Later on in the evening, however, she began to understand. Durracombe was a little old-world place, and had preserved many quaint and curious customs from ancient times. One of the most extraordinary of these was a kind of carnival held by the boys of the town at the beginning of the season of Lent. As soon as it was dusk they commenced to prowl about the streets wearing black paper masks and carrying turnip lanterns. They were supposed to represent imps of darkness, or perhaps will o' the wisps, and their chief sport was to ring door bells, or rat-tap with knockers, and then run away. Mavis and Merle, hearing repeated peals from the surgery bell, were amazed that Jessop did not answer it, till she explained it was merely a ruse of the Nicky Nans, and that nobody in Durracombe who knew their tricks would respond to such a summons. She offered however to take the girls out for ten minutes to look at the fun; so they donned coats and scarves and issued into the dim High Street. It was a moonless night, which made things all the better for such a saturnalia. In the distance a cluster of lights began to dance about, and presently up ran half a dozen little urchins, disguised in masks and waving turnip lanterns pierced with holes for eyes and mouths, so that the candles shining through them gave them the appearance of gruesome goblins. The children had indeed vied with one another as to which could produce the most horrible looking turnip head, and part of the sport was to hide in dark alleys and suddenly to exhibit the lanterns to unwary passers-by, to try to raise a scream. The small imps careered round and round, prancing and giving an occasional yell of "Nicky Nan". The girls laughed in much amusement, and Jessop, who had witnessed the custom from her youth up, felt in her pocket for some pennies, and threw them into the road to be scrambled for.
Presently came the noise of a tin-kettle band, and down the High Street marched a procession carrying "Jack o' Lent", a grotesque figure on the lines of a Guy Fawkes, stuffed with straw and wearing a mask and an old top hat. The Nicky Nans flew to join their fellows, showing their lanterns like the wise virgins in the parable, and the Guy was escorted by quite a crowd of leaping dancing will-o'-the-wisps, who added squeals and whistling to the din made on the old tea-trays and pans. They crossed the bridge to a field on the farther side of the river, where a bonfire had been built. Upon this Jack o' Lent was carefully hoisted, and a match was put to the straw. The Ramsays, hurried indoors by Jessop lest Mavis should catch cold, watched the scene from Aunt Nellie's bedroom window, and had a fine view of the flames blazing up, and the Nicky Nans prancing round in a circle, waving their weird turnip lights.
On this one night in the year the town's children were veritable Devonshire pixies. By immemorial custom they were licensed to carry away brooms, pails, or any objects which people were so foolish as to leave unguarded outside their houses. These they pounced upon and bore off as booty, exhibiting them the next morning in the pound, whence they might be redeemed by their owners for a fee varying from a penny to sixpence, according to their value. As the proceeds went to their football club, the Nicky Nans were naturally anxious to pick up every trifle which they could possibly find lying about, and every house and garden in the town was visited for that purpose. The matron, who missed her scrubbing-brush or her bucket, knew what Pucks and Robin Goodfellows had been flitting round in the darkness, and made a visit to the pound to recover her lost property, paying the price with a good-natured remembrance of the fun of her own young days.
Mavis and Merle, on their way to school on the morning following the saturnalia, peeped into the pound, a walled enclosure intended for the detention of lost cows or strayed sheep, and saw half a dozen of the boys, still wearing masks, guarding quite a collection of treasures and chaffing some of the owners over the gate. Evidently they had had a most successful evening, and the funds of their football club would be replenished.
"Little wretches. They're as light-fingered as elves," remarked Merle. "They've even taken the pots of geraniums off people's window-sills."
"I shall never forget them dancing in a mad circle round the bonfire," laughed Mavis, as the pair passed on.
When the pupils at The Moorings assembled that morning for call-over, Miss Fanny entered with a look upon her face which everybody at once mentally registered at stormy. Her "Good morning, girls!" was cold. She never noticed the vase full of flowers which the boarders had arranged upon her desk, and she took the names, as if she were reading a list of criminals, in a deep sad voice without an atom of her usual geniality. When this first preliminary was finished she turned to what was evidently the pressing business on her mind.
"Girls!" she began. "A very unpleasant thing has happened in the school. The metronome is missing from the piano. None of the boarders has interfered with it. Can any of you day girls tell what has become of it?"
A look of much astonishment passed round the assembled faces. On several it was even mingled with relief. To get rid of the metronome did not seem an unmixed evil. Perhaps Miss Fanny noted the expression. She paused for a whole solemn minute, then spoke again in a yet sterner voice.
"I put every girl in this room on her honour to tell what she knows."