Orphan Dinah By Eden Phillpotts Author of "Miser's Money," etc. 1920 London : William Heinemann LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN. 1920. CONTENTS CHAPTER I. THE HILLTOP II. FALCON FARM III. SUPPER IV. AT BUCKLAND-IN-THE-MOOR V. THE ACCIDENT VI. ON HAZEL TOR VII. AT GREEN HAYES VIII. THE OLD FOX-HUNTER IX. A HOLIDAY FOR SUSAN X. TALKING WITH DINAH XI. NEW BRIDGE XII. AFTERWARDS XIII. JOE ON ECONOMICS XIV. THE FACE ON THE ROCK XV. BEN BAMSEY'S DOUBTS XVI. SUNDAY XVII. DINAH XVIII. MAYNARD XIX. LIGHT OF AUTUMN XX. THE HUNTER'S MOON XXI. FUNERAL XXII. AT WATERSMEET XXIII. IN A SICK-ROOM XXIV. "THE REST IS EASY" XXV. JOHN AND JOE XXVI. MR. PALK SEEKS ADVICE XXVII. DISCOVERY XXVIII. THE LAW XXIX. JOE TAKES IT ILL XXX. THE NEST XXXI. JOE'S SUNDAY XXXII. JANE AND JERRY XXXIII. JOE HEARS THE SECRET XXXIV. AN OFFER XXXV. FOR RIGHT AND JUSTICE XXXVI. THE WEDDING DAY XXXVII. SHEPHERD'S CROSS XXXVIII. RETURN FROM THE HONEYMOON CHAPTER I THE HILLTOP The spectacle of a free horizon from Buckland Beacon, at the southern rampart of Dartmoor, challenges the least discerning eye by the accident of its immensity, and attracts an understanding vision for weightier reasons. Beheld from this high place, Dart Vale and the land beyond it afford a great composition of nature, orbicular and complete. Its obvious grandeur none can question, but there is much more to be said for it, and from beneath the conspicuous and rhetorical qualities there emerge enduring distinctions. The scene belongs to an order of beauty that does not grow old. Its sensitiveness to light and the operations of the sky; its gracious, yet austere, composition and its far flung arena for the masques and interludes of the dancing hours render it a centre of sleepless variation. Its native fabrics, now gay, now solemn, are a fit habit for the lyrical and epic seasons, and its garments are transformed, not only by the robings and disrobings of Spring and Winter, but at a point's change in the wind, at a rise or fall of temperature. These delicacies, with the more patent magic of fore-glow and dawn, sunset and after-glow, crepuscule and gloaming, are revealed under the most perfect imaginable conditions; for, by many chances and happy hazards, earth here responds to air in all its heights and depths so completely that each phenomenon finds all needful for fullest achievement. One might study the vision a thousand times, yet find no picture resemble another, even in detail of large forms; for the actual modelling changes, since light and atmosphere deal with forest, rock and ridge as though they were plastic--suppressing here, uplifting there, obliterating great passages at one moment and erecting into sudden prominence things concealed at another. The hill sinks at the pressure of a purple shadow; the unseen river suddenly sparkles its presence at a sunbeam.