It was just in the gray of the morning, and the silver light of dawn was stealing through the deep glens of the wood, brightening the dewy filaments that busy insects had spun across and across the grass, and shining in long, glistening lines, upon the broad clear stream. It was a lovely stream as ever the eye of meditation rested on, or thoughtful angler walked beside; and from about two miles beyond Slingsby Park to within half a mile of the small town of Tarningham, it presented an endless variety of quiet English scenery, such as does the heart of man good to look upon. In one part it was surrounded by high hills, not unbroken by jagged rocks and lofty banks, and went on tumbling in miniature cascades and tiny rapids. At another place it flowed on in greater tranquillity through green meadows, flanked on either hand by tall, stately trees, at the distance of eighty or ninety yards from the banks; not in trim rows, all ranged like rank and file upon parades, but straggling out as chance or taste had decided, sometimes grouping into masses, sometimes protruding far towards the stream, sometimes receding coyly into the opening of a little dell. Then again the river dashed on at a more hurried rate through a low copse, brawling as it went over innumerable shelves of rock and masses of stone, or banks of gravel, which attempted to obstruct its course; and nearer still to the town it flowed through turfy banks, slowly and quietly, every now and then diversified by a dashing ripple over a shallow, and a tumble into a deep pool.
It was in the gray of the morning, then, that a man in a velveteen jacket was seen walking slowly along by the margin, at a spot where the river was in a sort of middle state, neither so fierce and restive as it seemed amongst the hills, nor so tranquil and sluggish as in the neighbourhood of the little town. There were green fields around; and numerous trees and copses approaching sometimes very close to the water, but sometimes breaking away to a considerable distance, and generally far enough off for the angler to throw a fly without hooking the branches around. Amongst some elms, and walnuts, and Huntingdon poplars on the right bank, was an old square tower of very rough stone, gray and cold-looking, with some ivy up one side, clustering round the glassless window. It might have been mistaken for the ruin of some ancient castle of no great extent, had it not been for the axle-tree and some of the spokes and fellies of a dilapidated water-wheel projecting over the river, and at once announcing for what purposes the building had been formerly used, and that they had long ceased. There was still a little causeway and small stone bridge of a single arch spanning a rivulet that here joined the stream, and from a doorway near the wheel still stretched a frail plank to the other side of the dam, which, being principally constructed of rude layers of rock, remained entire, and kept up the water so as to form an artificial cascade. Early as was the hour, some matutinal trout, who, having risen by times and perhaps taken a long swim before breakfast, felt hungry and sharpset, were attempting to satisfy their voracious maws by snapping at a number of fawn-coloured moths which imprudently trusted themselves too near the surface of the water. The religious birds were singing their sweet hymns all around, and a large goatsucker whirled by on his long wings, depriving the trout of many a delicate fly before it came within reach of the greedy jaws that were waiting for it below the ripple.
But what was the man doing while fish, flies, and birds were thus engaged? Marry he was engaged in a very curious and mysterious occupation. With a slow step and a careful eye fixed upon the glassy surface beneath him, he walked along the course of the current down towards the park paling that you see there upon the left. Was he admiring the speckled tenants of the river? Was he admiring his own reflected image on the shining mirror of the stream? He might be doing either, or both; but, nevertheless, he often put his finger and thumb into the pocket of a striped waistcoat; pulled out some small round balls, about the size of a pea or a little larger, marvellously like one of those boluses which doctors are sometimes fain to prescribe, and chemists right willing to furnish, but which patients find it somewhat difficult to swallow. These he dropped one by one into the water, wherever he found a quiet place, and thus proceeded till he had come within about three hundred yards of the park wall. There he stopped the administration of these pills; and then, walking a little further, sat down by the side of the river, in the very midst of a tall clump of rushes.
In a minute or two something white, about the length of eighteen inches, floated down; and instantly stretching forth a long hooked stick, our friend drew dexterously in to the shore a fine large trout of a pound and a half in weight. The poor fellow was quite dead, or at least so insensible that he did not seem at all surprised or annoyed to find himself suddenly out of his element, and into another gentleman's pocket, though the transition was somewhat marvellous, from the fresh clear stream to a piece of glazed buckram. Most people would have disliked the change, but Mister Trout was in that sort of state that he did not care about any thing. Hardly was he thus deposited when one of his finny companions--perhaps his own brother, or some other near relation--was seen coming down the stream with his stomach upwards, a sort of position which, to a trout, is the same as standing on the head would be to a human being. This one was nearer the bank, and first he hit his nose against a stump of tree, then, whirling quietly round, he tried the current tail foremost; but it was all of no avail, he found his way likewise into the pocket, and two more were easily consigned to the same receptacle, all of them showing the same placid equanimity. At length one very fine fish, which seemed to weigh two pounds and a half, at the least, followed advice, and took a middle course. He was out of reach of the stick; the water was too deep at that spot to wade, and what was our friend of the pocket to do? He watched the fish carried slowly down the stream towards the place where the river passed under an archway into Sir John Slingsby's park. It was fat and fair, and its fins were rosy as if the morning sun had tinged them. Its belly was of a glossy white, with a kindly look about its half-expanded gills, that quite won our friend's affection. Yet he hesitated; and being a natural philosopher, he knew that by displacing the atoms of water the floating body might be brought nearer to the shore. He therefore tried a stone: but whether he threw it too far, or not far enough, I cannot tell; certain it is, the trout was driven further away than before, and to his inexpressible disappointment, he saw it carried through the arch. He was resolved, however, that it should not thus escape him. Difficult circumstances try, if they do not make, great men; and taking a little run, he vaulted over the park paling and into the park.
He was just in the act of getting over again, perhaps feeling if he stayed too long it might be considered an intrusion, and had the fish in his hand, so that his movements were somewhat embarrassed, when a little incident occurred which considerably affected his plans and purposes for the day.
