CHAPTER XXXVI
WHICH CONTAINS FURTHER MENTION OF A CERTAIN SNUFF-BOX
“To-day, Bob, is Thursday, I think?”
“It is, sir.”
“And your researches teach us that, upon every Thursday, Sturton rides over to Seaford, generally in the evening?”
“Aye, your honour, to a small tavern called ‘The Anchor.’”
“And there meets a red-headed, seafaring man to whom he pays money.”
“Pre-cisely, sir.”
“The sailor-man’s name being Skag—Jonas Skag.”
“The same, your honour.”
“Why, then, Bob, see the horses saddled; we will go a-riding.”
“To Seaford, sir?”
“To Seaford, Bob.”
Thus they were presently ambling down Alfriston’s ancient street, between neat and homely cottages from whose doors heads nodded in cheery greeting, past flowery gardens, by fragrant rickyard, where they had brief vision of Mr. Muddle virtuously busied with a pitchfork despite his limp, and so to the winding, tree-shaded road that led uphill and down towards the purple slopes of Windover.
“Sturton hath kept ye fairly busy o’ late, Bob.”
“His movements, sir, has been constant.”
“Indeed, Bob, since we gave up the harassing tactics for a more subtle method, your days ha’ been fully occupied. Yet I trust you ha’ found time to keep a friendly eye upon our Ancient Dumbrell?”
“I have, sir.”
“Good! And how is——”
“She is very well, your honour, and ... as young as ever!”
“Hum!” quoth Sir John, and they rode awhile in silence. Corporal Robert made to drop behind, but his master stayed him with a gesture.
“Regarding Mrs. Rose, Bob, she often visits the Dumbrells, I think?”
“When not wi’ Dame Haryott, sir, or slave-driving Willum Thompson.... A on-common dirty soldier he’d ha’ made, sir!”
“You see her—Mrs. Rose—frequently, then?”
“I do, sir.”
“And do you still think her ... ‘leggy’ was the term, I fancy?”
“Aye, sir, but I beg to withdraw ‘leggy’ as not being in order, Mrs. Rose not being ex-actly what she seems.”
“Explain, Bob.”
“Well, sir, her speech don’t always match her country clothes, and sometimes she’s that haughty!”
“Aye, I’ve noticed the same, myself.”
“Yes, your honour.”
“What d’ye mean by ‘yes,’ Bob?”
“I mean, sir, as ’tis nowise sup-rising you should notice, seeing as I’ve noticed as your honour notices—I mean that she notices—that she an’ your honour seem to take a powerful sight o’ notice of each other, sir.”
“Aye, we do, Bob.”
“No offence, your honour?”
“None in the world, Bob.”
“But, y’ see, sir, there’s others has noticed and a-noticing same—daily, your honour.”
“Who, Robert?”
“Well, there’s Peter Bunkle for one, there’s nothing as he don’t notice! And old Mr. Dumbrell, he talks o’ nothing else, lately.”
“Ah, he tells you that I am ‘sweet on her,’ I suppose?”
“Con-stantly, sir!”
“Well, Bob, the Aged Soul is right—so I am!”
“Yes, sir!”
“Ha, you were already aware o’ this incredible fact?”
“I sur-mised same, sir.”
“You see, Bob, I intend to marry her.”
The Corporal was, and actually looked, startled.
“Marry her!” he repeated in a strangled voice. “Your honour!... Marry her!”
“Indeed, Bob, I intend to marry and settle down at High Dering at last, unless—aye, unless the Fateful Sisters see fit to cut short the thread o’ my existence.”
“God forbid, sir!”
“Amen, Bob. And yet the world would wag as merrily without me.... Do you believe in presentiments, Bob?”
“No, sir ... and yet——”
“Neither do I.”
“Sir, I’ve known men as did.”
“Aye, we mortals be queer creatures, Bob! An ill dream, a fit o’ the indigestion, a chill on the liver, and we grow full o’ forebodings, see dire omens and portents in everything and start at our own shadows.... Queer creatures!... And here we part awhile. You to keep an eye on the unsuspecting Sturton should he ride hither, and I to ‘The Anchor,’ where you will meet me at six.”
