That Pembury woman, when I told her that I was the scarecrow in truth, clung to me tighter than ever. I can feel her
heart beating against me now. I always had an eye for a pretty wench, but oh, that woman!”
“Avoid all such conceit,” reproved the Parson. “No doubt she clung to you in order to get the thousand guineas
on the Scarecrow’s head. You must not misinterpret her motive.”
“Wee, I’ll never hold up old Pembury’s coach again, in case she embraces me again.” Laughed the Highwayman.
10
THE SCARECROW’S RIVAL
Although the Scarecrow did not tolerate independent smuggling in his territory, and compelled any man or gang of
men with such propensities to join his band of Nightriders or take the consequences, he had a soft spot for “old
Katie,” and made it possible for her to earn good money by the smuggling of Hollands.
“Old Katie” lived by herself in a little cottage at St. Mary’s-on-the-Marsh. Although she had turned seventy, she
was as strong as a horse and fearless. Many a Marsh farmhand or fisherman who displeased her, had received a
blow on the nose that had staggered him and left ‘Old Katie’ victorious, since no retaliation was permitted by order
of the Scarecrow who had proclaimed her as ‘an old body that was to be left alone.’ Maybe she took advantage of
this privilege, for she herself left nobody alone, and would get what she wanted out of anybody, either by the sheer
strength of her arm or through her engaging personality. She could out-talk the very devil himself, as she often
boasted, ‘and when I can’t, I hits.’ Despite this war-like tendency the old woman was popular, not only for her
rough humor and quick retorts, but for what she could do for people in need.
Now amongst a large section of human beings there is no need so persistent as the craving for strong drink, and
although most of the ablebodied men on Romney Marsh worked in secret for the Scarecrow, and were able to get for
themselves and families plenty of spirits as part of their payment, there were many who were not so fortunate.
Sickly men whose strength could not cope with the laborious tub-carrying: women whose menfolk would have
nothing to do with the Free Traders, either for fear of the scaffold, or though loyalty to the Government; and then
those poor people who could not afford to buy spirits that were taxed.
To such folk ‘Old Katie’ was a ministering angel, and her jolly red face and vast bulk were eagerly looked for,
since nobody ever suspected that she came in for anything else but a chat. To the sick and depressed she was always
welcome, because she had the latest gossip of the neighborhood, and could embroider upon it in the drollest fashion.
But it was what Katie carried underneath the folds of her voluminous skirt and petticoats that made her most
welcome. This was a pair of bladders each capable of holding a gallon of the best Hollands. They were ingeniously
made with a three-inch tube in their necks made out of cuttings of elder boughs, the pith taken out and vent pegs
inserted for corks. ‘Old Katie’ found this a handier contrivance than a bottle or keg could be, since it was lighter to
carry, and whether full or empty, adapted itself to her figure.
Very often, when leaving her cottage for her Dymchurch clients, with her bladders full, she would encounter that
sympathetic Vicar, Doctor Syn, who would ask her how she did, and whither bound.
“Oh, God bless you, Parson,” the old rascal would answer, curtseying with the greatest difficulty by reason of the
bladders, “and preserve you from ever being afflicted with the dropsy like ‘Old Katie’. Aye, it’s my dropsy you can
walk it down after a bit. I calls in and sees someone for a sit down when I gets tired, and by the time I gets home I
seems to have dispersed the liquid, and I feels thinner then.”
When Doctor Syn used to suggest that the suffer should consult Doctor Pepper, who could no doubt relieve her,
she would answer: “Not me. I’ll come to you, Parson, for the good of my soul, but not to him for my dropsy. I
knows it better than what he can.”
“Well, Katie, I don’t always agree with him myself,” the Vicar would answer. “After all, by our own experience
we should know what is best for our own bodies. Now some people maintain that any strong drink is bad for you
complaint, and so it is if taken to excess, but in moderation, taken purely medicinally, I should recommend you try a
little drop of good Hollands,. Believe me it is a very comforting drink, and if you would care to follow my
prescription, why I will instruct my housekeeper to give you a drop or so to keep by you.”
Katie was secretly amused at his suggestion, and recounting it to her clients would end up saying, “And there I
was a-bulging with the stuff, and he looking that tired and overworked that I longed to give him a measureful there
and then to keep the cold out and put the heart in him.”
Doctor Syn was equally amused when recounting the same incident to Sexton Mipps. “There she was, looking
for all the world like Shakespeare’s Fat Woman of Brentford, and complaining of her dropsy. Now had all that good
Hollands been under her own skin instead of a sheep’s, she would have been in the last stages of the disease. But
since she gets the stuff for next to nothing by the scarecrow’s orders, I thought it best to play the innocent by
suggesting a few drops of the very stuff she was weighed down under. I don’t grudge her the deceit, for she’s a
grand old sinner, though I shall not be surprised if one day we are put to it to save her from the gallows. She is the
only one at the moment outside the Scarecrow’s ruling.”
“And the only one what rules the Scarecrow’s men,” retorted Mipps. “You say she gets the stuff for next to
nothing every night there’s a ‘run’. I says she gets it for nothing now, and that there ain’t no ‘next’ about it. Only
the other night, when Curlew was filling up them bladders with the best, and exp ects her to fumble out payment
farthing by farthing, she holds up them apple cheeks of hers, and says, ‘A woman pays with her beauty, my lad, and
you may kiss me.’ Curlew refused, ‘cos he was afraid she’s tell his wife, whereupon Katie slaps him in the face for
insulting her, and makes him give extra measure at his own expense. I told Curlew it was lucky he was a-wearing
his mask, ‘cos a woman’s fingermarks across his face wouldn’t have done him no good with his wife neither. But
the crime of the whole transaction was that she paid nothing at all for the contraband, and Curlew, who we know
ain’t afraid of Preventive men, was too scared of Katie to ask her.”
“Caution ain’t cowardice, as you’ve often said yourself, sir,” went on Mipps, “and I looks at Katie this way.
Suppose she gets caught by this Captain Blain, for instance, what is making himself such a nuisance, he might well
force an old woman to talk the same as he made young Hart some time ago. No doubt you’d get us out of it
somehow as usual, but is it wise to let Old Katie see too much? She can’t wait for the stuff to be left at her cottage
now, but just rolls up amongst the men when the pack-ponies are being loaded, and tell ‘em she don’t want to wait
about all night. Now I considers that a cock on the steeple sort of attitude ain’t one that would do us any good if the
old girl got into a mess with that there Blain and his men.
“My good Mipps,” soothed Doctor Syn, “although I admit that her drolleries many be irritating at times, I would
stake my clerical wig that ‘Old Katie’ would never betray the Scarecrow. She’s a good old soul with the stoutest