“Can ye get they things without Mrs. Walters seein’ ye?” inquired he. “It would never do for her to be stickin’ her holy nose into it.”
Nannie laughed out. Her laugh was remarkable; it had a ring of ribaldry unsuited to her plain bonnet and knitted shawl.
“No fear o’ that. Mrs. Walters says to me, no more nor this mornin’, ‘Take you the keys, Nannie,’ she says, ‘an’ put away all them clothes o’ his. Let me forget I bore a child that’s to be a disgrace to my old age.’ ’Tis an ill wind that blows nobody good, ye see. But I must be gettin’ home now, Mr. Bumpett.”
So they parted.
As George entered Crishowell by another way, and got over the last stile dividing the fields from the village, the church bell began to sound. The first stroke was finishing its vibration as he laid his hand on the top rail, but he had gone a full furlong before he heard the next. They were evidently tolling. A woman came out of her door and listened to the bell.
“Who’s to be buried?” inquired Williams, as he passed.
“’Tis Vaughan the gate-keeper,” she answered, “him as was killed Tuesday.”
The young man proceeded until the road turned and brought him right in front of the lych-gate of the church; it was open, and the Vicar of Crishowell stood bareheaded among the graves. He went on by a path skirting the wall, and slipped into the churchyard by another entrance. A large yew-tree stood close to it, and under this he took up his stand unperceived; the bell kept on sounding.
Crishowell church was a plain building, which possessed no characteristic but that of solidity; bits had fallen out of it, and been rebuilt at various epochs of its history, without creating much incongruity or adding much glory to its appearance. The nave roof had settled a little, and the walls were irregular in places, but over the whole sat that somnolent dignity which clings to ancient stone. The chancel windows were Norman, and very small; indeed, so near the ground were they, that boys, sitting in the chancel pews, had often been provoked to unseemly jests during service by the sight of unchurch-going school-mates crowding to make grimaces at them from outside. The porch was high, and surmounted by the belfry, and some old wooden benches ran round its walls to accommodate the ringers. As the sexton, who performed many other functions besides those of his office, had just returned from the fields, Howlie Seaborne, his son, had taken his place and was tolling till his father should have changed his coat. He looked like a gnome as he stood in the shadow of the porch with the rope in his hand. The sound of many feet was heard coming up the lane, and Williams took off his hat.
The procession came in sight, black in front of the white hedges and trees, moving slowly towards the lych-gate. First went the coffin, carried under its dark pall, and heading a line of figures which trailed behind it like some interminable insect. From miles round people had come; Squire Fenton and Harry from Waterchurch, the yeomanry officer who had been present at the riot, men from Llangarth, gentlemen from distant parts of the country, all anxious to pay the only respect they could to the undaunted old man whose duty had really meant something to him. Immediately behind the dead walked a girl muffled up in a black cloak. They were at the lych-gate. The bell stopped.