Heigho!
I washed my penknife in the stream.
And the more I washed it the blood gushed out—
All down by the greenwood side, O!”
Old Peggy! When had she first established her ghoulish reign over us? Had she been employed here in my mother’s time? I only knew that I could not dispart her ancient figure and the mill in my memory.
I pushed open the door and walked into the kitchen. She was sitting darning by the frouzy little window—a great pair of spectacles on her bony nose—and looked at me with an eye affectedly vacant, as if she were a vicious old parrot speculating upon the most opportune moment for a snap at me.
“That’s a pretty song, Peggy,” I said.
“And a pretty old ’ooman to sing it,” she answered.
“Were you ever young, Peggy?”
“Not that I remembers. I were barn wi’ a wrinkle in my brow like a furrow-drain, and two good teeth in my headpiece.”