CHAPTER XI
THE LAST OF THE “PEABODY”

Fate, it seemed, had ordered a final fleeting happiness for the lonely young wife before her sun was to set in sorrow. For a season the glow of Daniel’s letter clung to her, warmed her heart, and lighted her spirit. Nor did she hide the news from all. Daniel’s parents heard much of the letter, as he directed, and Minnie trusted Mr Beer and his wife with the news also. But nobody else heard it. Then, as summer approached and she already began to count the days until another letter might reach her, a crashing grief fell upon the woman, and all her future was changed. Hope perished; life henceforth stretched forward into the dreary future without one ray of light to break its darkness.

For a moment in her shattering sorrow even the truth itself seemed no longer worth discovery. Nothing mattered any more, for the end had come. Even while she was reading his letter, so full of life and hope, the hand that wrote it was clay again; and, under circumstances the most awful, his little vessel and all thereon had perished.

When Titus Sim kept his appointment and brought himself to Hangman’s Hut that Minnie might sew a yellow button upon his gaiter, she had some ado to hide her splendid thoughts while she worked for him. From the first she had studiously concealed the truth from Titus, nor did she speak a word of it now. His presence always made her heart cold and hard; for as she thought of the past, his action grew more and more clear to her. He had laid a deadly trap for Daniel, and Daniel, trusting him better than anybody in the world, had fallen headlong into it. Whether Sim was actually present at the death of Thorpe Minnie still knew not; but that he was familiar with the circumstances, and that he had on the night of the murder fetched Daniel’s gun and placed it ready to be found on the following morning, she felt assured. His purpose was to gain herself. But what to do at this juncture she did not know. She dared not summon Daniel home as yet, and she dared not impart her discoveries to any other. Then happened circumstances that made all vain and turned revenge into a thing too mean and shallow to pursue. After the announcement of her husband’s death the perspective and significance of life were altered. For long days she moved listlessly from her bed back to her bed again. Sleep only had power to comfort her, while yet the overwhelming tragic truth tortured each waking hour. Sleep nightly she welcomed as she would have welcomed death.

In this strange fashion came the fatal news to her.

Sim was accustomed to bring books and newspapers upon the occasion of his visits, and in a daily journal, at the time of that awful event, telegrams appeared of the volcanic catastrophe that had burst upon the West Indies, had shaken St Vincent to its heights, and overwhelmed much of the unfortunate island of Martinique. Chance ordered the intelligence upon the day that Sim had fixed for his formal proposal, and her eyes were actually fixed upon the Western Morning News, where it lay spread over her table, at the moment that the man was asking her to marry him.

“I can’t hold it in no more,” he said. “You know right well what I mean. I’ve been patient too—the Lord knows how patient. Oh, woman, don’t torment me any longer. For God’s sake say you’ll marry me. My life’s one cruel stretch on the rack as it is. All I’ve done to get you you’ll never know. You’ve been the one thought and hope and prayer and longing of my life ever since I first set eyes on you, and now—now there’s nought between us—now—Minnie! Good God—what’s the matter—what have I done?”

He broke off and leapt to his feet, for she had fallen back in her chair and an expression of great terror and horror had come into her face. She had only heard his last words. The woman did not faint; but for the moment she was powerless to speak. Her emotion had robbed her cheek of blood and made her dizzy. In response to his cry she pointed to the sheet before her. He glanced at the long Reuter telegram, and then noted the brief paragraph upon which she kept her finger:—

“What is this to you or to me? What do you know? Tell me if I can do anything,” cried Titus Sim.

“‘Every soul—every soul,’” she said, quoting in a strange voice under her breath. “‘Every soul,’ but it means ‘everybody.’ The souls have gone back where there’s no hopes nor fears nor sorrows. But his body—his dear body—all—all—perished. I can’t read no more. Does it say all?”

“That awful thing in Martinique. Yes, they be full of it at the house, and full of thanksgivings that it wasn’t Tobago that was smitten. But you, Minnie—what is this to you?”

“Death,” she said. “His death; and his death be mine—the death of all that’s best in me—the death of all I kept alive for him.”

“For—for—you don’t mean your husband? Not Daniel Sweetland?”

“He was on board her. ’Twas to her he went and in her he sailed. I only heard it a thought more than a month agone. Heard it under his own hand. He wrote me a letter. And now—”

“There might be another ship of that name. But how much this means! And you could hide it all from me! And I thought—”

“You thought he was in Wall Shaft Gully. And now he lies in a bigger grave than that—my Dan—driven away to die. May God remember the man who ruined my husband!”

For once Sim was shaken from his power of ready speech; for once his tongue seemed tied. The tremendous nature of this event made him powerless. Yet at the bottom of his bewildered mind lurked joy. The thing he had toiled to bring about appeared at last accomplished without further possibility of failure. Doubt no longer existed. Sweetland was now dead indeed. He concealed his thanksgiving and began to mourn. No more of love he spake, but strove to find consolation for her in religious reflections. Dry-eyed she stared from him to the newspaper, from the newspaper back to him. Then she bade him leave her, and he went, but stopped at the publichouse hard by and told his tremendous news to Mr and Mrs Beer. They, who knew the secret of Daniel’s disappearance, were stricken with profound sorrow, and scarcely had Sim proclaimed the truth before Jane Beer hurried bare-headed from the house and ran to her friend.

“Poor young woman!” groaned Johnny in genuine grief, “what a world of up and downs and hopes and fears she have suffered, to be sure! To think as one pair of girl’s shoulders be called upon to carry such a burden. There’s nought to be done. Only time can help her; an’ maybe you.”

“To think,” said Sim, “and I was that moment putting marriage before her! Another moment and she must have told me she was a wife; and then it caught her eye—staring from the printed page—that she was a widow!”

“She told us the secret and I made a joyous rhyme about it; but what’s rhymes to her now? Yet I’ll do one, and this day I’ll do it, for many’s the poor broken heart as have sucked comfort from a well-turned verse—else why do we have hymns? Well, it will come back to you, Titus. For my part I could wish as Daniel had died to home where first we thought he did. A sea death be so open an’ gashly. For my part I’d sooner have gone down Vitifer mine shaft and know my bones would bide in the land that bred ’em.”