I have mentioned an old mill, and sundry trees and bushes at different distances from the bank, breaking the soft green meadow turf in a very picturesque manner. In the present instance, these various objects proved not only ornamental but useful--at least to a personage who had been upon the spot nearly as long as our friend in the velveteen jacket. That personage had been tempted into the mill either by its curious and ancient aspect, or by the open door, or by surprise, or by some other circumstance or motive; and once in he thought he might as well look out of the window. When he did look out of the window, the first thing his eyes fell upon, was the first-mentioned gentleman dropping his pills into the water; and there being something curious and interesting in the whole proceeding, the man in the mill watched the man by the river for some minutes. He then quietly slipped out, and as the door was on the opposite side from that on which the operations I have described were going on, he did so unperceived. It would seem that the watcher became much affected by what he saw; for the next minute he glided softly over the turf behind a bush, and thence to a clump of trees, and then to a single old oak with a good wide trunk--rather hollow and somewhat shattered about the branches, but still with two or three of the lower boughs left, having a fair show of leaves, like a fringe of curly hair round the poll of some bald Anacreon. From that he went to another, and so on; in fact, dodging our first friend all the way down, till the four first trout were pocketed, and the fifth took its course into the park. When the betrayer of these tender innocents, however, vaulted over the paling in pursuit, the dodger came out and got behind some bushes--brambles, and other similar shrubs that have occasionally other uses than bearing blackberries; and no sooner did he see the successful chaser of the trout, with his goodly fish in his hand and one leg over the paling, about to return to the open country, than taking two steps forward, he laid his hand upon his collar, and courteously helped him over somewhat faster than he would have come without such assistance.
The man of fishes had his back to his new companion at the moment when he received such unexpected support; but as soon as his feet touched the ground on the other side, he struggled most unreasonably to free his collar from the grasp that still retained it. He did not succeed in this effort; far from it; for he well-nigh strangled himself in the attempt to get out of that iron clutch; but, nevertheless, he contrived, at the risk of suffocation, to bring himself face to face with his tenacious friend, and beheld, certainly what he did not expect to see. No form of grim and grisly gamekeeper was before him; no shooting-jacket and leathern leggings; but a person in the garb of a gentleman of good station, furnished with arms, legs, and chest of dimensions and materials which seemed to show that a combat would be neither a very safe nor pleasant affair.
"Who the devil are you?" asked the lover of trout, in the same terms which Mr. Wittingham had used the night before to the very same personage.
"Ha, ha, my friend!" exclaimed Ned Hayward; "so you have been hocussing the trout have you?" And there they stood for a few minutes without any answers to either question.
Of all the turnings and windings in this crooked life, one of the most disagreeable is turning back; and yet it is one we are all doomed to from childhood to old age. We are turned back with the smaller and the greater lessons of life, and have alas, but too often, in our obstinacy or our stupidity to learn them over and over again. I with the rest of my herd must also turn back from time to time; but on the present occasion it shall not be long, as I am not in a sportive mood this morning, and could find no pleasure in playing a trout or a salmon, and should be disgusted at the very sight of a cat with a mouse.
We have seen our good friend, Ned Hayward, lay his hand stoutly on the collar of a gentleman who had been taking some unwarrantable liberties with the finny fair ones of the stream; but the question is, how happened Ned Hayward to be there at that particular hour of the morning? Was he so exceedingly matutinal in his habits as to be usually up, dressed, and out and walking by a piece of water at a period of the day when most things except birds, fish, and poachers are in their beds? Had he been roused at that hour by heartach, or headach, or any other ache? Was he gouty and could not sleep--in love, and not inclined to sleep? No, reader, no. He was an early man in his habits it is true, for he was in high health and spirits, and with a busy and active mind which looked upon slumber as time thrown away; but then though he rose early he was always careful as to his dress. He had a stiff beard which required a good deal of shaving, his hair took him a long time, for he liked it to be exceedingly clean and glossy. Smooth he could not make it, for that the curls prevented, curls being obstinate things and resolved to have their own way. Thus with one thing or another, sometimes reading scraps of a book that lay upon his dressing-table, sometimes looking out of window, and thinking more poetically than he had any notion of, sometimes cleaning his teeth till they looked as white and as straight as the keys of a new pianoforte, sometimes playing a tune with his fingers on the top of the table, and musing philosophically the while, it was generally at least one hour and a half from the time he arose before he issued forth into the world.
This was not always the case indeed, for on May mornings, when the trout rise, in August, if he were near the moors, on the first of September, wherever he might be, for he was never at that season in London, he usually abridged his toilet, and might be seen in the green fields, duly equipped for the sport of the season, very shortly after daybreak.
On the present occasion, and the morning of which I have just spoken, there cannot be the slightest doubt that he would have laid in bed somewhat longer than usual, for he had had a long ride the day before, some excitement, a good supper, and had sat up late; but there was one little circumstance which roused him and sent him forth. At about a quarter before five he heard his door open, and a noise made amongst the boots and shoes. He was in that sleepy state in which the events of even five or six hours before are vague and indefinite, if recollected at all, and although he had some confused notion of having ordered himself to be called early, yet he knew not the why or the wherefore, and internally concluded that it was one of the servants of the inn come to take his clothes away for the purpose of brushing them; he thought, as that was a process with which he had nothing to do, he might as well turn on his other side and sleep it out. Still, however, there was a noise in the room, which in the end disturbed him, and he gave over all the boots, physical or metaphysical, to the devil. Then raising himself upon his elbow, he looked about, and by the dim light which was streaming through the dimity curtains--for the window was unfurnished with shutters--he saw a figure somewhat like that of a large goose wandering about amidst the fragments of his apparel.
"What in the mischiefs name are you about?" asked Ned Hayward, impatiently. "Can't you take the things and get along?"
"It's me, Sir," said the low, sweet-toned voice of the humpbacked pot-boy, who had not a perfect certainty in his own mind that neuter verbs are followed by a nominative case, "you were wishing to know last night about--"
"Ah, hang it, so I was," exclaimed Ned Hayward, "but I had forgotten all about it--well, my man, what can you tell me about this fellow, this Wolf? Where does he live, how can one get at him? None of the people here will own they know any thing about him, but I believe they are lying, and I am very sure of it. The name's a remarkable one, and not to be mistaken."
"Ay, Sir," answered the pot-boy, "they knew well enough whom you want, though you did not mention the name they chose to know him by. If you had asked for Ste Gimlet, they'd have been obliged to answer, for they can't deny having heard of him. Wolf's a cant name, you see, which he got on account of his walking about so much at night, as they say wolves do, though I never saw one."
"Well, where is he to be found?" asked Ned Hayward, in his usual rapid manner, and he then added, to smooth down all difficulties, "I don't want to do the man any harm if I can help it, for I have a notion, somehow, that he is but a tool in the business; and therefore, although I could doubtless with the information you have given me of his real name, find him out, and deal with him as I think fit, yet I would rather have his address privately, that I may go and talk to him alone."
"Ah, Sir, he may be a tool," answered the pot-boy, "but he's an awkward tool to work with; and I should think you had better have two or three stout hands with you."
"Well, I will think of that, my man," answered the young gentleman; "but at all events I should like to know where to find him."
