"Mr. Davey," she whispered, "have you ever heard of wreckers?"
She had never said the word aloud before; she had not considered it even, and now that she heard it from her own lips it sounded fearful and obscene, like a blasphemy. It was too dark in the carriage to see the effect upon his face, but she heard him swallow. His eyes were hidden from her under the black shovel-hat, and she could only see the dim outline of his profile, the sharp chin, the prominent nose.
"Once, years ago, when I was hardly more than a child, I heard a neighbor speak of them," she said; "and then later, when I was old enough to understand, there were rumors of these things--snatches of gossip quickly suppressed. One of the men would bring back some wild tale after a visit to the north coast, and he would be silenced at once; such talk was forbidden by the older men; it was an outrage to decency.
"I believed none of these stories; I asked my mother, and she told me they were the horrible inventions of evil-minded people; such things did not and could not exist. She was wrong. I know now she was wrong, Mr. Davey. My uncle is one of them; he told me so himself."
Still her companion made no reply; he sat motionless, like a stone thing, and she went on again, never raising her voice above a whisper.
"They are in it, every one of them, from the coast to the Tamar bank; all those men I saw that first Saturday in the bar at the inn. The gypsies, poachers, sailors, the pedlar with the broken teeth. They've murdered women and children with their own hands; they've held them under the water; they've killed them with rocks and stones. Those are death wagons that travel the road by night, and the goods they carry are not smuggled casks alone, with brandy for some and tobacco for another, but the full cargoes of wrecked ships bought at the price of blood, the trust and the possession of murdered men. And that's why my uncle is feared and loathed by the timid people in the cottages and farms, and why all doors are barred against him, and why the coaches drive past his house in a cloud of dust. They suspect what they cannot prove. My aunt lives in mortal terror of discovery; and my uncle has only to lose himself in drink before a stranger and his secret is spilt to the four winds. There, Mr. Davey; now you know the truth about Jamaica Inn."
She leaned back, breathless, against the side of the carriage, biting her lips and twisting her hands in an emotion she could not control, exhausted and shaken by the torrent of words that had escaped her; and somewhere in the dark places of her mind an image fought for recognition and found its way into the light, having no mercy on her feelings; and it was the face of Jem Merlyn, the man she loved, grown evil and distorted, merging horribly and finally into that of his brother.
The face beneath the black shovel-hat turned towards her; she caught a sudden flicker of the white lashes, and the lips moved.
"So the landlord talks when he is drunk?" he said, and it seemed to Mary that his voice lacked something of its usual gentle quality; it rang sharper in tone, as though pitched on a higher note; but when she looked up at him his eyes stared back at her, cold and impersonal as ever.
"He talks, yes," she answered him. "When my uncle has lived on brandy for five days he'll bare his soul before the world. He told me so himself, the very first evening I arrived. He was not drunk then. But four days ago, when he had woken from his first stupor, and he came out to the kitchen after midnight, swaying on his two feet--he talked then. That's why I know. And that's perhaps why I've lost faith in humanity, and in God, and in myself; and why I acted like a fool today in Launceston."
The gale had increased in force during their conversation, and now with the bend in the road the carriage headed straight into the wind and was brought almost to a standstill. The vehicle rocked on its high wheels, and a sudden shower spattered against the windows like a handful of pebbles. There was no particle of shelter now; the moor on either hand was bare and unprotected, and the scurrying clouds flew fast over the land, tearing themselves asunder on the tors. There was a salt, wet tang in the wind that had come from the sea fifteen miles away.
Francis Davey leaned forward in his seat. "We are approaching Five Lanes and the turning to Altarnun," he said; "the driver is bound to Bodmin and will take you to Jamaica Inn. I shall leave you at Five Lanes and walk down into the village. Am I the only man you have honored with your confidence, or do I share it with the landlord's brother?"
Again Mary could not tell if there was irony or mockery in his voice. "Jem Merlyn knows," she said unwillingly. "We spoke of it this morning. He said little, though, and I know he is not friendly with my uncle. Anyway it doesn't matter now; Jem rides to custody for another crime."