“Well, the mystery be all out now. No doubt he visited her that night he gave the policemen the slip. ’Twas hard I should never know the secret, for I’m sure Dan would have told me afore all the world.”

“She’s only got his memory now, poor lamb; an’ that won’t keep her warm of a winter night. ’Twas ordained you should have her, no doubt. But you mustn’t ax her till the tears be dried. She’ll weep a lot. Turn and twist as you may, death will grab you some day. The appointed time comes round as sure as the sun rises. Pig or man, each has his span. There’s verses rising up in me, Titus, so I won’t keep you. What was the name of the poor hero’s ship? D’you call it to mind?”

“The Peabody,” answered Sim; then he departed with strange thoughts for company.

In truth Titus had much ado to marshal his ideas. He stood exactly where he believed that he had stood from the time of Daniel’s disappearance; but the fact that Sweetland was only now removed from his path by death startled him not a little. He hardly realised his fortune. In his mind was a dark cloud, for that Minnie should so carefully have kept her secret from him meant mischief. She had not trusted him with the truth. There was a reason for that, and the reason promised to be the reverse of pleasant. Sim had been deceived by Minnie’s attitude. Without attempt to blind his eyes, her demeanour had led him to suppose that she at least was content in his society, that she trusted him, that she bore to him the regard due to her husband’s first and favourite companion. But she had deliberately chosen to keep him in ignorance, not only of Daniel’s safety, but also concerning his actual existence; and this reserve caused Sim a great deal of painful surprise. Surely it indicated that Daniel’s widow did not trust him; and for that distrust a reason must exist.

Titus perceived that much depended upon his future attitude. To win her absolute confidence would now be necessary before any further talk of love. He ransacked his sleepless mind that night, and ere morning saw the way clear. His good faith must be made apparent; it must shine above any shadow of suspicion. Minnie should learn that her husband’s honour and fair name were as much to Titus Sim as to herself. How to effect this result was his problem, and the footman believed that he could solve it. For Sim was perfectly familiar with the truth concerning Adam Thorpe’s end; and no man knew better than did he that Daniel had no part in the crime. The secret murderer was not hidden from Titus, nor was the hand that placed Sweetland’s gun where he had found it.

Everything conspired to his purpose. He calculated that in a month’s time he would be able to clear Sweetland’s name before the world. Then his own reward seemed clear. Minnie, once convinced that her vague fears and suspicions did him wrong, could hardly deny him what he begged. Into his fixed and immovable resolution to make her his own he poured all the strength of a tremendous will. He had not come so far upon the journey to be repulsed. He had not moved by dark ways and committed worse than crimes for nothing. From a mental condition of anger and uneasiness, his devious soul plotted itself back into content and calm. The end was assured and the means to play his final strokes now lay clear before the man’s intelligence. To establish absolute confidence in himself as Sweetland’s friend—true even beyond death—was now his purpose; and the thing he planned to do, if brought to a successful issue, could hardly fail to show him in a noble light and convince the sceptic, if any such existed beside Minnie, that his aims were pure and his faith above all suspicion.

A week later, when she had told her secret, and her little world mourned in its wonder, and yet also triumphed at the ingenuity of the native who would never return again, Titus Sim visited Minnie with offers to assist her in any step she might now be contemplating. But she did not avail herself of the suggestion.

“I’m going back to my aunt come presently,” she said. “I can’t bide here no more now. After Michaelmas I give it up an’ return to Moreton.”

Her face was very pale against her black dress, and darkness and sorrow haunted her beautiful eyes; but no living soul had seen her deepest grief. That was hidden from all. Her voice never shook when she spoke of Daniel to Titus Sim, for instinct told her the man, despite his protestations, did not share her bereavement. Only with Daniel’s mother, or in the company of Jane Beer, did she reveal a glimpse of her breaking heart.

“Command me, if I can serve you in any possible manner,” he said. “And don’t think I’m forgetting this great sorrow because ’tis not always upon my tongue. Far from it; Daniel is never out of my thoughts. He’s beyond the reach of aught but prayers; but his honour and good name are the legacies he left behind, and ’tis for us to treasure them and make ’em shine out like the sun from behind this cloud that darkens them. I know only too well you don’t believe me. It’s been the greatest grief in a sad life—the greatest but Daniel’s death—that you kept his secret from me and did not let me know that he was still alive. I’ve had nought but sleepless nights thinking of it. And why for you don’t trust me I can’t guess, and why you hid the welfare of my greatest friend from me I shall never know; but this I know: you had no just reason and not by word or deed, or thought or dream have I ever done him wrong. Be that as it may. I’ll say nothing about it and I’ll ask you for no explanation, for ’tisn’t a time to wrangle which of us—man or woman—friend or wife—loved him best. I’ll not prate; I’ll do. I believe even now that ’twill be my blessed lot to clear his memory afore the world. You gaze at me as if you thought that ’twould be no joy to me to do it—see how I read what’s in your eyes! But I swear afore the Throne of Heaven that I’d sooner clear his name and sweeten his memory than be a prince in the land, or the ruler of cities.”

“If you could do it, why have you waited until now?” she asked coldly.

“Because Providence willed that I should wait. And even now I’m only hopeful, not positive. I should have striven to do all and bring you the glad news when I’d got it proved beyond the doubt of the world; but now Heaven has hit upon a better way. Yes, ‘Heaven’s’ the word, for in righting Daniel in the world’s eyes, I pray God will right me in yours, Minnie Sweetland.”

He paused, but she only surveyed him silently, and he spoke again.

