Run To Earth

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Title:     Run To Earth
Author: Talbot Baines Reed [More Titles by Reed]

Chapter I. ON THE TRAIL

Michael McCrane had bolted!

There was not a shadow of a doubt about it. The moment I reached the bank that eventful morning and saw the manager's desk open, and the tin cash-box lying empty on the floor, I said at once to myself, "This is McCrane's doing."

And as I and the messenger stood there, with dropped jaws, gaping at the dismal scene, I hurriedly called up in my mind the incidents of the past week, and, reading them in the light of this discovery, I was ready to stake my reputation as a paying cashier that my fellow-clerk was a robber and a fugitive.

McCrane had not been at our bank long; he had come to us from one of the country branches, and, much to the disgust of some of us juniors, had been placed over our heads as second paying cashier. I was third paying cashier, and from the moment I set eyes on my new colleague and superior I felt that mischief was in the wind.

A mysterious, silent man of twenty-six was Michael McCrane; so silent was he, indeed, that were it not for an occasional "How will you take it?"

"Not endorsed."

"Next desk," ejaculated in the course of his daily duties, any one might have supposed him dumb. He held himself gloomily aloof from his fellow- clerks. None of us knew where he lived, or how he lived. It was an event to get a word out of him; wherever it was possible he answered by signs or grimaces. He glided into his place in the morning like a ghost, and like a ghost he glided out at night and vanished.

More than that, his personal appearance was unsatisfactory. He was slovenly in figure and habits, with a stubbly beard and unkempt hair; and although he had L150 a year his clothes were threadbare and shabby. He seemed always hard up for money. He did not go out, as most of us did, in the middle of the day to get lunch, but fortified himself with bread and cheese, which he brought in his pocket, and partook of mysteriously behind the lid of his desk.

Now and then I had come upon him while he was deeply engaged in writing what appeared to be private letters, and I could not help noticing that on each occasion when thus interrupted he coloured up guiltily and hid his letter hastily away in his blotting-paper. And once or twice lately mysterious parcels had been handed to him over the counter, which he had received with a conscious air, hiding them away in his desk and carrying them home under his coat at night.

I did not at all like these oddities, and, holding the position I did, I had often debated with myself whether it was not my duty to take the manager or head cashier into my confidence on the subject. And yet there had never till now occurred anything definite to take hold of, nor was it till this October morning, when I saw the manager's desk broken and the empty cash-box on the floor, that it came over me that McCrane was even a worse fellow than I had taken him for.

He had been most mysterious about his holidays this year. He was to have taken them in May, among the first batch, but suddenly altered his arrangements, giving no reason, and requesting to be allowed to go in September. September came, and still he clung to his desk. Finally another change was announced: McCrane would start for his fortnight's holiday on the second Thursday of October.

These changes were all arranged so mysteriously, and with such an unusual show of eagerness on McCrane's part, and as the time itself drew near he exhibited such a mixture of self-satisfaction, concealment, and uneasiness, that no one could fail to observe it. Add to this that during the last day or two he had made more than one mistake in his addition, and had once received a reprimand from the manager for inattention, at which he vaguely smiled--and you will hardly wonder that my first words on that eventful morning--the first of his long-expected holiday--were--

"Michael McCrane has bolted!"

The manager when he arrived took the same view as I did.

"I don't like this, Samuels," said he; "not at all, Samuels."

When Mr Trong called any one by his name twice in one sentence it was a certain sign that he meant what he said.

"How much was there in the box?" I inquired.

"L23 5 shillings 6 pence," said the manager, referring to his petty cash account. "There was one five-pound note, but I do not know the number; the rest was cash."

The messenger was called in and deposed that Mr McCrane had stayed the previous evening half an hour after every one else, to wind up, as he said. The witness stated that he heard him counting over some money, and that when he left he had put out the gas in the office and given him--the deponent--the key of his--the suspect's--own desk.

"Bring his book," said the manager.

I did so, and we examined it together. The last page had not been added up, and two of the lines had not been filled out with the amounts in the money column. Oddly enough, when the two cancelled cheques were looked at they were found to amount to L21.

"We must go thoroughly into this," said the manager. "It looks worse and worse. What's this?"

It was a torn piece of paper between two of the leaves of the book, part of a memorandum in McCrane's handwriting. It read thus:

[A scrap of paper is illustrated here.]

"What do you make of that?" asked the manager. A light dawned on me.

