child does who tells herself a story and has a talent for invention. It hurt Mary to see her act this part, and she longed for her to be done with it, or be silent, for the flow of words was, in its way, more appalling than her tears had been. There was a footfall outside the door, and with a sinking heart Mary realised that Joss Merlyn had come downstairs again and had in all possibility listened to his wife's conversation.
Aunt Patience heard him too, for she turned pale and began to work her mouth. He came into the room and looked from one to the other.
'So the hens are clacking already?' he said, the smile and the laugh gone, his eyes narrow. 'You'll soon stop your tears if you can talk. I heard you, you blathering fool — gobble, gobble, gobble, like a turkey hen. Do you think your precious niece believes a word you say? Why, you wouldn't take in a child, far less a bunch of petticoats like her.'
He pulled a chair from the wall and crashed it against the table. He sat down heavily, the chair creaking beneath him, and, reaching for the loaf, cut himself off a great hunk of bread, which he slabbed with dripping. He crammed it into his mouth, the grease running down his chin, and beckoned Mary to the table. 'You need food, I can see that,' he said, and he proceeded to cut carefully a thin slice from the loaf, which he quartered in pieces and buttered for her, the whole business very delicately done and in striking contrast to his manner in serving himself — so much so that to Mary there was something almost horrifying in the change from rough brutality to fastidious care. It was as though there were some latent power in his fingers which turned them from bludgeons into deft and cunning servants. Had he cut her a chunk of bread and hurled it at her she would not have minded so much; it would have been in keeping with what she had seen of him. But this sudden coming to grace, this quick and exquisite moving of his hands, was a swift and rather sinister revelation, sinister because it was unexpected and not true to type. She thanked him quietly and began to eat.
Her aunt, who had not uttered since her husband entered the room, was frying bacon over the fire. No one spoke. Mary was aware of Joss Merlyn watching her across the table, and behind her she could hear her aunt fumbling with ineffectual fingers at the hot handle of the frying pan. In a minute she had dropped it, uttering a little cry of distress. Mary rose from her place to help her, but Joss thundered at her to sit down.
'One fool is bad enough, without making a couple of them,' he shouted. 'Keep your seat and let your aunt clear up the mess. It won't be for the first time.' He leant back in his chair and began to pick his teeth with his nails. 'What'll you drink?' he asked her. 'Brandy, wine, or ale? You may starve here, but you won't go thirsty. We don't get sore throats at Jamaica.' And he laughed at her, and winked, and put out his tongue.
'I'll have a cup of tea if I may,' said Mary. 'I'm not used to drinking spirits, nor wine neither.'
'Oh, you're not? Well, it's your loss, I'm glad to say. You can have your tea tonight, but, by God, you'll want some brandy in a month or two.'
He reached across the table and took hold of her hand.
'You've a pretty enough paw for one who's worked on a farm,' he said. 'I was afraid it would be rough and red. If there's one thing that makes a man sick it's to have his ale poured out by an ugly hand. Not that my customers are over-particular, but then we've never had a barmaid before at Jamaica Inn.' He gave her a mock bow and dropped her hand.
'Patience, my dear,' he said, 'here's the key. Go and fetch me a bottle of brandy, for the Lord's sake. I've a thirst on me that all the waters of Dozmary would not slake.' His wife hurried across the room at his word and disappeared into the passage. Then he fell to picking his teeth again, whistling from time to time, while Mary ate her bread and butter and drank the tea that he placed before her. Already a splitting headache tightened her brow, and she was ready to drop. Her eyes watered from the peat smoke. But she was not too tired to watch her uncle, for already she had caught something of the nervousness of her Aunt Patience and felt that in some sense they were here like mice in a trap, unable to escape, with him playing with them like a monstrous cat.
In a few minutes his wife returned with the brandy, which she put in front of her husband, and while she finished her cooking of the bacon and served Mary and herself, he fell to drinking, staring moodily before him, kicking the leg of the table. Suddenly he thumped the table with his fist, shaking the plates and cups, while one platter crashed to the floor and broke.
'I tell you what it is, Mary Yellan,' he shouted. 'I'm master in this house, and I'll have you know it. You'll do as you're told, and help in the house and serve my customers, and I'll not lay a finger on you. But, by God, if you open your mouth and squark, I'll break you until you eat out of my hand the same as your aunt yonder.'
