The Talleyrand Maxim, J. S. Fletcher [books to read fiction TXT] 📗

CHAPTER VI

THE UNEXPECTED

 

Pratt started when he heard that voice and felt the arresting hand. He

knew well enough to whom they belonged—they were those of one James

Parrawhite, a little, weedy, dissolute chap who had been in Eldrick &

Pascoe’s employ for about a year. It had always been a mystery to him

and the other clerks that Parrawhite had been there at all, and that

being there he was allowed to stop. He was not a Barford man. Nobody

knew anything whatever about him, though his occasional references to it

seemed to indicate that he knew London pretty thoroughly. Pratt shrewdly

suspected that he was a man whom Eldrick had known in other days,

possibly a solicitor who had been struck off the rolls, and to whom

Eldrick, for old times’ sake, was disposed to extend a helping hand.

 

All that any of them knew was that one morning some fifteen months

previously, Parrawhite, a complete stranger, had walked into the office,

asked to see Eldrick, had remained closeted with him half an hour, and

had been given a job at two pounds a week, there and then. That he was a

clever and useful clerk no one denied, but no one liked him.

 

He was always borrowing half-crowns. He smelt of rum. He was altogether

undesirable. It was plain to the clerks that Pascoe disliked him. But he

was evidently under Eldrick’s protection, and he did his work and did it

well, and there was no doubt that he knew more law than either of the

partners, and was better up in practice than Pratt himself. But—he was

not desirable … and Pratt never desired him less than on this

occasion.

 

“What are you after—coming on a man like that!” growled Pratt.

 

“You,” replied Parrawhite. “I knew you’d got to come up this lane, so I

waited for you. I’ve something to say.”

 

“Get it said, then!” retorted Pratt.

 

“Not here,” answered Parrawhite. “Come down by the quarry—nobody about

there.”

 

“And suppose I don’t?” asked Pratt.

 

“Then you’ll be very sorry for yourself—tomorrow,” replied Parrawhite.

“That’s all!”

 

Pratt had already realized that this fellow knew something. Parrawhite’s

manner was not only threatening but confident. He spoke as a man speaks

who has got the whip hand. And so, still growling, and inwardly raging

and anxious, he turned off with his companion into a track which lay

amongst the stone quarries. It was a desolate, lonely place; no house

was near; they were as much alone as if they had been in the middle of

one of the great moors outside the town, the lights of which they could

see in the valley below them. In the grey sky above, a waning moon gave

them just sufficient light to see their immediate surroundings—a

grass-covered track, no longer used, and the yawning mouths of the old

quarries, no longer worked, the edges of which were thick with gorse and

bramble. It was the very place for secret work, and Pratt was certain

that secret work was at hand.

 

“Now then!” he said, when they had walked well into the wilderness.

“What is it? And no nonsense!”

 

“You’ll get no nonsense from me,” sneered Parrawhite. “I’m not that

sort. This is what I want to say. I was in Eldrick’s office last night

all the time you were there with old Bartle.”

 

This swift answer went straight through Pratt’s defences. He was

prepared to hear something unpleasant and disconcerting, but not that.

And he voiced the first thought that occurred to him.

 

“That’s a lie!” he exclaimed. “There was nobody there!”

 

“No lie,” replied Parrawhite. “I was there. I was behind the curtain of

that recess—you know. And since I know what you did, I don’t mind

telling you—we’re in the same boat, my lad!—what I was going to do.

You thought I’d gone—with the others. But I hadn’t. I’d merely done

what I’ve done several times without being found out—slipped in

there—to wait until you’d gone. Why? Because friend Eldrick, as you

know, is culpably careless about leaving loose cash in the unlocked

drawer of his desk, culpably careless, too, about never counting it.

And—a stray sovereign or half-sovereign is useful to a man who only

gets two quid a week. Understand?”

 

“So you’re a thief?” said Pratt bitterly.

