Part 11

“Mr. Bradbury,” said my uncle coolly, “your coming’s most inopportune!”

“I realise it,” Mr. Bradbury agreed readily. “Most inopportune!”

“My father’s sudden seizure! He’s nigh to death.”

“My profound sympathy, sir, with you in your natural grief. My profound sympathy! Pray conduct me to him!”

“Mr. Bradbury, you assume an extraordinary air of authority,” my uncle protested. “My father cannot see you.”

“Authority!” said Mr. Bradbury, coldly. “My dear sir, I take my authority from my clients. I take it from Mr. Edward Craike. I am here to act at once in his interests, and in the interests of my client here, Mr. John Craike.”

The gentleman faced him, and barred his way. He said, “I regret, Mr. Bradbury, that you cannot see my father.”

“And I say to you, Mr. Craike, that I insist on seeing him.”

“By gad, sir, you insist! Will you force your way to him, dying?”

“I ask you, sir, to spare me the necessity. I am here this night by Mr. Craike’s desire, expressed to me on my lash visit. His business with me, he instructed me, would be of supreme importance.”

“I tell you he’s near death.”

“Who then?” said Mr. Bradbury, with a wave of his hand, “should give orders in this house except his grandson and heir?”

I heard the mutter of voices and the shrill, crackling laughter from the door; I saw my uncle’s eyes blaze at me like gems; the woman Barwise glare at me and clench her hands in her skirts. I took my cue instantly from Mr. Bradbury. “And I,” I said, “insist that Mr. Bradbury accompany me at once to my grandfather. Come, sir!”

My uncle looked upon me; the mask was lifted; and all his hate of me was revealed upon his face. I took a candle from the shelf, and signed to Mr. Bradbury to follow me. I thought that Charles Craike would bar my way, or strike me down, or cry out to the rogues not to let me pass; to my amaze my uncle stepped aside with a contemptuous bow.

“Bid your men follow us!” I said to Mr. Bradbury; so we went out among the rogues in the hall, and up the stairway and by the gallery to my grandfather’s room.

“Wait here,” said Mr. Bradbury to his men; and opening the door, drew back the curtain and stepped with me into the room. My grandfather, wrapped in his gown, lay in his chair. He seemed the very figure of death; the candlelight and the dancing fire showed his face livid; his eyes staring at us were anguished; no one was with him except Thrale, who held a glass. My grandfather’s hands gripped the arms of his chair; the sweat dripped from his face. All the while the lamenting winds were beating on the windows, the curtains of the bed were waving; the flickering lights and shadows dancing a ghostly dance about the room. His voice came gasping. “Bradbury! Ah, not too late,—though death’s crying out for me this night.”

“I am here,” said Mr. Bradbury simply, “somewhat ahead of the appointed time, Mr. Craike. I have with me the document drawn in accordance with your instructions. I ask but your approval and signature, sir. Go, Thrale! Your grandson, sir, must not remain.”

“Nay, bid him wait outside the door. Go, lad, go!”

I went out after Thrale, and Mr. Bradbury locked the door upon me. I waited in the corridor with the three fellows standing grim about me. I wondered that presently Mr. Bradbury should summon the two runners into the room, leaving me with his third attendant. I heard the tempest battering upon the old house, and shuddered for the deathly chill of the corridor and for the shadows seeming to cower beyond the radius of the candlelight. The tall fellow by me was growling presently at my ear, “D’ye not know me, master? Roger Galt, as got ye out of the Stone House. Didn’t think to see me here, did ye? ‘Set a thief to catch a thief,’ says Mr. Bradbury. Hist!”

_Chapter XXX_. _Not Yet_

But ere I might question Roger Galt, I saw my uncle come swiftly out of the darkness of the corridor; remarking me holding a candle high he gave me not a word and only a malignant glance, and without knocking he would have thrust open the door. But Mr. Bradbury had turned the key; and the gentleman turning to me, his face revealing his rage, though his voice was smooth, he said, “So, nephew, though you’re heir of Craike, you permit Bradbury to lock you out in the cold! What’s the gentleman’s business then?”

“Business at which he’d not have you or me disturb him,” I answered.

He assented, “Ay, no doubt! But would he keep me from my father’s death-bed?”—and knocked angrily upon the door.

