by fetching a deep sigh.
"Poor Edmonstone! he is quite touched on the point. Perhaps the affair
brought on a fever at the time, for he is an excitable fellow, and that
would account for it."
"But is he safe?" asked Robson, eagerly. "He can't be!"
"Oh, yes, he is; quite. I repeat, it is only on that one point, and
nobody knows it here. And, mind, you are not to breathe a word of it to
any single soul!"
Philip was entirely taken in for the time being; but his silence was
another matter. That could only be pardoned, even on short lease, by an
apology from the rude Colonial. The doctor's wrists smarted yet; his
self-esteem was still more sore.
"I am so likely," said he, with fine irony, "to do your bidding after
the manner in which you have treated me!"
"Call it taking my hint," said Miles, with a nasty expression in the
eyes again. "You will find it a hint worth acting upon."
"You had no business to treat me as you did. It was a gross outrage!"
said the doctor, haughtily.
"Come, now, I apologise. It arose from my irritation on Edmonstone's
account, at the thing getting out. For his sake, you must indeed promise
to hold your tongue."
"Very well," said Philip Robson, reluctantly; "I--I promise."
And he meant at the time to keep his promise, if he could. In fact, he
did keep it. For a little calm reflection, away from the glamour thrown
by Miles's plausibility, and in the sober light of Philip's own
professional knowledge, served to weaken the case of insanity against
Dick Edmonstone. At the same time, reflection strengthened Edmonstone's
case against Miles, though Robson had only oblique information as to the
specific nature of that case. But at any rate there was no harm in
opening the letter-box (which was cleared in the morning) late at night,
and sending just one anonymous line to the same name and address as
those upon the envelope directed in Edmonstone's hand. If Miles was
really a forger of some kind, and Edmonstone was really shielding him,
then there was an excellent chance of scoring off them both at once.
And Philip Robson had contracted a pretty strong grudge against both
these men since morning.
Meanwhile Miles remained subdued and pensive, furtively attentive, but
extremely humble, towards Miss Bristo, and talkative to one person
only--Mrs. Parish. He was indeed, as he said, no fool. He was full of
cunning and coolness, foresight and resource. He was biding his
time--but for what?
XXIII
THE EFFECT OF A PHOTOGRAPH
Laurence Pinckney was a hopeless sportsman. When he realised this for
himself he laid down his gun, and presently took up with Miss Bristo's
camera as a weapon better suited to him.
Alice had made no use of the apparatus for weeks and weeks; it was sent
down with other luggage without her knowledge, and she never thought of
unpacking it until Mr. Pinckney pleaded for instruction; when--perhaps
because Alice felt that without an occupation this visitor would be on
her hands all day--he did not plead in vain. He did not, however,
require many lessons. He knew something about it already, having given
the subject some attention (in the reading room of the British Museum)
before writing one of his rollicking articles. Nor were the lessons she
did give him much of a nuisance to Alice, for when he forgot to talk
about his work, and refrained from coruscation, there was no more
sensible and polite companion than Laurence Pinckney.
When, therefore, he set out on that Friday's ramble, which produced one
really good negative, and a number of quaint little Arcadian
observations jotted down in his notebook, it was with the entire
photographic impedimenta slung about his person, and some idea in his
head of an article on "The North Yorkshire Dales," to be illustrated by
the writer's own photographs.
His destination was a certain ancient abbey, set in gorgeous scenery,
eight long miles from Gateby. But long before he got there a hollow of
the plain country road tempted him, and he fell.
It was quite an ordinary bit of road; a tall hazel-hedge, and a pathway
high above the road on the left; on the right, a fence with trees beyond
it, one of them, an oak of perfect form, that stood in the foreground,
being of far greater size than most of the trees in this district, and
in strong contrast to its neighbours. That was really all. It never
would have been picturesque, nor have taken our artist's fancy, but for
the sunlight on the wet road and the fleecy pallor of the sky where it
met the sharp line of distant dark blue hills far away over the
hazel-hedge, to the left. But the sunlight was the thing. It came, as
though expressly ordered, from, so to say, the left wing. It rested
lightly on the hedge-tops. It fell in a million golden sparks on the
shivering leaves of the old oak. But it cleared the deep-cut road at a
bound, leaving it dark. Only a long way further on, where the bend to
the right began, did his majesty deign to step down upon the road; and
just there, because everything was wet from last night's rain, it was a
road of silver.
No sooner, however, was the picture focussed than the sun, which made it
what it was, disappeared behind a cloud--a favourite and mischievous
dodge of his for the mortification of the amateur photographer.
Now, while Pinckney waited for the sun to come out again, which he saw
was going to happen immediately, and while he held in his fingers the
pneumatic ball connected with the instantaneous shutter, two figures
appeared at the bend of the road that had been silver track a moment
before. They were a man and a woman, trudging along with the width of
the road between them. Pinckney watched them with painful interest. If
the cloud cleared the sun at that moment they would be horribly in the
way, for worse clouds were following on the heels of this one, and the
opportunity must be seized. There was nothing, of course, to prevent his
taking the tramps as they walked--no, it would spoil the picture. Stay,
though; it would add human interest. But the cloud did not pass so
rapidly after all, and the man and woman drew near the camera.
There was something peculiar in the appearance of the man that struck
Pinckney at once as un-English. This peculiarity was difficult to
localise. It was not in his clothes, which indeed looked new, but it was
partly in his heavy face, smooth-shaven and suntanned, partly in his
slow, slouching, methodical walk, and very much in his fashion of
carrying his belongings. Instead of the pudding-like bundle of the
English tramp he carried across his shoulders a long, neatly-strapped
cylinder, the outer coating of which was a blanket. About the woman, on
the other hand, there was nothing to strike the attention. Pinckney's
first glance took in, perhaps, the fact that her black skirt was torn
and draggled, and her black bodice in startling contrast to her white
face; but that could have been all.
Back came the sun, in a hurry, to the hedge-top and the oak-tree, and
the distant curve of the road. Pinckney had decided in favour of the
tramps in his picture, but they were come too near. He requested them in
his blandest tones to retrace a few steps. To his immense surprise he
was interrupted by a sullen oath from the man, who at once quickened his
steps forward, motioning to the woman to do the same.
"Thankee for nothing, and be hanged to you! Wait till we pass, will
you?"
If Pinckney had wanted further assurance that the man was a foreign
element, these sentences should have satisfied him; for your honest
British rustic is not the man to reject the favours of the camera, be
they never so promiscuous and his chance of beholding the result never
so remote.
Pinckney's answer, however, was a prompt pressure of the pneumatic ball
in his hand--a snap-shot at short range, the click of which did not
escape the sharp ears of the strange-looking, heavily-built old man.
"Have you took us?" asked he fiercely.
"Oh no," replied the photographer, without a blush, "I'm waiting till
you pass; look sharp, or I'll lose the sun again!"
The man scowled, but said no more. Next moment he passed by on one side
of the camera, and the woman on the other. Pinckney looked swiftly from
one to the other, and marked well the face of each. That of the man
repelled him, as bull-dog jaws upon a thick, short neck and small,
cruel-looking glittering eyes would repel most of us, even without this
man's vile expression. The man was tall and broad, but bent, and he
looked twenty years older at close quarters than at a distance. The
woman, on the other hand, was young, but so worn, and pinched, and
soured, and wearied that you had to look closely to find a trace of
youth. She never raised her eyes from the ground as she walked; but
Pinckney made sure they were dark eyes, for the well-formed eyebrows
were blue-black, like a raven's feather. Her wrist-bone showed
prominently--seeming to be covered by little more than skin--as she
caught together the shawl at her bosom with her left hand; a plain gold
hoop was on its third finger.
Pinckney watched the pair out of sight, still walking with the whole
road between them.
"That brute," muttered Pinckney, "beats his wife!"
And then he exposed another plate from the same position, packed up the
apparatus, and went his way.
Some hours later--towards evening, in fact--as Pinckney returned from
his ruined abbey and came in sight of Gateby, the rain--which had
gathered during the afternoon--came down from the leaden twilit sky in
earnest. It rains violently in the dales; and the photographer, hungry
though he was, and more than ready for dinner, saw no reason for getting
wet to the skin when the village was within a stone's-throw, and the
shooting-box half-a-mile further on. He burst into the inn for shelter;
and honest Robert Rutter conducted him to the private parlour with
peculiar satisfaction, having been intimate with Gateby rain many
years, and knowing also a thing or two about the appetites of gentlemen
from the south.
