THE SHORTEST WAY

THE SHORTEST WAY

District-Inspector Rochfort had risen very early on that wet August morning, to go trout-fishing along the Feltragh River. He hoped to get a couple of hours at it before breakfast; so he was not best pleased when Hugh Christie accosted him as he crossed the Ivy Bridge. Hugh was looking over the wreathed parapet up the river, and did not take his eyes off it; only put out a hand as Mr Rochfort passed, and stopped him with a touch on the arm. Undoubtedly Hugh had queer ways. His neighbours pronounced him to be “not all there,” which seemed an inappropriate description of his peculiarities, as rather there was more of him than of other people. But the more was something uncanny. He now said, still watching the water: “I was thinkin’ the Sargint might come by; howsome’er, sir, you’ll do as well.”

“That I won’t, my man,” said Mr Rochfort, “unless it can be done uncommonly smart, for I’ve no time to waste.”

“It’s as short as it’s long,” said Hugh. “But you needn’t mind about thim”—he pointed to the young man’s rod and creel—“there’ll be none of that work till it’s gone down, and risin’ it’ll be yet awhile.”

Mr Rochfort looked where Hugh was looking, and had reluctantly to admit the truth of this. The river ran far below them, down in a narrow steep-walled little glen, one of the many cracks that fissure Lisvaughan’s wind-swept, limestone plain. Almost each of these ravines has a stream in it, with a remnant of trees huddled together for shelter from the storms, whose stress they dare not meet in the open, and with ferns venturing out of the rock-clefts to droop ample fronds over the boulders on the margin. It is thus with Feltragh River, which rises in the moorland towards Shrole, and here, at the Ivy Bridge, comes round a sharp turn down a very stony stair. On the other side of the arch it broadens slightly, and a somewhat longer reach of it is in view; but Hugh Christie was staring up-stream, where the water rushed into sight abruptly within a pebble’s cast of his station. Swirling and tumbling it came, thrusting thick glassy strands between the boulders, or seething over the tallest of them in creamy fleeces. A roar ascended from those rapids hollowly and fitfully, so that the District-Inspector looked up and down the road occasionally, thinking a heavy cart must be lumbering along.

“There’s a strong current in it now,” said Hugh. “Man nor mortal couldn’t stand agin it. ’Twould lift a dead cow, let alone—anything else.”

“You’ve chosen a good place for a drenching,” said the District-Inspector, for the wind was driving its cold spray into their faces; “but I don’t see what else is to be got by staying in it.” And he was moving on, when Hugh said—

“Just wait a bit, till I tell you.”

Hugh’s clothes had a sodden appearance, as if they had given up trying to get any wetter, and his brown beard was all in a silvery mist of tiny drops; therefore he was not sensitive about the dampness of the weather. But what he said, though the District-Inspector did wait, was nothing more to the purpose than: “Last night was powerful dark; but it didn’t settle to rain till goin’ on for one o’clock—not to spake of, any way.”

“Well, it’s making up for lost time now, at all events,” said the District-Inspector, and had to be stopped again.

“See here, Mr Rochfort, you’re newish to the place; but ax anybody—ax his Riverence, or Mr Lennon at the public, or Sargint Moore—and every one of them’ll say I was niver known to raise a hand to do murdher on man or woman—or I might say child,” Hugh added after a pause, as if he felt that he was making large demands upon credulity.

“If I were you, Christie, I’d go home, out of the rain,” replied the District-Inspector.

“Och, no matther for that. I was goin’ to ax you, sir, did you remember the McAuliffes—the widdy and her daughter: that was all of them was in it, ever since you come to Lisvaughan.”

“Who lived at Brierly’s cottages over yonder?” the District-Inspector said, pointing towards the smooth-faced crag whose jut prevented them from seeing any farther up the Feltragh River. “I believe I do remember the old woman creeping to Mass—a little lame body; didn’t she die the other day?”

