Part 5 (1/2)
”You dog!” he cried, in a snarling sob ”You dog!” And his lash ca red wheal across Sir Oliver's dark face
With cries of diser the others, the parson, the Justice and the rustics got between the pair, for Sir Oliver was looking very wicked, and all the world knew him for a man to be feared
”Master Godolphin, I cry shame upon you,” ex-claimed the parson ”If evil coression
Get you gone from here!”
”Go to the devil, sir,” said Master Godolphin thickly ”Is my mother's name to be upon the lips of that bastard? By God, man, the matter rests not here He shall send his friends to me, or I will horse-whip him every time we meet You hear, Sir Oliver?”
Sir Oliver made him no reply
”You hear?” he roared ”There is no Sir John Killigrew this time upon whoet the punishment of which that whiplash is but an earnest” Then with a thick laugh he drove spurs into his horse's flanks, so furiously that he all but sent the parson and another sprawling
”Stay but a little while for me,” roared Sir Oliver after hie he bellowed for his horse, flinging off the parson and Master Baine, who endeavoured to detain and calht him, and whirled away in furious pursuit
The parson looked at the Justice and the Justice shrugged, his lips tight-pressed
”The young fool is drunk,” said Sir Andrew, shaking his white head
”He's in no case to er,” quoth Master Justice Baine ”I doubt I shall hear e where the bello stood idle, the sri to the rustics account of the happening
Master Baine it seeies ”Faith,” he said, ”the place was excellently well chosen They have forged here to-day a shich it will need blood to temper”
CHAPTER IV THE INTERVENER
The parson had notions of riding after Sir Oliver, and begged Master Baine to join hi nose and opined that no good purpose was to be served; that Tressilians were ever wild and bloodyto be avoided
Sir Andreas far froht be wisdom in the Justice's words, and reh of his oith a froithout taking up the burdens of others Master Godolphin and Sir Oliver between theot up this storm of theirs A God's na they should cut each other's throats haply the countryside would be well rid of a brace of turbulent fellows The pedlar deemed the of a sober citizen The others--the fishermen and the rustics--had not the means to follow even had they had the will
They dispersed to put abroad the news of that short furious quarrel and to prophesy that blood would be let in the adjusting of it This prognostication the they based entirely upon their knowledge of the short Tressilian way But it was aIt is true that Sir Oliver went galloping along that road that follows the Penryn river and that he pounded over the bridge in the town of Penryn in Master Godolphin's ithwildly thus with the red wheal across his white furious face said that he looked a very devil
He crossed the bridge at Penryn a half-hour after sunset, as dusk was closing into night, and itof his blood For as he reached the river's eastern bank he slackened his breakneck pace, even as he slackened the angry galloping of his thoughts The o to Rosamund smote him like a physical blow It checked his purpose, and, reflecting this, his pace fell to an aone to wrecking all the happiness that lay ahead of him What was a boy's whiplash, that his resentment of it; should set all his future life in jeopardy? Even thoughthe insult unavenged, what should that matter? Moreover, upon the body of hie so foolish Sir Oliver raised his eyes to the deep sapphire do frostily, and thanked God fro heart that he had not overtaken Peter Godolphin whilst his madness was upon him
A mile or so below Penryn, he turned up the road that ran down to the ferry there, and took his way home over the shoulder of the hill with a slack rein It was not his usual way He ont ever to go round by Trefusis Point that he lilance at theof her bower But to-night he thought the shorter road over the hill would be the safer way If he went by Godolphin Court he er warned hi, warned him to avoid it lest evil should betide Indeed, so i, and such were his fears of himself after what had just passed, that he resolved to leave Penarrow on the next day Whither he would go he did not then detero upon another cruise--an idea which he had lately dismissed under Rosamund's earnest intercession But it was ihbourhood, and place a distance between Peter Godolphin and hiht months or so of exile; but what matter? Better so than that he should be driven into some deed that would compel him to spend his whole lifetime apart from her He would write, and she would understand and approve when he told her what had passed that day
The resolve was firmly implanted in him by the time he reached Penarrow, and he felt himself uplifted by it and by the promise it afforded him that thus his future happiness would be assured
Hirooms he kept, one had by his leave set out yesterday to spend Christmas in Devon with his parents, the other had taken a chill and had been ordered to bed that very day by Sir Oliver, as considerate with those that served hireat log fire blazed in the enorh the vast roo ruddily upon the trophies of weapons that adorned the walls, upon the tapestries and the portraits of dead Tressilians Hearing his step, old Nicholas entered bearing a great candle-branch which he set upon the table
”You'm late, Sir Oliver,” said the servant, ”and Master Lionel bain't horunted and scowled as he crunched a log and set it sizzling under his wet heel He thought of Malpas and cursed Lionel's folly, as, without a word, he loosed his cloak and flung it on an oaken coffer by the here already he had cast his hat Then he sat down, and Nicholas came forward to draw off his boots