CHAPTER VIII

When Godfrey Cass returned from Mrs. Osgood's party at midnight, he
was not much surprised to learn that Dunsey had not come home.
Perhaps he had not sold Wildfire, and was waiting for another chance--
perhaps, on that foggy afternoon, he had preferred housing
himself at the Red Lion at Batherley for the night, if the run had
kept him in that neighbourhood; for he was not likely to feel much
concern about leaving his brother in suspense. Godfrey's mind was
too full of Nancy Lammeter's looks and behaviour, too full of the
exasperation against himself and his lot, which the sight of her
always produced in him, for him to give much thought to Wildfire, or
to the probabilities of Dunstan's conduct.

The next morning the whole village was excited by the story of the
robbery, and Godfrey, like every one else, was occupied in gathering
and discussing news about it, and in visiting the Stone-pits. The
rain had washed away all possibility of distinguishing foot-marks,
but a close investigation of the spot had disclosed, in the
direction opposite to the village, a tinder-box, with a flint and
steel, half sunk in the mud. It was not Silas's tinder-box, for the
only one he had ever had was still standing on his shelf; and the
inference generally accepted was, that the tinder-box in the ditch
was somehow connected with the robbery. A small minority shook
their heads, and intimated their opinion that it was not a robbery
to have much light thrown on it by tinder-boxes, that Master
Marner's tale had a queer look with it, and that such things had
been known as a man's doing himself a mischief, and then setting the
justice to look for the doer. But when questioned closely as to
their grounds for this opinion, and what Master Marner had to gain
by such false pretences, they only shook their heads as before, and
observed that there was no knowing what some folks counted gain;
moreover, that everybody had a right to their own opinions, grounds
or no grounds, and that the weaver, as everybody knew, was partly
crazy. Mr. Macey, though he joined in the defence of Marner against
all suspicions of deceit, also pooh-poohed the tinder-box; indeed,
repudiated it as a rather impious suggestion, tending to imply that
everything must be done by human hands, and that there was no power
which could make away with the guineas without moving the bricks.
Nevertheless, he turned round rather sharply on Mr. Tookey, when the
zealous deputy, feeling that this was a view of the case peculiarly
suited to a parish-clerk, carried it still farther, and doubted
whether it was right to inquire into a robbery at all when the
circumstances were so mysterious.

"As if," concluded Mr. Tookey--"as if there was nothing but
what could be made out by justices and constables."

"Now, don't you be for overshooting the mark, Tookey," said
Mr. Macey, nodding his head aside admonishingly. "That's what
you're allays at; if I throw a stone and hit, you think there's
summat better than hitting, and you try to throw a stone beyond.
What I said was against the tinder-box: I said nothing against
justices and constables, for they're o' King George's making, and it
'ud be ill-becoming a man in a parish office to fly out again' King
George."

While these discussions were going on amongst the group outside the
Rainbow, a higher consultation was being carried on within, under
the presidency of Mr. Crackenthorp, the rector, assisted by Squire
Cass and other substantial parishioners. It had just occurred to
Mr. Snell, the landlord--he being, as he observed, a man
accustomed to put two and two together--to connect with the
tinder-box, which, as deputy-constable, he himself had had the
honourable distinction of finding, certain recollections of a pedlar
who had called to drink at the house about a month before, and had
actually stated that he carried a tinder-box about with him to light
his pipe. Here, surely, was a clue to be followed out. And as
memory, when duly impregnated with ascertained facts, is sometimes
surprisingly fertile, Mr. Snell gradually recovered a vivid
impression of the effect produced on him by the pedlar's countenance
and conversation. He had a "look with his eye" which fell
unpleasantly on Mr. Snell's sensitive organism. To be sure, he
didn't say anything particular--no, except that about the
tinder-box--but it isn't what a man says, it's the way he says it.
Moreover, he had a swarthy foreignness of complexion which boded
little honesty.

"Did he wear ear-rings?" Mr. Crackenthorp wished to know, having
some acquaintance with foreign customs.

"Well--stay--let me see," said Mr. Snell, like a docile
clairvoyante, who would really not make a mistake if she could help
it. After stretching the corners of his mouth and contracting his
eyes, as if he were trying to see the ear-rings, he appeared to give
up the effort, and said, "Well, he'd got ear-rings in his box to
sell, so it's nat'ral to suppose he might wear 'em. But he called
at every house, a'most, in the village; there's somebody else,
mayhap, saw 'em in his ears, though I can't take upon me rightly to
say."

Mr. Snell was correct in his surmise, that somebody else would
remember the pedlar's ear-rings. For on the spread of inquiry among
the villagers it was stated with gathering emphasis, that the parson
had wanted to know whether the pedlar wore ear-rings in his ears,
and an impression was created that a great deal depended on the
eliciting of this fact. Of course, every one who heard the
question, not having any distinct image of the pedlar as _without_
ear-rings, immediately had an image of him _with_ ear-rings, larger
or smaller, as the case might be; and the image was presently taken
for a vivid recollection, so that the glazier's wife, a
well-intentioned woman, not given to lying, and whose house was
among the cleanest in the village, was ready to declare, as sure as
ever she meant to take the sacrament the very next Christmas that
was ever coming, that she had seen big ear-rings, in the shape of
the young moon, in the pedlar's two ears; while Jinny Oates, the
cobbler's daughter, being a more imaginative person, stated not only
that she had seen them too, but that they had made her blood creep,
as it did at that very moment while there she stood.

