The Tinker's Girl Read online

  They had just taken your papa's cart and horse away, but God gave you to me then.'

  'Oh! Max. Max.' She was sobbing openly in his arms.

  'Oh! Max; Max, I'll never leave you. Wherever I go they'll have to find a place for you.'

  His face now straight, he said, 'And leave him alone here? No, no; he's my friend. He's been very gggood to me. If you go into service it must be on your own.'

  Noticing Bruce descending the steps from the loft, Jinnie drew away from Max's hold, quickly wiped her eyes with her apron, then attended to the making of the tea.

  Although the clothes that Bruce was now wearing were well-worn, the tweed jacket almost threadbare at the elbows, he still looked a very presentable young man. His body was lithe, his head was well set on his shoulders, and his clean-shaven face, if not handsome, was pleasantly featured; and all was not lost upon Jinnie as she glanced at him, and she wished, really wished, from the bottom of her heart that she could have loved him with the love that he deserved, for she owed him so much.

  Bruce drank the tea, wiped his mouth on the pad of his thumb, pulled on his cap, then as casually as he could, he said, 'Well, I'm off.' And at this Max said,

  'I'll be walking on c-c-cinders until you come back.'

  But Jinnie said nothing. She only hoped that some good fortune would come his way and compensate him, if love could be compensated.

  Bruce sat in the office of Walters, Claire and Fowler, Solicitors. It was a well-upholstered office, all the chairs being covered in either leather or hide, and the desk, behind which sat either Mr Walters, Mr Claire or Mr Fowler, was very deep and wide. It too had a leather top.

  'Your name is . . .?'

  The thin man with the grey hair leant forward across the desk towards Bruce, and Bruce replied, 'Bruce Shaleman.'

  'Yes, Mr Bruce Shaleman, I'm Mr Claire and I'm very pleased that you have called. But may I ask if you have anything that can prove your identity?'

  Bruce's answer was terse as he replied, 'None whatever; only that's my name and I received a letter from you asking if I was Mr Harold Shaleman's brother. You had our address, although not the full one: it is Toilet's Ridge Farm, The New Coach Road, Whitfield.'

  'Would that be Hexham way?'

  'No, sir; quite a way beyond and beyond Haydon Bridge and Langley. Catton and Allendale are one way, Whitfield t'other. Above that. Yes, way above Whitfield.

  Do you know that part, sir?'

  Mr Claire cleared his throat and said, 'I have been almost as far. Yes, as far as Catton. That is the terminus of the train, isn't it?'

  'Yes, sir. Just beyond.'

  'Have you anyone who could vouch for your identity?'

  'Yes. Oh yes; a man of substance, too, Mr Richard BaxtonPowell.'

  'Oh, you know the BaxtonPowells?'

  'As I've said, I'm well acquainted with the son, Richard, sir.'

  'Oh. Oh, well; they have offices in the city, so we could soon verify that, couldn't we?'

  It was a moment before Bruce answered, 'Yes, sir; you could, and the sooner the better, I would say.'

  The grey-haired man now glanced towards his partner who was sitting at the end of the table writing, and he said, 'Do you think we could go ahead now, Mr Fowler?' And Mr Fowler, raising his head for the first time, looked straight at Bruce and muttered something that could have been, 'Yes, Mr Claire, of course;' then continued with his writing.

  Mr Claire was addressing Bruce again, saying, 'It is a most strange story. I am sure you don't know as yet that your brother died at sea.'

  'No; no, I didn't, sir. When was this?' Mr Claire again looked at Mr Fowler, and without raising his head Mr Fowler said, 'Off the Island of Jamaica, on May the second of this year, 1872, and he was buried at sea.'

  Bruce's attention was all on the man at the end of the desk now. He seemed a queer fellow. All the time he was talking, he was continuing to write rapidly. This was what solicitors did, he supposed.

