Du Maurier, Daphne (10 page)

Mary frowned at him and turned away, but he made answer with another shower of pebbles, this time cracking the glass in earnest, so that a small piece of the pane splintered onto the floor, with a stone beside it.

Mary unbolted the heavy entrance door and went out into the porch.

“What do you want now?” she asked him, conscious suddenly of her loose hair and rumpled dirty apron.

He still looked down at her with curiosity, but the insolence had gone, and he had the grace to appear the smallest bit ashamed of himself.

“Forgive me if I was rude to you just now,” he said. “Somehow I didn’t expect to see a woman at Jamaica Inn—not a young girl like you, anyway. I thought Joss had found you in one of the towns and had brought you back here for his fancy lady.”

Mary flushed again and bit her lip in annoyance. “There’s nothing very fanciful about me,” she said scornfully. “I’d look well in a town, wouldn’t I, in my old apron and heavy shoes? I should have thought anyone with eyes in his head could see I was farm bred.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said carelessly. “Put you in a fine gown and a pair of high-heeled shoes, and stick a comb in your hair, I daresay you’d pass for a lady even in a big place like Exeter.”

“I’m meant to be flattered by that, I suppose,” said Mary, “but, thanking you very much, I’d rather wear my old clothes and look like myself.”

“You could do a lot worse than that, of course,” he agreed; and, looking up, she saw that he was laughing at her. She turned to go back into the house.

“Come, don’t go away,” he said. “I know I deserve black looks for speaking to you as I did, but if you knew my brother as well as I do you’d understand me making the mistake. It looks strange, having a maid at Jamaica Inn. Why did you come here in the first place?”

Mary considered him from the shadow of the porch. He looked serious now, and his likeness to Joss had fled for the moment. She wished he were not a Merlyn.

“I came here to be with my Aunt Patience,” she said. “My mother died some weeks ago, and I have no other relative, I’ll tell you one thing, Mr. Merlyn—I’m thankful my mother isn’t alive to see her sister now.”

“I don’t suppose marriage with Joss is a bed of roses,” said his brother. “He always had the temper of the devil himself, and he drinks like a fish. What did she marry him for? He’s been the same as long as I can remember. He used to thrash me when I was a lad, and he’d do the same today if he dared.”

“I suppose she was misled by his bright eyes,” said Mary scornfully. “Aunt Patience was always the butterfly down in Helford, Mother used to say. She wouldn’t have the farmer who asked her, but took herself off upcountry, where she met your brother. That was the worst day in her life, anyway.’

“You’ve not much opinion of the landlord, then,” he said mocking her.

“No, I have not,” she replied. “He’s a bully and a brute and many worse things besides. He’s turned my aunt from a laughing, happy woman into a miserable drudge, and I’ll never forgive him for that as long as I live.”

Jem whistled tunelessly and patted his horse’s neck. “We Merlyns have never been good to our women,” he said. “I can remember my father beating my mother till she couldn’t stand. She never left him, though, but stood by him all his life. When he was hanged at Exeter, she didn’t speak to a soul for three months. Her hair went white with the shock. I can’t remember my grandmother, but they say she fought side by side with Granddad once near Callington, when the soldiers came to take him, and she bit a fellow’s finger right through to the bone. What she had to love in Granddad I can’t say, for he never as much as asked for her after he’d been taken, and he left all his savings with another woman the other side of Tamar.”

Mary was silent. The indifference in his voice appalled her. He spoke entirely without shame or regret, and she supposed that he had been born, like the rest of his family, lacking the quality of tenderness.

“How long do you mean to stay at Jamaica?” he asked abruptly. “It’s waste for a maid like you, isn’t it? There’s not much company for you here.”

“I can’t help that,” said Mary. “I’m not going away unless I take my aunt with me. I’d never leave her here alone, not after what I’ve seen.”

Jem bent down to brush a piece of dirt from bis pony’s shoe. “What have you learnt in your short time?” he questioned. “It’s quiet enough here, in all conscience.”

Mary was not easily led. For all she knew, her uncle had prompted his brother to speak to her, hoping in this way to obtain information. No, she was not quite such a fool as that. She shrugged her shoulders, dismissing the subject.

“I helped my uncle in the bar one Saturday night,” she said, “and I did not think much of the company he kept.”

