CHAPTER XXII.Mark Stote, the head–gamekeeper on the Nowelhurst estate, was a true and honest specimen of the West Saxon peasant—slow, tenacious, and dogged, faithful and affectionate, with too much deference, perhaps, to all who seemed “his betters”. He was now about fifty years old, but sturdy and active as ever, with a weather–beaten face and eyes always in quest of something. His home was a lonely cottage in one of the plantations, and there he had a tidy and very intelligent wife, and a host of little anxieties. His children, the sparrow–hawks, the weasels, the young fellows who “called theirselves under–keepers, and all they kept was theirselves, sir”,—what with these troubles, and (worst, perhaps, of all) that nest of charcoal–burners by the bustle–headed oak, with Black Will at the head of them, sometimes, Mark Stote wouldassure us, his head was gone “all wivvery[1]like”, and he could get no sleep of night–time.A mizzly, drizzly rain set in before the poor people got home that evening with the body of Clayton Nowell. Long mournful soughs of wind ensued, the boughs of the trees went heavily, and it blew half a gale before morning; but it takes a real storm to penetrate some parts of the forest. Once, however, let the storm get in, and it makes the most of the opportunity, raging with triple fury, as a lion does in a compound—the rage of the imperious blast, when it finds no exit.In the grey of the morning, two men met, face to face, in the overhanging of the Coffin Wood. Which was the more scared of the two, neither could have said; although each felt a little pleased at the terror of the other. The one of strong nerves was superstitious; the other, though free from much superstition, was nervous under the circumstances. The tall and big man was Mark Stote, the little fellow who frightened him Dr. Rufus Hutton. The latter, of course was the first to recover presence of mind, for Mark Stoteʼs mental locomotion was of ponderous metal.“What brings you here, Mr. Stote, at this time of the morning”?“And what brings you here, Dr. Hutton”?Mark might have asked with equal reason. He wondered afterwards why he did not; the wonder would have been if he had. As it was, he only said—“To see the rights o’ my young meester, sir”.“The wrongs, you mean”, said Rufus; “Mark Stote, there is more in this matter than any man yet has guessed at”.“You be down upon the truth of it, my word for it but you be, sir. Iʼve a shot along o’ both of ’em, since ’em wor that haigh, and seeʼd how they thought of their guns, sir; Meester Clayton wor laike enough to shoot Meester Cradock ’xidentually; but never wicey warse, sir, as the parson sayeth, never wicey warse, sir, for I niver see no one so cartious laike”.“Mark Stote, do you mean to say that Cradock shot his brother on purpose”?Mark stared at Rufus for several moments, then he thrust forth his broad brown hand and seized him by the collar. Dr. Hutton felt that he was nothing in that big manʼs grasp, but he would not play the coward.“Stote, let me go this instant. Iʼll have you discharged this very day unless you beg my pardon”.“That you moy then, if you can, meester. A leetle chap coom fram Ingy, an’ we bin two hunner and feefty year ’long o’ the squire and his foregoers”! Nevertheless he let Rufus go, and looked over his hat indignantly.“You are an honest fellow”, cried Hutton, when he got his breath again; “an uncommonly honest fellow, although in great need of enlightenment. It is not in my nature, my man”, here he felt like a patron, getting over his shaking, so elastic was his spirit; “I assure you, Luke—ah no, your name is Matthew; upon my word, I beg your pardon, I am almost sure it is Mark—Mr. Mark, I shall do my utmost for your benefit. Now talk no more, but act, Mark”.“I oodnʼt a talked nothing, but for mating with your honour”.“Then resume your taciturnity, which I see is habitual with you, and perhaps constitutional”.Mark Stote felt sore all over. Dr. Hutton now was the collarer. Mark, in his early childhood, had been to school for a fortnight, and ran away with a sense of rawness, which any big word renewed.“Mr. Stote, I will thank you to search in that direction, while I investigate this way”.Mark Stote longed to suggest that possibly Dr. Hutton, being (as you might say) a foreigner, was not so well skilled in examining ground as a woodman of thirty years’ standing; and therefore that he, old Mark, should have the new part assigned to him, before it was trampled by Rufus. But the gamekeeper knew not how to express it; sure though he was (as all of us are, when truth hits the heart like a hammer) that something evil would come of slurring the matter so feebly.But who are we to blame him?—we who transport a poor ignorant girl for trying to hide her ignominy, while we throttle, before she can cry, babe Truth, who should be received in society with a “Welcome, little stranger”!With the heavy rain–drops hanging like leeches, or running together, as they do, at every thorn or scale of the bark, seeking provocation to come down the nape of the neck of any man, Rufus Hutton went creeping under, trying not to irritate them, pretending that he was quite at home, and understood them like a jungle. Nevertheless he repented, and did not thoroughly search more than ten square yards. The things would knock him so in the face, and the stumps would stick in his trousers so, and the drops were so bad for his rheumatism; and, as it was quite impossible for any man to make way there, what on earth was there to look for?In spite of all this, he did find something, and stowed it away in his waistcoat pocket, to be spoken of, or otherwise, according to the turn of events. And by this he meant no dishonesty, at least in his own opinion, only he pitied young Cradock most deeply, and would do all he could in his favour. At the side of the narrow by–path leading from that woodmanʼs track (by which John Rosedew had approached) into the far depth of the thicket, Dr. Hutton found, under a blackberry–bush, a little empty tube, unlike any tube he had seen before. It was about two inches and a half in length, and three–fourths of an inch indiameter. Sodden as it was with the rain, and opened partway along the seam, it still retained, unmistakably, the smell of exploded powder. It seemed to be made of mill–board, or some other form of paper, with a glaze upon the outside and some metal foil at the butt of it. What puzzled Rufus most of all was a little cylinder passing into and across the bottom, something like a boot–tag.Dr. Hutton was not at this time skilled in modern gunnery. He knew how to load a fowling–piece, and what the difference was between a flint–gun and a percussion–gun; moreover, he had been out shooting once or twice in India, not from any love of the sport, but to oblige his neighbours. So he thought himself both acute and learned in arriving at the conclusion that this was a cartridge–case.“Mark, does Mr. Cradock Nowell generally shoot with cartridges”?“He laiketh mostways to be with a curtreege in his toard barryel, sir”.“Oh, keeps a cartridge in his left barrel, does he; and fires first the right, I suppose”?Leaving Mark to continue the search, Rufus returned to the Hall, after carefully taking the distances between certain important points. He was bound, as he felt, to lose no time in making the strictest examination of the poor youthʼs body. For now, in this great calamity, the management of everything seemed to fall upon Rufus Hutton. Sir Cradock, of course, was overwhelmed; JohnRosedew, although so deeply distressed, for the boys were like his own to him, was ready to do his utmost; but, as every one knew, except himself, he was not a man of the world. Unluckily, too, Mr. Garnet, always the leading spirit wherever he appeared, had not yet presented himself in this keen emergency. But his son came up, in the course of the day, to ask how Sir Cradock Nowell was, and to say that his father was quite laid up with a violent bilious attack.Dr. Hutton worked very hard, kept his mind on the stretch continually, ordered every one right and left. He even contrived to repulse all the kindred, to the twentieth collateral, who were flocking in, that day, to rejoice at the manhood of the heir. From old Hogstaff, who knew all the family, kith and kin, and friends and enemies, he learned the names of the guests expected, and met them with laconic missives handed through the closed gates at the lodges. In many cases, it is to be feared, indignation overcame sympathy; “upstart insolence”! was heard through the clatter of carriage–windows, very nearly as often as, “most sad occurrence”! However, most of them were consoled by the prospect of learning everything at the inquest on the morrow. What could be clearer than that Cradock must be hanged for Claytonʼs murder? The disgrace would kill the old baronet. “And then, it would be very painful, but my wife would be bound, sir, for the sake of her poor children, to prove her directdescent from that well–known Sir Cradock Nowell, who shot a man in the New Forest. Ah, I fear it runs in the family”.But their wrath was most unphilosophical, unworthy of any moralists, when they found that Rufus had cheated them all as to the time of the inquest. In every direction he spread a report that the coroner could not attend until three oʼclock on Friday, while he had arranged very quietly to begin the proceedings at noon. And he had taken good care to secure the presence of all the chief men in the neighbourhood—the magistrates, the old friends of the family, all who were interested in its honour rather than in its possessions. As none of the baffled cousins could solace themselves with outcry that the matter had been hushed up, they discovered that kind feeling had made the scene too sad for them.The coroner sat in the principal room at the “Nowell Arms”; the jury had been to see the body lying at the Hall, and now were to hear the evidence. Six or seven of the county magistrates sat behind the coroner, and their clerk was with them. Of course they did not attend officially, their jurisdiction being entirely several from that of the present court. But there could be little doubt that their action would depend, in a great measure, upon what should now transpire.The jury was chosen carefully to preclude, so far as might be, the charge of private influence. They were known, for the most part, as men ofindependence and probity, and two of them as consistent enemies to the influence of the Hall. As for general spectators, only a few of the village–folk allowed their curiosity to conquer their good feeling, or, perhaps, I should say their discretion; for all were tenants under Sir Cradock; and, though it was known by this time that Bull Garnet was ill and in bed, prostrated by one of his old attacks, everybody felt certain that he would find out who dared to be present, and visit them pretty smartly.It would be waste of time to recount all the evidence given; for we know nearly all that Dr. Hutton and the clergyman would depose. Another medical man, Dr. Gall, had also examined poor Claytonʼs remains; and the healing profession, who cure us (like bacon) after they have killed us, are remarkable for agreeing in public, and quarrelling sadly in private life. So Dr. Gall deposed exactly asMr.Hutton had done. He was very emphatic towards Rufus, in the use of the proper prefix; but we who know the skill displayed presuppose the game certificate.One part, however, of the medical evidence ought to be repeated. Poor Clayton had not died from an ordinary small–shot wound or wounds, but from a ghastly hole through his throat, cut as if by a bullet. As Dr. Gall, who knew something of guns, very concisely put it, the hole was like the hole in a door, when boys have fired, as they sometimes do, a tallow–candle through it. And yet itwas fluted at the exit, in the fleshy part of the neck, as no bullet could have marked it. That was caused by the shot diverging, beginning to radiate, perhaps from the opposition encountered.