He croaked, “And let ’em see me so!”—and clawed in his pocket and poked a
slim key into my hands, and whispered, “Hey! The press there—the
bottle—pour me a dram!”
I unlocked the press beside him, and taking out a bloated green
bottle—much as the bottle at Mother Mag’s—poured some spirit into a
glass; and his hands now shaking, so that he must have spilt the drink, I
held it to his lips, until he swallowed it down, choking and coughing.
Whatever the stuff, it lent him speedy strength and colour. He sat
blinking at me with those evil old eyes of his. I could feel scant pity
for him, save for the thought that he had been so strong, and was now old
and weak, and that the rogues who had formed his crew, and whom for some
odd fancy, or fear, he had kept about him would now tear him down, as
they would have torn him down, had he been less strong and ruthless, on
his ship.
I said, “You’ve a pretty crew of rogues about you, sir. Give me but the
word, and I’ll drive off and have Mr. Bradbury back here, and we’ll make
a sweep of the whole company.”
He answered, “No. Rogues, but they serve me well. And I ruled ’em once.
And I’ll rule ’em till I’m dead. You’ll stay by me, John—ay, ay, and
you’ll profit by it, and Charles shall pay for his sins. Now you may
leave me, lad. They’ll obey you. They’ll fear you, fearing me still.
There are many books in the old house. There’s a horse in the stable.
There’s the wench, Milne; and there’s the whelp, Oliver, who’ll ride with
you, and drink with you, and rook you. Ay, and there’s guineas for the
spending”—clawing suddenly into the pocket of his gown, and drawing out a
purse and slinging it to me. It rang with gold, as I caught it in my
hand.
_Chapter XXIV_. _The Wood_
Now I was not fated long to test the efficacy of my grandfather’s control
over his son and his servants. I’d have you know that twelve folk served
my grandfather at Craike House, and that excepting Nick Barwise, the
groom, these rogues were of the crew who served under Mr. Craike when he
sailed his own ship, and that in his fantastic spirit he would have them
by him after his return to England to assume his position as Craike of
Craike House. The gates were kept by Isaac, second son of the Barwise
union, and his woman, the swart gipsy, whom I had observed on my arrival
with Mr. Bradbury. All this disreputable company, as much as my
grandfather’s eccentricities, had won the house its ill-name—Rogues’
Haven, among the folk of the countryside; these rogues, too, were leagued
with smugglers such as Blunt, who plied their traffic under the very nose
of the justice Gavin Masters, and the coastguards.
My uncle, since his father’s advanced years and decay pointed to his
speedy death, had torn himself away from the diversions of London and
society, of which he was adjudged an ornament. Penniless, while he
played devoted son, he had established an advantageous understanding with
Blunt and his folk, who would alternate long voyages to America and the
Indies, on Lord knows what nefarious traffic, with running smuggled stuff
from the Continent to the English coast. That my uncle fretted under the
yoke of duty manifested itself daily in his covert sneers at his father;
the chagrin of Charles, my grandfather remarked to me, had lent a zest to
living.
The days I spent in Craike House passed dully and without noteworthy
event. I did not lose my dread of the house in the night; the
impressions of my first night under its roof abated in no way, but the
good-humour of my uncle, the servility of Thrale and his fellow-rogues,
the companionship of Oliver, and the sports which I shared with him, lent
me a confidence which was to prove groundless. I passed much of my time
in playing chess with my grandfather, in reading to him from old voyagers
and romancers—of whose works he had by him a great store, or in listening
to his narrative of his own sailings, which, if incomplete, gave me a
portrait of him by no means calculated to advance my affection for him.
Yet that I advanced daily in his favour was patent; my uncle masked his
chagrin under a bland demeanour, and a display of the graces and
accomplishments which surely rendered his absence deplored by society.
But though my grandfather assured me of protection, and though my uncle
professed a truce, I would have been wise to follow my first
inclination—not to remain under the roof of Craike House, as I shall now
relate.
