Miss Drummond — by virtue of what had passed, and knowing the spirit in which Pegram had set out — would be the first to believe in his guilt. So that even were he to escape hanging — which Wirgman doubted in view of the singularly heavy combination of circumstantial evidence — his life must become that of an outcast and a pariah, and Miss Drummond he could never marry.
In all this there was a certain sweet satisfaction. Yet Wirgman reflected with still greater satisfaction upon the fact that he had proven that pet theory of his to be correct. Under very exceptional circumstances, and finding himself heavily handicapped, he had accomplished the destruction of a fellow-creature in a manner that could not possibly implicate him.
In the morning and noon editions Of the papers there was no report whatever of any tragedy at Wimbush. As he was going on board at four o’clock that afternoon, he bought a late edition of an evening paper, and with this he stepped briskly toward the gangway. Already he had one foot upon it when suddenly a cheery voice somewhere behind him hailed him with:
“Hallo, Wirgman!”
Utterly taken off his guard, he looked round. Then, suddenly recollecting himself and his changed identity, he sought to assume an air of naturalness, as though his turning as the name was called had been no more than a coincidence. But a burly individual in a serge suit confronted him, and laid a singularly significant and possessive hand upon his shoulder, murmuring into his ear:
“Roger Wirgman, I arrest you!”
He started back, and his thoughts worked with the rapidity of lightning. Had Pegram by any chance suspected his conspiracy, and forestalled the discovery of his disappearance?
“In God’s name, on what charge?” he blurted out.
“On the charge of murdering Henry Stanhope Pegram last night on Wimbush Head.”
A ghastly pallor spread upon his lean face.
“Are you mad?” he choked.
“You had best not make a scene,” murmured the detective, adding the formal reminder that anything he said would be taken as evidence against him.
Like a man in a dream, Wirgman allowed the detective and his companion to lead him away from the gathering crowd, and take him to the waiting-room, where they locked themselves up with him.
“Our train is due out in a quarter of an hour,” he heard one say to the other.
Then he remembered the paper in his grasp, and, thinking that there he might find the solution of this marvel, be opened it with trembling hands, and was confronted by the headlines:
SHOCKING MURDER AT WIMBUSH. Flight of the Murder.
Swiftly his eyes devoured the bald, newspaper narrative that told how Harry Pegram’s body had been discovered the night before on Wimbush Head, death being due to fracture of the skull. The dead man had been rifled of all money and valuables, and theft had at first been thought the motive of the crime. But the lady to whom Mr. Pegram was engaged had told the police a story — since corroborated — which gave rise to the theory that the theft was a blind rather than a motive. It was known that a deadly enmity existed between the deceased and Mr. Roger Wirgman, of Copmore Gardens, W. This latter gentleman had come down from town that day; and it was known that he and Pegram had been together on Wimbush Head that evening. A hat containing the initials “R. W.,” and which was identified as belonging to Wirgman, was discovered a few hundred yards from the spot where the body, had been found, and, on the beach below, Pegram’s stick, smeared with blood which the murderer had no doubt wrenched from his hand and used against him. He read how the police — by means beyond his understanding — had succeeded in tracking him to the left-luggage office at Alwyn Bay, and how they were on the spoor at the time of going to press. That powerful imagination which he had taken such pride in showed him now, as in a flash, how each item of evidence he had manufactured so sedulously to serve against Pegram would weigh a hundredfold more heavily against himself under the existing circumstances. In addition, there was his flight — that most damning incrimination — under an assumed name and in altered personality, to say nothing of the threats he had uttered against Pegram, and the purpose which he had announced was taking him to Port Wimbush.
He realised that he was indeed hoist with his own petard, doomed irrevocably, and for a crime that was none of his committing.
But even in that hour of supreme defeat and bitter agony he contended that his theory was still right. Here was a fortuitous circumstance which he could not have foreseen. The whole of his elaborate scheme had crumbled and collapsed because it had occurred to some vulgar thief to hit Harry Pegram over the head that he might rob him.
