FIVE MILES IN FIVE MINUTES
Dawn fought with night and slowly conquered as Dan in the great motor
panted upwards from Middlecott to the high lands above. His way led
through dense woods, and the blaze of the lamp threw a cone of light far
ahead, while the wheels beneath him turned silently and swiftly over a
carpet of pine needles under the darkness, or jolted over the tree roots
that spread in ridges across the way. To the east a cold pallor stole
between the regiments of trunks, but as yet no bird called or diurnal
beast moved from its holt. In the earth as he drove along, Dan could mark
the fresh imprint of hoofs upon the ground, stamped darkly there. The
gate at the end of the wood hung open as the horseman had left it, and
Sweetland perceived that his master was in the right. Now, chafed by the
sweet cold air, his black face burned and his blood leapt at his heart.
But anger it was that heated him. The trust and friendship and honest
love of a lifetime were turned in these terrible moments to hatred.
As he leapt forward and altered his gear for climbing a steep and
tortuous hill, his mind’s gear likewise changed. From his soul he shut
off love and pity for ever; he forgot all this knave had suffered, but
only remembered his own sufferings and accumulated misfortunes. Sim had
hoped, and still hoped, to hang him; Sim had seized the chance offered
by the Devil to tear him from his young wife’s side upon their wedding
day; Sim had plotted and planned with a spider’s patience and craft to
fill his shoes; and even now what fiend’s errand might he be upon? But
the luxury of rage was not for this moment. Once Dan’s hand shook and in
a second he came near wrecking the motor between lofty hedge-banks. He
saved it by six inches and turned cold at the danger averted. Her life
might depend upon his skill and coolness now. The car grunted slowly up
a stiff hill of rough and broken surface. Here a horse’s progress must
be infinitely swifter than his own. His heart sank at the necessary
tardiness of progress; but his anger died, and, when it was possible to
increase speed, the man had mastered himself and drove with utmost skill
and judgment.
Light began to gather in the sky, and Dan was glad, for in five minutes
more he would be upon the waste land and must make his effort. From the
Moor gate to Johnny Beer’s publichouse was five miles, and Sweetland
calculated that if he could accomplish that distance in as many minutes,
he and Sim ought to arrive at the inn together. But two long and stiff
hills occurred upon the road. These must slow him down considerably and,
to make up for the lost time, it would be necessary to take declivities
and level ground at the greatest pace his car could travel. He thoroughly
estimated the tremendous risks he ran and the fatal issue of any mistake.
He was only thankful that, for good or ill, the ordeal must be over in
minutes. Either he would perish with a broken neck, or he would save
his wife from possible destruction. It was now light enough to see the
road ahead. The Moor gate, blown by the wind, also hung open; he rushed
forward without slackening of speed.
Sim, it seemed, had not counted upon such swift pursuit. By shutting the
gates behind him, he had much improved his own chances, but all stood
ajar save one, and Sweetland’s hope was so much the higher. Now out on
the high Moor, no further obstacles could be met with. The surface was
good, the road wide, and it was unlikely that any vehicle would share the
way with him or be passed, either going or approaching. Ponies or sheep
might, indeed, interrupt him, but he trusted to his hooter to frighten
them away before he reached them.
Dan set the powerful machine at work in earnest, and he felt it gather
itself together beneath him, like a living thing, hum like a hive of
bees, and leap forward with accelerated speed. The road, glimmering in
dawn light, seemed a shining white ribbon that was wound up by the car as
it flew onwards. There came a sensation that he sat upon a huge, busy,
but motionless monster that was swallowing the track. The roadway poured
under his wheels like a river; the Moor to right and left wound away like
mighty wheels whose axes were on the horizon.
Though Dan drove the five miles in rather less than five minutes, the
time to him seemed very long. Twice he was in peril, and twice escaped
death by a shade. At a steep hill, where it became absolutely necessary
to slow down, he put on pace again too soon while yet fifty yards of
the declivity remained to be run. But the car responded quicker than
he expected, and on a little bridge, which spanned the bottom of the
coomb and crossed a stream, his right fore-wheel actually touched the
parapet and the hub of the wheel struck a splinter from the granite,
which shot upward like a bullet and tore Dan’s elbow to the bone. Then
came the last straight mile--a long and level tract upon whose left
stood Bennett’s Cross, while to the right lay Furnum Regis, the Oven of
the King. Now a final rush began, and straining his watering eyes to
look ahead and see if by chance Titus Sim might be in sight, Dan saw,
three hundred yards in front of him, a sheep standing upon the middle
of the road with its back towards the car. He was now running more than
eighty miles an hour, and only seconds separated him from the creature.
