A DYING DEPOSITION
Before Mr. Beckett-Smythe sat down to dinner that evening a very
unpleasant duty had been thrust on him.
The superintendent of police drove over from Nottonby to show him the
county analyst's report. Divested of technicalities, this document
proved that George Pickering's dangerous condition arose from blood
poisoning caused by a stab from a contaminated knife. It was admitted
that a wound inflicted by a rusty pitchfork might have had equally
serious results, but the analysis of matter obtained from both
instruments proved conclusively that the knife alone was impregnated
with the putrid germs found in the blood corpuscles, which also
contained an undue proportion of alcohol.
Moreover, Dr. MacGregor's statement on the one vital point was
unanswerable. Pickering was suffering from an incised wound which could
not have been inflicted by the rounded prongs of a fork. The doctor was
equally emphatic in his belief that the injured man would succumb
speedily.
In the face of these documents it was necessary that George Pickering's
depositions should be taken by a magistrate. Most unwillingly, Mr.
Beckett-Smythe accompanied the superintendent to the "Black Lion Hotel"
for the purpose.
They entered the sick room about the time that Mrs. Saumarez was
crossing the green on her way to the Methodist Chapel. A glance at
Pickering's face showed that the doctor had not exaggerated the gravity
of the affair. He was deathly pale, save for a number of vivid red spots
on his skin. His eyes shone with fever. Were not his malady identified,
the unskilled observer might conclude that he was suffering from a
severe attack of German measles.
Betsy was there, and the prim nurse. The contrast between the two women
was almost as startling as the change for the worse in Pickering's
appearance. The nurse, strictly professional in deportment, paid heed to
naught save the rules of treatment. The word "hospital," "certificate,"
"method," shrieked silently from her flowing coif and list slippers,
from the clinical thermometer on the table, and the temperature chart on
the mantelpiece.
Poor Betsy was sitting by the bedside, holding her lover's hand. She was
smiling wistfully, striving to chatter in cheerful strain, yet all the
time she wanted to wail her despair, to petition on her knees that her
crime might be avenged on herself, not on its victim.
When the magistrate stepped gingerly forward, Pickering turned
querulously to see who the visitor was, for the nurse had nodded
permission to enter when the two men looked through the half-open door.
"Oh, it's you, squire," he said in a low voice. "I thought it might be
MacGregor."
"How are you feeling now, George?"
"Pretty sick. I suppose you've heard the verdict?"
"The doctor says you are in a bad state."
"Booked, squire, booked! And no return ticket. I don't care. I've made
all arrangements--that is, I'll have a free mind this time
to-morrow--and then, well, I'll face the music."
He caught sight of the police officer.
"Hello, Jonas! You there? Come for my last dying depositions, eh? All
right. Fire away! Betsy, my lass, leave us for a bit. The nurse can
stay. The more witnesses the merrier."
Betsy arose. There was no fear in her eyes now--only dumb agony. She
walked steadily from the room. While Mr. Beckett-Smythe was thanking
Providence under his breath that a most distressing task was thus being
made easy for him, they all heard a dreadful sob from the exterior
landing, followed by a heavy thud. The nurse hurried out. Betsy had
fainted.
With a painful effort Pickering raised himself on one arm. His forced
gayety gave place to loud-voiced violence.
"Confound you all!" he roared. "Why come here to frighten the poor
girl's life out of her?"
He cursed both the magistrate and Superintendent Jonas by name; were he
able to rise he would break their necks down the stairs. The policeman
crept out on tip-toe; Mr. Beckett-Smythe sat down. Pickering stormed
away until the nurse returned.
"Miss Thwaites is better," she said. "She was overcome by the long
strain, but she is with her sister now, and quite recovered."
Betsy was crying her heart out in Kitty's arms: fortunately, the sounds
of her grief were shut out from their ears. Jonas came back and closed
the door. The doomed man sank to the pillow and growled sullenly:
"Now, get on with your business, and be quick over it. I'll not have
Betsy worried again while I have breath left to protest."
