“Hang ’em for a lot of fools!” he burst out to the superintendent, who had accompanied him. “Do they think I’m going to run away? Likely thing—on a trumped-up charge like this. Here!—how soon shall you be wanting to start for yon place?”
The superintendent, who had cherished considerable respect for Mallalieu in the past, and was much upset and very downcast about this sudden change in the Mayor’s fortunes, looked at his prisoner and shook his head.
“There’s a couple of cars ordered to be ready in half an hour, Mr. Mallalieu,” he answered. “One for you, and one for Mr. Cotherstone.”
“With armed escorts in both, I suppose!” sneered Mallalieu. “Well, look here—you’ve time to get me a cup of tea. Slip out and get one o’ your men to nip across to the Arms for it—good, strong tea, and a slice or two of bread-and-butter. I can do with it.”
He flung half a crown on the table, and the superintendent, suspecting nothing, and willing to oblige a man who had always been friendly and genial towards himself, went out of the room, with no further precautions than the turning of the key in the lock when he had once got outside the door. It never entered his head that the prisoner would try to escape, never crossed his mind that Mallalieu had any chance of escaping. He went away along the corridor to find one of his men who could be dispatched to the Highmarket Arms.
But the instant Mallalieu was left alone he started into action. He had not been Mayor of Highmarket for two years, a member of its Corporation for nearly twenty, without knowing all the ins-and-outs of that old Town Hall. And as soon as the superintendent had left him he drew from his pocket a key, went across the room to a door which stood in a corner behind a curtain, unlocked it, opened it gently, looked out, passed into a lobby without, relocked the door behind him, and in another instant was stealing quietly down a private staircase that led to an entrance into the quaint old garden at the back of the premises. One further moment of suspense and of looking round, and he was safely in that garden and behind the thick shrubs which ran along one of its high walls. Yet another and he was out of the garden, and in an old-fashioned orchard which ran, thick with trees, to the very edge of the coppices at the foot of the Shawl. Once in that orchard, screened by its close-branched, low-spreading boughs, leafless though they were at that period of the year, he paused to get his breath, and to chuckle over the success of his scheme. What a mercy, what blessing, he thought, that they had not searched him on his arrest!—that they had delayed that interesting ceremony until his committal! The omission, he knew, had been winked at—purposely—and it had left him with his precious waistcoat, his revolver, and the key that had opened his prison door.
Dusk had fallen over Highmarket before the hearing came to an end, and it was now dark. Mallalieu knew that he had little time to lose—but he also knew that his pursuers would have hard work to catch him. He had laid his plans while the last two witnesses were in the box: his detailed knowledge of the town and its immediate neighbourhood stood in good stead. Moreover, the geographical situation of the Town Hall was a great help. He had nothing to do but steal out of the orchard into the coppices, make his way cautiously through them into the deeper wood which fringed the Shawl, pass through that to the ridge at the top, and gain the moors. Once on those moors he would strike by devious way for Norcaster—he knew a safe place in the Lower Town there where he could be hidden for a month, three months, six months, without fear of discovery, and from whence he could get away by ship.
All was quiet as he passed through a gap in the orchard hedge and stole into the coppices. He kept stealthily but swiftly along through the pine and fir until he came to the wood which covered the higher part of the Shawl. The trees were much thicker there, the brakes and bushes were thicker, and the darkness was greater. He was obliged to move at a slower pace—and suddenly he heard men’s voices on the lower slopes beneath him. He paused catching his breath and listening. And then, just as suddenly as he had heard the voices, he felt a hand, firm, steady, sinewy, fasten on his wrist and stay there.
XXIII
Comfortable Captivity
The tightening of that sinewy grip on Mallalieu’s wrist so startled him that it was only by a great effort that he restrained himself from crying out and from breaking into one of his fits of trembling. This sudden arrest was all the more disturbing to his mental composure because, for the moment, he could not see to whom the hand belonged. But as he twisted round he became aware of a tall, thin shape at his elbow; the next instant a whisper stole to his ear.
“H’sh! Be careful!—there’s men down there on the path!—they’re very like after you,” said the voice. “Wait here a minute!”
“Who are you?” demanded Mallalieu hoarsely. He was endeavouring to free his wrist, but the steel-like fingers clung. “Let go my hand!” he said. “D’ye hear?—let it go!”
“Wait!” said the voice. “It’s for your own good. It’s me—Miss Pett. I saw you—against that patch of light between the trees there—I knew your big figure. You’ve got away, of course. Well, you’ll not get much further if you don’t trust to me.
