The passengers became alarmed. The commercial traveller was rather less rubicund. Billy still tried to joke, but his efforts were not well received. The officer in his blue uniform at once took his place as rightful leader in a crisis. They all looked to him and appealed to him.
“What would you advise, sir? You don’t think there’s any danger of it coming down, do you?”
“Not the least. But it’s awkward to be stuck here all the same. I think I could jump across on to that girder. Then perhaps I could see what is wrong.”
“No, no, Tom; for goodness’ sake, don’t leave us!”
“Some people have a nerve,” said Billy. “Fancy jumping across a five-hundred-foot drop!”
“I dare say the gentleman did worse things in the war.”
“Well, I wouldn’t do it myself — not if they starred me in the bills. It’s all very well for old Isaiah. It’s his job, and I wouldn’t do him out of it.”
Three sides of the lift were shut in with wooden partitions, pierced with windows for the view. The fourth side, facing the sea, was clear. Stangate leaned as far as he could and looked upwards. As he did so there came from above him a peculiar sonorous metallic twang, as if a mighty harp-string had been struck. Some distance up — a hundred feet, perhaps — he could see a long brown corded arm, which was working furiously among the wire cordage above. The form was beyond his view, but he was fascinated by this bare sinewy arm which tugged and pulled and sagged and stabbed.
“It’s all right,” he said, and a general sigh of relief broke from his strange comrades at his words. “There is some one above us setting things right.”
“It’s old Isaiah,” said Billy, stretching his neck round the corner. “I can’t see him, but it’s his arm for a dollar. What’s he got in his hand? Looks like a screwdriver or something. No, by George, it’s a file.”
As he spoke there came another sonorous twang from above. There was a troubled frown upon the officer’s brow.
“I say, dash it all, that’s the very sound our steel hawser made when it parted, strand by strand, at Dix-mude. What the deuce is the fellow about? Hey, there! what are you trying to do?”
The man had ceased his work and was now slowly descending the iron trellis.
“All right, he’s coming,” said Stangate to his startled companions. “It’s all right, Mary. Don’t be frightened, any of you. It’s absurd to suppose he would really weaken the cord that holds us.”
A pair of high boots appeared from above. Then came the leathern breeches, the belt with its dangling tools, the muscular form, and, finally, the fierce, swarthy, eagle face of the workman. His coat was off and his shirt open, showing the hairy chest. As he appeared there came another sharp snapping vibration from above. The man made his way down in leisurely fashion, and then, balancing himself upon the cross-girder and leaning against the side piece, he stood with folded arms, looking from under his heavy black brows at the huddled passengers upon the platform.
“Hallo!” said Stangate. “What’s the matter?”
The man stood impassive and silent, with something indescribably menacing in his fixed, unwinking stare.
The flying officer grew angry.
“Hallo! Are you deaf?” he cried. “How long do you mean to have us stuck here?”
The man stood silent. There was something devilish in his appearance.
“I’ll complain of you, my lad,” said Billy, in a quivering voice. “This won’t stop here, I can promise you.”
“Look here!” cried the officer. “We have ladies here and you are alarming them. Why are we stuck here? Has the machinery gone wrong?”
“You are here,” said the man, “because I have put a wedge against the hawser above you.”
“You fouled the line! How dared you do such a thing! What right have you to frighten the women and put us all to this inconvenience? Take that wedge out this instant, or it will be the worse for you.”
The man was silent.
“Do you hear what I say? Why the devil don’t you answer? Is this a joke or what? We’ve had about enough of it, I tell you.”
Mary MacLean had gripped her lover by the arm in agony of sudden panic.
“Oh, Tom!” she cried. “Look at his eyes — look at his horrible eyes! The man is a maniac.”
The workman stirred suddenly into sinister life. His dark face broke into writhing lines of passion, and his fierce eyes glowed like embers, while he shook one long arm in the air.
“Behold,” he cried, “those who are mad to the children of this world are in very truth the Lord’s anointed and the dwellers in the inner temple. Lo, I am one who is prepared to testify even to the uttermost, for of a verity the day has now come when the humble will be exalted and the wicked will be cut off in their sins!”
