CHAPTER XXXI.

“BALAAM” DECLARES HIMSELF A “SPIRITUALIST.”

“What may this mean, That thou, dread corse, Revisitest thus the glimpses of the moon, Making night hideous?”

_Shakespeare._

Although two of the burglars engaged in the nocturnal attack on Waverdale Hall had been safely lodged in gaol, the whole region round about seemed to be infested with desperadoes, whose depredations where continually being heard of, and whose outrages, alike on travellers and dwellings, kept that portion of East Yorkshire in a state of perpetual fear. Squire Fuller had not been able to obtain tidings of the missing box, nor had the few and inefficient officers of justice been able to lay hands on any other of these dangerous disturbers of the public peace. To add to the general feeling of insecurity and alarm, the villagers of Nestleton were much exercised by reports to the effect that “Sister Agatha’s ghost,” to which my readers were introduced in the first chapter of these veracious chronicles, had latterly been seen by more than one belated villager who had passed the ruins of the old Priory at the witching hour of night. Jake Olliver, old Adam’s son and foreman on Gregory Houston’s farm, declared that he himself, on his return from certain amatory visits to Cowley Priory, had seen in the silvery moonlight the spirit of the erratic nun, arrayed in flowing robes of white, and with a broad crimson stain upon her breast. He saw her pace with outstretched arms around the ruined walls, and then at a certain crumbling archway, nearly overgrown with thorns and briars, a blue flame enveloped her, and with a wild, weird shriek, she vanished from his sight. He did not hesitate to confess that at the sight of that last phenomenon he took to his heels and ran.

The burly landlord of the Green Dragon, too, had seen the awful apparition. He deposed to two uncanny tenants of the haunted pile; but as he was rather partial to the spirit of malt, it is more than likely that he had an alcoholic gift of second sight, a faculty for “seeing double.” Probably, even out of the mouth of two witnesses, the truth would hardly have been established; but their story was confirmed in its chief particulars by a pillar of the Church, no less a dignitary, indeed, than the parish clerk.

It is not to be wondered at that the resurrection of Sister Agatha, who had for some years forgotten to revisit the glimpses of the moon, became the subject of subdued and anxious conversation at the Green Dragon. There was none of its _habitues_ who dared to cast a doubt upon the story except Piggy Morris. That saturnine ex-farmer had not given up his visits to the bar-room as the result of his late experiences, though it must be acknowledged that they had lately become few and far between. He did not hesitate to call the witnesses a parcel of cowards, and to insinuate with a sneer that the moonlight visitor was nothing more dreadful than Farmer Houston’s white bullock, which he himself had sold to its present owner some few weeks before.

“It’s all nonsense and gammon,” said Piggy Morris, as he pulled away at his pipe in the chimney corner, “I don’t believe in ghosts, an’ them ’at does has got a maggot in their brains, in _my_ opinion.”

At this audacious utterance, the burly Boniface waxed exceeding wroth, and being upheld by several beery supporters, who went in for the ghost, blood-spot, blue-fire, scream and all, he replied,--

“I’ll tell you what it is, Piggy Morris. I don’t mind standing a quart o’ Plymouth gin, if you’ll go at twelve o’clock to-night, and bring a stone from the old Abbey with a bit of carving on it to show that you’ve been there; an’ what’s more, I’ll draw beer enough to keep the company together till you come back again.”

This challenge, and the prospect of a good supply of foaming ale, won the emphatic approval of the assembled topers, who loudly dared Piggy Morris to show the courage of his opinions.

“That’s easily done,” said Morris, bravely. “It’ll be twelve by I get there; I’m off.”

He rapidly made his way along the back lane of the village until he arrived at the gate leading into the field, at the further corner of which stood the dark secluded ruins, from whose crumbling walls he meant to take the witness of his deed of daring.

He did not feel exactly comfortable, but would not give himself time to hesitate. He opened the gate, and noiselessly strode along the paddock, towards the haunt of Sister Agatha’s restless ghost. Lifting his eyes towards the hoary gables, standing gaunt and grim in the sombre night, he saw a sight which drove the blood from his beating heart. There, right before him, he saw the identical ghost of the suicidal nun! A tall figure draped in white, with cadaverous face, looking all the more deathly for the conventual linen bound tightly round the brow, and the dark blood-stain on her breast. She stretched her arm in silent menace to the astonished Morris, who stood transfixed with fear. Slowly advancing to the centre of the broken arch, she stood a moment in statuesque stillness, a low murmur rose from her bloodless lips, a lurid light shone round her and through her, culminating in a bluish vapour, out of which shriek after shriek echoed through the ruins. Then the darkness gathered as before, and the stillness was unbroken, save for the screech of the night owls and the twitter of birds which had been disturbed by the dread nocturnal scream! Piggy Morris, in a perfect ecstasy of terror, turned and fled, nor paused, till pallid and panting, he flung himself upon the oaken settle, saying,--

“It’s as true as Gospel! I’ve seen the ghost!”

