“Let us go out into the sunlight, for God’s sake!” said I, and my foot struck against a piece of iron, which went tinkling across the stone floor. I picked it up. “They are gone,” said I, with a shiver, “and there’s an end of them. But this shed is a nightmarish sort of place for me. For God’s sake, let us get into the sun!”
“Yes, they are gone,” said Tortue, “but they would have stayed if they dared, if I hadn’t set you free, for they went without the cross.”
I was still holding that piece of iron in my hand. By the feel of it, it was a key, and I slipped it into my pocket quite unconsciously, for Tortue’s words took me aback with surprise.
“Without the jewelled cross? But you had the plan,” said I, as I stepped into the open. “I heard you describe the spot — three chains in a line east of the east window in the south aisle of the church.”
“There was no trace of the cross.”
“It was true then!” I exclaimed. “I was sure of it, even after Roper had found the stick and the plan. It was true — that grave had been rifled before.”
“Why should the plan have been put back, then?”
“God knows! I don’t.”
“Besides, if the grave had been rifled, the spot of ground on St. Helen’s Island had not. There had been no spade at work there.”
“Are you sure of that?”
“Yes.”
“And you followed out the directions?”
“To the letter. Three chains east by the compass of the eastern window in the south aisle of St. Helen’s Church, and four feet deep! We dug five and six feet deep. There was nothing, nor had the ground been disturbed.”
“I cannot understand it. Why should Adam Mayle have been at such pains to hide the plan? Was it a grim joke to be played on Cullen?”
There was no means of answering the problem, and I set it aside.
“After all, they are gone,” said I. “That is the main thing.”
“All except me,” said Tortue.
“Yes. Why have you stayed?”
Tortue threw himself on the ground and chewed at a stalk of grass.
“I saved your life last night,” said he.
“I know. Why did you do it? Why did you cover my mistakes in that shed? Why did you cut the rope?”
“Because you could serve my turn. The cross!” he exclaimed, with a flourish. “I do not want the cross.” He looked at me steadily for an instant with his shrewd eyes. “I want a man to nail on the cross, and you can help me to him. Where is Cullen Mayle?”
The words startled me all the more because there was no violence in the voice which spoke them — only a cold, deliberate resolution. I was nevermore thankful for the gift of ignorance than upon this occasion. I could assure him quite honestly,
“I do not know.”
“But last night you knew.”
“I spoke of many things last night of which I had no knowledge — the cross, the plan — —”
“You knew where the plan was. Flesh! but you knew that!”
“I guessed.”
“Guess, then, where Cullen Mayle is, and I’ll be content.”
“I have no hint to prompt a guess.” Tortue gave no sign of anger at my answer. He sat upon the grass, and looked with a certain sadness at the shed.
“It does not, after all, take much more than a night to forget,” said he.
“I am telling you the truth, Tortue,” said I, earnestly. “I do not know. I never met Cullen Mayle but once, and that was at a roadside inn. He stole my horse upon that occasion, so that I have no reason to bear him any goodwill.”
“But because of him you came down to Tresco?” said Tortue quickly.
“No.”
Tortue looked at me doubtfully. Then he looked at the house, and
“Ah! It was because of the girl.”
“No! No!” I answered vehemently. I could not explain to him why I had come, and fortunately he did not ask for an explanation. He just nodded his head, and stood up without another word.
“I do not forget,” said I pointing to the shed. “And if you should be in any need — —” But I got no further in my offer of help; for he turned upon me suddenly, and anger at last had got the upper hand with him.
“Money, is it not?” he cried, staring down at me with his eyes ablaze. “Ay, that’s the way with gentlefolk! You would give me as much as a guinea no doubt — a whole round gold guinea. Yes, I am in need,” and with a violent movement he clasped his hands together. “Virgin Mary, but I am in need of Cullen Mayle, and you offer me a guinea!” and then hunching his shoulders he strode off over the hill.
So Helen Mayle’s instinct was right. Out of the five men there was one who waited for Cullen’s coming with another object than to secure the diamond cross. Would he continue to wait? I could not doubt that he would, when I thought upon his last vehement burst of passion. Tortue would wait upon Tresco, until, if Cullen did not come himself, some word of Cullen’s whereabouts dropped upon his ear. It was still urgent, therefore, that Cullen Mayle should be warned, and if I was to go away in search of him, Helen must be warned too.
I walked back again towards Merchant’s Point with this ill news heavy upon my mind, and as I came over the lip of the hollow, I saw Helen waiting by the gate in the palisade. She saw me at the same moment, and came up towards me at a run.
“Is there more ill-news?” I asked myself. “Or has Cullen Mayle returned?” and I ran quickly down to her.
“Has he come?” I asked, for she came to a stop in front of me with her face white and scared.
“Who?” said she absently, as she looked me over.
“Cullen Mayle,” I answered.
“Oh, Cullen,” she said, and it struck me as curious that this was the first time I had heard her speak his name with indifference.
