“Do, the graceless wench? Why, she said, ‘Is it rails you’re talking of, you pig-smothering old sow? Then here’s a rail for you,’ and she pulled the top bar off my own fence—for we were talking by the door—oak it was, and three by two—and knocked me flat—here’s the scar of it on my head—singing out, ‘Is that enough, or will you have the gate and the posts too?’ Oh! If there’s one thing I hate, it is railing, ‘specially if made of hard oak and held edgeways.”
So the wicked old hag babbled on, after her hideous fashion, while the Abbot stared at the ceiling.
“Enough of these sad stories of vice and violence. Such mischances will happen, and of course you were not to blame. Now, good Mistress Megges, will you undertake this case, which cannot be left to ignorant nuns? Though times are hard here, since of late many losses have fallen on our house, your skill shall be well paid.”
The woman shuffled her big feet and stared at the floor, then looked up suddenly with a glance that seemed to bore to his heart like a bradawl, and asked—
“And if perchance the blessed babe should fly to heaven through my fingers, as in my time I have known dozens of them do, should I still get that pay?”
“Then,” the Abbot answered, with a smile—a somewhat sickly smile—“then I think, mistress, you should have double pay, to console you for your sorrow and for any doubts that might be thrown upon your skill.”
“Now that’s noble trading,” she replied, with an evil leer, “such as one might hope for from an Abbot. But, my Lord, they say the Nunnery is haunted, and I can’t face ghosts. Man or woman, with rails or without ‘em, Mother Flounder doesn’t mind, but ghosts—no! Also Mistress Stower is a witch, and might lay a curse on me; and those nuns are full of crinks and cranks, and can pray an honest soul to death.”
“Come, come, my time is short. What is it you want, woman? Out with it.”
“The inn there at the ford—your Lordship, will need a tenant next month. It’s a good paying house for those who know how to keep their mouths shut and to look the other way, and through vile scandal and evil slanderers, such as the Smith girl, my business isn’t what it was. Now if I could have it without rent for the first two years, till I had time to work up the trade——”
The Abbot, who could bear no more of the creature, rose from his chair and said sharply—