“Ay did she, last Friday week in Shrole Union; for the daughter that kep’ her out of it went wid the fever in the spring, and her son Dan that ped their rint in ’Sthralia, was niver sendin’ her a word iver since. So she made up her mind he was dead too, and she didn’t care what become of her after that; and she broke her heart fretting in the Infirm’ry. But last night Dan landed home lookin’ for her, as plased as anythin’.”

“The unlucky devil,” said the District-Inspector.

“You may say that,” said Hugh; “but there’s unluckier. Sure it was meself met him a trifle down the road, and on’y for that, ’twould ha’ been nobody’s doin’, and done all the same. And if it hadn’t been that outrageous dark, I’d never ha’ seen a sight of him. But sure up agin ourselves we foosthered on the path, and I wasn’t long then doubtin’ who had the discourse out of him about the Divil and such. So: ‘Is it after desthroyin’ you, I am, Dan?’ sez I. And sez he, ‘To your sowl, if it’s yourself, Hughey Christie,’ he sez, for he and I did be as thick as thieves in the ould times. And ‘Come a step along wid me,’ sez he, ‘for I can’t be delayin’.’ ‘Sure where’s the hurry at all?’ sez I, misdoubtin’ what might be in his mind, if he knew no betther or worser. ‘Why, man,’ sez he, ‘isn’t it goin’ on for ten year since I was at home? And like a living dhrame to me now I’m thinkin’ I’m that near her agin.’ So sez I to myself, ‘The Divil’s in it’; and sez I to himself, ‘Take care it isn’t too soon you’ll be gettin’ there, since you couldn’t conthrive it any sooner.’ Sure now, you’d ha’ supposed he’d ha’ had the wit to git a fright at that. But all he said was, ‘Ah,—the sisther, poor Lizzie, the crathur; ’deed, then, that was the great pity entirely, and a cruel loss to her for sartin. But sure that’s the raisin of me comin’ home at all, thinkin’ me mother’d be left too lonesome altogether. And what wid th’ ould stame-boat bustin’ up in her ingines,’ sez he, ‘and meself takin’ bad where they stopped for repeers, I’ve been twyste the time I’d a right to on the way. She’ll be in dhread there’s somethin’ happint me. Howane’er, sorra a much fear of that is there now, Hughey man, and me, so to spake, at the door goin’ in to her, thanks be to goodness,’ sez he.

“And niver a word out of me head to that. But I declare to you, sir, you might ha’ thought the river itself, that’s a dumb crathur, was thryin’ its best to tell him, accordin’ to the quare mutterin’ like it kep’ on wid down below. For stumpin’ up the Quarry Lane he was, that’s the nearest road to his house; ’twas just turnin’ into it I met him. Nor aisy it wouldn’t ha’ been any ways to git a word into the talk he had, and it mostly all about what he’d saved in ’Sthralia, and the fine counthry it was, and the grand thing to ha’ got away out of it. ‘But,’ sez he, ‘maybe I’d ha’ sted in it a while longer, if I hadn’t been afeard me ould woman here’d get mopin’ and frettin’ left all to herself, which I couldn’t abide the thoughts of. For right well I was doin’ out there,’ sez he, ‘and in another couple of years I’d ha’ had a goodish bit more to be bringin’ home wid me.’ And, bedad, you could see the truth of that, because every glimmer of light in the black of the night was shinin’ on the len’ths of the gould watch-chain he had wearin’ on his weskit. ‘Howiver,’ he sez, ‘I’ve plinty to be keepin’ her iligant, and what great matther about anythin’ more, when herself’s the on’y mortal crathur I have belongin’ to me in the width of the world? Sure, if I hadn’t her to be spendin’ it on,’ sez he, ‘I’d as lief be slingin’ ivery blamed ould pinny I own over the bank there into the rowlin’ river, and meself after it—faix would I, the Lord knows.’

“Well now, sir, after his sayin’ that, wouldn’t tellin’ him ha’ been as good as biddin’ him go dhrownd himself? I put it to you: wouldn’t it now?”

“It’s hard to say,” said the District-Inspector: “but what did you do?”

