"And me just home from Plymouth with a fine new roasting-jack!" chimed in Mrs. Polwhele. "As though the day of wrath weren't bad enough without that waste o' money! Run, Calvin—run and tell the Vicar this instant—no, no, don't leave me behind! Take me home, that's a good man: else I shall faint at my own shadow!"
Well, they hurried off to the Vicarage: but, of course, there was no Parson to be found, for by this time he was half-way towards Little Dinnis, and running like a madman under the hot sun to see what damage had befallen his dearly-loved camp. The servants hadn't seen him leave the house; ne'er a word could they tell of him except that Martha, the cook, when she cleared away the breakfast things, had left him seated in his chair and smoking.
"But what's the meaning of this?" cried out Mrs. Polwhele, pointing to the tablecloth that Bligh had pulled all awry in his temper. "And the window open too!"
"And—hallo!" says my grandfather, staring across the patch of turf outside. "Surely here's signs of a violent struggle. Human, by the look of it," says he, picking up a thigh-bone and holding it out towards Mrs. Polwhele.
She began to shake like a leaf. "Oh, Calvin!" she gasps out. "Oh, Calvin, not in this short time—it couldn't be!"
"Charred, too," says my grandfather, inspecting it: and with that they turned at a cry from Martha the cook, that was down on hands and knees upon the carpet.
"Ashes! See here, mistress—ashes all over your best carpet!"
The two women stared at the fireplace: but, of course, that told them nothing, being empty, as usual at the time of year, with only a few shavings stuck about it by way of ornament. Martha, the first to pick up her wits, dashed out into the front hall.
"Gone without his hat, too!" she fairly screamed, running her eye along the row of pegs.
Mrs. Polwhele clasped her hands. "In the midst of life we are in death," said Arch'laus Spry: "that's my opinion if you ask it."