Pinckney, left alone, examined the room. It was gaudily carpeted,
uncomfortably furnished, stuffy for want of use and air, and crowded
with gimcracks. Foxes and birds, in huge cases, were perilously balanced
on absurd little tables. The walls were covered with inflamed-looking
prints, the place of honour being occupied by portraits of mine host and
hostess unrecognisable. The large square centre-table was laid out in
parterres of books never opened. In fact, the parlour was not what you
would have expected of the remote dales. For this very reason, perhaps,
that realist Pinckney took particular pains over the description which
was promptly set down in his note-book. The landlord coming in during
the writing, moreover, the poor man's words were taken out of his mouth
and set down red-hot, and on the phonetic principle, in a parenthesis.
This visit of Rutter's resulted subsequently in a heavy supper of ham
and eggs and beer, and a fire in the parlour, before which Pinckney
contentedly smoked, listening to the rain, which was coming down indeed
in torrents.
It was while this easy-going youth was in the most comfortable
post-prandial condition that the voices in a room, separated from the
parlour only by a narrow passage, grew loud enough to be distinctly
audible in it. Up to this point the conversation had been low and
indistinct, occasional laughter alone rising above an undertone; now the
laughter was frequent and hearty. The reasons were that the room in
question was the tap-room, and the fourth round of beer was already
imbibed. One voice--in which the local accents were missed--led the
talk; the rest interjaculated.
Mr. Pinckney pricked up his ears, and of course whipped out the
insatiable note-book. Simultaneously, in the kitchen, connected with the
tap-room on the opposite side, the landlord and his wife, with the
schoolmaster and his, were bending forward, and solemnly listening to
the stranger's wild stories, with the door ajar. Thus the glib-tongued
personage had more listeners, and more sober listeners, than he was
aware of.
"Sharks?" he was saying. "Seen sharks? You bet I have! Why, when I was
or'nary seaman--betwixt Noocastle, Noo South Wales and 'Frisco it was;
with coals--we counted twenty-seven of 'em around the ship the morning
we was becalmed in three south. And that afternoon young Billy
Bunting--the darling of our crew he was--he fell overboard, and was
took. Took, my lads, I say! Nothin' left on'y a patch of red in the blue
water and a whole set of metal buttons when we landed Mister John Shark
next morning." (Sensation.) "And that's gospel. But the next shark as we
got--and we was becalmed three weeks that go--the skipper he strung him
up to the spanker-boom, an' shot his blessed eyes out with a revolver;
'cause little Billy had been pet of the ship, d'ye see? And then we let
him back into the briny; and a young devil of an apprentice dived over
and swam rings round him, 'cause he couldn't see; and it was the best
game o' blindman's buff ever you seed in your born days." (Merriment.)
"What! Have ye never heard tell o' the shark in Corio Bay, an' what he
done? Oh, but I'll spin that yarn."
And spin it he did; though before he had got far the landlady exchanged
glances with the schoolmaster's lady, and both good women evinced
premonitory symptoms of sickness, so that the worthy schoolmaster
hastily took "his missis" home, and hurried back himself to hear the
end.
"A sailor," said Pinckney, listening in the parlour; "and even at that
an admirable liar."
He went out into the passage, and peeped through the chink of the door
into the tap-room. In the middle of the long and narrow table, on which
the dominoes for once lay idle, stood one solitary tallow candle, and
all around were the shadowy forms of rustics in various attitudes of
breathless attention--it was a snake-story they were listening to now;
and the face of the narrator, thrust forward close to the sputtering
wick, was the smooth, heavy, flexible face of the man whom Pinckney had
photographed unawares on the road.
Pinckney went softly back to the parlour, whistling a low note of
surprise.
"No wonder I didn't recognise the voice! That voice is put on. The surly
growl he gave me this morning in his natural tone. He's making up to the
natives; or else the fellow's less of a brute when he's drunk, and if
that's so, some philanthropist ought to keep him drunk for his natural
life. The terms might be mutual. 'I keep you in drink, in return for
which you conduct yourself like a Christian,--though an intoxicated one,
to me and all men.'"