“Thus it stands. The poor soul commonly called ‘Drunkard’ Parkinson, is now at his last gasp, or near it. He cannot live more than a month; doctor has told him so. But, as I have always feared, that man has evil secrets. What they are I only guess, but my guess during the last few days has developed into certainty. You know young Prowse lives in the cottage that adjoins Rix Parkinson’s? Two days ago he came to tell me that poor Rix wanted to see me, and to know how soon I could call upon him. I went at once, and then he confessed that there is much upon his conscience. I begged him to see Parson West, whose deep wisdom and sympathy and knowledge of Heaven are denied to no sinner; but he refused. ‘Not him, nor any other man,’ he said. ‘’Tis a woman I want to see—the wife of that chap, Dan Sweetland, as runned away after that they’d taken him for murder.’ He did not know that Dan was dead, and I did not tell him, for the fact might have changed his determination. I promised to bring you to him, and I prevailed with him that he would let me be present also. He is desirous to tell you something, and since the confession must have a witness to make it of any worth, I, too, shall hear it, that it may be supported in the world after Parkinson dies. For he is on the way to die, and he specially told me that the thing he meant to tell you must not be made public until his death. What it is I can guess, as I have said; and doubtless you can, too.”

“He killed Adam Thorpe.”

“I believe so with all my soul. They were old enemies, and three years ago Parkinson went to gaol for three months after assaulting Thorpe. Either he did it, or he knows right well who did. And he knows that the man who did it was not our poor Daniel.”

“I will come when he pleases,” said Minnie. “I hope your opinion may be the right one, Mr Sim.”

“And I hope that you will think kinder of me when, through my ceaseless toil and labour, I have cleared my friend’s memory.”

He left her then without waiting for an answer, and a week later a day was fixed.

It happened that Minnie was in Moretonhampstead upon the occasion of making this final appointment to visit the sick man, and as she returned to the Moor, she met young Samuel Prowse—well known to her as an old friend of Daniel. She passed him with a nod of recognition; then she changed her mind; a thought suddenly struck her, and she called the youth to her side.

CHAPTER XII.
HENRY VIVIAN TRIES TO DO HIS DUTY

It is now necessary to be occupied directly with Daniel, and those brief days before the Peabody met her fate.

From Tobago she returned to Barbados with a small cargo of turtle and cocoanuts; then she sailed directly to the Northern Lesser Antilles, and reached her next and last port, St Pierre, in Martinique.

But we are concerned with earlier events affecting young Sweetland, and these may best be chronicled by setting down the opening passages of a second letter that he began to write to his wife at Scarborough, the little port of Tobago. This communication was never completed, but it covers a period of fifteen days in the life of the writer, and when he put it aside to finish on another occasion he little dreamed that he would see the sheet no more.

“My own dear heart” wrote he—“Here’s the old tub at Tobago with steam in her rotten boilers again! Talk about volcanoes and suchlike! ’Tis us aboard the Peabody that be on a volcano, not the shore folks. This here’s a very fine island, and I’ve had a merry time when I could get ashore. They laugh at me, because I be gathering together such a lot of queer things for you. God He knows if you’ll ever get ’em and hang ’em round the walls to home, but if you do, I lay you’ll be mazed with wonder. There’s a huge river by name of Orinoco that pours out of the mainland of South America, and it brings to these shores all manner of queer seeds and shells and suchlike, including coral and coraline, like stone fans, all very beautiful for ornaments. I tramp along when off duty and fill my pockets, and say every minute, ‘My stars, won’t Minnie like that!’ or ‘These here will make a necklace almost so pretty as pearls, for her neck!’ There be little silver-like shells here, all curly. I’ve got scores; and the niggers say as there be real pink pearls to be got; but I doubt it, ’cause if there was, why don’t somebody with plenty of time get ’em? Sometimes the cocoanuts will fall with a bang just while you be under the palms. I near had my head knocked off by a whacker t’other day; then I forced a hole in his monkey face (for they be all like monkeys one end) and drank the milk and shared the creamy inside with a hungry dog as chanced to be passing that way. As for adventures, I had one with a hoss would make ’em laugh to home. I calls it a hoss, but never you seed such a lop-sided bag o’ bones. But ’twas something to have un between my legs, and I made un gallop a bit, much to his surprise, afore I’d done with un. A nigger boy went with me to get any queer things as might happen by the way, and I rode into the island to see a river where they say there be alligators. The hoss was called ‘Nap,’ and the nigger went by the name of Peter. And a very fine time us had of it at first. The road led up and up through palms and tamarinds and mangoes, and a million trees I’d never seed or heard of. Frangipani made the air sweet to the nose. It grows in stars ’pon great naked boughs, and they make scent of it. Then there was bindweeds, like we get to home but larger, all crawled all over the hedges, with yellow and purple flowers to ’em. And everywhere in the blazing woods was flowers and seeds, and berries and cocoa trees, which be just like them advertisements in the shop windows to Moreton of Cadbury’s Cocoa! The pods hang on the trees all purple and gold. I got seeds and berries for you, and having a little shotgun as Bradley lent me, I killed a few birds and one sun-bird as be like a splash of fire on the wing, and a green humming-bird or two. My hoss he loafed along, thinking of anything but his business, but he was eating out of the hedge all the while, and sometimes ’twas a fight between us which should get to something first. As to alligators, I never seed the tail of one; but lizards was there by the million, and iguanas too. They be very big chaps and pretty eating when you can catch ’em, so Bradley says. The lizards be all colours of the rainbow and all sizes, from a tadpole to a squirrel. In the trees was all manner of hothouse things a-blazing away and quite at home, and on the hill-sides grew wild plantain, wild indigo, guinea-grass, cotton, cashew trees (cashews be nuts), cabbage palms, and all manner of other fine things, with the humming-birds and butterflies looking like flowers blowed out of the trees. Then, as for the stream, it bustled along for all the world like a Dartmoor brook, and the sound of it among the stones was like a word from home. But instead of the heather and whortleberries and fern, there was all foreigners ’pon the bank, and instead of a Moorman coming along with a nitch of reeds or a cart of peat I found a lot of black gals washing linen in the stream.

“‘Well, my dears, have ’e seed any alligators upalong?’ I axed ’em; and they said, ‘No, massa sailor, we no see no alligators.’

“I had a row with the hoss coming back and was much surprised to find he’d got devil enough in him to run away. Of course I held on, and ’twas rather amusing except for all the things he jerked out of my pockets. ’Peared to me that he galloped on one side and trotted on t’other. When he runned away he was going about three miles an hour. Afore that I never seed the funeral as wouldn’t have catched him up and passed him. He got me down to the wharf; then his gear all carried away and I falled off with the saddle on top of me.

