FINDING that Ben’s services were not required, that day, either by the innkeeper or by Huggate, John left him in charge of the pike, midway through the morning, and walked down the road to the village. He was desirous of obtaining news of Gabriel Stogumber; and it was with satisfaction that he learned from Sopworthy that that sturdy gentleman was keeping his bed.
“It’s a queer set-out, so it is!” said the landlord, pushing a tankard of his nappy ale towards the Captain. “He tells me as he was pounced on last night by a couple o’ foot-scamperers, but whatever would such be hopeful of prigging on this road? That’s what has me fair humdudgeoned! The like has never happened, not in all the years I’ve lived here!” He perceived a splash of spilt ale on the counter, and wiped it carefully. “Asked me all manner of questions about you, he did, Mr. Staple. ’Course, there was naught I could tell him, excepting you was a kinsman of Brean’s—which I done! But what I would like to know, sir,—me being a man as likes to keep on the windy side o’ the law—what kind of a queer cove is this Stogumber?”
The Captain was spared the necessity of answering this question by the sudden irruption into the tap of Mr. Nathaniel Coate, who had ridden into Crowford from the Manor, and now stormed into the Blue Boar, demanding the landlord in stentorian accents. His fancy had prompted him to sport a striped toilinette waistcoat under a coat of corbeau-cloth, and this combination, worn, as it was, with breeches of Angola cloth and hunting-boots with white tops, so powerfully affected the Captain that for a full minute he sat with his tankard halfway to his mouth, and his gaze riveted upon the astonishing vision. He felt stunned, and looked quite as stupid as he would have wished. Mr. Coate, who had looked rather narrowly at him, upon first entering the tap, seemed to be reassured by the fixed stare. “Well, hempseed!” he said. “Take care your eyes don’t fall out of their sockets! Did you never see a gentleman before?”
“I never see a gentleman like you afore,” drawled the Captain. He shook his head, and took a pull at his ale. “As fine as fivepence, you be!” he said, in the tone of one who had beheld a marvel.
Mr. Coate turned a contemptuous shoulder to him, and addressed himself to the landlord. “What a clodpole! I suppose that in these benighted parts you never see anyone who is up to the knocker!”
The landlord, who had listened with a wooden countenance to the Captain’s sudden illiteracy, followed a lead of which he heartily approved, and replied: “No, sir. Never! I disremember when I saw Squire himself in such toggery. Slap up to the echo, I make no doubt! And what can I do for you, sir?”
Mr. Coate eyed him a little suspiciously, but his hard scrutiny was met with such a bland look of incomprehension that it was impossible to suspect Sopworthy of malice. He gave one of his rough laughs, and said: “Damme if I was ever in such a backward place! What you can do for me, fellow, is to direct me to the nearest constable! By God, a pretty state of affairs when a gentleman can’t step out to blow a cloud, and to stretch his legs, without being attacked by armed ruffians! Ay, you may stare!” He wheeled about, stabbing a finger at John. “You, there, rustic! You’re the gatekeeper, ain’t you? Who passed the pike last night?”
John shook his head. “Didn’t see no armed ruffians,” he said.
“Where was you attacked, sir?” asked Sopworthy, staring.
“Why, at the very gate of the Manor! I’m a handy man with my fives, but if my man hadn’t come along when he did I might have lost more than my watch and my fobs—ay, and sustained worse injury than a blow on the head which had almost knocked the wits out of me! One of the rascals set upon me from behind: it would have gone hard with him had he faced me, I can tell you!” He continued in this strain for several minutes, while the Captain, his countenance still schooled to an expression of open-mouthed vacuity, studied him carefully.
To anyone who knew the world it was not difficult to recognize the order from which he sprang. Men very like him were to be met with in any large city, obtaining footholds on the fringes of Society, and earning a tolerable livelihood by decoying gullible young gentlemen of fortune to gaming hells, or introducing them to horse-dealers who might be depended upon to sell them, at fabulous prices, showy looking animals which, instead of being the sweet-goers or beautiful steppers which these Captain Sharps swore them to be, turned out to be confirmed limpers or incurable millers.