“I don’t suppose you did,” said Jem. “The fellows who come to Jamaica have never been taught manners. They spend too much time in the county jail. I wonder what they thought of you? Made the same mistake as I did, I suppose, and are now spreading your fame far and wide about the countryside. You’ll have Joss throwing dice for you next time, I daresay, and when he loses you’ll find yourself riding pillion behind a dirty poacher from the other side of Rough Tor.”

“There’s not much likelihood of that,” said Mary. “They’d have to knock me senseless before I rode pillion with anyone.”

“Senseless or conscious, women are pretty much the same when you come down to it,” said Jem. “The poachers on Bodmin Moor would never know the difference, anyway.” And he laughed again and looked exactly like his brother.

“What do you do for a livelihood?” asked Mary, in sudden curiosity, for during their conversation she became aware that he spoke better than his brother.

“I’m a horse thief,” he said pleasantly, “but there’s not much money in it. My pockets are always empty. You ought to ride here. I’ve got a little pony that would suit you handsomely. He’s over at Trewartha now. Why don’t you come back with me and look at him?”

“Aren’t you afraid of being caught?” said Mary.

“Thieving is an awkward thing to prove,” he told her. “Supposing a pony strays from his pen, and his owner goes to look for him. Well, you’ve seen for yourself, these moors are alive with wild horses and cattle. It’s not going to be so easy for that owner to find his pony. Say the pony had a long mane, and one white foot, and a diamond mark in his ear—that narrows the field down a bit, doesn’t it? And off goes the owner to Launceston fair with his eyes wide open. But he doesn’t find his pony. Mark you, the pony is there, right enough, and he’s bought by some dealer and sold away upcountry. Only his mane is clipped, his four feet are all the same colour, and the mark in his ear is a slit, not a diamond. The owner didn’t even look at him twice. That’s simple enough, isn’t it?”

“So simple that I can’t understand why you don’t ride past Jamaica in your own coach, with a powdered footman on the step,” said Mary swiftly.

“Ah, well, there you are,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve never had the brain for figures. You’d be surprised to learn how quickly money slips through my fingers. Do you know, I had ten pounds in my pocket last week. I’ve only a shilling piece today. That’s why I want you to buy that little pony.”

Mary laughed, in spite of herself. He was so frank in his dishonesty that she had not the heart to be angry with him.

“I can’t spend my small savings on horses,” she said. “I’m laying aside for my old age, and if I ever get away from Jamaica I shall need every penny, you may depend on that.”

Jem Merlyn looked at her gravely, and then, on a sudden impulse, he bent towards her, first glancing over her head into the porch beyond.

“Look here,” he said, “I’m serious now; you can forget all the nonsense I’ve told you. Jamaica Inn is no place for a maid—nor for any woman, if it comes to that. My brother and I have never been friends, and I can say what I like about him. We go our own ways and be damned to one another. But there’s no reason why you should be caught up in his dirty schemes. Why don’t you run away? I’d see you on the road to Bodmin all right.”

His tones were persuasive, and Mary could almost have trusted him. But she could not forget he was Joss Merlyn’s brother, and as such might betray her. She dared not make a confidant of him—not yet, anyway. Time would show whose side he was on.

“I don’t need any help,” she said; “I can look after myself.”

Jem threw his leg over the pony’s back and stuck his feet into the leathers.

“All right,” he said, “I won’t worry you. My cottage is across the Withy Brook, if you ever want me. The other side of Trewartha Marsh, at the foot of Twelve Men’s Moor. I shall be there until the spring, anyway. Good day to you.” And he was off and away down the road before she had time to say a word in return.

Mary went slowly back into the house. She would have trusted him had his name been other than Merlyn. She was in urgent need of a friend; but she could not make a friend of the landlord’s brother. He was no more than a common horse thief, a dishonest scoundrel, when all was said and done. He was little better than Harry the pedlar and the rest of them. Because he had a disarming smile and his voice was not unpleasing, she had been ready to believe in him, and he all the time perhaps laughing at her the other side of his face. There was bad blood in him; he broke the law every day of his life, and whatever way she looked at it there was no escaping from that one unredeemable fact—he was Joss Merlyn’s brother. He had said there was no bond between them, but even that might be a lie to enlist her sympathy, while the whole of their conversation perhaps had been prompted by the landlord in the bar.

No, whatever happened, she must stand alone in this business and trust no one. The very walls of Jamaica Inn smelt of guilt and deceit, and to speak aloud in earshot of the building courted disaster.