“Stumpin’ along wid him I was, lettin’ on I was listenin’ to him, and all the while I was makin’ no more sinse of it than if he’d been a bullock I had dhrivin’ to market, that would be lettin’ a roar now and agin, at the mischief knows what. For thinkin’ to meself I was that unless I quitted foolin’ him, he’d be very prisintly walkin’ up to his door, and one of the Duggans, that he niver set eyes on in his life, shoutin’ to know who he was, and what he wanted, and tellin’ him the Union was after buryin’ his mother on him. So at last I’d twisted up me mind wid the notion I’d spake out the next time he said anythin’, and if I did, that minyit he hit me a clout on the back, and, ‘Och, Hughey, you bosthoon,’ sez he, ‘herself’ll be sittin’ this instiant of time be the fire in there, and niver thinkin’ I’m comin’ along a few perch down the ould road.’

“And sez I, ‘Tubbe sure, Dan, she’s thinkin’ no such thing at all’; and, for that matther, what truer could I ha’ said? And as sure as I’m alive, I’d ha’ gone on wid it, I would so, on’y ’twas just then we come round the turn opposite them Brierly Cottages. You know, sir, where they’re cocked up, across the river, fornint Fitzsimmons’ lime-kiln, wid ne’er a handy way of gittin’ at them except be the bridge; the next one above this it is—a wooden fut-bridge wid a hand-rail. But not a sight of it could we see in the dark, or anythin’ else, on’y the light burnin’ in the Duggans’ windy, the way it used to be afore they come there.

“And when Dan seen that, he let a sort of yell, and sez he, ‘There it is—there’s her ould bit of a lamp lightin’ the same as it was ever, and meself beholdin’ it agin—glory be to God.’ The Divil’s in it,” Hugh said, with a fierce clutch at the dripping ivy-sprays. “If the crathur hadn’t been so ready to be gloryin’ God, I’d ha’ found it in me heart to ha’ tould him the whole thing straight out—goodness help him!—but instead of that, I thought to be comin’ at it gradial. So I sez to him, lettin’ on I wasn’t mindin’ what he’d said, ‘Is it a star you’re lookin’ at?’ And sez he to me, ‘Musha, not at all, man; it’s somethin’ a dale nearer than a one of thim.’ And, ‘There’s things farther off than stars,’ sez I; and, ‘Belike there is,’ sez he, ‘but I’m not apt to be throublin’ me head about them when me ould woman’s waitin’ for me unbeknownst just across the sthrame. So I’ll be sayin’ good-night to you kindly, Hughey, and skytin’ over. Where at all’s the bridge? I can’t make out a stim before me. Ah, here it is!’ sez he, ‘right enough in its own place.’

“And it’s the truth I’m tellin’ you, Mr Rochfort, the truth I’m tellin’ you: not till the man was grabbin’ the rail wid one hand and mine wid the other, biddin’ me good-night, did the recollection come into me mind of anythin’ amiss. And then I dunno rightly how it was, but the same time I got considherin’ the way ’twould be, supposin’ I held me tongue for that minyit. For if I didn’t tell him the one thing, nobody’d ever tell him the other, and ’twould save throuble in a manner. Och, I dunno what come over me, but in the end all I sez to him was, ‘You’ll have to be walkin’ cautious, Dan,’—God forgive me, but for sure He won’t: that was every word I said.”

“But why should you have said more?” asked the District-Inspector. “The bridge is safe enough. Wasn’t the man sober?”

“Safe enough, begorra!” said Hugh. “If there warn’t six fut smashed slap out of the middle of it wid the big ash-tree buttin’ its head through it, that was blown off the top of the bank in the storm the night before last. Six fut clever and clane, and maybe six times six fut under it to drop down on the river and the rocks.”

“And you sent him over that in the dark?” said the District-Inspector. “What on earth possessed you?” This question, however, was merely a phrase, for he seemed to know the reason very well. “Was he killed?” he demanded, with the inquest in his mind. “Where’s the body lying?”

