CHAPTER III
MISCHIEF BREWING
At some little distance from the mysterious booth a trestle table hadbeen erected, at which some three or four wenches in hooped paniers andshort, striped kirtles, were dispensing spiced ale and sack to thethirsty village folk.
Here it was that Mirrab the witch and her attendant wizard were mostfreely discussed--with bated breath, and with furtive glances casthurriedly at the black flag, which was just visible above the row ofother booths and gayer attractions of the Fair.
There was no doubt that as the evening began to draw in, and the sun tosink lower and lower in the west, the superstitious terror, which hadall along set these worthy country yokels against the awesome mysteriesof the necromancer's tent, had gradually culminated into a hystericalfrenzy.
At first sullen looks had been cast towards that distant spot, whencethe sound of Abra's perpetual "This way, noble lords, this way!" cameevery now and then as a weird and ghostly echo; but now muttered cursesand even a threatening gesture from time to time had taken the place ofangry silence.
As the hard pates of these louts became heated with the foaming ale,their tempers began to rise, and the girls, with characteristic love ofmischief and gossip, were ready enough to add fuel to the smoulderingflames.
There was also present in the minds of these wenches an obvious feelingof jealousy against this mysterious veiled witch, who had proved soattractive to the Court gallants who visited the Fair.
Her supposed charms so carefully hidden beneath thick draperies, werereputed to be irresistible, and Mistress Dorothy, Susan, and Joan, whoshowed their own pretty faces unblushingly, were not sufficiently versedin mountebanks' tricks to realize that Mirrab's thick veil was, withoutdoubt, only a means for arousing the jaded curiosity of idlers from theCourt.
Be that as it may, it was an established fact that no one had seen thesoothsayer's face, and that Mistress Dorothy, who was pouring out a hugetankard of sack for her own attendant swain, was exceedingly annoyedthereby.
"Bah!" she said contemptuously, as Abra and his magic devices were beingdiscussed at the table, "he is but a lout. I tell thee, Matthew, thatthou'rt a fool to take count of him. But the woman," she added under herbreath, "is possessed of the devil."
Matthew, the shoemaker, took the tankard, which his sweetheart hadfilled for him, in both hands and took a long draught before he made anyreply. Then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, spat upon theground, and looked significantly at the circle of friends who weregathered round him.
"I tell you, my masters," he said at last with due solemnity, "that Isaw that witch last night fly out from yonder tree astride upon a giantbat."
"A bat?"
A holy shudder went round the entire assembly. Pretty Mistress Susancrossed herself furtively, whilst Joan in her terror nearly dropped thehandful of mugs which she was carrying.
Every one hung on the shoemaker's lips.
Short and somewhat tubby of body, Matthew had a round and chubby face,with pale blue, bulging eyes, and slightly elevated eyebrows, which gavehim the appearance of an overgrown baby. He was for some reason, whichhas never transpired to this day, reputed to have wonderful wisdom. Hisitems of news, gleaned from a nephew who was scullion in the royalkitchen, were always received with boundless respect, whilst theconnection itself gave him a certain social superiority of which he wasproudly conscious.
Like the true-born orator, Matthew had paused a moment in order to allowthe full strength of his utterance to sink into the minds of hishearers.
"Aye!" he said after a while, "she flew out from between the branchesand up towards the full moon, clad only----"
A brusque movement and a blush from Mistress Dorothy here stopped thegraphic flow of his eloquence.
"Er--hem--!" he concluded more tamely, "I saw her quite plainly."
"More shame then on thee, master," retorted Dorothy, whose wrath was farfrom subsiding, "for thus gazing on the devil's work."
But the matter had become of far too great import to allow of femininejealousies being taken into account.
"And I know," added an elderly matron with quaking voice, "that mysister Hannah's child caught sight of the witch outside her tent thismorning, and forthwith fell into convulsions, the poor innocent lamb."
"She hath the evil eye, depend on it," quoth Dorothy decisively.
The men said nothing. They were sipping their ale in sullen silence, andlooking to Matthew for further expressions of wisdom.
"Those evil spirits have oft a filthy countenance," explained theshoemaker sententiously, "and no doubt 'twas they helped to convulseMistress Hannah's child. Some have four faces--one in the usual place,another at the back of the head, and one looking out on either side;others appear with a tall and lean body and bellow like a bull."
"Hast seen them, Matthew?" came in awed whispers from those around.
"Nay! God and the Holy Virgin forbid!" protested Matthew fervently. "Godforbid that I should enter their abode of evil. I should lose my soul."
There was a long, ominous silence, broken only by quickly mutteredinvocations to the saints and to Our Lady.
The men looked furtively at one another. The women clung together, notdaring to utter a sound. Mistress Dorothy, all the boldness gone out ofher little heart, was sobbing from sheer fright.
"Friends," said Matthew at last, as if with sudden resolution, "if thatwoman be possessed of the devil, what's to be done?"
There was no reply, but obviously they all understood one another, foreach wore a shame-faced look all of a sudden, and dared not meet hisneighbour's eye. But the danger was great. The devil in their midstwould mean poisoned wells, the sweating sickness, some dire calamity forsure; and it was the duty of every true-hearted countryman to protecthis home and family from such terrible disasters.
Therefore when Matthew in his wisdom said, "What's to be done?" the menfully understood.
The women, too, knew that mischief was brewing. They drew closer to oneanother and shivered with cold beneath their kerchiefs, in spite of thewarmth of this beautiful late summer's afternoon.
"Beware of her, Matthew," entreated Mistress Dorothy tearfully.
She drew a small piece of blue cloth from the bosom of her dress: it waspinked and broidered, and had the image of the Holy Virgin painted onone side of it. Quickly she slipped it under her lover's jerkin.
"Take it," she whispered, "the scapulary of Our Lady will protect thee."
This momentous conclave was here interrupted by the approach of thesmall detachment of the town guard which had been sent hither to ensureorder amongst the holiday-makers.
Matthew and his friends began ostentatiously to talk of the weather andother such trifling matters, until after the guard had passed, then oncemore they put their heads together.
But this time they bade the women go. What had to be discussed now wasmen's work and unfit for wenches' ears.
The Tangled Skein Page 4