es mine, I shall know it'" 93

"This strange thing called Death...." _facing page_ 98

"Dad ... sat staring in moody silence" 101

"Tall, sturdy Will Shakespeare could buy up cattle ... as well as
the butcher's son" 109

A WARWICKSHIRE LAD

I

Little Will Shakespeare was going homeward through the dusk from Gammer
Gurton's fireside. He had no timorous fears, not he. He would walk
proudly and deliberately as becomes a man. Men are not afraid. Yet
Gammer had told of strange happenings at her home. A magpie had flown
screaming over the roof, the butter would not come in the churn, an' a
strange cat had slipped out afore the maid at daybreak--a cat without a
tail, Gammer said--

Little Will quickened his pace.

Dusk falls early these December days, and Willy Shakespeare scurrying
along the street is only five, and although men are not afraid yet----

So presently when he pulls up he is panting, and he beats against the
stubborn street door with little red fists, and falls in at its sudden
opening, breathless.

But Mother's finger is on her lips as she looks up from her low chair in
the living-room, for the whole world in this Henley Street household
stands still and holds its breath when Baby Brother sleeps. Brought up
short, Will tiptoes over to the chimney corner. Why will toes stump when
one most wants to move noiselessly? He is panting still too with his
hurrying and with all he has to tell.

"She says," begins Will before he has even reached Mother's side and his
whisper is awesome, "Gammer says that Margery is more than any ailin',
she is."

Now chimney corners may be wide and generous and cheerful with their
blazing log, but they open into rooms which as night comes on grow big
and shadowy, with flickers up against the raftered darkness of the
ceilings. Little Will Shakespeare presses closer to his mother's side.
"She says, Gammer does, she says that Margery is witched."

Now Margery was the serving-maid at the house of Gammer Gurton's
son-in-law, Goodman Sadler, with whom Gammer lived.

Mother at this speaks sharply. She is outdone about it. "A pretty tale
for a child to be hearing," she says. "It is but a fearbabe. I wonder at
Gammer, I do."

And turning aside from the cradle which she has been rocking, she lifts
small Will to her lap, and he stretching frosty fingers and toes all
ti