 CHAPTER 37 THE SUPPER-ROOM It was rather trying, in this state of things, to receive from the triumphant baronet, with only a parenthetical dear lake, I beg your pardon, a rough knock on the elbow of the hand that held his glass, and to be then summarily hustled out of his place. It was no mitigation of the rudeness in Lake's estimate that Sir Harry was so engrossed and elated as to seem hardly conscious of any existence but Miss Brandon's and his own. Lake was subject to transient paroxysms of exasperation, but even in these he knew how to command himself pretty well before witnesses. His smile grew a little stranger, and his face a degree whiter as he set down his glass, quietly glided a little away, and brushed off with his handkerchief the aspersion which his coat had suffered. In a few minutes more Miss Brandon had left the supper-room, leaning upon Lord Shelford's arm, and Sir Harry remained with a glass of pink champagne, such as young fellow's drink, with a faith and comfort so wonderful at balls and fates chimpatres. Sir Harry Brackton was already chafing a bit, as he expressed it, with the young lady who assisted in dispensing the good things across the supper-table, and was just calling up her blushes by a pretty parallel between her eyes and the sparkling quality of his glass, and telling her her mamma must have been sweetly pretty. Now Sir Harry's rudeness to Lake had not been, I'm afraid, altogether accidental. The baronet was sudden and vehement in his affairs of the heart, but curable on short absences and easily transferable. He had been vehemently enamoured of the heiress of Brandon a year ago and more, but during an absence Mark Wilder's suit grew up and prospered, and Sir Harry Brackton acquiesced, and to say truth the matter troubled his manly breast but little. He had hardly expected to see her here in this rollicking rustic gathering. She was, he thought, even more lovely than he remembered her. Beauty sometimes seen again does excel our recollections of it. Wilder had gone off the scene, as Mr. Carlisle says, into infinite space, who could tell exactly the cause of his dismissal, and why the young lady had asserted her capricious resolve to be free. There were pleasant theories adaptable to the circumstances, and Sir Harry cherished an agreeable opinion of himself, and so, all things favouring, the old flame blazed up wildly, and the young gentleman was more in love then, and for some weeks after the ball, than perhaps he had ever been before. Now some men, and Sir Harry was one of them, are cherlish and ferocious over their loves, as certain brutes are over their vitals. In one of these tender paroxysms, in the presence of his dulcinea, the young baronet was always hot, short, and saucy with his own sex, and when his jealousy was ever so little touched, positively impertinent. He perceived what other people did not, that Miss Brandon's eye once on that evening rested for a moment on Captain Lake, with a peculiar expression of interest. This look was but once and momentary, but the young gentleman resented it, and brooded over it every now and then, when the pale face of the Captain crossed his eye, and two or three times when the beautiful young lady's attention seemed unaccountably to wander from his agreeable conversation. He thought he detected her haughty eye moving in the same direction. So he looked that way too, and although he could see nothing noticeable in Stanley's demeanor, he could have belt it in his heart to box his ears. Therefore I don't think he was quite so careful as he might have been to spare Lake that jolt upon the elbow, which coming from a rival in a moment of public triumph was not altogether easy to bear like a Christian. Some grapes, please, said Lake to the young lady behind the table. Oh, Uncle, is that you, Lake? Big pardon, but you are so like my poor dear Uncle Langton. I wish you'd let me adopt you for an uncle. He was such a pretty fellow, with his fat white cheeks and long nose, and he looked half asleep. Do pray, Uncle Lake, I should like it so. And the baronet, who was, I am afraid, what some people would term perhaps vulgar, winked over his glass at the blooming confectioner, who turned away and tittered over her shoulder at the handsome baronet's charming banter. The girl, having turned away to titter, forgot Lake's grapes, so he helped himself, and leaning against the table, looked superciliously upon Sir Harry, who was not to be deterred by the drowsy gaze of contempt with which the captain retorted his angry chaff. Poor Uncle died of love, or chickenpox or something, at forty. You're not ailing, Nunky, are you? You do look woefully sick, though, too bad to lose a second uncle at the same early age. You're near forty, eh, Nunky? And such a pretty fellow. You'll take care of me in your will, Nunky, won't you? Come, what will you leave me? Not much tin, I'm afraid. No, not much tin, answered Lake, but I'll leave you what you want more, my sense and decency, with a request that you will use them for my sake. You're a devilish witty fellow, Lake. Take care, your wit, don't get you into trouble, said the baronet, chuckling and growing angrier, for he saw the heebe laughing, and, not being a ready man, though given to banter, he sometimes descended to menace in his jocularity. I was just thinking your dullness might do the same for you, draught Lake. What in do you mean to pay dollings that bet on the dobby? Demanded Sir Harry, his face very red, and only the ghost of his smile grinning there. I think you'd better. Of course it is quite easy. The baronet was smiling his best with a very red face, and that unpleasant uncertainty in his contracted eyes which accompanies suppressed rage. As easy as that, said Lake, chucking a little bunch of grapes full into Sir Harry Brackton's handsome face. Lake recoiled a step, his face blanched as white as the cloth, his left arm lifted, and his right hand grasping the haft of a table-knife. There was just a second in which the athletic baronet stood, as it were, breathless and incredulous, and then his herculean fist whirled in the air with the most unseemly oath. The girl screamed, and a crash of glass and crockery whisked away by their coats resounded on the ground. A chair between Lake and Sir Harry impeded the baronet's stride, and his uplifted arm was caught by a gentleman in moustache, who held so fast that there was no chance of shaking it loose. D. it Brackton. D. you. What did devil? Don't be a fool! And other soothing expressions escaped this peacemaker, as he clung fast to the young baronet's arm. The people hang it. You'll have all the people about you. Quiet! Quiet, can't you? I say, settle it quietly. Here I am. Well, let me go, that will do, said he, glowering furiously at Lake, who confronted him in the same attitude, a couple of yards away. You'll hear, and he turned away. I am at the brand in arms till to-morrow, said Lake, with white lips, very quietly to the gentleman in moustaches, who bound slightly and walked out of the room with Sir Harry. Lake poured out some sherry in a tumbler and drank it off. He was a little bit stunned, I think, in his new situation. Except for the waiters and the actors in it, it so happened that the supper room was empty during this sudden fracah. Lake stared at the frightened girl in his fierce abstraction. Then with his wild gaze he followed the line of his adversary's retreat, and shook his ears slightly, like a man at whose hair a wasp has buzzed. Thank you, said he to the maid, suddenly recollecting himself with a sort of smile. That will do. What confounded nonsense! He'll be quite cool again in five minutes, never mind. And Lake pulled on his white glove, glancing down the file of silent waiters, some looking frightened and some reserved, in white ties and waistcoats, and he glided out of the room, his mind somewhere else, like a some nambulist. It was not perfectly clear to the gentleman and ladies in charge of the ices, chickens, and champagne between which of the three swells who had just left the room the quarrel was. It had come so suddenly, and was over so quickly, like a clap of thunder. Some had not seen any, and others only a bit of it, being busy with plates and ice-tubs, and the few who had seen it all did not clearly comprehend it. Only it was certain that the row had originated in jealousy about Miss Jones, the pretty apprentice, who was judiciously withdrawn forthwith, by Mrs. Page, the properest of confectioners. LANNING. Wilder's Hand by J. Sheridan Lafanyu. CHAPTER 38. AFTER THE BALL. Lake glided from the feast with a sense of a tremendous liability upon him. There was no retreat. The morning, yes, the morning. What then? Should he live to see the evening? Sir Harry Brackton was the crack shot of Swivel's gallery. He could hit a walking cane at fifteen yards, at the word. There he was, talking to old Lady Chelford. Very well. And there was that fellow with the twisted moustache, plainly an officer and a gentleman, twisting the end of one of them, and thinking profoundly, with his back to the wall, evidently considering his coming diplomacy with Lake's friend. I, by the by, and Lake's eye wandered in bewilderment among village dawns and elderly country gentlemen in search of that inestimable treasure. These thoughts went whisking and whirling round in Captain Lake's brain, to the roar and clatter of the Joinville polka, to which fifty pair of dancing feet were hopping and skimming over the floor. Monstrous hot, sir! Eh, ha-ha, by Joe! said Major Jackson, who had just returned from the supper-room, where he had heard several narratives of the occurrence. Don't think I was so hot since the ball at Government House, by Joe, sir, in 1828! Awful sum of that! The Major was jerking his handkerchief under his florid nose and chin by way of ventilation, and eyeing the young man shrewdly the while, to read what he might of the story in his face. Benin calcota, Lake? No, very hot indeed. Could I say just a word with you? This way a little. So glad I met you. And they edged into a little nook of the lobby, where they had a few minutes' confidential talk, during which the Major looked grave and consequential, and carried his head high, nodding, now and then, with military decision. Major Jackson whispered, and abrupt word our tour in his ear, and threw back his head, eyeing Lake with grave and slide defiance, then came another whisper, and a wink, and the Major shook his hand, briefly but hard, and the gentleman parted. Lake strolled into the ballroom, and on to the upper end, where the best people are, and suddenly he was in Miss Brandon's presence. I've been very presumptuous, I fear, to-night, Miss Brandon. He said in his peculiar low tones, I've been very importunate. I prized the honour I sought so very much. I forgot how little I deserved it. And I do not think it likely you'll see me for a good while, possibly for a very long time. I've therefore ventured to come, merely to say good-bye, only that, just good-bye, and to beg that flower, and he plucked it resolutely from her bouquet, which I will keep while I live. Good-bye, Miss Brandon. And Captain Stanley Lake, that pale apparition, was gone. I do not know at all how Miss Brandon felt at this instant, for I never could quite understand that strange lady, but I believe she looked a little pale, as she gravely adjusted the flowers, so audaciously violated, by the touch of the cool young gentleman. I can't say whether Miss Brandon dained to follow him with her dark, dreamy gaze. I rather think not. And three minutes afterwards he had left the town hall. The Brandon party did not stay very late, and they dropped Rachel at her little dwelling. A very silent dorkess was, thought Rachel, as they drove from Gillingdon. Perhaps others were thinking the same of Rachel. Next morning, at half-past seven o'clock, a dozen or so of rustics, under command of Major Jackson, arrived at the back entrance of Brandon Hall, bearing Stanley Lake upon a shutter, with glassy eyes, they did not seem to see, sunken face, and a very blue tinge about his mouth. The Major fussed into the house and saw and talked with Larkham, who was solemn and bland upon the subject, and went out, first, to make personal inspection of the captain, who seemed to him to be dying. He was shot somewhere in the shoulder or breast. They could not see exactly where, nor disturb him as he lay. A good deal of blood had flowed from him upon the arm and side of one of the men who supported his head. Lake said nothing. He only whispered, rather indistinctly, one word—water—and was not able to lift his head when it came, and when they poured it into and over his lips, he sighed and closed his eyes. It is not a bad sign, bleeding so freely, but he looks develish, shaky, you see. I've seen lots of our fellows hit, you know, and I don't like his looks, poor fellow. You better see Lord Chelford this minute. He could not stand being brought all the way to the town. I'll run down and send up the doctor, and he'll take him on if he can bear it. Major Jackson did not run, though I have seen with an astonishment that has never subsided fellows just as old and as fat and braced up besides in the inflexibilities of regimentals keeping up at double quick, at the heads of their companies for a good quarter of a mile, before the Colonel on horseback mercifully called a halt. He walked at his best pace, however, and indeed was confoundedly uneasy about his own personal liabilities. The Major surprised