Replevin

“ Thresk abandoned all attempt to fence with her. Mrs. Repton was not of those women who would lightly give their women-friends away. Her phrase "my Stella" had, besides, revealed a world of love and championship. Thresk warmed to her because of it. He threw reticence to the winds.
"I am going to give you the real reason, Mrs. Repton. I saw her photograph this afternoon on Mrs. Carruthers' piano, and it left me wondering whether happiness could set so much character in a woman's face."
Mrs. Repton shrugged her shoulders.
"Some of us age quickly here." ”

“ All that remained for him to do was to walk across a yard and pass through the empty rooms of a lodge; and in a few moments he found himself in the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré. Of course—and this he had reckoned on—the police had not provided for this secret outlet.
"Well, what do you think of Baron Repstein?" cried Lupin, after giving me all the details of that tragic night. "What a dirty scoundrel! And how it teaches one to distrust appearances! I swear to you, the fellow looked a thoroughly honest man!" ”

“ You shall never be 'of us.'”
“I am happy to say that I disagree with you,” said Repton; “I am a much older man than you, and I can draw, therefore, on a longer experience. Now the change that I myself have seen come over the tone and temper of the world since I was a boy is far more marvellous to me than all the new-fangled discoveries around us in steam and electricity. Why, sir, the man who now addresses you, born of an ancient stock, as good blood as any untitled gentleman of the land, was treated once as Jack Cade might be in a London drawing-room. ”

“ Behind them, the gentry howled and loosed off their guns, but the brambles defeated them, for Revel caught no sounds of pursuit. A scream that thrilled up and choked off must have been the unfortunate Blue Breeches.
Revel looked up, thinking of the globes; he could see the sky in many places through the tangle, but realized that it was probably a thick green solid floor to a watcher from above. A god would have to come very low to see anything moving beneath it. ”

“ Revel stooped and took up the weapon of a dead man. It was a good pick, with a longer handle than the Mink's own. He reached it out to Ewyo, holding it by the head, and the squire took it and stepped back a pace.
"When you're ready, Mink."
"Now, Ewyo."
They circled each other, warily watching the eyes and arms of the enemy. "Why didn't you shoot me?" asked Revel in wonder.
"Too unsporting," growled the beefy squire, his pale eyes squinting with strain. "A gentleman doesn't take advantages." ”

“ Revel heard the phrase, wondered who "we" might be; but so much had happened in the last seconds that he did not question Jerran. He couldn't absorb all the shattering facts. A man could not only touch a god, he could murder it! The gods were not all-powerful, for they could not perform telepathy if rock were in the way. Truly it was a morning of wonders. The world was falling around him.
He stared at the limp corpse of the globe. The tentacles were already shriveling up, the emanation of energy that surrounded the living orbs was gone. ”

“ Mrs. Repton wanted to speak. Thresk gave her confidence. He seemed to be a man without many illusions, he was no romantic sentimentalist. She went back to the poem of which the lines had been chasing one another through her head all through this dinner, as a sort of accompaniment to their conversation. Had he found it out? she asked herself—
"The world and what it fears."
Thus she hung hesitating while Mrs. Carruthers gathered in her hands her gloves and her fan. There was a woman at the other end of the table however who would not stop talking. ”

“ Revel laughed grimly, "Haven't I been busy? Haven't I sent a troop for Dawvys in his hole in the coppice, and another to say in the lanes and shebeens that I'm alive? Here, Vorl, Sesker, and you three, get out! Steal horses from the mansions' stables, and spread the news. We rise tonight! Whether or not I find what I seek, we rise! If we all perish in a god-blast, still we rise! When you've enough men, attack the gentry's homes, beginning at Dolfya's center and spreading out. Put every horse available on the road to Korla and Hakes Town and every village within knowledge. ”

“ I don't want people at all. I want—oh, how I want——" She stopped and then she added vaguely: "Something else," and her voice trailed away into silence. She sat without a word, all tingling impatience, during the rest of that drive and continued so to sit after the carriage had stopped. When Jane Repton descended, and she woke up with a start and looked at the house, it was as though she brought her eyes down from heaven to earth. Once within the house she went straight up to Repton. He had left his wife behind with Stella at the Law Courts and had come home in advance of them. ”

