Chapter V: Front Matter (5)

What an awful sense of guilt clung round him; but the man deserved it, he kept telling himself. Why did he come sneaking round after another man’s girl? If it ever came out that he had killed him, everyone would allow that he had been sorely tried. As he sat there, black and moody, with eyes fixed on the sawdust-covered floor, scraps of conversation floated over to him from the bar where the men had gathered. He heard nothing at first; then a sentence pierced his preoccupied brain.

“Smart young fellow, wasn’t he? Did you see him, Bill?”

And then Bill’s answer struck dully on his ears:

“I just seed him go by. I was at the window there, an’ I looks up. ‘Why, there’s Tony, ses I’ bein’ as ’ow he was all togged up in grey. And I calls out, ‘Tony!’ ’cos I wanted them bootlaces he promised me. And the feller turns round and I couldn’t help larfin’, for it wasn’t Tony at all, but this other chap.”

There was a general laugh at Bill’s expense.

“I could have told you Tony was off for the day. I met him going to Riverside just after dinner-time.”

“An’ what was this young feller doin’ down here, this London chap, I mean?” came another question.

“Oh, just walking through Fullingham, as they do, you know, to see the country. He went up by Marten’s orchard last thing I see of him, going to Hawley, for sure.”

The talk drifted on then; but John Macpherson, seated near the open door whence the delicious balmy air, heavy with the scent of new-mown hay, came in and mixed with the beer and baccy of the bar, grew cold with horror as he sat and heard. An icy conviction gripped him to his inner being strangling him.

_He had killed the wrong man!_

He knew it. He felt sure of it. Tony’s gasping words came back to him backed up now so unexpectedly by this man at the bar. Tony had been to Riverside, he had “gorn sweethearting” but to his own legitimate property, his own girl. It was the other man in grey who--oh, the horror of it! He’d go mad if he sat there another minute. He got onto his feet and was just about to cross the threshold when another phrase from the little knot of men arrested him. They had got onto a prize-fight now. They were discussing it, as one of the men had seen it in a neighboring town.

“And there he lay, and nothin’ they could do seemed to bring him round. I thought he was dead, sure. Then another bloke comes along, and whether he tips brandy down ’is throat or what he does, I don’t know; but up springs my fine fellow as gay as you please, and they sets to again.”

A sudden ray of hope seemed to split the darkness in John’s mind. Suppose--suppose Tony was not quite dead? Oh! the wonderful joy of the thought. Suppose, like that other man, he could come round! Oh, if such a thing might happen now and let him out of this cold cell of terror he seemed shut up in, he swore within himself he would never lift hand against man, woman or child again!

He had his whiskey-flask in his pocket. Full of a new determination he turned and walked to the bar.

“Six-penn’orth?” asked the barman, as John handed him the flask.

“Fill it right up, man,” said John briefly. And when this was done and paid for, he turned and went out without a word.

The barman shook his head. “Macpherson looks bad to-night,” he remarked.

“Bin drinkin’ perhaps; or p’raps that girl’s leading him a dog’s life. She’s a termagant.”

Outside John sped up the road, new hope, dim, faint uncertain, but still hope glimmering in his heart. The full moon was up in a rich purple sky, and the night was soft and full of beauty. But John could see nothing. He felt the hangman’s cord about his neck, and for the wrong man--the wrong man!

All seemed quite still, calm as he had left it when he reached the wood. The silvery light filtered gently through the leaves and fell on his little path, showing him the way.

He stepped aside to the clump of azaleas and pushed them back. There lay the still body, just as he had left it. It had not stirred.

With a thumping heart and a prayer on his lips John knelt beside it, and raising the head pushed the neck of the open flask between the pallid lips.

There was no movement, but some seemed to go down the throat, but he could not be sure. Then he got desperate, and getting his handkerchief just soaked it in the spirit and rubbed it violently all over the man’s face and eyes.

“Tony man, wake up, I say!” he muttered, scrubbing his forehead with the fiery spirit.

At last, oh, God! that was a sigh! He was breathing!

John’s hand trembled so that he nearly spilt the rest of the flask.

Tony opened his eyes.

“Why, what’s this?” he uttered faintly. “Where am I?”

“Here, drink some more,” said John feverishly, tipping the flask up and sending a fresh stream down Tony’s throat.

He never touched spirits and it burnt him like fire.

He sat up, John supporting him, and looked round. “Is that you, Mac?” he said. “Oh, I remember. You nearly bashed me to death under the stile. What’s it all about, Mac?” His voice was rather weakly; his eyes wandered over John’s anxious face and then up to the tracery of boughs over them.

“It was all a mistake, Tony, and I am more sorry than I can say. But you’re not hurt much, are you?”

Tony was sitting up now. His face looked very white. His hat, carefully picked up by Macpherson and put beside him under the azaleas, was there still. His forehead looked damp, and the whiskey-soaked locks of hair hung loose over it. He leaned his cheek on his hand as he answered:

“I’ll have you up before the beak for this,” he said calmly. Tony was mostly calm.

“You won’t?” exclaimed John anxiously.

“It’s six months’ hard for ’sault and battery, and it’s two years quod for manslaughter,” remarked Tony.

John felt a cold sweat break out on him.

“But I’ve said it was a mistake,” he urged. “I thought it was you--” Then he began to stammer. After all, Apricot was his girl and he was not going to give her away.

“Well, why didn’t you find out before you came and knocked me about?” asked Tony in an aggrieved voice. “Spoiled my hat, too.” And he took it out from the azaleas and smoothed its battered brim in his hands.

“Look here, Tony,” said John desperately, “you must overlook this. Not a word must come out. Say how I can make up to you and I’ll do it.”