The next day Piggy Morris was driving his light cart over Nestleton Wold, with half-a-dozen porkers, covered by a net, in the body of his ramshackle vehicle. These he was about to dispose of at Kesterton Market. Half-way up a steepish hill, he stopped to give his not too flourishing steed a rest, just where Old Adam Olliver was “laying down” a quick-set hedge.

“Good mornin’,” said that cheery rustic. “Good mornin’, Maister Morris. Then you’re off te Kesterton. Ah wop you’re tackin’ yer pigs tiv a feyn markit, as t’ sayin’ is; an’ ’at you’ll cum back wiv a empty cart an’ a full poss.”

“Nay, I haven’t much hope as far as t’ purse goes, but the pigs ’ll hev to stop, whether they fetch little or much. But I’m fair bothered out of my wits this mornin’, an’ not in good trim for making bargains.”

“Why, bless uz,” said Adam, “Ah’s sorry for that. What’s matter wi’ yo’? Noo ah cum te leeak at yo’, you deea leeak a bit seedy like. Ah wop all’s right at yam. Hoo’s t’ missis?”

“Oh, she’s all right, for anything I know. But I’ll tell you what it is, Adam. I’ve seen Sister Agatha’s ghost!”

“Why, bless me soul, Piggy Morris! You’re t’ last man i’ t’ wolld ’at ah sud expect te say that. Ah didn’t think ’at you’d neea mair sense then te lissen te sitch an aud wife’s teeale as that.”

“Why, I thought so myself,” said Morris, in a tone of discontent at having to succumb to the general belief. “But it isn’t ‘listenin’,’ as you say. It’s _seein’_; and ’seein’s believin’,’ all the world round. I tell you that I saw it last night about twelve o’clock, and I’ve not got over it yet, and never shall, I doubt, for I was frightened out of my seven senses.”

“Ha, ha! Ah fancy you must ha’e left all seven on ’em at yam. Ah’s of opinion ’at it’s only fooaks ’at’s letten their wits gan wool-getherin’ ’at sees that sooart o’ cattle. Ah’ve been up an’ doon this neighbourhood for weel-nigh seventy year, an’ aud Balaam there’s been wi’ ma’ meeast o’ t’ tahme; an’ ah’ve niwer seen nowt na warse then him, an’ he’s niwer seen nowt mair awful then me. Balaam! hez thoo ivver seen a boggle?”

Whatever may have been the cause of the coincidence, it is true that, at that moment, Balaam was taken with one of those odd cantrips peculiar to his tribe. He cocked his ears, set his tail on end, and giving vent to a loud and continuous hee-ho that made the welkin ring, he galloped round and round, as if in vigorous protest against the sweeping scepticism of his matter-of-fact proprietor.

“There,” said Piggy Morris, with a sarcastic grin, “even your donkey rebukes your unreasonable want of faith, and looks for all the world as though he saw a ghost this minute.”

“Why,” said Adam laughing, “he _diz_ seeam te differ fre’ ma’ in his judgment; but what can yo’ expect frev a donkey? Mebbe,” and this with a humorous twinkle in his eye, “it’s gi’en te hasses te see ghausts an’ te donkeys te beleeave in ’em; but I isn’t gannin’ te pin mah faith te what they can testify, you may depend on’t.”

Piggy Morris was very irate at the uncomplimentary imputation. “Donkeys here or donkeys there,” said he, “I tell you that I went o’ purpose to see for myself, because I would not believe what folks said.”

“Why, if yo went te leeak for it, it isn’t mitch wunder ’at yo’ fun’ it. It was i’ ye’r fancy an’ ye’r een afoore yo’ went. An’ as yo’ teeak it wi’ yo’, it wad ha’e been a wunder if yo’ hadn’t catch’d a glint on’t. Maister Morris! if yo’ wad nobbut gi’e ye’r heart te God, that’ll lay all t’ ghausts i’ t’ wolld i’ t’ Rid Sea!”

“Nonsense,” said Piggy Morris, who did not mind the practical turn the conversation was taking. Mounting his cart, he drove off to Kesterton Market to dispose of his porkers, and to tell his nocturnal adventures to more credulous hearers in the infragrant bar-room of the Cowley Arms.

Adam Olliver picked up his slashing-knife and hedging-gloves, and mounting that disciple of spiritualism, his four-footed retainer, he cantered homeward, saying,--

“Balaam! If there is a ghaust, as thoo seeams te think, thoo an’ me mun see it, an’ ah promise tha’ ’at if thoo dizn’t run away, ah weean’t, an’ we’ll hev a crack o’ talk wi’ Sister Agatha’s ghaust.”

O, Adam Olliver! are you not aware that there are things between heaven and earth not dreamt of in your philosophy? Both you and Balaam will see the “sight horrific,” before many days are over, and when that great event transpires, then, as the immortaliser of John Gilpin says, “May I be there to see!”