The Adventures of Tom Leigh

by Phyllis Bentley

  In a few miles the coach drew up at a lane-end, and Mr. Gledhill and I dismounted. I waited till the coach had driven off, and then I turned on him.

  “I think I have a right to know what this mention of prison means,” I said.

  “That’s right, Tom. Barseland and Halifax believe I am taking you to York Castle to prison.”

  “And is this true?” I gasped.

  “Nay, lad, you know me better than that. We are going to Skipton, but Hollas must not guess our destination, so we take a long way round. Here, prompt to the word, comes the coach for us.”

  At first I was too much upset by the sudden alarm and its relief to take much notice of the landscape through which we passed, but presently I began to enjoy the many hills which, as we drew nearer Skipton, seemed higher and of a lighter rock than those near Barseland, while the valleys seemed wider and less tumultuously arranged. The amount of hills in the county of Yorkshire will always continue to astonish me.

  It was evening light when we reached Skipton. I took a fancy to this town, for it was more like the towns of Suffolk to which I was accustomed than those of Yorkshire. A fine broad market place led up to an old castle and a handsome church; on the left was an old half-timbered building which we were told was the gaol, and here we met the Constable of the township. By this time I was so sleepy I could hardly hold myself upright, so I have no recollection at all of this gentleman, save that he seemed to demur to my presence. But Mr. Gledhill insisted, and accordingly I trailed after them till we stopped in front of a neat house, not over large but a merchant’s house, and well kept.

  Mr. Gledhill shook me by the shoulder.

  “Wake up, Tom!” he said. “I want you to look at this man we shall see here, John Hollas by name, a linen-draper, and tell me if you have seen him before. He may be Daniel Defoe’s pock-marked man, you know.”

  The name of Daniel Defoe brought me awake quickly enough and I stepped forward as the Constable knocked. A neat maid-servant admitted the three of us and showed us into a parlour at the back and lighted the candles and went to fetch her master. I stood all agog, waiting for the entrance of this pock-marked man and thinking how exciting it was that a letter for me from a great writer in London should have led us over hill and dale to this thief. Then Mr. John Hollas entered the room.

  He was a short, plump man, very neatly dressed with bright shoe-buckles and a well-curled wig; florid in complexion and completely smooth of skin.

  I was so utterly cast down and confounded—for knowing Daniel Defoe to be absolutely exact in all his observations I had believed him entirely about the smallpox—that I staggered back and almost fell, then with an effort I rallied myself and forced myself to gaze earnestly again into his face. But there was not a pock-mark on him.

  “Well, Tom?” said Mr. Gledhill drily under cover of the Constable’s explanation of our errand. “Do you know him?”

  I shook my head and shrank back. This brought me to the windows, and gazing out in a daze of misery I muttered dully:

  “There is Dobbin.”

  “Dobbin?” exclaimed Mr. Gledhill, stepping towards me.

  “The horse from Barseland poorhouse.”

  “It is my cousin, then, and we can clear up this matter of the blue cloth at once, gentlemen,” said John Hollas. “For I assure you that I do not deal in stolen goods.”

  He stepped towards the hearth to pull the bell, but I was so eager to be out of the way of these men who must be thinking of me as a fool and a liar that without a pause for thought I ran out and along the passage and through the kitchen and out of the back door, crying: “Mr. Hollas! Mr. Hollas!”

  Mr. Hollas of the Barseland poorhouse was just dismounting from the cart, so that he had his back to me, but he heard my cry and turned to me with a smile. I gaped and halted, amazed, for in the light and shadow between the parlour candles and the setting sun, his freckles made dark spots on his cheeks, so that his face looked pitted.

  I gave a loud cry and bounded towards him, and his face changed to fury, and he flung himself up into the driver’s seat and whipped up the horse, and the cart clattered off down the narrow back street, swaying from side to side. I flew after him, and as I pounded down the street I suddenly remembered my great-grandfather and how he earned the silver watch, and my heart rose hot and strong within me, and I thought: “I can do what my great-grandfather did, I can catch the horse!”

