Murderer's Trail

by J. Jefferson Farjeon

  ‘Yus.’

  ‘Do you know that’s a long time?’

  ‘It was a long fall. Besides, I’ve toljer, I ain’t well.’

  ‘What’s the matter with you?’

  ‘When anybody speaks sharp ter me, me hinside wobbles.’

  ‘Perhaps that’s because you didn’t come quietly?’

  ‘I did, till the third officer ’it me.’

  ‘How do you know it was the third officer?’

  ‘Ain’t it hon ’is sleeve?’

  ‘Oh; you can read gold braid?’

  ‘Yus. This ain’t the first time I bin on a ship.’

  ‘Have you ever served on one?’

  ‘Yus.’

  ‘Name it.’

  ‘’Ilda.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘No. I was on a lot in the war.’

  ‘How, a lot?’

  ‘Well, you was blowed hup from one ter another, wasn’t yer?’

  There was a pause. The captain was giving Ben time to breathe. Then he asked, more slowly:

  ‘Would you like to serve on a ship again? On the Atalanta?’

  ‘’Oo’s that?’

  ‘The Atalanta is the name of this ship.’

  Ben blinked. The captain’s keen grey eyes were on him. For one tiny instant, their souls seemed to meet—the one within its spotless cloth, the other within its cloth that was nothing but spot. And, as happens during these rare momentary meetings, Ben replied with the simple truth.

  ‘Me ’eart’s a bit funny,’ he said; ‘but I can polish brass.’

  The captain nodded. Then he turned to the third officer.

  ‘Take him away, Mr Greene,’ he said, ‘and see he doesn’t get into mischief till I’ve decided what to do with him.’

  ‘May I suggest the stokehold, sir?’ answered the third officer. ‘We’ve heard that weak heart story before.’

  ‘I’ll see,’ replied the captain, and then shot his final question at Ben.

  ‘One moment,’ he said. ‘Do you know anything about a stoker who is supposed to be missing?’

  ‘No, sir,’ replied Ben.

  And the two souls drifted apart again.

  Alone once more, the captain and Mr Holbrooke regarded each other speculatively.

  ‘Well?’ queried the captain. ‘What do you make of it?’

  ‘This,’ answered Mr Holbrooke. ‘That you ought to be given a gold medal for patience! Why did you give the fellow all that rope?’

  The captain shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘Perhaps he interested me. He’s got the imagination of a first-class journalist, but he wouldn’t kill a fly unless he were driven to it. I’m some judge of character, Mr Holbrooke.’

  ‘Ah, but s’pose he was driven to it?’

  ‘I said a fly. If he killed a man, it would be an accident.’

  The captain rose, and his visitor followed suit.

  ‘Well, I’ll tell you what I think, captain,’ said Mr Holbrooke. ‘You’ll hear more of that fellow before you’re many hours older.’

  It was a true prediction. Before the captain was six hours older, he heard that the fellow had fallen overboard.

  It was the third officer who brought him the information.

  10

  The Man with the Sack

  If Ben had kept a diary, and it had been produced as evidence, it would have brought chaos to any police court. On rare occasions, his mind was as clear as yours or mine. He knew twice five was ten, he could tell you the time or the date, and he could say the alphabet backwards as far as X. But these were rare occasions; periods of unusual clarity; and the spaces between the occasions were vast and filmy. His brain functioned through a sort of smoke-screen.

  He would have said, through the smoke-screen, that the kind word you spoke to him yesterday had been spoken a week ago, or that the kick he had received a week ago had been delivered last night. He passed through two minutes in a month, or a month in two minutes. Last Thursday week was next Tuesday fortnight. When clocks struck, if he didn’t count carefully on his fingers, he couldn’t say whether it was tea-time or cheese.

  He had, nevertheless, a strange tenacity. Because of the fewness of his ideas (saving in the matter of repartee; God had vouchsafed him that one weapon), such ideas as came to him and were permitted to stay and settle grew into obsessions. He clung to them doggedly, ridiculously, often feeling that he would sink without them. There were two permanent ideas: cheese and cigarette ends. Others came and went in the confusing flow of time, shaping his thoughts and incentives.

