by Ellen Wood
“And it is a great and good thing you did enter it, Fred,” I said eagerly. “Gisby swears it was you who shot him, and he is dying; and Shepherd swears it too.”
“Gisby dying?”
“He is. I met Duffham as I came here; he told me there was little, if any, chance of his life; he had been expecting news of his death all the afternoon. They have posted handbills up, offering a reward of twenty pounds for your apprehension, Fred; and — and I am afraid, and so is Duffham, that they will try you for wilful murder. The whole neighbourhood is being searched for you for miles round.”
“Pleasant!” said Fred, after a brief silence. “I had meant to go out to-night and endeavour to ascertain how the land lay. Of course I knew that what could be put upon my back would be put; and there’s no denying that I was with the poachers. But I did not think matters would be as bad as this. Hang it all!”
“But, Fred, how did you get in here?”
“Well,” said he, “we hear talk of providential occurrences: there’s nothing Mr. Holland is fonder of telling us about in his sermons than the guiding finger of God. If the means that enabled me to take refuge here were not providential, Johnny, I must say they looked like it. When I met you yesterday afternoon, you must remember my chancing to say that the little Hollands were playing at ‘Salt Fish’ in the study, while I sat there, talking to Edna?”
Of course I remembered it.
“Directly after I left you, Johnny,” resumed Fred Westerbrook, “I put my hand in my coat-tail pocket for my handkerchief, and found a large key there. It was the key of the church, that the children had been hiding at their play; and I understood in a moment that Charley, whose turn it was to hide last, had made a hiding-place of my pocket. The parson keeps one key, you know, and Bumford the other — —”
“But, Fred,” I interrupted, the question striking me, “how came the young ones to let you come away with it?”
“Because, lad, their attention got diverted to something else. Ann brought in the tea-things, with a huge plate of bread-and-treacle: they screamed out in delight, and scuffled to get seats round the table. Well, I let the key lie in my pocket,” went on Fred, “intending to take it back to-day. In the night, when flying from pursuit, not knowing who or how many might be after me, I felt this heavy key strike against me continually; and, in nearing the church, the thought flashed over me like an inspiration: What if I open it and hide there? Just as young Charley had hidden the key in my pocket, so I hid myself, by its means, in the church.”
Taking a minute to think over what he said, it did seem strange. One of those curious things one can hardly account for; the means for his preservation were so simply natural and yet almost marvellous. Perhaps the church was the only building where he could have found secure refuge. Private dwellings would refuse to shelter him, and other places were sure to be searched.
“You are safe here, Fred. No one would ever think of seeking you here.”
“Safe, yes; but for how long? I can’t live without food for ever, Johnny. As it is, I have eaten none since last night.”
My goodness! A shock of remorse came over me. When I was at old Bumford’s knife-box, a loaf of bread stood on the dresser. If I had only secured it!
“We must manage to bring you something, Fred. You cannot stir from here.”
Fred had taken the key out, having returned it to his pocket in the night when he locked himself in. He sat looking at it as he balanced it on his finger.
“Yes, you have served me in good need,” he said to the key. “I shall turn out for a stroll during some quiet hour of the night, Johnny. To keep my restless legs curbed indoors for a whole day and night would be quite beyond their philosophy.”
“Well, take care of yourself, if you do. There’s not a soul in the place but is wild for the reward; and I dare say they will look for you by night more than by day. How about getting you in something to eat?”
“I don’t know,” he answered. “It would never do for you to be seen coming in here at night.”
I knew that. Old Bumford would be down on me if no one else was. I sat turning over possibilities in my mind.
“I will come in betimes to-morrow morning under the plea of practising, Fred, and bring what I can. You must do battle with your hunger until then.”
“I suppose I must, Johnny. Mind you lock the door when you come in, or old Bumford might pounce upon us. When I heard you unlock it on coming in this evening, I can tell you I shivered in my shoes. Fate is very hard,” he added, after a pause.
“Fate is?”
“Why, yes. I have been a bit wild lately, perhaps, savage too, but I declare before Heaven that I have committed no crime, and did not mean to commit any. And now, to have this serious thing fastened upon my back! The world will say I have gone straight over to Satan.”
I did not see how he would get it off his back either. Wishing him good-night and a good heart, I turned to go.
“Wait a moment, Johnny. Let me go back to my hiding-place first.”
He went swiftly up the aisle, lighter now than it had been, for the moonlight was streaming in at the windows. Locking the church safely, I crossed the graveyard to old Bumford’s. He was seated at his round table at supper: bread-and-cheese, and beer.
“Oh, Mr. Bumford, as I have to come into the church very early in the morning, or I shall never get my music up for Sunday, I will take the key home with me. Good-night.”
He shouted out fifteen denials: How dared I think of taking the key out of his custody! But I was conveniently deaf, rushed off, and left him shouting.
“What a long practice you have been taking, Johnny!” cried Mrs. Todhetley. “And how hot you look. You must have run very fast.”
The Squire turned round from his arm-chair. “You’ve been joining in the hunt after that scamp, Mr. Johnny; — you’ve not been in the church, sir, all this time. I hear there’s a fine pack out, scouring the hedges and ditches.”
“I got a candle from old Bumford’s den,” said I, evasively. And presently I contrived to whisper unseen to Tod — who sat reading — to come outside. Standing against the wall of the pigeon-house, I told him all. For once in his life Tod was astonished.
“What a stunning thing!” he exclaimed. “Good luck, Fred! we’ll help you. I knew he was innocent, Johnny. Food? Yes, of course; we must get it for him. Molly, you say? Molly be shot!”
“Well, you know what Molly is, Tod. Let half a grain of suspicion arise, and it might betray him. If she saw us rifling her larder, she would go straight to the Squire; and what excuse should we have?”
“Look here, Johnny. I’ll go out fishing to-morrow, you understand, and order her to make a lot of meat pasties.”
“But he must have something to eat to-morrow morning, Tod: he might die of hunger, else, before night.”
Tod nodded. He had little more diplomacy than the Squire, and would have liked to perch himself upon the highest pillar in the parish there and then, and proclaim Fred Westerbrook’s innocence.
We stole round to the kitchen. Supper was over, but the servants were still at the table; no chance of getting to the larder then. Molly was in one of her tempers, apparently blowing up Thomas. There might be more chance in the morning.
Morning light. Tod went downstairs with the dawn, and I followed him. Not a servant was yet astir. He laid hold of a great tray, lodged it on the larder-floor, and began putting some things upon it — a cold leg of mutton and a big round loaf.
“I can’t take in all that, Tod. It is daylight, you know, and eyes may be about: old Bumford’s are sure to be. I can only take in what can be concealed in my pockets.”
“Oh, bother, Johnny! You’d half famish him.”
“Better half famish him than betray him. Some slices of bread and meat will be best — thick sandwiches, you know.”
We soon cut into the mutton and the bread. Wrapping them in paper, I stowed the thick slices away in my pockets, leaving the rest of the loaf and meat on the s
helves again.
“How I wish I could smuggle him in a bottle of beer!”
“And so you can, Johnny. Swear to old Bumford it is for your own drinking.”
“He would know better.”
“Wrap a sheet of music round the bottle, then. He could make nothing of that.”
Hunting out a bottle, we went down to the cellar. Tod stooped to fill it from the tap. I stood watching the process.
“I’ve caught you, Master Johnny, have I! What be you about there, letting the ale run, I’d like to know?”
The words were Molly’s. She had come down and found us out: suspecting something, I suppose, from seeing the cellar-door open. Tod rose up.
“I am drawing some beer to take out with me. Is it any business of yours? When it is, you may interfere.”
