I
offered to lend him a hand in carrying it. But he hoisted it on his
back and took it no farther than the cottage in which he lived, where
it remained locked with a padlock.

"Towards Christmas-time, then, the house was ready, but to our
surprise he did not move into it. He seemed, indeed, of a sudden, to
have lost all liking for it, and whether it was that he had no longer
any work upon his hands, he took to following Mrs. Lovyes about, but
in a way that was unnoticeable unless you had other reasons to suspect
that his thoughts were following her.

"His conduct in this respect was particularly brought home to me on
Christmas Day. The afternoon was warm and sunny, and I walked over the
hill at Merchant's Point, meaning to bathe in the little sequestered
bay beyond. From the top of the hill I saw Mrs. Lovyes walking along
the strip of beach alone, and as I descended the hill-side, which
is very deep in fern and heather, I came plump upon Jarvis Grudge,
stretched full-length on the ground. He was watching Mrs. Lovyes with
so greedy a concentration of his senses that he did not remark my
approach. I asked him when he meant to enter his new house.

"'I do not know that I ever shall,' he replied.

"'Then why did you build it?' I asked.

"'Because I was a fool!' and then he burst out in a passionate
whisper. 'But a fool I was to stay here, and a fool's trick it was
to build that house!' He shook his fist in its direction. 'Call it
Grudge's Folly, and there's the name for it!' and with that he turned
him again to spying upon Mrs. Lovyes.

"After a while he spoke again, but slowly and with his eyes fixed upon
the figure moving upon the beach.

"'Do you remember the night I came ashore? You had caught a shark that
day, and you told me of it. The great lilac shadow which rises from
the depths and circles about the bait, and sinks again and rises again
and takes--how long?--two years maybe before he snaps it.'

"'But he does not carry it away,' said I, taking his meaning.

"'Sometimes--sometimes," he snarled.

"'That depends on how quick we are with the gaff."

"'You!' he laughed, and taking me by the elbows, he shook me till I
was giddy.

"'I owe Mrs. Lovyes everything,' I said. At that he let me go. The
ferocity of his manner, however, confirmed me in my fears, and, with a
boy's extravagance, I carried from that day a big knife in my belt.

"'The gaff, I suppose,' said Mr. Grudge with a polite smile when
first