Percy looked down on his handful ruefully. "My very letters! There was no jealousy in them; they were full of earnest love."
"Fuller of bad spelling," said the relentless girl. Then she went into details: "You spell abominable with two m's—and that's abominable; you spell ridiculous with a k—and that's ridicklous. So after this don't you presume to speak to me, for I shall never speak to you again."
"Very well, then," said Percy. "I, too, will be silent forever."
"Oh, I dare say," said Julia; "a chatter-box like you."
"Even chatter-boxes are silent in the grave," suggested Percy; "and if we are to part like this forever to-day, to-morrow I shall be no more."
"Well, you could not be much less," said Julia, but with a certain shame-faced change of tone that perhaps, if Percy had been more experienced, might have given him a ray of hope.
"Well," said he, "I know one lady that would not treat these presents with quite so much contempt."
"Oh, I have seen her," said Julia, spitefully. "She has been setting her cap at you for some time; it's Miss Susan Beckley—a fine conquest—great, fat, red-haired thing."
"Auburn."
"Yes, all-burn, scarlet, carrots,flamme d'enfer. Well, go and give her my leavings, yourself and your ancestral—paste."
"Well," said Percy, gloomily, "I might do worse. You never really loved me; you were always like an enemy looking out for faults. You kept postponing our union for something to happen to break it off. But I won't be any woman's slave; I'll use one to drive out the other. None of you shall trample on me." Then he burst forth into singing. Nobody stammers when he sings.
"Shall I, wasting in despair,Sigh because a woman's fair?Shall my cheeks grow pale with careBecause another's rosy are?If she be not kind to me,What care I how fair she be?"
This resolute little gentleman passed through the gate as he concluded the verse, waved his hand jauntily by way of everlasting adieu, and went off whistling the refrain with great spirit, and both hands in his pockets.
"You impudent!" cried Julia, almost choking; then, authoritatively,"Percy—Mr. Fitzroy;" then, coaxingly, "Percydear."
Percy heard, and congratulated himself upon his spirit. "That's the way to treat them," said he to himself.
"Well?" said he, with an air of indifference, and going slowly back to the gate. "What is it now?" said he, a little arrogantly.
She soon let him know. Directly he was quite within reach she gave him a slap in the face that sounded like one plank falling upon another, and marched off with an air of royal dignity, as if she had done the most graceful and lady-like thing in all the world.
How happy are those choice spirits who can always preserve their dignity!
Percy retired red as fire, and one of his cheeks retained that high color for the rest of the day.
We must now describe the place to which Hope conducted his daughter, and please do not skip our little description. It is true that some of our gifted contemporaries paint Italian scenery at prodigious lengthà propos de bottes, and others show in many pages that the rocks and the sea are picturesque objects, even when irrelevant. True that others gild the evening clouds and the western horizon merely to please the horizon and the clouds. But we hold with Pope that
"The proper study of mankind is man,"
and that authors' pictures are bores, except as narrow frames to big incidents. The true model, we think, for a writer is found in the opening lines of "Marmion," where the castle at even-tide, its yellow lustre, its drooping banner, its mail-clad warders reflecting the western blaze, the tramp of the sentinel, and his low-hummed song, are flung on paper with the broad and telling touch of Rubens, not from an irrelevant admiration of old castles and the setting sun, but because the human figures of the story are riding up to that sun-gilt castle to make it a scene of great words and deeds.
Even so, though on a much humbler scale, we describe Hope's cottage and garden, merely because it was for a moment or two the scene of a remarkable incident never yet presented in history or fiction.
This cottage, then, was in reality something between a villa and a cottage; it resembled a villa in this, that the rooms were lofty, and the windows were casements glazed with plate glass and very large. Walter Clifford had built it for a curate, who proved a bird of passage, and the said Walter had a horror of low rooms, for he said, "I always feel as if the ceiling was going to flatten me to the floor." Owing to this the bedroom windows, which looked westward on the garden, were a great height from the ground, and the building had a Gothic character.
Still there was much to justify the term cottage. The door, which looked southward on the road, was at the side of the building, and opened, not into a hall, but into the one large sitting-room, which was thirty feet long and twenty-five feet broad, and instead of a plaster ceiling there were massive joists, which Hope had gilded and painted till they were a sight to behold. Another cottage feature: the walls were literally clothed with verdure and color; in front, huge creeping geraniums, jasmine, and Virginia creepers hid the brick-work; and the western walls, to use the words of a greater painter than ourselves, were
"Quite overcanopied with lush woodbine,With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine."
In the next place, the building stood in a genuine cottage garden. It was close to the road. The southern boundary was plain oak paling, made of upright pieces which Hope had varnished so that the color was now a fine amber; the rest of the boundary was a quick-set hedge, in the western division of which stood an enormous oak-tree, hollow at the back. And the garden was fair with humble flowers—pinks, sweet-williams, crimson nasturtiums, double daisies, lilies, and tulips; but flower beds shared the garden with friendly cabbages, potatoes, onions, carrots, and asparagus.
To this humble but pleasant abode Hope conducted his daughter, and insisted upon her lying down on the sofa in the sitting-room. Then he ordered the woman who kept the house for him to prepare the spare bedroom, which looked into the garden, and to cut some of the sweet-smelling flowers. He himself had much to say to his daughter, and, above all, to demand her explanation of the awkward circumstances that had been just revealed. But she had received a great shock, and, like most manly men, he had a great consideration for the weakness of women, and his paternal heart said, "Let her have an hour or two of absolute repose before I subject her to any trial whatever." So he opened the window to give her air, enjoining her most strictly not to move, and even to go to sleep if she could; and then he put on his shooting coat, with large inside pocket, to go and buy her a little wine—a thing he never touched himself—and what other humble delicacies the village afforded. He walked briskly away from his door without the least idea that all his movements were watched from a hiding-place upon his own premises, no other than the great oak-tree, hollow and open at the back, in which Leonard Monckton had bored two peep-holes, and was now ensconced there watching him.