I was nobody in the household — never turning upon them. She’d have gone on at me for an hour, and probably walked off with the beer. Tod was altogether different. He held his own authority, even with Molly. She went up the cellar-stairs, grumbling to herself.
“I want a cork for this bottle,” said bold Tod, following her. And Molly, opening some receptacle of hers with a jerk, perforce found him one.
“Oh, and I shall want some meat pasties made to-day, for I think of going fishing,” went on Tod. “Let them be ready by lunch-time. I have cut myself some slices of meat to go on with — if you chance to miss any mutton.”
Molly, never answering, left her kitchen-grate, where she was beginning to crack up the huge flat piece of coal that the fire had been raked with the previous night, and stalked into the larder to see what depredations had been done. We tied up the bottle in paper on the parlour-table, and then wrapped it in a sheet of loose music. It looked a pretty thick roll; but nobody would be likely to remark that.
“I have a great mind to go with you and see him, Johnny,” said Tod, as we went together down the garden-path.
“Oh, don’t, Tod!” I cried. “For goodness’ sake, don’t. You know you never do go in with me, and it might cause old Bumford to wonder.”
“Then, I’ll leave it till after dark to-night, Johnny. Go in then, I shall.”
Bumford was astir, but not down yet. I heard him coughing, through his open casement; for I went with a purpose round the path by his house, and called out to him. He looked out in his shirt-sleeves and a cotton night-cap.
“You see how early I am this morning. I’ll bring you the key when I leave.”
“Eugh!” growled Bumford. “No rights to ha’ took it.”
Locking the church-door securely after me, I went down the aisle, calling softly to Fred. He came forward from a dark, high-walled pew behind a pillar, where he had slept. You should have seen him devour the bread and meat, if you’d like to know what hunger means, and drink the bottle of beer. I sat down to practise. Had old Bumford not heard the sound of the organ, he might have come thundering at the door to know what I was about, and what the silence meant. Fred came with me, and we talked whilst I played. About the first question he asked was whether Gisby was dead; but I could not tell him. He said he had gone out cautiously in the night and walked about the churchyard for an hour, thinking over what he could do. “And I really had an unpleasant adventure, Johnny,” he added.
“What was it?”
“I was pacing the path under the hedge towards Bumford’s, when all at once there arose the sound of voices and steps on the other side of it — fellows on the look-out for me, I suppose.”
I held my breath. “What did you do?”
“Crouched down as well as I could — fortunately the hedge is high — and came softly and swiftly over the grass and the graves to the porch. I only slipped inside just in time, Johnny: before I could close the door, the men were in the churchyard. The key has a trick of creaking harshly when turned in the lock, you know; and I declare I thought they must have heard it then, for it made a fearful noise, and the night was very still!”
“And they did not hear it?”
“I suppose not. But it was some minutes, I can tell you, before my pulses calmed down to their ordinary rate of beating.”
He went on to say that the only plan he could think of was to endeavour to get away from the neighbourhood, and go out of the country. To stand his trial was not to be thought of. His word, that he had not been the guilty man, had never even had a gun in his hand that night, would go for nothing, against Gisby’s word and Shepherd’s. Whatever came of it, he would have to be out of the church before Sunday. The great question was: how could he get away unseen? I told him Tod was coming with me at night, and we would consult together. Locking up the church again, and the prisoner in it, I gladdened Bumford’s heart by handing over the key, and ran home to breakfast.
Life yet lingered in Gisby; but the doctors thought he could not live through the day. The injury he had received was chiefly internal, somewhere in the region of the lungs. Fresh parties went out with fresh ardour to scour the country after Fred Westerbrook; and so the day passed. Chancing to meet Shepherd late in the afternoon, he told me Gisby still lived.