“In two words”, said Dr. Gall, when they had badgered him in his evidence, “the deceased was killed either by a balled cartridge, or by a charge of loose shot fired within six feet of him”.“Very good”, thought Rufus Hutton, who heard all Dr. Gall said; “Iʼll keep my cartridge–case to myself. Poor Crad shanʼt have that against him”.Hereupon, lest any mist (which goddesses abound in,videHomerpassim) descend upon the eyes or mind of any gentle follower of my poor Craddyʼs fortunes, let me endeavour to explain Dr. Gallʼs obscurities.Cartridges, as used by sportsmen with guns which load at the muzzle, are packages of shot compact, and rammed down in a body. Some of them have spiral cases of the finest wire, covered round with paper; others, used for shorter distance, have only cylinders of paper to enclose the shot. The interstices between the shots are solidified with sawdust. The only use of these things is—for they save little time in loading—to kill our brother bipeds, or quadrupeds, if such we are, at a longer distance. The shots are prevented from scattering so widely as they love to do, when freed from the barrelʼs repression. They fly in a closer body, their expansive instincts being checked, when first they leave the muzzle, by the constraint ofthe case and the tightness of their brotherhood. But it sometimes happens, mainly withwire–cartridges, that the shot can never burst its cerements, and flies in the compass of a slug, until it meets an obstacle. When this is so, the quarry escapes; unless a bullet so aimed would have hit it. This non–expansion is called, in good English, the “balling” of the cartridge. And those which are used for the longest distance, and for wild–fowl shooting—green cartridges, as they are called, containing larger shot—are especially apt to ball.Dr. Gall was aware, of course, that no one beating for a woodcock would think of putting a green cartridge into his gun at all; but it seemed very likely indeed that Cradock might have used a blue one, for a longer shot with his left barrel; and the blue ones, having wire round them, sometimes ball, though not so often as their verdant brothers. It only remains to be said that when a cartridge balls, it flies with the force, as well as in the compass, of a bullet. With three drachms of powder behind it, it will cut a hole at forty yards through a two–inch deal.Whether it were a balled cartridge or a charge of loose shot at six feet distance, was the momentous issue. In the former case, there would be fair reason to set it down as an accident; for the place where Cradock had first been seen was thirty yards from Clayton; and he might so have shot him thence, in the dusk, and through the thick of the covert. But if that poor boy haddied from a common charge of shot, “Murder” was the only verdict true men could return on the evidence set before them. For Cradock must have fired wilfully at the open throat of his brother, then flown to the hedge and acted horror when he saw John Rosedew. Where was Cradock? The jury trembled, and so did Rufus Hutton. The coroner repeated the question, although he had no right to do it, at that stage of the evidence.“Since it occurred he has not been seen”, whispered Rufus Hutton at last, knowing how men grow impatient and evil when unanswered.“Let us proceed with the rest of the evidence”, said his honour, grandly; “if the young man cares for his reputation, he will be here by–and–by. But I have ridden far to–day. Let us have some refreshment, gentlemen. Justice must not be hurried”.CHAPTER XXIII.It will have been perceived already that the coroner was by no means “the right man in the right place”. The legal firm, “Cole, Cole, and Son”, had been known in Southampton for many years, as doing a large and very respectable business. The present Mr. Cole, the coroner, who had been the “Son” in the partnership, became sole owner suddenly by the death of his father and uncle. Having brains enough to know that he was far from having too much, he took at once into partnership with him an uncommonly wide–awake, wary fellow, who had been head–clerk to the old firm, ever biding his time for this inevitable result. So now the firm was thriving under the style and title of “Cole, Chope, and Co”., Mr. Chope being known far and wide by the nickname of “Coleʼs brains”. Mr. Cole being appointed coroner, not many months ago, and knowing very little about his duties, took good care for a time not to attempttheir discharge without having “Coleʼs brains” with him. But this had been found to interfere so sadly with private practice, that little by little Cole plucked up courage, as the novelty of the thing wore off, and now was accustomed to play the coroner without the assistance of brains. Nevertheless, upon an occasion so important as this, he would have come with full cerebrum, but that Chope was gone for his holiday. Mr. Cole, however, was an honest man—which could scarcely be said of his partner—and meant to do his duty, so far as he could see it. In the present inquiry he had less chance of seeing it than usual, for he stood in great awe of Mr. Brockwood, a man of ability and high standing, who, as Sir Cradock Nowellʼs solicitor, attended to watch the case, at the suggestion of Rufus Hutton.Both the guns were produced to the coroner, in the condition in which they were found, except that John Rosedew, for safetyʼs sake, had lowered the right hammer of Claytonʼs to the half–cock, before he concealed it from Cradock. Cradockʼs own unlucky piece had been found, on the following morning, in a rushy pool, where he had cast it, as he fled so wildly. Both the barrels had been discharged, while both of Claytonʼs were loaded. It went to the heart of every man there who could not think Cradock a murderer, when in reply to a jurymanʼs question, what was the meaning of certain lines marked with a watch–spring file on the trigger–plate of his gun, it was explained that thetwins so registered the number and kind of the seasonʼs game.After this, Mark Stote was called, and came forward very awkwardly with a deal of wet on his velveteen cuffs, which he tried to keep from notice. His eyes were fixed upon the coroner, with a kind of defiance, but even while he was kissing the book, he was glad to sniff behind it.“Mr. Mark Stote”, said the coroner, duly prompted, “you have, I believe, been employed to examine the scene of this lamentable occurrence”?Mark Stote took a minute to understand this, and a minute to consider his answer.“Yees, my lard, I throwed a squoyle at ’un”.The representative of the Crown looked at Mark with amazement equal at least to that with which Mark was regarding him.“Gentlemen”, asked Mr. Cole, addressing the court in general, “what language does this man talk”?“West Saxon”, replied Mr. Brockwood, speaking apart to the coroner; “West Saxon of the forest. He can talk plain English generally, but whenever these people are nervous, they fall back unconsciously upon their native idiom. You will never be able to understand him: shall I act as interpreter”?“With all my heart; that is to say, with the consent of the jury. But what—I mean to say, how—— ”“How am I to be checked, you mean, unless Iam put upon oath; and how can you enter it as evidence? Simply thus—let your clerk take down the original answers. All the jury will understand them, and so, perhaps, will he”.The clerk, who was a fine young gentleman, strongly pronounced in attire, nodded a distinct disclaimer. It would be so unaristocratic to understand any peasant–tongue.“At any rate, most of the magistrates do. There are plenty of checks upon me. But I am not ambitious of the office. Appoint any one you please”.“Gentlemen of the jury”, said the coroner, glad to shift from himself the smallest responsibility, “are you content that Mr. Brockwood should do as he has offered”?“Certain, and most kind of him”, replied the jury, all speaking at once, “if his honour was unable to understand old English”.“Very good”, said Mr. Brockwood; “donʼt let us make a fuss about nothing. Mr. Stote says he ‘throwed a squoyle;’ that is to say, he looked at it”.“And in what state did you find the ground”? was the coronerʼs next question.“Twearable, twearable. Dwont ’e ax ov me vor gude now, dwont ’e”. And he put up his broad hand before his broad face.“Terrible, terrible”, said the coroner, going by the light of nature in his interpretation; “but Ido not mean the exact spot only where the body was found. I mean, how was the ground as regards dry and wet, for the purpose of retaining footmarks”?“Thar a bin zome rick–rack wather, ’bout a sannit back. But most peart on it ave a droud up agin. ’Twur starky, my lard, moor nor stoachy”. Here Mark felt that he had described things lucidly and powerfully, and looked round the room for approval.“Stiff rather than muddy, he means”, explained Mr. Brockwood, smiling at the coronerʼs dismay.“Were there any footprints upon it, in the part where the ground could retain them”?“ʼTwur dounted and full of stabbles, in the pearts whur the mulloch wur, but the main of ’un tuffets and stramots”.