  Mr Claire brought Bruce's attention to him again, saying, 'Well, Mr Shaleman, I will put it to you as plainly and as shortly as possible. For the full details you must see Captain Thomas Stoke, Master of The Admiral. He knows quite a bit about the matter; but the First Officer, Mr Carter, will take you deeper into your brother's life and his business. It is a very strange business, but it has netted you, Mr Shaleman, what to my mind is a small, though not so small, fortune.'

  Bruce said nothing: he just stared across the desk at the man and waited.

  'Before the boat left the last port of call, your brother put into the Captain's care a box containing five hundred pounds and valuables; jewellery, in fact. The Captain and his First Officer brought the box to me and asked for our advice. I suggested it be opened here in the presence of witnesses and when the contents were revealed, I suggested the money be banked at Lloyds, and the valuables left in the safe here for the present until we ascertained their value. Now, if I may suggest to you, I would go to where The Admiral is berthed and if the Captain and the First Officer are at liberty, I would invite them to a meal, and there I am sure you will get the whole story. Then, perhaps this afternoon, you will do me the honour of returning here at three o'clock, at which time I will take you and introduce you to the Lloyds Bank manager and also ask for a valuer to be there to give you an idea, even a rough idea, of what you can expect from the four pieces of jewellery that are deposited over there--' His hand pointed to the safe in the far wall.

  Bruce made no murmur of reply. Five hundred pounds and jewellery. From where, in God's name!

  could Hal have got five hundred pounds honestly?

  And jewellery. Jewellery! He must have been robbing somebody. And yet this man was telling him to take these two gentlemen, a Captain and his First Officer, out to a meal and all he had on him was one pound three and sixpence.

  As if the man at the end of the table had been reading his mind, he raised his head for a moment, stopped the movement of his pen, looked at his partner and said one word, 'Advance;' then he resumed his business, and Mr Claire said cheerfully, 'Oh yes; yes. You will be needing an advance, Mr Shaleman. Let me see, would ten pounds be in order?'

  ' Yes, sir. Thank you; that would be in order.' How was it he was able to answer so calmly? His voice certainly wasn't conveying his thoughts, which were in a racing jumble. He now watched Mr Claire bend to the side, open a drawer and take from it a box which he placed on the desk. From the box he extracted a chamois leather bag and, pushing it across the table towards Bruce, he said, 'I think you'll find the required sum in there.'

  'Thank you, sir.' Bruce put the bag into his pocket; then, pushing his chair back, he stood up and his voice still not sounding like his own, said, 'Until three o'clock, then.'

  Mr Claire now half rose from his chair and rang a bell on his desk, and when a door opened he said, 'Will you see Mr Shaleman out, Williams?' The clerk did not answer but inclined his head towards Bruce. However, when the door had closed on them, Mr Claire turned to his partner and said, 'Well, what do you think?' and the mutter came back, 'Honest, poor and half-fed. Could pass if he was dressed in a decent rig.' Then, looking towards the wall in which he had indicated the safe, Mr Claire said, ' I wonder how that fellow came across that little lot in there. I wouldn't like to guess at its worth.'

  'Yes, sir, I do. It would be helpful because I can't imagine my brother having that amount of money at any time.'

  'He never played cards with you at all?' It was the First Officer speaking to Bruce who shook his head and said,

  'No; we lived on a farm up in the hills; we never had much time for card playing.'

  'Well . . . well, where do we start?' said the Captain.

  'Really, we should have the Second Mate here, but he has already gone on before us to Scotland; we sail for the Clyde tonight, you know. We're picking up our next cargo from there. But the Second Mate could have put you in the picture much better than either of us. As it is, I think I'll leave it to Mr Carter here to tell you what he knows; and I t
hink he'd better start at the beginning.'

  The First Officer now cleared his throat as if about to make a speech, and then he said, 'Well, Mr Shaleman, you know your brother's character and temperament better than anybody, I should say; and if you were truthful you might add he wasn't an easy fellow to get along with.'

  'You're right there, sir.'

