Indeed Daniel looked firmer and more resolved in his mind; gone was the fear in his eyes, and when he seized my hand it was with a steady purpose.
“Get dressed, Tuffley,” he said. “We have only tonight in which to do our work.”
Poor Rogers lay across the bed, his head hanging over the edge at an acute angle, so that his face with its great staring eyes, seemed to look at us upside-down as we entered. The bedclothes had been whipped into a tumulus which half covered his body, and indicated the mighty struggle that had taken place.
Daniel gripped my wrist and whispered: “Abide here, Tuffley,” and then slipped through the door and was gone. I put the candle on the table and covered the awful staring face with a corner of the blanket, and sat down to wait. Outside the storm was raging.
Daniel was back again shortly. “I awakened the groom,” he says, “and gave him a guinea to come tell me if any lodger demands his horse, although I think it unlikely that any would leave, for it would brand him guilty. Now we must be a law unto ourselves, Tuffley, if we are to uncover within the night the villain who committed this crime. Are you willing to help me?”
“Why else have I come?” I asked,
“Good. In what chamber did the landlord lodge the fanatic?”
“Come, I will show you,” I said, and taking up the candle, led Defoe to the proper door.
First Daniel tried the latch, but found it locked; then he knocked gently.
After a moment there was a stir inside, and the creak of a floorboard.
“Who it is?” the man whispered from within.
“The landlord,” Daniel said, keeping his voice low but heavy. “I have a message for ye.”
As the door opened, Daniel pushed his way in and I followed. The fanatic, in his long nightgown and touseled hair, looked harmless enough.
“What do you want?” he asked in a dry whisper.
Daniel pushed him roughly upon the bed, which was a dumb-show to intimidate the fellow, for Daniel was not a violent man, and he said in a convincing tone: “Murder has been done this night, sir, and we think you have committed it. Unless you tell us why you have been following us from London to Edinburgh, we shall call the constable at once and hand you over to him.”
“No, no,” the man cried, his brown eyes wilder than ever. “I have done no murder!”
“Tell us then who you are, and what is your business here?”
“My name is Dunton — Philip Dunton,” said the other. “It is true I followed you, Mr. Defoe, but only so I might report upon your activities here in Edinburgh. I intended no violence.”
“Search his pockets for a Squadroni disk,” Daniel said to me, pointing to Dunton’s clothes upon a chair.
“Who sent you?” he demanded of Dunton.
“Must I tell you that, sir?” But seeing Defoe’s relentless look, Dunton bowed his head, and said in a whisper: “The minister, Mr. Robert Harley.”
“Even we Whigs do not trust one another, it seems,” Defoe said bitterly. “Anything, Tuffley?”
“No disk,” I said, completing my search.
“Come, then,” he said, opening the door. “You will not leave until morning, my spying Mr. Dunton.”
“I cannot,” said the other. “I have been assigned to stay and watch you.”
Daniel went next below stairs and rapped at the door to the landlord’s quarters. When McClain heard of Rogers’s murder, he wanted at once to send the groom for the constable; but Daniel stopped him and argued that since the attempt had been made upon his, Defoe’s life, he had every right to attempt to run down his would-be assassin without immediate interference.
But Defoe’s assumption of authority did not work as well with McClain as it had with Dunton. The innkeeper grew red with rage and swore great oaths, saying this was his inn and he was a law-abiding citizen, and he would call the constable at once. He made for the door, and Defoe, desperate at seeing his chance of vindication disappear, sent a gin bottle flying after McClain. The bottle landed on the innkeeper’s head with a mighty crack, and felled him on his own threshold like an ox.
I dragged the monumental McClain inside and shut the door against the storm, and as I looked up, I saw that two of the lodgers had descended to the public room — the boy McGregor and the wine-merchant, Masham.
“What animal combat takes place here?” Masham, in a dressing-gown, inquired angrily. “We lodgers cannot be expected to sleep through such Roman antics.”
Before Daniel could reply, the serving-maid looked out the door from McClain’s room, staring white-faced at the fallen innkeeper.
“He’s all right,” I assured her. “He just bumped his head.”
She gave me the look of a trapped wild animal, then pulled back and slammed the door.
The boy McGregor leaned over the innkeeper and whistled. “He’s got the devil’s own peg on the head — from a gin bottle, too.”
“Gin is the devil’s own drink,” Daniel said with perfect gravity. “Please sit down, gentlemen, and name your drink. I will be the host.”
The two men looked sharply at Daniel, then sat down at the long table near the shrinking fire. I threw on a log and moved the bulky McClain close to it, so he would not be chilled, and joined the others at the table. A round of introductions ensued, then Daniel explained what had happened. Finally, he took a place at the head of the table.
“Do you mean you suspect one of us of having attempted to murder you?” Masham asked frigidly.
“Or of actually murdering Mr. Rogers — put it how you please, the answer is yes,” Daniel said with authority.
“Then I will not drink with you!” Masham blurted out, rising.
“Sit down, Mr. Masham,” Daniel said, with even deadlier authority.
“Yes, sit down,” I echoed, fingering the hilt of my short sword.
Masham looked from one to the other of us, then sat down and glared sulkily into the fire.
Young McGregor spoke up then, and his clear eyes never left Defoe’s face.
“I’ll put it plain to you, Mr. Defoe,” he said. “I belong to a group of young men in Edinburgh who are mighty resistant to the idea of unification of Scotland and England. We would give our lives to prevent such a calamity. Your coming here tonight was heralded, and I was sent to speak to you, lest you continue to wield your talented pen in Scottish newspapers in favor of unity. I come to warn you, if you like.”
“Then why did you not speak with me before?” Daniel asked.
“I was told you were closeted with that sailor fellow,” said the other, “and planned to wait until morning.”
“But earlier you said you did not know Mr. Defoe when I pointed him out to you,” I reminded him.
McGregor hesitated. “I did not wish to become involved — in case something should happen.”
“Something did happen,” Defoe said. “Someone tried to kill me. Was that what you feared to be involved in?”
“Yes,” McGregor answered promptly. “The fact is, Mr. Defoe, you are a verra unpopular man with many parties.”
A creak at the top of the stairs brought Daniel suddenly to his feet and across the room. He clapped the newel post, crying: “Come on down, Mr. Dunton!”
Harley’s tool descended timidly, full dressed, his bundle in his hand.
“You were trying to sneak off,” Daniel accused. “Why?”