Ann Kerley had lived in great peace and contentment for more than
seventy-three years. Her neighbours considered her a good plain ’ooman,
who always had a kind word for every one, and was so ready to do a good
turn for another body as heart could wish. But, lo and behold! one fine
morning old Ann Kerley awoke to find herself a witch.
The previous day had been sultry and wild, with spells of fierce
sunshine that smote down upon honest people’s heads as they toiled
in cornfield or potato-plot, bringing out great drops of sweat on
sunburnt faces, and forcing more than one labourer to supplement the
shade and comfort of his broad chip hat by a cool moist cabbage leaf.
Withal furious gusts of wind rose every now and then--storm-wind, old
Jan Belbin said, and he was considered wonderful weather-wise--wind
that set the men’s shirt-sleeves flapping for all the world like the
sleeves of a racing jockey, and blew the women’s aprons into the air,
and twisted the maids’ hats round upon their heads if they so much as
crossed the road to the well. Yet this wind would drop as suddenly as
it had sprung up; the land would lie all bathed in fiery heat, and a
curious sense of uneasiness and expectancy would seem to pervade the
whole of Nature. The very beasts were disquieted in their pasture; the
corn stood up straight and stiff, each ear, as it were, on the alert;
not a leaf stirred in hedgerow or tree-top; and then “all to once,”
as Jan Belbin pointed out, the storm-wind sprang up again, tossing
the golden waste of wheat hither and thither like a troubled sea, and
making every individual branch and twig creak and groan.
Twilight was at last closing in with brooding stillness, and a group
of lads, who had been working for an hour or two in the allotments,
gathered idly round the gate, gossiping, and some of them smoking,
before proceeding homewards. It was too dark, as Joe Pilcher declared,
to see the difference between a ’tater and a turnip, and ’twas about
time they were steppin’ anyways. He was in the act of relating some
interesting anecdote with regard to last Saturday’s practice in the
Cricket field, when he broke off, and pointed up the stony path which
led past the allotments.
“Hullo! Whatever’s that?” he cried.
The bent outline of a small figure could be seen creeping along the
irregular line of hedge. It was apparently hump-backed, and wore a kind
of hood projecting over its face.
“’Tis a wold hag, seemin’ly,” said Jim Ford, craning forward over the
top rail.
“There!” cried Joe, “I took it for a sprite, but I don’t know as I
shouldn’t be just so much afeared of a witch any day. It be a witch,
sure.”
“Don’t be a sammy,” interposed an older man. “’Tis nothin’ but some
poor wold body what has been gatherin’ scroff. They’ve felled a tree
up-along in wood, an’ she’ve a-been a-pickin’ up all as she can lay
hands on for her fire. There, ’tis wold Ann Kerley. I can see her now.
She’ve a-got a big nitch o’ sticks upon her back, an’ she do croopy
down under the weight on’t, an’ she’ve a-tied her handkercher over her
bonnet, poor body, to keep it fro’ blowin’ away. There’s your hag for
you, Joe!”
“I be afeared, I say,” insisted Joe, feigning to tremble violently.
He considered himself a wag, and had quite a following of the village
good-for-noughts. “’Tis a witch, sartin sure ’tis a witch. Don’t ye go
for to overlook I, Ann Kerley, for I tell ’ee I won’t a-bear it!”
As the unconscious Ann drew nearer he squatted down behind the
gate-post, loudly announcing that he was that frayed he was fair
bibbering. Two or three of the others made believe to hide themselves
too, pretending to shiver in imitation of their leader; and peering out
like him between the bars of the gate.
Such unusual proceedings could not fail to attract the old woman’s
attention, and she paused in astonishment when she reached the spot.
“Why, whatever be to do here?” she inquired.
Joe uttered a kind of howl, and burrowed into the hedge.
“She be overlookin’ of we,” he shouted. “The witch be overlookin’ of
we.”
“Don’t ye take no notice, my dear woman,” said Abel Bond, the man
who had before spoken. “They be but a lot o’ silly bwoys a-talkin’
nonsense.”
“Witch!” cried Joe.
“Witch! witch!” echoed the rest.
Ann looked from one to the other of the grinning faces that kept
popping up over the rail, and disappearing again.
“Whatever be they a-talkin’ on?” she gasped.
“You be a witch, Ann,” cried Joe. “If you was served right you’d be
ducked in the pond. E-es, that you would.”
A small boy, fired with a desire to distinguish himself, picked up a
clod of earth, and flung it at her with so true an aim that it grazed
her cheek.
“Take that, witch!” he cried.
Joe, not to be outdone, threw another; pellets of earth and even small
pebbles began to assail the old woman from the whole line.
Abel Bond promptly came to the rescue, knocking the ringleaders’ heads
together, and impartially distributing kicks and cuffs among the
remainder.
“Bad luck to the witch!” cried the irrepressible Joe, wriggling himself
free; and the shout was taken up by the rest, even as they dodged the
avenger.
