“A book? of what sort? Let me see.”
Kate reluctantly produced the cherished volume.
“Pshaw!” said Pasco, rejecting it with disgust. “Poetry—rotten rubbish—I hate it. It’s no good to anyone, it stuffs heads with foolery. I wish I was king, and I’d make it a hanging matter to write a line of poetry and publish it. It’s just so much poison. No wonder you don’t like work, when you read that vile, unwholesome trash.”
Kate hastily folded up the volume and replaced it in her bosom.
“No wonder you and your father encourage vagabonds and incendiaries if you read poetry.”
“Father did not help Roger Redmore to escape,” said Kate. “It was I who rolled down the stones. Father came up when he had already got away to a hiding-place. I, and I alone, did it.”
“More shame to you! You’re a bad girl, a vicious girl, and will come to no good.”
He continued grumbling and snarling and harping on his grievances, and, for some while, jerking out spiteful remarks. Presently he relapsed into silence, and let the tired cob jog along till he reached a point where, near Holne, roads branched: one went down the hill to Ashburton without passing through the village, the other went round by the church and village inn. Here Pasco drew up, uncertain which road to take. There was not much difference in the distance. The direct way was the shorter, but by not more than half a mile, whereas the other afforded opportunity for refreshment.
At this point was a carpenter’s shop. The workman was not there, but he had left his shop open, and outside was a great pile of shavings.
As Pasco sat ruminating, doubtful which way to take, his eye rested for some while on the shavings. Presently, without a word, he got out of the conveyance, let down the back of the cart, collected as many shavings as he could carry, and thrust them in, under the seat. He went back to the pile, took as many more as he thought would suffice, and crammed the body of the cart with them. Then, still without speaking, he shut the back, remounted, and drove down the shortest way—the steep hill, the direct road to Ashburton that avoided the village.