“Because he must not show himself here. There is a reason! There is a danger still!”
“A danger,” she said, in a loud cry, and then “Oh! I shall never forgive myself!”
“For what?”
She caught hold of my arm.
“See?” she said. “Your coat-sleeve is frayed. It was a rope did that last night. No use to deny it. Dick told me. He saw that a rope too had seared your wrists. Tell me! What happened last night? I must know!”
“You promised not to ask,” said I, moving away from her.
“Well, I break my promise,” said she. “But I must know,” and she turned and kept pace with me, down the hill, through the house into the garden. During that time she pleaded for an answer in an extreme agitation, and I confess that her agitation was a sweet flattery to me. I was inclined to make the most of it, for I could not tell how she would regard the story of my night’s adventures. It was I after all who caused old Adam Mayle’s bones to be disturbed; and I understood that it was really on that account that I had shrunk from telling her. She had a right to know, no doubt. Besides there was this new predicament of Tortue’s stay. I determined to make a clean breast of the matter. She listened very quietly without an exclamation or a shudder; only her face lost even the little colour which it had, and a look of horror widened in her eyes. I told her of my capture on the hillside, of Tortue’s intervention, of the Cross and the stick in the coffin. I drew a breath and described that scene in the Abbey grounds, and how I escaped; and still she said no word and gave no sign. I told her of their futile search upon St. Helen’s, and how I had witnessed their departure from the top of the Castle Down. Still she walked by my side silent, and wrapped in horror. I faltered through this last incident of Tortue’s stay and came to a lame finish, amongst the trees at the end of the garden. We turned and walked the length of the garden to the house.
“I know,” I said. “When I guessed the stick held the plan, I should have held my tongue. But I did not think of that. It was not easy to think at all just at that time, and I must needs be quick. They spoke of attacking the house, and I dreaded that.... I should not have been able to give you any warning.... I
should not have been able to give you any help ... for, you see, the slab of stone was already removed in the shed.”
“Oh, don’t!” she cried out, and pressed her hands to her temples. “I shall never forgive myself. Think! A week ago you and I were strangers. It cannot be right that you should go in deadly peril because of me.”
“Madam,” said I, greatly relieved, “you make too much of a thing of no great consequence. I hope to wear my life lightly.”
“Always?” said she quickly, as she stopped and looked at me.
I stopped, too, and looked at her.
“I think so,” said I, but without the same confidence. “Always.”
She had a disconcerting habit of laughing when there was no occasion whatever for laughter. She fell into that habit now, and I hastened to recall her to Tortue’s embarrassing presence on the island.
“Of course,” said I, “a word to the Governor at Star Castle and we are rid of him. But he stood between me and my death, and he trusts to my silence.”
“We must keep that silence,” she answered.
“Yet he waits for Cullen Mayle, and — it will not be well if those two men meet.”
“Why does he wait? Do you know that, too?”
I did not know, as I told her, though I had my opinion, of which I did not tell her.
“The great comfort is this. Tortue did not make one upon that expedition to the Sierra Leone River, but his son did. Tortue only fell in with George Glen and his gang at an ale-house in Wapping, and after — that is the point — after Glen had lost track of Cullen Mayle. Tortue, therefore, has never seen Cullen, does not know him. We have an advantage there. So should he come to Tresco, while I go back along the road to search for him, you must make your profit of that advantage.”
She stopped again.
“You will go, then?”
“Why, yes.”
She shook her head, reflectively.
“It is not right,” she said.
“I am going chiefly,” said I, “because I wish to recover my horse.”
She always laughed when I mentioned that horse, and her laughter always made me angry.
“Do you doubt I have a horse?” I asked. “Or rather had a horse? Because Cullen Mayle stole it, stole it deliberately from under my nose — a very valuable horse which I prized even beyond its value — and he stole it.”
The girl was in no way impressed by my wrath, and she said, pleasantly:
“I am glad you said that. I am glad to know that with it all, you are mean like other men.”
“Madam,” I returned, “when Cullen Mayle stole my horse, and rode away upon it, he put out his tongue at me. I made no answer. Nor do I make any answer to the remark which you have this moment addressed to me.”
“Oh, sir!” said she, “here are fine words, and here’s a curtsey to match them;” and spreading out her frock with each hand, she sank elaborately to the very ground.
We walked for some while longer in the garden, without speech, and the girl’s impertinence gradually slipped out of my mind. The sea murmured lazily upon the other side of the hedge, and I had full in view St. Helen’s Island and the ruined church upon its summit. The south aisle of the church pointed towards the house, and through the tracery of a rude window I could see the sky.
“I wonder who in the world can have visited the Abbey burial-ground and rifled that grave?”
The question perplexed me more and more, and I wondered whether Helen could throw light upon it. So I asked her, but she bent her brows in a frown, and in a little she answered:
“No, I can think of no one.”
I held out my hand to her. “This is good-bye,” said I.
“You go to-day?” she asked, but did not take my hand.
