DULVERTON REVEL.
"Thee be'est a drunken old twoad!" exclaimed a buxom countrywoman,
apple-faced and dark-haired, to her laughing mate, not the least in
tones of conjugal reproof, but rather as a delighted damsel of the
present time might say to her degenerate admirer; "how _can_ you be so
silly!" while the strapping fellow's sides shook, and his honest face
grinned from ear to ear at such homely jests and simple sights as both
had trudged half-a-score of miles into Dulverton to enjoy. It was an
hour or so after noon, and the Revel seemed at its height. Two or three
booths offered the indispensable refreshment of cheese, cold meat, and
cider. On the floor of a waggon, which formed his primitive stage, a
jack-pudding, as he was called, performed certain antics, affording
inexhaustible amusement to the spectators, who were never tired of
watching him inflate his cheeks, loll out his tongue, eat lighted
candle-ends, or feign to pull straws out of his eye. A fat lady, a
giant, and a dwarf were respectively portrayed on the sides of a van, in
which all three were supposed to be domiciled; while a drum, fiddle, and
brass instrument played appropriate airs without ceasing and cruelly out
of time. The rustics, many of them stout moorland men from the wilds of
Brendon and Dunkerry, or borderers of North Devon and West Somerset,
with here and there a swarthy, broad-shouldered visitor all the way from
Cornwall, strolled about, gaping, grinning, and drinking, in a high
state of contentment and delight, each with a ruddy-faced damsel at his
elbow, to whom, as occasion served, he offered his boisterous jest or
rude and hearty salute. These gallants were mostly fine specimens of
manhood, tall, straight, and well-limbed, with a frank, fearless air
about them, as though equally ready for a feast and a fray. The women,
while of lower stature in proportion, were exceedingly comely, some even
beautiful, dark-haired, dark-eyed, delicate of features, and with the
bloom of health mantling in their cheeks. One and all wore garments of
bright colours and daring contrasts. One and all drank freely of cider
and other liquors. One and all seemed resolved thoroughly to enjoy the
present, and make the most of Dulverton Revel, seeing that it came but
once a year.
The band had just concluded a flourish of more than ordinary discord,
when a new arrival enhanced the excitement of the scene, causing a rush
from all quarters to encircle the strange vehicle, partly van, partly
cart, from which a pair of piebald horses, adorned with bells, were
unharnessed and turned loose to graze. With a dexterity that supplied
the want of screws, bolts, and such mechanical appliances, its occupant
quickly converted his carriage into a stage, on which articles of dress,
perfumery, and domestic use were exposed for sale; while he moved nimbly
about, flourishing over his head and displaying in turn laces, threads,
scissors, thimbles, a mousetrap, a gridiron, and a warming-pan, to the
intense delight of the bystanders. He was a meagre, active-looking man,
who might have been any age above fifty, wearing large green spectacles
to adorn a pale face and red nose, dressed in a blue coat bedizened with
gold lace, a red waistcoat, bright yellow breeches, silk stockings, and
an outrageously large cocked hat. Though his gestures were ludicrous,
and his jokes received with peals of laughter, his voice was grave, even
sad, and he never smiled; yet he had not occupied his post ten minutes
before every other attraction of the Revel was deserted in his favour.
The jack-pudding ceased his contortions, and embraced the opportunity to
swallow a mouthful of real brandy instead of artificial fire. The giant,
dwarf, and stout lady remained unsolicited in the retirement from which
they had not yet emerged; and even the strains of the band died away
into empty air without eliciting a single protest of disapproval or
regret. Dulverton Revel congregated itself round the stranger, and the
stranger seemed in all respects equal to the position.
"Haste thee, wench!" said every Jack to his Gill, accompanying the hint
with a dig in his lady's ribs; "Thic' be the vun o' the vair, I tell
'ee! Do 'ee lose never a morsel. Gie I a buss, that's a good wench, and
I'll warrant I'll vind thee a fairing!" After which elegant address, and
a struggle for the salute thus purchased in advance, the rustic pair
elbowed their way into the circle round the cart in a high state of glee
and delight.
The proprietor addressed his audience with the utmost volubility,
offering them, one after another, the different wares exposed for sale,
and making appropriate remarks on each. An ointment for sore eyes, that
would enable the purchaser to see through a brick wall; a salve for sore
lips, that would cause the opposite sex to imprint kisses whenever they
came within reach; a pocket mirror that, looked into by sunrise on
May-day, would reflect the future sweetheart's face; a mousetrap that
rid the house of vermin from the moment it was set on the kitchen floor;
a warming-pan, that retained conjugal love and discovered conjugal
infidelity; lastly, a pair of female garters, the only pair left in
stock, manufactured expressly for the Queen of Egypt, and possessing the
miraculous power of rendering their wearer invisible in the dark!
After brisk competition these desirable appendages were knocked down to
a demure and blushing damsel, who was forthwith requested, in a
stentorian voice, to "try them on at once, and see how they fit."
