Tinman

"I have thought of that, too," she replied. We had risen to our feet, and she was looking at me earnestly. "I saw Barbara go away to-night with a strange man: I was watching in the garden. She went reluctantly; I heard her question him as to whether he was sure of this and that. Tell me what it meant."

"Danger for her – ruin for her, unless she can be found," I replied. Then I told her rapidly of all that had happened that night, and of the plot that was afoot. She listened eagerly, questioning me on this detail and on that, speaking especially about the boy, and what attitude he would take in the business.

"Don't you see, Barbara," I exclaimed in a whisper – "don't you understand that he sets his feet to-night absolutely in the footmarks that were mine twenty years ago?"

"What do you mean?" she asked quickly, catching at my arm.

"Barbara, I set out twenty years ago to make a man eat his words, or to kill the lie that he had told about you. To-night this boy sets out on the same errand, with a new Barbara – your child – to inspire him. She is to him as pure and precious a thing as you were to me all those years ago. If he finds the man, he will strike him down, as I struck down Gavin Hockley; he will suffer as I suffered – although they may be more merciful in his case, and may take his life. Think of it!" I cried, wringing my hands as I stood there, bareheaded, trembling and helpless in the winter night – "think of it! I can do nothing, because I have no money and no strength left; you can do nothing, because you died to the world years ago, and at the best, even though you lived, you are poor and helpless as I am. While we stand here – two poor ghosts come back out of the world that is dead – this boy and girl take up the tale, and rush straight to disaster, just as we did."

"But we have come back to save her," she exclaimed quickly. "This is no time for despair, Charlie; we have a greater power given to us than you imagine. We shall work in secret – you and I – and we shall succeed. See now" – she held my hands, and looked into my eyes, and smiled encouragingly – "you are calmer already than you have been. It seems to me that the best thing we can do is to get to London at the earliest possible moment. Barbara has been taken there – the boy has gone there; this man Murray Olivant will inevitably follow. You know where he is to be found, and we may be able to trace the boy. There is nothing to be frightened of yet, Charlie; we will fight together, because we understand so much more than these other people do."

She was so wise and calm that she seemed to give me wisdom too. I presently found myself walking beside her back towards the town; it was her intention to shelter me for the night at that tiny cottage where she lived near Hammerstone Market. She had a key to the place, and we crept in silently; she gave me some poor food she had there, and insisted that I should stretch my weary limbs on an old couch in the sitting-room for the remainder of the night.

I slept heavily, and long before dawn, as it seemed, I found her standing beside me, gently waking me. She had prepared some steaming hot coffee, and I drank it gratefully, while she sat beside me and told me what I was to do.

"This man Murray Olivant still feels that you may be useful to him," she said; "in any case, you know too much about his plans to be lightly thrown aside. I have money here that will take you to London; you will go to those rooms where Fanshawe first took you, and you will wait there for Olivant. Do you understand?"

I said that I did, and that I would do all she suggested.

"Two things you have to remember," went on the calm voice. "The first, that the boy must be prevented, at the present time at least, from meeting Olivant; I shudder to think what might happen if they met now. Persuade Olivant to get away – to hide – anything. The second is to get hold of poor Barbara, and to bring her back to her father, if by any chance we do not find young Millard. It may happen that, if Olivant is frightened of what may befall him if the boy finds him, he may throw up the game, and get out of the way; then our course is clear. But in any case, Charlie, we must not travel together. You will go first, and I will come afterwards; we can arrange some place in which to meet in London."

She knew as little about London as I did; therefore she chose the first public place she could think of for our later meeting. I was to find her on one of the seats on the north side of Trafalgar Square, just under the terrace; it was the only place we could think of in the hurry of the moment.

I found that she had thought of everything; she had even bought an old discarded brown wideawake hat from her landlady for me, and had found out at what time the earliest train started for London. With a little money in my pocket I set off eagerly enough on my mission. I felt more hopeful than I had for many days past; I somehow felt that together we must succeed.

It was cold and raw, and there was a biting wind. There were but few people on the platform, and those for the most part were market folk going to intervening stations. I looked eagerly about, wondering if by any chance Murray Olivant had made up his mind to travel so early as that; but I saw nothing of him. Evidently he was so sure of the plans he had laid that he was not going to trouble himself to turn out on such a bitter morning, or to hurry to London.