One morn, a month, I should say, from my coming to Rogues’ Haven, my
grandfather informing me, through Thrale, that I was free to pass the day
as I pleased, I bade Thrale unlock the door for me, and passed out of the
house. The gold sunlight lay upon the garden; if it dispelled for a time
the gloom, it emphasised the disrepair of the old house, the ivy climbing
to the chimney stacks and lacing the windows; a few it had obscured
wholly. As I looked up, I saw the sinister face of Mrs. Barwise looking
from a high window; she bobbed back instantly. I estimated the covert
hostility of the rogues of Craike House; and, having a certain
apprehension of walking abroad unarmed, I took out my knife and speedily
fashioned me a heavy cudgel. I went down then by a flight of stone steps
into the old sunken garden to the right from the house,—steps crumbling
and green with moss, and overshadowed by a tangle of roses and
honeysuckle, descending into a cool depth which had been laid out once in
ornate flower beds and lawns, but was now overrun with fox-gloves,
prevailing through their sturdy strength over other flowers. Yet the air
was sweet with the white-starred jasmine over the crumbling walls,
shutting the deep garden from the old plantation, which had become a
dense wood.
Once paths had curved to the sundial at the heart of the garden. The
dial was broken and corroded now; a bramble had caught it in its claws;
sparrows fought and chirruped upon it in the sun. Arbours had become
thickets; through the broken wall I saw the wood go deep, but the
sunlight struck through the trees upon a path among tall grasses and
flowers spilled from the garden.
I climbed the broken wall and sauntered down the woodland path, taking
delight in beauty, and presently departing from the track, passed down to
left into a deep glade—silver and green in the sunlight; the dew was not
yet dry on fern and grass. And suddenly I saw the girl Evelyn Milne,—she
sat upon a fallen log, moss-grown and bramble-clustered. Her head was
bare; her bonnet lying on the turf beside her; she sat bent with her
hands clasped at her knees—a picture of melancholy and loneliness; yet
the sun found the glossy sheen in her dark hair, and the whiteness of her
neck and hands. At the crack of a stick under my feet, she started up,
and stood regarding me with sullen eyes. I swept off my hat, but she
offered me no greeting.
I stammered, “I ask your pardon, Miss Milne. I did not think to disturb
you.”
She looked about her hurriedly; leaning towards me then, she whispered,
“Now you’re out of the house—away from them all, why not go on and on
through the wood, and never return?”
“You mean,” I said, staring at her pale face, at her white hands
fluttering at her bosom, “it would be safer for me, that I’ll never be
safe in the house?”
“I mean—it doesn’t matter what I mean. Only, were I you, and had any
friends away from here—were not alone as I am alone—I’d go. I’d never
return.”
“Miss Milne,” said I, “I do assure you that I’m not afraid. Why should I
run away?”
“Afraid!” she whispered still. “You’re only a fool. You’re only a boy.
Your life’s before you. Why would you stay? Hoping to profit, and be
rich, when that old man is dead? Is that why you’d stay? There’s no
price that’s worth your life—to you. Why did you ever come to such a
house, or, knowing them for what they are, remain?”
“They are my folk,” I muttered, thinking her—from the wildness of her
look, the sudden fevered shining of her eyes, the ceaseless fluttering of
her thin hands—distraught from the terrors of the house; recalling how,
day after day, she sat by me at table, uttering not a word, and addressed
by no one; going then from table to be seen no more, till the next meal
was served. She had been no more to me than a pale grey shadow in the
house of shadows.
Nor had I felt in her more interest than to ask Oliver carelessly how she
spent her days; and he had answered, “Hid in her room for the most,
haunting the garden; she’s lifeless, bloodless, the wraith of a maid.”
“They are my folk,” then, I muttered, staring at her.
“Your folk! Are you as they?” she whispered still. “You think only of
the money the old man has, and care not how ’twas come by. You’ll smile
and fawn on him—that man, that evil old man—as his son smiles and fawns.
Knowing—as you must know—”
“The manner of man he is, and the manner of the men about him? The
danger I’m like to meet? Miss Milne, I’m not afraid. They failed once;
do you know that?”
“I know—yes, I know. They failed once; they’ll not fail again”—suddenly
leaning forward clasping her hands, peering at me with wild bright eyes,
and whispering, “Go! Go now ere it’s too late. Go! and take me with you
from this house—this wicked house!”