“Very good, sir!”
“’Tis like enough our quest may be ended sooner than we hoped, Robert.”
So saying, Sir John gave his steed the rein and rode on into Seaford town. Dismounting before the small Anchor Inn, he gave his horse to the ostler and his hand to Mr. Levitt the landlord, who forthwith ushered him into cosy parlour.
Mr. Levitt was by nature a jovial soul but, just now, his good-natured features were overcast, and he sighed, shaking despondent head over that hard Fate which, as he mournfully declared, “’ad made o’ pore Potter an ’omeless wanderer an’ drove Cap’n Sharkie Nye into the arms o’ them French furrineers and ruinated my trade, sir. Aye, by the Pize, sir, I moight jest as well close the ol’ ‘Anchor’ for arl the good I do these days—crool ’ard, I calls it!”
“How, is trade so bad, Mr. Levitt?”
“Worser’n bad it be, sir!”
“Is the place quite empty, then?”
“As a blessed drum, sir! Never a soul ’cept a couple o’ naun-account chaps. Lord, I dunno wot Sussex be a-comin’ tu, that I doan’t. Wot I sez is as them theer Preventives will ruin old England, aye by Goles, they will—dannel ’em! Shall us mak’ it French wine, sir, or summat a liddle stronger?”
“Nay, let it be October ale, thank ye, Mr. Levitt. And I’ll take it in the ‘tap.’”
“Why, sir,” demurred the landlord, “the ‘tap’ bean’t ’ardly the place for a gen’elman o’ your quality, an’ Sir ’Ector’s friend an’ arl.”
“But I’m minded for a bench and sanded floor,” smiled Sir John, and into the tap he took his way accordingly. It was a smallish chamber very orderly and clean, but empty except for a carter, in smock and leggings, who snored lustily with his head on the table, and a raw-boned individual with a shock of red hair and a dull, fish-like eye, who sat huddled in a corner and gloomed. To whom Sir John forthwith addressed himself:
“Friend, you drink nothing?”
“Well, an’ ’ow can I drink,” answered the red-headed man in surly tone; “’ow’s any man to drink out of a empty tankard?”
“That is easily amended.”
“Oh, is it, an arl—when a honest man’s pockets be as empty as ’is tankard an’ nobody to ax ’im to take nothin’?”
“Then I will. Fill for him, Mr. Levitt.”
“I wouldn’t, sir!” answered the landlord; “’e’s ’ad enough, I rackon!”
“’Oo’s ’ad enough?” demanded the red-haired man truculently. “I ain’t never ’ad enough! I never do ’ave enough, no, nor ain’t likely to ’ave enough! An’ if the loikes o’ ’im loikes to treat the loikes o’ me, what’s to prevent?”
“Well, keep a civil tongue to the gen’elman, an’ dannel ye, Jonas Skag!” and Mr. Levitt, setting down the refilled tankard with a bang, stalked away.
“Jonas Skag!” repeated Sir John, eyeing his unlovely companion and shifting nearer to him; “I’ve heard that name before.”
“No, you ain’t!” retorted the other fiercely. “Leastways if y’ave you’ve never ’eard naun but good of it!”
“True,” nodded Sir John; “for you told it me yourself.”
“What—I did?” exclaimed the red-headed man leaning forward to scowl.
“Aye,” answered Sir John, leaning forward also until he might look into the close-set eyes opposite. “You informed me that a more honest man never trod a plank.”
“Well, ’tis true! Honest I be, aye, honest as the day—an’ I’d loike t’ see the man as says I bean’t!” So saying, he lifted the ale to unshaven mouth and drank greedily.
“You don’t smoke tobacco!” said Sir John.
“No, I doan’t! An’ wot be that t’ you? Why should I smoke? I doan’t loike smoke an’ I bean’t a-goin’ to smoke! Not for the loikes o’ you, no—nor no man breathin’, I ain’t!”
“Perchance you prefer snuff?” Sir John suggested, finger and thumb in waistcoat pocket.
