Part 29 (1/2)
”I'll call on the Vicar to-morrow,” he said joyfully. ”It would be such a pity to disappoint the hope of Miss Penny's life,”--as that young person came back with the merry kettle.
”I am indebted to you,” said Hennie Penny. ”What about dresses, Meg?”
IV
It was that same night, as they were sauntering home from a starlight ramble, that they came on Johnnie Vautrin crouched in the hedge with Marielihou, and Marielihou had her hind leg bound up in a piece of white rag.
”h.e.l.lo, Johnnie! What's the matter with Marielihou?” asked Graeme. And Marielihou turned her malevolent yellow-green eyes on him and looked curses.
”G.o.derabetin! She've got hurt.”
”Oh! How was that?”
”I d'n know. Wisht I knowed who done it;” and just then, as luck would have it, old Tom Hamon came sauntering along in the gloaming, smoking a contemplative pipe with long slow puffs.
And at sight of him Marielihou ruffled and swelled to twice her size, and raked up most horrible and blood-curdling oaths from away down in her inside into her black throat, and spat them out at him, as he came up, in a fusillade that sounded like ripraps, and her eyes flamed baleful fires.
”Cuss away, y'ould witch!” said old Tom, with a grin through his pipe-stem. ”How's the leg?” and Marielihou with a final volley disappeared among the bushes, and Johnnie crawled after her.
”What on earth does he mean?” whispered Meg.
”Mr. Hamon has an idea that Marielihou and old Mme. Vautrin have something in common. In fact I believe he goes so far as to say that they are one and the same. Black magic, you know,--witchcraft, and all that kind of thing.”
”How horrid!”
”B'en!” chuckled old Tom again. ”You find out how 'tis with th' old witch. We know how 'tis with Marrlyou. 'Twere the silver bullet did it. If sh' 'adn't jumped 'twould ha' gone through 'er 'ead,” and he went off chuckling through his pipe-stem.
And the next evening, as they were sauntering slowly through the darkening lanes to the windmill, to see the life-lights flash out all round the horizon, it happened that they met the doctor just turning out of his gate.
”h.e.l.lo, doctor! How's old Mme. Vautrin to-day?” asked Graeme.
”She's going on all right,” said the doctor, with a touch of surprise.
”There seems a quite unusual amount of interest in that old lady all of a sudden. How is it?”
”What is it's wrong with her?”
And the doctor eyed him curiously for a moment, and then said, ”Well, she says she hurt her leg ormering, slipped on a rock and got the hook in it. But--Well, it's a bad leg anyway, and she won't go ormering or anything else for a good long time to come.”
Which matter, in the light of old Tom Hamon's silver bullets and evident knowledge of Marielihou's injury, left them all very much puzzled, though, as Graeme acknowledged, there might be nothing in it after all.
V
It was just after the second lesson, the following Sunday, that the Vicar stood up, tall and stately, his youthful face below the gray hair all alight with the enjoyment of this unusual break in the even tenour of his way, and soared into unaccustomed and very carefully enunciated English.
”I pub-lish thee Banns of Marrr-i-ache between John Cor-rie Graeme of Lonn-donn and Mar-garet Brandt of Lonn-donn. If any of you know cause, or just im-ped-i-ment, why these two pair-sons should not be joined to-gether in holy matri-mony, ye are to de-clare it. This is thee first time of as-king.”
Margaret and Miss Penny and Graeme heard it from their back seat among the school-children, and found it good.
There were not very many visitors there. Such as there were felt a momentary surprise at two English people choosing to get married in Sark, though, if it had been put to them, they must have confessed that there was no lovelier place in the world to be married in. They also wondered what kind of people they were.