When Anthony came home, he found that his father had been waiting supper a while for him, and then as he did not arrive, had ordered it in, and partaken of the meal.

The old man's humour was not pleasant. He had been over that afternoon to Kilworthy, and had heard of his son's act of recklessness. Fears were entertained for Fox's sight in one eye. He was ordered to have the eye bandaged, and to be kept in the dark.

When Anthony entered the room where was his father, the old man looked up at him from the table strewn with the remains of his meal, and said, roughly, "I expect regular hours kept in my house. Why were you not here at the proper time? About any new folly or violence?"

Anthony did not answer, but seated himself at the table.

"I have been to Kilworthy," said the old man, "I have heard there of your conduct."

"Fox insulted me. You would not have me endure an insult tamely?" His father's tone nettled the young man.

"Certainly not; but men pink each other with rapiers, instead of striking with lace tags."

"That is the first time any one has let fall that I am not a man," said Anthony.

There was always a certain roughness, a lack of amiability in the behaviour of father to son and son to father, not arising out of lack of affection, but that the old man was by nature coarse-grained, and he delighted in seeing his son blunt and brusque. He—young Tony—was no milk-sop, he was proud to say. He was a lad who could hold his own against any one, and fight his way through the world. The old man was gratified at the swagger and independence of the youth, and at every proof he gave of rude and over-bearing self-esteem. But he was not pleased at the brawl with Fox Crymes; it was undignified for one thing, and it caused a breach where he wished to see union. It threw an impediment in the way of the execution of a darling scheme, a scheme on which his heart had been set for twenty years.

"I do not know what it was about," said the father, "more than that I had heard you had been squabbling in an alehouse about some girl."

"The insult or impertinence was levelled at me," said Anthony, controlling himself; "I did not mean to injure Fox, on that you may rely. I struck him over the face because he had whipped me into anger which I could not contain. I am sorry if I have hurt his eye. I am not sorry for having struck him, he brought it on himself."

"It is not creditable," pursued old Cleverdon, "that your name should be brought into men's mouths about a vulgar brawl over some village drab or house wench."

The blood surged into Anthony's face, he laid down his knife and looked steadily across the table at his father.

"On that score," said he, "you may set your mind at rest. There has been no brawl over any village wench."

"I can quite understand," said the father, "that Fox Crymes was jealous and did not measure words. He can pepper and spice his speeches till they burn as cantharides. What is he beside you? If you cast a fancy here or there, and there be naught serious in it, and it interferes with his sport, he must bear it. But, Tony, it is high time you was married. We must have no more of these wrangles. Whose name came up between you? Was it his sister's? I can well understand he does not relish her marriage. There has ever been rough water between them. She has the property—and when old Justice Crymes dies—where will he be? Was that the occasion of the dispute?"

"No, father, it was not."

"Then it was not about Julian?"

"About Julian? Certainly not."

"Nor about some village girl?"

"Nor about any village girl, as I have said."

"Then what was it about? or rather, about whom was it?"

"There is no reason why you should not know," answered Anthony, with coolness, "though that is a side matter. Fox told me that a suitable ornament for my cap was a coxcomb. That is why I struck him."

The old man laughed out. "You did well to chastise him for that."

"As you asked what girl's name was brought up, I will tell you," said Anthony. "It was that of Urith Malvine."

"Urith Malvine!" scoffed old Cleverdon, his eyes twinkling malevolently. "Not surprised at that light hussy bringing herself into men's mouths in a tavern."

"Father!" exclaimed the young man, "not a word against her. I will not bear that from you or from any man."

"You will not bear it!" almost screamed old Anthony. "You—you! make yourself champion of a beggar brat like that?"

"Did you hear my words?" said the young man, standing up. "No one—not even you—shall speak against her. It was because Fox sneered at her that I struck him; he might have scoffed at me, and I would have passed that over."

"And you threaten me? You will knock out my eye with your tags?"

"I merely warn you, father, that I will not suffer her name to be improperly used. I cannot raise my hand against you, but I will leave the room."

"It is high time you were married. By the Lord! you shall be married. I will not be rasped like this."

"I will marry when I see fit," said Anthony.

"The fitness is now," retorted his father. "When a young gallant begins to squabble at village mug-houses about——"

"Father!"