"I am, indeed, very sorry to disturb you, George," said the magistrate
quietly. "It is a thankless office for an old friend. Try and calm
yourself. I do not ask your forbearance toward myself and Mr. Jonas, but
there are tremendous issues at stake. For your own sake you must help us
to face this ordeal."
"Oh, go ahead, squire. My bark is worse than my bite--not that I have
much of either in me now. If I spoke roughly, forgive me. I couldn't
bear to hear yon lass suffering."
Thinking it best to avoid further delay, Mr. Beckett-Smythe nodded to
the police officer, who drew forward a small table, which, with writing
materials, he placed before the magistrate.
A foolscap sheet bore already some written words. The magistrate bent
over it, and said, in a voice shaken with emotion:
"Listen, George. I have written here: 'I, George Pickering, being of
sound mind, but believing myself to be in danger of death, solemnly take
oath and depose as follows': Now, I want you to tell me, in your own
words, what took place last Monday night. You are going to the awful
presence of your Creator. You must tell the truth, fully and fearlessly,
not striving to determine the course of justice by your own judgment,
but leaving matters wholly in the hands of God. You are conscious of
what you are doing, fully sensible that you will soon be called on to
meet One who knoweth all things. I hope, I venture to pray, that you
will give testimony in all sincerity and righteousness.... I am ready."
Pickering heard this solemn injunction with due gravity. His features
were composed, his eyes fixed on the distant landscape through the open
window. No disturbing noise reached him save the lowing of cattle and
the far-off rattle of a reaping machine, for the police had ordered the
removal of the shooting gallery and roundabout to the other end of the
green.
He remained silent so long that the two men glanced at him anxiously,
but were reassured by the belief that he was only collecting his
thoughts. Indeed, it was not so. He was striving to bridge that dark
chasm on whose perilous verge he tottered--striving to frame an excuse
that would not be uttered by his mortal lips.
At last he spoke.
"On Monday night, about five minutes past ten, I met Kitty Thwaites, by
appointment, at the wicket gate which opens into the garden from the
bowling green of the 'Black Lion Hotel,' Elmsdale. We walked down the
garden together. We were talking and laughing about the antics of a
groom in this hotel, a fellow named Fred--I do not know his surname--who
was jealous of me because I was in the habit of chaffing Kitty and
placing my arm around her waist if I encountered her on the stairs. This
man Fred, I believe, endeavored to pay attentions to Kitty, which she
always refused to encourage. Kitty and I stopped at the foot of the
garden beneath a pear tree which stands in the boundary fence of the
paddock.
"I had my arm around her neck, but was only playing the fool, which
Kitty knew as well as I. There was a bright moon, and, although almost
invisible ourselves in the shadow of the hedge and tree, we could see
clearly into both paddock and garden. My back was toward the hotel.
Suddenly, we heard someone running down the gravel path. I turned and
saw that it was Betsy Thwaites, Kitty's sister, a girl whom I believed
to be then in a situation at Hereford. I had promised to marry Betsy,
and was naturally vexed at being caught in an apparently compromising
attitude with her sister. Betsy had a knife in her hand. I could see it
glittering in the moonlight."
He paused. He was corpse-like in color. The red spots on his face were
darker than before by contrast with the wan cheeks. He motioned to the
nurse, who gave him a glass of barley water. He emptied it at a gulp.
Catching Mr. Beckett-Smythe's mournful glance, he smiled with ghastly
pleasantry.
"It sounds like a coroner's inquest, doesn't it?" he said.
Then, while his eyes roved incessantly from the face of the policeman to
that of the magistrate, he continued:
"I imagined that Betsy meant to do her sister some harm, so sprang
forward to meet her. Then I saw that she was minded to attack me, for
she screamed out: 'You have ruined my life. I'll take care you do not
ruin Kitty's.'"