Dr. Buttle shaving. He popped in unceremoniously. The fat little doctor received him in drawers and a very tight web-wasted shirt, standing by the window, at which dangled a small looking-glass. By George, sir, they've been it mischief, burst forth the Major, and the doctor, razor in hand, listened with wide open eyes and half his face lathered to the story. Before it was over the doctor shaved the unshawn side, and the Major, still in the room, completed his toilette in hot haste. Honest Major Jackson was very uncomfortable. Of course Buttle could not give any sort of opinion upon the case which he had not seen, but it described uglyly, and the Major consulted in broken hints with an uneasy wink or two about our flight to Boulogne. "'Well, it will be no harm to be ready, but take no step till I come back,' said the doctor, who had stuffed a great role of lint and play-star, and some of the medicinal into one pocket, and his leather case of instruments, forceps, probes, scissors, and all the other steel and silver horrors, into the other. So he strutted forth in his great coat, unnaturally broad about the hips, and the Major, devilish, uncomfortable, accompanied him at a smart pace to the great gate of Brandon. He did not care to enter, feeling a little guilty, though he explained on the way all about the matter. How devilish stiff Bracton's man was about it! And by Job's, sir, you know, what was to be said, for Lake like a fool chucked a lot of grapes in his face, but nothing by George. The doctor, short and broad, was now stomping up the straight avenue under the noble trees that rotted over, and Major Jackson sauntered about in the vicinity of the gate, more interested in Lake's safety than he would have believed possible a day or two before. Lord Chelford, being an early man, was notwithstanding the ball of the preceding night, dressing, when St. Ang, his Swiss servant, knocked at his door with a dozen pocket-handkerchiefs, a bottle of odour-coudogne, and some other properties of his mittier. St. Ang could not wait until he had laid them down, but broke out with, oh, Milo, qu'est-il arrivait, le pauvre capitaine? Il est toi, il s'émure, il dase, d'une coupe de pistolet. He comes de se betre from beating himself in duel. Il était tant dans le prathrine, le pauvre gentilhomme, of a blow of the pistol. And so on, the young nobleman gathering the facts as best he might. Is L'Arcum there? Inducanerie Milo, ask him to come in. So Monsieur L'Arcum entered and bowed ominously. You've seen him, L'Arcum, is he very much at. He appears, my lord, to me, I regret to say, almost a-dying-like. Very weak does he speak to you. Not a word, my lord. Since he got a little water, he's quite quiet. Poor fellow, where have you put him? In the housekeeper's lobby, my lord. I rather think he's a-dying. He looks uncommon bad, and I, and Mrs. Estherbrook, the housekeeper, my lord, thought you would not like he should die out of doors. Has she got your mistress' directions? Miss Brandon is not called up, my lord, and Mrs. Estherbrook is unwilling to alarm her. So she thought it better I should come for orders to your lordship, which he thinks also the poor young gentleman is certainly a-dying. Is there any vacant bedroom near where you have placed him? What does Mrs. the housekeeper say? She thinks, my lord, the room opposite, where Mr. Sled, the architect, slept, when he would answer very nice. It is roomy and harry and no steps. Major Jackson, who has gone to the town to fetch the doctor, my lord, says Mr. Lake won't obey her, carried, and see the room on the level my lord would perhaps be more convenient. Certainly tell her so. I will speak to Miss Brandon when she comes down. How soon will the doctor be here? From a quarter to half an hour, my lord. Then tell the housekeeper to arrange as she proposes, and don't remove his clothes until the doctor comes. Everyone must assist. I know, St. Ange, you like to assist. So Larkham withdrew ceremoniously, and Lord Chalford hastened his toilette, and was downstairs and in the room assigned by the housekeeper to the ill-starred Captain Lake before Dr. Buttle had arrived. It had already the dismal character of a sick chamber, its light was darkened, its talk was in whispers, and its twoings and froings on tiptoe. An obsolete chambermaid had been already installed as nurse. Little Mrs. Estherbrook the housekeeper was fussing hither and thither about the room noiselessly. So this gay, astute man of fashion had fallen into the dungeon of sudden darkness, and the custody of old women, and lay helpless in the stalks, awaiting the judgment of Buttle—ridiculous little pudgy Buttle, how awful on a sudden are you grown, the interpreter of death in this very case. My case thought that seemingly listless figure on the bed. My case, I suppose, it is fatal. I am to go out of this room, in a long, cloth-covered box. I am going to try, alone and for ever, the value of those theories of futurity, and the unseen which I have quietly scouted all my days. Oh, that the Prophet Buttle were here, to end my tremendous suspense, and to announce a reprieve from heaven! While the wounded Captain lay on the bed with his clothes on, and the coverlet over him, and that clay-coloured apathetic face with closed eyes upon the pillow, without sigh or motion—not a whispered word escaped him—but his brain was appalled, and his heart died within him in the unspeakable horror of death. Lord Chelford, too, having looked on Lake with silent but awful misgivings, longed for the arrival of the Doctor, and was listening and silent when Buttle's short step and short respiration were heard in the passage. So Larkham came to the door to announce the Doctor, in a whisper, and Buttle bust into the room, and made his bow to Lord Chelford, and his brief compliments and condolences. Not asleep, he inquired, standing by the bed. The Captain's lips moved at his claimer, I suppose, but no sound came. So the Doctor threw open the window-shutters, and clipped Stanley Lake's exquisite coat ruthlessly through with his scissors, and having cleared the room of all useless hands, he made his examination. It was a long visit. Buttle, in the hall afterwards, declined breakfast. He had a board to attend. He told Lord Chelford that the case was a very nasty one. In fact, the chances were against the Captain, and he, Buttle, would wish a consultation with a London surgeon, whoever Lord Chelford led most confidence in. Sir Francis saidly, he thought, would be very desirable. But, of course, it was for the family to decide. If the messenger caught the quarter to eleven up-train at Dollington, he would be in London at six, and could return with the Doctor by the down-mail train, and so reach Dollington at ten minutes past four next morning, which would answer, as he would not operate sooner. As the Doctor toddled towards Dollington, with sympathetic Major Jackson by his side, before he entered the town, they were passed by one of the Brandon men, riding at a hard canter for Dollington. London shouted the Doctor, as the man touched his hat in passing, Yes, sir! Glad o' that, said the Major, looking after him. How am I, said the learned Buttle? I don't see hower to get the bullet out of him without mischief. Poor devil! I'm afraid he'll do no good. The ladies that morning had tea in their rooms. It was near twelve o'clock when Lord Chelford saw Miss Brandon. She was in the conservatory amongst her flowers, and on seeing him stepped into the drawing-room. I hope, Dorcas, you are not angry with me. I've been, I'm afraid, very impertinent. But I was called on to decide for you in your absence, and they all thought poor Lake could not be moved on to Gillingdon without danger. You did quite rightly, Chelford, and I thank you, said Miss Brandon coldly, and she seated herself and continued, Pray, what does the Doctor really say? He speaks very seriously. Does he think there is danger? Very great danger. Miss Brandon looked down, and then, with a pale gaze, suddenly, in Chelford's face, he thinks he may die, she said. Yes, said Lord Chelford, in a very low tone, returning her gaze solemnly. And nobody to advise, but that village doctor Buttle? That's hardly credible, I think. Pardon me. At his suggestion I have sent for Sir Francis Sedley from town, and I hope he may arrive early to more mourning. Why Stanley Lake may die to-day? He does not apprehend that, but it is necessary to remove the bullet, and the operation will be critical, and it is for that specially that Sir Francis is coming down. It is to take place to-morrow, and he'll die in that operation. You know he'll die, said Dorcas, pale and fierce. I assure you, Dorcas, I have been perfectly frank. He looks upon poor Lake as in very great danger, but that is all. What brutes you men are, said Dorcas, with a wild scorn in her look and accent, and her cheeks flushed with passion. You knew quite well last night there was to be this wicked duel in the morning, and you, a magistrate, a Lord Lieutenant, what are you? You connived at this bloody conspiracy, and he, your own cousin, Jelford, your cousin. Jelford looked at her very much amazed. Yes, you are worse than Sir Henry Brackton, for you're no fool, and worse than that wicked old man. Major Jackson, who shall never enter these doors again, for he was employed, trusted in their brutal plans, but you had no excuse and every opportunity, and you have allowed your cousin Stanley to be murdered. You do me great in justice, Dorcas. I did not know, or even suspect that a hostile meeting between poor Lake and Brackton was thought of. I merely heard that there had been some travelling altercation in the supper-room, and when intending to make bees between them I alluded to it, just before we left, and Brackton said it was really nothing, quite blown over, and that he could not recollect what either had said. I was entirely deceived. You know I speak truth, quite deceived. They think it fair, you know, to dupe other people in such affairs, and I will also say, he continued a little heartily, that you might have spared your centre until at least you had heard what I had to say. I do believe you, Chelford. You are not vexed with me. Won't you shake hands? He took her hand with a smile. And now, she said, Chelford, ought not we to send for poor Rachel, her only brother, is not it sad? Certainly shall I ask my mother, or will you write? I will write, she said. End of CHAPTER XXXVIII CHAPTER XXXIXIX in which Miss Rachel Lake comes to Brandon, and Dr. Biddle calls again. In about an hour afterwards Rachel Lake arrived in the carriage which had been dispatched for her with Dorcas's note. She was a good deal muffled up, and looked very pale, and asked whether Miss Brandon was in her room, whether she glided rapidly upstairs. It was a sort of boudoir, or dressing-room, with a few pretty old portraits and miniatures, and a number of Louis Cato's looking-glasses hung round, and such pretty quaint cabriol guilt and pale green furniture. Dorcas met her at the door, and they kissed silently. How is he, Dorcas? Very ill, dear, I'm afraid. Sit down, darling. Rachel was relieved, for in her panic she almost feared to ask if he were living. Is there immediate danger? The doctor says not, but he is very much alarmed for to-morrow. Oh, Dorcas, darling, he'll die! I know it! Oh, merciful heaven! How tremendous! You will not be so frightened in a little time. You have only just heard it, Rachel, dearest, and you are startled. I was so myself. I'd like to see him, Dorcas. Sit here a little and rest, dear. The doctor will make his visit immediately, and then we can ask him. He is a good-natured little creature, poor old buttle, and I am certain if it mayfully be he won't prevent it. Where is he, darling? Where is Stanley? So Dorcas described as well as she could. Oh, poor Stanley! Oh, Stanley! Poor Stanley! gassed Rachel with white lips. You have no idea, Dorcas. No one can. How terrific it is! Oh, poor Stanley! Poor Stanley! Drink this water, darling. You must not be so excited. Dorcas, say what the doctor may. See him, I must. There is time to think of that, darling. Has he spoken to any one? Very little, I believe. He whispers a few words now and then. That is all. Nothing to Chelford. Nothing particular, I mean. No, nothing, at least that I have heard of. Did he wish to see no one? No one, dear. Not poor William Wilder. No, dear. I don't suppose he cares more for a clergyman than for any other man. None of his family ever did, when they came to lie on a bed of sickness or of death, either. No, no, said Rachel Wilder. I did not mean to pray. I was not thinking of that, but William Wilder was different. And he did not mention me, either? Dorcas shook her head. I knew it, continued Rachel, with a kind of shudder. And tell me, Dorcas, does he know that he is in danger, such imminent danger? That I cannot say, Rachel, dear. I don't believe doctors like to tell their patients so. There was a silence of some minutes, and Rachel, clasping her hands in an agony, said, Oh yes, he's gone. He's certainly gone. And I remain alone under that dreadful burden. Please, Miss Brandon, the doctor downstairs with Captain Lake, said the maid, opening the door. Is Lord Chelford with him? Yes, Miss, please. Then tell him I will be so obliged if he will come here for a moment, when the doctor is gone, and ask the doctor now, from me, how he thinks Captain Lake. In a little while the maid returned. Captain Lake was not so low and rather better