“An’ wot if I do? I ain’t beggin’ an’ pleadin’—no, nor yet axin’ you for any, be I?”
“No,” answered Sir John; “but you may have a pinch for good-fellowship’s sake, none the less, if you’re so minded.”
“Well, s’posin’ I be so minded?”
“Then I make you welcome to my box.” And Sir John took snuff-box from pocket and gave it to the red-haired man’s hairy fingers.
The box was shut, and in the act of opening it Jonas Skag grew suddenly still, glaring down at the thing he held, speechless, motionless, scarce breathing, as if indeed it had possessed some deadly power to blast him as he sat; then he seemed to shrink in his clothes, his writhing lips opened, closed again speechlessly, and slipping from his twitching fingers the battered horn snuff-box rolled upon the tiled floor; even then he stared down at it where it lay, until moving slowly like an old man, he leaned down, shaking hand outstretched. But with an airy motion of his riding-whip, Sir John flicked it from his reach and picking it up slipped it back into his pocket.
With the same unnatural slowness Jonas Skag rose to his feet, and leaning across the table stood glaring at that pocket of Sir John’s waistcoat which held that dreadful thing; and after some interval, he spoke in broken whisper:
“Gimme ... gimme——”
Sir John, leaning back against the wall, stared up into the twitching face, while slowly, slowly, the wide, bloodshot eyes crept up and up until they were glaring into his; thus for a long moment eyes met eyes, and it seemed that Jonas Skag was halting between two courses, groping meanwhile in his darkened soul and questioning passionately with his look. At last, uttering a hoarse, inarticulate sound, he turned, lurched to the door, opened it, leaned there a moment, and was gone.
Then Sir John arose and, leaving his ale untasted, went seeking the landlord.
“Mr. Levitt,” said he, “I remember meeting yonder red-haired fellow aboard the True Believer. Is he one of Captain Sharkie’s regular men?”
“Not by no manner o’ means, sir!” answered Mr. Levitt. “A drunken, quarrelsome, naun-account chap be Jonas. Las’ toime Sharkie ’apped along—ah, a-settin’ in that very cheer, ‘Levitt,’ says ’e, ‘I’m done wi’ that Jonas for good an’ arl!’ ’e says.”
“And you, like Captain Sharkie, do not trust him?”
“Not so fur as I can see ’im, sir.... Why, here be Corporal Doubleday! How goes it, sir, an’ what’ll we make it?”
At a nod from Sir John, the Corporal, having “made it” ale, and finished it with commendable speed, Sir John presently arose and, taking hearty leave of Mr. Levitt, stepped into the yard and mounted.
“Well, Bob?” he inquired as they rode. “Our Sturton made hither as usual?”
“He did, sir, but——”
“Was met by the red-headed man, Bob.”
“Pre-cisely, sir. Which man seemed in mighty per-tub-ation about somewhat or other, whereupon Sturton takes him into the Bull yonder. And soon arter, sir, out they came from the yard and both of ’em mounted, and away at a gallop. Which seems strange.”
“Hum!” exclaimed Sir John. “Did they ride towards Alfriston?”
“Aye, your honour.”
“About how long ago?”
“Eggs-ackly eighteen and a half minutes, sir.”
“You did not follow ’em?”
“Your honour’s orders were to call for you at——”
“Aye, very true, Bob!... Eighteen minutes!”
Sir John reined in his horse and sat as if deeply pondering, while the Corporal watched him, serenely patient.
“Is aught wrong, sir?” he inquired at last.
Sir John glanced up and round about upon the peaceful beauty of the countryside.
“’Twill be a lovely evening, Robert.”
“Quite so, sir.”
“We don’t believe in presentiments, do we, Bob?”
“No, sir—leastways——”
“Or omens and the like liverish fancies? Now, do we happen to believe in warnings, by any chance?”
“Depends, sir, on who warns and what about.”
“And after all, Bob, as Mr. Potter once remarked: ‘What is to be, must be!’ So let us on and be done with it one way or t’other.”