The Watchers: A Novel

by A. E. W. Mason

  CHAPTER XI

  OUR PLANS MISCARRY UPON CASTLE DOWN

  The next morning, you may be sure, I crossed the hill betimes, andcame down to the house under Merchant's Rock with my good news. I toldher the news with no small elation, and with a like elation she beganto hear it. But as I related what had occurred at the Palace Inn, shefell into thought, and now smiled with a sort of pride, and nowchecked a sigh; and when I came to the knife upon the table's edge sheshuddered.

  "But you are in danger!" she cried. "Every minute you are in danger ofyour life, and on my account!"

  "Nay," said I lightly, "you exaggerate. The best of women have thatfault."

  But she did not smile. She laid a hand upon my arm, and said, veryearnestly:

  "I cannot have it. I am very proud you count the risk so little, butyou must go."

  "No," said I, "they must go, and we have the means to make them march.We have but to inform Captain Hathaway at the Garrison that here aresome of Bartholomew Robert's fry, and we and the world will soon bequit of them for ever."

  "But we cannot," she exclaimed, "for then it would be known thatmy"--she hesitated for a second, or rather she paused, for there wasno hesitation in her voice, as she continued--"my father also was ofthe band. It may be justice that it should be known. But I cannot helpit; I guard his memory. Besides, there is Cullen."

  It was to Cullen that she always came in the end, and with suchexcuses as a girl might make who was loyal to a man whom she must knownot to be worth her loyalty. The house in which she lived, the moneywhich she owned were his by right. She dreaded what story these men,if captured, might have to tell of Cullen--she could not be persuadedthat Glen and his friends had not a motive of vengeance as well as ofgain,--and that story, whatever it was, would never have been enacted,had not Cullen been driven penniless from Tresco. It did not occur toher at all that this house was not Cullen's by any right, but belongedto the scattered sons of many men with whom the ship _Royal Fortune_had fallen in.

  She repeated her arguments to me as we walked in the grass-growngarden at the back of the house. A thick shrubbery of trees grew atthe end of the garden, and behind the trees rose the Merchant's Rock.On one side the Castle Down rolled up towards the sky, on the other ahedge closed the garden in, and beneath the hedge was the sea. Overthe hedge I could see the uninhabited island of St. Helen's and theruined church upon the summit, and a ship or two in St. Helen's Pool;and this side of the ships the piled boulders of Norwithel. It was atNorwithel that I looked as she spoke, and when she had done Icontinued:

  "I do not propose that we should tell Captain Hathaway, but I can makea bargain with Glen. I can find out what he wants, and strike abargain with him. We have the upper hand, we can afford to speakfreely. I will make a bargain with him to-night, of which onecondition shall be that he and his party leave Tresco and nowhereattempt to molest Cullen Mayle."

  But she stopped in front of me.

  "I cannot have it," she said, with energy. "This means danger to youwho propose the bargain."

  "I shall propose it in the inn kitchen," said I.

  "And the knife on the table's edge?" she asked; "that too was in theinn kitchen. Oh, no! no!" she cried, in a voice of great trouble.There was great trouble too in her eyes.

  "Madam," I said, gently, "I never thought that this would prove aschoolboy's game. If I had thought so, I should be this instantwalking down St. James's. But you overrate my peril."

  I saw her draw herself erect.

  "No; it is I who will propose the bargain and make the conditions. Itis I who will charge them with their piracy."

  "How?" I asked.

  "I will go this morning to the Palace Inn."

  "George Glen went out this morning before I rose."

  She looked over to Norwithel.

  "There is no one to-day on Norwithel," said I.

  "I shall find Peter Tortue on the Castle Down."

  "But I crossed the Castle Down this morning----" and I suddenlystopped. There had been no one watching on the Castle Down. There wasno one anywhere upon the watch to-day. The significance of thisomission struck me then for the first time.

  "What if already we are quit of them!" I cried. "What if that one tinyword _Royal Fortune_ has sent them at a scamper into hiding?"

  Helen caught something of my excitement.

  "Oh! if it only could be so!" she exclaimed.

  "Most like it _is_ so," I returned. "No man cutting ore-weed uponNorwithel! No man lounging on the Castle Down! It must be so!" and weshook hands upon that likelihood as though it was a certainty. Westarted guiltily apart the next moment, for a servant came into thegarden with word that Dick Parmiter had sailed round in a boat fromNew Grimsby, and was waiting for me.

