pay the countin'. Give 'em to Clem wi' my
respects."

Then Will suffered a surprise. The little woman before him swelled and
expanded, her narrow bosom rose, her thin lips tightened, and into her
dim eyes there came pride and brightness. It was her hour of triumph,
and she felt a giantess as she stood regarding the envelope and Will.
Him she had never liked since his difference with her son concerning
Martin Grimbal, and now, richer for certain news of that morning, she
gloried to throw the gift back.

"Take your money again, bwoy. No Hicks ever wanted charity yet, least of
all from a Blanchard. Pick it up; and it's lucky Clement ban't home, for
he'd have said some harsh words, I'm thinking. Keep it 'gainst the rainy
days up to Newtake. And it may surprise 'e to knaw that my son's worth
be getting found out at last. It won't be so long 'fore he takes awver
Squire Grimbal's farm to the Red House. What do 'e think o' that? He've
gone to see un this very day 'bout it."

"Well, well! This be news, and no mistake--gude news, tu, I s'pose. Jan
Grimbal! An' what Clem doan't knaw 'bout farmin', I'll be mighty pleased
to teach un, I'm sure."

"No call to worry yourself; Clem doan't want no other right arm than his
awn."

"Chris shall have the money, then; an' gude luck to 'em both, say I."

He departed, with great astonishment the main emotion of his mind.
Nothing could well have happened to surprise him more, and now he felt
that he should rejoice, but found it difficult to do so.

"Braave news, no doubt," he reflected, "an' yet, come to think on it,
I'd so soon the devil had given him a job as Grimbal. Besides, to choose
him! What do Clement knaw 'bout farmin'? Just so much as I knaw 'bout
verse-writin', an' no more."

CHAPTER XV

"THE ANGEL OF THE DARKER DRINK"

Patches of mist all full of silver light moved like lonely living things
on the face of the high Moor. Here they dispersed and scattered, here
they approached and mingled together, here they stretched forth pearly
fingers above the shining granite, and changed their shapes at the whim
of every passing breeze; but the tendency of each shining, protean mass
was to rise to the sun, and presently each valley and coomb lay clear,
while the cool vapours wound in luminous and downy undulations along the
highest points of the land before vanishing into air.

A solitary figure passed over the great waste. He took his way northward
and moved across Scorhil