"
"Black servant!" I exclaimed.
"Oh, ah, real black he is--not half-and-half like his master, but as
black as a lump o' coal, an' ugly--oh, ah, he's ugly right enough.
Goes up to the Abbey Inn of a night he do, him and that there Gipsy
Hawkins, the prettiest pair o' rascals in Upper Crossleys. Drove all
the decent folk away from the place, and Martin keeps the best beer
about here, too. If I was Martin," continued the ancient, truculently,
"I'd know what to say to them two, I would; aye, and what to do to
'em," he added with great ferocity.
"Oh," said I; for this unexpected clearing up of so many minor
mysteries had rather taken me aback. "Then Dr. Greefe is not popular?"
"Popular!" echoed the old man.
He drained his tankard and set it down on the table with a bang.
"He's been the ruin o' these parts, he has. He's worse than the
turnip-fly."
"But in what way is he responsible for these evils of which you
complain?"
The old man peered into his empty mug with a glance of such eloquence
that I could not mistake its import. Accordingly, I caused it to be
refilled, thus preventing any check in the flow of his eloquence, and:
"In what way?" he asked, his voice raised in a high quavering note. He
laughed, and his laughter was pitched in the same time-worn key. "That
doctor is a blot on the country. When Sir Burnham was alive--and afore
he went to Egypt--it was different; although, mind you, it's my
belief--oh, ah, it is indeed--that him coming here had as much to do
with Sir Burnham's death as the loss of his son what I told you
about.
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