'Can you describe him?' asked Miss Which.e.l.lo, with some hesitation.

'He is tall and thin, with a dark, wicked-looking face, and he has a nasty scar on the right cheek, slanting across it to the mouth. But the funny thing is, that with all his rags and drunkenness there is something of the gentleman about him. I don't like him, yet I can't dislike him. He's attractive in his own way from his very wickedness.

But I'm sure,' finished Bell, with a vigorous nod, 'that he's a black-hearted Nero. He has done a deal of damage in his time both to men and women; I'm as sure of that as I sit here, though I can give no reason for saying so.'

Miss Which.e.l.lo listened to this graphic description in silence. She was very pale, and held her handkerchief to her mouth with one trembling hand; the other beat nervously on her lap, and it was only by a strong effort of will that she managed to conquer her emotion.

'I daresay you are right,' she observed, in a tremulous voice. 'Indeed, I might have expected as much, for last night he frightened my niece and her maid on the high road. I thought it would be best to give him money and send him away, so that so evil a man should not remain here to be a source of danger to the town.'

'Give him money!' cried Miss Mosk. 'I'd give him the cat-o-nine tails if I had my way. Don't you trouble about him, Miss Which.e.l.lo; he's no good.'

'But if I could see him I might soften his heart,' pleaded the old lady, very much in earnest.

'Soften a brick-bat,' rejoined Bell; 'you'd have just as much success with one as with the other. Besides, you can't see him, Miss Which.e.l.lo--at all events, not to-night--for he's on the common with his nasty gipsies, and--won't be back till the morning. I wish he'd stay away altogether, I do.'

'In that case I shall not trouble about him,' said the old lady, rising; 'on some future occasion I may see him. But you need not say I was asking for him, Miss Mosk.'

'I won't say a word; he'd only come worrying round your house if he thought you wanted to give him money.'

'Oh, he mustn't do that; he mustn't come there!' cried Miss Which.e.l.lo, alarmed.

'He won't, for I'll hold my tongue. You can rest easy on that score, Miss Which.e.l.lo. But my advice is, don't pick him up out of the mire; he'll only fall back into it again.'

'You have a bad opinion of him, Miss Mosk.'

'The very worst,' replied Bell, conducting her guest to the door; 'he's a gaol-bird and a scallywag, and all that's bad. Well, good-night, Miss Which.e.l.lo, and thank you for the jelly.'

'There is no need for thanks, Miss Mosk. Good-night!' and the old lady tripped up the street, keeping in the middle of it, lest any robber should spring out on her from the shadow of the houses.

The storm was coming nearer, and soon would break directly over the town, for flashes of lightning were weaving fiery patterns against the black clouds, and every now and then a hoa.r.s.e growl of thunder went grinding across the sky. Anxious to escape the coming downfall, Miss Which.e.l.lo climbed up the street towards the cathedral as quickly and steadily as her old legs could carry her. Just as she emerged into the close, a shadow blacker than the blackness of the night glided past her.

A zig-zag of lightning cut the sky at the moment and revealed the face of Mr Cargrim, who in his turn recognised the old lady in the bluish glare.

'Miss Which.e.l.lo!' he exclaimed; 'what a surprise!'

'You may well say that, Mr Cargrim,' replied the old lady, with a nervous movement, for the sound of his voice and the sudden view of his face startled her not a little. 'It is not often I am out at this hour, but I have been taking some jelly to Mrs Mosk.'

'You are a good Samaritan, Miss Which.e.l.lo. I hope she is better?'

'I think so, but I did not see her, as she is asleep. I spoke with her daughter, however.'

'I trust you were not molested by that ruffian Jentham, who stays at The Derby Winner,' said Cargrim, with hypocritical anxiety.

'Oh, no! he is away on Southberry Heath with his gipsy friends, I believe--at least, Miss Mosk told me so. Good-night, Mr Cargrim,' she added, evidently not anxious to prolong the conversation. 'I wish to get under shelter before the storm breaks.'

'Let me see you to your door at least.'

Miss Which.e.l.lo rejected this officious offer by dryly remarking that she had accomplished the worst part of her journey, and bidding the chaplain 'Good-night,' tripped across the square to her own Jenny Wren nest.

Cargrim looked after her with a doubtful look as she vanished into the darkness, then, turning on his heel, walked swiftly down the street towards Eastgate. He had as much aversion to getting wet as a cat, and put his best foot foremost so as to reach the palace before the rain came on. Besides, it was ten o'clock--a late hour for a respectable parson to be abroad.

'She's been trying to see Jentham,' thought Mr Cargrim, recalling Miss Which.e.l.lo's nervous hesitation. 'I wonder what she knows about him. The man is a mystery, and is in Beorminster for no good purpose. Miss Which.e.l.lo and the bishop both know that purpose, I'm certain. Well!

well! two secrets are better than one, and if I gain a knowledge of them both, I may inhabit Heathcroft Rectory sooner than I expect.'

Cargrim's meditations were here cut short by the falling of heavy drops of rain, and he put all his mind into his muscles to travel the faster.

Indeed, he almost ran through the new town, and was soon out on the country road which conducted to the palace. But, in spite of all his speed, the rain caught him, for with an incessant play of lightning and a constant roll of thunder came a regular tropical downpour. The rain descended in one solid ma.s.s, flooding the ground and beating flat the crops. Cargrim was drenched to the skin, and by the time he slipped through the small iron gate near the big ones, into the episcopalian park, he looked like a lean water-rat. Being in a bad temper from his shower bath, he was almost as venomous as that animal, and raced up the avenue in his sodden clothing, shivering and dripping. Suddenly he heard the quick trot of a horse, and guessing that the bishop was returning, he stood aside in the shadow of the trees to let his superior pa.s.s by.

