THE DEATH OF THE CURSE
Jim Harley's face twisted and stiffened like a grotesque and hideous
mask; his honest eyes narrowed and reddened; for a little while he stood
there, motionless as a figure of wood; then his tongue flickered out and
moistened his dry lips, and the fingers of his big hands opened and
closed several times. The strong fingers closed so desperately that the
nails furrowed the skin of his palms and came away with a stain of red.
"Damn you!" he cried, in a voice so terrible and unnatural that it
startled his hearers like a gun-shot in the small room. "Damn you, you
accursed murderer! You tell me that you murdered my father--and you sit
there and laugh. You devil! I'll kill you where you sit--with my empty
hands."
He sprang forward; but Banks threw out an arm like iron and grappled
with him in the nick of time. Of the others Rayton alone moved to help
in the protection of the old man who sat laughing in the chair. Dr. Nash
looked on with interest, Dick Goodine folded his arms and Fletcher
snarled, "Kill the old devil. Crazy or sane, he stinks to Heaven an'
cumbers the earth."
Banks and Harley staggered like drunken men within a foot of the old
man's chair. Harley was blind with rage. Every drop of blood, every
muscle, leapt to be at the slayer of his father. Nell, who had fled from
the room a moment before, now returned and ran to her brother, crying
out to him to be reasonable. Rayton followed the stumbling and reeling
of the wrestlers, too weak to assist Banks but plucking constantly at a
coat or shoulder. This time Harley was no child in the big sportsman's
arms. He fought like a mad man, possessed and a-fire with the
determination to destroy his father's murderer.
"It is a devil!" he cried. "Let me at him, I say," and twice he tripped
Banks and had him down with one knee on the floor. But he could not get
clear of the big fellow, nor overthrow him. And still Captain Wigmore
sat in the chair and laughed as if he should die of unholy mirth.
The superior weight of Mr. Banks told at last. He crushed Jim Harley to
the carpet and held him there, staring down at him with a flushed,
moist face. Harley glared up at him, still squirming and wriggling.
"Lie still," said Banks, breathlessly. "Do you want to add another
murder to the list of tragedies?"
"That's what I want to do," gasped Jim. "But it wouldn't be murder to
clean the face of the earth of that devil. Let me up, you big slob."
"You'll thank me for this, some day," replied Mr. Banks, sitting firmly
and heavily upon Jim Harley's heaving chest. By this time, Nell Harley
had subsided into Reginald's anxious and ready arms.
Captain Wigmore stopped laughing suddenly and glanced from Banks and Jim
on the floor to the girl and her lover.
"It's as good as a play," he said. "Banks, all this unseemly and
ungentlemanly struggle is thrown away. My young friend Jim was powerless
to do me any injury. I am beloved of the gods. I am the chosen
instrument of fate--of the fate of the Harley family. Reginald, you
silly young ass, I see you hold that lady in your arms with no other
feeling than that of pity for yourself. The fates have ordained that I
am to be her husband. Timothy, you glowering old fool, bring me a drink
of whisky. Don't stand there, sir! Step lively when I speak to you, or
I'll send for the bosun to put you in irons."
"Forget it," snarled Timothy Fletcher. "You'll never set yer lips to
another taste of whisky in this world, you old reprobate. I see death in
yer eyes now--an' already the flare of hell fire. It's a drink of water
ye'll be hollerin' for pretty soon."
"Let me up," said Jim Harley. "I promise you I won't touch him."
So Mr. Banks and Jim arose stiffly from the floor.
Captain Wigmore, or Captain Jackson, or the Sultan of Turkey--call him
what you will--glared at Timothy in silence for several seconds, with
hate and despair in his eyes. His long, slender fingers plucked at his
ashen lips. Again, as suddenly as a change of thought, he burst into mad
laughter; this laughter grew and thinned to shrieking, then fell
presently to sobbing and muttering. He seemed to crumple and shrink; and
slowly he slid from the low chair to the floor. The company looked on
without moving or speaking, some in a state of helpless horror, the
doctor and old Timothy Fletcher with harsh curiosity. Nell Harley hid
her face against Reginald's shoulder.
The murderer squirmed on the floor, sobbing and muttering; and by the
time Doctor Nash had decided that he was really having a fit the old
devil had finished having it. He was dead! Nash turned him over and felt
for his heart. The heart was still.
"The ugliest death I ever saw," said Nash, glancing up at the horrified
company.
"And the ugliest life," said old Timothy Fletcher.
Reginald led the girl from the room. They stumbled along the hall and
sat side by side upon the bottom step of the stairs. Then the girl began
to weep and the shaken young man to comfort her.
Old Wigmore's secret had not escaped with his wild and twisted spirit.
"Hoist him onto the sofa," said the doctor. "We'll sit on him here and
now."