Ere the laugh, elicited by this audacious suggestion, could die out, the
vendor's eye, travelling round that circle of grinning faces, had
recognised two acquaintances in the crowd. Also, and this seemed of
greater moment, he suspected they recognised him in return. Of these the
first was a square, thick-set man, in clerical attire, being indeed none
other than Parson Gale. The second, tall, slender, swarthy, supple of
limb, and graceful of gesture, was Fin Cooper, the gipsy. Each attended
Dulverton Revel less for pleasure than business. The Parson, sore of
heart, and brooding over his wrongs, was yet so far hampered by the
necessities of domestic life that he had been obliged to ride down from
the moor to this festivity for the purpose of engaging a kitchen wench,
and his establishment bearing no high character for regularity and
decorum, there appeared some difficulty in filling the situation.
In those convivial times, no affair, even of the most private nature,
could be conducted without a great deal to drink, and the Parson,
pledging one honest farmer after another in hard cider, dashed with
villainous brandy, had arrived at a very morose and uncomfortable state,
sober enough in head, but fierce, bitter, and sullenly despondent at
heart.
Not so Fin Cooper. That worthy, who was indeed a temperate fellow by
preference, whose frame had been toughened from childhood by continuous
exercise, and who never slept under a roof in his life, possessed a
constitution on which no stimulant less powerful than raw spirit seemed
to produce the slightest effect. On the present occasion he had reasons
of his own for keeping his wits at their brightest. Dulverton Revels,
like all other gatherings of the Gorgios, afforded to every true Romany
many opportunities for gain and peculation. There was jewellery to be
exchanged with ardent suitors and the objects of their admiration. There
were games to be played at cards with yokels patient of loss. There were
horses to be sold, swapped, or even stolen, when occasion offered. There
were a thousand ways and means, all more or less profitable, by which
the gipsy could take advantage of his natural prey.
But Fin Cooper had yet another object, causing the dark eye to glance
from face to face in restless search, the tawny hand to steal
unconsciously under the wide sash that swathed his waist towards the
handle of his knife. His suspicions that the girl he loved had set her
heart on a ruffling Gorgio, confirmed themselves day by day. Dulverton
feast would be a convenient place of meeting, and he had told Thyra that
he himself meant to be twenty miles off. If she held an assignation here
with her Gentile lover, he might be a witness to their interview, might
verify her bitterest fears, and satisfy himself of the worst! Fin
Cooper's face was evil to contemplate while he revolved this
contingency, and the salesman, delivering the garters to his blushing
customer, did not fail to draw his own conclusions from its scowl.
As for Parson Gale, he stood before the cart for several minutes in mute
astonishment. Then he rubbed his eyes, stared, and exclaimed,
"Katerfelto! as I'm a living sinner!" while he brought his broad hands
together with a vigorous smack.
His exclamation was not lost on its object. The latter glanced
stealthily round, bowed profoundly to his auditors, made them a little
speech, in which, with many jocose allusions, he informed them he was
about to shut up shop that he might eat his "bit of dinner," with a
promise to re-open again at three o'clock, and in a very few minutes the
cart had resumed its usual appearance and the proprietor had
disappeared.
Half-an-hour later, behind a canvas screen, on the outskirts of the
Fair, a priest and a gipsy might have been seen in earnest conversation,
pacing to and fro, while they glanced about them as if loth to be
overheard, though a donkey rolling on its back, and a horse tugging at a
truss of hay, were the only eaves-droppers they had to fear. The gipsy's
air was respectful, even deferential, while he listened to his
companion. The latter seemed annoyed and distrustful. In his cunning,
clever face might be read an expression of disappointment and something
amounting to self-reproach.
"How long is it since I dwelt with your people in their tents and did my
best to withhold the old Petulengro from the journey that grows easier
at every step; it must be more than seven years?" asked the priest.
"Seven years and seven months, oh' my father!" replied Fin Cooper, "and
you promised to teach me how to read the stars aright the night before
you went away."
"Yet you knew me to-day, Fin! knew me dressed up like a jack-pudding who
tumbles to amuse a score of clowns in a fair?"
"I would know you, father, if you were buried and dug up again. I would
know you in another life, if there _is_ another life. Some things the
gipsy never forgets. Father, I am your servant; all I have is yours. It
is not much. Only a quick eye, a ready hand, and a sharp knife. Do you
not _wish_ to be known?"
There was no mistaking his meaning. Katerfelto, notwithstanding his
perturbation, felt a thrill of triumph thus to have imposed on the
credulity of this rude yet keen-sighted nature. There is professional
vanity in every calling, even in that of the professional impostor.
"My life is in danger, Fin," answered the Charlatan gravely, "so far as
it may be threatened by any casualty of this lower world. Worse than
that, I might lose my liberty, if I could be identified here, for the
sage and philosopher, who always made it his boast that he is the
gipsy's friend. Therefore I came to the West in the disguise you saw me
wear an hour ago. Therefore I speak to you now, dressed as one of those
Jesuit priests whom your people have so often sheltered at their need;
therefore will I appeal to them for a refuge till I can steal down to
the coast and put the blue sea between the gipsy's friend and those who
would do him harm. _Shoon tu_, dost thou listen, my son? Said I well?"
