"If it hadn't been for you," sobbed Cherrie, "it never would have happened. I hate you, Mr. Blake! There!"
"Now, Cherrie, you know right well you would have run away with Captain Cavendish that time, married or not married. Oh! you may deny it, and perhaps you think so now; but I know better. But he's the greatest rascal that ever went unhung, to use you as he has; and if you had the spirit of a turnip, you would be revenged."
"I will!" cried Cherrie, clenching her little fist resolutely; "I will! I'll let him see I'm not the dirt under his feet! I've stood it long enough! I'll stand it no longer!"
Mr. Blake's eyes sparkled at the spirited declaration.
"That's my brave Cherrie! I always knew you were spunky! You shall hear from his own lips the avowal of his false marriage, and then you will go before a magistrate and swear to all you know about that night of the robbery and murder. There is a steamer to leave Charlottetown to-morrow, at nine. Will you be ready if I drive up here for you?"
"Yes," said Cherrie; "I haven't so much to pack, goodness knows! and I'm sick and tired of this place. How's all our folks? It's time to ask."
"They are all well, and will be very glad to get pretty Cherrie back again. Speckport's been a dull place since you left it. Cheer up, Cherrie! There's bright days in store for you yet."
Cherrie did not reply, and she did not look very hopeful. She was crying quietly; and Val's heart was touched as he looked at the pale, tear-stained face, and thought how bright and pretty and rosy and smiling it used to be. He bent over her, and—well, I shouldn't like Miss Blair to know it—but Mr. Blake deliberately kissed her!
"Keep up a good heart, little Cherrie; it will be all right yet, and we'll fix the flint of Captain G. P. Cavendish. I'll drive up here for you at eight to-morrow. Be all ready. Good-bye."
Cherrie was all ready and waiting at the gate, next morning, when Mr. Blake drove up through the slanting morning sunlight, dressed in her best. She was in considerably better spirits than on the previous day, and much more like the Cherrie of other days, glad to get home and eager for the journey. The lady passengers, during the day, asked her if "the tall gentleman" was her husband. That gentleman had a great deal to tell her; of poor Nathalie's death, and Charley's flight; of the new heiress, who had turned so many heads, and had given the worst turn of all to Captain Cavendish; of that gentleman's despair when she married Mr. Wyndham; of the changes and gay doings at Redmon; and lastly, of Nathalie's ghost. This last rather scared Cherrie. What if Nathalie should appear to her—to her, who had wronged her so deeply through her brother.
"Oh, no!" said Mr. Blake, to whom she imparted her fears; "I don't think she will, if you tell the truth; or, at all events, she will be a most unreasonable ghost if she does. You tell all, Cherrie, and Charley will come back to Speckport; and by that time you'll have got your red cheeks back again, and who knows what may happen?"
Mr. Blake whistled as he threw out this artful insinuation; but Cherrie caught at it eagerly, and her face lit up. Charley's handsome visage rose before her—blue-eyed, fair-haired Charley—who had always loved her, and never would have treated her as Captain Cavendish had done. Who knew what might happen! Who, indeed!
"I'll tell the whole truth," said Cherrie, aloud. "I'll tell everything, Mr. Blake, when I'm once sure I'm not Captain Cavendish's real wife. I know I did wrong to treat poor Charley as I did; but I will do all I can now to make up for it."
They reached S—— at dark, and remained there all night and the following morning. They might have gone down to Speckport in the eight P.M. train; but Val preferred to remain for the two A.M., for reasons of his own.
"If we land in Speckport at noon, Cherrie," he said, "we may be seen and recognized. We will go down in the afternoon and get there about nine, when it will be dark, and you can pass unnoticed. I don't want Captain Cavendish to find out you are there, until I am ready."
So Cherrie, thickly vailed, took her place in the car, after dinner; and was whirled through the pleasant country, with its fields and forests and villages, toward good old Speckport—that dull, foggy town that her heart had grown sick with longing many a time to see.
There were no lamps lit in the streets of Speckport that night. When the waning September moon shone out in such brilliance, surrounded by such a crowd of stars as persuaded one to believe all the constellations were flaming at once, gas became superfluous, and the city fathers spared it. The vailed lady was handed out by Mr. Blake; a proceeding which considerably excited the curiosity of some of Mr. Blake's friends, loafing around the platform.
"Blake can't have got married up the country, can he?" drawled out Lieutenant the Honorable L. H. Blank to young McGregor. "Who's the woman?"
"Blessed if I know," replied Alick.
Val hurried his charge into a cab, sprang in after her, and gave the order, "Wasson's Hotel."
"It's a new place, and not much patronized," he explained to Cherrie. "You won't be recognized there; and I'll tell them to fetch you your meals up to your room. And to-morrow, Cherrie, I want you to come round to my office at about eleven. Come in the back way off Brunswick street, you know; so you won't have to pass through the outer office, and be recognized by Clowrie and Gilcase, and the rest of 'em. I'll be waiting for you; and if Cavendish doesn't drop in, which he does to kill time about that hour every day, I'll send for him, and you'll hear his confession without being seen."
Mr. Blake walked home that night, chuckling inwardly all the way.
"I said I would pay you off, Cavendish," he soliloquized, "for leading Charley Marsh astray, and cutting up those other little cantrips of yours; and I think the time has come at last—I really think, my dear boy, the time has come!"
It was some time after ten when Mr. Blake presented himself at Mr. Blair's, and found the family about retiring for the night. Laura was not at home, she was up at Redmon—Laura's mamma said—stopping with Mrs. Wyndham, who seemed to be very unhappy.
"What was she unhappy about?" Mr. Blake inquired. But Mrs. Blair only sighed, and shook her head, and hinted darkly about hasty marriages.
"Eh?" said Val, "Wyndham doesn't thrash her, does he? She's big and buxom, and he's only a little fellow; and I think, on the whole, she would be a match for him in a free fight!"
Mr. Blair laughed, but Mrs. Blair looked displeased.
"My dear Mr. Blake, how can you say such things? Mr. and Mrs. Wyndham are not a happy couple, that is clear; but whose is the fault I cannot undertake to say. He is greatly changed of late. I suppose he worries about his mother."
"Oh, his mother! Has anybody seen that most mysterious lady yet?"
"Not that I am aware of! He has not even called in medical advice."
"And the ghost," said Val, lighting his bedroom-lamp, "has it been figuranting since?"
"No," said Mr. Blair; "the ghost hasn't showed since you left. I say, Blake, did you settle your country-business satisfactorily?"
"Very!" replied Mr. Blake, with emphasis. "I never settled any business more to my satisfaction in the whole course of my life!"
Mr. Blake was in his office bright and early next morning, hard at work. At about eleven he descended the stairs, and opened the back door, which fronted on a dull little street, through which a closely-vailed female figure was daintily picking her way. Val admitted the lady, and ran before her up-stairs.