"The near time is ripe. I will see Squire Crymes about it to-morrow."

"I am not going to take Julian Crymes."

"You shall take whom I choose."

"I am to marry—not you, father; accordingly, the choice lies with me."

"You cannot choose against my will."

"Can I not? I can choose where I list."

"Anyhow, you cannot take where I do not allow. I will never allow of a wife to you who is not of good birth and rich."

"Of good birth she is—she whom I have chosen; rich she is not, but what matters that when I have enough."

"Are you mad?" screamed the old man, springing from his chair and running up and down the room, in wild excitement. "Are you mad? Do you dare tell me you have chosen without consulting me—without regard for my wishes?"

"I shall take Urith, or none at all."

"Then none at all," snapped old Cleverdon. "Never, never will I consent to your bringing that hussy through my doors, under my roof."

"What harm has she done you? You have not heard a word against her. She is not rich, but not absolutely poor—she has, or will have, Willsworthy."

"Willsworthy! What is that compared with Julian's inheritance?"

"It is nothing. But I don't want Julian, and I will not take her for the sake of her property. Come, father, sit down, and let us talk this matter coolly and sensible."

He threw himself into a chair, and laid his hands on the arms, and stretched his legs before him.

The Squire stopped, looked at his son, then staggered back to his chair as if he had been struck in the breast. He thought his son must have lost his wits. Why—he had not known this girl, this daughter of his most deadly enemy, not more than a day, and already he was talking of making her his wife! And this, too, to the throwing over of his grand opportunity of uniting the Kilworthy property to Hall!

"Come, father, sit down, and keep cool. I am sorry if you prefer Julian to Urith, but unfortunately the selection has to be made, not by you, but by me, and I greatly prefer Urith to Julian. Indeed, I will not have the latter at any price—not if she inherited all the Abbey lands of Tavistock. You are disappointed, but you will get over it. When you come to know Urith you will like her; she has lost her father—and she will find one in you."

"Never!" gasped the old man; then with an oath, as he beat his fist on the table, "Never!"

Bessie heard that high words were being cast about in the supper-room, and she opened the door and came in with a candle, on the pretence that she desired to have the table cleared if her brother had done his meal.

"You may have all taken away," said Anthony. "My father has destroyed what appetite I had."

"Your appetite," stormed the old man, "is after most unwholesome diet; you turn from the rich acres to the starving peat bog. By heaven! I will have you shut up in a mad-house along with your wench. I will have a summons out against her at once. I will go to Fernando Crymes for it—it is sheer witchcraft. You have not seen her to speak to half-a-dozen times. You never came to know her at all till you had played the fool with her father's grave, and now——. By Heaven, it is witchcraft! Folks have been burnt for lighter cases than this."

Bessie went over to her father, and put her arms round him, but he thrust her away. She looked appealingly to her brother, but Anthony did not catch her eye.

"I do not see what you have against Urith," said Anthony, after a long pause, during which the old man sat quivering with excitement, working his hands up and down on the arms of his chair, as though polishing them. "That she is not rich is no fault of hers. I have seen her often, and have now and then exchanged a word with her, though only yesterday came to see much of her, and have a long talk with her. I did her a great wrong by my desecration of her father's grave."

"Oh! you would make that good by marrying the daughter. Well, you have put out Fox's eye. Patch that up by marrying his sister." The old man's voice shook with anger.

Anthony exercised unusual self-control. He knew that he had reached a point in his life when he must not act with rashness; he saw that his father's opposition was more serious than he had anticipated. Hitherto he had but to express a wish, and it was yielded to. Occasionally he had had differences with the old man, but had invariably, in the end, carried out his own point. He did not doubt, even now, that finally his father would give way, but clearly not till after a battle of unusual violence; but it was one in which he was resolved not to yield. His passion for Urith was of sudden and also rapid growth, but was strong and sincere. Moreover, he had pledged himself to her, and could not draw back.

Bessie was resolved, at all costs, to divert the wrath of her father from Anthony, if possible to turn his thoughts into another channel; so she said, stooping to his ear,

"Father; dear father! We met to-day our grandmother in the churchyard."

The old man looked inquiringly at her.

"Madame Penwarne," exclaimed Bessie.

He had forgotten for the moment that she could have a grandmother on any other side than his own, and he knew that his mother was long dead.