Such persons were nearly always knowledgeable in all matters of sport, bruising riders and expert dragsmen, and able to give good accounts of themselves in the boxing-ring, for these were accomplishments certain to make a good impression on their prospective victims. They knew as well how to toad-eat as to bully; and since they were almost invariably furnished with reliable racing-tips to impart to patrons, and could be relied upon to discover a really prime hunter, for a valued patron, and to acquire the animal for a ridiculously low price, it was seldom that they failed to attach themselves to several members of the ton who tolerated them for the sake of these useful attributes.
To this confraternity, John judged, Mr. Coate unquestionably belonged; but there hung about him an indefinable suggestion of force not usually found in the hangers-on of Society. That he was ruthless, John already knew; that he had a brazen courage, he now acknowledged. His policy was declared: the knowledge that a law-officer was on his trail would not frighten him into abandoning his schemes. Since his attempt to dispose of Stogumber had failed, he had adopted a line of conduct which, while it was unlikely to deceive Stogumber, would be hard to counter.
It soon appeared, from the information he was pouring out with such seeming carelessness, that he had whisked Gunn out of the way. He described the man as having sustained injuries which made it impossible for him to fulfill his duties; said with a crack of scornful laughter that he was blue-devilled with fright; and added that he had packed him off to Sheffield, with instructions to return to London by the stage-coach. “For I’d as lief have no servant as a bleater that thinks every bush a bogle, as the saying is!”
The Captain, having learnt enough, did not linger in the Blue Boar, but paid his shot, and slouched off, leaving the landlord to explain to Coate that if he desired to enlist the services of a constable he must ride to Tideswell—a piece of intelligence which provoked him to break into a fury of objurgation, and a declaration that he would be damned if he would put himself to so much trouble only to seek out some gapeseed who, he dared swear, would be of no more use than a month-old baby.
From the circumstance of his having got rid of Gunn, the Captain, so much more acute than he had given Coate reason to suppose, strongly suspected that it must have been Gunn who had recognized in Stogumber a Bow Street Runner. It seemed probable, therefore, that it was Gunn, and not his master, who was known to the officers of the law. Bold Coate might be, but he was not a fool, and for a man previously convicted of crime to remain openly at Kellands, once his presence there had been discovered by the Runner, would have been an act almost lunatic in its foolhardiness.
The Captain reached the toll-house again to find that Joseph Lydd had ridden from the Manor with a scribbled note from Nell. As he broke the wafer that sealed it, he said: “Lead the cob into the garden, out of sight: Coate is in the village, and will be returning, I fancy, at any minute.”
Joseph unhitched the cob’s bridle from the gate post, but said: “Is that where he is? I thought he was off to Tideswell to fetch the constable!”
“Not he!”
“Well, it wouldn’t do him no good if he did go there,” observed Joseph. “He says he was set on last night by a pair o’ foot-pads. I never heard the like, not on this road, but he swears his watch was snatched from him, and as for Gunn, which Coate says fought off these foot-pads, lord! he looks like a strained hair in a can! I don’t know whether it was foot-pads which gave it to him, but he’s had a proper melting, that’s sure! One of his knees is swole up like a bolster, and he can’t hardly walk on it, and he’s took a crack on the noddle that’s made him as dizzy as a goose. Mr. Henry’s man was told off to drive him to Sheffield this morning, so that’s a good riddance. I’d as lief it had been Coate—though there’s small choice in rotten apples!”
He then led the cob round the toll-house to the gate into the garden, and the Captain was left to read his letter. It was not long, and it gave him the impression that it had been written in a brave attempt to convince him that nothing had happened at Kellands to cause him to feel uneasiness. Nell was anxious, she assured him, only about her grandfather. Something which Henry had said to him had affected him profoundly; Winkfield had found him striving to heave himself to his feet; he had collapsed; and the doctor, summoned instantly, said that he had suffered a second stroke, not as severe as the first, but from which it was doubtful that he would recover. He was confined now to his bed, but he seemed to be unable to rest. Nell’s dear John would understand that she must not go out of reach: no one could tell when she might be summoned to her grandfather’s room for the last time.
Thrusting the single sheet of paper into the pocket of his leathers, John strode through the toll-house to the garden, where he found Ben being given a lesson in horse-manage. He dismissed him curtly, telling him to go back to the gate. Ben, who thought that he had been on duty for long enough, cast him a darkling look, and went off with a lagging step, and an audible sniff.
“He’ll make a likely lad in the stables,” remarked Joseph. “Given he gets the chance, that is. I’ve told Brean so afore now.”