"Up to time, Cherrie, there's nothing like it! I sent Bill Blair round to Cavendish's rooms to tell him to look in before twelve, and I expect them back every moment. By Jove! there's his voice outside now. Get in here quick, and sit down! There's a crack in the partition, through which you can see and hear. Not a chirp out of you, now. Come in!"
Mr. Blake raised his voice; and in answer, the door opened, and Captain Cavendish, smoking a cigar, lounged in. Val gave one glance at the buttoned door of the little closet in which he had hidden Cherrie, and nodded familiarly to his visitor.
"Good-morning, captain! find a chair. Oh, pitch the books on the floor—they're of no account. I'm to notice them all favorably in the 'Spouter'—the author sent a five-dollar bill for me to do it!"
"Young Blair said you wanted to see me," remarked the captain, tilting back his chair, and looking inquiringly through his cigar-smoke.
"Why, so I did. I heard before I went up the country a rumor that you were going to leave us—going to leave the army, in fact, and return to England. Is it so?"
"Yes. I'm confoundedly tired of Speckport, and this from-hand-to-mouth life. It is time I retired on my fortune, and I am going to do it."
"How?"
"Well, I mean to return home—run down to Cumberland, and saddle myself on my old uncle. He was always fond of me as a boy, and I know is yet, in spite of his new wife and heir. Perhaps I may drop into a good thing there—heiresses are plenty."
"I should think you had got your heart-scald of that," said Val, grinning. "You bait your hook for heiresses often enough, but the gold-fish don't seem to bite."
Captain Cavendish colored and frowned.
"All heiresses are not Miss Hendersons," he said, with a cold sneer. "I might know what to look for from your Bluenose and Quaker tradesmen's daughters. I shall marry an English lady—one whose father did not make his money selling butter or hawking fish."
"Oh, come now, Cavendish! You have been in love in Speckport. Don't deny it!"
"I do deny it," said the captain, coldly.
"Nonsense! You were in love with Nathalie Marsh."
"Never! Azure-eyed and fair-haired wax dolls never were any more to my taste than boiled chicken! I never cared a jot for Nathalie Marsh."
"Well, you did for Olive Henderson—you can't deny that! She is not of the boiled chicken order, and all Speckport knows you were mad about her."
"Speckport knows more than its prayers. I did admire Miss Henderson—I don't deny it; but she had the temper of the old devil, and I am glad I escaped her!"
"And Cherrie—have you quite forgotten Cherrie? You were spooney enough about her."
"Bah!" said Captain Cavendish, with infinite contempt; "don't sicken me by talking of Cherrie! I had almost forgotten there ever was such a little fool in existence!"
"And you never cared for Cherrie, either?"
Captain Cavendish broke into a laugh.
"You know how I cared for her. The woman a man can marry is another thing altogether!"
"Some far higher up in the world than Captain Cavendish have stooped to fall in love and marry girls as poor as Cherrie. You never could, I suppose?"
"Never! The idea is absurd! I wouldn't marry a girl like Cherrie if she had the beauty of the Venus de Medicis!"
"Did you ever undeceive Cherrie about that marriage affair? Did you let her know she was not your wife?"
"Not I," said Captain Cavendish, coolly. "I never took so much trouble about her! I was heartily sick of her before a week!"
"Well, it seems hard," said Val. "Poor little thing! She was very fond of you, too."
"Stuff! She was as fond of me as she was, or would be, of any other decently good-looking man. She was ready to rum off with any one who asked her, whether it were I, or young Marsh, or any of the rest. I know what Cherrie was made of."
"And so she thinks she is still your wife?"
"I don't know what she thinks!" exclaimed the young officer, impatiently; "and what's more, I don't care! What do you talk to me of Cherrie Nettleby for? I tell you I know nothing about her!"
"And I tell you I don't believe it," said Val. "You have her hid away somewhere, Cavendish; and if you are an honorable man, you will tell her the truth, and provide for her before you leave Speckport."
Captain Cavendish might have flown into a rage with any other man, but he only burst into a loud laugh at Val.
"Tell her the truth and provide for her! Why, you blessed innocent, do you suppose Cherrie, wherever she is, has been constant to me all this time? I tell you I know nothing of her, and care nothing! Make your mind easy, old fellow! the girl is off with somebody else long before this! What's that?"
Captain Cavendish looked toward the buttoned door of the closet. There had been a strange sound, between a gasp and a cry, but Mr. Blake took no notice.
"It's only the rats! So you will leave Speckport, and do nothing for Cherrie? Cavendish, I am sorry I ever had a hand in that night's work!"
"Too late now, my dear boy!" laughed the Englishman. "Make your mind easy about Cherrie! She's just the girl can take care of herself! If ever she comes back to Speckport, give her my regards!"
He pulled out his watch, still laughing, and arose to go.
"Half-past eleven—I have an engagement at twelve, and must be off. By-by, Blake! don't fret about Cherrie!"
Mr. Blake did not reply, and his face was very grave as he shut and locked the door after his visitor.
"You're a greater villain, Captain Cavendish," he said to himself, "than even I took you to be! Come out, Cherrie—have you heard enough?"
Yes, she had heard enough! She was crouching on the door, her hands clenched, her eyes flashing. She leaped up like a little tigress as he opened the door.
"Take me to a magistrate!" she cried. "Let me tell all I know! I'll hang him! I'll hang him, if I can!"
"Sit down, Cherrie," said Val, "and compose yourself. It won't do to go in such a gale as this before the authorities. Tell me first. By that time you will be settled!"
An hour afterward, Mr. Blake left his office by the back-door, accompanied by the vailed lady. Cherrie had told all.
Mr. Blake had made little notes of Cherrie's discourse, and had the whole story arranged in straightforward and business-like shape, for the proper authorities. He did not lead his fair companion straight to those authorities, as she vindictively desired, but back to her hotel.
"I think I'll hand over the case to Darcy, Cherrie," he said; "and he is out of town, and won't be back till to-morrow afternoon.—There's no hurry—Cavendish won't leave Speckport yet awhile. We'll wait until to-morrow, Cherrie."
Cherrie had to obey orders; and passed the time watching the passers-by under her window. There were plenty of passers-by, for the window fronted on Queen Street, and Cherrie knew almost every one. It was hard sometimes to hide behind the curtain instead of throwing open the casement and hailing those old friends who brought back so vividly the happy days when she had been the little black-eyed belle, and Captain Cavendish was unknown. It seemed only like yesterday since she had tripped down that sunlit street, in glittering silk, with all the men bowing, and smiling, and tipping their hats jocosely to her; only yesterday since the good-looking young drygoods clerks vaulted airily over the counters to do her bidding. And now, and now! She never could be what she had been again. And to this man, this false and treacherous Englishman, for whom she had sacrificed noble-hearted Charley Marsh, she owed it all. She set her teeth vindictively, and clenched her little fist at the thought.
"But I'll pay him for it! I'll teach him to despise me! I only hope they may hang him—the villain! Hard labor for life would not be half punishment enough for him!"
