"I've heard Madge say that she would much like it to fall out," declared Mrs. Stanbury; "but, for my part, Rhoda don't look to be seeking a husband. She's different to her kind, and I don't see her either wife or mother."
Bart was reminded of another maiden and he sighed, put his hand to his chin, and looked into vacancy with a very lack-lustre expression.
"Shillabeer was here afore you comed home," said his father; "and he says you'm too young to stand up to Mattacott. You'd kill the man."
"I may yet," declared Bart gloomily. "Anyway I can't wait like this much longer. No more can he. She won't say which 'tis to be, and the strain of mind is getting a bit too sharp. Something's got to go scat afore long--either him or me--or her."
"She ought to decide, no doubt," admitted his mother. "But I hope you ban't hopeful, Bart, for I'm not. T'other's better off than you and wiser; and Jane West has found it out, of course."
"He may be wiser, or he may not be," answered Bart. "Anyway I'm too wise to wait till Doomsday; and so I've told her; and she's going to decide afore the New Year."
"She'll take Timothy Mattacott," repeated his mother. "Stanburys ban't no good at competing with other people. No more was my family--they always went under; and now they've gone under altogether, for I'm the last of 'em."
CHAPTER III
THE VOICE FROM THE POOL
Mr. Billy Screech found himself more than usually busy on the eve of Christmas Day; but when three o'clock came he abandoned his work and set off into the Moor. A dismal enterprise lay before him, and bad weather made the prospect worse; but he had promised, and failure to keep his promise would upset others and lessen Billy's credit. Therefore he went, and presently, ascending above Kingsett Farm, reached Crazywell where it stared up out of the waste, like a blind eye in a black socket. Silence and desolation haunted the pool. It seemed an hour indeed when secret spirits might wake from sleep, rise, strike the leaden face of the waters, and bring terror to mankind. A heavy and hushed trance held the pool. But little wind blew; no cloud stirred in the grey vault of heaven; but beneath at earth level, fog crept leisurely along in streaks and hung motionless in patches. Even Billy--hardened unbeliever though he was--felt some slight uneasiness as he sank down into the hollow cup of Crazywell. The threatening mist made him both glad and fearful. It would certainly help the dramatic force of the thing to be done; but it might also increase in density and cause him to lose his way home. He turned up his coat collar, found a clump of furze near the water's brink, and settled there. All had fallen out as Mr. Screech desired, and presently Jane West and Bart Stanbury would pass that way on the road to Princetown for some Christmas shopping. Only one fear existed in the watcher's mind. If the mists increased in density, Bart might hesitate to take his sweetheart this way, but prefer to tramp round by road.