"What’s the use of telling like that?" asked Mrs. Stanbury fretfully. "How be twenty parsons going to overrule a voice like what we heard a bit ago? Oh, my God! my flesh creams to the bones when I call back them awful sounds." "’Twas more like a parrot than a human," said Bartholomew. "And there’ll be some such way to explain it," declared the son. "I’ll wager that Mr. Merle will laugh the whole story to scorn." "How’s that going to mend it, even if he do?" asked Constance. "Time enough to laugh when next year be dead and your father’s still living. But it can’t be. He’s got to leave us and I want for to know what becomes of me then?" She relapsed into a condition of hysterical emotion, and her husband sat up with her all night. In the morning Bart went for the doctor and also explained to Jane West that the hoped-for meeting at dinner could not take place. A medical man reached the fastness of Coombeshead before midday and found Mrs. Stanbury suffering from shock. He was interested and sympathetic. He drove Bart home to his surgery six miles off, and, at evening, Constance took her physic and soon slept in peace. Bart and his father were in the habit henceforth of regarding that occasion as the most mournful Christmas Day within their memories; and when the adventure began to be known a little later, their friends deeply sympathised with them and were divided in their opinions. Some secretly hoped that the solemn tradition of the pool would be upheld, and felt that it would be better for Mr. Stanbury to pass away than that the great mystery and glory of Crazywell should vanish. Others flouted the spirit and agreed with Bart that no sane person should take this meddlesome hobgoblin seriously. Elsewhere Christmas Day brought other discomforts. Mr. Screech and his wife and children spent the anniversary at Ditsworthy; but they went reluctantly as a substitute for David and Rhoda. This spoilt the pleasure of Dorcas, and both she and her husband were glad to be home again. They criticised everybody at the Warren House in an unfriendly spirit, and Dorcas could find nothing genial to say even of her own mother. Indeed, none of her own had ever been forgiven for their initial adverse attitude in the matter of Billy. With her father alone could Mrs. Screech be said to remain on good terms.