prisoner, even a braw, shock-headed lad, or sonsie, savage lassie of
the country. But he did not do justice to that goddess's love of
mischief. It was she who inspired into Mr. Robert Lambert the desire
to shine in the Great World; and it was she who gave him the idea of
taking for the season Lord Hardacre's house and forest of Tullispaith,
in lieu of the cash which he would never get. Thither he invited
certain spirited young clients, who had practically only the choice of
being Mr. Lambert's guests at Tullispaith or King Edward's at Holloway.
Thither he came, a week beforehand, to make ready for them.
At once he set about becoming an accomplished deer-stalker. For three
days he rode, or tramped, about the forest of Tullispaith, in search of
red deer which, in quite foolish estimate of their peril, insisted
always on putting a hill between themselves and his rifle. On the
fourth day he rested, for though his spirit was willing, his legs were
weak. This inactivity irked him, for he knew the tireless energy of
the English sportsman; and at noon Fortune inspired him with the most
disastrous idea of all, the idea of taking a stroll by himself. He
took his rifle and a packet of sandwiches, and set out. Now to the
unpractised eye any one brae, or glen, or burn of bonnie Scotland is
exactly like any other brae, or glen, or burn of that picturesque land.
He had not gone two miles before he had lost his way.
He did not mind, for he was sure that he knew his direction. He was
wrong; he may have been like his Oriental ancestors in some of his
qualities, but he lacked their ingrained sense of orientation; and he
was walking steadily away from the house of Tullispaith. He rested
often and he looked often at his watch. He passed over the border of
Tullispaith into the forest of Ardrochan, and wandered wearily on and
on. The autumn sun was moving down the western sky at a disquieting
speed, when at last he caught sight of the Dell's Den, and with a new
energy hurried towards it.
At about the same time Hildebrand Anne, the robber baron of Ardrochan,
caught sight of him, mounted Black Rudolph, and rode down to meet him,
ready to drag or lure him to his stronghold. The angel face of Tinker
had never looked more angelic to human being than it looked to the
weary money-lender. He had never seen him before; therefore, he had no
reason to suppose that that face was not the index to an angelic
nature. Unfortunately, Tinker knew by sight most of his father's
friends and enemies, and at the first glance he recognised the squat
figure, the thick, square nose, and muddy complexion of Mr. Robert
Lambert.
"My lad," said the money-lender, failing to perceive that he was
addressing one of the worst kind of man in all romance, "I've lost my
way. I want to get to the house of Tullispaith. Which is the road?"
"There is no road; and it's eight miles away," said Tinker, knitting
his brow into the gloomy and forbidding frown of a robber baron.
"Eight miles! What am I to do? Where is the nearest place I can get a
conveyance?"
"It would be a twenty-mile drive if you got a cart, and there's no cart
nearer than Ardrochan, and that's six miles away."
"Well, then, a horse, or a pony, and a guide?"
"You could get a pony at Hamish Beg's; and one of his sons could guide
you."
"Where does he live? How can I get there?"
"Three miles the other side of that tower."
"Will you show me the way? I'll give you--I'll give you half-a-crown."
"Hildebrand Anne of Ardrochan is not the hired varlet of every
wandering chapster," said Tinker with a splendid air.
"I'm not a wandering chapster," said the money-lender. "I'm a
gentleman of London. I'll give you five shillings--half a sovereign--a
pound!"
"The offer of money to one in whose veins flows the proudest blood of
the North is an insult!" said Tinker in a terrible voice.
"No offence! No offence!" said Mr. Lambert, cursing what he believed
to be the penniless Highland pride under his breath.
Suddenly Tinker saw his way. "From the top of yon tower I can show you
the path to Hamish Beg's. Follow me," he said, turned his pony, and
led the way up the hill with a sinister air.
With a groan, the money-lender, quite unobservant of the sinister air,
breasted the ascent. He set down his rifle by the door of the tower,
and followed Tinker up the ladders.
"You see those two pine trees between those two far hills?" said Tinker.
Mr. Lambert drew round his field-glasses, and after long fumbling,
focussed them on the pines. "Well?" he said.
There was no answer; he turned to his angel guide, and found himself
alone on the tower. He ran to the top of the ladder and looked down.
At the bottom stood Tinker regarding him with an excellent sardonic
smile: "Ha! ha!" he cried in a gruff, triumphant voice,
"Trapped--trapped!" And he turned on his heel.
