Ovington's Bank Page 16

  CHAPTER XVI

  Clement had walked with the doctor to the door and had secured a lastword with Arthur outside, but he had not ventured to enter the house,much less to ask for Josina. He knew how heavily the shock would fallon her, and his heart was wrung for her. But he knew also, or heguessed, that the poignancy of her grief would be sharpened byremorse, and he felt that in the first outburst of self-reproach hispresence would be the last she would welcome.

  It was not a pleasant thought for a lover; but then how much worse, hereflected, would it have been for her, had she never made up her mindto confession. And in his own person how much better he now stood. Hehad saved the Squire's life, and had saved it in circumstances thatmust do him credit. He had run his risks, and been put to the test,and he had come manfully out of it; and he still felt that elation ofspirit, that readiness to do and dare, to meet fresh ventures, whichattends on a crisis successfully encountered.

  He was not in a mood to be dashed by trifles therefore, or Arthur,when he came out to speak to him, would have dashed him, for Arthurwas rather short with him. "You can do nothing here," he said. "We aretumbling over one another. Get after that rascal. He has got away withfour hundred in gold and we must recover it. Watkins at the Griffinmay know where he'll make for."

  "He's in livery, isn't he?"

  "Begad, so he is! I'd not thought of that! I'll have his place watchedin case he steals back to change. But do you see Watkins."

  Clement took his dismissal meekly and went to Watkins. He soon learnedall that the inn-keeper knew, which amounted to no more than aconviction that Thomas would make for Manchester. Watkins shook hishead over the livery. The rascal was no fool; he'd have got rid ofthat. "Oh, he's a clever chap, sir, and a gallus bad one." hecontinued. "He'd talk here that daring that he'd lift the hair on myhead. But I never thought that he'd devil enough," in a tone ofadmiration, "to attack the Squire! Well, he'll swing this time, ifhe's taken! You're not in very good fettle yourself, sir. You knowthat your cheek's bleeding?"

  "It's nothing. And you think he'll make for Manchester?"

  "As sure as sure! He's done that this time, sir, as he never can besafe but in a crowd. And where'd he go but where he knows? He'll be inManchester before tomorrow night, and it'll take you all your time,sir, finding him there! It's a mortal big place, I understand, andhe'll have got rid of his livery, depend on it!"

  "I'll find him," Clement said. And he meant it. His blood was hot,he had tasted of adventure and he found it more to his liking thanday-books and ledgers. And already he had made up his mind that it washis business to pursue Thomas. He was angered by the rascal's cowardlyattack upon an old man, and were it only for that he would take him.But apart from that he saw that if he recovered the Squire's money itwould be another point to his credit--if the Squire recovered. If theold man did not, well, still he would have done something. As he rodehome, and passed the scene of the robbery, he laid his plans.

  He would leave the search in that district to the Head Constable atAldersbury. But he expected little from this. In those days if a manwas robbed it was the man's own business and that of his friends tofollow the thief and seize him if they could. In London the Bow StreetRunners saw to it, and in one or two of the big cities there werepolice officers organized on similar lines. But in the country therewere only parish constables, elderly men, often chosen because theywere past work.

  Clement knew, then, that he must rely on himself, and he tried toimagine what Thomas would do, and what route he would take if he madefor Manchester. Not through Aldersbury, for there he would run therisk of recognition. Nor would he venture into either of the directroads thence--through Congleton or by Tarporley; for it was alongthese roads that he would be likely to be followed. How, then? ThroughChester, Clement fancied. The man was already on the Chester side ofAldersbury, and he could make at once for that place, while in thefull stream of traffic between Chester and Manchester his traces wouldbe lost. Travelling on foot and by night, he might reach Chester aboutten in the morning, and probably, having money and being footsore, hewould take the first Manchester coach that left after ten.

  At this point Clement found himself crossing the West Bridge, thefaint scattered lights of the town rising to a point before him. Hisfirst business was to knock up the constable and tell his tale. Thisdone, he made for the bank, where he found the household awaiting hiscoming in some alarm, for it was close on midnight. Here he had totell his story afresh, amid expressions of wonder and pity, whileBetty fetched sponge and water and bathed his cheek; nor, modestly ashe related his doings, could he quite conceal the part that he hadplayed. The banker listened, approved, and for once experienced a newsensation. He was proud of his son. Moreover, as a dramatic sequel tothe Squire's withdrawal of the money, the story touched him home.