Hope had not gone many yards from his own door when he was confronted by one of those ruffians who, by their way of putting it, are the eternal butt of iniquitous people and iniquitous things, namely, honest men, curse them! and the law, confound it! This was no other than that Ben Burnley, who, being a miner, had stuck half-way between Devonshire and Durham, and had been some months in Bartley's mine. He opened on Hope in a loud voice, and dialect which we despair of conveying with absolute accuracy.
"Mr. Hope, sir, they won't let me go down t' mine."
"No; you're discharged."
"Who by?"
"By me."
"What for?"
"For smoking in the mine, in spite of three warnings."
"Me smoking in t' mine! Who telt you yon lie?"
"You were seen to pick the lock of your Davylamp, and that put the mine in danger. Then you were seen to light your pipe at the bare light, and that put it in worse peril."
"That's a lie. What mak's yer believe my skin's nowt to me? It's all one as it is to them liars that would rob me of my bread out of clean spite."
"It's the truth, and proved by four honest witnesses. There are a hundred and fifty men and twenty ponies in that mine, and their lives must not be sacrificed by one two-legged brute that won't hear reason. You are discharged and paid; so be good enough to quit the premises and find work elsewhere; and Lord help your employer, whoever he is!"
Hope would waste no more time over this fellow. He turned his back, and went off briskly on his more important errand.
Burnley shook his fist at him, and discharged a volley of horrible curses after him. Whilst he was thus raging after the man that had done his duty he heard a satirical chuckle. He turned his head, and, behold! there was the sneering face of his fellow jail-bird Monckton. Burnley started.
"Yes, mate," said Monckton, "it is me. And what sort of a pal are you, that couldn't send me a word to Portland that you had dropped on to this rascal Hope? You knew I was after him. You might have saved me the trouble, you selfish brute."
Burnley submitted at once to the ascendency of Monckton; he hung his head, and muttered, "I am no scholard to write to folk."
"You grudged a joey to a bloke to write for you. Now I suppose you expect me to be a good pal to you again, all the same?"
"Why not?" said Burnley. "He is poison to you as well as to me. He gave you twelve years' penal; you told me so at Portland; let's be revenged on him."
"What else do you think I am here for, you fool? But empty revenge, that's child's play. The question is, can you do what you are told?"
"Ay, if I see a chance of revenge. Why, I always did what you told me."
"Very well, then; there's nothing ripe yet."
"Yer don't mean I am to wait a year for my revenge."
"You will have to wait an opportunity. Revenge is like other luxuries, there's a time for it. Do you think I am such a fool as to go in for blindfold revenge, and get lagged or stretched? Not for Joseph, nor for you, either, Benjamin. I'll tell you what, though, I think this will be a busy day; it must be a busy day. That old fox Bartley has found out his blunder before now, and he'll try something on; then the Cliffords, they won't go to sleep on it."
"I don't know what yer talking about," says Burnley.
"Remain in your ignorance, Ben. The best instrument is a blind instrument; you shall have your revenge soon or late."
"Let it be soon, then."
"In the meantime," said Monckton, "have you got any money?"
"Got my wages."
"That will do for you to-day. Go to the public-house and get half-drunk."
"Half-drunk?"
"Half-drunk! Don't I speak plain?"
"Miners," said Burnley, candidly, "never get half-drunk in t' countyDurham; they are that the best part of their time."
"Then you get half-drunk, neither more nor less, or I'll discharge you asHope has done, and that will be the worst discharge of the two for you.When you are half-drunk come here directly, and hang about this place.No; you had better be under that tree in the middle of the field there,and pretend to be sleeping off your liquor. Come, mizzle!"
When he had packed off Burnley, he got back into his hiding-place, and only just in time, for Hope came back again upon the wings of love, and Grace, whose elastic nature had revived, saw him coming, and came out to meet him. Hope scolded her urgently: why had she got off the sofa when repose was so necessary for her?
"You are mistaken, dear father," said she. "I am wonderfully strong and healthy; I never fainted away in my life, and my mind will not let me rest at present—I have been longing so for my father."
"Ah, precious word!" murmured Hope. "Keep saying that word to me, darling. Oh, the years that I have pined for it!"
"Dear father, we will make up for all those years. Oh, papa, let us not part again, never, never, not even for a day."
"My child, we never will. What am I saying? I shall have to give you back to one who has a stronger claim than I—to your husband."
"My husband?" said Mary, turning pale.
"Yes," said Hope; "for you know you have a husband. Oh, I heard a few words there before I interfered; but it is not to me you'll say 'I don't know.' That was good enough for Bartley and a lot of strangers. Come, Grace dear, take my arm; have no concealments from me. Trust to a father's infinite love, even if you have been imprudent or betrayed; but that's a thing I shall never believe except from your lips. Take a turn with me, my child, since you can not lie down and rest; a little air, and gentle movement on your father's arm, and close to your father's heart, will be the next best thing for you." Then they walked to and fro like lovers.
"Why, Grace, my child," said he, "of course I understand it all. No doubt you promised to keep your marriage secret, or had some powerful reason for withholding it from strangers; and, indeed, why should you reveal such a secret to insolence or to mere curiosity. But you will tell the truth to me, your father and your best friend; you will tell me you are a wife."
"Father," said Mary, trembling, and her eyes roved as if she was looking out for the means of flight.
Hope saw this look, and it made him sick at heart, for he had lived too long, and observed too keenly, not to know that innocence and purity are dangers, and are more often protected by the safeguards of society than by themselves.
"Oh, my child," said he, "anything is better than this suspense; why do you not answer me? Why do you torture me? Are you Walter Clifford's wife?"
Mary began to pant and sob. "Oh papa, have patience with me. You do not know the danger. Wait till he comes back. I dare not; I can not."
"Then, by Heaven, he shall!"
He dropped her arm, and his countenance became terrible. She clung to him directly.
