The Hidden Man (37 page)

‘Who are you?' I asked.

I interpreted the muffled response to be, for God's sake, let me be hauled out. I therefore took hold of his legs and began to pull. At first nothing happened. The fellow was – as I later learned – stuck fast by his coat and waistcoat on thorns and protruding roots. His head was inside the narrow rabbit burrow and he had thrust his arms further inside, so that he was quite unable to get elbow purchase or bend his arms to push himself out. As Suez danced and yelped around me, I braced my legs, took the strain into my back and heaved. Slowly at first, and bringing most of the bramble bush with him, he came sliding out.

It was a young man, who climbed stiffly to his feet. He had a scratched, blood-streaked face and heavily soiled clothes. I knew him instantly. So indeed did Suez, who wagged his tail and thrust his nose familiarly into the man's crotch, being used to seeing him every day: his late master's craftsman-jeweller.

‘Mr Ambler!' I exclaimed as he struggled sheepishly to his feet. ‘What a surprise.'

He avoided my gaze, shifting his feet and mumbling something about trapping rabbits.

‘Rabbits, is it?' I enquired. ‘That's a tasty dish in the hands of a good cook, which I believe your mother is.'

I had already seen the truth, though I did not want Ambler to know that. I told him instead that I was pressed for time and must go on, but there was a matter respecting the goldsmithing business, and the future of Pimbo's shop, that I would like to discuss with him. Would he, I asked, be kind enough to attend me in the morning at my office? He brightened up at this and said he would. Then I sent him on his way.

*   *   *

As Suez and I picked up the trail of Fidelis and Barton, lightning flashed across the sky, followed by a smack of thunder and a rumbling chain of reverberations. The air, which all day had been so heavy, was charged now with energy and excitement. On my part, too, I felt a sense of relief as I kicked my horse to pick up its speed. The collection of silver from Pimbo's strong room that I had found under the Stone – why it was there and what I should do about it – had been weighing a little on the back of my mind all day. Now quite unexpectedly I felt sure of the truth.

I drove the horse as hard as possible along the lane that wound its way across the Moor to Cadley. Coming to the inward gate of Cadley Place, I saw a horse secured to its post: Fidelis's sleek and distinctive animal. I dismounted, attaching my own mount in the same way, and tying Suez similarly by a length of rope from the saddlebag. The gate itself was closed and secured to the post with baling twine in a complicated manner, so I vaulted over it and ventured into the carriageway.

I had advanced no more than a few steps when Fidelis's arm shot out from a thick clump of bushes and hooked me into his hiding place. The rain was falling steadily now, but the storm for the moment held its peace.

‘See there?' whispered my friend.

He pointed to Barton's horse, standing close to the front door of the house with its reins tied to a climbing plant. The animal, I noticed, was now furnished with a saddle.

‘He's in the house and he's armed,' Fidelis went on. ‘I was just on the point of walking up to the house when a maid came out with the saddle. He sent her to put it on the horse while he pointed a gun at her from inside the door. I saw the gun-barrel. He's getting ready to fly.'

‘Does he know you're here?'

‘He knows someone's here: he was aware of being followed. He's been shouting out, making threats against the women inside and calling on me to show myself. I've shut both gates and tied them with some baling twine that I found. I put in some complicated knots: he will not undo them easily.'

Now the front door of the house opened and two figures edged into sight: they were Barton and a woman that he was pushing before him like a shield. He held a hunting gun in one hand while gripping his hostage tightly above the elbow with the other. The hostage was Ruth Peel. He was aiming to get behind the horse, but she was making it difficult, struggling and giving out cries of indignation. The rain, falling harder now, blurred our vision but it seemed that suddenly the horse-coper clubbed the woman viciously over the head, for she ceased to resist. He lifted and deposited her face down over the crupper, checked the girth straps and swung himself into the saddle.

