ABOUT WITCHCRAFT
One day Peter went into the village to buy stimulants, and found, when
he reached the house of the creaking sign-board, that he was penniless;
a serious discovery, because the landlord was an austere man who allowed
no "slate." Some people are born thirsty, others have thirstiness thrust
upon them, and a third class, to which Peter belonged, acquire
thirstiness by toilsome and tedious endeavour. It was a long walk, and
the moor, like the bones in the valley, was very dry; there was not a
foot of shade, and the wind was parching. Peter had long ago discovered
it was easy to acquire thirst by the simple expedient of proceeding as
directly as possible to the place where it could be quenched. He would
borrow three-halfpence from his sister, or extract it from her box if
she was absent, and then make for the village by the nearest route,
winning the necessary dryness as he went. On this occasion he had
forgotten about money, chiefly because he had not been compelled to
borrow or steal from Mary recently, as Chegwidden had unconsciously
supplied him with the means for enjoyment.
Peter leaned against the wall, and cursed all living creatures and
things inanimate. He flattered himself with the belief that he was a man
who never wasted time. He had walked from the hut-circles with a
definite object, which was twofold: the acquiring of thirst and the
quenching of the same. The first part had been attained to perfection,
but unfortunately it was the inferior part, it was the laborious side,
and the reward was not to come because he had been absent-minded before
the event, instead of, as was usually the case, afterwards. He wondered
if there was in the immediate neighbourhood any charitable soul who
would lend him twopence, not to be repaid.
It was a feast-day in the village. Chapel tea and an Ebenezer love-feast
were in full swing, for Pezzack and his bride had arrived that day to
take up their abode in a cottage which had been freshly whitewashed to
symbolise the spotless nature of its new occupants' souls. Children,
dressed in their best, had earlier paraded the street with a yellow
banner, shrill hymn-screaming, and a box to collect the offerings of the
faithful.
It had been announced that Pezzack would preside over the tea, and that
his bride would pour it out. Eli would recite grace, and all the
children would say amen. Later there would be prayer and preaching, when
Pendoggat was expected to give further proof of his rough eloquence and
of his devotion to the particular form of religion which he favoured and
to the pastor who was its faithful and local representative. Then a
blessing would be given, and the girls and young men would pair off in
the dark and embrace in lonely places.
Peter saw signs of the love-feast, and tokens of the refreshments, and
the sight increased his thirst. Had beer been on supply within the
chapel, instead of rather weak tea, he would probably have experienced a
sudden ardour for religion, and have hurried there with incoherent
entreaties to be placed on the penitential bench and received into the
Wesleyan fold. As the festivities were of an entirely temperate nature,
so far as things fluid were concerned, he decided to go and visit
school-master. It was not in the least likely that the old man would
lend him twopence, but Peter had enough wit to argue that it is often
the most unlikely things which happen.
Master was sitting at his window, writing a letter to his son in Canada.
He welcomed Peter gladly, and at once asked him to spell "turnips." It
was a strange question, considering their positions, but Master
explained he was getting so old and forgetful, and never could get the
simple words right. The long and difficult words he could spell readily
enough, but when it came to anything easy he felt so mazed he couldn't
seem to think of anything.
"I be telling my Jackie how amazing fine the turnips be this fall," he
explained.
Peter was glad to oblige Master. To help him with such an obscure word
would be worth twopence. Slowly and stertorously he spelt it thus:
"Turnnups."
"B'est sure that's right?" said Master, rather suspiciously.
Peter had no doubt whatever. He could spell harder words than that, and
with the same accuracy.
"Seems to me somehow some spells 'en wi' one _n_," said Master.
"Us don't. Us allus spells 'en wi' two," said Peter.
"I reckon you'm right. What yew knows I larnt ye," said Master. "I larnt
yew and Mary to spell, and I mind the time when yew was a bit of a lad
wi' a turned-up nose and squinty eyes. Proper ugly yew was. Didn't I
whack they old breeks o' yourn? Aw now, didn't I? Dusted 'em proper, I
did. In these council schules what they has now there bain't no beating,
but love ye, Peter, in the old village schules us used to whack the lads
every day--aye, and the maids tu. There be many a dame about here and
Lydford whose buttocks I warmed when her was a maid. Them was brave
times, Peter, sure 'nuff."
