75 лучших рассказов / 75 Best Short Stories

‘He’s not thar – he can’t be thar – we see he’s not thar,’ said Turnbull, as dogmatically as old Joe Willet might have delivered himself – for he did not care that the George should earn the reputation of a haunted house. ‘He’s met an accident, sir: he’s dead – he’s elsewhere – and therefore can’t be here.’

Upon this the company entertained the stranger with the narrative – which they made easy by a division of labour, two or three generally speaking at a time, and no one being permitted to finish a second sentence without finding himself corrected and supplanted.

‘The man’s in Heaven, so sure as you’re not,’ said the traveller so soon as the story was ended. ‘What! he was fiddling with the church bell, was he, and d – d for that – eh? Landlord, get us some drink. A sexton d – d for pulling down a church bell he has been pulling at for ten years!’

‘You came, sir, by the Dardale-road, I believe?’ said the doctor (village folk are curious). ‘A dismal moss is Dardale Moss, sir; and a bleak clim’ up the fells on t’ other side.’

‘I say “Yes” to all – from Dardale Moss, as black as pitch and as rotten as the grave, up that zigzag wall you call a road, that looks like chalk in the moonlight, through Dunner Cleugh, as dark as a coal-pit, and down here to the George and the Dragon, where you have a roaring fire, wise men, good punch – here it is – and a corpse in your coach-house. Where the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together. Come, landlord, ladle out the nectar. Drink, gentlemen – drink, all. Brew another bowl at the bar. How divinely it stinks of alcohol! I hope you like it, gentlemen: it smells all over of spices, like a mummy. Drink, friends. Ladle, landlord. Drink, all. Serve it out.’

The guest fumbled in his pocket, and produced three guineas, which he slipped into Turnbull’s fat palm.

‘Let punch flow till that’s out. I’m an old friend of the house. I call here, back and forward. I know you well, Turnbull, though you don’t recognize me.’

‘You have the advantage of me, sir,’ said Mr. Turnbull, looking hard on that dark and sinister countenance – which, or the like of which, he could have sworn he had never seen before in his life. But he liked the weight and colour of his guineas, as he dropped them into his pocket. ‘I hope you will find yourself comfortable while you stay.’

‘You have given me a bedroom?’

‘Yes, sir – the cedar chamber.’

‘I know it – the very thing. No – no punch for me. By and by, perhaps.’

The talk went on, but the stranger had grown silent. He had seated himself on an oak bench by the fire, towards which he extended his feet and hands with seeming enjoyment; his cocked hat being, however, a little over his face.

Gradually the company began to thin. Sir Geoffrey Mardykes was the first to go; then some of the humbler townsfolk. The last bowl of punch was on its last legs. The stranger walked into the passage and said to the drawer:

‘Fetch me a lantern. I must see my nag. Light it – hey! That will do. No – you need not come.’

The gaunt traveller took it from the man’s hand and strode along the passage to the door of the stable-yard, which he opened and passed out.

Tom Scales, standing on the pavement, was looking through the stable window at the horses when the stranger plucked his shirtsleeve. With an inward shock the hostler found himself alone in presence of the very person he had been thinking of.

‘I say – they tell me you have something to look at in there’ – he pointed with his thumb at the old coach-house door. ‘Let us have a peep.’

Tom Scales happened to be at that moment in a state of mind highly favourable to anyone in search of a submissive instrument. He was in great perplexity, and even perturbation. He suffered the stranger to lead him to the coach-house gate.

‘You must come in and hold the lantern,’ said he. ‘I’ll pay you handsomely.’

The old hostler applied his key and removed the padlock.

‘What are you afraid of? Step in and throw the light on his face,’ said the stranger grimly. ‘Throw open the lantern: stand there . Stoop over him a little – he won’t bite you. Steady, or you may pass the night with him!’

* * *

In the meantime the company at the George had dispersed; and, shortly after, Anthony Turnbull – who, like a good landlord, was always last in bed, and first up, in his house – was taking, alone, his last look round the kitchen before making his final visit to the stable-yard, when Tom Scales tottered into the kitchen, looking like death, his hair standing upright; and he sat down on an oak chair, all in a tremble, wiped his forehead with his hand, and, instead of speaking, heaved a great sigh or two.

It was not till after he had swallowed a dram of brandy that he found his voice, and said: