"Gavril," he said, "my brother, to whom may the saints ensure a heavenly
kingdom for his behaviour that day,--Gavril, with his staff, whacked the
Swede on the head before he had quite killed Kuzma and me, and knocked
him senseless; in which condition Gavril and I put him in his boat and
sailed across to Narva, where we gave in our evidence against him in the
police court. We showed the pistol, and promised to produce Kuzma when
his arm was well enough to allow him to travel. This is his pistol that
you have bought; and that is my tale. It's all I know, and may the holy
saints preserve those who are honest folk, and punish the evil doers!
If I have pleased your Mercifulness, I will place the ten-rouble note
along with the other."
Thus, or to this effect, did the elder wander along, Michail laboriously
translating, and then he stopped, having said his say.
"Good Heavens! Peter," said Jack after a pause, "that's a tale well
worth ten roubles, I fancy; what say you?"
"Stop a bit," I gasped. "Ask him, Michail, what the Swede got out of
the earth? Does he know what the fellow was digging for, and did he
find it?"
"He did not give himself time," said the elder. "He flew at us before he
had dug for half an hour. As for that which he expected to find, how
should a plain fisherman know that? He was mad; what would a madman
expect to find growing upon an island, that he could dig up with a
spade? Gold and jewels, perhaps!" The elder laughed aloud and spat
freely. Jack still withheld the note.
"At anyrate, he found nothing?" he asked.
"Nothing but sand, Mercifulness."
"And what has become of the Swede?" said I. "Was he detained at Narva?"
"Detained at Narva to be tried, Mercifulness," said the elder. "But
there is hope that when the police behold Kuzma's arm, which will be
next week, the rascal may journey to Siberia without further trouble."
Jack handed in the ten-rouble note; our friend had certainly earned it;
for though, of course, I would not go so far as to say that this elder
told the truth (being a Russian that, of course, would be impossible;
the only Russian who ever told the truth is dead), yet that his tale was
not all lies was proved by the pistol.
Jack thought of a way of obtaining a little supplementary evidence in
corroboration.
"Get him to show us where the Swede shot at him," he said, addressing
Michail. "It would be interesting to see the mark in the tree made by
the bullet fired at the elder."
Strong's latest victim had no objection to giving us this pleasure, and
we were conducted to a place in the wood, and shown a tree which had an
undoubted bullet mark some seven feet up the trunk.
"Ah! I see," said artful Jack. "So that is where you stood, and Kuzma
here, and the mad Swede came rushing from over there."
"No, not there," said the elder; "your Mercifulness may see, if you
will, where the fellow was digging in the ground when we saw him.
Heaven! to come all this way to dig!"
*CHAPTER XXIX*
*MUCH DIGGING*
The elder's invitation fell out very propitiously with artful Jack's
designs, and we were shown the open space among the trees where Strong
had commenced his digging operations, which had come to such an untimely
end. There was the hole he had dug when interrupted and made to lose at
once his temper and his chance of wealth.
There too were the four posts, arranged exactly as in Bechuanaland, in
an irregular square. Strong, remembering where the treasure had been
found in the first instance, had gone straight to the corresponding
corner here, had pulled up the outer post, and begun to dig about its
socket. Jack laughed.
"The old fellow wouldn't have been likely to hide it in the same spot
twice," he said; "that would be too easy for us!"
I suggested that, at anyrate, we must not lay ourselves open to
suspicion by digging about or even remaining in the neighbourhood of
this particular spot, or we should have the whole village coming and
digging with us. We must pretend that our curiosity was satisfied by
the sight of the scene of the struggle, and that there our interest in
this spot ended. We must do a little hunting or fishing for a day or
two, and then return unsuspected to our real labours.
So we hired the elder and Gavril, the hero of the broomstick which had
overthrown James Strong, and went a-fishing among the tiny islands and
rocks that fringed the shores of Hogland itself, and here we spent a day
very pleasantly in allaying the suspicions of the elder and in catching
some good fish, in weight from one to fifteen pounds, including a few
which I believe to have been large lake trout. The water here was
scarcely brackish and the fish we caught were all denizens of the fresh
water.
But excitement and longing to be up and about so as to discover the
hidden treasure, burned like a banked fire within my bosom, and I was
feverishly anxious to be ashore once more and at work.
We were out all night, and a cold function indeed it was; and right glad
were we that we had brought our flasks to keep us alive and help our
circulation to maintain the struggle. It was now that Michail
discovered the existence of those flasks, for we had presented both the
elder and our interpreter each with a small portion of the contents, and
both men had found the English brandy to their taste. The consequence
to us was, that when we landed and retired to sleep those two artless
Russians stole our flasks and disappeared.
Now this, far from proving, as at first sight it might seem, an unmixed
disaster, was, as a matter of fact, the greatest boon that could have
happened to us; for though there was not very much of the spirit in our
stolen flagons, yet it was strong, and there was enough to keep both men
handsomely employed in recovering from its effects for three days.
Those three days of investigation, free from inquisitive observation and
possible interference, were exactly what we most desired, and at the
very first opportunity we shook off both the elder and Michail, who were
already in secret possession of the flasks and quite pleased to be
shaken off, and set to work in earnest at our digging.
The area to be investigated was of the same shape as our African
treasure-field, but smaller by half, for which mercy I was grateful to
destiny; for even half the old area was quite sufficient for the digging
of two men, unless they happened to desire to dig themselves into their
own graves, which Jack and I certainly did not.