"That's not quite so easy, Sir," replied the hunchback, "for he wanders about a good deal, but he has got a place where he says he lives on Yaldon Moor, behind the park, and that he's there some time in every day is certain. I should think the morning as good a time as any, and you may catch him on the look-out if you go round by the back of the park, and then up the river by the old mill. There's an overgo a little higher up, and I shouldn't wonder if he were dabbling about in the water; for it isn't the time for partridges or hares, and he must be doing something."
"But what sort of place has he on the moor?" asked Ned Hayward, beginning to get more and more interested in the pursuit of his inquiries; "how can I find it, my man?"
"It's not easy," answered his companion, "for it's built down in the pit. However, when you have crossed by the overgo, you will find a little path just before you, and if you go along that straight, without either turning to the right or the left, it will lead you right up to the moor. Then I'm sure I don't know how to direct you, for the roads go turning about in all manner of ways."
"Is it east, west, north, or south?" asked Captain Hayward, impatiently.
"Why east," answered the boy; "and I dare say if you go soon you will find the sun just peeping out over the moor in that direction. It's a pretty sight, and I've looked at it often to see the sunshine come streaming through the morning mist, and making all the green things that grow about there look like gold and purple, and very often, too, I've seen the blue smoke coming up out of the pit from Ste's cottage-chimney, Perhaps it may be so when you go, and then you'll easily find it."
"And whose park is it you speak of, boy?" said Ned Hayward. "There may be half-a-dozen about here."
"Why, Sir John Slingsby's," answered the boy, "that's the only one we call the park about here."
"Oh, then, I know it," rejoined the gentleman, stretching out his hand at the same time, and taking his purse from a chair that stood by his bedside; "there's a crown for you; and now carry off the boots and clothes, and get them brushed as fast as possible."
The boy did as he was told, took the crown with many thanks, gathered together the various articles of apparel which lay scattered about, and retired from the room. Ned Hayward, however, without waiting for his return, jumped out of bed, drew forth from one of his portmanteaus another complete suit of clothes, plunged his head, hands, and neck in cold water, and then mentally saying, "I will shave when I come back," he dressed himself in haste, and looked out for a moment into the yard, to see whether many of the members of the household were astir. There was a man at the very further end of the yard cleaning a horse, and just under the window, the little deformed pot-boy, whistling a plaintive air with the most exquisite taste, while he was brushing a coat and waistcoat. The finest and most beautiful player on the flageolet, never equalled the tones that were issuing from his little pale lips, and Ned Hayward could not refrain from pausing a moment to listen, but then putting on his hat, he hurried down stairs, and beckoned the boy towards him.
"Do not say that I am out, my man, unless any questions are asked," he said; "and when you have brushed the clothes, put them on a chair at the door."
The boy nodded significantly, and our friend, Ned Hayward, took his way out of the town in the direction that the boy had indicated. Of all the various bumps in the human head, the bump of locality is the foremost. This book the reader is well aware is merely a phrenological essay in a new form. So the bump of locality is the most capricious, whimsical, irrational, unaccountable, perverse, and unmanageable of all bumps. To some men it affords a faculty of finding their way about houses--I wish to Heaven it did so with me, for I am always getting into wrong rooms and places where I have no business--others it enables to go through all sorts of tortuous paths and ways almost by intuition; with others it is strong regarding government offices, and the places connected therewith; but in Ned Hayward it was powerful in the country, and it would have been a very vigorousignis fatuusindeed that would lead him astray either on horseback or on foot. Three words of direction generally sufficed if they were clear, and he was as sure of his journey as if he knew every step of the way. There might be a little calculation in the thing--a sort of latent argumentation--for no one knew better that if a place lay due north, the best way to arrive at it was not to go due south, or was more clearly aware that in ordinary circumstances, the way into the valley was not to climb the hill; but Ned Hayward was rarely disposed to analyse any process in his own mind. He had always hated dissected puzzles even in his boyhood; and as his mind was a very good mind, he generally let it take its own way, without troubling it with questions. Thus he walked straight on out of the little town along the bank of the river, and finding himself interrupted, after about three miles, by the park-wall, he took a path through the fields to the left, then struck back again to the right, and soon after had a glimpse of the river again above its passage through Sir John Slingsby's park.
All this time Ned Hayward's mind was not unoccupied. He saw every thing that was passing about him, and meditated upon it without knowing that he was meditating. The sky was still quite gray when he set out, but presently the morning began to hang out her banners of purple and gold to welcome the monarch of day, and Ned Hayward said to himself, "How wonderfully beautiful all this is, and what a fine ordination is it that every change in nature should produce some variety of beauty." Then he remarked upon the trees, and the birds, and the meadows, and the reflections of the sky in a clear, smooth part of the river, and with somewhat of a painter's mind, perceived the beautiful harmony that is produced by the effect that one colour has upon another by its side. And then he passed a little village church, with the steeple shrouded in ivy, and it filled his mind full of quiet and peaceful images, and simple rural life (with a moral to it all), and his thoughts ran on to a thousand scenes of honest happiness, till he had the game at skittles and the maypole on the green up before him as plain as if it were all real; and the ivy and two old yews carried him away to early times when that ancient church was new. Heaven knows how far his fancy went galloping!--through the whole history of England at least. But all these reveries went out of his head almost as soon as the objects that excited them, and then, as he went through some neat hedgerows and pleasant corn-fields, which promised well in their green freshness for an abundant harvest, he began to think of partridges and an occasional pheasant lying under a holly-bush, and pointing dogs and tumbling birds, a full game-bag, and a capital dinner, with a drowsy evening afterwards. Good Heaven! what a thing it is to be young, and in high health, and in high spirits; how easy the load of life sits upon one; how insignificant are its cares to its enjoyments; every moment has its flitting dream; every hour its becoming enjoyment, if we choose to seek it; every flower, be it bitter or be it sweet, be it inodorous or be it perfumed, has its nectarial fall of honeyed drops, ripe for the lip that will vouchsafe to press it. But years, years, they bring on the autumn of the heart, when the bright and blooming petals have passed away, when the dreams have vanished with the light slumbers of early years, and every thing is in the seed for generations to come; we feel ourselves the husks of the earth, and find that it is time to fall away, and give place to the bloom and blossom of another epoch.