  Then Clement, as he ate his supper, came to his point. "I'm goingafter him," he said.

  The banker objected. "It's not your business, my lad," he said."You've done enough, I'm sure."

  "But the point is--it's bank money, sir." Clement had grown cunning.

  "It was--this morning."

  "And he was a client this morning--and may be tomorrow."

  The banker considered. There was something in that; and this suddeninterest in the bank was gratifying. Yet--yet he did not quiteunderstand it. "You seem to be confoundedly taken up with this," hesaid, "but I don't see why you need mix yourself up with it farther.The scoundrel's neck is in a halter and he won't be taken without astruggle. Have you thought of that?"

  "I'd take him if he were ten," Clement said--and blushed at his ownenthusiasm. He muttered something about the man being a villain, andthe sooner he was laid by the heels the better.

  "Yes, by someone. But I don't see why you need be the one."

  "Anyway, I'm going to do it, sir," Clement replied with unexpectedindependence. "I shall go by the Nantwich coach at half-past five,drop off at Altringham, and catch him as he goes through. True, if hegoes by Frodsham I may miss him, but I fancy that the morning coach byFrodsham leaves Chester too early for him. And, after all, I can'tstop every bolt-hole."

  Ovington wondered anew, seeing his son in a new light. This was notthe idler with his eyes on the ledger and his thoughts abroad, whom hehad known in the bank, but a young man with purpose in his glance anda cut on his cheek-bone, who looked as if he could be ugly if it cameto a pinch. A quite new Clement--or new at any rate to him.

  He reflected. The affair would be talked of, and certainly it would bea feather in the bank's cap if the money, which the Squire hadwithdrawn, were recovered through the bank's exertions. Viewed in thatlight there was method in the lad's madness, whatever had bitten him,"Well, I think it is a dangerous business," he said at last, "and itis not your business. But go, if you will, only you must take Paynewith you."

  Payne was the bank man-of-all-work, but Clement would not hear ofPayne. If he could be called at five, he asked no more. Even if allthe seats on the Victory were booked, they would find room for himsomewhere.

  "But your face?" Betty said. "Isn't it painful? It's turning black."

  "I'll bet that villain's is as black!" he retorted. "I know I got homeon him once. Only let me be called."

  But his father saw that, as he passed through the hall, he took one ofthe bank pistols out of the case in which they were kept, and slippedit into his pocket. The banker wondered anew, and felt perhaps moreanxiety than he showed. At any rate, it was he who called the lad atfive and saw that he drank the coffee that Betty had prepared, andthat he ate something. At the last, indeed, Clement feared that hisfather might offer to accompany him, but he did not. Possibly he haddecided that if his son was bent on proving his mettle in this oddbusiness, it was wisest not to balk him.

  The sun was rising as Clement's coach rattled down the Foregatebetween the old Norman towers that crown the Castle Hill, and the longaustere front of the school, with its wide low casements twinkling inthe first beams. Early milk-carts drew aside to
give the coachpassage, white-eyed sweeps gazed enviously after it, mob-caps atwindows dreamt of holidays and sighed to be on it and away. Soon itburst merrily from the crowded houses and met the morning freshnessand the open country and the rolling fields. The mists were risingfrom the valley behind, as the horses breasted the ascent above theold battle-field, swept down the farther slope, and at eight miles anhour climbed up Armour Hill between meadows sparkling with dew andcoverts flickering with conies. Down the hill at a canter, whichpresently carried it rejoicing into Wem. There the first relay waswaiting, and away again they went, bowling over the barren gorse-cladheath that brought them presently through narrow twisting streets tothe White Lion at Whitchurch. Again, "Horses on!" and merrily theytravelled down the gentle slope to the Cheshire plain, where miles ofgreen country spread themselves in the sunshine, a land of fatness andplenty, of cheese and milk and slow-running brooks. The clock onNantwich church was showing a half after eight, as with a longflourish from the bugle they passed below it, and halted for breakfastat the Crown, in the stubborn old Round-head town.