  As there were two permanent ideas, so now there were two temporary ones—though one of the temporary ones threatened to become permanent. Thus, Ben’s life when he left the captain’s presence was composed of the following four items: Cheese, cigarette ends, Faggis and the girl. His stomach wanted cheese, his lips wanted cigarette ends, his heart feared Faggis, and his soul ached for the girl. Not for the romance of her. Just for the comfort of her. Queer! Couldn’t quite make it out. But there it was.

  And why, after all, should he be so afraid of Faggis? This third officer, who was hauling him off, was a more immediate menace! But there it was again. Faggis stuck in his mind like a terrible shadow. Like the shadow, indeed, that casts itself before the event!…

  ‘You got off light,’ the third officer grunted.

  ‘I feels light,’ Ben murmured, and became momentarily practical. ‘Does I git hennythink ter eat, or does I jest fade away, like?’

  Apparently, since the third officer made no response, he was to fade away like, and the swaying of the deck reinforced this theory. It occurred to Ben that he really might be fading away. They were crossing the boat deck, and it wouldn’t have surprised him if the boats had suddenly gone up like gas balloons.

  He saw a bit of comfort on the heaving ground. He bent down to the ground, as the ground came up.

  ‘Now, then!’ came the third officer’s sharp exclamation.

  ‘Cigarette hend,’ replied Ben. ‘I saw it fust.’

  Then he paused abruptly. The comfort was forgotten in a strange and disturbing sight.

  A tall, white-haired man was approaching. He was walking with a buoyant, swinging step, and his face wore a smile. The smile was almost child-like in its satisfaction and self-sufficiency. It said, ‘You may live in your world, but I live in mine, and mine is the really sensible world.’ In the sensible world, apparently, people strode along with sacks on their back.

  ‘Yus, I’m fadin’ away,’ Ben told himself, as the man and the sack grew larger and closer. ‘When ’e gits hup ter me, bet yer hennythink I goes pop!’

  The only things that went pop, however, were his eyes. They remained popped while the white-haired man stopped and greeted the third officer.

  ‘Aha, Mr Greene,’ he boomed. ‘When are you going to grow up to my size?’

  ‘Taking your constitutional, sir?’ replied Mr Greene amiably.

  ‘Yes. And I’ve increased the weight again. Feel!’

  The white-haired giant swung his sack down. Ben ducked, unnecessarily. As the third officer tested the weight of the sack, the white-haired giant turned to Ben, and his smile expanded.

  ‘Now, the next time I want to increase the weight of my sack,’ he exclaimed, ‘you’d be just about the right size to put in!’

  ‘’Oo?’ blinked Ben.

  ‘You must lend him to me, Mr Greene, when you’ve done with him,’ chuckled the white-haired giant. ‘Before we touch land I’ve got to work my load up to eight or nine stone.’

  ‘Well, you could have him now, Mr Sims, as far as I’m con- cerned,’ replied the third officer callously. ‘He’s a stowaway.’

  ‘Eh? What did you say?’

  ‘Stowaway.’

  ‘Indeed? A stowaway!’ The white-haired giant’s eyes again sought Ben’s. ‘Now, that’s intensely interesting! What does one do with stowaways?’

  Then he smiled at the third officer, and the third officer smiled at him, and he went on
his way.

  ‘Wot’s ’e practisin’ for?’ asked Ben. ‘A postman?’

  It did not seem for a moment as though the third officer were going to answer. Then he changed his mind.

  ‘One of those fresh-air, vegetarian, hygienic lunatics,’ he said. ‘He thinks that a straight back means a long life, and that a weight behind means a straight back. A sack a day keeps the doctor away.’

  ‘Well, I’m blowed,’ murmured Ben.

  ‘Yes, quite mad,’ nodded the third officer. ‘Get a move on!’

  Ben obeyed. Nasty, that man with a sack! Sims, the third officer had called him. Hadn’t he heard the name before somewhere? Sims … Sims …

  A girl near by turned her head, and nudged her companion.

  ‘Say, look at that funny little man!’ she said.

  Her companion looked. He agreed he was a funny little man.

  ‘But haven’t we got better things to look at?’ he suggested.

  ‘I dare say,’ replied the girl; ‘but he kind of makes me want to cry.’

