Run to Earth, Mary Elizabeth Braddon [epub ebook reader .TXT] 📗

>in speaking to a stranger; “I’ll send you a steak and a potato as soon

as they can be cooked.”

 

Thomas Milsom nodded. He pushed open the rough wooden door which was so

familiar to him, and went into the dingy little den which, in the

‘Jolly Tar’, was known as the private parlour.

 

It was the room in which he had first seen Valentine Jernam. Two years

and a half had passed since he had last entered it; and during that

time Mr. Milsom had been paying the penalty of his misdeeds in Van

Dieman’s Land. This dingy little den, with its greasy walls and low,

smoky ceiling, was a kind of paradise to the returned wanderer. Here,

at least, was freedom. Here, at least, he was his own master: free to

enjoy strong drinks and strong tobacco—free to be lazy when he

pleased, and to work after the fashion that suited him best.

 

He seated himself in one chair, and planted his legs on another. Then

he took a short clay pipe from his pocket, filled and lighted it, and

began to smoke, in a slow meditative manner, stopping every now and

then to mutter to himself, between the puffs of tobacco.

 

Mr. Milsom had finished his second pipe of shag tobacco, and had given

utterance to more than one exclamation of anger and impatience, when

the door was opened, and Dennis Wayman made his appearance, bearing a

tray with a couple of covered dishes and a large pewter pot.

 

“I thought I’d bring you your grub myself, mate,” he said; “though I’m

precious busy in yonder. I’m uncommonly glad to see you back again.

I’ve been wondering where you was ever since you disappeared.”

 

“You’d have left off wondering if you’d known I was on the other side

of this blessed world of ours. I thought you knew I was—”

 

Mr. Milsom’s delicacy of feeling prevented his finishing this speech.

 

“I knew you had got into trouble,” answered Mr. Wayman. “At least, I

didn’t know for certain, but I guessed as much; though sometimes I was

half inclined to think you had turned cheat, and given me the slip.”

 

“Bolted with the swag, I suppose you mean?”

 

“Precisely!” answered Dennis Wayman, coolly.

 

“Which shows your suspicious nature,” returned Milsom, in a sulky tone.

“When an unlucky chap turns his back upon his comrades, the worst word

in their mouths isn’t half bad enough for him. That’s the way of the

world, that is. No, Dennis Wayman; I didn’t bolt with the swag—not

sixpence of Valentine Jernam’s money have I had the spending of; no

even what I won from him at cards. I was nobbled one day, without a

moment’s warning, on a twopenny-halfpenny charge of burglary—never you

mind whether it was true, or whether it was false—that ain’t worth

going into. I was took under a false name, and I stuck to that false

name, thinking it more convenient. I should have sent to let you know,

if I could have found a safe hand to take my message; but I couldn’t

find a living creature that was anything like safe—so there I was,

remanded on a Monday, tried on a Tuesday, and then a fortnight after

shipped off like a bullock, along of so many other bullocks; and that’s

the long and the short of it.”

 

After having said which, Mr. Milsom applied himself to his supper,

which consisted of a smoking steak, and a dish of still more smoking

potatoes.

 

Dennis Wayman sat watching him for some minutes in thoughtful silence.

The intent gaze with which he regarded the face of his friend, was that

of a man who was by no means inclined to believe every syllable he had

heard. After Milsom had devoured about a pound of steak, and at least

two pounds of potatoes, Mr. Wayman ventured to interrupt his operations

by a question.

 

“If you didn’t collar the money, what became of it?” he asked.

 

“Put away,” returned the other man, shortly; “and as safe as a church,

unless my bad luck goes against me harder than it ever went yet.”

 

“You hid it?” said Wayman, interrogatively.

 

“I did.”

 

“Where?”

 

Mr. Milsom looked at his friend with a glance of profound cunning.

 

“Wouldn’t you like to know—oh, wouldn’t you just like to know, Mr.

Wayman?” he said. “And wouldn’t you just dose me with a cup of drugged

coffee, and cut off to ransack my hiding-place while I was lying

helpless in your hospitable abode. That’s the sort of thing you’d do,

if I happened to be a born innocent, isn’t it, Mr. Wayman? But you see

I’m not a born innocent, so you won’t get the chance of doing anything

of the kind.”

 

“Don’t be a fool,” returned Dennis Wayman, in a surly tone. “You’ll

please to remember that one half of Valentine Jernam’s money belongs to

me, and ought to have been in my possession long before this. I was an

idiot to trust it in your keeping.”

 

“You trusted it in my keeping because you were obliged to do so,”

answered Black Milsom, “and I owe you no gratitude for your

confidence. I happened to know a Jew who was willing to give cash for

the notes and bills of exchange; and you trusted them to me because it

was the only way to get them turned into cash.”

 

The landlord of the ‘Jolly Tar’ nodded a surly assent to this rather

cynical statement.

 

“I saw my friend the Jew, and made a very decent bargain,” resumed

Milsom. “I hid the money in a convenient place, intending to bring you

your share at the earliest opportunity. I was lagged that very night,

and had no chance of touching the cash after I had once stowed it away.

