when my sight cleared, i found myself in a long, low grey room—grey from the smoke and the stone walls. it was lit by a curious hanging lamp of iron, black with soot and oil; a fire of peat smouldered on the deep hearth; for furniture the room had in it a long table black with age, and grease, and oil dribbling from the lamp; heavy black chairs were set on either side of the hearth and at the table, and a black press standing against the wall, its brass fittings green and corroded. the brass candlesticks upon the chimney-piece were green and corroded, too; the curtain drawn before the window was green and moth-eaten; the floor was sanded; the rafters above were black with soot and dusty cobwebs. my captor pulling me forward,—as the old woman waited by the door presently to admit the other rider—dropped me like a sack of meal on to a chair; and straddled before the fire, stretching his arm cramped by the weight of me all that while in saddle.
blinking up at him i saw him for a huge fellow; p. 66he must have stood six feet in height, and was of a great breadth of shoulder and depth of chest. as his sleeve slipped back from his hairy forearm i saw its swelling muscles, and understood ruefully the ease with which he had held me. his face was handsome in a rough, bold way, though coarse and besotted; his chin and jaws were blue-black from the razor; his hair black and curling; his eyes blood-shot from drink. he wore a battered brown hat, a rough, brown riding coat, with leather breeches and mud-splashed riding boots; his soiled cravat was held by a brooch of flashing red stones. looking up at him, understanding the strength of the man, for something of good humour in his coarse drunken face i did not fear him, as i feared the crone, whose evil green eyes had glittered at me when my captor thrust me into the house. he grinned down at me, and growled, “so you’re well enough for the time, eh, young sir?”
“well enough but what’s your purpose with me? why have you brought me here?”
“when you know that,” said he, “you’ll know as much as i do. nay, you’ll know more.”
“you mean that you’re hired for this? you’re only the servant of an enemy of mine, whose interest it is to keep me out of rogues’ haven?”
p. 67“rogues’ haven! so you’ve caught the name?”
“to be sure i know the name,” i answered boldly for the good humour of the fellow. “and know the reason for it. and think i know the name of your principal.”
“oh, ho! though he plays his game in secret. you’ll be knowin’ more’n it’s safe for you to know, young sir. and”—with a sudden gesture towards the door—“if you’ll take a word from me, you’ll be wiser, if you keep your mouth shut.”
while yet i blinked at him, i heard the old woman once more unlock the door to admit the big fellow’s companion, who presently entered the room. i saw him for a lean, cadaverous, young man of no great height; his high-crowned hat, his coat, his buckskins, the laces at his throat dandified; he was jauntily flicking his top boots with his riding switch, and his spurs were jingling. an ill-looking fellow,—i marked his pale sneering lips and the sinister light of his green eyes; i feared him as an enemy even as i feared the crone with the blue shawl about her black rags, her evil eyes peering at me, and her jaws working, as she hobbled after him.
“so-ho, martin, here we are, all safe and snug,” cried the big man from the hearth. “find p. 68us the tipple in that cupboard of yours, mother mag, and then i’ll be packing.”
“you’ll be staying here, my friend roger,” said martin, coolly, dropping into a chair by the table. “you’re to wait until he comes.”
“i tell you i’ll have my drink and be off,” roger growled, scowling at him. “who the devil are you to be givin’ me orders? i’ve an affair twenty miles off as ever was by break o’ day.”
“yet you’ll be staying,” the young man insisted quietly. “i’m giving you his orders, not mine. what’s it to me whether you go or stay?”
“i’m damned, if i’ll wait!” roger asserted.
“you’re damned, if you go,” sneered martin, his eyes flashing up suddenly like two wicked green gems. “get him the drink, mother mag, and he’ll be staying—not risking his neck by going.”
i saw the red blood rush to roger’s face. i heard him growl and mutter to himself; he straddled still across the hearth. laughing hoarsely then he cried out, “ay, the drink, mother mag—the drink,” and turning his back on martin, kicked savagely at the fire.
while i sat blinking at them, and wondering whether it should be my uncle charles expected at the house, and what bearing his arrival should p. 69have upon my fortunes, the hag, taking a key from the jingling ring at her side, unlocked the press; and out of its recess drew a bloated bottle of violet-coloured glass; hugging this to her, she set out four thick, blue goblets, and poured into them some dark spirit or cordial, pausing ere she filled the fourth to point her skinny fingers at me, and then peer at martin, as if to gather from him whether i was to drink with them.
