The brothers shifted on their chairs and pronounced for Tregors simultaneously. The lawyer nodded. Very well then. As soon as he got their mother’s sanction he would set to work. Ortho promised to settle his mother and the two left.
Ortho had no difficulty with Teresa. He successfully used the hollow threat of a debtor’s prison to her, for she had been in a lock-up several times during her roving youth and had no wish to return.
Besides she was sick of debt, of being pestered for money here, there and everywhere.
She gave her consent readily enough, and within a fortnight was called upon to sign.
Carveth Donnithorne, the ever-prospering ship chandler of Falmouth, was the mortgagee; nine hundred and fifty pounds was the sum he paid, and very good value it was.
Teresa settled the Crowan liabilities with the lawyer, and, parading round the town, squared all her other accounts in a single afternoon. She did it in style, swept into the premises of those who had pressed her, planked her money down, damned them for a pack of thieves and leeches, swore that was the end of her custom and stamped majestically out.
She finished up in a high state of elation. She had told a number of her enemies exactly what she thought of them, was free of debt and had a large sum of ready money in hand again—two hundred and fifty pounds in three canvas bags, the whole contained in a saddle wallet.
Opposite the market cross she met an old crony, a retired ship captain by the name of Jeremiah Gish, and told him in detail what she had said to the shop-keepers. The old gentleman listened with all his ears. He admired Teresa immensely. He admired her big buxom style, her strength, her fire, but most of all he revered her for her language. Never in forty years seafaring had he met with such a flow of vituperation as Teresa could loose when roused, such range, such spontaneity, such blistering invention. It drew him like music. He caught her affectionately by the arm, led her to a tavern, treated her to a pot of ale and begged her to repeat what she had said to the shop-keepers.
Teresa, nothing loth, obliged. The old tarpaulin listened rapt, nodded his bald head in approval, an expression on his face of one who hears the chiming of celestial spheres.