I went straight to his rooms on reaching London, only to be told by the manservant that he was not there, and was not expected; indeed, the man seemed somewhat astonished at seeing me at all. I evaded his questions, and came away; turned back to deliver a message to the effect that if Mr. Murray Olivant came to the place, the man would beg him to stay until I came again; I had news for him of vital importance. Then I went away, and roamed the streets in the bitter weather, pursued and haunted by a thousand doubts and fears. And so back again to the rooms of Murray Olivant – to see the boy Arnold Millard pacing up and down outside, and keeping watch upon them.

I seemed to see myself again, twenty years before, raging up and down the pavement of Lincoln's Inn Fields, waiting for the man I was to kill!

I was afraid to go to him, or to let him know that I was there, because I feared lest he might think I was on the side of the enemy, fighting against him and the girl. And yet I was afraid, too, that Murray Olivant might at any moment come swinging into the street, and find himself face to face with the boy who had sworn to kill him. Keeping that borrowed hat well down over my brows, I set about to find Olivant, guessing pretty well which way he would come. I went to the end of the street, and presently saw a cab driving fast in the direction of Olivant's rooms; in the cab was the man I sought.

I ran along beside it, and called to Olivant excitedly. He threw up the trap in the roof, and told the man to stop; leaned out over the apron to speak to me.

"Hullo, friend Tinman," he said genially, "where have you sprung from? And who let you loose from the house?"

"There's danger – great danger," I panted, standing on the step of the cab and whispering to him. "Everything has come out; young Mr. Millard is waiting there up the street – has been waiting there for hours."

"Well – what of it?" he asked; but I thought his face went suddenly pale.

"He swears that he will kill you, and he means to do it," I said.

Something of my own excitement seemed to communicate itself to Olivant; he became suddenly serious. Thrusting open the doors of the cab, he caught up the bag that was beside him on the seat, and got out. He paid the cabman, and then handed me the bag. "Come along," he said quickly; "there's another way into the place down this side street. We can't stand talking here."

So we gained his rooms in that secret fashion; and the moment we entered the manservant began to explain to him that Mr. Arnold Millard had called, and would call again. Olivant cut him short quickly. "There – that'll do; I know all about it," he said. "Understand that no one is to be admitted; I have not yet returned from the country. Any one who comes can leave a message."

He seemed curiously perturbed, I thought; he did not even refer at first to my own escape, or to the fact of my being in London so strangely. He went to a window, and pulled aside a curtain, and looked out; turned away with an exclamation, and looked at me. "How long has he been there?" he demanded.

"As I have told you – some hours," I said.

He went to the sideboard, and poured some neat spirits into a glass, and drained it. Then he came back to me, and, after a moment's hesitation, began to question me.

"Now, in the first place, how did he connect me with the business?"

"I told him," I replied simply. "I had to tell him – I meant to tell him, for the sake of the girl."

"Well, Mr. Facing-Both-Ways, then what brings you here? You tell the boy where to find me, and then come skulking with your tail between your legs to warn me. I don't understand it."

"I wanted to save the girl," I answered fearlessly. "Don't you understand that he was to wait in a certain place, until I came to him, bringing the girl; he would have waited there for a time, and then have come to the house to find me? And don't you understand," I cried passionately, "that I'm not fighting for you now, but for him?"

He turned to me quickly; looked at me curiously. "Fighting for him?"

In the tense stillness of the room, as we looked into each other's eyes, it almost seemed to me that I could hear the echoing footsteps of the boy pacing up and down outside – waiting, with murder in his heart. My own heart was beating madly; I could scarcely get out the words I uttered.

"Yes – fighting for him," I whispered – "won't you understand that? Twenty years ago a man like you wronged a woman with his tongue, and died because of that wrong. A boy – just such another as the boy who walks up and down outside there now – struck him dead, and stood under the gallows for his crime. I was that boy; and he who waits below is but myself, come back to life to do what I did. I am not fighting for you – you are nothing; I am here to-night to save the boy from my fate. For as there is a God above us, he is here to kill you!"

