Part 8 (1/2)

”Yes.”

”That is the sixth man. He came to Tresco while I was in London. I found him here when I came back two days ago. But I had seen him before. He had come to Tres...o...b..fore. His name is George Glen.”

”George Glen!” said I. ”Wait a bit,” and I took another look at the man in the kitchen. ”He was quartermaster with Adam Mayle at Whydah, eh? He is the stranger you brought over to St. Mary's Church on the day when Cullen Mayle sat in the stocks.”

”Yes,” said d.i.c.k, and he asked me how I knew.

”Clutterbuck told me,” I replied.

From the inn we walked some few yards along a lane until we were free of the cottages, and then leaving the path, mounted inland up a hill of gorse. d.i.c.k gave me on the way an account of his journey homewards and the difficulties he had surmounted. I paid only an indifferent attention to his story, for I was wholly occupied with George Glen's presence upon the island. Glen had come first of all to visit Adam Mayle, and was now watching for Cullen. What link was there between his two visits? I was inclined to think that George Glen was the clue to the whole mystery. In spite of my inattention, I gathered this much however from d.i.c.k. That tramp of his to London was well known throughout the islands. His mother had given him up for dead when he went away, and had thrashed him soundly when he returned, but the next day had made him out a great hero in her talk. She did not know why he went to London, for d.i.c.k had the discretion to hold his tongue upon that point.

So much Parmiter had told me when he suddenly stopped and listened. I could hear nothing, however much I strained my ears, and in a moment or two d.i.c.k began to move on. The mist was very thick about us--I could not see a yard beyond my nose; but we were now going down hill, so that I knew we had crossed the ridge of the island and were descending towards the harbour of New Grimsby and the house under Merchant's Rock.

We had descended for perhaps a couple of hundred yards; then d.i.c.k stopped again. He laid a hand upon my arm and dragged me down among the gorse, which was drenched with the fog.

”What is it?” said I.

”Hush,” he whispered; and even as he whispered I saw a sort of brown radiance through the fog a long way to my left. The next instant a speck of clear light shone out in the heart of this radiance: it was the flame of a lantern, and it seemed miles away. I raised myself upon my elbows to watch it. d.i.c.k pulled my elbow from beneath me, and pressed me down flat in the gra.s.s; and it was fortunate that he did, for immediately the lantern loomed out of the fog not a dozen yards away. I heard it rattle as it swung, and the man who carried it tramped by so near to me that if I had stretched out my hand I could have caught him by the ankle and jerked him off his feet. It was the purest good fortune that he did not detect us, and we lay very still until the rustle of the footsteps had altogether died away.

”Is that one of them?” I asked.

”Yes; William Blads. He lodges with Mrs. Crudge next to our cottage.”

We continued to descend through the gorse for another quarter of an hour or so until an extraordinary sound at our feet brought us both to an halt. It was the strangest melancholy screeching sound that ever I had heard: it was so harsh it pierced the ears; it was so wild and eerie that I could hardly believe a voice uttered it. It was like a shrill cry of pain uttered by some live thing that was hardly human.

It startled me beyond words, and the more so because it rose out of the fog directly at our feet. d.i.c.k Parmiter trembled at my side.

”Quick,” he whispered in a shaking voice; ”let us go! Oh, let us go!”

But he could not move for all his moaning. His limbs shook as though he had the fever; terror chained him there to the ground. Had I not known the boy under other circ.u.mstances, I should have set him down for a coward.

I took a step forward. d.i.c.k caught hold of my arm and muttered something, but his voice so wavered and gasped I could not distinguish what he said. I shook his arm off, and again stepped forward for one, two, three paces. As I took the third pace the ground suddenly sloped, my feet slipped on the wet gra.s.s; I let go of my valise, and I fell to my full length upon my back, and slid. And the moment I began to slide my feet touched nothing. I caught at the gra.s.s, and the roots of it came away in my hands. I turned over on my face. Half my body was now hanging over the edge. I hung for a second by my waist, and as I felt my waist slipping, I struck out wildly upon each side with my arms. My right arm struck against a bush of gorse; I seized hold of it, and it bent, but it did not break. I lifted a knee carefully, set it on the edge, and so crawled up the slope again.

d.i.c.k was lying on his face peering down towards me.

”My G.o.d,” said he, ”I thought you had fallen;” and reaching out his hands, he caught both my arms as though he was afraid I should slip again. ”Oh, quick,” he said, ”let us go!”

And again I heard the shrill screech rise up from that hollow into which I had so nearly fallen. It was repeated and repeated with a regular interval between--an interval long enough for d.i.c.k to reiterate his eager prayer.

”It has begun again,” said I.

”It has never ceased since we first heard it,” said d.i.c.k, and no doubt he spoke the truth; only I had been deaf to it from the moment my foot slipped until now. ”Let us go,” and picking up my valise he hurried me away, turning his head as he went, shuddering whenever he heard that cry.

”But it may be some one in distress--some one who needs help.”

”No, no,” he cried; ”it is no one. I will tell you to-morrow.”

We skirted the top of the hollow, and once more descended. The fog showed no sign of clearing, but Parmiter walked with an a.s.sured tread, and in a little time he began to recover his spirits.

”We are close to the house,” said he.