and when she winced with the pain he drew in his breath quickly, and again she heard him swear. 'I might have spared you this,' he said; and then, blowing out the light, he sat down beside her on the bed and reached for her hand, which he held a moment, tight, and then gave back to her.
'God Almighty, why did you go with them?' he said.
'They were crazy with drink. I don't think they knew what they were doing. I could no more have stood against them than a child. There were a dozen of them or more, and my uncle… he led them. He and the pedlar. If you know about it, why do you ask me? Don't make me remember. I don't want to remember.'
'How much have they hurt you?'
'Bruises, scratches — you can see for yourself. I tried to escape, and I grazed my side. They caught me again, of course. They bound my hands and feet down on the shore, and tied sacking over my mouth so that I could not scream. I saw the ship come through the mist, and I could do nothing — alone there in the wind and the rain. I had to watch them die.'
She broke off, her voice trembling, and she turned on her side, her face in her hands. He made no move towards her; he sat there silently on the bed beside her, and she felt him far from her, wrapped in secrecy.
She was lonelier then than before.
'Was it my brother who hurt you most?' he said presently.
She sighed wearily. It was all too late and did not matter now.
'I've told you he was drunk,' she said. 'You know, better than I perhaps, what he can do then.'
'Yes, I know.' He paused a moment, and then once again he took her hand.
'He shall die for this,' he said.
'His death will not bring back the men he killed.'
'I'm not thinking of them now.'
'If you're thinking of me, don't waste your sympathy. I can revenge myself in my own way. I've learnt one thing at least — to rely on myself.'
'Women are frail things, Mary, for all their courage. You are best out of this business now. The issue lies with me.'
She did not answer him. Her plans were her own, and he did not enter into them.
'What do you intend to do?' he asked.
'I have not made up my mind,' she lied.
'If he leaves tomorrow night, you have little time to decide,' he said.
'He expects me to go with him, and Aunt Patience as well.'
'And you?'
'That will depend upon tomorrow.'
Whatever she felt for him, she would not hazard her plans into his keeping. He was still an unknown quantity, and above all else an enemy to justice. It came to her then that by betraying her uncle she might also betray him.
'If I ask you to do something, how would you answer me?' she said.
He smiled then for the first time, mocking and indulgent, as he had done in Launceston, and her heart leapt to him at once, encouraged at the change.
'How can I tell?' he said.
'I want you to go away from here.'
'I'm going now.'
'No, I mean away from the moors, away from Jamaica Inn. I want you to tell me you won't return here again. I can stand up against your brother; I'm in no danger from him now. I don't want you to come here tomorrow. Please promise me you'll go away.'
'What have you got in your mind?'
'Something which has no concern with you, but might bring you to danger. I can't say any more. I would rather you trusted me.'
'Trust you? Good God, of course I trust you. It's you who won't trust me, you damned little fool.' He laughed silently, and bent down to her, putting his arms round her, and he kissed her then as he had kissed her in Launceston, but deliberately now, with anger and exasperation.
'Play your own game by yourself, then, and leave me to play mine,' he told her. 'If you must be a boy, I can't stop you, but for the sake of your face, which I have kissed, and shall kiss again, keep away from danger. You don't want to kill yourself, do you? I have to leave you now; it will be daylight within the hour. And if both our plans miscarry, what then? Would you mind if you never saw me again? No, of course you you would not care.'
'I have not said so. You hardly understand.'
'Women think differently than men; they travel separate paths. That's why I have no liking for them; they make for trouble and confusion. It was pleasure enough to take you to Launceston, Mary, but when it comes to life and death, like my business now, God knows I wish you a hundred miles away, or sitting primly, your sewing in your lap, in a trim parlour somewhere, where you belong to be.'
'That's never been my life, nor ever will.'
'Why not? You'll wed a farmer one day, or small tradesman, and live respectably among your neighbours. Don't tell them you lived once at Jamaica Inn and had love made to you by a horse thief. They'd shut their doors against you. Good-bye, and here's prosperity to you.'
He rose from the bed and went towards the window, climbing through the gap he had broken in the pane; and, swinging his legs over the porch, with one hand on the blanklet, he lowered himself to the ground.
She watched him from the window, instinctively waving him farewell, but he had turned and gone without looking back at her, slipping across the yard like a shadow. Slowly she pulled up the blanket and replaced it on the bed. Morning would soon be here; she would not sleep again.
She sat on her bed, waiting until her door should be unlocked; and she made her plans for the evening to come. She must not draw suspicion upon herself during the long day; she must act passively, sullenly perhaps, as though feeling had at last been stifled in her, and she was prepared to undertake the proposed journey with the landlord and Aunt Patience.
Then, later, she would make some excuse — fatigue perhaps, a desire to rest in her room before the strain of the night journey — and then would come the most dangerous moment of her day. She would have to leave Jamaica Inn secretly and unobserved, and run like a hare to Altarnun. This time Francis Davey would understand; time would be against them, and he must act accordingly. She would then return to the inn, with his approval, and trust that her absence had remained unnoticed. This was the gamble. If the landlord went to her room and found her gone, her life would be worth nothing. She must be prepared for that. No excuse would save her then. But if he believed her to be sleeping still, then the game would continue. They would make preparations for the journey; they might even climb into the cart and come out upon the road; after that her responsibility would end. Their fate would be in the hands of the vicar of Altarnun. Beyond this she could not think, nor had she any great desire to look ahead.
So Mary waited for the day; and, when it came, the long hours stretched interminably before her; every minute was an hour, and an hour a particle of eternity itself. The atmosphere of strain was apparent amongst them all. In silence, haggardly, they waited for the night. Little progress could be made during the light of day; intrusion was always possible. Aunt Patience wandered from the kitchen to her room, her footsteps pattering incessantly in the passage and on the stairs, as she made helpless and ineffectual preparations. She would make bundles of what poor clothes remained to her, and then undo them again, when the memory of some forgotten garment jogged her wandering mind. She pottered in the kitchen aimlessly, opening the cupboards, looking into drawers, and she fingered her pots and pans with restless fingers, incapable of deciding which to take and which to leave behind. Mary helped her as best as she could, but the unreality of her task made it the more difficult; she knew, while her aunt did not, that all this labour was in vain.
Her heart misgave her at times, when she allowed her thoughts to dwell upon the future. How would Aunt Patience act? How would she look when they came to take her husband from her? She was a child and must be tended as a child. Again she pattered from the kitchen, climbing the stairs to her room, and Mary would hear her drag her box on the floor, pace up and down, up and down, as she wrapped a single candlestick in a shawl and put it side by side with a cracked teapot and a faded muslin cap, only to unwrap them again and discard them for treasures more ancient.