“ Heaven knows,” said he, sighing, “we have little left to tie us to anything or anywhere; and as to myself, it is a matter of the most perfect indifference whether I drag out the year or two that may remain to me on the shores of Galway or beside the Adriatic!”
“I can't bear this,” cried Repton, angrily. “If ever there was a man well treated by fortune, you are he.”
“I 'm not complaining.”
“Not complaining! but, hang it, sir, that is not enough! You should be overflowing with gratitude; your life ought to be active with benevolence ”

“ I'll take care of the wench."
Revel saw her lips curl slightly; she didn't believe she could be hurt, even though she had a moment before been screaming at the death of her gods. She was brave, or stupid, or very confident of her untouchability. He glanced down over her body, squeezed tight by the silver gown. Her breasts were fuller and higher than a ruck girl's, her limbs unbunched with muscles, smooth and lovely.
"No, she doesn't die," he said. "Not unless I do." ”

“ Revel laughed. It was too ridiculous a statement to merit an answer. He made a feint, Ewyo parried skillfully. Then the squire brought his pick down in a looping arc. His reach was as long as Revel's, and the pick gave him an advantage. Revel jumped back, slashed sideways and missed. They circled.
"The gods will win out," grunted Ewyo.
"Their day is done. We are aided by the Ancient Kingdom."
"Superstition! Things have always been as they are." ”

“ Repton, I see you do not keep all your flatteries for the jury-box.”
“My moments are too limited here to allow me time for an untruth. I must be off; to-night I have a special retainer for a great record at Roscommon, and at this very instant I should be poring over deeds and parchments, instead of gazing at 'orbs divinely blue;' not but, I believe, now that I look closer, yours are hazel.” ”

“ I ain’t going to have any truck with Krevin—after what I’ve learnt—and seen, especially seen. Business—such as I might have done—and expected to do—with him and Getch, is one thing, but murder and the like o’ that is another. I ain’t going to have no Krevin’s aboard my ship—now! What I’ve promised to do, young master, I will do!—and that’s to put you and the young lady ashore on the mainland, safe and sound. ”

“ You brave the greatest perils with a stout-heartedness that the best of us could scarcely summon.”
“But, in this case, the peril is not mine, sir.”
“I am not so sure of that, Miss Mary,” said Repton, doubtingly,—“I 'm not so sure of that.” And, with crossed arms and bent-down head, he paced the room slowly back and forwards. “Ay,” muttered he to himself, “Thursday night—Friday, at all events—will close the record. I can speak to evidence on the morning, and be back here again some time in the night. Of course it is a duty,—it is more than a duty.” ”

“ I asked. “Personally?”
“Spoken to the man a time or two,” he replied. “Seen him—many a time. I see him get five years, one time, at Exeter Assizes. Many years since that—he’s been put away since then, more than once. But I do know that he was used by Krevin—for various jobs. And, as I say, I reckon that in this last affair, when he’d done his job, Krevin and Getch done him in—just as Krevin’s done in Getch. And, of course, Krevin’ll get done in himself—if that Hindu chap as you spoke of hasn’t done him in already! ”

“ Three days later, starving and with frozen hands and feet, he came stumbling up to the stockade and fell in a lump.
“Feed him up,” ordered Reivers, smiling. “I’ve got a little use for him when he’s fixed up so he can feel. You see, Treplin,” he continued to Toppy, who had been called to bring the man back to life, “I’m not all cruelty. When I want to save a man to amuse myself with I’m almost as much of a humanitarian as you are.” ”

“ There was already a bloody gash on Revel's scalp, and the little yellow man, Jerran, lay quite still with red trickling out of his head.
Then Rack had picked up Revel's pick and disengaged the grip of his hand (was it as cold and lifeless as she'd thought? could the Mink be dead?) from her wrist, and booted Dawvys out on the trail.
That had been hours ago. They were still bumbling through the forest, although the sun was high.
"He's leading us wrong," she panted. "Don't trust him. He's an important rebel."
"He wants to live as badly as we do, Lady. He'll take us home." ”

