CHAPTER 9
A JUDGEMENT
Let them fight it out, friend. Things have gone too far,God must judge the couple: leave them as they are--_Browning_
I made as if I would follow the others, not wishing to see what I mustsee if I stayed behind, and knowing that I was powerless to bend Elzevirfrom his purpose. But he called me back and bade me wait with him, forthat I might be useful by and by. So I waited, but was only able to makea dreadful guess at how I might be of use, and feared the worst.
Maskew sat on the sward with his hands lashed tight behind his back, andhis feet tied in front. They had set him with his shoulders against agreat block of weather-worn stone that was half-buried and half-stuck upout of the turf. There he sat keeping his eyes on the ground, and wasbreathing less painfully than when he was first brought, but still verypale. Elzevir stood with the lanthorn in his hand, looking at Maskewwith a fixed gaze, and we could hear the hoofs of the heavy-laden horsesbeating up the path, till they turned a corner, and all was still.
The silence was broken by Maskew: 'Unloose me, villain, and let me go. Iam a magistrate of the county, and if you do not, I will have yougibbeted on this cliff-top.'
They were brave words enough, yet seemed to me but bad play-acting; andbrought to my remembrance how, when I was a little fellow, Mr. Glennieonce made me recite a battle-piece of Mr. Dryden before my betters; andhow I could scarce get out the bloody threats for shyness and risingtears. So it was with Maskew's words; for he had much ado to gatherbreath to say them, and they came in a thin voice that had no sting ofwrath or passion in it.
Then Elzevir spoke to him, not roughly, but resolved; and yet withmelancholy, like a judge sentencing a prisoner:
'Talk not to me of gibbets, for thou wilt neither hang nor see men hangedagain. A month ago thou satst under my roof, watching the flame burn downtill the pin dropped and gave thee right to turn me out from my old home.And now this morning thou shalt watch that flame again, for I will givethee one inch more of candle, and when the pin drops, will put this thineown pistol to thy head, and kill thee with as little thought as I wouldkill a stoat or other vermin.'
Then he opened the lanthorn slide, took out from his neckcloth that samepin with the onyx head which he had used in the Why Not? and fixed it inthe tallow a short inch from the top, setting the lanthorn down upon thesward in front of Maskew.
As for me, I was dismayed beyond telling at these words, and madegiddy with the revulsion of feeling; for, whereas, but a few minutesago, I would have thought nothing too bad for Maskew, now I was turnedround to wish he might come off with his life, and to look with terrorupon Elzevir.
It had grown much lighter, but not yet with the rosy flush of sunrise;only the stars had faded out, and the deep blue of the night given way toa misty grey. The light was strong enough to let all things be seen, butnot to call the due tints back to them. So I could see cliffs and ground,bushes and stones and sea, and all were of one pearly grey colour, orrather they were colourless; but the most colourless and greyest thing ofall was Maskew's face. His hair had got awry, and his head showed muchbalder than when it was well trimmed; his face, too, was drawn with heavylines, and there were rings under his eyes. Beside all that, he had gotan ugly fall in trying to escape, and one cheek was muddied, and down ittrickled a blood-drop where a stone had cut him. He was a sorry sightenough, and looking at him, I remembered that day in the schoolroom whenthis very man had struck the parson, and how our master had sat patientunder it, with a blood-drop trickling down his cheek too. Maskew kept hiseyes fixed for a long time on the ground, but raised them at last, andlooked at me with a vacant yet pity-seeking look. Now, till that moment Ihad never seen a trace of Grace in his features, nor of him in hers; andyet as he gazed at me then, there was something of her present in hisface, even battered as it was, so that it seemed as if she looked at mebehind his eyes. And that made me the sorrier for him, and at last I feltI could not stand by and see him done to death.
When Elzevir had stuck the pin into the candle he never shut the slideagain; and though no wind blew, there was a light breath moving in themorning off the sea, that got inside the lanthorn and set the flameaskew. And so the candle guttered down one side till but little tallowwas left above the pin; for though the flame grew pale and paler to theview in the growing morning light, yet it burnt freely all the time. Soat last there was left, as I judged, but a quarter of an hour to runbefore the pin should fall, and I saw that Maskew knew this as well as I,for his eyes were fixed on the lanthorn.
At last he spoke again, but the brave words were gone, and the thin voicewas thinner. He had dropped threats, and was begging piteously for hislife. 'Spare me,' he said; 'spare me, Mr. Block: I have an only daughter,a young girl with none but me to guard her. Would you rob a young girl ofher only help and cast her on the world? Would you have them find me deadupon the cliff and bring me back to her a bloody corpse?'
Then Elzevir answered: 'And had I not an only son, and was he not broughtback to me a bloody corpse? Whose pistol was it that flashed in his faceand took his life away? Do you not know? It was this very same that shallflash in yours. So make what peace you may with God, for you have littletime to make it.'
With that he took the pistol from the ground where it had lain, andturning his back on Maskew, walked slowly to and fro among thebramble-plumps.
Though Maskew's words about his daughter seemed but to feed Elzevir'sanger, by leading him to think of David, they sank deep in my heart; andif it had seemed a fearful thing before to stand by and see afellow-creature butchered, it seemed now ten thousand times more fearful.And when I thought of Grace, and what such a deed would mean to her, mypulse beat so fierce that I must needs spring to my feet and run toreason with Elzevir, and tell him this must not be.
He was still walking among the bushes when I found him, and let me saymy say till I was out of breath, and bore with me if I talked fast, andif my tongue outran my judgement.