The money-lender heard the door slam and the key turn in the lock. He
ran to the parapet, and saw Tinker mounting his pony with an easy grace
and the air of one who has performed a meritorious action.
"Hi! Hullo! What are you up to?" cried Mr. Lambert.
"Foul extortioner! Your crimes have found you out! You have consigned
many a poor soul to the dungeon, it is your turn now," said Tinker with
admirable grandiloquence. Then, dropping to his ordinary voice, he
added plaintively: "Of course it's not really a dungeon; it ought to be
underground--with rats. But we must make the best of it."
"Look here, my lad," said Mr. Lambert thickly. "I don't want any of
your silly games! I shall be late enough home as it is. You unlock
that door, and show me the way to this Beg's at once! D'ye hear?"
Tinker laughed a good scornful laugh. "Lambert of London," he said,
returning to the romantic vein, "to-night reflect on your misdeeds.
To-morrow we will treat of your ransom. Hans Breithelm and Jorgan
Schwartz, ye answer for this caitiff's safe keeping with your heads! I
charge ye watch him well. To horse, my brave men. We ride to
Ardrochan!" And he turned his pony.
[Illustration: "To-night reflect on your misdeeds. To-morrow we will
treat of your ransom."]
The money-lender broke into threats and abuse; then, as the pony drew
further away, he passed to entreaties. Tinker never turned his head;
he rode on, brimming with joyous triumph; he had a real prisoner.
Mr. Lambert shouted after him till he was hoarse, he shouted after him
till his voice was a wheezy croak. Tinker passed out of sight without
a glance back, and, for a while, that iron-hearted, inexorable man of
many loans, sobbed like a child with mingled rage and fear. Then he
scrambled down the ladder, and tried the door. There was no chance of
his bursting it open; that was a feat far beyond his strength; and
though he might have worked the rusted bars out of the window, he could
never have forced his rotundity through it. Then he bethought himself
of passers-by, and hurried to the top of the tower. There was no one
in sight. He shouted and shouted till he lost his voice again; the
echoes died away among the empty hills. He leaned upon the parapet
waiting, with the faintest hope that the diabolical boy would tire of
his joke, return, and set him free. Again and again he asked himself
who was this boy who had recognised him in this Scotch desert.
The dusk gathered till he could not see a hundred yards from the tower.
Then he came down, struck a match, and examined the bottom room; it was
being borne in upon him that he was destined to spend the night in it.
It was some twelve feet square, and the stone floor was clean. In one
corner was a pile of heather; but there was no way of stopping up the
window, and the night was setting in chill.
He went back to the top of the tower; it was dark now. He shouted
again. The conviction of the hopelessness of his plight was taking a
strong hold upon him, and he was growing hungry. He stamped wearily
round the top of the tower to warm his chilling body, pondering a
hundred futile plans of escape, breaking off to consign to perdition
the deceptive angel child, and meditating many different revenges. At
the end of an hour he went down the ladder, and flung himself on the
pile of heather in a paroxysm of despair.
Till nearly ten o'clock he went now and again to the top of the tower,
and shouted. He was beginning to grow very hungry. At ten o'clock he
buried himself in the heather, and slept for an hour. He awoke cold
and stiff, and his sensitive stomach, used to the tenderest indulgence,
was clamouring angrily. He was learning what the cold and hunger,
which, by a skilful manipulation of the laws of his adopted country, he
had been able to mete out to many foolish innocents with no grudging
hand, really were. He went to the top of the tower, and shouted
fruitlessly; he warmed himself by stamping up and down; then he came
and slept again. This was his round all the night through: snatches of
uneasy sleep, cold and hungry awakenings, shoutings, and stampings
round the top of the tower.
Meanwhile Tinker had ridden joyously home, and shown himself in such
cheerful spirits during dinner that Sir Tancred had observed him with
no little suspicion, wondering if it could really be that he had found
opportunities of mischief even in a deer-forest. After dinner Tinker
went into the kitchen, where he found Hamish Beg supping. He talked to
him for a while, on matters of sport; then he said, "I say, you told me
about the headless woman and the red-headed man with his throat cut, at
the Deil's Den, but you never told me about the man in brown who shouts
and waves from the top of the tower, and when you come to it, it's
empty."
Hamish, the cook, and the two maids burst into a torrent of
exclamations in their strange language. "Yes," said Tinker, "a man in
brown who shouts and waves from the top of the tower, and when you come
to it, no one's there."