"And suppose he could save his own skin by betraying his brother, what then, Mary Yellan? There is a consideration for you."
Mary started. This was a new possibility, and for a moment she clutched at the straw. But the vicar of Altarnun must have read her thoughts, for, glancing up at him for confirmation of her hopes, she saw him smile, the thin line of his mouth breaking for a moment out of passivity, as though his face was a mask and the mask had cracked. She looked away, uncomfortable, feeling like one who stumbles unawares upon a sight forbidden.
"That would be a relief to you and to him, no doubt," continued the vicar, "if he had never been involved. But there is always the doubt, isn't there? And neither you nor I know the answer to that question. A guilty man does not usually tie the rope around his own neck."
Mary made a helpless movement with her hands, and he must have seen the despair in her face, for his voice became gentle again that had been harsh hitherto, and he laid his hand on her knee. "Our bright days are done, and we are for the dark," he said softly. "If it were permitted to take our text from Shakespeare, there would be strange sermons preached in Cornwall tomorrow, Mary Yellan. Your uncle and his companions are not members of my congregation, however, and if they were they would not understand me. You shake your head at me. I speak in riddles. 'This man is no comforter,' you say; 'he is a freak with his white hair and eyes.' Don't turn away; I know what you think. I will tell you one thing for consolation, and you can make of it what you will. A week from now will bring the New Year. The false lights have flickered for the last time, and there will be no more wrecks; the candles will be blown."
"I don't understand you," said Mary. "How do you know this, and what has the New Year to do with it?"
He took his hand from her, and began to fasten his coat preparatory to departure. He lifted the sash of the window and called to the driver to rein in his horse, and the cold air rushed into the carriage with a sting of frozen rain. "I return tonight from a meeting in Launceston," he said, "which was but a sequel to many other similar meetings during the past few years. And those of us present were informed at last that His Majesty's Government were prepared to take certain steps during the coming year to patrol the coasts of His Majesty's country. There will be watchers on the cliffs instead of flares, and the paths known only at present to men like your uncle and his companions will be trodden by officers of the law.
"There will be a chain across England, Mary, that will be very hard to break. Now do you understand?" He opened the door of the carriage, and stepped out into the road. He bared his head under the rain, and she saw the thick white hair frame his face like a halo. He smiled again to her, and bowed, and he reached for her hand once more and held it a moment. "Your troubles are over," he said; "the wagon-wheels will rust and the barred room at the end of the passage can be turned into a parlor. Your aunt will sleep in peace again, and your uncle will either drink himself to death and be a riddance to all of you, or he will turn Wesleyan and preach to travelers on the high road. As for you, you will ride south again and find a lover. Sleep well tonight. Tomorrow is Christmas Day, and the bells to Altarnun will be ringing for peace and goodwill. I shall think of you." He waved his hand to the driver, and the carriage went on without him.
Mary leaned out of the window to call to him, but he had turned to the right down one of the five lanes, and was already lost to sight.
&nbs
p; The carriage rattled on along the Bodmin road. There were still three miles to cover before the tall chimneys of Jamaica Inn broke upon the skyline, and those miles were the wildest and the most exposed of all the long one-and-twenty that stretched between the two towns.
Mary wished now that she had gone with Francis Davey. She would not hear the wind in Altarnun, and the rain would fall silently in the sheltered lane. Tomorrow she could have knelt in the church and prayed for the first time since leaving Helford. If what he said was true, then there would be cause for rejoicing after all, and there would be some sense in giving thanks. The day of the wrecker was over; he would be broken by the new law, he and his kind; they would be blotted out and razed from the countryside as the pirates had been twenty, thirty years ago; and there would be no memory of them anymore, no record left to poison the minds of those who should come after. A new generation would be born who had never heard their name. Ships would come to England without fear; there would be no harvest with the tide. Coves that had sounded once with the crunch of footsteps on shingle and the whispered voices of men would be silent again, and the scream that broke upon the silence would be the scream of a gull. Beneath the placid surface of the sea, on the ocean-bed, lay skulls without a name, green coins that had once been gold, and the old bones of ships: they would be forgotten for evermore. The terror they had known died with them. It was the dawn of a new age, when men and women would travel without fear, and the land would belong to them. Here, on this stretch of moor, farmers would till their plot of soil and stack the sods of turf to dry under the sun as they did today, but the shadow that had been upon them would have vanished. Perhaps the grass would grow, and the heather bloom again, where Jamaica Inn had stood.