Needless to say, Jack now felt no compunction about taking his turn with
the spade, for I might fairly consider myself the only competitor now
left "in the running." Poor Clutterbuck murdered; young Strong eaten;
James Strong in Siberia, or on the way there--there were none left to
contest my claims.
So Jack dug with me, and very hard work he found it, and very stiff he
felt at the end of the first profitless day; so that I was able to screw
out of him a kind of apology for his want of sympathy with my stiffness
at Ngami. We had half intended to set a decoy for wolves, of which
there were said to be a few on the island; but we were both too tired
for anything of the sort, and preferred to sleep, wrapped in our
blankets, over a fire in the forest, as in the African days, only with
dark pines waving over our heads, and a sharper air biting at the
exposed parts of our persons, instead of strange palmy and ferny trees,
and prickly-pears and kei apples, and a soft, hothouse kind of air
around us.
On the second day we toiled from morn till dewy eve, but found nothing
to repay us, and by that time the surface of our ground was upheaved
from end to end to the depth of a spade-head. Then we determined to
spend the third day in trying various experiments.
We were full of excellent ideas, but the same thoughts had unfortunately
not occurred to old Clutterbuck while hiding his treasure.
First of all, we procured from the village a ball of string; they had
plenty there, for the making and mending of nets.
Then we fastened an end to one of the posts and carried a line across
diagonally to a second, and from a third across to the fourth, as from A
to B and from C to D in the chart--
A C
E
D B
Where the strings crossed at E, we dug a deep hole and had great hopes
for the result. But it seemed that this excellent plan had not occurred
to Mr. Clutterbuck; he had not concealed his wealth in accordance with
our ingenious geometrical device. Then we went and borrowed a horse and
a plough from the fisherfolk, who had a field or two near the village
for the growing of their rye and potatoes. And with that plough we
turned up every scrap of our acre of land, and began to grow desperate
because there was not a vestige of treasure or anything else but sandy
soil and a few worms.
Then we sat down to reflect, and gnashed our teeth, and took in vain the
name of old Clutterbuck who had beguiled us to this forsaken island to
dig for treasure which he had never buried.
"I believe Strong found it, after all," said Jack--"found it in five
minutes in the very first hole he made."
"If I thought that I would go to Siberia after him," I said, "and screw
his neck till he gave it up."
"My dear man, he couldn't take a load of treasure with him to Siberia!"
said Jack. "The authorities would have it in a minute."
"It might be all in one cheque," said I; "and he's hidden it--swallowed
it, or put it in his boot or something."
"Well, you can't very well follow him to Siberia with a stomach-pump in
one hand and your revolver in the other," laughed Jack; "but you may
bet, if he had found the stuff he would not have been so quarrelsome; he
would have been too pleased with himself to rush straight at these poor
peasants and empty his revolver at their heads!"
This seemed true, and we turned our thoughts once more to the invention
of devices that might have occurred to the old man for the more
ingenious concealment of his treasures. It could scarcely be supposed
that the old miser really desired to defeat altogether the ingenuity of
his heirs, should they prove to be in possession of a quantum of that
commodity; for if it had been his intention to deprive us altogether of
the money, he need never have made us his potential heirs. The money
must be here--that was as good as certain.
Then we tested other geometrical designs. We counted as many feet
towards the middle, from each post in turn, as the old man had lived
years, seventy-one; and we dug deeply at each seventy-first foot. We
turned up the soil at the spot where fell the only shadow of the
day--the shadow of a tall pine whose topmost boughs afforded us a few
feet of shade towards evening; but nothing came of it. We tried many
other devices, each more deeply ingenious, not to say "far-fetched,"
than the last; but the third day drooped and faded, and still we were no
wiser than before.
That night Michail returned to camp, looking as though he had passed
through great tribulation and had been making good resolutions. He
slunk in and lay down by the fire, and slept so soundly that no ordinary
artillery firing a royal salute at his ear would have disturbed him.
We were sorry to see Michail, for we did not desire his presence here.
We wished we had another flask for him.
This wish was redoubled when in the morning, as we dug and
delved--toiling and perspiring and almost despairing, though still
manfully playing up to the motto of my own family crest: "_Dum spiro
spero_" (which Jack translated "Stick to it, boys, till you're
pumped!")--while Michail still slept, the elder appeared suddenly upon
the scene. He too bore traces of bacchanalianism, though he did not
seem to have suffered so severely from the malady as Michail. The elder
was surprised to see us working, and asked us what we were about.
We gathered that this was the meaning of the elder's remark, but until
we had kicked Michail into the realms of consciousness in order to
translate it for us we could not be certain. Michail awoke at the
seventeenth kick, and said he had not been asleep, but had been lying
and thinking. He told us what the elder had said, the elder repeating
it.
"Tell him that's our business," said Jack surlily--he was disgusted,
like myself, with the failure of our labours; "and that he'd better go
home to the village and mind his own."
"Oh," said the elder, on hearing this, "certainly I will obey; I had no
wish to intrude upon their Mercifulnesses; only I thought their
Mercifulnesses might be digging here in order to find a certain tin box
with a letter in it which I myself found near this spot some years ago!"
The spade dropped from my hand; Jack's fell also.
"Michail," he said, or gasped; "what does the fellow mean? Where is the
tin box and the letter that he found here? Ask him quickly, idiot, or
I'll brain you with my spade!"
