The Lord of the Sea Part 7

"Well", said Frankl, walking away, "I can't wait all day. The detectives are at this moment downstairs--"

Now the Arab leapt up, and, in a movement of great dignity, with an out-rush of both arms, rent his caftan from the top to its muslin girdle.

"I will shoot myself", he said quietly.

Frankl took snuff.

The same night he took his secretary's typewriter, and spelled out the following note:

"SIR,

"Permit me to ask you as an old friend of your father's if you are aware that your sister Margaret is the lover of the lord of the manor?

Everybody seems to see it, but yourself. I have reason to know that the very day you receive this she will be meeting him at about 7.30 P.M.

under the old elm in the beech-wood near the Hall-park.

"ONE WHO SHALL BE NAMELESS".

Hogarth received it by post the next morning.

He had to think, as he worked, of something to say at the service that night on the text: "G.o.d's way is in the Sea", but the glare of forge and heated metal swam vaguely, a fog of red, about his consciousness. And mixed with those recurring words: "the old elm", "G.o.d's way", something with a voice shouted inside him--a name--_Margaret!_ Anon his face flushed to a dusky turbulence, and he hurled the sledge high to shatter the earth, like Thor.

Suddenly he had the thought that he would clean his rifle, and, dropping a hot iron which vanished with a stifled cry into black water, he tossed his tongs clattering, and almost ran toward the cottage.

He had not, however, reached the back door when he heard his name called from behind.

And now happened to him the most momentous event of his life--though nothing could have seemed more commonplace.

It was an old fellow named Tom Bates who had called him--father to that Fred arrested for the murder of his wife--a Yarmouth fisher and herring-curer.

And when Hogarth twisted round, with that stare of his large and bloodshot eye, "Here", said the old man, "take them"--holding out a basket of herrings.

Hogarth seemed not to understand, but then said: "All those for me?"

"Every bloomin' one!" answered Bates, with the dropped jaw of pantomime, and a far-away look of blue astonishment which he had.

"It is extremely handsome of you. Can you spare all that--?"

"Spare, _ya'as!_ They're easy enough come by, for that matter. Why, the day's work of a fisherman gives him enough fish to live on all the week, and he could lie around idling the other six days, if he chose, only anybody can't live on nothing but fish ".

These words, destined to produce a horror of great darkness, and a cup of trembling of which all the nations should drink, hardly affected Hogarth at the time. He _did_, indeed, shoot an interested glance at the old man, but the next moment his mind, numb that morning, was left dark.

"Here--take them--they are yours", said Bates. "But with regard to that G.o.d-forsaken son of mine: you'll be givin' evidence agen him, I'm told--"

When his sleeve wiped a tear, Hogarth promised to make his evidence mild, and was left alone.

Now his purpose of cleaning the rifle was turned: he went back to the forge, and worked till Margaret, at one o'clock, called: "The dinner is on the table".

At that table, for a long time, silence reigned, Margaret's eyes fixed on his face, his on his plate.

Toward the end he said: "Are you going to chapel to-night?"

Her bosom heaved; she cleared her throat: she had to meet Frankl by the towing-path.

"I don't think I shall..."

_Margaret!_

"Why not?"

"I have something to do".

"_What?_"

Silence.

"_What?_"

"Something"--with a stubborn nod, and pallor--"if I tell you _something_ that should be enough".

"You will go to chapel to-night".

"That I shan't".

"Yes"

Silence.

A little before seven they left the cottage together for the chapel, Hogarth taking his hunting-crop--from habit; he had also a little Bible; in his jacket, tight at the slight waist, unb.u.t.toned at the breast, lay the anonymous letter, and a little poetry-book, neither moon nor star lighting the night, bleak winds swooping like the typhoon among the year's dead leaves.

The chapel was a paltry place, though in the wall to the right of the preacher was a slab bearing the inscription:

ON THIS STONE JOHN WESLEY PREACHED IN THE VILLAGE, ON THE 9TH JULY 1768

And they sang a hymn; Hogarth "prayed"; read a chapter; once more the harmonium mourned; Hogarth gave the text: "G.o.d's way is in the sea..."

Even as he uttered it, he happened to glance toward the "mission-pew"--a square pew rather behind the pulpit: Margaret no longer there.

A paleness as of very death--then a dreadful wrath reddened his dark face.

He seized his hunting-crop; and, without a word, sped bent and thievish down the steps--and was gone.

Upon which Loveday in a middle pew, perceiving here something sinister, like a still wind flew to a back door, before ever the amazement of the people had given place to a flutter like leaf.a.ge; and running fast, he came up with Hogarth by a stile twenty yards behind the chapel, touched his shoulder.

"To the devil with you...!" shouted Hogarth, running still, and there Loveday stood.

Margaret, meantime, was hurrying toward the towing-path, while Richard, in a direction at right angles to hers, was pelting toward that spot terrible to him--the elm.

At the moment when he entered the deep darkness of the beeches, he heard what sounded like a pistol-shot, rain now falling drop by drop, and through the forest with an uplifting whoop, like batsmen, swooped the tomboy winds.