"Punctual to the appointed time, I met Mason at Teign Head cot. But my uncle did not appear. An hour we waited; then came the boy and the dogs. The lad had also heard one report of a distant fowling-piece, but he had worked all the way down to our starting-place without seeing his master. "Still I found myself not anxious. I partook of food, then went down the valley expecting to meet him at every turn. At last I reached the place where we had parted, and then Mason and the dogs together made that terrible discovery. You know the rest. My unhappy relative was reduced to the primal, 'porcelain clay of human kind.' He had slain himself by putting his weapon to his throat and pulling the trigger with his foot. My fishing-line had been used for that terrible purpose. "'Ill news is wing'd with fate, and flies apace,' says Dryden. Before set of sun, as though carried on magic pinions, the whole little world of Chagford knew what had happened. It was a very trying time for me. My spirit sank. But for thoughts of Fox Tor Farm I could have relinquished my new responsibilities and envied the eternal rest of the dead. I felt most dreadfully unsettled. Nothing mattered. The dubiety of mundane affairs was much borne in upon me. Reflections concerning the shortness and darkness of man's days crowded down like a fog upon my spirit. I felt as I never yet had felt, that "'The world's an inn, and death the journey's end.' Dryden again. "There he lay in his life's blood--extinct and cold as ice. He had chosen to destroy himself within a hollow worked by the old-time miners. Great deliberation and forethought clearly marked his actions. Yet I am thankful that they brought it in as insanity; and, for my part, I am positive that the dear gentleman's mind had given way under his misfortunes. But there is no marrying nor giving in marriage where he is now." Mrs. Malherb wept silently as Peter finished his story. Then her husband spoke. "He was a coward, and a coward is better out of the way. No human tribulations can justify the evasion of suicide. The man's duty had been to follow them, find his false lady, and, with proper formality, blow her lover's brains out, not his own. Go to the piano, Grace." CHAPTER VII THE SEVEN FAIL That night the weather changed from fair to foul. Dense vapours descended upon the Moor, driving mists wrapped hill and valley; scarce a mountain thrust its crown above the gloom. For two days the rain prevailed and Grace was in some fear that the change would delay Peter Norcot and lengthen his stay at Fox Tor Farm; but when she whispered that belief to Kekewich in the breakfast parlour on the morning of their visitor's departure, the old man showed no fear. "He'll go. He'm not the sort to change his plans for a scat o' rain. You'll be rids of him by noon." "Oh Kek, when shall I be rids of him altogether?"