He looked at me steadily for a moment or two, and then turned away. I saw him pull his handkerchief from the sleeve of his coat, and pass it once across his forehead, and then rub his hands with it hard, as though they were wet. Then, in the most matter-of-fact way, he came back to me, and looked at me steadily. His eyes were very bright – brighter and darker in contrast with the pallor of his face.

"You're not lying to me?" he demanded, in a whisper.

"I am not lying."

"And I suppose it doesn't happen by chance that you and this brother of mine are in league – and that you are to terrorize me, and find out about the girl – eh?"

"Don't you think in that case he would have come to you and made his threat in person?" I asked quickly.

"Yes, I suppose he would," he admitted. "In any case, I have to thank you for this; if you'd have held your tongue, he might have thought that the girl had run away, or that she wanted nothing more to do with him; he might never have connected me with the matter at all. And now, having caught me here like a rat in a trap, I suppose you think you can force me to do something, out of fear? Well, you won't do that; because in this unequal world it's the rich man that always scores in the long run. That poor beggar cooling his heels on the pavement outside may threaten as he likes; I am safe enough. But I wish I'd tied you up a little more securely, my friend," he added viciously.

"You can get out of this difficulty in a moment," I reminded him. "Say where the girl is, and produce her to this boy unharmed, and you are safe."

"No!" he exclaimed violently. "I'll not be threatened by him – I'll not be forced to do anything against my will. I can snap my fingers at him. Besides," he added with a grin, "there's another reason. I don't myself know where the girl is."

"But you sent her away with the man Dawkins," I exclaimed quickly.

"Who was to bring her to London, and to let me know where she was. And I haven't heard yet."

Even as he spoke I heard a sharp double knock at the outer door. I think for a moment Olivant imagined that this was but a ruse on the part of the boy to get in; I saw him move quickly to the further end of the room. But a moment later the manservant came in with a small salver on which lay a letter. Olivant, with almost a sigh of relief, picked it up and turned it over.

"Talk of the devil," he muttered with a laugh, and tore it open.

He seemed to read the thing through twice; and as he read his face grew harder and harder. Finally he turned to me, and spoke quietly, with something of the air of a man who is driven into a corner, but has set his back against the wall, and means to fight.

"This is from friend Dawkins," he said. "He tells me that he has brought the girl to London, and has put her in safe hands; he thinks, however, that he should have something for his trouble." He broke off, and turned to the letter. "'I am not a rich man,'" he read, "'and a small matter of five hundred pounds would be extremely useful to me just now. Didn't I mention this last night? Under the circumstances, and for the sake of the young lady, I think it better that you should know that I want this sum in exchange for her address. She's a dear girl, and quite worth it.'" He banged the letter savagely with his fist, and began to pace about the room, muttering to himself. "First one and then another – this threat and that; what do you all think I'm made of? So this dog thinks he'll hold the girl to ransom, does he? Sends me an address to which letters are to be forwarded." He suddenly strode to the door, and opened it.

"What are you going to do?" I asked quickly.

"I'm going out to face them – this fellow who threatens my life, and this other who threatens my pocket. I won't skulk like a dog here, and let them think I'm afraid of them."

I caught his arm, and strove to draw him back into the room. "Don't do that!" I pleaded – "don't do that!"

He came back into the room, and closed the door; suddenly he began to laugh in a grim fashion, as though he rather enjoyed the situation. "If I had anybody in whom I could put any confidence," he said, "I'd cheat them both yet. But you're not fighting for me – and you may be against me. If Fanshawe were here, I might be able to do something; Fanshawe's got a sort of deadly hatred of this girl that would carry him to any lengths. I wonder what is best to be done?"

Whatever he decided to do then he kept to himself; after pacing about the room for a time he told me I could go, and that if I came back to him on the following day he might have news for me. His last words to me as I left him were characteristic of the man.

"I'll beat you all yet – and I'll win my game!" he said.

In the grey of a winter twilight I found Barbara Savell – that older Barbara who had belonged to my life – pacing about at the north side of Trafalgar Square. We met – she full of eagerness and anxiety, I dejectedly enough. I told her that I had failed, but that I had hopes that I might yet find that other Barbara. She told me that she had secured a little lodging in a humble quarter, and told me where it was; I walked with her to it, and left her there for the night. Then, because I did not know what else to do, I went off to that place in which I had stayed before with Jervis Fanshawe – that shabby room in a shabby house near the river. I was worn out and miserable when I knocked at the door, and was admitted by the girl Moggs.

