Love and Money (3 page)

The truth was that during the first weeks after the mill-dam murder, when the pursuit of the law was very hot after him, Lockwood had hidden himself with the tenant of Cannel Hall, a small place some ten miles over hill and dale from his own home, and while there had come to love his host's young daughter.

It was not love at first, perhaps; just the pleasantly sensual feeling one gets when stroking and playfully teasing a pretty kitten. The soft fur, the half-frightened, half-delighted eyes, the quick graceful movements, the harmless bites from pretty teeth, presently the loving purr, the gentle caress, the adoring look—these were the kind of pleasures Lockwood enjoyed at first from Aline, who was very fair, small and gentle, with large grey eyes. Lockwood had to keep close while the search for him was keen, so he perforce spent long hours about the house with nothing to do save polish the handle of his dagger. This lack of occupation did not suit his impatient nature and he was unhappy; besides, he had lived for a long time with one burning ambition, to wipe out the family of Elland, and now that was accomplished, there seemed nothing left to do; his life was ashes. He felt a keen regret for Quarmby—he had not realised before how much that gay debonair lad had meant to him—and he missed, though less acutely, the sturdy cheerfulness of Beaumont. His host, a social inferior and an irresolute, uneasy man who had owed Lockwood's father money, was nervous about keeping him at Cannel, and his hostess, an obstinate pug-faced woman, was always nagging her husband to send him away. (We are never told this man's name; let us call him Cannel after his hall.) Only that Cannel was even more afraid of Lock-wood's haughty temper and ready dagger than of his wife's tongue, he would have turned his embarrassing guest out gladly, and he often let drop hints about the doings of the Sheriff's men and the dangers of the neighbourhood, which
Lockwood did not take, answering them only with a full ironic gaze straight into the man's watery eyes. So Lockwood felt friendless, weary, dull; if a kitten offered itself, why not play with it to while away the time?

So it was at first; but when he held her trembling young body in his arms, when he coaxed her to murmur words of love which he had first to teach her, when he gazed into her wonderfully starry eyes, his feeling changed. He spoke to her of the deep troubles of his soul—of his father's death and Quarmby's, of his present lassitude—at first tentatively, then with a full gush of expression, for she seemed to understand. Her beautiful eyes reflected something of his own anguish; she wound her charming young arms about his neck and gently stroked his crisp dark hair. He had never confided in anyone like this before; the release, the relief, were quite astonishing. Also, though he had had women before, he had never enjoyed possessing any as he enjoyed his sweet and loving Aline. All the tenderness, the chivalry, of his strong manly nature was called into play by her youth and innocence. He resented on her behalf the rough speech and careless manners of Cannel Hall, the perpetual loud scoldings of her mother; he wished to take her away and place her in surroundings more suitable to her delicate beauty. But as he was a hunted murderer that was at present impossible. All they could do was to seek a few moments of solitude together. They formed the habit of slipping away separately from the house and meeting at a hollow oak tree in the park of a larger hall nearby.

What Aline's feelings were in all this we shall perhaps presently discover.

The first written account of the Elland Feud which is still in existence dates from the sixteenth century, a couple of hundred years later than the events, and there is a certain Shakespearean ring in these meetings by a hollow oak, and their discovery by the park-keeper. Whether there were parks and keepers of parks in 1351 I really do not know, but somebody, whether a park-keeper or a forest-keeper or what not, saw from a distance Lockwood and Aline meet once or
twice, contrived to approach near enough to recognise them, and spread the news around. So presently with a very sour face Cannel told Lockwood that he had been seen in the park with his daughter, that his present abode and habit of meeting her at the oak were widely known and had reached the Sheriff's ears, and that if he valued his life he had better remove himself forthwith from the neighbourhood and stay away. There was nothing for it but to go at once, and Lock-wood left the hall, catching only a glimpse of a pale little face round the edge of a door, as he did so.

He hid himself elsewhere, no doubt with one or other of the men later indicted for harbouring him. But after a week or two he could no longer endure to be without a sight of Aline. By back lanes, woods, unfrequented moors, he made his way towards Cannel, and so met his two young lady cousins at the bridge.