than this morning, the doctor said. And Rachel raised her eyes and whispered an agitated thanksgiving. Was Lord Chelford coming? His lordship had left the room when she returned, and Mr. Larkham said he was with lawyer Larkham in the library. Mr. Larkham can wait. Tell Lord Chelford I wish very much to see him here. So a way went the maid again. A message in that great house was a journey, and there was a little space before they heard a knock at the door of Dorcas's pretty room, and Lord Chelford, duly invited, came in. Lord Chelford was surprised to see Rachel, and held her hand while he congratulated her on the more favourable opinion of the physician this afternoon, and then he gave them, as fully and exactly as he could, all the lights emitted by Dr. Buttle, and endeavoured to give his narrative as cheerful and confident and air as he could. Then at length he recollected that Mr. Larkham was waiting in the study. Quite forgot Mr. Larkham said he, I left him in the library, and I am so very glad we have had a pleasanter report upon poor Lake this evening, and I am sure we shall all feel more comfortable on seeing Sir Francis Sedley. He is such an admirable surgeon, and I feel sure he'll strike out something for our poor patient. I've known him hit upon such original expedience, and make such wonderful successes. So with a kind smile he left the room. Then there was a long pause. Does he really think that Stanley will recover? said Rachel. I don't know. I suppose he hopes it. I don't know, Rachel, what to think of any one, or any thing. What wild beasts there are? How swift to shed blood as poor William Wilder said last Sunday! Have you any idea what they quarreled about? None in the world. It was that odious Sir Harry Brackton was not it. Why so odious, Rachel? How can you tell, which was in the wrong? I only know he seems to be a better marksman than your poor brother. Rachel looked at her with something of haughty and surprised displeasure, but said nothing. You look at me, Raddy, as if I were a monster. Or monstrous, I should say. Whereas I am only a Brandon. Don't you remember how our great ancestor, who fought for the House of York, changed suddenly to Lancaster, and how Sir Richard left the King and took part with Cromwell? Not for any particular advantage, I believe, or for any particular reason even, but for wickedness and wounded pride perhaps. I don't quite see your meaning, Dorcas. I can't understand how your pride has been hurt. But if Stanley had any, I can well imagine what torture it must have endured. Wretched, wicked, punished fool! You suspect what they fought about, Raddy. Rachel made no answer. You do, Raddy, and why do you dissemble with me? I don't dissemble. I don't care to speak. But if you will have me say so, I do suspect. I think it must have originated in jealousy of you. You look, Raddy, as if you thought I had it. Whereas I really did not care. I do not understand you, Dorcas, but you appear to me very cruel, and you smile as I say so. I smile because I sometimes think so myself. With a fixed and wrathful stare Rachel returned the enigmatic gaze of her beautiful cousin. If Stanley dies, Dorcas, Sir Harry Brachten shall hear of it. I'll lose my life, but he shall pay the forfeit of his crime. So, saying, Rachel left the room, and gliding through passages and downstairs, she knocked at Stanley's door. The old woman opened it. Ah, Dorothy, I'm so glad to see you here, and she put a present in her hard, crumpled hand. So, noiselessly, Rachel Lake, without more parley, stepped into the room and closed the door. She was along with Stanley, with a beating heart and a kind of chill stealing over her by her brother's bed. The room was not so dark that she distinctly enough. There lay her brother, such as he was, still her brother, on the bleak neutral ground between life and death. His features peaked and earthy, and that look so new and peculiar which does not savor of life upon them. He did not move, but his strange eyes gazed cold and earnest from their deep sockets upon her face in awful silence. Perhaps he thought he saw a phantom. Are you better, dear? whispered Rachel. His lips stirred and his throat, but he did not speak until a second effort brought utterance, and he murmured, Is that you, Addy? Yes, dear. Are you better? No. I'm shot. I shall die to-night. Is it night yet? Don't despair, Stanley, dear. The great London doctor, Sir Francis Sedley, will be with you early in the morning, and Shelford has great confidence in him. I'm sure he will relieve you. This is Brandon? murmured Lake? Yes, dear. She thought he was going to say more, but he remained silent, and she recollected that he ought not to speak, and also that she had that to say which must be said. Sharp, dark and strange lay that familiar face upon the white pillow. The faintest indication of something like a peevish sneer. It might be only the lines of pain and fatigue. Still, it had that unpleasant character remaining fixed on its features. Oh, Stanley, you say you think you are dying. Won't you send for William Wilder and Shelford and tell all you know of Mark? She saw he was about to say something, and she leaned her head near his lips, and she heard him whisper, It won't serve, Mark. I'm thinking of you, Stanley. I'm thinking of you. To which he said either yes or so she could not distinguish. I view it now quite differently. You said you know in the park you would tell Shelford. And I resisted, I believe, but I don't now. I had rather you did. Yes, Stanley, I conjure you to tell it all. The cold lips were the livid halo round them, murmured. Thank you. It was a sneer, very shocking just then, perhaps, but unquestionably a sneer. Poor Stanley! she murmured, with a kind of agony looking down upon that changed face. One word more, Stanley. Remember, it's I, the only one on earth who stands near you in kindred, your sister Stanley, who implores of you to take this step before it is too late. At least, to consider. He said something. She thought it was, I'll think, and then he closed his eyes. It was the only motion she had observed. His face laid just as it had done on the pillow. He had not stirred all the time she was there, and now that his eyelids closed it seemed to say, our interview is over, the curtain has dropped. And so understanding it, with that one awful look that may be the last, she glided from the bedside, told old Dorothy that he seemed disposed to sleep, and left the room. There is something awful always in the spectacle of such a sick bed as that beside which Rachel had just stood. But not quite so dreadful is the sight, as are the imaginings and the despair of absence. So reassuring is the familiar spectacle of life, even in its subsidence, so long as bodily torture and mental aberration are absent. In the meanwhile, on his return to the library, Lord Chelford found his dowager mother in high chat with the attorney, whom she afterwards pronounced a very gentlemanlike man for his line of life. The conversation indeed was chiefly that of Lady Chelford, the exemplary attorney contributing for the most part a polite acquiescence, and those reflections which most oppositely pointed the moral of her ladyship's tale, which concerned altogether the vagaries of Mark Wilder, a subject which piqued her curiosity and irritated her passions. It was a great day for Josiah Larkin, for by the time Lord Chelford returned, the old lady had asked him to stay for dinner, which he did, not with standing his morning dress, to his great inward satisfaction, because he could henceforward mention, the other day when I was at Brandon, or old Lady Chelford assured me when last I dined at Brandon, and he could more intimately speak of our friends at Brandon, and the Brandon people, and in short this dinner was very serviceable to the excellent attorney. It was not very amusing this interchange of thought and feeling between Larkin and the dowager, upon a theme already so well ventilated as Mark Wilder's absconding, and therefore I let it pass. After dinner, when the dowager's place knew her no more, Lord Chelford resumed his talk with Larkin. I am quite confirmed in the view I took at first, he said. Wilder has no claim upon me, there are others on whom much more naturally the care of his money would devolve, and I think that my undertaking the office he proposes, under his present strange circumstances, might appear like an acquiescence in the extraordinary course he has taken, and a sanction generally of his conduct which I certainly can't approve. So Mr. Larkin, I have quite made up my mind, I have no business to undertake this trust, simple as it is. I have only, my Lord, to bow to your Lordship's decision. At the same time, I cannot but feel, my Lord, how peculiar and painful is the position in which it places me. There are rents to be received by me, and some's handed over, to a considerable—I may see, indeed, a very large amount—and my friend Lake—Captain Lake—now unhappily in so very precarious a state—appears to dislike the office also, and to anticipate annoyance in the event of his consenting to act. Altogether your Lordship will perceive that the situation is one of considerable—indeed, very great—embarrassment, as respects me. There is, however, one satisfactory circumstance disclosed in his last letter. His return, he says, cannot be delayed beyond a very few months, perhaps weeks, and he states, in his own rough way, that he will then explain the motives of his conduct, the entire satisfaction of all those who are cognizant of the measures which he has adopted. No more, Claret thinks. No more. A delicious wine! And he adds, it will then be quite understood that he has acted neither from caprice nor from any motive other than self-preservation. I assure you, my Lord, that is the identical phrase he employs, self-preservation. I, all along, suspected, or rather, I mean, supposed, that Mr. Wilder had been placed in this matter under coercion—a threat. A little more wine, asked Lord Chelford, after another interval. No, no more, I thank you. Your Lordship's very good, and the wine, I may say, excellent, delicious, Claret. Indeed, quite so. Ninety shillings, a dozen, I should venture to say, and hardly to be had at that figure. But it grows in me, I rather think, and the trustees of our little West Lay and Chapel—we've got a little into debt in that quarter, I am sorry to say, and I promise to advise with them this evening at nine o'clock. They have called me to counsel more than once, poor fellows, and so with your Lordship's permission I'll withdraw. Lord Chelford walked with him to the steps. It was a beautiful night, very little moon, but that and the star is wonderfully clear and bright, and all things looking so soft and airy. Try one of these, said the peer, presenting his cigar case. Lorcan, with a glow of satisfaction, took one of these noble cigars and rolled it in his fingers and smelt it. Fragment, wonderfully fragment, he observed meekly, with the connoisseur's shake of the head. The night was altogether so charming that Lord Chelford was tempted, so he took his cap and lighted his cigar, too, and strolled a little way with the attorney. He walked under the solemn trees, the same under whose airy, groining, wilder and lake had walked away together on that noteworthy night on which Mark had last turned his back upon the grand old gables and twisted chimneys of Brandon Hall. This way was rather around, it must be confessed, to the lodge, Josiah Lorcan's peaceful retreat, but a stroll with the Lord was worth more than that sacrifice, and every incident which helped to make a colourable case of confidential relations at Brandon, a point in which the good attorney had been rather weak either to, was justly prized by that virtuous man. If the trustees, Smith the pork-butcher, old Captain Snoggle's, the town clerk and the rest had to ate some twenty minutes in the drawing-room at the lodge, so much the better. An apology was perhaps the best and most modest shape into which he could throw the advertisement of his dinner at Brandon, his confidential talk with the proud old Dowager, and his after-dinner ramble with that rising young peer Lord Chelford. It would lead him gracefully into detail, and altogether the idea, the situation, the scene and prospect were so soothing and charming that the good attorney felt a silent exultation as he listened to Lord Chelford's two or three delighted sentences upon the illimitable wonders and mysteries glimmering in the heavens above them. The cigar was delicious, the air balmy and pleasant, his digestion happy, the society unexceptionably aristocratic. A step had just been gained, and his consideration in the town and the country round improved by the occurrences of the evening and his whole system in consequence in a state so serene, sweet and satisfactory that I really believe there was genuine moisture in his pink, dove-like eyes as he lifted them to the heavens and murmured, Beautiful! Beautiful! and he mistook his sensations for a holy rapture and silent worship. Cigars, like other pleasures, are transitory. Lord Chelford threw away his stump, tendered his case again to Mr. Larkin and then took his leave, walking slowly homewards. CHAPTER 40 The Attorney's Adventures on the Way Home Mr. Josiah Larkin was now moving alone under the limbs of the Brandon Trees. He knew the path as he had boasted to Lord Chelford from his boyhood, and as he pursued his way his mind got upon the accustomed and amused