Also, by way of throwing further light on this clue of the
tinder-box, a collection was made of all the articles purchased from
the pedlar at various houses, and carried to the Rainbow to be
exhibited there. In fact, there was a general feeling in the
village, that for the clearing-up of this robbery there must be a
great deal done at the Rainbow, and that no man need offer his wife
an excuse for going there while it was the scene of severe public
duties.

Some disappointment was felt, and perhaps a little indignation also,
when it became known that Silas Marner, on being questioned by the
Squire and the parson, had retained no other recollection of the
pedlar than that he had called at his door, but had not entered his
house, having turned away at once when Silas, holding the door ajar,
had said that he wanted nothing. This had been Silas's testimony,
though he clutched strongly at the idea of the pedlar's being the
culprit, if only because it gave him a definite image of a
whereabout for his gold after it had been taken away from its
hiding-place: he could see it now in the pedlar's box. But it was
observed with some irritation in the village, that anybody but a
"blind creatur" like Marner would have seen the man prowling
about, for how came he to leave his tinder-box in the ditch close
by, if he hadn't been lingering there? Doubtless, he had made his
observations when he saw Marner at the door. Anybody might know--
and only look at him--that the weaver was a half-crazy miser. It
was a wonder the pedlar hadn't murdered him; men of that sort, with
rings in their ears, had been known for murderers often and often;
there had been one tried at the 'sizes, not so long ago but what
there were people living who remembered it.

Godfrey Cass, indeed, entering the Rainbow during one of Mr. Snell's
frequently repeated recitals of his testimony, had treated it
lightly, stating that he himself had bought a pen-knife of the
pedlar, and thought him a merry grinning fellow enough; it was all
nonsense, he said, about the man's evil looks. But this was spoken
of in the village as the random talk of youth, "as if it was only
Mr. Snell who had seen something odd about the pedlar!" On the
contrary, there were at least half-a-dozen who were ready to go
before Justice Malam, and give in much more striking testimony than
any the landlord could furnish. It was to be hoped Mr. Godfrey
would not go to Tarley and throw cold water on what Mr. Snell said
there, and so prevent the justice from drawing up a warrant. He was
suspected of intending this, when, after mid-day, he was seen
setting off on horseback in the direction of Tarley.

But by this time Godfrey's interest in the robbery had faded before
his growing anxiety about Dunstan and Wildfire, and he was going,
not to Tarley, but to Batherley, unable to rest in uncertainty about
them any longer. The possibility that Dunstan had played him the
ugly trick of riding away with Wildfire, to return at the end of a
month, when he had gambled away or otherwise squandered the price of
the horse, was a fear that urged itself upon him more, even, than
the thought of an accidental injury; and now that the dance at
Mrs. Osgood's was past, he was irritated with himself that he had
trusted his horse to Dunstan. Instead of trying to still his fears,
he encouraged them, with that superstitious impression which clings
to us all, that if we expect evil very strongly it is the less
likely to come; and when he heard a horse approaching at a trot, and
saw a hat rising above a hedge beyond an angle of the lane, he felt
as if his conjuration had succeeded. But no sooner did the horse
come within sight, than his heart sank again. It was not Wildfire;
and in a few moments more he discerned that the rider was not
Dunstan, but Bryce, who pulled up to speak, with a face that implied
something disagreeable.

"Well, Mr. Godfrey, that's a lucky brother of yours, that Master
Dunsey, isn't he?"

"What do you mean?" said Godfrey, hastily.

"Why, hasn't he been home yet?" said Bryce.

"Home? no. What has happened? Be quick. What has he done with
my horse?"

"Ah, I thought it was yours, though he pretended you had parted
with it to him."

"Has he thrown him down and broken his knees?" said Godfrey,
flushed with exasperation.

"Worse than that," said Bryce. "You see, I'd made a bargain with
him to buy the horse for a hundred and twenty--a swinging price,
but I always liked the horse. And what does he do but go and stake
him--fly at a hedge with stakes in it, atop of a bank with a ditch
before it. The horse had been dead a pretty good while when he was
found. So he hasn't been home since, has he?"

"Home? no," said Godfrey, "and he'd better keep away. Confound
me for a fool! I might have known this would be the end of it."

"Well, to tell you the truth," said Bryce, "after I'd bargained
for the horse, it did come into my head that he might be riding and
selling the horse without your knowledge, for I didn't believe it
was his own. I knew Master Dunsey was up to his tricks sometimes.
But where can he be gone? He's never been seen at Batherley. He
couldn't have been hurt, for he must have walked off."

"Hurt?" said Godfrey, bitterly. "He'll never be hurt--he's
made to hurt other people."

"And so you _did_ give him leave to sell the horse, eh?" said
Bryce.

