‘A Priest in Spite of Himself’
The day after they came home from the sea-side they set out on a tour of inspection to make sure everything was as they had left it. Soon they discovered that old Hobden had blocked their best hedge-gaps with stakes and thorn-bundles, and had trimmed up the hedges where the blackberries were setting.
‘It can’t be time for the gipsies to come along,’ said Una. ‘Why, it was summer only the other day!’
‘There’s smoke in Low Shaw!’ said Dan, sniffing. ‘Let’s make sure!’
They crossed the fields towards the thin line of blue smoke that leaned above the hollow of Low Shaw which lies beside the King’s Hill road. It used to be an old quarry till somebody planted it, and you can look straight down into it from the edge of Banky Meadow.
‘I thought so,’ Dan whispered, as they came up to the fence at the edge of the larches. A gipsy-van—not the showman’s sort, but the old black kind, with little windows high up and a baby-gate across the door—was getting ready to leave. A man was harnessing the horses; an old woman crouched over the ashes of a fire made out of broken fence-rails; and a girl sat on the van-steps singing to a baby on her lap. A wise-looking, thin dog snuffed at a patch of fur on the ground till the old woman put it carefully in the middle of the fire. The girl reached back inside the van and tossed her a paper parcel. This was laid on the fire too, and they smelt singed feathers.
‘Chicken feathers!’ said Dan. ‘I wonder if they are old Hobden’s.’
Una sneezed. The dog growled and crawled to the girl’s feet, the old woman fanned the fire with her hat, while the man led the horses up to the shafts. They all moved as quickly and quietly as snakes over moss.
‘Ah!’ said the girl. ‘I’ll teach you!’ She beat the dog, who seemed to expect it.