“Bad luck, yourself,” retorted poor Ann, trembling with wrath and
alarm. “I’m sure nar’n o’ ye do deserve such very good luck arter
insultin’ a poor wold ’ooman what never did ye no harm.”
And she went on her way, grumbling and indignant.
But when she had reached her own little house in the “dip,” and had
walked up the flagged path between the phlox bushes and the lavender,
and pussy had come rubbing against her legs in greeting, her anger
cooled; and by the time her kettle had begun to sing over a bright wood
fire, and she had laid out her modest repast of bread and watercress,
she fairly laughed to herself.
“Lard! they bwoys be simple!” she said. “They did call I a witch, along
o’ my havin’ tied my handkercher over my head. Abel did give it to ’em,
but I reckon he didn’t hurt ’em much. Bwoys! there, they do seem so
hard as stoones very near. ‘Witch!’ says they. Well, that’s a notion.”
She chuckled again, and set down a saucer of milk for the cat to lap.
“They’ll be callin’ you a witch next, puss,” said she laughing.
Ann carried her bucket to the well as usual next morning, feeling
rather more cheerful than was her custom. Rain had fallen shortly after
daybreak, but the sky was now clear and limpid, and the air cool. On
her way to the well her attention was caught by a loud clucking in her
neighbour’s garden, and looking across the dividing hedge she descried
a hen violently agitating herself inside a coop, while a brood of
yellow downy ducklings some few hours old paddled in and out of a pool
beside the path.
“Well, of all the beauties!” cried Ann, clapping her hands together
until the bucket rattled on her arm; “why, Mrs. Clarke, my dear, you
must have hatched out every one--’tis a wonderful bit o’ luck.”
“E-es, indeed,” agreed Mrs. Clarke, “hatchin’ out so late an’ all. I
hope I may do well wi’ ’em.”
“I hope so, that do I,” agreed Ann heartily, and hobbled on towards the
well.
One or two women were there, who responded to her greeting with a
coldness which she did not at once realise.
“Fine rain this marnin’,” she remarked cheerfully, as her bucket went
clattering down the well; “we’ve had a good drop to-year, haven’t we?
Farmers may grumble, but, as I do say, ’tis good for the well. We’ll
be like to draw a bit less chalk nor we do in the dry seasons. There
be all sarts in our well, bain’t there? Water an’ chalk, an’ a good
few snails. There, when I do hear folks a-talkin’ about the Government
doin’ this an doin’ that, I do say to myself, I wish Government ’ud see
to our well.”
Usually such a sally would have been applauded, but, to poor old Ann’s
astonishment and chagrin, her remark was received on this occasion in
solemn silence. To hide her discomfiture she peered into the moss-grown
depths of the well.
“Don’t ye go a-lookin’ into it like that, Ann,” cried a vinegary-faced
matron in an aggressive tone. “Chalky water, e-es, an’ water wi’ snails
in’t is better than no water at all. ’Tis sure--’tis by a long ways.”
“Ah, ’tis!” agreed the others, eyeing Ann suspiciously.
She straightened herself and looked round in surprise.
“I never said it wasn’t,” she faltered. “Why do ye look at me so nasty,
Mrs. Biles?”
“Oh, ye don’t know, I s’pose?” retorted Mrs. Biles sourly. “How be your
’taters, Ann Kerley, this marnin’?”
“Doin’ finely, thanks be,” said poor Ann, brightening up, as she
considered the conversation was taking a more agreeable turn.
“Not blighted, I s’pose?” put in a little fat woman who had hitherto
been silent.
“Not a sign o’ blight about ’em,” said Mrs. Kerley joyfully. “There,
I did just chance to look at ’em when I did first get up, an’ they’re
beautiful.”
“That’s strange,” remarked Mrs. Biles, with a meaning sniff. “Every
single ’tater at the ’lotments be blighted, they do tell I. Mrs.
Pilcher did say when her husband went up there this marnin’ he could
smell ’em near a quarter of a mile away.”
“Dear, to be sure!” groaned Ann, sympathetically, being quite willing
to condone any little asperities of temper on the part of folks
suffering from such a calamity. “’Tis a terr’ble pity, Mrs. Biles.
There, ’tis along o’ the ’lotments layin’ out so open like, I d’ ’low.
Now my bit o’ garden be sheltered.”
The little fat woman, usually a meek sort of body, snorted fiercely.
“’Tisn’t very likely as your garden ’ud suffer, Mrs. Kerley,” she
cried, in a voice that trembled with wrath. “Your garden is safe
enough--an’ so was the ’lotments till yesterday.”
“Well, I be pure sorry, I’m sure,” said Ann, looking from one to the
other in bewilderment. “’Tis just as luck would have it, I s’pose.”
“Luck, indeed!” cried Mrs. Biles meaningly. “There’s them as went by
yesterday as wished bad luck, an’ bad luck did come.”