The words, of course, were spoken very slowly. They alternated with the
steady scratching of the pen. Others in the room were pallid now. Even
the rigid nurse yielded to the excitement of the moment. Her linen
bands fluttered and her bosom rose and fell with the restraint she
imposed on her breathing.
George Pickering suddenly became the most composed person present. His
hearers were face to face with a tragedy. After all, did he mean to tell
the truth? Ah, it was well that his affianced wife was weeping in an
adjoining room, that her soul was not pierced by the calm recital which
would condemn her to prison, perchance to the scaffold.
"Her cry warned me," he went on. "I knew she could not hurt me. I was a
strong and active man, she a weak, excited woman. She was very near,
advancing down the path which runs close to the dividing hedge of the
garden and the stackyard. To draw her away from Kitty, I ran toward this
hedge and jumped over. It was dark there. I missed my footing and
stumbled. I felt something run into my left breast. It was the prong of
a pitchfork."
The pen ceased. A low gasp of relief came from the nurse, for she was a
woman. The superintendent looked gravely at the floor. But the
magistrate faltered:
"George--remember--you are a dying man!"
Pickering again lifted his body. His face was convulsed with a spasm of
pain, but the strong voice cried fearlessly:
"Write what I have said. I'll swear it with my last breath. I'll tell
the same story to either God or devil. Write, I say, or shall I finish
it with my own hand?"
They thought that by some superhuman effort he would rise forthwith to
reach the table. The nurse, the policeman, leaped to restrain him.
Mr. Beckett-Smythe was greatly agitated.
"If I cannot persuade you--" he began.
"Persuade me to do what? To bolster up a lying charge against the woman
I am going to marry? By the Lord, do you think I'm mad?"
They released him. The set intensity of his face was terrible. It is
hard to say what awful power could have changed George Pickering's
purpose in that supreme moment. Yet he clenched his hands in the
bedclothes, as if he would choke some mocking fiend that grinned at him,
and his voice was hoarse as he murmured:
"Oh, man, if you have a heart, end your inquisition, or I'll die too
soon!"
Again the pen resumed its monotonous scrape. It paused at last. The
fateful words were on record.
"And then what happened?"
The magistrate's question was judicially cold. He held strong
convictions regarding the deeper mysteries of life; his faculties were
benumbed by this utter defiance of all that he believed most firmly.
"I said something, swore very likely, and staggered into the moonlight,
at the same time tearing the fork from my breast. Betsy saw what I was
doing, and screamed. I managed to get over the hedge again, and she ran
away in mortal fright, for I had pulled open my waistcoat, and she could
see the blood on my shirt. She fell as she ran, and cut herself with the
knife. By that time Kitty had reached the hotel, screaming wildly that
Betsy was trying to murder me. That is all. Betsy never touched me. The
wound I am suffering from was inflicted by myself, accidentally. It was
not caused by the knife, as is shown by the fact that I am dying of
blood poisoning, while Betsy's cuts are healing and have left her
unharmed otherwise."
His hearers were greatly perturbed, but they knew that further protest
would be unavailing. And there was an even greater shock in store.
Pickering turned in the bed and poised his pain-racked frame so as to
reach the manuscript placed before him for signature. With unwavering
hand he added the words:
"So help me God!"
Then he wrote his name.
"Now, sign that, all of you, as witnesses," he commanded, and they did
not gainsay him. It was useless. Why prolong his torture and their own?
Mr. Beckett-Smythe handed the sheets of paper to Jonas. He seemed
inclined to leave the room without another spoken word, but humane
impulse was stronger than dogma; he held out his hand.
"Good-by, George," he said brokenly. "'Judge not,' it is written. Let my
farewell be a prayer that you may die peacefully and painlessly, if,
indeed, God in His mercy does not grant your recovery."
"Good-by, squire. You've got two sons. Find 'em plenty of work; they'll
have less time for mischief. Damn it all, hark to that reaper! It'll
soon be time to rouse the cubs. I'll miss the next hunt breakfast, eh?
Well, good luck to you all! I've had my last gallop. Good-by, Jonas! Do
you remember the fight we had that morning with the poachers? Look here!
When you meet Rabbit Jack, tell him to go to Stockwell for a sovereign
and swim in beer for a week. Nurse, where's Betsy? I want her before it
is dark."
And in a few minutes Betsy, the forlorn, was bending over him and
whispering:
"I'll do it for your sake, George! But, oh, it will be hard to face
everybody with a lie in my mouth. The hand that struck you should
wither. Indeed, indeed, I shall suffer worse than death. If the Lord
took pity on me, He would let me be the first to go."
He stroked her hair gently, and there were tears in his eyes.
"Never cry about spilt milk, dearie. At best, or worst, the whole thing
was an accident. Come, now, no more weeping. Sit down there and write
what I tell you. I can remember every word, and Kitty and you must just
fit in your stories to suit mine. Stockwell will defend you. He's a
smart chap, and you need have no fear. Bless your heart, you'll be twice
married before you know where you are!"
She obeyed him. With careful accuracy he repeated the deposition. He
rehearsed the evidence she would give. When the nurse came in, he bade
her angrily to leave them alone, but recalled her in the next breath. He
wanted Kitty. She, too, must be coached. At his command she had placed
the fork where it was found. But she must learn her story with
parrot-like accuracy. There must be no contradiction in the sisters'
evidence.
Martin was eating his supper when Mrs. Bolland, bustling about the
kitchen, made a discovery.
"I must be fair wool-gatherin'," she said crossly. "Here's a little pile
o' handkerchiefs browt by Dr. MacGregor, an' I clean forgot all about
'em. Martin, it's none ower leaet, an' ye can bide i' bed i' t' mornin'.
Just run along te t' vicarage wi' these, there's a good lad. They'll
mebbe be wantin' 'em."
He hailed the errand not the less joyfully that it led him through the
fair. But he did not loiter. Perhaps he gazed with longing eyes at its
vanishing glories, for some of the showmen were packing up in disgust,
but he reached the vicarage quickly. It lay nearer the farm than The
Elms, and, like that pretentious mansion, was shrouded from the highroad
by leafy trees and clusters of laurels.
A broad drive led to the front door. The night was drawing in rapidly,
and the moon would not rise until eleven o'clock. In the curving avenue
it was pitch-dark, but a cheerful light shone from the drawing-room, and
through an open French window he could see Elsie bending over a book.
She was not deeply interested, judging by the listless manner in which
she turned the leaves. She was leaning with her elbows on the table,
resting one knee on a chair, and the attitude revealed a foot and ankle
quite as gracefully proportioned as Angele's elegant limbs, though Elsie
was more robust.
Hearing the boy's firm tread on the graveled approach, she straightened
herself and ran to the window.
"Who is there?" she said. Martin stepped into the light.
"Oh, it's you!"
"Yes, Miss Herbert. Mother sent me with these."
He held out the parcel of linen.
"What is it?" she asked, extending a hesitating hand.
"It is perfectly harmless, if you stroke it gently."
She could see the mischief dancing in his eyes, and grabbed the package.
Then she laughed.
"Our handkerchiefs! It was very kind of Mrs. Bolland----"
"I think Dr. MacGregor had them washed."
This puzzled her, but a more personal topic was present in her mind.
"I saw you a little while ago," she said. "You were engaged, or I would
have asked you if you were recovering all right. Your hands and arms are
yet bound up, I see. Do they hurt you much?"
"No. Not a bit."
He felt absurdly tongue-tied, but bravely continued:
"I was told to take Miss Saumarez home. That is how you happened to meet
us together."
"Indeed," she said, drawing back a little. Her tone conveyed that any
explanation of Miss Saumarez's companionship was unnecessary. No other
attitude could have set Martin's wits at work more effectually. He, too,
retreated a pace.
"I'm very sorry if I disturbed you," he said. "I was going to ring for
one of the servants."
She tittered.
"Then I am glad you didn't. They are both out, and auntie would have
wondered who our late visitor was. She has just gone to bed."
"But isn't your--isn't Mr. Herbert at home?"
"No; he is at the bazaar. He asked me to sit up until one of the maids
returns."
Again she approached the window. One foot rested on the threshold.
"I've been reading 'Rokeby,'" ventured Martin.
"Do you like it?"
"It must be very interesting when you know the place. Just imagine how
nice it would be if Sir Walter had seen Elmsdale and written about the
moor, and the river, and the ghylls."
"Do you think he would have found a wildcat in Thor ghyll?"
"I hope not. It might have spoiled the verse; and Thor ghyll is
beautiful."
"I'll never forget that cat. I can see it yet. How its eyes blazed when
it sprang at me! Oh, I don't know how you dared seize it in your hands."
She was outside the window now, standing on a strip of turf that ran
between house and drive.
"I didn't give a second thought to it," said Martin in his offhand way.
"I can never thank you enough for saving me," she murmured.
"Then I'll tell you what," he cried. "To make quite sure you won't
forget, I'll try and persuade mother to have the skin made into a muff
for you. One of the men is curing it, with spirits of ammonia and
saltpeter."
"Do you think I may need to have my memory jogged?"
"People forget things," he said airily. "Besides, I'm going away to
school. When I come back you'll be a grown-up young lady."
"I'm nearly as tall as you."
"Indeed you are not."
"Well, I'm much taller than Angele Saumarez, at any rate."
"There's no comparison between you in any respect."
And this young spark three short hours ago, behind the woodpile, had
gazed into Angele's eyes!
"Do you remember--we were talking about her when that creature flew at
me?"
He laughed. It was odd how Angele's name kept cropping up. The church
clock struck nine. They listened to the chimes. Neither spoke until the
tremulous booming of the bell ceased.
"I'm afraid I must be going," said Martin, without budging an inch.
"Did you--did you--find any difficulty--in opening the gate? It is
rather stiff. And your poor hands must be so sore."
From excessive politeness, or shyness, Elsie's tongue tripped somewhat.
"It was a bit stiff," he admitted. "I had to reach up, you know."
"Then I think I ought to come and open it for you."
"But you will be afraid to return alone."
"Afraid! Of what?"
"I really don't know," he said, "but I thought girls were always scared
in the dark."
"Then I am an exception."
She cast a backward glance into the room.
"The lamp is quite safe. It will not take me a minute."
They walked together down the short avenue. The gate was standing open.
"Really," laughed Martin, "I had quite forgotten."
"So boys have weak memories, too?"
"Of gates, perhaps."
"Well, now, I must be off. Good-night, and thank you so much."
She held out her hand. He took it in both of his.
"I do hope Mr. Herbert will ask me to another picnic," he said.
A boy on a bicycle rode past slowly. Instinctively, they shrank into the
shadow of a tree.
"Wasn't that Frank Beckett-Smythe?" whispered Elsie, forgetting to
withdraw her imprisoned hand, and turning a startled face to Martin.
"Yes."
"Where can he be going at this time?"
Martin guessed accurately, but sheer chivalry prevented him from saying
more than:
"To the fair, I suppose."
"At this hour; after nine o'clock?"
"S-s-h. He's coming back."
She drew closer. There was an air of mystery in this nocturnal bicycle
ride that induced bewilderment. Martin's right hand still inclosed the
girl's. What more natural than that his left arm should go around her
waist, merely to emphasize the need for caution, concealment, secrecy?
Most certainly his knowledge of womankind was striding onward in
seven-leagued boots.
The trot of a horse sounded sharply on the hard road. It was being
ridden by someone in a hurry. The young scion of the Hall, who appeared
to be killing time, inclined his machine to the opposite hedge.
But the rider pulled up with the skill of a practiced horseman. Even in
the dim light the boy and girl recognized one of Mr. Beckett-Smythe's
grooms.
"Is that you, Master Frank?" they heard him say.
"Hello, Williams! What's up?"
"What's up, indeed! T' Squire has missed ye. A bonny row there'll be. Ye
mun skip back lively, let me tell ye."
"Oh, the deuce!"
"Better lose nae mair time, Master Frank. I'll say I found ye yon side
o' T' Elms."
"What has The Elms got to do with it?"
The man grinned.
"Noo, Master Frank, just mount an' be off in front. T' Squire thinks
ye're efther that black-eyed lass o' Mrs. Saumarez's. Don't try an'
humbug him. He telt me te lay my huntin'-crop across yer shoulders, but
that's none o' my business. Off ye go!"
The heir, sulky and in deep tribulation, obeyed. They heard the horse's
hoofbeats dying away rapidly.
Elsie, an exceedingly nice-mannered girl, was essentially feminine. The
episode thrilled her, and pleased her, too, in some indefinable way, for
her companion was holding her tightly.
"Just fancy that!" she whispered.
"Oh, he will only get a hiding."
"But, surely, he could not expect to meet Angele?"
"It looks like it. But why should we trouble about it?"
"I think it is horrid. But I must be going. Good-night--Martin."
He felt a gentle effort to loosen his clasp.
"Good-night, Elsie."
Their faces were very close. Assuredly, the boy must have been a trifle
light-headed that day, for he bent and kissed her.
She tore herself from the encircling arm. Her cheeks were burning. At a
little distance--a few feet--she halted.
"How dare you?" she cried.
He came to her with hands extended.
"Forgive me, Elsie; I couldn't help it."
"You must never, never do such a thing again."
He had nothing to say.
"Promise!" she cried, but her voice was less emphatic than she imagined.
"I won't," he said, and caught her arm.
"You--won't! How can you say such a thing?"
"Because I like you. I have known you for years, though we never spoke
to each other until yesterday."
"Oh, dear! This is terrible! You frightened me so! I hope I didn't hurt
your poor arms?"
"The pain was awful," he laughed.
The girl's heart was beating so frantically that she could almost hear
its pulsations. The white bandages on Martin's wrists and hands aroused
a tumult of emotion. The scene in the ghyll flashed before her eyes; she
saw again the wild struggles of the snarling, tearing, biting animal,
the boy's cool daring and endurance until he crushed the raging thing's
life out of it and flung it away contemptuously.
An impulse came to her, and it was not to be repelled. She placed both
hands on his shoulders and kissed him, quite fearlessly, on the lips.
"I think I owed you that," she said, with a little sob, and then ran
away in good earnest, never turning her head until she was safe within
the drawing-room.
Martin, his brain in a whirl and his blood on fire, closed the gate for
himself. When the vicar came, half an hour later, his daughter was busy
over the same book.
"What, Elsie! None of the maids home yet?" he cried.
"No, father, dear. But Martin Bolland brought these."
"Oh, our handkerchiefs. What did he say?"
"Nothing--of any importance. I understood that Dr. MacGregor caused the
linen to be washed, but forgot to ask him why."
"Is that all?"
"Practically all, except that his arms and hands are all bound up, so I
went with him as far as the gate. It is stiff, you know. And--yes--he
has been reading 'Rokeby.' He likes it."
The vicar filled his pipe. He had had a trying day.
"Martin is a fine lad," he said. "I hope John Bolland will see fit to
educate him. Such a youngster should not be allowed to vegetate in a
village like this."
"Ah!" said Elsie, "that reminds me. He told me he was going away to
school."
"Capital!" agreed the vicar. "Out of evil comes good. It required an
earthquake to move a man like Bolland!"