"No, no; wait till I have seen him. He will be back this very evening. Do not judge hastily; and oh, papa, as you love your child, do not act rashly."
"I shall act firmly," was Hope's firm reply. "You have come from a sham father to a real one, and you will be protected as well as loved. This lover has forbidden you to confide in your father (he did not know that I was your father, but that makes no difference); it looks very ugly, and if he has wronged you he shall do you justice, or I will have his life."
"Oh, papa," screamed Mary, "his life? Why, mine is bound up with it."
"I fear so," said Hope. "But what's our life to us without our honor, especially to a woman? He is the true Cain that destroys a pure virgin."
Then he put both his hands on her shoulder, and said, "Look at me, Grace." She looked at him full with eyes as brave as a lion's and as gentle as a gazelle's.
In a moment his senses enlightened him beyond the power of circumstances to deceive. "It's a lie," said he; "men are always lying and circumstances deceiving; there is no blush of shame upon these cheeks, no sin nor frailty in these pure eyes. You are his wife?"
"I am!" cried Grace, unable to resist any longer.
"Thank God!" cried Hope, and father and daughter were locked that moment in a tender embrace.
"Yes, papa, you shall know all, and then I shall have to fall on my knees and ask you not to punish one I love—for—a fault committed years ago. You will have pity on us both. Walter and I were married at the altar, and I am his wife in the eyes of Heaven. But, oh, papa, I fear I am not his lawful wife."
"Not his lawful wife, child! Why, what nonsense!"
"I would to Heaven it was; but this morning I learned for the first time that he had been married before. Oh, it was years ago; but she is alive."
"Impossible! He could not be so base."
"Papa," said Mary, very gravely, "I have seen the certificate."
"The certificate!" said Hope, in dismay. "What certificate?"
"Of the Registry Office. It was shown me by a gentleman she sent expressly to warn me; she had no idea that Walter and I were married, but she had heard somehow of our courtship. I try to thank her, and I tried, and always will, to save him from a prison and his family from disgrace."
"And sacrifice yourself?" cried Hope, in agony.
"I love him," said Mary, "and you must spare him."
"I will have justice for my child."
Grace was in such terror lest her father should punish Walter that she begged him to consider whether in sacrificing herself she really had not been unintentionally wise. What could she gain by publishing that she had married another woman's husband "I have lost my husband," said she "but I have found my father. Oh take me away and let me rest my broken heart upon yours far from all who know me. Every wound seems to be cured in this world, and if time won't cure this my wound, even with my father's help, the gravewill."
"Oh, misery!" cried Hope; "do I hear such words as these from my child just entering upon life and all its joys?"
"Hush, papa," said Grace; "there is that man."
That man was Mr. Bartley. He looked very much distressed, and proceeded at once to express his penitence.
"Oh, Mary, what can I say? I was simply mad, stung into fury by that foul-mouthed ruffian. Mary, I am deeply sorry, and thoroughly ashamed of my violence and my cruelty, and I implore you to think of the very many happy years we have spent together without an angry word—not that you ever deserved one. Let us silence all comments; return to me as the head of my house and the heiress of my fortune; you will bind Mr. Hope to me still more strongly, he shall be my partner, and he will not be so selfish as to ruin your future."
"Ay," said Hope, "that's the same specious argument you tempted me with twelve years ago. But she was a helpless child then; she is a woman now, and can decide for herself. As for me, I will not be your partner. I have a small royalty on your coal, and that is enough for me; but Grace shall do as she pleases. My child, will you go to the brilliant future that his wealth can secure you, or share my modest independence, which will need all my love to brighten it. Think before you answer; your own future life depends upon yourself."
With this he turned his back and walked for some distance very stoutly, then leaned upon the palings with his back toward Grace; but even a back can speak, and the young lady looked at him and her eyes filled; then she turned them toward Bartley, and those clear eyes dried as if the fire in the heart had scorched them.
"In the first place, sir," said she, with a cold and cutting voice, very unusual to her, "my name is not Mary, it is Grace; and, be assured of this, if there was not another roof in all the world to shelter me, if I was helpless, friendless and fatherless, I would die in the nearest ditch rather than set my foot in the house from which I was thrust out with shame and insult such as no lady ever yet forgave. But, thank Heaven, I am not at your mercy at all. He to whom nature has drawn me all these years is my father—Oh, papa, come to me; is it foryouto stand aloof? It is into your hands, with all the trust and love you have earned so well from your poor Grace, I give my love, my veneration, and my heart and soul forever." Then she flung herself panting on his bosom, and he cried over her. The next moment he led her to the house, where he made her promise to repose now after this fresh trial; and, indeed, he would have followed her, but Bartley implored him so piteously, for the sake of old times, not to refuse him one word more, that he relented so far as to come out to him, though he felt it was a waste of time.
He said, "Mr. Bartley, it's no use; nothing can undo this morning's work: our paths lie apart. From something Walter Clifford let fall one day, I suspect he is the person you robbed, and induced me to rob, of a large fortune."
"Well, what is he to you? Have pity upon me; be silent, and name your own price."
"Wrong Walter Clifford with my eyes open? He is the last man in the world that I would wrong in money matters. I have got a stern account against him, and I will begin it by speaking the truth and giving him back his own."
Here the interview was interrupted by an honest miner, one Jim Perkins. He came in hurriedly, and, like people of that class, thrust everybody else's business out of his way. "You are wanted at the mine, Mr. Hope. The shoring of the old works is giving way, and there's a deal of water collecting in another part."
"I'll come at once," said Hope; "the men's lives must not be endangered.Have the cage ready." Jim walked away.
Hope turned to Bartley.
"Pray understand, Mr. Bartley, that this is my last visit to your mine."
"One moment, Hope," cried Bartley in despair; "we have been friends so long, surely you owe me something."
"I do."
"Well, then, I'll make you rich for life if you will but let Mary return to me and only just be silent; speak neither for me nor against me; surely that is not much for an old friend to ask. What is your answer?"