"Yes, father," said Bessie. "And she says Anthony is the living image of our dear, dear mother."

The old man turned his eyes slowly on his son. The light of the candle was on his face, bold, haughty, defiant, and wonderfully handsome. Yes! he was the very image of his mother, and that same defiant smile he had inherited from her. The old man in a moment recalled many a wild scene of mutual reproach and stormy struggle. It was as though the dead woman's spirit had risen up against him to defy him once more, and to strike him to the heart.

Then Anthony said, "It is true, father. We both of us met her; and it is unfit that she should find a shelter elsewhere than in this house. Something must be done for her."

"Oh! you will teach me my duty! She is naught to me."

"But to us she is. She is the mother of our mother," answered Anthony, looking straight into his father's eyes, and the old man lowered his; he felt the reproach in his son's words and glance.

Then he clenched his hands and teeth, and stood up, and wrung his hands together.

Presently, with a gasp, he said, "Because I married a beggar, is this mating with beggars to be a curse in the family from generation to generation, entailed from father to son. It shall not be; by heaven! it shall not be. You have had your own way too long, Anthony! I have borne with your whimsies, because they were harmless. Now you will wreck your own happiness, your honour, make yourself the laughing-stock of the whole country! I will save you from yourself. Do you hear me? I tried the sport, and it did not answer. I had wealth and she beauty, and beauty alone. It did not answer. We were cat and dog—your mother and I. Bessie knows it. She can bear me witness. I will not suffer this house to be made a hell of again."

"Father," said Anthony, "it was not that which caused you unhappiness—it was that you had interfered with the love of two who had given their hearts to each other."

Bessie threw herself between her father and brother. "Oh, Anthony! Anthony!" she cried.

"You say that!" exclaimed the old man.

"I do—and now I warn you not to do the same thing. Urith and I love each other, and will have each other."

"I tell you I hate the girl—she shall never come here."

"Father," said Anthony—his pulses were beating like a thundering furious sea against cliffs, as a raging gale flinging itself against the moorland tors—"father, I see why it is that you are against Urith. You nourish against her the bitterness you felt against her father. You laughed and were pleased when I had dishonoured his grave. That surprised me. Now I understand all, and now I am forced to speak out the truth. You did a wrong in taking our mother away from him whom she loved, and then you ill-treated her when you had her in your power. You have nothing else against Urith—nothing. That she is poor is no crime."

Bessie clasped her arms about the old man. "Do not listen to him," she said. "He forgets his duty to you, only because he has been excited and wronged to-day." Then to her brother: "Anthony! do not forget that he is your father, to whom reverence is due."

Anthony remained silent for a couple of minutes, then he stood up from his chair, and went over to the old man. "I was wrong," he said. "I should not have spoken thus. Come, father, we have had little puffs between us, never such a bang as this. Let it be over; no more about the matter between us for a day or two, till we are both cool."

"I will make an end of this affair at once," said Squire Cleverdon. "What is the good of putting off what must be said?—of expecting a change which will never take place. You shall never—never obtain my consent. So give up the hussy, or you shall rue it."

"Nothing is gained, father, by threatening me. You must know that. I have made up my mind." He folded his arms on his breast.

"And so have I mine," answered old Cleverdon, folding his arms.

Father and son stood opposite each other, hard and fixed in their resolves—both men of indomitable, inflexible determination.

"Hear mine," said the Squire; "you give the creature up. Do you hear?"

"I hear and refuse. I will not, I cannot give up Urith. I have pledged my word."

"And here I pledge mine!" shouted the old man.

"No—no, in pity, father! Oh, Anthony, leave the room!" pleaded Bessie, again interposing, but again ineffectually; her brother swept her aside, and refolded his arms, confronting his father.

"Say on!" he said, with his eyes fixed on the old man.

"I swear by all I hold sacred," exclaimed the father, "that I will never suffer that beggar-brat to cross my threshold. Now you know my resolution. As long as I am alive, she shall be kept from it by my arms, and I shall take care that she shall never rule here when I am gone. Now you know my mind, marry her or not as you please. That is my last word to you."

"Your last word to me!" repeated Anthony. He set his hat on his head, the hat in which hung the utterly withered marsh marigolds. "Very well; so be it." He walked to the door, passed through, and slammed it behind him.