“’Tis pretty eating here, and we have tree oysters, if you’ll believe it, that grow on the roots of trees in the salt creeks. Also snapper-fish, yams, gourd soup, muscovy ducks, cocoanut pudding, guava cheese, and many other tidy things.

“Yesterday I seed Mister Henry ’pon the wharf, with his overseer from the Pelican Sugar Estate—a chap by the name of Jabez Ford. It made me feel terrible queer to see Mister Henry. We was getting a boatload of cocoanuts at the time, so I didn’t make myself knowed to him. But when the chance comes I will.

“That man Ford lost his wife rather sudden two or three nights agone. She was half a black woman and believed in a lot of queer, horrible things like the full-blooded niggers do. And come nightfall, after she died, a awful wailing and howling broke out ashore, for scores of negresses was singing all round Ford’s house to keep the Jumbies away. Jumbies belong to the religion of Obi, and they’m awful, flesh-sucking vampires as scent out a corpse like vultures and come through the air and out of the earth to be at it. But if the beast hears women singing, it chokes him off. Certainly the black females sing very nice; and they sang hymns the parson out here has taught them—hymns that comed from England. I almost cried to hear ’em, Minnie, till I remembered as they were being sung to keep off Jumbies; then I laughed. There’s another awful terrible customer called a loopgaroo.[2] He’s worse than Jumby almost, and he takes off his skin when he’s at his nightly devilries, and hides it onder a silk cotton tree. This be all part of Obeah, and I hear tell there’s an awful wicked and awful powerful Obi Man, called Jesse Hagan, in Tobago, who’s gotten tame Jumbies to work for him. The niggers shiver when they tell about him.

“As to cocoanuts, which you’ve only seed at a revel ‘three shies a penny,’ out here they be a regular trade, though not like what they was. A grower told me that in the old days he’d get a clear profit of £2 on every thousand nuts he sold; now he don’t get £1. We be bringing home hundreds of sacks of ’em, but the seller don’t count to do much good. Another queer freight we be taking back to Barbados is turtles. These creatures be very common round Tobago. They come up out of the sea of a moonlight night and paddle about in the sand, and lay their eggs. Then niggers, as be lying in wait for ’em, rush out and catch ’em, and throw ’em over ’pon their backs. There they lie till the morn do come, and then they’m brought off to the wharf for shipment. First the owner’s mark be branded on the poor devils with a red-hot iron on their yellow bellies; but they be all shell outside, and it don’t hurt ’em more than putting a hot shoe on a horse’s hoof. Then the turtles is tied by their flippers—two and three at a time—and hoisted aboard. On deck we’ve got turtle tanks ’waiting for ’em. These be full of salt water, and the turtle lives there as best he can; or if he can’t, he dies. No beasts on God’s earth have a worse time than turtles when they’m catched. They don’t get bit or sup no more, for there’s nought we can give ’em that they’ll eat. Many die on the way home, if the weather turns very cold; and aboard a ship you can tell how the turtle be faring by the amount of turtle soup as comes to dinner. And if they do get home, ’tis to have their throats cut pretty quick. But they pay well if they get home alive.

“Now I’ll knock off, because I be going ashore to see Mister Henry. We sail to-morrow, so I can’t leave it no longer. I’ll finish this when I’ve had speech with him, and much I do hope as I’ll find he’ll come over to my side.”

Here the unfinished letter broke off, and the things that happened after may be immediately related.

Daniel went ashore with a special message from his captain for the harbour master; but the order was not delivered, because good fortune, as it seemed, had brought Henry Vivian to the pier-head, and, as Daniel climbed up the steps, he almost touched his boyhood’s friend. The overseer of the Pelican Estate stood beside him. Mr Jabez Ford had a private venture of turtles about to be shipped in the Peabody for Barbados, and now he watched his own mark being set upon the unhappy reptiles. Vivian was also an interested spectator. He turned with an expression of sorrow from the turtles and found Daniel Sweetland’s eyes fixed upon them.

“Mister Henry, ’tis I, Sweetland, from home! I be here this minute to speak to you. And I pray you, for old time’s sake, to listen.”

Young Vivian started back, and the blood leapt to his cheek.

“Alive!” he said.

“And kicking, your honour. I had to do all I done an’ give they policemen the slip, for the law was too strong for me. But afore God I swear I’m an innocent man, and, after my wife, I’d sooner you believed in me than any living.”

“Oaths are nothing to you,” said the other, coldly. “Come aside and speak to me.”

They walked apart on the wharf, and Vivian continued,—

“Why did you lie to the officers and deceive them, and escape, and subsequently delude the world into supposing that you had destroyed yourself? Tell me that. Were those the actions of an innocent man, Daniel Sweetland? I do not think so. If you can prove to me that you did not murder Adam Thorpe, do it; if not, my duty, painful as it may be, is clear. You have escaped justice thus far; but you shall not escape it altogether, if I can prevent you.”

Dan stared aghast at such a turn of affairs. The speaker was inflexible. No gentleness marked his voice. He had not noticed the hand that Daniel ventured timidly to put forward.

“I thought ’twas Providence that threw me here,” said the sailor. “I counted to find you, sir, as was my friend always, ready to stand up for me against—— But what can I say? How can I prove aught, having no witnesses? My gun was found—the beautiful gun you gived me. And if I swear afore my Maker I know no more than you do how it comed in Middlecott woods upon that night, what’s the use? I see in your face you be against me and won’t believe me.”

“I am not a fool, whatever else I may be,” answered the other. “To say you do not know how that gun came into Middlecott Lower Hundred is folly. You alone had access to the gun. You must know. Whether you killed Thorpe or not, I cannot say; that you saw him die, I believe; and if you could have thrown the blame elsewhere, you would naturally have done so. I am sorry you dared to come to me—sorry for your sake and my own. I have enough anxiety and difficulty on my hands at present without you.”

