Part 1 (1/2)

Moonfleet

by J Meade Falkner

CHAPTER 1

IN MOONFLEET VILLAGE

So sleeps the pride of fore of Moonfleet lies half a ht or west bank of the Fleet stream This rivulet, which is so narrow as it passes the houses that I have known a good jumper clear it without a pole, broadens out into salt e, and loses itself at last in a lake of brackish water The lake is good for nothing except sea-fowl, herons, and oysters, and for shut off froreat beach or dike of pebbles, of which I shall speak ht that this place was called Moonfleet, because on a still night, whether in suhtly on the lagoon; but learned afterwards that 'twas but short for 'Mohune-fleet', froreat family ere once lords of all these parts

My nae when this story begins My father and mother had both been dead for years, and I boarded with my aunt, Miss Arnold, as kind to me in her own fashi+on, but too strict and precise ever toin the fall of the year 1757 It otten the exact date, and I sat in the little front parlour reading after tea My aunt had few books; a Bible, a Common Prayer, and some volumes of sermons are all that I can recollect now; but the Reverend Mr Glennie, who taught us village children, had lent me a story-book, full of interest and adventure, called the Arabian Nights Entertain loth to leave off reading for several reasons; as, first, the parlour was a chilly room with horse-hair chairs and sofa, and only a coloured-paper screen in the grate, for my aunt did not allow a fire till the first of November; second, there was a rank s winter candles on frames in the back kitchen; third, I had reached a part in the Arabian Nights which tightenedfor very anxiousness of expectation It was that point in the story of the 'Wonderful Lamp', where the false uncle lets fall a stone that seals the round chamber; and immures the boy, Aladdin, in the darkness, because he would not give up the laain This scene rehtmares, where we drea in upon us, and so i in an adventure that befelland stepped out into the street It was a poor street at best, though once, no doubt, it had been finer Now, there were not two hundred souls in Moonfleet, and yet the houses that held the either side of the road Nothing was ever e; if a house wanted repair badly, it was pulled down, and so there were toothless gaps in the street, and overrun gardens with broken-doalls, and h they could stand but little longer

The sun had set; indeed, it was already so dusk that the lower or sea-end of the street was lost fro or s weeds, and that first frosty feeling of the autu fires and the cos to co of a ha, for we had no trades in Moonfleet save that of fishi+ng It was Ratsey the sexton at work in a shed which opened on the street, lettering a toraver He had been mason before he became fisherman, and was handy with his tools; so that if anyone wanted a headstone set up in the churchyard, he went to Ratsey to get it done I lent over the half-door and watched hiht froto do, come in and hold the lantern for et all finished'

Ratsey was always kind to me, and had lent me a chisel many a time tohiraver, and blinking the while when they came too nearthe finishi+ng touches to a little sea-piece carved at the top of the stone, which showed a schooner boarding a cutter I thought it fine work at the tih; indeed, you may see it for yourself in Moonfleet churchyard to this day, and read the inscription too, though it is yelloith lichen, and not so plain as it was that night This is how it runs:

SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF DAVID BLOCK

Aged 15, as killed by a shot fired from the Elector Schooner, 21 June 1757

Of life bereft (by fell design), I le with my fellow clay

On God's protection I recline To save ement Day

There too must you, cruel man, appear, Repent ere it be all too late; Or else a dreadful sentence fear, For God will sure revenge my fate

The Reverend Mr Glennie wrote the verses, and I knew theivenwith the tale of David's death, and it was yet in every mouth He was only child to Elzevir Block, who kept the Why Not? inn at the bottoe, and ith the contrabandiers, when their ketch was boarded that June night by the Governistrate Maskew of Moonfleet Manor who had put the Revenue men on the track, and anyway he was on board the Elector as she overhauled the ketch There was soside, of one another, and Maske a pistol and fired it off in young David's face, with only the two gunwales between theht the ketch into Moonfleet, and there was a posse of constables to lers off to Dorchester Jail The prisoners trudged up through the village ironed two and two together, while people stood at their doors or followed the thestave and Monkburyfor their wives But they left David's body in the ketch, so the boy paid dear for his night's frolic

