CHAPTER X
THE OTHER WITNESS
It was with a thumping heart and nerves all a-tingle that I followed AbelCrone out of his front shop into a sort of office that he had at the backof it--a little, dirty hole of a place, in which there was a ramshackletable, a chair or two, a stand-up desk, a cupboard, and a variety of oddsand ends that he had picked up in his trade. The man's sudden revelationof knowledge had knocked all the confidence out of me. It had nevercrossed my mind that any living soul had a notion of my secret--forsecret, of course, it was, and one that I would not have trusted toCrone, of all men in the world, knowing him as I did to be such a one forgossip. And he had let this challenge out on me so sharply, catching meunawares that I was alone with him, and, as it were, at his mercy, beforeI could pull my wits together. Everything in me was confused. I wasthinking several things all at a time. How did he come to know? Had Ibeen watched? Had some person followed me out of Berwick that night? Wasthis part of the general mystery? And what was going to come of it, nowthat Abel Crone was aware that I knew something which, up to then, I hadkept back?
I stood helplessly staring at him as he turned up the wick of an oillamp that stood on a mantelpiece littered with a mess of small things,and he caught a sight of my face when there was more light, and as heshut the door on us he laughed--laughed as if he knew that he had me in atrap. And before he spoke again he went over to the cupboard and took outa bottle and glasses.
"Will you taste?" he asked, leering at me. "A wee drop, now? It'll doyou good."
"No!" said I.
"Then I'll drink for the two of us," he responded, and poured out ahalf-tumblerful of whisky, to which he added precious little water."Here's to you, my lad; and may you have grace to take advantage ofyour chances!"
He winked over the rim of his glass as he took a big pull at itscontents, and there was something so villainous in the look of him thatit did me good in the way of steeling my nerves again. For I now sawthat here was an uncommonly bad man to deal with, and that I had best beon my guard.
"Mr. Crone," said I, gazing straight at him, "what's this you have tosay to me?"
"Sit you down," he answered, pointing at a chair that was shoved underone side of the little table. "Pull that out and sit you down. What weshall have to say to each other'll not be said in five minutes. Let'sconfer in the proper and comfortable fashion."
I did what he asked, and he took another chair himself and sat downopposite me, propping his elbow on the table and leaning across it, sothat, the table being but narrow, his sharp eyes and questioning lipswere closer to mine than I cared for. And while he leaned forward in hischair I sat back in mine, keeping as far from him as I could, and juststaring at him--perhaps as if I had been some trapped animal thatcouldn't get itself away from the eyes of another that meant presently tokill it. Once again I asked him what he wanted.
"You didn't answer my question," he said. "I'll put it again, and youneedn't be afraid that anybody'll overhear us in this place, it's safe! Isay once more, what for did you not tell in your evidence at that inquestthat you saw Sir Gilbert Carstairs at the cross-roads on the night of themurder! Um?"
"That's my business!" said I
"Just so," said he. "And I'll agree with you in that. It is yourbusiness. But if by that you mean that it's yours alone, and nobodyelse's, then I don't agree. Neither would the police."
We stared at each other across the table for a minute of silence, andthen I put the question directly to him that I had been wanting to putever since he had first spoken. And I put it crudely enough.
"How did you know?" I asked.
He laughed at that--sneeringly, of course.
"Aye, that's plain enough," said he. "No fencing about that! How did Iknow? Because when you saw Sir Gilbert I wasn't five feet away from you,and what you saw, I saw. I saw you both!"
"You were there?" I exclaimed.
"Snug behind the hedge in front of which you planted yourself," heanswered. "And if you want to know what I was doing there, I'll tell you.I was doing--or had been doing--a bit of poaching. And, as I say, whatyou saw, I saw!"
"Then I'll ask you a question, Mr. Crone," I said. "Why haven't you told,yourself?"
"Aye!" he said. "You may well ask me that. But I wasn't called as awitness at yon inquest."
"You could have come forward," I suggested.
"I didn't choose," he retorted.
We both looked at each other again, and while we looked he swigged offhis drink and helped himself, just as generously, to more. And, as I wasgetting bolder by that time, I set to work at questioning him.
