The Toll-Gate (21 page)
That drew a reluctant laugh from John; he allowed Stogumber to go on his way, and himself went to open the gate.
The vehicle, which proved to be a gig, carried Farmer Huggate and his wife. If this worthy couple thought it peculiar to find the gatekeeper nattily attired in a riding-coat of expensive cloth and fashionable cut, and with a modish cravat arranged in intricate folds about his neck, they admirably concealed their surprise. The farmer had only to hand in his ticket, purchased at the first toll-gate out of Sheffield, but he lingered to explain chattily that he and his rib (as he designated the stout lady beside him) had been out on the spree to celebrate the anniversary of their wedding-day. John replied suitably; and Mrs. Huggate ventured to say that she hoped it would not be long before he was celebrating his own wedding-day. John was spared the necessity of answering this sally by the farmer's telling her severely not to talk so free, bidding him a cheery goodnight, and driving off down the road.
The Captain, walking across the field to where his horse stood patiently awaiting him, outside the barn, was forced to the conclusion that the secret of his matrimonial hopes was shared by most of the inhabitants of the village, and certainly by the entire staff of servants employed at the Manor.
He entered the toll-house presently to find Lydd snoring gently beside the dying fire in the kitchen. He shook him awake, saying: "Well, you're a fine gatekeeper! I wonder how many people have opened the pike for themselves, and cheated us of the tolls?"
"Lor' bless you, sir, I'd rouse up at the least thing!" Lydd assured him.
"What do you call the least thing? A regiment with a full military band? Tell me, Joseph! Can you watch that pair up at the Manor without their knowing it? Young Stornaway, and Coate?"
Lydd looked at him, stroking his chin. "I can—and I can't, gov'nor. It all depends. It might be that I'd have to go off somewheres with Miss Nell, you see. And, if you was to ask me, I should say as there's three of 'em as needs watching. Holt—he's Mr. Henry's man—ain't no better than a clunch—and oyster-faced at that!—but Roger Gunn, which calls himself Coate's groom, is a regular ding-boy, or I never see one! Whatever it is them pair o' shog-bags is up to, he's in it, to the chin!"
"Do what you can!" John said. "Keep your eye on Mr. Henry, and don't fail to let me know if he does anything you think smoky! Particularly watch where he goes, and tell me!"
But it was not, in the event, Joseph who saw where Henry Stornaway went, but the Captain himself, and that by the merest accident. With no other thought in mind than to exercise his horse, and to do it at an hour when it was not only unlikely that any vehicle would wish to pass the gate, but when few people would be abroad to see the gatekeeper bestriding a horse of his quality, he got up shortly after dawn on the following morning, and walked through the dank mist to Farmer Huggate's barn. Not wishing either to ride through Crowford, or to branch off short of the village up the very uneven lane which had led him down from the moors on Saturday night, he set off in an easterly direction, following the line Nell had taken on the previous morning. An easy jump over the hedge brought him into the spinney, and through this he was obliged to wend his way circumspectly, until he came to a ride, which led, after a short distance, to a rotting gate. He remembered seeing this when he rode to Kellands, and knew that he had reached the pike road. It was not precisely what he wanted, but if nothing better offered there was at least the broad grass verge along which Beau could stretch his legs in a canter. The mist was lifting momently, and the gate could be seen quite clearly, so that he had no hesitation in putting Beau at it. The big horse, pulling a little, seemed almost to take it in his stride, and, landing neatly on the verge, gave the Captain to understand that after so many idle hours he would like to be allowed to have his head. But the Captain had no intention of galloping down an unknown road while the mist made it impossible for him to see what lay more than fifty yards ahead, and he held him in to an easy canter. He recalled that he had noticed, the night before, that a narrow lane led from the road to the north; it seemed probable that it ran upward to the moors; and he determined to ride along it, in the hope of coming within a few miles to open country, where Beau could have a chance to gallop the fidgets out of himself.