"That I will speak the truth, and keep my conscience and my child."
This answer literally crushed Bartley. His very knees knocked together; he leaned against the palings sick at heart. He saw that Colonel Clifford would extort not only Walter's legacy, but what the lawyers call the mesne profits, that is to say, the interest and the various proceeds from the fraud during fourteen years.
Whilst he was in this condition of bodily collapse and mental horror a cold, cynical voice dropped icicles, so to speak, into his ear.
"In a fix, governor, eh? The girl won't come back, and Hope won't hold his tongue."
Bartley looked round in amazement, and saw the cadaverous face and diabolical sneer of Leonard Monckton. Fourteen years and evil passions had furrowed that bloodless cheek; but there was no mistaking the man. It was a surprise to Bartley to see him there and be spoken to by a knave who had tried to rob him; but he was too full of his immediate trouble to think much of minor things.
"What do you know about it?" said he, roughly.
"I'll tell you," said Monckton, coolly.
He then walked in a most leisurely way to the gate that led into the meadow whose eastern boundary was Hope's quick-set hedge, and he came in the same leisurely way up to Mr. Bartley, and leaned his back, with his hands behind him, with perfect effrontery, against the palings.
"I know all," said he. "I overheard you in your office fourteen years ago, when you changed children with Hope."
Bartley uttered an exclamation of dismay.
"And I've been hovering about here all day, and watched the little game, and now I am fly, and no mistake."
Bartley threw up his hands in dismay. "Then it's all over; I am doubly ruined. I can not hope to silence you both."
"Don't speak so loud, governor."
"Why not?" said Bartley, "others will, if I don't." He lowered his voice for all that, and wondered what was coming.
"Listen to me," said Monckton, exchanging his cynical manner for a quiet and weighty one.
Bartley began to wonder, and look at him with a sort of awe. The words now dropped out of Monckton's thin lips as if they were chips of granite, so full of meaning was every syllable, and Bartley felt it.
"It's not so bad as it looks. There are only two men that know you are a felon."
Bartley winced visibly.
"Now one of those men is to be bought"—Bartley lifted his head with a faint gleam of hope at that—"and the other—has gone—down a coal-mine."
"What good will that do me?"
The villain paused, and looked Bartley in the face.
"That depends. Suppose you were to offer me what you offered Hope, and suppose Hope—was never—to come up—again?"
"No such luck," said Bartley, shaking his head sorrowfully.
"Luck," said Monckton, contemptuously; "we make our own luck. Do you see that vagabond lying under the tree, that's Ben Burnley."
"Ah!" said Bartley, "the ruffian Hope discharged."
"The same, and a man that is burning to be revenged on him:he'syour luck, Mr. Bartley; I know the man, and what he has done in a mine before to-day."
Then he drew near to Bartley's ear, and hissed into it these fearful words:
"Send him down the mine, promise him five hundred pounds—if WilliamHope—never comes up again—and William Hope never will."
Bartley drew back aghast. "Assassination!" he cried, and by a generous impulse of horror he half fled from the tempter; but Monckton followed him up and laid his hand upon his shoulder.
"Hush," said he, "you are getting too near that window; and it is open.Let me see there's nobody inside."
He looked in. There was nobody. Grace was upstairs, but it did so happen that she came into the room soon after.
"Nothing of the kind. Accident. Accidents will happen in mines, and talking of luck, this mine was declared dangerous this very day."
"No, no," groaned Bartley, trembling in every limb, "it's a horrible crime; I dare not risk it."
"It is but a risk. The alternative is certain. You will be indicted for fraud by the Cliffords."
Bartley groaned.
"They'll live in your home, they'll revel in your money, while you wear a cropped head—and a convict dress—in a stone cell at Portland."
"No, never!" screamed Bartley. "Man, man; you are tempting me to my perdition!"
"I am saving you. Just consider—where is the risk? It is only an accident, and who will suspect you? Men don't ruin their own mines. Here, just let me call him."
Bartley made a faint gesture to forbid it, but Monckton pretended to take that as an assent.
"Hy, Ben," he cried, "come here."
"No, no," cried Bartley, "I'll have nothing to do with him."
"Well," said Monckton, "then don't, but hear what he has got to say; he'll tell you how easily accidents happen in a mine."
Then Burnley came in, but stood at some distance. Bartley turned his back upon them both, and edged away from them a little; but Monckton stood between the two men, determined to bring them together.
"Ben," said he, "Mr. Bartley takes you on again at my request, no thanks to Mr. Hope."
"No, curse him; I know that."
"Talking of that, Ben, how was it that you got rid of that troublesome overseer in the Welsh colliery?"
Ben started, and looked aghast for a moment, but soon recovered himself and told his tale of blood with a strange mixture of satisfaction and awe, washing his hands in the air nervously all the time.
"Well, you see, sir, we put some gun-cotton in a small canister, with a fuse cut to last fowr minutes, and hid it in one of the old workings the men had left; then they telt t' overseer they thowt t' water was coming in by quickly. He got there just in time; and what with t' explosion, fire-damp, and fallen coal, we never saw t' over-seer again."
"Dear me," said Monckton, "and Mr. Hope has gone down the mine expressly to inspect old workings. Is it not a strange coincidence? Now if such an accident was to befall Mr. Hope, it's my belief Mr. Bartley would give you five hundred pounds."
Bartley made no reply, the perspiration was pouring down his face, and he looked a picture of abject guilt and terror.
Monckton looked at him, and decided for him. He went softly, like a cat, to Ben Burnley and said, "If an accident does occur, and that man never comes up again, you are to have five hundred pounds."
"Five hundred pounds!" shouted Ben. "I do t' job. Nay,nay, but," said he, and his countenance fell, "they will not let me go down the mine."
The diabolical agent went cat-like to Bartley.
"Please give me a written order to let this man go to work again in the mine."