"You'll be attaching some importance to what you saw?" said I.
"Well," he replied slowly, "it's not a pleasant thing--for a man'ssafety--to be as near as what he was to a place where another man's justbeen done to his death."
"You and I were near enough, anyway," I remarked.
"We know what we were there for," he flung back at me. "We don't knowwhat he was there for."
"Put your tongue to it, Mr. Crone," I said boldly. "The fact is, yoususpicion him?"
"I suspicion a good deal, maybe," he admitted. "After all, even a man ofthat degree's only a man, when all's said and done, and there might bereasons that you and me knows nothing about. Let me ask you a question,"he went on, edging nearer at me across the table. "Have you mentioned itto a soul?"
I made a mistake at that, but he was on me so sharp, and his manner wasso insistent, that I had the word out of my lips before I thought.
"No!" I replied. "I haven't."
"Nor me," he said. "Nor me. So--you and me are the only two folkthat know."
"Well?" I asked.
He took another pull at his liquor and for a moment or two sat silent,tapping his finger-nails against the rim of the glass.
"It's a queer business, Moneylaws," he said at last. "Look at it anywayyou like, it's a queer business! Here's one man, yon lodger of yourmother's, comes into the town and goes round the neighbourhood readingthe old parish registers and asking questions at the parson's--aye,and he was at it both sides of the Tweed--I've found that much outfor myself! For what purpose? Is there money at the back ofit--property--something of that sort, dependent on this Gilverthwaiteunearthing some facts or other out of those old books? And then comesanother man, a stranger, that's as mysterious in his movements asGilverthwaite was, and he's to meet Gilverthwaite at a certain lonelyspot, and at a very strange hour, and Gilverthwaite can't go, and he getsyou to go, and you find the man--murdered! And--close by--you've seenthis other man, who, between you and me--though it's no secret--is asmuch a stranger to the neighbourhood as ever Gilverthwaite was orPhillips was!"
"I don't follow you at that," I said.
"No?" said he. "Then I'll make it plainer to you. Do you know that untilyon Sir Gilbert Carstairs came here, not so long since, to take up histitle and his house and the estate, he'd never set foot in the place,never been near the place, this thirty year? Man! his own father, oldSir Alec, and his own sister, Mrs. Ralston of Craig, had never clappedeyes on him since he went away from Hathercleugh a youngster ofone-and-twenty!"
"Do you tell me that, Mr. Crone?" I exclaimed, much surprised at hiswords. "I didn't know so much. Where had he been, then?"
"God knows!" said he. "And himself. It was said he was a doctor inLondon, and in foreign parts. Him and his brother--elder brother, you'reaware, Mr. Michael--they both quarrelled with the old baronet when theywere little more than lads, and out they cleared, going their own ways.And news of Michael's death, and the proofs of it, came home not so longbefore old Sir Alec died, and as Michael had never married, of course theyounger brother succeeded when his father came to his end last winter.And, as I say, who knows anything about his past doings when he was awaymore than thirty years, nor what company he kept, nor what secrets hehas? Do you follow me?"
"Aye, I'm following you, Mr. Crone," I answered. "It comes to this--yoususpect Sir Gilbert?"
"What I say," he answered, "is this:
he may have had something to dowith the affair. You cannot tell. But you and me knows he was near theplace--coming from its direction--at the time the murder would be in thedoing. And--there is nobody knows but you--and me!"
"What are you going to do about it?" I asked.
He had another period of reflection before he replied, and when he spokeit was to the accompaniment of a warning look.
"It's an ill-advised thing to talk about rich men," said he. "Yon man notonly has money of his own, in what you might call considerable quantity,but his wife he brought with him is a woman of vast wealth, they tell me.It would be no very wise action on your part to set rumours going,Moneylaws, unless you could substantiate them."
"What about yourself?" I asked. "You know as much as I do."
"Aye, and there's one word that sums all up," said he. "And it's a shortone. Wait! There'll be more coming out. Keep your counsel a bit. And whenthe moment comes, and if the moment comes--why, you know there's mebehind you to corroborate. And--that's all!"
He got up then, with a nod, as if to show that the interview was over,and I was that glad to get away from him that I walked off withoutanother word.