'Ay, 'twas a cruel, cruel thing to fire on so young a lad,' Ratsey said, as he stepped back a pace to study the effect of a flag that he was chiselling on the Revenue schooner, 'and trouble is likely to come to the other poor fellows taken, for Lawyer E at next assize I recollect', he went on, 'thirty years ago, when there was a bit of a scuffle between the Royal Sophy and the Marnhull, they hanged four of the contrabandiers, andto see the poor chaps turned off at Dorchester, and standing up to his knees in the river Froht of them, for all the countryside was there, and such a press there was no place on land There, that's enough,' he said, turning again to the gravestone 'On Monday I'll line the ports in black, and get a brush of red to pick out the flag; and now, my son, you've helped with the lantern, so come down to the Why Not? and there I'll have a ith Elzevir, who sadly needs the talk of kindly friends to cheer hilass of Hollands to keep out autuht it a vast honour to be asked to the Why Not?-for did not such an invitation raise nity of er are we as boys to be quit of thee, hat regret do we look back on thee before our man's race is half-way run! Yet was not my pleasure without alloy, for I feared even to think of what Aunt Jane would say if she knew that I had been at the Why Not?-and beside that, I stood in awe of gririmmer and sadder a thousand times since David's death

The Why Not? was not the real name of the inn; it was properly the Mohune Arms The Mohunes had once owned, as I have said, the whole of the village; but their fortunes fell, and with them fell the fortunes of Moonfleet The ruins of their e; their alle deserted and overgrown; the Mohune i fro that bore it was stamped also with the superscription of decay And here it is necessary that I say a feords as to this fae; for, as you will see, I was to bear it all rave The Mohune shi+eld was plain white or silver, and bore nothing upon it except a great black 'Y I call it a 'Y', though the Reverend Mr Glennie once explained to me that it was not a 'Y' at all, but what heralds call a cross-pall Cross-pall or no cross-pall, it looked for all the world like a black 'Y', with a broad ar in each of the top corners of the shi+eld, and the tail conizance carved on the manor, and on the stonework and ork of the church, and on a score of houses in the village, and it hung on the signboard over the door of the inn Everyone knew the Mohune 'Y' forcalled the inn the Why Not? in jest, the name had stuck to it ever since

More than once on winter evenings, whenin the Why Not?, I had stood outside, and listened to the One, Two, Three', or sos had neither beginning nor ending, and very little sense to catch hold of in the middle One man would crone the air, and the others would crone a sole, for Elzevir Block never got drunk hiet drunk either On singing nights the roolass inside that one could not see in; but at other tih the red curtains and watched Elzevir Block and Ratsey playing backgammon at the trestle-table by the fire It was on the trestle-table that Block had afterwards laid out his son's dead body, and soht and seen the father trying to wash the blood- and talking to the lifeless clay as if it could understand Anyhow, there had been little drinking in the inn since that tirew more and more silent and morose He had never courted customers, and now he scowled on any that cahted spot, and went to drink at the Three Choughs at Ringstave

My heart was in my mouth when Ratsey lifted the latch and led ht except a fire of seawood on the hearth, burning clear and lambent with blue salt flames There were tables at each end of the room, and wooden-seated chairs round the walls, and at the trestle table by the chi at the fire He was a rizzled hair, a broad but not unkindly face of regular features, bushy eyebrows, and the finest forehead that I ever saw His fra; indeed, the countryside was full of tales of his strange prowess or endurance Blocks had been landlords at the Why Not? father and son for years, but Elzevir's ot his outland name and could speak Dutch Few men knew much of him, and folks often wondered hoas he kept the Why Not? on so little custom as went that way Yet he never seemed to lack for th, they would speak also of s helped, and sick coifts, and hint that soriot up as we came in, and my fears led me to think that his face darkened when he saw me

'What does this boy want?' he said to Ratsey sharply

'He wants the salass of Ararat milk to keep out autu another chair up to the trestle-table

'Cows' milk is best for children such as he,' was Elzevir's answer, as he took two shi+ning brass candlesticks from the mantel-board, set the chip froe as David, and cothe paint upon the shi+ps, and, please God, by Monday night ill have it set fair and square in the churchyard, and then the poor ladhe has above him Master Ratsey's best handiwork, and the parson's verses to set forth how shaht that Elzevir softened a little as Ratsey spoke of his son, and he said, 'Ay, David rests in peace 'Tis they that brought him to his end that shall not rest in peace when their time comes And itmore to himself than to us I knew that he istrate that he had better keep out of Elzevir's way, for there was no knohat a desperate e street, and nothing worse co look from Block

'Tush, man!' broke in the sexton, 'it was the foulest deed ever man did; but let not thy ed Leave that to Providence; for He whose wisdos be done, will surely see they eance is Mine; I will repay, saith the Lord”' And he took his hat off and hung it on a peg