"_Tatchipen si, Meero Dado!_ You speak truth, oh! my father," answered
the other. "And you will lodge with us to-night on the moor. The fullest
platter shall smoke, and the softest blanket be spread, for the gipsy's
friend!"
Katerfelto shook his head. "If I came to your tent and claimed my own,
Fin," he asked, "would your welcome be so hearty and free?"
The gipsy's face fell. "I love her," he said. "She was given to me long
before you bought her from our people. You told me I should have her
back at some future time, father, the morning you took her away. I
reminded her of it only yesterday."
The other glanced sharply at him from under his bushy eyebrows. This was
scarcely as he expected. Judging from all he knew, he calculated that
Waif must have accompanied John Garnet into the West, and had vowed from
the moment he discovered her flight, that he would be revenged on both,
while he supposed they were in hiding together. He now saw that she must
either have required the assistance of her tribe or found it impossible
to elude their observation. He knew quite enough of the girl to be sure
that even while with her own people she would find opportunities to meet
her lover, and from that lover, lately his own emissary, he was still
inclined to exact the penalty, that all paid, sooner or later, who ran
counter to the designs of Katerfelto.
"Keep her in your tents, Fin," said he with a smile, "and fear no
hindrance from me. But remember, though she is of a wandering nature,
and comes of a wandering race, a Romany lass may wander too free and too
far."
Fin's dark face turned black as night. "I understand you, father," he
muttered. "You mean, you mean, that she has a Gorgio lover!"
The veins in his handsome throat swelled while he spoke, and his voice
came so thick it was hardly intelligible. "I mean," answered Katerfelto
coolly, "that he whom the Gorgios call John Garnet is better out of the
way, both for you and for me and for Waif. He knows too much, and he
dares too much. Your eyes are as keen as a hawk's, Fin. Can you not see
that as he cozened me out of my horse, he would cozen you out of your
bride?"
The gipsy's low, smothered laugh seemed the very reverse of mirth.
"There is no better sheath for a Romany's blade," he answered, "than the
bowels of a pampered Gorgio."
"My son," replied the other, "wisdom is the child of experience. Let
King George take the trouble off your hands, and pay you besides a purse
of gold for your forbearance. John Garnet's is a hanging matter, and a
reward of one hundred guineas is offered for his apprehension. Set the
bloodhounds on him at once, and the thing is done. Better by far keep
that long knife of yours for cutting your bread and cheese!"
"I helped him," said Fin thoughtfully, "helped him, because Thyra bade
me, as frankly as if he had really been poor Galloping Jack come down
from Tyburn-tree. The bloodhounds might turn round and lay hold of the
informer. Counsel me, father. I can right myself so easily with three
inches of steel!"
The other shook his head. No man alive had fewer scruples of mercy or
forbearance, but it was Katerfelto's nature to plot rather than execute.
While he would have felt no qualms in concocting or administering a
subtle poison, he shrank from the very idea of personal contest and
shedding of blood. "A hundred guineas of red gold," he answered; "think
of that, Fin, and then talk about a hand's breadth of bare steel! You
cannot compare them. Be advised by me, my son, and you will rid yourself
of a rival, win a bride, and gain a wedding-portion all in one sentence.
That Exmoor Parson. I saw him here to-day. I would venture a wager he is
drinking in one of the booths now. Watch for him riding home. He is a
magistrate; never fear him for that. Lay your hand on his horse's mane
and say to him in the king's name, 'I can show you the man you
want--follow me!'"
"But would he not ask for the hundred guineas and get them himself?"
argued the gipsy, who, with all his strong passions, had a keen eye to
the main chance. "There is no justice nor fair dealing on either side
between the Romany and the Gorgio."
For the first time during their interview Katerfelto laughed outright.
"My son," he said, "I think I can trust you to look after your own
interests without assistance from me. When you have delivered John
Garnet into the hands of Abner Gale you will have accomplished your
object and mine. For my own part I will not return into the Fair. I need
hardly ask, Fin, if you are here alone?"
"We are like the hooded crows, my father," answered Fin. "When you see
one of us you may be sure there are others not far off. We must needs
hang together, or the Romany would soon be swept from the face of the
earth."
"Then let one of your people drive my cart to Exeter," continued
Katerfelto. "He will know where to leave it with no questions asked. As
for me, my son, I must make my way to your tents without losing an hour.
I have changed my disguise once to-day. I can change it a score of
times, if necessary; yet I would not that roystering Parson had
recognised me but now in the Fair."
"I shall be alone with him on the moor presently," said Fin Cooper, in a
tone of meaning. "My father, do you desire that he should tell no tales?
Shall I silence him once for all?"
Katerfelto pondered. "Not at present, Fin," he answered, after a pause.
"It will be better to make use of him when we want him, and put him on
the right scent. If a hound runs counter, the farther he goes the
farther he is left behind!"