"I wonder if it means Euston, 1:30? Perhaps he's going by that train."

The manager looked at me, then at the clock, and then went to his desk and took up a Bradshaw.

"1:30 is the train for Rugby, Lancaster, Fleetwood. Samuels!"

"Sir," said I.

"You had better take a cab to Euston, you have just time. If he is there stop him, or else follow him, and bring him back. If necessary, get the police to help you, but if you can bring him back without, so much the better. I'm afraid the L23 is not all; it may turn out to be a big robbery when we go through his book. I must trust to your judgment. Take some money with you, L20, in case of emergency. Be quick or you will be late. Telegraph to me how you succeed."

It was a word and a blow. A quarter of an hour later my hansom dashed into the yard at Euston just as the warning bell for the 1:30 train was sounding.

"Where for, sir?" asked a porter. "Any luggage?"

I did not know where I was for, and I had no luggage.

I rushed on to the platform and looked anxiously up and down. It was a scene of confusion. Groups of non-travellers round the carriage doors were beginning to say a last good-bye to their friends inside. Porters were hurling their last truck-loads of luggage into the vans; the guard was a quarter of the way down the train looking at the tickets; the newspaper boys were flitting about shouting noisily and inarticulately; and the usual crowd of "just-in-times" were rushing headlong out of the booking-office and hurling themselves at the crowded train.

I was at a loss what to do. It was impossible to say who was there and who was not. McCrane might be there or he might not. What was the use of my--

"Step inside if you're going," shouted a guard.

I saw a porter near the booking-office door advance towards the bell.

At the same moment I saw, or fancied I saw, at the window of a third- class carriage a certain pale face appear momentarily, and, with an anxious glance up at the clock, vanish again inside.

"Wait a second," I cried to the guard, "till I get a ticket."

"Not time now," I heard him say, as I dashed into the booking-office.

The clerk was shutting the window.

"Third single--anywhere--Fleetwood!" I shouted, flinging down a couple of sovereigns.

I was vaguely aware of seizing the ticket, of hearing some one call after me something about "change," of a whistle, the waving of a flag, and a shout, "Stand away from the train." Next moment I was sprawling on all fours on the knees of a carriage full of passengers; and before I had time to look up the 1:30 train was outside Euston station.

It took me some time to recover from the perturbation of the start, and still longer to overcome the bad impression which my entry had made on my fellow-passengers.

Indeed I was made distinctly uncomfortable by the attitude which two, at any rate, of these persons took up. One was a young man of the type which I usually connect with detectives. The other was a rollicking commercial traveller.

"You managed to do it, then?" said the latter to me when finally I had shaken myself together and found a seat.

"Yes, just," said I.

The other man looked hard at me from behind a newspaper.

"Best to cut your sort of job fine," continued the commercial, knowingly. "Awkward to meet a friend just when you're starting, wouldn't it?" with a wink that he evidently meant to be funny.

I coloured up violently, and was aware that the other man had his eye on me. I was being taken for a runaway!

"Worth my while to keep chummy with you," said the heartless man of the road. "Start a little flush, don't you?"

I ignored this pointed inquiry.

"Not bank-notes, I hope--because they've an unkind way of stopping them. Not but what you might get rid of one or two if you make haste. But they're ugly things to track a chap out by, you know. Why, I knew a young fellow, much your age and build, borrowed a whole sheaf of 'em and went up north, and made up his mind he'd have a high old time. He did slip through a fiver; but--would you believe it?--the next he tried on, they were down on him like shooting stars, and he's another two years to do on the mill before he can come another trip by the 1:30. They all fancy this train."

This style of talk, much as it amused my fellow-passengers and interested the man in the corner, made me feel in a most painful position. My looks and blushes, I am aware, were most compromising; and my condition generally, without luggage, without rug, without even a newspaper, enveloped me in such an atmosphere of mystery and suspicion that I half began to wonder whether I was not an absconding forger myself.

Fortunately the train stopped at Willesden and I took advantage of the halt to change my carriage, explaining clumsily that I should prefer a carriage where I could sit with my face to the engine, whereat every one smiled except myself and the man in the corner.

I tried hard to find an empty carriage; but the train was full and there was no such luxury to be had. Besides, guards, porters, and station- masters were all shouting to me to get inside somewhere, and a score of heads attracted by the commotion appeared at the windows and added to my discomfort. Finally I took refuge in a carriage which seemed less crowded than the rest--having but two occupants.

