Gehenna, though of quieter disposition, and trained by his master like any circus horse. As for Gehenna, woe betide
any who tried to touch him other than the three jolly rascals in the stable. Gehenna had never lost a fierceness which
even the gypsy horse-dealers had failed to tame.
“Help yourself, my good Jimmie Bone, to the good things in the pony’s panniers,” said the Vicar. “You’ll find
some good liquor in one of them, and we can all do with a tot of brandy. Then while you make a meal we will get to
work on our new code, Mister Sexton.”
The Highwayman, who depended upon Doctor Syn and old Mother Handaway for his safety
And food, fell to one end of the table upon a cold capon which the Vicar’s housekeeper had prepared, thinking it
was for some poor sick soul upon the Marsh.
Meantime the Vicar, between sips of brandy, dipped a goose-quill into an ink-horn, and wrote out a list of places
along that part of the coast. He then began to sketch in pairs of aces against them.
“You must find time to chisel out these eight pieces of wood for Percy’s buckets this very day,” he said. “We
shall start using them immediately, and I should like to have them when I meet the Nightriders at the Oast House
this evening, in order to give them their instructions.”
An hour later Doctor Syn, with empty panniers, and followed by Mipps, jogged his way back to Dymchurch, in
order to entertain the Captain at dinner.
During the meal, their conversation was general, since Doctor Syn sensed that the Captain was anxious not to
discuss the object of his arrival on the Marsh. So the talk gradually veered into distant parts, for both men had sailed
the seven seas. The Captain in his line of business, and Syn, as he explained, in the cause of spreading the Gospel
amongst the heathenish parts of sea and land. By the time they had lighted their churchwarden pipes, both men had
acquired a respect and liking for each other, while their various adventures were exchanged.
After their long march from Dover, the Captain had instructed his Bos’n to let the men rest in the barn, as he
wished to take them out that very night upon the Marsh in order to accustom them to the dyke-land which he hoped
would be their battlefield in the near future. For the same reason Captain Blain retired to his room, in order to
snatch a little sleep before the night march, and Doctor Syn prepared to set out once more across the Marsh with his
panniers filled with good things for his poor and needy.
Captain Blain set his casement open wide, and for some time studied the lie of the land through his telescope. He
watched particularly the route taken by the Vicar and Sexton, jotting down directions in his note-book.
“I’ll lay that same course,” he said to himself, watching the white pony and donkey as they zigzagged this way
and that, “for they seem to have reached the centre of the Marsh and have not once descended into a dyke.”
At last they disappeared into a belt of mist which prevented him from seeing their arrival at Mother Handaway’s.
Supper having been fixed for ten o’clock, and Doctor Syn, having given Mrs. Fowey, the housekeeper, orders to
call his guest at nine-thirty, the Captain closed his telescope, divested himself of coat, waistcoat and cravat, kicked
off his buckled shoes, and lay down upon his four-poster bed.
Meanwhile the secret stable had once more swallowed up the Vicar of Dymchurch and his Sexton, as well as
both their animals. Here, while Jimmie Bone groomed the three horses, ready for business, Syn and Mipps
perfected the code and committed it to memory. There then followed other affairs connected with the Scarecrow to
be discussed and settled. The various gangs of men had to be allocated to their particular jobs for the next ‘run.’
Doctor Syn, or rather the Scarecrow, had already received the names of the vessels expected for the landing on the
following night, and each vessel had to have sufficient men for the unloading on the beach. The route to be taken
from the coast to the hills way gone over carefully with the help of a large map that marked every twisting lane and
dyke upon the Marsh. Doctor Syn had copied this from amongst the ordinance survey archives in the Court House.
He had made three copies secretly. One he kept at the Vicarage, another in the hidden stable, and a third in the little
summer hut which the Squire had had built for him upon the sea wall, a place in which he very often worked out his
sermons, so that he could keep an eye upon shipping in the fairway of the Channel, when needing a relaxation from
divinity.
By the time Doctor Syn’s plan of campaign had been settled in detail, it was dark outside upon the Marsh.
While Mipps helped his master to divest himself of clerical clothes and to put on the wild rags of the Scarecrow,
the Highwayman painted the faces of the horses with phosphorus.
