He departed, and Margaret and David saw him go and knew that he had failed.
Madge sighed for him; her husband showed no emotion.
"Come what may come, 'twill be best," he declared. "Rhoda knows her own mind; and that's more than half the maidens do nowadays."
They returned to her and found her sweeping the hearth.
"Mr. Crocker have gone," she said. "I was to bid you good-bye from him."
Elsewhere the baffled suitor tramped through Dartmoor under conditions of setting sunlight and approaching darkness. Strong winds had scattered the fog of the preceding evening and now a gale shouted along the heath and drove the clouds before it. Flashes of light broke through the west and, like golden birds, floated upward over the dark bosoms of the hills. They reached the ragged summits of the land, revealed the granite there, then seemed to take wing into the sky.
CHAPTER IV
POINTS OF VIEW
The folk were coming to church, and some walked by road; some drove from distant hamlets; some tramped by sheep-tracks and rough pathways over wide spaces of heath and stone. Down through outlying farms that stretch tentative fields into the Moor; down past gorse-clad banks and great avenues of beeches; down past Kit Tin Mine--busy then, but empty and silent now; down into the valley bottom, drawn by the thin bell music from the tower above the trees, came the family of the Bowdens. It was smaller than of old. But the boys were growing; Napoleon and Wellington had become responsible persons in the scheme of life at Ditsworthy, and even the twins could be trusted to work without a ruling eye upon them. Mr. Bowden and his wife came to pray upon this early summer noon. Of women there were only two left at Ditsworthy; therefore Sarah and her daughter Sophia had to take Sunday at church alternately; and to-day the widow stopped at home to cook the dinner. With the Bowdens came other of the people. Susan Saunders appeared beside her nephew; but he saw her to the entrance only; there he stopped and talked with a knot of men. Among them was David Bowden. He, however, stayed not long outside and soon joined his family and Rhoda. She was already seated between Joshua and her father in the Bowden pew. Charles Moses was finding seats for chance visitors; Reuben Shillabeer, who never missed Sunday service, sat in his corner, having just handed four collecting dishes to those who would presently carry them through the congregation. He was a sidesman now, and Mr. Merle held the old prize-fighter in high esteem as a valuable example to the young men.
Mr. Screech arrived with his elder child. Mattacott met him and they talked apart. Their conversation concerned Timothy himself. Jane West had ceased to smile on Mattacott since the winter; yet there was no report of any engagement between her and Bart Stanbury. The appearance of Timothy's rival cut this conversation short. He came with his father and mother. The men entered and Mrs. Stanbury spoke to Mr. Crocker.