The old savage sought her stores; and then she discovered the bread and meat and eggs that Lee had brought for Grace.
"My jimmery! This was what made Jack so hungry of late! Well, us will have bit an' sup when I come back. I must keep you fat and plump for Mr. Peter now. Afore sun's up I'll be here again. Me an' the sun ban't like to be friends no more this many a day. For that matter moon's always more kindly to me."
"Will you, at least, loose my eyes? I promise you faithfully I'll make no attempt to escape while you are away."
Lovey laughed and took the bandage from Grace's face.
"Since there's nought to see but the gold moss you hate, look about so much as you please; an' as for escaping—I'll give 'e full leave to do it if you can. A horse couldn't break that rope, let alone a slip of a girl."
Lovey now climbed carefully out of her treasure house and Grace saw one blessed gleam of blue daylight before the great stone above was swung back into its place and Mrs. Lee tramped away.
CHAPTER XI
APOCALYPSE
Now were the threads of three lives to be tangled by Fate upon the vast bosom of Cater's Beam; and here, within the secret morasses beneath that great hill, walked Maurice Malherb under the dawn and tempest. He ranged with the thunderbolt, for the storm had called him from his bed; the elemental chaos echoed his own heart and drew him forth into it.
He suffered such misery as only men built in his great, futile pattern are called to suffer. The calculating and responsible find themselves in no such sea of troubles; for their flotillas hold inshore; their sapient eyes ever scan the weather of life, and their ready hands trim sail to it. But this faulty fool with his mad temper and sanguine trust in self, had listened to none, marked no sign, heeded no warning. He had played the greatest game that he knew, in hope that an unborn babe might some day bless his name and perpetuate it. He had staked all and lost all. His daughter was driven from him; his wife, in the agony of her bereavement, had shed bitter tears, and, for the first time in her life, lifted up her voice against his judgment. His plans had miscarried; his money was nearly all lost. He stood under the storm bankrupt of everything that he had worked for and hoped for. He felt naked when he thought of his life, now stripped so bare; for every interest was torn out of it, and, as a tree robbed of leaves, it threatened to perish. Present tribulations thundered on his heart as the storm upon his ears. His soul felt deafened and bewildered; therefore he ran for shelter into the past. Time rolled back for him and he saw the tortuous journey of his days stretching into childhood. The vernal, sweet delights of youth appeared again, and he remembered old forgotten springtimes—birds' eggs—minnows—his first pony—the scent of the new-mown hay. Then his own disposition developed and darkened the hour. Puberty was past; freedom became his and he abused it. Manhood plunged him into gloomy and sombre avenues of years, lighted only by the flashing flame-points of his own temper. He marked how ungoverned wrath had at last grown ungovernable, and had risen, time out of mind, like a demon, between him and wisdom; how his own action had ceaselessly turned him out of the proper road, had clouded justice and threatened honour. He clung to honour as a drowning man to a straw. He fought the cruel white light of truth and strove to shut his eyes to it; for soaked in that blinding ray, honour stood no longer undefiled. A canker grew there; a blot dimmed it; and the spectacle, shattering self-respect, hurt him worse than loss of friends and fortune and his only child. Cowardice and high honour could not chime together; and light showed him that the canker-growth spelt cowardice. He had outraged the freedom of his daughter; he had used force against her liberty; he had denied her sacred rights in the disposal of her own life and body.