The elder was not disturbed by our excitement; he said he thought the
tin box was somewhere up at the village; he wasn't quite sure!
*CHAPTER XXX*
*I TAKE A STRONG LEAD IN THE RACE*
Jack seized the elder by the shoulders and shook him--shook him
handsomely and thoroughly till his splendid white moujik-teeth rattled
in his head. The elder burst into tears and fell on his knees as soon
as Jack let go of him, crossing himself repeatedly and jabbering
vociferously. The fox had changed in an instant into a rabbit, and a
timid one at that. It was impossible to translate what he said, Michail
protested. On being pressed to do so, Michail observed--
"He say his prayers," and I think that must have been about the measure
of it; at all events, he was saying nothing about tin boxes.
"Tell him we don't wish to hurt him," said Jack; "but we intend to have
that tin box; and if his memory does not improve in the next five
minutes, so that he leads us straight to where he has hidden it,
something dreadful will happen to him."
This truculent message was given to the elder, who allowed himself but
one more minute for the consolation of prayer and then took to his heels
for the village, we taking care to keep up with him. Jack's threat
seemed to have wonderfully assisted the process of recalling the past,
for Alexander led us straight to his own house, into the living room
(where his astonished wife and five amazed children were feasting upon
black bread and dried fish, their mouths, opened to receive those
dainties, remaining open by reason of their surprise), and without
hesitation opened a kind of cupboard in the corner in which he kept his
three teacups and his two tumblers (one cracked), together with his
store of vodka.
From this receptacle, which he opened but a fraction, as though jealous
lest we should steal a peep at his teacups, he quickly produced a tin
box, the facsimile of that which I had unearthed in far-away Bechuana.
The elder crossed himself, spat on the ground, made a droll gesture of
surrender to superior force, and banged the box down upon the table.
Then his face assumed a beseechful, maudlin expression, and he said that
he had done as the gentleman desired, but if the gentleman considered it
worth a gratuity that he should have safely preserved this box until the
gentleman came for it, why--
"Tell him to go to the deuce," said Jack; "and wait there till we see
what's in it and what isn't. Here, Peter; it's yours--examine."
I opened the box: there was another within it, as before; neither was
locked; and as before, inside the inner receptacle was an envelope, and
within the envelope a letter; no cheque to bearer, no bank-notes for one
hundred thousand pounds.... My disgust and disappointment were too great
for words; I could not speak; I could not even swear; I believe I burst
into tears.
"Come, come!" said Jack bracingly, "don't give way, old chap; it's just
as well there are no diamonds or gold--this elder fellow would have had
the lot! Cheer up, man, and read the letter, or I will! I for one
don't mind another journey--I haven't travelled half enough yet! Read
the letter!"
It was all very well for Jack. The issue was nothing to him
(comparatively speaking); to me it was everything--all the world, and
the happiness of life!
"I told you how it would be," I raved; "the old rascal meant to swindle
us from the beginning. He will keep us travelling from pillar to post in
this way till the worms have eaten up his hoardings and his miser's
carcass as well. The whole thing's a fraud, Jack, and I am the victim."
"You're better off than the other victims, at all events," said Jack.
"Read the letter, man. Don't abuse the old boy till you know he
deserves it."
"Confound the letter," I said, "and him too! Read it yourself--I'm sick
of the business!"
I was, as my conduct indicates, very angry, very disappointed, and very
ridiculous. I have since exonerated Mr. Clutterbuck and apologised to
Jack, many a time. I still think, however, that the old man's methods
were extremely exasperating; and though ashamed of my loss of temper, I
am not in the least surprised that I should have succumbed to my
feelings of rage and disappointment.
But there was one thing which I have never regretted in the slightest
degree, and that is, that when Michail suddenly laughed out at this
point, finding, I suppose, something comical about my words or actions,
I laid hold of him by the shoulders from behind, and walked him twice
round the room and out at the door, I kicking and he yelling. After
this I felt consoled and returned to hear Jack read out the letter.
It was very much like the other.
"The Prize to the Swift," the document began, and continued as
follows:--
"Do not despair, you whose energy has proved equal to emergency. Having
succeeded up to this point, you are sure to succeed to the end. My
treasure is not here. I would never leave it so far from home and at
the mercy of prying strangers in a foreign land. How do I know that I
am not watched at this moment by jealous eyes from the fishing village a
mile away? This box will possibly be dug up after my departure, but I
do not dread such an event, since it will add, perhaps, to your trouble
in finding it, my most indolent relatives and heirs, and that is a
contingency which I hail with joy. That any finder of the box will
destroy it, I am not afraid. He will rather keep it by him and sell it
to those who come to seek it.
"As for you, my treasure is where it should be, and must ever have been,
for I would never trust it elsewhere--in my own country and in my own
home. Where else should it be? Return, then, successful pilgrim; seek
nearer home. Where my treasure is, there is my heart, or near it. I
lie buried in Streatham churchyard; my treasure is not far away from my
bones! ... Dig, dig, and dig again.
"The only land upon which I or my heirs possess the right of digging is
my own garden in Streatham. Dig there, my friend, and success to him
who digs wisest and deepest.
"My portrait is part of the spoil for the winner; it was done for me by
a pavement artist for two shillings and three pence, but do not throw it
away on that account. It is the portrait of your benefactor, and his
blessing will go to him who preserves it well."
The letter ended here, without signature or date.
*CHAPTER XXXI*
*THE ELDER MAKES A GOOD BARGAIN, AND
MICHAIL A POOR ONE*
"What does he mean?" I growled. "Where's the portrait?"