Alas! to my horror and dismay I discovered when the train had started that I had intruded myself on a palpably honeymoon couple, who glared at me in such an unfriendly manner that for the next hour and a half, without respite, I was constrained to stand with my head out of the window. Even in the tunnels I had no encouragement to turn my head round.

This was bad enough, but it would have been worse had it not happened that, in craning my head and neck out of the window, I caught sight, in the corner of the carriage--next to mine, of half of the back of a head which I felt sure I knew. It belonged, in fact, to Michael McCrane, and a partial turn of his face left no doubt on the matter. I had run my man down already! I smiled to myself as I contemplated the unconscious nape of that neck and recalled the gibes of the commercial traveller and the uncomfortable stare of the man in the corner.

What should I do? The train would stop for two minutes at Bletchley, and not again until we reached Rugby. Should I lay my hand on his shoulder at the first place or the second?

I wished I could have dared to retire into my carriage and consult my timetable about trains back. But the consciousness of the honeymoon glare at my back glued me to the window. I must inquire at Bletchley and act accordingly.

We were beginning to put on the break, and show other signs of coming to a halt, when I was startled by seeing McCrane stand up and put his head out of the window. I withdrew as hastily as I could; not daring, of course, to retreat fully into the carriage, but turning my face in an opposite direction, so as to conceal my identity. I could not guess whether he had seen me or not, it had all occurred so quickly. If he had, I might have need of all my strategy to run him to earth.

As the train pulled up I saw him lower his window, and, with anxious face, make a sudden bolt across the platform.

That was enough for me. I darted out too, much to the satisfaction of my fellow-travellers.

"When's the next train back to Euston?"

"Take your seats!" bawled the guard, ignoring me.

"When does the next train go to Euston?"

"There's a time-table there."

I went; keeping one eye on the train, another on the spot where my man had vanished, and feeling a decided inconvenience from the lack of a third with which to consult the complicated document before me. In a rash moment I ventured to concentrate my whole attention on the timetable. I had found Bletchley; and my finger, painfully tracing down one of the long columns, was coming very near to the required latitude, when I became aware of a whistle; of a figure, bun in hand, darting from the refreshment-room to a carriage; of a loud puff from the engine.

I abandoned the time-table, and rushed in the same direction. Alas! the train was in full motion; a porter was standing forbiddingly between me and my carriage, and the honeymoon couple were blandly drawing down the blinds in my very face! Worst of all, I saw the half-profile of Michael McCrane, inflated with currant bun, vanish; and as the end carriage whirled past me I received a friendly cheer from the commercial traveller, and a particularly uncomfortable smile from his silent companion in the corner.

I was left behind! The bird had flown out of my very hand; and there was nothing now but to return in confusion and report my misfortunes at the bank.

Stay! I could telegraph to detain my man at Rugby. Let me see. "To Station Master, Rugby. Detain Michael McCrane--bank robbery--tall, dark--third-class--left Euston 1:30--I follow--Samuels." How would that do? I was pleased with the look of it; and, in the fullness of my heart, consulted the station-master.

He eyed me unfavourably.

"Who are you?" he had the boldness to inquire.

"I'm from the bank."

"Oh!" he said; and added, "your best plan is to follow him in the supplemental. It will be up in five minutes. He's sure to be bound for Fleetwood, and you'll catch him on the steamer. They won't stop him on the road without a warrant. They don't know you."

I admitted the truth of this, and, after some inward debate-- particularly as I had a ticket through--I decided to take advice, and avail myself of the "Supplemental."

It was painfully supplemental, that train--a string of the most ramshackle carriages the line could muster, and the carriage in which I found myself smelt as if it had been in Billingsgate for a month. However, I could sit down this time. There was neither honeymoon, commercial traveller, nor man in the corner to disturb my peace; only a rollicking crowd of Irish harvest men on their way home, in spirits which were not all of air.

I was claimed as one of their noble fraternity before we were many stages on the road; and although I am happy to say I was not compelled to take part in their potations, for the simple reason that they had none left to offer me, I was constrained to sing songs, shout shouts, abjure allegiance to the Union Jack, and utter aspirations for the long life of Charlie Parnell and Father Mickey (I believe that was the reverend gentleman's name), and otherwise abase myself, for the sake of peace, and to prevent my head making acquaintance with the shillalahs of the company. I got a little tired of it after a few hours' incessant bawling, and was rather glad, by the assistance of a few half-crowns (which I fervently trusted the manager would allow me to charge to his account), to escape their company at Preston, and seek the shelter of a more secluded compartment for the rest of the way.