Bartley trembled and hesitated, but at last took out his pocket-book and wrote on a leaf,
"Take Burnley on again.
Whilst writing it his hand shook, and when it was written he would not tear it out. He panted and quivered and was as pale as ashes, and said, "No, no, it's a death-warrant; I can not;" and his trembling hand tried to convey the note-book back to his pocket, but it fell from his shaking fingers, and Monckton took it up and quietly tore the leaf out, and took it across to Burnley, in spite of a feeble gesture the struggling wretch made to detain him. He gave Ben the paper, and whispered, "Be off before he changes his mind."
"You'll hear of an accident in the mine before the day is over," said Burnley, and he went off without a grain of remorse under the double stimulus of revenge and lucre.
"He'll do it," cried Monckton, triumphantly, "and Hope will end his days in the Bartley mine."
* * * * *
These words were hardly out of his lips when Grace Hope walked out of the house, pale, and with her eyes gleaming, and walked rapidly past them. She had nothing on her head but a white handkerchief that was tied under her chin. Her appearance and her manner struck the conspirators with terror. Bartley stood aghast; but the more resolute villain seized her as she passed him. She was not a bit frightened at that, but utterly amazed. It was a public road.
"How dare you touch me, you villain!" she cried. "Let me go. Ah, I shall know you again, with your face like a corpse and your villainous eyes. Let me go, or I'll have you hung."
"Where are you going?" said Bartley, trembling.
"To my father."
"He is not your father; it is a conspiracy. You must come home with me."
"Never!" cried Mary, and by a sudden and violent effort she flungMonckton off.
But Bartley, mad with terror, seized her that moment, and that gaveMonckton time to recover and seize her again by the arm.
"You are not of age," cried Bartley; "you are under my authority, and you shall come home with me."
"No! no!" cried Mary. "Help! help! murder! help!"
She screamed, and struggled so violently that with all their efforts they could hardly hold her. Then the devil Monckton began to cry louder still, "She's mad! she's mad! help to secure a mad woman." This terrified Grace Hope. She had read of the villainies that had been done under cover of that accusation, which indeed has too often prevented honest men from interfering with deeds of lawless violence. But she had all her wits about her, woman's wit included. She let them drag her past the cottage door. Then she cried out with delight, "Ah! here is my father." They followed the direction of her eye, and relaxed their grasp. Instantly she drew her hands vigorously downward, got clear of them, gave them each a furious push that sent them flying forward, then darted back through the open door, closed it, and bolted it inside just as Monckton, recovering himself, quickly dashed furiously against it—in vain.
The quick-witted villain saw the pressing danger in a moment. "To the back door or we are lost!" he yelled. Bartley dashed round to that door with a cry of dismay.
But Grace was before him just half a minute. She ran through the house.
Alas! the infernal door was secure. The woman had locked it when she went out. Grace came flying back to the front, and drew the bolt softly. But as she did so she heard a hammering, and found the door was fast. Unluckily, Hope's tool-basket was on the window-ledge, and Monckton drove a heavy nail obliquely through the bottom of the door, and it was immovable. Then Mary slipped with cat-like step to the window, and had her hand on the sill to vault clean out into the road; she was perfectly capable, it being one of her calisthenic exercises. But here again her watchful enemy encountered her. He raised his hammer as if to strike her hand—though perhaps he might not have gone that length—but she was a woman, and drew back at that cruel gesture. Instantly he closed the outside shutters; he didn't trouble about the window, but these outside shutters he proceeded to nail up; and, as the trap was now complete, he took his time, and by a natural reaction from his fears, he permitted himself to exult a little.
"Thank you, Mr. Hope, for the use of your tools." (Rat-tat.) "There, my little bird, you're caged." (Rat-tat-tat.) "Did you really think—(rat-tat)—two men—(rat-tat-tat)—were to be beaten by one woman?"
The prisoner thus secured, he drew aside with justifiable pride to admire his work. This action enabled him to see the side of the cottage he had secured so cleverly in front and behind, and there was Grace Hope coming down from her bedroom window; she had tied two crimson curtains together by a useful knot, which is called at sea a fisherman's bend, fastened one end to the bed or something, and she was coming down this extemporized rope, hand over hand alternately, with as much ease and grace as if she were walking down marble steps. Monckton flung his arm and body wildly over the paling and grabbed her with his finger ends, she gave a spang with her heels against the wall, and took a bold leap away from him into a tulip-bed ten feet distant at least: he yelled to Bartley, "To the garden;" and not losing a moment, flung his leg over the paling to catch her, with Bartley's help, in this new trap. Mary dashed off without a moment's hesitation at the quick-set hedge; she did not run up to it and hesitate like a woman, for it was not to be wriggled through; she went at it with the momentum and impetus of a race-horse, and through it as if it was made of blotting-paper, leaving a wonderfully small hole, but some shreds of her dress, and across the meadow at a pace that neither Bartley nor Monckton, men past their prime, could hope to rival even if she had not got the start. They gazed aghast at one another; at the premises so suddenly emptied as if by magic; at the crimson curtain floating like a banner, and glowing beautifully amongst the green creepers; and at that flying figure, with her hair that glittered in the sun, and streamed horizontal in the wind with her velocity, flying to the mine to save William Hope, and give these baffled conspirators a life of penal servitude.
The baffled conspirators saw Grace Hope bound over a stile like a deer and dash up to the mine; then there was a hurried colloquy, and some men were seen to start from the mine and run toward Hope's cottage. What actually took place was this: She arrived panting, and begged to be sent down the mine at once; the deputy said, "You cannot, miss, without an order from Mr. Hope."
"I am his daughter, sir," said she; "he has claimed me from Mr. Bartley this day."
At that word the man took off his hat to her.
"Let me down this instant; there's a plot to fire the mine, and destroy my dear father."
"A plot to fire the mine!" said the man, all aghast. "Why, who by? Hy! cage ready there!"
