The Deemster Part 50

Presently there came up to them from the bay, over the dull rumble of the waves on the sh.o.r.e, a quick creaking sound, followed by a splash and then a dead roll. They knew it was the anchor being slipped to its berth. Soon afterward there came from the land to the south the sharp yap of dogs, followed at a sharp interval by the heavy beat of a horse's hoofs on the road. Was it Teare with the horse? Was he pursued? The men listened, but could hear no other noise. Then there came through the dense air the m.u.f.fled sound of a bell ringing at the quay. It was the first of three bells that were rung on the c.u.mberland packet immediately before it set sail.

The horse behind drew nearer, the bell in front rang again. Then Teare came up leading a big draft mare by the bridle. He had been forced to take it from the stable at Lague, and in getting it away he had aroused the dogs; but he had not been followed, and all was safe. The bell rang a third time, and immediately a red light crept out from the quay toward the sea, which lay black as a raven below. The c.u.mberland packet had gone.

At that moment Corkell and Davy Fayle returned, Corkell holding Davy by the neck of his guernsey. The lad had begun to give signs of a mutinous spirit, which the man had suppressed by force. Davy's eyes flashed, but he was otherwise quiet and calm.

"What for is all this, you young devil?" said Quilleash. "What d'ye mean? Out with it, quick! what tricks now? D---- his fool's face, what for does he look at me like that?"

"Dowse that, Billy, and bear a hand and be quiet," said Crennell.

"The young pauper's got the imperence of sin," said Quilleash.

Then the man lifted Dan on to the back of the big mare, and strapped him with his covered face to the sky. Never a word was spoken to him, and never a word did he speak.

"Let's make a slant for it," said Teare, and he took the bridle. Corkell and Crennell walked on either side of the horse. Quilleash walked behind, carrying the fowling-piece over his left shoulder. Davy was at his right hand.

The journey thereafter was long and heavy. They took the path that is to the north by Barrule and Clag Ouyre and runs above Glen Auldyn and winds round to the south of Snaefell. Ten miles they plodded on in the thick darkness and the cold, with only the rumbling rivers for company, and with the hidden mountains making unseen ghosts about them. On they went, with the horse between them, taking its steady stride that never varied and never failed, even when the rivers crossed the path and their own feet stumbled into ruts. On and on, hour after hour, until their weary limbs dragged after them, and their gossip ceased, and even their growling and quarreling was no more heard. Then on and still on in the gruesome silence.

Under the breast of Snaefell they came into the snow of two days ago, which had disappeared in the valleys but still lay on the mountains, and was now crisp under their feet. It seemed, as they looked down in the darkness, to pa.s.s beneath them like short, smoky vapor that dazed the eyes and made the head giddy. Still higher, the sound of running waters suddenly stopped, for the rivers were frozen and their voices silenced.

But the wind blew more strongly as they ascended the chill heights.

Sometimes at the top of a long rise they stopped to breathe the horse, and then, with no sound above or around except the shrill sough of the wind in the gorse, their courage began to fail. Ghostly imaginings would not be kept down.

"Did you ever hear the Lockman!" said Crennell beneath his breath.

"I never come agen him," said Quilleash. "When I see anything at night on the mountains I allis lave it alone."

The other men shuddered, and forthwith began to whistle right l.u.s.tily.

Sometimes they pa.s.sed a mountain sheep-pen, and the sheep being disturbed, would bleat. Sometimes a dog at a distant house would hear them and bark; and even that, though it was a signal of danger, was also a sort of human companionship on the grim mountain-side.

It was a dreary walk, and to Dan, bound hand and foot on the horse, it was a painful ride--a cold one it could not be, for the awkward motion brought warmth. The night wore on, and the air grew keener; the men's beards became crisp with the frost.

At length the silent company rounded Snaefell to the north of Cronk-y-Vane and Beinn-y-Phott. Then Teare at the horse's head twisted about. "Do we take the ould mine-shed for it?" he asked.

"Ay," said Quilleash.

Their journey was almost ended. The sky over the sea behind them was then dabbled with gray, and a smell of dawn was coming down from the mountains.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

A RUDE TRIBUNAL

The course taken by the coroner and his seven men, with Mona on the horse, came to a triangle of mountain-paths above a farm known as the Sherragh Vane. One path wound close under the west foot of Snaefell, another followed the bed of the river that ran through a glen called Crammag, and the third joined these two by crossing the breast of Beinn-y-Phott. At the acute angle of the Sherragh Vane the coroner drew up.

