The Adventures of Tom Leigh (12 page)

“They won't sell Upper High Royd, though,” said Jeremy, wagging his head. “They'll keep it for Gracie and the man she weds. Happen tha means to be him, eh, Tom Leigh?”

I was furious. That Gracie's name should be bandied about like this by a man like Jeremy put me in a real rage.
I know I crimsoned. But I bit back the hot words which sprang to my lips, and picking up our mugs, went out of the workshop without saying a word. When I returned Jeremy was weaving, and I picked up my cards and we said no more.

The hours went on, the sun set, we gave up work and went downstairs. The wind began to rise and moan a little about the house. I made a good fire, fed Sandy, lighted the candles and got our supper, and we ate it very comfortably, though I was vexed that Jeremy took Mr. Firth's chair. There was no harm in it, perhaps, but I do not like to do behind folks' backs what you would not do before their faces. I let Sandy out—it was a fine night, with moonlight off and on; the moon almost full but with clouds chasing sometimes across its face.

When I came back to the hearth, I don't know why it was, but I felt suddenly uneasy. It was Jeremy's look, I think; as he lounged in Mr. Firth's chair he had such an air of triumph. There was no reason for this that I could see, but I was sure Jeremy had a reason, and it would be a bad one. It struck me how alone we were, how far from any other house, how long the night would be, how completely I was in Jeremy's power. He was not a strong-looking man, being thin and weedy in body, but his arms were like iron from throwing the shuttle all day long, and I had seen him carry a piece of cloth (which would weigh about twenty pounds) over his shoulder a mile uphill, without being in the least breathless or put about. His eyes gleamed as he looked at me sideways, and that sneering smile of triumph again curved his thin lips. I was just thinking how glad I was that Gracie was safe with Mr. Gledhill when he spoke.

“Be off with you to your bed, Tom Leigh.”

I was glad enough to think of being out of his company, but I felt so sure everything he wished was evil that I resisted.

“It's early yet, Jeremy,” I said, looking at the tall clock in the corner, which lacked a minute of nine.

“Happen. But I'm tired of the sight of you. Be off now.”

“Sandy's still out.”

“I'll let him in.”

At this moment there came a not very loud crash from outside, as if the wind were banging an open door or window.

“I'll see to it,” said Jeremy, starting up. “Now, art going to do as th'art told and get off to bed, or shall I make thee?”

His look was so ugly that I went straight for the stairs, pausing only to light my candle at the fire and pick up my two volumes of
Robinson Crusoe
. The clock struck nine as I put my foot on the step.

The wind was now howling about the house and causing all kinds of shuffling and cracking noises, but I lay comfortably in bed and read again about Crusoe's clothes: his high goatskin cap, his jacket and breeches of goatskin and his umbrella. I read about his fence, and his bed, and his grapes, and then reached the page when he suddenly came upon the print of a man's naked foot on the sandy shore of his island. Crusoe was terrified, and I am not ashamed to say that so was I. For such was Mr. Defoe's skill in the writing, that, though I had read it before, I felt all Crusoe's fright at finding this evidence of a man's presence on an island he had thought to be uninhabited. Crusoe fled to the house he had made for himself, in fear, and I turned uneasily in my bed and tried to keep my eyes from the shadows in the workshop corners.

It was just at this moment that I heard a very faint mew and a scratching at my door.

“It is Sandy,” I said to myself, and felt quite comforted, and went to the door to let him in.

I raised the latch and pulled on the door. It did not yield. I gave a harder tug, but the door did not stir. I stooped and gazed at the handle and the space between door and jamb, and saw what was wrong: I was locked in. Just at this moment I heard a soft whisper from below, and the voice was the pedlar's.

Then suddenly I saw the reason and nature of the thing, and could not imagine how I had been such a blind stupid fool as not to see it before. Jeremy and the pedlar were the thieves who stole cloth from the tenters. Jeremy hated me because my presence crossed his plans; he wanted me out of the house; all his unkindness to me was to get rid of me, to maim me, to cause Mr. Firth to break my indentures, to drive me into running away. Jeremy's strange gestures at the tenters, the first day I came to Upper High Royd, had been warnings to the pedlar to stay away. When the pedlar came to the house the first time, Jeremy had pushed me downstairs so that he should see me and give up the plan of enticing Mr. and Mrs. Firth away from Upper High Royd that day—it was Jeremy who had sighed with relief when the pedlar told Mrs. Firth her father was in good health.

For the message of his illness to-day was false without a doubt. (The pedlar's urging that Gracie should be taken to see her grandfather showed his true motive: to get all the Firths out of the house.) The thieves had grown tired of waiting for me to be got rid of—or rather, the pedlar and the other accomplice had grown tired; that was what they were all arguing about when Mr. Defoe had seen them at the Rose and Crown. Jeremy had made one last attempt to get rid of me, leaving me behind in the Old Cock stable, hoping I would run away. But when I turned up—how furious Mr. Gledhill's rescue of me must have made him—he decided to risk the danger of my presence and lock me in. The tenters were out of sight of the workshop windows. And the pedlar, a man with a licence to sell, always travelling about, was just the person to arrange the cloth's sale. Yes, it was all clear; everything that had perplexed me about Jeremy was now explained.

And here was I, alone in the house with two thieves, Mr. Firth away, his cloth under his apprentice's care. If I was to be his “good and faithful servant”, as my indentures said, I
must
try to prevent the theft.

The mewing at my door had now ceased; Sandy no doubt had given me up and gone away.

I dressed, as quickly and quietly as I was able, putting on my jacket to cover the white of my shirt, but leaving off my clogs, as they would clatter on the stones of the yard.

The house door closed softly. I listened with all my ears, and thought I heard quiet footsteps going towards the far end of the house.

But there was only one way to make sure. I waited a few moments to give Jeremy and the pedlar time to be out of earshot; then I unbolted the taking-in doors and swung them back. I unwound the rope and let it slide over the pulley till the hook was nearly at the ground, then fastened it round the staples. I drew the rope towards me, grasped it firmly with both hands, swung out and descended it hand below hand.

I cannot pretend that this descent was comfortable or that I performed it well. Each time I had to move one hand I was afraid of falling, never having done anything like this before. To avoid this fear, I tried at one moment to slide down the rope, but this took the skin off my palms and left them very sore. For a moment I hung helpless in mid-air, sweating—I do not deny it—with fear. At last I found that if I clasped the rope between my feet much weight was taken off my hands, and after that I did pretty well, except that I caught one foot in the curve of the hook when I reached it and could not at first get free. I fell to the ground and hopped about, following the rope as it swayed, but at length managed to release myself and stood safe on the ground in my stockinged feet.

I crept round the back of the house and clambered very softly—this is not easy on these mortarless West Riding walls—over the wall at the side of the tentercroft. The moon had escaped from its clouds and was riding high, shedding a bright silver light over house and fields. The scene was very beautiful but somehow rather eerie, because of the deep black shadows cast by buildings and walls. For one of these black shadows, however, I was very grateful; it stretched along the side of the tentercroft wall and enabled me to crawl along
towards the tenters, unseen. I kept my face down, so that the moonlight should not shine white upon it, as I approached. Yes, there they were: Jeremy unhooking the cloth, the pedlar standing by; each grumbling at the other.

“Can't you hurry, man?” said the pedlar. “In this moonlight we can be seen a mile away.”

“It were you who chose to do it tonight,” growled Jeremy.

“I was tired of waiting.”

“I were only trying to get rid o' that nuisance of a lad.”

“He's perfectly safe locked up in the workshop. He'll help to support your own tale of not having heard any sounds in the night. Come, man, make haste!”

“If you want more haste you can help to make it,” snarled Jeremy. “Take your coat off and give me a hand.”

“Oh, very well,” said the pedlar, shrugging. “Where shall I start work, eh?”

“Go back to the beginning and take cloth off top nails—I've taken it off bottom row, back there.”

The pedlar stepped towards me, so that for a moment my heart was in my mouth. I buried my head in my arms on the ground and lay absolutely still for what seemed the longest moment of my life. I heard soft shuffling sounds as the pedlar took off his coat, and then a clink—the brass buttons, I guessed, had struck against the wall as he threw the coat aside. This clinking sounded very near, and I own I was afraid.

“Ouch!” cried the pedlar of a sudden.

I ventured to raise my head a very little. Having often helped Jeremy or Josiah to take a piece off the tenters and knowing its difficulties, I could not help being amused at the pedlar's lack of skill—he had torn one of his fingers on the tenter nails. He had this finger in and out of his mouth, shaking it and sucking it, and was dancing with the pain, and loosing off a string of oaths when his mouth was free.

“Make less noise, will you?” said Jeremy. “And pay more heed. It's going to take us all night to get twelve yards off, if you go on like this.”

“We'll take the whole eighteen yards; it's not worth stealing less.”

“It'll look more natural like to take twelve.”

“But more dangerous. They'll have some left, then, for a pattern.”

“I say twelve.”

“Don't forget,” said the pedlar smoothly, “that it was I who arranged the sale, Jeremy Oldfield.”

“I could ha' done that mysen.”

“But you didn't.”

“Howd thy gab,” said Jeremy viciously. “And get to work. Or by gum, I'll make thee.”

“There is no need to lose your temper, my dear Jeremy,” said the pedlar in his smoothest tones.

I do not know whether it was their hateful talk, or the remembrance of the many vile ways in which Jeremy had tried to get rid of me from Upper High Royd, or the cunning of the pedlar's skilful lie about Mrs. Firth's father—I do not know, I say, what put it into my head; but I was wearing my jacket and the scissors Gracie had given me were in my inner pocket as always, and the pedlar's full-skirted coat lay only a few inches from my head. I drew it softly into the deep black shadow and turned it partly over, and I took out my scissors, and pinched up the lining in the fold of the back skirt of the pedlar's coat and cut out a small piece like this.

Just as I began I remembered Sir Henry cutting my indentures in a zigzag line, and I remembered the reason he had given me for doing so, and I cut the edges of my piece of the pedlar's lining zig-zag too. I shall never forget the shape.

I tucked the scissors and the piece of lining firmly into my pocket, and I gathered my courage, and then I stood up and stepped out of the black shadow into the silver moonlight.

It would be a lie to pretend that I was not afraid. I was so much afraid that my voice shook and my stomach seemed to fall out of me as I said:

“What are you about, Jeremy?”

Jeremy turned and saw me. His face contorted into a grimace so evil that it haunts me yet in my dreams, and with a scream of rage he hurled himself upon me. The force of his charge bore me to the ground; he held me down with his left hand and began to beat my head with his clenched right fist. I kicked at his ankles; my left hand being free I caught his wrist and tried to throw him off, and we rolled over and over on the ground. His right arm was so strong (from continually throwing the shuttle) that I could not retain it for long in my grasp, but I pushed it back upwards as hard as I was able. In this posture my own left arm was at full stretch, exposed to the view of the pedlar, whose smooth face I could see from time to time; he stood to one side of the fight, not moving, his eyebrows raised sardonically. At this point he raised his right foot, and with a smile of pleasure kicked my forearm hard.

I heard the bone crack, and could not forbear a cry of pain. My arm dropped useless at my side, and Jeremy's face above me grinned with satisfaction.

“Don't kill him, Jeremy,” said the pedlar smoothly, bending over us.