“That is to say”, Mr. Brockwood translated, “the ground was full of impressions and footmarks, where there was any dirt to retain them; but most of the ground was hillocky and grassy, and so would take no footprints”.“When you were searching, did you find anything that seemed to have been overlooked”?“Yees, my lard, I vound thissom”—producing Cradʼs stubby meerschaum—“and thissom”—a burnt felt–wad—“and a whaile vurther, ai vound thissom”. Here he slowly drew from his pocket a very fine woodcock, though not over fat, with its long bill tucked most carefully under its wing. He stroked the dead bird softly, and set its feathersprofessionally, but did not hand it about, as the court seemed to anticipate.“In what part, and from what direction, has that bird been shot”?“Ramhard of the head, my lard, as clane athert shat, and as vaine a bird as iver I wish to zee. But, ahʼs me, her be a wosebird, a wosebird, if iver wur wan”.Mark could scarcely control his tears, as he thought of the birdʼs evil omen, and yet he could not help admiring him. He turned him over and over again, and dropped a tear into his tail coverts. Mr. Brockwood saw it and gave him time; he knew that for many generations the Stotes had lived under the Nowells.“Oh, the bird was shot, you say, on the right side of the head, and clean through the head”.“Thank you”, proceeded the coroner. “Now, do you think that he could have moved after he touched the ground”?“Nivir a hinch, I allow, my lard. A vell as dead as a stwoun”.“Now inform the court, as nearly as you can, of the precise spot where you found it”.It took a long time to discover this, for Mr. Stote had not been taught the rudiments of topography. Nevertheless, they made out at last that the woodcock had been found, dead on his back, with his bill up, eight or ten yards beyond the place where Clayton Nowell fell dead, and in a direct line over his body from the gap in the hedgewhere Cradock stood. Dr. Hutton must have found the bird, if he had searched a little further.“Now”, said the coroner, forcibly. “Mr. Stote, I will ask you a question which is, perhaps, a little beyond the rules of ordinary evidence, I mean, at least, as permitted in a court of record”—here he glanced at the magistrates, who could not claim the rank of record—“which of these two unfortunate brothers caused, in your opinion, the death of—of that woodcock”?Mr. Brockwood glanced at the coroner sharply, and so did his own clerk. Even the jury knew, by intuition, that he had no right to tout for opinions.“Them crink–crank words is beyand me. Moy head be awl wivvery wi’ ’em, zame as if my old ooman was patchy”.“His honour asks you”, said Mr. Brockwood, with a glance not lost on the justices—for it meant, You see how we court inquiry, though the question is quite inadmissible—“which of the brothers in your opinion shot the bird which you found”?“Why, Meester Cradock, o’ course. Meester Cleaton ’ud needs a blowed un awl to hame, where a stwooud”.“Mr. Clayton must have blown him to pieces, if he shot him from the place where he stood, at least from the place where Mr. Clayton fell. And poor Mr. Clayton lay directly between his brother and the woodcock”?Mr. Brockwood in his excitement forgot that hehad no right to put this question, nor, indeed, any other, except as formally representing some one formally implicated. But the coroner did not check him.“By whur the blude wor, a moost have been naigh as cud be atwane the vern–patch and the wosebird”.“Very good. That fern–patch was the place where Mr. Cradock dropped from the gap in the hedge. Mr. Rosedew has proved that. Now let us have all you know, Mark Stote. Did you see anyothermarks, stabbles you call them, not, I mean, in the path Mr. Rosedew came along, nor yet in the patches of thicket through which poor Cradock fled, but in some other direction”?This was the very question the coroner ought to have put long ago. Thus much he knew when Brockwood put it, and now he was angry accordingly.“Mr. Brockwood, I will thank you—consider, sir, this is a court of record”!“Then donʼt let it record stupid humbug”! Mr. Brockwood was a passionate man, and his blood was up. “I will take the responsibility of anything I do. All we want to elicit the truth is a little skill and patience; and for want of that the finest young fellow I have ever known may be blasted for life, for this world and the other. Excuse me, Mr. Coroner, I have spoken precipitately; I have much reverence for your court, but far more for truth”.Here Mr. Brockwood sat down again, and all the magistrates looked at him with nods of approbation. Human passions and human warmth are sure to have their way, even in Areopagus. At last the question was put by the coroner himself. Of course it was a proper one.“Yees, I zeed wan”, said Mark Stote, scratching the back of his head (where at least the memoryoughtto be); “but a wadnʼt of no ’count much”.“Now tell us where that one was”.“Homezide of the rue, avore you coams to them hoar–witheys, naigh whur the bower–stone stanneth. ’Twur zumbawdy yaping about mebbe after nuts as had lanced fro’ the rue auver the water–tabble”.Before this could be translated, a great stir was heard in the outer–room, a number of people crying “Donʼt ’ee–now”! and a hoarse voice uttering “I will”. The coroner was just dismissing Mr. Stote with deep relief to both of them, and each the more respecting because he could not understand the other.“Mark Stote, you have given your evidence in a most lucid manner. There are few people more to be respected than the thorough Saxon gamekeeper”.“Moy un goo, my lard”? asked the patient Mark, with his neck quite stiff, as he at first had stuck it, and one eye cocked at the coroner, as along the bridge of a fowling–piece.“Mr. Stote, you may now depart. Your evidencedoes you the greatest credit, both as the father of a family, and as—as a conservator of game, and I may say—ah, yes—as a faithful family retainer”.“Thank ’ee, my lard, and vor my peart I dwoanʼt bʼleeve now as you manes all the ’arm as most volks says of ’ee”.Mark was louting low, trying to remember the fashion they taught him forty years since in the Sunday–school, when the door flew back, and the cold wind entered, and in walked Cradock Nowell.As regards the outer man, one may change in fifty ways in half of fifty hornʼs. Villainous ague, want of sleep, violent attacks of bile, inferior claret, love rejected, scarlet fever, small–pox, any of these may make a man lose memory in the looking–glass; but all combined could not have wrought such havoc, such appalment, such drought in the fountains of the blood, as that young face now told of. There was not one line of it like the face of Cradock Nowell. It struck the people with dismay, as they made room and let him pass; it would have struck the Roman senate, even with Cato speaking. Times there are when we forget even our sense of humour, absorbed in the power of passion, and the rush of our souls along with it. No one in that room could have laughed at the best joke ever was made, while he looked at Cradock Nowell.Utterly unconscious what any fellow thought of him (except perhaps in some under–current of electric sympathy, whose wires never can be cut, upto the drop of the gallows), Cradock crossed the chairs and benches, feeling them no more than the wind feels the hills it crosses. Yet with the inbred courtesy of natureʼs thorough gentleman, though he forgot all the people there as thinking of himself, he did not yet forget himself as bound to think of them. He touched no man on leg or elbow, be he baronet or cobbler, without apologizing to him. Then he stood in the foremost place, looking at the coroner, saying nothing, but ready to be arraigned of anything.Mr. Cole had never yet so acutely felt the loss of his “brains”; and yet it is likely that even Chope would have doubted how to manage it. The time a man of the world might pass in a dozen common–places, passed over many shrewd heads there, and none knew what to say. Cradockʼs deep grey eyes, grown lighter by the change of health, and larger from the misery, seemed to take in every one who had any feeling for him.“Here I am, and cannot be hurt, more than my own soul has hurt me. Charge me with murder if you please, I never can disprove it. Reputation is a thing my God thinks needless for me; and so it is, in the despair which He has sent upon me”.Not a word of this he spoke, but his eyes said every word of it, to those who have looked on men in trouble, and heard the labouring heart. As usual, the shallowest man there was the first to speak.“Mr. Nowell”, asked the coroner, blandly, as of a wealthy client, “am I to understand, sir, that you come to tender your evidence”?“Yes”, replied Cradock. His throat was tight, and he could not manage to say much.“Then, sir, I am bound to administer to you the caution usual on these occasions. Excuse me; in fact, I know you will; but your present deposition may be—I mean it is possible—— ”“Sir, I care for nothing now. I am here to speak the truth”.“Very laudable. Admirable! Gentlemen of the jury—Mr. Brockwood, perhaps you will oblige the court by examining in chief”?“No, your honour, I cannot do that; it would be a confusion of duties”.“I will not be examined”, said Cradock, with a low hoarse voice; he had been in the woods for a day and two nights, and of course had taken cold,—“I donʼt think I could stand it. A woman who gave me some bread this morning told me what you were doing, and I came here as fast as I could, to tell you all I know. Let me do it, if you please, in the best way I can; and then do what you like with me”.The utter despair of those last words went cold to the heart of every one, and Mark Stote burst out crying so loud that a woman lent him her handkerchief. But Cradockʼs eyes were hard as flint, and the variety of their gaze was gone.The coroner hesitated a little, and whispered to his clerk. Then he said with some relief, and a look of kindness—“The court is ready, Mr. Nowell, to receive your statement. Only you must make it upon oath”.Cradock, being duly sworn, told all he knew, as follows:“It had been agreed between us, that my—my dear brother should go alone to look for a woodcock, which he had seen that day. I was to follow in about an hour, and meet him in the spire–bed just outside the covert. For reasons of my own, I did not mean to shoot at all, only to meet my brother, hear how he had got on, and come home with him. However, I took my gun, because my dog was going with me, and I loaded it from habit. Things had happened that afternoon which had rather upset me, and my thoughts were running upon them. When I got to the spire–bed, there was no one there, although it was quite dusk; but I thought I heard my brother shooting inside the Coffin Wood. So I climbed the hedge, with my gun half–cocked, and called him by his name”.Here Cradock broke down fairly, as the thought came over him that henceforth he might call and call, but none would ever answer.