THE ABDUCTION
Mr. Granby ca me away from the Manor and his interview with his old friend, Squire Clifford, in anything but the most satisfied frame of mind. He was face to face with a very knotty problem — for a lover. However much the squire might favour his suit, the fact remained that sweet Jenny Egerton — the squire’s ward — whilst very friendly disposed towards Granby, was obviously careful to be nothing more.
Mr. Granby strode through the dusk kicking the snow before him and making for the lights of the town at the foot of Manor Hill, and as he went his thoughts were very busy with what Squire Clifford had said. Jenny’s nature was romantic, and if Mr. Granby would win her heart as well as her hand the squire opined that he might be well-advised to present himself romantically to her consideration. But Granby, for all that he was a stolid, unimaginative man, realised that, rising forty as he was and being a shade wider at the waist than at the shoulders, in aiming at the romantic he might achieve no more than the ridiculous.
Still brooding, with hands deep in the pockets of his riding-coat, whip under his arm, and three-cornered hat pulled down over his brows, he strode on through the town, where the snow was becoming slush under the traffic that was toward. He made his way up the High Street with ears deaf to the shouts of the busy shopkeepers and busier vendors at the booths of the Christmas fair, and, still deep at his thoughts, he turned into the King’s Arms. He nodded carelessly to the drawer in the tap-room, and his ill-fortune guided his steps to the bar parlour and into the company of three graceless young neighbours of his, who sat with wigs awry and coats unlaced in a cloud of smoke over a bowl of punch.
He stood in the blaze of candle-light, the fine powder of snow that had gathered on the shoulders of his scarlet coat being rapidly transmuted by the warmth of the room into glittering diamonds of water, whilst those merry bloods hailed him noisily. Mr. Granby had long been a choice butt for the practical jokers of the country-side, though he had never yet perceived it.
They hailed him to the fire; they gave him punch to drink — a hot, delicious beverage of brandy, muscadine, lemon, and spices — which so warmed his heart and choked discretion that, when presently they toasted Jenny Egerton, and drank to her speedy union with Mr. Granby, he must needs pour out the whole story of his unprospering love affair and the quandary in which he now found himself, winding up with an appeal to those merry jesters for advice and guidance in the pursuit of the romantic.
Their response was prompt and hilarious. As with one breath, they urged him to carry his tale to Ned Pepper, who, they swore, was the very man to help him.
“You couldn’t find a better man for your business in the whole country,” one of them assured him. “Ned Pepper’s the most romantic young dog in England.”
“And he’s upstairs now,” added another, “drinking himself out of his senses in solitude.” And so they urged him noisily to go up at once.
“But if I should intrude,” he faltered. “Mr. Pepper and I are but slightly acquainted.”
“Ned Pepper will give you a warm welcome,” they assured him amid fresh laughter; and so, persuading and pushing, they got him above-stairs to the room where Ned Pepper sat wondering what might be the source of the bursts of merriment that floated up to him through the floor.
Granby found Mr. Pepper — a comely young gentleman, with a good chin and a roguish eye — very much at his ease
before a blazing fire. He was comfortably ensconced in a spacious oak chair, and rested the shapeliest silk-cased legs in Surrey upon a second one. There was a bowl of steaming punch at Mr. Pepper’s elbow, a pipe between his fingers. His head was rested against one of the wings of his chair, his peruke — which he had doffed for greater comfort — was perched upon the other, his broidered vest was open, and he had undone the silver buckles of his lacquered shoes. As I have said, Mr. Pepper was very much at his ease.
At the foot of the stairs the young bloods stood grouped expectantly, with smirks and nudges and smothered guffaws. They knew Ned Pepper to be as peppery as his name implied, and they had reason to believe that he would presently be kicking Mr. Granby downstairs. Therefore they waited.
But they were disappointed. At sight of Mr. Granby hesitating in the doorway a flicker of interest had for a moment lighted Mr. Pepper’s dark eyes; then he smiled lazily, and as lazily invited him to come inside.