I was silent, and stared at her, colouring; thinking her surely mad—such
the wildness and terror of her look; as realising, she seemed to struggle
to control herself; facing me white and quivering, she said at last more
calmly, “Mr. Craike, I hear so many secrets in the house. I have lived
here so many years—so many lonely years, and am so little accounted, that
they do not heed me, or care, if I hear many things that, if they feared
me, I would not hear and know. Knowing—I do beseech you, do not stay
within the house! Oh, let no thought of loss, if you offend your
grandfather, prevail with you! Go!—ere it is too late!”
I said, standing clumsily before her, no longer meeting her look, “Miss
Milne, you ask me to assist you. I know—surely by now I know—the house
is no house for a maid; I’ll aid you to leave it. Have you no kin or
friends out of the house?”
“No kin, no friends. I have lived in this house since I was a little
child. No friends within the house; none in all the world.”
“I’ve a purse of gold,” I said. “I’ll give it to you. With it you may
make your way to London and seek out Mr. Bradbury. With this message
from me—that he conduct you to my mother, who will befriend you.
Come—here’s the purse. I’ll go with you through the wood. You may take
a coach from the village inn and drive to London. But I stay here.”
She drew back from me. She whispered, “No! Go now, and take me with
you! How should I find my way to London alone, or seek out this man
Bradbury, or your mother? I have lived nigh all my life in this house; I
am afraid. Go with me!”
“Miss Milne, I must remain,” I said.
“For money?” she said, with scorn; but I answered, “Think that if you
will. For adventure, for a promise.”
“It’s like to end in death,” cried she, and drew back from me.
“Well, then, what have you heard?” I asked.
“Plots! Plots! What use to tell you, if you will not heed me? If I
tell you, will you go from this house? Will you take me out of it?”
“I do not say I’ll go. But I’ll help you, surely!”
She looked at me with her eyes now dark and sullen; bitterly she said,
“I’ve given you warning. I’ll not tell you more. Why should I tell you
aught I know? What do I know of you save that you seem a boy—a fool—and
not yet lost as they. Though coming of their stock—”
“I do assure you,” I stammered, “I—”
She burst out, “Stay—if you will! Stay! And yet I warn you.” She
slipped from me, and vanished like a wraith into the shadows of the wood.
_Chapter XXV_. _Insistence of Captain Blunt_
Now attempting to follow Miss Milne, and have further conversation with
her, I found myself presently in a wild tangle of the wood, so that I had
much difficulty in forcing my way through it. Not finding her,
bramble-scratched and moss-stained at last I reached the wall, and
followed it down, thinking to find the breach by which I had left the
garden. But as I approached it, I halted suddenly, hearing voices from
the garden; and, knowing them for the voices of Blunt and Martin Baynes
and my uncle, engaged in an unseemly wrangle, I rejoiced that I was still
hidden by the creepers hanging over the wall.
Blunt was growling, “Ay, ay, you’ve given me to know you’ll be rich, when
the old man’s gone. You think to lay your hands then on the spoil he’s
piled up and held all these years. Ay, but the old man’s alive, and I’m
sailin’ again with never a penny of profit to me.”
“And the lad’s come to the old man,” Martin broke in, “and by all saying
he’s likely to have every penny, and you not the colour of a farthing.
What d’ye say to that, Mr. Craike? what d’ye say?”
My uncle answered disdainfully, “You get nothing from me. You’re a
pretty pair of rogues to come and threaten. I trust you, Baynes, to hold
the rogue and you to take him aboard, Blunt; and he slips through your
hands. I wonder at your audacity.”
“Fine talk!” cried Blunt; and Martin burst out, “You’ll pay nothing!
Will you not? What if I go to old Sir Gavin? What if I give him the
tale? He’d listen and he’d set you by the heels, as gladly as he’d set
Roger Galt. Though you’re one of his kind—”
“You have it,” my uncle assented, “one of Sir Gavin’s kind. Do you
threaten me, Martin Baynes, you, for all the repute of the Stone House
and Mistress Baynes and her grandsons? Are there not strange tales of
the Stone House—of travellers lost on the moors? Of a pedlar whose dog
was heard wailing at the gates of the Stone House, as dogs wail for their
dead masters? Do you threaten me, Martin Baynes? And you, Blunt? Did
you never sail further than the coasts of France? Did you never plunder
an English ship? Were you never more than smuggler?”
“Never more,” cried Blunt, “than Edward Craike, and never so much.”