"Who is that customer?" Pinckney asked of Bob Rutter, as they settled up
outside on the shining flags--shining in the starlight; for the heavy
rain had suddenly stopped, and the sky as suddenly cleared, and the
stars shone out, and a drip, drip, drip fell upon the ear from all
around, and at each breath the nostril drew in a fragrance sweeter than
flowers.
"He's a sailor," said honest Rutter; "that's all I know; I don't ask no
questions. He says his last voyage was to--Australia, I think they call
it--and back."
"I saw he was a sailor," said Pinckney.
"He asked," continued Rutter, "if there was anybody from them parts
hereabout; and I said not as I knowed on, till I remembered waddycallum,
your crack shot, up there, and tould him; and he seemed pleased."
"Has he nobody with him?" asked Pinckney, remembering the wan-faced
woman.
"Yes--a wife or sumthink."
"Where is she?"
"In t'blacksmith's shed."
Rutter pointed to a low shed that might have been a cow-house, but in
point of fact contained a forge and some broken ploughshares.
"Landlord," said Pinckney, severely, "you ought to turn that low
blackguard out, and not take another farthing of his money until he
finds the woman a fit place to sleep in!"
And with that young Pinckney splashed indignantly out into the darkness,
and along the watery road to the shooting-box. There he found everyone
on the point of going to bed. He was obliged, for that night, to keep to
himself the details of his adventures; but, long after the rest of the
premises were in darkness, a ruby-coloured light burned in Mr.
Pinckney's room; he had actually the energy to turn his dry-plates into
finished negatives before getting into bed, though he had tramped
sixteen miles with accoutrements! Not only that, but he got up early,
and had obtained a sun-print of each negative before going over to
breakfast. His impatience came of his newness to photography; it has
probably been experienced by every beginner in this most fascinating of
crafts.
These prints he stowed carefully in his pocket, closely buttoning his
coat to shield them from the light. At breakfast he produced them one by
one, and handed them round the table on the strict understanding that
each person should glance at each print for one second only. They were
in their raw and perishable state; but a few seconds' exposure to the
light of the room, said the perpetrator, would not affect them. In
truth, no one wished to look at them longer; they were poor productions:
the light had got in here, the focus was wrong in that one. But Mr.
Pinckney knew their faults, and he produced the last print, and the
best, with the more satisfaction.
"This one," said he, "will astonish you. It's a success, though I say
it. Moreover, it's the one I most wanted to come out well--a couple of
tramps taken unawares. This print you must look at only half-a-second
each."
He handed it to Alice, who pronounced it a triumph--as it was--and
glanced curiously at the downcast face of the woman in the foreground.
She handed it to the doctor, sitting next her. The doctor put the print
in his uncle's hand, at the head of the table. The Colonel's comment was
good-natured. He held out the print to Miles, who took it carelessly
from him, and leant back in his chair.
Now as Miles leant back, the sunlight fell full upon him. It streamed
through a narrow slit of a window at the end of the room--the big
windows faced southwest--and its rays just missed the curve of
table-cloth between the Colonel and Miles. But on Miles the rays fell:
on his curly light-brown hair, clear dark skin, blond beard and
moustache; and his blue eyes twinkled pleasantly under their touch. As
he idly raised the print, leaning back in the loose rough jacket that
became him so well, the others there had never seen him more handsome,
tranquil, and unconcerned.
Miles raised the print with slow indifference, glanced at it, jerked it
suddenly upward, and held it with both hands close before his eyes. They
could not see his face. But the sunlight fell upon the print, and
Pinckney cried out an excited protest:
"Look out, I say! Hold it out of the sun, please! Give it here, you'll
spoil the print!"
But Miles did not heed, even if he heard. The square of paper was
quivering, though held by two great strong hands. All that they could
see of Miles's face behind it was the brow: it was deeply scored across
and across--it was pale as ashes.
A minute passed; then the print was slowly dropped upon the table. No
print now: only a sheet of glossy reddish-brown paper.
Miles burst into a low, harsh laugh.
"A good likeness!" he said slowly. "But it has vanished, clean gone,
and, I fear, through my fault. Forgive me, Pinckney, I didn't understand
you. I thought the thing was finished. I know nothing about such
things--I'm an ignorant bushman"--with a ghastly smile--"but I
thought--I couldn't help thinking, when it vanished like that--that it
was all a hoax!"
