It was after one of these days, taking him clean back to happier times, that he brought a horrible vengeance on himself. One afternoon, when the children were coming home from school, he went out to the forbidden footpath under the chestnuts and played. He forgot all about the cottage just across, and Marget of the music-hating heart. He forgot that he was only a beggar-man and that somebody paid his keep. He only remembered that he was Fiddlin’ Kit, at sight of whom folk had always danced, and the feet of the children stirred his ancient blood. The young feet, the feet of the coming generation of dancers, always stirred his blood. From the end of the village they came skipping down the road, singing a little tune they had learned in school. Most of them came in twos and threes, linked together by twining arms, or trailing a little cloak by its hem in the dust. Some whispered great mysteries in others’ ears. Some held a little school on the kerb, as if they had not already had enough, and in the midst of the lesson gathered themselves up and ran. And all the time, here and there, some of them sang, and the tune that they sang got into the fiddle and played. Kit, down the long perspective of the street, saw the white school from which they had come, and the tune, as it were, coming with them out of the door. He had known the song long ago, and he never forgot a tune. It was only in nature that the fiddle should sing, too.

Marget, staring crossly at neglected plants in the ill-treated patch behind the house, heard both fiddle and voices lilting over the roof. They climbed the slates and swung off the chimney-tops to drop in delicate sweetness on her head. She thought of Kit, of course, in the first breath, but remembered that she had left him nodding in the house. The red-haired baby, she knew, had had him under its eye. She glanced suspiciously down the cottage backs, wondering which harboured this nuisance to the rest. The Martin boy had a fancy for fiddling, she believed; she had caught him talking to Kit about it in the road. Then there was that lass of Simpson’s that thought she played—the one that was going to service before so long. Folks never seemed to care whether the neighbours liked the noise, though they were fit to swear if the red-haired baby cried. There was more than one that she wanted a word with about that, a word flung in like a bomb at a cottage door. This dratted fiddling might give her her excuse, so she picked up her vegetables and hurried down.

She thought of Kit again as she flapped along, and again told herself that it was somebody else. He was safe enough under her thumb, by now, the silly old man. He had given her a deal of trouble at first, fiddling in other folks’ houses when he might not fiddle in hers, but of course she had easily traced him by the sound. Then she had stolen upon him unawares, breaking the harmonies like so much silvered glass, and after a time or two he had never done it again. Besides, this playing came from the street, and if she was sure of anything she was sure she had cured him of that. It was much more likely to be some fiddling tramp, who would be knocking for ha’pence at her door. She slipped as she ran down the steps to give him the best of her tongue, and the potatoes flew out of her apron left and right. It took her some minutes to pick them up again, and as she was doing so the music changed. Now it was playing a dismal little tune, and little voices began to sing it in breathless little jerks. On the top of the tune she heard laughter and applause, and then fiddle and voices went on their way alone. Puzzled, she scrambled up with grubby hands, bunched the potatoes in her grimy apron and opened the cottage door.

The old man stood on the footpath under the trees, his ear bent to the fiddle as he played. His eyes, looking gravely before him at the scene, were as intent as if the fate of nations hung on his bow. The street was full of folk as far as she could see, and in the midst of them the children were playing “London Bridge.” Under the trees and over the sun-flecked road they moved slowly and solemnly to the tune, and between the laughing folk on either side their faces looked serious and sad. There were babies among them, for this is the little children’s game, and even the babies’ faces were sad. They stood facing each other in rows across the street, keeping themselves up by the grasp of their little hands. Sometimes they lost their balance and fell down, but they were so intent on the game that even as they bumped their faces never changed. Suddenly Marget discovered some of her own offspring in the crowd, and that the younger ones were even taking part. Last of all she saw the red-haired baby among the rest, clenching determined fists and setting a firm mouth.

“London Bridge is broken down,

Broken down, broken down.

London Bridge is broken down,

(My fair Ladye!)

Build it up with pins and needles,

Pins and needles, pins and needles.