"Better volks tu. Us had Dartmoor to ourselves them days," said Peter,
anxious to propitiate the old man.
"Mun spell all the words proper when I writes to Jackie. He'm vull o'
education," Master went on. "T-u-r-double-n, turnn, n-u-p-s, nups,
turnnups. Aw, Peter, yew ain't forgot what I larnt ye."
He put down his pen, assumed the mantle of Nestor, and asked: "Can I
oblige ye, Peter?"
The little man replied that he could, to the extent of twopence.
Master became grave and sorrowful, wagged his head, and behaved
generally as people will when the integrity of their purse is
threatened.
"Anything else, Peter--advice, sympathy, loving-kindness, you'm
welcome," he answered. "I be a poor man. I was never treated as I
deserved, yew mind. If I lends two pennies they don't come back. I be an
old man, and I've a-larnt that. They be like little birds, what come to
my window in winter for crumbs, and don't come back 'cept for more
crumbs. I be advising yew, Peter; don't ye borrow money, I ses. And I be
advising myself; don't ye lend it, I ses."
This was all very wise, only Peter could not appreciate it. Wisdom
slakes no man's thirst. He replied that he had come to the village for
sugar, and Mother Cobley at the shop refused to serve him without the
money, which he had unfortunately forgotten. He added an opinion of
Mother Cobley which was not charitable.
Master recited other verses from his book of wisdom. To succeed in trade
it was necessary to be severe when people came buying without money. He
admitted that Mother Cobley practised severity to the point of
ruthlessness, he was not prepared to deny that Mother Cobley would
rather permit her closest relations to walk in darkness than advance
them one tallow candle to walk by on credit, but he impressed upon Peter
the fact that Mother Cobley was a "poor lone widdie" who had to protect
herself against the wiles of customers. To sum up the matter: "If yew
buys her sugar her wants your twopence. It bain't no profit to she if
yew has her sugar and she don't ha' your twopence. It gives she what us
calls book-debts, and they be muddlesome and contrairy things."
With the ethics of business Peter was not concerned while the thirst was
spreading through his body. So far it had been confined to the tongue
and throat, but while Master talked it extended its ravages throughout
the whole of his system. Peter began to be afraid he would not be able
to walk home without liquid assistance. Not the smallest copper coin of
the realm could be hoped for from Master; but Peter was something of a
strategist, he comprehended there were more ways than one out of his
present difficulties, just as there are more ways than one into a house,
and an enemy can be attacked from the rear as well as in front. Master
certainly refused to advance him twopence, but he could hardly in common
charity refuse him what the twopence would have purchased, if he was
convinced that the need was urgent. So Peter put a hand to his throat,
and made strange noises, and said it was coming on again.
"What be the matter?" asked Master.
"Hot vuzzy kind o' prickiness all over like. Starts in the throat, and
goes all through. I be main cruel sick, Master."
"My dear life, but that be serious," cried Master. "What du'ye tak' for
'en, Peter?"
"Something cooling. Water will du. Beer be better though."
"I ain't got any beer, but I ha' cider, I'll fetch ye some in a mug,"
said Master.
He trotted off, while Peter sat and chuckled, and felt much better. He
was not wasting his time after all; neither was he spending any money.
When Master returned with a froth-topped cloam Peter adopted something
of the reverential attitude of Sir Galahad in the presence of the
Sangreal, drank deeply, and when he could see the bottom of the mug
declared that the dangerous symptoms had departed from him for a season.
Having nothing else to detain him he rose to go, and was at the door
when Master called him back.
"Purty nigh forgot to tell ye," he said, pointing to a goose-quill erect
in a flower-pot upon the window-seat. "Put that feather there to mind me
to tell Mary or yew, if so be I saw yew go by. There be volks stopping
wi' Betty Middleweek, artist volks, and they'm got a gurt ugly spaniel
dog what's been and killed a stray goosie. Betty ses 'tis Mary's Old
Sal, and I was to tell ye. Betty ha' got the goosie in her linny. Mary
had best go and look at 'en."