Our friend, however, if not in the budding time of life, had nothing of the sere and yellow leaf about him; he was one of those men who was calculated to carry on the day-dream of boyhood, even beyond its legitimate limit; nothing fretted him, nothing wore him, few things grieved him. It required the diamond point to make a deep impression, and though he reflected the lights that fell upon him from other objects, it was but the more powerful rays that penetrated into the depth, and that not very frequently. Thus on he went upon his way, and what he had got to after partridges and field-swamps, and matters of such kind, Heaven only knows. He might be up in the moon for aught I can tell, or in the Indies, or riding astride upon a comet, or in any other position the least likely for a man to place himself in, except when aided by the wings of imagination; and yet, strange to say, Ned Hayward had not the slightest idea that he had any imagination at all. He believed himself to be the most simple jog-trot, matter-of-fact creature in all the world; but to return, he was indulging in all sorts of fantasies, just when a little path between two high hedges opened out upon a narrow meadow, by the side of the river at a spot just opposite the old mill, and not more than forty or fifty yards distant from the door thereof. He saw the old mill and the stream, but saw nothing else upon my word, and thinking to himself,
"What a picturesque ruin that is, it looks like some feudal castle built beside the water, parting two hostile barons' domains. What the deuce can it have been?"
Doubt with him always led to examination, so without more ado, he crossed over the open space with his usual quick step, entered the mill, looked about him, satisfied himself in a minute as to what had been its destination, and then gazed out of the windows, first up the stream, and next down. Up the stream he saw some swallows skimming over the water, the first that summer had brought to our shores; and, moreover, a sedate heron, with its blue back appearing over some reeds, one leg in the water, and one raised to its breast. When he looked down, however, he perceived the gentleman I have described, dropping some pellets into the water, and he thought "That's a curious operation, what can he be about?"
The next minute, however, the legitimate wooer of the fishes turned his face partly towards the mill, and Ned Hayward murmured, "Ah ha, Master Wolf,aliasSte Gimlet, I have you now, I think." And issuing forth, he dogged him down the bank as I have before described, till at length, choosing his moment dexterously, he grasped him by the collar, in such a manner, that if he had had the strength of Hercules, he would have found it a more difficult matter to escape, than to kill forty Hydras, or clean fifty Augean stables.
"Hocussing the fish!" said the prisoner, in answer to one of Captain Hayward's first intimations of what he thought of his proceedings. "I don't know what you mean by hocussing the fish--I've got a few dead 'uns out of the river, that's all; and no great harm, I should think, just to make a fry."
"Ay, my good friend," replied Ned Hayward, "dead enough, I dare say they were when you got them; but I'm afraid we must have a coroner's inquest upon them, and I do not think the verdict will be 'Found drowned.' What I mean, my man, is that you have poisoned them--a cunning trick, but one that I know as well as your name or my own."
"And what the devil is your name?" asked the captive, trying to twist himself round, so as at least to get a blow or a kick at his captor.
"Be quiet--be quiet!" answered Ned Hayward, half strangling him in his collar. "My name is my own property, and I certainly will not give it to you; but your own you shall have, if you like. You are called Ste Gimlet or I am mistaken, but better known at night by the name of Wolf."
The man muttered an angry curse, and Ned Hayward continued,
"You see I know all about you; and, to tell you the truth, I was looking for you."
"Ah, so he's had some 'un down from London," said Wolf, entirely mistaking the nature of Captain Hayward's rank and avocation. "Well, so help me--, if I ever did this on his ground, afore, Sir."
"Well, Master Gimlet," answered Ned Hayward, perfectly understanding what was passing in the man's mind, and willing to encourage the mistake, "I have been asked down certainly, and I suppose I must take you before Sir John Slingsby at once--unless, indeed, you like to make the matter up one way or another."
"I haven't got a single crown in the world," answered the poacher; "if you know all, you'd know that I am poor enough."
"Ay, but there are more ways than one of making matters up," rejoined Ned Hayward, in a menacing tone. "You know a little bit of business you were about last night."
The man's face turned as white as a sheet, and his limbs trembled as if he had been in the cold fit of an ague. All his strength was gone in a moment, and he was as powerless as a baby.
"Why," faltered he at length, "you could not be sent for that affair, for there's not been time."
"No, certainly," replied the young gentleman; "but having been asked down here on other matters, I have just taken that up, and may go through with it or not, just as it suits me. Now you see, Ste," he continued, endeavouring to assume, as well as he could, somewhat of the Bow-street officer tone, and doing so quite sufficiently to effect his object with a country delinquent, "a nod you know is quite as good as a wink to a blind horse."
"Ay, ay, I understand, Sir," answered Mr. Gimlet.
"Well then," continued Ned Hayward, "I understand, too; and being quite sure that you are not what we call the principal in this business, but only an accessory, I am willing to give you a chance."
"Thank'ee, Sir," replied Wolf, in a meditative tone, but he said no more; and his captor, who wished him to speak voluntarily, was somewhat disappointed.
"You are mighty dull, Master Wolf," said Ned Hayward, "and therefore I must ask you just as plain a question as the judge does when he has got the black cap in his hand ready to put on. Have you any thing to say why I should not take you at once before Sir John Slingsby?"
"Why, what the devil should I say?" rejoined the man, impatiently. "If you know me, I dare say you know the others, and if you're so cunning, you must guess very well that it was not the money that we were after; so that it can't be no felony after all."
"If it is not a felony, it is not worth my while to meddle with," answered Ned Hayward, "but there may be different opinions upon that subject; and if you like to tell me all about it, I shall be able to judge. I guessed it was not for money; but there is many a thing as bad as that. I don't ask you to speak, but you may if you like. If you don't, come along."
"Well, I'll speak all I know," answered Wolf, "that's to say, if you'll just let me get breath, for, hang me, if your grip does not half strangle me. I'll not mention names though, for I won't peach; but just to show you that there was nothing so very wrong, I'll tell you what it was all about--that's to say, if you'll let me off about these devils of fish."
"Agreed as to the fish," replied Ned Hayward, "if you tell the truth. I don't want to throttle you either, my good friend; but mark me well, if I let go my hold, and you attempt to bolt, I will knock you down, and have you before a magistrate in five minutes. Sit down there on the bank then." And without loosening his grasp, he forced his prisoner to bend his knees and take up a position before him, from which it would not have been possible to rise without encountering a blow from a very powerful fist. When this was accomplished, he let the man's collar go, and standing directly opposite, bade him proceed.
This seemed not so easy a task as might have been imagined, at least to our friend Mr. Gimlet, who, not being a practised orator, wanted the art of saying as much as possible upon every thing unimportant, and as little as possible upon every thing important. He scratched his head heartily, however, and that stimulus at length enabled him to produce the following sentence.
"Well, you see, Sir, it was nothing at all but a bit of lovemaking."
