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‘Do you remember it?’ said the Lord Chief justice.
Stephen nodded sagely, and his voice seemed to come from a long way off:
‘Yes, I remember it, my lord. It was a melancholy little street.’
Sabine Baring-Gould
Aunt Joa
In the Land’s End district is the little church-town of Ze
In Ze
Near this monument of a hoar and indeed unknown antiquity lived an old woman by herself, in a small cottage of one story in height, built of moor stones set in earth, and pointed only with lime. It was thatched with heather, and possessed but a single chimney that rose but little above the apex of the roof, and had two slates set on the top to protect the rising smoke from being blown down the chimney into the cottage when the wind was from the west or from the east. When, however, it drove from north or south, then the smoke must take care of itself. On such occasions it was wont to find its way out of the door, and little or none went up the chimney.
The only fuel burnt in this cottage was peat – not the solid black peat from deep, bogs, but turf of only a spade graft, taken from the surface, and composed of undissolved roots. Such fuel gives flame, which the other does not; but, on the other hand, it does not throw out the same amount of heat, nor does it last one half the time.
The woman who lived in the cottage was called by the people of the neighbourhood Aunt Joa
Her conduct was reprehensible certainly. But that of Aunt Joa
The nearest farm to Aunt Joa
‘See you now, auntie, you’m gettin’ old and crimmed wi’ rheumatics. How can you get about? An’ there’s no knowin’ but you might be took bad in the night. You ought to have some little lass wi’ you to mind you.’
‘I don’t want nobody, thank the Lord.’
‘Not just now, auntie, but suppose any chance ill-luck were to come on you. And then, in the bad weather, you’m not fit to go abroad after the turves, and you can’t get all you want – tay and sugar and milk for yourself now. It would be handy to have a little maid by you.’
‘Who should I have?’ asked Joa
‘No,’ answered the old woman, ‘I’ll have none o’ they Hexts, not I. The Lord is agin Rose and all her family, I know it. I’ll have none of them.’
‘But, auntie, you must be nigh on ninety.’
‘I be ower that. But what o’ that? Didn’t Sarah, the wife of Abraham, live to an hundred and seven and twenty years, and that in spite of him worritin’ of her wi’ that owdacious maid of hem, Hagar? If it hadn’t been for their goings on, of Abraham and Hagar, it’s my belief that she’d ha’ held on to a hundred and fifty-seven. I thank the Lord I’ve never had no man to worrit me. So why I shouldn’t equal Sarah’s life I don’t see.’
Then she went indoors and shut the door.
After that a week elapsed without Mrs. Hockin seeing the old woman. She passed the cottage, but no Joa
‘Well, I’ve naught on my hands now,’ said the farmer, ‘so I reckon we will go.’ The two walked together to the cottage. No smoke issued from the chimney, and the door was shut. Jabez knocked, but there came no answer; so he entered, followed by his wife.
There was in the cottage but the kitchen, with one bedroom at the side. The hearth was cold. ‘There’s some’ut up,’ said Mrs. Hockin.
‘I reckon it’s the old lady be down,’ replied her husband, and, throwing open the bedroom door, he said: ‘Sure enough, and no mistake – there her be, dead as a dried pilchard.’
And in fact Auntie Joa
‘Whativer shall we do?’ asked Mrs. Hockin. ‘I reckon,’ said her husband, ‘us had better take an inventory of what is here, lest wicked rascals come in and steal anything and everything.’
‘Folks bain’t so bad as that, and a corpse in the house,’ observed Mrs. Hockin. ‘Don’t be sure o’ that – these be terrible wicked times,’ said the husband. ‘And I sez, sez I, no harm is done in seein’ what the old creetur had got.’
‘Well, surely,’ acquiesced Elizabeth, ‘there is no harm in that.’ In the bedroom was an old oak chest, and this the farmer and his wife opened. To their surprise they found in it a silver teapot, and half a dozen silver spoons.