He kept his story to this, and presently came back to his father,
assured that the more loudly Mr. Lambert yelled, and the more wildly he
waved, the further would any inhabitant of Ardrochan fly from the
Deil's Den. He went to bed in a gloating joy, which kept him awake a
while; and it was during those wakeful moments that a memory of "Monte
Cristo" suggested that he should gain a practical advantage from what
had so far been merely an act of abstract justice.
It was past eleven when Tinker came riding over the hills at the head
of his merry, but imaginary men. Horribly hungry, but warmed by the
sun to a quite passable malignity, the money-lender watched his coming
from the top of the tower, pondering how to catch him and thrash him
within an inch of his life. He did not know that far more active men
than he had cherished vainly that arrogant ambition, but Tinker's
cheerful and confident air afforded little encouragement to his purpose.
"Halt!" cried the robber baron, reining up his pony. "Hans and Jorgan,
is your captive safe? Good. Bring him forth." He turned to his
invisible band. "To your quarters, varlets! I would confer alone with
the usurious"--he rolled the satisfying word finely off his
tongue--"rogue."
Hand on hip he sat, and watched his merry figments dismount and lead
away their horses.
He turned, and frowned splendidly on the prisoner. "What think ye of
our hospitality, Lambert of London?" he said.
Mr. Lambert scowled; his emotion was too deep for words.
Suddenly Tinker dropped the robber baron, and became his frank and
engaging self: "I'm sorry to be so late," he said with a charming air
of apology, "but I had to send a message to Tullispaith to say that you
would not be back till Saturday, or perhaps Monday."
"What!" screamed Mr. Lambert. "What do you mean?"
"Well, I didn't want them to hunt for you. I'm going to keep you here
till you do what I want," said Tinker with a seraphic smile.
"You young rascal! You mean to try and keep me here!" screamed Mr.
Lambert, jumping about in a light, but ungainly fashion. "Oh, I'll
teach you! I'll make you repent this till your dying day! You think
you can keep me here! You shall see. The first shepherd, the first
keeper who passes will let me out. And I won't rest"--and he swore an
oath quite unfit for boyish ears--"till I've hunted you down!"
"No one will come within a mile of the Deil's Den," said the unruffled
Tinker. "It's haunted by a headless woman and a redheaded man with his
throat cut. But perhaps you've seen them. Besides, I've told them
that there's a man in brown who shouts and waves, and then disappears
when anyone comes to the tower. Why, if they see you, they'll run for
their lives." He spoke with a convicting quietness.
Mr. Lambert doubled up over the parapet in a gasping anguish.
"You're not going to leave here till you give me a letter for your
clerk, telling him to hand over Sir Tancred Beauleigh's promissory
note," said Tinker.
Mr. Lambert rejected the suggestion in extravagant language.
"You bandy words with me!" cried the Baron Hildebrand Anne of
Ardrochan. "Lambert of London, beware! Think, rash rogue, on your
grinders! Hans and Jorgan, prepare the red-hot pincers! You have a
quarter of an hour to reflect, Lambert."
He flung himself off his pony, tethered it, strode down to the spring
which trickled out of the hillside some forty yards away, and came back
bearing a big jug full of water.
Mr. Lambert watched him in a bursting fury, at whiles scanning the
empty hills with a raging eye. Suddenly light dawned on him: "Are you
the boy who stole the flying-machine?" he cried.
"You mind your own business!" said Tinker tartly; it was his cherished
belief that he had borrowed the flying-machine.
Mr. Lambert understood at last with whom he had to deal; and the
knowledge was not cheering. His angry stomach clamoured at him to come
to terms, but his greed was still too strong for it.
"The time is up, Lambert of London!" said Tinker presently, very
sternly. "Will you ransom your base carcase?"
The money-lender turned his back on him with a lofty dignity.
"Ha! ha! Hunger shall tame that proud spirit!" said the Baron of
Ardrochan.
Suddenly the money-lender heard the door opened, and he dashed for the
ladder. He scrambled down it in time to hear the key turn again, but
the jug of water stood inside. He took it up and drank a deep draught.
He had not known that he was so thirsty, never dreamed that water could
be so appetising. He heard Tinker summon his men, and when he came
back to the top of the tower, he was riding away. He watched him go
with a sinking heart, and, since he was so empty, it had a good depth
to sink to. Twice he opened his mouth to call him back, but greed
prevailed.
The day wore wearily through. His spoilt stomach was now raving at him
in a savage frenzy. Now and again he shouted, but less often as the
afternoon drew on, for he knew surely that it was hopeless.
