The Toll-Gate (34 page)

"Believe you! I'll come to watch you strung up at Tyburn! I know more of you than the Runner has yet discovered. I have been busy while I took charge of the gate—busy tracing your movements since the day you left London! Do not let us waste time! I know that it was you who laid the plans to steal a consignment of sovereigns on its way to Manchester. You not only knew that there would be such a consignment; you persuaded your friend at the Treasury to disclose the very date when it would set out from London!"

"It's untrue! If he said that, he is a liar! I did not—I never thought of such a thing! It was he who told me, cupshot, one night! I didn't plan it—it was Nat Coate! He saw how it could be done, but he promised there should be no killing! He promised me!"

"But there was killing, and two men were guilty of that double murder."

"I was not one! I had no hand in it! On my soul, I had not!"

"You were there, at the ford," John said implacably. "I know that, if the Runner does not."

"You can't prove I was there! I did nothing, nothing! It was Nat, and the Gunns—all of it! Nat and Roger Gunn shot the guards, and Gunn's brother drove the waggon! It was his own, and when—after the gold was taken off it, he drove it away, before daylight. I can tell you where he lives! It's in Yorkshire, not far from——"

"Ah, you are altogether contemptible!" John said involuntarily.

This was not perfectly understood. "It's true! Nat made me go with them, because I know the roads here! I did not wish to! He forced me, I tell you! I was in his power and could not refuse him!"

"You would not have been for long in his power had you carried the information to Bow Street of what he planned to do," said John.

Tears began to run down Stornaway's ashen cheeks. "I wish I had! I wish I were well out of the business! Nat said there would be no danger. I never dreamed he meant to shoot the guards! He swore they should be bound and gagged only!"

"How could two armed men be bound and gagged, you fool?"

"I don't know—I didn't think! I had no hand in it!" Stornaway repeated desperately.

"No hand in it! Was it Coate, then, who knew where the gold could be hidden safely? Or was it you who knew that somewhere in these hills there is a cavern, in which your father once broke his leg? A cavern which has been closed ever since, and is now almost—but not quite!—forgotten?"

If there had been any suspicion in Stornaway's mind that the Captain could not possibly know so much about him as he had alarmingly hinted, this evidence that he was uncannily in possession of the one piece of information which could more effectively than all the rest implicate him in the robbery, effectually banished it. He looked so ghastly that John wondered whether he might be going to swoon; and although he opened and shut his mouth several times no sound came from it.

"As yet," said John, faintly stressing the words, "the Runner doesn't know of the existence of this cavern. But I fancy I could tell him whereabouts to look for it. Where had you been, Mr. Stornaway, when I encountered you very early in the morning on the lane that leads over the hills? And for what purpose were you carrying a lantern?"

Only a whimper answered him. He remained silent and motionless, waiting.

After a long pause, Stornaway whispered: "What do you mean to do? Why have you come here?"

"I am not perfectly sure yet what I mean to do," John replied. "I came to discover the truth from you. Where is Ned Brean?"

A shudder ran through Stornaway; he covered his face with his shaking hands. "Dead!"

"By whose hand?"

"Nat Coate's. I swear that's the truth! If you knew—if you had seen—you would know I'm telling you the truth! He was stabbed! He was a big fellow, and very strong: I could not have stabbed him, or have dragged his body——" He stopped, gulping. "If I tell you the whole, you'll believe me? You must believe me! When Brean disappeared, I was afraid—but Nat would tell me nothing! So I went one night—because I had to know! I could not bear it! I found Brean!" Another shudder ran through him. "It was horrible, horrible!" He looked up. "He will stick at nothing! Nothing, I tell you! I wish I had never met him! I wish I had never heard of that curst gold! I wish I were dead!"

"That wish at least is likely soon to be fulfilled," said John dryly. "There are three murdered men to be answered for."

"I killed none of them!"

