Volume I Part 45 (1/2)
”More!--What meanest thou?”
”Come to the feast, as I have bidden thee. If thou likest not the savour of our company, thou shalt depart, and without harm.”
”But who shall give me a safe conduct that I come back, and harmless as I went? Once in your possession, methinks”----
”What!” shouted the beldame, with a look of dark and devilish malignity:--”the word of a prince! Shall Goody d.i.c.kisson, the miller's wife, hold it in distrust? Go, poor fool, and chew thy bitterness, and bake thy bannocks, and fret thy old husband until thy writhen flesh rot from thy bones, and thou gnawest them for malice and vexation. Is it not glorious to ride on the wind--to mount the stars--to kiss the moon through the dark rolling clouds, when the blast scatters them in its might? To ride unharmed on their huge peaks tipped with thunder? To be for ever young in desire and enjoyment, though old and haggard, and bent double with age and infirmities? To have our wish and our revenge--ay, and the bodies of our enemies wasting before our spells, like wax to the flame? But go, sneak and drivel, and mind thy meal and barley-cakes, and go childless to thy grave.”
She rose as if to depart; but Goody d.i.c.kisson's evil destiny prevailed, and she promised to attend the feast, with this condition only, that no harm should befall her, nor force nor entreaty should be used to win her consent to join their confederacy. But she returned not from that unhallowed a.s.sembly until body and soul were for ever under the dominion of the destroyer.
The mill went merrily on no more, and the miller's song was still. He looked a heavy and a doomed man. Strange suspicions haunted him. His wife's ill-humour he could have borne; but her very laugh now made him tremble: it was as if the functions of mind and body were animated by a being distinct from herself. Her countenance showed not that her thoughts mingled in either mirth or misery, except at times, when terrible convulsions seemed to pa.s.s over like the sudden roll of the sea, tossed by some unseen and subterraneous tempest. The neighbours began to shun his dwelling. His presence was the signal for stolen looks and portentous whispers. To church his wife never came; but the bench, her usual sitting-place, was deserted. At the church-doors, after sermon, when the price of grain, the weather, and other marketable commodities were discussed and settled, Giles was evidently an object of avoidance, and left to trudge home alone to his own cheerless and gloomy hearth.
d.i.c.k Hargreave's only cow was bewitched. The most effectual and approved method of ascertaining under whose spell she laboured was as follows:--
The next Friday, a pair of breeches was thrown over the cow's horns; she was then driven from the s.h.i.+ppen with a stout cudgel. The place to which she directed her flight was carefully watched, for there a.s.suredly must dwell the witch. To the great horror and dismay of Giles d.i.c.kisson, the cow came bellowing down the lane, tail up, in great terror--telling, as plain as beast could speak, of her distress, until she came to a full pause, middle deep in his own mill-dam. This was a direct confirmation to his suspicions; but the following was a more undeniable proof, if need were, of his wife's dishonest confederacy with the powers of darkness.
One morning, ere his servant-man Robin had taken the grey mare from the stable, Giles awoke early, and found his wife had not lain by his side.
He had beforetime felt half roused in the night from a deep but uneasy slumber; but he was too heavy and bewildered to recollect himself, and sleep again overcame him ere he could satisfy his doubts. He had either dreamt, or fancied he had dreamt, that his wife was, at some seasons, away for a whole night together, and he was rendered insensible by her spells. This morning, however, he awoke before the usual time, probably from some failure in the charm, and he met her as she was ascending the stairs. Something like alarm or confusion was manifest. She had been to look after the cattle, she stammered out, scolding Robin for an idle lout to lie a-bed so long. The stable-door was open. With an aching heart, he went in. The grey mare was in a bath of foam, panting and distressed as though from some recent journey. Whilst pondering on this strange occurrence, Robin came in. His master taxed him with dishonesty.
After much ado, he confessed that his mistress had many times of late borrowed the mare for a night, always returning before the good man awoke. Giles was too full of trouble to rate Robin as he deserved, contenting himself with many admonitions and instructions how to act in the next emergency.
Not many nights after, as Robin was late in the stable, his mistress came with the usual request, and her magic bridle in her hand.
”Now, good Robin, the cream is in the bowl, and the beer behind the spigot, and my good man is in bed.”
”Whither away, mistress?” said Robin, diligently whisping down and soothing the mare, who trembled from head to foot when she heard her mistress's voice.
”For a journey, Robin. I have business at Colne; but I will not fail to come back again before sunrise.”
”Ay, mistress, this is always your tale; but measter catched her in a woundy heat last time, and will not let her go.”
”But, Robin, she shall be in the stable and dry two hours before my old churl gets up.”
”But measter says she maunna go.”
”Thou hast told him, then,--and a murrain light on thee!”
With eyes glistening like witch-fires, did the dame bestow her malison.
Robin half-repented his refusal; but he was stubborn, and his courage not easily shaken. Besides, he had bragged at the last Michaelmas feast that he cared not a rush for never a witch in the parish. He had an _Agnus Dei_ in his bosom, and a leaf from the holy herb in his clogs; and what recked he of spells and incantations? Furthermore, he had a waistcoat of proof given to him by his grandmother.[40]
”Since thou hast denied me the mare, I'll take thee in her place.”
Robin felt in his bosom for the _Agnus Dei_ cake, but it was gone!--He had thrown of his waistcoat, too, for the work, and his clogs were lying under the rack. Before he could furnish himself with these counter-charms, Goody d.i.c.kisson threw the bridle upon him, using these portentous words:--
”Horse, horse, see thou be; And where I point thee carry me.”
Swift as the rush of the wind, Robin felt their power. His nature changed: he grew more agile and capacious; and without further ado, found Goody upon his back, and his own shanks at an ambling gallop on the high-road to Pendle. He panted and grew weary, but she urged him on with an unsparing hand, las.h.i.+ng and spurring with all her might, until at last poor Robin, unused to such expedition, flagged and could scarcely crawl. But needs must when the witches drive. Rest and despite were denied, until, almost dead with toil and terror, he halted in one of the steep gullies of Pendle near to Malkin Tower.
It was an old grey-headed ruin, solitary and uninhabited. The cold October wind whistled through its joints and crannies;--the walls were studded with bright patches of moss and lichen;--darkness and desolation brooded over it, unbroken by aught but the cry of the moor-fowl and the stealthy prowl of the weasel and wild cat.