Ann fairly gasped. Mrs. Biles threw out her hand warningly.
“Take your eyes off I, Mrs. Kerley. Take ’em off, I say! I bain’t
a-goin’ to have ’ee overlookin’ of I, same as you did do to poor Joe
Pilcher--’tis well if the poor bwoy don’t die of it.”
Ann obediently dropped her eyes, a nightmare-like sensation of
oppression overwhelming her.
“I d’ ’low ye won’t deny ye did overlook Joe Pilcher,” went on Mrs.
Biles; “there, ye did no sooner turn your back yesterday, nor the lad
was took wi’ sich a bad pain in his innards that he went all doubly up
same as a wold man.”
“Well, that’s none o’ my fault,” expostulated Ann warmly, for even a
worm will turn. “He’ve a-been eatin’ summat as disagreed wi’ he.”
“Nothin’ o’ the kind!” cried the women in chorus.
“It comed so sharp as a knife,” added one, “all twisty turny.”
“The poor bwoy did lie upon the floor all night,” put in another,
“a-pankin’ and a-groanin’ so pitiful. ‘Ann Kerley has bewitched I,’
says he. E-es, the bwoy come out wi’ the truth. ‘’Tis Mother Kerley
what has overlooked I,’ says he.”
“Well,” returned Ann vehemently, “I never did nothin’ at all to the
bwoy. ’Tis nonsense what you do talk, all on you. He’ve a-been eatin’
green apples--that’s what the matter wi’ he.”
“Green apples!” exclaimed Mrs. Biles, with shrill sarcasm. “Dear, to be
sure, if a bwoy was to be upset every time he ate a green apple, there
wouldn’t be a sound child in village. He hadn’t had above five or six,
his mother did say herself, an’ he can put away as many as fourteen
wi’out feelin’ the worse for it. Ye must agree ’tis very strange,
Ann--there, ye did say out plain for all to hear: ‘Bad luck, yourself,’
says you to the innercent bwoy. ‘Ye won’t be like to have such very
good luck, nar’n o’ you,’ says you, an’, sure enough, there be the
’taters blighted, an’ there be the poor bwoy upset in’s inside.”
“I didn’t really mean it, neighbours,” faltered Ann, looking piteously
round. “I was a bit vexed at the time, an’ when the lads did start
a-floutin’ me wi’ stones an’ that, and a-callin’ ill names and
a-wishin’ me bad luck, I just says back to ’em, quick like, ‘Bad luck,
yourself!’ an’ ’twasn’t very like they’d have good luck; but I didn’t
mean it in my heart--not me, indeed. The Lard sees I hadn’t no thought
o’ really wishin’ evil to nobody--that I hadn’t, neighbours. You don’t
believe I did have, do ’ee now, Mrs. Whittle?”--turning in despair to
the little woman on her right--“you, what has knowed I sich a many
year--you did ought to know I wouldn’t wish no harm to nobody.”
Mrs. Whittle looked sheepish and uncomfortable. Despite the sinister
aspect of things, her heart melted at her old crony’s appeal.
“Why, I scarce can believe it,” she was beginning, when Mrs. Biles
struck in:--
“Deny it if you can, Ann Kerley. There’s the ’taters blighted, an’
there’s the bwoy took bad, an’ it’s you what wished ’em ill-luck. What
can ye make o’ that, Mrs. Whittle? Ye’ll ’low ’tis strange.”
Mrs. Whittle shook her head dubiously, and Ann, deprived, as she
thought, of her only ally, threw her apron over her head, and wept
behind it.
“Don’t ’ee take on, Mrs. Kerley, that’s a dear,” said Mrs. Whittle,
softening once more. “’Twas maybe a chance thing. You did say them
words wi’out thinkin’ an’ they did come true to be a warnin’ to ’ee. We
do all do wrong sometimes; this ’ere did ought to be a warnin’ to all
on us.”
“I’m sure ’twill be a lesson to I,” sobbed Ann inarticulately. “So long
as I do live I’ll never say such things again. ’Twas very ill-done o’
me to ha’ spoke wi’out thought, sich a wold ’ooman as I be, an’ so near
my end an’ all, an’ the Lard has chastised I. I can’t do more nor say
I’m sorry, an’ I hope the A’mighty ’ull forgive me.”
“There, the ’ooman can’t say no fairer nor that,” said Mrs. Whittle,
looking round appealingly; “she can’t do more nor repent.”
“Oh, if she do repent it’ll be well enough,” said Mrs. Biles darkly.
“’Tis to be hoped as she do repent. But by all accounts ’tis easier for
to begin that kind o’ work nor to leave it off again.”
She turned on her heel with this parting innuendo, and, taking up her
full bucket, walked away. The others followed suit, and Ann, left
alone, sobbed on for a moment or two with a feeling akin to despair,
and then, drawing down her apron, wiped her eyes with it sadly, wound
up her pail from the depths where it had lain forgotten, and made her
way homewards.
For days afterwards she was ashamed to show her face, and rose at
extraordinarily early hours in order to procure her supply of water,
and crept out of her own quarters at dusk to make her necessary
purchases.
One morning, about a week after the affair at the allotments, when Ann
sallied forth as usual for water, she paused incidentally to look over
her neighbour’s gate. The hen-coop was still in view, the hen cackling,
and the ducklings waddling up and down the path. But how few of them
there were! Only three! What could have become of the others? Possibly
they were squatting at the back of the coop. She was craning her head
round in order to ascertain if this were the case, when a window in
Mrs. Clarke’s house was thrown open, and that lady’s voice was heard in
angry tones:--
“I’ve catched you at it, have I? I’ve catched you at it! Well, you
did ought to be ashamed of yourself, Ann Kerley. To try an’ do me a
mischief--me, as has been sich a good neighbour to ’ee.”
“Why, what’s the matter?” returned Ann, backing away from the gate, and
raising dim, distracted eyes.
“I’ve catched you in the very act,” continued Mrs. Clarke vehemently.
“Says I to myself when the ducklin’s kep’ a-droppin’ off like that, ‘I
wonder if it can be Ann?’ says I, an’ then I thinks, ‘No, it never can
be Ann; her an’ me was always friends,’ I says. Ah, you ungrateful,
spiteful creetur’!”
An arm, clad in checked flannelette, was here thrust forth, and the
fist appertaining thereto emphatically shaken.
“I’m sure,” protested the unfortunate Ann, staggering back against her
own little gate, “I don’t know whatever you can mean by such talk,
Mrs. Clarke; I never touched your ducks. I be a honest ’ooman, an’ I
wouldn’t take nothin’ what didn’t belong to I.”
“I don’t say you stole ’em,” retorted Mrs. Clarke, “but I say you
overlooked ’em, an’ that’s worse; a body ’ud know what to be at
if ’twas only a thief as was makin’ away wi’ ’em, but when ’tis a
witch--Lard, whatever is to be done? I couldn’t ha’ thought ye’d ha’
found it in your heart to go striking down they poor little innercent
things. What harm did they do ye? Sich beauties as they was. But there,
ye must go gettin’ up in the very dummet that ye mid overlook the poor
little creetur’s, so that, one after another, they do just croopy down
an’ die.”
“Mrs. Clarke,” said Anne, solemnly and desperately, “I can’t tell how
sich a thing did come about--I can’t indeed. ’Tis no fault o’ mine,
I do assure ye. I wouldn’t ha’ had they poor little duck die for
anything. I never wished ’em ill. I was admirin’ of ’em. I never had no
other thought.”
“Well, see here,” returned Mrs. Clarke, somewhat mollified. “Don’t
ye look at ’em at all, that’s a good ’ooman. Maybe ’tis no fault o’
yourn, but ’tis very strange, Mrs. Kerley, what do seem to have come
to you to-year. You do seem to bring bad luck, though you midn’t do it
a-purpose.”
“I’m sure I don’t,” protested Ann, “an’ I can’t believe, Mrs. Clarke,
as a body can do bad wi’out knowin’ it.”
“Well, ’tis queer, I d’ ’low,” agreed her neighbour, “but when a body
sees sich things for theirsel’s as do happen along o’ you, they can’t
but believe their own eyes. Ye mind that there bar-hive what Mr. Bridle
got last month?”
“E-es,” returned Ann feebly, “I mind it well. I never see sich a
handsome contrivance nor so clever. Mr. Bridle showed it to I.”
“E-es, I d’ ’low he did,” agreed the other, with a certain triumph. “I
d’ ’low ye was a-lookin’ at it a long time.”
“I was,” confessed Ann, with a sinking heart.
Mrs. Clarke nodded portentously. “That’s it,” she said. “The bees be
all dead, Mrs. Kerley. Bridle, he did say to I yesterday, ‘I couldn’t
think,’ says he, ‘whatever took the bees. I had but just moved them out
of the wold skip and they did seem to take to the bar-hive so nice,’ he
says, ‘an’ now they be all a-dyin’ off so quick as they can. I couldn’t
think,’ he says, ‘what could be the reason, but I do know now. I do
know it was a great mistake to ha’ brought Ann Kerley up to look at
’em.’”
“Oh dear, oh dear,” cried the last-named poor old woman, wringing her
hands, “do he really think I did hurt ’em?”
“He do, indeed,” said Mrs. Clarke firmly. “There, my dear, it do seem
a terr’ble thing, but you be turned into a witch seemin’ly, whether it
be against your will or whether it bain’t.”
Ann stood motionless for a moment, her hands squeezed tightly together,
her face haggard and drawn.
“I think I’ll go indoor a bit,” she said, after a pause. “I’ll go
indoor an’ set me down. I don’t know what to do. Mrs. Clarke----?”
