A SKELETON KEYS. CHAPTER I. SOMBRE landscape and a fading light. In the west, a great patch of silver edged with copper colour; the copper colour falling into purple, and the purple into black. A zenith like ink, and an eastern sky of almost blindfold darkness. One straight road on a level plain running darkly to the east, and with a sombre gleam stretching back to the patch of silver in the west. A doleful place and time, and two doleful figures plodding away from the silver gleam to assail the wall of darkness in the east. Splash, splash. Splash, splash. Side by side, with heads and shoulders butting at the east wind. The east wind pelting past them bitterly, and doing all its spiteful might to drive the cloud-shutters lower on the last sign of day. Splash, splash, side by side, and the bitter wind in their ears with a shriek, and not another sound for an hour. Tiburce Menseau, native of Paris, six feet high, powerfully built, but attenuated and ragged; John Jones, native of London, short in stature, sturdily made, but attenuated and ragged: these were the doleful two who tramped together. They were human scarecrows both, but the Frenchman was the raggeder of the two and the more downcast. John Jones, bullet-headed, fair-haired, and of a naturally cheerful countenance, went miserably enough, to be sure; but now and again he rammed the shocking bad hat he wore a little closer to his head, and always when he did so he smiled as though something pleased him. Tiburce Menseau watched this gesture furtively, and between times awaited it furtively, and never a word he said. Tiburce lived by his wits; and though upon occasion they profited him little, they were sharp. He had found opportunity for the study of Holy Writ in several institutions supported by the British Government, and one text curiously attacked his memory now, recurring to his mind every time John Jones rammed the shocking bad hat a little tighter-"Where the treasure is there will the heart be also." Uncompromising officials in blue uniforms had on several occasions described Tiburce in public. The phrase they chose was curt, severe, and widely inclusive. Moreover, it never varied. "Do you know anything of the prisoner?" which drew forth the descriptive criticism. blue uniform responded "Habitual criminal." So ran the question The descriptive critic in To do Tiburce justice, he looked the part. Leave a dark-complexioned man unshaven for a week, half-starve him for a month, dress him in rags, and let the rags be dirty, put a bitter devil of resentment in his breast, and though he were a curate to begin with, these things would tell unfavourably upon his aspect. Tiburce, who was not a curate to begin with, suffered those personal disabilities, and looked his part of habitual criminal all over. "Where the treasure is," said he to himself as his companion's hand went up to the shocking bad hat; and his companion smiled. A man who lives by his wits should be observant, and Tiburce watched all things that seemed worth watching "with lidless dragon eye." Whenever John Jones's hand went up to his hat-and it did so with unnecessary frequency-the fingers seemed to stay a little after fixing the hat more firmly, and there was a little movement in them as though they felt for something, and then John Jones smiled as if he had felt the something and was satisfied. Tiburce Menseau made continuous furtive note of this proceeding. What was a tramp likely to have concealed in his shocking bad hat? Half-a-crown? Half-a-sovereign? A bank note? A stolen ring of value? Tiburce had known such things. John Jones looked like a tramp of the home-made kind. The real British tramp is not like the customary vagabond of any other country, and John might have been taken for a type amongst the typical. He was sturdily built-as has been said already-but he slouched as a tramp ought to slouch, and he lounged-there is no other word for it-straight on, regardless of puddles, as alone a tramp lounges. At every step the water spirted from his broken boots, and the wind fluttered his rags as though he had been dressed in little dirty bannerets. He limped now and then, but only now and then, when his sore feet gave him an extra twinge. Suddenly Tiburce Menseau stopped short and cursed in a tautological patois, blending damns and sacrés. "What's the matter?" said John Jones, stopping also and facing him. "Is there no end to the road?" asked the other, with a curse upon the dreary highway. "Five miles, yet," said John. "A good five miles." Tiburce Menseau, taking refuge in his native language, cursed each individual mile in the five, and his companion made another start. Tiburce took one step after him and stopped again to curse the five miles collectively. Then he turned about, and glared at the fading streak of silver in the west, now tarnished, and the black road, with its pools of water, shining with a tarnished gleam. Meantime, John Jones had made a hundred yards or more, and Tiburce, turning again to face the wind, cursed his companion's haste, his own soreness and weariness, and the bitter landscape, and so went on limping and growling curses under his breath, hugging his rags together, with "Habitual criminal" written large all over him for any passing stranger's eyes to read. One passing stranger read it broadly at a glance. He was not so intelligent a stranger as to be in the habit of reading character as he went along the highway, but he would have been dull-eyed indeed had he been unable to decipher so large-lettered and simple a placard as Tiburce carried. The stranger was a carter, dressed in heavy fustian, and bearing a folded sack upon his shoulders as an extra protection against the weather. He drove a lumbering horse at a lumbering trot in a lumbering country cart, and as he passed Tiburce he looked over his shoulder at the scowling, uplifted face, and pronounced a ready verdict-"Gaolbird!" Overtaking John Jones in turn a hundred yards ahead of the other, he looked back again at an uplifted face which wore no scowl, but only a look of fatigued resolution, which, in spite of fatigue, was resolution still The carter pulled up. "Be you a goin' on to Nebham, mate?" "Yes," said John Jones. "I can give you a lift nigh into the town," said the carter. "Thank you,” said John, "but there's a chum of mine behind." "I doan't like the look of un," the carter answered; "I're gyme to give you a lift if you likes, but I ain't got no room for more 'an one." Now, as a matter of fact, he had room for half a dozen, and his first reason for rejecting Tiburce was more satisfying than the second. "Well, the fact is, mate," said John Jones, "he's dead beat, and I'm not quite. It would be a real charity to him. I can manage it, somehow, and I don't believe he can." "Vurry well, then," said the carter, "since beggars has come to be choosers you can manage it together." "Well, thank you all the same, mate," said John Jones, and Tiburce came into earshot. "You're a decent-spoke young feller," said the carter; "you woan't git no good out o' he. Git into the cyart." "No, thank you," responded John. "Thank you all the same.” "Then stop whur you be, fur a fool," responded the kindly carter. "Gee up!" He cracked his whip and lumbered on again, murmuring that he didn't want no gaolbirds, and most likely there was a pair on 'em. Else what did they stick together for? When the carter had been so complimentary as to tell John that he was a decent-spoken young fellow, John's face was suddenly, but briefly, agleam with a smile of much humour, as though he enjoyed a special joke, the secret of which was his alone. The carter was looking back at the limping, cursing, scowling Tiburce, and did not see the smile. It was so merry and jovial for just the swift second or two for which it lasted, that it might have puzzled him to find it on the face of any man under such circumstances as the tramp stood in the midst of. John Jones and Tiburce Menseau were comrades for a day by chance, and a man who had camaraderie enough in him to hold by so casual and unexpressed a contract was likely to have heart enough to feel a little more kindly to his comrade after such a deed than before it. "We'll see the day through together, any way," said John Jones cheerfully. "He offered to give you a lift," said Tiburce, in correct but foreign-sounding English. "Yes," answered John, "but he wouldn't take the two of us." "I heard him," said Tiburce. "Pig!" Then he cursed under his breath again, with an anathema for every limping step, and a groan of weariness for every anathema. "Take it easy," said John Jones; and his hand went up to his hat again. He began to sing to no particular tune— Then merrily hent the footpath way, And merrily over the stile, ha! Where did this bullet-headed, thick-set tramp scrape acquaintance with the great poet? The Frenchman scowled at him, and John Jones, having begun to sing, went on singing in a nasal and unmusical manner My lodging is on the cold ground And very hard is my fare. He went clean through that quaint ditty, and ending with a pro. longed note between a howl and a groan, he sent his hand to his hat once more and smiled cheerfully. "Where the treasure is," thought scowling Tiburce, always watchful of the gesture. What was the treasure? If John Jones carried any treasure it might, perhaps, be as well for him to be out of Tiburce Menseau's way. The unconscious Briton lounged wearily on and ceased to sing. Splash, splash; side by side, with heads and shoulders butting at the wind, and not another sound for an hour. The cloud shutters were quite blown down across the tarnished silver streak by this time, and the bitter wind was louder and keener, and worried the two weary travellers more savagely. It grew so dark that they could barely keep the road. Suddenly Tiburce Menseau tripped and fell against John Jones, in such wise as accidentally to knock off his hat. "Pardon!" said Tiburce, and groping in the darkness picked up the hat, and passing his thin, thievish fingers swiftly round within the lining, felt and held a little package no larger than a penny-piece. It came away with a slight tearing feel as though it were gummed or pasted to the hat. This did not detain the skilful Tiburce half a second, and the thing was done with such delicate rapidity that even in daylight it might have escaped notice. "I have knocked your hat off," said Tiburce. "This filthy road is filled with ruts and holes. Oh, I have it. Here you are." The wind howled so that Tiburce had to repeat his last words. John Jones was groping wildly with both hands in mud and water. He felt greedily for the hat, and meeting the outstretched hands of the apologetic Tiburce, took it and felt within the lining, at first assuredly, and then rapidly and undecidedly. Then, with a wild yell, he was down on his knees in the mud and water groping wrist deep. "What is the matter?" cried Tiburce, hugging the little parcel in his hand. Surely of value-surely. Else why such care of it, and why such a cry of enraged despair at losing it? John Jones made no reply, but went about on hands and knees in the mud, still groping. "What is the matter?" cried Tiburce again, touching him on the shoulder. "Have you lost anything?" "Lost!" said John Jones, voicelessly, "who can tell what I have lost!" and he groped on in the mud, while Tiburce waited with signal patience. The search came to nothing, but it went on until the searcher's bones were numbed, and until his hands could no longer feel the ground he groped on. Then with heavy heart he staggered to his feet. |