itself with speculations respecting the vagaries of Mark Wilder. I wonder what his lordship thinks. He was very close, very, ruminated Larkin, no distinct ideas about it possibly, and did not seem to wish to lead me to the subject. Can he know anything? Eh! can he possibly? Those high fellows are very knowing often, so much on the turf and all that—very sharp and very deep. He was thinking of a certain noble lord in difficulties who had hit a client of his rather hard and whose affairs did not reflect much credit upon their noble conductor. Aye! I dare say deep enough and intimate with the lakes. He expects to be home in two months' time. He's a deep fellow too. He does not like to let people know what he's about. I should not be surprised if he came tomorrow. Lake and Lord Chelford may both know more than they say. Why should they both object merely to receive and fund his money? They think he wants to get them into a fix, eh? If I'm to conduct his business I ought to know it. If he keeps a secret from me, affecting all his business relations like this and driving him about the world like an absconding bankrupt, how can I advise him? All this drifted slowly through his house, and each suggestion had its collateral speculations, and so it carried him pleasantly a good way on his walk, and he was now in the shadow of the dense copsewood that mantles the deep ravine which debouches into Redmond's Dell. The road was hardly two yards wide, and the wood walled it in, and overhung it occasionally in thick irregular masses. As the attorney marched leisurely onward, he saw—or fancied that he saw, now and then, in uncertain glimpses, something white motion among the trees beside him. At first he did not mind, but it continued, and grew gradually unpleasant. It might be a goat, a white goat. But no, it was too tall for that. Had he seen it at all? Aye, there it was, no mistake now. A poacher, maybe? But their poachers were not of the dangerous sort, and there had not been a robber about Gillington within the memory of man. Besides, why on earth should either show himself in that absurd way? He stopped, he listened, he stared suspiciously into the profound darkness, then he thought he heard a rustling of the leaves near him, and he hallowed, who's there? But no answer came. So taking heart of grace he marched on, still zealously peering among the trees, until, coming to an opening in the pathway, he more distinctly saw a tall white figure standing in an ape-like attitude with its arms extended, grasping two bows and stooping as if peeping cautiously as he approached. The good attorney drew up and stared at this grey phantasm, saying to himself, yes, in a sort of quiet hiss. He stopped in a horror, and as he gazed, the figure suddenly drew back and disappeared. Very pleasant this, said the attorney after a pause, recovering a little. What on earth can it be? Josiah Larkin could not tell which way it had gone. He had already passed the midway point where this dark path begins to descend through the ravine into Redmond's Dell. He did not like going forward, but to turn back might bring him again beside the mysterious figure. And though he was not, of course, afraid of ghosts, nor in this part of the world of robbers, yet somehow he did not know what to make of this gigantic grey monkey. So not caring to stay longer and seeing nothing to be gained by turning back. The attorney buttoned the top button of his coat, and holding his head very erect and placing as much as he could of the path between himself and the side where the figure had disappeared, marched on steadily. It was too dark and the way not quite regular enough to render any greater speed practicable. From the thicket, as he proceeded, he heard a voice. He had often heard woodcocks in that cover, calling in a tone that sounded in his ears like banter. Mark, mark, mark, mark! He stopped, holding his breath, and the sound ceased. Well, there certainly is not usual, murmured Mr. Larkin, who was a little more perturbed than perhaps he quite cared to acknowledge, even to himself. Some fellow perhaps watching for a friend, or tricks, maybe. Then the attorney, trying his supercilious smile in the dark, listened again for a good while, but nothing was heard except those whisperings of the wood which poets speak of. He looked before him with his eyebrows screwed in a vain effort to pierce the darkness and the same behind him, and then after another pause he began uncomfortably to move down the path once more. In a short time the same voice with the same uncertain echo among the trees cried faintly, Mark, Mark! And then a pause, then again, Mark, Mark, Mark! And then it grew more distant, and sounded among the trees in reverberations of the glen like laughter. Mark, ha, ha, haark! Ha, ha, ha, haark! Mark, Mark, ha, ha, haark! Who's there! cried the attorney in a tone rather ferocious from fright and stamping on the path, but his summons and the provocation died away together in the profoundest silence. Mr. Josiah Larkin did not repeat his challenge. This cry of Mark was beginning to connect itself uncomfortably in his mind with his speculations about his wealthy client, which in that solitude and darkness began to seem not so entirely pure and disinterested as he was in the habit of regarding them, and a sort of wood demon such as a queer little school-fellow used long ago to read a tale about in an old German story-book was now dogging his darksome steps and hanging upon his flank with a vindictive design. Josiah Larkin was not given to fancy, nor troubled with superstition. His religion was of a comfortable, punctual business-like caste, which, according with his genius, denied him indeed some things for which, in truth, he had no taste, but in no respect interfered with his main mission upon earth which was getting money. He had found no difficulty hitherto in serving God and Mammon, the joint business prospered. Let us suppose it was one of those falterings of faith which try the best men that just now made him feel a little queer, and gave his thoughts about Mark Wilder, now grown habitual, that new and ghastly complexion which made the situation so unpleasant. He wished himself more than once well out of this confounded past, and listened nervously for a good while, and stared once more half-frightened in various directions into the darkness. If I thought there could be anything the least wrong or reprehensible—we are all fallible—in my allowing my mind to turn so much upon my client, I can certainly say I should be very far from allowing it. I shall certainly consider it, and I may ask myself to decide in a Christian spirit, and if there be a doubt, to give it against myself. This resolution, which was he trusted that of a righteous man, was, I'm afraid, the effect rather of fright than reflection, and employed in that sense somewhat in the manner of an exorcism, whispered rather to the ghost, than to his conscience. I am sure Larkin did not himself suppose this. On the contrary, he really believed, I am convinced, that he scouted the ghost, and had merely volunteered this salutary self-examination as an exercise of conscience. He could not, however, have doubted that he was very nervous, and that he would have been glad of the companionship even of one of the Gillingdon shopkeepers through this infested bit of wood. Having again addressed himself to his journey, he was now approaching that part of the path where the trees recede a little, leaving a considerable space unoccupied at either side of his mountain of march. Here there was faint moonlight and starlight, very welcome, but a little in advance of him, where the cop's wood closed in again, just above those stone steps which Lake and his sister Rachel had mounted together upon the night of the memorable rendezvous, he fancied that he again saw the gray figure cowering among the foremost stems of the wood. It was a great shock. He stopped short, and as he stared upon the object, he felt that electric chill and rising of the hair which accompanied supernatural panic. As he gazed, however, it was gone. Yes! At all events he could see it no more. Had he seen it there at all? He was in such an odd state he could not quite trust himself. He looked back, hesitatingly, but he remembered how very long and dark the path that way was, and how unpleasant his adventures there had been, and although there was a chance that the gray monkey was somewhere near the path, still there was now but a short space between him and the broad carriage-track down Redmond's Dell, and once upon that he considered himself almost in the street of Gillingdon. So he made up his mind, and marched resolutely onward, and had nearly reached that point at which the converging screen of thicket again overshadows the pathway, when close at his side he saw the tall white figure push itself forward among the branches, and in a startling undertone of inquiry, like a conspirator challenging his brother, a voice, the same which he had so often heard during this walk, cried over his shoulder, Mark Wilder! Larkin sprung back a pace or two, turning his face full upon the challenger, who in his turn was perhaps affrighted for the same voice uttered a sort of strangled shriek, and he heard the branches crack and rustle as he pushed his sudden retreat through them, leaving the attorney more horrified than ever. No other sound but the melancholy sawing of the night breeze, and the hoarse murmur of the stream rising from the stony channel of Redmond's Dell were now, or during the remainder of his walk through these haunted grounds, again audible. So with rapid strides passing the dim gables of Redmond's farm, he at length found himself with a sense of indescribable relief upon the Gillingdon Road, and could see the twinkling lights in the windows of the Main Street. CHAPTER 41 In Which Sir Francis Sedley Manipulates At about two o'clock, Buttle was called up, and speared it away to Brandon in a dog-cart. A hemorrhage, perhaps, a sudden shivering and inflammation, a sinking, maybe, or delirium, some awful change probably, for Buttle did not return. Old Major Jackson heard of it in his early walk at Buttle's door. He had begun to grow more hopeful. But hearing this he walked home, and replaced the dress coat and silk stockings he had ventured to remove, promptly in his valise, which he buckled down and locked, swallowed with agitated veracity some fragments of breakfast, got on his easy boots and gaiters, brushed his best hat, and locked it into its leather case, placed his rug, great coat, and umbrella, and a rough walking stick for service, and a gold-tipped, exquisite cane for duty on promenades of fashion, neatly on top of his valise, and, with his old white hat and shooting coat on, looking and whistling as much as possible as usual, he popped carelessly into John Hobb's stable, where he was glad to see three horses standing, and he mentally chose the black cob for his flight to Darlington. A blood-thirsty rascal that Brackton muttered the Major. The expenses were likely to be awful, and some allowance was to be made for his state of mind. He was under Dr. Buttle's porch and made a flimsy rattle with his thin brass knocker. Maybe he has returned. He did not believe it, though. Major Jackson was very nervous, indeed. The up-trains from Darlington were few and far between, and that, diddled crutchly, would be down on him the moment the breath was out of poor Lake. It was plain yesterday at the sessions that infernal woman, his wife, had been at him. She hates Brackton like poison because he likes the Brandon people, and by Jove he'll have up every soul concerned. The devil and his wife, I call them. If poor Lake goes off anywhere between eleven and four o'clock, I'm nabbed by George. The door was opened. The doctor peeped out of his parlor. Well, inquired the Major, confoundedly frightened. Pretty well, thank ye, but awfully fagged up all night and no use. But how is he asked the Major with a dreadful quam of dismay? Same as yesterday, no change. Only a little bleeding last night. Not arterial. Venus, you know. Only Venus. The Major thought he spoke of the Goddess, and though he did not well comprehend, said he was glad of it. Think he'll do, then? He may—very unlikely, though, a nasty case, as you can imagine. He'll certainly not go, poor fellow, before four o'clock p.m., I daresay, eh? The Major's soul was at the Darlington Station, and was regulating poor Lake's departure by Bradshaw's guide. Who knows? We expect Sir Francis this morning, glad to have a share of the responsibility off my shoulders, I can tell you. Come and have a chop, will you? No, thank you, I've had my breakfast. You have, have you? Well, I haven't, cried the doctor with an agreeable chuckle, shaking the Major's hand, and disappearing again into his parlor. I found in my lodgings in London on my return from Doncaster, some two months later, a copy of the county paper of this date, with a cross scrawled beside the piece of intelligence which follows. I knew that tremulous cross. It was traced by the hand of poor old Miss Cibes, with her many faults always kind to me. It bore the brand and postmark, and altogether had the impress of authenticity. It said, We have much pleasure in stating that the severe injury sustained four days since by Captain Stanley Lake at the time a visitor at the lodge, the picturesque residence of Josiah Larkin Esquire in the vicinity of Gillingdon, is not likely to prove so difficult of