Mary faced him across the table. She held her hands in her lap so that he should not see them tremble.
'I understand you,' she said. 'I'm not curious by nature, and I've never gossiped in my life. It doesn't matter to me what you do in the inn, or what company you keep. I'll do my work about the house and you'll have no cause to grumble. But if you hurt my Aunt Patience in any way, I tell you this — I'll leave Jamaica Inn straight away, and I'll find the magistrate, and bring him here, and have the law on you; and then try and break me if you like.'
Mary had turned very pale, and she knew that if he thundered at her now she would break down and cry, and he would have the mastery of her for ever. The torrent of words had come from her in spite of herself, and, wrung with pity for the poor broken thing that was her aunt, she could not control them. Had she but known it, she had saved herself, for her little show of spirit impressed the man, and he leant back in his chair and relaxed.
'That's very pretty,' he said; 'very prettily put indeed. Now we know just what sort of lodger we have. Scratch her, and she shows her claws. All right, my dear; you and I are more akin than I thought. If we are going to play, we'll play together. I may have work for you at Jamaica one day, work that you've never done before. Man's work, Mary Yellan, where you play with life and death.' Mary heard her Aunt Patience give a little gasp beside her.
'Oh, Joss,' she whispered. 'Oh, Joss, please!'
There was so much urgency in her voice that Mary stared at her in surprise. She saw her aunt lean forward and motion her husband to be silent, and the very eagerness of her chin and the agony in her eyes frightened Mary more than anything that had happened that night. She felt eerie suddenly, chilled, and rather sick. What had roused Aunt Patience to such panic? What had Joss Merlyn been about to say? She was aware of a fevered and rather terrible curiosity. Her uncle waved his hand impatiently.
'Get up to bed, Patience,' he said. 'I'm tired of your death's-head at my supper table. This girl and I understand one another.'
The woman rose at once and went to the door, with a last ineffectual glance of despair over her shoulder. They heard her patter up the stairs. Joss Merlyn and Mary were alone. He pushed the empty brandy glass away from him and folded his arms on the table.
'There's been one weakness in my life, and I'll tell you what it is,' he said. 'It's drink. It's a curse, and I know it. I can't stop myself. One day it'll be the end of me, and a good job too. There's days go by and I don't touch more than a drop, same as I've done tonight. And then I'll feel the thirst come on me and I'll soak. Soak for hours. It's power, and glory, and women, and the Kingdom of God, all rolled into one. I feel a king then, Mary. I feel I've got the strings of the world between my two fingers. It's heaven and hell. I talk then, talk until every damned thing I've ever done is spilt to the four winds. I shut myself in my room and shout my secrets in my pillow. Your aunt turns the key on me, and when I'm sober I hammer on the door and she lets me out. There's no one knows that but she and I, and now I've told you. I've told you because I'm already a little drunk and I can't hold my tongue. But I'm not drunk enough to lose my head. I'm not drunk enough to tell you why I live in this God-forgotten spot, and why I'm the landlord of Jamaica Inn.' His voice was hoarse, and now he scarcely spoke above a whisper. The turf fire had sunk low in the hearth, and dark shadows stretched long fingers on the wall. The candles too had burnt down, and cast a monstrous shadow of Joss Merlyn on the ceiling. He smiled at her, and with a foolish drunken gesture he laid his finger against his nose.
'I've not told you that, Mary Yellan. Oh no, I've got some sense and cunning left. If you want to know any more you can ask your aunt. She'll pull you a tale. I heard her blathering tonight, telling you we kept fine company here, and the squire takes off his hat to her. It's lies, all lies. I'll tell you that much, for you'll come to know it anyway. Squire Bassat's too mortal scared to shove his nose in here. If he saw me in the road he'd cross his heart and spur his horse. And so would all the precious gentry. The coaches don't stop here now, nor the mails neither. I don't worry; I've customers enough. The wider berth the gentry give to me the better pleased I am. Oh, there's drinking here all right, and plenty of it too. There's some who come to Jamaica Saturday night, and there's some who turn the key of their door and sleep with their fingers in their ears. There are nights when every cottage on the moors is dark and silent, and the only lights for miles are the blazing windows of Jamaica Inn. They say the shouting and the singing can be heard as far down as the farms below Rough Tor. You'll be in the bar those nights,
