A FATAL LETTER
For the last of many days the light-housekeeper had watched from his
aerie for the coming of the fleet--and had not been disappointed.
His horse and buggy stood by the tower doorstep, and into it he
leaped, whipping up the horse with the same motion. Then down the road
he had flown like Paul Revere rousing the villagers, and followed by
an excited, half-hysterical procession of women and children.
So thick had been the murk and scud that he had only caught sight of
the approaching leader while she was a bare two miles off the point,
and even when Nat had landed the crowd was momentarily being augmented
from all the houses along the King's Road and as far south as
Castalia.
When the officer of the law laid his hand on Code's arm and spoke the
words that meant imprisonment and disgrace in the very heart of the
village festival, a groan went up that caused the officer to look
sharply about him.
Despite the work Nat had done on his brief stop at the Head, Code was
the hero of the day, for he had come in with the first cargo of fish
and had won the distinction of being the first to effect the salvation
of the island.
"Oh, let him go!" said a voice. "He ain't goin' to run away!" Nat,
standing behind his captive, turned sharply upon the offender.
"No, you bet he ain't!" he snapped. "He's been doin' that too long
already. He's got somethin' to answer for this time."
Into the harbor at that moment swept the Tanners' _Rosan_, and abreast
of her the steamer from St. John's. Five minutes behind came Jed
Martin's _Herring Bone_, and the first of the fleet was safely in.
As the discontented and muttering mob followed Code toward the little
jail back of the Odd Fellows' Hall, none noticed that the lovely
schooner that had led the procession in was stealing quietly out again
into the thick of the gale.
And those who did notice it thought nothing of it in the excitement of
the moment, probably judging her to be some coaster who had run in to
look for a leak. She had been tied up just ten minutes at the Mallaby
wharf.
As the sorry procession passed the Schofield cottage, Code's mother
ran out sobbing and threw herself upon him. She had not seen her son
before (although orphan Josie had told her the _Lass_ was in), for
Code had been closeted with Boughton, and now her first glimpse of him
was as an accused criminal.
But, regardless of watching eyes and public opinion, she walked all
the way to the jail with him and went inside; and the two were
absolutely oblivious to their surroundings, so overjoyed were they to
see each other and so intimate was their companionship.
Along the edge of the crowd great Pete Ellinwood slouched, looking
with dimmed eyes at mother and son.
"Ain't she the mother, though?" he said to himself. "Just like a girl
she is--not a day past thirty by her looks!"
The jailer, who was regularly employed as janitor of the Free Baptist
Church, opened the little house for his unexpected guest. It consisted
of a room, fitted for sleeping, and a cell. These were not connected,
but were side by side, facing the passage that ran through from front
to back of the building.
Code was taken to the cell, and only his mother and Pete stayed with
him to talk over the situation. It was determined to have Squire Hardy
come over in the evening (it was now five o'clock) and give his
opinion on the legal situation.
Ma Schofield went home and prepared her boy's supper herself, and
brought it with her own hands for him to eat. Code was in the best of
spirits at his success of the afternoon, and had no fear whatever as
to the outcome of his present situation.
Pete had gone away for an hour, and Ma Schofield had taken the dishes
back home, when the detective came in, saying that a little girl who
called herself Josie had come with a message.
Code asked to see her, and the great-eyed, dark little thing wept
bitterly over him, for to her fourteen years he represented all the
heroes of romance. Even as she passed him the message she knew that
she could never love again and that she would shortly die of a broken
heart.
Code kissed her, promptly forgot her presence, and opened the note.
It was from Elsa.
"Will be down to see you to-night at eight. Have sent a note to Nat in
your name, telling him to be there, too. I think we have him on the
hip, so be sure and have the squire and the officer present."
Code wondered vaguely how they had Nat on the hip, as he had been
unable to find a single iota of proof to push home the case he and
Elsa had built up against him.
The note brought him stark awake and eager for the conference. He had
begun to drowse after a good home dinner and sixty hours without
sleep, but this acted like an electric shock. He was keen and alert,
for he knew that this was the night of his destiny. Either he should
triumph as he had in the grueling race, or he should have to face the
ignominy of transfer and legal proceedings at St. Andrew's.
