The Man with a Shadow

The doctor took the lamp once more, and held it over the head of the coffin, to scan with the deepest interest the head and face revealed.

“Sheared!” said Moredock grimly; “what is there to be skeared on? Only seems to be asleep.”

“Yes,” said the doctor, gazing down and thoughtfully repeating the sexton’s words; “seems to be asleep. Suppose he is?”

The old man stared with his jaw dropping, and his features full of wonder.

“Asleep? Nay, you said he’d broke his neck. No sleep that, poor chap.”

“Hush!” said the doctor.

Moredock looked at him curiously, as he bent lower over the occupant of the coffin.

“Rum game for us if he were only asleep,” muttered the sexton uneasily. “Dally wouldn’t like that, and I shouldn’t like it. That wouldn’t do.”

“Hale, strong – life arrested by that sudden accident,” said the doctor, as he laid his hand upon the cold forehead. “It must be possible. I am satisfied now, and I will.”

“Did you speak, doctor?” said Moredock.

“No. Yes,” said North, setting down the lamp quickly. “Here, help me.”

Moredock approached, wondering what was to be done next, and with a vague idea in his brain that the doctor was about to test whether the body before them contained any remains of life before making some examination for increasing his anatomical knowledge.

“Now, quick. Lift.”

“We two can’t lift that, doctor. It takes four men. Why, there was eight to bring it down.”

“Can we shift it to the edge of this slab?”

“Ay, we might do that.” And lifting first at the head, and then at the foot, they moved the coffin to the extreme edge of the stone table, leaving a good space on one side.

“Now, then, lift again. I will take the head; you the feet.”

“What! lift him out, doctor?”

“Yes, man, yes. Don’t waste time.”

Moredock hesitated for a moment, and drew a long breath. Then, obeying the orders he had received, he helped to lift the body out upon the table, where it lay white and strange-looking in the yellow light.

“Now we can easily lift the coffin,” said North. “Over yonder – out of the way.”

The sexton uttered a low whistle, as he once more obeyed, taking the bottom handle of the massive casket, and it was placed on one side close to where a generation or two of the passed-away Candlishes lay in their bin-like niches.

This done, the old man passed his arm across his damp forehead.

“Mind me having a pipe, doctor?” he said uneasily. “This is a bit extry like. I didn’t know – ”

“No, no; you must not smoke here,” said the doctor hastily. “One moment – into the middle of the table here.”

Moredock obeyed again, and the recumbent figure of the dead squire was placed exactly where the coffin had stood.

“That will do,” said North. “Now, Moredock, what do you say to a glass?”

“Glass? Ay, doctor. Want it badly,” cried the old man eagerly, as the doctor produced a silver flask, drew the cup from the bottom, and gave it to the sexton.

Before doing so, however, North gave the flask a sharp shake, and the old man’s eyes sparkled as his countenance assumed a suspicious look at this movement, so suggestive of medicine.

“I say, what is it?” he said.

“What is it? Cordial.”

“Brandy?”

“No.”

“Look here, doctor,” said the old sexton hoarsely; “no games.”

North paused.

“Shall I tell you what you are thinking, Moredock?” he said.

“Nay, you can’t do that, clever as you are,” cried the old man with a chuckle.

“I can. You are thinking that I have poison here, ready to give you a dose, so that you may die out of the way, and never be able to expose me by betraying what you have seen.”

The old man’s jaw dropped again, and his face grew more wrinkled and puckered up, if possible, as he scratched his head with one yellow claw.

“Well, it were some’at o’ that kind,” he said, with a grim chuckle.

“You old fool!” exclaimed the doctor; “don’t I know that you could not expose me without exposing yourself? Do you think me blind?”

“Nay, doctor, nay; you’re a sharp one. You can see too much.”

“Have I not seen how dexterous you are at work of this kind? Do you think I cannot read what it all means? Moredock, I’ll be bound to say that one way or another you have made yourself a rich man.”

“No, no, doctor; no, no!” cried the sexton. “A few pounds gathered together to keep me out of the workus some day when I grow old.”

“You think that I want to poison you, then, and to hide your body here?”

“Nay, nay, doctor, I don’t. You haven’t got no need, have you? Give us a drop of the stuff.”

“Yes, we are wasting time,” said North, pouring out a portion of the contents of his flask, and handing it to the old man, who took it, and, in spite of all said, smelt it suspiciously.

“’Tarn’t poison, is it, doctor?” he said piteously.

“Yes, if you took enough of it. But that drop will not hurt you. There, don’t be afraid. Toss it off. It is a liqueur.”

The old man hesitated for a moment, gazing wildly at the doctor, and then tossed it off at a draught.