Ghost Stories of an Antiquary - Montague Rhodes James (feel good books to read .TXT) 📗
- Author: Montague Rhodes James
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with uncanny quickness, a strip of thin light paper. The window was open,
but Harrington slammed it to, just in time to intercept the paper, which
he caught. ‘I thought so,’ he said; ‘it might be the identical thing that
was given to my brother. You’ll have to look out, Dunning; this may mean
something quite serious for you.’
A long consultation took place. The paper was narrowly examined. As
Harrington had said, the characters on it were more like Runes than
anything else, but not decipherable by either man, and both hesitated to
copy them, for fear, as they confessed, of perpetuating whatever evil
purpose they might conceal. So it has remained impossible (if I may
anticipate a little) to ascertain what was conveyed in this curious
message or commission. Both Dunning and Harrington are firmly convinced
that it had the effect of bringing its possessors into very undesirable
company. That it must be returned to the source whence it came they were
agreed, and further, that the only safe and certain way was that of
personal service; and here contrivance would be necessary, for Dunning
was known by sight to Karswell. He must, for one thing, alter his
appearance by shaving his beard. But then might not the blow fall first?
Harrington thought they could time it. He knew the date of the concert at
which the ‘black spot’ had been put on his brother: it was June 18th. The
death had followed on Sept. 18th. Dunning reminded him that three months
had been mentioned on the inscription on the car-window. ‘Perhaps,’ he
added, with a cheerless laugh, ‘mine may be a bill at three months too. I
believe I can fix it by my diary. Yes, April 23rd was the day at the
Museum; that brings us to July 23rd. Now, you know, it becomes extremely
important to me to know anything you will tell me about the progress of
your brother’s trouble, if it is possible for you to speak of it.’ ‘Of
course. Well, the sense of being watched whenever he was alone was the
most distressing thing to him. After a time I took to sleeping in his
room, and he was the better for that: still, he talked a great deal in
his sleep. What about? Is it wise to dwell on that, at least before
things are straightened out? I think not, but I can tell you this: two
things came for him by post during those weeks, both with a London
postmark, and addressed in a commercial hand. One was a woodcut of
Bewick’s, roughly torn out of the page: one which shows a moonlit road
and a man walking along it, followed by an awful demon creature. Under it
were written the lines out of the “Ancient Mariner” (which I suppose the
cut illustrates) about one who, having once looked round—
walks on,
And turns no more his head,
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.
The other was a calendar, such as tradesmen often send. My brother paid
no attention to this, but I looked at it after his death, and found that
everything after Sept. 18 had been torn out. You may be surprised at his
having gone out alone the evening he was killed, but the fact is that
during the last ten days or so of his life he had been quite free from
the sense of being followed or watched.’
The end of the consultation was this. Harrington, who knew a neighbour of
Karswell’s, thought he saw a way of keeping a watch on his movements. It
would be Dunning’s part to be in readiness to try to cross Karswell’s
path at any moment, to keep the paper safe and in a place of ready
access.
They parted. The next weeks were no doubt a severe strain upon Dunning’s
nerves: the intangible barrier which had seemed to rise about him on the
day when he received the paper, gradually developed into a brooding
blackness that cut him off from the means of escape to which one might
have thought he might resort. No one was at hand who was likely to
suggest them to him, and he seemed robbed of all initiative. He waited
with inexpressible anxiety as May, June, and early July passed on, for a
mandate from Harrington. But all this time Karswell remained immovable at
Lufford.
At last, in less than a week before the date he had come to look upon as
the end of his earthly activities, came a telegram: ‘Leaves Victoria by
boat train Thursday night. Do not miss. I come to you tonight.
Harrington.’
He arrived accordingly, and they concocted plans. The train left Victoria
at nine and its last stop before Dover was Croydon West. Harrington would
mark down Karswell at Victoria, and look out for Dunning at Croydon,
calling to him if need were by a name agreed upon. Dunning, disguised as
far as might be, was to have no label or initials on any hand luggage,
and must at all costs have the paper with him.
Dunning’s suspense as he waited on the Groydon platform I need not
attempt to describe. His sense of danger during the last days had only
been sharpened by the fact that the cloud about him had perceptibly been
lighter; but relief was an ominous symptom, and, if Karswell eluded him
now, hope was gone: and there were so many chances of that. The rumour of
the journey might be itself a device. The twenty minutes in which he
paced the platform and persecuted every porter with inquiries as to the
boat train were as bitter as any he had spent. Still, the train came, and
Harrington was at the window. It was important, of course, that there
should be no recognition: so Dunning got in at the farther end of the
corridor carriage, and only gradually made his way to the compartment
where Harrington and Karswell were. He was pleased, on the whole, to see
that the train was far from full.