The three men then put on hideous masks, and mounting their spirited horses, rode from the stable into the dry
dyke, while the old hag, who had been watching from the opening of the door since darkness had settled in, was
ready to close it quickly behind them. Telling her that they would return within the hour, they galloped away across
the lonely Marsh towards the Oast House on double -dyke Farm.
The interior was lighted by lanterns, and the three leaders sat upon barrels, facing the others who were ranged
against the circular brick wall.
The doors were safely barred, and then the Scarecrow addressed them, calling each man by the name he went by
in the gang.
Indeed, for everyone’s security, no one knew rightly just who his colleagues might be in the ordinary way of life
upon the Marsh. This guarded against any personal betrayal, and gave to each the same feeling of security as the
Scarecrow himself enjoyed. Certainly not one of them had any idea who the great leader was, and though they
might have had a shrewd guess as to one or two identities, the only one they were sure about was Sexton Mipps,
since whether he was dressed as Hellspite or himself, he was the voice of the scarecrow when the leader was not
present.
With the utmost patience the Scarecrow explained the new code and put each man through a rigorous
examination of it.
“Now, Curlew,” he would say in his croaking voice which he always used when playing the Scarecrow, “suppose
Percy carries a wooden diamond floating in his right bucket, and a club in the left, what will you know by that?”
“That the cargo is to be landed at Herring Hang. Scarecrow,” came the answer in the singing tone used by the
Nightriders to disguise their ordinary speech.
“Correct,” replied the Scarecrow. “And now, Raven, if the signs were reversed, what then?”
“Littlestone Beach, Scarecrow,” came the sing-song answer from him who bore the title of the Raven.
It was a long and tedious business, since half of the Nightriders were more valuable in brawn and muscle than
brains, but as Mipps remarked to his master later, Doctor Syn showed the same care in teaching his wild class as
ever he did as the Vicar in the Sunday school.
At last, when satisfied that each of them knew every signal, including those who had been on guard outside
whose places had been taken by those who had learned the code quickest, the Scarecrow warned his men that
Captain Blain would be a real danger, since he was a man of ingenuity, but that if they kept rigidly to the orders he
gave, they could feel confident that the ‘runs’ would be carried out in safety.
He then dismissed them with the order to be prepared for a big ‘landing’ on the following night, and to keep a
weather-eye open for the water-carrier’s buckets.
By ten o’clock Doctor Syn was supping pleasantly with the Captain, but though he gave his guest many details of
the Scarecrow’s past achievements, he was still unable to make the Captain communicative concerning his own
plans, save that he intended to take his men for a night march in order to accustom them at once into the sort of night
work they would be called upon to carry out till the Scarecrow was caught and placed in irons.
“We shall be setting out at midnight, Vicar,” he said.
“Has I not a sermon to prepare against next Sunday, I might have offered you my services as a guide,” replied
Doctor Syn. “But I shall be working after midnight, I fear. My parish is so scattered, and I have so many of my
flock down with the Marsh ague, that I get little time for study during the day, and even in the night hours I am no
more free from being called from my bed than is our good physician Doctor Pepper.”
“Ah well,” said the Captain, “we shall steer a safe enough course I make no doubt, even though it may be taken
by cutlass point. And if you will kindly loan me a key to your front door, I shall be able to let myself in without any
disturbance.”
Doctor Syn did not sit up long after midnight. He did not need to prepare a sermon. He could always depend
upon his own ready tongue when the moment came. It amused him to preach dry-as-dust sermons, because no man
in the Church had an easier facility for preaching good ones that gripped a congregation when he felt the occasion
warranted it. He only became dry-as-dust, to prevent his own preferment in the Church. He did not seek publicity
or popularity as a preacher because it would not have suited his book at all to be transferred from little Dymchurch.
Knowing the value of conserving his strength, he went to bed and to sleep directly the Captain had set out,
knowing also that for that night at least the sea-dogs could do no harm upon the Marsh, which they would find
utterly deserted.
He was awakened by Mrs. Fowey, the housekeeper, with a cup of chocolate at nine o’clock, and so good a host
he was that he ordered her to let the Captain sleep.”
“I have no idea when he came in from his duty,” he said, “but I told him to ring when he woke and needed
chocolate and shaving water. Did you hear him come in?”
Mrs. Fowey had not.
