Mrs. Yellam exploded. What ridiculous notions young maids got, to be sure! Cards, indeed! Very scornfully, she informed Fancy of the existence of a so-called wise woman, half-gypsy, who lived in a tumble-down cottage at Ocknell.

"You go and see that old grammer. 'Twill cost 'ee sixpence. For a shillin' she'll tell 'ee a fine fortin, marry 'ee to a young lord, and make 'ee the mother o' nine children. I ha' no patience wi' such tricks."

Fancy said humbly:

"Alfred thinks it foolishness, just as you do, but ..."

"Well?"

"The lady in Salisbury, as taught me, did say that I should marry a soldier. Alfred laughed at that, till--till he became one."

"You bain't married to a soldier yet."

"No. That's true."

Fancy sighed. Mrs. Yellam went on with some knitting. Suddenly, she said sharply:

"What did they cards say?"

Fancy smiled faintly.

"They said that Alfred would come back--soon."

Mrs. Yellam knitted on. After a long pause, she p.r.o.nounced a verdict.

"I bain't one to talk about what I don't understand. If so be as Alfred comes back soon, and if he marries 'ee, I may own up that cards do tell truth sometimes."

CHAPTER XII

THE EMPTY PEW

After her Alfred went to the front, Mrs. Yellam's interest in the Tommies who had been "over the top" became more acute. She listened to everything said, regardless of a timely caution from Lionel Pomfret, who, before he rejoined his battalion, warned her that Mr. Atkins, with all his glorious qualities, was not too scrupulous a respecter of the truth. When the wounded men fell to talking amongst themselves, or before sympathetic females, the hypercritical might have noted a valiant determination on the part of each speaker to go "one better" than his predecessor. And the essential fact that these boys, most of them under twenty-five years of age, laughed at and chaffed each other when relating horrors merely piled Pelion upon Ossa in the mind of Mrs.

Yellam. It seemed to her--and to how many more mothers?--that none could escape death or mutilation. One man was dumb from sh.e.l.l-shock. A "Black Maria" had buried him and ten others. He alone survived, unable to tell in speech what he had undergone. Mrs. Yellam paid this man particular attention, because her imagination was lively enough to realise what loss of speech would mean to herself. She told Jane Mucklow, with portentous shakings of the head, that the poor lad had lost his tongue for evermore. What else could be expected? Jane, now in happier mood, remarked sententiously that miracles still happened. Mrs. Yellam smiled grimly, wondering whether Jane was thinking of what George had done and accounted that achievement a miracle. And Jane could afford to take a rosy view of life, inasmuch as Adam was still in England, and George, with a view to stimulating recruiting, had been given a snug billet at the depot of his regiment. All the credit due to George had, by this time, been a.s.sumed by Uncle. He not only took part, as has been said, in the heart-thrilling exploit, but a.s.sured everybody that the valour of his son had been begotten in him by a sire known far and wide to be without fear, the Bayard of the countryside! Jane accepted this hypothesis with creditable derision. She would say in reply to strangers avid for details: "Do 'ee talk to Garge's father. _He was there!_ Garge be his father's son from stem to starn. My boy'd ha' behaved hisself very different. He'd ha' crawled down a rabbit-hole, he would, so be as one were handy."

Some strangers, pleased with this whimsical exposition, pressed money into Jane's hand, which she accepted with a humble and grateful heart, adding even more slily: "Thank 'ee very kindly. Money be scarce wi' us, since my dear husband's son won the Victoria Cross, because the father o' such a notable hero has to drink his brave boy's health so many times a day."

One memorable night, when most of the Tommies were asleep in the Saloon, the dumb man burst into excited speech, and talked for about two hours, to the delight of seventeen comrades. When Mrs. Yellam heard the wonderful news next morning, she was immensely comforted. That afternoon Fancy noticed a change in her, and was emboldened to strike iron when it happened to be hot.

"Miracles do happen," she affirmed, with an odd expression upon her pale little face.

Mrs. Yellam pa.s.sed no remark on this. In her opinion, formulated long before the war, miracles had been wrought long ago in the misty, prehistoric times of the apostles, and not since. Fancy continued nervously:

"A miracle happened to me."

"What do you say, child? A miracle happened to--_you_?"

Fancy nodded. As a little girl, during her school-days, she had told her tale many times with the abominable conviction that it failed to convince, although it might excite astonishment and sympathy. When she grew older and more reserved she ceased to tell it, wincing from incredulity. She hated to tell it to this austere old woman, whose tongue could be so sharp, but impulse conquered apprehension.

"I was four years old at the time. And I was playing in the street just opposite to our house with some other children. A great dog came rushing down on us, snapping right and left. Folks said afterwards he was mad, but I don't know. Someway he was killed, so Father told me, before that was made certain; killed and buried."

"A mad dog! My!"

"The other children ran away. I--I didn't."

"Why ever not?"

"I couldn't. I stood still, all of a dreadful tremble. And he came bang at me."

"What a fearsome tale! You pore lil' maid!"

Up to this point of the narrative, Fancy had generally received just such sympathy, particularly when telling the story to mothers. She paused; her cheeks flushed; but her large eyes rested tranquilly upon the eyes of Susan Yellam.

"Well, dear, go on!"

"When the dog was quite close, I saw Mother."

Mrs. Yellam gasped.

"You saw your mother, who was dead!"

"I never think of Mother as dead. Yes, I saw Mother standing between me and the dog. She never looked at me; she looked at the dog. And the dog saw her."

"I never heard such a tale in all my life."

"The dog saw her. He stopped of a sudden, turned, and went back--howling. And I howled, too. Mother turned as the dog turned, and give me one beautiful look. Then she went."

Mrs. Yellam grasped the arms of her chair, still staring into Fancy's artless face. But no outburst of incredulity escaped from her as Fancy had feared it would. Her logical mind grappled with the facts as presented. She said, after a long pause:

"You thought you saw her."

"No. I did see her--plain as plain."

"But, Fancy dear, seeing as she died afore you was born, how did 'ee know 'twas she?"

"I'd seen Mother ever so often before."

"When and how?"

After some hesitation, Fancy narrated, with many details, her psychic experiences not only with her mother but with the four Evangelists. The girl's mordant anxiety that the astounding tale should be believed bit deep into the elder woman's heart. To Fancy's delight no incredulity was expressed. And Mrs. Yellam's face remained calm and kind. Solomon listened, also, with singular alertness and an eager intelligence which, to Fancy, indicated full belief. Indeed, Solomon seemed to be saying to himself: "Yes, yes, we know about that. We see things every day that would astonish all of you, if we were allowed to talk about them." And, in the middle of the story, the dog, that never showed any affection for others in the presence of his mistress, leapt suddenly into Fancy's lap and remained there. Long afterwards, Mrs. Yellam admitted that this mark of confidence upon Sol's part had impressed her. Inwardly she explained things quite to her satisfaction. She beheld Fancy as a four-year-old, a tiny mite, all eyes, physically weak, the victim of a perfervid imagination. Her own little girl, Lizzie, physically robust, would invent somewhat similar stories about tramps and sweeps quite as apocryphal as these tales of communings with Matthew and Mark. She remembered smacking Lizzie, and telling her that she was a little liar.

No doubt, Fancy's father, rather a weakling, has encouraged the mite.

Since Alfred's engagement, Mrs. Yellam had met Mr. Broomfield, and summed him up trenchantly as half a man.

However, she kept such thoughts to herself, saying quietly: