Freda was by this time getting too much accustomed to the shifts and
surprises of the smugglers’ haunt to be greatly alarmed by the
discovery that she was not alone in the underground chamber. Besides,
her indignation against Thurley gave her a fellow-feeling with even
the most lawless of the men he had been sent to spy upon. So she cried
out in a clear voice:
“It is I, Freda Mulgrave; I have come down here to escape being
carried off to London by John Thurley. Who are you?”
The man raised to the level of his face a dark lantern, turning its
rays full upon himself. The girl, in spite of the fact that she was
prepared to keep her feelings well under control, gave a cry of joy.
It was her father.
Freda stretched out her arms to him, trembling, frightened, crying
with misery and with joy.
“You have escaped!” she whispered. “Escaped! Oh, what can I do to help
you? to save you?”
Captain Mulgrave laughed, but with a quiver in his voice, as he
smoothed her bright hair.
“Calm down, child,” he said kindly. “I--I want to talk to you. Come
with me to the ruins! I want to get out to the daylight, where I can
see your little face.”
“But, father, John Thurley may still be about. He wanted to take me
away to London this afternoon, and I came down here to be safe.
Perhaps----”
“Never mind him. He shan’t take you anywhere unless you want to go.
Come with me.”
Surprised by the tone he took, which was not that of a hunted man,
Freda followed her father in silence along the underground passage,
and up the steps into the ruined church. Captain Mulgrave then helped
his daughter up the broken steps which led to the window in the west
front, and they sat down on the old stones and looked out to the sea.
A conviction which had been growing in Freda’s mind as they came
along, brightening her eyes and making her heart beat wildly, became
stronger than ever when he deliberately chose this spot, in full view
of any one who might stroll through the ruins. It was a grey, cold
day, with a drizzle of rain falling; the sea was all shades of murky
green and brown, with little crests of foam appearing and
disappearing; the sea-birds flew in and out restlessly about the worn
grey arches, screaming and flapping their wide wings; the wind blew
keen and straight from the northwest, but Freda did not know that she
was bitterly cold, and that her lips and fingers were blue, for her
heart and her head were on fire.
“Father,” she whispered, crouching near him and looking into his face,
“forgive me for what I thought. Oh, I see it was not true, and I could
die of joy!”
She was shaking from head to foot, panting with excitement. Captain
Mulgrave looked affectionately into her glowing face.
“Why, child,” he said, “there wasn’t a man or woman in England who
wouldn’t have condemned me! Why should you blame yourself. When
Barnabas Ugthorpe caught me, as he thought, red-handed, I saw that
nothing but a miracle could save my neck; if I lived, it was sure to
leak out. So I died. And they buried the murdered man instead of me.”
“But father, the jury--were they all in the secret!”
“No. They viewed a live body instead of a dead one. I had a
beautifully painted wound on my breast, and I lay in the coffin till I
was as cold as the dead; and I took care that the jury shouldn’t be
warm enough to want to hang about long, or to have much sensitiveness
of touch left if they were inclined to be curious.”
“But, father, wouldn’t it have been less risk just to go away?”
“No, for my disappearance would have told against me at the inevitable
time, when Barnabas should babble out his secret. I thought, too, that
my supposed death would put the real murderer off his guard, and that
I might be able to track him down in the end.”
“Did you know who it was?” she asked in a whisper, after a pause.
“I guessed--and guessed correctly.”
“Who was it?”
“Bob Heritage.”
“And they have caught him?”
“Last night, hiding about the old farm-house. I went away yesterday in
my yacht, because I had got wind of the search, and thought they were
after _me_. This morning I came sneaking back to find out whether you
were safe, and Crispin was on the scaur with the news.”
Freda listened to these details, conscious, though she would not have
owned it, of a secret disappointment in the midst of her joy at
learning her father’s innocence. In spite of the kindness he showed
when he was with her, she was to him only an afterthought. He had made
no provision for her safety yesterday, left her no directions for her
protection in the time of trouble which was coming. One other
consideration grieved her deeply: the shame and distress which had
been lifted from her shoulders now fell upon those of poor Dick. These
thoughts caused her to drop into a silence which her father made no
attempt to break. While they were still sitting side by side without
exchanging a word, they heard the click of the gate behind, and a
man’s voice saying “Thank you” to the lodge-keeper. It was John
Thurley.
Captain Mulgrave and he caught sight of each other at the same moment,
and the former at once came down. The meeting between the two men was
a strange one. Each held out his hand, but with diffidence. Thurley
spoke first.
“Captain Mulgrave,” said he, “I am indeed sorry that I should have
been the means of bringing justice down upon you. At the same time I
must say I should have thought that a man who had served his country
so well would be the last to have any hand in defrauding her.”
Captain Mulgrave laughed harshly.
“‘My country’ rated my services so highly that in return for them they
turned me off like a dog. ‘My country’ made me an outlaw by her
treatment; let ‘my country’ take the blame of my reprisals.”
“I should have expected more magnanimity from you.”
“To every man his own virtues; none of the meeker ones are among
mine,” said the other grimly. “I have been disgraced and left to eat
my heart out for fifteen years. And I tell you I think the debt
between my country and me is still all on her side.”
“Perhaps your country begins to think so too. At any rate the
government, I feel sure, would be reluctant to prosecute you, as it
would have done anybody else in your case. For it would not be only
smuggling against you, Captain Mulgrave; it would be conspiracy.”
“The government knows, as well as I do, that prosecution of me would
lead to unpleasant inquiries and reminiscences. The same party is in
now that was in at the time of my disgrace; and as we are on the eve
of a general election, my case would make a very good handle for the
opposite side to use.”
“Well, don’t count on that too much. You can’t deny it is a serious
offence to form such an organisation for illegal purposes as you have
done. This place must be cleared out, the underground passages (which
I know all about) blocked up; and if you don’t find it convenient to
leave England for a time, I am afraid you’ll find that your past
services won’t save you from arrest.”
“The organisation is better worked than you think; my going away will
not break it up. There’s another good head in it.”
“If you mean Crispin Bean’s, it is a good head indeed. On finding,
this morning, that the game was up, he came to me and gave me full
details of the band, its working, names, everything.”
Captain Mulgrave was not only astonished, he was incredulous.
“The d----l he did!” he muttered.
And it was not until John Thurley had read him out some notes he had
taken down during Crispin’s confession, that the master of Sea-Mew
Abbey would believe that his lieutenant had gone over to the enemy.
Then he shrugged his shoulders and chose a cigar very carefully.
“Will you have one?” he said, offering the case to Thurley. “They
smoke none the worse for being contraband.”
John Thurley declined.
“Ah, well,” continued the other, “I bear you no ill-will for causing
my expatriation, especially as in doing so you have cleared my name of
a charge I saw no means of disproving. By-the-bye, why didn’t you
speak out sooner about the murder?”
“Because I had no very strong evidence myself. I put the case in the
hands of the police, and detectives were sent down here who discovered
that a man on horseback had come from Oldcastle Farm on the day of the
murder, that he had tied up his horse in a shed at the bottom of the
hill, just outside the town, and had been seen with a revolver in his
hand making his way across the field to the spot where Barnabas
Ugthorpe found the body. The man was identified as Robert Heritage; it
was found out that he had just learnt the servant’s intention to
betray his master’s secrets to you. This is evidence enough to try the
man on, if not to hang him.”
“And the cousin, what becomes of him?”
This was the question Freda had been dying to ask, and she drew near,
clasping her hands tightly in her anxiety to learn Dick’s fate.
“I don’t quite know. He seems to have been used as a tool from a very
early age by his good-for-nothing cousin. It’s an exceedingly awkward
business, especially for me, as I am distantly connected with the
family, and I feel for the poor lady very much. I must look into their
affairs, and try to get the farm let for her benefit. As for this
Dick, he had better emigrate.”
“He won’t do that,” interrupted Freda quickly.
“He would rather starve than leave his old home!”
Both gentlemen turned in surprise, for the girl spoke with feeling and
fire. John Thurley looked hurt and angry, her father only amused.
“What do you know about the young rascal’s sentiments?” asked the
latter.
“I only know what he told me,” she answered simply, with a blush.
There was a pause in the talk for a few minutes. Then Captain Mulgrave
said:
“We might go over to the farm this afternoon, and see the fellow.”
The other assented without alacrity. There was another person to be
provided for, whose welfare interested him more than that of a hundred
young men.
“What about your daughter?” he asked in a constrained voice.
“Oh, Freda’s going back to the convent. You have always wanted to,
haven’t you, child?”
“Yes, father,” answered the girl, who had, however, suddenly fallen
a-trembling at the suggestion.
“I--I could have provided for her better than that, if--if she had
chosen,” said John Thurley, blushing as shyly as a girl, and finding a
difficulty in getting his words out.
“Eh! _You?_ cried Captain Mulgrave. Do you mean that you thought of
marrying my little lame girl? Here, Freda, what do you say to that?”
Freda blushed and kept her eyes on the ground.
“I say, father, that I am very much obliged to Mr. Thurley, but I
would rather go back to the convent, if you please.”
“You hear that, Mr. Thurley? I told you so. The child was born for a
nun--takes to the veil as a duck does to water.”
But John Thurley did not feel so sure of that, and he looked troubled.
When, later in the day, the dogcart stood at the door waiting for the
two gentlemen, they found Freda standing beside it in her outdoor
dress.
“What, little one, are you going with us?” asked Captain Mulgrave.
“Yes, if you will please take me, father.”
“Well, as you’re going to see so little more of the world, I suppose
you must be humoured. Jump up in front. Mr. Thurley, will you drive,
or shall I?”
“You drive one way, and I the other, if you will let me.”
“All right. You’ll take the reins coming back then.”
And Freda saw by the expression of John Thurley’s face that he was too
much annoyed to wish to sit by her just then.