But all this did not divert the general attention from the important matter of Goarly’s attack. “Let it be how it will,” said Mr. Runciman, “a fellow like that should be put down.” He did not address himself specially to Mr. Masters, but that gentleman felt that he was being talked at.
“Certainly he ought,” said Dr. Nupper. “If he didn’t feel satisfied with what his lordship offered him, why couldn’t he ask his lordship to refer the matter to a couple of farmers who understood it?”
“It’s the spirit of the thing,” said Mr. Ribbs, from his place on the sofa. “It’s a hodious spirit.”
“That’s just it, Mr. Ribbs,” said Harry Stubbings. “It’s all meant for opposition. Whether it’s shooting or whether it’s hunting, it’s all one. Such a chap oughtn’t to be allowed to have land. I’d take it away from him by Act of Parliament. It’s such as him as is destroying the country.”
“There ain’t many of them hereabouts, thank God!” said the landlord.
“Now, Mr. Twentyman,” said Stubbings, who was anxious to make friends with the gentleman-farmer, “you know what land can do, and what land has done, as well as any man. What would you say was the real damage done to them two wheat-fields by his lordship’s game last autumn? You saw the crops as they were growing, and you know what came off the land.”
“I wouldn’t like to say.”
“But if you were on your oath, Mr. Twentyman? Was there more than seven-and-sixpence an acre lost?”
“No, nor five shillings,” said Runciman.
“I think Goarly ought to take his lordship’s offer—if you mean that,” said Twentyman.
Then there was a pause, during which more drink was brought in, and pipes were re-lighted. Everybody wished that Mr. Masters might be got to say that he would not take the case, but there was a delicacy about asking him. “If I remember right he was in Rufford Gaol once,” said Runciman.
“He was let out on bail and then the matter was hushed up somehow,” said the attorney.
“It was something about a woman,” continued Runciman. “I know that on that occasion he came out an awful scoundrel.”
“Don’t you remember,” asked Botsey, “how he used to walk up and down the covert-side with a gun, two years ago, swearing he would shoot the fox if he broke over his land?”
“I heard him say it, Botsey,” said Twentyman.
“It wouldn’t have been the first fox he’s murdered,” said the doctor.
“Not by many,” said the landlord.
“You remember that old woman near my place?” said Stubbings. “It was he that put her up to tell all them lies about her turkeys. I ran it home to him! A blackguard like that! Nobody ought to take him up.”
“I hope you won’t, Mr. Masters,” said the doctor. The doctor was as old as the attorney, and had known him for many years. No one else could dare to ask the question.
“I don’t suppose I shall, Nupper,” said the attorney from his chair. It was the first word he had spoken since he had put down young Botsey. “It wouldn’t just suit me; but a man has to judge of those things for himself.”
Then there was a general rejoicing, and Mr. Runciman stood broiled bones, and ham and eggs, and bottled stout for the entire club; one unfortunate effect of which unwonted conviviality was that Mr. Masters did not get home till near twelve o’clock. That was sure to cause discomfort; and then he had pledged himself to decline Goarly’s business.
V
Reginald Morton
We will now go back to Hoppet Hall and its inhabitants. When the old squire died he left by his will Hoppet Hall and certain other houses in Dillsborough, which was all that he could leave, to his grandson Reginald Morton. Then there arose a question whether this property also was not entailed. The former Mr. Masters, and our friend of the present day, had been quite certain of the squire’s power to do what he liked with it; but others had been equally certain on the other side, and there had been a lawsuit. During that time Reginald Morton had been forced to live on a very small allowance. His aunt, Lady Ushant, had done what little she could for him, but it had been felt to be impossible that he should remain at Bragton, which was the property of the cousin who was at law with him. From the moment of his birth the Honourable Mrs. Morton, who was also his aunt by marriage, had been his bitter enemy. He was the son of an innkeeper’s daughter, and according to her theory of life, should never even have been noticed by the real Mortons. And this honourable old lady was almost equally adverse to Lady Ushant, whose husband had simply been a knight, and who had left nothing behind him. Thus Reginald Morton had been friendless since his grandfather died, and had lived in Germany, nobody quite knew how. During the entire period of this lawsuit Hoppet Hall had remained untenanted.
When the property was finally declared to belong to Reginald Morton, the Hall, before it could be used, required considerable repair. But there was other property. The Bush Inn belonged to Reginald Morton, as did the house in which Mr. Masters lived, and sundry other smaller tenements in the vicinity. There was an income from these of about five hundred pounds a year. Reginald, who was then nearly thirty years of age, came over to England, and stayed for a month or two at Bragton with his aunt, to the infinite chagrin of the old dowager. The management of the town property was entrusted to Mr. Masters, and Hoppet Hall was repaired. At this period Mr. Mainwaring had just come to Dillsborough, and having a wife with some money and