treatment, or so imminently dangerous, as was at first apprehended. The gallant gentleman was removed from the scene of his misadventure to Brandon Hall, close to which the accident occurred, and at which mansion his noble relatives, Lord Chelford and the Dowager Lady Chelford, are at present staying on a visit. Sir Francis Sedley came down, expressed from London, and assisted by our skillful county practitioner, Humphrey Buddle Esquire, M.D. of Gillingdon, operated most successfully on Saturday last, and we are happy to say the gallant patient has since been going on as favourably as could possibly have been anticipated. Sir Francis Sedley returned to London on Sunday afternoon. Within a week after the operation, Buddle began to talk so confidently about his patient, that the funerial cloud that overhung Brandon had almost totally disappeared, and Major Jackson had quite unpacked his portmanteau. About a week after the accident, there came one of Mr. Mark Wilder's strange letters to Mr. Josiah Larkin. This time it was from Marseille, and bore date the twenty-seventh November. It was much the longest he had yet received, and was in the nature of a dispatch rather than of those short notes in which he had hithered to, for the most part, communicated. Like the rest of his letters it was odd, but written as it seemed, in better spirits. Dear Larkin, you will be surprised to find me in this port, but I think my secret cruise is nearly over now, and you will say the plan was a master-stroke, and well executed by a poor devil, with nobody to advise him. I am coiling such a web round them and making it fast as you may see a spider, first to this point and then to the other, that I won't leave my persecutors for one solitary chance of escape. I'll draw it quietly round and round, closer and closer, till they can neither blow nor budge, and then up to the yard arm they go, with what breath is left in them. You don't know yet how I am dodging, or why my measures are taken, but I'll shorten your long face a good inch with a genuine broad grin when you learn how it all was. I may see you to tell the story in four weeks' time, but keep this close. Don't mention where I write from, nor even so much as my name. I have reasons for everything which you may guess, I dare say, being a sharp chap, and it is not for nothing be very sure that I am running this queer rig, masquerading, hiding and dodging like a runaway forger, which is not pleasant anyway, and, if you doubt it, only try, but needs must when the old boy drives. He is a clever fellow, no doubt, but has been sometimes outwitted before now. You must arrange about Chelford and Lake. I don't know where Lake is staying. I don't suppose at Brandon, but he won't stay in the country, nor spend his money to please you or I. Therefore, you must have him at your house, be sure, and I will square it with you. I think three pounds a week ought to do it very handsome. Don't be a muff and give him expensive wines. A pint of sherry is plenty between you, and when he dines at his club half a pint does him. I know. But if he costs you more, I hereby promise to pay it. Won't that do? Well, about Chelford. I have been thinking he takes heirs, and maybe he is on his high horse about that awkward business about Miss Brandon. But there is no reason why Captain Lake should object. He has only to hand you a receipt and my name for the amount of checks you may give him, and to lodge a portion of it where I told him, and the rest to buy consoles. And I suppose he will expect payment for his no trouble. Every fellow, particularly these gentlemen like fellows, they have a pluck at you when they can. If he is at that, give him at the rate of a hundred a year, or a hundred and fifty, if you think he won't do for less, though one hundred pounds ought to be a good deal to Lake. And tell him I have a promise of the agitancy of the county militia if he likes that, and I am sure of a seat in Parliament, either for the county or for Darlington, as you know, and can do better for him then, and I rely on you one way or another to make him undertake it. And now for myself. I think my vexation is very near-ended. I have not fired a gun yet, and they little think what a raking broadside I'll give them. Any of the county people you meet tell them I'm making a little excursion on the Continent, and if they go to particularies, you may say the places I have been at. Don't let anyone know more. I wish there was any way of stopping that old she—it looked like dragon or devil, but was traced over with a cloud of flourishes, and only Lady Chelford's mouth was left untouched. Don't expect to hear from me so long a yarn for some time again, and don't write. I don't stay long anywhere, and don't carry my own name, and never ask for letters at the post. I have a good glass, and can see pretty far, and make a fair guess enough what's going on aboard the enemy. I remain always, dear Larkin, ever yours truly, Mark Wilder. He hardly trusts Lake more than he does me, I presume, murmured Mr. Larkin, elevating his tall bald head with an offended and supercilious air, and letting the thin, open letter fall, or rather throwing it with a slight whisk upon the table. No, I take leave to think he certainly does not. Lake has got private directions about the disposition of a portion of the money. Of course, if there are persons to be dealt with who are not pleasantly approachable by respectable professional people, in fact it would not suit me. It is really more a compliment, and relieves me of the unpleasant necessity of saying, no. Yet Mr. Larkin was very sore, and curious, and in a measure hated both Lake and Wilder for their secret confidences, and was more than ever resolved to get at the heart of Mark's mystery. End of Chapter 41 Chapter 42 of Wilder's Hand This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Kathy Barrett. Wilder's Hand by Jay Sheridan Lafanyou Chapter 42 A Paragraph in the County Paper The nature of his injury considered, Captain Lake recovered with wonderful regularity and rapidity. In four weeks he was out rather pale and languid, but still able to walk without difficulty, leaning on a stick for ten or fifteen minutes at a time. In another fortnight he had made another great advance, had thrown away his crutch-handled stick, and recovered flesh and vigor. In a fortnight more he had grown quite like himself again, and in a very few weeks more I read in the same County Paper, transmitted to me by the same fair hands, but this time not with a cross, but three distinct notes of admiration standing tremulously at the margin of the paragraph, the following to me for a time incredible and very nearly to this day amazing announcement. Marriage in High Life The auspicious event so interesting to our county which we have this day to announce, though for some time upon the tepee, has been attended with as little publicity as possible. The contemplated union between Captain Stanley Lake, late of the guards, sole surviving son of the late General William Stanley Lake, of Plasherwin, and the beautiful and accomplished Miss Brandon of Brandon Hall in this county was celebrated in the ancestral chapel of Brandon, situated within the menorial boundaries in the immediate vicinity of the town of Gillingdon on yesterday. Although the marriage was understood to be strictly private, none but the immediate relations of the bride and bridegroom being present, the bells of Gillingdon rang out merry peels throughout the day, and the town was tastefully decorated with flags and brilliantly illuminated at night. A deputation of the tenantry of the Gillingdon and the Longmore Estates, together with those of the Brandon estate, went in procession to Brandon Hall in the afternoon, and read a well-conceived and affectionate address which was responded to in appropriate terms by Captain Lake, who received them, with his beautiful bride at his side, in the great gallery, perhaps the noblest apartment in that noble ancestral mansion. The tenantry were afterwards handsomely entertained under the immediate direction of Josiah Larkin, Esquire of the Lodge, the respected manager of the Brandon Estates at the Brandon Arms in the town of Gillingdon. It is understood that the great territorial influence of the Brandon family will obtain a considerable accession in the estates of the bridegroom in the south of England. There was some more which I need not copy, being very like what we usually see on such occasions. I read this piece of intelligence half a dozen times over during breakfast. How that beautiful girl has thrown herself away, I thought. Surely the Chelfords who have an influence there ought to have exerted it to prevent her doing anything so mad. His estates in the south of England indeed. Why, he can't have three hundred pounds a year clear from that little property in Devon. He is such a liar and so absurd as if he could succeed in deceiving anyone upon the subject. So I read the paragraph over again, and laid down the paper simply saying, well, certainly that is disgusting. I had heard of his duel. It was also said that it had in some way had referenced to Miss Brandon. But this was the only rumored incident which would at all have prepared one for the occurrence. I tried to recollect anything particular in his manner. There was nothing, and she positively seemed to dislike him. I had been utterly mystified, and so I presume had all the other lookers on. Well, after all, it was no particular business of mine. At the club I saw it in the morning-post, and an hour after, old Joe Gabelos, that prosy argous who knows everything, recounted the details with patient precision, and in legal phrase, put in letters from two or three country houses proving his statement. So there was no doubting it longer in Captain Stanley Lake late of Her Majesty's regiment of guards, idler, scamp, coxcomb in the beautiful Dorcas Brandon, heiress of Brandon, were man and wife. I wrote to my fair friend Miss Cibes and had an answer confirming, if that were needed, the public announcement, and mentioning enigmatically that it had caused a great deal of conversation. The posture of affairs in the small world of Gillingdon, except in the matter of the alliance just referred to, was not much changed. Since the voluminous dispatch from Marseilles, promising his return so soon, not a line had been received from Mark Wilder. He might arrive any day or night. He might possibly have received some unexpected check, if not checkmate, in that dark and deep game on which he seemed to have staked so awfully. Mr. Josiah Larkin sometimes thought one thing, sometimes another. In the meantime Captain Lake accepted the trust. Larkin at times thought there was a constant and secret correspondence going on between him and Mark Wilder, and that he was his agent in adjusting some complicated and villainous piece of diplomacy by means of the fund. Secret service money, which Mark had placed at his disposal. He, Mr. Larkin, was treated like a child in this matter, and his advice never so much as asked, nor his professional honour accredited by the smallest act of confidence. Sometimes his suspicions took a different turn, and he thought that Lake might be one of those persecutors of whom Mark spoke with such mysterious hatred, and that the topic of their correspondence was perhaps some compromise, the subject or the terms of which would not bear the light. Lake certainly made two visits to London, one of them of a week's duration, the attorney being a sharp, long-headed fellow who knew very well what business was, knew perfectly well, too, that two or three short letters might have settled any legitimate business which his gallant friend had in the capital. But Lake was now married, and under the incantation whistled over him by the toothless arch-deacon of Mundellbury, had sprung up into a magnet, and was worth cultivating and to be treated tenderly. So the attorney's business was to smile and watch, to watch, and of course to pray, as here too for, but specially to watch. He himself hardly knew all that was passing in his own brain. There are operations of physical nature which go on actively without your being aware of them, and the moral respiration, circulation, insensible perspiration, and all the rest of that peculiar moral system which exhibited its type in Josiah Larkin, proceeded automatically in the immortal structure of that gentleman. Being very gentlemanlike in externals, with a certain grace amounting very nearly to elegance, and having applied himself diligently to please the county people, that proud fraternity, remembering his father's estates, condoned his poverty, and took Captain Lake by the hand, and lifted him into their superb, though not very entertaining, order. There were solemn festivities at Brandon, and festive solemnities at the principal county-houses in return. Though not much of a sportsman, Lake lent himself handsomely to all the sporting proceedings of the county, and subscribed in a way worthy of the old renown of Brandon Hall, to all sorts of charities and gallows. So he was getting on very pleasantly with his new neighbors, and was likely to stand very fairly in that dull, but not unfriendly society. About three weeks after this great county marriage there arrived, this time from Frankfurt, a sharp letter addressed to Josiah Larkin Esquire. It said, My dear sir, I think I have reason to complain. I have just seen by accident the announcement of the marriage at Brandon. I think