"'Ullo!" she exclaimed, her face expanding in a grin – "so you've come back, 'ave yer? The other party 'asn't bin 'ere fer days an' days; but I fink 'e's expected."

"Why do you think that?" I asked carelessly.

"'Cos there's some one waitin' for 'im – pleasant sort o' gent, wiv a smile that does yer 'eart good to see. Real genel'man, mind you," she added, with a confident nod.

"Has he told you his name?" I asked, in a whisper.

"Yus. Name o' Dawkins," she replied.

I went scrambling and stumbling up the stairs; behind me as I ran I heard the girl Moggs calling to me, but I paid no heed.

CHAPTER VIII

I Assist the Enemy

As I came to the door of that shabby room in which I knew the man Dawkins was, a great trembling fell upon me, so that I hesitated, and was afraid to go in. It was not fear for myself: I think at that time I had no fear of anything; it was only that I knew that I should not be able to control myself, if I stood face to face with this creature who had assisted Murray Olivant to secure the girl, and now held her to be sold for a price. I stopped outside the door, with my hands clenched, and with my heart beating wildly.

The tumult of passion in me was stilled by the girl, who had run hard after me up the stairs. I felt her coarsened grubby little hand gripping mine; slowly she drew me back away from the door.

"'Ere – pull yerself togevver," she whispered. "Wot's wrong wiv yer?"

"If I go into that room I am afraid of what I may do," I said, clutching at the girl, and staring at the closed door. "I'm afraid of myself."

"Wot's 'e done?" she whispered excitedly.

"Nothing you'd understand," I said. "But oh, Moggs – have you ever read or heard anywhere any fairy tale, concerning some wonderful princess, shut away in prison and left to pine, while her lover waited in vain for her. Have you, Moggs?"

She nodded quickly, and her face expanded into a grin. "Yus – I did once," she whispered. "It came 'ere with summink wrapped in it – bit of a Christmas story, it was."

"There's a wonderful princess held prisoner by that man," I whispered eagerly. "And he'll smile – and smile – and I am powerless to do anything to help. You wise little person – tell me what to do?"

She plunged her grubby hands into her hair, and wrinkled up her face in thought; then she caught at my hand again, and whispered a startling suggestion. "Go in an' talk to 'im," she said, "an' keep yer dander down. W'en 'e goes out presently, I'll foller 'im – an' if I don't come back knowin' w'ere she is, my name ain't Moggs. Is she a real tiptopper?"

"Beautiful, and gentle, and good," I assured her, as she listened unctuously.

"An' 'im wot's sweet on 'er – is 'e all right?"

"The best fellow in the world," I replied.

"Then this is just w'ere I come in!" exclaimed the strange little creature. "I was born for this 'ere!"

I shook hands with her solemnly on the dark and grimy staircase; and I blessed and thanked her. Then I opened the door, and went into the room, praying hard for strength to control myself. Dawkins was sitting on the edge of the table, swinging one leg, and smoking a cigar; he did not trouble to look round as I entered, probably from the fact that he felt that only one person could come into that room with any assurance.

"Well, Fanshawe, it's taken you long enough to get to London," he said, flicking the ash from his cigar.

"I beg your pardon," I said, "but it's not Mr. Fanshawe."

He jumped off the table, and leant against it, staring at me; I think it was the first time I had seen his face without a smile upon it. "By George!" he exclaimed, in a low voice – "I thought I'd tied you up better than that!"

"I was so fortunate as to get away," I replied. "I have seen my – my master, Mr. Olivant; he knows all about my escape. I have just left him."

"Then perhaps you've brought something for me from him?" he exclaimed eagerly, with his habitual smile breaking over his face.

I shook my head. "Nothing," I said. "I did not expect even to find you here."

"True; I'd forgotten that," he said, in a tone of disappointment. "I suppose you came looking for Fanshawe – eh? As a matter of fact, I want to see Fanshawe myself."

