The Wizard of West Penwith: A Tale of the Land's-End

by William Bentinck Forfar

Several days and nights pass, and the patient is still delirious. The man continues most attentive and skilful. The patient gradually gets better. He is out of danger; and, one evening, the man, after giving the woman the most minute instructions as to her treatment of the invalid, leaves, desiring her to keep strict watch over him, and keep the doors locked, so that he may not get away from the house until his return. The boy was left to assist the woman in attending on the invalid and keeping watch.

Frederick had now been an inmate of this lonely house about a week. He was fast recovering from the effects of the fall, but still too weak to leave his bed, although he wished most earnestly to get away, or to have his questions answered; for he didn't at all remember what took place after the horse fell, nor did he know where he was, nor who his attendants were.

The woman pretended not to know anything, and the boy generally evaded the questions, or answered very wide of them. The morning after the departure of the man, under whose skilful treatment Morley was progressing so favourably towards recovery, the boy entered the room with a cunning smile on his countenance, and said that he had a letter for the invalid.

"A letter!" said Morley, feebly, "who can possibly have written a letter to me? no one but those I have seen about me, know where I am." Taking the letter from the boy, however, he was astonished to find that it was from Alrina. He was too anxious and impatient to read it, to think of the bearer, or to ask any questions concerning the letter or its writer, until he had read its contents, which he did with such eagerness, that the boy was alarmed lest the invalid should relapse into delirium again;—not that he was easily alarmed or frightened at anything he saw or heard, but he knew that if the gentleman became delirious again, it would give him extra trouble.

In her letter, Alrina complained of her lot. She had thought, she said, that Frederick would, at least, have written her a line in reply to her first letter. She felt, now, that she was deserted by all. Everything seemed going against her. Her aunt had not returned yet; but her father came frequently, and she felt convinced there was some terrible secret, which they endeavoured to keep from her, but she was determined to find it out. The boy seemed willing to befriend her, she said, but she was almost afraid to trust him. And so she went on to the end of the letter, in the same desponding strain; winding up by asking Frederick, if he really loved her to lose no time in coming to her rescue, or, at least, to write a line, that she might know there was, at least, one person in the world who cared for her. It was a melancholy letter from beginning to end, and its perusal made her lover wretched. She was evidently under restraint somewhere; but where? that was the question: even if he knew, it was impossible for him to go to her at present; he was too weak. The boy who brought her letter might know something, and he turned to ask him, but he had left the room. He tried to get up; the exertion was too much for him, and he sank back on his pillow again. His only resource was to read the letter again and again. The more he reflected on Alrina's position, however, and on the unfortunate circumstances which had prevented his receiving her first letter in time, and his consequent inability to render her that assistance and consolation which he would have given worlds to have been able to do, the more irritated and unhappy did he feel; so that when the boy returned, he was in such a high state of excitement, that his attendant was afraid, at first, to go near him.

The wish for further information, however, which he believed the boy could give him, caused Morley to subdue his feelings, and to induce him, by the promise of a reward, to be a little more communicative than he had hitherto been. By degrees, the boy approached the bed cautiously, when Morley asked him, as mildly as he could, when and where he had received the letter, and if he knew where Alrina was at that moment confined, with many other questions too numerous for the boy to answer without a little time and consideration. Before he answered any of them, therefore, he gave that cunning smile, which had so annoyed Morley before, and which now irritated him beyond measure, when he was so anxious to hear something of her to whom he felt he had unwittingly given cause for complaint; but he soon saw that he should get nothing out of the boy by threats or angry expressions, so he changed his tactics, and extracted the information he wanted by asking one question at a time. That was certainly the oddest boy he had ever met with, he thought; for, although, judging from his diminutive stature, no one would have supposed him to be above eight or nine years of age, yet, from his shrewd knowledge of the world, and aged expression of countenance, he might have been eight- or nine-and-twenty. He was the same boy whom Mr. Brown formerly employed to look after his mare; and it was said, even then, and generally believed, that he was in constant attendance on Mr. Freeman, and knew a good many of his secrets.

He was found one night, when quite an infant, lying at the door of a farm-house in the neighbourhood of St. Just, wrapped up in coarse flannel; but it was never discovered who put him there, nor who the child's parents were. He was placed in the poor-house; and when he was old enough, he was apprenticed to one of the farmers of the district; but he would never settle down under one master,—and after trying to subdue him, without success, his master gave him up to his own inclinations, and so he got his living by doing odd jobs. From his constant intercourse with Mr. Freeman, he lost the broad Cornish dialect in a measure, and only spoke in that way when he was associating with the miners. He was fond of going into Penzance and mixing with the gentlemen's servants there occasionally, from whom he picked up many a slang expression, which he would retail to the frequenters of Mr. Brown's bar, very much to their amusement. He was an awkward individual to gain information from; so Morley was obliged to deal with him accordingly, and put his questions with caution:—

(Morley) "I think I have seen you before, my boy?"

(Boy) "I shouldn't wonder if you had, sir; and, maybe, I've seed you before."

(Morley) "You kept that mare like a picture;—I never saw a better groom, either at home or abroad."