“It’s that I’m watchin’ for,” said Hugh, his eyes still following the rough white race below, “ever since I had light to see. He might be comin’ by any minyit now. But until the river riz wid the rain a couple of hours back, I doubt was there water enough to bring him; there was no very great dale runnin’ in it before then. So I wouldn’t think he could ha’ slipped past, and I not to notice.”

“Do you mean to say,” said the District-Inspector, “that you went off and left the unfortunate man there, without so much as ascertaining whether he was dead or alive?”

“Alive is it?” said Hugh. “Sure the wooden bridge is a good bit higher than this one; but if I tuk a standin’ lep off of the ledge here, it’s breakin’ me neck I’d be afore I knew where I was. And the jagged lumps of big stones is terrible; he might be wedged in between two of them. Och, no! for all the life’s left in him, poor Dan’ll ha’ had a paicibler night of it up there than meself had here, considherin’ quare things in the dark this long while. Ay will he, for the sort of moanin’ and screeches there was in it now and again was nothin’ on’y the win’, and the rain polthoguin’, I very well know.”

“And are you certain that the bridge hadn’t been mended?” said the District-Inspector.

“How could I help bein’ sartin sure? And I goin’ by it on’y a while before, in the grey of the light, and Mrs Duggan herself bawlin’ across to me that they were kilt thrampin’ half-a-mile or so afore they could git over anywheres.”

“But if you didn’t wait, how do you know that he mayn’t have turned back?”

“Wait? Bedad no, it’s runnin’ away down here I was, as fast as I could pelt. But what was to turn him back, and he flourishin’ off wid himself in the greatest hurry at all? You might ha’ thought it was ten fine fortin’s he was goin’ after; and not a stim to see a step before him wid. So if it isn’t a murdher, get me one. And that’s the raison I was thinkin’ I’d a right to be mentionin’ it to yourself, sir, or the Sargint.”

“It’s a very curious case,” said the District-Inspector, beginning instinctively to grope about for precedents, and finding none.

“But murdher or no,” said Hugh, “I do be thinkin’ diff’rent ways of it, and some of them’s bad. For I sez to meself, ‘In a fine disthraction poor Dan’d ha’ been, when he heard tell of th’ ould crathur breakin’ her heart in the House.’ And then again I sez to meself, ‘And supposin’? Many’s the fine disthraction you’ve been in yourself, me man, and niver tuk a lep into the river out of it.’ And arter that agin sez I to meself, ‘But sure, if some one’d ha’ up and shoved me over unbeknownst, so to spake, sorra the blame I’d ha’ blamed him.’ However, since the day’s light’nin’ overhead, little doubt I’ve had in me mind but that I’d liefer see him comin’ along the road on his feet, disthracted or not disthracted; and that’s what I’ll niver behould, if it was twyste as clear. Terrible clear it is gettin’,” he said, glancing furtively up.

The sky was all one floating, drifting greyness, dim and impenetrable even in a place rather low on the east, where many invisible hands seemed to be straining the vast web in devious directions, so that it thinned and paled. But at this moment it rent there right through, leaving a rift filled strangely with a liquid radiance of silver light glowing into amber, which suddenly darted into the eyes of the two men, and threw their shadows across the wet road, and set the puddles on fire.

“Look,” said Hugh excitedly, standing up straight and pointing towards the water.

A wave wider and wilder than the others was coming down the river, with something lapt round in it that made a dark core to its turbid brown. But this was borne along no farther than to the first ridged step in the fleeting rapids. There it halted and lay still, while the turmoil of water and foam fell away from about it in a flurry, draining off through the interstices of the boulders, or pouring over their veiled crests. It was the body of a man. One arm hung down against the straight rock-ledge, and the face looked up to the sun-gleam so naturally that when the next wave rushed by, weltering on and on and on interminably over it, the District-Inspector gave a gasp as if something had been taking his own breath.

“There he is, the very way I tould you,” said Hugh. At the sound of his voice the District-Inspector turned quickly, and, seeing that he had stepped up on to the low, ivied parapet, made a grasp at him, but was not in time to reach him. “Stop where you are, Dan, one instiant yet,” Hugh shouted: “for here I am, too!”