Peter rubbed his hands and became very convalescent. The heavens were
showering favours upon him. Artist folks could afford to pay heavy
damages. "I'll go and tell Mary to wance," he said. "Us will mak' 'em
pay. Old Sal be worth a sight o' money. Us wouldn't ha' lost she for
fifty pound. Thank ye kindly, Master."
"Nothing's no trouble, Peter. Hope you'll be better to-morrow," said the
kindly old man.
Peter brought on another thirst by the haste with which he hurried back
to inform his sister that her Old Sal had been destroyed "by artist
volks stopping wi' Betty Middleweek, at least not by they, but by a gurt
big ugly Spanish dog what belongs to 'em."
Mary wasted no time. She did not trouble to attire herself suitably, but
merely took a great stick "as big as two years and a dag," as she
described it, and set off for the village; while Peter, who had "got the
taste," as he described it, determined to help himself from Mary's
money-box and follow her later on with a view to continuing the
treatment which had benefited him so greatly in Master's cottage.
The artists were having their evening meal when Mary arrived and beat
heavily upon the door. They were summoned, the body of the goose was
brought from the linhay, Mary became coroner and sat upon the defunct
with due solemnity. There was no question about its identity. The name
of the bird which had been done to death by the dangerous dog was Old
Sal beyond all argument.
"Aw now, bain't it a pity, a cruel pity, poor Old Sal!" wailed Mary, and
would not be comforted until the artist produced his purse and said he
was willing to pay, while his wife hovered in attendance to see that he
did not pay too much. "He was a booty, the best mother on Dartmoor, and
he laid eggs, my dear. Aw ees, a butiful lot o' eggs. He was always
a-laying of 'em. And now he'm dead, and wun't lay no more, and wun't
never be a mother again. Hurts I cruel to see him lying there. Would
rather see Peter lying there than him."
"I understand the market price of geese is eightpence a pound," said the
artist nervously, awed by the gaunt presence of Mary and her patriarchal
staff. "If you will have the bird weighed I will pay you, as I cannot
deny that my dog killed it."
At that Mary gave an exceeding bitter cry. Eightpence a pound for Old
Sal! That was the market price, she admitted, but Old Sal had been
unique, a paragon among web-footed creatures, a model for other geese to
imitate if they could, the original goose of which all others were
indifferent copies, the very excellence and quintessence of ganders. It
was impossible to estimate the value of Old Sal in mere cash, although
she was willing to make that attempt. It was the perfection of Old Sal's
moral character and domestic attainments that Mary dwelt upon. He had
been all that a mother and an egg-layer should be. He was---- Words were
wanting to express what. He had been the leader of the flock, the
guiding star of the young, and the restraining influence of the foolish.
The loss was irreparable. Such geese appeared possibly once in a
century, and Mary would not live to see the like of her Old Sal again.
Then there were the mental and moral damages to be considered. Money
could not mend the evil which had been done, although money should
certainly be allowed to try. Mary suggested that the experiment might
commence with the transfer of five pounds.
"This bird is in very poor condition. It is quite thin," said the
artist's wife.
"Thin!" shouted Mary. "Aw, my dear, du'ye go under avore yew be struck
wi' lightning. He'm vull o' meat. Look at 'en, not a bone anywheres.
He'm as soft wi' fat as a bog be o' moss, and so cruel heavy I can't
hardly lift 'en. Yew don't know a goosie when yew sees one, my dear.
Never killed one in your life, I reckon. Aw now, never killed a goosie,
and ses Old Sal be thin! He was as good a mother as yew, my dear, and
when it comes to laying eggs--"
The artist's wife thought it was time to "go under," or at all events to
disappear, as Mary was getting excited.
At that point Betty Middleweek appeared and whispered to Mary; and at
the same time a little boy in quaint costume, with a head two sizes too
large, shuffled up the garden path, and stood staring at the defunct
goose with large vacant eyes. "He bain't your Old Sal after all," said
Betty. "He belongs to Mary Shakerley, and her little Charlie ha' come
for him. He saw the dog go after 'en, and he ran away mazed like to tell
his mother, but her had gone to Tavistock market, and ha' just come
home."
