“In all the whole warld,” he said, looking round upon his wife and his elder child, raising his hand as he uttered the words, and speaking with an emphasis that was terrible to the hearers, “there is no thing so vile as a harlot.” All the dreaded fierceness of his manner had then come back to him, and neither of them had dared to answer him. After that he at once went back to the mill, and to Fanny who followed him he vouchsafed to repeat the permission that his daughter should be allowed to remain beneath his roof.
Between twelve and one she again went to fetch him to his dinner. At first he declared that he would not come, that he was busy, and that he would eat a morsel, where he was, in the mill. But Fanny argued the matter with him.
“Is it always to be so, father?”
“I do not know. What matters it, so as I have strength to do a turn of work?”
“It must not be that her presence should drive you from the house. Think of mother, and what she will suffer. Father, you must come.”
Then he allowed himself to be led into the house, and he sat in his accustomed chair, and ate his dinner in gloomy silence. But after dinner he would not smoke.
“I tell ’ee, lass, I do not want the pipe today. Now’t has got itself done. D’ye think as grist’ll grind itself without hands?”
When Carry said that it would be better than this that she should go again, Fanny told her to remember that evil things could not be cured in a day. With the mother that afternoon was, on the whole, a happy time, for she sat with her lost child’s hand within her own. Late in the evening, when the miller returned to his rest, Carry moved about the house softly, resuming some old task to which in former days she had been accustomed; and as she did so the miller’s eyes would wander round the room after her; but he did not speak to her on that day, nor did he pronounce her name.
Two other circumstances which bear upon our story occurred at the mill that afternoon. After their tea, at which the miller did not make his appearance, Fanny Brattle put on her bonnet and ran across the fields to the vicarage. After all the trouble that Mr. Fenwick had taken, it was, she thought, necessary that he should be told what had happened.
“That is the best news,” said he, “that I have heard this many a day.”
“I knew that you would be glad to hear that the poor child has found her home again.” Then Fanny told the whole story—how Carry had escaped from Salisbury, being driven to do so by fear of the law proceedings at which she had been summoned to attend, how her father had sworn that he would not yield, and how at length he had yielded. When Fanny told the Vicar and Mrs. Fenwick that the old man had as yet not spoken to his daughter, they both desired her to be of good cheer.
“That will come, Fanny,” said Mrs. Fenwick, “if she once be allowed to sit at table with him.”
“Of course it will come,” said the Vicar. “In a week or two you will find that she is his favourite.”
“She was the favourite with us all, sir, once,” said Fanny, “and may God send that it shall be so again. A winsome thing like her is made to be loved. You’ll come and see her, Mr. Fenwick, some day?” Mr. Fenwick promised that he would, and Fanny returned to the mill.
The other circumstance was the arrival of Constable Toffy at the mill during Fanny’s absence. In the course of the day news had travelled into the village that Carry Brattle was again at the mill;—and Constable Toffy, who in regard to the Brattle family, was somewhat discomfited by the transactions of the previous day at Heytesbury, heard the news. He was aware—being in that respect more capable than Lord Trowbridge of receiving enlightenment—that the result of all the inquiries made, in regard to the murder, did, in truth, contain no tittle of evidence against Sam. As constables go, Constable Toffy was a good man, and he would be wronged if it were to be said of him that he regretted Sam’s escape; but his nature was as is the nature of constables, and he could not rid himself of that feeling of disappointment which always attends baffled efforts. And though he saw that there was no evidence against Sam, he did not, therefore, necessarily think that the young man was innocent. It may be doubted whether, to the normal policeman’s mind, any man is ever altogether absolved of any crime with which that man’s name has been once connected. He felt, therefore, somewhat sore against the Brattles;—and then there was the fact that Carry Brattle, who had been regularly “subpoenaed,” had kept herself out of the way—most flagitiously, illegally and damnably. She had run off from Salisbury, just as though she were a free person to do as she pleased with herself, and not subject to police orders! When, therefore, he heard that Carry was at the mill—she having made herself liable to some terribly heavy fine by her contumacy—it was manifestly his duty to see after her and let her know that she was wanted.
At the mill he saw only the miller himself, and his visit was not altogether satisfactory. Old Brattle, who understood very little of the case, but who did understand that his own son had been made clear in reference to that accusation, had no idea that his daughter had any concern with that matter, other than what had fallen to her lot in reference to her brother. When, therefore, Toffy inquired