The lane was halfway between the toll-gate and Kellands Manor, and was soon reached. John turned Beau into it, and found it to be no more than a deeply rutted cart-track, separated on either side by a ditch and a bank from fields under cultivation. Between the ruts the ground was grassgrown, and sufficiently level to make it possible for John to let Beau break into a canter again. The big horse had a formidable stride, and he was impatient, trying to lengthen it more and still more. The pace, John knew, was not really very safe on an unknown track, which might, for anything he knew, contain bad pot-holes; it was too swift for him to be able to detect possible dangers ahead, in the chill white mist; and too swift for a solitary pedestrian, making his way towards the pike road, to do more than jump off the track almost into the ditch as he saw Beau looming ahead of him. He had plenty of time to do this, however, and John, perceiving him some thirty yards away, had the impression that if there had been a hedge he would have dived into it for cover. There was something in his aspect which was panic-stricken rather than merely startled; he looked round, as though seeking shelter, and, finding none, seemed almost to cower on the brink of the ditch.
John had no time to wonder what there was to alarm anyone in the appearance of a horse and rider, however unexpectedly encountered, before he was abreast of the man. He had made Beau check his pace a little, and he turned his head, intending to shout an apology for having discommoded this early pedestrian, whom he supposed to be a farm labourer. Then he realised that the man was wearing a coat with a superfluity of shoulder-capes; had a glimpse of pale, blood-shot eyes glaring up at him out of a white face; and rode on, without uttering a word. The head had been ducked almost immediately, but he had recognised Henry Stornaway.
It was only for a moment that he saw him plainly, but the Captain was not slow-witted, and his powers of observation were acute. He noticed two things about Mr. Stornaway: the first, that in his face had been an expression of starting horror; the second, that he carried an unlit lantern. For the look of horror, no explanation presented itself: something more dreadful than dismay at having been seen had inspired it; the lantern seemed to indicate that he had set forth from the Manor in darkness. Yet even though the night had been overcast, it had not, John thought, been so dark as to have made a lantern necessary for a traveller on foot.
He rode on, keeping a sharp look-out for any house which might have been Stornaway's objective. He saw nothing but two small cottages, and a cluster of farm buildings; beyond them, the country became more wooded, and the lane began to ascend sharply towards the tangled hills which loomed dimly through the mist. These were typical of the district: wild shapes tossed up in confusion, with crags of outcropping limestone, and deep gorges cut in their precipitous sides. The track wound steadily upwards through a pass; one or two sheep, straying across it, scurried away at the approach of a rider; but of human habitation there was no sign. The sharp, sweet tang of the moors came to John's nostrils; the road became level again, dipped slightly, rose again, so that he knew he must have reached the summit, and was now wending his way across the undulations of the moor to whatever town or village the track served.
It began after a mile or two to descend again, and presently ran through a small village, huddled on the northern slope of the hill. John halted there, for the place was awake, and housewives were already shaking mats out of doors, and one or two men were to be seen on the single street, plodding off to work. Enquiries elicited the information that the road went to some town, of which John had never heard, seven miles to the north-west, serving on its way only one house of any size, which appeared, from the somewhat unintelligible description vouchsafed, to be situated only a couple of miles short of the town. It seemed extremely improbable that Henry Stornaway could have walked as far; and John, feeling that it was useless to go on, turned Beau, and rode back the way he had come.
By the time he reached the foot of the pass the mist had cleared appreciably, and he was able to see that besides the farmstead and the two cottages there were no houses within sight. The farm lay some two hundred yards back from the lane, and just as John was wondering whether it would serve any useful purpose if he were to ride up to it, on some pretext or another, he saw an immensely stout man in the garb of a farmer, leaning on an ash-plant, and surveying with a ruminative eye a small mixed herd of cows. He turned his head when he heard the sound of hooves. John pulled up, and, after a minute, the farmer began to walk ponderously towards the gate. As he drew nearer he was seen to have a large, ruddy, and cheerful countenance; and when he came within earshot he called out, in a deep, wheezy voice: "'Morning, sir! Anything I can do for you?"
