CHAPTER XXXIII

ONE CRIME LEADS TO ANOTHER

Pasco remained in the dark in his house for about half an hour, waiting till he supposed that Jason was far away. He allowed him time to harness his ass, put it into the cart, and depart. He went once or twice to the door to listen, but did not venture to open it, lest Jason should be without, and should take advantage of the occasion to burst in. He remained all the while bathed in a clammy sweat, his hair stuck to his skull as though plastered about his temples with fish-glue, he felt it heavy and dank on his head like a cap.

Repeatedly did he try to collect his thoughts and to coolly consider whether it were not advisable for him, under the circumstances, to abandon his scheme. But his thoughts were in a condition of dislocation, he could not gather them and fit them together into consecutive order. He felt himself impelled, having formed his resolve, to proceed with it, and to leave to the future the removal of such difficulties as might spring up, as came in his way.

He was restless, yet afraid to be stirring. He was impatient for the time to pass, and counted the ticks of the clock, yet forgot after a few minutes the number he had reached.

The seat was hard and bruised him, he leaned back, and his back ached. He held out his hand, placed it on the table and endeavoured to steady it. He was aware that it shook, and he used all the power of his will to arrest its convulsive quiver, but ineffectually. At length, unable longer to endure inaction, and convinced that sufficient time had elapsed for his brother-in-law to have got away, he cautiously unlocked the door and looked out.

In the dark he could see no one; he listened and could hear no sound.

Then he stepped back to the kitchen table and removed the candle-end from the stick, and put it into his pocket. No sooner had he reached the door again, however, than it occurred to him that a candlestick without a tallow candle in it, if left on the table, would attract attention and comment. He therefore returned for it, and placed it on the mantelshelf above the hearth. In doing this he knocked over a canister that fell at his feet. He groped and found the canister; the cover had come off, and some of the contents were spilled. This was gunpowder. Greatly disconcerted, Pasco felt for a brush and swept all the grains he could into the hollow of his hand, and shook them into his trousers-pocket, then he swept the brush vigorously about, so as to disperse over the floor any particles that had escaped him in the dark. After which he proceeded carefully to replace the canister. He now again made his way to the door, passed without, locked the door behind him, and placed the key in a hollow above the lintel, known to Zerah and himself.

Then he stealthily crossed the yard to his great warehouse, but at every second step turned his ears about, listening for a sound which might alarm him.

He did not breathe freely till he was within his store. He had not locked it—indeed, of late he had been wont to leave it unfastened, labouring under the hope that the hint thrown out to Roger Redmore might be taken by the fellow, thus relieving himself of his self-imposed task.

Without, there was a little light from the grey sky. Within was none. What amount might have found its way in through the window was excluded by the sacking that Pasco had nailed over the opening.

He now proceeded to light his candle end. When the wick was kindled, he looked about him timidly, then with more confidence; lastly with a sensation of great regret and even pity for the fabric in which he had so long stored his supplies that he retailed to the neighbourhood.

But no thought of retreat came over his mind now, he was impelled forward irresistibly. The doubt was past that had tortured him, after his interview with Jason Quarm.

He stuck the candle-end upon the ground, and went about among the coals, examining the places where he had put the shavings, adding here and there some bits of stick, or rearranging the coals, and then strewing over them the contents of his out-turned pocket. Then he sat down and panted. He must rest a moment and wipe his brow before the irrevocable act was accomplished.

Presently, slowly, painfully, he rose from the block of coal on which he had seated himself. The sack lay hard by into which he had stuffed the shavings. It was now empty.

He took up the candle-end and went towards the nearest mass of shavings, stooped—the grease ran over his fingers. The wick had become long and the flame burnt dull. He thought to snuff it with his fingers, but they shook too much to be trusted. He might extinguish the flame, and he shuddered at the thought of being left there—in his old storehouse—in the dark. He again set down the candle, and with a bit of stick beat the red wick, and struck off sparks from it, till he had somewhat reduced the length of the snuff.

He was about to take up the candle to apply it to the shavings, when he heard a sound—a strange grating, rattling sound behind him.

He looked round, but could see nothing, his great body was between the light and the rear of the shed, whence the sound proceeded. He was too much alarmed to perceive the cause of the obscurity. Then he heard a voice—

“Pasco, I never thought you a scoundrel till now—but now I know it.”

Pepperill recognised the voice at once—it was that of Jason Quarm.

Immediately he realised the situation. Expelled from Coombe Cellars, debarred from sheltering in his own house, Quarm had entered the store-shed, and had climbed the ladder into the loft to lie among the wool, and there sleep.

A sudden wild, fierce thought shot through Pasco’s brain like the flash of summer lightning. He sprang to his feet. The terror that had momentarily unnerved him passed away. Leaving the candle burning on the ground, without a word, he strode to the ladder, which Quarm was descending laboriously, owing to his lameness.