“Very well,” said Sweetland, “if that’s your answer, then we be man to man and no love lost. I’ll go my way and you can go yours, an’ I hope afore your beard’s growed you’ll get a larger heart in you. If it had been t’other way round, I’d have believed your word like the Bible, an’ I’d have fought for you an’ spared no sweat to show the world you was an honest, true man. But since you won’t believe further than you can see, and haven’t got no friendship stronger than what goes down afore this trial, then go your way, an’ be damned to you; an’ may you never find yourself at a loose end with nought but sudden death waiting for you an’ no friend’s hand ready to help!”

“Friendships may be broken, and I will never willingly assist a criminal against the laws he has defied and the State he has outraged. You fled to escape the just penalty of your deeds, and no honourable man would succour you. It is not I that am faithless, but yourself. I have never changed; my devotion to duty and to honour has never been hidden from you, and if you had ordered your life on my example, you would not stand where you do to-day.”

“I hope you’ll see clearer in the time to come, then,” answered Daniel. “I be sorry to have troubled you with my poor affairs. I’ll ax no more from ’e except to keep your mouth shut about me. That, at least, ban’t too much to ax?”

“Your moral sense is not merely weak, but wanting,” answered the other. “To ignore you is to ignore your crime. No Englishman can do that. I, at least, will not have it on my conscience that I let a murderer go free. Move at your peril!”

The sailor glared in sheer wonder; then his surprise gave place to passion.

“By God, but you’m a canting prig! Your friendship—’tis trash I wouldn’t own for money. Talk of vartue and duty to me! Do ’e think of all I’ve suffered—all the torment and misery I’ve gone through—a man as innocent as the young dawn! Taken from my wife—called a murderer afore I was tried—every man’s hand against me! The likes of you would make Job break loose. Your honour and your duty! Bah—stinking stuff. I’d rather be a mongrel nigger without a shirt than you! I’d—”

Vivian interrupted him and cried out in a loud voice,—

“Arrest this man! In the name of the law, take him! He is a murderer!”

They stood some distance from the rest, and now Jabez Ford hastened forward with several negroes. The coloured men chattered wildly, but none made any effort to run in on Sweetland. Before they reached him Vivian had already closed with his old friend.

“For justice!” he cried. “Right is on my side, and well you know it!”

“Liar!” answered the other. “You’re no man to do this thing. Neither right nor might be on your side. Take what you’ve courted!”

The unequal struggle was quickly at an end, for Vivian’s physical powers were as nothing beside the strength of Daniel. The sailor shook him like a dog shakes a rat; then he gripped his huge arms round him and hugged him breathless.

“So let all be sarved as turns upon their friends in the time of need!” he bellowed. “Come on—come on, the pack of ’e!”

It might have been observed that at this sensational moment the overseer, Jabez Ford, made no instant effort to come to Henry Vivian’s rescue. He was as big as Daniel, and apparently as powerful; but while his black eyes blazed and he shouted wildly to the negroes to secure Sweetland, himself he took no risk. He saw the struggling men get nearer and nearer to the edge of the wharf; but he only bawled to the terrified coloured men to separate the fighters.

At last a big buck negroe tried to grasp Daniel from behind, and the sailor, bending his head, drove with full force at the black’s chest, and fairly butted him head foremost into the sea. A moment later Vivian was in the water also, while Ford cried to the negroes to leap in and frighten the sharks. The overseer fumbled with a lifebelt the while; but long before he had cut it from its fastenings Henry Vivian swam with strong strokes to the landing stage and climbed upon it.

No anger marked his demeanour, despite this sharp reverse. He brushed the water from his face and looked for Sweetland, only to find Daniel had vanished.

“Thank Heaven—thank Heaven!” said Ford, warmly. “My heart was in my mouth. The water under this stage harbours a dozen sharks.”

“Where’s that man?”

“He’s safe enough. He can’t escape in the long run. He knocked down two policemen, and then the harbour-master, who tried to stop him. After that he bolted to the left there, and has got into the woods. It may be a long job, but he must be caught sooner or late.”

“He’s a runaway from justice—a poacher and a murderer. By an amazing chance we have met here. We were boys together. Everything must be done that can be done to arrest him.”

“Come to my house and get a change of clothes,” answered Jabez Ford. “Thank God, the wretch was not a murderer twice over. You’ve had a merciful and marvellous escape, Mr Vivian.”

“Which might have itself been escaped if you had been quicker and braver,” answered the young man, coldly. “I’m afraid you are a coward, Jabez Ford.”

“Presence of mind is a precious gift,” answered the overseer, with great humility. “I did the best that I could think of. Of course, had I guessed that he was going to throw you into the sea, I should have rushed at him myself, cost what it might.”

Mr Ford turned his face away as he spoke.

“Come,” he said. “You must change your clothes quickly or you will be chilled.”

“After I have been to the Office of Police, not before,” answered Henry Vivian.

Meanwhile the runaway made small work of such opposition as was offered to his escape. Two negroes tried to stop him, but only one stood up to him at the critical moment, and was paid for his pluck by a terrific knock-down blow on his flat nose. The harbour-master—a small but brave Scot—next stood in the way of liberty and, despite Dan’s shouted warning, attempted to intercept the runaway. He was in the dust a moment later, and Sweetland, sending a dozen men, women, and children flying like cackling poultry before his rush, got clear of Scarborough and took to the hills. He pushed steadily onwards and upwards to an impenetrable jungle that lay on the steep side of Fort Saint George, and there, where aforetime French and English had fought at death grips, he rested, drew his breath, and considered his position. Far beneath spread the stagnation of the little port, southward gleamed the metal roofing of the Pelican Sugar Estate, and from time to time, faint through the distance, he heard a hooter roaring from the hungry works to the plantations for more cane. Steam puffed from tall pipes; smoke rolled from chimneys; like bright insects the Coolies ran hither and thither in the compounds.

Day died while the fugitive kept his hiding-place. Then a swift, but amazing sunset encompassed him. Rose and gold was the sky, all streaked with tattered ribbons of orange cloud. The light swam reflected upon the sea, and it spread to the lofty horizon in broad sheets of reflected splendour. From the mountains the scene was superb in its manifold glory; then the vision perished and inky silhouettes of palm and plantain and bread-fruit tree stood out black and solid against the water. Far below the Peabody lay, like a toy ship, and twinkled with lights upon the rosy sea. Darkness leapt out of the East and under the fringes of the forest night had already come. Tree-frogs chirruped with endless crisp tinkle of sound; the air was filled with the drowsy hum of insect life, fireflies flashed; and from far below, the mournful boomings of the marsh-frogs made music proper to the time.