  And I doubled my speed and hurled myself down the street, and the people standing there screamed and ran aside, and I drew level with the cart wheel and I saw it bump and turn and slide, and then there was Dobbin’s heaving brown flank and the long cart shaft, and a sharp pain across my neck and shoulders where Hollas had struck me with the whiplash, and then I caught one rein and pulled at it, and Dobbin slewed round towards me, and everything was huge yellow horse’s teeth and wide nostrils and mane flopping and great rolling eyes and trampling hoofs, and in the background Hollas standing up, lashing wildly at me, and I thought Dobbin was going to swing me off my feet but I caught the other rein by his mouth and pulled down as hard as I could, and suddenly everything was still.

  Dobbin stood quiet, trembling, the cart had swung across the street and hit the wall of a house and was jammed there, passers-by had pulled Hollas off the cart and held his arms behind his back, and Mr. Gledhill stood beside me with his hand on my shoulder, saying:

  “Well done, Tom.”

  And so I am sitting comfortably in the housebody at Upper High Royd, writing down, with pens sharpened by Gracie, all that has happened to me since I came to Yorkshire. I have done no carding nor weaving for many days. But I hope soon to be back at work, for tomorrow we go to York, and the day after (I think) we shall be at the York assizes, and I shall be giving evidence before the Court.

  The evidence is very strong now against Jeremy and the pedlar. Mr. John Hollas of Skipton, an honest man who had no notion that the goods he bought from his cousin were stolen, admitted frankly that he had bought from poorhouse Hollas, and sold in the Monday market at Skipton, a length of blue cloth which matched the pattern Mr. Gledhill had obtained from the merchant Rowlands to show him. The cloth had been sold to a Skipton tailor, who had made it up for a country gentleman, his customer. All these people were traced and gave their depositions, and Mr. John Hollas was so angry with his cousin for having involved him in dishonesty that he took his oath that he had bought the cloth openly and honestly from him. At this George Hollas (of the freckles and the poorhouse) said he had bought the cloth honestly from the pedlar. But nobody believed him, for one does not buy honestly in the middle of the night, as he must have done; and if he were guiltless, why did he run from me? It is rumoured, therefore, that he will turn King’s Evidence, and go into the witness-box against Jeremy and the pedlar.

  Sir Henry Norton and Harry, Mr. Gledhill, Mr. Swain, Mr. and Mrs. Firth and Gracie and myself of course, are all going to York by coach tomorrow, and it is thought in Barseland that Mr, Sykes may go to the assizes also, to prove malice aforethought by the pedlar, because of the false message about his health. There is a good deal of joking about Mr. Sykes in Barseland, and Harry tells me he has heard his father say he hopes the old fool will not go, for he will be sure to make a mess of the case. Mrs. Firth has had my suit washed and brushed and has made me a new neckcloth, and I am to wear white stockings, and my hair tied back in a black bow. I own I am excited by the prospect of the trial, and if all goes well I intend to write down an account of it on my return.

  10

  The Trial

  I had been so much instructed and exhorted about the trial—by Mr. Firth, Mr. Gledhill and even by Sir Henry—that I felt I knew all about it beforehand, but this did not prove to be the case. Indeed one of the things I have learned in the past year, which has turned me from a thoughtless boy into a responsible lad, is that the unexpected is always awaiting one round the corner; one must accustom oneself to face these surprising occurrences without flinching, if one is to be at all sati
sfied with one’s own behaviour. We had not been in York an hour before a very great surprise fell upon me.

  It happened in this way. There was a great to-do and bustle at the inn, settling into the various chambers which had been engaged for us, with myself running up and down with our baggage—a small bandbox of Mrs. Firth’s had been misplaced and I had much ado to find it. Then all our party seemed to vanish behind their doors, to wash and change after the journey, I suppose, because when I knocked at Mr. and Mrs. Firth’s door to ask permission to go out for a while, Mr. Firth was in his shirt sleeves and without a wig.

  “Yes, yes,” he said hastily. “Be off with you. But don’t be too long, Tom,” he called after me as I went down the stairs.

