CHAPTER XXXII
AN ANXIOUS SEARCH
Early the next morning Mr. Force, Leonidas and Wynnette, who begged to make one of the party, left Enderby Castle for Lancashire.
The gray-haired coachman drove them in an open carriage to the Nethermost Railway Station.
On this drive they retraced the road on the top of the cliffs which they had traversed on the previous day.
They reached Nethermost just in time to jump on board the “parliamentary,” a slow train—none but slow trains ever did stop at this obscure and unfrequented station.
Mr. Force secured a first-class compartment for himself and party, and they were soon comfortably seated and being whirled onward toward Lancaster.
For some miles the road followed the line of the coast in a southerly direction, and then diverged a little to the eastward until it reached the ancient and picturesque town of Lancaster, perched upon its own hill and crowned with its old castle, which dates back to the time of John of Gaunt.
Here they left their train, and on consulting the local time-table in the ticket office found that the next train on the branch line going to the station nearest Angleton did not start until 3 P.M.
This, as it was now but 11 A.M., gave the party an opportunity of seeing the town, as well as of getting a luncheon.
A chorus of voices offered cabs; but Mr. Force, waving them all away, walked up the street of antiquated houses and brought his party to the ancient inn of “The Royal Oak.”
Here he ordered luncheon, to be ready at two, and then set out with his young people to walk through the town.
They climbed the hill and viewed the castle, now fallen from its ancient glory of a royal fortress—not into ruin, but into deeper degradation as the county jail. But the donjon keep, King John’s Tower, and John of Gaunt’s Gate remain as of old.
They next visited the old parish church of St. Mary’s, where they saw some wonderful stained glass windows, brass statuary, and oak carvings of a date to which the memory of man reached not back.
They could only gaze upon the outside of the cotton and silk factories and the iron foundries before the clock in the church tower struck two, and they returned to the hotel for lunch.
At three o’clock they took the train for Angleton.
Their course now lay eastward through many a mile of the manufacturing districts, and then entered a moorland, waste and sparsely inhabited, stretching eastward to the range of mountains known in local phraseology as “England’s Backbone.”
It was six o’clock on a warm June afternoon when the slow train stopped at a little, lonely station, in the midst of a moor, where there was not another house anywhere in sight.
Here our travelers left their compartment and came out upon the platform, carpetbags in hand; and the train went on its way.
Our party paused on the platform, looking about them.
On their right hand stood the station, a small, strong building of stone with two rooms and a ticket office. Behind that the moor stretched out in unbroken solitude to the horizon.
On their left hand was the track of the railroad, and beyond that the moor rolling into low hills, toward the distant range of mountains.
There was not a vehicle of any sort in sight; and there were but two human beings besides themselves on the spot—one was the ticket agent and the other the railway porter.
Mr. Force spoke to the latter.
“Where can I get a carriage to take my party on to Angleton?”
The man, a red, shock-haired rustic, stared at the questioner a minute before answering.
“Noa whurr, maister, leaf it be at t’ Whoit Coo.”
“And where is the White Cow?” inquired the gentleman.
The rustic stretched his arm out and pointed due east.
Mr. Force strained his eyes in that direction, but at first could see nothing but the moor stretching out in the distance and rolling into hills as it reached the range of mountains.
“Papa,” said Wynnette, who was straining her eyes also, “I think I see the place. I know I see a curl of smoke and the top of a chimney, and the peak of a gable-end roof. I think the rise of the ground prevents our seeing more.”
“Oie, oie, yon’s t’ Whoit Coo,” assented the porter.
“How far is it from here?” inquired Mr. Force.
“Taw mulls, maister.”
“Can you go there and bring us a carriage of some sort? I will pay you well for your trouble,” said Mr. Force.
“Naw, maister. Oi’ mawn’t leave t’ stution.”
“Uncle!” exclaimed Le, “I can go and bring you a carriage in no time. You take Wynnette into the house and wait for me.”
And without more ado Le ran across the track and strode off across the moor.
Mr. Force took Wynnette into the waiting room of the little wayside station, where they sat down.
There was no carpet on the floor, no paper on the walls, no shades at the windows, but against the walls were rows of wooden benches, and on them large posters of railway and steamboat routes, hotels, watering places, and so forth, and one picture of the winner of the last Derby.
They had scarcely time to get tired of waiting before Le came back with the most wretched-looking turnout that ever tried to be a useful conveyance.