"One Burnley, but he's bribed by a stranger. Send me down to warn my father; but you run and seize that villain; you can not mistake him. He wears a light suit of tweed, all one color. He has very black eyebrows, and a face like a corpse, and a large gold ring on the little finger of his right hand. You will find him somewhere near my father's cottage. Neither you nor I have a moment to lose."
Then the deputy called three more men, and made for Hope's cottage, whileGrace went down in the cage.
Bartley fled in mortal terror to his own house, and began to pack up his things to leave the country. Monckton withdrew to the clump of fir-trees, and from that thin shelter watched the mine, intending to levant as soon as he should see Hope come up safe and sound; but, when he saw three or four men start from the mine and run across to him, he took the alarm and sought the thicker shelter of a copse hard by. It was a very thick cover, good for temporary concealment; but he soon found it was so narrow that he couldn't emerge from it on either side without being seen at once, and his quick wit told him that Grace had denounced him, and probably described him accurately to the miners; he was in mortal terror, but not unprepared for this sort of danger. The first thing he did was to whip off his entire tweed suit and turn it inside out; he had had it made on purpose; it was a thin tweed, doubled with black kerseymere, so that this change was a downright transformation. Then he substituted a black tie for a colored one, whipped out a little mirror and his hare's-foot, etc., browned and colored his cheek, put on an admirable gray wig, whiskers, mustache, and beard, and partly whitened his eyebrows, and hobbled feebly out of the little wood an infirm old man. Presently he caught sight of his gold ring. "Ah!" said he, "she is a sharp girl; perhaps she noticed that in the struggle?" He took it off and was going to put it in his pocket, but thought better of that, and chucked it into a ditch. Then he made for the village. The pursuers hunted about the house and, of course, didn't find him; but presently one of them saw him crossing a meadow not far off, so they ran toward him and hailed him.
"Hy! mister!"
He went feebly on, and did not seem to hear; then they hailed him again and ran toward him; then he turned and stopped, and seeing men running toward him, took out a large pair of round spectacles, and put them on to look at them. By this artifice that which in reality completed his disguise seemed but a natural movement in an old man to see better who it was that wanted him.
"What be you doing here?" said the man.
"Well, my good man," said Monckton, affecting surprise, "I have been visiting an old friend, and now I'm going home again. I hope I am not trespassing. Is not this the way to the village? They told me it was."
"That's right enough," said the deputy, "but by the way you come you just have seen him."
"No, sir," said Monckton, "I haven't seen anybody except one gentleman, that came through that wood there as I passed it."
"What was he like, sir?"
"Well, I didn't take particular notice, and he passed me all in a hurry."
"That would be the man," said the deputy. "Had he a very pale face?"
"Not that I remarked; he seemed rather heated with running."
"How was he dressed, sir?"
"Oh, like many of the young people, all of one pattern."
"Light or dark?"
"Light, I think."
"Was it a tweed suit?"
"I almost think it was. What had he been doing—anything wrong? He seemed to me to be rather scared-like."
"Which way did he go, sir?"
"I think he made for that great house, sir."
"Come on," said the deputy, and he followed this treacherous indication, hot in pursuit.
Monckton lost no time. He took off twenty years, and reached the Dun Cow as an old acquaintance. He hired the one vehicle the establishment possessed, and was off like a shot to Derby; thence he dispatched a note to his lodgings to say he was suddenly called to town, but should be back in a week. Not that he ever intended to show his face in that neighborhood again.
Nevertheless events occasioned that stopped both his flight andBartley's, and yet broke up their unholy alliance.
It was Hope's final inspection of the Bartley mine, and he took things in order. Months ago a second shaft had been sunk by his wise instructions, and but for Bartley's parsimony would have been now completed. Hope now ascertained how many feet it was short, and noted this down for Bartley.
Then, still inspecting, he went to the other extremity of the mine, and reached a sort of hall or amphitheatre much higher than the passages. This was a centre with diverging passages on one side, but closed on the other. Two of these passages led by oblique routes to those old works, the shoring of which had been reported unsafe.
This amphitheatre was now a busy scene, empty trucks being pushed off, full trucks being pushed on, all the men carrying lighted lanterns, that wavered and glinted like "wills of the wisp." Presently a bell rung, and a portion of the men, to whom this was a signal, left off work and began to put on their jackets and to await the descent of the cage to take them up in parties. At this moment Hope met, to his surprise, a figure that looked like Ben Burnley. He put up his lamp to see if he was right, and Ben Burnley it was. The ruffian had the audacity to put up his lamp, as if to scrutinize the person who examined him.
"Did I not discharge you?" said Hope.
"Ay, lad," said Ben; "but your master put me on again." With that he showed Bartley's order and signature.
Hope bit his lips, but merely said, "He will rue it." Burnley sidled away; but Hope cried to one or two men who were about,
"Keep a sharp lookout on him, my men, your lives are not safe whilst he's in the mine."
Burnley leaned insolently against a truck and gave the men nothing to observe; the next minute in bustled the honest miner at whose instance Hope had come down the mine, and begged him to come and visit the shoring at once.
Hope asked if there were any other men there; the miner replied in the negative.
"Very well, then," said Hope, "I'll just take one look at the water here, and I'll be at the shoring in five minutes."
Unfortunately this unwary statement let Burnley know exactly what to do; he had already concealed in the wood-work a canister of dynamite, and a fuse to it to last about five minutes. He now wriggled away under cover of Hope's dialogue and lighted the fuse, then he came flying back to get safe out of the mine, and leave Hope in his death-trap.
But in the meantime Grace Hope came down in the cage, and caught sight of her father and came screaming to him, "Father, father!"
"You here, my child!"
"There's a plot to murder you! A man called Burnley is to cause an explosion at the old works just as you visit them."
"An explosion!" cried Hope, "and fire-damp about. One explosion will cause fifty—ring the bell—here men! danger!"
Then there was a rush of men.
"Ben Burnley is firing the mine."