  'Well, now that's out of the way, I can say he had a pretty rough time when he first came aboard this ship. You see, we are very proud of our crew, most of them having been with us for years, some even from boys. I am just putting you in the picture that when your brother came aboard he was for using both his fists and his tongue, and neither of them was a match for those of some of the crew; and so going out to the Indies was rather a rough passage for him, with one exception. We had a man aboard who was a bit of a magician. Oh, that's wrong, Captain, my saying Samson was a bit of a magician, he was a magician.

  The Captain here had picked him up from one of the Islands four years previously. He was a good worker but he was a better entertainer; he could do anything with cards . . . and rats. He could be in his bare pelt up to here' - the First Officer now put his hand around his waist - 'and his breeks would just reach his knees,

  he would never touch them but he'd bring a rat from behind his back and tweek its whiskers. To say that he was feared is putting it mildly: sailors don't usually like weird or odd individuals, so he hadn't any friends on board, a lot of admirers you could say, but no friends; until your brother appeared, that is. Your brother did not seem to be afraid of him and all the hocuspocus he got up to. You could say now that he cultivated him in order to learn his tricks, and the tricks he did learn best were those that can be achieved with a pack of cards, because Samson - that's the nickname the men gave our odd man - could win every hand he played, without anyone being able to detect a cheating move.

  We've sat in, haven't we, Captain?' He looked at his superior, and the Captain nodded, saying, 'Yes; many a time.'

  'Anyway, it didn't make the men like your brother any better when he became a mate of Samson. When we reached some of the islands the Captain did not allow any of the crew to go ashore. The women were rotten, as was the food and drink in some of these places, but there was one particular town where leave was always granted. There were many whites there, mostly settlers on the outskirts, but the town itself was run by half-breeds, and there were three main gambling saloons. But, as Samson said, he never allowed himself to win more than ten of the island's golden coins in any one game, an insurance for getting out alive. But ten of these coins apparently were not enough to satisfy your brother. And although he was your brother I must say that he was like a ferret in his actions. He managed to unearth the fact that some private gambling games went on outside the town, and for pretty high stakes; and that the planters would sometimes play all night. Then, one day, a strange thing happened: Samson jumped ship when we were berthing at one of the islands. He had given no reason to anyone that he was going, except that on the day prior to his disappearance he told one of the stokers, 'Hal man unlucky,' which the stoker found very strange, because everybody knew they were mates.

  In any case, you don't talk about being unlucky aboard any ship. Once a man gets known as a jinx, there's trouble all round.

  'Anyway, when we next made a port where the men could go ashore - quite a civilised place, really, even though the town itself was run by half-breeds - your brother went on shore leave by himself. No-one ever went out of his way to seek his company, and on this particular night, when he returned about two in the morning, one of the men, being awake, noticed that he seemed very pleased with himself. By the way, you knew, of course, that he kept his head shaved, didn't you?' He looked towards Bruce, and Bruce nodded at him, saying, 'Yes. Yes. Almost bald.'

  'He was very touchy about it when he first came aboard and resented being called Baldy. That was the start of his bashing period, I think. Anyway, two days before we left port he was out again late at night; in fact, it was about four in the morning when he returned.

  He was carrying this small steel box; and early the next morning he came to the Captain here, didn't he, Captain? in this very cabin. I was here at the time, as was the Second Mate. We were doing much as we are doing now - going over our course - and he asked if the Captain would keep the box in his safe and if he could tell him how to get a sum of money forwarded to Newcastle. The Captain suggested that since they were preparing for a home run, it would be quicker to take it with him. At first, he didn't seem to take to this idea, but I pointed out to him that with the kind of banking arrangements to be found in the islands, it might be a long time before he saw his money. At the time I did not add "if ever". Consequently the Captain persuaded him to leave the money with the box. Your brother then left the cabin and returned with the steel box in which he said he had placed money and property. And being of a deceitful mind himself, and believing that everyone else was of the same nature, he had sealed the box with red wax in a number of places, with the key hanging from a piece of string attached to it.'