“By what name did you call him”? Mr. Brockwood looked at the coroner angrily. What difference could it make?“I called, ‘Viley, Viley, my boy!’ three times, at the top of my voice. I used to call him so in the nursery, and he always liked it. I canʼt make out why he did not answer, for he must have been close by—though the bushes were very thick, certainly. At that instant, before I had time to jump down into the covert, a woodcock, flushed, perhaps, by the sound of my voice, crossed a little clearing not thirty yards in front of me. I forgot all about my determination not to shoot that day, cocked both barrels in a moment, but missed him clean with the first, because a branch of the hedge flew back and jerked the muzzle sharply. But the bird was flying rather slowly, and I got a second shot at him, as he crossed a little path in the copse, too narrow to be called a ride. I felt quite sure that I shot straight at him, and I thought I saw him fall; but the light was very bad, and the trees were very thick, and he gave one of those flapping jerks at the moment I pulled the trigger, so perhaps I missed him”.“That ’ee doednʼt, Meester Craydock. Aiʼse larned ’ee a bit too much for thic. What do ’ee call thissom”? Here he held up the woodcock. “Meester Craydock, my lard, be the sprackest shat anywhur round these pearts”.Poor Mark knew not that in his anxiety to vindicate his favouriteʼs skill, he was making the case more black for him.“Mark Stote, no more interruptions, if youplease”, exclaimed the coroner; “Mr. Nowell, pray proceed”.“Dwoanʼt ’ee be haish upon un, my lard, dwoanʼt ’ee vaind un guilty. A coodnʼt no how ’ave doed it. A wor that naice and pertiklar, a woodnʼt shat iven toard a gipsy bwoy. And his oyes be as sprack as a merlinʼs. A cood zee droo a mokpieʼs neestie”.Cradockʼs face, so pale and haggard but a minute before, was now of a burning red. The jury looked at him with astonishment, and each, according to his bias, put his construction upon the change. Two of them thought it was conscious guilt; the rest believed it to be indignation at the idea of being found guilty. It was neither; it was hope. The flash and flush of sudden hope, leaping across the heart, like a rocket over the sea of despair. He could not speak, but gasped in vain, then glutched (to use a forest word, which means gulped down a sob), and fell back into John Rosedewʼs arms, faint, and stark, and rigid.The process of his mind which led him to the shores of light—but only for a little glimpse, a glimpse and then all dark again—was somewhat on this wise: “Only a bullet, or balled cartridge, at the distance I was from him, could have killed my darling Viley on the spot, as I saw him dead, with the hole cut through him. I amalmostsure that my cartridge was in the left barrel of the gun, where I always put it. And now it is clear that the left barrel killed that unlucky bird, and killedhim with shot flying separate, so the cartridge must have opened. Viley, too, was ten feet under the height the bird was flying. I donʼt believethat I hit him at all. I had loose shot in my right barrel; the one that sent so random, on account of the branch that struck it. I amalmostsure I had, and I fired quite straight with the left barrel. God is good, the great God is merciful, after all I thought of Him”. No wonder that he fainted away, in the sudden reaction.There is no need to dwell any longer on the misery of that inquest. The principal evidence has been given. The place where Cradock stood in the hedge, and the place where Clayton fell and died; how poor Cradock saw him first, in the very act of jumping, and hung like a nut–shuck, paralysed; how he ran back to his dead twin–brother and could not believe in his death, and went through the woods like a madman, with nothing warm about him except his brotherʼs blood,—all this, I think, is clear enough, as it had long been to the jury, and now was to the coroner. Only Cradock awoke from his hope—what did he care for their verdict? He awoke from his hope not in his moral—that there could be no doubt of—but in his manual innocence; when, to face all circumstances, he had nothing but weak habit. He could not swear, he could not even feel confident (and we want three times three for swearing, that barbarous institution) that he had rammed the cartridge down the left barrel, and the chargeof shot down the right. All he could say was this, that it was a very odd thing if he had not.The oddity of a thing is seldom enough to establish its contrary, in the teeth of all evidence. So the jury found that “Violet Clayton Nowell had died from a gunshot wound, inflicted accidentally by his brother Cradock Nowell, whom, after careful consideration, they absolved from all blame”.CHAPTER XXIV.Rufus Hutton rode home that night to Geopharmacy Lodge. He had worked unusually hard, even for a man of his activity, during the last three days, and he wanted to see his Rosa again, and talk it all over with her. Of course he had cancelled her invitation, as well as that of all others, under the wretched circumstances. But before he went, he saw Cradock Nowell safe in the hands of the rector, for he could not induce him to go to the Hall, and did not think it fair towards his wife, now in her delicate health, to invite him to the Lodge. And even if he had done so, Cradock would not have gone with him.If we strike the average of mankind, we shall find Rufus Hutton above it. He had his many littlenesses—and which of us has few?—his oddities of mind and manner, even his want of charity, and his practical faith in selfishness; none the less for all of that there were many people who loved him.And those of us who are loved of any—save parents, wife, or daughter—loved, I mean, as the word is felt and not interpreted,—with warmth of heart, and moistened eyes (when good or ill befalls us); any such may have no doubt of being loved by God.All this while, Sir Cradock Nowell had been alone; and, as Homer has it, “feeding on his heart”. Ever since that fearful time, when, going home to his happy dinner with a few choice friends, he had overtaken some dark thing, which he would not let them hide from him—ever since that awful moment when he saw what it was, the father had not taken food, nor comfort of God or man.All they did—well–meaning people—was of no avail. It was not of disgrace he thought, of one son being murdered, and the other son his murderer; he did not count his generations, score the number of baronets, and weep for the slur upon them; rave of his painted scutcheon, and howl because this was a dab on it. He simply groaned and could not eat, because he had lost his son—his own, his sweet, his best–beloved son.As for Cradock, the father hoped—for he had not now the energy to care very much about it—that he might nothappenhenceforth to meet him (for all things now were of luck) more than once a month, perhaps; and then they need not say much. He never could care for him any more; of that he felt as sure as if his heart were become a tombstone.Young Cradock, though they coaxed and petted, wept before him at the parsonʼs, and still more behind him, and felt for him so truly deeply that at last he burst out crying (which did him Heavenʼs own good)—Cradock, on his part, would not go to his father, until he should be asked for. He felt that he could fall on his knees, and crawl along in abasement, for having robbed the old grey man of all he loved on earth. Only his father must ask for him, or at least give him leave to come.Perhaps he was wrong. Let others say. But in the depths of his grief he felt the need of a fatherʼs love; and so his agony was embittered because he got no signs of it. Let us turn to luckier people.“Rufus, why, my darling Rufus, how much more—— are you going to put on that little piece of ground, no bigger than my work–table”?Mrs. Hutton had been brought up to “call a spade a spade”; and she extended this wise nomenclature to the contents of the spade as well.“Rosa, why, my darling Rosa, that bed contains one hundred and twenty–five feet. Now, according to the great Justus Liebig, and his mineral theory—— ”“One hundred and twenty–five feet, Rue! And I could jump across it! I am sure it is not half so long as my silk measure in the shell, dear”!“Dearest Rosa, just consider: my pet, get out your tablets, for you are nothing at mental arithmetic”.“Indeed! Well, you never used to tell me things like that, Rufus”!“Well, perhaps I didnʼt, Roe. I would have forsworn to any extent, when I saw you among the candytuft. But now, my darling, I have got you; and from a lofty feeling, I am bound to tell the truth. Consider the interests, Rosa—— ”“Go along with your nonsense, Rue. You talk below your great understanding, because you think it suitsme”.“Perhaps I do”, said Rufus, “perhaps I do now and then, my dear: you always hit the truth so. But is it not better to do that than to talk Greek to my Rosa”?“I am sure I donʼt know; and I am sure I donʼt care either. When have I heard you say anything, Rufus, so wonderful, and so out of the way, that I,poor I, couldnʼt understand it? Please to tell me that, Rufus”.“My darling, consider. You are exciting yourself so fearfully. You make me shake all over”.“Then you should not say such things to me, Rufus. Why, Rue, you are quite pale”!—What an impossibility! She might have boiled him in soda without bringing him to a shrimp–colour.—“Come into the house this moment, I insist upon it, and have two glasses of sherry. And youdosay very wonderful things, much too clever for me, Rufus; and indeed, I believe, too clever for any woman in the world, even the one that wrote Homer”.Rosa Hutton ran into the house, and sought for the keys high and low; then got the decanter at last out of the cellaret, and brought out a bumper of wine. Crafty Rufus stopped outside, thoroughly absorbed in an autumn rose; knowing that she liked to do it for him, and glad to have it done for him.“Not a drop, unless you drink first, dear. Rosa, here under the weeping elm: you are not afraid of the girls who are making the bed, I hope”!