John looked at him consideringly. Hope gleamed in the pale eyes which watched him so furtively. Stornaway put out a tentative hand, and ventured to lay it on his breeched knee. John could almost feel his flesh creep under the touch, but he restrained the impulse to shake the hand off, and sat still.

"You've no grudge against me!" Stornaway urged, keeping his eyes fixed on that unyielding face. "If you know what I've suffered! I swear, had I guessed what it would all mean, I would never have joined Nat in the business!" He saw the Captain's mouth curl, not pleasantly, and added hastily: "It was madness! The gull-gropers are after me, and this place is so encumbered it will do me no good when my grandfather dies! I tell you, I had to get money!"

"Unfortunate that this money cannot benefit you for many a day to come!" interrupted the Captain scathingly.

"No, well—I didn't realise that!" Stornaway muttered. "I wish to God I had never touched it! If I could be quit of it all—but how the devil can I? I didn't kill those men—no one could be sorrier than I am that they are dead!—but what a fix I am in, what a hellish fix I am in!" He gave a groan, and once more buried his face in his hands.

"Do you want to escape from it indeed?"

"I can't escape from it!"

"If I could be sure that yours was not the hand which killed Brean, I would help you to do so."

For a moment, the meaning of these words scarcely penetrated to Stornaway's intelligence. The voice which uttered them was so hard that he could not believe he had heard aright. He looked up, staring. The eyes that looked down into his were as cold as sea-water. But the Captain said steadily: "I could bring you off—if I chose to do it."

Stornaway passed the tip of his tongue between his lips. A little colour mounted to his cheeks. "There's a fortune in the cavern!" he said, rather breathlessly. "Only keep your mouth shut, and you shall have——"

"I do not want your fortune, or any part of it. Nor would it save you if I were to keep my mouth shut. The Runner is not here by chance: he knows that somewhere in this district the gold is hidden. Sooner or later he will find it, make no mistake about that! I'm not here to help you to the enjoyment of a fortune: it goes back to the Treasury. As for you, you may end the affair as a felon and a murderer, or as a mere tool, deceived by a rogue. If you did not kill Brean I have no interest in sending you to the gallows. If you show me Brean's body, stabbed as you have described, and show me also where the gold is lying, I will bring you off scatheless."

There was a long pause. "How?" Stornaway said at last, watching him.

"I will tell the Runner that you have been entertaining Coate in all good faith; that when it was proved to you what his reason was for wishing to visit Kellands you realised that it was due to your folly and gabbing tongue that these crimes came about; that in your anxiety to atone for your unwitting share in them you used your best endeavours to discover where the gold was hidden; that you and I went to search for it in one of the caverns with which this country abounds. You will appear a fool, but not a knave."

Stornaway said suspiciously: "Why should you do this?"

"I have a reason," John replied.

"I don't understand! What reason could you have?"

The level gaze indifferently scanned his face. "I shall not tell you that. It is nothing you would understand. But you may trust me to do as I have promised."

Stornaway's restless eyes shifted. "You want me to take you to the cavern?" he said mechanically, as though he were thinking of something else.

"Yes," John replied.

There was another pause. Stornaway looked up quickly, and away again. "Not now! I am unwell—I cannot go out into the night air! I won't do that! I have the sore throat. I caught cold in that place!"

"In the morning," John said. "We will ride there together."

"In the morning . . . How can I know that you are not leading me into a trap?"

"You will lead, not I."

"Yes, but . . ."

"I give you my word," John said deliberately, "that if you deal honestly with me I will bring you off safely."

"I'll take you there." Stornaway's face twitched. He added, with another fleeting look up at John: "Coate must not know, of course. But he does not rise early in the morning. When—when should we go?"

"When you wish."

"At—yes, at eight, then!"

"Very well. I will meet you in the lane."

"Yes. Yes, that will be best." His voice sharpened. "The Runner! What have you told him?"

"Nothing that can harm you."

"But you knew of the cavern," Stornaway said, suspicion in his face. "How can I know you have not told him that?"

"You cannot, but I have not."

Stornaway plucked at the sheet. "I'll trust you! I have no choice!"

