A GHOST OF A CHANCE
His first experience of life crushed down with all the weight of the
world on Daniel Sweetland and kept him dumb. He stared straight before
him and only answered with nod or shake of head the remarks addressed to
him by Luke Bartley and the inspector.
“Better leave the lad in peace,” said the kindly giant, who drove. “He
wants to think, an’ no doubt he’s got a deal to think about.”
The prisoner’s native genius now worked swiftly with him, and his sole
thought was of escape as dusk gathered on Dartmoor. He puzzled his head
in vain to see the drift of these doings. It seemed that his gun had been
found beside the spot where Adam Thorpe was shot. What human hands could
have put it there? He knew of no enemy on earth. Measuring the chances
of establishing an _alibi_, he saw that they were small. Search could
prove the fact that he had killed pheasants on the previous night, and it
was quite possible for him to have killed a man also. He might have shot
Thorpe at Middlecott and have spoken to the other keepers at Westcombe
afterwards. Indeed, the hours agreed. Then he remembered the shadow that
had leapt up out of the heath when he left Hangman’s Hut for the last
time. That man it was who had destroyed him; and that man would never be
found unless Daniel himself made the discovery. Revolving the matter in
his young brains, the poacher believed that his only chance was present
escape.
Once free and beyond the immediate and awful danger of the moment, Daniel
Sweetland trusted that he might establish his innocence and prove the
truth. But as a prisoner on trial, with his present scanty knowledge,
there appeared no shadow of hope. He looked up at the man who drove and
instinctively strained the steel that handcuffed his wrists. Escape
seemed a possibility as remote as any miracle.
“What be your name, policeman?” asked Daniel, meekly. “You took me very
quiet an’ gentle, an’ I thank you for it.”
“I’m called Corder--Alfred Corder. I’m the biggest man in the force.”
“An’ so strong as you’m big, by the looks of it.”
“Well, I’ve yet to meet my master,” said the officer. He had one little
vanity, and that was his biceps.
“Be you any relation to Alf Corder, the champion of Devon wrestling,
then?”
“I am the man,” said Mr Corder. “Never been throwed since I was
twenty-two; an’ now I’m thirty-four.”
Daniel nodded.
“A very famous hero. I should have thought you’d make more money
wrestling in London than ever you would doing cop’s work to Plymouth.”
The giant was interested at this intelligent remark.
“I’ve often been tempted to try; but I’m not a man that moves very quick
in my mind; though I can shift my sixteen stone of carcase quick enough
when it comes to wrestling or fighting. Once my hand gets over a limb, it
sticks--like a bull-dog’s teeth. ’Tis the greatest grip known in the West
Country--to say it without boasting.”
Daniel nodded and relapsed into silence. He was thinking hard now. All
his ideas centred on the wild hope to escape. Scheme after scheme sped
through his brains. Once a shadowy enterprise actually developed, but he
dismissed it as vain.
Then Luke Bartley spoke to Mr Corder and suggested another line of action.
“This here was the man who had that cute thought that the burglars to
Westcombe got away on a motor-car--didn’t he, Gregory?”
The inspector admitted it.
“Yes; I gave you all credit for that, Sweetland. ’Twas a clever opinion,
and the right one. I’m sure of that. Hue an’ cry was so quick that they
never could have got clear off with any slower vehicle.”
Daniel made no answer; but he jumped at the topic of the recent burglary
and turned it swiftly in his mind. Here, perhaps, was the chance he
wanted. For half an hour he kept silence; then he spoke to Bartley.
“’Twas you who first thought as I might have a hand in that business
myself, Luke?”
“No, no; Mr Gregory here.”
“Of course, I hope you hadn’t; but you might have had. Anyhow, that will
be a mystery for evermore, I reckon,” said the inspector.
“Five thousand pounds’ worth of plate they took,” explained Daniel to his
driver; but Mr Corder knew all about it.
“Five thousand and more. ’Twas always a great regret to me that I wasn’t
in that job.”
“You couldn’t have done no better than I done,” struck in Gregory. “That
I’ll swear to. The London man gave me great credit for what I did do. He
said he’d never known such a nose for a clue. That was his own words.”
“It was,” declared Bartley. “That was the very word of the London man,
for I heard it.”
“They are not a bit smarter than us to Plymouth really,” said Corder.
“I’ve known them make mistakes that I’d have blushed to make. But ’tis
just London. If a thing comes from London it must be first chop. They
only beat Plymouth in one matter as I knows about; an’ that’s their
criminal classes.”