  I was walking towards the huge cathedral which I could see in the distance—it is called the Minster, and has three great towers—but progressing slowly because of the crowded pavements and narrow streets, when suddenly ahead of me by the bank of the river I saw the manufacturer who had hired my father to leave Lavenham and come to the West Riding! At first I could not believe my eyes; I stared and gasped; but yes, it was most certainly he; the short stout body, in the cinnamon cloth suit, the head held so far back that he seemed to look down his nose at his own paunch, the round, florid face, the turned-out toes, the air of self-importance—it was he! I shouted and remembered I did not know what name to shout, and tried to hurl myself towards him, but he strutted along ahead of me and entered the archway of one of the great gates of the old York walls. By the time I reached this archway he had disappeared.

  Then I thought: I shall be able to see which way he has gone if I look down at the streets from above; and I ran up the steps and on to the walls; and I could not see him amid the throng and so I ran a few steps further, and so it came about that I found myself quite a long way from the archway I knew, and alone on the walls. Then I came to a flight of steps leading downwards and stupidly thought it would be quicker and more direct to return on the ground, and so descended. In a word, I well and truly lost myself, and it was a clock hour before I found myself again at the doorway of my inn.

  I stepped in quickly and found myself the centre of a circle of accusing eyes: our whole party was drawn up in a ring gazing angrily at me—our whole party, with one addition: the gentleman with the back-held head and the turned-out toes.

  “Where have you been, Tom?” said Mr. Firth, very much vexed.

  “I lost myself chasing that gentleman,” said I, pointing to the cinnamon suit.

  “Chasing me?” said he in a prim tone, elevating his nose.

  “You are the one who hired my father, sir, in Lavenham,” I panted.

  “What, what?”

  “You hired my father, in Lavenham, to come and weave for you in the West Riding.”

  “Why, it is true I engaged a weaver, but he did not come.”

  “Do you not remember me, sir? I ran into the cottage and tripped over your foot.”

  “That was a much smaller boy, a dirty little child. Who is this great lad?”

  “This is Thomas Leigh, my apprentice,” said Mr. Firth. “He accompanied his father, and came on Barseland poorhouse when his father was drowned in the beck.”

  “What was his father doing in Barseland?”

  “He had lost his way, no doubt. But why did you appoint him to meet you at Halifax market?” said Mr. Firth. He spoke grimly, as if this was the last straw on an irritation which had been piling for a long time. “Huddersfield is your nearest town, Mr. Sykes.”

  “Mr. Sykes!” I exclaimed.

  “Aye, it is Mr. Sykes,” said Mr. Firth as before.

  Mr. Sykes’ fair face flushed. “I do not want all my fellow manufacturers to know my business,” he said in his pompous tones. “I am one who, as you know, Stephen, prefers to keep his affairs to himself. It would be better for you if you did the same.”

  “What!” exclaimed Mr. Firth angrily. “To what affairs do you refer, sir?”

  “Stephen! Father!” moaned Mrs. Firth.

  “Well, no matter,” said Mr. Sykes in his stately way. “No matter, Stephen.”

  “It was your being ill which dragged me from Upper High Royd and left my tenters open to theft, let me remind you, Mr. Sykes.”

  “I was not ill and sent no message.”

  “Gentlemen, gentlemen, we must go to Serjeant Braithwaite,” said Sir Henry. “We are late already, and Serjeant Braithwaite is not a man whom one can delay with impunity.”

  “All this time I have fed and housed the boy, while he should have been at your charges.”

  “I deny that. In any case, how could I know aught of the boy? You told me nothing. I have not seen my daughter for six months.”

  “You did not invite us,” snapped Mr. Firth.

  “You wrote me no letter about the boy.”

  “Why should I? I did not know you had any connection with him.”

  “Gentlemen, I must insist that you accompany me at once,” said Sir Henry in a stern magisterial tone.

  So we set off, and went to call upon Mr. Serjeant Braithwaite, who was to be one of the Counsel for the Prosecution in the trial; for it seems this word serjeant, which I had always thought of only in a military way, was applied also to high officers of the law.

  Of this visit I remember almost nothing. I am told that the serjeant took me through my whole story and deposition, but I do not recall it, for I was lost in misery. To be the occasion of a disagreement between Mr. Firth and his wife’s father was a most wretched thing for me; only less wretched, indeed, than to hear my master grumble about my cost as his apprentice. The sight of Mr. Sykes, too, had recalled to my mind my dear father, and Lavenham and our journey and the Barseland beck in Mearclough, and I felt the pain of my bereavement as keenly as the moment when I first heard it. I was not surprised to hear Serjeant Braithwaite—who was a small sharp man with very bright black eyes—say in a complaining tone:

  “He looks very hangdog.”

