“An’ quite right, tu; as you was the first to say at the time.  Who’s gwaine to pity a thief who loses the purse he’s stole, or a poacher that fires ‘pon another man’s bird an’ misses it?”

“All the same, I doubt he would have made a better husband for Phoebe Lyddon than ever your brother will.”

His sweetheart gasped at criticism so unexpected.

“You—­you to say that!  You, Will’s awn friend!”

“It’s true; and you know it as well as anybody.  He has so little common sense.”

But Chris flamed up in an instant.  Nothing the man’s cranky temper could do had power to irritate her long.  Nothing he might say concerning himself or her annoyed her for five minutes; but, upon the subject of her brother, not even from Clem did Chris care to hear a disparaging word or unfavourable comment.  And this criticism, of all others, levelled against Will angered her to instant bitter answer before she had time to measure the weight of her words.

“‘Common sense’!  Perhaps you’ll be so kind as to give Will Blanchard a li’l of your awn—­you being so rich in it.  Best look at home, and see what you can spare!”

So the lovers’ quarrel which had been steadily brewing under the sunshine now bubbled over and lowered thunder-black for the moment, as such storms will.

Clement Hicks, perfectly calm now that his sweetheart’s temper was gone, marched off; and Chris, slamming the cottage door, vanished, without taking any further leave of him than that recorded in her last utterance.

CHAPTER II

NEWTAKE FARM

Clement Hicks told the truth when he said that Mrs. Blanchard fell something short of her usual sound judgment and sagacity in the matter of Will’s enterprise.  The home of childhood is often apt enough to exercise magic, far-reaching attraction, and even influence a mind for the most part unsentimental.  To Damaris the thought of her son winning his living where her father had done so was pleasant and in accordance with eternal fitness.  Not without emotion did she accompany Will to Newtake Farm while yet the proposed bargain awaited completion; not without strange awakenings in the dormant recesses of her memory did Will’s mother pass and pass again through the scenes of her earliest days.  From the three stone steps, or “upping stock,” at the farmhouse door, whereat a thousand times she had seen her father mount his horse, to the environment of the farmyard; from the strange, winding staircase of solid granite that connected upper and lower storeys, to each mean chamber in Newtake, did Mrs. Blanchard’s eyes roam thoughtfully amid the ghosts of recollections.  Her girl’s life returned and the occasional bright days gleamed forth again, vivid by contrast with the prevailing grey.  So active became thought that to relieve her mind she spoke to Will.