As it happened the Captain had let himself in very quietly about six o’clock, for Percy had seen the sailors return
muddy and weary when he was working the windlass for his first pair of buckets, which he carried round to the
Coffin Shop earlier than usual, since he was anxious to see the new pieces of wood which Mipps had told him about
the night before.
He found the Sexton still in his hammock when he peeped through the open casement, and blew loudly upon his
whistle.
“Belay there with that pipe,” ordered Mipps, “while I lights up mine. Then I’ll show a leg and let you abroad.
Mipps stretched and yawned, and then took a tinderbox from the oak beam above his head and lit his short clay
pipe. He then gripped the beam with his fingers, and unhooked the head end of the hammock, then swinging
himself along to the other end he let the hammock fall to the ground, dropping down lightly on the top of it. He then
rolled it up in man-of-war’s fashion, and stowed it away upon a shelf. All this time clouds of tobacco smoke
surrounded his head. He went to the door and raised the bar, letting Percy in.
“There are your floats,” said the Sexton, pointing to eight neatly chiselled pieces of wood which lay on the coffin
lid
While Percy lifted them carefully one by one, with many a gurgle of delight, Mipps went to another shelf and
took down a tin which Percy knew of old contained snuff.
“You’ll keep them signs here, my lad,” announced the Sexton, “ and each morning I’ll tell you which ones we’ll
put in, eh? Sometimes we’ll have hearts, and sometimes diamonds, clubs or spades, as the fancy strikes us, eh?: I’ll
wager the villagers will be wondering every journey you take which ones will be floating in them bucket. I
shouldn’t be surprised if it don’t encourage betting more than a race-meeting.”
“Will you chooses one and me choose one?” asked Percy, “or do we go turn and turn about?”
“We’ll always ask Judy,” replied the Sexton solemnly, “and I’ll go and ask her now.”
Judy was the mane of a wooden idol which Mipps had acquired in the east Indies. A female figure with large
ears, sleepy-looking eyes, and elaborately carved necklace upon her naked breasts, a tall head-dress and a skirt with
carved snakes all over it. Her hands were clasped upon her middle as she stood with bare feet upon hr block of
wood.
This brown figure, which was about a foot in height, possessed Percy with vague terrors for the soul of mister
Mipps. He thought it misguided of a Christian sexton to posses an idol, until its owner had assured him solemnly
that he had himself baptized the goddess into the Christian Faith, and given her the good name of Judy in place of a
long heathenish title which he had never been able to pronounce.
Mipps held a piece of parchment in front of the idol and thrust his little finger through the crook of her arm.
‘Now, Judy, my beauty,” began the Sexton,” we wants you to point out with the help of my finger, since you
can’t move your own off your belly, which floats will be lucky for Percy to place in his buckets. Take your time,
my girl, and choose. First which of these signs goes in the right one. Here they all be drawed out very nice. What
do you say?” He put the idol up to his ear, as though it was whispering to him. “Oh, I see. Well certainly, having
been a goddess you’ve every right to have you own say in it. You don’t want to choose from the drawings, eh? You
wants to choose the bits of wood yourself and give ‘em to Percy into his own paws, eh? Well, then, we shan’t be
wanting the drawings any more then since the signs is all made shipshape, so we’ll throw it away? Certainly.” He
crumpled up the parchment and dropped it on the floor behind the coffin which served as his counter.
He then thrust his other little finger through the other crook in her arm and walked the idol up and down the
coffin lid as though it was viewing the various pieces of wood. He then made the figure stoop, and with his fingers
he lifted up one of the two aces of clubs.
“There you are, Percy,” said Mipps solemnly. “Take it from her and hold it in your right hand while she
considers the other one.” This time he made the idol pick up one of the diamond shapes, which Percy accepted in
his left hand, giving the idol an absurd little bob of respect.
“So that’s settled all very amicable,” went on the Sexton. “Put the club in you starboard bucket and the diamond
in the port. And mind you, Percy, if you was to change them without Judy here telling you, she’d bring the most
‘orrible disaster upon you, me and the village, not to mention Squire and the’oly Vicar. So don’t you change ‘em
for no one, see?”
Percy did as he was ordered, and stooped down to place the floats carefully at the bottom of the empty buckets,
for he had poured the water into the cask as he had come into the door.