“E-es, my dear. There, you needn’t look up at I so earnest--I can hear
’ee quite well wi’out that.”
Ann turned away with an impatient groan, and went staggering up her
path. The other looked after her remorsefully.
“Bide a bit, Mrs. Kerley, do ’ee now. What was ye goin’ to ax I?”
“I was but goin’ to ax,” faltered Ann, still with her face averted, “if
you’d be so kind as to fetch I a drop o’ water this marnin’ when you do
go to get some for yoursel’. There, I don’t some way feel as if I could
face folks--an’ there mid be some about. ’Tis gettin’ a bit late now.”
“E-es, sure; I could do it easy,” agreed Mrs. Clarke eagerly. “I could
do it every marnin’--’tisn’t a bit more trouble to fill two pails nor
one. An’ ’t ’ud be better for ee, Ann, my dear, not to go about more
nor you can help till this ’ere visitation wears of.”
“’T ’ull never wear off,” said Ann gloomily, as she walked unsteadily
away.
Now, as Mrs. Clarke subsequently remarked, those words of Ann’s made
her fair bibber, same as if a bucket of cold water were thrown down her
back. She was full of compassion for her neighbour, and, though she was
willing to believe that the strange, unpleasant power of which she had
suddenly become possessed was unwelcome to her and unconsciously used,
she was nevertheless forced to agree with Mrs. Biles that that didn’t
make the thing no better, and that the more Ann Kerley kept herself to
herself the safer it would be for all parties.
Meanwhile, the anguish of mind endured by the unwilling sorceress
defies description. Day by day her deplorable plight became more
evident to her. Now an indignant farmer’s wife would come to complain
that butter had not come, and on poor Ann’s protesting that she had
never so much as set foot near the dairy, would retort that she had
been seen gathering sticks at nightfall in the pasture, and had
doubtless bewitched the cows. Now a village mother would hastily snatch
up a child when it toddled towards the witch’s house; even the baker
tossed the weekly loaf over the gate in fear, and left his bill at Mrs.
Clarke’s, saying he would call for the money there. That lady informed
her of the fact through the closed door as she dumped her morning
bucket of water on the path without, adding that if she would like to
leave the money in the bucket when she put it ready overnight, it would
save trouble to every one.
Ann Kerley understood: even her old crony was now afraid to meet her
face to face.
As she realised this she fell to crying feebly and hopelessly, as
she had done so often of late, and Pussy came and jumped upon her
knee, rubbing herself against her, and gazing at her with golden
inscrutable eyes. The warm contact of a living creature, even a cat,
was comforting, and the old woman hugged her favourite closely; but
presently, struck by a sudden thought, she pushed it away, and turned
aside her head.
“There! get down, love! do--get away with ’ee, else I’ll maybe be
doin’ thee a mischief. Oh dear, Puss, whatever should I do if anything
happened to thee?”
The idea positively appalled her, and from that moment she was careful
to avert her face when she set the cat’s food before her.
Perhaps the greatest trial of all was the Sunday church-going.
“I d’ ’low the Lard won’t let I do nobody no harm in His House,” she
had said to herself at first, almost hopefully; and she had donned her
decent Sunday clothes eagerly, not to say joyfully. She was by nature
sociable, and had suffered as severely from the inability to indulge in
an occasional chat, a little harmless gossip, with this one and that
one, as from a sense of being under a ban.
So she had set forth cheerily, volunteering “A fine marnin’,
neighbours,” to the first group she had passed upon the road. But dear,
to be sure! how the folks had jumped and squeezed themselves against
the wall to let her go by! She had not had the heart to greet the next
couple, staid elderly folk, who were pacing along in front of her,
full of Sabbath righteousness; but presently the man had looked round,
and had then nudged his wife, and she had gathered up her skirts and
scuttled on without so much as a glance over her shoulder. Poor Ann had
fallen back and turned aside into a by-path until all the congregation
had streamed in, and then had crept up the steps alone, and made her
way to her place blindly, for her eyes were full once more of piteous
tears.
But even there humiliation awaited her, for she found herself alone in
her pew, none of its accustomed occupants being willing to worship in
such dangerous proximity.
“I must be a terr’ble wicked ’ooman, sure,” groaned Ann to herself, and
raised her poor smarting eyes to the east window, whence the figure of
the Good Shepherd looked back at her, full of compassion and benignity.
But Ann quickly dropped her eyes again. Was He not carrying a lamb upon
His shoulder? It seemed to her that even the painted innocent would
droop and falter beneath her gaze.
And so thenceforth she started for church long after the other members
of the congregation, and instead of seeking her own place, stole humbly
to a dark corner, where, hidden away behind a pillar, she worshipped in
sorrow of heart.
Such a state of things could not have continued if the old rector had
been at home, but he was away holiday-making in Switzerland, and the
_locum tenens_, a young curate from the neighbouring town, could not be
expected to notice a matter of the kind.
