“That’s it?” said old Betty, nodding reluctantly. “But there’s more than that too. There’s summat as must be said.”
“I never heerd tell o’ nothin bein’ said, an’ I can mind my cousin Lizzie castin’ a spell over her step-mother wi’ an image like that, an’ she were took wi’ the rheumatiz the next week an’ never looked up arter.”
“’Twarn’t on account of the spell then if she didn’t say nothin’,” retorted Betty contemptuously. “No spell would ever work wi’out the words. Why, did ye never hear tell o’ saying the Lard’s Prayer back’ards, beginnin’ with Amen?”
“Lard no! that I didn’t! An’ it bain’t what I’d like to be doin’, Aunt Betty.”
“Neither should I, my dear—’tis just what I be a-tellin’ ’ee. But charm won’t work wi’out ye do.”
A pause ensued, after which Kate, rising disconsolately and crooking her arm into her heavy market-basket, remarked that it was time to be goin’. Jim rose too, and stood dismally facing his great-aunt.
“If ye like to come back in a few days I’ll get that love charm ready,” she remarked compassionately. “Bain’t there no maid as knows her as ye could get to sew it somewhere about her clothes?”
“No,” retorted Jim sullenly. “I’ll not try no love charms. I’ll try my hand at gettin’ rid o’ him first.”
Mother and son trudged away together in gloomy silence. The early dusk had closed in upon the autumnal landscape. In the little town they had left behind, lights were beginning to gleam forth, but before them there was only the dim glimmer of the wet road to guide them on their way. Now and then a van passed them, jogging downwards to the town, or a heavily-laden waggon with the carter slouching alongside, and growling out Good-night as he went by.
All at once Jim nudged his mother, and pointed with a trembling finger.