It was dark in the house, and quiet once more. The landlord had returned to the peat stack at the bottom of the garden, and Aunt Patience was in her kitchen. The surprise of the visit had been a little excitement and a breaking up of the long, monotonous day. Jem Merlyn had brought something of the outer world with him, a world that was not entirely bounded by the moors and frowned upon by tors of granite; and now that he had departed the early brightness of the day went with him. The sky became overcast, and the inevitable rain came sweeping from the west, topping the hills in mist. The black heather bowed before the wind. The ill temper that had fastened upon Mary at the beginning of the morning had passed away, and in its place had stolen a numb indifference born of fatigue and despair. Interminably the days and weeks stretched themselves before her, with no other sight but the long white road to tempt her, the stone walls, and the everlasting hills.

She thought of Jem Merlyn riding away with a song on his lips, kicking his heels into his pony’s side, and he would ride hatless, careless of the wind and the rain, choosing his own road.

She thought of the lane that led to Helford village, how it twisted and turned and wound suddenly to the water’s edge, while the ducks paddled in the mud before the turn of the tide, and a man called to his cows from the field above. All those things were progressive, and part of life, and they went their way without a thought of her, but she was bound here by a promise that she must not break, and the very patter of Aunt Patience’s feet as she passed to and fro in the kitchen was a reminder and a warning.

Mary watched the little stinging rain blur the glass of the parlour window, and as she sat there, alone, with her chin in her hand, the tears ran down her cheeks in company with the rain. She let them fall, too indifferent to wipe them away, while the draught from the door she had forgotten to close ruffled a long torn strip of paper on the wall. There had once been a rose pattern, but it was now faded and grey, and the walls themselves were stained deep brown where the damp had turned them. Mary turned away from the window; and the cold, dead atmosphere of Jamaica Inn closed in upon her.

That night the waggons came again. Mary woke to the sound of the hall clock striking two, and almost at once she was aware of footsteps beneath the porch, and she heard a voice speak soft and low. She crept out of bed and went over to the window. Yes, there they were; only two carts this time, with one horse in harness, and less than half a dozen men standing in the yard.

The waggons looked ghostly in the dim light, like hearses, and the men themselves were phantom figures, having no place in the world of day by day, but moving silently about the yard like some weird pattern in a nightmare fantasy. There was something horrible about them, something sinister in the shrouded waggons themselves, coming as they did in stealth by night. This night the impression they left upon Mary was even more lasting and profound; for now she understood the significance of their trade.

They were desperate men who worked this road and carried convoys to Jamaica Inn, and last time they brought their waggons to the yard one of their number had been murdered. Perhaps tonight yet another crime would be committed, and the twisted length of rope dangle once again from the beam below.

The scene in the yard held a fatal fascination and Mary could not leave the window. This time the waggons had arrived empty and were loaded with the remainder of the cargo deposited at the inn the time before. Mary guessed that this was their method of working. The inn served as a store for a few weeks at a time, and then, when opportunity occurred, the waggons set forth once more, and the cargo was carried to the Tamar bank and so distributed. The organisation must be a big one to cover the ground in the time, and there would be agents scattered far and wide who kept the necessary watch on events. Perhaps there were hundreds implicated in the trade, from Penzance and St. Ives in the south to Launceston on the border of Devon. There had been little talk of smuggling in Helford, and when there had been, it was with a wink and a smile of indulgence, as though a pipe of baccy and a bottle of brandy from a ship in Falmouth port were an occasional harmless luxury and not a burden on any person’s conscience.

This was different, though. This was a grim business, a stern and bloody business, and precious little smiling or winking went with it, from all that Mary had seen. If his conscience pricked a man, he received a rope round his neck in payment. There must be no weak link in the chain that stretched from the coast up to the border, and there was the explanation of the rope on the beam. The stranger had demurred, and the stranger had died. It was with a sudden sting of disappointment that Mary wondered whether the visit of Jem Merlyn to the Jamaica Inn this morning had significance. A strange coincidence that the waggons should follow in his train. He had come from Launceston, he said, and Launceston stood on the Tamar bank. Mary was angry with him and with herself. In spite of everything, her last thought before sleeping had been the possibility of his friendship. She would be a fool if she had hopes of it now. The two events ran together in an unmistakable fashion, and it was easy enough to read the purpose of it.