Everything was still; weirdly, painfully so. There must have been birds in the great crags that rose terrace above terrace from the grey-green grass and lost themselves in the low-lying clouds; but they had shown no sign of life. The lonely farm he passed might have been deserted, for no sound came from it—not even the inquiring bark of a dog. The moor bird’s cry is not agreeable, but the man would have welcomed anything that cut the silence. A howling wilderness was better than a wilderness of death.
He had climbed six hundred feet or more in an hour, and the exertion had put no strain on either heart or lungs. He was in excellent physical condition, and, though perhaps a little too lean to be perfectly proportioned, a fine athletic-looking man. His dress was superior to that of a labourer or even a journeyman, but it was ill-fitting as if bought ready-made for the emergency of a funeral, and it was entirely black. He carried neither stick nor baggage and was without overcoat. A bowler hat shabbier than the rest of his outer clothing, was worn low down on his head and almost concealed his hair. The face was expressive of determination and self-confidence and these qualities made it striking; but one would have needed to scan the features a second time or a third before pronouncing the man even passably good-looking. He trod firmly; yet despite his unwillingness to company with darkness on that grim waste he was not forcing the pace. Three miles an hour on such a rough upland road was enough and more than enough.
When the track became a mere stretch of grass the man paused. He was in the shadow of two high mountains whose summits were barely two hundred and fifty feet above his head. Night lurked already in the dark gullies, and he cursed the folly that had led him to risk the shorter bridle route when a third-rate road had been available, and nothing saved but a mile or two of foot-drill at the most.
With a shrug of the shoulders he went forward again; but another quarter-hour brought him to the apex of the path and the mountains ran out on to the moor. It was downhill now and he plodded on, sometimes half uncertain of his way, until the descent became abrupt, when he narrowed his eyelids and sought for signs of the village which he knew must lie some five hundred feet below. He failed to find them, however, for in the murk of advancing night it was difficult to discern grey houses against grey hillsides, and what was worse he lost the path, and was some time in finding it again.
At length he struck the road and saw the glimmer of lights in the valley.
“That’ll be Mawm,” he muttered. “The longest way round ’ud have been the shortest way home. Now which end of the village has this old hammer-slinger his shop, I wonder?”
The location could have been of little consequence, for the houses were few in number and straggled to no great distance. Fortune, however, had placed Baldwin Briggs’ woodyard at the extreme northerly end of the village, so that Inman stumbled upon it without the necessity of seeking information, being also guided by the sound of voices in altercation.
A low wall bounded the road on which the front of the two-storied shop abutted and several men of advanced years were leaning against it and giving silent audience to the disputants at the door. To these the stranger joined himself.
“You’ve changed, Mr. Briggs,” a man about Inman’s own age was saying in an emphatic but not loud voice; “I’ve heard father say ’at when you and him worked for Mr. Clegg there was nobody readier than you to ask for your wages raising. Oft and oft I’ve heard him say it, and ’at you egged the others on to stand by you. Now it’s like skinning the flint to get another penny out of you, for all you’re putting your own prices up every few months. You’ve changed, I say.”
The voice fell away and became almost plaintive and the stranger’s lip curled contemptuously.