‘And is that,’ asked Mr Bailey,’ what you’re off to fetch today at five o’clock of the morning? What brings you out so early, man? If you asked me, I’d say you ought to put a bit of something on that nose of yours, Harry. I’ve never seen a nastier bruise than that.’
‘I’ve brought you news,’ said Noke. ‘Ay, and something besides. Gogzoons, I’ve had a tarrible queer night of it. A man needs a collop of bacon after such a night, and I’m much beholden, Mus Bailey, and I looks t’ards you.’
‘Well, what’s your news?’ asked Mr Bailey cheerfully. ‘Since it got you out of bed so early you’ve been a long time coming to it.’
‘Bad news’ll keep, I rackon.’ Noke, stopping in mid-munch, filled the unoccupied half of his mouth with ale before resuming speech. ‘You had a strange pair of folkses come last night, didn’t ye now?’
Mr Bailey nodded. His eyes shone with sudden interest.
‘A man,’ said Noke deliberately, ‘and a woman with him.’
‘A young lady,’ amended Mr Bailey.
‘That’s as may be,’ said Noke. ‘Woman or young lady, tis all one on Doomsday, bainta? Now last night, Mus Bailey, that same man or gennelman do come prancing along my common with a brace of nags.’ He paused, to watch the effect of his words. ‘Mark that.’
Mr Bailey could not control his impatience. ‘So that’s how tis. Tell me. This is mighty important. Where is he now, d’you ’low?’
‘I ’low naught,’ answered Noke. ‘I knows.’
He jerked a thumb towards the street. ‘He be outside.’
‘Outside!’ The landlord jumped to his feet.
‘Ay, outside in the street. I brought him along in my cart. Now——’
Mr Bailey was too deeply agitated to wait for explanations. ‘Now God bless my soul, I did the gentleman an injustice. How delighted the young lady his sister will be!’ He was suddenly full of fussy hospitality, so eager that he did not know which way to turn but could only stand hesitating and twittering. ‘And in your cart, you say, and us sitting here gossiping. God bless my soul, the gentleman will be wanting his breakfast.’
‘Nay,’ said Noke, ‘he’ll want no breakfast. He’ve had all the breakfast he can want. Besides, he can’t eat no breakfast, with his neck broke the way it is. Could you now?’
‘Broken his neck!’ stammered Mr Bailey. ‘D’you mean . . .’
‘Ay, indeed a has. Fell off his horse a did, and snap!—twas the end of breakfasts for him, Mus Bailey. And suppers too, I shoon’t wonder. And now he do lie quiet and cold under a cover of sacking. And the harse that throwed un be tied up at home, ready for them as claims un.’
‘But——’ Mr Bailey had not yet come to the end of his astonishment: sudden death compelled from him the customary tribute of wonder. ‘But I saw him myself only last night. With my own eyes I saw him, as hale and brisk a gentleman as you please. And now, you tell me, he’s dead and gone. I can’t believe it, Harry Noke. What a shocking affair, to be sure. I can’t believe it. And you saw him fall, did you? How came it to happen, and what in the name of goodness and mercy are we to do with him now?’ He glanced nervously towards the street. ‘And him in that cart of yours! What’s to be done? We can’t leave him lying there as though he was no more than a dead dog.’
Harry Noke winced at these words, and made an ugly wry grimace. ‘Do you bring un in, Mus Bailey, if you do feel so nice about ut. Gogzoons, that’s because why I brung un along, bainta? Bring un in and set un up on the bench and ask un how ut did chance.’ After a moody silence he went on in a milder tone: ‘Better goo and take a look at un. You’ll find un lying snug enough, and all his gear with him. Hat and wig and saddlebags and alclass="underline" just as I found ’em. He be a quiet enough carpse: I’ll say that. But he’ve a look in his eyes I’ve never seen the like of, nor doon’t wanta.’
‘I’ll not have him in here unless I must,’ said Mr Bailey. ‘Twould bring nothing but bad luck, and twould frighten that poor dear young lady into ten thousand vapours to find she’d got a dead body for a brother.’
Noke’s voice became thick and quick with urgency and dread. ‘That be no way to talk, Mus Bailey. The carpse took a room in your house, didn’t a, and so there he must lie. Tis no carpse of mine, so why should I be moidered with un? If ut baint your consarn, ut be the young woman’s. And if ut baint hers, ut be Richard Mykelborne the coffin-maker’s.’
But the landlord had made up his mind. He spoke with decision. ‘Now hearken to me, Harry Noke. This is a matter for Squire Marden. He’s a gentleman and a magistrate, and what happens amiss in this Fee is for him to weigh and consider. Coroner’s inquest they do call it. I’m nothing but an innkeeper: Squire’s the man for you. Squire’s the man to say who tis, and why tis, and all about it. And if you want to find a home for that poor corpse, Harry Noke, and not have it by you for the rest of your born days, you’ll take counsel of me and drive away off to Squire Marden’s with it this very minute.’
There was force in this contention, and Mr Bailey’s persuasiveness proved irresistible. In his eagerness to be rid of Harry Noke, and of the responsibility the fellow sought to thrust upon him, he seized his arm and all but led him to the door. To the door but no further. One glance shewed him a street from which the darkness was lifting, a sky grown paler; and he turned quickly back into the room, his heart eased and comforted by the crunch and creak and rumble of the departing wagon. He addressed himself busily to the day’s work: unfastened the shutters, extinguished the candles, began sweeping the floor vigorously.
A step on the stairs disturbed him in the midst of these activities, and frightened him into wondering what he must tell the young lady. He was in no mind to be caught by her with a broom in his hand: an attitude much at variance with his notion of what was loverlike and gallant and genteel. Nor did he wish to be seen in his unwashed unshaven state by one to whom he had dedicated his life and soul. He was aware of having slept in his clothes, and felt incapable of sustaining a conversation upon the giddy heights he had reached last night with his charmer. Moreover he was a humane man, and dreaded the pain he must inflict on her by his tragic news. Already his attitude had insensibly changed. Exquisite and ravishing she still was, in his thoughts, but these things came second: she was now, first of all, a bereaved woman, and, by virtue of her bereavement, a child claiming protection. This was a sobering thought bringing many small anxieties in its train. His admiration was sincere; his devotion, he assured himself, was profound; but, when it came to protection, he could not shut his eyes to difficulties. He cast the broom from him, struggled back into his jacket, and assumed a selfconscious pose. All this, these thoughts and movements, occupied no more than a second or two. The next moment the stiffness of his attitude relaxed. He picked up the broom and resumed his sweeping. The footsteps drew nearer, and without alarming him, for he now knew that they were not those of the fair stranger. Yes, there were difficulties in the way of his offering protection to chance young women in trouble; and the chief of them, as his ears told him, was at this moment descending the stairs.