“Not but what we’ve got our flyers at a crime too,” said Mr Gregory,
who was highly patriotic. “Take that there burglary job to Westcombe.
’Twasn’t a fool who planned and carried that out.”
“But they comed down from London for certain,” argued Corder.
“They might, or they might not,” answered the inspector.
“Then, for murders like this here murder of Adam Thorpe,” added Bartley.
“I’m sure the county of Devon stands so high as anybody could wish.
’Tisn’t a deed to be proud of, certainly; but I won’t allow for one that
London beats Devonsheer in anything. As many hangs to Exeter gaol as to
any other county gaol in my knowledge.”
“Shall I hang over this job, do ’e reckon, Mr Corder?” asked Daniel,
humbly.
“Ban’t for me to say, my son. A gun be a very damning piece of evidence.
But if you can prove you wasn’t there, that’s all that need be done.”
“I was using my gun, but--”
“Don’t say nothing to me,” interrupted the giant. “I wish you well; but
anything you say is liable to be used against you according to law.
Therefore you’ll do wisest to keep your mouth shut till you can get your
lawyer to listen to you.”
Silence fell; then the Warren Inn came into sight, and at the same moment
Mr Corder pulled up and looked anxiously down his horse’s flank.
“Just jump out, will ’e, one of you men, an’ see if he’s picked up a
stone. He has gone lame all of a sudden--in the near hind leg, I think.”
Bartley alighted and lifted the horse’s hoof. Then he examined the
others. But there was no stone. Yet the horse went lame when they started
again.
“He’s hurt his frog. He’ll be all right in an hour,” said Gregory, who
was learned on the subject. “Here’s the Warren Inn just handy. You’ll do
well to put up there for a bit. Us can go in the parlour an’ wait; then,
if there’s any in the bar, they won’t see us.”
John Beer and his wife were, of course, not yet at home; but a potman
kept house and waited in the public room.
The place was empty. Mr Corder and Gregory took Daniel Sweetland into a
little parlour, while Bartley stabled the lame horse.
Presently he returned and brought a lamp with him, for it was now growing
dark.
“An hour I’ll wait, and only an hour,” declared Corder. “Then, if the
horse be still lame, we must get another.”
The officers sent for bread, cheese and beer. They asked Daniel to join
them, and he agreed; then suddenly, while they were at their meal, he
spoke.
“I’ve got a word to say to you chaps. ’Tis a terrible matter, but I’d
rather have it off my mind than on it just at present. Will you do the
fair thing if I tell you, an’ give me credit after?”
“You’d better far keep quiet,” said Corder.
“’Tis like this. The cleverness of you three men mazes me. To think as
Gregory here saw so clear about the burglary; an’ Bartley too! Well,
now your horse goes lame an’ everything. ’Tis fate, an’ so I’ll speak if
you’ll listen. Only I ax this as a prisoner; I ax this as the weak prays
the strong for mercy; that you’ll remember to my credit how I made a
clean breast of everything without any pressure from any of you.”
Mr Corder stared.
“Trouble’s turned your head, my son, by the looks of it. Whatever rummage
be you talking about?”
“’Tis sense, I promise you. I nearly told just now when us was speaking
about the burglary. Then, just here of all places, your horse falls lame.
’Tis like Providence calling me to speak.”
Daniel was playing his solitary card. The chances were still a thousand
to one against him; but he saw a faint possibility, if things should
fall out right. His swift mind had seized the accident of the horse’s
lameness, and his plot was made.
“Be plain if you can,” said Corder. “Don’t think I’m against you. Only I
say again, there’s no power in us to help you, even if we had the will.”
“I’m thinking of last August--that burglary. Well, now, how about it
if I was able to help you chaps to clear that up? Wouldn’t I be doing
you a good turn, Greg, if you was able to say at headquarters that by
cross-questioning me you’d wormed the truth out of me?”
Mr Gregory stared. He licked his lips at the very idea.
“An’ if Mr Corder here was agreeable, an’ let me explain, you might find
that when you drive into Plymouth in a few hours’ time, you would be
taking five thousand pounds of silver plate along with you, besides me.
Wouldn’t there be a bit of a stir about it--not to name the reward? Why,
you’d all be promoted for certain.”
“Twelve hundred and fifty pounds’ reward was offered by the parties,”
said Mr Corder.
“And do you mean that you know anything?” asked the inspector, much
excited.