All agreed that the so called Captain Wigmore had died in a fit. Then
Dick Goodine left the house, saying that a little fresh air would make
him feel cleaner. Mr. Banks lit a cigar, remarking that he would
fumigate this chamber of horrors. Then Dr. Nash, as coroner, and Jim
Harley, who was a justice of the peace, agreed that they had the
authority to search the belongings of the deceased. Timothy Fletcher
said that he knew where the old devil kept all his private papers. So
Rayton took Nell home, and Nash, Banks, Harley and the old servant drove
over to the dead man's house, taking the shrunken and stiffened clay
along with them in the back of the pung. They entered the empty house
and Timothy lit a candle and led the way upstairs to the captain's
bedroom. He pointed to a large, iron-bound wooden chest which stood at
the foot of the bed.
"There's where he keeps his ungodly secrets," he said. "Mind the corp,
gentlemen, or it'll turn over in agony when we unlock the box. Hell! how
I do wish the old sinner was alive to see it. I shouldn't wonder but
we'll find some bones of dead men in that box."
"Where is the key?" asked Banks, shivering at Timothy's words and
puffing nervously at a freshly lit cigar.
Timothy chuckled at the big man's discomfort and borrowed a strong knife
from Jim Harley. He went to a mahogany secretary which stood at the head
of the bed, opened the top drawer and applied the blade of the knife to
the front of a secret compartment within the drawer. He turned in a
moment and tossed a bunch of keys to Mr. Banks. Nash took the keys from
the New Yorker's hands and knelt down before the chest. Jim Harley held
the candle. The chest had three locks and each of the three called for a
separate key. At last the heavy lid was freed and lifted. The top of the
trunk was full of clothing. They lifted out a tray and found more
clothing. They lifted out another tray and found, in the bottom of the
chest, books, nautical instruments, a chart or two, a small bag of
English gold, a brace of revolvers and a small iron dispatch-box. In the
dispatch-box they found many documentary proofs of the old man's claim
to the style and title of Captain John Edward Jackson. They found his
ship-master's certificate, an appointment to the command of a gun-boat
in the Brazilian navy, title deeds to several mining properties in
Brazil, a yellow clipping from a St. John newspaper recording the
marriage of Captain Thomas Harley, and another reporting and commenting
upon Harley's sudden and deplorable death at the hands of an unknown
assassin.
"This little snake was the murderer. There can be no doubt about it,"
said Jim Harley.
"He is answering for it now," said Mr. Banks, quietly.
"I am afraid we must turn all these things over to the Crown," said
Nash. "I don't know anything about the law; but I imagine it is the
business of the Crown to take care of these things and look for heirs."
Mr. Banks nodded.
"I think the lawyers will find it a very pretty thing," he remarked. "As
for Samson's Mill Settlement, it will become known to the world."
"But we'll burn these newspaper clippings," said Jim Harley, snatching
them up and crushing them in his hand. "The murderer is dead and the
curse is dead. We'll let the old story die, too."
"I wonder if the title-deeds are straight," murmured Nash. "Can the
Crown collect, do you think? I'll make out my bill for professional
services, anyway."
"Heaven only knows what the lawyers will make of it," said Banks.
Harley thrust the scraps of old newspaper into the flame of the candle,
and as the blaze crawled up and threw red wavers of light around the
room, Banks and Nash jumped as if they were on springs, and old Timothy
Fletcher let out a yell.
"I thought the old varment was a-fire already an' lookin' over my
shoulder," explained Timothy, a minute later. He lit several more
candles and led the way downstairs and into the dining-room. He got out
a decanter of whisky, glasses and water. All four helped themselves to
stiff doses. Nash took a sip, then raised his glass.
"The old bounder started all manner of mischief in this place, between
friends and neighbors," he said, "but now he's dead we'll have a little
peace. Here's to peace! I wish Reginald Rayton was here to shake hands
with me."
"A very proper wish," said Mr. Banks. "The old rascal made fools of
every mother's son of us."
"He was a wonder," said Timothy Fletcher. "This place will be dull as
ditch water now. He was a great pot cracked, a great bottle busted. I
hope he stays dead, that's all. What yarns he used to tell me, when I
was his nurse at Fairville--afore he begun to pretend he was cured. I
used to think they was all lies; but now I guess they was true--the most
of them, anyhow. Of course I never stood for the Sultan of Turkey story.
An' he'd talk about the sea, an' foreign ports all smelly with sugar an'
rum an' spice, until I was pretty near ripe to run away an' sign on
with some skipper. An' the adventures! To hear him, gentlemen, you'd
swear that in all his v'yages he'd never gone ashore without savin' the
life of a beautiful woman nor glanced up at a window in the narrow
street without havin' a rose or a letter chucked out to him. He was a
wonder. Oh, yes, I admired his brains, even after I begun to hate him.
He was a good master to me for awhile after we left the mad-house--until
he commenced rollin' me up in blankets every now an' agin' an' jumping
on top of me when I was sound asleep, yowlin' like a moon-struck dog. I
should have spoke about all them things to one of you gentlemen, I know;
but I figgered as how he might grow out of them tricks some day an'
maybe remember me in his will. I'll miss him; but I ain't sorry to see
the last of him, damn him! I got my wages all safe--an' he paid me
well."