“Mother! Mother!” cried the little boy, in terror.
“There, there! It’s all right, Jack,” said the buxom woman, and then, in a burst of womanly wrath, “What d’you want to make the child cry for? You’re a pretty man, you are!”
“Better he should cry now than in the outer darkness. Let him seek safety while there is yet time.”
The officer measured the gap with a practised eye. It was a good eight feet across, and the fellow could push him over before he could steady himself. It would be a desperate thing to attempt. He tried soothing words once more.
“See here, my lad, you’ve carried this joke too far. Why should you wish to injure us? Just shin up and get that wedge out, and we will agree to say no more about it.”
Another rending snap came from above.
“By George, the hawser is going!” cried Stangate. “Here! Stand aside! I’m coming over to see to it.”
The workman had plucked the hammer from his belt, and waved it furiously in the air.
“Stand back, young man! Stand back! Or come — if you would hasten your end.”
“Tom, Tom, for God’s sake, don’t spring! Help! Help!”
The passengers all joined in the cry for aid. The man smiled malignantly as he watched them.
“There is no one to help. They could not come if they would. You would be wiser to turn to your own souls that ye be not cast to the burning. Lo, strand by strand the cable snaps which holds you. There is yet another, and with each that goes there is more strain upon the rest. Five minutes of time, and all eternity beyond.”
A moan of fear rose from the prisoners in the lift. Stangate felt a cold sweat upon his brow as he passed his arm round the shrinking girl. If this vindictive devil could only be coaxed away for an instant he would spring across and take his chance in a hand-to-hand fight.
“Look here, my friend! We give you best!” he cried. “We can do nothing. Go up and cut the cable if you wish. Go on — do it now, and get it over!”
“That you may come across unharmed. Having set my hand to the work, I will not draw back from it.”
Fury seized the young officer.
“You devil!” he cried. “What do you stand there grinning for? I’ll give you something to grin about. Give me a stick, one of you.”
The man waved his hammer.
“Come, then! Come to judgment!” he howled.
“He’ll murder you, Tom! Oh, for God’s sake, don’t! If we must die, let us die together.”
“I wouldn’t try it, sir,” cried Billy. “He’ll strike you down before you get a footing. Hold up, Dolly, my dear! Faintin’ won’t ‘elp us. You speak to him, miss. Maybe he’ll listen to you.”
“Why should you wish to hurt us?” said Mary. “What have we ever done to you? Surely you will be sorry afterwards if we are injured. Now do be kind and reasonable and help us to get back to the ground.”
For a moment there may have been some softening in the man’s fierce eyes as he looked at the sweet face which was upturned to him. Then his features set once more into their grim lines of malice.
“My hand is set to the work, woman. It is not for the servant to look back from his task.”
“But why should this be your task?”
“Because there is a voice within me which tells me so. In the night-time I have heard it, and in the daytime too, when I have lain out alone upon the girders and seen the wicked dotting the streets beneath me, each busy on his own evil intent. ‘John Barnes, John Barnes,’ said the voice. ‘You are here that you may give a sign to a sinful generation — such a sign as shall show them that the Lord liveth and that there is a judgment upon sin.’ Who am I that I should disobey the voice of the Lord?”
“The voice of the devil,” said Stangate. “What is the sin of this lady, or of these others, that you should seek their lives?”
“You are as the others, neither better nor worse. All day they pass me, load by load, with foolish cries and empty songs and vain babble of voices. Their thoughts are set upon the things of the flesh. Too long have I stood aside and watched and refused to testify. But now the day of wrath is come and the sacrifice is ready. Think not that a woman’s tongue can turn me from my task.”
“It is useless!” Mary cried. “Useless! I read death in his eyes.”
Another cord had snapped.
“Repent! Repent!” cried the madman. “One more, and it is over!”
