THE SCARECROW RIDES (3 page)

“What do you want here?” she asked.

He turned away, muttering, “My scarf.” He hovered round the bed,
pretending to search for it.

She rose from her knees, dashed the tears from her eyes with the
back of her hand, and in a business-like way went to the window-sill
and picked up the candle. Her quick eyes immediately saw the scarf
where he had dropped it. With her other hand she pointed to it.

“There it is,” she said, but made no attempt to stoop for it.

For a moment he watched her as she stood there in the candle-light,
and a terrifying thought took hold of his brain. He knew that for this
woman he could kill rashly, without taking pains for his own safety as
he had always done before. The possible result of such foolishness
frightened him. He somehow resented the power she had over him, and he
vowed that though her spell might mean danger to him, he would utterly
destroy her first.

The voice of Abel jerked him into action:

“Can't you find it, man? You're wasting time.”

“Got it,” answered Merry, as he shambled forward awkwardly and
picked up the scarf. As he straightened himself up, he seemed surprised
to find himself so close to her. There was only the candle which she
held between them. Now, he decided, was the time to give her his
message.

“Should anything happen to him,” he whispered, jerking his head
toward the stairs, “I shall be here to take charge of you, see?”

Meg looked bewildered, as indeed she was. “I don't understand you,
Mr. Merry,” she said.

“No?” he queried. “Well, you've made me understand something, you
have. I see now why them damned fool moths gets caught up in the
flame.”

As he spoke he had dropped the knife down into his pocket, and his
fingers had fluttered in tiny circles above the lighted candle which
she held between them. Then suddenly they had dropped, extinguishing
the flame and plunging the bedroom into darkness. Before she could cry
out in her astonishment, her head was clenched in the crook of his arm
and she was half suffocated against the wetness of his coat. As he held
her there, she heard once more a wail of agonised terror from the ship
outside.

“Come on,” cried Abel, climbing the stairs.

She felt herself freed, and as the lightning flashed again she was
alone.

“Have you got a light to rekindle the candle for Mrs. Clouder?” said
Merry from the top of the stairs. “The draught blew the damned thing
out.”

Abel produced a 'flasher' from his pocket and passing Merry on the
stairs went into the bedroom. 'Flashers' were small pistols without
barrels, about four inches long in all, with flintlock and a pan to
hold about a quarter thimble-full of powder. 'Flashers' were used by
the Dymchurch men to signal night messages to one another across the
Marsh, or perhaps to the crew of a lugger awaiting a 'run' on Dymchurch
Bay. They could also answer the innocent purpose of a tinder box.

Presenting the flasher at his wife's head, Abel growled in mock
sepulchral tones, “Stand and deliver,” and then, as he flashed the
powder and lit the candle, he added, laughing: “And how's that for your
handsome Jimmie Bone?”

Jim Bone was the notorious highwayman who transacted a brisk
business on the busy Dover Road and periodically went into hiding upon
the Marsh when the chase became too hot. Though a hard man to cross, he
was a good friend to his friends, amongst whom the Clouders were
numbered.

“The seas are too high for you to attempt a rescue, Abel.”

“That's for the other lads to decide,” he answered. “If they think
it's possible, I shall have to attempt something.”

Meg, who was seething with anger against Merry's madness, turned her
temper against the villagers who took her young husband's strength and
daring so much for granted.

“But why should you risk so much for others, for strangers? You
forget you are married, Abel.”

“Not I,” he contradicted. “Why, that's the reason I'm married to
you, and it's because I love you that I have to do more than the rest.
Don't you see that I must do things that others can't or won't do in
order to be a little more deserving of my good fortune?”

Meg smiled. “You're a clever old flatterer, Abel, and as obstinate
as you are good-looking. But for all that, I want you to do something
for me.”

“Why, anything, except to be a coward, and you wouldn't ask that I
know.”

“I want you to take care of that man Merry,” she said solemnly.