At sundown I went in to practise again, and took a big mould-candle with me, showing it to Bumford, that he might not be uneasy on the score of his stock in the vestry. As soon as dusk came on, and before the tell-tale moon was much up, I left the organ, opened the church-door, and stood at it, according to the plan concerted with Tod. He came swiftly up with his basket of provisions which he had got together by degrees during the day; and then we locked the door again. After Fred had regaled himself, we consulted together. Fred was to steal out of the church about one o’clock on Sunday morning, and make off across the country. But to do this with safety it was necessary he should be disguised. By that time the ardour of the night-searching might have somewhat passed; and the hour, one o’clock in the morning, was as silent and lonely a one as could be expected. It was most essential that he should not be recognized by any person who might chance to meet him.
“But you must manage one thing for me,” said Fred, after this was settled. “I will not go away without seeing Edna. She can come in here with you to-morrow night.”
We both objected. “It will be very hazardous, Fred. Old Bumford would be sure to see her: his eyes are everywhere.”
“Tell him you want her to sing over the chants with you, Johnny. Tell him anything. But go away for an indefinite period, without first seeing her and convincing her that it is not guilt that sends me, I will not.”
So there was no more to be said.
Getting provisions together seemed to have been easy compared with what we should have to get up now — a disguise. A smock-frock, say, and the other items of a day-labourer’s apparel. But it was more easy to decide than to procure them.
“Mack leaves belongings of his in the barn occasionally,” said Tod to me, as we walked home together. “We’ll look to-morrow night.”
It was our best hope. Failing that, there would be no possibility of getting a smock-frock anywhere; and Fred would have to escape in his coat turned inside out, or something of that sort. His own trousers, braced up high, and plastered with mud at the feet, would do very well, and his own wideawake hat, pulled low down on his face. There would be no more trouble about provisions, for what Tod had taken in would be enough.
Saturday. And Tod and I with our work before us. Gisby was sinking fast.
Late in the afternoon I went to the Parsonage, wondering how I should get to see Edna Blake alone. But Fortune favoured me — as it seemed to have favoured us throughout. The children were all at play in the nearest field. Edna was in what they called the schoolroom in her lilac-print dress, looking over socks and stockings, about a wheelbarrow-full. I saw her through the window, and went straight in. Her large dark eyes looked as sad and big as the hole she was darning; and her voice had a hopeless ring in it.
“Oh, Johnny, how you startled me! Nay, don’t apologize. It is my fault for being so nervous and foolish. I can’t think what has ailed me the last fe
w days: I seem to start at shadows. Have — have you come to tell me anything?”
By the shrinking voice and manner, I knew what she feared — that Fred Westerbrook was taken. Looking round the room, I asked whether what we said could be heard.
“There’s no one to hear,” she answered. “Poor Mrs. Holland is in bed. Mr. Holland is out; and Anne is shut up, cleaning the kitchen.”
“Well, then,” I said, dropping my voice, “I have brought you a message from Fred Westerbrook.”
Down went the socks in a heap. “Oh, Johnny!”
“Hush! No: he is not taken; he is in safe hiding. What’s more, Edna, he is no more guilty than I am. He met the poachers accidentally that night just before the affray, and he never had a gun in his hands at all.”
A prolonged, sobbing sigh, as if she were going to faint, and then a glad light in her eyes. She took up her work again. I went over to the seat next her, and told her all. She was darning all the while. With such a heap of mending the fingers must not be idle.
“To America!” she repeated, in answer to what I said. “What is he going to do for money to carry him there?”
“He talks of working his passage over. He has enough money about him, he says, to take him to the coast. Unfortunately, neither Tod nor I can help him in that respect. We have brought empty pockets from school, and shall have no money before the time of going back again. Will you go in and see him, Edna?”
“Yes,” she said, after a minute’s consideration. “And I will bring a roll of music in my hand, as you suggest, Johnny, for the satisfaction of Clerk Bumford’s curiosity. I will be at the stile as near eight o’clock as I can, if you will come out there to meet me: but it is Saturday night, you know, when there’s always a great deal to do.”