Awhile Mr. Bradbury paid no heed; my uncle, knocking repeatedly and failing to obtain an answer, drew away from the door; and, mastering his choler, said quizzically to me, “Well for you, John, you’re telling yourself, no doubt, that Bradbury and his hinds found their way into this house to-night. You’re bidding fair to lose your guardian and protector—eh?”

“Well for me,” I answered, “as you know, sir.”

“And does Bradbury think to keep me shivering here?”—he was beginning, but ceased, as Mr. Bradbury unlocked the door.

“Your pardon, Charles,” said Mr. Bradbury, smoothly, “but my business with your father was private and particular. Pray step in! Your natural anxiety may be allayed. You’ll find Mr. Craike much easier in mind and body,”—smiling blandly, and ushering my uncle into the room. The thief-catchers coming out, he bade them await him. “Pray step in, Mr. John,” he said to me, laying his hand upon my arm, and leading me in at my uncle’s heels.

My grandfather lay in his chair; though he was ghastly of look, and his body was propped up with cushions, his sweating had ceased; his eyes, if dull, were sane and steady. My uncle, looking down on him, assured him, “I’m happy to see you better, sir! Shall I ring for Thrale? Were there a physician within miles—”

“No! When I need Thrale, I’ll ring,” the old man answered huskily. “But hark ’ee, Charles, hark ’ee”—seeming to labour with his speech, his hands shaking on the arms of his chair.

“I listen, sir,” said Charles.

“Ay, that’s well! You thought me broken, Charles!”

“I am so much relieved that—”

“Oh, ay! We’re all liars, Charles! I promise there was a pretty to-do, when I was taken sick.”

“The natural alarm of your old servants.”

“I picture ’em,” he croaked, chuckling, “thinking me dying. Plotting mutiny, and robbing me of what I have; thinking to lay hands on what they’ve itched for all these years.”

“Sir, you agitate yourself unnecessarily,” Charles protested. “Let me ring for Thrale to help you to bed.”

“No. I’ll have the boy by me. Richard’s son. Hey, Bradbury, you’re going and will soon be back?”

“Immediately I have carried out your instructions, Mr. Craike,” said Mr. Bradbury.

“Ay, and you’ll be careful lest Charles or any of ’em seek to rob you by the way,”—chuckling to himself.

“Sir, you wrong me cruelly,” said Charles.

“Take a message down to ’em, Charles,” said the old man malignantly. “This from me—two words, ‘Not yet!’”—and chuckled still; and huskily went on, “Not a night in all my years of sailing they’d not have made an end of me, had they known me sick and broken as they think me now. If I’d have died to-night, they’d have been drunk by now on the best from my cellars; they’d have been searching all over the house for what they’ll never get. Give ’em the words from me, Charles! Not yet!”

“And pray give them this from me, Mr. Charles—under authority from their master,” cried Mr. Bradbury, “that with this night there’s an end of their doings in this house. Tell them that, though I go, I return to make an end!”

“You go!” my uncle repeated, smiling on Mr. Bradbury, “and you return! Surely, Bradbury.”

I had a notion instantly that he contemplated directing attack on Mr. Bradbury, believing that the gentleman bore with him the secret of my grandfather’s hoard—if there were hoard. Or, indeed, that my uncle had remained downstairs after us to give instructions to the stouter rogues.

“I go armed and with my men armed,” said Mr. Bradbury significantly. “Let them understand this for an obvious reason, Charles. And that I have friends at hand. With whom I shall return. Come, John!”

“Nay, the boy stays by me,” my grandfather piped from his chair.

“My dear sir,” said Mr. Bradbury, taken aback.

“John stays by me! Or by God, Bradbury, I’ll—I’ll—you’ll not take away—what you take! Charles, but those words ‘Not yet!’ and there’s not a dog among ’em shall bark this night. Am I not master yet? Am I not, Bradbury?”

He grew so violent, the blood rushing to his face, the sweat starting from him, that Mr. Bradbury hastened to pacify him. “Surely, sir, surely,” he said, “Mr. John will stay, if you’ll have it so.”

“I’ll have it so! Hark ’ee, John, are you afraid to watch the night through with me?”

“I’m not afraid,” I lied. “To be sure I’ll stay!”—though I was shaking in my shoes, and would have given much to be out of the house with Mr. Bradbury.