"Yes; I wanted to part with the horse--he was always a little too
hard in the mouth for me," said Godfrey; his pride making him wince
under the idea that Bryce guessed the sale to be a matter of
necessity. "I was going to see after him--I thought some
mischief had happened. I'll go back now," he added, turning the
horse's head, and wishing he could get rid of Bryce; for he felt
that the long-dreaded crisis in his life was close upon him.
"You're coming on to Raveloe, aren't you?"

"Well, no, not now," said Bryce. "I _was_ coming round there,
for I had to go to Flitton, and I thought I might as well take you
in my way, and just let you know all I knew myself about the horse.
I suppose Master Dunsey didn't like to show himself till the ill
news had blown over a bit. He's perhaps gone to pay a visit at the
Three Crowns, by Whitbridge--I know he's fond of the house."

"Perhaps he is," said Godfrey, rather absently. Then rousing
himself, he said, with an effort at carelessness, "We shall hear of
him soon enough, I'll be bound."

"Well, here's my turning," said Bryce, not surprised to perceive
that Godfrey was rather "down"; "so I'll bid you good-day, and
wish I may bring you better news another time."

Godfrey rode along slowly, representing to himself the scene of
confession to his father from which he felt that there was now no
longer any escape. The revelation about the money must be made the
very next morning; and if he withheld the rest, Dunstan would be
sure to come back shortly, and, finding that he must bear the brunt
of his father's anger, would tell the whole story out of spite, even
though he had nothing to gain by it. There was one step, perhaps,
by which he might still win Dunstan's silence and put off the evil
day: he might tell his father that he had himself spent the money
paid to him by Fowler; and as he had never been guilty of such an
offence before, the affair would blow over after a little storming.
But Godfrey could not bend himself to this. He felt that in letting
Dunstan have the money, he had already been guilty of a breach of
trust hardly less culpable than that of spending the money directly
for his own behoof; and yet there was a distinction between the two
acts which made him feel that the one was so much more blackening
than the other as to be intolerable to him.

"I don't pretend to be a good fellow," he said to himself; "but
I'm not a scoundrel--at least, I'll stop short somewhere. I'll
bear the consequences of what I _have_ done sooner than make believe
I've done what I never would have done. I'd never have spent the
money for my own pleasure--I was tortured into it."

Through the remainder of this day Godfrey, with only occasional
fluctuations, kept his will bent in the direction of a complete
avowal to his father, and he withheld the story of Wildfire's loss
till the next morning, that it might serve him as an introduction to
heavier matter. The old Squire was accustomed to his son's frequent
absence from home, and thought neither Dunstan's nor Wildfire's
non-appearance a matter calling for remark. Godfrey said to himself
again and again, that if he let slip this one opportunity of
confession, he might never have another; the revelation might be
made even in a more odious way than by Dunstan's malignity: _she_
might come as she had threatened to do. And then he tried to make
the scene easier to himself by rehearsal: he made up his mind how he
would pass from the admission of his weakness in letting Dunstan
have the money to the fact that Dunstan had a hold on him which he
had been unable to shake off, and how he would work up his father to
expect something very bad before he told him the fact. The old
Squire was an implacable man: he made resolutions in violent anger,
and he was not to be moved from them after his anger had subsided--
as fiery volcanic matters cool and harden into rock. Like many
violent and implacable men, he allowed evils to grow under favour of
his own heedlessness, till they pressed upon him with exasperating
force, and then he turned round with fierce severity and became
unrelentingly hard. This was his system with his tenants: he
allowed them to get into arrears, neglect their fences, reduce their
stock, sell their straw, and otherwise go the wrong way,--and
then, when he became short of money in consequence of this
indulgence, he took the hardest measures and would listen to no
appeal. Godfrey knew all this, and felt it with the greater force
because he had constantly suffered annoyance from witnessing his
father's sudden fits of unrelentingness, for which his own habitual
irresolution deprived him of all sympathy. (He was not critical on
the faulty indulgence which preceded these fits; _that_ seemed to
him natural enough.) Still there was just the chance, Godfrey
thought, that his father's pride might see this marriage in a light
that would induce him to hush it up, rather than turn his son out
and make the family the talk of the country for ten miles round.

This was the view of the case that Godfrey managed to keep before
him pretty closely till midnight, and he went to sleep thinking that
he had done with inward debating. But when he awoke in the still
morning darkness he found it impossible to reawaken his evening
thoughts; it was as if they had been tired out and were not to be
roused to further work. Instead of arguments for confession, he
could now feel the presence of nothing but its evil consequences:
the old dread of disgrace came back--the old shrinking from the
thought of raising a hopeless barrier between himself and Nancy--
the old disposition to rely on chances which might be favourable to
him, and save him from betrayal. Why, after all, should he cut off
the hope of them by his own act? He had seen the matter in a wrong
light yesterday. He had been in a rage with Dunstan, and had
thought of nothing but a thorough break-up of their mutual
understanding; but what it would be really wisest for him to do, was
to try and soften his father's anger against Dunsey, and keep things
as nearly as possible in their old condition. If Dunsey did not
come back for a few days (and Godfrey did not know but that the
rascal had enough money in his pocket to enable him to keep away
still longer), everything might blow over.