They talk of presentiments! Surely, there never was such a thing, else why had George Cavendish no dim foreshadowing of the doom darkening so rapidly around him. He had told Val Blake he had an engagement. So he had; it was in Prince Street, with Mr. Tom Oaks, who had returned to Speckport, and who was going the road to ruin faster than any victim Captain Cavendish had ever in hand before. It was growing dusk when they left the gambling-hell; and Mr. Oaks was poorer and Captain Cavendish richer by several hundred pounds than when they entered. The gorgeous coloring of the sunset yet flared in the sky, though the crimson and amber were flecked with sinister black. Captain Cavendish drew out a gold hunting-watch, and looked at the hour. "Past six," he said, carelessly; "I shall be late at Redmon, I fear. The hour is seven, I believe. Do you drive there this evening?"
"No," said Mr. Oaks, with a black scowl, "I hope my legs will be palsied if ever they cross the threshold of that woman! I'm not a hound, to fawn on people who kick me!"
Captain Cavendish only smiled—he rarely lost his temper—and went off to his hotel, whistling an opera air. He passed under Cherrie's window; but no prescience of the flashing black eyes above troubled the serenity of his mind. He was walking steadily to his fate, as we all walk—blindly, unconsciously.
Captain Cavendish was the last to arrive at Redmon—all the other guests were assembled in the drawing-room when he entered, and they had been discussing him and his departure for the last quarter of an hour.
The dinner party at Redmon was a very pleasant one; and every one, except, perhaps, the stately hostess herself, was very gay and animated. Mr. Wyndham, despite the trouble he was in about his poor mad mother, was the most entertaining and agreeable of hosts. The ladies, when they flocked back to the drawing-room, enthusiastically pronounced Mr. Wyndham "a perfect love!" and declared they quite envied Mrs. Wyndham a husband who could tell such charming stories, and who was so delightfully clever and talented. And Olive Wyndham smiled, and sat down at the piano to do her share of the entertaining, with that dreary pain at her beating and rebellious heart that never seemed to leave it now. Yes, it was a very pleasant evening; and Captain Cavendish found it so, and lingered strangely, talking to his hostess after all the rest had gone. Lieutenant the Honorable L. H. Blank, who was waiting for him on the graveled drive outside, grew savage as he pulled out his watch and saw it wanted only a quarter of twelve.
"Confound the fellow!" he muttered, "does he mean to stay all night talking to Mrs. Wyndham, and I am sleepy. Oh, here he is at last! I say, Cavendish, what the dickens kept you?"
Captain Cavendish laughed, as he vaulted into his saddle.
"What's your hurry, my dear fellow? I was talking to Mrs. Wyndham, and common politeness forbade my cutting the conversation short."
"Common bosh! Mrs. Wyndham was yawning in your face, I dare say! My belief is, Cavendish, you are as much in love with that black-eyed goddess now as ever."
"Pooh! it was only a flirtation all through; and I would as soon flirt with a married lady any day as a single one. She looked superb to-night, did not she, in that dress that flashed as she walked—was it pink or white—and that ivy crown on her head?"
"She always looks superb! I should like to fetch such a wife as that back to old England. A coronet would sit well on that stately head."
A strangely-bitter regret for what he had lost smote the heart of Captain Cavendish. It might have been. He might have brought that black-eyed divinity as his wife to England, but for Paul Wyndham. Why had she preferred that man to him?
"I wonder if she loves him?" he said aloud.
"Who?—her husband? Do you know, Cavendish, she puzzles me there. She treats him with fearfully frigid politeness, but she never ceases to watch him. If he were any kind of man but the kind he is, I should say she was jealous of him. He is a capital fellow, anyhow, and I like him immensely."
They rode through the iron gates as he spoke, which clanged noisily behind them. The night was not very bright, for the moon struggled through ragged piles of black cloud, and only glimmered with a wan and pallid light on the earth. The trees loomed up black against the clear sky, and cast vivid and unearthly shadows across the dusty road. A sighing wind moaned fitfully through the wood, and the trees surged and groaned, and rocked to and fro restlessly. It was a spectral night enough, and the young lieutenant shivered in the fitful blast.
"I feel as if I had taken a shower-bath of ice-water," he said. "Wasn't it somewhere near here that Val Blake saw the ghost? Good Heavens! What's that?"
As he spoke, there suddenly came forth from the shadow of the tree, as if it took shape from the blackness, a figure—a woman's figure, with long disordered fair hair, and a face white as snow. Captain Cavendish gave an awful cry as he saw it; the cry startled his horse—only a half-tamed thing at best—and, with a loud neigh, it started off like an arrow from a bow. The horse of Lieutenant Blank, either taking this as a challenge, or frightened by the sudden appearance of the woman, pricked up its ears and fled after, with a velocity that nearly unseated his rider. The lieutenant overtook his companion as they clattered through the streets of the town, and the face of Captain Cavendish was livid.
"For Heaven's sake, Cavendish!" cried the young man, "what was that? What was that we saw?"
"It was Nathalie Marsh!" Captain Cavendish said, in an awful voice. "Don't speak to me, Blank! I am going mad!"
He looked as if he was, as he galloped furiously out of sight, waking the sleeping townsfolk with the thunder of his horse's hoofs. He had heard the story of the ghost, and had laughed at it, with the rest; but he had heard it in broad daylight, and the most timid of us can laugh at ghost-stories then. He had not been thinking of her, and he had seen her—he had seen her at midnight—true ghostly hour—on the lonesome Redmon road, with her death-white face and streaming hair! He had seen her—he had seen the ghost of Nathalie Marsh!
Mr. Johnston, the sleepy valet, sitting up for his master, recoiled in terror as that master crossed the threshold of the room. Captain Cavendish only stared vaguely as the man spoke to him, and strode by him and into his room, with an unearthly glare in his eyes and the horrible lividness of death in his face. Mr. Johnston stood appalled outside the door, wondering if his master had committed a murder on the way home—nothing less could excuse his looking like that. Once, half an hour after, Captain Cavendish opened his door, still "looking like that," and ordered brandy, in a voice that did not sound like his own; and Mr. Johnston brought it, and got the door slammed in his face afterward.
The usually peaceful slumbers of Mr. Johnston were very much disturbed that night by this extraordinary conduct on the part of his master. He lost at least three hours' sleep perplexing himself about it, for never since he had had the honor of being the captain's man, had that gentleman behaved so singularly, or exhibited so ghastly and deathlike a face. When, in the early watches of the morning, he presented himself at his master's door with towels and water, it was in a state of mingled curiosity and terror; but he found there was no call for the latter emotion. Beyond looking uncommonly pale and hollow-eyed (sure tokens of a sleepless night), Captain Cavendish was perfectly himself again; and whether this was owing to the brandy he had drank or the exhilarating effect of the morning sunshine, Mr. Johnston could not tell, but he was inclined to set it down to the brandy. Even the paleness and hollow-eyedness was not noticeable after he had shaved and dressed, and partaken of his breakfast, and sauntered out, swinging his cane and smoking his cigar, to kill thought in the bustling streets of the town. Val Blake, standing in his office-door, hailed him as he passed.
