"Couldn't be much worse if they had," said my grandfather. "Some person've a-stole my shovel, pick, and biddicks."
"Nonsense!" said the Parson.
"The corpse won't find it nonsense, Sir, if I don't get 'em back in time. I left 'em lying, all three, at the bottom of the grave overnight."
"And now they're missing?"
"Not a trace of 'em to be seen."
"Someone has been playing you a practical joke, Calvin. Here, stop a moment——" The Parson ran back to his room, fetched a key, and flung it out into the yard. "That'll unlock the tool-shed in the garden. Get what you want, and we'll talk about the theft after breakfast. How soon will the grave be ready?"
"I can't say sooner than ten o'clock after what has happened."
"Say ten o'clock, then. This is Saturday, and I've my sermon to prepare after breakfast. At ten o'clock I'll join you in the churchyard."
II
My grandfather went off to unlock the tool-shed, and the Parson back to comfort Mrs. Polwhele—which was no easy matter. "There's something wrong with the parish since I've been away, and that you can't deny," she declared. "It don't feel like home any longer, and my poor flesh is shivering like a jelly, and my hand almost too hot to make the butter." She kept up this lidden all through breakfast, and the meal was no sooner cleared away than she slipped on a shawl and stepped across to the churchyard to discuss the robbery.