“I mean this. You was right, Gregory, I didn’t do the burglary, but
I knowed about it, and I can tell you all an’ more than you want to
know. There’s twelve hundred and fifty pounds for the men who recover
that Giffard silver; an’ it can be done. But what I ax you three men is
this--If I put that money into your pockets, will you do something for
me?”
“That’s impossible,” answered Corder, firmly. “I know what’s in your
mind, my lad; and ’tis natural enough that it should be; but you might
so soon ask them handcuffs on your wrist to open without my key as ask me
to help you now, if that’s your game.”
“It isn’t,” answered Daniel. “Afore God, no such thought as axing you to
let me go comed in my mind. ’Twould be like offering you three men five
thousand pound to let me off. I wouldn’t dream of such a thing. You’re
honourable, upright chaps, an’ I respect you all a lot too much to do it.
Five thousand pound divided into three be only a dirty little sixteen
hundred or so apiece. Though, as a matter of fact, there was far more
took than that. But I never meant no such thing. I’m booked for trial,
an’ you can’t help me. No, you can’t help me--none of you. ’Tis my poor
little wife I be breaking my heart for.”
A fly crawled up to the inn as Daniel spoke and stopped at the door.
Looking out through the open window, he caught a passing glimpse of
Minnie herself under the lamp at the door, and heard her voice. She paid
the driver and he went into the bar; but Daniel knew that Minnie was now
walking alone across the Moor to Hangman’s Hut.
“Go on,” said Gregory. “Let’s hear all you’ve got to say. No harm in
that. My heart bleeds for your mother, not your wife, Sweetland. Little
did she think that she was bringing such a bad lot into the world the day
you was born.”
“I’m not so bad neither. Anyway, time’s too short to be sorry now. ’Tis
like this. It’s not in my mind to ax anything for myself; but I pray for
a bit of mercy for my wife. If I swing over this, what becomes of her?
She’ve got but fifty-five pounds in the world.”
“’Tis enough to keep her till an honest man comes along an’ marries her,”
said Bartley. “For that matter, Titus Sim will wed her if the worst
overtakes you, Daniel.”
“You put it plain,” answered the prisoner, “an’ I thank you for it, Luke.
All the same, they may not hang me; an’ if I get penal servitude, Minnie
can’t marry any other man. Now the reward for finding out that burglary
job be twelve hundred an’ fifty pounds, as Mr Corder says. That divided
betwixt the three of you would be four hundred odd apiece. An’ I want to
know just what you’ll do about it. In exchange for the money an’ fame an’
glory this job will bring you men, I want two hundred pounds--not for
myself, but for my poor girl. Ban’t much to ax, an’ not a penny less will
I take. That’s my offer, an you’d best to think upon it. If you refuse, I
shall make it to somebody else.”
Silence followed. Then Dan spoke again.
“’Tis terrible awkward eating bread an’ cheese wi’ handcuffs on. Will e’
take ’em off for a bit, please? I can’t get out of the winder, for ’tis
too small; so if you stands afore the door, you needn’t fear I’ll give
you the slip.”
Mr Corder perceived the truth of this and freed the prisoner’s hands.
“You’ve put a pretty problem afore us, young man,” he said; “an’ us must
weigh it in all its parts. Can’t say as ever I had a similar case in my
experience.”
“Nor me neither,” declared Inspector Gregory.
Bartley remained silent. He was asking himself what it would feel like to
be the richer by hundreds of pounds.
Daniel ate his bread and cheese, drank a pint of beer, and held out his
wrists for the handcuffs.
Then Mr Corder himself went to see to his horse, and while he was away
Daniel spoke to the others.
“You chaps know how hard a thing it is to get the public ear.
Surely--surely ’tis worth your while to find out this great burglary job
an’ put money in your pockets? You’m fools to hesitate. But if you be
such greedy souls that you won’t spare a crumb to my poor wife, then you
sha’n’t have a penny, so help me.”
“’Tis throwing away money to refuse,” declared Bartley to Corder, who
now returned. “You see, that money have got to be earned, an’ why for
shouldn’t we earn it? There’s no under-handed dealings, or playing with
the law.”
“The hoss is all right again, an’ the sooner we go the better,” answered
Mr Corder.
“You won’t fall in then?” asked Daniel, with a sinking heart.
“I don’t say that; but if you’m in earnest, you can tell us all about it
as we go along.”
“An’ you’ll swear, all three of you, to give Minnie Sweetland two hundred
pounds of the reward?”