“A gentleman of fortune,” said my uncle, “a voyager born a hundred years
and odd after his time. Tush, that my father profited by his voyages is
nothing, Blunt; he plundered no English ships; if his men spilt any
blood, it was not English.”
“Barwise in his cups—” Blunt began.
“Barwise is just such a besotted fellow,” cried my uncle, “as should
pitch you the tale you’d wish to hear, Blunt. Now ere you two presume to
threaten me, think who’ll believe you? If I sought to keep John Howe out
of the house, and have him shipped overseas—what of it? What should this
count against me save with a few virtuous fools to whose praise or blame
I am indifferent? D’ye think I’ve no credit with His Majesty’s
Ministers? D’ye think that the Town would ever regard me as other than a
man of birth and fashion? What if there be rumours of my father’s past,
or scandal against me? Your words would avail you nothing. But you, you
rogues; the word from me would hang you both. Tush, when you threaten
me, you’re fools.”
“We want no more than payment,” Blunt growled.
“That I’d not have to give you, if you’d earned it.”
“There’s money in the house,” Blunt urged. “There’s plate. There’s talk
of a great chest of gold and jewels.”
“I would,” said my uncle softly, “I might dip my hands into it.”
“D’ye not know of it?” Blunt asked. “D’ye not know it’s talk among all
the folk of the house that the old man hid the richest stuff he ever
took?”
“I do not know this, Blunt—upon my honour.”
“And I know,” Martin struck in, “that whatsoever the old man has is like
to go to his grandson. And that the old man’s threatened you, if you so
much as lift a finger against the boy, he’ll not spare you. I have it
from old Thrale.”
“Tush,” said my uncle, “I’ve listened too long, my friends. Your threats
do not perturb me. I hold the cards, not you. I know nothing of such a
chest. Pray, go! Well for you to be sailing, Blunt. Sir Gavin is no
fool, and the _Wasp_ lies off the coast too long for your security. And
well for you, Martin Baynes, to be sailing with Blunt; you’re idle;
you’re mischievous; you’d be well away.”
“Ay, and the lad?” Blunt asked. “Would you have him sail with us yet?”
“I have no preference.”
“Ay, but if you knew he was safe aboard, and sailing with me—not for
France, for pickings in the Indies—would you find me the hundred guineas
then, Mr. Craike, ere I sailed?”
“I should find one hundred guineas with ease,” my uncle answered. “I
suggest nothing, direct nothing—have no share in any plot against my
nephew. Yet if I knew—and none here knew—that he was safely under
hatches, Blunt, I’d pay this hundred guineas ere you sailed.”
“He’ll be out of the house this night, aboard by the morning,” Blunt
vowed.
I heard my uncle’s light laughter; I heard him humming a tune as he
walked away. Blunt and Martin came scrambling over the wall, and not
detecting me hidden under the creepers, tramped away through the wood.
_Chapter XXVI_. _Sir Gavin Masters_
Now for a space I lay hid under the wall, having no mind to enter the
garden and meet my uncle, but seeking time to review the perils
threatening me, and the steps by which I should avoid them. I believed
that Blunt, ere he made his offer to my uncle, had already planned with
the old rogues my removal from the house, and that of this the girl
Evelyn Milne would have warned me. I thought first of going immediately
to my grandfather and of laying the plot before him; having with me
always the thought of the broken figure, of the will striving ever to
prevail over decay, I could perceive little hope from such a course. Had
Miss Milne faced me now; had she appealed to me to take her out of the
house, and escape with her to my friends, I should have hesitated not at
all; my concern for myself urged me to instant flight; yet I was no such
coward as to take to my heels, and leave her friendless in a house of
which she had expressed such terror. I could devise no better plan than
further to search the wood for her, and if I failed to find her, proceed
to seek out Sir Gavin Masters, tell my tale to him, and urge his
intervention and protection for us, and his immediate communication with
Mr. Bradbury. I marvelled that one so acute as Mr. Bradbury, knowing the
character of the house and its folks, and the peril I must encounter,
should have thought fit to leave me at Rogues’ Haven.
I remained hid under the wall, till Blunt and Martin should be well away;
crawling back then to the wood I sought the girl as best I might, fearing
to call her name, lest I bring my enemies upon me. Failing, I forced my
way out of the old plantation; struggled through a ditch; climbed through
a sunken fence, and muddy and torn with brambles, sought the road by
which Mr. Bradbury had brought me to Craike House.