It was a long cart covered with faded and torn black leather, and furnished with wooden seats without cushions. Its harness was worn and patched. But there was one comfort in the whole equipage—the horse was in very good condition. It was a strong draught horse.
“I shall not have to cry for cruelty to animals, at any rate,” said Wynnette, as her father helped her up into a seat.
“How far is it to Angleton?” inquired Mr. Force of the driver.
“Sux mulls, surr,” answered the man. “Sux mulls, if yur tek it cross t’ moor, but tun, ’round b’ t’ rood.”
“Is it very rough across the moor?” inquired Mr. Force.
“Muddlin’, maister,” replied the man.
“Go across the moor,” said the gentleman, as he stepped up into the carriage.
Le followed him. The horse started and trudged on, jolting them over the irons on the railway track and striking into the very worst country road they had ever known.
Yes. It was rough riding across that moor, sitting on hard benches, in a cart without springs, and drawn by a strong, hard-trotting horse.
Our travelers were jolted until their bones were sore before they reached the first stopping place.
This was “‘The White Cow,” an old-fashioned inn, in a dip of the moor, where the ground began to roll in hills and hollows toward the distant mountains.
The house fronted east, and, as it lay basking in the late afternoon summer sun, was very picturesque. Its steep, gable roof was of red tiles, with tall, twisted chimneys, and projecting dormer windows; its walls were of some dark, gray stone, with broad windows and doors, and a great archway leading into the stable yard. A staff, with a swinging sign, stood before the door.
The declining sun threw the shadow of the house in front of it; and in this shade a pair of country laborers sat on a bench, with a table before them. They were smoking short pipes and drinking beer, which stood in pewter pots on the board.
This was the only sign of life and business about the still place.
As the cart drew up Mr. Force got out of it and helped his daughter to alight.
Le followed them.
“I think we will go in the house and rest a while, and see if we can get a decent cup of tea, my dear. We have had nothing since we left Lancaster, at three o’clock, and it is now half-past seven. You must be both tired and hungry,” said the squire, leading her in.
“‘I’m killed, sire,’”
responded Wynnette, misapplying a line from Browning, as she limped along on her father’s arm.
The man who had driven them from the railway station, and whom after developments proved to be waiter, hostler, groom and bootblack rolled into one for the guests of the White Cow, left his horse and cart standing and ran before Mr. Force to show the travelers into the house.
It was needless; but he did it.
They entered a broad hall paved with flagstones.
On the left of this an open door revealed the taproom, half full of rustic workingmen, who were smoking, drinking, laughing and talking, and whose forms loomed indistinctly through the thick smoke, tinted in one corner like a golden mist by the horizontal rays of the setting sun that streamed obliquely through the end window.
On the right another open door revealed a large low-ceiled parlor, with whitewashed walls and sanded floor, a broad window in front filled with flowering plants in pots, and a broad fireplace at the back filled with evergreen boughs and cut paper flowers. On the walls were cheap colored pictures, purporting to be portraits of the queen and members of the royal family. Against the walls were ranged Windsor chairs. On the mantelpiece stood an eight-day clock, flanked by a pair of sperm candles, in brass candlesticks.
In the middle of the floor stood a square table, covered with a damask cloth as white as new fallen snow, and so smooth and glossy, with such sharp lines where it had been folded, that proved it to have been just taken from the linen press and spread upon the table.
The house might be old-fashioned and somewhat dilapidated, not to say tumble-down, as to its outward appearance; but this large, low-ceiled room was clean, neat, fresh and fragrant as it was possible for a room to be.
“This is pleasant, isn’t it, papa?” said Wynnette, as she stood by the flowery window, threw off her brown straw hat, pulled off her gloves, drew off her duster, put them all upon one chair and dropped herself into another.
“Yes. If the tea proves as good as the room, we shall be content,” replied Mr. Force.
The man-of-all-work, who had slipped out and put on a clean apron, and taken up a clean towel, with magical expedition, now reappeared to take orders.
“What would you please to have, sir?”
“Tea for the party, and anything else you have in the house that is good to eat with it.”
“Yes, sir.”
And the waiter pulled the white tablecloth this way and that and smoothed it with the palms of his hands, apparently for no other reason than to prove his zeal, for he did not improve the cloth.
Mr. Force and Le walked out “to look around,” they said.