"It did not look like it," answered Ned Hayward.
"Well, it was though," said Mr. Gimlet, in a decided tone. "The young gentleman, whom I'm talking of, wanted to get the young lady away; for you see her mother looks very sharp after her, and so he had a chaise ready, and me and another to help him, and if those two fellows had not come up just as we were about it, he'd have had her half way to Scotland by this time."
"And where is the young gentleman, as you call him, now?" asked Ned Hayward, in that sort of quiet, easy tone, in which people sometimes put questions, which, if considered seriously, would be the least likely to receive an answer, just as if a straightforward reply were a matter of course.
But his companion was upon his guard. "That's neither here nor there," he replied.
"It is I can assure you, my good friend Wolf," said the young gentleman; "for whatever you may think, this was just as much a felony as if you had taken a purse or cut a throat. Two pistols were fired, I think--the young lady is an heiress; and forcibly carrying away an heiress, is as bad as a robbery; it is a sort of picking her pocket of herself. So, if you have a mind to escape a noose, you'll instantly tell me where he is."
The man thrust his hands into his pockets, and gazed at his interrogator with a sullen face, in which fear might be seen struggling with dogged resolution; but Ned Hayward the moment after, added as a sort of rider to his bill,
"I dare say he is some low fellow who did it for her money."
"No, that he's not, by--!" cried the other. "He's a gentleman's son, and a devilish rich un's too."
"Ah ha! Mr. Wittingham's!" cried Ned Hayward, "now I understand you," and he laughed with his peculiar clear, merry laugh, which made Mr. Gimlet, at first angry, and then inclined to join him. "And now, my good friend," continued Ned Hayward, laying his hand upon his companion's shoulder, "you may get up and be off. You've made a great blunder, and mistaken me for a very respectable sort of functionary, upon whose peculiar province I have no inclination to trespass any further--I mean a thief-taker. If you will take my advice, however, neither you nor Mr. Wittingham will play such tricks again, for if you do you may fare worse; and you may as well leave off hocussing trout, snaring pheasants and hares, and shooting partridges on the sly, and take to some more legitimate occupation. You would make a very good gamekeeper, I dare say, upon the principle of setting a thief to catch a thief, and some of these days I will come up to your place upon the moor, and have a chat with you about it; I doubt not you could show me some sport with otters, or badgers, or things of that kind."
"Upon my soul and body you're a cool hand," cried Ste Gimlet, rising and looking at Captain Hayward, as if he did not well know whether to knock him down or not.
"I am," answered our friend Ned, with a calm smile, "quite cool, and always cool, as you'll find when you know me better. As to what has passed to-day I shall take no notice of this fish affair, and in regard to Mr. Wittingham's proceedings last night, I shall deliberate a little before I act. You'd better tell him so when you next see him, just to keep him on his good behaviour, and so good morning to you, my friend."
Thus saying, Ned Hayward turned away, and walked towards the town, without once looking back to see whether his late prisoner was or was not about to hit him a blow on the head. Perhaps had he known what was passing in worthy Mr. Gimlet's mind, he might have taken some precaution; for certainly that gentleman was considerably moved; but if the good and the bad spirit had a struggle together in his breast, the good got the better at length, and he exclaimed, "No, hang it, I won't," and with a slow and thoughtful step he walked up the stream again, towards the path which led to the moor.
Upon that path I shall leave him, and begging the reader to get upon any favourite horse he may have in the stable--hobby or not hobby--canter gaily back again to take up some friends that we have left far behind.
The reader may remember that we left a lady and her daughter, whom Ned Hayward afterwards discovered to be a Mrs. and Miss Clifford, standing at the door of Sir John Slingsby's house, in the heart of what was called Tarningham Park. All that Ned Hayward (or the reader either) knew of their history at the moment that he quitted them, after having assisted them to alight from their carriage, was as follows: that the elder lady had been sent for to see her elder brother in his last moments, he having been accused of having gout in the stomach, and that she and her daughter had been stopped on the king's highway by three personages, two of whom, at least, had pistols with them, that they had been rescued by Captain Hayward himself, and another gentleman, that on arriving at Tarningham House it did not look at all like the dwelling of a dying man, and that the answer of the butler to Mrs. Clifford's inquiries regarding her brother's health was, "Quite well, thank you Ma'am," delivered in the most commonplace tone in the world.
At the precise point of time when this reply was made, Ned Hayward took his leave, remounted his horse, and rode back to Tarningham, and after he was gone Mrs. Clifford remained for at least thirty seconds somewhat bewildered with what seemed to her a very strange announcement. When she had done being bewildered, and seemed to have got a slight glimpse of the real state of the case, she turned an anxious glance to her daughter, to which Miss Clifford, who fully understood what it meant, replied at once, without requiring to have it put into words, "You had better go in, dear mamma," she said, "it will grieve poor Isabella if you do not, and besides, it might be risking a great deal to go back at night with nobody to protect us."
Mrs. Clifford still hesitated a little, but in the meantime some by-play had been going on which decided the question. The butler had called a footman, the footman had taken a portmanteau and some smaller packages from the boot of the carriage. The name of Mrs. Clifford had been mentioned once or twice, a lady's-maid crossing the hall had seen the two ladies' faces by the light of a great lamp, and in a moment after, from a door on the opposite side of the vestibule, came forth a fair and graceful figure, looking like Hebe dressed for dinner.
"Oh, my dear aunt!" she exclaimed, running across to Mrs. Clifford and kissing her, "and you, too, my dear Mary! This is indeed an unexpected pleasure; but come in, come into the drawing-room; they will bring in all the things--there is no one there," she continued, seeing her aunt hesitated a little, "I am quite alone, and shall be for the next two hours, I dare say."
Mrs. Clifford suffered herself to be led on into a fine large old-fashioned drawing-room, and then began the explanations.
"And so, Isabella, you did not expect me to-night," said the elder lady, addressing Hebe. "Either for jest or for mischief some one has played us a trick. Have you got the letter, Mary?"
It was in Miss Clifford's writing-desk, however, as letters always are in some place where they cannot be found when they are wanted; but the fact was soon explained that Mrs. Clifford that very day about four o'clock had received a letter purporting to come from the housekeeper at Turningham House, informing her that her brother, Sir John Slingsby, had been suddenly seized with gout in the stomach, and was not expected to live from hour to hour, that Miss Slingsby was too much agitated to write, but that Sir John expressed an eager desire to see his sister before he died.
"Good gracious!" exclaimed the fair Isabella, "who could have done such a thing as that?" and then she laughed quietly, adding, "Well, at all events I am very much obliged to them; but it was a shameful trick, notwithstanding."