  “He is not used to look so; he is a lad of spirit,” said Sir Henry in a reproachful tone.

  “Does your arm yet pain you?” enquired the serjeant. “I see it is still in a sash.”

  “Not much,” said I, drearily and not quite truthfully. “If you wish me to take off the sash—”

  “No, no! You must keep it bound till after the trial,” said the serjeant hastily. “What is wrong with you then, Tom Leigh?”

  “I am just—grieved,” said I, turning my head aside.

  “Nay, don’t grieve, Tom,” said Mr. Firth more kindly. “It is not your fault. But I cannot help but feel vexed.”

  Mrs. Firth, who was sitting with her mouth primmed up and her head turned aside, gave a small sob.

  “Come, come, good people!” exclaimed Mr. Braithwaite, smiling—he was hard put to it not to laugh outright at us, it seemed to me. “We are to prosecute thieves tomorrow, remember. These megrims will not suit our judge, Sir Gervase King, I promise you. You will need all your wits at hand.”

  And so indeed it proved. We were all still somewhat sullen when we set off to the court in the morning, but when we had reached the huge York Castle, passed through the heavy archway with its round towers, made our way up the long curving drive and climbed the flight of steps, all thronged with people, attorneys in gowns bustling about and ordinary folk in their best clothes, looking perplexed and miserable if they were witnesses, grinning and curious if they were spectators—then we began to feel overawed and thankful to have Barseland people near us. We were put into a small place for witnesses with a court officer and the door shut on us, and were summoned into court one by one. Mr. Firth went first, looking pale. Mrs. Firth wept at his departure, and her father rebuked her in his prim tones.

  “Your grief is excessive, my dear Margaret; pray control yourself,” said he.

  Mr. Gledhill was next; I gathered from the talk that Mr. Firth had to witness that the cloth was on the tenters when he left Upper High Royd at five in the afternoon, and Mr. Gledhill to prove that it
was not there at ten o’clock that night.

  Presently Mr. Sykes’ name was called, and he walked out with his usual stately, pigeon-toed step, and his head held stiff. A few minutes later we thought we heard a gale of laughter coming from the court; Sir Henry and Mr. Swain exchanged meaning glances, and Harry winked at me, but from respect to Mrs. Firth nobody made any remark.

  Then at last my name came echoing down the passage: “Call Thomas Leigh! Call Thomas Leigh!”

  I rose and made for the door, feeling as if my stomach would drop out.

  “Good luck, Tom!” said Harry soberly.

  “Aye, good luck!” they all cried.

  “Speak the truth and you have nothing to fear,” added Sir Henry.

  To me this sounded like one of those conventional pious exhortations grown folk think it right to give to youngsters, which are not always easy to believe. However, I did my best with this from Sir Henry, since it was the only support I was likely to receive.

  The officer opened the door and ushered me into the court and another led me to the witness-box.

  A waft of hot air struck me in the face, for the large lofty chamber was crowded, faces ranked in tiers reaching up to the roof. The first thing which drew my eye was on a table to one side: a blue piece of ours, and a well-cut suit of breeches, coat and waistcoat of the same blue, beside it. I remembered now having heard Serjeant Braithwaite say the day before that the piece was the one bought by Mr. Rowlands, fetched back from Holland for the case, and the suit the one tailored in Skipton from the stolen piece. The blue stood out bright and I felt proud of it.

  Aloft on a dais, before a great coloured, embossed royal coat of arms, sat the judge in a flowing red gown with ermine somewhere at his shoulders, and one look put me in awe of him. He had a very handsome, lean, beaked face, with the most piercing, gleaming grey eyes I have ever seen—they were like points of steel. He sat very easily in his great carved chair, but perfectly still. His hands rested on some papers on the table before him, very fine, long and white and delicate. His voice, when he spoke, was silvery but strong, like steel again, easy to hear; every word was very clearly and beautifully said but with no affectation. He looked at me and I felt pierced to the marrow.