“By the way, Mark, you say young Darley had half-a-dozen ruffianly fellows with him, and they wanted to stone you, and then throw you off the cliff?”
“Yes, father.”
“Do you think any of them were part of the rough crew who came here with that red-faced captain?”
“I think not, father.”
“I’m afraid they went to Sir Morton Darley; so we must be watchful. Let that other trouble drop now, and be careful for the future. Don’t worry me now; Rugg wants to see me about the mining accounts. Keep out of mischief, and don’t let me hear any more about young Darley.”
Mark promised, and went out with the intention of going down the river to see old Master Rayburn, and ask him whether he had received the egg. But before he had gone far, the memories of the whole business seemed so distasteful, and he felt so much annoyed with himself, that he turned back.
“He’d make me tell him all about it, and I feel as if I couldn’t,” muttered the lad. “It tastes more and more bitter every time I think about it, and if Master Rayburn began to ask me questions, he’d get it all out of me, for he has such a way of doing it. I don’t believe any one could tell him a lie without being found out. Of course I shouldn’t tell him one. No, I won’t go. He’d say that I behaved badly, and I don’t want to be told, for though I wouldn’t own it, I know it better than any one could tell me. Hang the Darleys! I wish there wasn’t one on the face of the earth.”
So, instead of going to old Master Rayburn’s cottage, Mark walked back to the Black Tor, and after making up his mind to go down into the lead-mine, and chip off bits of spar, he went and talked to his sister, and told her, naturally enough, all that had passed.
Mary Eden, who was about a year older, and very like him in feature, shuddered a good deal over parts of his narration, and looked tearful and pained at the end.
“What’s the matter?” he said, rather roughly; “why, you’re going to cry!”