Barbara Lynn: A Tale of the Dales and Fells.

by Emily J. Jenkinson

Joel began by winning, and saw an easy way of retrieving his fortunes opening out before him. Then he lost, and, growing desperate, lost more and more heavily, till he had little left to lose. He owed money to the village tradesmen, but that did not trouble his conscience. When he could not meet his debts of honour—as he was pleased to call them—he felt disgraced; hurt in his pride. So he came riding home, gave himself up to brooding, sent word to Lucy that he was ill, and kept the house for days.

Ill he most certainly was, but in mind and conscience, not in body. One afternoon he sat alone in the parlour of Forest Hall, his head sunk on his breast, and his eyes burning. The fire had died out, and the hearth was filled with ash, yet, though it was June, he shivered.

Mally Ray, his old nurse and now his housekeeper, had gone off for the day, and left him to fend for himself. On the table lay the remains of a meal, and the atmosphere of the room was heavy, in spite of the sunshine outside, and the chiming of a light wind through the tree-tops of the forest.

He had slept little of late, and his nights had been made hideous by dreams, which belonged neither to the sphere of waking nor sleeping, but beset him when he was only half-conscious; and when reality, instead of being obliterated, was turned into a distortion of the truth.

A vision of old Mistress Lynn and her money-bags haunted him. But he managed to banish it in his clearer moments. No sooner, however, had his will become weakened by weariness, than the vision returned. He spent, or seemed to spend, hours counting the coins, and dropping them into a bag. Through the night, through the day, at unexpected moments, he was possessed by this demon of counting. He felt the cold metal between his fingers, yet his hands were in his empty pockets, or hanging by his side.

He looked round the room, and realised suddenly that the fire was out. Then he got up.

"Sleep," he muttered, "I must sleep or I shall lose my wits," and he flung himself down on a settle.

He closed his eyes. For a while he felt dizzy, tossed up and down upon a sea of darkness, then his brain became illuminated as with fire; he began again to count. One by one he dropped the coins into a bag. He roused himself with a smothered curse, turned over, and tried to fix his mind upon something else.

He had gone fishing the week before with some of his friends, and they had betted on their probable catch. But he had hooked only two or three little trout, too small to be of any use, so he had flung them back into the mere. Now he heard them fall with a splash, and jingle as they reached the bottom. He seemed to be fishing again, and dropping them over the side of the boat, but sometimes it was a coin he dropped, sometimes a silver-bellied fish. Still he went on counting. The trout and the money were confused in his mind. He knew that he had mixed them up; he knew that he was neither asleep nor awake, and he tried to clear his brain. The effort was painful, he struggled as though fighting with evil powers, but in the end he overcame, yet rose up feeling sick, dazed, and in despair.

The room was dusky. How long had he been lying on the settle? He looked at the clock, and it began to strike the hour of nine. At six he had counted the strokes, since then he had not heard them, yet he had not slept. He must sleep, or he would go mad. He sat staring before him for a minute, then went to the door.