At half-past seven Squire Hardy, his round, red face fringed by snowy
whiskers, came in. He dragged a chair into the passageway in front of
the bar and was beginning a long and laborious law opinion when the
detective, who had been to Mis' Shannon's boarding-house for dinner,
returned.
The two began to fight the matter out between them when, at a quarter
to eight, Nat came in, dressed in his best clothes and smoking a land
cigar.
"Well, what do you want of me, Schofield?" he asked. "You sent for me,
but you needn't try to beg off. I won't listen to it. Now, go ahead."
On the instant a feminine voice was heard outside, and a moment later
Elsa Mallaby stepped into the little four-foot passage.
"Oh, how many there are here!" she said in a surprised voice.
"Perhaps, Code, I had better wait until later."
"Hey, Roscoe!" sung out Code, hardly able to control his desire to
grin. "Bring Mrs. Mallaby a chair." Roscoe obeyed and added two more,
so that all were placed within a small compass just outside Code's
cell.
From Elsa Mallaby's first entrance Nat had observed her with a certain
flicker of fear and hatred in his eyes. She, on the other hand,
greeted him with the same formal cordiality she had used toward the
others. Though utterly incongruous in such surroundings, she seemed
absolutely at her ease and instantly assumed command of the
situation.
"Excuse me," said Nat, who had not sat down and shifted from one foot
to the other, "but Schofield sent for me, an' I would like to find out
what he wants. I've got to go along."
"Schofield didn't send for you--I sent for you. There are several
things about this imprisonment of Code that don't look right to me,
and we may as well settle the whole business once and for all while we
are here together. Now, Mr. Durkee," she said, turning to the
detective, "would you mind telling me what the charge is against
Captain Schofield?"
"To tell you the truth, ma'am," said he respectfully, "there are two
charges out against him. One, by the insurance company, sues for
recovery of money paid on the schooner _May Schofield_, and charges
that the said schooner was sunk intentionally, first because Schofield
wanted a newer boat, and second because the policy of the _May_ was to
expire in a few days and could not have been renewed except at a much
advanced rate."
"And the other charge?"
"Is for murder in the first degree, growing out of the intentional
sinking of the schooner. Captain Burns is the complainant."
"Thank you." She flashed one of her radiant smiles at him and made him
a friend for life.
"That was a great race to-day," she remarked irrelevantly, but with
enthusiasm. "How much did you beat the _Nettie B._, Code?"
"A half an hour," he replied, mystified at the turn of the conversation.
"Well, that _is_ a coincidence." She looked from one to the other.
"It's exactly the same amount of time he beat you seven months ago
when he raced the old _May_ against the _M. C. Burns_, isn't it?" Her
glance shot to Nat.
"Why, I believe it is, Mrs. Mallaby," he stammered. The quick
transition to that painful and dangerous period had caught him off his
guard.
"That was a great race, too," she said cheerfully, "and it's too bad
you never sailed the second one. Especially after you wanted to bet so
much. You thought you would win the second race, didn't you, Nat?" She
was sweetness itself.
"Why, yes, I thought so," he admitted guardedly. "But I don't see what
all this has got to do--"
"Well, it hasn't very much," she said deprecatingly, "but I was just
interested. What made you so sure you would win that second race that
you tried to bet?"
"Oh, I don't know," he answered easily. "I just had confidence--"
"In what, Nat Burns? Your schooner had easily been beaten the first
time and she was notoriously slower than the _May_. Every one in the
island knows that you can't sail a vessel like Code Schofield can, and
that you are afraid to carry sail. To-day proved it. Anybody with half
an eye could see that that stays'l was cut with a knife and didn't
blow off. All these things being so, what made you so sure that you
would win that second race seven months ago?"
Nat looked at her steadily. His nervousness had gone, apparently, and
he was his old crafty self once more.
"That is none of your business, Mrs. Mallaby," he said insolently.
"And now if you'll let me pass I'll keep an engagement."
"Mr. Durkee," she said, "please keep Mr. Burns here until we have
entirely finished."
"Yes, ma'am, I will," said the hypnotized man, and Nat, after a glare
around upon the unsympathetic audience slumped down into a chair and
smoked sullenly.