One Sunday afternoon it chanced that Farmer Joyce, who lived up
Riverton way, drove over to Little Branston, and was good enough to
give a lift to his neighbour, Martha Hansford, Ann’s married daughter,
who was feeling, as she confessed, a bit anxious at not hearing from
her mother.
“There, she haven’t a-wrote since I can’t say when,” she explained to
the farmer, as the trap went spinning along the road; “she don’t write
herself, mother don’t, but she do generally get somebody to drop me a
line for her, and I haven’t heard a word to-month; no, nor last month
either.”
“Rheumatics perhaps,” suggested the farmer.
“I’m sure I hope not, Mr. Joyce. My mother have never had sich a thing
in her life, an’ ’tis to be hoped she bain’t a-goin’ to begin now.”
“The wold lady’s busy, very like,” hazarded Mr. Joyce, after ruminating
a while. “The time do slip away so quick, an’ one day do seem so
like another, folks can’t always be expected to put their minds to
letter-writin’.”
“Lard love ’ee, sir,” returned Martha, startled into familiarity,
“farmer folks mid be busy enough, an’ lab’rin’ folks too--I can scarce
find the day long enough to put in all as I’ve a-got to do--but mother!
what can a poor wold body like mother have to work at, wi’out it’s a
bit o’ knittin’, or some such thing. No, it’s summat else, an’ I’m sure
I can’t think what it can be.”
Mr. Joyce was not imaginative enough to assist her by any further
hypothesis; therefore, he merely touched up the horse and remarked
reassuringly that they would soon be there. And for the rest of the
drive Martha devoted herself to the somewhat difficult task of keeping
her three-year-old boy, Ally, from wriggling out of her arms.
Dropped at the bottom of the “dip” wherein was situated Mrs. Kerley’s
cottage, Martha hastened towards it, Ally trotting gleefully beside
her. Instead of finding the cottage door open--as might have been
expected this sunny October afternoon--and catching a glimpse of her
mother’s quiet figure in its elbow-chair, she found the house shut up,
and apparently no sign of life about the place. The very garden had a
neglected look, or so it seemed to her; and the little window, usually
gay with flowers, was blank and desolate, the check curtain within
being drawn across it.
“Mother!” cried Martha, in a tone of such anguish that Ally immediately
set up a corresponding wail. “Oh mother, whatever is to do? Be you
dead? Oh, mother! be you dead?”
To her intense relief she heard the sound of a chair being pushed back
over the flagged floor within, and her mother’s well-known step slowly
cross the little kitchen.
“Martha! be it you, my dear?” But she did not open the door, and when
Martha eagerly tried the latch she found that it did not yield.
“Mother, mother,” she cried in an agony of fear, “oh, mother, what is
it? Why don’t ye let I in?”
“I can’t, my dear,” came the tremulous voice from within. “No, don’t ax
it of I. I dursen’t, Martha! There, I mid do ’ee a mischief.”
“Mother, what be talkin’ on?” Martha was beginning incredulously, when
her small son, impatient of the delay, fairly drowned her voice with
shrill clamour for admittance, and vigorous kicking of his little
hobnailed boots at the panels of the door. Martha snatched him up
and impatiently clapped her hand over the protesting mouth. In the
momentary pause that ensued she heard her mother weeping.
“Be that Ally? Oh, my blessed lamb! Oh, dear heart! Oh, oh!” Then in
a louder key came the words broken by sobs: “Take en away, Martha,
do--take en away, lovey! Somethin’ bad might happen else!”
Here Ally, wrenching himself free, burst into a roar of indignation,
and his mother, popping him down on the ground, threw herself upon the
door, and, exerting all her strength, succeeded in bursting it open.
With a wail Ann shrank away from her into the farthest corner of the
room, hiding her face against the wall.
“Don’t ye come a-nigh me, Martha, don’t ye--don’t ye! And take the
blessed child away! Take him away this minute!”
“I’ll do nothin’ o’ the kind,” returned Martha vehemently. “Be you gone
crazy, mother? Whatever is the matter?”
“Nay, my dear, I bain’t gone crazy--it be worse, a deal worse. I can’t
tell however it did come about, Martha, but, there, I be turned into
a witch! I be evil-eyed, they d’ say! There, ye’d never believe the
terr’ble things what have a-come about along o’ me jist lookin’.”
Martha dropped down in a chair and burst out laughing. She was a hale,
hearty young woman, who had had a bit of schooling, and took a sane and
cheerful view of life.
“God bless us, mother!” she cried, wiping her eyes at last and
springing up, “what put such a notion as that in your head? You a
witch! You hurtin’ things wi’ lookin’ at ’em! I never did hear such
nonsense-talk in my life!”
“But it be true, Martha--it be true!” returned Ann, still hiding her
face in her trembling hands. “There, I’ve seed it myself. Don’t you
come too nigh, my dear, and for mercy’s sake keep the darlin’ child
away!”