Jack looked in the boxes, and turned the letter round; there was no sign
of a drawing or of anything connected with portraiture.
I walked up to the elder's cupboard and looked in. Besides the teacups
and other domestic treasures there was a tin case, in size about one
foot by nine inches. I took this without permission from the elder, who
had disappeared after Michail. I opened it.
Sure enough, it was a portrait of old Clutterbuck--the vilest that could
be conceived, but still recognisable. The old man could never, I should
say, have laid claim to good looks; but the "pavement artist" had
scarcely done him justice; he had, in fact, represented his client as so
repulsively hideous that the lowest criminal would probably have
reconsidered his position and turned over a new leaf if informed that he
possessed a face like this of poor maligned Clutterbuck.
"By George!" said Jack, "the old chap couldn't have been very vain to
bequeath such a thing as that to his heirs. What a terrible specimen he
must have been! Was he like this thing?"
"He wasn't as bad as that," I replied. I felt that I had a grievance
against the man, and I was not inclined to give him more than the barest
justice; but I was bound to admit this much.
"I'm glad to hear it," said Jack; "for if he had been, I think I should
have lost my faith in the _bona fides_ of his letters and of the whole
thing. That pavement artist ought to have been hanged, and his body
danced on. What, in Heavens name, did the old man want to leave you a
thing like that for? Why couldn't he get himself photographed if he was
sentimentally anxious that his heirs should possess his portrait?"
Jack laughed; I could not help joining in. It was really rather funny;
and the more one looked at the picture the more one felt inclined to
laugh. The artist was evidently not ashamed of his work, for he had
painted his name in full at the foot of it, "Thomas Abraham Tibbett,"
bless him! I know his name well--I read it every day of my life, for
his masterpiece hangs over my washstand, and I look at it whenever I
feel low in spirits and think that a little T. A. Tibbett will do me
good.
"What a merciful dispensation that one can't see his eyes, or, rather,
that they are looking downwards and don't follow you about as they do in
some portraits that are not by pavement artists," said Jack. "Look at
them; there'd be a lifetime of nightmares in a pair of eyes like those,
if they happened to be looking up."
I have often thought how true this was, and have rejoiced that the
artist of the pavement mistrusted his skill and made the eyes as he did;
but for my joy there are more reasons than now appear.
Michail and the elder were outside when we left the house. I think they
were conspiring against us; no violence, or anything of that sort--a
mere conspiracy of roubles. Michail desired a solatium for the kicks he
had received from me; the elder grieved because he had delivered up his
tin box, under the influence of fear, without pecuniary equivalent.
Both were sulky and uncommunicative, or perhaps assumed sulkiness for
their own ends. The only information that we could obtain from Michail,
in reply to our requests that he would inquire of the elder where and
how he found the tin boxes, was that Kuzma was going to sail across to
Narva to give evidence against the Swede who had shot him.
"What has that to do with it?" said Jack.
Michail grinned and scratched his head, and said something in Russian to
the elder, who did likewise and cleaned up his mouth with the back of
his hand besides.
"Well?" said Jack; "go on!"
"The other great lord kicked me in a painful manner!" continued Michail,
placing his hand near the afflicted part.
"He will kick you again in a still more painful manner," said Jack, "if
you don't explain yourself."
"There is plenty of good vodka at Narva," said Michail, "forty, fifty,
or sixty copeks the bottle, or two-forty for a _vedro_." (A _vedro_
contains, approximately, a gallon.)
"Oh, I see," said Jack. "All right, sonny, you shall be healed, don't
fear; and the other fellow too, but ask him about the boxes first!"
"Tea-money first!" said Michail. "Alexander says the little box is
worth five roubles and the big one ten. At Narva, if I complained
against the merciful gentleman for kicking me, he would be detained and
fined. A gallon of vodka and twenty roubles is my price for being
kicked by the honourable lord."
"Kicked how many times?" said Jack. "For that sum we shall certainly
kick you round the island, my friend. The police at Narva will fine as
much for one kick as for thirty. We shall take all our kicks,
remember!"
Michail decided not to go to Narva, and to charge me for the original
kicking only--the price of which was fixed at a vedro of vodka, to be
brought back from Narva by Kuzma, and one rouble.
As for the elder, we paid him for the tin boxes, for, after all, they
were treasure-trove, and might prove to be very much more valuable to us
than the price asked.
This little matter being satisfactorily settled, Alexander the elder
deigned to inform us how he came by the property.
This, he said, was a very simple matter. He had had the things five
years, keeping them because he felt sure someone would arrive one day to
find them. Five years ago an old Englishman had come on the island, all
alone, to seek rare flowers and plants, as he informed everyone through
a pilot at the lighthouse, since departed, who spoke English.
The elder had watched the old man's botanical researches, and saw him
collect a number of roots of "_brusnika_ and other rubbish," and saw him
also plant four posts in the wood, digging holes for each and putting
them in and piling earth to keep them steady. Then he had dug a fifth
hole, somewhere near, and buried these boxes in it, laughing and
jabbering to himself, said the elder, like a madman. The rest was very
simple. Old Clutterbuck sailed away in the English steamer that stopped
to pick him up, and the elder quickly went and dug up the boxes, hoping
to find cash, but discovering nothing more valuable than a letter he
could not read. He had thought of destroying both this and "the picture
of the devil," as he called old Clutterbuck's portrait, but had taken
the wiser course of preserving both in case someone to whom they were
not valueless should come to find them.