I found one occupied by two files of soldiers in charge of a couple of deserters, and in this genial company performed the remainder of the journey in what would have been something like comfort but for the ominous gusts of wind and rain which, as we neared the coast, buffeted the carriage window, and promised a particularly ugly night for any one contemplating a sea voyage.

 

Chapter II. BOWLED OUT

When we reached Fleetwood it was blowing (so I heard some one say) "half a cap." I privately wondered what a whole cap must be like; for it was all I could do, by leaning hard up against the wind, and holding on my hat--a chimney-pot hat, by the way--to tack up the platform and fetch round for the Belfast steamer, which lay snorting and plunging alongside.

It takes a very good sailor to be cheerful under such circumstances. I felt profoundly melancholy and wished myself safe at home in my bed. The sight of the black and red funnel swaying to and fro raised qualms in me which, although still on _terra firma_, almost called for the intervention of a friendly steward. Alas! friend there was none.

In my desperation I was tempted basely to compromise with duty. How did I know Michael McCrane was on the steamer at all? He might have dropped out at any one of a dozen wayside stations between Bletchley and here. Indeed the probability was that he had. Or--and I felt almost affectionately towards him as the thought crossed my mind--even if he had come so far, he, like myself, might be a bad sailor, and prefer to spend the night on this side of the angry Channel. I could have forgiven him much, I felt, had I been sure of that.

In any case, I asked myself earnestly, was I justified in running my employers into the further expense of a return ticket to Belfast without being reasonably sure that I was on the right track? And _was_ I reasonably sure? Was I even--

On the steerage deck of the steamer below me, with a portmanteau in one hand and a brand-new hat-box and a rug in the other, a figure staggered towards the companion ladder and disappeared below. That figure, even to my unwilling eyes, was naught else but a tragic answer to my own question.

Michael McCrane was on board, and going below!

A last lingering hope remained.

"Hardly put off to-night, will you?" said I to a mate beside me, with the best assumption of swagger at my command.

He was encasing himself in tarpaulins, and appeared not to hear me.

I repeated my inquiry, and added, in the feeble hope that he might contradict me, "Doesn't look like quieting down."

"No," said he, looking up at the sky; "there'll be a goodish bit more of it before we're over. All aboard there?"

"No," I shouted, rushing towards the gangway; "I'm not!"

Oh, how I wished I could have found myself just left behind. As it was I was precipitated nearly head first down the gangway, amid the by no means friendly expletives of the sailors, and landed at the bottom a clear second after my hat, and two seconds, at least in advance of my umbrella. Before I had recovered all my component parts the _Royal Duke_ was off.

It was not the slightest comfort to me to reflect that if only I had dashed on board the moment I saw my man, and arrested him there and then, we might both be standing at this moment comparatively happy on that quay whose lights blinked unkindly, now above us, now below, now one side, now the other, as we rolled out of the harbour.

"Bit of a sea outside, I guess," said a voice at my side.

Outside! Then what was going on now did not count! I clapped my hat down on my head and made for the cabin door.

It had entered my mind to penetrate into the steerage at once and make sure of my runaway; but when I contemplated the distance of deck between where I now stood and where I had seen him disappear; and when, moreover, as the boat's head quitted the lee of the breakwater a big billow from the open leapt up at her and washed her from stem to stern, something within me urged me to go below at once, and postpone business till the morning.

I have only the vaguest recollection of the ghastly hours which ensued. I have a wandering idea of a feeble altercation with a steward on hearing that all the berths were occupied and that he had nowhere to put me. Then I imagine I must have lain on the saloon floor or the cabin stairs; at least, the frequency with which I was trodden upon was suggestive of my resting-place being a public thoroughfare.

But the treading under foot was not quite so bad as being called upon to show my ticket later on. That was a distinctly fiendish episode, and I did not recover from it all the night. More horrible still, a few brutes, lost to all sense of humanity, attempted to have supper in the saloon, within a foot or two of where I lay. Mercifully, their evil machinations failed, for nothing could stay on the table.