  ‘He’s a pitiable-looking object all right,’ nodded her companion, who looked himself the reverse of pitiable. His suit was a youthful grey. ‘But what can we do about it?’

  ‘He sure is,’ said the girl, and raised her voice. ‘Say, officer!’

  Mr Greene halted politely. Ben became conscious that his bump was being stared at.

  ‘I hope there’s not been an accident?’ asked the girl.

  ‘No, miss. Just a stowaway,’ answered Mr Greene. ‘Nothing to worry about.’

  ‘It’s orl loverly,’ added Ben.

  Now he became conscious that she was staring at his eyes.

  ‘But the poor fellow’s hurt himself!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘We’ll look after him,’ the third officer assured her. ‘There was a bit of a scrap.’

  ‘Tha’s right, nothink worth menshunin’,’ corroborated Ben. ‘’E on’y ’it me ninety times.’

  ‘Get on!’ growled the third officer. ‘You’re not supposed to chat with passengers!’

  The girl’s eyes followed the pair as they departed. Her companion smiled.

  ‘Queer cove,’ he commented. ‘What about a game of shovel-board, Miss Holbrooke?’

  Sims! Sims! Where had he heard the name before? Sims … Sims …

  He thought about it while he was being taken to a small, confined space. He thought about it while he was eating a meagre meal that some semi-Christian provided for him. He thought about it while faces peeped in to have a squint at him, and winked at him. Some of the winks were unkind, but others were quite good-natured. Sims … Sims … One face said, ‘Cheer up, old cock!’ and when it disappeared Ben found a gasper in his hand. A whole gasper. He got a match from another face.

  He went on thinking about it. Sims! It filled the time of waiting. His eyes drooped. The white-haired giant with the sack leapt into his vision, twelve times life-size. He opened his eyes quickly. The nasty vision vanished. Sims … Sims …

  Minutes went by. Or hours. The man with the sack dodged in and out, a filmy figure leaping through the spaces of Ben’s mind. Once the sack leapt through without the man.

  ‘Oi!’ gasped Ben.

  That was ’orrible! He opened his eyes in terror, and saw the third officer looking at him. And, all at once, it occurred to him that the third officer wasn’t any pleasanter than the white-haired giant with the sack.

  ‘I hope you’ve enjoyed your snooze,’ said the third officer sarcastically; ‘but you haven’t booked a bedroom for the trip, you know.’

  ‘Wotcher mean?’ replied Ben.

  ‘That it’s time you worked a bit for your living,’ answered the third officer. ‘Let’s see if you can do that polishing you boasted about!’

  Ben rubbed his eyes, and suddenly stared. It was dark out on the deck. How long had he been asleep?

  ‘Wot—polishin’ at night?’ he muttered.

  ‘Yes; at night,’ responded the third officer. ‘But you needn’t be afraid of the dark. I shall be looking after you.’

  In response to a prod, Ben rose. He stared out of the opening through which the third officer had come. Yes, it was certainly night …

  Sims! Now he’d got it! Sims was the other name that had been mentioned in the conversation in the coal bunker. Sims! The man with the sack!

  ‘Gawd, was he in it too?’

  11

  On the Boat Deck

  Ben didn’t like it. He tried to make a stand.

  ‘Look ’ere,’ he said, ‘I wanter see the captain.’

  ‘And, of course,’ returned the third officer, ‘the captain’s just dying to see you!’

  ‘Yus, but I’m seerious!’

  ‘To do you justice, you look serious! What do you want to see the captain about?’

  Ben couldn’t tell the third officer that. He fell back upon generalities.

  ‘I ain’t bein’ treated fair,’ he muttered.

  ‘It seems to me you’ve been treated with quite unusual fairness,’ answered the third officer. ‘You have been right to the fountain-head, and have had your case considered by the Old Man himself. You have not been put in chains. You have not been sent down to the stokehold. Instead, you are given a meal and a long sleep, and now you complain when I ask you to breathe on brass for a few minutes. I’m afraid I can’t see your cause for grumbling.’

  But then the third officer could not see his own face. It was really the third officer’s face that was the trouble.