"You haven't heard the whole yet, Isabella," replied Mrs. Clifford, "for we have been stopped between this and Tarningham, and should have been robbed--perhaps murdered--if two gentlemen had not come up to our rescue--good Heaven, it makes me feel quite faint to think of it." And she sat down in one of the large arm-chairs, and put her hand to her head, while her check turned somewhat pale.
"Take a little wine, my dear aunt," cried Isabella, and before Mrs. Clifford could stop her she had darted out of the room.
As soon as she was alone with her daughter, the widow lady gazed round the chamber in which she sat with a thoughtful and melancholy look. She was in the house where her early days of girlhood had passed--she was in the very room where she had gone in all the agitation of happy love as a bride to the altar. She peopled the place with forms that could no longer be seen, she called up the loved and the dead, the parents who had cherished and instructed her, the fair sister who had bloomed and withered by her side. How many happy, how many a painful scene rose to the eye of memory on that stage where they had been enacted. All the material objects were the same, the pictures, the furniture, the old oak paneling with its carved wreaths; but where were they who moved so lately beside her in that chamber--where was all that had there been done? The grave and the past--man's tomb, and the tomb of man's actions had received them, and in the short space of twenty years all had gone, fading away and dissolving into air like a smoke rising up unto heaven, and spreading out thinner and thinner, till naught remains. Herself and a brother, from whom many circumstances had detached her, were all that were left of the crowd of happy faces that remembrance called back as she sat there and gazed around. Some tears rose to her eyes, and Mary who had been standing by gazing at her face, and reading in it with the quick appreciation of affection all the emotions which brought such shadows over the loved mother's brow, knelt down beside her, and taking her hand in hers said earnestly, "Mamma, dear mamma, I know this is painful, but pray for my sake and Isabella's let the shameful deceit that has been played upon us produce a good and happy result. You are here in my uncle's house; be reconciled to him fully, I beseech you. You know that he is good-humoured notwithstanding all his faults, and I cannot but think that if those who might have led him to better things had not withdrawn from him so completely, he might now have been a different man."
Mrs. Clifford shook her head mournfully.
"My dear child," she said, "you know that it is not resentment; it was your good father who did not feel it consistent with his character and station to countenance all that takes place here."
"But for Isabella's sake," said Miss Clifford, earnestly, and before her mother could answer, the young lady of whom she spoke re-entered the room with a servant carrying some refreshments.
"Oh dear aunt," she said, while the wine and water and biscuits were placed upon a small table at Mrs. Clifford's elbow, "it makes me so glad to see you, and I have ordered the blue room at the south side to be got ready for you directly, and then there is the corner one for Mary, because it has a window both ways, and when she is in a gay mood she can look out over the meadows and the stream, and when she is in her high pensiveness she can gaze over the deep woods and hills. Then she is next to me too, so that she may have merry nonsense on one side, and grave sense on the other; for I am sure you will stay a long while with us now you are here, and papa will be so glad."
"I fear it cannot be very long, my love," replied Mrs. Clifford. "In the first place I have come it seems uninvited, and in the next place you know, Isabella, that I am sometimes out of spirits, and perhaps fastidious, so that all guests do not at all times please me. Who have you here now? There seemed a large party in the dining-room."
"Oh, there are several very foolish men," answered Sir John Slingsby's daughter, laughing, "and one wise one. There is Mr. Dabbleworth, who was trying to prove to me all dinner-time that I am an electrical machine; and in the end I told him that I could easily believe he was one, for he certainly gave me a shock, and Sir James Vestage who joined in and insisted that instead of electrical machines men were merely improved monkeys. I told him that I perfectly agreed with him, and that I saw fresh proofs of it every day. Then up by papa was sitting old Mr. Harrington, the fox-hunter; what he was saying I do not know, for I never listen to any thing he says, as it is sure either to be stupid or offensive. Then there was Charles Harrington, who lisped a good deal, and thought himself exceedingly pretty, and Mr. Wharton, the lawyer, who thought deeply and drank deeply, and said nothing but once."
"But who was your wise man, dear Isabella?" asked Mary, very willing to encourage her fair cousin in her light cheerfulness, hoping that it might win Mrs. Clifford gently from sadder thoughts.
"Oh, who but good Dr. Miles," answered Miss Slingsby, "who grumbled sadly at every body, and even papa did not escape, I can assure you. But all these people will be gone in an hour or two, and in the meantime I shall have you all alone."
"Then there is no one staying in the house, Isabella?" said Mrs. Clifford. "I heard at Tarningham that your father expected some people from London."
"Only one, I believe," answered the fair daughter of the house, "but he has not arrived yet, and perhaps may not. He is a Captain Hayward, who was ensign in papa's regiment long ago. I never saw him, but people say 'he's the best fellow in the world.' You know what that means, Mary: a man that will drink, or hunt, or shoot, or fish with any body, or every body, and when none of these are to be done, will go to sleep upon the sofa. Pray, pray do stay, dear aunt, till he is gone, for I know not what I should do with him in the house by myself. I positively must get papa to ask somebody else, or get the good doctor to come up and flirt with him to my heart's content, just as a diversion from the pleasures of this Captain Hayward's society."
"A very disagreeable person, I dare say," replied Mary Clifford; "it is very odd how names are perverted, so that 'a good creature' means a fool in the world's parlance; 'a very respectable man' is sure to be a very dull one; and 'the best fellow in the world' is invariably--"
But her moralising fit was suddenly brought to an end by the door of the drawing-room being thrown open, and Sir John Slingsby rushing in.