Commander Stangate felt as if it were all some extraordinary dream — some monstrous nightmare. Could it be possible that he, after all his escapes of death in warfare, was now, in the heart of peaceful England, at the mercy of a homicidal lunatic, and that his dear girl, the one being whom he would shield from the very shadow of danger, was helpless before this horrible man? All his energy and manhood rose up in him for one last effort.
“Here, we won’t be killed like sheep in the shambles!” he cried, throwing himself against the wooden wall of the lift and kicking with all his force. “Come on, boys! Kick it! Beat it! It’s only matchboarding, and it is giving. Smash it down! Well done! Once more all together! There she goes! Now for the side! Out with it! Splendid!”
First the back and then the side of the little compartment had been knocked out, and the splinters dropped down into the abyss. Barnes danced upon his girder, his hammer in the air.
“Strive not!” he shrieked. “It avails not. The day is surely come.”
“It’s not two feet from the side girder,” cried the officer. “Get across! Quick! Quick! All of you. I’ll hold this devil off!” He had seized a stout stick from the commercial traveller and faced the madman, daring him to spring across.
“Your turn now, my friend!” he hissed. “Come on, hammer and all! I’m ready for you.”
Above him he heard another snap, and the frail platform began to rock. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that his companions were all safe upon the side girder. A strange line of terrified castaways they appeared as they clung in an ungainly row to the trellis-work of steel. But their feet were on the iron support. With two quick steps and a spring he was at their side. At the same instant the murderer, hammer in hand, jumped the gap. They had one vision of him there — a vision which will haunt their dreams — the convulsed face, the blazing eyes, the wind-tossed raven locks. For a moment he balanced himself upon the swaying platform. The next, with a rending crash, he and it were gone. There was a long silence and then, far down, the thud and clatter of a mighty fall.
With white faces, the forlorn group clung to the cold steel bars and gazed down into the terrible abyss. It was the Commander who broke the silence.
“They’ll send for us now. It’s all safe,” he cried, wiping his brow. “But, by Jove, it was a close call!”
MY FRIEND THE MURDERER AND OTHER MYSTERIES AND ADVENTURES
CONTENTS
ELIAS B. HOPKINS, THE PARSON OF JACKMAN’S GULCH.
MY FRIEND THE MURDERER
THE MAN FROM ARCHANGEL
THAT LITTLE SQUARE BOX.
THE AMERICAN’S TALE
BONES. THE APRIL FOOL OF HARVEY’S SLUICE
THE MYSTERY OF SASASSA VALLEY
OUR DERBY SWEEPSTAKES
SELECTING A GHOST. THE GHOSTS OF GORESTHORPE GRANGE
ELIAS B. HOPKINS, THE PARSON OF JACKMAN’S GULCH.
He was known in the Gulch as the Reverend Elias B. Hopkins, but it was generally understood that the title was an honorary one, extorted by his many eminent qualities, and not borne out by any legal claim which he could adduce. “The Parson” was another of his sobriquets, which was sufficiently distinctive in a land where the flock was scattered and the shepherds few. To do him justice, he never pretended to have received any preliminary training for the ministry, or any orthodox qualification to practise it. “We’re all working in the claim of the Lord,” he remarked one day, “and it don’t matter a cent whether we’re hired for the job or whether we waltzes in on our own account,” a piece of rough imagery which appealed directly to the instincts of Jackman’s Gulch. It is quite certain that during the first few months his presence had a marked effect in diminishing the excessive use both of strong drinks and of stronger adjectives which had been characteristic of the little mining settlement. Under his tuition, men began to understand that the resources of their native language were less limited than they had supposed, and that it was possible to convey their impressions with accuracy without the aid of a gaudy halo of profanity.
We were certainly in need of a regenerator at Jackman’s Gulch about the beginning of ‘53. Times were flush then over the whole colony, but nowhere flusher than there. Our material prosperity had had a bad effect upon our morals. The camp was a small one, lying rather better than a hundred and twenty miles to the north of Ballarat, at a spot where a mountain torrent finds its way down a rugged ravine on its way to join the Arrowsmith River. History does not relate who the original Jackman may have been, but at the time I speak of the camp it contained a hundred or so adults, many of whom were men who had sought an asylum there after making more civilised mining centres too hot to hold them. They were a rough, murderous crew, hardly leavened by the few respectable members of society who were scattered among them.