“I reckon he can more than take care of himself, but why—”

“I mean avoid him,” she corrected. “Keep clear of him. He hates you,
Abel, and he carries a knife.”

“Well, we all carry knives, but 'hates' me? Nonsense.” Abel laughed.
“Now why should anyone take the trouble to hate a good enough natured
fool like me? I haven't an enemy in the world, please God.”

“Perhaps there are some who are jealous of your good nature,” she
said.

“Jealous?” he repeated. “My faith, the only jealousy I shall meet in
my life will be your fault. Everyone's jealous that I happened to win
you, Meg, and quite right too. But you can take it from me that Merry
ain't that way. He's altogether too sour and selfish to be taken up
with a pretty girl.”

“You may find you're wrong, husband, and later I'll tell you my
reasons, but in the meanwhile don't give him a chance to use his knife
behind your back.”

“Trust me for that, but the fellow's a coward. There's no danger
from miserable Merry so long as Jack Ketch don't run out of rope. I
must go, lass. I wouldn't have 'em say that Abel Clouder hung back. I
love you too well, Meg.”

“Thank you, Abel,” she answered with a smile. “And as I love you,
watch Merry.”

“Trust me,” he nodded, and with her kiss on his cheek, he went down
the stairs and gave the sour Merry a hearty clump on the back which
made him look the sourer.

“Now, lads, open the door, and let's see if we can cheat the devil
and snatch a few souls from his grip. Ready? Then out into the
lightning and the waves.”

A splash of spray in the passage, a gust of wind that set every beam
and floor-board creaking, and then a silence, told Meg on her knees
beside the bed that they had gone.

The three men reached the fast-gathering group under the shadow of
the boat-house. They were joined by the parson with the news that the
burning ship seemed to have stuck fast in the sand and that the waves
breaking over the well deck, kept the fire in the after hold beneath
the poop deck cabin, and prevented it from spreading amidship. He
agreed with the fishermen that it would be impossible to launch a boat,
but he did think that a strong swimmer might reach the wreck with a
rope, and he stoutly maintained that he was quite willing to attempt
it.

Accordingly, the necessary tackle was brought out from the
boat-house. However, since both tide and wind were driving into the
bay, it was doubtful whether a single swimmer would be able to make
headway with the weight of the rope hampering him. Abel immediately
suggested that if the middle of another line were fixed to the end of
the rescue rope and each end attached to a cork jacket, that he would
then adventure with the parson.

Both men accordingly stripped off their coats and boots and buckled
on their life preservers to which the line's ends were fixed, and then
with practically the whole male population of the village assembled to
pay out the slack, the two heroes climbed the sea-wall, arm-in-arm, and
waiting for a favorable backwash of a gigantic wave, they plunged in
side by side and were swept out to meet the oncoming seas.

Meanwhile, the news of the wreck had spread through the village and
reached the Court House, so that by the time the swimmers, fighting for
every inch of progress, had cleared the end of the stone groyne which
was about half-way to the ship, the helpers on the rope were augmented
by the squire himself, four or five gentlemen who had been his dinner
guests, and Dr. Sennacharib Pepper, whom they had collected on the way.
With these extra strong and willing hands, it was simple for Merry to
move away without being missed for while his colleagues were busy over
the living, he decided that it might be more to his advantage to get
busy with the dead, or nearly dead.