It is a failing in haughty natures which know themselves to have some nobility, to despise people of commoner views and yet not calculate where those commoner views will lead their owners. Lockwood despised his former host at Cannel most heartily, but it never occurred to him that Cannel might betray him. In point of fact Cannel seems to have put up more resistance in the matter than might have been expected.

He held Cannel, house and land, as a tenant from a man named Bosville, and at this juncture Bosville was Deputy Sheriff of Yorkshire. When Bosville heard the gossip about Lockwood and Aline, he had sent for Cannel and told him roundly that if Cannel harboured Lockwood without informing him, he would put him out of his tenancy; on the other hand, if Cannel would send word when Lockwood next visited the neighbourhood, Bosville would make him a handsome present. Cannel, most uncomfortably conscious that Lockwood was at that moment sitting eating his dinner in Cannel Hall, swore a great many oaths that he would do his best endeavours in the matter. He might, of course, have betrayed the young man at once and taken the present, but in spite of all his wife said he could not make up his mind to
do so. Old Lockwood had been good to him about the money, which was still unpaid—his murder had been shocking—when all was said and done Wilkin was a fine handsome lad—Aline liked him. The Ellands' overlord was on top at present, it was true, but these matters were always uncertain, the Beaumonts' lord might rise in the King's favour soon and then Lockwood would be pardoned and powerful again. Besides—and this was the crux of the matter—young sprigs such as Lockwood, kinsmen to knights, were dangerous; they would out with their daggers if a puff of wind ventured to cross them. Cannel had no desire for bloodshed, especially his own. He therefore held his tongue about Lockwood's whereabouts, then went quickly home and cleared him out of the house in a hurry, as has been related.

He was therefore simply horrified when, only a fortnight or so later, as he was out on his land arguing with Bosville's steward about a matter of strayed sheep, he saw Lockwood, his bow on his back, slipping down the hill through the trees towards Cannel Hall. For a moment he did not know what to do, but stood still, perplexed and gaping. Fortunately— from his point of view—he said nothing, for Bosville's steward turned quickly and gave him a keen suspicious look and asked him outright if that was not the murderer Lock-wood.

“It is he of a certainty,” admitted Cannel unhappily, trying to put a show of eagerness into face and voice. “Now we must consider how to give the Deputy Sheriff due knowledge thereof.”

“We will go together,” said the steward grimly.

They went off at once, and as it chanced met the Deputy Sheriff and his men no great distance away—the lady cousins had talked about the meeting by the bridge, and it had reached the ears of enemies who were haunting the neighbourhood in the hope of trapping the felon.

Meanwhile Lockwood had reached the hall. Cannel's wife was busy with some roasting of fowls for the steward's entertainment. Lockwood slipped in unnoticed through the bustle, and there in a corner he found Aline, whose pale sad
face took on a look of mingled fear and ecstasy when she saw him. She put her finger on her lip to command silence and drew him into a more private place, and there the lovers fell into each other's arms, clasping each other as if they could never be near enough however close, and kissing and embracing with all the passion which had mounted in their hearts during their absence from each other's company. Aline's eyes, in which Lockwood saw himself mirrored as she lay in his arms, had that strange look of anguish which sometimes wrung his heart and even a little perplexed him with its reflection of his own misery, but she clung to him as though she would never let go, and rained kisses upon his face and neck.

Then suddenly Lockwood started and raised his head. He listened, and then sprang up and looked out. Bosville's men were gathering about the house.

We do not know what Cannel Hall was like in those far-off days, nor whether this room in which Lockwood was trapped was an upper chamber, a solar with a window perhaps at each end giving a view of the back and front approaches to the house, or whether it was some kind of barn at the other end of the hall. If the place was the solar, the drawing-room of the day, perhaps a piece of tapestry which Aline was embroidering lay there, with all the tools necessary for the work; if it was a barn, tools hung on the wall. Whichever it was, if it had a door we can imagine Lockwood hastily barricading it with bench or table; that it had windows—though not of course glassed—large enough to shoot an arrow through, we can be sure. Bosville himself, a round, red-faced man with an appearance of bonhomie belied by his greedy little eyes, had now joined his men; he called out for Lockwood, who answered boldly:

“I am here.”