With clenched teeth and contracted brow, and with every muscle knotted like cord, Pepperill threw himself on the ladder, just as Jason got his head below the opening of the loft, and shook it.

“For Heaven’s sake! what are you about?” screamed Jason.

“I’ll rid myself of a danger,” answered Pasco between his teeth and lips, indistinctly, and he twisted the ladder, and kicked at its feet to throw it down.

“Pasco, let go! Pasco, will you kill me?” shrieked the crippled man, catching ineffectually at the floor through which he had crawled, then clutching the side of the ladder.

Pepperill uttered an oath; he ran under the ladder, set his back against it and kicked with his heels.

“Pasco! I’ll not tell—I swear!”

“I won’t give you the chance,” gasped Pepperill. The ladder was reeling, sliding, the feet were slipping on the slate floor. A piercing scream, and down came ladder and man upon Pasco, throwing him on his knees, but precipitating the unfortunate cripple with a crash on the pavement.

Pepperill, though shaken and bruised, was not seriously hurt. He gathered himself up, stretched his limbs, felt his arms, and with lowering brow stepped towards his prostrate brother-in-law, who lay on his back, his arms extended, the hands convulsively contracted. His chin was up, and the dim glow of the candle cast its light below the chin, and had no rays for the upper portion of the face.

Pepperill felt in his pocket for the lucifer matches, and, stooping over Quarm, lit one, and passed the flame over his countenance. Jason was apparently insensible. Blood was flowing from his mouth at the corners. The flame of the match was reflected in the white of the upturned eyes.

Pasco held the match till it burnt his fingers, then he let it fall, and remained considering for a moment. Should he let his brother-in-law lie where he was? Could he be sure that he would not awake from a momentary daze caused by the blow on his head as he fell on the stone floor?

Pasco picked up a huge lump of coal and stood over Jason, ready to dash it down on his head, and make sure of his not awaking. But though his heart was hard, and he was launched on a course of crime, yet conscience makes strange distinctions in crime, and shrinks from doing boldly the evil at which it aims covertly.

Pasco laid aside the block of coal. He would not dash out his brother-in-law’s brains, but he would by other means make sure that he should not rouse to give him future trouble.

He took the sack, in which had been the shavings, and proceeded to thrust into it the legs of Quarm, who offered no more resistance than would a dead man, and gave no sign of consciousness. With much labour, Pasco drew the sack up, enclosing the body; he pulled down the arms and forced them into the sack also. But he was unable to envelop Jason completely. The sack was not of sufficient length for the purpose. It reached to his breast and elbows only.

There was a rope hanging in the store to a crook in the wall. Pepperill disengaged this, and with the cord bound Jason’s feet, then tightly strapped him about the arms so as to make it impossible for him to free himself, should he return to consciousness.

The exertion used by Pasco had steadied his nerves. He no longer trembled. His hand had ceased to shake, and his heart no longer contracted with fear.

Greatly heated by his labour, he stood up and wiped his brow with his sleeve. Then he was aware of a cool current of air wafting across him, and he saw that in this same current the candle-flame consumed its wick and swaled away profusely. He turned in the direction of the draught, and found that the door into the shed was partly open. He had not locked it when he entered, but had closed it. The night wind had swung it ajar, and then by its own weight it had opened farther. Pepperill shut it again, and placed a lump of coal against the foot to prevent a recurrence of the same thing.

As he returned to where Jason lay, he heard a slight noise overhead, and saw a white and black pigeon perched on a swinging pole.

The bird was young. It had been given to Pasco the week before, as he had expressed a wish to have pigeons. He had shut the bird up in his shed to accustom it to regard the shed as its home, and to remain there. He had fed the bird himself with crumbs, and had entertained an affection for it.

Now a qualm came over his heart. He could not bear to think of this innocent bird falling a victim. He had compunction for the pigeon, none for the unconscious Jason. Therefore, rolling a barrel under the perch, he climbed upon it, captured the sleep-stupid bird and carried it between his hands to the door, pushed aside the lump of coal, and threw the pigeon into the open air without.

That act of mercy accomplished, he shut the door and went back to where the candle was. This he now detached from the floor and the mass of melted tallow around it, and applied the flame to one, then to another, of the little parcels of combustibles in various places. Flames danced about, and for a minute Pasco looked on with satisfaction, assuring himself that the shavings had ignited the sticks, and the sticks had kindled the coals. When well satisfied that all was as he desired, he knelt down, and by sheer force rolled the heavy, lifeless body of Jason Quarm from the floor, up the slope of the coals, and lodged it among large blocks on the top.

Then Pepperill turned, extinguished his candle, went out through the door, locked it, and started at a run across the fields in the direction whence he had come an hour before.