"Steady as she goes my friend," broke in Squire Hardy, looking at Nat.
"Answer the lady's question. What made you think you would win?"
"I refuse to answer."
"He really doesn't need to answer," said Elsa. "I will answer for him.
Code kindly let me have the log of the _M. C. Burns_."
Schofield drew the old book from his pocket and handed it through the
bars. Then Elsa, opening it to the last pages, read aloud the few
entries that Code had discovered that day when he was a prisoner
aboard the _Nettie B._ As she read the silence was intense, but all
eyes were upon Nat, who, startled at the sudden appearance of this
document he had so long forgotten, chewed savagely upon his dead
cigar. His face had grown pale and his rough hands were clasped
tightly together.
"You see," said Elsa, when she had finished, "that Burns had
determined upon the winning of his next race. It is perfectly clear,
is it not?"
The breathless circle nodded.
It was a strange setting for the working out of the drama. Overhead a
suspended oil-lamp flamed and smelled. Outside the crash of surf
against the rocks came to them, and the wind whistled about the eaves
of the little stone building.
"Now the mirror," she said to Code, and, still wondering, he handed
the trinket to her. "Tell about this," she directed him with a smile
and a long look from her deep dark eyes.
And Code told them. He told of the time his father first gave it to
him, of his experiments in astronomy, and of Nat's coveting the
mirror. He told of that night after the first race when he had looked
for the log-book of the _May_ and had seen the mirror in its drawer.
He told of its final discovery in the secret box of the storeroom on
the _Nettie_.
As he talked the memory of the wrongs against him flamed in his
breast, and he directed his story at Nat, who sat silent and immovable
in the corner.
"If I found this aboard the _Nettie_ it proves that he must have come
and got it!" he cried. "He boarded the old _May_, but it was not for
this that he came!"
"What, then?" asked Hardy.
"To damage the schooner so that she would break down under the strain
of the next race," flared Code, facing Nat dramatically. Burns only
clenched his jaws tighter on his cigar.
"You don't believe this, perhaps, squire, but listen and I'll tell you
how the old _May_ sank." And once again he described the crashing
calamity aboard the overloaded boat as she struggled home to Freekirk
Head with the last of her strength.
"You, squire, you've sailed your boats in your time! You know that
never could have happened even to the old _May_ unless something had
been done. And something _was_ done! Burns had weakened the topm'st
and the mainstay!"
All eyes were fixed on Nat, but he did not move. He was very pale now,
but apparently self-possessed. Suddenly, with a hand that appeared
firm, he removed the cigar from his mouth and cast it on the floor.
"That," he said with deadly coolness, "is a blasted fine plot that you
have all worked out together. But every word of it is a lie, for the
whole thing is without a single foundation in fact. Prove it!"
"I'll give you a last chance, Burns," said Elsa in a level voice that
contained all the concentrated hatred that Code had detected in her
before. "Dismiss these charges against Code."
"Never!" The word was catapulted from him as though by a muscular
convulsion. "He murdered my father, and he shall pay for it!"
Without a word Elsa rose from her chair and walked back into the
adjoining room. A moment later she reappeared, leading a beautiful
girl who was perhaps twenty years old.
The effect was electric. The people in the little group seemed frozen
into the attitudes they had last assumed.
Only in Nat Burns was there a change.
He seemed to have shrunk back into his clothes until he was but a
little, wizened man. His face was ghastly and clammy perspiration
glittered on his forehead in the lamplight.
"Caroline!" he cried in a hoarse voice that did not rise above a
whisper.
"Yes, Caroline," said Elsa, her black eyes flashing fire. "You had
forgotten her, hadn't you? You had forgotten the girl who loved you,
that you drove away from the island! You had forgotten the girl that
gave you everything and got nothing! But that has come back upon you
now, and these people are here to see it. Even your father, in his
log-book, mentioned when my sister left Grande Mignon, apparently to
work in the factory at Lubec. As though my sister should ever work in
a factory!"
"So this explains why she went that time," said Squire Hardy gently.
"We all wondered at it, Elsa--we all wondered at it."