"He've only got one eye," piped little Charlie in evidence.
Mary examined the dead body. It was that of a one-eyed goose.
"Aw now," she said in a disappointed fashion, "I reckon he bain't my Old
Sal after all."
"I am willing to pay some one. Who is it to be?" asked the artist, who
wanted to get back to his food.
"Please to pay little Charlie, sir," said Betty Middleweek. "Charlie,
come up to the gentleman."
"Well, my lad, how much do you want for your goose? Eightpence a pound,
is it?"
"Dear life!" cried Mary. "He hain't worth eightpence a pound. Look at
'en! He'm a proper old goosie, wi'out a bit o' meat on his bones, and
the feathers fair dropping out o' his skin wi' age. He'd ha' scared the
dog off if he'd been a young bird, or got away from 'en. My Old Sal
would ha' tored any dog to pieces. Don't ye pay eightpence a pound. He
hain't worth it. He never laid no eggs, I reckon, and he warn't no good
for a mother. He'd ha' died purty soon if that dog o' yours hadn't
killed 'en."
"You seem to have altered your opinions rather suddenly," said the
artist.
"Well, I bain't a one-eyed old gander," said Mary. "I knows what goosies
ought to be to fetch eightpence a pound, and I can see he ain't got
enough meat on him to feed a heckimal. Aw, my dear life, if I can't tell
a goosie when I sees him who can?" And off went Mary, striking her big
stick noisily on the ground, wiping her nose on the back of her hand,
and muttering an epitaph upon the still missing Old Sal, who, she
supposed, had been carried off by some evil beast and devoured in the
secret places of the moor.
It was dark by this time, and the Ebenezer love-feast was over, so far
as the eating and drinking and prayer-meeting were concerned. The god of
good cheer had been worshipped, and now the goddess of common wayside
love was receiving incense. Autumn invariably discovers those hardy
perennials of the hedges and ditches--lovers--leaning against gates as
if they were tied there. The fields and the moor are too wet to sprawl
on, so at the end of October the gate season sets in, and continues
until spring dries the grass. The gates are nothing like so damp as the
hedges, and are much softer than boundary walls, although the latter are
not without their patrons. Lovers are orthodox folk, who never depart
from their true religion, or seek to subtract any clause from their
creed. The young girl knows that her mother was courted against a gate,
and that her grandmother was courted against a gate, so she is quite
ready to be courted against a gate. It must be difficult to feel the
necessary ardour, when several degrees of frost are nipping their noses,
and a regular Dartmoor wind whirls up and down the lanes; but these
gate-leaners manage it somehow.
Peter was having a pleasant day. He had followed up his success at
Master's expense with a little bout at Mary's, and it was with a feeling
of unalloyed satisfaction with himself that he started for home,
returning thanks after his own manner to the god who presides over
beer-houses. The benign influence of malted liquors was over him,
stimulating his progress, rendering him heedless of the dark, and
impervious to the cold. It was an unpleasant night, not frosty, but
choked with clouds, and filled with raw mist. Peter had passed several
gates, most of them occupied by couples finishing the day in a devout
fashion, but he had said nothing, not even the customary "good-night,"
because it was not lawful to speak to people when thus privily engaged.
Couples are supposed to be invisible while courting, and with the full
knowledge of this point of etiquette they usually conduct themselves as
if they were. Peter got up upon the moor, where the wind twisted his
beard about as if it had been a furze-bush, and made his way beside one
of the boundary walls which denoted some commoner's field. It was the
usual Dartmoor wall, composed of blocks of granite placed one above the
other in an irregular pattern without mud or method, each stone kept in
place by the weight of those above it; a wall which a boy could have
pulled down quickly one stone at a time, but if unmolested would stand
and defy the storms for ever. It was a long wall, and there were three
gates in it, but no lovers against them; at least not against the first
two. But as Peter approached the last, which was well out on the moor
where nobody but himself would be likely to pass that night, he heard
voices, or rather one voice, speaking loudly, either in anger or in
passion, and he recognised that it was Pendoggat who was speaking.