“Nay, but I won’t,” retorted Martha; and, catching up the child, she
advanced with a determined air. “You shall look at us--both of us--that
you shall! Kiss grandma, Ally, love--that’s it! Pull away her hands,
and give her a big hug. There, the mischief’s done now, if mischief
there be. Bain’t he growed, grandma? Bain’t he a fine boy? There, come
an’ sit ye down and take en on your knee and feel the weight of en.”
Ann could not withstand the spell of the little clinging arms, the
kisses rained upon her withered cheek. She suffered the child to climb
from his mother’s arms into hers, and hugged him back passionately.
“Bless you, my lamb! Bless you, my darlin’ little angel! Dear, but he
be a fine boy, Martha. Bless you, love! E-es; grandma ’ull find en a
lump o’ sugar. Ah, Martha, I be a-feared--it do seem a terr’ble risk;
but, there, I can’t think but what the Lard ’ull purtect the innercent
child.”
“Now, you come along, mother, and sit ye down, an’ don’t ye go so
trembly. You’ll not hurt Ally; he be a deal more like to hurt you, such
a mischievous boy as he be. Now, then, whoever has been frightenin’ of
ye with such talk?”
“My dear, they do all say it,” murmured Ann, looking fearfully round.
Brokenly, and with many digressions, she told her tale. Long before
she had ended Martha was weeping too--weeping with indignation and
with a sense of despair; for, argue as she might, she could not divest
her mother of her persuasion in her own fell powers. If Ann herself
could not be convinced of the folly of the supposition, what hope could
Martha have to do away with the unjust suspicions of the neighbours?
Each fresh proof of the ostracism which had become her mother’s
portion added to her wrath and woe. She had not had a bit of meat to
her dinner, as was invariably the case on Sunday, not having dared to
venture forth to buy it. There was not so much as a drop of milk in
the house, the child who usually brought it having declined to perform
that office. Ann had not liked even to go out and get herself a few
“spuds”--there were so many folks about on Saturdays, she explained.
There was no fire in the grate, though the autumn day was sharp, for
Farmer Cosser had “dared” her to pick up any more sticks in his field.
“I d’ ’low ye’d ha’ been dead afore long, if I hadn’t ha’ come,” cried
Martha, and then fell a-sobbing again. What was the use of her having
come? What good could she do?
The two women were sitting together in very melancholy mood, when
Farmer Joyce called to say that he would hitch the horse at six
o’clock, and Martha must meet him at the top of the road.
“Hullo!” he cried, breaking off short at sight of their tearful faces,
“be you all a-cryin’ in here?”
And then Martha, eager for sympathy, made bold to clutch at his stout
arm and pour forth her tale. The farmer, leaning against the door-post,
listened at first in amusement, afterwards with an indignation almost
equal to the daughter’s own.
“I never did hear such a thing!” he cried emphatically, as she paused
for breath. “They must be a pack o’ sammies in this place--and wicked
uns, too. Dear heart alive! they’ve fair gallied the poor wold ’ooman
out of her wits. Be there any one about? I’ll soon show ’em what I
think of ’em.”
“There’s a good few folks just goin’ their ways to church,” cried
Martha, eagerly pointing up the lane.
“Then I’ll step up and give ’em a bit o’ my mind,” returned he. “You
come along wi’ I, Mrs. Kerley--don’t ye stop for to put on your
bonnet--throw this ’ere ’ankercher over your cap--else we’ll not be in
time to catch ’em, maybe.”
“No, I dursen’t do that,” protested Ann, plucking away the handkerchief
which he had thrown over her head; “’twas that which did first start
the notion. ’Twas a windy day, d’ye see, an’ I was going to pick a bit
o’ scroff, an’ I just tied my handkercher round my head--an’ when the
bwoys did see I, they did pelt I wi’ stones and call I witch.”
“Young rascals!” ejaculated the farmer, who had by this time hauled
her out of the house, and was hurrying with her up the lane. “Come on,
Martha! Make haste, ’ooman! There be a lot of ’em yonder.”
In a few moments he and the breathless women found themselves in the
midst of quite a little crowd, for Farmer Joyce had waylaid the first
group he came across, and the sound of his stentorian tones, raised in
wrathful accusation, speedily summoned others.
“You be a wise lot here, you be!” he cried; “you do know summat, you
do. Tell ’ee what--you be the biggest lot o’ stunpolls as ever was
seed or heerd on. This be your witch, be it?--thikky poor wold ’ooman
what have never done anybody a bit o’ harm in her life--poor wold
Ann Kerley what was born and bred here, and did get married to a
Little Branston man an’ all, and what have lived among ye so quiet an’
peaceful as a body could do. Why, look at her! Look at the poor wold
frightened face of her; d’ye mean for to tell I that’s the face of a
witch?”