“Yes, if I can find a ship to take me. I go to St. Helen’s first. Can I borrow your boat; Dick will bring it back. I want to see that east window in the aisle.”
A few more words were said, and I promised to return, whether I found Cullen Mayle or not. And I did return, but sooner than I expected, for I returned that afternoon.
CHAPTER XV
THE LOST KEY IS FOUND
IT HAPPENED IN this way. I took Dick Parmiter with me and sailed across to St. Helen’s. We beached the boat on the sand near to the well and quarantine hut, and climbed up eastwards till we came to the hole which Glen’s party had dug. The ground sloped away from the church in this direction; and as I stood on the edge of the hole with my face towards the side of the aisle, I could just see over the grass the broken cusp of the window. It was exactly opposite to me.
It occurred to me, however, that Glen had measured the distance wrong. So I sent Dick in the boat across to Tresco to borrow a measure, and while he was away I examined the ground there around; but it was all covered with grass and bracken, which evidently had not been disturbed. Here and there were bushes of brambles, but, as I was at pains to discover, no search for the cross had been made beneath them.
In the midst of my search Dick came back to me with a tape measure, and we set to work from the window of the church. The measure was for a few yards, so that when we had run it out to its full length, keeping ever in the straight line, it was necessary to fix some sort of mark in the ground, and start afresh from that; and for a mark I used a big iron key which I had in my pocket. Three chains brought us exactly to the hole which had been dug, and holding the key in my hand, I said:
“They made no mistake. It is plain the plan was carelessly drawn.”
And Dick said to me: “That’s the key of our cottage.”
I handed it to him to make sure. He turned it over in his hand.
“Yes,” said he, “that’s the key;” and he added reproachfully, with no doubt a lively recollection of his mother’s objurgations: “So you had it all the time.”
“I found it this morning, Dick,” said I.
“Where?”
“In the shed on the Castle Down. Now, how the deuce did it get there? The dead sailormen had no use for keys.”
“It’s very curious,” said Dick.
“Very curious and freakish,” said I, and I sat down on the grass to think the matter out.
“Let me see, your mother missed it in the morning after I came to Tresco.”
“That’s three days ago.” And I could hardly believe the boy. It seemed to me that months had passed. But he was right.
“Yes, three days ago. Your mother missed it in the morning. It is likely, then, that it was taken from the lock of the door the night before.”
“That would be the night,” said Dick, suspiciously, “when you tapped on my window.”
“The night, in fact, when I first landed on Tresco. Wait a little.”
Dick sat still upon the grass, and I took the key from his hand into mine. There were many questions which at that moment perplexed me — that hideous experience in Cullen Mayle’s bedroom, the rifling of Adam Mayle’s grave, the replacing of the plan in it and the disappearance of the cross, and I was in that state of mind when everything new and at all strange presented itself as a possible clue to the mystery. It seemed to me that the key which I held was very much more than a mere rusty iron key of a door that was never locked. I felt that it was the key to the door of the mystery which baffled me, and that feeling increased in me into a solid conviction as I held it in my hand. I seemed to see the door opening, and opening very slowly. The chamber beyond the door was dark, but my eyes would grow accustomed to the darkness if only I did not turn them aside. As it was, even now I began to see dim, shadowy things which, uncomprehended though they were, struck something of a thrill into my blood, and something of a chill, too.
“The night that I landed upon Tresco,” I said, “we crossed the Castle Down, I nearly fell on to the roof of the shed, where all the dead sailormen were screeching in unison.”
“Yes!” said Dick, in a low voice, and I too looked around me to see that we were not overheard. Dick moved a little nearer to me with an uneasy working of h
is shoulders.
“Do you remember the woman who passed us?” I asked.
“You said it was a woman.”
“And it was.”
I had the best of reasons to be positive upon, that point. I had scratched my hand in the gorse and I had seen the blood of my scratches the next day on the dress of the woman who had brushed against me as she passed. That woman was Helen Mayle. Had she come from the shed? What did she need with the key?
“Is that shed ever used?” I asked.
“Not now.”
“Whom does it belong to?”
He nodded over towards Merchant’s Rock.
“Then Adam Mayle used it?”
“Cullen Mayle used it.”
“Cullen!”
I sprang up to my feet and walked away; and walked back; and walked away again. The shadowy things were indeed becoming visible; my eyes were growing indeed accustomed to the darkness; and, indeed, the door was opening. Should I close, slam it to, lock it again and never open it? For I was afraid.
But if I did shut it and lock it I should come back to it perpetually, I should be perpetually fingering the lock. No; I would open the door wide and see what was within the room. I came back to Dick.
“What did Cullen Mayle use it for?”
“He was in league with the Brittany smugglers. Brandy, wine, and lace were landed on the beach of a night and carried up to the shed.”
“Were they safe there?”
Dick laughed. Here he was upon firm ground, and he answered with some pride:
Complete Works of a E W Mason Page 330