Peter crept up stealthily, keeping close beside the wall, which was just
about the height of his nose. When near the gate he went on his hands
and knees. The voice had ceased, but he heard kisses, and various other
sounds which suggested that if Pendoggat was upon the other side of the
wall there was probably a woman with him. Peter crawled closer, lifted
himself, placed the grimy tips of his fingers upon the top stones, which
were loose and rocking, and peeped over. There was a certain amount of
light upon the high moor, enough of a weird ghostly sort of
phosphorescence for him to see the guilty couple, Pendoggat and
Thomasine. They were quite near, upon the peat, beside one of the
granite gate-posts, and directly underneath Peter's nose. The little man
grinned to see such sport. The moral side of the affair did not present
itself before his barbaric mind. It was the spectacular part which
appealed to him. He decided to remain there, and play the part of
Peeping Tom.
Had Pendoggat been sensible, which was not possible, as sense and
passion do not run together, he must have known that the discovery of
his liaison with Thomasine could only be a matter of time. The greatest
genius that ever lived would find it beyond him to conduct an illicit
love-affair in a Dartmoor parish without being found out in the long
run. He had employed every ordinary caution. It was not in the least
likely that any one would be crossing beside that wall after dark; but
the least likely things are those which happen, not only in Dartmoor
parishes, but elsewhere.
Peter had not stood there long when very ordinary things occurred, all
of them unfortunate for him. To begin with, he developed a violent
attack of hiccups which could not be restrained. Then the stone to which
he was holding kept on rocking and giving forth grating noises. The wind
was also blowing pretty strongly; and what with the wind externally and
the hiccups within Peter was soon in a bad way. He made up his mind to
beat a retreat, but his decision came rather too late. He felt a hiccup
approaching more violent than its predecessors; he compressed his lips
and held his breath, hoping to strangle it; but Nature was not to be
cheated; his lips were forced asunder, the hiccup came, its sound went
out into the moor, and at the same moment Peter slipped, grabbed at the
stone, and sent it bowling upon the peat on the other side of the wall.
He gave a squeal like a frightened rabbit, and with another parting
hiccup turned and ran.
He did not get far before Pendoggat caught him. Peter was a stumpy
little creature with no idea of running; and he was captured at the end
of the wall, and received a blow upon the head which nearly stunned him.
Pendoggat stood over him, half mad with fury, striking at him again and
again; while Peter made quaint noises, half passion and half pain.
Suddenly the clouds parted westward, and Pendoggat could see Ger Tor
outlined against a liverish patch of night sky. By the same light he saw
Peter; and his madness departed, and he became a coward, when he caught
a glimpse of the little man's malignant eyes. Peter was his enemy for
ever, and he knew it.
Neither of them had spoken a word. Pendoggat had growled and spluttered;
Peter had choked and mumbled; the river far beneath roared because it
was full of rain. These were all incoherent noises. Pendoggat began to
slink away, as if he had received the beating, shivering and looking
back, but seeing nothing except a dull little heap beside the wall,
which seemed to have many hands, all of them scrabbling in the dirt.
Peter panted hard, as if he had been hunted across the moor by the whist
hounds, and had come there to take shelter; but all the time he went on
scraping up the clay, gathering it into a ball, spitting on it, moulding
it, and muttering madly from time to time: "You'm him! You'm him!"
During those first few moments, after leaving that horrible little man
beneath the wall scrabbling with his hands, Pendoggat swore solemnly
that he would make Thomasine his wife, swore it to himself, to the God
that he believed in, and to her, if only nothing happened.
Presently Peter went on towards his home; and in his arms was a
fantastic little thing of clay, a thing forked and armed like a human
being, a sort of doll. When he got back he cleared the hearthstone, blew
the peat into a red smoulder with his mouth, then took the doll, spoke
to it solemnly, placed it upon the hottest part of the hearth, and piled
the red embers round it. When Mary came in to call him to supper she
found Peter sitting in a kind of trance before the hearthstone, and
following his gaze she saw the quaint clay doll sitting upright in the
centre of the fire, with the red peat gathered into a fiery little hell
around it on every side.
"Aw, Peter!" she gasped in a tremulous whisper, falling on her knees at
his side. "Who be the mommet, Peter? Who be the mommet?"
"Varmer Pendoggat," said Peter.