The Third R. Austin Freeman Megapack. R. Austin Freeman
Читать онлайн книгу.
large tusks in three large crates, at present in the hold of the brigantine Speedwell, and fifty-one scribellos in a large canvas bag wired up and sealed, also in the hold’ also the vessel herself, and, most astonishing of all, ‘my freehold house in Bristol, known as number sixty-five Garlic Street’ and a sum of about three thousand pounds, a part invested in certain named securities and the remainder lying on deposit at a specified bank in Bristol. It was an amazing document. As Osmond read and re-read it he found himself wondering at the perverseness of the little shipmaster in hiding his kindly, appreciative feelings under so forbidding an exterior; but, to judge by the wording of the preamble, his experience of men would seem not to have been happy. Osmond, having put back the will in the bag, tied up that and the other and replaced them in the safe. As he locked the door and pocketed the key, he reflected on the irony of his present position. In all the years during which he had lived amidst his friends and relatives, no one had ever bequeathed to him a single penny. Yet in the course of a few months, in this unfrequented and forgotten corner of the world, he had twice been made the sole legatee of almost complete strangers. And now he had be come a man of modest substance, an owner of landed property; and that in a country which prudence insisted that he must never revisit.
CHAPTER IX
Arms and the Man
Speaking in general terms, Welshmen cannot be fairly described as excessively rare creatures; in fact, there are some parts of the world—Wales, for instance—in which they are quite common. But circumstances alter cases. When Jack Osmond, busily engaged in posting up his account-books, lifted his eyes and beheld a specimen of this well-known type of mammal, he was quite startled; not merely because he had never before heard anyone say “Good morning” with an accent on the “ning”—which the present example did, although it was actually three in the afternoon—but because no ship had called in the neighbourhood quite lately and he had not known of the presence of any European in the village.
The stranger introduced himself by the name of Jones, which being not entirely without precedent was accepted without difficulty. He had an additional name, but as Osmond failed to assimilate it, and it could be expressed in writing only by an extravagant expenditure of l’s and double d’s, it is omitted from this merely Saxon chronicle. He shook Osmond’s hand exuberantly and smiled until his face—particularly the left side—was as full of lines as a ground-plan of Willesden Junction.
“I come to you, Mr. Larkom,” said the visitor, retaining Osmond’s unwilling hand and apparently adopting the name that remained unaltered over the door of the factory, “as a fellow-countryman in distress, craving a charitable judgment and a helping hand.”
He would have been well advised to leave it at that; for Osmond’s natural generosity needed no spur, and the memory of his own misfortunes was enough to ensure his charity to others. But Mr. Jones continued, smiling harder than ever: “I come to you confidently for this help because of the many instances of your kindness and generosity and good-fellowship that I have heard—”
“From whom?” interrupted Osmond.
“From—er—from—well, I may say, from every one on the Coast who knows you.”
“Oh,” said Osmond; and his face relaxed into a grim smile. Jones saw that he had made a mistake and wondered what the deuce it was.
“Come into my room,” said Osmond, “and tell me what you want me to do. Have a cocktail?”
Mr. Jones would have a cocktail, thank you; and while Osmond twirled the swizzle-stick and raised a pink froth in the tumbler, he cautiously opened his business.
“I am taking some risk in telling you of my little affair, but I am sure I can trust you not to give me away.”
“Certainly you can,” Osmond replied, incautiously.
“You promise on your honour as a gentleman not to give me away?”
“I have,” said Osmond, handing him the cocktail.
Jones still hesitated somewhat, as if desirous of further formalities, but at length plunged into the matter in a persuasive whisper, with much gesticulation and a craftily watchful eye on Osmond’s face.
It was not an encouraging face. A portrait of the ‘Iron Duke’ at the age of thirty, executed in very hard wood by a heavy-handed artist with a large chisel and mallet, would give you the kind of face that Mr. Jones looked upon; and as the ‘little affair’ unfolded itself, that face grew more and more wooden. For Osmond’s charity in respect of errors of conduct did not extend to those that were merely in contemplation.
It transpired gradually that Mr. Jones’s sufferings and distress were occasioned by a little cargo that he had been unable to land; which cargo happened to include—er—in fact, to be quite candid, consisted largely of Mauser rifles, together with some miscellaneous knick-knacks—such as Mauser cartridges, for instance—all of which were at present rolling in the hold of a privately-chartered vessel (name not mentioned). It also appeared that the Colonial Government had most unreasonably prohibited the importation of arms and ammunition on account of the silly little insurrection that had broken out inland; which very circumstance created an exceptional opportunity—don’t you understand?—for disposing of munitions of war on profitable terms. It appeared, finally, that Mr. Larkom’s factory was an ideal place in which to conceal the goods and from which to distribute them among local sportsmen interested in target-practice or partridge-shooting.
“To put it in a nutshell,” said Osmond, “you’re doing a bit of gun-running and you want to use me as a cat’s paw; and to put it in another nutshell, I’ll see you damned first.”
“But,” protested Jones, “you sell arms yourself, don’t you?”
“Not while this row is on. Besides, the niggers don’t buy my gas-pipes for war-palaver. My customers are mostly hunters from the bush.”
Mr. Jones lingered a while to ply the arts of persuasion and consume two more cocktails; and when at last he departed, more in sorrow than in anger, he paused on the threshold to remark:
“You have promised, on your honour, not to give me away.”
“I know I have, like a fool,” replied Osmond “Wish I hadn’t. Know better next time. Good day.” And he followed his departing guest to the compound gate and shut it after him.
From that moment Mr. Jones seemed to vanish into thin air. He was seen no more in the village, and no whispers as to his movements came from outside. But a few nights later Osmond had a rather curious experience that somehow recalled his absent acquaintance. He had gone out, according to his common custom, to take a quiet stroll on the beach before turning in, and think of his future movements and of the everlasting might-have-been. Half a mile west of the village he came on a fishing canoe, drawn up above tide-marks, and as he had just filled his pipe he crept under the lee of the canoe to light it—for one learns to husband one’s matches in West Africa. Having lighted his pipe, he sat down to think over a trading expedition that he had projected, but, finding himself annoyed by the crabs, which at nightfall pour out of their burrows in myriads, he shifted to the interior of the canoe. Here he sat, looking over the spectral breakers out into the dark void which was the sea, and immersed in his thoughts until he was startled by the sudden appearance of a light. He watched it curiously and not without suspicion. It was not a ship’s anchor-light, nor was it a flare-lamp in a fishing-canoe. By the constant variation in its brightness Osmond judged it to be a bull’s-eye lantern which was being flashed to and fro along the coast from some vessel in the offing to signal to someone ashore.
He looked up and down the dark beach for the answering signal, and presently caught a dull glimmer, as of a bull’s-eye lantern seen from one side, proceeding from the beach a short distance farther west. Watching this spot, he soon made out a patch of deeper darkness which grew in extent, indicating that a crowd of natives had gathered at the water’s edge; and, after a considerable interval a momentary flash of the lantern fell on a boat dashing towards the beach in a smother of spray.
Soon after this a number of dark shapes began to separate themselves from the