Читать книгу The Dust of Conflict - Harold Bindloss - Страница 6

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THE inquest on keeper Davidson was duly held, and at the commencement seemed likely to cause Tony Palliser less anxiety than he had expected. There were reasons for this, and among them was the fact that the Pallisers had lived at Northrop for generations, and the fathers of the men who served them had watched their game and groomed their horses. Godfrey Palliser was also a liberal master, who seldom put an embargo on any man’s perquisites; while Tony scattered pleasant words and silver with a tactful kindliness that made either doubly acceptable.

There was accordingly a desire to spare them unpleasantness in the minds of those who attended the informal courts of inquiry held at the “Black Bull,” as the result of which the men who appeared to testify at the one sanctioned by the law of the land came there with convictions already formed, for Northrop village had thrashed out the question. Northrop knew all about Tony’s flirtation with Lucy Davidson, but it also knew a good deal more about that lady than Tony did, and exculpated him. He had, it was true, been seen to give Davidson five pounds, but that was not an astonishing thing when the friends he brought down had been enthusiastic over, the partridge shooting provided them; while there were not many men in his uncle’s service he had not given sovereigns to. The men remembered this, and hoped for more.

It was also known that he had not left his room on the eventful night, and though everybody was aware that Appleby had gone out, the guests at the hall were occasionally addicted to taking nocturnal strolls after an evening in the billiard room. Northrop accordingly knew just how much it meant to admit when it attended the inquest, and when the rustic mind adopts that attitude there is nothing further to be extracted from it.

The coroner did not elucidate a great deal when he commenced his inquiry. Tony, who appeared distressed by the recollection, as indeed he was, deposed to the finding of the body and was corroborated by two of his friends. He was listened to sympathetically. Sergeant Stitt testified that he had found signs which apparently suggested a scuffle, but could not be certain there had been one. Then a hush of attention followed the appearance of the doctor. He alluded to certain bruises.

“The one upon the head was evidently caused by a fall upon a stone, which would, I think, alone have produced insensibility,” he said. “The one upon the cheek was apparently the result of a blow from a stick, but it might have been occasioned by a fall.”

“Would either of the blows alone have occasioned death?” asked a juryman.

“Not directly,” said the doctor. “The cause of death was exhaustion resulting from immersion. A man who fell upon the boulders beneath the bridge and rolled into the water would be very likely to succumb in that fashion.”

Two servants from the hall were called, and then Tony’s man. “I saw Mr. Appleby go out,” he said. “It was about eleven o’clock, but might have been later. He took something from a rack which held sticks and riding-whips. He usually did take a stick. What do I mean by usually? Well, he would walk down the avenue and home by the footpath now and then just before he went to his room at night. I heard him come in about half an hour later. I noticed mud on his shoes and trousers next morning; but he would have to cross a wet place before he reached the lawn.”

Everybody seemed satisfied; but there was a little murmur when Miss Wayne appeared, and somewhat indignant glances were cast upon Sergeant Stitt. She wore a veil, but she removed it when she turned to the jury; and it was in a clear, cold voice, which had a trace of haughtiness in it, she answered the questions asked her.

“I am. I believe, the last person Mr. Appleby spoke to before he went out,” she said. “So far as I noticed he did not appear disturbed or in any way irritated. I met him at the head of the stairway.”

“Was the meeting accidental?”

A faint trace of color crept into the girl’s cheek, but it was in a clear, even voice she said: “He had given me to understand that he wished to see me.”

“Had he anything in particular to say to you?”

One or two of the jury made it evident that they considered the question in bad taste, but there was a curious silence when it was seen that the witness hesitated.

“He asked me for ten pounds,” she said.

Tony gasped when this was told him, and felt his face grow a trifle warm, while a little thrill of indignation ran through him. He had been pleased to see his friend and sweetheart on good terms, but that one should borrow ten pounds from the other suggested a degree of intimacy he had not contemplated.

“Do you know why he wanted the money?” asked the coroner.

The girl looked at him steadily, and nobody saw that her hands were trembling. “No,” she said coldly. “That is, I do not know exactly. I had, however, asked him to do me a favor which might cost a little money, and surmised that he needed some. It was not quite certain that I should see him on the morrow.”

“What was the favor?”

Violet Wayne straightened herself with an almost imperceptible movement, but there was a change in her pose, and she held her shapely head higher. “It had nothing to do with anything that could concern this inquiry,” she said.

“You are on oath, Miss Wayne,” said the coroner. “Remembering that, you are willing to repeat the assurance you have just given me?”

“Yes,” said the girl, standing very still, though every nerve in her was tingling. She long remembered the strain she underwent just then, but it was not until afterwards she was sorry that she had submitted to it. She did nothing by half, and her love for Tony carried an obligation with it. There were only one or two people, and Tony was not among them, who realized all that Violet Wayne was, but they paid her a respectful homage they offered to no other woman.