as my friend, and a friend to the Brandon family, you ought to have done something to delay if you could not stop it. Of course you had the settlements, and devils in it if you could not have beat about a while. It was not so quick with me, and not doubled the point in a single tack, and you know the beggar has next to nothing. Anyway, it was your duty to have printed some notice that the thing was thought of. If you had put it, like a bit of news, in Gallignani I would have seen it, and known what to do. Well, that ships blew up, but I won't let all go, the cur will begin to try for the county, or for Darlington. You must quietly stop that, mind, and if he persists, just you put an advertisement in Gallignani, saying Mr. Smith will take notice that the other party is desirous to purchase, and becoming very pressing. Just you hoist that signal, and somebody will bear down, and blaze into him at all hazards. You'll see how. Things have not gone quite smooth with me since, but it won't belong till I run up my flag again, and take the command. Be perfectly civil with Stanley Lake till I come on board, that is indispensable, and keep this letter as close from every eye as sealed orders. You may want a trifle to balk, Stanley Lake's electioneering, and there's an order on Lake for two hundred pounds. Don't trifle about the county and borough. He must have no footing in either till I return. Yours, dear Larkin, very truly, but look after my business better. M. Wilder. The order on Lake, a little note, was enclosed. Dear Lake, I wish you joy, and all the good wishes going, as I could not make the prize myself. Be so good to hand my lawyer Mr. Josiah Larkin of the lodge, Gillington, two hundred pounds sterling on my account. Yours, dear Lake, very faithfully M. Wilder. Two hundred pounds. Twenty-third February, et cetera, et cetera. When Josiah Larkin presented this little order, it was in the handsome square room in which Captain Lake transacted business. A lofty apartment, Wayne scotted in carved oak, and with a great stone mantelpiece, with the Wilder arms projecting in bold relief in the centre, and a florid scrawl with resurgum standing forth as sharp as the day it was chiseled nearly three hundred years before. There was some other business, brandon business, to be talked over first, and that exhausted Mr. Larkin sat as usual, with one long thigh crossed upon the other, his arm thrown over the back of his chair, and his tall bald head a little back, and his small mild eyes twinkling through their pink lids on the enigmatic Captain, who had entered upon a march of ambition in a spirit so spacious and conquering. I heard a line from Mr. Mark Wilder yesterday afternoon, as usual without any address but the postmark, and good Mr. Larkin laughed a mild little patient laugh, and lifted his open hand and shook his head. It really is growing too absurd. A mere order upon you to hand me two hundred pounds. How I am to dispose of it I have not the faintest notion. And he laughed again, at the same time he gracefully poked the little note between two fingers to Captain Lake, who glanced upon him for a second, as he took it. And how is Mark, inquired Lake with his odd sly smile, as he scrawled a little endorsement on the order? Does he say anything? No, absolutely nothing. He's a very strange client, said Larkin, laughing again. There can be no objection, of course, to your reading it, and he thinks—he thinks he'll be here soon again. Oh, here it is! Mr. Larkin had been fumbling first in his deep waistcoat, and then in his breast pocket, as if for the letter which was locked fast into the iron safe, with Chubb's patent lock in his office at the lodge. But it would not have done to have kept a secret from Captain Lake, of Brandon, and therefore his not seeing the note was a mere accident. Oh, no, stupid! That's mullet and hawks. I've not got it with me. But it does not signify, for there's nothing in it. I hope I shall soon be favoured with his directions as to what to do with the money. He's an odd fellow, and I don't know how he feels towards me, but on my part there is no feeling I do assure you, but the natural desire to live on the friendly terms which are ties of family and our position in the county. Stanley Lake was writing the check for two hundred pounds, meanwhile, and handed it to Larkin, and as that gentleman penned a receipt, the captain continued, his eyes lowered to the little vellum-bound book in which he was now making an entry. You have handed me a large sum, Mr. Larkin—three thousand two hundred seventy-six pounds, eleven shillings, four pennies. I undertook this, you know, on the understanding that it was not to go on very long, and I find my own business pretty nearly as much as I can manage. Is Wilder at all definite as to when we may expect his return? Oh, dear no! Quite as usual. He expects to be here soon, but that is all. I so wish I had brought his note with me, but I'm positive that is all. So this little matter settled. The End of Chapter forty-two Chapter forty-three of Wilder's Hand This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Kathy Barrett Wilder's Hand by Jay Sheridan Lafanyou Chapter forty-three An Evil Eye Looks on the Vicar There were influences of a wholly unsuspected kind already gathering round the poor vicar, William Wilder, as worlds first begin in thinnest vapor and whirl themselves in time into consistency and form, so do these dark machinations, which at times gather round unsuspecting mortals as points of revolution begin nebulously and intangibly and grow in volume and in density till a colossal system with its inexorable tendencies and forces crushes into internal darkness the centre it has enveloped. Thou shalt not covet, thou shalt not cast an eye of desire, out of the heart proceed murders, these dreadful realities shape themselves from so filmy a medium as thought. Ever since his conference with the vicar, Good Mr. Larkin had been dimly thinking of a thing. The Good Attorney's weakness was money. It was a speck at first. A metaphysical microscope of no conceivable power could have developed its exact shape and colour. A mere speck floating as it were in a transparent kiss in his soul. A mere germ, by and by, to be an impish embryo and ripe for action. When lust, hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. The vicar's troubles grew and gathered, as such troubles will, and the Attorney gave him his advice, and the business of the Reverend William Wilder gradually came to occupy a good deal of his time. Here was a new reason for wishing to know really how Mark Wilder stood. William had undoubtedly the reversion of the estate. But the Attorney suspected sometimes, just from a faint phrase which had once escaped Stanley Lake, as the likeliest solution that Mark Wilder had made a left-handed marriage somehow and somewhere, and that a subterranean wife and family would emerge at an unlucky moment and squat upon that remainder, and defy the world to disturb them. This gave to his plans and dealings in relation to the vicar, a character of irresolution and caprice foreign to his character, which was grim and decided enough when his data were clear and his object in sight. William Wilder, meanwhile, was troubled, and his mind clouded by more sorrows than one. Poor William Wilder had those special troubles which haunt nervous temperaments and speculative minds when under the solemn influence of religion. What the great Luther called, without describing them, his tribulations, those dreadful doubts and apathies which at times menace and darken the radiant fabric of faith and fill the soul with nameless horrors. The worst of these is that unlike other troubles they are not always safely to be communicated to those who love us best. These terrors and dubitations are infectious. Other spiritual troubles too there are, and I suppose our good vicar was not exempt from them any more than other Christians. The best man, the simplest man that ever lived, has his reserves. The conscious frailty of mortality owes that sad reference to itself, and to the esteem of others. You can't be too frank and humble when you have wronged your neighbour, but keep your offences against God to yourself, and let your battle with your own heart be waged under the eye of him alone. The frankness of the sentimental Jean-Jacques Rousseau and of my coarse friend Mark Wilder is but a dammable form of vicious egotism. A miserable sinner have I been, my friend, but details profit neither thee nor me. The inner man had best be known only to himself and his maker. I like that good and simple Welsh parson of Bomerys, near two hundred years ago, who with a sad sort of humour placed for motto under his portrait, done in stained glass, nonc primum transperoi. But the spiritual tribulation which came and went was probably connected with the dreadful and incessant horrors of his money trouble. The gigantic brockenspector projected from himself upon the wide horizon of his futurity. The poor vicar. He felt his powers forsaking him. Hope, the life of action, was gone. Despair is fatalism and can't help itself. The inevitable mountain was always on his shoulders. He could not rise, he could not stir. He could scarcely turn his head and look up beseechingly from the corners of his eyes. Why is that fellow so supine? Why is his work so ill-done when he ought most to exert himself? He disgusts the world with his hang-dog looks. Alas, with the need for action, the power of action is gone. Despair, distraction, the fury sit with him. Stunned, stupid, and wild, always agitated, it is not easy to compose his sermons as finely as here too for. He's always jotting down little sums in relation and subtraction. The cares of the world, the miseries of what the world calls difficulties and a struggle these were for the poor vicar. The worst torture for ought we know which an average soul out of hell can endure. Other sorrows bear healing on their wings. This one is the Promethean vulture. It is a falling into the hands of men, not of God. The worst is that its tendencies are so godless. It makes men bitter. Its promptings are blasphemous. Wherefore, he who knew all things in describing the thorns which choke the word, places the cares of this world first, and after them the deceitfulness of riches and the lusts of other things. So if money is a root of evil, the want of it, with debt, is root, and stem, and branches. But all human pain has its intervals of relief. The pain is suspended, and the system recruits itself to endure the coming paroxysm. An hour of illusion, an hour of sleep, an hour's respite of any sort, to six hours of pain, and so the soul, in anguish, finds strength for its long labour, abridged by neither death nor madness. The vicar, with his little boy, fairy by the hand, used twice at least in the week to make sometimes an hours, sometimes only half hours, visit at Redmond's Farm. Poor Rachel Lake made old Tamar sit at her worsteds in the window of the little drawing-room while these conversations proceeded. The young lady was so intelligent that William Wilder was obliged to exert himself in controversy with her eloquent despair. And this combat, with the doubts and terrors, of a mind of much more than ordinary vigor and resource, though altogether feminine, compelled him to besture himself, and so for the time found him entire occupation, and thus memory and forecast and suspense were superseded for the moment by absorbing mental action. Rachel's position had not been altered by her brother's marriage. Dorcas had urged her earnestly to give up Redmond's Farm and take up her abode permanently at Brandon. This kindness, however, she declined. She was grateful, but no, nothing could move her. The truth was she recoiled from it with a species of horror. The marriage had been after all as great a surprise to Rachel as to any of the Gillingdon Gossips. Dorcas, knowing how Rachel thought upon it, had grown reserved and impenetrable upon the subject. Indeed, at one time I think she had half made up her mind to fight the old battle over again and resolutely exercise this fatal passion. She had certainly mystified Rachel, perhaps was mystifying herself. Rachel grew more sad and strange than ever after this marriage. I think that Stanley was right, and that living in that solitary and darksome dell helped to make her hypochondriac. One evening Stanley Lake stood at her door. I was just thinking, dear Raddie, he said in his sweet low tones, which to her ear always bore a suspicion of mockery in them. How pretty you can thrive to make this bright little garden at all times of the year, you have such lots of those evergreens and ivy and those odd flowers. They call them immortels in France, said Rachel, in a cold, strange tone, and make chaplets of them till they upon the coffin lids and the graves. Ah, yes, to be sure, I have seen them there, and in Perlachès, so they do. They have them in all the cemeteries. I forgot that. How tearful, how very sensible. Don't you think it would be a good plan to stick up a death's head and cross bones here and there, and to split up old coffin lids for your setting sticks, and get old moulders, the sextant to bury your roots, and cover them in with a dust to dust, and so forth, and plant a yew-tree in the middle, and stick those bits of painted board that look so woefully like gravestones all round it, and then let old Tamar prowl about for a ghost. I assure you, Raddie, I think you, all to nothing, the