Uncertainty in such cases is the unnerving thing. I turned sharply, and began to walk back on tiptoe in the direction from which I had come.
I had not been mistaken. A moment later a dark figure loomed up out of the darkness, and the exclamation which greeted me, as I made my presence known, showed that I had taken him by surprise.
There was a momentary pause. I expected the man, whoever he might be, to run, but he held his ground. Indeed, he edged forward.
'Get back!' I said, and allowed my stick to rasp suggestively on the road before raising it in readiness for any sudden development. It was as well that he should know it was there.
The hint seemed to wound rather than frighten him.
'Aw, cut out the rough stuff, bo,' he said reproachfully in a cautious, husky undertone. 'I ain't goin' to start anything.'
I had an impression that I had heard the voice before, but I could not place it.
'What are you following me for?' I demanded. 'Who are you?'
'Say, I want a talk wit youse. I took a slant at youse under de lamp-post back dere, an' I seen it was you, so I tagged along. Say, I'm wise to your game, sport.'
I had identified him by this time. Unless there were two men in the neighbourhood of Sanstead who hailed from the Bowery, this must be the man I had seen at the 'Feathers' who had incurred the disapproval of Miss Benjafield.
'I haven't the faintest idea what you mean,' I said. 'What is my game?'
His voice became reproachful again.
'Ah chee!' he protested. 'Quit yer kiddin'! What was youse rubberin' around de house for last night if you wasn't trailin' de kid?'
'Was it you who ran into me last night?' I asked.
'Gee! I fought it was a tree. I came near takin' de count.'
'I did take it. You seemed in a great hurry.'
'Hell!' said the man simply, and expectorated.
'Say,' he resumed, having delivered this criticism on that stirring episode, dat's a great kid, dat Nugget. I fought it was a Black Hand soup explosion when he cut loose. But, say, let's don't waste time. We gotta get together about dat kid.'
'Certainly, if you wish it. What do you happen to mean?'
'Aw, quit yer kiddin'!' He expectorated again. He seemed to be a man who could express the whole gamut of emotions by this simple means. 'I know you!'
'Then you have the advantage of me, though I believe I remember seeing you before. Weren't you at the "Feathers" one Wednesday evening, singing something about a dog?'
'Sure. Dat was me.'
'What do you mean by saying that you know me?'
'Aw, quit yer kiddin', Sam!'
There was, it seemed to me, a reluctantly admiring note in his voice.
'Tell me, who do you think I am?' I asked patiently.
'Ahr ghee! You can't string me, sport. Smooth Sam Fisher, is who you are, bo. I know you.'
I was too surprised to speak. Verily, some have greatness thrust upon them.
'I hain't never seen youse, Sam,' he continued, 'but I know it's you. And I'll tell youse how I doped it out. To begin with, there ain't but you and your bunch and me and my bunch dat knows de Little Nugget's on dis side at all. Dey sneaked him out of New York mighty slick. And I heard that you had come here after him. So when I runs into a guy dat's trailin' de kid down here, well, who's it going to be if it ain't youse? And when dat guy talks like a dude, like they all say you do, well, who's it going to be if it ain't youse? So quit yer kiddin', Sam, and let's get down to business.'
'Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr Buck MacGinnis?' I said. I felt convinced that this could be no other than that celebrity.
'Dat's right. Dere's no need to keep up anyt'ing wit me, Sam. We're bote on de same trail, so let's get down to it.'
'One moment,' I said. 'Would it surprise you to hear that my name is Burns, and that I am a master at the school?'
He expectorated admirably.
'Hell, no!' he said. 'Gee, it's just what you would be, Sam. I always heard youse had been one of dese rah-rah boys oncest. Say, it's mighty smart of youse to be a perfessor. You're right in on de ground floor.'
His voice became appealing.
'Say, Sam, don't be a hawg. Let's go fifty-fifty in dis deal. My bunch and me has come a hell of a number of miles on dis proposition, and dere ain't no need for us to fall scrappin' over it. Dere's plenty for all of us. Old man Ford'll cough up enough for every one, and dere won't be any fuss. Let's sit in togedder on dis nuggett'ing. It ain't like as if it was an ornery two-by-four deal. I wouldn't ask youse if it wasn't big enough fir de whole bunch of us.'