There was a yell of fury; but a distant explosion turned it to one of dismay. Hope caught his daughter up in his arms and put her into a cavity.
"Fly, men, to the other part of the mine," he cried.
There was a louder explosion. In ran Burnley terrified at his own work, and flying to escape. Hope sprang out upon him. "No you don't—living or dead, you are the last to leave this mine."
Burnley struggled furiously, but Hope dashed him down at his feet. Just as a far more awful explosion than all took place, one side of that amphitheatre fell in and the very earth heaved. The corner part of the shaft fell in upon the cage and many poor miners who were hoping to escape by it; but those escaped for the present who obeyed Hope's order and fled to another part of the mine, and when the stifling vapors drifted away there stood Hope pale as death, but strong as iron, with the assassin at his feet, and poor Grace crouching and quivering in her recess. Their fate now awaited these three, a speedy death by choke-damp, or a slow death by starvation, or a rescue from the outside under circumstances of unparalleled difficulty, since there was but one shaft completed, and that was now closed by a mountain of débris.
The explosions so tremendously loud below were but muffled sounds at the pit's mouth; but, alas! these muffled sounds, and one flash of lurid flame that shot up into the air, told the tale of horror to every experienced pitman and his wife, and the cry of a whole village went up to heaven.
The calamity spread like wildfire. It soon found its way to Clifford Hall, and the deputy ran himself with the news to Mr. Bartley. Bartley received it at first with a stony glare, and trembled all over; then the deputy, lowering his voice, said, "Sir, the worst of it is, there is foul play in it. There is good authority to say that Ben Burnley fired the mine to destroy his betters, and he has done it; for Mr. Hope and Miss Hope that is, Miss Bartley that was, are both there." He added, in a broken voice, "And if they are not buried or stifled, it will be hard work to save them. The mine is a ruin."
Bartley delivered a wild scream, and dashed out of the house at once; he did not even take his hat, but the deputy, more self-possessed, took one out of the hall and followed him.
Bartley hurried to the mine, and found that several stout fellows had gone down with their pickaxes and other tools to clear the shaft, but that it must be terribly slow work, so few men could work at a time in that narrow space. Bartley telegraphed to Derby for a more powerful steam-engine and experienced engineers, and set another gang to open the new shaft to the bottom, and see if any sufferers could be saved that way. Whatever he did was wise, but his manner was frenzied. None of his people thought he had so much feeling, and more than one of the quaking women gave him a kind word; he made no reply, he did not even seem to hear. He wandered about the mine all night wringing his hands, and at last he was taken home almost by force.
Humanity overpowered prejudice, and Colonel Clifford came to the mine to see if he could be of any use to the sufferers. He got hold of the deputy and learned from him what Bartley was doing. He said he thought that was the best course, as there would be division of labor; but, said he, "I am an old campaigner, and I know that men can not fight without food, and this work will be a fight. How will you house the new-comers?"
"There are forty-seven men missing, and the new men can sleep in their cottages."
"That's so," said the Colonel, "but there are the wives and the children. I shall send sleeping tents and eating tents, and provisions enough to feed a battalion. Forty-seven lives," said he, pityingly.
"Ay, sir," said the deputy, "and such lives, some of them; for Mr. Hope and Miss Mary Bartley—leastways that is not her name now, she's Mr. Hope's daughter."
"Why, what has she to do with it?"
"I am sorry to say, sir, she is down the mine."
"God forbid!" said the Colonel; "that noble girl dead, or in mortal danger."
"She is, sir," and, lowering his voice, "by foul play;" then seeing the Colonel greatly shocked and moved, he said, "and I ought not to keep it from you. You are our nearest magistrate; the young lady told me at the pit mouth she is Mr. Hope's daughter."
"And so she is."
"And she said there was a plot to destroy her father in the mine by exploding the old workings he was going to visit. One Ben Burnley was to do it; a blackguard that has a spite against Mr. Hope for discharging him. But there was money behind him and a villain that she described to us—black eyebrows, a face like a corpse, and dressed in a suit of tweed one color. We hoped that she might have been mistaken, or she might have warned Mr. Hope in time; but now it is to be seen that there was no mistake, and she had not time to warn him. The deed is done; and a darker deed was never done, even in the dark."
Colonel Clifford groaned: after a while he said, "Seize that Ben Burnley at once, or he will soon leave this place behind him."
"No, he won't," said the deputy. "He is in the mine, that is one comfort; and if he comes out alive his life won't be worth much, with the law on one side of the blackguard and Judge Lynch on t'other."
"The first thing," said the Colonel, "is to save these precious lives.God help us and them."
He then went to the Railway, and wired certain leading tradesmen in Derby for provisions, salt and fresh, on a large scale, and for new tents. He had some old ones stored away in his own house. He also secured abundance of knives, forks, plates, buckets, pitchers, and jugs, and, in short, he opened a commissariat. He inquired for his son Walter, and why he was so late. He could learn nothing but that Walter had mounted a hunter and left word with Baker that he should not be home till eight o'clock. "John," said the Colonel, solemnly, "I am in great trouble, and Walter is in worse, I fear. Let nobody speak to him about this accident at the mine till he has seen me."
* * * * *
Walter Clifford rode to the Lake Hotel to inquire after the bracelet. The landlady told him she had sent her husband over with it that day.
"Confound it," said Walter; "why, he won't know who to take it to."
"Oh, it's all right, sir," said she. "My Sam won't give it to the wrong person, you may be sure."
"How do I know that?" said Walter; "and, pray, who did you tell him to give it to?"
"Why, to the lady as was here with you."
"And how the deuce is he to find her? He does not know her name. It's a great pity you could not keep it till I came."
"Well, sir, you was so long a-coming."
"That's true," said Walter; "let us make the best of it. I shall feed my horse, and get home as quickly as I can."