The coroner had not seen her until that morning, but her bearing, and perhaps her beauty, had an effect, for he signified that he was contented, and Godfrey Palliser was called. He carried himself a trifle stiffly, and was as usual immaculate in dress while it was with a suggestion of carefully suppressed annoyance, which some of those present sympathized with, he gave his evidence.

Davidson had served him four years, he said. He frequently went round the woods at night, and had of late suspected that poachers had been at work about the fir spinny. So far as he knew, and he had made inquiries, nobody but Bernard Appleby, a relation of his own, and a young man of unimpeachable character, had gone out of his house on the night in question. Appleby had spent fourteen days at the hall and it was at least twelve months since he had stayed there before. It appeared unlikely that he should have intended to meet Davidson.

Palliser was followed by a teamster, whose evidence made an impression. “I came out of the ‘Black Bull’ with Davidson at ten minutes to eleven,” he said. “He wasn’t exactly what one would call sober, though a man who didn’t know him wouldn’t have noticed it. He told me he was going round by the fir spinny to see if he could catch somebody who’d been laying snares. I told him to be careful he didn’t pitch over the footbridge.”

Most of those present were sensible of a little relief. Nothing unpleasant could, it seemed, transpire now, and the jury, who waited for Appleby to inform them that he had seen nothing of Davidson during his stroll, began to see what their verdict would be. There was also no great show of interest when the coroner asked for Bernard Appleby.

He asked twice, however, and there was no answer, while the jury exchanged significant glances when five minutes passed and the witness did not appear. Then there was a curious silence as Sergeant Stitt, flushed with haste, came in.

“Mr. Appleby was duly summoned, sir,” he said. “I have just received this telegram from the solicitors he is engaged with.”

Nobody moved while the coroner opened the message, and there was deep stillness as he read aloud: “In reply to inquiry Appleby has not resumed his duties here as expected. Have no clue to his whereabouts. Anxious for information.”

“It will be the duty of the police to discover them as soon as possible,” he said. “Have you any notion, Sergeant Stitt?”

Stitt led in a young man whom everybody recognized as the booking clerk from the station four miles away. “Mr. Appleby bought a ticket for Liverpool just in time to catch the train on the evening Davidson’s body was found,” he said. “He came into the office and sat down about a minute. I noticed he turned up the steamer sailings in the paper he borrowed.”

“A mail-boat left for New York the following afternoon,” said Sergeant Stitt.

The effect was evident. Men looked at one another with suspicion in their eyes, the coroner sent for Palliser and conferred with him and Stitt, while the heavy stillness the murmur of their voices emphasized was curiously significant. Hitherto nobody had seriously thought of connecting Appleby with Davidson’s death, but it now appeared that there could be only one meaning to the fact that he had sought safety in flight. Then the coroner stood up.

“It is unfortunate that more precautions were not taken to secure the attendance of so important a witness as Mr. Appleby,” he said. “As it appears tolerably certain that he is no longer in this country, there is, I think, nothing to be gained by postponing the inquiry, and it is for you to consider whether you can arrive at a decision without his testimony.”

The jury were not long over the work, and the Northrop carpenter and wheelwright made their decision known. “We find,” he said, “that the deceased died of exhaustion as the result of a fall from the footbridge, during, or very soon after, a struggle with a person, or more than one person, by whom he was injured. We recommend that a double fence be placed on the said bridge, with three by two standards and two rails well tennoned in.”

“I am afraid that is a trifle too ambiguous,” said the coroner.

There was another consultation, and this time the verdict was concise. “Manslaughter by some person or persons unknown.”

“It will now be the duty of the police to find them,” said the coroner.

Northrop Hall was almost empty of its guests that evening. They, of course, knew what everybody’s suspicions now pointed to, and while it was unpleasant to leave abruptly, felt that it would be an especially tactful thing to Godfrey Palliser accepted their excuses with dry concurrence, but he pressed Violet Wayne and her aunt to remain. It would be a kindness, he said, because Tony seemed considerably distressed by the affair. The girl fancied that he appeared so when he came into the room where she sat beside a sinking fire. Only one lamp was lighted and the room was dim; while a cold wind wailed outside, and the rain beat upon the windows. Tony shivered, and his face seemed a trifle haggard when he stopped and leaned on the back of her chair.

“It is a wild night, he said.

“Tell me what you are thinking, Tony,” said the girl, “I fancy I know.”

“I was thinking of the big liner driving through the blackness with Bernard on board. She will be plunging forecastle under into the Atlantic combers now. I almost wish I were on board her too.”

“But I should be here,” the girl said softly. “Do you want to leave me, Tony?”

Tony laughed. “Oh, I talk at random now and then, and I’m not quite myself to-day. That confounded coroner made me savage for one thing. Did you feel it very much?”

“Can’t you see that I am tired, dear?”

Tony, who moved a little, saw it plainly by the pallor of her face and the weariness in her eyes.

“I felt I could have killed the officious beast,” he said, and stood still, looking down on her irresolutely. “But whatever did you give Bernard ten pounds for, Violet?”

“Is there any reason why I should tell you?”

