After whistling he began to sing, making, it must be owned, a shocking noise. He did not know the words of the ballads, nor more than a single line of the Wesleyan hymn which children sing in procession upon chapel anniversary day. Brightly had often listened as he tramped by, with his full basket and his empty stomach, but he had never caught the Words because the children gabbled them so in their hurry to get the religious exercises over and attack the cakes and splits. "Jesu, Master, us belongs to yew," he howled discordantly, while Ju howled in dismal agreement, and began to whimper when her master went on to scream about Jerusalem and dairy produce.
"I reckon that be the beautifullest tune as ever was sung," commented Brightly, "I'll sing 'en again, Ju, and I'll get 'en right this time. I mun sing him a bit stronger. I reckon the end o' the world can't be over far off, wi' volks got so cruel wicked, and us mun get ready vor't."
He folded his hands upon his knees, and was about to resume his noises when the moor gate clicked. Brightly's faculties were as keen as a bat's. He could not see much, but he could sense the approach of danger; and when he heard the gate slam violently, and a thick voice exclaim: "There a' be!" he started up, anxious to get back to his solitude, conscious somehow that unfriendly beings were upon him, to steal his "duppence," and put him out of business by smashing his vases. He stared through his glasses until he distinguished two fat figures, one in uniform, the other in shabby raiment, advancing upon him with threatening movements, one the village constable, the other the village reprobate; and when he saw them, that grim thing called terror descended upon Brightly. He had done nothing wrong so far as he knew, but all the same he could not resist the fear, so he fled away as hard as he could, the basket dragging upon his arm, and Ju trotting at his heels. He knew what it meant to fall into the hands of his fellow-men. Pendoggat had shown him, and most men were Pendoggats to Brightly.
He went up the moor towards the top of the village, and the stout constable soon gave up the chase, as he was not used to violent exercise, nor did he receive any extra pay for exerting himself. Besides, he was sure of the man. He wiped his face and told the village reprobate, who was his most obliging servant and had to be, that it was cruel hot, and he'd got that lusty he didn't seem able to run properly, and he thought he would return to the village and prepare for more strenuous deeds with a drop o' cider; and he charged the reprobate to follow Brightly and head him off at the top of the village, and keep him close until he, the constable, should have cooled down and recovered from his fatigue sufficiently to attend in great pomp and arrest the rascal. He reminded the reprobate he must not arrest Brightly because that was not allowed by law; but he was at perfect liberty to knock him down, and trample on him, and inform him that the criminal law of the land was about to spread its net around him. The constable's state of mind regarding the law was peculiar. He had no idea that laws were made to punish crime. He conceived that creatures like Brightly existed to supply the demands of the law.
At the head of the village Brightly encountered more man-hunters, but he managed to escape again, although he had to leave his basket behind. Some children soon rifled it, and took the gorgeous vases home to their mothers. With the instinct of the hunted animal the fugitive turned upon his tracks, fled up a side lane, climbed over a hedge, waited until his pursuers had passed, then hurried back for his basket, hoping to reclaim it and get away upon the moor, where he could soon hide himself. But he had not gone far when he saw a vision; the angel again, the angel of Tavistock, the angel from Jerusalem, who had dropped out of the church window and set him up in business with half-a-crown; and she came to meet him in the road, as angels do, with his basket in her hand, and just the same pitiful look in her eyes. There was no church just by, only a little white cottage; but perhaps it was furnished like a church, with coloured windows, booming organ, and a big black book on the outspread wings of a golden goose.
"I have got some of the vases. The children have not taken them all," said Boodles. "I saw it from the window. What have you done?"
"They knows, your reverent; I don't," gasped Brightly. He didn't know how he ought to address the angel, but he thought "your reverent" might do for the present. He stood upon the road, panting, shivering, and coughing, while Boodles looked at him and tried to laugh, but couldn't.
"What a dreadful cough!" she said sorrowfully.
"It's asthma, your reverent. I allus has it, and rheumatics tu—just here, cruel, your reverent. I be getting blind. I don't seem able to see you properly," he said, in the voice of one saying his prayers, and half choking all the time.
"Don't call me your reverent," said Boodles. "How silly! I—I'm only a little girl."