Stay a moment, reader, and observe him before he advances. Honest Jack Slingsby! Roystering Sir John! Jolly old Jack! Glorious Johnny! By all these names was he known, or had been known by persons in different degrees of acquaintanceship with him. That round and portly form, now extending the white waistcoat and black-silk breeches, had once been slim and graceful: that face glowing with the grape in all its different hues, from theœil de perdrixupon the temples and forehead to the deep purple of old port in the nose, had once been smooth and fair. That nose itself, raising itself now into mighty dominion over the rest of the face, and spreading out, Heaven knows where, over the map of his countenance, like the kingdom of Russia in the share of Europe, was once fine and chiselled like Apollo's own. That thin white hair flaring up into a cockatoo on the top of his head to cover the well-confirmed baldness, was once a mass of dark curls that would not have disgraced the brow of Jove. You may see the remains of former dandyism in the smart shoe, the tight silk-stocking, the well cut blue-coat; and you may imagine how much activity those limbs once possessed by the quick and buoyant step with which the capacious stomach is carried into the room. There is a jauntiness, too, in the step which would seem to imply that the portion of youthful vigour and activity, which is undoubtedly gone, has been parted from with regret, and that he would fain persuade himself and others that he still retains it in his full elasticity; but yet there is nothing affected about it either, and perhaps after all it is merely an effort of the mind to overcome the approach of corporeal infirmity, and to carry on the war as well as may be. Look at the good-humoured smile, too, the buoyant, boisterous, overflowing satisfaction that is radiating from every point of that rosy countenance. Who on earth could be angry with him? One might be provoked, but angry one couldn't be. It is evidently the face of one who takes the world lightly--who esteems nothing as very heavy--retains no impressions very long--enjoys the hour and its pleasures to the very utmost, and has no great consciousness of sin or shame in any thing that he does. He is, in fact, a fat butterfly, who, though he may have some difficulty in fluttering from flower to flower, does his best to sip the sweets of all he finds, and not very unsuccessfully.
With that same jaunty light step, with that same good-humoured, well-satisfied smile, Sir John Slingsby advanced straight to his sister, took her in his arms, gave her a hearty kiss, and shook both her hands, exclaiming in around, full, juicy voice, almost as fat as himself,
"Well, my dear Harriet, I'm very happy to see you; thisiskind, this is very kind indeed; I could hardly believe my ears when the servants told me you were here, but I left the fellows immediately to fuddle their noses at leisure, and came to assure myself that it was a fact. And my dear Mary, too, my little saint, how are you, my dear girl?"
"We were brought here, John," replied Mrs. Clifford, "by a very shameful trick." And she proceeded to explain to him the trick which had been practised upon her.
"Gout!" exclaimed Sir John, "gout in the stomach! It would be a devilish large gout to take up his abode in my stomach, or else he'd find the house too big for him;" and he laid his hand upon his large paunch with an air of pride and satisfaction. "Gout! that does not look like gout I think," and he stuck out his neat foot, and trim well-shaped ankle; "never had but one threatening of a fit in my life, and then I cured it in an afternoon--with three bottles of Champagne and a glass of brandy," he added, in a sort of loud aside to Mary, as if she would enter into the joke better than her mother. "And so really, Harriet, you would not have come if you had not thought me dying. Come, come now, forget and forgive; let bygones be bygones; I know I am a d--d fool, and do a great many very silly things; but 'pon my soul I'm very sorry for it, I am indeed; you can't think how I abominate myself sometimes, and wonder what the devil possesses me. I'll repent and reform, upon my life I will, Harriet, if you'll just stay and help me--it's being left all alone to struggle with temptation that makes me fail so often, but every ten minutes I'm saying to myself, 'What an old fool you are, Jack Slingsby!' so now you'll stay like a dear good girl, as you always were, and help to make my house a little respectable. Forget and forgive, forget and forgive."
"My dear John, I have nothing to forgive," answered Mrs. Clifford. "You know very well that I would do any thing in the world to promote your welfare, and always wished it, but---"
"Ay, ay, it was your husband," answered Sir John, bringing an instant cloud over his sister's face. "Well, he was a good man--an excellent man--ay, and a kind man too, and he was devilish right after all; I can't help saying it, though I suffer. In his station what could he do? An archdeacon and then a dean, it was not to be expected that he should countenance rioting, and roaring, and drinking, and all that, as we used to do here; but 'pon my life, Harriet, I'll put an end to it. Now you shall see, I won't drink another glass to-night, and I'll send all those fellows away within half an hour, by Jove! I'll just go back and order coffee in the dining-room, and that'll be a broad hint, you know. Bella will take care of you in the meantime, and I'll be back in half an hour--high time I should reform indeed--even that monkey begins to lecture me. I've got a capital fellow coming down to stay with me--the best fellow in the world--as gay as a lark, and as active as a squirrel; yet somehow or other he always kept himself right, and never played at cards, the dog, nor got drunk either that I ever saw; yet he must have got drunk too, every man must sometimes, but he kept it devilish snug if he did--by the by, make yourselves comfortable." And without waiting to hear his sister's further adventures on the road, Sir John Slingsby tripped out of the room again, and notwithstanding all his good resolutions, finished two-thirds of a bottle of claret while the servants were bringing in the coffee.
"Rather a more favourable account of your expected guest, Isabella, than might have been supposed," said Mrs. Clifford, as soon as Sir John Slingsby was gone. "A young man who did not drink or play in your father's regiment, must have been a rare exception; for I am sorry to say that it had a bad name in those respects long before he got it, and I believe that it did him a great deal of harm."
"Papa is so good-humoured," replied Miss Slingsby, "that he lets people do just what they like with him. I am sure he wishes to do all that is right."
Mrs. Clifford was silent for a moment or two, and then turned the conversation; but in the house of her brother she was rather like a traveller who, riding through a country, finds himself suddenly and unexpectedly in the midst of what they call in Scotland a shaking moss; whichever path she took, the ground seemed to be giving way under her. She spoke of the old park and the fine trees, and to her dismay, she heard that Sir John had ordered three hundred magnificent oaks to be cut down and sold. She spoke of a sort of model farm which had been her father's pride, and after a moment or two of silence, Isabella thought it better, to prevent her coming upon the same subject with her father, by telling her that Sir John, not being fond of farming, had disposed of it some three months before to Mr. Wharton, the solicitor.
"He could not find a tenant easily for it," she continued, "and it annoyed him to have it unoccupied, so he was persuaded to sell it, intending to invest the money in land adjoining the rest of the property."
"I hope Mr. Wharton gave him a fair price for it?" said Mrs. Clifford.
"I really don't know," answered her niece; "I dislike that man very much."
"And so do I," said Mary Clifford.
"And so do I," added her mother, thoughtfully.
Mr. Wharton had evidently not established himself in the favour of the ladies, and as ladies are always right, he must have been a very bad man indeed.
To vary the pleasures of such a conversation, Miss Slingsby soon after ordered tea, trusting that her father would return before it was over. Sir John Slingsby's half hour, however, extended itself to an hour and a half, but then an immense deal of loud laughing and talking, moving feet, seeking for hats and coats, and ultimately rolling of wheels, and trotting of horses, was heard in the drawing-room, and the baronet himself again appeared, as full of fun and good-humour as ever. He tried, indeed, somewhat to lower the tone of his gaiety, to suit his sister's more rigid notions; but although he was not in the least tipsy--and indeed it was a question which might have puzzled Babbage's calculating machine to resolve what quantity of any given kind of wine would have affected his brain to the point of inebriety--yet the potations in which he had indulged had certainly spread a genial warmth through his bosom, which kept his spirits at a pitch considerably higher than harmonised very well with Mrs. Clifford's feelings.