  Half an hour to refresh, topping up with a glass of famous Nantwichale, and away again. But now the sun was high, the world abroad, theroads were alive with traffic. Onwards from Nantwich, where they beganto run alongside the Ellesmere Canal, with its painted barges and gaymarket boats, the road took on a new importance, and many a smilingwayside house, Lion or Swan, cheered the travellers on their way.Spanking four-in-hands, handled by lusty coachmen, the autocratsof the road, chaises-and-four with postboys in green or yellow,white-coated farmers and parsons on hackneys, commercials in gigs, andpublicans in tax-carts, pedlars, packmen, the one-legged sailor, andPunch and Judy--all these met or passed them; and huge wains ladenwith Manchester goods and driven by teamsters in smocks with longwhips on their shoulders. And the inns! The inns, with their swayingsigns and open windows, their benches crowded with loungers and theiryards echoing with the cry of "Next team!"--the inns, with theirgroaning tables and huge joints and gleaming silver, these came sooften, swaggered so loudly, imposed themselves so royally, that halfthe life of the road seemed to be in and about them.

  And Clement saw it all and rejoiced in it all, though his eyes neverceased to search for a dour-looking man with a bruised face. Herejoiced in the cantering horses and the abounding life about him, inthe freedom of it and the joyousness of it, his pulses leaping in tunewith it; and not the less in tune, so splendid a thing is it to beyoung and in love, because he had fought a fight and slept only threehours. He watched it all pass before him, and if he had ever believedin his father's scheme of an iron way and iron horses he lost faith init now. For it was impossible to believe that any iron road runningacross fields and waste places could vie with this splendid highway,this orderly procession of coaches, travelling and stopping andmeeting with the regularity of a weaver's shuttle, these long lines ofladen wagons, these swift chaises horsed at every stage! He sawstables that sheltered a hundred roadsters and were not full; ostlersto whom a handful of oats in every peck gave a gentleman's income;teams that were clothed and curried as tenderly as children; mightycaravanserais full to the attics. A whole machinery of transportpassed under his wondering eyes, and the railway, the ValleysRailway--he smiled at it as at the dream of a visionary.

  They swept through Northwich before noon, and an hour later Clementdropped off the coach in front of the Bowling Green Inn at Altringham,and knew that his task lay before him. The little town had no church,but it boasted for its size more bustle than he had expected, and ashe eyed its busy streets and its flow of traffic his spirits sank; itdid not call itself one of the gates of Manchester for nothing.However, he had not come to stand idle, and the first step, to seekout a constable, was easy. But to secure that worthy's aid--he was buta deputy, a pot-bellied, spectacled shoemaker--was another matter. Theman rolled up his leather apron and pushed his horn-rimmed glasses onto his forehead, but he shook his head. "A very desperate villain," hesaid, "a very desperate villain! But lor', master, a dark sullen chapwith a black eye and legs a little bandy? Why, I be dark and I bebandy, and for black eyes--I'm afeared there's more than one o' thatcut on the road."

  "But not to-day," Clement urged. "He'll come through to-day orto-night."

  "Ay, and more likely night than day. But how be I to see if he's ablackened peeper in the dark! I can't haul a gentleman off a coach toask the color of his eyes."

  "Well, anyway, do your best."

  "We might bill him and cry him?"

  "That's it! Do that!" Clement saw that that was about the extent ofthe help he would get in this quarter. "Send the crier to me at theBowling Green, and I'll write a bill--Five pounds reward forinformation!"

  The constable's eyes twinkled. "Now you're on a line, master," hesaid. "Now we'll do summat, maybe!"

  Clement took the hint and bettered the line with a crownpiece, andhastening back to his inn he took seisin of a seat in the coffee roomwhich commanded the main street. Here he wrote out a bill, and bribeda waiter to keep the place for him: and in it he sat patiently,scanning every person who passed. But so many passed that an hour hadnot elapsed before he held his task hopeless, though he continued toperform it. The constable had undertaken to go round the inns and toset a watch on a side street; and the bill might do something. But hisfancy pictured half a dozen by-ways through the town, or the man mightavoid the town, or he might go by another route. Altogether it beganto seem a hopeless task, his fancied sagacity a silly conceit. But hehad undertaken the task, and as he had told his father he could notclose all holes. He could only set his snare across the largest andhope for the best.

  Presently he heard the crier ring his bell and cry his man. "Oh yes!Oh yes! Oh yes!" and the rest of it, ending with "God save the King!"And that cheered him for a while. That was something. But as hourafter hour went by and coaches, carriages, and postchaises stopped andstarted before the door, and pedestrians passed, and still no Thomasappeared--though half a dozen times he ran out to take a nearer viewof some traveller, or to inspect a slumberer in a hay-cart--he beganto despair. There were so many chances against him. So many strawsfloated by, half seen in the current.