He did not look to be at all the sort of man to be engaged on any nefarious enterprise, and within a very few moments John was satisfied that his farm had not been Henry Stornaway's objective. He was of a chatty and an expansive disposition, only too pleased to enter into conversation with strangers, of whom he saw very few. He was one of the Squire's tenants, and shook his head sadly over Sir Peter's illness, saying that things would be very different when he died. It was an easy matter to get him to expatiate on this theme; and it soon became apparent that although he had a great regard for Miss Nell, he didn't (as he put it) reckon much to Mr. Henry, whom he scarcely knew, and who didn't (if the half of what he heard tell were true) take any interest in the estate. Yes, he had been told that Mr. Henry was staying at Kellands, and a fine London friend with him, but you wouldn't catch Mr. Henry coming in to pass the time of day with his grandpa's tenants, not he! No, he had never seen the London friend, and he didn't know as he much wanted to, for he had seen another Londoner that week, and a regular leather-head he was! He was wishful to buy a property in the district, but from the silly questions he asked it was easy to see as he was a chap as would be nailed, sure as check! What was he like? He was a muffin-faced chap, a little on the squat, and precious wide in the boughs.
The Captain, recognising, from this pungent description, Mr. Gabriel Stogumber, rode on his way, a frown knitting his brow. He failed to perceive what object Stogumber could have had in questioning the farmer; and he was still puzzling over this problem when he reached the toll-house. He had been away from it for longer than he had intended, and he found Ben in a mood of considerable disquiet, flatteringly overjoyed to behold him again.
No one visited him from the Manor that day. He spent the morning in the expectation of seeing Nell; but she did not come; and by the time it became apparent that something had prevented her, Mrs. Skeffling had gone home, and there was no one in whose charge John could leave the gate, Ben having been engaged by Farmer Huggate for the whole day, to assist in taking livestock to market. Gatekeeping had never been more irksome, for there were certain questions John wished to ask either of Nell, or of Joseph, who, he supposed, must be even more familiar with the district. Thinking over his strange encounter with Henry Stornaway, and cudgelling his brains to hit upon some solution to account for his presence upon a lonely lane at such an unseasonable hour of the morning, there had flashed across his memory an echo of something Nell had talked of during their drive to Tideswell. If her idle words did indeed hold the key to the mystery, he was still far from understanding it, but it might well be within his power to discover it. Then he remembered the look of sick horror in Stornaway's face, and he thought it might be wiser to address his questions to Joseph rather than to Nell. But Joseph did not come, and a certain anxiety was added to the Captain's impatience. When Ben returned from Tideswell, pleasantly weary, and full of all that he had seen and done in the town, John made an attempt to convince him that he had no longer anything to fear in being left for an hour to mind the pike after dark. But Ben, who, while he knew his large protector to be at hand, seemed almost to have forgotten his alarms, no sooner realised that he was in danger of being left alone than he became slightly tearful, and with the utmost urgency begged John not to leave him. It was useless to point out to him that his father's visitor must by this time know that he would no longer find Brean at the toll-house; he merely said, in considerable agitation, that if John went out he himself would run away, and spend the night with Beau in Farmer Huggate's big barn. It was plainly useless to argue with him, and the Captain, suppressing exasperation, promised not to leave the toll-house, and commanded him to stop whining. As it happened he was forced to realise that he could scarcely have done so, had Ben been never so willing.
After the unaccustomed excitement of the day, the boy was so sleepy that he dropped off before he had finished his supper, and could not be roused. When picked up, and carried off to his truckle-bed, he did no more than stir, and murmur something unintelligible: it seemed unlikely that anything less than a coach-horn blown in his ear would waken him.
Scarcely an hour later, John had reason to be glad that he had not, after all, gone to Kellands, for he heard the owl's hoot, twice repeated, which had previously heralded Jeremy Chirk's arrival at the toll-house. He walked over to the back door, and opened it. Chirk's voice, lowered, but sufficiently penetrating, reached him. "Lend a hand here, Soldier!"