“I should rather hope not, indeed! Rue, dear, my best love to you. Do you think Iʼd keep a girl in the house I was afraid to see through the window”?To prove her spirit, Mrs. Hutton tossed a glass of wine off, although she seldom took it, and it was not twelve oʼclock yet. Rufus looked on with some dismay, till he saw she had got the decanter.“Well done, Rosa! What good it does me to see you take a mere drop of wine! You are bound now to obey me. Roe, my love, your very best health, and that involves my own. Youʼre not heavy on my shoulder, love”.“No, dear, I know that: you are so very strong. But donʼt you see the boy coming? And that hole among the branches! And the leaves coming off too! Oh, do let me go in a moment, Rue!—— ”“Confound that boy! Iʼm blest if he isnʼt always after me”.The boy, however, or man as he called himself,was far too important a personage in their domestic economy to be confounded audibly. Gardener, groom, page, footman, knife–boy, and coachman, all in one; a long, loose, knock–kneed, big–footed, what they would call in the forest a “yaping, shammocking gally–bagger”. His name was Jonah, and he came from Buckinghamshire, and had a fine drawl of his own, quite different from that of Ytene, which he looked upon as a barbarism.“Plase, sir, Maister Reevers ave a zent them traases as us hardered”. Jonahʼs eyes, throughout this speech, which occupied him at least a minute, were fixed upon the decanter, with ineffable admiration at the glow of the wine now the sun was upon it.“Then, Jonah, my boy”, cried Rufus Hutton, all animation in a moment, “I have a great mind to give you sixpence. Rosa, give me another glass of sherry. Hereʼs to the health of the great horticulturist, Rivers! Most obliging of him to send my trees so early, and before the leaves are off. Come along, Roe, you love to see trees unpacked, and eat the fruit by anticipation. I believe youʼll expect them to blossom and bear by Christmas, as St. Anthony made the vines do”.“Well, darling, and so they ought, with such a gardener as you to manage them.—Jonah, you shall have a glass of wine, to drink the health of the trees. He has never taken his eyes off the decanter, ever since he came up, poor boy”.Rosa was very good–natured, and accustomedto farm–house geniality. Rufus laughed and whispered, “My love, my Indian sherry”!“Canʼt help it”, said Mrs. Hutton; “less chance of its disagreeing with him. Here, Jonah, you wonʼt mind drinking after your master”.“Here be vaine health to all on us”, said Jonah, scraping the gravel and putting up one finger as he had seen the militia men do (in imitation of the regulars); “and may us nayver know no taime warse than the prasent mawment”.“Hear, hear”! cried Rufus Hutton; “now, come along, and cut the cords, boy”.Dr. Hutton set off sharply, with Rosa on his arm, for he did not feel at all sure but what Jonahʼs exalted sentiment might elicit, at any rate, half a glass more of sherry. They found the trees packed beautifully; a long cone, like a giant lobster–pot, weighing nearly two hundred–weight, thatched with straw, and wattled round, and corded over that.“Out with your knife and cut the cords, boy”.“Well, Rufus, youareextravagant”!—“Rather fine, that”, thought Dr. Hutton, “after playing such pranks with my sherry”!—“Jonah, I wonʼt have a bit of the string cut. I want every atom of it. Whatʼs the good of your having hands if you canʼt untie it”?At last they got the great parcel open, and strewed all the lawn with litter. There were trees of every sort, as tight as sardines in a case, with many leaves still hanging on them, and the roots tied up in moss. Half a dozen standard apples;half a hundred pyramid pears, the prettiest things imaginable, furnished all round like a cypress, and thick with blossom–spurs; then young wall–trees, two years’ trained, tied to crossed sticks, and drawn up with bast, like the frame of a schoolboyʼs kite; around the roots and in among them were little roses in pots No. 60, wrapped in moss, and webbed with bast; and the smell of the whole was glorious.“Hurrah”! cried Rufus, dancing, “no nurseries in the kingdom, nor in the world, except Sawbridgeworth, could send out such a lot of trees, perfect in shape, every one of them, and every one of them true to sort. What a bore that Iʼve got to go again to Nowelhurst to–day! Rosa, dear; every one of these trees ought to be planted to–day. The very essence of early planting (which in my opinion saves a twelvemonth) is never to let the roots get dry. These peach–trees in a fortnight will have got hold of the ground, and be thinking of growing again; and the leaves, if properly treated, will never have flagged at all. Oh, I wish you could see to it, Rosa”.“Well, dear Rufus, and so I can. To please you, I donʼt mind at all throwing aside my banner–screen, and leaving my letter to cousin Magnolia”.“No, no. I donʼt mean that. I mean, how I wish you understood it”.“Understood it, Rue! Well, Iʼm sure! As if anybody couldnʼt plant a tree! And I, who hada pair of gardening gloves when I was only that high”!“Roe, now listen to me. Not one in a hundred even of professional gardeners, who have been at it all their lives, knows how to plant a tree”.“Well, then, Rufus, if that is the case, I think it very absurd of you to expect that I should. But Jonah will teach me, I dare say. Iʼll begin to learn this afternoon”.“No, indeed, you wonʼt. At any rate, you must not practise onmytrees; nor in among them, either. But you may plant the mop, dear, as often as you like, in that empty piece of ground where the cauliflowers were”.“Plant the mop, indeed! Well, Dr. Hutton, you had better ride back to Nowelhurst, where all the grand people are, if you only come home for the purpose of insulting your poor wife. It is there, no doubt, that you learn to despise any one who is not quite so fine as they are. And what are they, I should like to know? What a poor weak thing I am, to be sure; no wonder no one cares for me. I can have no self–respect. I am only fit to plant the mop”.Hereupon the blue founts welled, the carmine of the cheeks grew scarlet, the cherry lips turned bigarreaux, and a very becoming fur–edged jacket lifted, as if with a zephyr stealing it.Rufus felt immediately that he had been the lowest of all low brutes; and almost made up hismind on the spot that it would be decidedly wrong of him to go to Nowelhurst that evening. We will not enter into the scene of strong self–condemnation, reciprocal collaudation, extraordinary admiration, because all married people know it; and as for those who are single, let them get married and learn it. Only in the last act of it, Jonah, from whom they had retreated, came up again, looking rather sheepish—for he had begun to keep a sweetheart—and spake these winged words:“Plase, sir, if you be so good, it baint no vault o’ maine nohow”.“Get all those trees at once laid in by the heels. What is no fault of yours, pray? Are you always at your dinner”?“Baint no vault o’ maine, sir; but there coom two genelmen chaps, as zays they musten zee you”.“Must see me, indeed, whether I choose it or no! And with all those trees to plant, and the mare to be ready at three oʼclock”!“Zo I tould un, sir; but they zays as theymustzee you”.“In the name of the devil and all his works, but Iʼll give them a bitter reception. Let them come this way, Jonah”.“Oh dear, if you are going to be violent! You know what you are sometimes, Rue—enough to frighten any man”.“Never, my darling, never. You never findRufus Hutton formidable to any one who means rightly”.“No, no, to be sure, dear. But then, perhaps, they may not. And after all that has occurred to–day, I feel so much upset. Very foolish of me, I know. But promise me not to be rash, dear”.“Have no fear, my darling Rosa. I will never injure any man who does not insult you, dear”.While Rufus was looking ten feet high, and Mrs. Rufus tripping away, after a little sob and a whisper, Jonah came pelting down the walk with his great feet on either side of it, as if he had a barrow between them. At the same time a voice came round the corner past the arbutus–tree, now quivering red with strawberries, and the words thereof were these:“Perfect Paradise, my good sir! I knew it must be, from what I heard of him. Exactly like my friend the Dookʼs, but laid out still more tastefully. Bless me, why, his Grace must have copied it! Wonʼt I give him a poke in the ribs when he dines with me next Toosday! Sly bird, a sly bird, I say, though he is such a capital fellow. Knew where to come, Iʼm blest if he didnʼt, for taste, true science, and landscape”.“Haw! Yes; I quite agree with you. But his Grace has nothing so chaste, so perfect as this, in me opeenion, sir. Haw”!The cockles of the Rufine heart swelled warmly; for of course he heard every word of it, though, ofcourse, not intended to do so. “Now Rosa ought to have heard all that”, was passing in his mind, when two gentlemen stood before him, and were wholly amazed to see him. One of them was a short stout man, not much taller than Rufus, but of double his cubic contents; the other a tall and portly signor, fitted upon spindle shins, with a slouch in his back, grey eyebrows, long heavy eyes, and large dewlaps.The short gentleman, evidently chief spokesman and proud of his elocution, waved his hat most gracefully, when he recovered from his surprise, drew back for a yard or so, in his horror at intruding, and spoke with a certain flourish, and the air of a man above humbug.“Mr. Nowell Corklemore, I have the honour of making you known to the gentleman whose scientific fame has roused such a spirit among us. Dr. Hutton, sir, excuse me, the temptation was too great for us. My excellent friend, Lord Thorley, who has, I believe, the honour of being related to Mrs. Hutton, pressed his services upon us, when he knew what we desired. But, sir, no. ‘My lord’, said I, ‘we prefer to intrude without the commonplace of society; we prefer to intrude upon the footing of common tastes, my lord, and warm, though far more rudimental and vague pursuit of science’. Bless me, all this time my unworthy self, sir! I am too prone to forget myself, at least my wife declares so. Bailey Kettledrum, sir, is my name, of Kettledrum Hall, in Dorset. AndI have the enlightenment, sir, to aspire to the honour of your acquaintance”.Rufus Hutton bowed rather queerly to Mr. Nowell Corklemore and Mr. Bailey Kettledrum; for he had seen a good deal of the world, and had tasted sugar–candy. Moreover, the Kettledrum pattern was known to him long ago; and he had never found them half such good fellows as they pretend to think other people. Being, however, most hospitable, as are nearly all men from India, he invited them to come in at once, and have some lunch after their journey. They accepted very warmly; and Mrs. Hutton, having now appeared and been duly introduced, Bailey Kettledrum set off with her round the curve of the grass–plot, as if he had known her for fifty years, and had not seen her for twenty–five. He engrossed her whole attention by the pace at which he talked, and by appeals to her opinion, praising all things, taking notes, red–hot with admiration, impressively confidential about his wife and children, and, in a word, regardless of expense to make himself agreeable. Notwithstanding all this, he did not get on much, because he made one great mistake. He rattled and flashed along the high road leading to fifty other places, but missed the quiet and pleasant path which leads to a womanʼs good graces—the path, I mean, which follows the little brook called “sympathy”, a winding but not a shallow brook, over the meadow of soft listening.Mr. Nowell Corklemore, walking with RufusHutton, was, as he was forced to be by a feeble nature enfeebled, a dry and pompous man.