Джорджетт Хейер - The Toll-Gate

“Do you want to escape from it indeed?”

“I can’t escape from it!”

“If I could be sure that yours was not the hand which killed Brean, I would help you to do so.”

For a moment, the meaning of these words scarcely penetrated to Stornaway’s intelligence. The voice which uttered them was so hard that he could not believe he had heard aright. He looked up, staring. The eyes that looked down into his were as cold as sea-water. But the Captain said steadily: “I could bring you off—if I chose to do it.”

Stornaway passed the tip of his tongue between his lips. A little colour mounted to his cheeks. “There’s a fortune in the cavern!” he said, rather breathlessly. “Only keep your mouth shut, arid you shall have———”

“I do not want your fortune, or any part of it. Nor would it save you if I were to keep my mouth shut. The Runner is not here by chance: he knows that somewhere in this district the gold is hidden. Sooner or later he will find it, make no mistake about that! I’m not here to help you to the enjoyment of a fortune: it goes back to the Treasury. As for you, you may end the affair as a felon and a murderer, or as a mere tool, deceived by a rogue. If you did not kill Brean I have no interest in sending you to the gallows. If you show me Brean’s body, stabbed as you have described, and show me also where the gold is lying, I will bring you off scatheless.”

There was a long pause. “How?” Stornaway said at last, watching him.

“I will tell the Runner that you have been entertaining Coate in all good faith; that when it was proved to you what his reason was for wishing to visit Kellands you realized that it was due to your folly and gabbing tongue that these crimes came about; that in your anxiety to atone for your unwitting share in them you used your best endeavours to discover where the gold was hidden; that you and I went to search for it in one of the caverns with which this country abounds. You will appear a fool, but not a knave.” Stornaway said suspiciously: “Why should you do this?”

“I have a reason,” John replied.

“I don’t understand! What reason could you have?”

The level gaze indifferently scanned his face. “I shall not tell you that. It is nothing you would understand. But you may trust me to do as I have promised.”

Stornaway’s restless eyes shifted. “You want me to take you to the cavern?” he said mechanically, as though he were thinking of something else.

“Yes,” John replied.

There was another pause. Stornaway looked up quickly, and away again. “Not now! I am unwell—I cannot go out into the night air! I won’t do that! I have the sore throat. I caught cold in that place!”

“In the morning,” John said. “We will ride there together.”

“In the morning. . . . How can I know that you are not leading me into a trap?”

“You will lead, not I.”

“Yes, but . . .”

“I give you my word,” John said deliberately, “that if you deal honestly with me I will bring you off safely.”

“I’ll take you there.” Stornaway’s face twitched. He added, with another fleeting look up at John: “Coate must not know, of course. But he does not rise early in the morning. When—when should we go?”

“When you wish.”

“At—yes, at eight, then!”

“Very well. I will meet you in the lane.”

“Yes. Yes, that will be best.” His voice sharpened. “The Runner! What have you told him?”

“Nothing that can harm you.”

“But you knew of the cavern,” Stornaway said, suspicion in his face. “How can I know you have not told him that?”

“You cannot, but I have not.”

Stornaway plucked at the sheet. “I’ll trust you! I have no choice!”

“None,” agreed the Captain calmly.

IT was three o’clock when the Captain reached the tollhouse again. He entered it through the office, and went into the kitchen so quietly that Chirk, who was seated at the table inspecting a collection of small objects laid upon it, was startled, and half leaped from his chair. When he saw who had entered, he sank down again, exclaiming: “Dang you, Soldier! What call have you to go like a cat?”

“I thought you might be asleep.”

“I had a nimwinks a while ago. What’s now?”

The Captain was looking at the oddments on the table. He raised an eyebrow at Chirk. “Tonight’s haul? Didn’t you tell me you were turning to pound dealing?”

“So I will,” asserted Chirk, scooping up a handful of coins, and bestowing them in his pocket. “Just as soon as I get my fambles on this reward you tell me about, that is! In the meantime, Soldier, my windmill’s dwindled into a nutcracker, so I was bound to make a recover, else I’d have starved.”

John could not help laughing. “I wish you will not! I could lend you some blunt.”

“Thank ’ee, Soldier, breaking shins is what I don’t hold with!” said Chirk, whose morality, though eccentric, was rigid.

John smiled, but said nothing. A handsome gold watch lay on the table, and he picked it up. “You were fortunate, weren’t you? A well-breeched swell!”

