Unnoticed, she slipped away through the shadows of the little church; and after consigning her small effects to Barnaby (and picking up, on a sudden tender thought of her father, the anxious Belphegor) she struck across the wet grass towards the park entrance, followed by the dismal tolling of the Bindon church bell. The hood of her cloak pulled over her face, its folds wrapped round her, she sped through the misting rain, so plunged in thought as scarcely to notice, until within a few paces, the knot of village folk advancing up the avenue. Then she halted, unpleasantly struck by something strange and threatening in their demeanour. They were coming along at a great rate, like people belated, talking eagerly among themselves, and with fierce gesture. There were some eight or ten of them: an elderly man with a long draggled streamer of black crape tied to a bludgeon, a couple of lanky lads fighting over the possession of a pitchfork, and the rest women, one of whom dragged a child by the hand. Upon the instant that Ellinor and Barnaby halted they were recognised, and a shout went up that made her blood run cold. The next moment she was surrounded, and the words of execration hurled at her fell with almost as stunning effect as the blows they seemed to presage. “Witch! Poisoner! Murderer of poor people! She’s trying to run away! It was she planted the poison bush: burn her with a faggot of it! She’s in league with the Devil, and that’s the Devil’s imp. The witch and her boy! Seize her, duck her!” Angry hands were outstretched, and Ellinor, with energies suddenly restored by the realisation of danger, stepped back against one of the mighty beeches, holding out the wide cloak to shield Barnaby. A new howl broke out at the sight of her burden. “The witch and her cat! Burn her! Burn them!” “Give me back my wife!” cried the man with the bludgeon. “And where’s good Mrs. Nutmeg?” shrieked an old hag. “See, Jamesie,” exclaimed the woman with the child, “spit upon her! It is she who bewitched your poor daddy!” The child hurled a stone which fell short of its aim. This was the signal for the passage from anger to frenzy; and it would have fared ill with Master Simon’s three innocent associates, had not it been for an unexpected aid. Barnaby’s face was already streaming with blood, and Ellinor had received on her arm a vicious blow—which Jamesie’s mother, armed with a flint, had levelled at Belphegor—when the sound of an authoritative shout produced a sudden halt. The sight of the keeper, advancing at full run from his gate-lodge and significantly handling his gun, immediately altered the complexion of affairs. Yet he had not come a moment too soon, nor was there one to be lost; for already a few stragglers, drunk with the triumph of destruction, were running down the avenue towards them from the Herb-Garden.