  "There is something new!" said Helen, clasping her hands over herheart, and in a second she was all anxiety. I hastened to reassureher. Dick had come at my bidding, for I was minded to sail over to St.Mary's, and discover if there was anywhere upon that island a recordof the doings of the _Royal Fortune_. To that end I asked Helen togive me a letter to the chaplain there, who would be likely to knowmore of what happened up and down the world than the natives of theislands. I was not, however, to allow that I had any particularinterest in the matter, lest the Rev. Mr. Milray should smell a rat asthey say, and on promising to be very exact in this particular and toreturn to the house in time for supper, I was graciously given theletter.

  I found the Rev. Mr. Milray in his parsonage at Old Town, a small,elderly man, who would talk of nothing but the dampness of his housesince the great wave which swept over this neck of land on the day ofthe earthquake at Lisbon. I left him very soon, therefore, and wentabout another piece of business.

  I had travelled from London with no more clothes and linen than asmall valise would hold. On setting out, I had not considered, indeed,that I should be thrown much into the company of a lady, but only thatI was journeying into a rough company of fisher-folk. Yesterday,however, it had occurred to me that I must make some addition to mywardrobe and the necessity was yet more apparent to-day. I waspleased, therefore, to find that Hugh Town was of greater importancethan I had thought it to be. It is much shrunk and dwindled now, butthen ships from all quarters of the world were continually putting inthere, so that they made a trade by themselves, and there was alwaysfor sale a great store of things which had been salved from wrecks. Iwas able, therefore, to fit myself out very properly.

  I sailed back to the Palace Inn, dressed with some care, and walkedover to sup at Merchant's Rock--little later perhaps. Helen Mayle wasstanding in the hall by the foot of the stairs. I saw her face againstthe dark panels as I entered, and it looked very white and strainedwith fear.

  "There is no news of Cullen at St. Mary's," I said, to lighten herfears; and she showed an extravagant relief, before, indeed, she couldbarely have heard the words. Her face coloured brightly and then shebegan to laugh. Finally she dropped me a curtsey.

  "Shall I lend you some hair-powder?" she asked, whimsically; and whenwe were seated at table, "How old are you?"

  "I was thirty and more a month ago," said I, "but I think that I amnow only twenty-two."

  "As much as that?" said she, with a laugh, and grew serious in aninstant. "What did you discover at St. Mary's besides a milliner?"

  "Nothing," said I, "except that the Rev. Milray suffers from therheumatics."

  She remained in the same variable disposition during the whole of thatsupper, at one moment buoyant on a crest of light-heartedness and hereyes sparkling like stars, at another sunk into despondency and herwhite brows all wrinkled with frowns. But when supper was over shewent to a cabinet, and taking from it a violin, said:

  "Now, I will play to you."

  And she did--out in that tangled garden over the sea.

  "The violin came to the Scillies in a ship that was wrecked upon theStevel Rock one Christmas. But the violin will tell you," she said,with a smile. "My father bought it at St. Mar
y's and gave it to me,and an old pilot now dead taught me;" and she swept the bow across thestrings and the music trembled across the water, through the lucentnight, up to the stars, a voice vibrating with infinite wisdom andinfinite passion.

  It seemed to me that I had at last got the truth of her. All myguesses, my suspicions of something like duplicity, even myrecollection of our first meeting were swept out of my mind. She sat,her white face gleaming strangely solemn under her black wealth ofhair, her white hand flashing backwards and forwards, and she made theviolin speak. It spoke of all things, things most sad and things mostjoyous; it spoke with complete knowledge of the heights and thedepths; it woke new, vague, uncomprehended hungers in one's heart; itcalled and called till all one's most sacred memories rose up, as itwere from graves, to answer the summons. It told me, I know, all mylife, from my childhood in the country to the day when I set out withmy cadet's portion to London. It sang with almost a paean of thosefirst arduous years--set them to a march,--and then with a great pitytold of those eight wasted years that followed--years littered withcards, stained with drink; years in which, and there was thehumiliation of it, my fellow-drunkards, my fellow-gamblers had allbeen younger than myself--years in which I grew a million years old.That violin told it all out to me, until I twisted in my chair throughsheer shame, and I looked up and the girl's eyes were fixed upon me.What it was that compelled me to speak I could never tell, unless itwas the violin. But as she looked at me, and as that violin sobbed outits notes, I cried in a passionate excuse:

  "You asked me how old I was. Do you know I never was young--I neverhad the chance of youth! When the chance came, I had forgotten whatyouth can do. That accounts, surely, for those eight years. I wastired then, and I was never young."

