So half an hour later Aunt Agatha, having taken Lisette to see the wonders of the sea-wall of Marsh, passed a young man coming from the direction of the Vicarage, who raised his hat with a flourish and gave them a sweeping bow. She remarked to her maid that he must be in very good spirits for she never did see such a well-set-up young man, adding however that as men went, she still had a penchant for that naughty highwayman. She was further reminded of the said gentleman when, upon walking slowly back through the village, MisterPitt making almost as complete an investigation of it as Mrs. Honeyballs, the local coach went by in great style, horn blowing gaily. But Aunt Agatha’s musical ear was slightly confused, for though the tune it played was undoubtedly ‘those same dratted Grenadiers’, it somehow merged into one of her own Scottish songs — a popular Jacobite air.
Descending the grand staircase on her way down to luncheon, she remarked to Lady Caroline that she was in good appetite, having thoroughly enjoyed her morning perambulation, but it amazed her to observe that, though having such bracing air, Dymchurch seemed a very sleepy place in the daytime, and she hoped that Sir Antony’s tenants were not keeping late hours.
Then, strangely enough, as she passed into the dining-room, she found herself humming, quite loudly, that lively tune, ‘The Girl I Left Behind Me’.
Chapter 8
The Squire Sums Up
Sir Antony’s worst fears were justified. His day was ‘decidedly aggravatin’.’ To begin with, no sooner had he finished his breakfast when old Doctor Sennacherib Pepper was announced, and he was forced to go and watch the inquest. ‘Most unhealthy, probin’ about a corpse just after a meal — enough to make a feller’s cold grouse freeze inside him’; which it did later, having eaten so quickly, thereby giving him a bad attack of his usuals. But on leaving the mortuary to be rid of the nauseating sight, he had bumped into a fat constable, and ‘the great clumpin’ creature’ had trodden clumsily upon his throbbing toe, which so pained him for the rest of the morning that he was compelled to loosen the buckle of his shoe, surreptitiously easing it off beneath his robes, so that when the court rose for the luncheon recess, and he pompously led the procession down the stairs, it was not until he trod upon a coffin-nail that he realized he was without it; and so, in a most undignified manner, he had to scamper back up the stairs. Retrieving the offending shoe with difficulty, he bumped his head against the reading-desk, which knocked his judge’s wig askew, and since, by this time, things had gone too far and he had not bothered to put it straight, he knew, by the ‘disapprovin’’ look on her ladyship’s face, that she thought he had been at it again. Stifling a desier to do naturally what he had done that morning with the aid of a hunting-horn, he tried to enjoy his food, but Sennacherib Pepper, whom he had purposely placed at the far end of the table, kept shouting details of his grisly trade, which ‘me wife’s Aunt Agatha’, who sat beside him, kept ‘hummin’’ that maddenin’ tune, that all the village seemed to have been at that mornin’. Indeed, upon whistling it himself that afternoon, he had not been able to understand why he was looked at by several in the Court in such a peculiar manner. The fact was that they did not understand why the Chief Magistrate was in truth passing the smugglers’ signal for that very night. Blissfully innocent of this, however, he continued with the proceedings. After lengthy weighing of the pros and cons, during which he became painfully aware that his seat of jurisdiction had been badly bruised beneath that confounded bell-pull, the jury at last managed to agree upon one point, that the corpse in question was the remains of one Gabriel Creach which everyone had known in the beginning. Indeed, everyone having known him for years, the whole thing was, therefore, a shocking waste of time.
Well — there it was. He had been hanged by the neck until he was dead, by some person or persons unknown — to wit — the Scarecrow, which the jury found on one was able to do anything about, since the Army, the Navy, the Revernue and Bow Street Runners, to say nothing of private enterprise, had all been after him for years and failed to catch this notorious malefactor.
Sir Anthony Cobtree, in his summing-up, found there was so little to say upon the subject, that he had to try and spin things out, to make it sound better, and becoming thus gravelled for lack of matter, he discovered that in order to make some sort of impression, he had, after a lengthy, pompous oration, involved himself most damnably. In order to get out of this difficulty with what little dignity he had left, he had, therefore, quite without meaning it, pledged himself to a further thousand guineas, out of his own purse, over and above the Government’s proclaimed reward, ‘to any who shall rid us of this
— er — this um — this thorn in our — um’ (fumbling for the word that had escaped him, a twinge from his bruise gave him his cue) ‘in our seat of um-er. Oh, well, anyway, in my seat of errum — of JUSTICE. I mean — this botherin’ nuisance.’ Finishing thus lamely, he sat down cautiously, perspiring freely and none too happy as to what Caroline would say to him for having so willfully mortgaged her pin-money. He was, therefore, agreeably surprised when the whole Court rose and cheered him for a ‘jolly good fellow. Long live the Squire’. Villagers and jury alike, equally surprised that for once their Squire had done more than was expected of him, applauded him vigorously for thus turning what had been a thoroughly dismal and boring affair into a cause for jollification.
Gratified at the enthusiasm of his tenants, and pleasantly conscious that his personal success had put that ‘dratted corpse in the shade’, his departure from the Court House was like a triumphal progress, as amid loud cheerings, surrounded by bobbing villagers he followed the Sword of Justice borne by the Clerk of the Court out into the street. Here Sir Anthony, now thoroughly swollen-headed, was easily prevailed upon to repair to the Ship Inn for refreshment.
And so some two hours later, slightly dishevelled and smelling most strongly of the public bar, judicial wig over one ear and official robes looped high for convenience, he burst into the boudoir of his astonished lady wife, and, knowing that the best method of defence is attack pursed his lips, and loudly did what he had longed to do all day. Then he told her ladyship in no mean language that this time he had really been at it.
The Dymchurch beadle came in for a little of the Squire’s reflected glory, for at the Ship Inn, Sir Antony, after several of Mrs. Waggets’ specials, decided to have his Proclamation sent out there and then. So he and the Beadle had, between the rapid succession of rounds, written and solemnly rehearsed it together. This entailed a deal of serious thinking and was indeed thirsty work, so that before setting out on his rounds of the village the Beadle had had so many rounds with Sir Antony that his condition was pleasantly mellow.
Armed with bell, lantern and parchment he set off up the street to the Court House Square. Using the Squire’s mounting-block for his pulpit, and much pomp and ceremony and many ringings of his large hand-bell, he commenced. His voice, well lubricated with good strong ale, intoned the familiar ‘Oyez! Oyez! Oyez!’ which caused Sir Antony, who was dressing for dinner, to open his bedroom window and wave to him in brotherly greeting while shouting encouraging remarks. The Beadle waved back, and after several false starts began.
‘Sir Antony Cobtree, Chief Magistrate and Leveller of Marsh Scotts, deeming it meet and right, does out of his personal privy purse offer 1000 guineas over and above the Government reward already proclaimed, making in all 2000 guineas to be paid by His Majesty’s Lords of the Level of Romney Marsh, to any person or persons who shall hand over, or cause to be handed over, the leader of certain evil-disposed persons who ship overseas shorn wool and gold in exchange for rum, brandy, sundry spirits and silks. This desperate character, trading under the name of the Scarecrow, is wanted for trial on a capital charge at the next convenient Assizes, to be held at the Royal Court House at Dymchurch-under-the-Wall in the County of Kent. God save the King.’