WE MEET DAFT JEREMY
The next morning, bright and early, Elsie and I were up and out.
Indeed, I was throwing up stones at her window when she was already
dressed and out in the little back garden feeding the hens. Of course
I know I should have tried to dissuade Elsie from going on such an
errand. But I knew that would only make her all the keener to go.
And, indeed, once she had taken a thing in her head she would go
through with it in spite of everything.
Poor Harry Foster and his fate was always in the background of my mind.
But not so much, as I could see, in Elsie's. Now I like my father well
enough, as fathers go. He is a grocer, not at all mysterious, but
makes lots of money. Now if, instead, he were the Red Rover of the
Seas--well, bless me if I would give twopence to find out about him.
But of course Elsie is different. She always was different from every
one else, and now she was keen as a terrier at a rat hole to find out
all about the Stennises, and the queer crew that was battening on her
grandfather, old Hobby, the Golden Farmer of Deep Moat Hollow.
Before I saw her, Elsie had made Nance's breakfast, shared it, and seen
her off to her work. Nance was in great demand. She could act as
foreman or grieve on occasion, and people who wanted their work quickly
done, like my father, used often to give Nance as much as a shilling a
day extra for coming to them.
I don't think either of us had much thought of finding out about poor
lost Harry Foster. How could we, with all those city detectives, from
East Dene and Thorsby, even (they whispered) from Scotland Yard itself,
ranging everywhere like pointer dogs over the heather?
Indeed we were almost like dogs on a scent ourselves, so keen were we
to see with our eyes the mysterious Grange and all the queer folk
there. I hardly think we would have turned aside to look at Harry
Foster himself, had he been lying in his last bloody sleep, as plain as
in a waxwork. But we were not tried. Nothing of the kind happened.
As we went across the moor, every low spiky arch of bramble and tuft of
gorse was shining and sparkling. The wren and the gowdspink were
preening themselves and shaking off the dews that fell on their
feathers as they fussed to and fro about their nesting business. Then
we dived into Sparhawk Wood, and came out again on the country
cross-road along which Bailiff Ball had seen Dappled Bess plunging
madly with her empty cart. The Brom Water flowed still as a canal on
our left, down towards the Moat Pond. It was certainly heartsomer to
be out under the sky and the crying whaups, with the blue Cheviots
looking over the tree tops, than in Grange Longwood, where somebody
might be watching you from behind every bush and you none the wiser.
But before we came to the Bridge End, where we had found the marks of
the struggle that first morning, Elsie had an idea that if we struck
across the road and kept round the edge of the Brom Water, we would
escape the bailiff's cottage and stand a good chance of seeing Deep
Moat Grange without being discovered by anybody.
When we got there it was only about six in the morning, and eerie
enough in the gloomy bits, where you could not see a handsbreadth of
sky, and nasty things, which you told yourself were only rabbits, would
keep moving and rustling in the undergrowth.
I would have been glad to go back even then, because after all, it was
silly. Just imagine--mad folks, and murderers, maybe, skulking in
coverts! I am as brave as anybody when all is open and I have a chance
to run. I am too old to believe in ghosts, of course; but for all that
there are queer things to be seen in old green droopy woods like that
of Deep Moat Hollow. The trees whisper and seem to know such a lot.
After about an hour I get shivers down my back.
But it was no use arguing with Elsie. She went on first, and I guarded
the rear--that being the most dangerous position. And I did it well,
for I declare I got crick in the neck just with looking over my
shoulder.
So we crept and crept, foot by foot, looking and testing everything.
And it was as well. Because, quite without warning, the thick bushes
ceased, and there we were on the edge of a deep trench with very black
water at the bottom. The sides were steep and green with grass. But
on the other bank all was green and yellow, with spreading lawns and
Lent lilies growing, and a woman in a short skirt, coming and going
among them, with a gardening spade in her hand.
Somehow I knew at once that that was Daft Jeremy's elder sister, Aphra
Orrin, the one who was not so mad as the others, and kept house for
Elsie's grandfather.
She came quite near. We could have tossed a dog biscuit to her
feet--could, that is--somehow, I didn't want to. It might have
startled the poor lady, and besides I hate making oneself conspicuous.
