The Complete Sherlock Holmes

“What’s come over you, Jack?” she cried. “Why
were you so scared of me? Oh, Jack, if your conscience
was at ease, you would not have looked at
me like that!”
“Sure, I was thinking of other things, and when
you came tripping so lightly on those fairy feet of
yours—”
“No, no, it was more than that, Jack.” Then a
sudden suspicion seized her. “Let me see that letter
you were writing.”
“Ah, Ettie, I couldn’t do that.”
Her suspicions became certainties. “It’s to another
woman,” she cried. “I know it! Why else
should you hold it from me? Was it to your wife
that you were writing? How am I to know that
you are not a married man—you, a stranger, that
nobody knows?”
“I am not married, Ettie. See now, I swear it!
You’re the only one woman on earth to me. By the
cross of Christ I swear it!”
He was so white with passionate earnestness
that she could not but believe him.
“Well, then,” she cried, “why will you not show
me the letter?”
“I’ll tell you, acushla,” said he. “I’m under oath
not to show it, and just as I wouldn’t break my
word to you so I would keep it to those who hold
my promise. It’s the business of the lodge, and
even to you it’s secret. And if I was scared when
a hand fell on me, can’t you understand it when it
might have been the hand of a detective?”
She felt that he was telling the truth. He gathered
her into his arms and kissed away her fears
and doubts.
“Sit here by me, then. It’s a queer throne for
such a queen; but it’s the best your poor lover can
find. He’ll do better for you some of these days,
I’m thinking. Now your mind is easy once again,
is it not?”
“How can it ever be at ease, Jack, when I know
that you are a criminal among criminals, when I
never know the day that I may hear you are in
court for murder? ‘McMurdo the Scowrer,’ that’s
what one of our boarders called you yesterday. It
went through my heart like a knife.”
“Sure, hard words break no bones.”
“But they were true.”
“Well, dear, it’s not so bad as you think. We are
but poor men that are trying in our own way to
get our rights.”
Ettie threw her arms round her lover’s neck.
“Give it up, Jack! For my sake, for God’s sake,
The Valley Of Fear
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give it up! It was to ask you that I came here today.
Oh, Jack, see—I beg it of you on my bended
knees! Kneeling here before you I implore you to
give it up!”
He raised her and soothed her with her head
against his breast.
“Sure, my darlin’, you don’t know what it is
you are asking. How could I give it up when it
would be to break my oath and to desert my comrades?
If you could see how things stand with me
you could never ask it of me. Besides, if I wanted
to, how could I do it? You don’t suppose that the
lodge would let a man go free with all its secrets?”
“I’ve thought of that, Jack. I’ve planned it all.
Father has saved some money. He is weary of this
place where the fear of these people darkens our
lives. He is ready to go. We would fly together
to Philadelphia or New York, where we would be
safe from them.”
McMurdo laughed. “The lodge has a long arm.
Do you think it could not stretch from here to
Philadelphia or New York?”
“Well, then, to the West, or to England, or to
Germany, where father came from—anywhere to
get away from this Valley of Fear!”
McMurdo thought of old Brother Morris.
“Sure, it is the second time I have heard the valley
so named,” said he. “The shadow does indeed
seem to lie heavy on some of you.”
“It darkens every moment of our lives. Do you
suppose that Ted Baldwin has ever forgiven us? If
it were not that he fears you, what do you suppose
our chances would be? If you saw the look in those
dark, hungry eyes of his when they fall on me!”
“By Gar! I’d teach him better manners if I
caught him at it! But see here, little girl. I can’t
leave here. I can’t—take that from me once and for
all. But if you will leave me to find my own way,
I will try to prepare a way of getting honourably
out of it.”
“There is no honour in such a matter.”
“Well, well, it’s just how you look at it. But if
you’ll give me six months, I’ll work it so that I can
leave without being ashamed to look others in the
face.”
The girl laughed with joy. “Six months!” she
cried. “Is it a promise?”
“Well, it may be seven or eight. But within a
year at the furthest we will leave the valley behind
us.”
It was the most that Ettie could obtain, and yet
it was something. There was this distant light to
illuminate the gloom of the immediate future. She
returned to her father’s house more light-hearted