"And well you might. But he is the cause! And he wouldn't marry her! I
have waited for this chance of revenge, and now he shall pay."
Caroline Fuller, who was even more beautiful than her sister, looked
at Nat in a kind of daze. Suddenly there was a spasmodic working of
her features.
"Oh, that I could ever have loved him!" she said in a faint voice.
"Here, Elsa, read it to them all!"
From under her cloak she drew a crumpled envelope which she passed to
her sister.
With a snarl like that of a wild animal Nat leaped from his chair
toward the girl, but Durkee struck him violently and he reeled back
into it.
"You swore you burned them all!" muttered Nat. "You swore it! You
swore it!"
"Yes, and she did, the innocent child--all but this one that she had
mislaid in a book you once sent her," cried Elsa. "But I found it,
Burns. Where do you think I've been all this while? At St. John's,
where she lives with my aunt. And do you think there was no reason for
that letter being saved? God takes care of things like this, and now
you've got to pay, Nat Burns! I knew there would come a time. I knew
there would!"
She was still standing, and she drew the letter out of the envelope.
"Look, squire, Code, any of you who know. Is this Nat's writing?"
"Yes," they all declared as the letter passed from hand to hand.
"Read it," said the squire, forcing Caroline Fuller to sit down in his
chair.
"I'll spare him hearing the first of it," said Elsa. "It is what men
write to women they love or feign to love, and it belongs to my
sister. But here"--she turned the first sheet inside out--"listen to
this."
Involuntarily they all leaned forward, all except Durkee, who went
over and stood beside Nat. The latter gave no sign except a dry
rattling sound in his throat as he swallowed involuntarily.
"I've got him, Caroline--I've got him!" she read. "He'll beat me
again, will he? Well, not if I know it! Everybody in the Head seems
tickled to death that he won, but you know how little that means to
me. It is simply another reason why I should beat him the next time.
"Dearest little girl, it's the easiest thing in the world. I've just
come back from going over the _May_ (it's midnight), and the thing
looks good. You know Schofield is a great hand to carry sail. Well,
when you hear about the race, maybe you'll hear that his foretopmast
came down in a squall. If you don't, I'll be much surprised, for I've
attended to it myself, and I don't think it will take much of a
squall.
"Maybe you'll hear, too, that his mainstay snapped and his sticks went
into the water all because he carried too much sail. I shouldn't be
surprised. I've attended to that, too. So I guess with his foretopmast
cracked off and his mainstay snapped the old _M. C._ ought to romp
home an easy victor, if she is an old ice-wagon. I tried to get
Schofield to bet, but he's so tight with his cash he wouldn't shake
down a five-cent piece. Good thing for him, though, he doesn't know
it. Nothing would do me more good than to get his roll, the virtuous
old deacon!"
She stopped reading as a rumble of mirth went round the circle. Code
in the role of a virtuous deacon was a novelty. Even the hard lines of
Elsa's face relaxed and she smiled, albeit a trifle grimly.
"That's all," she said, folding up the letter and putting it back into
the envelope. "The rest is personal and not ours. Now, Mr. Durkee, if
you still care to consider Captain Schofield as the defendant in those
two suits I want your arguments."
"I don't, Mrs. Mallaby," said the detective, and called the Freekirk
Head jailer. "But I know who is going to take Schofield's place."
He glared at Nat Burns, who cowered silent and miserable in his
corner. Despite his sailing as Nat's guest he had never brought
himself to like the man, and now he was glad to be well rid of him.
Code stepped out a free man, and his first action was to take both of
Elsa's hands and try to thank her. Her eyes dropped and she blushed.
When he had stammered through his speech he turned to Caroline Fuller
and repeated it, but the sad smile she gave him tore at his heart.
"I came because Elsa asked me to save a friend," she said, "not
because I wished to revenge myself on Nat. I am glad it was you, for I
would do anything on earth for Elsa."
Code turned mystified eyes upon Mrs. Mallaby.
"I thought you did this to revenge yourself on Nat," he half
whispered.
"I did, partly," she replied. She lifted her eyes to his and he saw
something in them that startled him--something that, in all his
association with her, he had never seen before. He stood silent,
amazed, overwhelmed while she turned her face away.