perversist fool I ever encountered or heard of in the course of my life. Well, Stanley, suppose you to. I'll not dispute it. Perhaps you are right, said Rachel, still standing at the door of her little porch. Perhaps, he repeated with a sneer, I venture to say, most positively, I can't conceive any sane reason for your refusing Dorcas' entreaty to live with us at Brandon, and leave this trist, and unwholesome in every way objectionable place. She was very kind, but I can't do it. Yes, you can't do it, simply because it would be precisely the most sensible, prudent, and comfortable arrangement you could possibly make. You won't do it, but you can and will practice all the errors and foolries of a bad melodrama. You have succeeded already in filling Dorcas' mind with surmise and speculation. And do you think the Gillingdon people are either blind or dumb? You are taking, I've told you again and again, the very way to excite attention and gossip. What good can it possibly do you? You'll not believe until it happens, and when it does you'd give your eyes you could undo it. It is so like you. I have said how very kind I thought it of Dorcas to propose it. I can't explain to her all my reasons for declining, and to you I need not. But I cannot overcome my repugnance, and I won't try. I wonder, said Stanley, with a sly look of inquiry, that you who read the Bible and a very good book it is, no doubt, and believe in all sorts of things that will do, Stanley, I'm not so weak as you suppose. You know, Raddy, I'm a seducie, and that sort of thing does not trouble me the least in the world. It is a little cold here. Maybe go into the drawing-room. You can't think how I hate this. House! We are always unpleasant in it." This auspicious remark he made taking off his hat, and placing it and his cane on her work-table. But this was not a tempestuous conference by any means. I don't know precisely what they talked about. I think it was probably the prose and cons of that migration to Brandon, against which Rachel had pronounced so firmly. I can't do it, Stanley. My motives are unintelligible to you, I know, and you think me obstinate and stupid, but, be I what I may, my objections are insurmountable. And does it not strike you that my staying here, on the contrary, would tend to prevent the kind of conversation you speak of? Not the least, dear Raddy. That is, I mean, it could have no possible effect, unless the circumstances were first supposed, and then it could be of no appreciable use, and your way of life and your looks, for both are changed, are likely in a little preting village, where every human being is watched and discussed incessantly, to excite conjecture. That is all, and that is everything. It had grown dark while Stanley sat in the little drawing-room, and Rachel stood on her doorstep and saw his figure glide away slowly into the thin mist and shadow, and turn upward to return to Brandon by that narrow ravine where they had held rendezvous with Mark Wilder on that ill-oamened night when trouble began for all. To Rachel's eyes that disappearing form looked like the moping spirit of guilt and regret haunting the scene of the irrevocable. When Stanley took his leave after one of these visits, stolen visits somehow they always seemed to her, the solitary mistress of Redmond's farm invariably experienced the nervous reaction which follows the artificial calm of suppressed excitement. Something of panic or horror relieved sometimes by a gush of tears, sometimes more slowly and painfully subsiding without that hysterical escape. She went in and shut the door and called to Mar, but to Mar was out of the way. She hated that little drawing-room in her present mood. Its associations were odious and even ghastly, so she sat herself down by the kitchen fire and placed her pretty feet, cold now, upon the high steel fender, and extended her cold hands towards the embers leaning back in her chair. And so she got the girl to light candles and asked her a great many questions and obliged her, in fact, to speak constantly though she seemed to listen but little. And when at last the girl herself, growing interested in her own narrative about a kidnapper, grew voluble and animated, and looked round upon the young lady at the crisis of the tale, she was surprised to remark on a sudden that she was gazing vacantly into the bars, and when margaries struck by her fixed and melancholy countenance stopped in the midst of a sentence, the young lady turned and gazed on her wistfully, with large eyes and pale face, and sighed heavily. CHAPTER 44 In which old Tamar lifts up her voice in prophecy. Certainly Stanley Lake was right about Redmond's Dell, once the sun had gone down behind the distant hills it was the darkest, the most silent, and the most solitary of nooks. It was not indeed quite dark yet. The upper sky had still a faint gray twilight halo, and the stars looked wane and faint. But the narrow walk that turned from Redmond's Dell was always dark in Stanley's memory, and seduces, although they believed neither in the resurrection nor the judgment, are no more proof than other men against the resurrections of memory and the penalties of association and of fear. Captain Lake had many things to think of. Some pleasant enough as he measured pleasure, others troublesome, but as he mounted the stone steps that conducted the passenger up the steep aclivity to the upper level of the dark and narrow walk he was pursuing, one black sorrow met him and blotted out all the rest. Captain Lake knew very well and gracefully practised the art of not seeing inconvenient acquaintances in the street. But here, in this narrow way, there met him full, a hated shadow whom he would feign have cut, by looking to right or left or up or down, but which was not to be evaded, would not only have his salutation but his arm and walked, a horror of great darkness, by his side, through this solitude. Committed to a dreadful game in which the stakes had come to exceed anything his wildest fears could have anticipated, from which he could not, according to his own cannons, by any imaginable means recede, here was the spot where the dreadful battle had been joined, in his covenant with futurity sealed. The young captain stood for a moment still on reaching the upper platform, a tiny brook that makes its way among briars and shingle to the more considerable millstream of Redmond's Dell, sent up a horse babbling from the darkness beneath. Why exactly he halted there he could not have said. He glanced over his shoulder down the steps he had just scaled. Had there been light his pale face would have shown just then a malign anxiety, such as the face of an ill-conditioned man might wear, who apprehends danger of treading on a snake. He walked on, however, without quickening his pace, waving very slightly from side to side his ebony walking cane, thin as a pencil, as if it were a wand to beckon away the unseen things that haunt the darkness. And now he came upon the wider plateau, from which the closed cops receding admitted something more of the light faint as it was that lingered in the heavens. A tall grey stone stands in the centre of this space. There had once been a boundary and a style there. Stanley knew it very well, and was not startled as the attorney was the other night when he saw it. As he approached this, someone set close in his ear. I beg your pardon, Master Stanley. He cowered down with a spring as I can fancy a man ducking under a round shot, and glanced speechlessly and still in his attitude of recoil upon the speaker. It's only me, Master Stanley, your poor old Tamar, don't be afraid, dear. I'm not afraid, woman. Tamar, to be sure. Why, of course, I know you, but what the devil brings you here, he said. Tamar was dressed just as she used to be when sitting in the open air at her knitting, except that over her shoulders she had a thin grey shawl. On her head was the same close linen nightcap, borderless and skull-like, and she laid her shriveled freckled hand upon his arm, and looking with an earnest and fearful gaze in his face she said, It has been on my mind this many a day to speak to you, Master Stanley, but whenever I meant to some it came over me and I couldn't. Well, well, well, said Lake Uneasley, I mean to call to-morrow, or next day or some day soon at Redmond's Farm. I'll hear it then. This is no place, you know, Tamar, to talk in. Besides, I'm pressed for time and can't stay now to listen. There's no place like this, Master Stanley, it's so awful secret, she said, with her hand still upon his arm. Secret? Why, one place is as well as another, and what the devil have I to do with secrets? I tell you, Tamar, I mean hasten, can't stay. I won't stay, there. Master Stanley, for the love of heaven, you know what I'm going to speak of. My old bones have carried me here, it is years since I walked so far. I'd walked till I dropped to reach you, but I'd say what's on my mind. It is like a message from heaven, and I must speak. I, dear, I must. But I say I can't stay. Who made you a prophet? You used not to be a fool, Tamar. When I tell you I can't, that's enough. Tamar did not move her fingers from the sleeve of his coat, on which they rested, and that thin pressure mysteriously detained him. See, Master Stanley, if I don't say it to you, I must to another, she said. You mean to threaten me, woman, said he, with a pale, malevolent look. I'm threatening nothing but the wrath of God who hears us. Unless you mean to do me an injury, Tamar, I don't know what else you mean, he answered, in a changed tone. Old Tamar will soon be in her coffin, and this night, far in the past, like many another, and will be everything to you one day, for wheel or woe, to hark into her words now, Master Stanley. Why, Tamar, haven't I told you I'm ready to listen to you? I'll go and see you, upon my honour, I will, to-morrow, or next day, at the dell. What's the good of stopping me here? Because, Master Stanley, something told me tis the best place. We're quiet, and you're more like to weigh my words here, and you'll be alone for a while after you leave me, and can ponder my advice as you walk home on your path. Well, whatever it is, I suppose it won't take very long to say, let us walk on to the stone there, and then I'll stop and hear it, but you must not keep me all night, he said very peevishly. It was only twenty steps further on, and the woods receded round it, so as to leave an irregular amphitheater or some sixty yards across, and Captain Lake, glancing from the corners of his eyes this way and that, without raising or turning his face, stopped listlessly at the time war in white stone, and turning to the old crone who was by his side, he said. Well, then, you have your way, but speak low, please, if you have anything unpleasant to say. Tomorrow laid her hand upon his arm again, and the old woman's face afforded Stanley Lake no clue to the coming theme. Its expression was quite as usual, not actually discontent or peevishness, but crimped and puckered all over with unchanging lines of anxiety and suffering. Neither was there any flurry in her manner. Her bony arm and discoloured hand, once her fingers lay upon his sleeve, did not move. Only she looked very earnestly in his face as she spoke. You'll not be angry, Master Stanley, dear. Though if you be, I can't help it, for I must speak. I've heard it all. I heard you and Miss Raddie speak on the night you first came to see her after your sickness, and I heard you speak again by my room door, only a week before your marriage, when you thought I was asleep. So I've heard it all, and though I may not understand all the ins and outs on't, I know it well in the main. Oh, Master Stanley, Master Stanley, how can you go on with it? Come to mar, what do you want of me? What do you mean? What the damn is it all about? Oh, well you know, Master Stanley, what it's about. Well, there is something unpleasant, and I suppose you have heard a smattering of it in your muddled way. But it is quite plain you don't in the least understand it, when you fancy I can do anything to serve anyone in the smallest degree connected with that disagreeable business, or that I am personally in the least to blame in it. And I can't conceive what business you had listening at the keyhole to your mistress in me, nor why I am wasting my time talking to an old woman about my affairs, which you can neither understand nor take part in. Master Stanley, it won't do. I heard it. I could not help hearing. I little thought you had any such matter to speak, and you spoke so sudden like I could not help it. You were angry and raised your voice. What could Old Tomar do? I heard it all before I knew where I was. I really think, Tomar, you've taken leave of your wits. You are quite in the clouds. Come, Tomar, tell me, once for all, only drop your voice a little, if you please, what the plague has got into your old head. Come, I say, what is it? He stooped and leaned his ear to Tomar, and when she had done he laughed. The laugh, though low, sounded wild and hollow in that dark solitude. Really, dear Tomar, you must excuse my laughing. You dear old witch, how the plague could you take any such frightful nonsense into your head? I do assure you, upon my honour, I never heard of so ridiculous a blunder. Only that I know you are really fond of us. I should never speak to you again. I forgive you. But listen no more to other people's conversation. I could tell you how it really stands now, only I have not