I suddenly made up my mind that I would make the attempt on my own part to find out something about the girl; I might even be able to persuade this man that he would get nothing from Murray Olivant, and so induce him, out of revenge, to let me know where Barbara was. After a moment's hesitation I plunged into the business.

"When you left me tied up and gagged at the house at Hammerstone Market," I began, "you took away with you a young lady – Miss Barbara Savell."

"And a deuced nice girl, too," exclaimed the man, nodding his head and smiling. "You were nicely diddled over that business, Tinman; and in turn I diddled our friend Olivant. It's a pity that so charming a young lady should be played catch-ball with in this fashion; but that's her fault, because she is so charming. Now, I suppose you've really been sent by Olivant to spy out the land – eh? You may as well let me know the truth, because I shall discover it in any case. I'm much too wily for you people."

"I tell you again that I did not imagine for a moment you would be here," I reminded him. "Mr. Olivant knows nothing of your whereabouts; he has simply had your letter, giving an address to which letters may be sent. But I assure you that you will get nothing out of him."

"Oh, so you know that, do you?" he said with a sneer. "Very well, I can afford to wait. The young lady, though inclined to be troublesome and fretful, is really very charming company."

"I want to believe, sir, that you're a gentleman," I went on again patiently.

"Thank you," he responded, smiling.

"And I want to appeal to your better nature. This girl is friendless in the world, save for me and for the boy who loves her; you have been fortunate enough and wise enough to get her out of the hands of Murray Olivant; give her into mine, and let me send her back to her lover – or to her father."

Even as I made the appeal I realized the futility of it. But I saw here that violence would not do, and that he would scoff at any threatening; I had felt at first, when I began to speak, that there was a faint chance that I might move the man. As he laughed and shook his head, I saw that I must, after all, trust to that frail support – Moggs.

"My good man, it is quite refreshing to hear any one talk as you do," he said. "You really appear to be in earnest, and under other circumstances I might almost be prepared to listen to you. But the prize is too good to be lost, whether I get the money or stick to the lady. Personally, I believe that Olivant may be squeezed, and may decide that it is best for him to pay; but in any case I score. No, friend Tinman, this is not a game with which you are concerned. Mind your own business, and leave these things to your betters. And as it seems that Fanshawe is not coming, I think I'll return to the lady."

"And if I follow you?" I exclaimed, maddened at the thought that he set me aside so lightly. "What then?"

He struck a match, and relit his cigar; looking at me over the smoke of it, he laughed, and shook his head. "You're really very simple, Tinman," he said. "I don't believe for a moment that you really take so deep an interest in the lady and her lover; I am inclined to believe that you are a spy from the camp of Mr. Murray Olivant. If you have the audacity to follow me, I shall do one of two things: I shall either go in a wrong direction, at some inconvenience to myself; or I shall call the attention of the first constable I meet to you, and inform him that you have been begging from me, and threatening me. You look shabby, Tinman, and you have a bad record behind you, I understand. For your own sake you'd better stay here."

At that time I had no very great faith in the powers of Moggs; however eager she might be to throw herself into the business, I felt that in all probability this astute man of the world would prove more than a match for her. It was with something very like despair in my heart that I saw him saunter out of the room. I ventured to the door the moment after he had left the room, and opened it cautiously; he was going down the stairs, and he stopped for a moment to look back at me.

"You can tell Fanshawe that it doesn't matter, after all; I'm not particularly anxious to see him. And if you want the lady, Tinman – well – your master Murray Olivant knows how to get her. Good-night to you!"

I saw nothing of Moggs; I went back into the room, and shut the door. It seemed at that time as though all I had striven to do and all I had hoped for had been brought to naught; I stood helpless in this poor shabby room, staring about me, and wondering what I should do. What power did I possess – poor broken outcast, without even a name, and assisted only by a little drab of the streets; what could we do against such men as Olivant? I recognized, now that it was too late, that I ought to have played a different game; that I should have matched cunning with cunning, and devilry with devilry; I had been too blunt and outspoken. And then my thoughts flew back to the boy, waiting doggedly outside the rooms of the man who had set out to ruin him and the girl he loved; and I saw the Fate that had dogged and destroyed me marching grimly on over me, and striking down young Arnold Millard. I had no power to stay his hand; nor was there any power behind such threats as I might use to Olivant and the others.