“A cold night, Mr. Pepper,” said Granby civilly.
“Ring for another glass,” said Mr. Pepper, like a man taking a hint, and with the stem of his long pipe he pointed to the brew, thus clearing up any obscurity in his meaning.
The glass was brought, and, having helped himself, Granby drew up to the fire and took a pipe.
“I hope,” said he, “I’m not intruding, though I must confess that I am taking a great liberty. I have come to you for advice. I have been advised to do so.”
Mr. Pepper took the pipe from between his teeth, and gave his guest every encouragement to proceed. They were alone in that cosy parlour. The punch warmed and expanded Granby’s simple nature, and he remembered the assurances he had received that Mr. Pepper was the very man to help him in his quandary. So out came the whole story, all but the names, which, with a remnant of discretion, Granby thought better to omit.
“And do you tell me you were sent to me for advice in this matter?” quoth Mr. Pepper, whose eyes had now lost all sign of drowsiness. “By whom?”
Granby told him, and Pepper nodded with a slow smile.
“I am sore perplexed,” added the luckless lover earnestly. “I don’t know whether you have ever been in the like position.”
“I have, indeed,” answered Mr. Pepper, “with this difference that with me the maid was willing, but the father, who accounted me a hairbrain, wouldn’t hear of it. I carried her off; we were overtaken, and I was laid by the heels for a time. Her father was too friendly with the sheriff.”
“You carried her off,” mused Granby. “Now that was a romantic enough thing to do!”
Mr. Pepper stared at him. “If it’s romance you want, you may do the same. As for me, I prefer to wait until the lady is of age. The county gaol cured me of any leanings towards romance.”
“But our cases are hardly parallel,” Mr. Granby reminded him. “I have no pursuit to fear since her guardian is my friend.”
“True,” said Pepper with a roguish smile, “but, then, you say the lady isn’t, and you’ll hardly make her so by a display of violence.”
“Ah!” sighed the unimaginative Granby, and his honest, rugged face grew clouded. Pepper puffed in silence for a moment or two; then spoke.
“To abduct her forcibly, and against her will, were to do a monstrous ill thing. Your suit thereafter must be hopeless and deservedly. But—” And be paused solemnly, raising a delicate white hand that sprouted from a cloud of lace, and poising it in line with Granby’s suddenly uplifted eyes— “but if someone else were to do the thing, and you were to prove the heroic rescuer—”
“Gad!” cried Granby, and the pipe slipped from his fingers, and was shivered on the floor.
“You would reap the heroic rescuer’s reward,” concluded Pepper. “By your promptness of action you would inspire gratitude; by your ready courage — there might be a little sword-play in the comedy — admiration; and by your restraint and courtesy to the lady in her plight, you should awaken confidence and trust. These, my friend, are the compounds that go to make up that poison men call love.”
“Yes, yes,” gasped Granby, in some amazement at the other’s fertility of imagination. “But how would you go about it, Mr. Pepper?”
Mr. Pepper pondered awhile, puffing vigorously. Then, setting down his pipe, he leaned forward, and propounded the result of his cogitations. On the morrow there was a Christmas dance to be held at Sir John Tyler’s, two miles away, to which, no doubt, Squire Clifford and his ward would be going.
“Clifford?” gasped the startled Granby, leaping to his feet. “How guessed you I spoke of them? I never mentioned—”
“The whole country-side knows all about it,” said Pepper shortly, and Granby sat down again. Pepper proceeded with his expounding. At Kerry’s Corner Mr. Granby was to post some obliging rogue who would play the highwayman for him; he would hold up Mr. Clifford’s coach, but at sight of the lady be so taken with the jewels that were her eyes, as to have no thought for other riches. The highwayman should request her to alight, and then make off with her on his crupper, the Squire being forewarned to offer no resistance.