Oh, the horrors of that night! Who can say at what angles I did not incline? Now, as we swooped up a wave I stood on my head, next moment I shivered and shuddered in mid-air. Then with a wild plunge I found myself feet downward, and as I sunk my heart and all that appertained to it seemed to remain where they had been. Now I was rolling obliquely down the cabin on to the top of wretches as miserable as myself. Now I was rolling back, and they pouring on to the top of me. The one thought in my mind was--which way are we going next? and mixed up with it occasionally came the aspiration--would it were to the bottom! Above it all was the incessant thunder of the waves on the decks above and the wild wheezing of the engines as they met the shrieking wind.

But I will not dwell on the scene. Once during the night I thought of Michael McCrane, and hoped he was even as I was at that moment. If he was, no dog was ever in such a plight!

At last the early dawn struggled through the deadlights.

"At last," I groaned, "we shall soon be in the Lough!"

"Where are we?" said a plaintive voice from the midst of the heap which for the last few hours had regularly rolled on the top of me whenever we lurched to larboard.

"Off the Isle of Man," was the reply. "Shouldn't wonder if we get a bit of a sea going past, too."

Off the Isle of Man! Only half way, and a bit of a sea expected as we went past!

I closed my eyes, and wished our bank might break before morning! Whether the "bit of sea" came up to expectations or not I know not. I was in no condition to criticise even my own movements. I believe that as time went on I became gradually amalgamated with the larger roiling heap of fellow-sufferers on the floor, and during the last hour or so of our misery rolled in concert with them. But I should be sorry to state positively that it was so.

All I know is that about a hundred years after we had passed the Isle of Man I became suddenly awake to the consciousness that something tremendous had happened. Had we struck in mid-ocean? had the masts above us gone by the board? were we sinking? or what?

On careful reflection I decided we were doing neither, and that the cause of my agitation was that the last wave but one had gone past the ship without breaking over her. And out of the next dozen waves we scrambled over I counted at least five which let us off in a similar manner!

Oh, the rapture of the discovery! I closed my eyes again lest by any chance it should turn out to be a dream.

The next thing I was conscious of was a rough hand on my shoulder and a voice shouting, "Now then, mister, wake up; all ashore except you. Can't stay on board all day!"

I rubbed my eyes and bounded to my feet.

The _Royal Duke_ was at a standstill in calm water, and the luggage- crane was busy at work overhead.

"Are we there?" I gasped.

"All except you," said the sailor.

"How long have we been in?"

"Best part of an hour. Got any luggage, mister?"

An hour! Then I had missed my man once more! Was ever luck like mine?

I gathered up my crumpled hat and umbrella, and staggered out of that awful cabin.

"Look here," said I to the sailor, "did you see the passengers go ashore?"

"I saw the steerage passengers go," said he; "and a nice-looking lot they was."

"There was one of the steerage passengers I wanted particularly to see. Did you see one with a portmanteau and hat-box?"

"Plenty of 'em," was the reply.

"Yes; but his was quite a new hat-box; you couldn't mistake it," said I.

"Maybe I saw him. There was one young fellow--"

"Dark?"

"Yes; dark."

"And tall?"

"Yes; tall enough."

"Dismal-looking?"

"They were all that."

"Did you see which way he went?"

"No; but I heard him ask the mate the way to the Northern Counties Railway; so I guess he's for the Derry line."

It was a sorry clue; but the only one. I was scarcely awake; and, after my night of tragedy, was hardly in a position to resume the hue and cry. Yet anything was preferable to going back to sea.

So I took a car for the Northern Counties station. For a wonder I was in time for the train, which, I was told, was due to start in an hour's time.

I spent that hour first of all in washing, then in breakfasting, finally in telegraphing to my manager--

"Fancy tracked him here rough crossing--will wire again shortly."

Then having satisfied myself that none of the steamer passengers could possibly have caught an earlier train, and determined not to lose the train this time, I took a ticket for Londonderry, and ensconced myself a good quarter of an hour before the appointed hour in a corner of a carriage commanding a good view of the booking-office door.

As the minutes sped by, and no sign of my man, I began to grow nervous. After all he might be staying in Belfast, or, having got wind of my pursuit, might be escaping in some other direction. It was not a comfortable reflection, not did it add to my comfort that among the passengers who crowded into my carriage, and helped to keep out my view of the booking-office door, was the gloomy, detective-looking individual whose demeanour had so disconcerted me during the first stage of this disastrous journey.

