Tales of Wonder
Page 5
The Bad Old Woman in Black
The bad old woman in black ran down the street of the ox-butchers.
Windows at once were opened high up in those crazy gables; heads werethrust out: it was she. Then there arose the counsel of anxiousvoices, calling sideways from window to window or across to oppositehouses. Why was she there with her sequins and bugles and old blackgown? Why had she left her dreaded house? On what fell errand shehasted?
They watched her lean, lithe figure, and the wind in that old blackdress, and soon she was gone from the cobbled street and under thetown's high gateway. She turned at once to her right and was hid fromthe view of the houses. Then they all ran down to their doors, andsmall groups formed on the pavement; there they took counsel together,the eldest speaking first. Of what they had seen they said nothing,for there was no doubt it was she; it was of the future they spoke,and the future only.
In what notorious thing would her errand end? What gains had temptedher out from her fearful home? What brilliant but sinful scheme hadher genius planned? Above all, what future evil did this portend? Thusat first it was only questions. And then the old grey-beards spoke,each one to a little group; they had seen her out before, had knownher when she was younger, and had noted the evil things that hadfollowed her goings: the small groups listened well to their low andearnest voices. No one asked questions now or guessed at her infamouserrand, but listened only to the wise old men who knew the things thathad been, and who told the younger men of the dooms that had comebefore.
Nobody knew how many times she had left her dreaded house; but theoldest recounted all the times that they knew, and the way she hadgone each time, and the doom that had followed her going; and twocould remember the earthquake that there was in the street of theshearers.
So were there many tales of the times that were, told on the pavementnear the old green doors by the edge of the cobbled street, and theexperience that the aged men had bought with their white hairs mightbe had cheap by the young. But from all their experience only this wasclear, that never twice in their lives had she done the same infamousthing, and that the same calamity twice had never followed her goings.Therefore it seemed that means were doubtful and few for finding outwhat thing was about to befall; and an ominous feeling of gloom camedown on the street of the ox-butchers. And in the gloom grew fears ofthe very worst. This comfort they only had when they put their fearinto words--that the doom that followed her goings had never yet beenanticipated. One feared that with magic she meant to move the moon;and he would have dammed the high tide on the neighbouring coast,knowing that as the moon attracted the sea the sea must attract themoon, and hoping by his device to humble her spells. Another wouldhave fetched iron bars and clamped them across the street, rememberingthe earthquake there was in the street of the shearers. Another wouldhave honoured his household gods, the little cat-faced idols seatedabove his hearth, gods to whom magic was no unusual thing, and, havingpaid their fees and honoured them well, would have put the whole casebefore them. His scheme found favour with many, and yet at last wasrejected, for others ran indoors and brought out their gods, too, tobe honoured, till there was a herd of gods all seated there on thepavement; yet would they have honoured them and put their case beforethem but that a fat man ran up last of all, carefully holding under areverent arm his own two hound-faced gods, though he knew well--as,indeed, all men must--that they were notoriously at war with thelittle cat-faced idols. And although the animosities natural to faithhad all been lulled by the crisis, yet a look of anger had come intothe cat-like faces that no one dared disregard, and all perceived thatif they stayed a moment longer there would be flaming around them thejealousy of the gods; so each man hastily took his idols home, leavingthe fat man insisting that his hound-faced gods should be honoured.
Then there were schemes again and voices raised in debate, and manynew dangers feared and new plans made.
But in the end they made no defence against danger, for they knew notwhat it would be, but wrote upon parchment as a warning, and in orderthat all might know: "_The bad old woman in black ran down the streetof the ox-butchers._"