In his hatred of Abel Clouder—and of the parson too, for that
matter—he could not help rejoicing that they had gone, through their
own heroic conceit, to almost certain death. 'Yes—surely the devil
would do his utmost to crush the man of God and the virtuous Abel? But
if not? If they succeeded?—and the bare possibility made him curse the
two heroes as 'damned flamboyant busybodies'—why, then a direct
communication between the wreck and the land would be established that
might at least save the strongest aboard. But with reasonable luck—not
at all. The weaker bodies would be battered to pieces and be swirled
under the upward curl of masonry that was the strong foundation of the
sea-wall, and by calculating tide and wind in relation to the wreck, he
imagined such bodies would come ashore near the flight of steps built
into the sea-wall opposite Sycamore Farm. There, too, he would be able
to crouch in shelter till a likely moment of action. If those
busybodies, Abel and the Parson, failed, the heat of the ship's fire
would assuredly drive passengers and crew overboard, or if they
attempted to reach the fore-deck by way of the well, they would be
washed over by the force of the breakers. Thus the bodies would be
swept along to the steps just the same, and it seemed probable that he
alone would be there to receive them. By the convulsive groping of his
fingers for the knife, he knew what sort of a reception these victims
of the storm would get, and looking at it from every point of view, he
considered that such a barbarous welcome would be safe enough. The lure
of the wreckage would keep the villagers opposite the breaking ship,
when at low tide they could swoop aboard to get anything worth taking.
They were not likely to think so cunningly as he. And yet it seemed
obvious that any men of sense, travelling the world by sea where so
many pirates were afloat, would secrete his valuables about his person,
especially at the first danger of shipwreck. Well, the bodies that he
found would not have the price of their own burial by the time he had
shown them some attention.

Accompanied by these murderous thoughts, the miserable Merry
scurried away under the shelter of the sea-wall till he reached his
coign of vantage. Clambering up the rough tussocks of turf that faced
the wall on the Marsh side, he gained the top, where he met the full
violence of the wind and spray. As it was impossible to stand up, he
crawled on his stomach across the flat summit to the cut steps, down
which he slithered headfirst. Curling himself up against the masonry,
he escaped the violence of the storm. And every cry that could be heard
above the booming waves and lashing spindrift, whether the encouraging
shouts of the party at the boat-house or the despairing shrieks of the
people on the ship or the melancholy call of some buffeted sea-bird,
this infamous man prayed to his master the devil to make it the
death-cry of Abel Clouder. Once, a bright red reflection on some water
held in a pool between the great boulders of the breakwater made him
look round the edge of the wall towards the wreck, where he saw that
flames were shooting up through a part of the poop deck, and he also
perceived two men, their shadows silhouetted against the fire, climb
over the bulwarks and jump into the sea. How would they reach him—dead
or alive? However strong a man might be, surely the battering of those
cruel waves would beat him on to the boulders more dead than alive?
Besides, on reaching the shore after such peril, who would be prepared
for a sudden knife attack? Not on the shores of Kent. Thus Merry
comforted himself that on that score he had nothing to fear, for should
the survivor thus prove himself a Hercules, he could have a good look
at the fellow first by adopting the role of rescuer until, thinking
himself at last to be free of peril, he might be taken off his guard,
or should that be too risky, at worst there was the possibility of a
handsome reward paid out in gratitude for his preservation.

So, crouched down in his strong recess like a wild beast scenting
prey, he waited for what the devil would send him from the sea.

Crouched over the rope as they paid it out inch by inch from hand to
hand, the villagers wondered what was happening at the other end, and
whether both, or one, or neither of the men would effect a landing on
the ship.

Crouched against the window, unable to pray more, Meg waited for
each flash of lightning, trying to distinguish her husband's figure
amongst the crowd, but the passing of the rope told its own tale, and
she waited for the worst.

None of these watchers had long to wait, for catastrophe was at
hand, terrifying in its sudden and surprising climax.

A particularly vivid lightning flash, which showed the valiant
swimmers already beneath the broken bowsprit of the brig, was answered
in the darkness that followed, by a roll of thunder, that grew louder
and louder. All then that could be seen was the glow of the derelict's
fire, which, confined to such a heat in the hold, had at last burst up
through the flooring of the deck cabin, and up again through the
ceiling which served as the planking of the poop deck.

While the rolling rotundity of the resounding thunder was drumming
up to its last grandeur, a strong stench of sulphur swept down across
the sea and hung in spreading fumes upon the sea-wall, until with a
sharp crackle as percussive as a square of muskets, another fire, a
ball of flaming gas enveloping a thunder-stone, darted across the sky
and dashed with a hissing explosion into the sea.