“I will,” said Bartley. “’Tis flying in the face of Providence to do
otherwise.”
“If it can be proved we’m not straining the law, I’ll do the same,”
declared Inspector Gregory. “What do you say, Corder?”
“The law’s clear, for that matter,” answered the big man. “The law ban’t
strained. The law have nothing to do with a private bargain. This here
man comes to us an’ says, ‘I’ll put you chaps in the way to make twelve
hundred an’ fifty pounds between you.’ An’ we says, ‘Do it.’ Then he
says, ‘But I must have two hundred for my wife; because I, who be her
natural support, be taken from her.’ Well--there it is. My conscience is
clear. Since he’s brought to book an’ may go down on it, the burglary
never will be any use to him; so he peaches. For my part I’ll promise
what he wants this minute.”
“And so will I,” said Bartley. “’Tis a very honest, open offer for a
condemned man.”
“Not condemned at all--merely an arrested man,” corrected Gregory. “An’
I’ll take his offer too,” he added; “so it only remains for him to tell
us where the stuff be hidden.”
Daniel looked straight into Corder’s face.
“That was why I axed you not to be in a hurry,” he said. “The Giffard
plate from Westcombe was brought up to the Moor, an’ such a fuss have
been made that the burglars haven’t been able to get it clear for all
these weeks. Nobody dared to go near it. But I’ve kept secret watch on it
for ’em. As for the stuff, ’tis within a mile of this very house, though
I daresay Johnny Beer would have a fit if he knowed about it.”
“Within reach of us?” gasped Bartley.
“That’s why I said you could take it along to Plymouth to-night, if you
had a mind to. Drive across with me into King’s Oven under Hurston Ridge
an’ borrow a spade or two, an’ I’ll wager you’ll have every pennyweight
of the silver in your trap in two hours or less from this minute. Take it
or leave it. I’m in solemn earnest; that I swear to. Only this I’ll say:
you’ll not find it without me--not if you dig for ever an’ a day. ’Tis
safe enough.”
The policemen held a hurried colloquy aside. In Gregory’s mind was a
growing suspicion that the prisoner did not speak the truth. But the
others believed him.
“What motive should he have to lie about it?” asked Corder, under his
breath. “It won’t advantage him if we find nothing. If we do find it, the
credit is ours. An’ I sha’n’t grudge his wife her share of the reward,
I’m sure. Ban’t even as if ’twas blood money; for that stealing job won’t
make any difference to this hanging one. Better let him show us the stuff
now. Who be the worse? If he’s fooling us, he’s not helping himself. For
my part, I believe him. He’s just come from marrying his wife; an’ ’tis
human nature that she should be the uppermost thought in his heart.”
“King’s Oven do lie no more than a mile from here,” said Gregory; “so
there’s no reason why we shouldn’t get going. You put in the hoss, Luke.
Sooner this job’s over an’ we’m on the Plymouth road again, the better
I’ll be pleased.”
Corder spoke to Daniel.
“We’ll fall in with your offer, young man. Show us that stuff an’ your
missis shall have her two hundred pounds so soon as the reward is paid.”
“Very well. If you slip a spade and a pick or two in the trap afore we
start, ’twill be all the better. An’ a bit of rope, for that matter. Us
have got our work cut out,” answered the prisoner. “What they Londoners
will say to me for turning traitor, I don’t know; an’ I don’t care now
neither,” he added.
“You won’t give ’em up?”
“Not the men. Only the stuff--for my wife’s sake.”
Bartley brought the trap to the door, and as Sweetland was helped in, Mr
Beer and his wife drove up in their little market cart.
The police said nothing, and soon they were on their way again, but not
before Johnny Beer had spoken to his friend.
“Keep a cheerful face in this terrible case. Us’ll do all we can for our
old pal, Dan. To think of the tragedy on your wedding day! It have so got
hold upon me that I’ve made tragical rhymes upon it all the way back from
Moreton. Please God, I’ll get the chance to tell ’em to ’e some day.”
“I hope you will, Johnny, though it don’t look very likely.”
The trap drove off. Its lamps were lighted, and they cast a bright blaze
forward into a dark night. Presently Daniel stopped them, and Bartley
jumped down and took the horse’s head.
“Now keep over the grass track to the right an’ us will be in King’s Oven
in ten minutes,” said Sweetland.
Swaying and jolting, their dog-cart proceeded into the great central
silence and stillness of the Moor.