“We are Sheriff's men. Yield yourself in the King's name,” shouted Bosville.

“Never while I have life,” cried Lockwood firmly.

He bent his bow and began to shoot with his usual cool accuracy and strength. Several men were hit, and the whole
band fell into some disorder, and seemed disposed to retire. In vain did Bosville remind them that Lockwood would come to an end of his arrows presently; it was not a comforting thought that another half-dozen of them would have to fall before this happened.

“Bring me a brand from the fire—we'll burn the house over his head,” shouted Bosville.

Lockwood laughed defiantly, and fitting another arrow to his bow, sighted along it to take aim at Bosville.

At this moment Aline cut his bowstring with a knife.

It is this extraordinary action which stops us short, amazed. How could she possibly bring herself to do it? Just out of the man's arms—a man who had been her accepted lover, for whom she had risked all to become his mistress! After all, their meetings at the hollow oak were voluntary; no woman need keep a rendezvous with a lover, from her father's house, unless of her own free will. Was it simply that she was afraid for her life? But surely she was in less danger from fire than from Lockwood? The old story tells how she turned and ran from him, but any man can catch almost any woman, especially one clad in a long robe and kirtle, and the betrayed man's hands about her throat would have ended her life quickly and with pain. Did she care nothing for Lockwood? Then why the hollow oak? Was it an early case of a mother with a hoard of maxims preaching down her daughter's heart? Then why had she stayed with Lockwood now; why not call her mother when she first saw him? Was she afraid for her father? One would imagine that such a man as he kept well out of the flight of the arrows. Did she want to earn Bosville's favour?

Turn it how you will, the deed is very strange. Even suppose Aline to be not as I have imagined her but a coarse selfish strumpet, even so it is difficult to reconcile her previous trysts with her present betrayal. If she was the kind of woman who would commit an act of treachery for the sake of personal or family gain, why did she ever grant her
favours to Lockwood, a hunted felon with nothing to offer her save danger? If on the other hand she had ever loved him, or even had a light fancy for him, what could have caused in her a revulsion of feeling so strong, so sudden, and so cruel?

Only one thing, I think. What follows is all mere hypothesis, mere imagination, of course, but I explain the affair to myself in this way. The key to the puzzle is the death of Quarmby. That winning and light-hearted lad had courted the pretty Aline, and she, young and innocent and flattered, had taken his compliments and protestations more seriously than they deserved. They had strolled in the greenwood together, Quarmby had stolen a kiss or two, Aline had plighted her troth to him and meant it with all her heart. Then he had been dragged into the Elland murders by that horrible Lockwood, and finally he lay beneath an oak tree in the Ainleys wood, wounded and suffering, and Lockwood and Beaumont ran away and left him, and the Elland men found him and put him most cruelly to death. Lockwood ran away and left him! So Aline hated Lockwood with all her childish heart.

Then Lockwood came to hide in Cannel Hall. He was not in the least what Aline expected, not a fierce rough overbearing ogre at all. He was kind and polite; his speech was far superior to her father's, his manners were excellent. He was also handsome, sombre and strong. Her heart gave a strange leap the very first time she saw him, and as the days went by his lean strong hands, his crisp dark hair, the very eyelashes which lay so thick and black on his tanned cheek, made her feel weak every time she saw them. In a word, she loved him; not with the innocent unfledged liking she had felt for debonair Hugh Quarmby, but with a woman's passion; she would do anything for Lockwood, suffer anything, follow him anywhere through any pain or toil.

But all the time her vows to Quarmby nagged her. She had vowed, she had sworn, she had taken an oath, to be true to Quarmby, and now here she was, yielding her body to his murderer! For Lockwood, in her mind, was guilty of 28
Quarmby's death; Lockwood had betrayed Quarmby, deserted him, abandoned him, run away safe himself and left poor Hugh to his enemies' knives. In Lockwood's arms, in the very moment of passion, this fearful thought of her broken vows came and tormented her almost beyond bearing —she was not, perhaps, very strong in mind, poor Aline.