"Can any one see the lead shaft?" he asked. None could see it. The darkness had lifted away, and the crown of Snaefell was bare against the sky, like an islet of green floating over a cloud of vapor. But the mists still lay thick on the moorlands, and even the high glens were obscure.

"It must be yonder, about a mile and a half up the river," said the coroner.

The lead mine was in the southeast angle of the triangle of paths, under the southwest of Snaefell and the north of Beinn-y-Phott. For some minutes the company was at a stand while the coroner considered their movements.

Mona's impatience was manifest. "Let us push on," she said.

The coroner merely eyed her largely, and resumed his deliberations.

"Oh! how we waste our time," she said again. "If the lead mine is there, what have we to do but reach it?"

The coroner with an insolent smile inquired if the lady felt the cold.

"He is in danger for his life, and here we waste the precious minutes in idle talk," she answered.

"Danger for his life," the coroner echoed, and laughed coldly. Then in a tone of large meaning he added, "Possible, possible," and smiled at his own subtle thought.

Mona's anxiety mastered her indignation.

"Look, the mist is lifting. See, there is the shed--there in the gap between the hills, and it is the very place I saw. Come, make haste--look, it is daylight."

"Be aisy, be aisy. If they're in yonder shed, they are packed as safe as herrings in a barrel," said the coroner.

Then he divided his forces. Three men he sent down the path of the Glent Crammag. Two he left where they then stood to guard that outlet to the Curraghs of the north and west. Two others were to creep along the path under Snaefell, and shut out the course to the sea and the lowlands on the south and east. He himself would walk straight up to the shed, and his seven men as they saw him approach it were to close quickly in from the three corners of the triangle.

"Is it smoke that's rising above the shed? A fire? Possible. He thinks he's safe, I'll go bail. Och! yes, and maybe eating and drinking and making aisy. Now, men, away with you."

Within the shed itself at that moment there was as grim a scene as the eye of man has yet looked upon. The place was a large square building of two rooms, one on the ground-level and the other above it, the loft being entered by a trap in the floor with a wooden ladder down the wall.

It had once served as gear-shed and office, stable, and store, but now it was bare and empty. In the wall looking east there was a broad opening without door, and in the wall looking north a narrow opening without window. To a hasp in the jamb of the doorway the big mare was tethered, and in the draught between the two openings the lad Davy with wandering mind was kindling a fire of gorse over two stones. The smoke filled the place, and through its dense volumes in the dusk of that vaporous dawn the faces of the men were bleared and green and haggard.

The four fishermen stood in a group together, with old Quilleash a pace to the fore, the fowling-piece in his hand, its b.u.t.t on the ground.

Before him and facing him, two paces in front, stood Dan, his arms still bound to his sides, his head uncovered, and his legs free. There was a gaunt earnestness in every face.

"Listen to me," said old Quilleash. "We're going to judge and jury you, but all fair and square, as G.o.d is above us, and doing nothing that we can't answer for when the big day comes and every man has to toe his mark. D'ye hear what we're saying, sir?"

Dan hoved his head slightly by way of a.s.sent.

"We've trapped you, it's true, and fetched you by force, that's sartin; but we mean to be just by you, and no violence; and it's spakin' the truth we're going to do, and never a word of a lie."

The other men muttered "Ay, ay;" and Quilleash went on: "We're chaps what believes in a friend, and buckin' up for them as bucks up for you, and being middlin' stanch, and all to that; but we're after doing it once too often."

"So we are," said Crennell, and the others muttered again, "Ay, ay."

Quilleash spat behind his hand and continued: "The long and short of it is that you're goin' middlin' straight for hanging us, and it isn't natheral as we're to stand by and see it done."

Dan lifted his face from the ground. "I meant to do you no harm, my good fellows," he said, quickly.

"Meaning's meaning, but doing's doing, and we've heard all that's going," said Quilleash. "You've surrendered and confessed, and the presentment is agen us all, and what's in for you is in for us."

"But you are innocent men. What need you fear?"