What the people saw was a long, thin doll in riding breeches, Norfolk jacket, and hard hat. It stared out with sunken, sallow cheeks, and the torchlight played upon its life-size, life-like body. In the other coffin lay the female doll, and her tow hair was drawn back from her forehead and her red lips smiled. The face had been most carefully modelled and painted; therefore its resemblance to Sarah Jane Brendon was clear to all who knew her.
"God's light! what's this?" Lethbridge asked loudly; but Agg did not answer.
A great murmur shook the throng. Names were cried back and forward. A few laughed, some already shouted angrily for the mummery to cease.
"'Tis Sarah Jane and Hilary Woodrow—sure as I'm a sinful man," said Philip Weekes to his wife.
She did not answer, but glared at the figures.
Several voices cried out "Sarah Jane Brendon!" Others remembered the vanished farmer and named him. A spirit decidedly averse from the performers was apparent in the crowd, and Philip Weekes voiced it.
"This is a damned, wicked, wanton shame!" he roared out; "and I say it, though my own son's mixed in it."
"Order—order!" yelled a voice or two.
Mr. Huggins tried to get out of the ring, but was drawn back by the Infant. Mr. Churchward and Mr. Spry among the spectators also showed fear, and the latter, feeling that the sooner he departed from Thornyside the better for his reputation, set out to do so. Adam, in much concern, followed him. Jarratt Weekes, unmoved, proceeded grimly with the service as long as he could be heard. He had seen what none else had as yet; he had marked where the great form of Daniel Brendon suddenly reared itself behind the crowd. His voice shook at the sight, but he proceeded—
"'Man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to live and is full of misery. He cometh up and is cut——'"