"How are you, Cavendish? Heavenly morning, isn't it? Have you any particular engagement for this afternoon?"
"This afternoon? What hour?"
"Oh, about three. You must postpone your engagements to accommodate me."
"I have none so early. I dine with the mess at six. What is it?"
"A little surprise that I have in store for you. Drop into Darcy's office about five, and we'll give you a little surprise!"
"A little surprise! Of what nature, pray?"
"Honor bright!" said Val, turning to run up-stairs. "I won't tell. Will you come?"
"Oh, certainly! It will kill time as well as anything else."
He sauntered on unsuspiciously, never dreaming he was sealing his own fate, Val Blake had no compunctions about entrapping him. He was so artful a villain he must be taken by surprise, or he might baffle them yet.
"So slippery an eel," argued Mr. Blake to himself, "must not be handled with gloves. He may as well walk into Darcy's office himself, as be brought there by a couple of police-officers."
Captain Cavendish returned to his hotel early, and avoided all places where he was likely to meet Lieutenant Blank. Of all people, he wanted to shun him from henceforth; of all subjects, he never wanted to speak of the terrible fright he had received the previous night. So he returned to his rooms, and smoked and read, and wrote letters, and dined at two, and as the town clock was striking five, he was opening the door of Mr. Darcy's office. And still no presentiment of what was so near dawned darkly upon him; no weird foreboding thrilled in nameless dread through his breast; no dim and gloomy shadowing of the awful retribution overtaking him so fast, made his step falter or his heart beat faster as he opened that door. Perhaps it is only to good men that their angel-guardians whisper in that "still small voice" those mystic warnings, that tell us poor pilotless mariners on the sea of life of the shoals and quicksands ahead. Perhaps it is only men like this man, whose souls are stone-blind, that cannot see dimly the hidden shipwreck at hand. He saw nothing, felt nothing; he walked in carelessly, and saw Mr. Darcy, old Squire Tod, and Mr. Blake, sitting close together and talking earnestly. He wondered why they all looked so grave, and why two constables, who had been looking out of a window, should place themselves one on each side of the door, as if on guard, as he came in. He wondered, but nothing more. Mr. Darcy arose very gravely, very gravely bowed, and presented him with a chair.
"Good afternoon, gentlemen," he said, indifferently, "I have dropped in on my way to the mess-room, at the request of Mr. Blake, who told me there was a surprise in store for me here."
"There is, sir," replied Mr. Darcy, in a strange tone. "There is a surprise in there for you, and not a very pleasant one, either. Mr. Blake was quite right."
Something in his voice chilled Captain Cavendish, for the first time; but he stared at him haughtily, and pulled out his gold hunting-watch.
"I dine at six," he said coldly. "It is past five now. I beg you will let me know what all this means, as fast as possible. I have no time to spare."
"You will make time for our business, Captain Cavendish; and as for the mess-dinner, I think you must postpone that altogether to-day."
"Sir," cried Captain Cavendish, rising; but Mr. Darcy returned his gaze stonily.
"Sit down, sir, sit down! The business that rendered your presence here necessary is of so serious a nature—so very serious a nature, that all other considerations must yield before it. You will not go to the mess-dinner, I repeat. I do not think you will ever dine at the mess-table again."
The face of Captain Cavendish turned ghastly, in spite of every effort, and he turned with a look of suppressed fury at Val Blake.
"You traitor!" he said, "you have done this. Your invitation was only a snare to entrap me."
"Honest men, Captain Cavendish," said Mr. Blake, composedly, "fear no snare, dread no trap. It is only criminals, living in daily dread of detection, who need fear their fellow-men. I preferred you should enter here of your own accord, to being brought here handcuffed by the officials of the law."
Every drop of blood had left the face of the Englishman; but he strove manfully to brave it out.
"I cannot comprehend what you mean by these insults," he said. "Who dare talk to me, an English officer and a gentleman, of handcuffs and crimes?"
"We dare," replied Mr. Darcy. "We, in whom the laws of the land are invested. These laws you have vilely broken, Mr. Cavendish—for I understand you have sold out of the service, and have no longer claim to military rank. In the name of the law, George Cavendish, I arrest you for the willful murder of Jane Leroy!"
It was an utter impossibility for the white face of the man to grow whiter than it had been for the last ten minutes; but at the last words he gave a sort of gasp, and caught at the arms of the chair on which he sat. If they had wanted moral conviction before of his guilt, they wanted it no longer—it was written in every line of his bloodless face, in every quiver of his trembling lips, in every choking gasp of breath he drew. They sat looking at him with solemn faces, but no one spoke. They were waiting for him to recover from the shock, and break the silence. He did break it at last; but in a voice that shook so, the words seemed to fall to pieces in his mouth.
"It is false!" he said, trying to steady his shaky voice. "I deny the charge. Charley Marsh was tried and found guilty long ago. He is the murderer!"'
"Charley Marsh is an innocent man—you are the murderer. Your own face is your accuser," said Mr. Darcy. "I never saw guilt betrayed more plainly in all my life. You murdered Jane Leroy—yes, strangled her for her pitiful wealth."
"Who has told you this infernal story?" exclaimed the infuriated captive, glaring upon the lawyer. "Has that d—d scoundrel found——" He stopped suddenly, nearly choking himself with his own words, and the phlegmatic lawyer finished the sentence.
"Found Cherrie?—yes! You see there is no hope for you now. Here, Cherrie, my girl, come out!"
There was a door standing ajar opposite them, that looked as if it led into some inner and smaller office. As the door opened wide, the prisoner caught a glimpse of two men, only a glimpse; for the next moment Cherrie stood before him. The last faint glimmer of hope died out in his breast at sight of her with that vindictive look in her face.
"Oh, you villain!" screamed Cherrie, shaking her fist at him, her black eyes flashing fire. "You mean, lying, deceitful villain! I'll fix you off for the way you have treated me! I'll tell everything—I have told it, and I'll tell it again, and again, and again; and I hope they'll hang you, and I'll go to see you hung with the greatest pleasure, I will!"
Here Cherrie, who had not drawn breath, and was scarlet in the face, had to stop for a second, and Mr. Darcy struck in:
"Hold your tongue, Cherrie! Not another word! Stick to facts—abuse is superfluous. You see, Captain Cavendish, with the evidence of this witness, nothing more is needed but drawing out a warrant for your arrest. She is prepared to swear positively to your guilt."
"I don't doubt it," said Captain Cavendish, with a bitter sneer; "such a creature as she is would swear to anything, I dare say. We all know the character of Cherrie Nettleby."
"Silence, sir!" thundered Mr. Darcy; "you are the very last who should cast a stone at her—you, who have deliberately led her to her ruin!"
"He told me I was his wife," sobbed Cherrie, hysterically, "or I never should have gone. I never knew it was a sham marriage, until Mr. Blake told me so down in Charlottetown. We were married in the Methodist meeting-house, and I thought it was a minister; and Mr. Blake was there, and I thought it was all right! Oh, dear me!" sobbed Cherrie, the hysterics growing alarming; "everybody was in a wicked plot against me, and I was only a poor girl, and not up to them; and I wish I had never been born—so there!"