“There’s that fifty pounds you’ve saved up,” remarked Tony mildly, still stroking his hat.

John fell back flabbergasted. Fifty pounds! The savings of his whole life! The sacred sum put by so that when it grew to a hundred he could set up house with Apricot!

“What do you mean?” he asked with trembling lips.

“It won’t be nice doin’ hard for six months; and it’s two years if they bring it in manslaughter.”

“But I didn’t kill you, man! They can’t call it that!”

“You meant to, though; and you nearly did me in. Oh, my head! it do feel bad!” And Tony leant against a bush beside him and closed his eyes.

John seized his flask and made him take another gulp.

“You better take me home,” he said weakly. “I’d like to die in the old house.”

John was desperate.

“Look here, Tony, if you don’t die and don’t say a word you shall have the fifty, I promise you.”

Tony straightened himself a little.

“I’ll do my best, Mac,” he said feebly. “How soon can I have the money? Soon as I’ve got it I’ll say I had a fit; then if I dies you’re safe, anyway; and I’ll leave Bessie the fifty.”

“You’re a cool one,” growled out John. “Fifty pounds is a lot of money, Tony.”

“Well, don’t pay it, don’t pay it, Mac. Maybe you’ll find it all right in quod. Two years ain’t long, you know.”

Cold shivers went down John’s spine. Prison for one of the Highland Macphersons! And Apricot alone and unprotected for two years! She’d never wait for him; nor would old Marten ever let him have his daughter then. He knew Tony had some knowledge of the law. His grandfather had been a solicitor in a small way, and on this account many were the knotty points referred to Tony by the villagers. But he hated like anything to lose his cherished fifty, and made another effort.

“Look here,” he said, “I don’t see what’s to prevent my denying the whole thing. It’s your word against mine.”

Tony shook his head solemnly. “I’d have the truth on my side, and the truth’s a fierce thing to be up against.”

John considered. He felt that Tony was right. He could never stand up and call God to witness that he had not laid a finger on Tony. He felt he’d be struck dead or blind if he did.

“An’ a man’s dying oath is always took in evidence,” added Tony in a mournful tone.

“How can it be a dyin’ oath if you don’t die?”

“If I _think_ it’s my dyin’ oath it’s the same thing.”

“’Spose it all comes out, anyway?”

“Can’t,” said Tony, sitting up and speaking with more vigour. “I’f I gets your fifty I’m mum unless I feels like dyin’. If it’s that way, I’ll say I have had a fit; and if I say it’s a fit, a fit it is.”

John gave in. “All right,” he said with a long sigh. “I’ll get you the money to-night. Now let’s get back.”

He assisted Tony to his feet and put his battered hat on his head.

“Oh, it do ache!” groaned Tony.

“That’s all the whiskey you’ve drunk,” returned John unsympathetically.

“Maybe it is, and maybe it’s the bashing it’s had,” returned Tony. And after that, in silence, the two men emerged from the wood onto the moonlit road.

John walked along in black gloom, pondering alternately on his lost fifty and on Apricot.

He wondered if she had walked as far as Hawley with the stranger; if she had got back home by now; if there was the smallest chance of his seeing her to-night. He thirsted for the touch of her red lips to console him for all he had suffered in emotion that day.

Oddly enough he did not feel angry with her. It is a curious point of ethics with the lower classes that what is done with a gentleman does not count. There is not considered to be anything serious about it; it’s only “a bit of a lark”; and while the thought of Tony supplanting him had filled him with red fury against him, he had nothing at all against the gentleman from town who had stolen a kiss from his girl in passing through the village. In fact, far away in the recesses of his heart there burnt a spark of pride that Apricot’s beauty could not be resisted by anyone.

The two men reached the village with hardly a word exchanged, Tony occasionally stopping to lean on his companion’s arm.

John left him at the store and went dolefully enough to fetch the price of his folly. He brought over the small tin box in which he had saved it and added to it through so many years, and put it into the other’s hands in the back bedroom behind the shop. He could not bear to see it counted out by the smiling Tony, but with a hoarse mutter of: “It’s all there. Mind you keep your word, durn you!” he hurried away.

The night was exquisitely lovely, full of sweet scents, and all the whispers of Summer in the air. He walked past Marten’s orchard and looked longingly up to the wall where the trees hung their branches heavy with fruit over the top.

But there was no one to be seen, and finally he walked away disconsolately back to the farm.

All the next day he longed to see Apricot; but it was not till the evening when all the village was dipped in soft violet shadows that he at last met her, just as she was coming out of the store. She looked so lovely his heart rose in a great bound, and he threw his arm around her and pressed his lips into the side of her creamy neck.

“What you been to the store for?” he asked jealously.

“Only for a bit of ribbon; but I stopped to talk to Tony. Oh, John! Think! He’s going to marry Bessie Smith in a month, and he’s got fifty pounds to start housekeeping! Some folks do save wonderful, don’t they?”

“Yes, and some has things given ’em,” said John savagely. “But we’ll be getting married, too. What would you say if I put the banns up to-morrow?”

Apricot lifted two soft arms and put them about his neck. They were sheltered by an old oak that grew near the store, and there was no one to see. Her upturned face and glowing eyes looked very fair and sweet in the dusk.

She loved her John and meant to marry him, and no one else in this world, but walks and talks like yesterday’s with the stranger were very great fun and she was afraid they might be few and far when she was Mrs. Macpherson. Her scarlet mouth closed on John’s as she murmured back:

“I think I’d say, John dear, don’t be so hasty!”

SUPPING WITH THE DEVIL