After about half an hour's conversation, then, she complained of fatigue, and retired to bed, and was followed by her niece and her daughter, after the former, at her father's desire, had sung him a song to make him sleep comfortably. Sir John then stretched his legs upon a chair to meditate for a minute or two over the unexpected event of his sister's arrival. But the process of meditation was not one that he was at all accustomed to, and consequently he did not perform it with great ease and dexterity. After he had tried it for about thirty seconds, his head nodded, and then looking up, he said, "Ah!" and then attempted it again. Fifteen seconds were enough this time; but his head, finding that it had disturbed itself by its rapid declension on the former occasion, now sank gradually on his shoulder, and thence found its way slowly round to his breast. Deep breathing succeeded for about a quarter of an hour, and then an awful snore, loud enough to rouse the worthy baronet by his own trumpet. Up he started, and getting unsteadily upon his legs, rubbed his eyes, and muttered to himself, "Time to go to bed." Such was the conclusion of his meditation, and the logical result of the process in which he had been engaged.
The next morning, however, at the hour of half-past nine, found Sir John in the breakfast-room, as fresh, as rosy, and as gay as ever. If wine had no effect upon his intellect at night, it had none upon his health and comfort in the morning; the blushing banner that he bore in his countenance was the only indication of the deeds that he achieved; and kissing the ladies all round, he sat down to the breakfast-table, and spent an hour with them in very agreeable chat. He was by no means ill-informed, not without natural taste, a very fair theoretical judgment, which was lamentably seldom brought into practice, and he could discourse of many things, when he liked it, in as gentlemanlike and reasonable a manner as any man living; while his cheerful good-humour shed a sunshine around that, in its sparkling warmth, made men forget his faults and over-estimate his good qualities. He had a particular tact, too, of palliating errors that he had committed, sometimes by acknowledging them frankly, and lamenting the infatuation that produced them, sometimes by finding out excellent good reasons for doing things which had a great deal better been left undone. Mary and Isabella had been walking in the park before breakfast, talking of all those things which young ladies find to converse about when they have not met for some time; and Sir John, at once aware that his niece's eye must have marked the destruction going on among the old trees, asked her in the most deliberate tone in the world, if she had seen the improvements he was making.
Mary Clifford replied "No," and looked at her cousin as if for explanation, and then Sir John exclaimed,
"God bless my soul, did you not see the alley I am cutting? It will make the most beautiful vista in the world. First you will go round from the house by the back of the wood, slowly mounting the hill, by what we call the Broad Walk, and then when you have reached the top, you will have a clear view down through a sort of glade, with the old trees on your right and left hand, over the clumps of young firs in the bottom, catching the stream here and there, and having the park-wall quite concealed, till the eye passing over the meadows, just rests upon Tarningham church, and then running on, gets a view of your own place Steenham, looking like a white speck on the side of the hill, and the prospect is closed by the high grounds beyond. My dear Mary, it is the greatest improvement that ever was made--we will go and see it."
Now the real truth was, that Sir John Slingsby, some four or five months before, had very much wanted three thousand pounds, and he had determined to convert a certain number of his trees into bank-notes; but being a man of very good taste, as I have said, he had arranged the cutting so as to damage his park scenery as little as possible. Nevertheless, in all he said to Mary Clifford, strange as the assertion may seem, he was perfectly sincere; for he was one of those men who always begin by deceiving themselves, and having done that, can hardly be said to deceive others. It is a sort of infectious disease they have, that is all, and they communicate it, after having got it themselves. Before he had cut a single tree, he had perfectly persuaded himself that to do so would effect the greatest improvement in the world, and he was quite proud of having beautified his park, and at the same time obtained three thousand pounds of ready money.
Doubtless, had the conversation turned that way, he would have found as good an excuse, as valid a reason, as legitimate a motive, for selling the model farm; but that not being the case, they went on talking of different subjects, till suddenly the door opened, the butler, who was nearly as fat as his master, advanced three steps in a solemn manner, and announced, "Captain Hayward."
Sir John instantly started up, and the three ladies raised their eyes simultaneously, partly with that peculiar sort of curiosity which people feel when they look into the den of some rare wild beast, and partly with that degree of interest which we all take in the outward form and configuration of one of our own species, upon whom depends a certain portion of the pleasure or pain, amusement or dulness, of the next few hours. The next moment our friend Ned Hayward was in the room. He was well-dressed and well-looking, as I have already described him in his riding costume. Gentleman was in every line and every movement, and his frank, pleasant smile, his clear, open countenance were very engaging even at the first sight. Sir John shook him warmly by the hand, and although the baronet's countenance had so burgeoned and blossomed since he last saw him, that the young gentleman had some difficulty in recognising him, his former colonel, yet Ned Hayward returned his grasp with equal cordiality, and then looked round, as his host led him up towards Miss Slingsby, and introduced them to each other. Great was the surprise of both the baronet and his daughter, to see Mrs. Clifford rise, and with a warm smile extend her hand to their new guest, and even Mary Clifford follow her mother's example, and welcome, as if he were an old friend, the very person with whose name they had seemed unacquainted the night before.
"Ah ha, Ned!" cried Sir John; "how is this, boy? Have you been poaching upon my preserves without my knowing it? 'Pon my life, Harriet, you have kept your acquaintance with my little ensign quite snug and secret."
"It is an acquaintance of a very short date, John," replied Mrs. Clifford; "but one which has been of inestimable service to me already."
And she proceeded in a very few words to explain to her brother the debt of gratitude she owed to Captain Hayward for his interference the night before, and for the courtesy he had shown in escorting and protecting her to the doors of that very house.
Sir John immediately seized his guest by the two lapels of the coat, exclaiming,
"And why the devil didn't you come in, you dog? What, Ned Hayward at my gates, an expected guest, and not come in! I can tell you we should have given you a warm reception, fined you a couple of bottles for being late at dinner, and sent you to bed roaring drunk."
Ned Hayward gave a gay glance round at the ladies, as if inquiring whether they thought these were great inducements; he answered, however,
"Strange to say, I did not know it was your house, Sir John."
And now having placed our friend Ned Hayward comfortably between two excessively pretty girls of very different styles of beauty, and very different kinds of mind, I shall leave Fate to settle his destiny, and turn to another scene which had preceded his arrival at Tarningham House.