Dead Mens Money | Page 8

shod, firmly and swiftly down, and with this alternate
sound came the steady and equally swift tapping of an iron-shod stick.
Whoever this night-traveller was, it was certain he was making his way
somewhere without losing any time in the business.
The man came close by me and my cover, seeing nothing, and at a few
yards' distance stopped dead. I knew why. He had come to the
cross-roads, and it was evident from his movements that he was
puzzled and uncertain. He went to the corners of each way: it seemed to
me that he was seeking for a guide-post. But, as I knew very well, there
was no guide-post at any corner, and presently he came to the middle of
the roads again and stood, looking this way and that, as if still in a
dubious mood. And then I heard a crackling and rustling as of stiff
paper--he was never more than a dozen yards from me all the
time,--and in another minute there was a spurt up of bluish flame, and I
saw that the man had turned on the light of an electric pocket-torch and
was shining it on a map which he had unfolded and shaken out, and
was holding in his right hand.
At this point I profited by a lesson which had been dinned into my ears
a good many times since boyhood. Andrew Dunlop, Maisie's father,
was one of those men who are uncommonly fond of lecturing young
folk in season and out of season. He would get a lot of us, boys and
girls, together in his parlour at such times as he was not behind the
counter and give us admonitions on what he called the practical things
of life. And one of his favourite precepts--especially addressed to us
boys--was "Cultivate your powers of observation." This advice fitted in
very well with the affairs of the career I had mapped out for myself--a
solicitor should naturally be an observant man, and I had made steady
effort to do as Andrew Dunlop counselled. Therefore it was with a
keenly observant eye that I, all unseen, watched the man with his
electric torch and his map, and it did not escape my notice that the hand
which held the map was short of the two middle fingers. But of the rest
of him, except that he was a tallish, well-made man, dressed in--as far
as I could see things--a gentlemanlike fashion in grey tweeds, I could

see nothing. I never caught one glimpse of his face, for all the time that
he stood there it was in shadow.
He did not stay there long either. The light of the electric torch was
suddenly switched off; I heard the crackling of the map again as he
folded it up and pocketed it. And just as suddenly he was once more on
the move, taking the by-way up to the north, which, as I knew well, led
to Norham, and--if he was going far--over the Tweed to Ladykirk. He
went away at the same quick pace; but the surface in that by-way was
not as hard and ringing as that of the main road, and before long the
sound of his steps died away into silence, and the hot, oppressive night
became as still as ever.
I presently mounted my bicycle again and rode forward on my last
stage, and having crossed Twizel Bridge, turned down the lane to the
old ruin close by where Till runs into Tweed. It was now as dark as
ever it would be that night, and the thunderclouds which hung all over
the valley deepened the gloom. Gloomy and dark the spot indeed was
where I was to meet the man of whom Mr. Gilverthwaite had spoken.
By the light of my bicycle lamp I saw that it was just turned eleven
when I reached the spot; but so far as I could judge there was no man
there to meet anybody. And remembering what I had been bidden to do,
I spoke out loud.
"From James Gilverthwaite, who is sick, and can't come himself," I
repeated. And then, getting no immediate response, I spoke the
password in just as loud a voice. But there was no response to that
either, and for the instant I thought how ridiculous it was to stand there
and say Panama to nobody.
I made it out that the man had not yet come, and I was wheeling my
bicycle to the side of the lane, there to place it against the hedge and to
sit down myself, when the glancing light of the lamp fell on a great red
stain that had spread itself, and was still spreading, over the sandy
ground in front of me. And I knew on the