The Peace of Mowsle Barton
Crefton Lockyer sat at his ease, an ease alike of body and soul, in the littlepatch of ground, half-orchard and half-garden, that abutted on the farmyard atMowsle Barton. After the stress and noise of long years of city life, the reposeand peace of the hill-begirt homestead struck on his senses with an almostdramatic intensity. Time and space seemed to lose their meaning and theirabruptness; the minutes slid away into hours, and the meadows and fallows slopedaway into middle distance, softly and imperceptibly. Wild weeds of the hedgerowstraggled into the flower-garden, and wallflowers and garden bushes madecounter-raids into farmyard and lane. Sleepy-looking hens and solemn preoccupiedducks were equally at home in yard, orchard, or roadway; nothing seemed tobelong definitely to anywhere; even the gates were not necessarily to be foundon their hinges. And over the whole scene brooded the sense of a peace that hadalmost a quality of magic in it. In the afternoon you felt that it had alwaysbeen afternoon, and must always remain afternoon; in the twilight you knew thatit could never have been anything else but twilight. Crefton Cockyer sat at hisease in the rustic seat beneath an old medlar tree, and decided that here wasthe life-anchorage that his mind had so fondly pictured and that latterly histired and jarred senses had so often pined for. He would make a permanentlodging-place among these simple friendly people, gradually increasing themodest comforts with which he would like to surround himself, but falling in asmuch as possible with their manner of living.As he slowly matured this resolution in his mind an elderly woman came hobblingwith uncertain gait through the orchard. He recognized her as a member of thefarm household, the mother or possibly the mother-in-law of Mrs. Spurfield, hispresent landlady, and hastily formulated some pleasant remark to make to her.She forestalled him."There's a bit of writing chalked up on the door over yonder. What is it?"She spoke in a dull impersonal manner, as though the question had been on herlips for years and has best be got rid of. Her eyes, however, looked impatientlyover Crefton's head at the door of a small barn which formed the outpost of astraggling line of farm buildings."Martha Pillamon is an old witch" was the announcement that met Crefton'sinquiring scrutiny, and he hesitated a moment before giving the statement widerpublicity. For all he knew to the contrary, it might be Martha herself to whomhe was speaking. It was possible that Mrs. Spurfield's maiden name had beenPillamon. And the gaunt, withered old dame at his side might certainly fulfillocal conditions as to the outward aspect of a witch."It's something about some one called Martha Pillamon," he explained cautiously."What does it say?""It's very disrespectful," said Crefton; "it says she's a witch. Such thingsought not to be written up.""It's true, every word of it," said his listener with considerable satisfaction,adding as a special descriptive note of her own, "the old toad."And as she hobbled away through the farmyard she shrilled out in her crackedvoice, "Martha Pillamon is an old witch!""Did you hear what she said?" mumbled a weak, angry voice somewhere behindCrefton's shoulder. Turning hastily, he beheld another old crone, thin andyellow and wrinkled, and evidently in a high state of displeasure. Obviouslythis was Martha Pillamon in person. The orchard seemed to be a favouritepromenade for the aged women of the neighbourhood."'Tis lies, 'tis sinful lies," the weak voice went on. "'Tis Betsy Croot is theold witch. She an' her daughter, the dirty rat. I'll put a spell on 'em, the oldnuisances."As she limped slowly away her eye caught the chalk inscription on the barn door."What's written up there?" she demanded, wheeling round on Crefton."Vote for Soarker," he responded, with the craven boldness of the practisedpeacemaker.The old woman grunted, and her mutterings and her faded red shawl lostthemselves gradually among the tree-trunks. Crefton rose presently and made hisway towards the farmhouse. Somehow a good deal of the peace seemed to haveslipped out of the atmosphere.The cheery bustle of tea-time in the old farm kitchen, which Crefton had foundso agreeable on previous afternoons, seemed to have soured today into a certainuneasy melancholy. There was a dull, dragging silence around the board, and thetea itself, when Crefton came to taste it, was a flat, lukewarm concoction thatwould have driven the spirit of revelry out of a carnival."It's no use complaining of the tea," said Mrs. Spurfield hastily, as her gueststared with an air of polite inquiry at his cup. "The kettle won't boil, that'sthe truth of it."Crefton turned to the hearth, where an unusually fierce fire was banked up undera big black kettle, which sent a thin wreath of steam from its spout, but seemedotherwise to ignore the action of the roaring blaze beneath