When they move once more, Mr. Crisparkle is seen to
look up at the sky, and to point before him. They then slowly
disappear; passing out into the moonlight at the opposite end of
the Corner.
It is not until they are gone, that Mr. Jasper moves. But then he
turns to Durdles, and bursts into a fit of laughter. Durdles, who
still has that suspended something in his cheek, and who sees
nothing to laugh at, stares at him until Mr. Jasper lays his face
down on his arms to have his laugh out. Then Durdles bolts the
something, as if desperately resigning himself to indigestion.
Among those secluded nooks there is very little stir or movement
after dark. There is little enough in the high tide of the day,
but there is next to none at night. Besides that the cheerfully
frequented High Street lies nearly parallel to the spot (the old
Cathedral rising between the two), and is the natural channel in
which the Cloisterham traffic flows, a certain awful hush pervades
the ancient pile, the cloisters, and the churchyard, after dark,
which not many people care to encounter. Ask the first hundred
citizens of Cloisterham, met at random in the streets at noon, if
they believed in Ghosts, they would tell you no; but put them to
choose at night between these eerie Precincts and the thoroughfare
of shops, and you would find that ninety-nine declared for the
longer round and the more frequented way.
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