So, you see, it was no fault of mine that you didn’t get the money.”

 

“Humph!” muttered Mr. Wayman. “It has been rather hard lines for me to

be kept out of it so long. And now you have come back, I suppose you

can take me at once to the hiding place. I want money very badly just

now.”

 

“Do you?” said Thomas Milsom, with a sneer. “That’s a complaint you’re

rather subject to, isn’t it—the want of money? Now, as I’ve answered

your questions, perhaps you’ll answer mine. Has there been much stir

down this way while I’ve been over the water?”

 

“Very little; things have been as dull as they well could be.”

 

“Ah! so you’ll say, of course. Can you tell me whether any one has

lived in my old place while my back has been turned?”

 

The landlord of the ‘Jolly Tar’ started with a gesture of alarm.

 

“It wasn’t there you hid the money, was it?” he asked, eagerly.

 

“Suppose it was, what then?”

 

“Why every farthing of it is lost. The place has been taken by a man,

who has pulled the best part of it down, and rebuilt it. If you hid

your money there, there’s little chance of your ever seeing it

again,” said Wayman.

 

Black Milsom’s dark face grew livid, as he started from his chair and

dragged on the crater coat which he had taken off on entering the room.

 

“It would be like my luck to lose that money,” he said; “it would be

just like my luck. Come, Wayman. What are you staring at, man?” he

cried impatiently. “Come.”

 

“Where?”

 

“To my old place. You can tell me all about the changes at we go. I

must see to this business at once.”

 

The moon was shining over the masts and rigging in the Pool, and over

the housetops of Bermondsey and Wapping, as Black Milsom and his

companion started on their way to the old house by the water.

 

They went, as on a former occasion, in that vehicle which Mr. Wayman

called his trap; and as they drove along the lonely road, across the

marshy flat by the river, Dennis Wayman told his companion what had

happened in his absence.

 

“For a year the house stood empty,” he said; “but at the end of that

time an old sea-captain took a fancy to it because of the water about

it, and the view of the Pool from the top windows. He bought it, and

pulled it almost all to pieces, rebuilt it, and I doubt if there is any

of the old house standing. He has made quite a smart little place of

it. He’s a queer old chap, this Cap’en Duncombe, I’m told, and rather a

tough customer.”

 

“I’ll see the inside of his house, however tough he may be,” answered

Milsom, in a dogged tone. “If he’s a tough customer, he’ll find me a

tougher. Has he got any family?”

 

“One daughter—as pretty a girl as you’ll see within twenty miles of

London!”

 

“Well, we’ll go and have a look at his place to-night. We’d better put

up your trap at the ‘Pilot Boat.’”

 

Mr. Wayman assented to the wisdom of this arrangement. The “Pilot Boat”

was a dilapidated-looking, low-roofed little inn, where there were some

tumble-down stables, which were more often inhabited by bloated grey

water-rats than by horses. In these stables Mr. Wayman lodged his pony

and vehicle, while he and Milsom walked on to the cottage.

 

“Why I shouldn’t have known the place!” cried Milsom, as his companion

pointed to the captain’s habitation.

 

The transformation was, indeed, complete. The dismal dwelling, which

had looked as if it were, in all truth, haunted by a ghost, had been

changed into one of the smartest little cottages to be seen in the

suburbs of eastern London.

 

The ditch had been narrowed and embanked, and two tiny rustic bridges,

of fantastical wood-work, spanned its dark water. The dreary pollard-willows had vanished, and evergreens occupied their places. The black

rushes had been exchanged for flowers. A trim little garden appeared

where all had once been waste ground; and a flag-staff, with a bit of

bunting, gave a naval aspect to the spot.

 

All was dark; not one glimmer of light to be seen in any of the

windows.

 

The garden was secured by an iron gate, and surrounded by iron rails on

all sides, except that nearest the river. Here, the only boundary was a

hedge of laurels, which were still low and thin; and here Dennis Wayman

and his companion found easy access to the neatly-kept pleasure-ground.

 

With stealthy footsteps they invaded Captain Duncombe’s little domain,

and walked slowly round the house, examining every door and window as

they went.

 

“Is the captain a rich man?” asked Milsom.

 

“Yes; I believe he’s pretty well off—some say uncommonly well off. He

spent over a thousand pounds on this place.”

 

“Curse him for his pains!” returned Black Milsom, savagely. “He knows

how to take care of his property. It would be a very clever burglar

that would get into that house. The windows are all secured with

outside shutters, that seem as solid as if they were made of iron, and

the doors don’t yield the twentieth part of an inch.”

 

Then, after completing his examination of the house, Milsom exclaimed,

in the same savage tone—

 

“Why, the man has swept away every timber of the place I lived in.”

 

“I told you as much,” answered Wayman; “I’ve heard say there was

nothing left of old Screwton’s house but a few solid timbers and a

stack of chimneys.”

 

Screwton was the name of the miser whose ghost had been supposed to

haunt the old place.

 

Black Milsom gave a start as Dennis uttered the words