 

“I’m precisely what you are—a thief!” retorted Parrawhite. “You stole

John Mallathorpe’s will last night. I heard everything, I tell you!—and

saw everything. I heard the whole business—what the old man said—what

you, later, said to Eldrick. I saw old Bartle die—I saw you take the

will from his pocket, read it, and put it in your pocket. I know

all!—except the terms of the will. But—I’ve a pretty good idea of what

those terms are. Do you know why? Because I watched you set off to

Normandale by the eight-twenty train tonight!”

 

“Hang you for a dirty sneak!” growled Pratt.

 

Parrawhite laughed, and flourished a heavy stick which he carried.

 

“Not a bit of it!” he said, almost pleasantly. “I thought you were more

of a philosopher—I fancied I’d seen gleams—mere gleams—of philosophy

in you at times. Fortunes of war, my boy! Come now—you’ve seen enough

of me to know I’m an adventurer. This is an adventure of the sort I

love. Go into it heart and soul, man! Own up!—you’ve found out that the

will leaves the property away from the present holders, and you’ve been

to Normandale to—bargain? Come, now!”

 

“What then!” demanded Pratt.

 

“Then, of course, I come in at the bargaining,” answered Parrawhite.

“I’m going to have my share. That’s a certainty. You’d better take my

advice. Because you’re absolutely in my power. I’ve nothing to do but to

tell Eldrick tomorrow morning.”

 

“Suppose I tell Eldrick tomorrow morning of what you’ve told me?”

interjected Pratt.

 

“Eldrick will believe me before you,” retorted Parrawhite,

imperturbably. “I’m a much cleverer, more plausible man than you are, my

friend—I’ve had an experience of the world which you haven’t, I can

easily invent a fine excuse for being in that room. For two pins I’ll

incriminate you! See? Be reasonable—for if it comes to a contest of

brains, you haven’t a rabbit’s chance against a fox. Tell me all about

the will—and what you’ve done. You’ve got to—for, by the Lord

Harry!—I’m going to have my share. Come, now!”

 

Pratt stood, in a little hollow wherein they had paused, and thought,

rapidly and angrily. There was no doubt about it—he was trapped. This

fearful scoundrel at his side, who boasted of his cleverness, would

stick to him like a leach—he would have to share. All his own smart

schemes for exploiting Mrs. Mallathorpe, for ensuring himself a

competence for life, were knocked on the head. There was no helping

it—he would have to tell—and to share. And so, sullenly, resentfully,

he told.

 

Parrawhite listened in silence, taking in every point. Pratt, knowing

that concealment was useless, told the truth about everything,

concisely, but omitting nothing.

 

“All right!” remarked Parrawhite at the end, “Now, then, what terms do

you mean to insist on?”

 

“What’s the good of going into that?” growled Pratt. “Now that you’ve

stuck your foot in it, what do my terms matter?”

 

“Quite right,” agreed Parrawhite, “They don’t. What matter is—our

terms. Now let me suggest—no, insist on—what they must be. Cash! Do

you know why I insist on that? No? Then I’ll tell you. Because this

young barrister chap, Collingwood, has evidently got some suspicion

of—something.”

 

“I can’t see it,” said Pratt uneasily. “He was only curious to know what

that letter was about.”

 

“Never mind,” continued Parrawhite. “He had some suspicion—or he

wouldn’t have gone out there almost as soon as he reached Barford after

his grandfather’s death. And even if suspicion is put to sleep for

awhile, it can easily be reawakened, so—cash! We must profit at

once—before any future risk arises. But—what terms were you thinking

of?”

 

“Stewardship of this estate for life,” muttered Pratt gloomily.

 

“With the risk of some discovery being made, some time, any time!”

sneered Parrawhite. “Where are your brains, man? The old fellow, John

Mallathorpe, probably made a draft or two of that will before he did his

fair copy—he may have left those drafts among his papers.”

 

“If he did,