Over the lily patches and the flower beds we got glimpses of a
red-tiled house, low and old, all overgrown with ivy about the gables
and porches. It had small windows with criss-cross panes, and smoke
was coming out of one of the chimneys, though it was yet so early.
That I took to be the kitchen of Deep Moat Grange.
The canal seemed to go all the way round, and to join on to the pond
which we could see glimmering beyond the house, looking gray through a
fringe of willows.
The place was nested in woods and water, like a dabchick's nest, yet
for all that comfortable and fair to see with its lawns and greenery
set about it. I looked at Elsie to see if she was feared. But not
she. Instead, there was a queer, eager look, and her eyes kept
glittering, as if you could have struck a match at them. Then all at
once it struck me that Elsie was going to be pretty; but I resolved to
say nothing about that for the present.
It was thinking about her mother that did it, I expect. And that is a
funny thing, too. For I care about my mother, and sometimes look
eager, like Elsie; but it is when I tease her to tell me what we are
going to have for dinner. Elsie was different. She said "S-h-h-h-!"
whenever I moved; and once, when a stick cracked underfoot, turned and
gave me a look, which would have speaned a foal.
"You fidgety worm--_can't_ you be quiet," that look said.
We went on watching the house and the woman watering the flower beds.
Nance had told us that the old housekeeper always did that herself. No
hireling was allowed to put a spade in the soil of the Grange garden.
Very soon we had proof that she was quite mad. The Lent lilies grew
about in great clumps, flourishing strong and high--a brave show. The
gaunt old woman waved the rose of her watering can over each with a
kind of ritual, like what I have since seen the priests use in Catholic
churches. Then she kneeled down and prayed--yes, prayed to the lilies.
Actually I saw her--and so did Elsie.
But that was not all. Out of the house there came a company of three
other women, one behind the other. They had their hair down their
backs, and long cloaks with gold and silver patches covered them. Each
was carrying something narrow and black in her arms. At first they
were too far away for us to see clearly, but as they came nearer, I
gasped and caught at Elsie's hand. The long black things were little,
tiny coffins, neatly modelled, and covered with black cloth all
complete with fringe, name-plates, and cords. A little to the side,
capering and dancing, flinging his legs high in the air, and blowing a
merry marching tune on a soldier's clarionet, pranced Daft Jeremy.
Every now and then he would stop blowing to give the brass instrument a
shake. Then he would laugh and egg on the women with the coffins to
dance also. But they went along quite peaceably, keeping their
countenances wonderfully, and making quaint signs with their hands.
They marched round and round, the idiot laughing and blowing while the
elder woman with the gardening spud went on praying, paying no
attention whatever to them, till they came to a rude altar, just two
upright posts and a stone laid across them, quite at the end of the
garden, opposite to where we were.
Upon this they laid the coffins down, and the women-creatures kneeled.
But the monster with the clarionet leaped up between the coffins nimbly
as a jackanapes, crossed his legs, and began to play.
Now I cannot tell whether it was because of the little elevation on the
crossbar of the altar which enabled him to spot us, or if I moved; but
in another instant Mad Jeremy seemed to spring down, swift and
unexpected, and before we could move, he had jerked out a big "gully"
knife, and rushed to the canal bank, leaped into the middle, driving
the black scum of the water every way, and almost before we could think
he was upon us.
The madman made for me first with the big knife uplifted, and but for
my ducking and running in, there would have been an end of me on the
spot. We fell, and his weapon now being in his way, he let go, and I
felt the grip of immense hands about my neck. That had almost been my
last memory on earth. For though Elsie had seized the knife and was
about to kill the madman, it would have been too late so far as I was
concerned.
But out of the undergrowth, as if he had been watching, came a little
quick-tripping old man, bow-backed and wizened, who called, "Jeremy!
Jeremy!" in a high, piping key.
At the sound the madman lifted himself up from my neck, as if moved by
a spring, and stood before the little man smiling and sucking his
thumb--for all the world like a child caught stealing sugar.
The little old man pointed to the moat. "Go back as you came!" he said.
The "mounster" threw himself into the black water without a complaint.
I saw him come out on the opposite side dripping, and with long threads
of green scum trailing about him. He never looked round once, but made
for the house.
Then the little old man turned fiercely upon Elsie and me, with a kind
of cold hateful sneer on his face.
"And now, my pretties," he said, "what may you be seeking in Deep Moat
Hollow?"