However, he knew he would be late, and thought he had better go straight home. He sent a telegram to Mary Bartley: "Landlord gone to you with bracelet;" and this he signed with the name of the landlady, but no address. He was afraid to say more, though he would have liked to put his wife upon her guard; but he trusted to her natural shrewdness. He mounted his horse and went straight home, but he was late for dinner, and that vexed him a little, for it was a matter Colonel Clifford was particular about. He dashed up to his bedroom and began to dress all in a hurry.
John Baker came to him wearing a very extraordinary look, and after some hesitation said, "I would not change my clothes if I were you, Mr. Walter."
"Oh," said Walter, "I am too late, you know; in for a penny, in for a pound."
"But, sir," said old John, "the Colonel wants to speak to you in the drawing-room."
Now Walter was excited with the events of the day, irritated by the affront his father had put upon him and Mary, strung up by hard riding, etc. He burst out, "Well, I shall not go to him; I have had enough of this—badgered and bullied, and my sweetheart affronted—and now I suppose I am to be lectured again; you say I am not well, and bring my dinner up here."
"No, Mr. Walter," said the old man, gravely, "I must not do that. Sir, don't you think as you are to be scolded, or the angel you love affronted; all that is over forever. There has been many a strange thing happened since you rode out of our stable last, but I wish you would go to the Colonel and let him tell you all; however, I suppose I may tell you so much as this, that your sweetheart is not Mary Bartley at all; she is Mr. Hope's daughter."
"What!" cried Walter, in utter amazement.
"There is no doubt about it, sir," said the old man, "and I believe it is all out about you and her, but that would not matter, for the Colonel he takes it quite different from what you might think. He swears by her now. I don't know really how that came about, sir, for I was not there, but when I was dressing the Colonel he said to me, 'John, she's the grandest girl in England, and an honor to her sex, and there is not a drop of Bartley's blood in her.'"
"Oh, he has found that out," said Walter. "Then I'll go to him like a bird, dear old fellow. So that is what he wanted to tell me."
"No," said John Baker, gravely.
"No," said Walter; "what then?"
"It's trouble."
"Trouble," said Walter, puzzled.
"Ay, my poor young master," said Baker, tenderly—"sore trouble, such trouble as a father's heart won't let me, or any man break to you, while he lives to do it. I know my master. Ever since that fellow Bartley came here we have seen the worst of him; now we shall see the best of him. Go to him, dear Master Walter. Don't waste time in talking to old John Baker. Go to your father and your friend."
Walter Clifford cast a look of wonder and alarm on the old man, and went down at once to the drawing-room. His father was standing by the fire. He came forward to him with both hands, and said,
"My son!"
"Father," said Walter, in a whisper, "what is it?"
"Have you heard nothing?"
"Nothing but good news, father—that you approve my choice."
"Ah, John told you that!"
"Yes, sir."
"And did he tell you anything else?"
"No sir, only that some great misfortune is upon me, and that I have my father's sympathy."
"You have," said the Colonel, "and would to God I had known the truth before. She is not Bartley's daughter at all; she is Hope's daughter. Her virtue shines in her face; she is noble, she is self-denying, she is just, she is brave; and no doubt she can account for her being at the Lake Hotel in company with some man or other. Whatever that lady says will be the truth. That's not the trouble, Walter; all that has become small by comparison. But shall we ever see her sweet face again or hear her voice?"
"Father," said Walter, trembling, "you terrify me. This sudden change in your voice that I never heard falter before; some great calamity must have happened. Tell me the worst at once."
"Walter," said the old man, "stand firm; do not despair, for there is hope."
"Thank God for that, father! now tell me all."
"Walter, there has been an explosion in the mine—a fearful explosion; the shaft has fallen in; there is no getting access to the mine, and all the poor souls confined there are in mortal peril. Those who are best acquainted with the mine do not think that many of them have been destroyed by the ruin, but they tell me these explosions let loose poisonous gases, and so now those poor souls are all exposed to three deadly perils—choke-damp, fire-damp, and starvation."
"It's pitiable," said Walter, "but surely this is a calamity to Bartley, and to the poor miners, but not to any one that I love, and that you have learnt to respect."
"My son," said the Colonel, solemnly, "the mine was fired by foul play."
"Is it possible?"
"It is believed that some rival owner, or else some personal enemy of William Hope, bribed a villain to fire some part of the mine that Hope was inspecting."
"Great heavens!" said Walter, "can such villains exist? Poor, poor Mr.Hope: who would think he had an enemy in the world?"
"Alas!" said the Colonel, "that is not all. His daughter, it seems, over-heard the villain bribing the ruffian to commit this foul and terrible act, and she flew to the mine directly. She dispatched some miners to seize that hellish villain, and she went down the mine to save her father."
"Ah!" said Walter, trembling all over.
"She has never been seen since."
The Colonel's head sank for a moment on his breast.
Walter groaned and turned pale.
"She came too late to save him; she came in time to share his fate."
Walter sank into a chair, and a deadly pallor overspread his face, his forehead, and his very lips.
The Colonel rushed to the door and called for help, and in a moment John Baker and Mrs. Milton and Julia Clifford were round poor Walter's chair with brandy and ether and salts, and every stimulant. He did not faint away; strong men very seldom do at any mere mental shock.
The color came slowly back to his cheeks and his pale lips, and his eyes began to fill with horror. The weeping women, and even the stout Colonel, viewed with anxiety his return to the full consciousness of his calamity. "Be brave," cried Colonel Clifford; "be a soldier's son; don't despair; fight: nothing has been neglected. Even Bartley is playing the man; he has got another engine coming up, and another body of workmen to open the new shaft as well as the old one."
"God bless him!" said Walter.
"And I have an experienced engineer on the road, and the things civilians always forget—tents and provisions of all sorts. We will set an army to work sooner than your sweetheart, poor girl, shall lose her life by any fault of ours."
"My sweetheart," cried Walter, starting suddenly from his chair. "There, don't cling to me, women. No man shall head that army but I. My sweetheart! God help me—SHE'S MY WIFE."