He sounded his hooter, but the sheep did not move, and Dan had barely
time to grip the iron rail in front of him when there came the crash of
impact. The car was now skimming the ground rather than running upon it;
thus the full weight of the motor struck the wether. It was hurled ten
yards forward and fell in a crushed heap of wool and bones. The impact
carried away the motor-lamp, which dropped to the right, and the car had
passed between lamp and sheep and was a hundred yards beyond them before
Dan drew his breath. A bolt had given at one end of the bar he held, and
a moment later it became detached in his hand.
Half a minute more and the Warren Inn came into sight, while, at the same
moment, Daniel saw a horse galloping hard three hundred yards ahead
of him. Compared with the speed of the car, it appeared to be standing
still; but just as he found himself beside it, the Warren Inn rose on
his right, and Sweetland was forced to slow down that he might stop.
As he did so he sounded the hooter with all his might to waken Beer.
Sim, on the horse, had become aware of a motor’s approach long before
it reached him, and, guessing that Dan was following, he had pushed his
horse too fast. He knew it was failing; but he also knew that Sweetland
must slow down before he could alight, and the sequel proved him correct,
for Daniel had already overshot the turning to Hangman’s Hut by two
hundred yards before he could pull up. By rather more than two hundred
yards, therefore, Sim had a start upon the half-mile of rough ground
that separated the high road from Minnie’s home. Sim was also mounted,
but herein lay no advantage, for his steed, cruelly over-ridden, now
came down with a crash and threw the rider over his head. Titus turned
a clean somersault and fell in a peat mire on his back unhurt. Dripping
with black mud from head to heel, but none the worse, he rushed on, and
as Daniel breasted the last hillock, he saw Titus knock at the door of
Hangman’s Hut and Minnie throw it wide. Sim’s fall had lost him ground,
and he was not a hundred yards ahead of his enemy when he entered the
cottage.
Wild monsters both the men looked now, but Sweetland’s guise was the
strangest. His shirt had blown open, his hat was off. A breast ivory
white supported his ink-black neck and face. A sleeve had been torn away
as he leapt out of the car, and from a white arm extended a black hand
dripping blood. The blow at the bridge he had not felt, but the man’s arm
was deeply wounded and now gore freely dripped from the injury. In his
hand he carried the front bar of the motor-car, which had come off. Henry
Vivian’s pistol was still in his pocket, but he had forgotten it.
The way now led downhill, and little more than ten seconds had elapsed
before Daniel reached the door of his home. It was shut, but he threw
himself against it and the latch broke. Then he stood in the kitchen of
the cottage and saw Sim with Minnie on her knees at his feet. Titus was
bending over her, and he had one hand on her hair dragging back her head.
The other hand held a jack-knife to his mouth, and he opened this weapon
with his teeth as Sweetland sprang in upon him. Sim’s hand went back for
the blow, but it was not delivered. Instead, his arm was pinned to his
side and he found himself wrestling with a demon.
Both men were powerful, but both were spent. Sweetland had lost much
blood from his elbow, and he found himself growing weak. Titus had fared
better, though he too blew hard after a half-mile run.
He had come to kill Minnie Sweetland; now he exulted and worked to tire
out the other. The knife had fallen out of his hand, but as Minnie rushed
to reach it from him, Sim put his foot upon it.
“So much the better!” he cried, going down easily as Daniel threw him.
“Do what you like--go on--you’re bleeding to death! But Death’s self
sha’n’t cheat me of you. Your death’s my--”
He spoke no more, for Sweetland was now quite aware that only moments
separated him from falling. He was growing weak fast, and his head swam.
He knew that he must strike, and strike with every atom of strength that
remained to him, or he would drop unconscious and leave his wife to her
fate. For a moment he relaxed his hold, and as he did so Sim’s arm shot
out and he grasped his knife. Then a strange thing happened, for the
watching woman, who had disregarded Daniel’s order to fly and escape,
flung herself straight between the men; and it seemed that it was not to
shield her husband, but the would-be murderer, that she came. Daniel had
only loosed his grip to regain his iron bar. This he did and, in using
it, he was quicker than Sim. Even as the footman regained his knife, the
other, now on his knees, raised the heavy and shining metal rod over his
shoulder and, with both hands and all his remaining strength, brought it
down upon Sim’s head. Then between that certain death and the man’s skull
Minnie lifted her slight arm and broke the blow. Like a carrot the bone
cracked, but force enough still remained in Daniel’s stroke to stretch
out his enemy senseless.
“God’s life! Why for did you do that?” cried Dan. “Oh--your little
arm--Minnie--Minnie!”
“’Tis only broke,” she said. “That’s naught. I saw you were going to kill
him. ’Twould have wasted all my work for ’e, husband, an’ spoilt all the
time to come. You be free afore the world, an’ innocent afore the world.
I can prove it, Dan. I can prove it!”
