A Smuggler Tale of the Romney Marsh - Thorndike Russell (книги серии онлайн .txt) 📗

?I must beg of you, sir, not to take the words of God out of my mouth!? The Doctor spoke the words in just the same tones as the rest of his sermon, and continued as if nothing had happened?continued his sermon in mild tones, with two pistols grinning over the red-cushioned desk.

?There was a man hanged at Rye. His name was Clegg. So it has always been believed. But the real Clegg was never hanged at Rye. Clegg had the

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laugh on the authorities all his life, and certainly he had the laugh on them at his hanging, for he was never hanged at all, although he was present to see the affair conducted all properly. Oh, yes, indeed, he was present to read the prayers over the man whom he had got to take his place. You see, my dear brethren, it was all so ridiculously simple. The man condemned for the Rye tavern murder was one of Clegg?s own men, and, most fortunate for Clegg, the rascal had a daughter that he loved?that everybody loved. This girl would have no guardian had the murderer betrayed his great captain, and this is how the captain saved his life: Visiting the condemned man in prison, he bargained for his life. The murderer confessed to the parson that he was Clegg, and so got a public hanging, quite a big affair, in fact, a funeral of which a lord might well have been proud. So you see he got well paid for taking Clegg?s adventures upon his shoulders. He received the curses of the military and the admiration of the countryside as he marched with the redcoats to the scaffold, and the joke of

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it all was that the solemn-eyed parson who was exhorting the poor fellow to repentance till his body jangled in the chains was hardly able to keep back his laughter, for the idea of Clegg, the notorious pirate, being a country parson had of course not occurred to any one. Funny it certainly was, although there were only two to enjoy the joke?myself and my friend on the gallows. Funny the end was then; funny the end will be now; for our good friend Captain Collyer, having come down here to discover the ringleader of the wool-running organization, brought with him a man, a murderous rascal, who was marooned on a coral reef many years ago. I marooned that man for sedition and mutiny. He was a Cuban priest and was a dangerous practiser of black magic, and as I didn?t choose to have such satan?s tricks aboard my God-fearing vessel, the Imogene, I left him on the reef. How the man got off the reef I know not; for it was a thing impossible to do. But get off he did, and it must have been by some hell?s trick that he managed it. To get him caught I forced Rash, our esteemed

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schoolmaster, whom you all admire for his great work among the smugglers here, to commit murder upon Sennacherib Pepper, who was seeing more upon the Marsh than was altogether healthy for him; but when my faithful murderer began thinking of King?s evidence, I had to see that he was removed by the Marsh witches and done to death. I like you to know all this, because I am something of a vain fellow, and I never can abide people having the laugh on me, and so, my dear friend Captain Collyer, oblige me like a good-natured and sensible fellow by handing over that blue paper that is sticking out of your pocket with my death written thereon.?

?No. I?ll be damned??

?If you don?t there will be such a nasty mess for Mister Mipps to clear up in that pew!?

A man stepped from the choir and snatched the blue paper from the captain and handed it to Doctor Syn.

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?Thank you, my man!? said the cleric, taking it. ?And now for my farewell. You are all of you in this church in eminent peril. The place is surrounded by redcoats who are in danger of being badly hurt when the fight comes, and all in this church are in danger of me being caught by the redcoats, and being obliged to turn King?s evidence against you all to save my life. I should be very loath to do such a dirty thing, so you had better persuade our friend the captain to let me go quietly.? do such a dirty thing, so you had better persuade our friend the captain to let me go quietly.?

Doctor Syn deliberately thrust both his pistols beneath his black gown; at the same moment the captain sprang at the pulpit, but was knocked over with a violent blow from the brass candlestick that Doctor Syn had snatched from the pulpit socket. The sailors clambered out of their pew, but were met with a volley of hymn-books and hassocks from the sea salts in the choir. One or two pistols flashed, and in a second the entire church was a writhing, fighting mass of men. The women screamed and were trodden down as the redcoats entered

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the west door and forced their way over the upturned benches in the aisles. Above the congregation flew a shower of missiles?hassocks, books, hats, sticks, anything that could be grabbed went flying through the air, and Syn leaped the pulpit and fell upon the writhing mass that was fighting below.

It took the redcoats a quarter of an hour to restore order in the church, and then Mister Mipps and Doctor Syn had disappeared.

But although Collyer was very badly cut and bruised, he was confident, for the church had been surrounded, so he knew that the miscreants couldn?t escape. Presently a cry from the vestry rang out: ?Help!? It was Mipps?s voice. Collyer rushed the door, followed by some of his men. The remaining redcoats who had been watching the church were ordered inside to help in the arrest. These men cried out that they had seen the Doctor in the vestry from the window, and they were one and all eager to be in at the death.

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Within the vestry stood Sexton Mipps with a blunderbuss at the head of Doctor Syn, who was crouched in terror at the old oak table.

?There he is! Seize him! The devil! The murderer! Seize him!?

?So you?ve turned King?s evidence after all, have you, Mister Sexton??

But Mipps only cried again: ?There he is! Ain?t none of you a-goin? to take him??

Captain Collyer obeyed the sexton and cried: ?Clegg, I arrest you in the name of the King!? and coming forward he laid his hand upon the Doctor?s shoulder. But the Doctor did not move. The captain shook him, but he did not move. Then the captain put his hand upon the white hair and the hand was covered with something white.

?My God!? he cried. ?He?s nailed to the table. It?s not Syn! It?s Morgan Walters. Where?s that damned sexton??

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But the sexton had disappeared, and Clegg had gone, and there, with three nails driven, one through the neck and one through each arm, driven right through into the table, lay the theatrical figure of Morgan Walters, in all points resembling Doctor Syn.

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Chapter 37

The Dead Man?s Throttle

Then the redcoat got a bad time, for a great fight was put up by the Dymchurch men. Doctor Syn?s popularity had gone up at a bound. He had gauged his audience to a nicety, and had he declared himself to be the Prince Regent he couldn?t have bettered his position, for around Clegg?s name a million romances had been spun, but none so romantic, so daring, so altogether impertinent as this last announcement that he was the preacher Syn. That the greatest pirate hung should have unhanged himself upon the pulpit of a three-decker was indeed a colossal piece of impudence, and calculated to appeal to