He eyed me as suspiciously as ever from behind his everlasting newspaper, and under his scrutiny I hardly dared persevere in my own look-out. I made a pretext of buying a newspaper in order to keep near the door. To my dismay the whistle suddenly sounded as I was counting my change, and the train began to move off. At the same moment a figure, carrying in one hand a portmanteau and in the other a hat-box, rushed frantically into the station, and made a blind clash at the very door where I stood. I shrunk back in a panic to my distant corner, with my heart literally in my mouth. There was a brief struggle on the doorstep; the hat-box flew in, and the door was actually opened to admit the owner, when a couple of porters laid violent hands upon him and dragged him off the train.

It was not I who had been left behind this time, but Michael McCrane; and while he and his portmanteau remained disconsolate in Belfast, I and his hat-box were being whirled in the direction of Londonderry in the company of a person who, whatever he may have thought of McCrane, without doubt considered me a fugitive!

It was a trying position, and I was as much at sea as I had been during the agitated hours of the terrible night, I tried to appear calm, and took refuge behind my newspaper in order to collect my ideas and interpose a screen between myself and the critical stare of my fellow- passenger. Alas! it was avoiding Scylla only to fall into Charybdis. The first words which met my eyes were:--

"Bank Robbery in London.--

"A robbery was perpetrated in ---'s bank on Wednesday night, under circumstances which point to one of the cashiers as the culprit. The manager's box, containing a considerable amount of loose cash, was found broken open, and it is supposed the thief has also made away with a considerable sum in notes and securities. The cashier in question has disappeared and is supposed to have absconded to the north. He is dark complexioned, pale, mysterious in his manners, and aged 26. When last seen wore a tall hat, gloves, and a grey office suit."

Instinctively I pulled off my gloves and deposited my hat in the rack overhead, and tried to appear engrossed in another portion of the paper. But I could not refrain from darting a look at my fellow-traveller. To my horror I perceived that the paper he was reading was the same as the one I had; and that the page between which and myself his eyes were uncomfortably oscillating was the very page on which the fatal paragraph appeared.

_I_ was dark, _I_ was pale (after my voyage), and who should say my manners were not mysterious?

In imagination I stood already in the box of the Old Bailey and heard myself sentenced to the treadmill, and was unable to offer the slightest explanation in palliation of my mysterious conduct.

In such agreeable reveries I passed the first hour of the journey; when, to my unfeigned relief, on reaching Antrim my fellow-traveller quitted the carriage. No doubt his object was a sinister one, and when I saw him speak to the constable at the station, I had no doubt in my own mind that my liberty was not worth five minutes' purchase. But even so, anything seemed better than his basilisk eye in the corner of the carriage.

I hastily prepared my defence and resolved on a dignified refusal to criminate myself under any provocation. What were they doing? To my horror, the "detective," the constable, the guard, and the station- master all advanced on my carriage.

"In there?" said the official.

My late fellow-traveller nodded. The station-master opened the door and entered the carriage. I was in the act of opening my lips to say--

"I surrender myself--there is no occasion for violence," when the station-master laid his hand on the hat-box.

"It's labelled to C--," he said; "take it along, guard, and put it out there. He's sure to come on by the next train. Right away there!"

Next moment we were off. What did it all mean? I was not under arrest! Nobody had noticed me; but McCrane's hat-box had engaged the attention of four public officials.

"Free and easy way of doing things on this line," said an Englishman in the carriage; "quite the regular thing for a man and his luggage to go by different trains. Always turns up right in the end. Are you going to Derry, sir?" he added addressing me.

"No," said I, hastily. "I'm getting out at the next station."

"What--at --" and he pronounced the name something like "Tobacco."

"Yes," I said, pining for liberty, no matter the name it was called by.

At the next station I got out. It was a little wayside place without even a village that I could see to justify its claim to a station at all. Nobody else got out; and as soon as the train had gone, I was left to explain my presence to what appeared to be the entire population of the district, to wit, a station-master, a porter, and a constable who carried a carbine. I invented some frivolous excuse; asked if there wasn't a famous waterfall somewhere near; and on being told that the locality boasted of no such attraction, feigned to be dismayed; and was forced to resign myself to wait three hours for the next train.

It was at least a good thing to be in solitude for a short time to collect my scattered wits. McCrane was bound for C--, and would probably come in the _next_ train, which, by the way, was the last. That was all I had a clear idea about. There was a telegraph office at the station, and I thought I might as well report progress to my manager.

"On the trail. Expect news from C--. Wire me there, post-office, if necessary."

