Hearing Secret Harmonies - Anthony Powell [68]
‘How did he know they were devils?’
‘They had horns.’
‘He probably saw some horned sheep. There are a flock of them round about here.’
‘It was horns like deer. High ones.’
‘How were they dressed?’
‘They weren’t dressed, ‘cording to Ernie.’
‘They were naked?’
‘Ernie swears they were naked as the day they were born – if they were human, and were born.’
‘Men or women?’
‘Ernie couldn’t properly see.’
‘Can’t he tell?’
Mr Gauntlett gave up any attempt to restrain the heartiness of his laughter. When that stopped he agreed that Ernie Dunch’s sophistication might well fall short of being able to distinguish between the sexes.
‘Appearing and disappearing they were, Ernie said, and there might ha’ been more than four, though he didn’t stop long to look. He figured there might ha’ been two male, and two female, at least, but sometimes it seemed more, sometimes less, one of ’em a real awful one, but, such was the state he was in hisself, he was uncertain o’ the numbers. Even in his own home, when he was telling the tale – Mrs Dunch and me nigh him – Ernie began to shake. He said he didn’t go any nearer to The Fingers, once he saw what he saw, just swivelled the Land Rover round as quick as might be, and made for the farm. He said to me ’twas a wonder he didn’t turn the Land Rover the wrong way up on the run back, banging through the tussocks o’ grass and furrows o’ ploughland. His forewheel did catch in one rut, but he managed to right the wheel again. Mrs Dunch says he was more dead than alive, when he got back. She says she never saw him like that before. Ernie swears he don’t know how he did it.’
‘He thought they were supernatural beings?’
‘I don’t know what Ernie thought – that the Devil had come to take him away.’
‘They must have been some jokers.’
‘You tell Ernie Dunch they were jokers, Mr Jenkins.’
‘If they’d been the genuine ghosts of The Fingers there’d only have been two of them.’
‘Ernie may have seen double. He wasn’t at all positive about the numbers. All he was positive about was that he wouldn’t go up there again that night for a thousand pounds.’
‘This happened last night as ever is?’
‘St John’s Eve.’
Mr Gauntlett, always an artist in effects, mentioned the date quite quietly.
‘So it was.’
‘Mrs Dunch reminded Ernie o’ that herself.’
‘What did Mrs Dunch think?’
‘Told Ernie it was the last time she’d let him out after dark with the Land Rover. She said she’d never spent such a night. Every time the young owls hooted, Ernie would give a great jump in the bed.’
‘What do you think yourself, Mr Gauntlett?’
Mr Gauntlett shook his head. He was not going to commit himself, however much prepared to laugh at Ernie Dunch about such a matter.
‘Ernie looked done up. That’s true enough. Not at all hisself.’
‘Would you be prepared to visit The Devil’s Fingers, Mr Gauntlett, say at midnight on Hallowe’en?’
Mr Gauntlett looked sly.
‘Don’t know about Hallowe’en, when it might be chilly, but I wouldn’t say I’d not been on that same down on a summer night as a lad – nor all that far from The Fingers – and never took no harm from it.’
Mr Gauntlett smiled in reminiscence.
‘You must have struck a quiet night, Mr Gauntlett.’
‘Well, it were pretty quiet some o’ the time. Some o’ the time it were very quiet.’
Mr Gauntlett did not enlarge on the memory. It sounded a pleasant enough one. At that moment Mr Tudor appeared beside us. I don’t think Mr Gauntlett had more to say, either about Ernie Dunch’s experiences at The Devil’s Fingers, or his own in the same neighbourhood. He now transferred his attention to Mr Tudor. Mr Tudor either wanted to ask Mr Gauntlett’s advice, as a local sage of some standing, or the two of them had been hatching a plot, before the meeting, which now required to be carried a stage further. They moved off together towards the easterly fork of the ridge. I pushed on alone.
This final field, plough when Isobel and I had visited the place