“Haw! I am given to understand you have made all this yourself, sir. In me ’umble opeenion, it does you the greatest credit, sir; credit, sir, no less to your heart than to your head. Haw”!Here he pointed with his yellow bamboo at nothing at all in particular.“Everything is in its infancy yet. Wait till the trees grow up a little. I have planted nearly all of them. All except that, and that, and the weeping elm over yonder, where I sit with my wife sometimes. Everything is in its infancy”.“Excuse me; haw! If you will allow me, I would also say, with the exception of something else”. And he looked profoundly mystic.“Oh, the house you mean”, said Rufus. “No, the house is not quite new; built some seven years back”.“Sir, I do not mean the house—but the edifice, haw!—the tenement of the human being. Sir, I mean, except justthis”.He shut one eye, like a sleepy owl, and tapped the side of his head most sagely; and then he said “Haw”! and looked for approval.And he might have looked a very long time, in his stupidly confident manner, without a chance of getting it; for Rufus Hutton disliked allusions even to age intellectual, when you came to remember that his Rosa was more than twenty years younger.“Ah, yes, now it strikes me”, continued Mr. Corklemore, as they stood in front of the house, “that little bow–window—nay, I am given to understand, that bay–window is the more correct—haw! I mean the more architectural term—I think I should have felt inclined to make that nice bay–window give to the little grass–plot. A mere question, perhaps, of idiosyncrasy, haw”!“Give what”? asked Rufus, now on the foam. That his own pet lawn, which he rolled every day, his lawn endowed with manifold curves and sweeps of his own inventing, with the Wellingtonia upon it, and the plantain dug out with a cheese–knife—that all this should be called a “little grass–plot”, by a fellow who had no two ideas, except in his intonation of “Haw”!“Haw! It does not signify. But the term, I am given to understand, is now the correct and recognised one”.“I wish you were given to understand anything except your own importance”, Rufus muttered savagely, and eyed the yellow bamboo.“Have you—haw! excuse my asking, for you are a great luminary here; have you as yet made trial of the Spergula pilifera”?“Yes; and found it the biggest humbug that ever aped Godʼs grass”.Dr. Hutton was always very sorry when he had used strong language; but being a thin–skinned, irritable, cut–the–corner man, he could not be expected to stand Nowell Corklemoreʼs “haws”.And Mr. Corklemore had of “haw” no less than seven intonations. First, and most common of all, the haw of self–approval. Second, the haw of contemplation. Third, the haw of doubt and inquiry. Fourth, that of admiration. Fifth, that of interlude and hiatus, when words or ideas lingered. Sixth, the haw of accident and short–winded astonishment;e.g.he had once fallen off a hayrick, and cried “Haw”! at the bottom. Seventh, the haw of indignation and powerful remonstrance, in a totally different key from the rest; and this last he now adopted.“Haw—then!—haw!—I have been given to understand that the Spergula pilifera succeeds most admirably with people who have—haw!—have studied it”.“Very likely it does”, said Rufus, though he knew much better, but now he was on his own door–step, and felt ashamed of his rudeness; “but come in, Mr. Corklemore; our ways are rough in these forest outskirts, and we are behind you in civilization. Nevertheless, we are heartily glad to welcome our more intelligent neighbours”.At lunch he gave them home–brewed ale and pale sherry of no especial character. But afterwards, being a genial soul, and feeling still guilty of rudeness, he went to the cellar himself and fetched a bottle of the richest Indian gold. Mrs. Hutton withdrew very prettily; and the three gentlemen, all good judges of wine, began to warm over it luminously, more softly indeed thanthey would have done after a heavy dinner. Surely, noble wine deserves not to be the mere operculum to a stupidly mixed hot meal.“Have another bottle, gentlemen; now do have another bottle”.“Not one drop more for the world”, exclaimed they both, with their hands up. None the less for that, they did; and, what was very unwise of them, another after that, until I can scarcely write straight in trying to follow their doings. Meanwhile Jonah had prigged three glassfuls out of the decanter left under the elm–tree.“Now”, said Rufus, who alone wasalmostin a state of sobriety, “suppose we take a turn in the garden and my little orchard–house? I believe I am indebted to that for the pleasure of your very disagreeable—ahem, most agreeable company to–day”.Bailey Kettledrum sprang up with a flourish. “No, sir, no, sir! Permit me to defend myself and this most marketable—I—I mean remarkable gentleman here present, Mr. Nowell Corklemore, from any such dis—dish—sparagus, disparagizing imputations, sir. An orchard, sir, is very well, and the trees in it are very well, and the fruit of it is very good, sir; but an orchard can never appear, sir, to a man of exalted sentiments, and temporal—I mean, sir, strictly intemperate judgment, in the light of an elephant—irrelevant—no, sir, I mean of course an equilevant—for a man, sir, for a man”! Here Mr. Bailey Kettledrum hit himselfhard on the bosom, and broke the glass of his watch.“Mr. Kettledrum”, said Rufus, rising, “your sentiments do you honour. Mine, however, is not an orchard, but an orchard–house”.“Ha, ha, good again! House in an orchard! yes, I see. Corklemore, hear that, my boy? Our admirable host—no, thank you, not a single drop more wine—I always know when I have had enough. Sir, it is the proud privi—prilivege of a man—— Corklemore, get up, sir; donʼt you see we are waiting for you”?Mr. Corklemore stared heavily at him; his constitution was a sleepy one, and he thought he had eaten his dinner. His friend nodded gravely at Dr. Hutton; and the nod expressed compassion tempering condemnation.“Ah, I see how it is. Ever since that fall from the hayrick, the leastest little drop of wine, prej—prej—— ”“Prejudge the case, my lord”, muttered Mr. Corklemore, who had been a barrister.“Prejudicially affects our highly admired friend. But, sir, the fault is mine. I should have stretched forth long ago the restraining hand of friendship, sir, and dashed the si—si—silent bottle—— ”“Chirping bottle, possibly you mean”.“No, sir, I do not, and I will thank you not to interrupt me. Who ever heard a bottle chirp? I ask you, sir, as a man of the world, and a man of common sense, who ever heard a bottle chirp?What I mean, sir, is the siren—the siren bottle from his lips. What is it in the Latin grammar—or possibly in the Greek, for I have learned Greek, sir, in the faulchion days of youth;—is it not, sir, this:improba Siren desidia? Perhaps, sir, it may have been in your grammar, if you ever had one,improba chirping desidia”. As he looked round, in the glow and sparkle of lagenic logic, Rufus caught him by the arm, and hurried him out at the garden door, where luckily no steps were. The pair went straight, or, in better truth, went first, to the kitchen garden; Rufus did not care much for flowers; all that he left to his Rosa.“Now I will show you a thing, sir”, cried Rufus in his glory, “a thing which has been admired by the leading men of the age. Nowhere else, in this part of the world, can you see a piece of ground, sir, cropped in the manner of that, sir”.And to tell the plain, unvinous truth, the square to which he pointed was a triumph of high art. The style of it was wholly different from that of Mr. Garnetʼs beds. Bull Garnet was fond of novelties, but he made them square with his system; the result was more strictly practical, but less nobly theoretical. Dr. Hutton, on the other hand, travelled the entire porker; obstacles of soil and season were as nothing to him, and when the shape of the ground was wrong, he called in the navvies and made it right.A plot of land four–square, and measured to exactly half an acre, contained 2400 trees, cuttingeither way as truly as the spindles of machinery; there was no tree more than five feet high, the average height was four feet six inches. They were planted just four feet asunder, and two feet back from the pathway. There was every kind of fruit–tree there, which can be made by British gardeners to ripen fruit in Britain, without artificial heat. Pears especially, and plums, cherries, apples, walnuts (juglans præparturiens), figs, and medlars, quinces, filberts, even peaches, nectarines, and apricots—though only one row, in all, of those three; there was scarcely one of those miniature trees which had not done its duty that year, or now was bent upon doing it. Still the sight was beautiful; although far gone with autumn, still Coxʼs orange–pippin lit the russet leaves with gold, or Beurré Clairgeau and Capiaumont enriched the air with scarlet.Each little tree looked so bright and comely, each plumed itself so naturally, proud to carry its share of tribute to the beneficent Maker, that the two men who had been abusing His choice gift, the vine, felt a little ashamed of themselves, or perhaps felt that they ought to be.“Magnificent, magnificent”! cried Kettledrum, theatrically; “I must tell the Dook of this. He will have the same next year”.