“The bwoy Ted’s just comed wi’ it.  ’T is this way:  Bonus be at death’s door wi’ a smashed nose, an’ Blanchard done it; an’ Jan Grimbal’s vanished off the faace o’ the airth.  Not a sign of un seed arter he drove away last night from the Jubilee gathering.  An’ if ’t is murder, you’ll be in the witness-box, knawin’ the parties same as you do; an’ the sow ’s got a braave litter, though what’s that arter such news?”

“Guess you ‘m dreamin’, Blee,” said Mr. Lyddon, as he took his hat and walked into the farmyard.

Billy was hurt.

“Dreamin’, be I?  I’m a man as dreams blue murders, of coourse!  Tu auld to be relied on now, I s’pose.  Theer!  Theer!” he changed his voice and it ran into a cracked scream of excitement.  “Theer!  P’r’aps I’m dreamin’, as Inspector Chown an’ Constable Lamacraft be walkin’ in the gate this instant moment!”

But there was no mistaking this fact.  Abraham Chown entered, marched solemnly to the party at the door, cried “Halt!” to his subordinate, then turned to Mr. Lyddon.

“Good-day to you, Miller,” he said, “though ’t is a bad day, I’m fearin’.  I be here for Will Blanchard, alias Tom Newcombe.”

“If you mean my son-in-law, he ’s not out of bed to my knawledge.”

“Dear sawls!  Doan’t ’e say ’t is blue murder—­doan’t ’e say that!” implored Mr. Blee.  His head shook and his tongue revolved round his lips.

“Not as I knaws.  We ‘m actin’ on instructions from the military to Plymouth.”

“Theer ’s allus wickedness hid under a alias notwithstanding,” declared Billy, rather disappointed; “have ’e found Jan Grimbal?”

“They be searchin’ for un.  Jim Luke, Inspector to Moreton, an’ his men be out beatin’ the country.  But I’m here, wi’ my staff, for William Blanchard.  March!”

Lamacraft, thus addressed, proceeded a pace or two until stopped by Mr. Lyddon.

“No call to go in.  He’ll come down.  But I’m sore puzzled to knaw what this means, for awnly last night I heard tell from Jan Grimbal’s awn lips that he’d chaanged his mind about a private matter bearin’ on this.”

“I want the man, anyways, an’ I be gwaine to have un,” declared Inspector Chown.  He brought a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and gave them to the constable.

“Put up them gashly things, Abraham Chown,” said the miller sternly.  “Doan’t ’e knaw Blanchard better ’n that?”

“Handcuffed he’ll be, whether he likes it or not,” answered the other; “an’ if theer’s trouble, I bid all present an’ any able-bodied men ’pon the premises to help me take him in the Queen’s name.”

Billy hobbled round the corner, thrust two fingers into his mouth, and blew a quavering whistle; whereupon two labourers, working a few hundred yards off, immediately dropped their tools and joined him.

“Run you here,” he cried.  “P’lice be corned to taake Will Blanchard, an’ us must all give the Law a hand, for theer’ll be blows struck if I knaw un.”