“Away goes the amorous highwayman,” Pepper proceeded, “whereupon the lady lets out a cry or two, which attracts the attention of a very staid and sober gentleman riding in the opposite direction. That gentleman is yourself. You call upon the ruffian to stand; he rides on, and you give pursuit. A pistol shot or two — in the air, of course — will add effect, and show the general earnestness of the affair. And now you are racing through the night, and the highwayman is racing ahead of you; the race must be protracted. To overtake him too soon would be injudicious. You must wait until the lady’s feelings of terror have been wrought to their highest pitch. She knows a rescuer is behind, and when, towards dawn, that rescuer comes up, and compels the highwayman to mend his manners and deliver up the lady, lo! she discovers that it is the man to whose gallantry, courage, and resource she has so long and so foolishly been blind. If she does not promise to marry you there and then, you are the most hopeless bungler that ever tired of being a bachelor.”
In a burst of enthusiasm Granby tore at the bell-rope; then he crossed the room, and grasped one of Mr. Pepper’s slender hands in his own massive fist.
“You’re a man of heart and brain, Mr. Pepper,” said he; “a man I’m proud to call my friend.” Then, to the drawer who entered, “Another bowl of punch,” he ordered. And with that the enthusiasm went out of him as suddenly as it had flared up.
“But, rat me!” he cried, “where am I to find a man who will play the highwayman for me?”
“Surely,” said Pepper, “that should not be difficult. You’ll have some friend—”
“But the task asks more than friendship. It asks tact, it asks resource, it asks — I scarce know what.” And then he grew inspired. “Now, if you, Mr. Pepper—”
“Alas!” sighed Pepper. “It is just such a frolic as would sort well with my rascally instincts, such a night ride as I should relish. But, unfortunately, I am bidden, myself, to Lady Tyler’s ball.”
“If that be all, surely the difficulty might be overcome. But perhaps I make too bold, sir. I presume, maybe, when I consider that you might stand my friend. Our acquaintance is, after all, but slight.”
“A misfortune which the years may mend,” said Pepper pleasantly.
“You mean that?” quoth the simple Granby.
“If you need proof of it — why, I am your man in this affair.”
Thus was it planned, and on the following night — or, rather, towards two o’clock of a sharp and frosty Christmas morning — was the plan put into execution.
Half a mile from Kerry’s corner — which was a mile, or so, from Tyler Park — Mr. Granby walked his horse up and down in the moonlight, waiting.
A coach rolled past him, followed soon after by another, whereat, realizing that these were homeward bound guests from Lady Tyler’s, Mr. Granby waxed impatient for the arrival of Mr. Pepper. Presently hoofs rattled in the distance, growing rapidly louder and n
earer, and ringing sharp and clear on the still, frosty air. A horseman riding madly down the road loomed black in the moonlight, and Mr. Granby rode to meet him.
Affairs had sped well with Mr. Pepper. He had held up Squire Clifford’s coach, and carried off Squire Clifford’s ward, what time the Squire instructed in his role, bellowed and trumpeted, but took care to do nothing that might hinder the make belive highwayman in his task. The girl had not gone without a struggle, it is true. But in the end, masterful Mr. Pepper had swung her to the withers of his horse, and dashed off, his left arm embracing and supporting her, and her head — for she seemed to have lapsed into a half-stupor — fallen back against his breast. Thus they rode until they came upon Mr. Granby ambling in the opposite direction. The girl struggled, and let out a cry or two for help as she was swept past that bulky figure, and Mr. Granby, taking his cue from that, wheeled about, and called upon the abductor to stand. Mr. Pepper laughed for answer, and rattled on. Shots went off in the night, with no hurt to anyone, and Mr. Granby flung himself into hot and gallant pursuit.
He gained on them too quickly at first, so he slackened his pace, mindful of Pepper’s instructions that the chase should be a long one. Suddenly something stirred by the roadside; a third horseman loomed on that lonely road, barring Mr. Granby’s path; a pistol barrel gleamed before him, and —
Collected Works of Rafael Sabatini Page 464