Communication between Jackman’s Gulch and the outside world was difficult and uncertain. A portion of the bush between it and Ballarat was infested by a redoubtable outlaw named Conky Jim, who, with a small band as desperate as himself, made travelling a dangerous matter. It was customary, therefore, at the Gulch, to store up the dust and nuggets obtained from the mines in a special store, each man’s share being placed in a separate bag on which his name was marked. A trusty man, named Woburn, was deputed to watch over this primitive bank. When the amount deposited became considerable, a waggon was hired, and the whole treasure was conveyed to Ballarat, guarded by the police and by a certain number of miners, who took it in turn to perform the office. Once in Ballarat, it was forwarded on to Melbourne by the regular gold waggons. By this plan the gold was often kept for months in the Gulch before being despatched, but Conky Jim was effectually checkmated, as the escort party were far too strong for him and his gang. He appeared, at the time of which I write, to have forsaken his haunts in disgust, and the road could be traversed by small parties with impunity.
Comparative order used to reign during the daytime at Jackman’s Gulch, for the majority of the inhabitants were out with crowbar and pick among the quartz ledges, or washing clay and sand in their cradles by the banks of the little stream. As the sun sank down, however, the claims were gradually deserted, and their unkempt owners, clay-bespattered and shaggy, came lounging into camp, ripe for any form of mischief. Their first visit was to Woburn’s gold store, where their clean-up of the day was duly deposited, the amount being entered in the storekeeper’s book, and each miner retaining enough to cover his evening’s expenses. After that, all restraint was at an end, and each set to work to get rid of his surplus dust with the greatest rapidity possible. The focus of dissipation was the rough bar, formed by a couple of hogsheads spanned by planks, which was dignified by the name of the “Britannia Drinking Saloon.” Here Nat Adams, the burly bar-keeper, dispensed bad whisky at the rate of two shillings a noggin
, or a guinea a bottle, while his brother Ben acted as croupier in a rude wooden shanty behind, which had been converted into a gambling hell, and was crowded every night. There had been a third brother, but an unfortunate misunderstanding with a customer had shortened his existence. “He was too soft to live long,” his brother Nathaniel feelingly observed, on the occasion of his funeral. “Many’s the time I’ve said to him, ‘If you’re arguin’ a pint with a stranger, you should always draw first, then argue, and then shoot, if you judge that he’s on the shoot.’ Bill was too purlite.
He must needs argue first and draw after, when he might just as well have kivered his man before talkin’ it over with him. This amiable weakness of the deceased Bill was a blow to the firm of Adams, which became so short-handed that the concern could hardly be worked without the admission of a partner, which would mean a considerable decrease in the profits.
Nat Adams had had a roadside shanty in the Gulch before the discovery of gold, and might, therefore, claim to be the oldest inhabitant. These keepers of shanties were a peculiar race, and at the cost of a digression it may he interesting to explain how they managed to amass considerable sums of money in a land where travellers were few and far between. It was the custom of the “bushmen,” i.e., bullock-drivers, sheep tenders, and the other white hands who worked on the sheep-runs up country, to sign articles by which they agreed to serve their master for one, two, or three years at so much per year and certain daily rations. Liquor was never included in this agreement, and the men remained, per force, total abstainers during the whole time. The money was paid in a lump sum at the end of the engagement. When that day came round, Jimmy, the stockman, would come slouching into his master’s office, cabbage-tree hat in hand.
“Morning, master!” Jimmy would say. “My time’s up. I guess I’ll draw my cheque and ride down to town.”
“You’ll come back, Jimmy?”
“Yes, I’ll come back. Maybe I’ll be away three weeks, maybe a month. I want some clothes, master, and my bloomin’ boots are well-nigh off my feet.”
Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) Page 673