  The Captain himself now took over the story: 'I detected a great bitterness in your brother,' he said. 'From when he first came aboard it was as if he was fighting something or someone, and on the day he brought the box and I asked him what he intended to do with the money when he got back home, he said, "I've got what you would call a mission to perform, Captain.

  Oh yes, I've got what you would call a mission to perform." Now, I have repeated the words as he said them. And he went on, "If you've got money you can bring things about." I recall there seemed to be an implied threat in the words; I felt he had it in for someone and he was going to make them pay. Am I right?'

  'Yes, sir. Yes, you are right."

  'Well,' the Captain now turned to his officer and said,

  'Carry on and give Mr Shaleman the rest. There's not much more to tell.'

  So the First Officer took up the tale again, saying,

  'We didn't know till later that after coming aboard with his spoils that night he was sick, and two or three times more before we sailed, and that during that time he never left the boat. We were two days out when he went down with a fever. We haven't a doctor on board, but our Second Mate is very knowledgeable with herbs and such, and he has books on different diseases. From these he could find nothing, but his own opinion was that the man had been poisoned.

  And poisoning wasn't anything new in the islands. To confirm this he found a mark like a puncture on your brother's body. Death comes in many strange ways in the islands, and here was a sailor who was winning too much money and they couldn't prove he was cheating.

  It is now evident, of course, that he must have been in a position to play for high stakes to win whatever was in the box. Or else, as has happened to many a man, he would have found himself trussed up and thrown into a stinking hole to die there slowly. It has been known in those parts. Anyway, his ills were short for within five days of his acquiring the fortune we buried him at sea.'

  There was a pause during which Bruce thought, Dear God! What a way to go! But then, if he hadn't been poisoned when he was, he could have seen to it that Max and Jinnie were taken care of, as he had promised.

  He wouldn't have needed to go further than Newcastle Quay to find somebody to do his dirty work, especially if it promised to pay well.

  'Now, the box,' the Captain was saying. 'I was of two minds what to do with it: either hand it over to the shipping company or to the police. But then I thought of the solicitors Walters, Claire and Fowler. I knew them as being very good at straightening out sticky matters.

  'Well, now you know them. And they have been fortunate in tracing you, because your brother left his correct address when he signed on. And this doesn't always happen, you know, when a man doesn't want to leave a half-pay note to some lady. And Mr Claire told me it didn't take much investigation after that to discover that your parents had both died whilst your brother was at sea, and that you were the only known relative.
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  'Now the time's getting on. Have you to go back to see Mr Claire?'

  'Yes, at three o'clock. But about the meal . . .'

  'Well, perhaps we just have time to push in a bite.'

  It was exactly three o'clock when Bruce was shown into the solicitors' office accompanied by the Captain and the First Officer, and what struck him immediately was that Mr Fowler was still seated in the same place, and still writing. It was as if he had never moved.

  After some pleasantries were exchanged between the Captain and Mr Claire the box was brought from the safe and placed on the desk. It was small, not more than six by five inches and apparently made of steel.

  Bruce uttered no word until the box was opened and the four pieces of jewellery displayed on the desk, and then all he could say was, 'Oh my!'

  And Mr Claire repeated the words, then he added,

  'Their brilliance is startling, isn't it? They must have been intended for a lady with a very delicate hand, because the rings aren't all that large, nor is the bangle.'

  At that moment there was a tap on the door, then it opened and the clerk announced, 'Mr Stoneford.'

  'Ah! Good-day to you, Mr Claire,' cried the newcomer.

  'And good-day to you, Mr Stoneford. We have the display all ready for you.'

  The visitor said nothing, but nodded to the Captain and the First Officer, then with a smile on his face, he turned towards Mr Fowler, saying jovially, 'That law book not finished yet? My! my!' and at this Mr Fowler raised his head and said, 'Never will be if I'm interrupted with such trite remarks.'

  'Never changes, does he, Mr Claire?' His hand went out to the jewellery and he said, 'What have we here?

  My! my! Two rings, a bangle and a necklace all to match. Why, if they're as good as they appear to be, somebody is going to be warm for the rest of his days.