Doctor Syn Returns by Russell Thorndike

Author:Russell Thorndike [Thorndike, Russell]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2013-02-13T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10. The grievance of Mr. Jimmie Bone

Captain Faunce was piqued. The fact that he had failed to arrest the highwayman was annoying, especially when he became convinced that the notorious Bone was also the mysterious Scarecrow by whose daring his prisoners had escaped from his guards.

Amongst others who believed in it was the Preventative Officer. For some time past he had had his suspicions that he could put his hand upon the highwayman, but he did not think it his duty to arrest him, since a gentleman of the road had nothing to do with the Customs. Moreover, he was not the man to earn a hundred guineas on a man's head. The man had a popular reputation amongst the poor, and were Jimmie Bone to be arrested on information received, it would be short shrift for the informer.

This knowledge frightened Merry, and he told as much to Dr. Syn, who took such a serious view of it that he persuaded Merry to slip over into Sussex till Romney Marsh became safer. This plan suited Dr. Syn, for as he mentioned to Mipps: "There is enough to do regarding a certain business without that rascal hanging about the vicarage with his eyes open." So Merry departed for Rye, and through a kindly recommendation from the vicar of Dymchurch, he was given odd jobs in the Mermaid Tavern.

It was after a particularly long day of parochial work that Dr. Syn insisted that Mipps should join him in his study for a drink, and it was while they were sitting in the dim candlelight that Mipps suddenly cocked his head towards the ceiling and began to sniff like a terrier.

"What's wrong?" whispered the doctor.

"Someone upstairs," replied Mipps. "I can smell a horsey sort of odour about the place. There's a creak going on now above deck."

"Very well, then, Mipps," whispered Syn, "we will satisfy ourselves. Pistols and upstairs." They left the room quietly, Dr. Syn going first with a pistol in his hand.

Through the hall and up the stairs he went, to his bedroom door, which he pushed open, stepping aside into the dark passage as he did so. Mipps waited on the other side of the door, also with his pistol ready.

"Whoever you are," said Dr. Syn quietly, "will you be good enough to show yourself? I may add that there are two of us here, both armed, but purely in selfdefence. We have no quarrel with anyone who is in trouble." Dr. Syn saw the curtains of his four-poster stir by the open window.

"Who is with you?" demanded a voice.

"My sexton, Mr. Mipps," replied the doctor. "He's a man you may trust as myself. But he shoots as well as I do."

"Very well, then, there need be no shooting," the voice answered. "I have come to you for help. Where can we talk?"

"You will follow me downstairs to my study, and Mr. Mipps will follow you. Please come out, and consider yourself quite safe." The shadow of a big man in a long overcoat crossed the window and came out of the door.

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