It was now toward noon of a clear day; the wood was green about me; the
sunlight and the sense of freedom after the terrors of the close old
house restored my spirits speedily. I had a certain compunction at my
flight—leaving the girl, and, indeed, my grandfather, old and broken,
among the covetous rogues. I told myself that I should save them better
by reaching Sir Gavin Masters, yet I could not rid my mind of the thought
that by running off in fear of Blunt I played the coward. So much at
last this thought concerned me, that even on the very bank above the road
I stood irresolute. Not yet was I resolved when the sound of hoof-beats
made me cower into the grass, for fear lest any of my enemies should ride
that way. Peering through the covert, I saw a stout red-coated gentleman
mounted on a cob; with joy I recognised Sir Gavin Masters. He paused
below me, sheltering his eyes with his hand against the sun, he was
staring up toward Craike House, whose chimney stacks alone showed above
the wood. As I rose out of the grass, he uttered an exclamation; his
hand sought the pistol in his holster.
“Sir Gavin,” cried I, “don’t you know me—John Craike?”
“Aha, Master Craike—aha!” He laughed and touched his hat with his whip.
“What are you doing here, lad? Walking abroad?”
“Seeking you, Sir Gavin. Asking your help and advice. Purposing as soon
as I may to seek Mr. Bradbury in London.”
“Oho, not liking the house and the folk in it,” drawing in by the bank,
and beckoning me to him.
Standing beside him, I saw that his face, which I had thought dull as
worthy Mr. Chelton’s, was marked by a certain strength and intelligence;
his eyes watched me shrewdly. He muttered, “So you’ve had trouble, lad!
You want advice from me and Bradbury. Well then!”
“Mr. Bradbury being now in London—” I began.
“Mr. Bradbury,” he laughed, “is no further away than at my house. That’s
for your ear alone. He’s within your reach whenever you may have need of
him.”
“I’ve need of him at once,” I said, overjoyed.
“Must you have speech with him?” he asked, “or is it a word that I may
carry to him?” I looked at him doubtfully; he went on swiftly, “Mr.
Bradbury made no mention to you of his association with me, I being
newly-appointed justice of the peace for these parts, and bent on
enforcing His Majesty’s laws, and putting an end to a variety of
evil-doings. I’m well-informed of Bradbury’s wishes. It’s his wish that
you remain at Craike House. You’re running away. Why?”
“Having overheard a pretty plot to put me aboard Blunt’s ship and get me
out of England. Fearing—ay, fearing though you think me a coward, sir,
to stay in the house with never a friend.”
“Young Oliver! You’ve been riding abroad with him; you were swimming in
the sea with him this morn. You seemed friends.”
“You saw us, sir?”
“Some of my folk. Oliver’s your friend?”
“Yes, my friend, but—”
“I tell you this, John Craike,” he said, impatiently, “if you’ll believe
me and trust me and my folk, knowing that Bradbury’s within reach, you’ll
go back to the house. I promise you none of the rogues in the house’ll
do you hurt, while old Mr. Edward lives, and I promise you Blunt’ll never
take you out of it or ship you aboard. For Blunt’ll never sail.” He
spoke now in low and earnest tone, his eyes keeping a sharp watch, as if
apprehensive lest any overhear or see us together. “Hark ’ee,” he said,
“go back! It’s well that you stay to profit by your grandfather’s fancy
for you. Take my assurance for it, lad; my plans and Bradbury’s are
surely set; they’re one and the same. Take my word for it.”
“Ay, but the old man’s near to dying,” I said, doubtfully.
He muttered, “So! Bradbury gave me no word of it.”
Rapidly I recounted the nature of my interviews with my grandfather, his
orders to his servants, his collapse on that first morning, my belief
that his reason tottered,—all the whispering menace of the rogues about
us. I told him of my uncle’s conversation with Blunt and Martin, and of
the warning from Miss Milne.
He heard me attentively, his brows frowning. He said at last, “Ay,
ay,—and for all Bradbury’s plans it’s high time to make an end—high time!
But first I must have a word with Bradbury. Will you go back this day
assured that speedily you’ll hear from us?”