We must have been wandering for a week or more, bearing northwards all the while, before we halted for a few days at a village inn: the Snow Man I believe it was called. It seemed to me as though our life of hardships had begun afresh, for as far as possible we kept to woods and byways where there was shelter and hiding. And yet it was on this journey that my father gave me my first lessons with the pistol; and I think he found me an eager pupil. As with the knife, he promised me a pistol of my own when I became expert enough to merit one, and with this bait to lure on my endeavour I practised sedulously with the weapon every morning, for our travelling was done mostly at night.
My father soon regained all his buoyancy and cheerfulness, and questioned me eagerly about my discovery of the cave. "What are we to call it?" he cut me short almost at the beginning of my narrative. I had my answer ready, for this matter of naming places had become almost a second nature with me; and I said, "Drift-Wood Cavern," and added, "and the passage you showed me is the Smugglers' Tunnel."
"Very well," he agreed. "And now tell me your story, Tommy."
I told him with as much coherence as his constant questionings would permit, for he was so eager to learn all about my find that he continually interrupted me with questions of his own, running on ahead of me as it were, and was rather disappointed when my recital came to an abrupt finish.
"But surely, Tommy," he said, "you found where it went?"
"I don't know any more," I declared.
"Why, it might lead anywhere," he insisted with fervour. "It might go for miles. It must be full of secrets, Tommy, and hidden treasures, and.... Why didn't you...."
"Well, the runners...." I began in my defence, meaning to say that the less time I spent there the better while the runners were still hunting for Dirk; but he cut in, saying:
"Ah, the runners; yes. If it hadn't been for the runners, Tommy, I should have had the secret out of it by now."
This surprised me, for as soon as the soldiers had gone my father had packed up his kit and vanished too. So I asked, "Why didn't you stay then, daddy?"
He looked at me more sharply than usual, for it wasn't my custom to question him like this; and at the moment his answer seemed a strange one, for after a pause he suddenly exclaimed, "By gad, Tommy, you're quite a little man! Soon be calling me father."
"No, daddy, no," I protested, for somehow the colder title didn't seem to suit our relationship. I put up my arms and kissed him to show I wasn't beyond that yet, though I was growing rapidly in these days; and I think the sentimental little scene pleased him.
"Well, well!" he said affectionately, patting my cheek.
I was quiet, for he hadn't answered my question. He seemed to be meditating something, and twice he was about to speak; but eyeing me askance he held his peace. And it wasn't until we were installed at the Snow Man some days later that the answer came, and then in a strange manner.
As at the Dolphin we shared an upstairs room, and I noticed that my father's uneasiness hadn't lessened with our flight, though he was cheerful enough. Indeed I have scarcely ever known him otherwise than cheerful, though now I can realize something of the harrowing anxiety that must have been his almost daily portion. We hadn't been alone in our room for half a minute before he began examining the locks and bolts of the door and window, sounding the walls, peering into cupboards and behind pictures, and feeling up the chimney. Later he tested the possibility of climbing down the wall outside the window, which was well hidden from the road. He managed it, but with great difficulty, and that seemed to set him more at ease. But chiefly I noticed how late he sat up at nights by his reading-lamp; and as there was no screen in the room I was able to see something of what he was doing, though he always sat with his back to me, shielding me from the light as well as he could. But I could see him turning pages, and tracing lines with his pencil, sometimes leaning back with the pencil between his teeth, thinking.
As a rule, however, I was tired enough not to be over curious, soon dropping off to sleep, and only occasionally waking to see him still at his task, or to feel him creeping carefully into bed beside me so as not to wake me up.
But about the third night, if I remember rightly, I awoke to find him kneeling at my side, gazing so intently at me that it seemed as though his very gaze had awakened me. I opened my eyes full upon him and didn't move, and for his part he remained looking not so much at me as at something deep within me which he was dumbly questioning. Then his widened pupils contracted, and with a flitting smile as though he were awakening to reality he said, "You see, Tommy, it's like this. Who put the smugglers on my track, scenting round me as though I was harming them? And who was it betrayed those two last year? And why?" His voice had a strange ring in it which I hadn't heard before. "Why, Tommy why?" he added more excitedly, and seemed to be waiting for an answer.