  "Until to-night," she said quietly, and the music quickened. I supposethat she was right, for I had never spoken so intimately to any one,whether man or woman; and I cursed myself for a fool, as one does whenone is first betrayed into speaking of one's secret self.

  She took the violin from her shoulder, and the glory of the music diedoff the sea, but lingered for a little faintly upon the hills. I roseup to go and Helen drew a breath and shivered.

  "This afternoon," said I, "a brig went out from the islands throughCrow Sound, bound for Milford. I'll wager the five were on it."

  "But if not?"

  "There's the 'Palace' kitchen."

  "Speak when there are others by, not within hearing, but within reach!You will? Promise me!"

  I promised readily enough, thinking that I could keep the promise, andshe walked back with me through the house to the door. There is alittle porch at the door, four wooden beams and a slate roof on thetop, and half a dozen stone steps from the porch to the garden. HelenMayle stood in the porch, with her violin still in her hand. Shewished me "Good-night" when I was at the bottom of the steps, but alittle afterwards, when I had passed through the gateway of thepalisade and had begun to ascend the hill, she drew the bow sharplyacross one of the strings and sent a little chirp of music after me,which came to my ears, with an extraordinarily friendly sound. The airwas still hereabouts, though from the motion of the clouds there wassome wind in the sky, and the chirp came very clear and pretty.

  It was a few minutes short of ten when I left the house, and Iset off at a good pace, for I was anxious to keep my promise andmake my bargain with George Glen, quietly in a corner, before thefishing-folk had gone home to bed. A young moon hung above the crestof the hill, a few white clouds were gathering towards it, and thegorse at my feet was black as ink. I walked upwards then steadily. Ihad walked for perhaps a quarter of an hour, when I heard a low, softwhistle. It came to me quite as clearly as the chirp of the violin,but it had not the same friendly sound. It sounded very lonesome, itset my heart jumping, it brought me to a stop. For I had heardprecisely that whistle on one occasion before, on the night when Ifirst crossed this hill with Dick Parmiter down to Merchant's Rock.

  The whistle had sounded from below me and from no great distance away.I turned and looked down the slope, but I could see no one. It wasvery lonely and very still. Whoever had whistled lay crouched on thegorse. And then the whistle sounded again, but this time it came fromabove me, higher up the slope. Immediately I dropped to the ground.The gorse which hid them from me might well hide me from them. A fewpaces above me the gorse seemed thicker than it was where I lay. Icrawled laboriously, flat upon my face, till I reached this patch. Iforced myself into it, holding my face well down to keep the thornsout of my eyes, until the bushes were so close I could crawl nofurther. Then I lay still as a mouse, holding my breath, listeningwith every nerve. I had eluded them before in just this way, but I gotlittle comfort from that reflection. There had been a fog on thatnight, whereas to-night it was clear. Moreover, they had a more urgentreason now for persevering in their search. I possessed some dangerousknowledge about them as they were aware--knowledge, too dangerous;knowledge which would harden into a weapon in my hand if--if I reachedthe Palace Inn alive.

  I lay very still, and in a little I heard the brushing of their feetthrough the grass. They were closing down from above, they wereclosing up from below; but they did not speak or so much as whisper. Iturned my head sideways, ever so gently, and looked up to the sky. Isaw to my delight that the clouds were over the moon. I buried my faceagain in the grass, lest they should detect me by its pallor againstthe black gorse. I was very thankful indeed that I had not acceptedthat proffered loan of hair-powder--I was dressed in black, too, fromhead to foot; I blessed the good fortune which had led me to buy blackstockings at St. Mary's, and, in a word, my hopes began to revive.

  The feet came nearer, and I heard a voice whisper:

  "It was here." The voice was Peter Tortue's, as I knew from the Frenchaccent, and the next instant a stick fell with a heavy thud not a footfrom my head. If only the clouds hung in front of the moon! Round andabout they tramped--the whole five of them. For in a little they beganin low tones to curse, first of all me, and afterwards Peter Tortue,who had whistled from below. Let them only quarrel amongst themselves,I thought, and there's a good chance they will forget the reason oftheir quarrel. It seemed that they were well on the road to a quarrelat last; a man, quite young as I judged from his voice, flung himselfdown on the grass with an oath.

  "But he is here, close to us," said Peter. "I heard the girl thrumgood-night to him on her fiddle, and then I saw him, and followed him,and whistled."

  "Well, it is your business, not mine. Yours and George Glen's," theother returned. I learned later that his name was Nathaniel Roper. "Iwas never on no _Royal Fortune_, devil damn me."

