Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [538]
Accordingly, he called upon Captain Shockley. When Adam heard what he wanted, he burst out laughing and declared:
“If you want my help, you shall have it. Are you prepared to take the risk?”
He was indeed.
“I have all my savings,” Eli declared. “They’ll be at your service.”
One fine morning a week later the Salisbury-to-Bath stagecoach rolled out of the city.
Adam Shockley had been as good as his word to Eli, and although it had been known for several days that he was going to Bristol to make an important transaction, no one had any inkling of what it was he intended to buy. He had only one companion from Salisbury, an elderly lady. His luggage included a large and heavy portmanteau that was stowed in the basket behind.
The portmanteau, well padlocked, contained Eli Mason’s savings, and as Adam sat quietly in the coach with his fellow passenger, he could not help thinking of the trust Eli had placed in him and hoping for the game little fellow’s sake that the business would not miscarry.
The journey was delightful – along the Fisherton turnpike to Wilton; a brief pause there, then along the line of the Wylie river before turning up on to the high ground.
Soon they were up there, rolling over the broad ridges; there was a glimpse of the top of the spire, then it vanished. What a noble country it was, nothing but sheep, the great sweep of the high ground, and the open sky that seemed to touch it: that familiar, bare and timeless landscape. Wherever he was in the world, he knew his thoughts would always return to the high ground above Sarum.
For an hour the coach made its solitary way across the great windswept tract.
It was several miles outside the town of Warminster that the disaster occurred. It took even Adam Shockley completely by surprise.
He had waited behind a tiny clump of trees, and stepped out, a single figure on horseback, so quietly and quickly that neither the coachman, his guard, who carried a blunderbuss which, in his confusion he fired the wrong way, nor the passengers had any time to react. He was well-dressed, rode a fine bay horse, and wore a mask over his face. One of his two double-barrelled pistols was levelled calmly and precisely between Adam Shockley’s eyes as he threw open the door and politely said:
“Your valuables, please.”
The elderly lady produced two rings and gold to the value of ten pounds. The highwayman seemed satisfied with this. Shockley had almost nothing to give him except a gold watch and some small coins. He parted from the watch reluctantly, wondering if this would satisfy the rogue.
It did not.
“Luggage,” he called peremptorily to the coachman.
The portmanteau.
If only he had had a gun, it seemed to Adam that, though the highwayman was still covering him with his pistol, he might still have had a chance. But, like a perfect fool, he had come unarmed. Why had the idiot of a guard panicked?
The coachman and the guard, both shaking a little, were manhandling the large portmanteau out of the basket. They placed it on the ground.
Eli’s savings.
“Yours?” the highwayman asked.
Adam nodded.
“Key.”
If he could just distract him.
He shook his head.
“The key’s at my brother’s house in Bristol.”
The highwayman looked at him. “He must guess it’s a lie,” thought Adam, “but perhaps he will search me, and then . . .”
The highwayman wasted no time. In two strides he was by the portmanteau. With one shot from his pistol he blew off the padlock and raised the lid.
Even he gasped, as he saw that it was full of gold coins.
“No!” Shockley bellowed and started out of the coach. The highwayman swung both pistols towards him, there was a crash of spilling coins.
Caught completely off guard, the highwayman looked down in astonishment to see, squatting in the