Squire Tod and Mr. Darcy turned with looks of stern inquiry upon Mr. Blake.
"What does this mean?" asked old Squire Tod. "You never said anything about this, Blake."
"No," said Val, perfectly undisturbed; "I only told you Cherrie had run away with Captain Cavendish."
"That is my irreproachable accuser, you see," said Captain Cavendish, with sneering sarcasm. "What that woman says is true; I did inveigle her into a sham marriage, but Mr. Val Blake managed the whole affair—got the church and the sham clergyman, and deceived that crying fool there fifty times more than I did; for she trusted him!"
Squire Tod's face darkened into a look of stern severity as he turned upon Val.
"Mr. Blake," he said, "I am more astonished and shocked by this than anything I have heard yet. That you should be guilty of so base and unmanly an act—you, whom we all respected and trusted—as to entrap a poor weak-minded child (for she was only a child) to misery and ruin! Shame, shame on you, sir, for such a coward's act!"
Very few people ever suspected Val Blake of dignity. One would have thought he must have shrunk under these stern words, abashed. But he did not—he held his head proudly erect—he rose with the occasion, and was dignified.
"One moment!" he said, "wait one moment, squire, before you condemn me! Gentlemen," he rose up and threw wide the door of the room from which Cherrie had emerged, "gentlemen, please to come out."
Everybody looked, curious and expectant. Cherrie ceased the sobbing to look, and even Captain Cavendish forgot for a moment his supreme peril, in waiting for what was to come next.
Two gentlemen, the Reverend Mr. Drone, of the Methodist persuasion, and another clerical and white neck-clothed gentleman, came out and stood before the company. Mr. Drone was well known, the other was a stranger, a young man, with rather a dashing air, considering his calling, and a pair of bright, roving dark eyes. Captain Cavendish had only seen him once in his life before, but he recognized him instantaneously.
"You all know Mr. Drone, gentlemen," said Val, "this other is the Reverend Mr. Barrett, of Narraville. Mr. Barrett, it is a year since you were in Speckport is it not?"
"It is," replied Mr. Barrett, with the air of a witness under cross-examination.
"Will you relate what occurred on the last night of your stay in this town, on the occasion of that visit?"
"With pleasure, sir! I am a minister of the Gospel, gentlemen, as you may see," said Mr. Barrett, bowing to the room, "and a cousin of Mr. Drone's. I had been settled about two years up in Narraville last summer, when I took it into my head to run down here for a week or so on a visit to Mr. Drone. I had known Mr. Blake for years, and had a very high respect for his uprightness and integrity, else I never should have complied with the singular request he made me the day before I left."
"What was the request?" asked Mr. Darcy, on whom a new light was bursting.
"He came to me," said Mr. Barrett, "and having drawn from me a promise of strict secrecy, told me a somewhat singular story. A gentleman of rank and position, an English officer, had fallen in love with a gardener's pretty daughter, a young lady with more beauty than common sense, and wanted to entrap her into a sham marriage. He had intrusted the case to Mr. Blake, whose principles, he imagined, were as loose as his own, and Mr. Blake told me he would inevitably succeed in his diabolical plot if we did not frustrate him. Mr. Blake's proposal was, that I should marry them in reality, while letting him think it was only a mockery of a holy ordinance. He urged the case upon me strongly; he said the man was a gambler, a libertine, and a fortune-hunter; that he was striving to win for his wife a most estimable young lady—Miss Marsh—for her fortune merely; that if he succeeded, she would be miserable for life, and that this was the only way to prevent it. He told me the man was so thoroughly bad, that all compunctions would be thrown away on him; and at last I consented. To prevent a great crime, I married them privately in Mr. Drone's church. Mr. Blake was the witness, and the marriage is inserted in the register. I told Mr. Drone before I left, and he consented to keep the matter secret until such time as it was necessary to divulge it. I married George Percy Cavendish and Charlotte Nettleby the night before I left Speckport, and took a copy of the certificate with me; and I am ready to swear to the validity of the marriage at any time and in any place. I recognize them both, and that man and woman are lawfully husband and wife!"
Mr. Barrett bowed and was silent. Poor Cherrie, with one glad cry, sprang forward and fell on her knees before Mr. Val Blake, and did him theatrical homage on the spot. Val lifted her up, and looked in calm triumph at the baffled Englishman, and saw that that gentleman's face was purple with furious rage.
"Liar!" he half screamed, glaring with tigerish eyes as he heard Mr. Barrett, "it is false! You never performed it—I never saw you before!"
"You have forgotten me, I dare say," said Mr. Barrett, politely, "but I had the pleasure of marrying you to this lady, nevertheless. It is easily proved, and I am prepared to prove it on any occasion."
"You may as well take it easy, Cavendish," said Val. "Cherrie is your wife fast enough! Don't cry, Cherrie, it's all right now, and you're Mrs. Cavendish as sure as Church and State can make you."
"It's a most extraordinary story," said Squire Tod, "and I hardly know what to say to you, Blake. How came you to let him get engaged to Miss Henderson, knowing this?"
"Oh," said Val, carelessly, "Miss Henderson never cared a snap about him; and then Paul Wyndham came along and cut him out, just as I was getting ready to tell the story. I meant to make him find Cherrie before he left Speckport, and publish the marriage; only Providence let me find her out myself, to clear the innocent, and bring this man's guilt home. I had to keep Cherrie in the dark, as I never would have got that confession out of her."
"Well," said Mr. Darcy, rising, "it is growing dark, and I think there is no more to be done this evening. Burke, call a cab. Captain Cavendish, you will have to exchange the mess-room for the town-jail to-night."
Captain Cavendish said nothing. His fury had turned to black, bitter sullenness, and his handsome face was disturbed by a savage scowl.
"You, gentlemen, and you, Mrs. Cavendish," said Mr. Darcy, bowing to Cherrie, and smiling slightly, "will hold yourselves in readiness to give evidence at the trial. I think we will have no difficulty in bringing out a clear case of willful murder."
An awful picture came before the mind of the scowling and sullen captain. A gaping crowd in the raw dawn of a cheerless morning, a horrible gallows, the dangling rope, the hangman's hand adjusting it round his neck, the drop, a convulsed figure quivering in the air in ghastly agony, and then——Great beads of cold sweat broke out on his forehead, and his livid face was contracted by a spasm of mortal agony. Then he saw the two clergymen, Mr. Blake, and Cherrie standing up to go.
"I think I'll take you home, Cherrie," said Val, "I'll get another cab for you! Won't they open their eyes when they see you, though?"
Mr. Blake and Cherrie departed, followed by the two clergymen; and no one spoke to the ghastly-looking man, sitting, guarded by the constable, staring at the floor, with that black, desperate scowl, that so changed his face that his nearest friend would hardly have known it. Cherrie trembled and shrank away as she passed him, and did not breathe freely until she was safely seated in the cab beside Val, and rattling away through the streets on her way home.