Sweetland pursued his slow way until midnight came. He climbed on mechanically hour after hour, until the air on his cheek and the stars above told him that he had reached some mountain-top. Further for the present it was impossible to proceed. Until day, therefore, he postponed thought and action. He tightened his belt to stay hunger; then rolled up in a dry corner under the savage and spined foliage of an opuntia, and there slept dreamlessly until the return of the sun.

CHAPTER XIII
THE OBI MAN

When Daniel awoke the sun was climbing swiftly to the zenith, and the full blaze of it burnt upon a tropical tangle of palmetto and mango, plantain and palm. He found himself hidden in a brake of luxuriant vegetation almost at the apex of a lofty hill that overlooked the Caribbean Sea. Strange sounds fell upon his ears, and he perceived that his resting-place was beneath a prickly-pear fence, on the other side of which stood a thatched cottage and extended an acre of cleared land. Beneath stretched the dark green and orange-tawny of the forests; strips of thorny cactus hedge ensured privacy for the clearing, and here a tamarind tree reared its delicate foliage, and here the broad leaves of bananas rustled, with foliage all tattered by the breezes. A goat was tethered to a little pomegranate tree in the garden, and over the cleared soil grew vines of the sweet potato.

A second glance at the hut revealed to Daniel its exceptional character and significance. Before he saw the strange and solitary human being who inhabited it, the sailor guessed that he stood upon the threshold of mystery. As a matter of fact he had intruded into the secret stronghold of Jesse Hagan, the Obi Man. The situation was silent and mysterious; the place was adorned, or made horrible, with fragments of things dead. Two bullocks’ skulls stood at the entrance of Mr Hagan’s dwelling, and round his land bobbed a fantastic ribbon whereon hung empty bottles, bright feathers, and fragments of gaudy rag. Within this zone none dared to enter uninvited, for Obeah is still alive—a creed beyond the power of missionary to shatter or destroy. Fools fear Obi, and wise men find him useful; hence the high priests of that Satanic cult still thrive. A negro would no more speak disrespectfully of them than he would of his own grand-parents.

Suddenly, as Daniel stared and felt a growing inclination to be gone, the mystic himself appeared and stood in the morning light. He appeared profoundly ancient, and his ribs made a gridiron of his lean breast. His limbs were skin and bone; his scanty wool was grey; a tangled network of furrows and deep lines scarred and seamed his face in every direction; and, curiously wide apart, on either side of a huge, flat, Ethiopian nose, the man’s eyes gleamed from his withered headpiece, like the eyes of a toad. Jesse was in extreme undress. Only the ruins of a pair of trousers covered his loins and a band of red cloth circled his throat. Despite his advanced age, no little physical strength remained to him, and now, as Daniel watched, the negro displayed it. Taking an iron spade and seeking a corner of the garden near his unseen visitor, Jesse turned aside the long, creeping fingers of a snake gourd that trailed there under the shade of a citron tree, and began to dig in soft earth. As the old creature worked and sank swiftly downward into the soil, he sang to himself in a piping treble with the usual West Indian whine. The voice was feeble; but the words were sinister and told of evil. A blue bird sat on a thorn and put his head on one side to hear the song; a green lizard, with eyes like Jesse’s own, rustled out from the cactus fence and stopped, with palpitating, tremulous motion of its front paws, to listen also. Then the bird flew and the reptile fled, and Daniel Sweetland was sole, secret audience of the song.

The song rose and sank and seemed to hang in the trees and creep about like an evil presence. The refrain rose into a wail, and its last penetrating note was answered by crisp stridulation of great winged grasshoppers. Jesse’s uncanny melody fitted the place, the man, and the task.

“I never did!” thought Daniel, as his eyes grew round. “If the old devil ban’t digging a grave! And singing rhymes to his beastly self over it too! To think that Johnny Beer ban’t the only verse-maker as I’ve met with in my travels! But Johnny never in all his born days let off such a rhyme as that. I’m sure us never would have stood it. A grave, sure enough—an’ more’n one poor wretch has been buried there seemingly.”

The remark was called forth by an incident, for Mr Hagan suddenly exhumed a skull. It was low and flat-browed. Jesse set it very gravely upon the edge of the pit and then addressed it.

“Who was you, sar?” he asked. “You no answer me, sar? Den you berry rude, imperent young fellow!”

Whereupon he smacked the empty brain-pan with a spade, so that some of the teeth fell out. The man and the skull grinned at each other, then Jesse grew serious and spoke again.

“You larf—eh? You larf! Me Gard, I dunno what you got to larf about! You’s Jephson—dat’s you. I ’member Jephson. Massa Ford, he want Jephson ‘rub out,’ and send him wid a message to ole Jesse. Den ole Jesse ‘rub you out.’ To kill a nigger is only to rub out a black mark. Dey soon gone. And some white folk too. Dey all berry quiet when dey eat and drink poor ole Jesse’s rum and cakes. He, he! Obi Man berry good fren to Massa Ford!”

He laboured in silence and dug on until he had sunk a hole five feet deep. Next he concealed all trace of the work very carefully. He buried the pile of damp earth under dead palm leaves and brushwood, while the hole itself he covered with twigs and trailed over them long shoots and sprays of the luxuriant snake-gourd.

