eighteen

The cart rattled on leaving the two men in the car behind them. Those two men, police officials one might presume, stayed where they were and remained watching the road. Finally, once the car had disappeared into the distance Roy spoke up.

‘It wouldn’t be you they were talking about would it?’

‘I don’t think so. I haven’t committed any crimes. Thank you for covering for me though.’

‘That’s alright. They didn’t seem right to me somehow. You are trying to get to Shepley Down though aren’t you?’

‘I am. But only because I’m delivering a package, and even that was because of a chance meeting.’

Both men fell to thinking now. Roy pondered if what George said was true or if he was a fugitive of some kind. But he had a good intuition with people, perhaps thanks to being a sociable person and having to bargain and barter and sell at market time. There was also the fact that George just did not seem like a criminal to him, he seemed too polite.

George was thinking again about the package and the meeting at the harbour front at Gorlis. It had been a very unusual meeting in very unusual circumstances, and now that it was possible he was wanted by the law, he wondered if it had been too strange.

‘Maybe we should open the package I was given. Perhaps I was too trusting before.’

‘I think I agree with you.’

It was nearing lunch and so they agreed to stop at a convenient and shaded spot, both to eat some food, but also to open that package. At last, they approached a wooded patch of road, and here Roy tied the horses together and allowed them to graze a bit, while he and George sat down and ate some simple fare.

‘I read the letter recently because I felt worried about the package and everything. I got told that the ship that came into port had been in trouble and had to crash in the port because the crew had gone mad. I was to deliver this package which had been brought ashore by one of the sailors.’

George untied the string around the package, and then tore the paper that held the little box. Inside George saw something that he could not quite make out.

‘What do you think it is?’

‘Looks like a mushroom I think. Not one that I’ve ever seen though.’

It was indeed a mushroom, but instead of some typical fungus, this one was very unusual. Upon its cap was an image of a skull.