Like the chaplain, Dr Pendle was streaming with water, and his horse's hoofs plashed up the sodden ground as though he were crossing a marsh.

By the livid glare of the lightnings which shot streaks of blue fire through the descending deluge, Cargrim caught a glimpse of the bishop's face. It was deathly pale, and bore a look of mingled horror and terror.

Another moment and he had pa.s.sed into the blackness of the drenching rain, leaving Cargrim marvelling at the torture of the mind which could produce so terrible an expression.

'It is the face of Cain,' whispered Cargrim to himself. 'What can his secret be?'

CHAPTER XIV

'RUMOUR FULL OF TONGUES'

It is almost impossible to learn the genesis of a rumour. It may be started by a look, a word, a gesture, and it spreads with such marvellous rapidity that by the time public curiosity is fully aroused, no one can trace the original source, so many and winding are the channels through which it has flowed. Yet there are exceptions to this general rule, especially in criminal cases, where, for the safety of the public, it is absolutely necessary to get to the bottom of the matter.

Therefore, the rumour which pervaded Beorminster on Monday morning was soon traced by the police to a carter from Southberry. This man mentioned to a friend that, when crossing the Heath during the early morning, he had come across the body of a man. The rumour--weak in its genesis--stated first that a man had been hurt, later on that he had been wounded; by noon it was announced that he was dead, and finally the actual truth came out that the man had been murdered. The police authorities saw the carter and were conducted by him to the corpse, which, after examination, they brought to the dead-house in Beorminster.

Then all doubt came to an end, and it was officially declared during the afternoon that Jentham, the military vagabond lately resident at The Derby Winner, had been shot through the heart. But even rumour, prolific as it is in invention, could not suggest who had murdered the man.

So unusual an event in the quiet cathedral city caused the greatest excitement, and the streets were filled with people talking over the matter. Amateur detectives, swilling beer in public-houses, gave their opinions about the crime, and the more beer they drank, the wilder and more impossible became their theories. Some suggested that the gipsies camped on Southberry Heath, who were continually fighting amongst themselves, had killed the miserable creature; others, a.s.serting that the scamp was desperately poor, hinted at suicide induced by sheer despair; but the most generally accepted opinion was that Jentham had been killed in some drunken frolic by one or more Irish harvesters. The Beorminster reporters visited the police station and endeavoured to learn what Inspector Tinkler thought. He had seen the body, he had viewed the spot where it had been found, he had examined the carter, Giles Crake, so he was the man most likely to give satisfactory answers to the questions as to who had killed the man, and why he had been shot.

But Inspector Tinkler was the most wary of officials, and pending the inquest and the verdict of twelve good men and true, he declined to commit himself to an opinion. The result of this reticence was that the reporters had to fall back on their inventive faculties, and next morning published three theories, side by side, concerning the murder, so that the _Beorminster Chronicle_ containing these suppositions proved to be as interesting as a police novel, and quite as unreliable. But it amused its readers and sold largely, therefore proprietor and editor were quite satisfied that fiction was as good as fact to tickle the long ears of a credulous public.

As the dead man had lodged at The Derby Winner, and many people had known him there, quite a sensation was caused by the report of his untimely end. From morning till night the public-house was thronged with customers, thirsting both for news and beer. Nevertheless, although business was so brisk, Mosk was by no means in a good temper. He had returned early that morning from Southberry, and had been one of the first to hear about the matter. When he heard who had been killed, he regarded the committal of the crime quite in a personal light, for the dead man owed him money, and his death had discharged the debt in a way of which Mr Mosk did not approve. He frequently referred to his loss during the day, when congratulated by unthinking customers on the excellent trade the a.s.sa.s.sination had brought about.

'For, as I allays ses,' remarked one wiseacre, 'it's an ill wind as don't blow good to somebody.'

'Yah!' growled Mosk, in his beery voice, 'it's about as broad as it's long so far as I'm concerned. I've lost a couple of quid through Jentham goin' and gettin' shot, and it will take a good many tankards of bitter at thru'p'nce to make that up.'

'Oo d'y think shot 'im, Mr Mosk?'

'Arsk me sum'thin' easier, carn't you? I don't know nothin' about the cove, I don't; he comes 'ere two, three weeks ago, and leaves owin' me money. Where he comes from, or who he is, or what he's bin doin' to get shot I know no more nor you do. All I does know,' finished Mosk, emphatically, 'is as I've lost two bloomin' quid, an' that's a lot to a poor man like me.'

'Well, father, it's no good making a fuss over it,' cried Bell, who overheard his grumbling. 'If Jentham hadn't been shot, we wouldn't be doing so well. For my part, I'm sorry for the poor soul.'

'Poor blackguard, you mean!'

'No, I don't. I don't call any corpse a blackguard. If he was one, I daresay he's being punished enough now without our calling him names. He wasn't the kind of man I fancied, but there's no denying he was attractive in his own wicked way.'

'Ah!' said a dirty-looking man, who was more than suspected of being a welcher, 'couldn't he tell slap-up yarns about H'injins an' 'eathens as bows down to stocks and stones. Oh, no! not he--'

'He could lie like a one-year-old, if that's what y' mean,' said Mosk.

'Bloomin' fine lyin', any'ow,' retorted the critic. 'I'd git orf the turf if I cud spit 'em out that style; mek m' fortin', I would, on th'

paipers.'

'Y've bin chucked orf the turf often enough as it is,' replied the landlord, sourly, whereat, to give the conversation a less personal application, the dirty welcher remarked that he would drain another bitter.