time, but you'll take my word of honour for it. You have made the most absurd mistake that ever an old fool tumbled into. No, Tomar, I can't stay any longer now, but I'll tell you the whole truth when next I go down to Redmond's farm. In the meantime you must not plague poor Miss Raddy with your nonsense. She has too much already to trouble her, though of quite another sort. Good night, foolish old Tomar. Oh, Master Stanley, it will take a deal to shake my mind, and if it be so, as I say, what's to be done next? What's to be done? Oh, what is to be done? I say good night, old Tomar, and hold your tongue, do you see? Oh, Master Stanley, Master Stanley, my poor child! My child that I nursed! Anything would be better than this. Sooner or later judgement will overtake you, so sure as you persist in it. I heard what Miss Raddy said, and is not it true, is not it cruel, is not it frightful to go on? You don't seem to be aware, my good Tomar, that you have been talking slander all this while, and might be sent to jail for it? There, I'm not angry, only you're a fool! Good night!" He shook her hand, and jerked it from him with suppressed fury, passing on with a quickened pace, and as he glided through the dark, towards splendid old Brandon, he ground his teeth, and uttered two or three sentences which no respectable publisher would like to print. CHAPTER 45 Deep and Shallow Lawyer Larkin's mind was working more diligently than anyone suspected upon this puzzle of Mark Wilder. The investigation was a sort of scientific recreation to him, and something more. His sure instinct told him it was a secret well worth mastering. He had a growing belief that and perhaps he only, except Wilder himself, knew the meaning of all this mysterious marching and counter-marching. Of course, all sorts of theories were floating in his mind, but there was none that would quite fit all the circumstances. The attorney, had he asked himself the question, what was his object in these inquisitions, would have answered, I'm doing what few other men would, I am, heaven knows, giving to this affair of my absent clients gratuitously, as much thought and vigilance as ever I did to any case in which I was duly remunerated. This is self-sacrificing and noble, and just the conscientious conduct I should expect from myself. But there was also this consideration which you failed to define. Yes, my respected client, Mr. Mark Wilder, is suffering under some acute pressure, applied perhaps by my friend Captain Lake. Why should not I share in the profit, if such there be, by getting my hand, too, upon the instrument of compression? It is worth trying. Let us try. The reverend William Wilder was often at the lodge now. Larkin had struck out a masterly plan. The vicar's reversion, a very chimerical contingency, he would by no means consent to sell. His little man, little fairy! Oh, no, he could not. The attorney only touched on this, remarking in a friendly way, but then, you know, it is so mere a shadow. This indeed poor William knew very well, but though he spoke quite meekly, the attorney looked rather black, and his converse grew somewhat dry and short. The sinister change was sudden, and immediately followed the suggestion about the reversion, and the poor vicar was a little puzzled, and began to consider whether he had said anything gauche or offensive. It would be so very painful to appear ungrateful. The attorney had the statement of title in one hand, and leaning back in his chair, read it demurely in silence, with the other tapping the seal end of his gold pencil case between his lips. Yes, said Mr. Larkin mildly, it is so very shadowy, and that feeling, too, in the way. I suppose we had better, perhaps, put it aside, and maybe something else may turn up. And the attorney rose grandly to replace the statement of title in its tin box, intimating thereby that the audience was ended. But the poor vicar was in rather urgent circumstances just then, and his troubles had closed in recently with a noiseless but tremendous contraction, like that iron shroud in Mr. Mudford's fine tale, and to have gone away into outer darkness, with no project on the stalks and the attorney's countenance averted, would have been simply despair. To speak frankly, said the poor vicar, with that hectic in his cheek that came with agitation, I never fancied that my reversionary interest could be saleable. Neither is it in all probability, answered the attorney, as you are so seriously pressed, and your brother's return delayed, it merely crossed my mind as a thing worth trying. It was very kind and thoughtful, but that feeling that—my poor little man, however, I may be only nervous and foolish, and I think I'll speak to Lord Chelford about it. The attorney looked down, and took his netherlip gently between his finger and thumb. I rather think he had no particular wish to take Lord Chelford into counsel. I think before troubling his lordship upon the subject, if indeed on reflection you should not think it would be a little odd to trouble him at all in reference to it, I had better look a little more carefully into the papers, and see whether anything in that direction is really practicable at all. Do you think, Mr. Larkin, you can write that strong letter to stay proceedings which you intended yesterday? The attorney shook his head and said, with a sad sort of dryness, I can't see my way to it. The vicar's heart sank with a flutter, and swelled, and sank another bit, and his forehead flushed. There was a silence. You see, Mr. Wilder, I relied, in fact, altogether upon this, um, arrangement, and I don't see that anything is likely to come of it. The attorney spoke in the same dry and reserved way, and there was a shadow on his long face. I have forfeited his good will somehow. He has ceased to take any interest in my wretched affairs. I am abandoned, and must be ruined. These dreadful thoughts filled in another silence. And then the vicar said, I am afraid I have quite unintentionally offended you, Mr. Larkin, perhaps in my ignorance of business, and I feel that I should be quite ruined if I were to forfeit your good offices, and pray tell me if I have said anything I not not. Oh, no, nothing I assure you, replied Mr. Larkin, with a lofty and gentle dryness. Only I think I have perhaps a little mistake in the relation in which I stood, and fancied wrongly that was in the light somewhat of a friend as well as of a professional adviser, and I thought perhaps I had rather more of your confidence than I had any right to, and did not at first see the necessity of calling in Lord Shelford, whose experience of business is necessarily very limited, to direct you. You remember, my dear Mr. Wilder, that I did not at all invite these relations, and I don't think you will charge me with want of zeal in your business. Oh, my dear Mr. Larkin, my dear sir, you have been my preserver, my benefactor, in fact under heaven verily nearly my last and only hope. Well, I had hoped I was not remiss or wanting indiligence. And Mr. Larkin took a seat in his gentlemanlike fashion, crossing his long legs and throwing his tall head back, raising his eyebrows and letting his mouth languidly drop a little open. My idea was that Lord Shelford would see more clearly what was best for little Fairy. I am so very slow and so silly about business, and you so much, my friend, I have found you so that you might think only of me. I should, of course, consider the little boy, said Mr. Larkin condescendingly, a most interesting child. I am very fond of children myself, and should, of course, put the entire case, as respected him as well as yourself, to the best of my humble powers before you. Is there anything else just now, you think of? For time presses, and really we have ground to apprehend something unpleasant to-morrow. You ought not, my dear sir, pray permit me to say. You really ought not to have allowed it to come to this. The poor vicar sighed profoundly, and shook his head, a contrite man. I forgot that it was arithmetically impossible for him to have prevented it, unless he had got some money. Perhaps said the vicar, brightening up suddenly, and looking in the attorney's eyes for answer, perhaps something might be done with the reversion, as a security, to borrow a sufficient sum, without selling. The attorney shook his high head, and whiskers Gray and Foxy, and meditated with the seal of his pencil case between his lips. I don't see it, said he, with another shake of that long head. I don't know that any lender, in fact, would entertain such a security. If you wish it, I will write to Burlington Smith and Company about it. They are largely in policies and post-obits. It is very sad—very sad indeed. I wish so much, my dear sir, I could be of use to you. But you know the fact is, we solicitors seldom have the command of our own money—always in advance, always drained to the uttermost chilling, and I am myself in the predicament you will see later. And he threw a little note from the Dullington Bank to Josiah Larkin Esquire, the Lodge, Gillingdon, announcing the fact that he had overdrawn his account certain pounds, shillings, and pence, and inviting him forthwith to restore the balance. The vicar read it with a vague comprehension, and in his cold fingers shook the hand of his fellow sufferer. Less than fifty pounds would not do. Oh, where was he to turn? It was quite hopeless, and poor Larkin pressed, too. Now there was this consolation in poor Larkin's case, that although he was quite run aground, and a defaulter in the Dullington Bank to the extent of seven pounds, twelve shillings, four pence, yet in that similar institution, which flourished at Naunton only nine miles away, there stood to his name the satisfactory credit of five hundred and sixty-four pounds, eleven shillings, seven pence. One advantage which the good attorney derived from his double account with the rival institutions was that whenever convenient he could throw one of these certificates of destitution and impotence sadly under the eyes of a client in want of money like poor Will Wilder. The attorney had no pleasure in doing people ill turns, but he had come to hear the distresses of his clients as tranquilly as doctors do the pangs of their patients. As he stood meditating near his window he saw the poor vicar with slow limbs past countenance, walk under his labyrinums and lourist innces towards his little gate, and suddenly stop and turn round, and make about a dozen quick steps like a man who has found a bright idea towards the house, and then come to a thoughtful halt, and so turn and recommence his slow march of despair homeward. At five o'clock it was dark now, there was a tread on the doorsteps, and a double tattoo at the tiny knocker, it was the lawyer. Mr. Larkin entered the vicar's study, where he was supposed to be busy about his sermon. My dear sir, thinking about you, and I have just heard from an old humble friend who wants high interest and of course is content to take security somewhat personal in its nature. I have written already, he's in the hands of Burlington Smith and Company. I have got exactly fifty-five pounds since I saw you, which makes me all right at Darlington, and here's my check for fifty pounds, which you can send, or perhaps I had better send by this night's post, to those Cambridge people. It settles that, and you give me a line on this stamp, acknowledging the fifty pounds on account of money to be raised on your reversion. So that's off your mind, my dear sir. Oh, Mr. Larkin, my—you don't know, sir, what you have done for me. The agony. Oh, thank God, what a friend is raised up! And he clasps and rung the long hands of the attorney, and I really think there was a little moisture in that gentleman's pink eyes for a moment or two. When he was gone, the vicar returned from the doorstep, radiant, not to the steady, but to the parlor. Oh, Willie, darling, you look so happy! You were uneasy this evening, said his little ugly wife with a beautiful smile jumping up and clasping him. Yes, darling, I was, very uneasy, but thank God it is over, and they cried and smiled together in that delightful embrace, while all the time little fairy with a paper cap on his head was telling them half a dozen things together and pulling wopsy by the skirts. Then he was lifted up and kissed, and smiled on by that sunshine only remembered in the sad old days—parental love. And there was high festival kept in the parlor that night. I am told six crumpets and a new egg apiece besides a tea, to make merry with and stories and little songs for fairy. Willie was in his old college spirits. It was quite delightful, and little fairy was up a great deal too late, and the vicar and his wife had quite a cheery chat over the fire, and he and she both agreed he would make a handsome sum by Eusebius. Thus, if there are afflictions, there are also comforts. Great consolations, great chastisements, there is a comforter, and there is a chasener. Every man must taste of death. Every man must taste of life. It shall not be all bitter, nor all sweet for any. It shall be life. The unseen ministers of a stupendous equity have their eyes and their hands about every man's portion. As it is written, he that had gathered much had nothing over, and he that had gathered little had no lack. It is the same earth for all, the same earth for the dead, great and small, dust to dust, the same earth for the living. Thorns also, and thistle shall it bring forth, and God provides the flowers too.