The station-master (who, as usual, was postmaster too) received this message from my hands, and the remainder of the population--I mean the porter and the constable--who were with him at the time read it over his shoulder. They all three looked hard at me, and the station-master said "Tenpence!" in a tone which made my blood curdle. I was doomed to be suspected wherever I went! What did they take me for now?

I decided to take a walk and inspect the country round. It annoyed me to find that the constable with his carbine thought well to take a walk too, and keep me well in view.

I tried to dodge him, but he was too smart for me; and when finally to avoid him I took shelter in a wayside inn, he seated himself on the bench outside and smoked till I was ready to come out.

I discovered a few more inhabitants, but it added nothing to my comfort. They, too, stared at me and followed me about, until finally I ran back to the station and cried out in my heart for the four o'clock train.

About five o'clock it strolled up. I got in anywhere, without even troubling to look for Michael McCrane. If he should appear at C--, well and good, I would arrest him; if not, I would go home. For the present, at least, I would dismiss him from my mind and try to sleep.

I did try, but that was all. We passed station after station. Some we halted at, as it appeared, by accident; some we went past, and then, on second thoughts, pulled up and backed into. At last, as we ran through one of these places I fancied I detected in the gloaming the name C-- painted up.

"Is that C--?" I asked of a fellow-traveller.

"It is so! You should have gone in the back of the train if you wanted to stop there."

Missed again! I grew desperate. The train was crawling along at a foot's pace; my fellow-traveller was not a formidable one. I opened the door and jumped out on to the line.

I was uninjured, and C-- was not a mile away. If I ran I might still be there to meet the back of the train and Michael McCrane.

But as I began to run a grating sound behind me warned me that the train had suddenly pulled up, and a shout proclaimed that I was being pursued.

Half a dozen passengers and the guard--none of them pressed for time-- joined in the hue and cry.

What it was all about I cannot imagine; all I know is that that evening, in the meadows near C--, a wretched Cockney, in a battered chimney-pot hat, and carrying an umbrella, was wantonly run to earth by a handful of natives, and that an hour later the same unhappy person was clapped in the village lock-up for the night as a suspicious character! It had all been tending to this. Fate had marked me for her own, and run me down at last. Perhaps I _was_ a criminal after all, and did not know it. At any rate, I was too fatigued to care much what happened. I "reserved my defence," as they say in the police courts, and resigned myself to spend the night as comfortably as possible in the comparative seclusion of a small apartment which, whatever may have been its defects, compared most favourably with the cabin in which I had lain the night before.

It was about ten o'clock next morning before I had an opportunity of talking my case over with the inspector, and suggesting to him he had better let me go. He, good fellow, at once fell in with my wishes, after hearing my statement, and in his anxiety to efface any unpleasant impressions, I suppose, proposed an adjournment to the "Hotel" to drink "siccess to the ould counthree."

The proposed toast was not sufficiently relevant to the business I had on hand to allure me, so I made my excuses and hastened to the telegraph office to ascertain whether they had any message for me there.

They had. It was from my manager, as I expected; but the contents were astounding--

"Return at once. Robber captured here. Keep down expenses."

It would be hard to say which of these three important sentences struck me as the most cruel. I think the last.

I was standing in the street, staring blankly at the missive, when I was startled beyond measure by feeling a hand on my shoulder, and a voice pronouncing my name--

"Samuels!"

It was Michael McCrane. But not the Michael McCrane I knew in the City, or the one I had seen going below on board the steamer. He wore a frock-coat and light trousers, lavender gloves, and a hat--glorious product of that identical box--in which you might see your own face. A rose was in his button-hole, his hair was brushed, his collar was white, and his chin was absolutely smooth.

"Whatever are you doing here?" he asked.

"Oh," faltered I, for I was fairly overcome, both by my own misfortunes and his magnificent appearance, "nothing; only a--a little business run, you know, for the manager."

"I didn't know we had any customers in these parts."

"Well no. But, I say, what are _you_ doing here?"

"Business too," said he--"grave business. By the way, Samuels, have you got any better clothes than these?"

Here was a question. And from Michael McCrane!

"Because," he went on--and here he became embarrassed himself--"if you had--in fact, you'd do as you are, because you won't have to wear your hat. What I mean is, that now you _are_ here--I'd be awfully obliged if you'd be my best man--I'm to be married this morning. I say, there's the bell beginning to ring. Come on, Samuels."

[The end]
Talbot Baines Reed's short story: Run To Earth

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