it."It's been there more than an hour, an' boil it won't," said Mrs. Spurfield,adding, by way of complete explanation, "we're bewitched.""It's Martha Pillamon as has done it," chimed in the old mother; "I'll be evenwith the old toad, I'll put a spell on her.""It must boil in time," protested Crefton, ignoring the suggestions of foulinfluences. "Perhaps the coal is damp.""It won't boil in time for supper, nor for breakfast tomorrow morning, not ifyou was to keep the fire agoing all night for it," said Mrs. Spurfield. And itdidn't. The household subsisted on fried and baked dishes, and a neighbourobligingly brewed tea and sent it across in a moderately warm condition."I suppose you'll be leaving us now that things has turned up uncomfortable,"Mrs. Spurfield observed at breakfast; "there are folks as deserts one as soon astrouble comes."Crefton hurriedly disclaimed any immediate change of plans; he observed,however, to himself that the earlier heartiness of manner had in a large measuredeserted the household. Suspicious looks, sulky silences, or sharp speeches hadbecome the order of the day. As for the old mother, she sat about the kitchen orthe garden all day, murmuring threats and spells against Martha Pillamon. Therewas something alike terrifying and piteous in the spectacle of these frail oldmorsels of humanity consecrating their last flickering energies to the task ofmaking each other wretched. Hatred seemed to be the one faculty which hadsurvived in undiminished vigour and intensity where all else was dropping intoordered and symmetrical decay. And the uncanny part of it was that some horridunwholesome power seemed to be distilled from their spite and their cursings. Noamount of sceptical explanation could remove the undoubted fact that neitherkettle nor saucepan would come to boiling-point over the hottest fire. Creftonclung as long as possible to the theory of some defect in the coals, but a woodfire gave the same result, and when a small spirit-lamp kettle, which he orderedout by carrier, showed the same obstinate refusal to allow its contents to boilhe felt that he had come suddenly into contact with some unguessed-at and veryevil aspect of hidden forces. Miles away, down through an opening in the hills,he could catch glimpses of a road where motor-cars sometimes passed, and yethere, so little removed from the arteries of the latest civilization, was a bat-haunted old homestead, where something unmistakably like witchcraft seemed tohold a very practical sway.Passing out through the farm garden on his way to the lanes beyond, where hehoped to recapture the comfortable sense of peacefulness that was so lackingaround house and hearth - especially hearth - Crefton came across the oldmother, sitting mumbling to herself in the seat beneath the medlar tree. "Let unsink as swims, let un sink as swims," she was repeating over and over again, asa child repeats a half-learned lesson. And now and then she would break off intoa shrill laugh, with a note of malice in it that was not pleasant to hear.Crefton was glad when he found himself out of earshot, in the quiet andseclusion of the deep overgrown lanes that seemed to lead away to nowhere; one,narrower and deeper than the rest, attracted his footsteps, and he was almostannoyed when he found that it really did act as a miniature roadway to a humandwelling. A forlorn-looking cottage with a scrap of ill-tended cabbage gardenand a few aged apple trees stood at an angle where a swift-flowing streamwidened out for a space into a decent-sized pond before hurrying away againtrough the willows that had checked its course. Crefton leaned against a tree-trunk and looked across the swirling eddies of the pond at the humble littlehomestead opposite him; the only sign of life came from a small procession ofdingy-looking ducks that marched in single file down to the water's edge. Thereis always something rather taking in the way a duck changes itself in an instantfrom a slow, clumsy waddler of the earth to a graceful, buoyant swimmer of thewaters, and Crefton waited with a certain arrested attention to watch the leaderof the file launch itself on to the surface of the pond. He was aware at thesame time of a curious warning instinct that something strange and unpleasantwas about to happen. The duck flung itself confidently forward into the water,and rolled immediately under the surface. Its head appeared for a moment andwent under again, leaving a train of bubbles in its wake, while wings and legschurned the water in a helpless swirl of flapping and kicking. The bird wasobviously drowning. Crefton thought at first that it had caught itself in someweeds, or was being attacked from below by a pike or water-rat. But no bloodfloated to the surface, and the wildly bobbing body made the circuit of the pondcurrent without hindrance from any entanglement. A second duck had by this timelaunched itself into the pond, and a second struggling