He nodded approval. He muttered, “Bradbury, I’ve thought to die on a night like this! To go out on the storm. Hark to the wind and the voices in it! And the wind blows from the sea. Oh, God, there’s many a soul of the dead men out of the sea rides with the wind to-night!”

“Sir,” cried Mr. Bradbury, shuddering, “the dead shall not rise from the sea till the last trump sound!”

“I’ll have the boy by me,” the old man whispered. “I’ll have him watch. I’ll lie upon my bed; I’ll rest—if he’ll watch by me.”

“Surely, sir,” said Charles, “I am willing to sit with you!”

“I’ll have the boy,” he growled. “Not you—John here!”

Mr. Bradbury, securing his cloak about him, said in a clear voice, though he looked uneasily at me, “Then, sir, I take my leave of you. Mr. John Craike shall stay by you. But, Charles, let this be known among the folk of this house—it’s no time to mince words: if any harm come to him, I’ll have the reckoning. Gentlemen, I go, and I’ll return with all the speed I may. Good night! Charles, pray, will you light me down the stair?”

_Chapter XXXI_. _The Night Watch_

Now the event proved the truth of my assumption that Mr. Bradbury had about him that which he was eager to convey immediately from the house to safety, lest Charles, or Blunt, or any other rogues should lay their hands upon it. He feared to leave me in the house, but believing that my grandfather had a secret purpose in his insistence, he consented, thinking to return speedily with assistance.

My grandfather cried out to my uncle, as he took my candle to light Mr. Bradbury from the room, “You’ll not return, Charles, unless I ring!”

Charles, eyeing him askance, nodded, and went out with Mr. Bradbury.

My grandfather, looking cunningly at me, chuckled and muttered, “Good lad! Good lad! You’re not afraid of Charles. You’ll profit by stayin’. Hey, you will! We’ll have the merriest of nights of it. Hark to the wind on the house. Like as if the crew below were knocking. Lock the door and bar it!”

I sped to the door and turned the key, and set the iron bar across it in its sockets, noting how massive was the door, and how great the lock; feeling safer then, though dreading the mad humour of my grandfather.

As I would have sat down, he called out, “Find the bottle and the glasses. Pour me a dram! Pour yourself a dram; ’twill put heart in you.”

Taking bottle and glasses from the press, I poured the drink; he took his glass in his shaking hand and raised it to his lips, but scarcely tasted the liquor, muttering to me, “Drink, lad! You’re not afraid of your grog, are ye? You can carry it.”

I made pretence of drinking the fiery stuff; and piling up the fire, I sat down facing him. He remained mute awhile thence, his head poked forward, and his look intent, as though he listened for sounds below. But no sound rose distinguishable from the tumult of the wind; ever the wind cried out, and beat upon the windows; and the moon, breaking from the driving clouds, illumined the green panes; the lashing ivy cutting its pale gleam. Weird lights and shadows flickered on the floor, and seemed to glide towards the bed, cower and leap back, as the clouds took the moon once more, and darkness fell without. So with the fitful moon, the waving candles and the leaping fire, the whole room seemed awhirl with ghostly lights and shadows; and with the draughts, the curtains of the bed, the tapestries upon the walls, continually were stirred; rustled and flapped like wings, or bulged as though some rogue or visitant were secreted behind them. I sat and shivered by the fire, my mind oppressed with terror and forebodings.

My grandfather, breaking the silence fallen between us, muttered at last, “I’ve thought to die on such a night as this. Lad, what’s after, d’ye think? What’s after?”

I answered awkwardly, “We’re told mercy to the repentant.”

“Repentance!” he said, laughing. “What’s repentance but fear? When I was young and strong, I didn’t fear aught; I repented nothing. What use now—hey? What d’ye think?”

“I do not know. Yet—”

“Ay, to be safe, be penitent,” he mocked. “You think me near my death, lad, and I am. To-night a knife seemed to stick into my heart, and the knife’ll strike again, till my heart’s broken for the pain of it. I die, soon—maybe this night. I go into the dark. I know not whither. Repent! I’m no such fool or coward. Hey, John, but I lived my life as it pleased me, till I was old. I sinned what sins I would. Repent, ay,—and mutter prayers,—make a good death of it—for fear! I’ve had no god save my own self. I’ve owned no other judge.” He lifted up his shaking hand, and the red jewels seemed blood upon it, “For all my sins I’m ready for the reckoning, repenting nothing, unafraid!”