When Strong arrived and commenced his digging operations, the elder
hoped that his opportunity had dawned; but Strong proved to be a madman
with whom it was impossible to enter into negotiations.
The rest, of course, we knew.
Were we really on the road to success at last? At all events, Jack and I
had the grace to admit that we had enjoyed fairly good luck after all,
supposing that the letter was actually the passport to wealth which it
purported to be. If the elder had destroyed it we should never have got
any farther than Hogland in our researches! As for the picture, he
might have done what he liked with that, we thought; though, since it
seemed to be the desire of the testator that we should keep it, we
piously determined to do so.
So that here we were with our object attained, or attained so far as it
was possible to attain it, and with another week or so on our hands to
be spent on this island before the steamer could be expected to return
and fetch us away. What was to be done, and how should the time be
spent?
There was fishing, and there was wandering about with our shot guns, in
hopes of picking up a few grouse or other game which might be met with
in the moorland and woods which covered the island. But the elder made
a tempting suggestion which we caught at, though we did not anticipate
much result from his idea.
There were three wolves on the island, he said, half-starved and rather
savage. They lived here because they could not return to the mainland,
whence they had come in the days of ice, last February or March. If we
liked to pay for a sheep, he would kill one and lay it down as a decoy.
On the third night, if we passed the hours of darkness in a tree over
the spot, we should probably have an opportunity of shooting the brutes,
and a good thing too; and it was in consideration of this fact that the
elder would let us have a sheep for a merely nominal sum--fifteen
roubles.
We agreed to pay this sum, so the sheep fell a victim, and was laid to
rest not in but upon the earth beneath a tree.
Meanwhile the wounded Kuzma was about to sail for the mainland in order
to bring up his bandaged arm in testimony against James Strong, and the
question arose whether Jack and I were not bound to accompany him in
order to do what we could to ensure a fair trial to a fellow-countryman
in distress.
He had done his best to murder us more than once, true. He had also
foully done to death his own cousin, the younger Clutterbuck; and he had
only failed to shoot down three innocent Russian peasants because one of
the three had had the cleverness to knock him on the head before his
purpose was half accomplished.
Yet, for all his crimes, we felt compunction about allowing him to pass,
friendless and helpless, into the hands of those who are ever ready, as
Englishmen (who know nothing about it) invariably believe, to draft
their victims away to Siberia whether guilty or innocent. He deserved
"Siberia," whatever that name may imply, as thoroughly as any rascal;
but, somehow, though neither of us would have moved a finger to save his
neck had it been in danger at the hands of an English hangman, yet we
felt inexplicably averse to permitting Russians to have the twisting of
it.
Why this was so I do not attempt to explain--it is a psychological
problem which I leave to other heads to solve; all I know, is that it
was only the sturdy good sense of Jack Henderson that prevented me from
stepping on board his fishing-lugger with Kuzma, and another peasant,
and sailing away to Narva to make a quixotic fool of myself in defence
of the indefensible James Strong.
*CHAPTER XXXII*
*WE RECEIVE A TERRIBLE SHOCK*
As it was, we contented ourselves with sending a letter to the British
Consul there (supposing that there existed such a functionary),
exhorting him to use his influence to obtain a fair trial for the rogue
called James Strong, and to see that he was not sent to Siberia without
good and sufficient cause shown.
"Great Jupiter!" said Jack, when he had read over my letter. "Why, man,
we have evidence enough to send the fellow to Siberia, or to the next
world for that matter, half a dozen times over!"
So we had, of course.
"And I'll tell you what, Peter!" continued Jack, "it will serve us well
right, when we've got the rascal out of his scrape by our confounded
meddling, if he turns up just in time to snatch the treasure out of your
fingers at the very last minute. What'll you do if he shows up at
Streatham and claims the right to dig with you, neck and neck for the
last lap?"
"Oh, come," I said, "that's quite a different thing! I should let him
hang in England, fast enough, but it's unpleasant to think of Russians
stringing the poor beggar up far away from friends and country!"
Doubtless Jack agreed with me, for he took no steps to prevent the
despatch of my letter. But it has since struck me that it is, after
all, very doubtful whether the proximity of "friends and country" would
have comforted Strong much if he had had the rope round his neck, even
an English rope.
What with fishing all day and sitting shivering in pine trees all night
(like a couple of frozen-out sedge-warblers, as Jack picturesquely
expressed it), we contrived to pass away the time for the best part of a
week, and then Kuzma arrived, having prepared for us a surprise which
for absolute breathless unexpectedness undoubtedly broke the record in
so far as my own limited experience went, or Henderson's either!
Michail came running up to the moor where Jack and I were busily engaged
in trying to induce a covey of grouse to allow us within range of our
guns, and imparted the exciting information that Kuzma's boat was in
sight.
At the news Jack and I gladly conceded the honours of war to our covey
of grouse and hastened down to the shore to see Kuzma's boat, for it had
come to this, that we were so very hard up for excitement on this island
that we would have gone miles to see anything or nothing.
"There are three men on board," said Jack, as the boat came nearer,
running straight for the shore before a fresh breeze. "I suppose
they've brought a police officer along to make inquiries on the spot."
"I hope he won't ask _us_ to go to Narva as witnesses!" I laughed.
"That would be a bad look-out for poor Strong, Jack, eh?"