“Well, she did blight our ’taters,” growled somebody.
“An’ she did overlook Mrs. Clarke’s young duck----”
“Did she?” retorted Farmer Joyce, sarcastically. “Well, she didn’t
overlook my young duck, and they be dead--the most on ’em--what do ye
make o’ that? Did ye never hear, you wise folk, as duckling do mostly
die in thunder weather? And I’ll warrant you be too wise hereabouts
to have heerd that this be a blight-year. A lot o’ my ’taters be
blighted----”
“I’m sure,” put in poor Martha, eagerly, “our ’taters be blighted too.
There, my husband do say ’tis scarce worth while to get ’em up.”
“I s’pose,” cried Farmer Joyce, looking round with withering sarcasm,
“I s’pose this ’ere witch have a-gone and wished ill-luck to her own
darter’s ’taters. ’Tis very likely, I’m sure. And there’s another
thing--I did hear some tale o’ bees a-dyin’ arter they’d a-been put in
a new hive.”
“That’s true enough.” “’Tis true, sure,” came one or two voices in
reply, not with any great enthusiasm, however; then a man’s sullen
tones--“’Tis so true as anything. They was my bees, an’ I can answer
for ’t bein’ true.”
“How much food did ye put in for ’em when ye did shift ’em?” inquired
Joyce, fixing his eyes on the speaker.
“How much food? I d’ ’low bees be like to keep theirselves.”
“Not when you do take their store off ’em so late in the season. You’ve
a-killed your own bees, good man; they were too weak, d’ye see, to keep
wosses off when they did come a-fightin’ of ’em. I’d ha’ thought you’d
ha’ been clever enough to ha’ knowed that, seein’ what knowin’ folks you
be in Little Branston. There, you did know poor wold Mrs. Kerley tied
her ’andkercher over her head to make herself a witch--’twas that what
made her a witch, weren’t it? Now I be a witch, bain’t I?”
He whisked off his hat suddenly, and drawing a cotton handkerchief from
his pocket threw it over his head and tied the ends beneath his chin.
The sight of his large red face with its fringe of grey whisker looking
jubilantly out of the red and yellow folds, was irresistibly comic;
the bystanders fairly roared. The farmer was quick to follow up his
advantage.
“I must be a witch,” he persisted, “seein’ as I’ve a-got a witch’s head
on;” then, seized by a yet more luminous inspiration, he crowned the
meek and trembling Ann Kerley with his own broad-brimmed and shaggy
beaver.
“Now, Mrs. Kerley be a farmer. She must be a farmer, sure, for she be
a-wearin’ a farmer’s hat. There be jist so mich sense in the one notion
as t’other. Here we be--Farmer Kerley and Witch Joyce!”
The merriment at this point grew so uproarious that the clergyman in
his distant vestry very nearly sallied forth to inquire the cause;
but it died away as suddenly as it had begun. The sight of poor old
Ann’s lined face looking patiently out from beneath its ridiculous
headgear was, on the whole, more pathetic than ludicrous; folks began
to look at each other, and to own to themselves that they had been not
only foolish, but cruel. Every word that the farmer spoke had carried
weight, and he could have employed no more forcible argument than the
practical demonstration at the end. He was the very best advocate
who could have been chosen to plead for her--a good plain man, like
themselves, who thoroughly understood the case. By the time Farmer
Joyce had resumed his hat and restored his handkerchief to his pocket,
the cause was won. People had gathered round Ann with rough apologies
and kindly handshakes, and she was escorted homewards by more than one
long-estranged friend.
When little Ally, who had been asleep on the settle, woke at the sound
of the approaching voices, and came trotting out of the banned house,
rubbing his eyes and calling loudly for “Grandma,” the good women
nodded to each other meaningly, and said that he was a fine boy, bless
him, and he wouldn’t be likely to look so well if---- And then somebody
sniffed the air, and observed that he shouldn’t wonder but what Mrs.
Kerley’s ’taters was a bit blighted too, and Mrs. Kerley replied that
she was sure they mid be, but she didn’t know, for she hadn’t had the
heart to look. And then the expert returned authoritatively that he was
quite sure they was done for, which seemed wonderfully satisfactory to
all parties.
And then Farmer Joyce bethought him that it was time to hitch the
horse, and the rest of Ann’s friends remembered that “last bell” would
soon ha’ done ringing; so gradually the little crowd melted away,
and Martha embraced her mother with a thankful heart, and went away
likewise, leaving Ally behind, according to the farmer’s advice, who
had reminded her in a gruff whisper that the little chap would be more
like to take off the wold body’s mind from that there queer notion nor
anything else.
So the little house, which had been so desolate a few hours before, was
now restored to homely joy and peace; and when Martha looked back from
the summit of the lane, she saw her mother standing, all smiles, in the
open doorway, shading her eyes from the sun, which was making a glory
round the curly head of the child in her arms.