The Relentless City

by E. F. Benson

Bilton did not at once move from the breakfast-table after his secretary had left him, but remained seated there, his elbow on the table, his lips caressing an unlit cigar. Adept as he was at seeing combinations, and supplying from his imagination factors which alone would account for certain combinations presented to him as problems, he could not at once see his way through this. More than that, he could not determine with any internal satisfaction on his next move. That move might, of course, be merely a negative move—mere inaction on his part; but, turn the matter over in what way he might, he could not see how to say 'check' in answer to this 'check.' He was threatened—threatened, too, by a firm of eminently reputable solicitors who presumably would not undertake business of any but the securest nature. Fifteen thousand pounds, it is true, did not mean anything very particular to him, but he saw further than that. Should he pay it, the very fact of his payment was equivalent, to his shrewd American brain, to a confession of his guilt. What if he paid only to find that he had clinched the proof against himself? And if he did not pay, if he shrugged his shoulders at the whole matter, what if the 'other hands' were entrusted with it?'

He rose from the table, biting his cigar through.

'The blackmailer blackmailed,' he muttered. 'New sensational novel. Guess I'll think it over.'

He glanced again at the letter, and saw that he had till the evening of the next day in which to commit himself definitely to one or the other course of action. He would be back in London in the course of the next afternoon; there would be time then, and to-day he was really too busy to give the matter the attention which he was afraid it deserved. But by mid-day to-morrow the affair of the strike in any case would be off his mind; he would devote the whole of the hours occupied by his journey back to London, if necessary, to the consideration of this matter. Then there was the note from Amelie stopping the coal-boring.... In a moment a possible reconstruction of what had happened suggested itself to him. She knew.

He went down to the scene of the strike that afternoon, and found things rather more serious than he had anticipated. The bricklayers had already gone out, the platelayers had sent in demands which he did not feel himself justified in accepting without consultation with Mr. Palmer, and, what was much more serious, in spite of their indentures, there was a hint of trouble with the signalmen. It took him, indeed, some two or three hours to find out the full extent of that with which the line was threatened, and in the back of his mind all the time was the consciousness of that with which he himself was threatened. He had, in fact, to leave the inspection of the tunnel till the next morning. He left also till the next morning, in case the result of his negotiations with the strikers might prove to be nugatory, the despatch of a telegram to Mr. Palmer, asking him to have the express in which he would travel to Liverpool stopped at the Wyfold junction, so that he himself might get in there, and during the journey to Liverpool talk over the situation. In that case it would be necessary also perhaps to get an extra day for himself in his own private matter; and after dinner he telegraphed to Messrs. Hobarts and Howard saying that he would reply to them by the evening of September 4. Extremely urgent business, he said, engaged his attention, and, being at a loss to understand their communication, he asked for this extension.

He went up to bed in the rather dingy hotel in which he was forced to stay, conscious of extreme weariness, but unhappily conscious of an inability to obtain the refreshment of sleep. Often before now he had suffered from insomnia, and he was aware when he got into bed that the worst form of insomnia—namely, the utter absence of the slightest drowsiness, which to some extent compensates for the absence of sleep—was likely to be his. He knew that there lay before him a seemingly infinite period of intensely active thought, inharmoniously linked with an intensely active desire for sleep. A mill-race of coherent images foamed through his brain, all tinged with failure. He cursed himself for all he had done: he had made a mess of his courtship of Sybil; he had made a mess over the wretched fifteen thousand pounds. Knowing Bertie, he thought he had known how safe this small transaction was. True, it was scarcely worth while, but the man who makes his million makes it by consideration of very much smaller sums, and it was not in his nature to have neglected any chance. The chance seemed certain: his money was paid; his letters were returned; never had blackmail gone on smoother wheels. But in his wakefulness, and in his agitation about the strike, which involved larger issues to him than the mere payment of this sum, the latter assumed nightmare proportions; it swelled and encompassed him. If he paid, there was his confession; if he did not pay, there were the 'other hands' ready to undertake the business. 'I did not think the young man had so much blood in him,' he thought, as he tossed in his abominable feather-bed.

During the last forty-eight hours the plans of the Palmer family had somewhat altered. Mrs. Palmer, for instance, had discovered that it was necessary to start at ten in the morning in order to join the Liverpool and Southampton line, by which her husband wished to travel. That was clearly out of the question, and the matter resolved itself into a decision whether they should go by Euston or spend the night at Molesworth, stopping the Liverpool express there. The latter counsel prevailed, and a couple of hours after Bilton had left London they also left, four of them; for Bertie was of the party. His plans, too, had changed. He was going to America now instead of following a fortnight later.

The inn at which Bilton passed the night was close to the railway-station at Frampton, near which on the south lay the tunnel where there was trouble with the strikers. Frampton itself was originally a small village, but was now extending huge suckers of jerry-built houses into the country; for it lay on the junction between the Liverpool and Southampton line, and the new communication with South Wales. It was on the junction, too, of the Molesworth and Wyfold estates, Molesworth lying on the north, Wyfold to the south. Consequently, the Palmer party had passed through it the afternoon before, and had got out at the station of Molesworth, some five miles further on. This, of course, was unknown to Bilton, who imagined they were still in London.

He rose from his bed the next morning feeling tired and unrefreshed, dressed, and sent a telegram to Mr. Palmer at Seaton House, asking him to have the train stopped at Wyfold, where he himself would get in, as he wanted to consult with him over the situation. It should reach him in London in plenty of time before he started, and he himself would have the greater part of the morning at Frampton, and would get over to Wyfold in time to take the train there. He wished also to see for himself the condition of the unfinished and abandoned work in the tunnel, and get an estimate, if possible, from the engineer of the shortest time in which it would be possible to finish the work without interrupting traffic, in case he decided to import labour at once. His work in connection with other matters, however, took him rather longer than he had anticipated, and he set off down the mile of line which lay between Frampton and the tunnel to meet the engineer who was appointed to be waiting for him there rather short of time. He had expected to be obliged to go over to Wyfold in the course of the morning, and he had therefore telegraphed to have the train stopped there. This had proved, however, to be unnecessary, but it was too late now to alter the rendezvous to Frampton.

The tunnel in question was a very deep burrow under some mile of hill that rose steeply above it, and its completion—or so close an approach to completion that it could be used—had been the great triumph of speed in the construction of the line. He found that the work remaining to be done was easily compassable within a week or two, if sufficient numbers of men could be brought to the spot, while there was also at the Wyfold end of the tunnel another unfinished piece of less extent, if anything, than this. The report of the engineer also put matters in rather a less serious light: the great beams and timber which supported the wooden arch over which the bricks had to be laid were at present absolutely secure; it would take weeks of rain before danger was even threatened, but would it not be well, if possible, to finish so small a job at once, and have it off their minds? Bilton was decidedly of this opinion, and gave orders that steps should be taken to get outside labour without delay. This concluded his morning's work.