  But Clement was dogged. He persisted, though hope had almost abandonedhim, and it was long after midnight before, sinking with fatigue, heleft his post. Even so he was out again by six, but if there wasanything of which he was now certain, it was that the villain had goneby in the night. Still he remained, his eyes roving ceaselessly overthe passers-by, who were now few, now many, as the current ran fast orslow, as some coach high-laden drew up before the door with a noisyfanfaronade, or some heavy wagon toiled slowly by.

  It was in one of these slack intervals, when the street was tolerablyempty, that his eyes fell on a man who was loitering on the other sideof the way. The man had his hands in his pockets and a straw in hismouth, and he seemed to be a mere idler; but as his eyes met Clement'she winked. Then, with an almost imperceptible gesture of the head, helounged away in the direction of the inn yard.

  Clement doubted if anything was meant, but grasping at every chance hehurried out and found the man standing in the yard, his hands in hispockets, the straw in his mouth. He was staring at an object, which,to judge from his aspect, could have no possible interest for him--apump. "Do you want me?" Clement asked.

  "Mebbe, mister. Do you see that stable?"

  "Well?"

  "D'you go in there and I'll--mebbe I'll join you."

  But Clement was suspicious. "I am not going out of sight of thestreet," he said.

  "Lord!" contemptuously. "Your man's gone these six hours. He's many amile on by now! You come into the stable."

  The fellow's looks did not commend him. He was blear-eyed andunder-sized, wearing a mangy rabbit-skin waistcoat, and no coat. Hehad the air of a postboy run to seed. Still, Clement thought it betterto go with him, and in the stable, "Be you the gent that offered fivepounds?" the man asked, turning upon him.

  "I am."

  "Then fork out, squire. Open
your purse, and I'll open my mouth."

  "If you come with me to the constable----"

  "Not I. I ben't sharing with no constable. That is flat."

  "Well, what do you know?"

  "What you want to know. Howsumdever, if you'll give me your wordyou'll act the gentleman?"

  "Who are you, my lad?"

  "Ostler at the Barley Sheaf in Malthouse Lane. You're on? Right. Isee, you're a gentleman. Well, your chap come in 'bout eleven lastnight on an empty dray from Chester. He had four sacks of corn withhim."

  "Oh, but that can't be the man!" Clement exclaimed, his face falling.

  "You listen, mister. He had four sacks of corn with him, and wagoner,he'd bargained to carry him to Manchester. But they had quarrelled,and t'other chucked off his sacks in our yard, and there was prettynigh a fight. Wagoner he went off and left him cursing, and he offeredme a shilling to find him a lift to Manchester first thing i' themorning. 'Bout daylight there come in a hay-cart, but driver'd onlytake the man and not the forage. Howsumdever, he said at last he'dtake one sack, and your chap up and asked me would I take care oft'other three till he sent for 'em. I see he was mighty keen to geton, and I sez, 'No,' sez I, 'but I'll buy 'em cheap.' 'Right,' sez he,and surprising little bones about it, and lets me have 'em cheap! Sothinks I, who's this as chucks away money, and as he climbed up Imanaged to knock off his tile and see his eye was painted, and he thevery spot of your bill! I'd half a mind to stop him, but he wasover-weight for me--I'm a little chap--and I let him go.' He addedsome details which satisfied Clement that the traveller was reallyThomas.

  "Did you hear where he was going to in Manchester?"

  "Five pound, mister!" The man held out his grimy paw.

  Clement did not like the cunning in the bleary eyes, but he had goneso far that he could hardly draw back. He counted out four one-poundnotes. "Now then?" he said, showing the fifth, but keeping a firm holdon it.

  "The lad that took him is Jerry Stott--of the Apple-Tree Inn in FennelStreet. You go to him, mister. One of these will do it."

  Clement gave him the other note. "He didn't tell you where he wasgoing?"

  "He very particlar did not. But I'm thinking you'll net him atJerry's. Do you take one of Nadin's boys. He's a desperate-lookingchap. He gave you that punch in the face, I guess?" with interest.

  "He did."

  "Ah, well, you marked him. But you get one of Nadin's boys. You'll nottake him easy."