Now, having made an end of this business, Jesse sought his outer gate and, posting himself there, screened his face from the glare of the risen sun and looked out with his bright, lizard eyes down the tremendous escarpments of the hill beneath him. An amazing panorama of forest, shore and sea spread below; and winding through the woods, struggling as it were with difficulty through dense undergrowth and narrow places full of cactus and thorns, there ascended a bridle-path flanked by bewildering tangles of foliage, by volcanic boulders and huge trees. Here and there through the forest flamed like fire the flowers of the bois immortelle; at other points, all festooned and linked together with twining and climbing parasites, or grey curtains of lace-like lichens and wind pines, arose notable forest giants, some gleaming with blossoms, some bending under wealth of fruits. And through the mingled leafy draperies of green and brown, olive and gold, under the feathery crown of the bamboo, amongst the green inflorescence of the mango, like liquid gems in the sunlight, did little humming-birds with breasts of emerald and ruby, flash and glitter. Every step or terrace in the steep acclivities of the hills was crowned with cabbage palms or other lofty trees, and from point to point the gaunt, bleached limbs of some forest corpse stared out lightning-stricken, where the dead thing waited for the next hurricane to bring its bones to earth. Far below glimmered a white beech, and, through the woods, all silent in the growing heat, there rose a sigh of surf breaking—surf that even from this elevation could be seen lying like a band of silver between the many-tinted sea and the pale shore.

Away on the western side of the hills extended long and undulating fields of green vegetation, and in their midst arose buildings with tall chimneys and metal roofs that flashed like liquid silver under the sunshine. There extended the Pelican Sugar Estate, and indications of prosperity surrounded them; but elsewhere companion enterprises had clearly been less fortunate. In other parts of the island stagnation marked similar concerns. The plantations were deserted; the land was returning to the wilderness; the works fell into ruins.

But Jabez Ford still held the key of success, if it was possible to judge by visible signs. Tobago felt proud of him and of the Pelican Estates. Wide interest was taken in the visit of the owner’s son, and none doubted but that Ford would benefit by the circumstance and win a reward worthy of his long and honourable stewardship.

Two people understood otherwise, however, and one was Jabez Ford himself. The overseer had failed to satisfy Henry Vivian, and he knew it. The accounts were scrupulously rendered; the staff of coolies from Bombay was happy and contented; the sugar commanded high praise and ready sale; but there was a disparity between the apparent prosperity and the real output. Other puzzling circumstances also much tended to increase young Vivian’s doubt. Ford was an easy and convincing talker. He had an answer for every question, an explanation of every difficulty. But the fact remained: Henry Vivian disliked and distrusted him; and Jabez knew it and did not conceal the truth from himself. An implicit duel rapidly developed between them and the elder man seemed likely to win it, for he was the stronger every way. He stood on his own dunghill and, for the present, had no intention of being removed therefrom. His private plans demanded another year for their fulfilment. Then, the richer by a sustained and skilful system of peculation, he proposed to leave Tobago and take himself and his hoard to some secret place in South America, far beyond the reach of all former acquaintance. The sudden and unexpected advent of Henry Vivian had taxed this rascal’s ingenuity severely, and the visitor’s own reserve made the matter more difficult, for Sir Reginald’s son investigated everything without comment and found fault with nothing. But Ford was a student of human nature and wanted no words to know that he stood in danger.

Now, as Jesse Hagan looked down from his mountain-top and waited, there rode through the deep glen below the overseer. His plans were already made. It needed only a further conference with his ancient ally to mature them. Jabez himself had black blood in his veins. His great-grandfather had been a negro, and he himself had married a Creole. This woman shared the man’s life for twenty years; then death fell upon her, and it was to keep Jumbies from the body that negresses had sung all night as Daniel described to Minnie.

A glimmer of white caught Jesse’s eyes far below. He heard the tramp of a horse and knew that his man was coming. Daniel still lay concealed beside the cactus fence, and through the flat and thorny leaves of opuntia, he saw Jabez Ford ride up. Jesse had disappeared for a moment into his hut, but now he came forward with a bottle and a calabash.

“Marning, massa—rum punch for massa—what Jesse get ready.”

The man drank before answering, then he threw the calabash on the ground.

“I want another sort of brew to-morrow. It’s got to be. I’m sorry for the young devil, for I’ve no quarrel with him; but he’s too cute. It don’t do to be too cute with Jabez Ford.”

“Him rub out, sar?”

“No choice. Let me come in. I’ll tell you what happened last night. He’s booked.”

“Dar’s a nice, cool, quiet hole under de snake-gourd waitin’ for Massa Vivian. He’ll be berry comfable dar wid de udder gem’men.”

“You talk too much,” said Ford. “Come in and don’t make jokes at your time of life. Think of the Devil, your master, and how precious soon you’ll go back to him, Jesse.”

“You my massa, sar; Jesse dun want no udder massa dan Massa Ford. Marse Debbil, he no pay such good wages as you.”

Ford laughed and dismounted from his horse. He was a big, hard man, roasted and shrivelled somewhat by a life in the tropics. He always wore white ducks and a felt hat that sloped well back over the nape of his neck. His hair was black, his eyes were also black, and his face might have been considered handsome. His clean-shorn mouth showed unusual strength of character and spoke of greed and craft as well. Tobago admired Jabez without liking him; the little island was proud of his prosperity, but it did not trust him. His downfall would have brought sorrow to few, for many secretly suspected him of dark things. But he was strong, and not a man among his neighbours would have cared or dared to fall foul of him.

Now Ford followed the priest of Obi into his secret dwelling, where monstrous matters were hidden in the gloom and evil smells stole out of the darkness. Three dried mummies first appeared. One was a crocodile and hung from the roof; the other two had been human beings. They sat propped in corners with a loathsome semblance of living and listening about them. Festoons of bird’s eggs, curious seeds, and dried pumpkins were stretched across the ceiling; skins of animals and birds littered the floor. Unseen things squeaked in cages; there was a piece of red glass in the roof and through it, on to a wooden table, there fell a round, flaming eye of light which luridly illuminated the assembled horrors. Uncanny and malodorous fragments filled the corners; filth, mystery and darkness blended here; and across one corner of the hut hung a curtain which hid Arcanum, the Holy of Obeah Holies.

Jabez Ford sat down on a three-legged stool by the table, and the red light shone like a sulky fire upon his dark locks. He sniffed the infamous air, then took a cigar from his case and lighted it.

Meantime, with more pluck than wisdom, and only thinking of the things that he had heard and seen, Daniel Sweetland followed close upon the heels of the strange pair. Now he stood outside the hut near the open door, and, crouching here, listened clearly to the conversation within. Beside him the tethered goat still browsed, and Ford’s horse sniffed the ground for something to eat. But only the lush foliage of the snake-gourd spread within his reach, and that the beast declined. It dragged its bridle as far as possible, stamped the earth, and with unceasing swish, swish, swish of tail kept the flies from its sweating flanks.