He pushed back his chair, and stalked to the door. No one spoke--no one
knew what to say--one and all, they were mystified. On the threshold
Miles turned, and looked pleadingly towards the Colonel and Alice.
"Pray forgive me, I am covered with shame; but--but it was strangely
like some one--some one long dead," said Miles, hoarsely--and slowly,
with the exception of the last four words, which were low and hurried.
And with that he went from the room, and cannoned in the passage against
Dick Edmonstone, who was late for breakfast.
That day, the champion from Australia shot execrably, which was
inexplicable; and he kept for ever casting sudden glances over his
shoulders, and on all sides of him, which was absurd.
XXIV
THE EFFECT OF A SONG
Late that afternoon, in Robert Rutter's meadow at the back of the inn, a
man and a woman stood in close conversation. The man was Jem Pound, the
woman Elizabeth Ryan.
"Then you have not seen him yet?"
"No, not yet; I have had no chance."
"You mean that you have been drunk, Jem Pound!"
"Not to say drunk, missis. But I've been over to a town called
Melmerbridge, and I went a long way round so as not to cross the moor.
They're shooting up there all day. It'd be no sort o' use tackling him
there."
"But surely they are back by now?" exclaimed Mrs. Ryan, impatiently. "I
tell you he must be seen to-day--this evening--now."
"Ay, ay; I'm just going. Straight along this path it is, across a few
fields, and there you are--opposite the house; and you may trust me----"
"I know; I have seen it for myself. But I am going too."
This was precisely what Pound did not want. He was treating the woman
with unwonted civility, not to say respect, with a view to the more
easily dissuading her from dangerous projects. And this was a dangerous
project from Pound's point of view; but Mrs. Ryan had set her soul upon
it. Argue as Jem would, she was bent upon seeing her husband with her
own eyes, and at once. And there, with that thin white face of hers she
might go and get him actually to pity her, and spoil everything--for Jem
Pound.
"After finding him again, do you think I will endure this a moment
longer?" asked Elizabeth scornfully.
Pound's reply was in the reflective manner.
"Well," said he, with slow deliberation, "I'm not sure but what it
mightn't, after all, do good for you to see him."
"Good--do good! To whom? What do you mean? What have you to do with it?"
Pound ground his teeth; he had everything to do with it. It was the old
story over again: this woman was using him as the guide to her own ends,
yet would cut him adrift the very moment those ends were in sight. How
he hated her! With his lips he cringed to her, in his heart he ground
her to powder; but if he was not in the position to bully her to-day, he
had lost few opportunities when he was; and he was at least forearmed
against her.
He affected a bluff kindliness of manner that would not have deceived
her had Mrs. Ryan been a little more composed.
"Look here, missis, you and me, we've been bound up in a ticklish job
together. I don't say as I've always done by you as I should, but there
is allowances to be made for a man that carries, as they say, his life
in his hand, and that's staked his life on this here job. I don't say,
either, as we're both on the exact same tack, but one thing's certain;
we must work together now, and if you can't work my way, why, I must
work yours. Now, missis, you ain't fit for the strain of seeing him. If
you could see your own face you'd know it, ma'am."
Her eyes had opened wide at his tone; she sighed deeply at his last
words.
"No," she said sadly, "I know I'm not fit for much. But I must go--I
must go."
"Then if you must, ma'am, take a teaspoonful of this first. It'll help
you through, and anyway keep you from fainting, as you did last time. I
got it in Melmerbridge this afternoon, after I see you look so sick."
He uncorked a small flask and held it to her lips.
"What is it?"
"Brandy--the best."
"And water?"
"Half and half. Remember that other night!"
"He is right," muttered the woman: "there must be no fainting this
time."
She sipped from the bottle and felt revived.
"Now we will go," she said, sternly.
They crossed the meadow, and so over the stile into the potato-field
that came next. Then Pound began to lag behind and watch his companion.
When they reached the gate she was reeling; she clung to the gate-post,
and waited for him to come up.
"You fiend!" she screamed, glaring impotently upon him. "Poisoner and
fiend! You have--you--"
She fell senseless at his feet without finishing the sentence. Pound
surveyed the helpless heap of clothes with complete satisfaction.