“Getting winged ain’t my idea of good fortune!” said Chirk tartly. “If he’d had more than one barker, likely I’d be as dead as a herring by now, for he was a good shot: hit me while his prad was trying to bolt with him!”

“Jerry, was there an exchange of shots?” John asked, a little sternly.

“Ay, but I fired over his head, so you’ve no call to look at me like that, Soldier! I ain’t a man o’ violence!”

“You’re a very foolish fellow. Don’t rob any more travellers! If all goes as I believe it will, we shall finish our business tomorrow.”

“I’d as lief we did,” commented Chirk.

“And I! I am going to tell you just what I have arranged to do, and what your part must be. Everything depends on Stornaway, but I think he will do exactly what I want him to do.”

“I daresay you know what you’re about,” said Chirk.

But by the time the Captain had come to the end of a brief account of what had passed between himself and Stornaway, the faintly sceptical expression on the highwayman’s face had changed to one of blank dismay. “And I thought you was a downy one!” he ejaculated. “Lord, Soldier, you’ve got more hair than wit, seemingly!”

“Have I?” said the Captain, smiling.

“If you don’t see that you’ll be queered on that suit, you’re wood-headed!” said Chirk bluntly. “I never clapped my ogles on young Stornaway, but by what Rose has told me—let alone what you’ve just told me—any cove as ’ud trust him an inch beyond the reach of his barker is no better than a bleater! God love you, Soldier, he’ll turn cat in pan on you! A cull as’ll whiddle on his friends, like he done tonight to you, won’t think twice afore he tips you the double! P’raps you’ll tell me why he was so anxious you shouldn’t force him to show you the cavern till it was morning—if them windmills you’ve got in your head don’t stop you thinking?”

The smile lingered in John’s eyes. “Oh, no! Not a bit! He wanted time to take counsel of Coate, of course.”

Chirk’s jaw dropped. “He——And you’re being so very obliging as to let him?”

“It is precisely what I wish him to do. By hedge or by stile, I must get Coate into that cavern. I’ve been in the deuce of a puzzle to know how to do it—till I hit upon this notion. I believe it will answer: if it doesn’t, the lord only knows what’s to be done next!”

“Just what do you think will happen?” enquired Chirk, regarding him with a fascinated eye.

“Well, setting myself in Coate’s place, it’s as plain as a pikestaff I must be disposed of. I’m working with the Redbreast; I know too much. It may be dangerous to kill me, but it would be far more dangerous to let me live to tell Stogumber the gold is hidden in a cavern here. Furthermore, Coate knows I came here unexpectedly, and that I’m a stranger to everyone in Crowford, and he might well think that no one would feel any particular degree of surprise if I were to vanish as suddenly as I appeared. I think, then, that Henry will keep his tryst with me, and will lead me to the cavern.”

“So that Coate can murder you there?”

“So that Coate can murder me there,” nodded the Captain cheerfully. “I do him the justice to believe that he would prefer to have no hand in my murder, but between greed of gold and fear of Coate he will obey his orders—and weep over the harsh necessity later!”

“Yes, I remember as how you said you was going to enjoy yourself!” said Chirk acidly. “Rare fun and gig it’ll be, down in that tomb! Well, I knew when I first saw you that you’d broken loose from Bedlam! You’ll find Coate waiting for you, and a nice, easy shot it’ll be for him, with you carrying a lantern so as he’ll know just where to aim his pop!”

The Captain grinned. “If Coate is already in the cavern I shall know it, for he cannot fasten the fence from within. But I think he won’t be: he leaves little to chance, and even if he took the fence down, and concealed it in the undergrowth, anyone must see that a fence or a gate has stood there. He won’t wish to make me even a little suspicious. If I am wrong, and find the cavern open, be sure I’ll be content to enter with only Stornaway’s lantern to light me—and will stay beyond its beam!”

“The only thing as I’m sure of is that you’ll be put to bed with a shovel!”

“Oh, not if you play your part, and Stogumber his, I hope!”

“What are you wishful I should do?” asked Chirk uneasily. “I’ll tell you to your head, Soldier, I ain’t a-going to help you to make a pea-goose of yourself! I daresay you think it ’ud be a capital go if you was to get your noddle blown off in that cavern, but precious queer stirrups I’d find myself in, if that was to happen!”