“Will he, though”? said Rufus, thinking of the many hours he had spent among those trees, and of his careful apprenticeship to the works of their originator; “I can tell you one thing. He wonʼt,unless he has a better gardener than I ever saw in these parts. Now let us go to the orchard–house”.The orchard–house was a span–roofed building, very light and airy; the roof and ends were made of glass, the sides of deal with broad falling shutters, for the sake of ventilation. It was about fifty feet in length, twenty in width, and fifteen in height. There was no ventilation at the ridge, and all the lights were fixed. The free air of heaven wandered through, among peaches, plums, and apricots, some of which still retained their fruit, crimson, purple, and golden. The little trees were all in pots, and about a yard apart. The pots were not even plunged in the ground, but each stood, as a tub should, on its own independent bottom. The air of the house was soft and pleasant, with a peculiar fragrance, the smell of ripening foliage. Bailey Kettledrum saw at once—for he had plenty of observant power, and the fumes of wine were dispersing—that this house must have shown a magnificent sight, a month or two ago. And having once more his own object in view, he tripled his true approval.“Dr. Hutton, this is fine. Fine is not the word for it; this is grand and gorgeous. What a triumph of mind! What a lot you must pay for wages”!“Thirteen shillings a week in summer, seven shillings a week in the winter”. This was one of his pet astonishments.“What! Iʼll never believe it. Sir, you must either be a conjuror, the devil, or—or—— ”“Or a liar”, said Rufus, placidly; “but I am none of the three. Jonah has twelve shillings a week, but half of that goes for housework. That leaves six shillings for gardening; but I never trust him inside this house, for he is only a clumsy dolt, who does the heavy digging. And besides him I have only a very sharp lad, at seven shillings a week, who works under my own eye. I have in some navvies, at times, it is true, when I make any alterations. But that is outlay, not working expense. Now come and see my young trees just arrived from Sawbridgeworth”.“Stop one moment. What is this stuff on the top of the pots here? What queer stuff! Why, it goes quite to pieces in my hands”.“Oh, only a little top–dressing, just to refresh the trees a bit. This way, Mr. Kettledrum”.“Pardon me, sir, if I appear impertinent or inquisitive. But I have learned so much this afternoon, that I am anxious to learn a little more. My friend, the Dook, will cross–examine me as to everything I have seen here. He knew our intention of coming over. I must introduce you to his Grace, before you are a week older, sir; he has specially requested it. In fact, it was only this morning he said to Nowell Corklemore—but Corklemore, though a noble fellow, a gem of truth and honour, sir, is not a man ofourintelligence; in one word, he is an ass”!“Haw! Nowell Corklemore, Nowell Corklemore is an ass, is he, in the wise opeenion of Mr. Bailey Kettledrum? Only let me get up, good Lord—and perhaps he told the Dook so. There, itʼs biting me again, oh Lord! Nowell Corklemore an ass”!By the door of the orchard–house grew a fine deodara, and behind it lay Mr. Corklemore, beyond all hope entangled. His snores had been broken summarily by the maid coming for the glasses, and he set forth, after a dozen “haws”, to look for his two comrades. With instinct ampeline he felt that his only chance of advancing in the manner of a biped lay or stood in his bamboo. So he went to the stick–stand by the back–door, where he muzzily thought it ought to be. Mrs. Hutton, in the drawing–room, was rattling on the piano, and that made his head ten times worse. His bamboo was not in the stick–stand; nevertheless he found there a gig–umbrella with a yellow handle, like the top of his fidus Achates. Relying upon this, he made his way out, crying “haw”! at every star in the oilcloth. He progged away all down the walk, with the big umbrella; but the button that held the cord was gone, and it flapped like a mutinous windmill. However, he carried on bravely, until he confronted a dark, weird tree, waving its shrouded arms at him. This was the deodara; so he made a tack to the left, and there was hulled between wind and water by an unsuspected enemy. This was Rufus Huttonʼs pet of all pet pear–trees, a perfect model of symmetry,scarce three feet six in height, sturdy, crisp, short–jointed, spurred from keel to truck, and carrying twenty great pears. It had been so stopped and snagged throughout, that it was stiffer than fifty hollies; and Rosa was dreadfully jealous of it, because Rufus spent so much time there. He used to go out in the summer forenoon, whenever the sun was brilliant, and draw lines down the fruit with a wet camelʼs hairbrush, as the French gardeners do. He had photographed it once or twice, but the wind would move the leaves so.Now he had the pleasure of seeing Nowell Corklemore flat on his back, with his pet Beurré Superfin (snapped at the stock), and the gig–umbrella between his legs, all a hideous ruin. The gig–umbrella flapped and flapped, and the agonised pear–tree scratched and scratched, till Nowell Corklemore felt quite sure that he was in the embrace of a dragon. The glorious pears were rolling about, some crushed under his frantic heels, the rest with wet bruises on them, appealing from human barbarism.“Well”! said Rufus Hutton. He was in such a rage, it would have choked him to say another word.“Haw! I donʼt call it well at all to be eaten up by a dragon. Pull him away for mercyʼs sake, pull him away! and Iʼll tell all about this business”.At last they got him out, for the matter wasreally serious, and Rufus was forced to hide his woe at the destruction of the pear–tree. And after all he had no one but himself to thank for it. Why did he almost force his guests to drink the third bottle of sherry?“Wonderful, perfectly wonderful”! exclaimed Mr. Bailey Kettledrum, as Rufus was showing them out at the gate, before having his own horse saddled. “The triumphs of horticulture in this age are really past belief. You beat all of us, Dr. Hutton, you may depend upon it; you beat all of us. I never would have believed that trees ought to be planted with their heads down, and their roots up in the air. Stupid of me, though, for I have often heard of root–pruning, and of course you could not prune the roots unless they grew in that way”.Rufus thought he was joking, or suffering from vinous inversion of vision.“Remember, my good friend Hutton—excuse my familiarity, I feel as if I had known you for years—remember, my dear friend, you have pledged your word for next Wednesday—and Mrs. Hutton too, mind—Mrs. Hutton with you. We waive formality, you know, in these country quarters. Kettledrum Hall, next Wednesday—honour bright, next Wednesday! You see I know the motto of your family”.“Thank you, all right”, said Rufus Hutton; “itʼs a deuced deal more than I know”, he added,going up the drive. “I didnʼt know we had a motto. Well, Iʼm done for at last”!No wonder he was done for. He saw what Kettledrum had taken in the purest faith. All those lovely little trees, dwarf pyramids, &c., were standing on the apex. Jonah, after all the sherry given to and stolen by him, had laid them in by the heels with a vengeance. All the pretty heads were a foot under ground, and the roots, like the locks of a mermaid, wooing the buxom air.
CHAPTER XXII.Mark Stote, the head–gamekeeper on the Nowelhurst estate, was a true and honest specimen of the West Saxon peasant—slow, tenacious, and dogged, faithful and affectionate, with too much deference, perhaps, to all who seemed “his betters”. He was now about fifty years old, but sturdy and active as ever, with a weather–beaten face and eyes always in quest of something. His home was a lonely cottage in one of the plantations, and there he had a tidy and very intelligent wife, and a host of little anxieties. His children, the sparrow–hawks, the weasels, the young fellows who “called theirselves under–keepers, and all they kept was theirselves, sir”,—what with these troubles, and (worst, perhaps, of all) that nest of charcoal–burners by the bustle–headed oak, with Black Will at the head of them, sometimes, Mark Stote wouldassure us, his head was gone “all wivvery[1]like”, and he could get no sleep of night–time.A mizzly, drizzly rain set in before the poor people got home that evening with the body of Clayton Nowell. Long mournful soughs of wind ensued, the boughs of the trees went heavily, and it blew half a gale before morning; but it takes a real storm to penetrate some parts of the forest. Once, however, let the storm get in, and it makes the most of the opportunity, raging with triple fury, as a lion does in a compound—the rage of the imperious blast, when it finds no exit.In the grey of the morning, two men met, face to face, in the overhanging of the Coffin Wood. Which was the more scared of the two, neither could have said; although each felt a little pleased at the terror of the other. The one of strong nerves was superstitious; the other, though free from much superstition, was nervous under the circumstances. The tall and big man was Mark Stote, the little fellow who frightened him Dr. Rufus Hutton. The latter, of course was the first to recover presence of mind, for Mark Stoteʼs mental locomotion was of ponderous metal.“What brings you here, Mr. Stote, at this time of the morning”?“And what brings you here, Dr. Hutton”?Mark might have asked with equal reason. He wondered afterwards why he did not; the wonder would have been if he had. As it was, he only said—“To see the rights o’ my young meester, sir”.“The wrongs, you mean”, said Rufus; “Mark Stote, there is more in this matter than any man yet has guessed at”.“You be down upon the truth of it, my word for it but you be, sir. Iʼve a shot along o’ both of ’em, since ’em wor that haigh, and seeʼd how they thought of their guns, sir; Meester Clayton wor laike enough to shoot Meester Cradock ’xidentually; but never wicey warse, sir, as the parson sayeth, never wicey warse, sir, for I niver see no one so cartious laike”.“Mark Stote, do you mean to say that Cradock shot his brother on purpose”?Mark stared at Rufus for several moments, then he thrust forth his broad brown hand and seized him by the collar. Dr. Hutton felt that he was nothing in that big manʼs grasp, but he would not play the coward.“Stote, let me go this instant. Iʼll have you discharged this very day unless you beg my pardon”.“That you moy then, if you can, meester. A leetle chap coom fram Ingy, an’ we bin two hunner and feefty year ’long o’ the squire and his foregoers”! Nevertheless he let Rufus go, and looked over his hat indignantly.