“Yes”—and the man’s tone suggested that he felt his grievance was warranted. “I think there is. Of course, I’m not a censorious person—I can’t afford to be—but it really didn’t seem quite the thing, you know.”

The protest was perhaps natural, but Violet Wayne checked a little sigh. She was in love with Tony, and that meant a good deal, but he was trying now and then, and she had discovered that his views were narrow, and now and then somewhat mean. Indeed, she had once or twice received an almost painful astonishment when he had made them plain to her.

In the present case his reproaches were especially ill-timed after what she had suffered on his behalf. Tony was in difficulties, and she had desired to free him of them; but it had been clear that he must be helped surreptitiously, lest his self-respect should suffer, which was why she had passed on the task to a man she had confidence in, and had so feared the coroner would force a revelation from her.

“You don’t wish to vex me?” she said.

“No,” said the man, still with a trace of petulance. “That is the last thing I would like to do; but if you ever want ten pounds when you haven’t got them I wish you would come to me. You see, it really isn’t flattering to me that you would sooner borrow from Tom, Dick, and Harry, and it sets the confounded idiots talking.”

A faint light crept into Violet Wayne’s eyes, and Tony knew he had gone far enough.

“The one thing I resent is that it apparently sets you thinking,” she said. “I can’t be satisfied with less than I offer you, Tony, and the man who loves me must believe in me implicitly. I did not get angry when you would not share your troubles with me.”

Tony softened. “I’m sorry, Violet, but the fact is I don’t feel very pleased about anything to-night. Nobody could expect it!”

“Is it Davidson’s death that is troubling you?”

She looked at him with a curious intentness, for Tony’s face was haggard, and a horrible fear came upon the man as she did so. Her gaze disconcerted him, and he fancied he saw suspicion in it. Accordingly he clutched at the first excuse that presented itself.

“Not altogether! It’s Bernard,” he said.

Another irretrievable step was taken. Tony had waited as usual for events, instead of choosing a path to be adhered to in spite of them. As the result he was forced into one by which he had not meant to go, and it led rapidly down hill. Violet Wayne, however, straightened herself a trifle in her chair.

“Tony,” she said, “it is quite impossible that you should think what your words suggest.”

The man’s face flushed, for her quiet assurance stirred the bitterness of jealousy that had hitherto lain dormant in him, and again he answered without reflection, eager only to justify himself.

“When a man borrows money, and goes out at night to meet another who may have been blackmailing him, and then disappears when that man is found dead with marks of violence on him, what would anybody think?” he said.

“Blackmailing him!” said Violet Wayne, and then sat very still a moment while the blood crept into her pale cheek, for the meaning of one or two vague allusions she had heard concerning Lucy Davidson flashed upon her.

“It slipped out. Of course, I should not have mentioned it to you.”

“You have done so, but the thing is so utterly hateful that it carries its refutation with it”; and there was a portentous sparkle in the girl’s eyes as she fixed them upon him.

Tony saw it, and trembled inwardly. He had been favored with glimpses of Violet Wayne’s inner self before, and could discern the difference between a becoming prudery and actual abhorrence.

“Still,” he said slowly, realizing that he was committed, “he disappeared. Of course, the affair may not be as black as it looks, and perhaps he was driven into it. Men with really good intentions are forced into doing what they never meant to now and then.”

Violet Wayne laughed a little scornful laugh. “Isn’t the cowardice which leads a man into meanness he is ashamed of more contemptible than bold iniquity?”

“Well,” said Tony, “I don’t quite know. I don’t worry over those questions, but it seems to me there is something to be said for the man who does what he shouldn’t when he can’t help it.”

“Can’t help it?”

“Yes,” said Tony. “I mean when it would only cause trouble to everybody if he did the correct thing.”

The girl looked at him curiously. “I think we had better abandon that subject, Tony,” she said. “We will go back to the other. Your friend could have had no hand in Davidson’s death—because he is your friend, and because I know what kind of man he is. Is there nothing you could do to clear him?”

Tony shook his head. “No; I wish I could,” he said.

“Still, you see, it doesn’t matter quite so much in his case. He leaves nobody to worry about it behind him, and had no prospects. He told me he was going out to try his fortune in another land, anyway.”

“It doesn’t matter! Is it nothing that he should go out with a brand of that kind upon him?”

“Well,” said Tony reflectively, “I really don’t think it counts for very much where he is going to. You see, they are not remarkably particular in America.”

Violet Wayne rose. “You are not in a pleasant mood tonight, Tony, and I am tired. We will not stay here and vex each other.”

Tony endeavored to slip his arm about her. “I know I’m a bad-tempered beast now and then. I can only tell you that you are ever so much too good for me again.”

The girl did very little to repulse him, in fact scarcely more than lift her eyes, but Tony’s arm fell to his side. Then she smiled somewhat curiously. “Don’t make too determined an effort to convince me,” she said. “I should not like to believe you.”

She went out, leaving Tony alone with a horror of himself. He realized that there could be no turning back now. He must go on by the path he had taken, and standing with hand clenched on the mantle he groaned a little.