As I said nothing, he proceeded.
'It ain't square, Sam, to take advantage of your having education. If it was a square fight, and us bote wit de same chance, I wouldn't say; but you bein' a dude perfessor and gettin' right into de place like dat ain't right. Say, don't be a hawg, Sam. Don't swipe it all. Fifty-fifty! Does dat go?'
'I don't know,' I said. 'You had better ask the real Sam. Good night.'
I walked past him and made for the school gates at my best pace. He trotted after me, pleading.
'Sam, give us a quarter, then.'
I walked on.
'Sam, don't be a hawg!'
He broke into a run.
'Sam!' His voice lost its pleading tone and rasped menacingly.
'Gee, if I had me canister, youse wouldn't be so flip! Listen here, you big cheese! You t'ink youse is de only t'ing in sight, huh? Well, we ain't done yet. You'll see yet. We'll fix you! Youse had best watch out.'
I stopped and turned on him. 'Look here, you fool,' I cried. 'I tell you I am not Sam Fisher. Can't you understand that you have got hold of the wrong man? My name is Burns---Burns-.'
He expectorated--scornfully this time. He was a man slow by nature to receive ideas, but slower to rid himself of one that had contrived to force its way into what he probably called his brain. He had decided on the evidence that I was Smooth Sam Fisher, and no denials on my part were going to shake his belief. He looked on them merely as so many unsportsmanlike quibbles prompted by greed.
'Tell it to Sweeney!' was the form in which he crystallized his scepticism.
'May be you'll say youse ain't trailin' de Nugget, huh?'
It was a home-thrust. If truth-telling has become a habit, one gets slowly off the mark when the moment arrives for the prudent lie. Quite against my will, I hesitated. Observant Mr MacGinnis perceived my hesitation and expectorated triumphantly.
'Ah ghee!' he remarked. And then with a sudden return to ferocity, 'All right, you Sam, you wait! We'll fix you, and fix you good! See? Dat goes. You t'ink youse kin put it across us, huh? All right, you'll get yours. You wait!'
And with these words he slid off into the night. From somewhere in the murky middle distance came a scornful 'Hawg!' and he was gone, leaving me with a settled conviction that, while I had frequently had occasion, since my expedition to Sanstead began, to describe affairs as complex, their complexity had now reached its height. With a watchful Pinkerton's man within, and a vengeful gang of rivals without, Sanstead House seemed likely to become an unrestful place for a young kidnapper with no previous experience.
The need for swift action had become imperative.
II
White, the butler, looking singularly unlike a detective--which, I suppose, is how a detective wants to look--was taking the air on the football field when I left the house next morning for a before-breakfast stroll. The sight of him filled me with a desire for first-hand information on the subject of the man Mr MacGinnis supposed me to be and also of Mr MacGinnis himself. I wanted to be assured that my friend Buck, despite appearances, was a placid person whose bark was worse than his bite.
White's manner, at our first conversational exchanges, was entirely that of the butler. From what I came to know of him later, I think he took an artistic pride in throwing himself into whatever role he had to assume.
At the mention of Smooth Sam Fisher, however, his manner peeled off him like
a skin, and he began to talk as himself, a racy and vigorous self vastly different from the episcopal person he thought it necessary to be when on duty.
'White,' I said, 'do you know anything of Smooth Sam Fisher?'
He stared at me. I suppose the question, led up to by no previous remark, was unusual.
'I met a gentleman of the name of Buck MacGinnis--he was our visitor that night, by the way--and he was full of Sam. Do you know him?'
'Buck?'
'Either of them.'
'Well, I've never seen Buck, but I know all about him. There's pepper to Buck.'
'So I should imagine. And Sam?'
'You may take it from me that there's more pepper to Sam's little finger than there is to Buck's whole body. Sam could make Buck look like the last run of shad, if it came to a showdown. Buck's just a common roughneck. Sam's an educated man. He's got brains.'
'So I gathered. Well, I'm glad to hear you speak so well of him, because that's who I'm supposed to be.'
'How's that?'
'Buck MacGinnis insists that I am Smooth Sam Fisher. Nothing I can say will shift him.'
White stared. He had very bright humorous brown eyes. Then he began to laugh.
'Well, what do you know about that?' he exclaimed. 'Wouldn't that jar you!'
'It would. I may say it did. He called me a hog for wanting to keep the Little Nugget to myself, and left threatening to "fix me". What would you say the verb "to fix" signified in Mr MacGinnis's vocabulary?'
White was still chuckling quietly to himself.
'He's a wonder!' he observed. 'Can you beat it? Taking you for Smooth Sam!'
'He said he had never seen Smooth Sam. Have you?'
'Lord, yes.'
'Does he look like me?'
'Not a bit.'
'Do you think he's over here in England?'
'Sam? I know he is.'
'Then Buck MacGinnis was right?'
'Dead right, as far as Sam being on the trail goes. Sam's after the Nugget to get him this time. He's tried often enough before, but we've been too smart for him. This time he allows he's going to bring it off.'
'Then why haven't we seen anything of him? Buck MacGinnis seems to be monopolizing the kidnapping industry in these parts.'
'Oh, Sam'll show up when he feels good and ready. You can take it from me that Sam knows what he is doing. Sam's a special pet of mine. I don't give a flip for Buck MacGinnis.'
'I wish I had your cheery disposition! To me Buck MacGinnis seems a pretty important citizen. I wonder what he meant by "fix"?'
White, however, declined to leave the subject of Buck's more gifted rival.
'Sam's a college man, you know. That gives him a pull. He has brains, and can use them.'
'That was one of the points on which Buck MacGinnis reproached me. He said it was not fair to use my superior education.'
He laughed.
'Buck's got no sense. That's why you find him carrying on like a porch-climber. It's his only notion of how to behave when he wants to do a job. And that's why there's only one man to keep your eye on in this thing of the Little Nugget, and that's Sam. I wish you could get to know Sam. You'd like him.'
'You seem to look on him as a personal friend. I certainly don't like Buck.'
'Oh, Buck!' said White scornfully.
We turned towards the house as the sound of the bell came to us across the field.
'Then you think we may count on Sam's arrival, sooner or later, as a certainty?' I said.
'Surest thing you know.'
'You will have a busy time.'
'All in the day's work.'
'I suppose I ought to look at it in that way. But I do wish I knew exactly what Buck meant by "fix".'
White at last condescended to give his mind to the trivial point.
'I guess he'll try to put one over on you with a sand-bag,' he said carelessly. He seemed to face the prospect with calm.
'A sand-bag, eh?' I said. 'It sounds exciting.'
'And feels it. I know. I've had some.'
I parted from him at the door. As a comforter he had failed to qualify. He had not eased my mind to the slightest extent.
CHAPTER 7
Looking at it now I can see that the days which followed Audrey's arrival at Sanstead marked the true beginning of our acquaintanceship. Before, during our engagement, we had been strangers, artificially tied together, and she had struggled against the chain. But now, for the first time, we were beginning to know each other, and were discovering that, after all, we had much in common.
It did not alarm me, this growing feeling of comradeship. Keenly on the alert as I was for the least sign that would show that I was in danger of weakening in my loyalty to Cynthia, I did not detect one in my friendliness for Audrey. On the contrary, I was hugely relieved, for it seemed to me that the danger was past. I had not imagined it possible that I could ever experience towards her such a tranquil emotion as this easy friendliness. For the last five years my imagination had been playing round her memory, until I suppose I had built up in my mind some almost superhuman image, some goddess. What I was passing through now, of course, though I was unaware of it, was the natural reaction from that state of mind. Instead of the goddess, I had found a companionable human being, and I imagined that I had effected the change myself, and by sheer force of will brought Audrey into a reasonable relation to the scheme of things.
I suppose a not too intelligent moth has much the same views with regard to the lamp. His last thought, as he enters the flame, is probably one of self-congratulation that he has arranged his dealings with it on such a satisfactory commonsense basis.