For answer his head rolled back and he fell forward from his knees to the
ground. She stood above the two unconscious men, herself tottering and
powerless to help either.
Then it was that Beer, in the lightest of attire, and followed by his
wife, rushed upon the scene. Mrs Sweetland bade him first tend her
husband, and Johnny soon propped Dan’s head and tied up the bleeding arm
above the elbow. After that Dan recovered consciousness and called to his
wife.
“Give me something to drink--spirits. I shall be all right in an hour.
You was right, Min. ’Twould have been a poor home-coming to kill this
devil. But your arm--that awful sound.”
“You go,” said Johnny to his wife. “Get a bottle of brandy and nip back
as quick as lightning. And call the boy at the same time an’ tell him to
saddle the pony an’ ride like hell for Dr Budd. This chap’s dead, I’m
thinking.”
He spoke of Sim, who had not recovered consciousness.
“What May games be these, Dan Sweetland?” asked Mr Beer. Dan, however,
had no leisure for Johnny. He lay quite still and fought to keep
consciousness.
“Us can’t wait for Sim,” he said; “Minnie’s more than this here man.
After I’ve took in a tumbler of spirits, I’ll stand up again and get to
the car. Then I’ll drive her straight to the cottage hospital and come
back for Sim. He’s not dead. ’Twas that li’l broken arm there saved him.”
“A masterpiece you be, sure enough! Black, an’ blue, an’ bloody; an’ yet
the real old Dan Sweetland, an’ no other! Let me see your elbow again.
Yes, it have done bleeding now.”
“Don’t trouble about me,” said Dan. “Listen to his chest an’ see if you
can hear his heart beating. Ban’t no odds if I’ve killed him; for if I
hadn’t done it, he’d have killed me an’ my wife too. A near shave, by
God! He had her by the hair an’ thicky pig-sticking knife between his
teeth.”
“However comed you to let him in after last night, my dear?” asked Johnny.
“I was on the watch,” she answered. “I seed a man with a black face
running through the dawnlight, an’ I didn’t stop to think, but rushed to
the door an’ flinged it open for him. He was on me like a tiger, an’ I
thought ’twas all over when my husband leapt at him.”
“A brave day’s doings,” said Mr Beer. “Matter for a book of verses, if
you only get well again, Daniel.”
As he spoke he put his ear to the breast of Titus Sim, and the others
waited in silence.
“There’s something going on,” pronounced the publican. “The works be
moving--no doubt ’tis the organ of his heart. But it don’t sound too
merry by no means. However, where there’s life there’s hope; and where
there’s death there’s hope in another world. Though ’twill take the
Almighty all His time to get this chap saved. Cut off with murder in his
heart!”
Mrs Beer returned. She had run all the way, and could not speak for a
time. Daniel drank the spirits like a sailor; then Minnie was made to
take a little, but not until it had been attempted to get some down the
throat of Sim. This, however, proved impossible.
“I’d take him with us in the car,” said Sweetland, “but ’twill be all I
can do to get to it myself. The doctor may look after him. Now, if you
give me an arm, Johnny, I’ll make shift to walk to the road.”
Mrs Beer remained by the senseless footman, and her husband supported
Daniel to the motor. Minnie followed them. She was suffering great agony,
but made no sound. Once, midway between the cottage and the road, Daniel
sat down to rest and drank more brandy; then he reached the motor and
mounted it. Minnie climbed by his side, and the car was turned slowly
round. Dan now felt better, and refused Johnny Beer’s offer to accompany
him.
“I be right now,” he answered. “You go back to that devil in my house,
an’ save his filthy life, if you can.”
Half way to Moreton, Daniel passed the doctor hastening on horseback to
Hangman’s Hut. The medical man stopped a moment, directed Minnie how to
place her arm that her pain might be lessened, and then rode forward
again.
The husband and wife hardly spoke upon the journey into Moretonhampstead,
and it was Minnie’s turn to succumb as the grey, snug shelter of the
cottage hospital came before her eyes. A minute later she was carried out
of the car, and within an hour her broken arm had been set, and she found
herself in a comfortable bed with kind hands busy for her.
In the afternoon of that day Daniel, who had slept for six hours and
taken plenty of useful nourishment, came to spend a little while with his
wife. He found her light-headed, and only stopped five minutes. He felt
the greatest alarm, but those in attendance on the case assured him there
was no need to do so.
Next morning Minnie was better, and Daniel’s visit went far to restore
the even tenor of her mind and customary, patient self-control.
“They brought Sim here last night,” he said. “Mr Vivian went up himself
and fetched the man down with the doctor in the motor-car. And they tell
me that at midnight Sim came to his senses. He’ve got a concussion of the
brain; but his head-bones ban’t cracked, thanks to you; an’ he’s very
likely to live.”