Chapter 27

CHAPTER XXVII.

Mr. Scogan had been accommodated in a little canvas hut. Dressed
in a black skirt and a red bodice, with a yellow-and-red bandana
handkerchief tied round his black wig, he looked--sharp-nosed,
brown, and wrinkled--like the Bohemian Hag of Frith's Derby Day.
A placard pinned to the curtain of the doorway announced the
presence within the tent of "Sesostris, the Sorceress of
Ecbatana." Seated at a table, Mr. Scogan received his clients in
mysterious silence, indicating with a movement of the finger that
they were to sit down opposite him and to extend their hands for
his inspection. He then examined the palm that was presented
him, using a magnifying glass and a pair of horn spectacles. He
had a terrifying way of shaking his head, frowning and clicking
with his tongue as he looked at the lines. Sometimes he would
whisper, as though to himself, "Terrible, terrible!" or "God
preserve us!" sketching out the sign of the cross as he uttered
the words. The clients who came in laughing grew suddenly grave;
they began to take the witch seriously. She was a formidable-
looking woman; could it be, was it possible, that there was
something in this sort of thing after all? After all, they
thought, as the hag shook her head over their hands, after
all...And they waited, with an uncomfortably beating heart, for
the oracle to speak. After a long and silent inspection, Mr.
Scogan would suddenly look up and ask, in a hoarse whisper, some
horrifying question, such as, "Have you ever been hit on the head
with a hammer by a young man with red hair?" When the answer was
in the negative, which it could hardly fail to be, Mr. Scogan
would nod several times, saying, "I was afraid so. Everything is
still to come, still to come, though it can't be very far off
now." Sometimes, after a long examination, he would just
whisper, "Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," and
refuse to divulge any details of a future too appalling to be
envisaged without despair. Sesostris had a success of horror.
People stood in a queue outside the witch's booth waiting for the
privilege of hearing sentence pronounced upon them.

Denis, in the course of his round, looked with curiosity at this
crowd of suppliants before the shrine of the oracle. He had a
great desire to see how Mr. Scogan played his part. The canvas
booth was a rickety, ill-made structure. Between its walls and
its sagging roof were long gaping chinks and crannies. Denis
went to the tea-tent and borrowed a wooden bench and a small
Union Jack. With these he hurried back to the booth of
Sesostris. Setting down the bench at the back of the booth, he
climbed up, and with a great air of busy efficiency began to tie
the Union Jack to the top