As the dusk fell, he found himself remembering Tinker's words about the
headless woman and the redheaded man, and began to curse his folly in
not having come to terms. At times his hunger was a veritable anguish.
This night was a thousand times worse than the night before. His
hunger gave him little rest, and he awoke from his brief sleep in fits
of abject terror, fancying that the redheaded man was staring in
through the window; he saw his gashed throat quite plainly. He grew
colder and colder, for he was too faint with hunger to stamp about the
top of the tower. Later he must have grown delirious, for he saw the
headless woman climbing up the ladder to the second story. It must
have been delirium, for the figure he saw wore an ordinary nightrail,
whereas the lady of the legend wore a russet gown. Some years later,
as it seemed to him, the dawn came. It grew warmer; and he huddled
into the pile of heather and slept.
He was awakened by a shout of "Lambert of London, awake!" and tottering
to the window, groaning, he beheld a cold grouse, a three-pound chunk
of venison, two loaves, and a small bottle of whiskey neatly set out on
a napkin. His mouth opened and shut, and opened and shut.
"The letter, rogue! Are you going to give me the letter?" shouted the
Baron Hildebrand Anne fiercely.
Mr. Lambert tore himself from the window, and flung himself down on the
heather, sobbing. "Fourteen hundred and fifty pounds!" he moaned,
"Fourteen hundred and fifty pounds!--and costs!" Suddenly his wits
cleared . . . What a fool he'd been! . . . Why shouldn't he give the
boy the letter, and wire countermanding his instructions? . . . Oh, he
had been a fool!
He hurried to the window, and cried, "Yes, yes, I'll give it you! Give
me the paper. I've got a fountain pen!"
"You'd better have a drink of whiskey first; your hand will be too
shaky to write your usual handwriting," said the thoughtful Tinker,
handing him the bottle along with the note-paper.
Mr. Lambert took a drink, and indeed it steadied his hand. Sure that
he could make it useless, he wrote a careful and complete letter, lying
at full length on the floor, his only possible writing table.
He scrambled up, and thrust it through the window, crying, "Here you
are! Let me out!"
Tinker spelled the letter carefully through, and put it into another
letter he had already prepared to send to Sir Tancred's solicitors.
Then he handed the money-lender a thick venison sandwich, cut while he
had been writing.
The tears ran down Mr. Lambert's face as his furious jaws bit into it.
"Don't wolf it!" said Tinker sternly. "Starving men should feed
slowly."
Mr. Lambert had no restraint; he did wolf it. Then he asked for more.
"In a quarter of an hour," said Tinker, and he gave him nothing sooner
for all his clamorous entreaties.
After a second sandwich the money-lender was another man, and Tinker,
seeing that he was not ill, said, "I must be going; I have a long ride
to post this letter"; and he began to hand in the rest of the food
through the window.
"Be careful not to eat it all up at once," he said. "It's got to last
you till to-morrow."
"What's this! What's this!" cried Mr. Lambert. "You promised to
release me when you got the letter!"
"When I get the promissory note, or when my father's solicitor gets it.
I've told him to wire."
The money-lender snarled like a dog; his brilliant idea had proved of
no good. He stormed and stormed; Tinker was cheerful, but indifferent.
He thrust a rug he had brought with him through the window, summoned
his phantom band, and rode away.
Mr. Lambert spent a gloomy, but, thanks to the soothing of his stomach,
a not uncomfortable day. He was very sad that he had lost the chance
of swindling Sir Tancred Beauleigh out of 1450 pounds; and his sadness
and an occasional twinge of rheumatism filled him with thoughts of
revenge. Slowly he formed a plan of disabling Tinker by an unexpected
kick when he opened the door, thrashing him within an inch of his life,
riding off on his pony, and leaving him helpless, to starve or not,
according as he might be found. This plan was a real comfort to him.
He passed an unhaunted night; and next morning Tinker brought him more
food. For some hours he played at robber baron, and now and again held
conversations about the money-lender with his band. None of them
contained compliments. Mr. Lambert watched him with a sulky malignity,
and matured his plan.
The next morning he awoke late, but very cheerful at the prospect of
freedom and revenge. He came to the window rubbing his hands joyfully,
and saw a little parcel hanging from the bars. He opened it, and found
the key of the door, a little compass, and a letter. Swearing at his
vanished chance of revenge, he opened it; it ran:
Fly at once. Steer N. E. for Tulyspathe. Hamish believes you are
uncanny, and has molded a silver bullet out of a half crown to lay your
resless spirrit with. His rifel is oldfashuned, but he will not miss
and waist the half crown he is so thriffty.