“ Jerran had explained away the psychic scent left by the Lady Nirea. He must be talking to a god. But another voice spoke now, and Revel sat up, thinking, The gods don't make sounds!
"Was there a girl with him, a girl of the gentry in a silver gown?"
"No, Lord Ewyo—" it was her father, then!—"he was alone."
"He may have hidden her body somewhere," said a heavy voice. Rack, by the Orbs, Revel's brother Rack! "He's turned violent today."
"I understand he's your brother?" said Ewyo.
"Aye. A strong violent man, but worse today than ever he's been." ”

“ She stayed with him till he breathed his last breath, and then—in virtue of some pledge I hear that she made him—she fled, no one knows whither. All trace of her is lost; and though I have sent messengers on every side, none have yet discovered her.”
“Suicide is not the vice of our people,” said Repton, gravely.
“I know that well, and the knowledge makes me hopeful. But what sufferings are yet before her, what fearful trials has she to meet!”
“By Jove!” cried Repton, rising and pacing the room, “you have courage, young lady, that would do honor to a man. ”

“ The old grudge of social disqualification had eaten deep into his heart, and, as Repton saw, it would take at least two generations of men, well-to-do and successful, to eradicate the sentiment.
Nelligan was quick enough to see that these opinions of his were not shared by his guest, and said, “I cannot expect, Mr. Repton, that you will join me in these views; you have seen these people always as an equal, if not their superior; they met you with their best faces and sweetest flatteries. Not so with us. They draw a line, as though to say, go on: make your fortunes; purchase estates ”

“ For an instant his eyes narrowed, as if trying to see beyond Toppy’s smile and read what lay behind, but Toppy’s good poker-face now stood him in good stead, and he looked blandly back at Reivers’ peering eyes and continued to smile. Reivers laughed.
“Quite right, Treplin; obliged to you for correcting me,” he said. “A chap gets rusty out here, where none of the laws of speech are observed. I’ll depend upon you to bring me back to form again—later on. Is your ankle really feeling strong?” ”

“ Thresk went out of the room without a word more to either Repton or his wife. Whatever he did now he must do by himself. He would not be admitted into that house again. He closed the door of the room behind him, and hardly had he closed it when he heard the snap of a switch and the line of light under the door vanished. Once more there was darkness in the drawing-room. Repton no doubt had returned to his wife's side and they were huddled again side by side on the sofa. Thresk walked down the hill with a horrible feeling of isolation and loneliness. ”

“ Repton.”
“I kiss your hand, Miss Martin,” said he, accompanying the speech by the act, with all the grace of a courtier. “It's worth while being an old fellow, to be able to claim these antiquated privileges.”
There was something in the jaunty air and well-assumed gallantry of the old lawyer which at once pleased Mary, who accepted his courtesy with a gracious smile. She had been picturing to herself a very different kind of companion, and was well satisfied with the reality.
“I proposed to young Mr. Nelligan to join us,” said Repton, as he conducted her to the door ”

“ Whom the gods destroy, they first madden. That was part of the Globate Credo, wasn't it? Well, Revel had been gradually made mad that day, and now, by Orbs, he'd show them something before he was destroyed!
As the first descended past him, and wrapped two tentacles under the girl's armpits to lift her, he lifted his pick to smack it as he had the supervising deity in the mine. He felt a tug; another globe had a whiplash arm around his pick. Gritting teeth, he threw his tremendous brawn into a swing, and the pick tore loose from the tentacle and sprayed the guts out of the sphere before him. ”

“ I ha’ known Krevin a many years! He was a main bad ’un, Krevin! The sort o’ man, you understand, as was clever at engineering things—very often keeping hisself in the background. Didn’t operate much this part o’ the world, though—his work was mainly on the East Coast—in them Essex marshes, though now and then he was Dorset way. There was a time when he wasn’t in England at all—he’d experience of India, and Burma, and China, had that man. And ’tis my belief, master, as he engineered for Getch to take that public-house at Wreddlesham—Getch, he was a Cornish native by rights. ”