The horse wheeled and I touched Fidelis's arm in warning: we were not well placed to stop him, having no firearms, and being a little too far from our own horses. In a moment, as we watched helplessly, Barton had ridden towards the out-gate but instead of trying to open it he simply put his horse at it and leapt into the lane. It was an easy jump for such a horse but one which nevertheless nearly jolted the girl off. Barton, though he still gripped the musket, managed to haul her back into position across the crupper, and immediately made towards our own horses tethered to the in-gate. Running up, we saw him begin loosening the horses from the gate-post, intending no doubt to take them with him far enough to make a clean escape. He had not, however, reckoned with the temperament of Grimshaw's mare – nor with the tenacity of Suez.

No doubt remembering that earlier kick, the dog was enraged by John Barton's appearance and he let fly a furious volley of growls and barks, leaping on his hind legs at the end of the rope that restrained him. In a couple of seconds the rope came loose and, free to move, he dived at the feet of Barton's high-strung horse, nipping at the fetlocks and hooves so that the animal, who was already unnerved by her proximity to two geldings, spooked and finally kicked out. A crack of thunder added to the confusion and all three horses suddenly bucked and reared, and I saw one of Barton's feet slip from the stirrup, causing him to cant sideways and let go the weapon in his hand. As it clattered to the ground, the woman was also finally dislodged from her place athwart the horse, and landed in an untidy heap on the ground.

We broke from our cover and ran forward. Fidelis got hold of Miss Peel and plucked her from further danger while I seized hold of the gun. Barton was still trying to bring his horse under control.

‘Dismount, Sir!' I shouted, ‘or I shall blow your damnable brains out.'

I put my finger to the trigger and levelled the weapon until it was pointing to a spot exactly between his eyes. I was shaking furiously but, at that range, I could hardly have missed. Barton, having regained control of his mount, looked down at me, his wormy lips apart, his face muscles drawn tight and his eyes narrowed. There was a moment in which he considered his chances, but it was a very short one. Then he kicked one leg up and over the horse's head and descended to earth.

 

Chapter Twenty-nine

D
AY WAS BECOMING
evening as Fidelis and I made our way back across the Moor towards Preston, with a sullen John Barton tightly roped around the wrists and riding between us. Before our departure we had brought Miss Peel into the house and revived her with the help of a smelling-bottle. She was weak and unsteady, though Fidelis found the bodily harm to be superficial. He bandaged her injured head, then settled her at the parlour fireside, with an order to the servants to give her a Jamaica ginger infusion, or a ginger posset with white bread for her shock. He promised to return on the morrow.

The storm clouds cleared as quickly as they had gathered and now warm, watery sunlight made the land glisten. Abreast once more of the Bale Stone, I turned to Barton and said,

‘So tell me, Barton: why did you mutilate Jackson's face? And why did you stab him with the wooden stake?'

Barton's habitual expression was sullen, but now it was a good deal sullener.

‘I know nothing about it,' he uttered. ‘I'll say no more.'

And, for the time being, he didn't. In thirty minutes' time we had come up Friar Gate, crossed Market Place and dismounted at Moot Hall where I asked for the Mayor to be sent for, or any member of the magistrates' Bench that happened to be in the building. A few minutes later Grimshaw himself came hurrying out to us.

‘I hope this is not one of your trivialities, Cragg. I have grave matters in hand. I am writing letters to London about the issue of my bond by which we shall finance the Guild.'

‘I have brought John Barton to you, Mr Grimshaw.'

‘Hello, Barton. Good God, man, is that my Molly you're riding? You have her in the devil of a lather.'

The enquiry elicited nothing but a scowl. I said:

‘I am delivering this man a prisoner into your hands.'

Grimshaw looked at Barton in surprise, noticing for the first time his bound wrists.

‘What on earth? A prisoner? What is this, Cragg?'

‘It is murder, Mr Grimshaw. He is suspected of killing Tybalt Jackson.'

‘Great heavens! But we have already had a fellow brought in today on that charge. What has John Barton to do with it?'

‘A joint enterprise is suspected. He should appear before you tomorrow with Moreton Canavan to answer. There is also a third man.'

‘A third man? This is a gang, then?'

‘The third is Zadok Moon.'

‘Moon! The one Pimbo accused of – what was it? Fraud?'

