“SHIP INN.

“To Sir Antony Cobtree of the Court House, Leveller of the Marsh Scotts,

“SIR: I beg to inform you on behalf of the British Admiralty that the person of Mister Rash, Dymchurch schoolmaster, has disappeared. I feel sure that there is somebody in power who is organizing Romney Marsh for his own ends. Somebody is running wool to France, and from the clever organization of these runs, I know that some cultured brain is directing affairs. Your attitude of utter indifference forces me to suspect you. As Leveller of the Marsh Scotts you are in a safe place to control such a scheme, and so I have taken a strong measure in attaching the person of your son, Mister Denis Cobtree. If the body of that unfortunate schoolmaster, dead or alive, is not produced before me within the next twenty-four hours, I shall take steps to force your hand.

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[Signed] “CAPTAIN HOWARD COLLYER, “Coast Agent and Commissioner.

“P.S. There is a press gang at work in Rye who will ship your son to sea in twenty-four hours.”

“Now what am I to do? Press gang at Rye! Twenty-four hours! What have I got to do with that flabby-faced schoolmaster? Where’s he got to? How the devil should I know? P’raps he thinks that I have danced him off somewhere. Never heard of such a thing in my life. But what am I to do? That’s what I want to know! What am I to do? My poor Denis! Why, I wouldn’t have quarrelled with him if I’d known. Why has that schoolmaster disappeared? By what infernal right, I say, has that insignificant anćmic louse disappeared?”

Doctor Syn then briefly related the bo’sun’s story of Rash’s disappearance, which the squire listened to impatiently.

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“Well, sir,” the latter exclaimed at the conclusion, “as far as that schoolmaster’s concerned, I don’t mind if he’s roasting on Lucifer’s spit, for I dislike the man, but when his disappearance concerns the safety of my son, my God! he’s got to put in an appearance and be quick about it. For I’ll have him routed out of his infernal hiding-place. I’ll rouse the Marshmen and have him routed out.”

“That’s all very well, Squire, but how?”

“How, sir?” echoed that irascible gentleman. “How? Do you ask me how? Well, I don’t know! How? Yes, how?”

“That’s the question,” ruefully remarked Doctor Syn.

“Of course it is,” returned the other. “Well, how would you set about it yourself?”

“I’d beat the Marsh from border to border.”

“So I will, sir, so I will!”

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“And I should get that mulatto and hang him, for he’s a sorcerer, a witchman; and I believe that as long as we have such a Jonah’s curse among us that nothing will come right.”

“I’ll do that at once. But we’ve only twenty-four hours.”

Imogene stood up and looked at the squire, and in a steady voice, as if she were pronouncing a definite judgment, she said: “It is enough for me. I will undertake to find your son for you, and the schoolmaster, too.” And without waiting for a reply she swiftly passed out of the room.

“But what can we do?” stammered the squire.

“I should find that mulatto and hang him.”

“But I don’t care a fig about finding him.”

“You must,” persisted the cleric, “for he is the cause of the trouble. Find the mulatto, and leave the rest to Imogene. She has spoken, and you may be sure she’ll keep her word. But find that mulatto!”

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Chapter 31

A Certain Tree Bears Fruit

Jerk was kept busy all day at the Ship Inn, for Imogene had left her post and Mrs. Waggetts, who appeared to have grave matters of her own to fuss about, kept the young potboy in command. He was sorry about this, for he was unable to visit his estate upon the Marsh, and he was eager to view his latest purchase, the gallows. But to his great satisfaction he heard it discussed by a farmer and a fisherman who sat drinking at the bar.

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“I tell you that there’s a gallows erected on the Marsh nigh Littlestone Point,” the fisherman was saying. “I could see it quite plain at sunrise when we were running up on to the beach.”

“And you say that there was a man a-hangin’ from it?” said the farmer.

“Aye, that’s what I said, and I thought as how you could tell me what man it was.”

“I don’t know nothing,” replied the farmer, “except that the demon riders was out again last night, and if what you says is right, why, they’re at their tricks again, I suppose.” And the farmer gave the fisherman a knowing wink. However, this didn’t trouble Jerry, for the laugh was all on his side. Not content with an empty scaffold, he had gone out the night before, while Doctor Syn and the captain had been chatting in the sanded parlour, and collected two great sack full of dried sticks and sand, which, with the help of a few tightly knotted lengths of twine, he had converted into the semblance of a man, and

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this same dummy he had hanged from the rusty chain. It had looked splendid swinging there with the mist wrapped round its feet. This indeed was playing hangman’s games with a vengeance. Impatient as he was to see the fruits of his labour, impatient he had to remain, for he was not released till nightfall, when Mrs. Waggetts entered the bar with Sexton Mipps. Freed at last from duty, Jerry stopped outside, pulling his hat over his eyes and tucking up his collar, for the wind was blowing up for a cold night. He was leaving the yard with a brisk step when he noticed a cloaked figure coming to meet him. It was Imogene. Jerry stopped outside, pulling his hat over his eyes and tucking up his collar, for the wind was blowing up for a cold night. He was leaving the yard with a brisk step when he noticed a cloaked figure coming to meet him. It was Imogene.

“Jerry,” she whispered, “who put up that gallows on your plot of land?”

“It’s my gallows,” answered Jerry proudly. “I paid for it, and Mister Mipps it was wot helped me to set it up.”

“It’s a real one, Jerry,” the girl replied.

“Yes, that it is—and ain’t it fine?”

“But there’s a man, a real man hanging there.”

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At this Jerk slapped his knee with enthusiasm and cried aloud: “Now by all the barrels of rum! if I ain’t fit to take in the devil hisself, wot I believes is a sexton dressed up. For that same corpse wot you’ve seed a-danglin’ from my gallows ain’t a corpse at all, but sticks, sand, and sacks wot I invented to look like one.”

“Are you sure, Jerry?” said the girl.

“I’m a-goin’ out there myself now; so come along and see for yourself.”

“I’ve been there once this evening, Jerry.”

“Well, come along o’ me and you shall give the old scarecrow wot’s a-swing on my gallows a good sharp tweak in the ribs.” So off they set through the churchyard and out over the Marsh.

“Jerry,” whispered the girl presently, “there’s something queer going to happen soon. Perhaps to-night. Perhaps to-morrow night. And it’s something uncommon queer, too.”

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“Now what makes you think that?” said Jerry, looking up at her.

“I believe, Jerry, that there are certain tides that run from the Channel round Dungeness that wash up the dead seamen from the deep waters, and all the time that they lie near shore waiting for the ebb to take ’em back to their old wrecked ships in the deep their spirits come ashore and roam about us. I feel that way to-night. I can almost smell death in the air.”