She sat in the corner of the carriage, with the vision of the new world before her; and through the open window, travelling down upon the wind, she heard a shot ring out in the silence of the night, and a distant shout, and a cry. The voices of men came out of the darkness, and the padding of feet upon the road. She leaned out of the window, the rain blowing in on her face, and she heard the driver of the carriage call out in fear, as his horse shied and stumbled. The road rose steeply from the valley, winding away to the top of the hill, and there in the distance were the lean chimneys of Jamaica Inn crowning the skyline like a gallows. Down the road came a company of men, led by one who leaped like a hare and tossed a lantern before him as he ran. Another shot rang out, and the driver of the carriage crumpled in his seat and fell. The horse stumbled again and headed like a blind thing for the ditch. For a moment the carriage swayed upon its wheels, rocked, and was still. Somebody screamed a blasphemy to the sky; somebody laughed wildly; there was a whistle and a cry.
A face was thrust in at the window of the carriage, a face crowned with matted hair that fell in a fringe above the scarlet, bloodshot eyes. The lips parted, showing the white teeth; and then the lantern was lifted to the window so that the light should fall upon the interior of the carriage. One hand held the lantern, and the other clasped the smoking barrel of a pistol; they were long slim hands, with narrow pointed fingers, things of beauty and of grace, the rounded nails crusted with dirt.
Joss Merlyn smiled; the crazy, delirious smile of a man possessed, maddened, and exalted by poison; and he leveled the pistol at Mary, leaning forward into the carriage so that the barrel touched her throat.
Then he laughed, and threw the pistol back over his shoulder, and, wrenching open the door, he reached for her hands and pulled her out beside him on the road, holding the lantern above his head so that all could see her. There were ten or twelve of them standing in the road, ragged and unkempt, half of them drunk as their leader, wild eyes staring out of shaggy bearded faces; and one or two had pistols in their hands, or were armed with broken bottles, knives, and stones. Harry the pedlar stood by the horse's head, while face-downwards in the ditch lay the driver of the carriage, his arm crumpled under him, his body limp and still.
Joss Merlyn held Mary to him and tilted her face to the light, and when they saw who she was a howl of laughter broke from the company of men, and the pedlar put his two fingers to his mouth and whistled.
The landlord bent to her, and bowed with drunken gravity; he seized her loose hair in his hand and twisted it in a rope, sniffing at it like a dog.
"So it's you, is it?" he said. "You've chosen to come back again, like a little whining bitch, with your tail between your legs?"
Mary said nothing. She looked from one to the other of the men in the crowd and they stared back at her, jeering, hemming in upon her and laughing, pointing to her wet clothes, fingering her bodice and her skirt.
"So you're dumb, are you?" cried her uncle, and he hit her across the face with the back of his hand. She called out and put up an arm to protect herself, but he knocked it away and, holding her wrist, he doubled it behind her back. She cried with the pain, and he laughed again.
"You'll come to heel if I kill you first," he said. "Do you think you can stand against me, with your monkey face and your damned impudence? And what do you think you do, at midnight, riding on the King's highway in a hired carriage, half naked, with your hair down your back? You're nothing but a common slut, after all." He jerked at her wrist, and she fell.
"Leave me alone," she cried; "you have no right to touch me or speak to me. You're a bloody murderer and a thief, and the law knows it too. The whole of Cornwall knows it. Your reign is over, Uncle Joss. I've been to Launceston today to inform against you."
A hubbub rose among the group of men; they pressed forward, shouting at her and questioning, but the landlord roared at them, waving them back.