Waking like that in the dead of night it all seemed very queer to me; for to see my father's eyes bent upon me so, and to hear his "Why, Tommy, why?" was somehow vaguely troubling. The clothes across my chest felt very heavy all at once, and my limbs seemed bound to the bed; for there was something that held me there and wouldn't let me move. A kind of spell was upon me, and I felt I wanted to scream. And then my father rose and began pacing the room, and the horrid charm snapped. I gave a great gulp, and realized I had been holding my breath all the while; and the numbness fell from my limbs, and they were mine once more to move as I would.
My father came to a halt and sat on the bed beside me. I was quite awake now and understood something of his drift. He began to speak again, but his tone was calmer:
"One way of ridding yourself of an enemy, Tommy, is to set another on his track. When you can't fight your own battles, perhaps if you are clever enough, you may get another to fight them for you. Now suppose...."
"Oh, daddy, I see, I see," I cried, for I loved to display my sagacity before my father.
"Well," he smiled at me.
"Why," I went on breathlessly, "it's Shadow-of-Fear." I paused for a moment at the awful name and looked furtively about me, repeating in a lower tone, "Shadow-of-Fear." I took courage again and continued: "He couldn't catch you, so he made the smugglers think you were a spy."
"Quite right, Tommy; full marks," said my father. "But ..."--and now he leant over me and said very slowly and solemnly--"how does he know the sign of the burn? How does he know, Tommy? How does he know?" And again something of the tone that had frightened me rang in his voice.
"Daddy, he's wonderful," I said; for that was my simple creed.
I think the childish words relieved the tension of his mind, for he laughed brightly, and tucking in the bed-clothes about my shoulders he told me to get back to my dreams. When I woke later all was dark, and he was sleeping peacefully at my side.
But that wasn't the last of my strange awakenings. It must have been two nights later when I found myself lying on my back gazing at the ceiling in that state of strange awareness which precedes full consciousness. Dimly the utter quietness of the room made itself felt like a pressure at my heart, and my ears seemed to be straining out to an infinite distance to catch some faintest echo of sound. And the room was full of light.
In sudden alarm I sprang up, but was immediately reassured, for my father was sitting with his arms across the table, his head thrown forward, asleep. I could see the slow heaving of his shoulders as he breathed.
My first thought was to lie down again, but the sight of a large parchment across which his arms were sprawled piqued my curiosity, and I didn't debate long with myself before I was out of bed and scanning a sheet of beautiful black script, but written in a language I didn't understand. And then a word or two told me it was Latin, but the meaning was quite dark to me, as my father hadn't so far succeeded in making much of a scholar of me.
There were a few odd papers too with tracings on them like plans, some scored through, and some mere fragmentary sketches; but they conveyed little to me, half hidden as they were by my father's arms. I could see they were his own work, and by occasional underlined passages in the manuscript, and by odd notes jotted in the margin, I guessed he had been drawing up plans according to some mysterious instructions in the parchment.
The manuscript looked to me exceedingly old and frail. The edges were frayed and tattered, and here and there decayed pieces had fallen from the text itself. But it was obvious that great pains had been taken to preserve and restore it, and where the old ink was faint the words had been written over afresh. But it seemed to me that the task of deciphering it must be no easy one. A glimmering of an idea flittered through my mind, that it was somehow on account of this manuscript that my father wanted me to learn Latin.
All these considerations were merely momentary, for a glance or two showed me the whole picture there, and something of its meaning; and I began to understand what the mystery was which kept my father from his bed, though of course I couldn't guess at the contents of the ancient script.
I was for creeping back to bed again unheeded, but stopped short at my father's open eyes fixed upon me. He had awakened without a sound or a stir, and was watching me. I half wondered whether he would be angry, but with something of the matter-of-factness with which he had accepted my discovery of the Smugglers' Tunnel he said, almost in the same words, "Very well, Tommy, I'll show you."
Very carefully he turned a page or two of the manuscript, and the dry old stuff crackled beneath his fingers.