Home! how poor Cherrie's heart longed for the peace of that little cottage where those who loved her, and had mourned her, dwelt. She was crying quietly, as she sat silently away in a corner, thinking what a long, and wretched, and forlorn, and dreary year the last had been, and what a foolish girl she had been, and how much she owed to Val Blake.
Mr. Blake did not disturb her reflections; he was thinking of wronged Charley Marsh, exiled from home, branded as a felon.
The cab, for which Mr. Darcy had sent one of the constables, drew up at the office door, as Mr. Blake's drove away; and the prisoner, between the two officials, with Mr. Darcy following close behind, came down-stairs.
Captain Cavendish had gone down-stairs very quietly between his two guards, neither speaking nor offering the slightest resistance; but his eyes were furtively taking in everything, and the captive's instinct of flight was strong upon him. One of the constables went forward to open the cab-door, the other had but a slight grasp of his arm. The murky darkness, the empty street, favored him.
With the rapidity of lightning, he wheeled round, struck the constable a blinding blow in the face with his fist, that forced him to release his hold, and, like a flash, he sped off, turned sharp round a corner, and was gone! The whole thing had been the work of two seconds. Before any one among them could quite comprehend he had really gone, he was entirely out of sight.
The next instant, the still street was in an uproar, the two constables and Mr. Darcy, shouting for assistance as they went, started in pursuit. The corner round which Captain Cavendish had cut, and which they now took, led to a dirty waterside street, branching off into numerous wharves, crowded with hogsheads, bales, barrels, and piles of lumber, affording a secure and handy hiding-place for any runaway. It was like looking for a needle in a hay-stack even in daylight; and now, in the thick fog and darkness, it was the wildest of wildgoose-chases. They ran from one wharf to another, collecting a crowd about them wherever they went; and all the time, he for whom they were searching was quietly watching them in a black and filthy alley, that cut like a dirty vein of black mud from that waterside street to the one above.
Drawing his hat far down over his eyes, Captain Cavendish started up the alley, and found himself again in the street he had left. The cab still stood before the office door of Mr. Darcy; he gave it one derisive glance as he strode rapidly along, and struck into another by-street. If he could only make good his escape; if he could baffle them yet! Hope sent his heart in mad plunges against his side—if he could only escape!
Suddenly, a thought flashed upon him—the cars. There had been a picnic that day, and an excursion-train, he knew, left at half-past seven to fetch the picnickers home. If he could only get to the depot in time, he might stay in hiding about the country until the first hue and cry was over, then, in disguise, make his way to S——, and take the steamer for Quebec. He had a large sum of money about him; he might do it—he might escape yet.
He pulled out his watch as he almost ran along, twenty-five minutes past seven; only five minutes, and a long way off still. He fled through the dark streets like a madman, but no one knew him, and reached the depot at last, panting and breathless. A crowd lingered on the platform, a bell was clanging, and the train was in motion. Desperation goaded him on; he made a furious leap on board, and—there was a wild cry of horror from the bystanders, an awful shriek of "O my God!" from a falling man, and then all was uproar, and confusion, and horror, and dismay. Whether in his blind haste he had missed his footing, whether the darkness of the night deceived him, whether the train was moving faster than he had supposed, no one ever knew; but he was down, and ground under the remorseless wheels of the terrible Juggernaut.
The train was stopped, and everybody flocked around in consternation. Two of the brakemen lifted up something—something that had once been a man, but which was crushed out of all semblance of humanity now. No one there recognized him; they had only heard that one agonized cry wrung from the unbelieving soul in that horrible moment—giving the lie to his whole past life—but they had heard or knew nothing more. Some one brought a door; and they laid the bloody and mangled mass upon it, and now raised it reverentially on their shoulders, and carried it slowly to the nearest house. A cloth was thrown over the white, staring face, the only part of him, it seemed, not mangled into jelly; and so they carried him away from the spot, a dreadful sight, which those who saw never forgot.
He was not dead. He was not even insensible. While they carried him carefully through the chill, black night, and when they carried him into the nearest house, and laid him tenderly on a bed, the large, dark eyes were wide open and fixed, but neither in death nor unconsciousness. It was a hotel they had carried him to; and one of the pretty chambermaids, who owned a sentimentally-tender heart, and read a great many novels, cried as she looked at him.
"Poor fellow!" she said, to another pretty chambermaid; "it's such a pity, ain't it—and he so handsome?"
"Who is he, I wonder?" the other chambermaid wanted to know; but no one could tell her.
"He looks like an officer," some one remarked; "I think I've seen him in the town before, and I'm pretty sure he's one of the officers."
"The doctor will know, maybe," suggested the land-lord. "Poor fellow! I'm afraid it's all up with him. I don't think he can speak."
He had never spoken but that once, when the soul of the infidel, in that supreme moment of mortal agony, in spite of the infidel creed of his life, had uttered that awful invocation—"O my God!" But the power of speech was not gone, nor of hearing; he retained all his senses, and, strangely enough, did not seem to suffer much. He lay quiescent, his dark eyes wide open, and staring vacantly straight ahead, his dark hair, dabbled with blood, falling loose on the pillow and around his bloodless face. They had drawn a white spread over him; and he had a strangely corpse-like look, with his white set face, and marble-like rigidity. But life burned yet in the strained, wide-open eyes.
The doctor came—it was Dr. Leach; and he knew him immediately, and told the gaping and curious bystanders who he was. He was very much shocked, and more shocked still when the white spread was drawn away, and the terrible truth revealed. The eyes of the wounded man followed him as he made his examination, but with no eagerness or hopefulness—only with a dull and awful sort of apathy.
"Do you know me, Captain Cavendish?" Dr. Leach asked, tenderly touching the heavy, dark hair falling over his face.
"Yes. How long——?"
He did not finish the sentence, not because he was unable to do it, but that he evidently thought he had finished it, and his eyes never once left the physician's face.
Dr. Leach looked very sadly down in the dark, inquiring eyes.
"My poor fellow!" he said, "it is hard, I know, and for one so young and so far from all your friends. It is hard to die like this; but it is Heaven's will, and we must submit."
"How long?" repeated the sufferer, as if he had not heard him, and with that steady, inquiring gaze.
"You mean, how long can you last? I am afraid—I am afraid, my poor boy, but a short time; not over three hours at the most."
The dark, searching eyes turned slowly away from his face, and fixed themselves on vacancy as before; but he showed no signs of any emotion whatever. Physical and mental sense of suffering and fearing seemed alike to have forsaken him in this last dreadful hour. He had been a bad man; the life that lay behind him was a shameful record. He had been a gamester, a swindler, a libertine, a robber, and a murderer; and now he was dying in his sins, in a dull stupor, without remorse for the past or fear of the awful future. Dr. Leach stooped over him again, wondering at his unnatural apathy.
"Would you like a clergyman, my poor boy?" he said.
"No!"