“Yes, perhaps. Joseph, what is happening up at the Manor? Never mind what your mistress told you to say to me! I want the truth!”
“Squire’s mortal bad,” Joseph replied. “What’s more, he ain’t dying easy. He’s worriting and worriting, and whether it’s on account of Mr. Henry, or something as he’s expecting his lawyer to send him from London, Mr. Winkfield don’t know. Maybe it’s his Will. He would have me ride to Sheffield to meet the mail yesterday afternoon, though me and Mr. Winkfield knew there wouldn’t be nothing on it, ’cos there wasn’t time enough, seeing when it was I carried his letter to the mail. He don’t seem to be able to reckon the days no more, though he ain’t dicked in the nob—far from it! I’m to go again this afternoon, and I hopes to God there’ll be an express packet for him!”
“Miss Nell has told me that the Squire is dying. What she has not told me is what those two hell-born rogues are doing!”
“Now, there’s no call for you to fly into your high ropes, gov’nor! Barring Mr. Henry’s took to his bed, as blue as megrim, they ain’t doing nothing. Nor they won’t, not while Squire’s above ground, and all of us still at the Manor. It’s when Squire’s dead and buried that the mischief will begin, by what Mr. Huby managed to hear Coate saying to Mr. Henry last night. He’s a cunning old Trojan, Mr. Huby is! He saw Coate go up to Mr. Henry’s room, and he hopped up after him, as spry as a two-year old, and slipped into the room alongside Mr. Henry’s. There’s a powder-closet between the two of ’em, and into it he creeps, all amongst Mr. Henry’s fine coats, which is hung up in it, and sets his ear to the door into Mr. Henry’s room.”
“What did he contrive to hear?” John asked quickly.
“Why, he says as Coate was in a rare tweak with Mr. Henry, calling him a paper-skulled gabster, and cursing him something wicked for having gone next or nigh Squire. ‘Didn’t I tell you I wouldn’t have no trouble made, you mouth?’ he says. Then Mr. Henry says something as Mr. Huby couldn’t hear, and Coate says, ‘Wait till he’s snuffed it, and the game’s our own!’ he says. ‘You’ll send these damned servants packing, the whole curst set of insolent dotards!’—meaning Mr. Huby, and Mr. Winkfield, and me. ‘You won’t have no trouble over that,’ he says, ‘for they wouldn’t work for you, Henry, not if you was to offer ’em a fortune for to do it!’ Which is true as death,” said Joseph meditatively. “Myself, I’d as soon drive a hack—or worse!”
“Yes, and then?”
“Well, then Mr. Huby heard Mr. Henry say, screeching like he was in a fury, yet scared too, ‘And what about my cousin?’ Coate, he cursed him some more for not keeping his voice down, and he says, ‘I’ll have to marry the girl, and, damme,’ he says, ‘I’ve a mind to, for I’ll swear she’s a piece as is worth taming!’ Which fairly made Mr. Huby’s blood boil, but there was worse to come. Ay! For Mr. Henry says as Miss Nell wouldn’t have Coate, and Coate, he laughs, and says, ‘Trust me, she’ll be glad to have me! And once I’ve got her to wife,’ he says, ‘there ain’t nothing to be afraid of, ’cos I’ll school her to keep her chaffer close, don’t doubt me! And once you’re master here,’ he says, ‘me and she will stay long of you, and no one won’t think it queer; and when they’ve called the hounds off, there’s a fortune waiting for us!’ Then Mr. Huby heard a board creak, like Coate had got up out of his chair so he crept away, soft-like. And pitiful it was to see him, when he told Mr. Winkfield and me what had passed! Fair napping his bib, he was, to think his strength was gone from him, and he couldn’t give Coate a leveller, let alone choke the puff out of him, which he was wishful to do!”
“Let him not weep for that!” said Captain Staple, through his even, white teeth. “I will settle all scores with this villain, and in full!”
“Well, sir,” said Joseph, with a deprecatory cough, “seeing as Mr. Huby was in such a taking, Mr. Winkfield took the liberty of telling him so. Which heartened him up wonderful—If I may say so!”
“Did you tell me you must go to Sheffield today?” John asked abruptly. “When will you be here again?”
“Oh, I’ll be back by six o’clock at latest, sir! The London mail’s due at four. It might be a minute or two late, but not above a quarter of an hour, at this season! What was you wanting me to do?”
“Come and take my place here after dark! I must see Miss Nell!”
Joseph nodded. “I’ll come if I can, gov’nor,” he promised. “But I better be off now—if that Coate has passed the gate!”
He had not, but in a few minutes he came into sight, trotting briskly down the road. John sent Ben out to open the gate; and, after a discreet pause, Joseph mounted the cob, and rode off in his wake.
The Captain then took pity on Ben, and released him from his duties, merely recommending him to eat his dinner before sallying forth to join certain of his cronies on an afternoon of high adventure. Since Mrs. Skeffling had left a stew redolent of onions simmering on the hob, Ben thought well of following this advice. He tried to engage the Captain in conversation, but found him to be in an abstracted mood. As his parent, by the simple expedient of clouting him heavily, had trained him not to obtrude his chatter upon unwilling ears, he immediately stopped talking, consumed with startling rapidity an enormous plateful of steak, and slid from the toll-house before his protector could (in the manner of adult persons) change his mind, and set him to perform some wearisome task.
The Captain finished his own meal In a more leisurely style, and, still deeply considering the problem which lay before him, washed up the crockery. He was wiping his hands on a towel when an imperative voice intruded upon his consciousness.
“Gate! Gate, there!” it called.
The Captain turned his head quickly. The call was repeated, in exasperated accents. The Captain cast the towel aside, and strode out into the road.
Drawn up before the toll-house was a sporting curricle, to which a pair of match-bays was harnessed. The bays were sweating a little, and their legs were mud-splashed, like the wheels of the curricle, but the turn-out was a handsome one, and nothing more point-device could have been imagined than the gentleman holding the reins in one elegantly gloved hand.
He was the model of a nonpareil attired for a journey in rural surroundings, and only the exquisite cut of his coat and breeches, and the high polish on his top-boots, drew attention to his person. His waistcoat was of a sober dove-colour; the points of his collar stiff, but by no means exaggeratedly high; his cravat tied with artistry, but without flamboyance. A beaver hat, of the same delicate hue as his waistcoat, was set at a slight angle on a head of glossy, carefully arranged locks; and cast over the back of the empty seat beside him was a very long and full-skirted greatcoat embellished with a number of shoulder-capes. Upon the Captain’s appearance on the threshold of the toll-house, he transferred the reins to his whip hand, and with his disengaged hand sought the quizzing-glass which hung on a black riband round his neck, and raised it to one eye.
For a moment they stared at one another, the fair giant, in leather breeches and waistcoat, and a coarse shirt open at the throat, standing apparently transfixed; and the Tulip of Fashion looking him over from head to foot, an expression on his face of gathering anguish. “Good Gad!” he said faintly.
“Bab!” ejaculated the Captain. “What the devil—?”
“Dear boy—taken the words out of my mouth! What the devil—?” said Mr. Babbacombe.
“Confound you, what’s brought you here?” demanded the Captain.
“Just reconnoitering, dear boy!” said Mr. Babbacombe, late of the 10th Hussars, with an airy wave of the quizzing-glass. “No good flying into a miff, Jack! Dash it, no business to write me mysterious letters if you don’t mean me to come and see what kind of a lark you’re kicking up!”
“Damn you!” John said, reaching up to grip his hand. “I might have known it indeed, you inquisitive fribble! Did you bring my gear with you?”
Mr. Babbacombe removed his driving-coat from the seat beside him, disclosing a bulky package. Indicating this, with every evidence of revulsion, he said: “Take it! If there had been room for your portmanteaux as well as my own, dashed if I wouldn’t have brought ’em! You great gudgeon, we had to smash the locks! I hadn’t the keys!”
“Oh, that’s of no consequence!” said John, picking up the package, and tucking it under his arm. “But what’s this about your portmanteaux? I don’t see them!”
“No, no, I left ’em at the inn!”
“What inn?”
“Little place down the road. I don’t remember what it’s called, but you must know it! It’s only a mile away, dash it!”
“You can’t stay at the Blue Boar!” John exclaimed.
“Just racking up for the night,” explained Mr. Babbacombe. “Seems a snug little inn. Anything amiss with it?”
“Bab, have you been asking for me there?”
“Wasn’t necessary. Fact of the matter is, Jack, I’ve had news of you for some way along the road. Dashed roadbook of mine ain’t to be trusted ’cross country, so there was nothing for it but to ask the way. No, I didn’t say a word about you, but it’s my belief you couldn’t mention the Crowford Toll-gate anywhere for six or seven miles round without being told that there’s a queer new keeper to it, the size of a mountain. As for the ale-draper at this Blue Boar of yours, he seemed to twig it was you I wanted the instant I spoke of the tollgate.”
“Lord!” said John. “Oh, well! It must be all over the village by now, so there’s no help for it! I’m devilish glad to see you, old fellow, but you must brush tomorrow! It won’t do if certain fellows here get wind of you.”
“I must what?” said Mr. Babbacombe, all at sea.
“Brush! Pike! Lope off!” said John, his eyes brimful of laughter. “In your own flash tongue, depart!”
“Yes, I know you’re up to fun and gig,” said Mr. Babbacombe severely. “Not but what I must depart tomorrow, because I didn’t bring Fockerby along with me, and what with having to see to it that the ostler at the inn I stayed at last night looked after these tits of mine, and being obliged to dashed well stand over the boots this morning—and even now they don’t look as they should—my boots, I mean!—it’s devilish exhausting! Where can I stable the bays? I can’t talk to you on the high road!”
“Well, you can’t stable them here. You must take them back to the Blue Boar.”
“But I want to talk to you!” objected Mr. Babbacombe.
“Of course, but you must see there’s no place for a curricle here, let alone a pair of horses! You’ll have to walk back: it’s not much more than a mile! Oh, lord! here’s the carrier! Mind, now, Bab, you’ve mistaken the road!” He then said, raising his voice: “No, sir, you should ha’ turned right-handed, short of the village!” and turned from the curricle to fetch the tickets from the office.
Mr. Babbacombe sat in a trance-like state, listening to an interchange of conversation, during the course of which he learned that his eccentric friend was apparently keeping the gate for someone called Brean. The carrier seemed surprised that this person had not yet returned; Mr. Babbacombe was even more surprised to hear that Mr. Brean was John’s cousin. No sooner had the pike been closed behind the carrier than he exclaimed: “If you are not the most complete hand I ever knew! Now, Jack, stop bamming, and tell me what the devil you’re doing!”
“I will,” John promised, grinning up at him, “but take that natty turn-out of yours away first! If Sopworthy—that’s your ale-draper!—knows you’ve come here to see me, you may as well borrow his cob: I can stable him in the henhouse.”
“Jack!” said Mr. Babbacombe. “Are you stabling your own horse in a dashed hen-house?”
“No, no, he’s in that barn, up there! Now, do be off, Bab!” He watched Mr. Babbacombe turn his pair, and bethought him of something, and called out: “Wait, Bab!—I daresay you won’t see him, but if you should meet a fellow at the Blue Boar called Stogumber, take care what you say to him! He was nursing a broken head and a gashed shoulder this morning, but if he gets wind of such an out-and-outer as you, putting up at the inn, he’s bound to think it smoky, and very likely he’ll leave his bed to discover what your business may be. You’d better tell him you came here to visit Sir Peter Stornaway, up at the Manor, but hearing that he’s very ill you’ve thought it best not to intrude upon the family. Now, don’t forget!—Stornaway—Kellands Manor! Stogumber’s a Bow Street Runner, but he don’t know I’ve bubbled him.”
Mr. Babbacombe regarded him in fascinated horror. “A Bow Street—No, by God, I’ll be damned if I’ll go another yard until you’ve told me what kind of a kick-up this is! Dear boy, you ain’t murdered anyone?”
“Lor” bless you, gov’nor, I ain’t a queer cove!” said the Captain outrageously. “Nor no trap ain’t wishful to snabble me!”
“Dutch comfort! Do you mean the Runner ain’t after you?”
“No, he only suspects he may be,” replied the Captain. “He thinks I’m a trifle smoky.”
“If he knew as much about you as I do,” said Mr. Babbacombe, with feeling, “he’d know you’re a dangerous lunatic, and dashed well put you under restraint!”
With these embittered words, he drove off, leaving the Captain laughing, and waving farewell.
Half an hour later he was once more at the tollhouse, dismounting from the landlord’s cob, which animal he apostrophized as the greatest slug he had ever crossed in his life. The hen-house, he considered, would be a fitting stable; and allowing John to lead the cob away, he entered the tollhouse, and was discovered by his friend, a few minutes later, inspecting the premises with interest not unmixed with consternation.
“How do you like my quarters?” John asked cheerfully.
“Well, your bedroom ain’t so bad, but where do you sit?” enquired Mr. Babbacombe.
“Here, in the kitchen, of course!”
“No, really, Jack!”
“Lord, you’ve grown very nice, haven’t you? Were you never billeted in a Portuguese cottage, with no glass in the windows, and a fire burning in the middle of the floor, so that you were blinded by the smoke?”
“I was,” acknowledged Mr. Babbacombe. “That’s why I sold out!”
“Don’t you try to play off the airs of an exquisite on me, my buck! Sit down! By the way, why the devil didn’t you pack up my cigarillos with the rest of my gear? I’ve none left!”
With a sigh, Mr. Babbacombe produced a case from his pocket, and held it out. “Because you didn’t tell me to, of course. Here you are!”
“Bless you!” said the Captain. “Well, now we’ll blow a cloud together, Bab, and I’ll tell you what I’m doing here!”
After this promising beginning he seemed to find it hard to continue, and for a moment or two sat staring into the fire, smoking, and frowning slightly. Mr. Babbacombe, his elegant form disposed as comfortably as a Windsor chair would permit, watched him through his lashes, but preserved a patient silence. John looked up at last, a rueful smile in his eyes. “It all came about by accident,” he said.
Mr. Babbacombe sighed. “I knew that,” he replied. “You’ve never been in a scrape yet but what it came about by accident. The thing is, no one else has these accidents. However, I ain’t going to argue about it! Why did you send your baggage to Edenhope, though? Been puzzling me!”
“I was coming to stay with you!” said the Captain indignantly.
“Well, what made you change your mind?” mildly enquired Mr. Babbacombe.
“I’ll tell you,” said the Captain obligingly; and settled down to give him a brief account of his present adventure. Certain aspects of it he chose to keep to himself, perhaps considering them to be irrelevant, and although the Squire’s name occurred frequently during his recital, the most glancing of references only were made to his granddaughter. But the rest of the story he told his friend without reservation.
Mr. Babbacombe, listening in astonishment, and with no more than an occasional interruption, learned with incredulity that the Captain had no immediate intention of divulging to Stogumber the whereabouts of the treasure. He was moved to protest, saying in deeply moved accents: “No, really, my dear fellow—! Only one thing to be done! Tell the Redbreast at once!”
“If you had paid the least heed to what I have been saying,” retorted John, “you would know that what I am trying to do is to keep young Stornaway’s name out of this!”
“Well, you can’t do it, and, damme, I don’t see why you should wish to! Sounds to me like a devilish loose fish!”
“Yes, a contemptible creature! But I promised his grandfather I would do my possible to keep his name clean!”
“So you may have—though I’ll be damned if I see why you should!—but you didn’t know then what kind of a business he was mixed up in! I tell you, this is serious, Jack! Good God, it’s a hanging matter!”
“Don’t I know it!”
“Well, it don’t seem to me as though you’ve the least notion of it!” said Mr. Babbacombe, with considerable asperity. “Dash it, who is this old fellow, and what made you take such a fancy to him?”
This home question brought the colour up into John’s face. Avoiding his friend’s eye, he was just about to embark on an explanation, which sounded lame even in his own ears, when he was interrupted by a shout from the road. Never more thankful to be recalled to his duties, he apologized hastily to Mr. Babbacombe, and went off to open the gate, and to collect the toll. By the time he returned to the kitchen, he was once more in command of himself, and the situation, and informed Babbacombe crisply that he had his own sufficient reasons for desiring to spare Sir Peter as much pain as possible. “It don’t matter why: it is so!” he said. “Just accept that, will you, Bab?”
Mr. Babbacombe was conscious of a horrid sinking at the pit of his stomach. “You’re doing it rather too brown, Jack!” he said uneasily. “The more I think of it, the more I’m sure there’s more to this affair than you’ve told me!”
The Captain looked guilty, but there was a decided twinkle in his eye. “Well, yes, there is a little more!” he acknowledged. “No, no, I had nothing to do with stealing those sovereigns! don’t look so horrified! But—well, never mind that now! The thing is, I’ve given the Squire my word I’ll do my utmost to shield Henry, and I will! Nothing you can say is going to stop me, Bab, so spare yourself the trouble of saying it!”
Mr. Babbacombe groaned, and expressed the bitter wish that he had never come to Crowford. “I might have known I should find you in some damned, crazy fix!” he said. “If you don’t put a rope round your own neck it will be a dashed miracle! How can you keep Henry out of it? Now, don’t tell me you mean to help t’other fellow to escape as well, because for one thing I know you too well to believe you; and for another, if you did do anything so totty-headed, the chances are the Redbreast would arrest you and this highwayman of yours! Stands to reason!”
John laughed. “Chirk might not be able to prove an alibi, but I imagine I could. But you may be perfectly easy on that head! I don’t mean to let Coate escape! No, not for anything that was offered me!”
“That’s all very well,” objected Babbacombe, “but you can’t have one arrested without the other! The fellow’s bound to squeak beef on Henry!”
John nodded. “Yes, naturally I have thought of that. I wish I knew how deeply he may be implicated! I must discover that.”
This was said with decision, and with a certain hardening of the muscles round his mouth. Mr. Babbacombe, looking up at the fair, handsome face, with the smiling eyes that held so level and steady a regard, and the good-humour that dwelled round that firm mouth, reflected gloomily that Crazy Jack was the oddest of fellows. Anyone would take him for a man with as level a head as his frank eyes, and so, in general, he was; but every now and then a demon of mischief seemed to take possession of him, and then, as now, he would plunge headlong into any perilous adventure that offered. It was quite useless to argue with him. For all his easygoing ways, and the kindliness which endeared him to so many people, there was never any turning him from his purpose, once he had made up his mind. He had a streak of obstinacy, and although he had never in the smallest degree resented the attempts of his friends to stand in the way of his will, Mr. Babbacombe could not call to mind when the most forceful of representations had born the least weight with him. If you stood in his way, he just put you aside, perfectly kindly, but quite inexorably; and if you swore at him, when all was done, for having done a crazy, dangerous thing, although he was genuinely penitent for having caused a friend anxiety you could see that he was puzzled to know why you should worry about him at all.
“The trouble with you, Jack,” said Mr. Babbacombe, following, aloud, the trend of these thoughts, “is that you’re neither to lead nor drive!”
John glanced down at him, amusement springing to his face. “Yes, I am. Why, what a fellow you make me out to be!”
“Once you’ve taken a notion into your silly head, one might as well try reasoning with a mule as with you!” insisted Babbacombe.
“Well,” said John apologetically, wrinkling his brow, “a man ought to be able to make up his mind for himself, and once he’s done so he shouldn’t let himself be turned from his purpose. I daresay I’m wrong, but so I think. In this case, I know very well what I’m about—and I swear to you I’m not funning, Bab! I own, at the outset I thought it might be good sport to keep the gate for a day or two, and try whether I could discover what was afoot here, but that’s all changed, and I’m serious—oh, more than ever in my life! And also I am quite determined,” he added.
“Something,” said Babbacombe, looking narrowly at him, “has happened to you, Jack, and I’m dashed if I know what it can be!” He paused hopefully, but the Captain only laughed. “And another thing I don’t know is what the deuce there is in this affair to put you into such high gig! I’d as lief handle live coals myself!”
“No, would you? I wouldn’t have missed such an adventure for a fortune!” John said ingenuously.
“Wait until you find yourself explaining to a judge and a jury how you came to aid and abet these rogues—for that’s what you are doing, dear boy, every instant you delay to tell what you’ve discovered to the Redbreast, or to the nearest magistrate!”
“Oh, no, I’m not! Now, consider, Bab! If Stogumber knew—if he had proof—that Coate and Stornaway are the men he’s trying to catch, he would not be prowling about the district, seeking to come by information. He can do no more than suspect them; it may be that he does not even do that, but has merely some inkling that the treasure is to be looked for here. Of course he would be glad to recover it immediately, but if I know anything of the matter he won’t be content only to find those chests. To perform his task successfully, he must also apprehend the thieves. Good God, Bab, there were two guards shot dead at the ford, poor fellows, and the gatekeeper stabbed, and left to petrify in that cavern, and an attempt made to murder Stogumber himself!”
