“Is thy servant a dog,” said I, holding out my hand, “that he should do this thing? No, my dear Mr. Crum, though I may be of a slow-blooded, not to say poltroon-like spirit, and you are still in the midst of the middle ages, if you will excuse my saying so, as far as the practicalities of life go, I’m sure we shall get on together as well as two thorough opposites always do, and I can’t say more than that.” Then I wrung his hand heartily, and fled, but for the life of me I couldn’t say for certain that I was right and he was wrong.
CHAPTER IV
WHAT BAINES KNEW
It was three weeks after my first interview with Crum that I found myself travelling down to Liverpool to meet Baines, my uncle’s man, who was bringing home his body. It was a dull, rainy, depressing day as I stood upon the dock-side above the landing-stage, and watched the tender come sidling up with the crowd of umbrellaed passengers upon her deck, and my errand was not of a kind to elevate the spirits. Beyond the mournful circumstances that had brought me there, I had a sense of foreboding as if undefined evil was coming to me with the dead, though, considering my very slender acquaintanceship with my uncle, it seemed extremely unreasonable. But there it was all the same. I put it down to the weather and the worry of the last three weeks. For really I had had a very trying time. Gerry was more or less at the bottom of it, and Crum and my own conscience helped largely. The fact was that in a moment of weakness I had detailed to Gerry the story of the screed and the two mysterious coins left by my old buccaneer ancestor. He had fastened upon the thing like a dog chewing a meaty bone, and rested not day nor night dinning into me his opinion that my bounden duty was to investigate the affair “up to the hilt,” as he inappositely remarked. And in another astoundingly weak phase of absent-mindedness I had taken him with me on one of my visits to Crum. The two had managed somehow to get on the subject of the mystery, and then had started in full cry together to browbeat me for my lack of enthusiasm, proving—Gerry with terse vulgarity and the lawyer with deliberate decorum—that I was throwing away the chance of a lifetime, failing in my duty to myself, my honor, and my nation, and showing forth a pusillanimity and poverty of imagination which was a disgrace to the name of Dorinecourte. And out of their badgerings a wild and hasty promise had grown—wrung from me by pure bullying—that should any further news of the ancient scroll of hieroglyphics come to hand, or perchance the scroll itself, I would not fail to do my utmost to obtain translation for the same, even to the extent of crossing the Atlantic myself and interviewing Professor Lessaution. Pondering, therefore, this rash mortgaging of my future happiness and freedom of movement, I stared down upon the snapping little steamboat with melancholy eyes, reflecting that she possibly bore to me a cargo of worry and unrest which would shadow my life with unmerited discontent.
There was the usual fuss when the dripping passengers landed, the usual rush for the customs, the grating of the rolling-luggage stage, the interchange of impudence between the dock porters and the crowd, in fact the everyday hurly-burly of a liner’s incoming, and it was not till after an hour’s patient toil and the signing of various detestable documents, that Baines and I were permitted to load our burden upon the hearse that waited, and get it to the railway-station. I had no chance in the crowded train of conversing with the man in any sort of privacy, so arranged that he should call at my rooms that evening, and that there he should tell me all there was to tell. Fortunately Crum had notified a firm of undertakers to meet us at Euston, and there take charge of the coffin, and finally I was at liberty to make my way home, change, and eat with what appetite I could. Then lighting my pipe I set myself to await Baines and his revelations with all the apathy I could command.
And then Gerry saw fit to drop in. He was brimful of inquiry and investigation regarding the day’s doings, and showed unbounded disappointment that as yet no further developments had ensued. He hinted, in fact, that I was burking all further knowledge of the subject, and sat arguing and discussing like an embodied British Association. It was in vain that I tacitly agreed to all his premises, and passed over his insults. He sat and sat, and there he was when Baines arrived, and then I knew that the game was fairly up. Under Gerry’s encouraging cross-examination I felt sure that the worthy valet would have seen and heard marvels which no man could gainsay, and would be guided into revelations of my uncle’s last words and messages which might bear any sort of meaning that Gerry chose to apply to them. I groaned as the smooth-faced, dapper little chap was ushered in by Barker, and Gerry’s face of enthusiastic delight was a picture.
Baines stood in an uncertain sort of attitude near the door, fingering his hat, and waiting, after the first good-evening had passed between us, for me to speak. I motioned him to sit down, and as he deposited himself gingerly on the edge of a chair I rose, and straddling across the hearthrug, began my interrogation.
“Well, Baines,” said I, “it has been a sad time for you. Can you give us any details of your master’s illness?”
“It was very short and sudden, my lord,” said Baines, with a terseness for which I blessed him. “It came on at ’Uanac, where we were camped; ’is lordship went about much as usual for the first day; the second he was very bad, and we sent on down to Greytown for a doctor, but by the next day ’is lordship was delirious, and died the day after. The doctor came too late. I nursed him all the time, my lord,” and Baines’s eyes shone mistily for a moment in the candle-light, “and I think all was done that could be done, but there was no help for it. They tell me these malarial fevers always are like that, but ’is lordship was never what I should call robust, my lord.”
“Do you think he knew that he was dying?” I queried, as he paused. “At least, was he delirious all the time, or was there an interval of consciousness?” I added hopefully.
“Oh yes, my lord. He was quite calm at the last, and knew he was going. I think what vexed him most was that he hadn’t finished the business he’d come for.”