"None," agreed the Captain calmly.

CHAPTER XVII.

IT was three o'clock when the Captain reached the toll-house again. He entered it through the office, and went into the kitchen so quietly that Chirk, who was seated at the table inspecting a collection of small objects laid upon it, was startled, and half leaped from his chair. When he saw who had entered, he sank down again, exclaiming: "Dang you, Soldier! What call have you to go like a cat?"

"I thought you might be asleep."

"I had a nimwinks a while ago. What's now?"

The Captain was looking at the oddments on the table. He raised an eyebrow at Chirk. "Tonight's haul? Didn't you tell me you were turning to pound dealing?"

"So I will," asserted Chirk, scooping up a handful of coins, and bestowing them in his pocket. "Just as soon as I get my fambles on this reward you tell me about, that is! In the meantime, Soldier, my windmill's dwindled into a nutcracker, so I was bound to make a recover, else I'd have starved."

John could not help laughing. "I wish you will not! I could lend you some blunt."

"Thank'ee, Soldier, breaking shins is what I don't hold with!" said Chirk, whose morality, though eccentric, was rigid.

John smiled, but said nothing. A handsome gold watch lay on the table, and he picked it up. "You were fortunate, weren't you? A well-breeched swell!"

"Getting winged ain't my idea of good fortune!" said Chirk tartly. "If he'd had more than one barker, likely I'd be as dead as a herring by now, for he was a good shot: hit me while his prad was trying to bolt with him!"

"Jerry, was there an exchange of shots?" John asked, a little sternly.

"Ay, but I fired over his head, so you've no call to look at me like that, Soldier! I ain't a man o' violence!"

"You're a very foolish fellow. Don't rob any more travellers! If all goes as I believe it will, we shall finish our business tomorrow."

"I'd as lief we did," commented Chirk.

"And I! I am going to tell you just what I have arranged to do, and what your part must be. Everything depends on Stornaway, but I think he will do exactly what I want him to do."

"I daresay you know what you're about," said Chirk.

But by the time the Captain had come to the end of a brief account of what had passed between himself and Stornaway, the faintly sceptical expression on the highwayman's face had changed to one of blank dismay.

"And I thought you was a downy one!" he ejaculated. "Lord, Soldier, you've got more hair than wit, seemingly!"

"Have I?" said the Captain, smiling.

"If you don't see that you'll be queered on that suit, you're wood-headed!" said Chirk bluntly. "I never clapped my ogles on young Stornaway, but by what Rose has told me—let alone what you've just told me—any cove as 'ud trust him an inch beyond the reach of his barker is no better than a bleater! God love you, Soldier, he'll turn cat in pan on you! A cull as'll whiddle on his friends, like he done tonight to you, won't think twice afore he tips you the double! P'raps you'll tell me why he was so anxious you shouldn't force him to show you the cavern till it was morning—if them windmills you've got in your head don't stop you thinking?"

The smile lingered in John's eyes. "Oh, no! Not a bit! He wanted time to take counsel of Coate, of course."

Chirk's jaw dropped. "He—— And you're being so very obliging as to let him?"

"It is precisely what I wish him to do. By hedge or by stile, I must get Coate into that cavern. I've been in the deuce of a puzzle to know how to do it—till I hit upon this notion. I believe it will answer: if it doesn't, the lord only knows what's to be done next!"

"Just what do you think will happen?" enquired Chirk, regarding him with a fascinated eye.

"Well, setting myself in Coate's place, it's as plain as a pikestaff I must be disposed of. I'm working with the Redbreast; I know too much. It may be dangerous to kill me, but it would be far more dangerous to let me live to tell Stogumber the gold is hidden in a cavern here. Furthermore, Coate knows I came here unexpectedly, and that I'm a stranger to everyone in Crowford, and he might well think that no one would feel any particular degree of surprise if I were to vanish as suddenly as I appeared. I think, then, that Henry will keep his tryst with me, and will lead me to the cavern."