"It's an old, old story," he began, "and I'll tell it to you some day. But this is what is troubling me."
He folded a page back, and here instead of writing was an elaborate diagram; but the edges of this page were particularly worn, as though by frequent use, and part of the diagram was missing.
"Now, Tommy," said my father, drawing the lamp up close, "you've got good eyes. What do you make of this?"
He pointed with his pencil to the very spot where the diagram faded from the frayed edge.
I stooped over the table and strained my eyes to the sheet. What I saw looked to me like a long passage, but just at the crucial point where something important seemed to be indicated the impression was faded and blurred.
"Looks like a hole here," I said at last.
"Yes, yes," said my father eagerly.
"And something stopping it."
"Yes...."
I looked more intently. The passage was sloping down to what I guessed must be the opening, though this was off the page. Beneath the passage was a short stairway leading to a tunnel which followed parallel beneath the passage above; and after this the rest was comparatively clear. But the puzzling part was how the stairway joined the passage. Was it from beneath or from the side? The precious fragment which held the secret was missing, and only a roughly rounded line, which might have been a hole or a boulder, faded off the sheet.
I turned away blinking and rubbed my eyes, dazzled with the strain. "Sorry, daddy," I said, "I can't see. But I think...."
"Yes, Tommy?"
"I think there's a hole in the earth, and a big stone on top."
"Ah," he said, "on top."
There was a long pause, while he sat toying with his pencil. Then he turned to me again and said rather sadly, "You see, I thought it might have been Ebb-Tide Gate. But if the hole is in the floor...."
"But," I said, "there is a hole in the floor where the gate drops down. It might be...."
"No, Tommy," he smiled at me, "if there were it would be full of water. And see here." He pointed to the diagram which marked the low-water line, and the steps were clear. My father continued, "If the hole were in the wall, you see, and fairly high, the steps would still be dry. But," he added with a strange little smile, "there ain't no hole, Tommy."
He began folding up the document, very carefully, pressing it down page by page, and smoothing out the creases. And as he turned the last page I saw in great black letters, at the very end, the words:
MALEDICTUS SIT THESAURUS
Now whether by chance I had met the words somewhere in my random studies, or whether the haunting memory of some old story of my father's lingered in my mind, I can't say; but the meaning was instantaneously flashed across my brain, and involuntarily I exclaimed, "Accursed be the treasure!"
My father started, but smiling humorously said, "A little learning, Tommy ..." but left the quotation unfinished.
"Tell me the story," I said eagerly.
"Sometime, Tommy, sometime," he put me off.
"Now," I pleaded.
"But it's midnight, Tommy. And listen how the wind says 'Hush!' And see how black it is through the window. You'd dream."
"I like to dream," I said.
"Yes, Tommy, yes," he answered. "I'd like to dream your dreams. Golden sands, and a wide blue sea; and palms and reefs, and caverns, and long, white, racing waves. Eh, Tommy? But there are dreams that spring at you out of the dark and clutch at your throat and tangle you in a net, and your limbs are heavy and dead, and your lungs are bursting, but you can't utter a sound; and something laughs 'Ah!' and a hand goes over your face...."
"Yes, yes," I said, as he paused.
But all he answered was "Not to-night, Tommy; not to-night."
So I went back to bed again quietly, and dipping my head into my pillow saw in glittering great letters that deepened into red like blood, MALEDICTUS SIT THESAURUS. And the night was full of dreams, for all that I hadn't heard the story; for the strange curse rang like a cry through my imagination, wailing menacingly like an echo from another world; and ever it seemed that a coffined corpse struggling frenziedly in its prison shook a fleshless fist at me, and glared at me from hollow eyeless sockets, repeating and repeating a terrible threat which I couldn't understand though I strained my ears to listen. And though the earth was between us I could see the writhing figure tearing at the stifling tangles of its shroud, chattering insanely. Then suddenly I was the corpse myself; and I knew I was dead, but the grave-clothes were choking me; and with an agonized effort I heaved at the suffocating obstruction, and woke panting and puffing with the blankets about my face.
I threw them off; and the room was white with morning.
