“Nevertheless, lad,” said Jacob Trusty, who was talking with me on the second day, “I like not to see it, for ’tis not natural. If she would cry now, it would be a comfort and a thing to praise God for. I pray she may break down when they take him away. For it is a bad thing, William, boy, to keep one’s grief bottled up as it were. ’Tis like a dove which you may prison in a cage, and which will make no murmur, but will die silently. Howbeit, she will feel it badly when they fasten him up for burial.”
Jacob had felt my father’s death very keenly. When I could bear it he had taken me on one side and asked me the manner of it, and I had told him all I could think of. Jacob’s face grew grave and thoughtful as he listened, and he shook his head often.
“What do you think of it, Jacob?” I said at last.
“Nay, lad, nay, what can I think? Thy father had but one enemy in all the world. See how befriended he was! Have they not been here this past two days, gentle and simple, high and low, so that the doorstep hath never cooled of them? Hast hearkened how they praised him, how all had a good word for him? Nay, weep not, William, lad. Be proud that all men thought so well of thy poor father. But, William, one man hath not come, and only one of all the neighbourhood.”
“You mean Rupert Watson?”
Jacob nodded his gray head. “Ay,” said he, “him I do mean. Certainly, seeing that they had never been friends, and had lately had extra cause of unpleasantness, it might seem strange to some if Rupert Watson had come here. But I can remember that when thy grandfather died this Watson’s father was bidden to the funeral and came like a Christian. But this one stays aside, and hath never sent word of sympathy.”
“Jacob,” I said, “do you think it was Rupert Watson who did it?”
“I know not, lad—I know not. Let it be.”
“Nay,” I said, “that I will not. If he killed my father I will fasten it on him and kill him.”
“Whisht, lad, whisht!” said Jacob Trusty. “Thou art too young to talk of killing. Rest assured that whoever killed thy father will be sorry enow for it. For there was never crime done in this world, lad, that did not come home to the doer. It may be long first, but come it will.”
I had to tell all I knew about the manner of my father’s death to the coroner and his jury, and they examined me at great length, and with me Philip Lisle and his friend Captain Ready. But there was nothing in our testimony that was clear, and they gave in a verdict that my father was murdered by some unknown person, and there was an end of it. And two days after that we buried him in the churchyard at Darrington, and there was such a throng of folk as I had never seen before, people coming from far and near to pay their respects to his memory. And Lucy and I went and followed after the coffin, and the people said kind things to us, but my mother stayed at home. Ah me! without him the house seemed shorn of all its light and life, and when we came back from the funeral and I realized that I never should again see him or hear him, never again touch his hand, or learn from him, I broke down utterly, and went to my mother’s side and laid my head on her knee and wept my heart out. And presently I felt her hot tears drop on my face, and so at last she wept and relieved her heart and was somewhat comforted.
Now, after my father had been buried, men began to talk of the manner of his death and to ask questions and give opinions. And knowing that he had but one enemy, and that enemy a man over whom he had just achieved a triumph, there were not wanting those who hinted in broad fashion that it was Rupert Watson who had slain my father, out of hatred and revenge. And little by little men began to look darkly upon him when they met him in high-road or marketplace, and some would hardly speak to him, and even his associates looked fearfully at him. So patent did these things become that he could not fail to notice them, for, indeed, people began to shun him as they would the plague.
But Rupert Watson was not the man to patiently suffer this, and setting us down as the originators of the feeling against him, he rode over one afternoon and drew rein at our door, and knocked thereon. And my mother having caught sight of him went out herself, and I followed, my heart beating