A SEKRET WORNER.
Mr. Lambert steered N.E. at once; he went not like the wind, but as
much like the wind as his soft, short legs would carry him. He scanned
every bush and gully with fearful eyes; he gave every thicket a wide
berth, and every time he saw Hamish, and he saw him behind a thousand
bushes and boulders, he shouted: "I'm Mr. Lambert from London, I'm not
a spirit!"
It was, indeed, a wasted and dirty money-lender who reached Tullispaith
late in the day. He had but one thought in his mind, to fly
immediately after dinner from this expansive and terrifying country.
He wired to his guests not to come; he discharged his servants; and as
he crossed the border next day, he bade farewell to the stern and wild
Caledonia in a most impressive malediction.
When Sir Tancred Beauleigh received his lawyer's letter containing the
promissory note, he was not a little bewildered; Tinker was quick to
enlighten him; and he heard that angel child's explanation of his
application of mediaeval German methods to a modern monetary difficulty
with a grateful astonishment.
CHAPTER NINE
TINKER INTERVENES
Sir Tancred lingered on at Ardrochan Lodge, for he saw that in that
strong air Tinker was losing the last of the delicacy which had been
the effect of his attack of scarlet fever. And when Lord Crosland and
two other men joined him there, he was very well contented. The others
shared his content; Tinker, more and more the Baron Hildebrand of
Ardrochan, was quite happy, and there they stayed till the Scotch
winter came down on them in all its fell severity.
Then they moved southwards to Melton Mowbray, and hunted till the frost
put an end to that sport. On the third night of the frost, as they
were cutting for partners for a fresh rubber of bridge, Lord Crosland
said: "I tell you what, Beauleigh, the sooner we get out of this
weather the better. Let's be off to Monte Carlo, make up a pool, and
try that system of yours."
"It's a very good idea," said Sir Tancred. "The only question is
whether the English winter isn't good for Tinker. It's hardening, you
know."
"Always Tinker," said Lord Crosland with a smile. "I tell you what,
Nature ought to have made you a woman: what a splendid mother you'd
have made!"
"I think she'd have found she'd made a pretty bad mistake," said Sir
Tancred.
"Besides," said Lord Crosland, "the Admirable is as hard as a tenpenny
nail as it is. I've never seen the little beggar tired yet; and I've
seen him at the end of some hardish days."
"Well, we'll see," said Sir Tancred. "We're partners." And the game
went on.
Next morning he asked Tinker if he would like to go to the south of
France, or stay and be hardened. Tinker thought a while, made up his
mind that his father would like to go to the South of France, and said,
"I think I'm hard enough, sir,--to go on with. Besides,
"When the wind is in the East
It's neither fit for man nor beast.
In fact it shrivels me up. I should like some sunshine."
"Then we will go," said Sir Tancred.
Accordingly, the middle of the next week found them lodged at the Hôtel
des Princes, Monte Carlo, enjoying the nourishing sunshine of the
Riviera. At least Tinker was enjoying it; the demands of a system
required his father and Lord Crosland to spend most of their day in the
darker, though hardly cooler air of the Temple of Fortune. But the
system went well, and they did not repine.
The first time he dined in the restaurant of the hotel, Sir Tancred was
disagreeably surprised to see sitting at a neighbouring table his
loathed uncle, Sir Everard Wigram. They had met now and again during
the past nine years; but as such a meeting had always resulted in some
severe wound to the Baronet's dignity, he shunned his nephew like the
pest, and abused him from a distance. At the same table sat a
charming, peach-complexioned English girl. After a careful scrutiny of
her, Sir Tancred decided that she must be his cousin Claire, Sir
Everard's eldest child, and admitted with a very grudging reluctance
that even the rule that thorns do not produce grapes is proved by
exceptions. The third person at their table was a handsome young man,
with glossy black hair, a high-coloured, florid face, and a roving
black eye. Sir Tancred's gaze rested on him with a malicious
satisfaction; he knew all about Mr. Arthur Courtnay.
Presently Lord Crosland's eye fell on that table. "Hullo!" he said
sharply. "How on earth comes that bounder Courtnay to be dining with
the Wigrams?"
"Like to like," said Sir Tancred with a surprising, cheerful animation.