body rolled and twistedunder the surface. There was something peculiarly piteous in the sight of thegasping beaks that showed now and again above the water, as though in terrifiedprotest at this treachery of a trusted and familiar element. Crefton gazed withsomething like horror as a third duck poised itself on the bank and splashed in,to share the fate of the other two. He felt almost relieved when the remainderof the flock, taking tardy alarm from the commotion of the slowly drowningbodies, drew themselves up with tense outstretched necks, and sidled away fromthe scene of danger, quacking a deep note of disquietude as they went. At thesame moment Crefton became aware that he was not the only human witness of thescene; a bent and withered old woman, whom he recognized at once as MarthaPillamon, of sinister reputation, had limped down the cottage path to thewater's edge, and was gazing fixedly at the gruesome whirligig of dying birdsthat went in horrible procession round the pool. Presently her voice rang out ina shrill note of quavering rage:"'Tis Betsy Croot adone it, the old rat. I'll put a spell on her, see if Idon't."Crefton slipped quietly away, uncertain whether or no the old woman had noticedhis presence. Even before she had proclaimed the guiltiness of Betsy Croot, thelatter's muttered incantation "Let un sink as swims" had flashed uncomfortablyacross his mind. But it was the final threat of a retaliatory spell whichcrowded his mind with misgiving to the exclusion of all other thoughts orfancies. His reasoning powers could no longer afford to dismiss these old-wives'threats as empty bickerings. The household at Mowsle Barton lay under thedispleasure of a vindictive old woman who seemed able to materialize herpersonal spites in a very practical fashion, and there was no saying what formher revenge for three drowned ducks might not take. As a member of the householdCrefton might find himself involved in some general and highly disagreeablevisitation of Martha Pillamon's wrath. Of course he knew that he was giving wayto absurd fancies, but the behaviour of the spirit-lamp kettle and thesubsequent scene at the pond had considerably unnerved him. And the vagueness ofhis alarm added to its terrors; when once you have taken the Impossible intoyour calculations its possibilities become practically limitless.Crefton rose at his usual early hour the next morning, after one of the leastrestful nights he had spent at the farm. His sharpened senses quickly detectedthat subtle atmosphere of things-being-not-altogether well that hangs over astricken household. The cows had been milked, but they stood huddled about inthe yard, waiting impatiently to be driven out afield, and the poultry kept upan importunate querulous reminder of deferred feeding-time; the yard pump, whichusually made discordant music at frequent intervals during the early morning,was today ominously silent. In the house itself there was a coming and going ofscuttering footsteps, a rushing and dying away of hurried voices, and long,uneasy stillnesses. Crefton finished his dressing and made his way to the headof a narrow staircase. He could hear a dull, complaining voice, a voice intowhich an awed hush had crept, and recognized the speaker as Mrs. Spurfield."He'll go away, for sure," the voice was saying; "there are those as runs awayfrom one as soon as real misfortune shows itself."Crefton felt that he probably was one of "those," and that there were momentswhen it was advisable to be true to type.He crept back to his room, collected and, packed his few belongings, placed themoney due for his lodgings on a table, and made his way out by a back door intothe yard. A mob of poultry surged expectantly towards him; shaking off theirinterested attentions he hurried along under cover of cowstall, piggery, andhayricks till he reached the lane at the back of the farm. A few minutes walk,which only the burden of his portmanteaux restrained from developing into anundisguised run, brought him to a main road, where the early carrier soonovertook him and sped him onward to the neighbouring town. At a bend of the roadhe caught a last glimpse of the farm; the old gabled roofs and thatched barns,the straggling orchard, and the medlar tree, with its wooden seat, stood outwith an almost spectral clearness in the early morning light, and over it allbrooded that air of magic possession which Crefton had once mistaken for peace.The bustle and roar of Paddington Station smote on his ears with a welcomeprotective greeting."Very bad for our nerves, all this rush and hurry," said a fellow-traveller;"give me the peace and quiet of the country."Crefton mentally surrendered his share of the desired commodity. A crowded,brilliantly over-lighted music-hall, where an exuberant rendering of "1812" wasbeing given by a strenuous orchestra, came nearest to his ideal of a nervesedative.
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