'Thou hast a warm heart, lad,' he said, 'and 'tis for that I like thee.And if thou hast a chief place in thy heart for me, I cannot grumble ifthou find a little room there even for our enemies. Would I could set thysoul at ease, and do all that thou askest. In the first flush of wrath,when he was taken plotting against our lives, it seemed a little thingenough to take his evil life. But now these morning airs have cooled me,and it goes against my will to shoot a cowering hound tied hand and foot,even though he had murdered twenty sons of mine. I have thought ifthere be any way to spare his life, and leave this hour's agony to read alesson not to be unlearned until the grave. For such poltroons dreaddeath, and in one hour they die a hundred times. But there is no way out:his life lies in the scale against the lives of all our men, yes, and thylife too. They left him in my hands well knowing I should take account ofhim; and am I now to play them false and turn him loose again to hangthem all? It cannot be.'
Still I pleaded hard for Maskew's life, hanging on Elzevir's arm, andusing every argument that I could think of to soften his purpose; but hepushed me off; and though I saw that he was loth to do it, I had aterrible conviction that he was not a man to be turned back from hisresolve, and would go through with it to the end.
We came back together from the brambles to the piece of sward, and theresat Maskew where we had left him with his back against the stone. Only,while we were away he had managed to wriggle his watch out of the fob,and it lay beside him on the turf, tied to him with a black silk riband.The face of it was turned upwards, and as I passed I saw the hand pointedto five. Sunrise was very near; for though the cliff shut out the eastfrom us, the west over Portland was all aglow with copper-red and gold,and the candle burnt low. The head of the pin was drooping, though veryslightly, but as I saw it droop a month before, and I knew that the finalact was not far off.
Maskew knew it too, for he made his last appeal, using such passionatewords as I cannot now relate, and wriggling with his body as if to gethis hands from behind his back and hold them up in supplication. Heoffered m
oney; a thousand, five thousand, ten thousand pounds to be setfree; he would give back the Why Not?; he would leave Moonfleet; and allthe while the sweat ran down his furrowed face, and at last his voice waschoked with sobs, for he was crying for his life in craven fear.
He might have spoken to a deaf man for all he moved his judge; andElzevir's answer was to cock the pistol and prime the powder in the pan.
Then I stuck my fingers in my ears and shut my eyes, that I mightneither see nor hear what followed, but in a second changed my mind andopened them again, for I had made a great resolve to stop this matter,come what might.
Maskew was making a dreadful sound between a moan and strangled cry; italmost seemed as if he thought that there were others by him besideElzevir and me, and was shouting to them for help. The sun had risen, andhis first rays blazed on a window far away in the west on top of PortlandIsland, and then there was a tinkle in the inside of the lanthorn, andthe pin fell.
Elzevir looked full at Maskew, and raised his pistol; but before he hadtime to take aim, I dashed upon him like a wild cat, springing on hisright arm, and crying to him to stop. It was an unequal struggle, a lad,though full-grown and lusty, against one of the powerfullest of men, butindignation nerved my arms, and his were weak, because he doubted of hisright. So 'twas with some effort that he shook me off, and in thestruggle the pistol was fired into the air.
Then I let go of him, and stumbled for a moment, tired with that bout,but pleased withal, because I saw what peace even so short a respite hadbrought to Maskew. For at the pistol shot 'twas as if a mask of horrorhad fallen from his face, and left him his old countenance again; andthen I saw he turned his eyes towards the cliff-top, and thought that hewas looking up in thankfulness to heaven.
But now a new thing happened; for before the echoes of that pistol-shothad died on the keen morning air, I thought I heard a noise of distantshouting, and looked about to see whence it could come. Elzevir lookedround too, but Maskew forgetting to upbraid me for making him miss hisaim, still kept his face turned up towards the cliff. Then the voicescame nearer, and there was a mingled sound as of men shouting to oneanother, and gathering in from different places. 'Twas from the cliff-topthat the voices came, and thither Elzevir and I looked up, and there tooMaskew kept his eyes fixed. And in a moment there were a score of menstood on the cliff's edge high above our heads. The sky behind them waspink flushed with the keenest light of the young day, and they stood outagainst it sharp cut and black as the silhouette of my mother that usedto hang up by the parlour chimney. They were soldiers, and I knew thetall mitre-caps of the 13th, and saw the shafts of light from the sunrisecome flashing round their bodies, and glance off the barrels of theirmatchlocks.
I knew it all now; it was the Posse who had lain in ambush. Elzevir sawit too, and then all shouted at once. 'Yield at the King's command: youare our prisoners!' calls the voice of one of those black silhouettes,far up on the cliff-top.
'We are lost,' cries Elzevir; 'it is the Posse; but if we die, thistraitor shall go before us,' and he makes towards Maskew to brain himwith the pistol.
'Shoot, shoot, in the Devil's name,' screams Maskew, 'or I am adead man.'
Then there came a flash of fire along the black line of silhouettes,with a crackle like a near peal of thunder, and a fut, fut, fut, ofbullets in the turf. And before Elzevir could get at him, Maskew hadfallen over on the sward with a groan, and with a little red hole in themiddle of his forehead.
'Run for the cliff-side,' cried Elzevir to me; 'get close in, and theycannot touch thee,' and he made for the chalk wall. But I had fallen onmy knees like a bullock felled by a pole-axe, and had a scorching pain inmy left foot. Elzevir looked back. 'What, have they hit thee too?' hesaid, and ran and picked me up like a child. And then there is anotherflash and fut, fut, in the turf; but the shots find no billet this time,and we are lying close against the cliff, panting but safe.