Poison Island Part 12

And what are you doing here?"

"Mr. Rogers," I broke in, "I know this man. His name is Goodfellow; he lives at Falmouth; and you are wrong, quite wrong, in suspecting him. But what is more, Mr. Rogers, you are wasting time.

There's blood on the stile down the lane. Whoever broke into the garden must have escaped that way--by the path through the plantation--"

"Eh?" Mr. Rogers jumped at me and caught me by the arm. "Why the devil--you'll excuse me, Miss Plinlimmon--but why on earth, child, if you have news, couldn't you have told it at once? Blood on the stile, you say? What stile?"

"The stile down the lane, sir," I answered, pointing. "And I couldn't tell you before because you didn't give me time."

"Show us the way, quick! And you, Hosken, catch hold of the mare and lead her round to Miss Belcher's stables. Or, stay--she's dead beat.

You can help me slip her out of the shafts and tether her by the gate yonder. That's right, man; but don't tie her up too tight. Give her room to bite a bit of gra.s.s, and she'll wait here quiet as a lamb."

"What about the prisoner, sir?" asked the stolid Hosken.

"D--n the prisoner!" answered Mr. Rogers, testily, in the act of unharnessing. "Slip the handcuffs on him. And you, Miss Plinlimmon, will return to the cottage, if you please."

"I'd like to come, too, if I may," put in Mr. Goodfellow.

"Eh?" Mr. Rogers, in the act of rolling up one of the traces, stared at him with frank admiration. "Well, you're a sportsman, anyhow.

Catch hold of his arm, Hosken, and run him along with us. Yes, sir, though I say it as a justice of the peace, be d--d to you, but I like your spirit. And with the gallows staring you in the face, too!"

"Gallows? What gallows?" panted Mr. Goodfellow in my ear a few moments later, as we tore in a body down the lane. "Hus.h.!.+" I panted in answer. "It's all a mistake."

"It ought to be." We drew up by the stile, where I pointed to the smear of blood, and Mr. Rogers, calling to Hosken to follow him, dashed into the coppice and down the path into the rank undergrowth.

I, too, was lifting a leg to throw it over the bar, when Mr.

Goodfellow plucked me by the arm. "Terribly hasty friends you keep in these parts, Brooks," he said plaintively. "What's it all about?"

"Why, murder!" said I. "Haven't you heard, man?"

"Not a syllable! Good Lord, you don't mean--" He pa.s.sed a shaky hand over his forehead as a cry rang back to us through the coppice.

"Here, Hosken, this way! Oh, by the Almighty, be quick, man!"

I vaulted over the stile, Mr. Goodfellow close after me. For two hundred yards and more--three hundred, maybe--we blundered and crashed through the low-growing hazels, and came suddenly to a horrified stand.

A little to the left of the path, between it and the stream, Mr.

Rogers and the constable knelt together over the body of a man half hidden in a tangle of brambles.

The corpse's feet pointed towards the path, and I recognized the shoes, as also the sea-cloth trousers, before Mr. Rogers--cursing in his hurry rather than at the pain of his lacerated hands--tore the brambles aside and revealed its face--the face of Captain Coffin, blue-cold in death and staring up from its pillow of rotted leaves.

I felt myself reeling. But it was Mr. Goodfellow who reeled against me, and would have fallen if Hosken the constable had not sprung upon one knee and caught him.

"If you ask my opinion," I heard Hosken saying as he raised himself and held Mr. Goodfellow upright, steadying him, "'tis a case o'

guilty conscience, an' I never in my experience saw a clearer."

CHAPTER XIII.

CLUES IN A TANGLE.

"Guilty or not," said Mr. Jack Rogers, sharply, "I'll take care he doesn't escape. Run you down to Miss Belcher's kennels, and fetch along a couple of men--any one you can pick up--to help. And don't make a noise as you go past the cottage; the women there are frightened enough already. Come to think of it, I heard some fellows at work as I drove by just now, thinning timber in the plantation under the kennels. Off with you, man, and don't stand gaping like a stuck pig!"

Thus adjured, Constable Hosken ran, leaving us three to watch the body.

"The man's pockets have been rifled, that's plain enough," Mr. Rogers muttered, as he bent over it again, and with that I suppose I must have made some kind of exclamation, for he looked up at me, still with a horrified frown.

"Hallo! You know him?"

I nodded.

"His name's Coffin. He came here from Falmouth."

For a moment Mr. Rogers did not appear to catch the words. His eyes travelled from my face to Mr. Goodfellow's.

"You, too?"

"Knew him intimate. Know him? Why, I live but two doors away from him in the same court."

"Look here," said Mr. Rogers, slowly, after a pause, "this is a black business, and a curst mysterious one, and I wasn't born with the gift of seeing daylight through a brick wall. But speaking as a magistrate, Mr. What's-your-name, I ought to warn you against saying what may be used for evidence. As for you, lad, you'd best tell as much as you know. What d'ye say his name was?"

"Coffin, sir."

"H'm, he's earned it. The back of his head's smashed all to pieces.

Lived in Falmouth, you say? And you knew him there?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then what was he doing in these parts?"

"He started to call on my father, sir."

"Eh? You knew of his coming?"

"Yes, sir. We planned it together."

Mr. Rogers, still on his knees, leaned back and regarded me fixedly.

"You planned it together?" he repeated slowly. "Well, go on.

He started to call on your father? Why?"

"He wanted to show my father something," said I, with a glance at Mr.

Goodfellow. "Are you sure, sir, there's nothing in his pockets?"

"Not a penny-piece. I'll search 'em again if you insist, though I don't like the job."

"He carried it in his breast-pocket, sir; there, on the left side."

"Then your question's easy to answer." Mr. Rogers turned back the lapel and pointed. The pocket hung inside out. "But what was it he carried?"