  "Whist, you lousy fool"--and this was George Glen speaking. I am surehe was winking and pinching the fellow's arm,--"we are all in the sameboat whether we've sailed in the _Royal_----" and he stopped.

  All at once there was a dead silence. I have never in my lifeexperienced anything so horrible as that sudden, complete silence. Icould not see what caused it, for my face was buried in the grass, andI dared not move. One moment I had a sensation that they were gazingat my back, and I felt--it is the only way I can express it--I felt_naked_. Another moment I imagined it to be a ruse to beguile me intostirring; and it lasted for ever and ever.

  At length one sound--not a voice--broke the silence: the man who hadthrown himself down was getting to his feet. But when he had stood uphe made no further movement; he stood motionless, like the others, andthe silence began again and again it lasted for ever and ever.

  All sorts of tremors began to creep over my body; the muscles of myback jerked of their own accord. The suspense was driving me mad. Ihad to move, I had to see, if only to hinder myself from leaping to myfeet and making a headlong rush. Very slowly I turned my headsideways; I looked backwards along the ground, until I saw. The moonhad swum out from the clouds, and the five men were standing inarrested attitudes with their eyes fixed upon something that glitteredvery bright upon the ground. I could see it myself through the gorseglittering and burning white, like
a delicate flame, and my heart gavea great leap within me as I understood what it was. It was a bigsilver shoe-buckle that shone in the moonlight, and the shoe-bucklewas on my foot.

  The game was up. I thought that I might as well make a fight of itat the last, and I jumped to my feet suddenly, with a faint hope thatthe suddenness of the movement might startle them and let me through.But there was to be no fighting for me that night. It is true thatthe men all scattered from about me, but a voice a few yards to myright thundered, "Stand!" and I stood stock-still, obedient as acharity-school boy.

  For Peter Tortue was standing stock still too, with his right armstretched out in a line with his shoulder and the palm of his handupturned. On the palm of that hand was balanced a long knife with anopen blade, and the moonlight streaked along that blade in flame, justas it had burned upon my shoe-buckle.

  George Glen rubbed his hands together.

  "You will lie down, Mr. Berkeley," said he, with his most insinuatingsmile. "You will down, 'flat on my face,' says you."

  "But I have only just got up," said I.

  Glen tittered nervously, but no one else showed any appreciation of mysally. I thought it best to lie down flat on my face.

  "Cross your hands behind your back," said George Glen, and I knew hewas winking.

  "Any little thing like that, I am sure," I murmured, as I obeyed."Only too happy," and in a trice I was nothing more than a coil ofrope. It cut into my wrists, it crushed my chest, it snaked round mylegs, it bit my ankles.

  "To be sure," said I, "they mean to send me somewhere by the post."

  Mr. George Glen sniggered and mentioned my destination, which wasimpolite, though he mentioned it politely; but Roper thumped me in thesmall of the back, and thrust my handkerchief into my mouth. So I haddone better to have kept silence.

  Two of the men lifted me up on their shoulders and staggered up hill.In a moment or two they descended a small incline, and I saw that Iwas being carried into the hollow where the shed stood. Glen pushed atthe door of the shed and it fell open inwards. A great cavern ofblackness gaped at us, and they carried me in and set me downunceremoniously on the floor.

  "Brisk along with that lantern, Nat Roper," said Glen, and the youngfellow who had flung himself down on the grass struck a light and setfire to the candle. The shed was divided by a wooden partition, inwhich was a rickety door hardly hanging on its hinges.

  "In there!" said Glen, swinging the lantern towards the inner room. Mybearers picked me up again and carried me to the door. One of themkicked at the door, but it did not yield.

  "It's jammed," said the other, "there's some-thing 'twixt it and thefloor," and raising a great sea boot, he kicked with all his might.

  I heard a metallic clinking, as though a piece of iron was hoppingacross the stone floor, and the door flew open.

  They carried me into the inner room and set me down against thepartition. There was no furniture of any sort, not even a bucket tosit upon; there was no window either, a thatched roof rested uponheavy beams over my head. They placed the lantern at my feet, four ofthem squatted down about me, the fifth went out of the shed to keepwatch.

  It was, after all, not in the inn kitchen of the Palace Inn that anybargain was to be struck. I could not deny that they had chosen theirplace very well. Not a man in Tresco but would give this shed thewidest of berths, and if he saw the glint of this lantern through achink, or heard, perhaps, as he was like to do, one loud cry--why, hewould only take to his heels the faster. The ropes, too, made my bonesache.

  I would have preferred the kitchen at the Palace Inn.