"Are they coming?" she asked again, presently.
"Yes, they are close to us," I replied, for at that moment they had passed the rock by which we had at first stood.
CHAPTER VI
I DISCOVER ANOTHER CAVE, AND HEAR A CONVERSATION BETWEEN RICHARD TRESIDDER AND HIS SON
"I am sure I saw a man and woman," I heard Nick Tresidder say.
"I thought I did, too," replied his father; "but we must have been mistaken, I suppose. Of course, they could have got behind Great Bear and then kept along under the cliff."
"Then they must have gone past, for they are nowhere to be seen."
"Perhaps they wanted to hurry to be before the tide."
"Yes; I suppose that must be it," replied Nick, doubtfully.
"Still, I don't know that it matters. We should not have troubled at all if we hadn't thought it might be Naomi."
"No; where can she be, I wonder?"
"She's a strange girl, Nick. She doesn't seem to feel happy at Pennington, neither does she make friends with Emily. She's always roaming among the woods or along the beach. I shouldn't wonder at all if she hasn't lost herself among the woods. You must be careful, my lad."
"Oh, it's all right, there's no danger. I say, do you know that Jacob Buddie told me he believed he saw Jasper Pennington in the lane outside Betsey Fraddam's house last night?"
"I don't believe it; we've got rid of him effectually. But we must hurry on, Nick, we've just time to get to Granfer Fraddam's path before the tide gets in."
"Yes, it's a good way on. Isn't Granfer Fraddam's Cave here somewhere?"
"I've my doubts whether there is such a place. There may have been such a cave in the old man's time, but lots of ground has fallen in during the past fifty years. Anyhow, I've often searched along the coast and could never find it."
"But it's around here that the noises have been heard. You know people say it's haunted by the old man's ghost."
"Well, I've never been able to find it."
They hurried on, and I gave a sigh of relief.
"Are they gone?" asked Naomi.
"Yes, they are gone; they don't know anything. It will take them a long while to get home. It's a long way to Pennington by Granfer Fraddam's path. The cliff is steep, too."
"But I must go now," she said, anxiously.
"You shall get home before they can," I said, eagerly.
"I will take you through another opening. You will know another secret of this cave then. You see, I trust you wholly, and you will know my hiding-place almost as well as I know it myself."
"But do you live here?"
Then I told her what I had to do, and how Eli Fraddam brought food to me, and how when winter came I should have to make other plans.
She listened quietly, and said no word, but allowed me to lead her up the cave until we reached the copse of which I have spoken. We were still hidden from sight, for the bushes grew thick, and the trees were large and had abundant foliage. She held out her hand to say good-bye.
"I shall remember your kindness," she said.
"And do not think too hardly about me," I pleaded, "remember what I have had to suffer."
"I shall think of you very kindly," was her response; "not that it matters to you," she added. "We are strangers, most probably we shall never meet again, and the opinion of a stranger cannot help you."
"It is more than you can think," I answered, eagerly. "When I saw that look of sympathy on your face when I stood in the pillory at Falmouth it made everything easier to bear. Besides, you say you will stay at Pennington, and I look upon Pennington as my home."
"Yes; but surely you will not stay here. It cannot be right for a man to idle away his time as you are idling it; besides, you can never win back Pennington thus. If I were you I would find work, and I would honourably make my way back to fortune."
"But the Tresidders will not allow me," I replied, stung into shame by her words, "they have always put obstacles in my path."
"Then I would go where the Tresidders could not harm me," she cried, and then she went away, as though I were the merest commonplace stranger, as indeed I was.
I mused afterward that she did not even tell me her name, although she had no means of knowing that I had found it out, neither did she tell me that she would keep the secret of my hiding-place from my enemies. And more than all this, she bade me leave St. Eve, where I should be away from her, although my longings grew stronger to stay by her side. All this made me very weary of life, and I went back to the mouth of the cave and sat watching the sea as it rose higher and higher around "The Spanish Cavalier," and wondered with a weary heart what I should do.
When night came on Eli Fraddam brought me food, and sat by me while I ate it, looking all the while up into my face with his strange wild eyes.
"Jasper missuble," he grunted, presently.
"Yes, Eli," I said, "everything and everybody is against me."
"I knaw! I knaw!" cried Eli, as though a new thought had struck him, "I'll 'elp 'ee, Jasper; I'll vind out!"
"Find out what, Eli?"
But he would not answer. He hugged himself as though he were vastly pleased, and laughed, in his low guttural way, and after a time took his departure.
When I was left alone, I tried to think of my plans for the future, for Naomi's words kept ringing in my ears, "If I were you I would find work, and I would honourably make my way back to fortune." I saw now that for a year I had acted like a madman. Instead of meeting my reverses bravely, I had acted like a coward. I had sunk in the estimation of others as well as in my own. I had loafed around the lanes, and had made friends with the idle and the dissolute. Even my plans for vengeance were those of a savage. I, Jasper Pennington, could think of no other way of punishing my enemies than by mastering them with sheer brute force. Besides, all the time I had made no step toward winning back my home, and thus obeying my father's wishes. I felt this, too; I had deservedly lost the esteem of the people. I had become what the Tresidders said I was. I saw myself a vagrant and a savage, and although my fate had been hard, I deserved the punishment I was then suffering. I had forgotten that I was a Pennington, forgotten that I was a gentleman.
But what could I do? Houseless, homeless, friendless, except for the friendship of Eli Fraddam and his mother, and practically outlawed, what was there that I, Jasper Pennington, could put my hand to? I could not tell. The possibility of honourably making my way back to fortune seemed a dream impossible to be fulfilled.
For a long time I sat brooding, while the candle which Eli had brought burnt lower and lower, and finally went out. The darkness stirred new thoughts within me. Hitherto I had not troubled about Granfer Fraddam's ghost haunting the cave. The wind which wailed its way up through the cave till it found vent in the copse above explained the sounds which had been heard. But now all the stories which I had heard came back to me. Did Granfer Fraddam die there? and did his ghost haunt this dreary cavern? Even then I might be sitting on the very spot where he had died.
I started up and lit another candle. I looked around me, and shuddered at the black, forbidding sides of the cavern, then leaving the candle to cast its ghostly light around I crept toward the entrance. I saw the sea lapping the black rocks around, and heard its dismal surge. Then I heard a rushing noise whir past me, and it seemed as though a ghostly hand had struck my face. Directly afterward I heard a cry which made the blood run cold in my veins. Most likely it was only a seagull which I had frightened from its resting-place among the rocks, but to me it was the shriek of a lost soul.
Trembling, I found my way back to the cave again, where the candle still burnt, and cast its flickering light around. I was afraid to stay there any longer, and determined to