‘Yes, the same. He's fled along the northern road, and is perhaps making for Scotland. I hope by now that Mallender has taken him, and that he too will be brought before you.'

‘Well, I look forward to meeting the fellow at last, as he appears to be certainly a villain. But I have no time to discuss this now.'

He looked at the prisoner severely.

‘Well, Barton, I am appalled at your treatment of my mare. Do you presume to use her as a mere riding horse?'

The horse-coper would not look at the Mayor, but shuffled his feet with his eyes cast down.

‘Very well,' said Grimshaw, ‘if you will say nothing in your defence: I mandate your committal to the cells, and order you to appear before the Bench tomorrow morning.'

He jabbed Barton in the chest with his finger.

‘You can state your case then, man. And in the meantime I shall take Molly back. You have lost my confidence and I'm damned if you shall have her to train any longer. Bring him in.'

No sooner had the Parkin brothers taken Barton inside than their superior officer Mallender arrived fresh from the hue and cry. His laden horse approached us with whistling breath and staggering legs and, with much to-do and head-shaking, the Sergeant got himself to the ground. He had no one with him.

*   *   *

The hue and cry, Mallender told us, had caught a man at Garstang, which stands on the old Roman road about half way to Lancaster. They were sure it was their quarry. He was at the largest inn, trying to bargain a fresh horse out of the landlord in exchange for the lame one on which he had earlier ridden into town. The landlord was asking for additional money, which this stranger either did not have, or would not pay. On their arrival the pursuers produced old Shuttleworth's warrant, took the man up and asked to see his limping horse, which indeed was a grey with a braided tail, exactly according to the description given on the warrant. It was at this point that Mallender arrived and himself took charge of the prisoner.

‘I examined the gentleman in the inn parlour,' Mallender said. ‘I was surprised to find him angry, passionately angry, you know. He called me names that I would not care to repeat, and others that I did not even know the meaning of. I said that I suspected him of being Zadok Moon, and a murderer, but he denied it flat. Said he had never heard of Zadok Moon. I challenged him to prove that he was not the man and he brought out letters and documents and a captain's commission, all addressed to or concerning one with a different name, and nothing on him in the slightest degree to do with any Zadok Moon. So I was forced to the conclusion, Mr Cragg, that he was not Moon at all. It was a question of crossing scents, and the hounds picking up the wrong one half way through the hunt, with the mischance that the two men had the same kind of horse.'

‘Perhaps,' I said. ‘But tell me more about the man you questioned. You said he had a captain's commission. You mean in the militia?'

‘No, Sir, a sea captain, he said he was. On his way back to his ship in Lancaster it seems. Well, the more I saw of him, the more he looked like a ship's captain and the more I heard him, the more he sounded like a ship's captain. So I agreed that he was indeed, as I just said, a ship's captain and not Zadok Moon, as named on the warrant. So I was obliged to let him go on his way.'

‘I am nevertheless interested in knowing what his name was.'

‘Well, I've got it writ down safe. Let me see.'

He searched one coat pocket after another until he brought out a slip of paper. This he unfolded and handed across. I held it up for Fidelis to see and, though written in Mallender's crabbed handwriting, it was quite clear: the name was Edward Doubleday.

*   *   *

Canavan, and now John Barton, were due to appear before the Bench at ten next morning. Thinking to get Canavan's statement taken down before the Mayor could trample over the ground with clumsy questions, I decided to go immediately to him in the gaol below Moot Hall. Fidelis came with me and Suez, sticking to my heels like a shadow, followed us.

We were taken to the cell by Tarlton, the Moot Hall turnkey – a man of few words, and none of them pretty. The cell, though it was gloomy and dank enough, was the largest and best at the town's disposal, as might befit a prisoner of the merchant class. What light there was came from openings in the wall immediately below the ceiling – you would hardly call them windows – which gave onto the outside world at ground-level and were fitted with grilles. Canavan had had Tarlton bring candles and his boxes down to him, and, casting off his travelling clothes, had dressed himself in the trappings of respectability – an embroidered waistcoat, full wig, lace in the collar and cuffs, buckle shoes. It was attired in this way that we found him, sitting on his plain bed of wooden planks.