Jack was gazing at the boat as it neared the land; I gazed too, watching
the jolly little craft cut the water into an endless V as it flew
scudding towards us, as though rejoiced at the prospect of getting home.
"Peter," said Jack presently, "look at the fellow in the bows; he's got
his head round this way. If I were not absolutely certain that such a
thing were impossible, I should say it was James Strong."
"_What?_" I shrieked, "which? where?" I stared at the man; it _was_
Strong, there could not be a doubt of it--there was no mistaking his
face, even at this distance.
"Good gracious! Jack, what are we to do?" I said, trembling at the
knees like any coward. "Heaven help us, what will happen now?" I added.
My nerve seemed to have taken to itself wings at the sight of James
Strong!
"Why, what's the matter, man?" said Jack. "It's a mystery to me how the
fellow happens to be in that boat, but you may take your oath that he's
pretty harmless as far as _we_ are concerned; he won't catch us napping
again, if we have to watch him all day and night till the steamer
comes!"
I recovered presently, and called myself many evil names for yielding to
a craven instinct at sight of this ill-omened person. I was not really
afraid of the fellow; it was the unexpected that upset me--it always
does.
As a matter of fact, there was little to be afraid of in the wretched
man. It was not the James Strong whom we had known in Africa that
landed among us that afternoon in Hogland. It was a poor,
broken-spirited, hopeless creature that raised his arms with a cry of
despair at seeing us, and hid his face and trembled and refused to leave
the boat when Kuzma and others beached it and ran it, with him still
seated in the bows, up the shore. I felt quite sorry for the terrified
wretch.
"Well, James Strong," said Jack, "this is an unexpected meeting, after
all that has passed! How come _you_ here, pray?"
"I didn't expect to find you on the island," said Strong. "Oh, curse my
luck!" he added, in a wailing tone which changed into one of sudden
ferocity as his eye fell upon Jack, who was laughing at him.
"Yes, it _is_ poor luck for you, I admit," said the latter, "but, if it
is any comfort for you to know it, you would have been too late in any
case, for we have got all there was to find."
"I don't believe a word of it," said Strong.
"And what's more," continued Jack, ignoring Strong's remark, "the elder
had it all the while, and would have given it to you if you hadn't shot
at him. So you see what comes of evil temper, James Strong. Now, if
you had not shot poor Clutterbuck, and tried to murder my friend and me,
you might have followed us to England, and perhaps, even yet, have
robbed us of our possessions. As it is, you see, if you come to England
you will certainly hang!"
James Strong swore one of his vile oaths and spluttered there was no
proof. Who was going to believe our lies? It was much more probable
that we had shot Clutterbuck than he, and any jury of Englishmen would
see that the whole yarn was a foul conspiracy. Then he changed his tone
and whimpered, and said he had passed a miserable fortnight in the
Russian prison in Narva, and beseeched us, if we were men and
Englishmen, to help him escape to England and thence anywhere we
pleased. The Narva police would be after him by to-morrow for a
certainty, even if these Russian fiends did not carry him back and
deliver him up.
"Tell us your story, with as few lies as you can put into it," said
Jack, "and we'll think what's best to be done with you."
*CHAPTER XXXIII*
*HOW STRONG ESCAPED FROM PRISON*
"You're such an infernal blackguard, you see, Strong," continued Jack,
with engaging candour, "that one must be very careful in dealing with a
man like yourself. It seems to me that it's Siberia or the gibbet, my
friend; and upon my word, I don't quite know which to advise in your
best interests. Tell us what happened at Narva."
James Strong was considerably cowed by his experiences, and obeyed
without further demur. Undoubtedly, his tale was full of untruth, but as
he gave it to us I will pass it on to the reader. We were able to learn
a truer version subsequently.
Strong declared that he had been taken to Narva by the fishermen, having
been bound by them while still unconscious from the effects of a blow on
the head from Gavril's staff. At Narva he was thrust into a miserable
prison or police cell, where he was interrogated by persons who could
not understand him, nor he them. A Swedish interpreter was brought, and
Strong was knocked about and bullied because he protested that he could
understand Swedish no better than Russian. He repeated the word
"English" in hopes that an English interpreter would be produced, but
none appeared. He was half starved and atrociously bullied by Russian
policemen, and so the time passed until the witness Kuzma came to give
evidence against him. At the trial the English Consul came and spoke
for him (this was in consequence of our letter, no doubt), but he was
taken back to his cell, the Consul informing him that he could do
nothing to save him from the consequences of his violence. He would
probably be convicted of attempted murder and deported to Siberia.
That night was celebrated, Strong explained, some Russian church
holiday, and everyone was drunk or half drunk. He succeeded in escaping
from the wooden building in which he was confined, and in finding his
way down by the river to the port, securing a small boat, which proved
to be rotten and to leak vilely, in which he put out to sea; he hoped to
get away and finally return somehow to Hogland, where he might even yet
find the treasure before we arrived, and escape with it on the first
steamer that passed.
"You can't blame me for that," interposed Strong at this point. "I had
as much right to the treasure as you, if I could find it first."
"Oh, quite so, Strong," said Jack. "We don't always approve of some of
your methods--as, for instance, of your attempts to remove us out of the
way, us and poor Clutterbuck--but we never denied your right to compete.
Proceed. Whom did you murder, and how, in order to escape from your
cell?"
"You never give me a chance, curse you!" said Strong, looking livid with
rage. "I have never killed a human creature. Clutterbuck fell down a
nullah and broke his neck. I shot wide of you on purpose--it was
necessary to frighten you off--and these fellows too. Did I murder one
of them or one of you?"