“Yes, and one of these pretty rascals you mean to shield!” struck in Babbacombe.
“Well, yes,” John admitted. “I must do so, for the sake of—of others, who are quite guiltless, and don’t deserve to have an honourable name smirched. If it were not for that I wouldn’t shield him! Lord, I’d hand him over to Stogumber, and think the world well rid of him—even though I doubt very much whether he has played any but a minor role in the affair! I am very sure he knew nothing of Brean’s death, until he found his body in the cavern, and I’d go bail it was Coate and his rogue of a servant—if servant he is!—who shot down the guards. His part in this was to provide the safe hiding place for those chests, and shelter for Coate and Gunn. Shelter near at hand, too! You may depend upon it, Coate would not go far from where the chests are hid!”
Mr. Babbacombe, perceiving that a little ash from his cigarillo had dropped on to his coat, carefully flicked it away, and with some anxiety inspected the superfine cloth. Satisfied that no damage had been done, he raised his eyes again, and said: “Seems to me, then, that if that’s all Stornaway was brought into the business to do, this Coate of yours is paying pretty high for his services! Resourceful sort of a fellow: couldn’t he hit upon a hiding-place without using a hen-hearted weasel that would turn King’s Evidence at the first hint of danger?”
John looked at him, half frowning. “I don’t know. It might not be so easy, after all, to find a sure hiding-place for six chests of gold! They must remain hidden for many months, remember! Then, too, it had to be near the holdup—I mean, not so far off that the chests could not be conveyed to it before daylight. Nor yet so close, of course, that it must have been instantly suspected. I fancy that the thirty miles which lie between this place and the Wansbeck ford must have been the extremest limit. I’ve been thinking about that. This is a wild country, Bab, and if you look at the map of the county, hanging in the office there, you’ll see that it would be possible to reach that cavern, from the Wansbeck ford, without passing any toll-gate but this. There is something else that occurs to me. It may well be that when the time is ripe to remove the chests Coate means to dispose of Stornaway, just as he has already disposed of Brean. In fact, I think it very likely. But he dare not murder Stornaway while he still needs an excuse for remaining in this district.”
Mr. Babbacombe threw the butt of his cigarillo into the fire. “Well, if that’s the kind of cut-throat villain he is, take care he don’t stab you first!” he recommended.
“I’ll take devilish good care he don’t! But I think he don’t suspect me—yet! I’ve let it be known I’m a discharged trooper, and any flash language I use is due to my having been a batman. Rose—she is Miss Stornaway’s maid!—has told the woman who keeps this place clean, and cooks for me, that my mother was Brean’s aunt, who married a man in comfortable circumstances. It’s possible Coate really believes me to be Brean’s cousin—though I don’t think that. I fancy he don’t know yet what my—er—lay is! It don’t signify: he’ll find me harder to kill than Brean! But I’ve had some further thoughts on this head, Bab! One of the three confederates recognized Stogumber for a Runner—and I think that one must have been Gunn: he has been got rid of very quickly, which seems to tell its own tale! Now, it seems to me that neither Coate nor Stornaway can have had the least expectation of being known to any law-officer: they would not else be staying at the Manor so openly. It is certainly a bad thing for them that Gunn was known to Stogumber; but I think it was a worse thing for him to have been recognized. He had no expectation of that either, for he has been wandering about the country calling himself an agent of some sort, and that he would not have done had he known that a cracksman with whom he was already acquainted was mixed up in this business. Well, had it not been for Chirk, he must have suffered Brean’s fate, and gone to join him in the cavern. But Chirk chased off his assailants, and however much he may suspect that they were Coate and Gunn, he don’t know it for certain, since they had their faces muffled in their scarves. But Coate knows that he’s a Runner, and forewarned, Bab, is forearmed!”
“They’ll recall him from Bow Street, and send another in his stead!”
“That wouldn’t fadge! Any stranger will now be suspect by Coate! I hoped he might take fright, and run for it, but he’s a mighty cool customer, and he means to stand fast. That seems to mean that he knows nothing can be brought home to him. Well! Without me, it’s possible Stogumber may discover that cavern, and what it contains. But with me, he may be able to arrest Coate also; and I fancy he won’t quarrel with me over the means I took to bring that about!”