The Squire's Daughter. Hocking Silas Kitto

Ralph," Ruth said, "they're cutting neck at Treligga."

      Cutting neck means cutting the last shock of the year's corn, and is celebrated by a big shout in the field, and a special supper in the farmer's kitchen.

      Ralph raised himself from his stooping posture, and his father did the same. Ruth took her mother's hand in hers, and all four stood and listened. Clear and distinct across the moonlit fields the words rang —

      "What have 'ee? What have 'ee?"

      "A neck! A neck!"

      "Hoorah! Hoorah! Hoorah!"

      Slowly the echoes died over the hills, and then silence reigned again.

      Ralph and David had also cut neck, but they raised no shout over it. They were in no mood for jubilation.

      Sir John Hamblyn had not spoken yet, nor had his steward been across to see them. Why those many days of grace, neither David nor Ralph could surmise.

      It was reported that the squire's daughter was slowly recovering from her accident, but that many months would elapse before she was quite well and able to ride again.

      "We shall not have to wait much longer, depend upon it," David said, on Monday morning, as he and Ralph went out in the fields together; and so it proved. About ten o'clock a horseman was seen riding up the lane toward the house. David was the first to catch sight of him.

      "It's the squire himself," he said.

      CHAPTER VII

      DAVID SPEAKS HIS MIND

      Sir John alighted from his horse and threw the reins over the garden gate, then he walked across the stockyard, and looked at the barn and the cowsheds, taking particular notice of the state of repair they were in. After awhile he returned to the dwelling-house and walked round it deliberately, looking carefully all the time at the roof and windows, but he did not attempt to go inside.

      David and Ralph watched him from the field, but neither attempted to go near him.

      "He'll come to us when he has anything to say," David said, with a little catch in his voice.

      Ralph noticed that his father trembled a good deal, and that he was pale even to the lips.

      The squire came hurrying across the fields at length, slapping his leg as he walked with his riding-crop. His face was hard and set, like a man who had braced himself to do an unpleasant task, and was determined to carry it through. Ralph watched his face narrowly as he drew near, but he got no hope or inspiration from it. The squire did not notice him, but addressed himself at once to David.

      "Good-morning, Penlogan!" he said. "I see you have got down all your corn."

      "Yes, sir, we cut neck on Saturday night."

      "And not a bad crop either, by the look of it."

      "No, sir, it's pretty middling. The farm is just beginning to show some fruit for all the labour and money that have been spent on it."

      "Exactly so. Labour and manure always tell in the end. You know, of course, that the lease has fallen in?"

      "I do, sir. It's hard on the parson at St. Goram, and it's harder lines on me."

      "Yes, it's rough on you both, I admit. But we can't be against these things. When the Almighty does a thing, no man can say nay."

      "I'm not so sure that the Almighty does a lot of those things that people say He does."

      "You're not?"

      "No, sir. I don't see that the parson's son had any call to go out to Egypt to shoot Arabs, particularly when he knew that my farm hung on his life."

      "He went at the call of duty," said the squire unctuously; "went to defend his Queen and country."

      "Don't believe it," said David doggedly. "Neither the Queen nor the country was in any danger. He went because he had a roving disposition and no stomach for useful ways."

      "Well, anyhow, he's dead," said the squire, "and naturally we are all sorry – sorry for his father particularly."

      "I suppose you are not sorry for me?" David questioned.

      "Well, yes; in some respects I am. The luck has gone against you, there's no denying, and one does not like to see a fellow down on his luck."

      "Then in that case I presume you do not intend to take advantage of my bad luck?"

      The squire raised his eyebrows, and his lip curled slightly.

      "I don't quite understand what you mean," he said.

      "Well, it's this way," David said mildly. "According to law this little farm is now yours."

      "Exactly."

      "But according to right it is not yours – it is mine."

      "Oh, indeed?"

      "You need not say, 'Oh, indeed.' You can see it as clearly as I do. I've made the farm. I reclaimed it from the waste. I've fenced it and manured it, and built houses upon it. And what twelve years ago was a furzy down is now a smiling homestead, and you have not spent a penny piece on it, and yet you say it is yours."

      "Of course it is mine."

      "Well, I say it isn't yours. It's mine by every claim of equity and justice."

      "I'm not talking about the claims of equity and justice," the squire said, colouring violently. "I take my stand on the law of the country; that's good enough for me. And what's good enough for me ought to be good enough for you," he added, with a snort.

      "That don't by any means follow," David answered quietly. "The laws of the land were made by the rich in the interests of the rich. That they're good for you there is no denying; but for me they're cruel and oppressive."

      "I don't see it," the squire said, with an impatient shrug of his shoulders. "You live in a free country, and have all the advantages of our great institutions."

      "I suppose you call the leasehold system one of our great institutions?" David questioned.

      "Well, and what then?"

      "I don't see much advantage in living under it," was the reply.

      "You might have something a great deal worse," the squire said angrily. "The high-and-mighty airs some of you people take on are simply outrageous."

      "We don't ask for any favours," David said meekly. "But we've a right to live as well as other people."

      "Nobody denies your right, that I know of."

      "But what am I to do now that my little farm is gone? All the savings of a lifetime, and all the toil of the last dozen years, fall into your pocket."

      "I grant that the luck has been against you in this matter. But we have no right to complain of the ways of Providence. The luck might just as easily have gone against me as against you."

      "I don't believe in mixing luck and Providence up in that way," David answered, with averted eyes. "But, as far as I can see, what you call luck couldn't possibly have gone against you."

      "Why not?"

      "Because you laid down the conditions, and however the thing turned out you would stand to win."

      "I don't see it."

      "You don't?" And David gave a loud sniff. "Why, if all the 'lives' had lived till they were eighty, I and mine would not have got our own back."

      "Stuff and nonsense!" the squire said angrily. "Besides, you agreed to the conditions."

      "I know it," David answered sadly. "You would grant me no better, and I was hopeful and ignorant, and looked at things through rose-coloured glasses."

      "I'm sure the farm has turned out very well," the squire replied, with a hurried glance round him.

      "It's just beginning to yield some little return," David said, looking off to the distant fields. "For years it's done little more than pay the ground rent. But this year it seems to have turned the corner. It ought to be a good little farm in the future." And David sighed.

      "Yes, it ought