It seemed as though the very storm took up the challenge. For the wind smote upon the house with a great sound, as seas upon a cliff, or thunder from the heaven. The old house shuddered; the chimneys rumbled; the casement was blown back; the wind struck cold as death upon us. Instantly the candlelight was gone; the room was black save for the red glow upon the hearth; horror of darkness and chaotic sound were all about us. I started up, and rushing to the window sought to close the casement; momentarily the wind prevailed; vainly I fought against it; looking back, I saw my grandfather stagger from his chair; the red flames blowing up from the hearth seemed to burn all about him. Still his laughter sounded like a madman’s defiance to the wind.

The wind lulled for the time. I closed the casement; I hurried back to relight the candles. The curtains of the bed flapped yet like the wings of death about me. With light I saw him lying in his chair; he shuddered now; he muttered, “For the time—I thought—death came. And yet—and yet—I live!”

He remarked then the curtains moving, and pointed to the bed, “When the wind came,” he croaked, “I heard the beating of the wings of death. I saw the dark take shape and thought to die, and go out on the storm. ’Twas nothing—nothing but the curtains and the darkness and the cold! Ay, ay, though never have I known ghosts or terrors in the dark and storm until to-night . . . I could tell you . . . We were off the Cape just such a night, with the winds and the seas sounding so. I remember them—Barwise and Thrale and the rest—crying out, and comin’ scuttlin’ all about me. They’d seen the ghost-ship—the Dutch ship—that seeks to weather the Cape, while time is. I remember the moon riding white through the clouds, as it rides this night. Ay, they vowed that they saw the Dutchman still, the ghosts on the decks, and the lights burning blue,—we’d never make port again, they swore; and they all fell to prayers—Barwise and Thrale and the rest. They to pray! But I said no prayers. For I saw no phantom-ship. And I brought my own ship safe to port. . . . Hark, the wind comes again. Like voices on it! Hark!”

The wind came crying from the sea. Again it forced the casement open; as I reached the window, momentarily I saw the garden illumined by the moon. I saw dark shadows hurrying to the house; I forced the window to, believing for the instant that I had seen only the shadows of the wind-tossed trees; remembering then Blunt’s threat to take me from the house, I feared.

When I re-lit the candles, my grandfather perceived my concern, and caught me by the arm, muttering, “What did ye see? Or think to see?”

I answered, “Shadows, maybe, or men—Blunt’s men.”

“Blunt’s men? Or do ye think ’em ghosts? Why do ye look so white, lad? Why should Blunt’s men come here this night? Look again!”

Returning to the window, opening the casement, and peering down, I saw only the leaping shadows of the trees, much as those dark, hurrying figures. I called back to him, “Shadows—only shadows!” and secured the casement.

We sat in silence then by the fire. The storm was nearing its height; wave of sound following upon wave of sound as breaker upon breaker; the house appeared to reel under the succession of shocks, always the voices sounded on the wind. If there were sound below, if drunken voices, menacing voices, were uplifted, as seemed to me, I could not be assured; the wind usurped all sounds, in or without the house. My grandfather lay back in his chair with his hands clutching its arms; I saw him lift his right hand from time to time, and eye it shaking with the palsy, the red gems leaping into flame upon it; for all his will and his professed hardihood, I believed that the terror of the night grew on him, even as on me. He leaned forward at last, and quavered, “What’s death, d’ye think, lad? What comes after?”

“How can I answer? Who should tell?” I said, being in no mood now to preach faith or penitence to him.

“You’re honest!” he said, nodding. “Charles would have turned priest. Charles would have talked of Judgment Day. Ay, you’re honest! Eighty years I’ve lived, and till these weeks past never thought of what came after; or of to-morrow but as to-day or yesterday. I never thought of myself as dead. John”—with sudden starting terror—“doesn’t that show it?”

“What, sir—what?”

“When we die and rot and the worms have us, it’s not the end of us. We’re never able to think of ourselves as dead! Whether we’re strong and lusting with life, or whether we’re old and breaking, we never think of ourselves as dead. Because we never die!”

He mumbled on, “Ay, there’s voices in the wind to-night! Voices I’ve heard! I do remember a merchantman—from the East it was—and full to the decks with rich stuffs. Many folks aboard. We boarded it at noon, and we sunk it at eve. None could live; there were men aboard as had known me. I remember the sunset—blood-red it was—and the seas were like blood about us. And the great cry when the ship went down; and the crying of the wind that night, as we sailed away. How the wind cries!”

I saw the sweat again upon him. I saw his brows wet, and his wet hands stained with the red gems. He gasped, “I’ve never thought to die! . . . Ah, Christ, that I rot in the ground and end so! . . . But to blow with the winds about the world, forever about the world—knowing no rest—no rest!”

I rose and held his glass to his lips. He drank, and for the time his courage and strength were restored to him; he gibed and mocked the crying wind, the voices that were about the house, in the house; surely now I heard sounds from below, laughter, and roaring chorus of drunken voices. No one yet sought admission to the room.

Now leaning forward, plucking at my sleeve, he whispered, “You’ve been wondering why I kept you here this night?”

“Surely because you loved my father, and would have me by you! Will you not lie down on your bed and rest?”

“No! No! But to show you—give you—what’s mine, what’s to be yours. Help me up! I’m weak! I fear the pain. Bring a light, boy!”

Wondering, I gave him my arm, and propped by me he made his way from the hearth to the wall beyond his chair. I saw him clutch at the tapestry and tear it aside; the cloud of dust nigh blinded me. Drawing from my support, he tapped and clawed at the old oaken panels; they parted suddenly, revealing a deep recess in the stones of the wall. Leaning against me, he fumbled at his breast, and took forth two slim keys on a silken ribbon strung about his neck, and groped in the recess, muttering, “The light, boy! Show the light!”

And while I held the candle, I saw in the recess a little iron door built into the stone; he set a key at last in the lock, and opening the door drew out a black box. This box was deep, but of no great length; it was heavy, for he nigh dropped it when he pulled it out; he clutched it to his breast and bore it to his chair with him. He cried to me, “Pull the curtain back. Hide the panels! Come and see!”

He sat with the black box resting on his knees; it seemed of ebony, and was bound plainly with silver. He set the key in the lock, and lifted the lid. Leaning over him, I saw that the contents of the box were packed in black silk. At his word, I aided him to lift this package out, and set the box down at his feet. The silk reeked with spices; with clawing fingers he unfolded the wrapper of silk, till it draped about his knees to the hearth—a flag of black silk it seemed, wrought with a design in silver thread and ringed with silver. And suddenly the grim thing shrouded in this black silken flag, broidered with the death’s head and cross bones, lay bare to me; for he gripped between his palms a white skull. Now this skull was fashioned into the form of a casket overwrought with silver, having a silver lid upon the crown, and in the sockets of the eyes two blue jewels burning to the reflection of the candles and the fire with an unholy light. The jaws were banded with silver, so that the skull resting on his palms, grinned at me, as shuddering I drew back, and dared not look upon the old man’s face and feared his laughter. Lowering the skull upon his knees, he touched the silver crown of it with his fingers; the lid flew up; and instantly, at the wonder of it, I cried out, for it seemed that fire burned from the casket—a miracle of light and colour, as the flame upon the hearth and from the candles gave life to the gems within. My grandfather’s fingers seemed to dip in fire. He laughed to himself; he drew out wonderful gems; held them gorgeous and glowing on his palms; he let them fall back into the skull.

He muttered, “Only a little store, only a little store,—and yet half the years of my sinning, child, are told in this odd little box. I had it fashioned to my fancy; they’re rare gems for its eyes. D’ye understand what’s hid in it? D’ye understand there’s not a man but would sell his soul for what’s in this little box? D’ye see this white stone—this big white stone? Did ever the moon or the sun shine like it? Was ever blood so red as this red stone, or leaf so green as this, or ever the Main so blue? Ay, there’s diamonds, there’s rubies, emeralds and sapphires; and there’s wonderful pearls. And thirty years and odd went to fill this box. Gold and plate, and many a precious thing that was scarce safe to sell—ivory and silks and spices—ay, they’re all told in the stones of this little box. There’s been blood on these stones—many of ’em. They’ve been plucked from white necks and dead fingers—ay, many of them! Charles has lost his soul for the bare tell of ’em. All my rogues are lost for the lust of ’em—Barwise and Thrale and the rest. Knowing I held my hoard—though where ’twas hid no one knew, and feared to seek, and feared to murder me, lest where ’twas hid should never be known. Ay—What’s that?”

“Knocking upon the door!” I whispered, shuddering.