And then, when I was feeling particularly safe and complacent, disaster came.
The day was Wednesday, and my 'afternoon off', but the rain was driving against the windows, and the attractions of billiards with the marker at the 'Feathers' had not proved sufficient to make me face the two-mile walk in the storm. I had settled myself in the study. There was a noble fire burning in the grate, and the darkness lit by the glow of the coals, the dripping of the rain, the good behaviour of my pipe, and the reflection that, as I sat there, Glossop was engaged downstairs in wrestling with my class, combined to steep me in a meditative peace. Audrey was playing the piano in the drawing-room. The sound came to me faintly through the closed doors. I recognized what she was playing. I wondered if the melody had the same associations for her that it had for me.
The music stopped. I heard the drawing-room door open. She came into the study.
'I didn't know there was anyone here,' she said. 'I'm frozen. The drawing-room fire's out.'
'Come and sit down,' I said. 'You don't mind the smoke?'
I drew a chair up to the fire for her, feeling, as I did so, a certain pride. Here I was, alone with her in the firelight, and my pulse was regular and my brain cool. I had a momentary vision of myself as the Strong Man, the strong, quiet man with the iron grip on his emotions. I was pleased with myself.
She sat for some minutes, gazing into the fire. Little spurts of flame whistled comfortably in the heart of the black-red coals. Outside the storm shrieked faintly, and flurries of rain dashed themselves against the window.
'It's very nice in here,' she said at last.
'Peaceful.'
I filled my pipe and re-lit it. Her eyes, seen for an instant in the light of the match, looked dreamy.
'I've been sitting here listening to you,' I said. 'I liked that last thing you played.'
'You always did.'
'You remember that? Do you remember one evening--no, you wouldn't.'
'Which evening?'
'Oh, you wouldn't remember. It's only one particular evening when you played that thing. It sticks in my mind. It was at your father's studio.'
She looked up quickly.
'We went out afterwards and sat in the park.'
I sat up thrilled.
'A man came by with a dog,' I said.
'Two dogs.'
'One s
urely!'
'Two. A bull-dog and a fox-terrier.'
'I remember the bull-dog, but--by Jove, you're right. A fox-terrier with a black patch over his left eye.'
'Right eye.'
'Right eye. They came up to us, and you--'
'Gave them chocolates.'
I sank back slowly in my chair.
'You've got a wonderful memory,' I said.
She bent over the fire without speaking. The rain rattled on the window.
'So you still like my playing, Peter?'
'I like it better than ever; there's something in it now that I don't believe there used to be. I can't describe it--something--'
'I think it's knowledge, Peter,' she said quietly. 'Experience. I'm five years older than I was when I used to play to you before, and I've seen a good deal in those five years. It may not be altogether pleasant seeing life, but--well, it makes you play the piano better. Experience goes in at the heart and comes out at the finger-tips.'
It seemed to me that she spoke a little bitterly.
'Have you had a bad time, Audrey, these last years?' I said.
'Pretty bad.'
'I'm sorry.'
'I'm not--altogether. I've learned a lot.'
She was silent again, her eyes fixed on the fire.
'What are you thinking about?' I said.
'Oh, a great many things.'
'Pleasant?'
'Mixed. The last thing I thought about was pleasant. That was, that I am very lucky to be doing the work I am doing now. Compared with some of the things I have done--'
She shivered.
'I wish you would tell me about those years, Audrey,' I said. 'What were some of the things you did?'
She leaned back in her chair and shaded her face from the fire with a newspaper. Her eyes were in the shadow.
'Well, let me see. I was a nurse for some time at the Lafayette Hospital in New York.'
'That's hard work?'
'Horribly hard. I had to give it up after a while. But--it teaches you.... You learn.... You learn--all sorts of things. Realities. How much of your own trouble is imagination. You get real trouble in a hospital. You get it thrown at you.'
I said nothing. I was feeling--I don't know why--a little uncomfortable, a little at a disadvantage, as one feels in the presence of some one bigger than oneself.
P G Wodehouse - Little Nugget Page 9