he replied curtly, “ay, pour him a dram,—half a glass—mother mag; he looks about to croak,” and sneered at me.
roger, swinging round from the fire, took up his glass and tossed off the contents; snatching the bottle then from mother mag he filled up a glass which he handed to me, growling, “drink it down, lad! it’ll put heart into you.” the woman, with a shrill cry, leaped like a cat upon him, seeking to snatch the bottle from him; holding it above her reach and fending her off from me, he refilled and drained his glass, and set the bottle down once more. she clutched it to her, set in the stopper, and poked it away in the cupboard, all the while chattering to herself and mouthing like some gibbering ape. taking her own glass then, with so palsied a hand that she surely spilt half the contents, she hobbled to the hearth and crouched down by it, alternately p. 70licking her fingers and sipping her grog,—her green eyes glinting at roger and me.
i tasted the liquor in the glass, and finding it a spirit that burnt my very lips, i did not drink it, but handed the glass back to roger, who, muttering “your health, young master,” drained it for me. martin sat drinking slowly; roger, as warming from the stuff, began to stamp impatiently to and fro over the stone floor. pausing at last by martin, he demanded, thickly, “what hour’s he like to be here? how long am i to wait in this stinkin’ den?”—at which mother mag cackled sardonically, choked and spat, lying back against the chimney-piece red-eyed and gasping.
“he did not say what hour,” martin answered, indifferently. “how should he know what hour the coach would come, or we be here? sit down by the fire, man. get your pipe; there’s tobacco in the jar on the shelf.”
“am i to be kept here all night, when by break o’ day i should be about my business?”
martin lifted his glass as though to admire its colour in the lamp-light. “go then, my friend,” he said smoothly. “oh, go by all means! only blame yourself, not me, for aught that may happen in the course of a day or so. you’d make p. 71a pretty figure in the cart, roger, and ’twould need a double rope to hold your body.”
“damn you!” roared roger, swinging up his hand, but martin’s eyes, watching him intently, and the smile flickering still upon his lips, the big man swung round once more and pointed to me. “you’re makin’ a sweet song o’ hangin’, martin,” he muttered. “you’re sayin’ what your precious gentleman may do or mayn’t, as the case may be. peach on me, you mean—if so be i don’t wait for him, and if so be i don’t do as i’m told. only, don’t you be forgettin’, that ’twas him as told us to hold up old skinflint’s coach, and nab the lad there. and that’s robbery by the king’s highway,—and get that into your head, and keep it there. and, by god, martin, if he’s got his claws on me, i’ve got my claws on to him from this night forth; and if he talks of hangin’, there’s others—ay, there’s others. you, martin, and old mag here, and him.”
“pish, man,” said martin, coolly, though his look was livid. “who’d listen to you? who’d believe you? old gavin masters—eh? he loves you, roger. he has confidence in you.”
roger stood cursing to himself, demanding finally, “and the lad here,—what’s he goin’ to do with the lad?”
“how in the devil’s name does it concern you, p. 72galt?” cried martin, with sudden flaming anger. “you’ve done your share of the work and you’ll be paid for it.”
“ay, but you answer me! what’s to be done with the lad? hark ’ee, martin, i’m sick to death of the whole crew of ye. and of none more than yourself, unless it’s himself. i’ve done my work on the roads, and there’s a few the poorer for it; but i’ve never done aught of a kind with this. kidnappin’ an’ maybe murder at the finish.”
“what d’ye mean?” martin asked, drawing back his chair, to be out of reach of roger galt’s rising rage, as the drink worked within him.
“what’s he goin’ to do with the lad there?” roger growled. “get him out of the way—oh, ay, i know that, and can guess for why. from the looks of him! but how’s he goin’ to rid himself of him? ship him overseas with blunt, or what? martin, i’ll have no hand in aught that don’t give the lad a chance for his life,—d’ye hear me? who’s he? dick craike’s lad as ever was! and they did for dick craike—ay, they did, they did, years agone.”
martin, starting up, screeched out, “shut your fool’s mouth! you’re drunk, roger galt. the lad’s to be kept here, till he comes. he’ll be here to-night. tell him what you’ve said to me! p. 73tell him! get the lantern and give me the keys, mother mag. we’ll lock the lad away upstairs; when the master comes he’ll not be wanting him taking his ease here like a gentleman!”
