‘Tut, tut,’ answered the minister, ’it is only their own fears that make such noises terrible to the vulgar.  As for Blackbeard, I am not here to say whether guilty spirits sometimes cannot rest and are seen wandering by men; but for these noises, they are certainly Nature’s work as is the noise of waves upon the beach.  The floods have filled the vault with water, and so the coffins getting afloat, move in some eddies that we know not of, and jostle one another.  Then being hollow, they give forth those sounds you hear, and these are your evil angels.  ’Tis very true the dead do move beneath our feet, but ’tis because they cannot help themselves, being carried hither and thither by the water.  Fie, Ratsey man, you should know better than to fright a boy with silly talk of spirits when the truth is bad enough.’

The parson’s words had the ring of truth in them to me, and I never doubted that he was right.  So this mystery was explained, and yet it was a dreadful thing, and made me shiver, to think of the Mohunes all adrift in their coffins, and jostling one another in the dark.  I pictured them to myself, the many generations, old men and children, man and maid, all bones now, each afloat in his little box of rotting wood; and Blackbeard himself in a great coffin bigger than all the rest, coming crashing into the weaker ones, as a ship in a heavy sea comes crashing down sometimes in the trough, on a small boat that is trying to board her.  And then there was the outer darkness of the vault itself to think of, and the close air, and the black putrid water nearly up to the roof on which such sorry ships were sailing.

Ratsey looked a little crestfallen at what Mr. Glennie said, but put a good face on it, and answered—­

’Well, master, I am but a plain man, and know nothing about floods and these eddies and hidden workings of Nature of which you speak; but, saving your presence, I hold it a fond thing to make light of such warnings as are given us.  ’Tis always said, “When the Moons move, then Moonfleet mourns”; and I have heard my father tell that the last time they stirred was in Queen Anne’s second year, when the great storm blew men’s homes about their heads.  And as for frighting children, ’tis well that heady boys should learn to stand in awe, and not pry into what does not concern them—­or they may come to harm.’  He added the last words with what I felt sure was a nod of warning to myself, though I did not then understand what he meant.  So he walked off in a huff with Elzevir, who was waiting for him outside, and I went with Mr. Glennie and carried his gown for him back to his lodging in the village.

Mr. Glennie was always very friendly, making much of me, and talking to me as though I were his equal; which was due, I think, to there being no one of his own knowledge in the neighbourhood, and so he had as lief talk to an ignorant boy as to an ignorant man.  After we had passed the churchyard turnstile and were crossing the sludgy meadows, I asked him again what he knew of Blackbeard and his lost treasure.