"What about my leg, Strong? you infernal lying blackguard!" I said.
"I was bound to keep you back how I could," he cried hotly; "I am sorry
I hurt you, but that's not murder, and you know it."
"I know it was meant to be," I said.
"It was not," he cried; "I fired wide on purpose. One doesn't hit a man
in the leg if one means killing."
"Oh, come, Strong; you are a poor shot, you know, at the best!" said
Jack. "We don't forget Graciosa! Go on with your story."
"Oh, curse Graciosa, and you too!" said Strong surlily, and not another
word could we get out of him at this time.
But Kuzma told us the rest of it--that is to say, from the point at
which Strong left off--though we only heard the true version of his
escape from Narva at a later date, and from another source.
Kuzma returning to Hogland in his fishing-boat, had seen in the
distance, when about an hour out from Narva, a small craft occupied by
one man, who seemed to be in difficulties, since he shouted and
gesticulated.
As Kuzma and his companion consulted whether to head for the small boat
in order to offer assistance, they suddenly observed that the vessel had
disappeared. Sailing up to the place where it had sunk they had come
upon a man swimming, whom they did not recognise for Strong until they
had pulled him on board.
When they did recognise him, said Kuzma, they were for pitching him back
into the sea; but Strong had a knife, and looked so dangerous, that they
thought it wiser to bring him along, which they did. They knew nothing
of his escape or anything else, excepting that they fully intended to
make a little money out of the job, presently, by restoring him to the
authorities, and claiming a gratuity.
Had they known more, they would probably have smashed in his head with
an oar, and pitched him back into the gulf. Cash rewards are very, very
pleasant things; but under some circumstances Kuzma would have felt even
greater satisfaction in smashing a head than in earning money by
preserving it whole for others to smash!
On the following day we might fairly begin to look out for the return of
our good steamship the _Thomas Wilcox_, and it became necessary to
settle something as to James Strong and his fate.
The Russians, Kuzma and his friends, being aggrieved parties, and also
interested in a pecuniary way in returning the prisoner to his bonds,
were naturally all for conveying him back to Narva under strong escort;
but this James Strong besought us with tears and piteous entreaties at
all hazards to disallow. He would assuredly be sent to Siberia or
starved or flogged to death, he protested; nothing could save him. "For
the love of Heaven," he begged us, "let me sail with you from this
accursed place."
"But I can't, we can't do it, as honest men!" said Jack, in some
perplexity for the wretched fellow. "Don't you see, man, that if you
set foot in England we are bound to denounce you?"
"Then land me at Copenhagen," said Strong, "or anywhere."
"But you'll take the first steamer on to Hull, and the difficulties will
all begin again," said I.
"I won't--I swear it!" he cried. "I'll sign anything you like."
Jack and I held a consultation over this knotty question. No doubt it
will be said that our duty was obviously either to abandon the miscreant
to these poor fellows, whom he had deeply aggrieved, and who would
restore him into the hands of those who would try him; or else to take
him to England ourselves, and arraign him there.
And yet, stern and judicial reader of these lines, we felt that either
course would be equally repugnant to us. We could not allow these
Russians to have their will of the fellow; how did we know that they
would not knock him on the head, without trial, so soon as we were
afloat? As for taking him to England and accusing him of murder, fully
as we believed him guilty, we were without absolute proof, and the work
of establishing a case against him was not an enterprise we cared to
undertake.
In the end we decided to buy the man off from these islanders for the
sum of one hundred roubles, which they gladly accepted, and to allow him
to accompany us as far as Copenhagen, where he should land. In
consideration, therefore, of a signed statement from him that he was
guiltless of the murder of Clutterbuck, who, he solemnly declared, had
fallen in fair fight during a struggle for the revolver, which had
exploded and killed Clutterbuck on the spot; in consideration, I say, of
a declaration to this effect, Jack and I both undertook to leave Strong
unmolested so long as he did not cross our path in England. So sure as
he ever came near us again, for good or ill, he should be denounced by
us without further compunction.
*CHAPTER XXXIV*
*EXIT STRONG*
We did not altogether believe Strong's story even then; I believe it now
still less, in the light of subsequent information bearing upon his
conduct at Narva. Taking him all in all, I daresay, and indeed I hope,
that I shall never look upon the like of James Strong again; for I do
not suppose the earth contains many such callous and sanguinary rascals
as he, and it would be more than my share of ill luck to come across two
such scoundrels in the course of one lifetime.
I will not dwell upon his "gratitude" and joy when our decision was
communicated to him. He had knelt weeping before us, praying aloud and
blubbering while we had the matter in consideration, and when the thing
was decided he--well, it was a sickly exhibition, and, of course, his
gratitude was only sham. He would have stabbed either of us in the back
any minute, for a five-pound note.
Thus, when the good ship _Thomas Wilcox_ arrived off the island next
morning early, we took leave of our gentle but avaricious elder and his
friends, and left the island without much regret, and James Strong went
with us.
"Well," said kind and hearty Captain Edwards, shaking each of us warmly
by the hand, "found your coal?"
As for me, I had completely forgotten our coal-mining enterprise, and
was foolishly taken aback by the remark. But Jack, as usual, was "all
there."
"There is certainly coal in the island," he said; "but I don't think it
will prove to exist in paying quantities."