  ‘I bin a fool!’ Ben told himself, as he stared at the offending face and at the malignance with which it was saturated. ‘I orter’ve tole the captain more’n I did while I ’ad the charnce.’ Well, he would have to make another chance. Meanwhile, there seemed nothing to do but to obey the third officer.

  ‘Where are we goin’?’ asked Ben.

  ‘I don’t think that concerns you,’ retorted the third officer, ‘seeing you’ve no choice.’

  ‘No ’arm in arskin’, is there?’

  ‘Not the slightest, if you don’t expect answers. Now, then! Right turn! Quick march! And lift your feet!’

  The final injunction came a moment too late. Ben tripped over a ledge, and went sprawling.

  The third officer picked him up reprovingly.

  ‘You know, if you’re not more careful, you’ll go overboard,’ he observed. ‘You wouldn’t like that, would you?’

  Ben did not reply. The remark, and the tone of it, chilled him.

  They proceeded in silence. The sea churned darkly under a starry sky. The wind played its lonely night music. From somewhere in the distance, somewhere glowing with light, came other music. This other music was designed to destroy the loneliness of which the wind was chanting. The waltz from Bitter Sweet brought couples close in a miniature sanctuary of light and colour. Intimate smiles, whispered confidences, warm little pressures, flowed from the magic of the orchestra, combining to create the sweet illusions in which frightened humanity hides its head. But the song of the wind, rhythmless to finite ears, formless to finite minds, and designed by a fathomless need beyond human comprehension, told of the loneliness of oceans—the loneliness against which the other music fought—and of the might of space.

  Ben, with each music in his ear, could not have described the separate messages. But he was conscious of them. He was conscious of the warmth of the one, and the coldness of the other.

  They passed a few dim people. Some standing alone, some strolling or chatting in couples. Ben wanted to stop and talk to them, just to break up this horrible, silent journey with the third officer. But what could he have said? They were not of his world, or he of theirs.

  ‘’Ow much further?’ he asked, at last.

  ‘Up you go,’ replied the third officer.

  They ascended a companion to the boat deck. It was deserted. The boats were the only company. The third officer walked towards the boats. They hung from their davits in static expectancy, waiting for the crisis that never came. The crisis of a
wreck, or of a man overboard. Ben’s steps grew slower. He felt fingers on his sleeve. Not the firm, warm fingers of his little companion in the coal bunker. These were like the invisible fingers that had stretched towards him when he had been approaching dockland—the fingers that had drawn him through the opening in the wall, that had made him trip over the dead stoker, and shoot through the hole in the side of the ship. Only the fingers weren’t invisible any longer. They belonged to a third officer, and protruded from a respectable sleeve with a gold line and a diamond …

  ‘What’s the matter?’ asked the third officer.

  Ben did not answer. The curve of one of the boats hung over their heads. Beyond the curve’s outline, and below it, was a rail, and beyond the rail was the sea. The sea, and the wind, and the loneliness …

  They were not walking any more. They were standing.

  ‘So you want to see the captain,’ said the third officer.

  ‘Wot’s that?’ answered Ben.

  The question surprised him, but only for an instant.

  ‘If I take you to the captain—I might be able to manage it, you know—what will you tell him?’

  ‘Wotcher mean, wot’ll I tell ’im?’ muttered Ben.

  The third officer shrugged his shoulders, and waited. Ben noticed that the third officer’s fingers were still gripping his sleeve.

  ‘I ain’t bein’ treated fair, that’s wot,’ he said.

  ‘It won’t wash,’ sighed the third officer. ‘Really, old dear, it won’t wash!’ He shook his head. ‘I suppose what you really want to see the captain for is to spin him some more lies about—that chloroform.’

  ‘Me, lies?’ burst out Ben. ‘The lies was your’n!’

  ‘Not quite so loud,’ suggested the third officer, glancing round.

  ‘Why not?’ demanded Ben.

  ‘After all, it doesn’t really matter,’ the third officer retracted. ‘No one’ll hear you. We’re on the lee side. So—I told the lies, did I?’

  ‘Yus. You sed the clorridgeform was in my pocket.’

  ‘And wasn’t it?’

  ‘You knows it weren’t.’

  ‘In that case, where was it?’