Karswell was on the alert, but gave no sign of recognition. Dunning took
the seat not immediately facing him, and attempted, vainly at first, then
with increasing command of his faculties, to reckon the possibilities of
making the desired transfer. Opposite to Karswell, and next to Dunning,
was a heap of Karswell’s coats on the seat. It would be of no use to slip
the paper into these—he would not be safe, or would not feel so, unless
in some way it could be proffered by him and accepted by the other. There
was a handbag, open, and with papers in it. Could he manage to conceal
this (so that perhaps Karswell might leave the carriage without it), and
then find and give it to him? This was the plan that suggested itself. If
he could only have counselled with Harrington! but that could not be. The
minutes went on. More than once Karswell rose and went out into the
corridor. The second time Dunning was on the point of attempting to make
the bag fall off the seat, but he caught Harrington’s eye, and read in it
a warning.
Karswell, from the corridor, was watching: probably to see if the two men
recognized each other. He returned, but was evidently restless: and, when
he rose the third time, hope dawned, for something did slip off his seat
and fall with hardly a sound to the floor. Karswell went out once more,
and passed out of range of the corridor window. Dunning picked up what
had fallen, and saw that the key was in his hands in the form of one of
Cook’s ticket-cases, with tickets in it. These cases have a pocket in the
cover, and within very few seconds the paper of which we have heard was
in the pocket of this one. To make the operation more secure, Harrington
stood in the doorway of the compartment and fiddled with the blind. It
was done, and done at the right time, for the train was now slowing down
towards Dover.
In a moment more Karswell re-entered the compartment. As he did so,
Dunning, managing, he knew not how, to suppress the tremble in his voice,
handed him the ticket-case, saying, ‘May I give you this, sir? I believe
it is yours.’ After a brief glance at the ticket inside, Karswell uttered
the hoped-for response, ‘Yes, it is; much obliged to you, sir,’ and he
placed it in his breast pocket.
Even in the few moments that remained—moments of tense anxiety, for they
knew not to what a premature finding of the paper might lead—both men
noticed that the carriage seemed to darken about them and to grow warmer;
that Karswell was fidgety and oppressed; that he drew the heap of loose
coats near to him and cast it back as if it repelled him; and that he
then sat upright and glanced anxiously at both. They, with sickening
anxiety, busied themselves in collecting their belongings; but they both
thought that Karswell was on the point of speaking when the train stopped
at Dover Town. It was natural that in the short space between town and
pier they should both go into the corridor.
At the pier they got out, but so empty was the train that they were
forced to linger on the platform until Karswell should have passed ahead
of them with his porter on the way to the boat, and only then was it safe
for them to exchange a pressure of the hand and a word of concentrated
congratulation. The effect upon Dunning was to make him almost faint.
Harrington made him lean up against the wall, while he himself went
forward a few yards within sight of the gangway to the boat, at which
Karswell had now arrived. The man at the head of it examined his ticket,
and, laden with coats he passed down into the boat. Suddenly the official
called after him, ‘You, sir, beg pardon, did the other gentleman show his
ticket?’ ‘What the devil do you mean by the other gentleman?’ Karswell’s
snarling voice called back from the deck. The man bent over and looked at
him. ‘The devil? Well, I don’t know, I’m sure,’ Harrington heard him say
to himself, and then aloud, ‘My mistake, sir; must have been your rugs!
ask your pardon.’ And then, to a subordinate near him, ”Ad he got a dog
with him, or what? Funny thing: I could ‘a’ swore ‘e wasn’t alone. Well,
whatever it was, they’ll ‘ave to see to it aboard. She’s off now. Another
week and we shall be gettin’ the ‘oliday customers.’ In five minutes more
there was nothing but the lessening lights of the boat, the long line of
the Dover lamps, the night breeze, and the moon.
Long and long the two sat in their room at the ‘Lord Warden’. In spite of
the removal of their greatest anxiety, they were oppressed with a doubt,
not of the lightest. Had they been justified in sending a man to his
death, as they believed they had? Ought they not to warn him, at least?
‘No,’ said Harrington; ‘if he is the murderer I think him, we have done
no more than is just. Still, if you think it better—but how and where
can you warn him?’ ‘He was booked to Abbeville only,’ said Dunning. ‘I
saw that. If I wired to the hotels there in Joanne’s Guide, “Examine your
ticket-case, Dunning,” I should feel happier. This is the 21st: he will
have a day. But I am afraid he has gone into the dark.’ So telegrams were
left at the hotel office.
It is not clear whether these reached their destination, or whether, if
they
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