I don't think it will either; for, so far as I know, the only coals to
be found in the place are the few ashes shot out by steamers passing the
island near enough for their siftings to be washed ashore.
"Ah, that's a pity!" said Edwards; "I was looking forward to be a
director, one day! So your trip's been a failure?"
"Well, not altogether," said Jack, grave as a judge; "we've enjoyed some
good fishing, and haven't had a bad time altogether."
We paid Strong's passage to Copenhagen, and landed him there. Not
wishing to enter into particulars as to his story, we gave out that he
had come to the island a month ago, _via_ Helsingfors, upon much the
same errand as ourselves; and if Captain Edwards was surprised to hear
that there had been three fools instead of two in the matter, he was too
polite to say so. But after Strong had, to our relief, finally
departed, and we were once more in full sail for England, we received a
piece of news from Captain Edwards which gave us what is commonly called
"a turn," and we were glad at first that we had not received it but a
few hours earlier. We had just seen Strong off, and were sitting and
talking in the dining-saloon, discussing various matters, when Edwards
suddenly startled us by saying--
"Nice pranks a countryman of ours has been playing at Narva!"
"What--Strong?" I blurted in my foolishness. Jack coughed as though
choking over his glass of sherry.
"How your mind is running upon Strong, Peter!" he said. "At Narva this
was, Captain Edwards said; didn't you, captain?"
"Yes, at Narva," said Edwards, suspecting nothing; "it's a place not so
very far from Hogland, on the Esthonian shore. The fellow was a sailor
apparently, and had behaved violently towards other sailors, Russians--I
don't know the history of it; but he was placed in 'quod' for his
misdeeds. Well, what does the fellow do one night, finding that most
people about the lock-up were drunk by reason of a church holiday (it's
a sin to be sober on a church holiday, you must know, in Russia); what
does he do but set fire to the place, stick a knife into one policeman,
brain another with a stool, and escape in the confusion down to the
water, where he gets to sea in a leaky boat, and goes Heaven knows
where?--probably to the bottom, for the boat is described as a totally
impossible craft."
"Do you mean to say, captain, that the two men he attacked are actually
dead--murdered?" I asked, feeling that I was paler than I ought to be to
hear of these excesses in a stranger.
"Why, certainly," said the captain; "he appears to have run amuck
entirely; and I should say that if he went to the bottom he did a deuced
wise thing, for if they catch him there'll be a bad quarter of an hour
for him; on that you may bet your pile."
"Anyone burnt?" said Jack. He too looked somewhat appalled by these
revelations.
"Most probably--I only saw a telegram, mind you, in the French paper,
the _Journal de St. Petersbourg_. There must have been a number of
drunken people about the place,--bah! it isn't a pretty story. Upon my
word, you have both gone quite pale over it. Pass the sherry, Mr.
Henderson--help yourself and your friend; you both look to require it."
Talking over this horrible story with Jack, afterwards, we agreed that
if we had known of this before leaving Hogland, we could not possibly,
in conscience, have allowed the fellow to escape. We must have sent him
back to Narva. It was lucky indeed that Kuzma had known nothing of it,
having simply picked the man up in mid-sea!
"What should we have done if Captain Edwards had told us this story
while Strong was still on board?" I asked.
"Nothing," said Jack. "What would have been the use? It would have
been very awkward for Edwards; and besides, rogue as Strong is, I don't
think I should hand the poor wretch back to Russian judges any the
easier after this. Heaven only knows what would happen to him!"
At all events, it was a matter to be thankful for that we were at length
happily quit of this nightmare, and, as we hoped, for ever.
As we hoped, yes. But it's a delusive thing, this bubble "Hope," and
very given to bursting!
It was during lunch that Captain Edwards had told Jack and me all about
the Narva business, and it was while sitting and smoking a pipe in my
cabin an hour later that it suddenly occurred to me--I don't know
why--to have a look at old Clutterbuck's last letter and the daub which
was supposed to be a reproduction of his features upon canvas.
I did not suspect anything. On the contrary, it never for one moment
occurred to me that anything could have happened to the things. They
were useless to anyone but myself, unless it were Strong; but that
thoroughly cowed individual would never have dared possess himself of
them--why should he? It was impossible for him to show himself in
England, for he would know that we should have no mercy if he were
deliberately to disobey orders and risk his neck in this way.
I suppose I wanted to have a peep at the things--my stock in trade, such
as it was; just as one enjoys taking out one's money, from time to time,
and counting it, in the mere pleasure of possession. I can think of no
other reason why I should have gone to my portmanteau to have a look at
that foolish old letter and that unspeakable caricature. At anyrate I
went.
The portmanteau was unlocked, and strapped only on one side, because of
the nuisance of hunting up keys and unfastening buckles when at sea.
Dressing in a cabin with a rocking floor beneath one's feet is an
extremely disagreeable process, and I am always unwilling to add to the
necessary time to be expended in the operation by fastening up bags and
portmanteaus.
Let them lie open, day and night--there are no thieves to come picking
and stealing at the first-class passengers' end of the ship! That is
what had been my idea in the matter, an idea supported by the reflection
that I had nothing worth stealing. But when I went to the portmanteau
and found that both letter and picture had totally disappeared, I
realised, not for the first time, that Mr. James Strong was an
individual whose craftiness should not be measured with the ordinary
tape-yard applicable to the shrewdness of others. He required a measure
all to himself. He had got the better of us again!
*CHAPTER XXXV*
*MORE CHECKS*