Another school of opinion followed Mr. Fearenside, and either accepted the piebald view or some modification of it; as, for instance, Silas Durgan, who was heard to assert that “if he choses to show enself at fairs he’d make his fortune in no time,” and being a bit of a theologian, compared the stranger to the man with the one talent.  Yet another view explained the entire matter by regarding the stranger as a harmless lunatic.  That had the advantage of accounting for everything straight away.

Between these main groups there were waverers and compromisers.  Sussex folk have few superstitions, and it was only after the events of early April that the thought of the supernatural was first whispered in the village.  Even then it was only credited among the women folk.

But whatever they thought of him, people in Iping, on the whole, agreed in disliking him.  His irritability, though it might have been comprehensible to an urban brain-worker, was an amazing thing to these quiet Sussex villagers.  The frantic gesticulations they surprised now and then, the headlong pace after nightfall that swept him upon them round quiet corners, the inhuman bludgeoning of all tentative advances of curiosity, the taste for twilight that led to the closing of doors, the pulling down of blinds, the extinction of candles and lamps—­who could agree with such goings on?  They drew aside as he passed down the village, and when he had gone by, young humourists would up with coat-collars and down with hat-brims, and go pacing nervously after him in imitation of his occult bearing.  There was a song popular at that time called “The Bogey Man”.  Miss Statchell sang it at the schoolroom concert (in aid of the church lamps), and thereafter whenever one or two of the villagers were gathered together and the stranger appeared, a bar or so of this tune, more or less sharp or flat, was whistled in the midst of them.  Also belated little children would call “Bogey Man!” after him, and make off tremulously elated.

Cuss, the general practitioner, was devoured by curiosity.  The bandages excited his professional interest, the report of the thousand and one bottles aroused his jealous regard.  All through April and May he coveted an opportunity of talking to the stranger, and at last, towards Whitsuntide, he could stand it no longer, but hit upon the subscription-list for a village nurse as an excuse.  He was surprised to find that Mr. Hall did not know his guest’s name.  “He give a name,” said Mrs. Hall—­an assertion which was quite unfounded—­“but I didn’t rightly hear it.”  She thought it seemed so silly not to know the man’s name.

Cuss rapped at the parlour door and entered.  There was a fairly audible imprecation from within.  “Pardon my intrusion,” said Cuss, and then the door closed and cut Mrs. Hall off from the rest of the conversation.