"Is there any one you would like to see? Your time is very short, remember."
Captain Cavendish turned to him with something like human interest in his glance, for the first time.
"I should like to see Val Blake," he said, "and Mr. Darcy."
"I'll send for them," said the doctor, going out, and dispatching a couple of messengers in hot haste. "He wants to make his will, I suppose," Dr. Leach thought, as he returned to the bedroom. "Poor fellow; and Val Blake was his friend!"
Dr. Leach had requested one of the messengers to go for the army-surgeon before he came back. He knew the case was utterly hopeless, but still it was better to have the surgeon there. He found his patient lying as he had left him, staring blankly at a lamp flaring on a table under the window, while the slow minutes trailed away, and his short span of life wore away. His last night on earth! Did he think of it as he lay there, never taking his eyes from the lamp-flame, even when the doctor came to his bedside again and held something to his lips.
"My dear," Dr. Leach said, feeling as though he were speaking to a woman, and again stroking back his hair with a tender touch; "hadn't you better see a clergyman? You are dying, you know."
"Did you send for them?" said Captain Cavendish, looking at him.
"For Blake and Darcy? Yes. But will I not send for a clergyman too?"
"No."
"Would you like me to read to you, then? There is a Bible on the table?"
"No."
He sank back into his lethargic indifference once more and looked at the lamp again. Dr. Leach sighed as he sat down beside him, to watch and wait for the coming of the others.
They came at last—Val Blake and Mr. Darcy—knowing all beforehand. Their presence seemed to rouse him. Dr. Leach would have left the room, but the lawyer detained him.
"You may as well stay," he said, "it can make no difference to him now if all the world hears him. It is not his will—it is a confession he has to make."
Mr. Darcy was right. Strangely enough he wanted to do that one act of justice before he went out of life, and he seemed to make an effort to rally, and rouse himself to do it. The doctor gave him a stimulant, for he was perceptibly sinking, and the lawyer sat down to write out the broken sentences of that dying confession. It was not long; but it was long enough to triumphantly vindicate Charley Marsh before any court in the world, and just as it was completed the surgeon came. But a more terrible visitor was there too, before whom they held their breath in mute awe. Death stood terrible and invisible in their midst, and no word was spoken. They stood around the bed, pale and silent, and watched him go out of life with solemn awe at their hearts. There was no frightful death struggles—he died peacefully as a little child, but it was a fearful deathbed for all that. The soul of the unbeliever had gone to be judged. "God be merciful to him!" Dr. Leach had said, and they had all answered, "Amen." They drew the counterpane over the marble face, beautiful in death, and left the room together. All were pale, but the face of Val Blake was ghastly. He leaned against an open window, with a feeling of deadly sickness at his heart. It was all so awful, so suddenly awful; they, poor erring mortals, had judged and condemned him, and now he had gone before the Great Judge of all mankind—and the dark story had ended in the solemn wonder of the winding-sheet.
"Speak nothing but good of the dead," a pitiful old proverb says. "We were friends once," Val Blake thought. "I never want to speak of him again."
The body of the dead man was to be taken to his hotel. The surgeon and Mr. Darcy volunteered to arrange it, and Dr. Leach and Val left. The doctor had his patients to attend to, and Val was going to tell Cherrie. She was his wife and ought to know, and Val remembered how she had loved the dead man once. But that love had died out long ago, under his cruel neglect; and though she cried when she heard the tragic end of the man to whom she had been bound by the mysterious tie of marriage, they were no very passionate tears. And before the Nettleby family had quite learned to comprehend she was a wife they found that Mrs. Cherrie Cavendish was a widow!
Of all the shocks which Speckport had received within the last twenty years, there was none to equal this. Charley Marsh innocent, Captain Cavendish guilty! Cherrie Nettleby come back, his wife, his widow! And still it spread, and "still the wonder grew;" and it was like a play or a sensation novel, and the strange old proverb, "Truth is stranger than fiction," was on the tongues of all the wiseacres in the town.
And while the good people talked and exclaimed and wondered, and told the story over and over and over again to one another, and found it ever new, the dead man lay in his own elegant room in the hotel, and Cherrie, his widow, sat at his bedhead, feeling she had become all at once a heroine, and making the most of it.
Among the visitors to that darkened room were Mr. and Mrs. Wyndham, Miss Blair, and Mr. Blake. Olive Wyndham, stately and beautiful, as ever, but paler and thinner, and less defiantly bright than of old, stood beside the bed of death, and looked down on the white, beautiful face of the dead man, with a strange, remorseful pang at her heart. How her soul bowed down before the disembodied spirit, and how touching was the marble beauty of that rigid face! If he had been old and ugly, perhaps people would not have felt so sadly pitiful about his dreadful fate; but he was so young and so handsome, that tears came into their eyes, and they forgot he had been a villain in life, and went away shaking their heads and saying, "Poor fellow! Poor fellow! It's such a pity!"
Laura Blair—but Laura was always tender-hearted—cried as she looked at him, and thought how much she had liked him, and what pleasant hours they had spent together. He was very bad, of course, but still——Laura never could get any further, for the tears came so fast they choked her words.
She actually kissed Cherrie, who cried from sympathy, and Val Blake looked at her with a more tender glance than any one had ever seen in Val's unsentimental eyes before.
The pony-phaeton from Redmon was in waiting at the hotel door. Mr. Wyndham assisted the ladies in, and touched his hat as if in leave-taking.
"Are you not going back?" his wife asked, with strange timidity. She was in the habit now of speaking to him, and always in that strangely-hurried tone so foreign to her character.
"No," Mr. Wyndham said, "not just now. I shall return before dinner."
The carriage drove off. Mr. Wyndham took Val's arm, lit a cigar, and strolled with him down Queen Street.
"It's a very sad business!" he said, thoughtfully. "I am sorry for him, poor fellow!—one can't help it; but, after all, I don't know that it is not a merciful deliverance. The public disgrace, the imprisonment, the trial, the sentence, would have been to him far more terrible. There are worse things than death!"
He said the last words with a sudden bitterness that made Val look at him. "It's his mother he is thinking of," said Mr. Blake to himself. "Poor woman, she's mad!"
"And it is really true that he confessed all before he died?" Mr. Wyndham asked; "and exculpated, beyond all doubt, Charley Marsh?"
"Yes," said Val; "Charley Marsh is free to return to Speckport whenever he pleases now. I always knew he was innocent. I had a letter from him last night, too, inclosing one to his mother."
"Indeed!" Mr. Wyndham said, with a look of interest. "Is he well? Is he still in the army?"
"Yes; but his time is nearly up, it appears. I shall write to him to-day, and tell him to come back to us. I have a note—she called it a note, though it's four sheets of paper closely written, and she sat up until three this morning to finish it—from Laura Blair, to inclose to him. If he is proof against four sheets of entreaty from a lady, all I can say to him will not avail much."
"Laura is a good little girl," said Mr. Wyndham, "and very much in earnest about all her friends. You ought to marry her, Blake."
