The Angel watched the second tinker walk back, and, with affectionate blasphemy, assist the first to his hat and his coat. Then he turned, absolutely mystified, towards the village again.
XXVII.
After that incident the Angel walked along past the mill and round behind the church, to examine the tombstones.
"This seems to be the place where they put the broken pieces," said the Angel—reading the inscriptions. "Curious word—relict! Resurgam! Then they are not done with quite. What a huge pile it requires to keep her down.... It is spirited of her."
"Hawkins?" said the Angel softly,.... "Hawkins? The name is strange to me.... He did not die then.... It is plain enough,—Joined the Angelic Hosts, May 17, 1863. He must have felt as much out of place as I do down here. But I wonder why they put that little pot thing on the top of this monument. Curious! There are several others about—little stone pots with a rag of stiff stone drapery over them."
Just then the boys came pouring out of the National School, and first one and then several stopped agape at the Angel's crooked black figure among the white tombs. "Ent 'e gart a bääk on en!" remarked one critic.
"'E's got 'air like a girl!" said another.
The Angel turned towards them. He was struck by the queer little heads sticking up over the lichenous wall. He smiled faintly at their staring faces, and then turned to marvel at the iron railings that enclosed the Fitz-Jarvis tomb. "A queer air of uncertainty," he said. "Slabs, piles of stone, these railings.... Are they afraid?... Do these Dead ever try and get up again? There's an air of repression—fortification——"