She did not move.
'Come, Mehalah, draw up your chair,' said her mother.
'I am not going to eat,' she answered resolutely.
'You shall,' shouted Elijah, rising impetuously, and thrusting his chair back. 'You are insulting me in my own house if you refuse to eat with me.'
'I have no appetite.'
'You will not eat, I heard you say so. I know the devilry of your heart. You will not, but I will? In his rage he stamped on the trap-door that he had uncovered, when removing the chair. Instantly a prolonged, hideous howl rose from the depths and rang through the room. Mistress Sharland started back aghast. Mehalah raised her head, and the colour left her cheek.
'Oh ho!' roared Elijah. 'You will join in also, will you?' He drew the bolts passionately back.
'Look here,' he cried to Mehalah. 'Come here!'
Involuntarily she obeyed, and looked down. She saw into a vault feebly illuminated by daylight through one of the circular windows she had noticed on approaching the house. There she saw looking up, directly under the trap, a face so horrible in its dirt and madness that she recoiled.
'She won't eat, she won't bite with me,' shouted Rebow, 'then neither shall her mother eat, nor will I. You shall have the whole.' He caught up the dish, and threw down the rashers. The man below snapped, and caught like a wild beast, and uttered a growl of satisfaction.
Rebow flung the door back into its place, and rebolted it. Then he placed his chair in its former position, and looked composedly from the widow to Mehalah and seemed to draw pleasure from their fear.
'My brother,' he explained. 'Been mad from a child. A good job for me, as he was the elder. Now I have him in keeping, and the land and the house and the money are mine. What I hold, I hold fast. Amen.'
CHAPTER V.
THE DECOY.
There was commotion on the beach at Mersea City.
A man-of-war, a schooner, lay off the entrance to the Blackwater, and was signalling with bunting to the coastguard ship, permanently anchored off the island, which was replying. War had been declared with France some time, but as yet had not interfered with the smuggling trade, which was carried on with the Low Countries. Cruisers in the Channel had made it precarious work along the South Coast, and this had rather stimulated the activity of contraband traffic on the East. It was therefore with no little uneasiness that a war ship was observed standing off the Mersea flats. Why was she there? Was a man-of-war to cruise about the mouth of the Colne and Blackwater continually? What was the purport of the correspondence carried on between the schooner and the coastguard? Such were the queries put about among those gathered on the shingle.
They were not long left in doubt, for a boat manned by coastguards left the revenue vessel and ran ashore; the captain sprang out, and went up the beach to his cottage, followed by a couple of the crew. The eager islanders crowded round the remainder, and asked the news.
The captain was appointed to the command of the schooner, the 'Salamander,' which had come from the Downs under the charge of the first lieutenant, to pick him up. The destiny of the 'Salamander' was, of course, unknown.
Captain Macpherson was a keen, canny Scot, small and dapper; as he pushed through the cluster of men in fishing jerseys and wading boots he gave them a nod and a word, 'You ought to be serving your country instead of robbing her, ye loons. Why don't you volunteer like men, there's more money to be made by prizes than by running spirits.'
'That won't do, captain,' said Jim Morrell, an old fisherman. 'We know better than that. There's the oysters.'
'Oysters!' exclaimed the captain; 'there'll be no time for eating oysters now, and no money to pay for them neither. Come along with me, some of you shore crabs. I promise you better sport than sneaking about the creeks. We'll have at Johnny Crapaud with gun and cutlass.'
Then he entered his cottage, which was near the shore, to say farewell to his wife.
'If there's mischief to be done, that chap will do it,' was the general observation, when his back was turned.
Attention was all at once distracted by a young woman in a tall taxcart who was endeavouring to urge her horse along the road, but the animal, conscious of having an inexperienced hand on the rein, backed, and jibbed, and played a number of tricks, to her great dismay.
'Oh, do please some of you men lead him along. I daresay he will go if his head be turned east, but he is frightened by seeing so many of you.'
'Where are you going, Phoebe?' asked old Morrell.
'I'm only going to Waldegraves,' she answered. 'Oh, bother the creature! there he goes again!' as the horse danced impatiently, and swung round.
'De Witt!' she cried in an imploring tone, 'do hold his head. It is a shame of you men not to help a poor girl.'
George at once went to the rescue.
'Lead him on, De Witt, please, till we are away from the beach.'
The young man good-naturedly held the bit, and the horse obeyed without attempting resistance.
'There's a donkey on the lawn by Elm Tree Cottage,' said the girl; 'she brays whenever a horse passes, and I'm mortal afeared lest she scare this beast, and he runs away with me. If he do so, I can't hold him in, my wrists are so weak.'
'Why, Phoebe,' said De Witt, 'what are you driving for? Waldegraves is not more than a mile and a half off, and you might have walked the distance well enough.'
'I've sprained my ankle, and I can't walk. I must go to Waldegraves, I have a message there to my aunt, so Isaac Mead lent me the horse.'
'If you can't drive, you may do worse than sprain your ankle, you may break your neck.'
'That is what I am afraid of, George. The boy was to have driven me, but he is so excited, I suppose, about the man-of-war coming in, that he has run off. There! take care!'
'Can't you go on now?' asked De Witt, letting go the bridle. Immediately the horse began to jib and rear.
'You are lugging at his mouth fit to break his jaw, Phoebe. No wonder the beast won't go.'
'Am I, George? It is the fright. I don't understand the horse. O dear! O dear! I shall never get to Waldegraves by myself.'
'Let the horse go, but don't job his mouth in that way.'
'There he is turning round. He will go home again. O George! save me.'
'You are pulling him round, of course he will turn if you drag at the rein.'
'I don't understand horses,' burst forth Phoebe, and she threw the reins down. 'George, there's a good, dear fellow, jump in beside me. There's room for two, quite cosy. Drive me to Waldegraves. I shall never forget your goodness.' She put her two hands together, and looked piteously in the young man's face.
Phoebe Musset was a very good-looking girl, fair with bright blue eyes, and yellow hair, much more delicately made than most of the girls in the place. Moreover, she dressed above them. She was a village coquette, accustomed to being made much of, and of showing her caprices. Her father owned the store at the city where groceries and drapery were sold, and was esteemed a well-to-do man. He farmed a little land. Phoebe was his only child, and she was allowed to do pretty much as she liked. Her father and mother were hard-working people, but Phoebe's small hands were ever unsoiled, for they were ever unemployed. She neither milked the cows nor weighed the sugar. She liked indeed to be in the shop, to gossip with anyone who came in, and perhaps the only goods she condescended to sell was tobacco to the young sailors, from whom she might calculate on a word of flattery and a lovelorn look. She was always well and becomingly dressed. Now, in a chip bonnet trimmed with blue riband, and tied under the chin, with a white lace-edged kerchief over her shoulders, covering her bosom, she was irresistible. So at least De Witt found her, for he was obliged to climb the gig, seat himself beside her,