"Eh!" said Mr. Blake, aghast.
"You ought to marry her," repeated Mr. Wyndham, as composedly as though he were saying, "You ought to smoke another cigar." "I am sure you will never come across one more suited to the purpose, if you live to be as old as Methuselah's cat!"
"My dear Wyndham," expostulated Mr. Blake, rather shocked than otherwise, "what are you talking about? I give you my word I never thought of such a thing in my life."
"I don't doubt it, in the least; but you know the proverb, 'Better late than never.'"
"Nonsense! What do I want with a wife?"
"A good deal, I should think; if only to save the trouble of boarding out, and securing some one to darn your stockings and button your shirt-collar. Have you never indulged in any vision, O most prosaic of men! of a quiet domestic fireside, garnished on one side by yourself, with your feet in slippers, and on the other by a docile cat and a Mrs. Blake?"
"Never!" responded Mr. Blake, emphatically.
"Then it's time you did! Your hair's turning gray, man, and your sister has left you! Come, rouse up, old fellow, and secure that little prize, Laura Blair, before some more ardent wooer bears her off, and leaves you in the lurch."
Mr. Blair stared at him.
"I say, Wyndham, what crotchet have you got in your head to-day? Marry Laura Blair! What should I marry her for, more than any one else?"
"Well, for pure artlessness, Mr. Blake," he said, "I'll back you against the world! Why should you marry Laura Blair, indeed! Why you overgrown infant, because you are in love with her! That's why!"
"Am I?" responded Mr. Blake, helplessly. "I didn't know it. Is she in love with me, too?"
"Ask her," said Mr. Wyndham, still laughing. "Here we are at the office. Good-morning to you."
"Won't you come in?"
"Not this morning; I am going to Rosebush Cottage."
"Oh," said Val, hesitatingly, for it was an understood thing the subject was very painful, "how is your mother?"
"She is no better," said Mr. Wyndham, briefly. "Good-morning!"
Mr. Blake went into his sanctum, and the first thing he did was to write to Charley and tell him all.
"Come back to Speckport, dear old boy," wrote Val, "everybody is in a state of remorse, you know, and dying to see you. Come back for your mother's sake, and we will give you such a reception as no man has had since the Prince of Wales, long life to him! visited our town. Come back, Charley, and cheer us again with the sight of your honest sonsie face."
It took some time for Speckport to recover thoroughly from the severe shock its nervous system had received in the death of Captain Cavendish, and the various wonderful facts that death brought to light. It was fully a month before the wonder quite subsided, and people could talk of other things over the tea-table.
Cherrie, the bereaved, was safely back again in the parental nest. Creditors had flocked in with the dead man's long bills; and when all was settled, nothing was left for the widow. But some good men among them made up two hundred pounds, and Mrs. Wyndham added another hundred, and the three were presented to Mrs. Cavendish, with the sympathy of the donors. It was a little fortune for Cherrie, though a pitiful ending of the brilliant match she had made; and she took it, crying very much, and was humbly thankful. Once more she tripped the streets of her native town, and her crape, and bombazine, and widow's cap, were charmingly becoming; and when the roses began to return to her cheeks, she was prettier than ever.
The town was quiet, and October was wearing away. The last week of that month brought a letter from Charley Marsh—a letter that was not like Charley, but was very grave, almost sad.
"Under God, my dear Val," he wrote, "I owe the restoration of my good name to you. I know all you have done for me and mine—my poor mother has told me; but I cannot thank you. I am sure you do not want me to thank you; but it is all written deep in my heart, and will be buried with me. I am coming back to Speckport—ah! dear old Speckport! I never thought it could be so dear! I shall be with you in November, and perhaps I may say to you then what I cannot write now. I am coming back a man, Val; I went away a hot-headed, passionate, unreasoning boy. I have learned to be wise, I hope, and if the school has been a hard one, I shall only remember its lessons the longer. I am coming back rich; blessings as well as misfortunes do not come alone. I have been left a fortune—you will see an account of it in the paper I send you. Our colonel, a gallant fellow, and a rich Georgian planter, has remembered me in his will. I saved his life shortly after I came here, almost at the risk of my own, I believe. They promoted me for it at the time, and I thought I had got my reward; but I was mistaken. He died last week of a bayonet-thrust, and when his will was read, I found I was left thirty thousand dollars. He was a childless widower, with no near relatives; so no one is wronged. You see I shall not have to fall back upon Dr. Leach's hand on my return, and my mother need depend no more on Mrs. Wyndham's generosity. I am very grateful to that lady all the same."
"I believe I'll show this letter to Father Lennard," said Val to himself; "he asked me on Sunday if I had heard from Charley lately, and told me to let him know when I did. Charley was always a favorite of his, since the day when he was a little shaver and an acolyte on the altar."
Mr. Blake was not the man to let grass grow under his feet when he took a notion in his head; so he started off at once, at a swinging pace, for the cathedral. The October twilight was cold and gray. A dreary evening, in which men went by with pinched noses and were buttoned up in greatcoats, and women had vails over their faces, and shivered in the street—a melancholy evening, speaking of desolation, and decay, and death, and the end of all things earthly.
Mr. Blake, to whom it was only a rawish evening, strode along, and reached the cathedral in the bleak dusk. The principal entrances were all closed, but he went in through a side door, and looked into the side chapel for the priest. Not finding him, he entered the cathedral through one of the transepts, but neither was Father Lennard there. The gray twilight shone but dimly through the painted windows, and the long and lofty aisles were very dim and shadowy. There was but one light in the great church—a tiny lamp burning on the grand altar—a lamp that never went out by night or day. Two or three shadowy female figures knelt around the altar-rails in silent prayer, and Val thought one of them looked like Miss Rose. He knew she was in the habit of coming in the twilight here; but something else had caught his attention, and he turned away and went on tiptoe down the echoing nave, staring up at the choir. Some one was singing softly there—singing so softly that it seemed but the sighing of the autumn-wind, and seemed to belong to it. But Val had a quick ear, and the low melancholy cadences struck him with a nameless thrill. What was there that sounded so strangely familiar in that voice? It was a woman's voice—a sweet, full soprano, that could rise to power at its owner's will. But what did it remind him of? A thought flashed through him—a sudden and startling thought—that brought the blood in a red gush to his face, and then left him cold and white. He softly ascended the stairs, the low, mournful voice breaking into a sweetly-plaintive vesper hymn as he went.
Val Blake trembled from head to foot, and a cold sweat broke out on his face. He paused a moment before he entered into the choir, his heart beating faster than it ever had beat before. A woman sat before the organ, not playing, but with her fingers wandering noiselessly over the keys, her face upraised in the ghostly light. She looked like the picture of St. Cecilia, with a cloud of tressed hazy golden hair falling about that pale, earnest, upraised face. Her mantle had fallen back—a white cashmere mantle, edged with ermine and lined with blue satin—and she sung, unconscious, as it seemed, of all the world. Val Blake stood like a man paralyzed—struck dumb and motionless—and the sweet voice sang on: