Once again he bit his nails as his horse carried him down the stony track, for even the coin he bore away did not cover his baffled rage at defeat. Presently his thin lips spread into a smile of self-congratulation, and his eyelids nearly met as he communed with himself.
'It was lucky I did not call on Griffith for his rent first. I clinched the nail on Evan's dishonest flight in acknowledging that. A clever idea of mine his begging grace for Edwards' widow. Covers his call at my office. I suppose that forward jade is the woman he was going to marry. She will wait a long while for a husband if she waits for Evan Evans, look you. And as for that cock-crowing Rhys, I'll cut his comb before I've done with him. He shall not crow over me with impunity; no, indeed. I've bled the old woman pretty freely this time. She'll not get over it in a hurry. The farm will go to the dogs now that long-headed farming-man is gone. Lease, indeed! I defy any power in earth or heaven to keep them on their farm when I am ready to turn them out. Yes, indeed!'
A strong defiance that, Mr. Pryse, crafty and potential though you may be!
CHAPTER XV. A STOP-GAP.
As soon as Mr. Pryse was gone, Mrs. Edwards sank down on the oaken settle exhausted with the conflict of disturbing thoughts, and the harassing scene in which she had just borne a part. The old stocking-foot, which had been her only possible savings bank all the years of her thrifty widowhood, lay, with her limp hand, in her lap, in a corresponding state of collapse. Only three weeks before it had been plump and pleasant to contemplate, a testimony to industry, and a pledge of future prosperity. Now, within those three short weeks, the full half-year's rent had been a second time withdrawn, with exorbitant costs in addition, and the residue had ample space to chink.
There was a troubled aspect of careworn bewilderment on her countenance as she sat there, gazing abstractedly on her diminished store, endeavouring to reconcile the irreconcilable. And all the while Rhys was pacing the kitchen floor, with noisy tramp, in his wood-soled shoes, chafing and fuming over the cruel insolence of Mr. Pryse, as well as over their loss, yet wondering vaguely if there could be any truth in his allegations.
He did not altogether trust Mr. Pryse, but he had never had his mother's unbounded confidence in Evan, and, as Owen Griffith had suggested, so much money in his hands all at once might have proved too great a temptation, or he might have got drunk and lost it, and been ashamed to return. (But Evan did not drink.)
Now and then a sharp, jerky expletive gave expression to his crude doubts and suspicions, but he could not wring from his mother any word to strengthen his suspicions.