate fastnesses of Holne Moor. Here, with cautious passage across half-frozen swamps, the sportsmen sought their game.