“I’ll tell you what’s happened since we met,” said Ford to his creature. “Last night the youngster wrote his letters home and left them with mine to be taken to the post office to catch the mail. The Solent sailed this morning, but she didn’t take Henry Vivian’s letter to his father. She took one from me instead, signed in his name. I’ve got his in my pocket, and it contained exactly what I expected. He makes no definite charge, because it is impossible to prove anything against me; but he states in detail that more money is being made than appears, and advises Sir Reginald to be rid of me at once. Meantime he is going to look round the island and find a new overseer. But this little plan won’t suit me. I must stop at the Pelican for another year at least. So, having unsealed and read our young friend’s letter after he retired to bed, I wrote another—on my typewriter—and gave myself a better character, you may be sure. His signature was very easy to imitate, and now my letter, not his, has set sail for home. There it goes now.”

He pointed below where a steamer slipped away from Tobago and the station ship, Solent, proceeded on her course to Trinidad and Barbados.

“My letter went in his envelope,” continued Ford. “And when Sir Reginald reads it, he will be favourably impressed because I gave myself a better character than Vivian did. Of course a letter from me will reach him by the next mail.”

“You write, too, massa?”

“Yes—I shall write—all about what is going to happen.”

“I see. You tell de great man at home how his son meet wid dam sad accident and lose him life in Tobago?”

“Exactly. The boy’s as good as dead. I rather wish it had been possible to avoid this; but it is not. He mustn’t go home.”

“He trust you?”

“Absolutely. He has no idea that I have seen through him and know that he is not satisfied. Therefore, from his standpoint, I have no reason to hate him. We are the best of friends. I am showing him all the sights and taking him all over the island. He is anxious to see everything and everybody. Of course he is on the look-out for a new overseer, but I’m not supposed to know that. Now he’s excited, too, about that sailor who knocked him down yesterday. A wretched fellow off a tramp steamer. We were on the wharf watching them load turtles, when he spotted the man. Then there was a row, and my gentleman got knocked into the water. I hoped there might have been a shark cruising round! It would have saved us a deal of trouble.”

“I will do all Marse shark could do, sar. A berry nice hole dug under the snake-gourd. When he come?”

“Soon. I’ve told him that Jesse Hagan, the Obi Man, is the first wonder of the island; so he’ll be here with me to see you. Have all your war-paint on. Afterwards, I’ll take his horse away—and his boots and clothes. The rest is simple enough. They’ll find the horse loose on the beach, and his garments together, and prints of feet going to the bathing-place, but none returning.”

“Dar’s nobody like Massa Ford!”

“We must be short and sharp. He’s resolute and quick. But he’s small—what’s that? There’s somebody moving out there!”

“My goat, sar.”

But Ford had leapt to his feet and left the hut. A moment later and he stood face to face with Daniel Sweetland. The sailor was some distance from the cottage when Jabez accosted him. His back was turned and he stood on a stone and pulled down green bananas from one of the Obi Man’s trees.

“Who are you and what do you do here?” asked the overseer. “You must be mad or a desperate man to run your head into this place.”

The other looked innocently round. Mere temporary fear seemed to leap into his eyes at this threat. He showed by no deed or look that the truth was known to him. But Daniel had heard the course of conversation very clearly, and the necessity for swift action had forced itself upon his mind. His first idea was to leap upon Ford’s horse, hasten to the Pelican Estate, and give an alarm; then he remembered his own position as a hunted fugitive. A plan worthy of the ingenious brain that had freed him from the handcuffs of Mr Corder swiftly dawned in the man’s head. He saw the dangers waiting for Henry Vivian and for himself. In a few moments he decided upon action, and his words indicated that Daniel evidently held self-preservation the first law of nature. He left the heir of Middlecott to his fate, and played for his own hand only.

“Please, sir, listen afore you give me up,” said Daniel. “Afore God I’m innocent of what this man says against me. He’s a hard, cruel young devil, and many’s the poor chap at home he’s driven desperate. Not a spark of pity has he got, an’ now I be desperate—as any hunted man would be—an’ so I’ve climbed up here with my life in my hand to this terrible old chap they tell me about. An’ I was going to ax him to help me; but hearing voices, I just waited here till he was free. I’ll pay him well for his bananas, and I’ll pay him better for something else, which is to help me against that young bloodhound, Henry Vivian. I don’t care what I do against him, for he’ll ruin me if he can; and if I was guilty I’d say nought, but I’m innocent. An’ if I’ve got to swing, I’ll swing for him! That’s why I comed with a present to this here mystery man, to ax him to hide me an’ help me against my enemy. An’ I’ll tell you something too, if you’ll listen, an’ that is that Mister Henry Vivian ban’t no friend to you. I come from the same place he does, and I heard about it afore my own trouble at home. He’m here as a spy, an’ I lay after he’s gone, you’ll find your goose be cooked.”

This speech interested Mr Ford not a little.

“’Twas you that shot his father’s gamekeeper then?” he asked; but Daniel denied it.

“It looked bad against me—so bad that I didn’t stop to talk about it, but got clear off. Time will show ’twas no work of mine, however; an’ this man, as have knowed me from my youth up, ought to be my friend—not my enemy. But since he’m against me, I’m against him, an’ I’d cut his throat to-morrow if I got the chance.”

The overseer nodded and turned to Jesse Hagan. Jesse had brought a gun out of his dwelling, and now deliberately pointed it at Daniel.

“Shall I shoot dis gem’man?” he inquired with his finger on the trigger. “Him berry rude young man walk in my garden widdout saying ‘please,’ an’ eat my bananas.”

“Stop!” answered Ford. “This sailor is a friend. At least I think so. No, don’t shoot him. Let him come in and give him something to eat. He’s hungry.”

“Lucky Massa Ford speak for you, Marse sailor-man—else you food for de ‘John Crows’ dis minute. But he say ‘eat’; so you eat instead ob being eaten, sar.”

Then Daniel entered the Obi Man’s hut with Jabez Ford and old Jesse.