Dr Riccabocca, awakened out of his reverie by the sound of
footsteps--was still so little sensible of the indignity of his
position, that he enjoyed exceedingly, and with all the malice of
his natural humour, the astonishment and stupor manifested by Stirn,
when that functionary beheld the extraordinary substitute which fate
and philosophy had found for Lenny Fairfield. Instead of the weeping,
crushed, broken-hearted captive whom he had reluctantly come to
deliver, he stared, speechless and aghast, upon the grotesque but
tranquil figure of the Doctor, enjoying his pipe and cooling himself
under his umbrella, with a _sang-froid_ that was truly appalling
and diabolical. Indeed, considering that Stirn always suspected the
Papisher of having had a hand in the whole of that black and midnight
business, in which the Stocks had been broken, bunged up, and consigned
to perdition, and that the Papisher had the evil reputation of dabbling
in the Black Art, the hocus-pocus way in which the Lenny he had
incarcerated was transformed into the Doctor he found, conjoined with
the peculiarly strange, eldritch, and Mephistophelean physiognomy and
person of Riccabocca, could not but strike a thrill of superstitious
dismay into the breast of the parochial tyrant. While to his first
confused and stammered exclamations and interrogatories, Riccabocca
replied with so tragic an air, such ominous shakes of the head, such
mysterious, equivocating, long-worded sentences, that Stirn every
moment felt more and more convinced that the boy had sold himself to
the Powers of Darkness; and that he himself, prematurely, and in the
flesh, stood face to face with the Arch-Enemy.
Mr Stirn had not yet recovered his wonted intelligence, which, to do
him justice, was usually prompt enough--when the Squire, followed hard
by the Parson, arrived at the spot. Indeed, Mrs Hazeldean's report of
the Squire's urgent message, disturbed manner, and most unparalleled
invitation to the parishioners, had given wings to Parson Dale's
ordinarily slow and sedate movements. And while the Squire, sharing
Stirn's amazement, beheld indeed a great pair of feet projecting from
the stocks, and saw behind them the grave face of Doctor Riccabocca,
under the majestic shade of the umbrella, but not a vestige of the only
being his mind could identify with the tenancy of the Stocks, Mr Dale,
catching him by the arm, and panting hard, exclaimed with a petulance
he had never before been known to display--except at the whist-table,--
"Mr Hazeldean, Mr Hazeldean, I am scandalised--I am shocked at you.
I can bear a great deal from you, sir, as I ought to do; but to ask
my whole congregation, the moment after divine service, to go up and
guzzle ale at the Hall, and drink my health, as if a clergyman's sermon
had been a speech at a cattle-fair! I am ashamed of you, and of the
parish! What on earth has come to you all?"
"That's the very question I wish to heaven I could answer," groaned the
Squire, quite mildly and pathetically--"What on earth has come to us
all! Ask Stirn:" (then bursting out) "Stirn, you infernal rascal, don't
you hear?--what on earth has come to us all?"
"The Papisher is at the bottom of it, sir," said Stirn, provoked out of
all temper. "I does my duty, but I is but a mortal man, arter all."
"A mortal fiddlestick--where's Leonard Fairfield, I say?"
"_Him_ knows best," answered Stirn, retreating mechanically, for
safety's sake, behind the Parson, and pointing to Dr Riccabocca.
Hitherto, though both the Squire and Parson had indeed recognised the
Italian, they had merely supposed him to be seated on the bank. It
never entered into their heads that so respectable and dignified a
man could by any possibility be an inmate, compelled or voluntary, of
the Parish Stocks. No, not even though, as I before said, the Squire
had seen, just under his nose, a very long pair of soles inserted
in the apertures--that sight had only confused and bewildered him,
unaccompanied as it ought to have been with the trunk and face of Lenny
Fairfield. Those soles seemed to him optical delusions, phantoms of the
overheated brain; but now, catching hold of Stirn, while the Parson in
equal astonishment caught hold of him--the Squire faltered out, "Well,
this beats cock-fighting! The man's as mad as a March hare, and has
taken Dr Rickey-bockey for little Lenny!"
"Perhaps," said the Doctor, breaking silence, with a bland smile, and
attempting an inclination of the head as courteous as his position
would permit--"perhaps, if it be quite the same to you, before you
proceed to explanations,--you will just help me out of the Stocks."
The Parson, despite his perplexity and anger, could not repress a
smile, as he approached his learned friend, and bent down for the
purpose of extricating him.
"Lord love your reverence, you'd better not!" cried Mr Stirn. "Don't be
tempted--he only wants to get you into his claws. I would not go a-near
him for all the--"
The speech was interrupted by Dr Riccabocca himself, who now, thanks
to the Parson, had risen into his full height, and half a head taller
than all present--even than the tall Squire--approached Mr Stirn, with
a gracious wave of the hand. Mr Stirn retreated rapidly towards the
hedge, amidst the brambles of which he plunged himself incontinently.
"I guess whom you take me for, Mr Stirn," said the Italian, lifting
his hat with his characteristic politeness. "It is certainly a great
honour; but you will know better one of these days, when the gentleman
in question admits you to a personal interview in another and--a hotter
world."