"Get back, you damned fools! Can't you see she's trying to save her skin by lies?" he thundered. "How can she inform against me when she knows nothing? She's never walked the eleven miles to Launceston. Look at her feet. She's been with a man somewhere down on the road, and he sent her back on wheels when he'd had enough of her. Get up--or do you want me to rub your nose in the dust?" He pulled her to her feet and held her beside him. Then he pointed to the sky, where the low clouds fled before the scurrying wind and a wet star gleamed.
"Look there," he yelled. "There's a break in the sky and the rain's going east. There'll be more wind yet before we're through, and a wild gray dawn on the coast in six hours' time. We'll waste no more of it here. Get your horse, Harry, and put him in the traces here; the carriage will carry half a dozen of us. And bring the pony and the farm-cart from the stable; he's had no work for a week. Come on, you lazy drunken devils, don't you want to feel gold and silver run through your hands? I've lain like a hog for seven crazy days, and, by God, I feel like a child tonight and I want the coast again. Who'll take the road with me through Camelford?"
A shout rose from a dozen voices, and hands were thrust into the air. One fellow burst into a snatch of song, waving a bottle over his head, reeling on his feet as he stood; then he staggered and fell, crumpling onto his face in the ditch. The pedlar kicked him as he lay, and he did not stir; and, snatching the bridle of the horse, he dragged the animal forward, urging him with blows and cries to the steep hill, while the wheels of the carriage passed over the body of the fallen man, who, kicking for an instant like a wounded hare, struggled from the mud with a scream of terror and pain, and then lay still.
The men turned with the carriage and followed it, the sound of their running feet pattering along the high road, and Joss Merlyn stood for a moment, looking down upon Mary with a foolish drunken smile; then on a sudden impulse he caught her in his arms and pulled her towards the carriage, wrenching the door once more. He threw her onto the seat in the corner, and then, leaning out of the window, he yelled to the pedlar to whip the horse up the hill.
His cry was echoed by the men who ran beside him, and some of them leaped onto the step and clung to the window, while others mounted the driver's empty seat, and rained at the horse with sticks, and a shower of stones.
The animal quivered, sweating with fear; and he topped the h
ill at a gallop, with half a dozen madmen clinging to the reins and screaming at his heels.
Jamaica Inn was ablaze with light; the doors were open, and the windows were unbarred. The house gaped out of the night like a live thing.
The landlord placed his hand over Mary's mouth and forced her back against the side of the carriage. "You'd inform against me, would you?" he said. "You'd run to the law, and have me swinging on a rope's end like a cat? All right, then, you shall have your chance. You shall stand on the shore, Mary, with the wind and the sea in your face, and you shall watch for the dawn and the coming in of the tide. You know what that means, don't you? You know where I'm going to take you?"
She stared back at him in horror; the color drained from her face, and she tried to speak to him, but his hands forbade her.
"You think you're not afraid of me, don't you?" he said. "You sneer at me with your pretty white face and your monkey eyes. Yes, I'm drunk; I'm drunk as a king, and heaven and earth can smash for all I care. Tonight we shall ride in glory, every man jack of us, maybe for the last time; and you shall come with us, Mary; to the coast..."
He turned away from her, shouting to his companions, and the horse, startled by his cry, started forward again in his stride, dragging the carriage behind him; and the lights of Jamaica Inn vanished in the darkness.
11
It was a nightmare journey of two hours or more to the coast, and Mary, bruised and shaken by her rough handling, lay exhausted in the corner of the carriage, caring little what became of her. Harry the pedlar and two other men had climbed in beside her uncle, and the air became foul at once with the stink of tobacco and stale drink, and the smell of their bodies.
The landlord had worked himself and his companions into a state of wild excitement, and the presence of a woman among them brought a vicious tang to their enjoyment, her weakness and distress acting pleasurably upon them.
At first they talked at her and for her, laughing and singing to win her notice, Harry the pedlar bursting into his lewd songs, which rang with immoderate force in such close quarters and brought howls of appreciation from his audience, stimulating them to greater excitement.
Jamaica Inn Page 18