“You are an honest fellow”, cried Hutton, when he got his breath again; “an uncommonly honest fellow, although in great need of enlightenment. It is not in my nature, my man”, here he felt like a patron, getting over his shaking, so elastic was his spirit; “I assure you, Luke—ah no, your name is Matthew; upon my word, I beg your pardon, I am almost sure it is Mark—Mr. Mark, I shall do my utmost for your benefit. Now talk no more, but act, Mark”.“I oodnʼt a talked nothing, but for mating with your honour”.“Then resume your taciturnity, which I see is habitual with you, and perhaps constitutional”.Mark Stote felt sore all over. Dr. Hutton now was the collarer. Mark, in his early childhood, had been to school for a fortnight, and ran away with a sense of rawness, which any big word renewed.“Mr. Stote, I will thank you to search in that direction, while I investigate this way”.Mark Stote longed to suggest that possibly Dr. Hutton, being (as you might say) a foreigner, was not so well skilled in examining ground as a woodman of thirty years’ standing; and therefore that he, old Mark, should have the new part assigned to him, before it was trampled by Rufus. But the gamekeeper knew not how to express it; sure though he was (as all of us are, when truth hits the heart like a hammer) that something evil would come of slurring the matter so feebly.But who are we to blame him?—we who transport a poor ignorant girl for trying to hide her ignominy, while we throttle, before she can cry, babe Truth, who should be received in society with a “Welcome, little stranger”!With the heavy rain–drops hanging like leeches, or running together, as they do, at every thorn or scale of the bark, seeking provocation to come down the nape of the neck of any man, Rufus Hutton went creeping under, trying not to irritate them, pretending that he was quite at home, and understood them like a jungle. Nevertheless he repented, and did not thoroughly search more than ten square yards. The things would knock him so in the face, and the stumps would stick in his trousers so, and the drops were so bad for his rheumatism; and, as it was quite impossible for any man to make way there, what on earth was there to look for?In spite of all this, he did find something, and stowed it away in his waistcoat pocket, to be spoken of, or otherwise, according to the turn of events. And by this he meant no dishonesty, at least in his own opinion, only he pitied young Cradock most deeply, and would do all he could in his favour. At the side of the narrow by–path leading from that woodmanʼs track (by which John Rosedew had approached) into the far depth of the thicket, Dr. Hutton found, under a blackberry–bush, a little empty tube, unlike any tube he had seen before. It was about two inches and a half in length, and three–fourths of an inch indiameter. Sodden as it was with the rain, and opened partway along the seam, it still retained, unmistakably, the smell of exploded powder. It seemed to be made of mill–board, or some other form of paper, with a glaze upon the outside and some metal foil at the butt of it. What puzzled Rufus most of all was a little cylinder passing into and across the bottom, something like a boot–tag.Dr. Hutton was not at this time skilled in modern gunnery. He knew how to load a fowling–piece, and what the difference was between a flint–gun and a percussion–gun; moreover, he had been out shooting once or twice in India, not from any love of the sport, but to oblige his neighbours. So he thought himself both acute and learned in arriving at the conclusion that this was a cartridge–case.“Mark, does Mr. Cradock Nowell generally shoot with cartridges”?“He laiketh mostways to be with a curtreege in his toard barryel, sir”.“Oh, keeps a cartridge in his left barrel, does he; and fires first the right, I suppose”?Leaving Mark to continue the search, Rufus returned to the Hall, after carefully taking the distances between certain important points. He was bound, as he felt, to lose no time in making the strictest examination of the poor youthʼs body. For now, in this great calamity, the management of everything seemed to fall upon Rufus Hutton. Sir Cradock, of course, was overwhelmed; JohnRosedew, although so deeply distressed, for the boys were like his own to him, was ready to do his utmost; but, as every one knew, except himself, he was not a man of the world. Unluckily, too, Mr. Garnet, always the leading spirit wherever he appeared, had not yet presented himself in this keen emergency. But his son came up, in the course of the day, to ask how Sir Cradock Nowell was, and to say that his father was quite laid up with a violent bilious attack.Dr. Hutton worked very hard, kept his mind on the stretch continually, ordered every one right and left. He even contrived to repulse all the kindred, to the twentieth collateral, who were flocking in, that day, to rejoice at the manhood of the heir. From old Hogstaff, who knew all the family, kith and kin, and friends and enemies, he learned the names of the guests expected, and met them with laconic missives handed through the closed gates at the lodges. In many cases, it is to be feared, indignation overcame sympathy; “upstart insolence”! was heard through the clatter of carriage–windows, very nearly as often as, “most sad occurrence”! However, most of them were consoled by the prospect of learning everything at the inquest on the morrow. What could be clearer than that Cradock must be hanged for Claytonʼs murder? The disgrace would kill the old baronet. “And then, it would be very painful, but my wife would be bound, sir, for the sake of her poor children, to prove her directdescent from that well–known Sir Cradock Nowell, who shot a man in the New Forest. Ah, I fear it runs in the family”.But their wrath was most unphilosophical, unworthy of any moralists, when they found that Rufus had cheated them all as to the time of the inquest. In every direction he spread a report that the coroner could not attend until three oʼclock on Friday, while he had arranged very quietly to begin the proceedings at noon. And he had taken good care to secure the presence of all the chief men in the neighbourhood—the magistrates, the old friends of the family, all who were interested in its honour rather than in its possessions. As none of the baffled cousins could solace themselves with outcry that the matter had been hushed up, they discovered that kind feeling had made the scene too sad for them.The coroner sat in the principal room at the “Nowell Arms”; the jury had been to see the body lying at the Hall, and now were to hear the evidence. Six or seven of the county magistrates sat behind the coroner, and their clerk was with them. Of course they did not attend officially, their jurisdiction being entirely several from that of the present court. But there could be little doubt that their action would depend, in a great measure, upon what should now transpire.The jury was chosen carefully to preclude, so far as might be, the charge of private influence. They were known, for the most part, as men ofindependence and probity, and two of them as consistent enemies to the influence of the Hall. As for general spectators, only a few of the village–folk allowed their curiosity to conquer their good feeling, or, perhaps, I should say their discretion; for all were tenants under Sir Cradock; and, though it was known by this time that Bull Garnet was ill and in bed, prostrated by one of his old attacks, everybody felt certain that he would find out who dared to be present, and visit them pretty smartly.It would be waste of time to recount all the evidence given; for we know nearly all that Dr. Hutton and the clergyman would depose. Another medical man, Dr. Gall, had also examined poor Claytonʼs remains; and the healing profession, who cure us (like bacon) after they have killed us, are remarkable for agreeing in public, and quarrelling sadly in private life. So Dr. Gall deposed exactly asMr.Hutton had done. He was very emphatic towards Rufus, in the use of the proper prefix; but we who know the skill displayed presuppose the game certificate.One part, however, of the medical evidence ought to be repeated. Poor Clayton had not died from an ordinary small–shot wound or wounds, but from a ghastly hole through his throat, cut as if by a bullet. As Dr. Gall, who knew something of guns, very concisely put it, the hole was like the hole in a door, when boys have fired, as they sometimes do, a tallow–candle through it. And yet itwas fluted at the exit, in the fleshy part of the neck, as no bullet could have marked it. That was caused by the shot diverging, beginning to radiate, perhaps from the opposition encountered.“In two words”, said Dr. Gall, when they had badgered him in his evidence, “the deceased was killed either by a balled cartridge, or by a charge of loose shot fired within six feet of him”.“Very good”, thought Rufus Hutton, who heard all Dr. Gall said; “Iʼll keep my cartridge–case to myself. Poor Crad shanʼt have that against him”.Hereupon, lest any mist (which goddesses abound in,videHomerpassim) descend upon the eyes or mind of any gentle follower of my poor Craddyʼs fortunes, let me endeavour to explain Dr. Gallʼs obscurities.Cartridges, as used by sportsmen with guns which load at the muzzle, are packages of shot compact, and rammed down in a body. Some of them have spiral cases of the finest wire, covered round with paper; others, used for shorter distance, have only cylinders of paper to enclose the shot. The interstices between the shots are solidified with sawdust. The only use of these things is—for they save little time in loading—to kill our brother bipeds, or quadrupeds, if such we are, at a longer distance. The shots are prevented from scattering so widely as they love to do, when freed from the barrelʼs repression. They fly in a closer body, their expansive instincts being checked, when first they leave the muzzle, by the constraint ofthe case and the tightness of their brotherhood. But it sometimes happens, mainly withwire–cartridges, that the shot can never burst its cerements, and flies in the compass of a slug, until it meets an obstacle. When this is so, the quarry escapes; unless a bullet so aimed would have hit it. This non–expansion is called, in good English, the “balling” of the cartridge. And those which are used for the longest distance, and for wild–fowl shooting—green cartridges, as they are called, containing larger shot—are especially apt to ball.Dr. Gall was aware, of course, that no one beating for a woodcock would think of putting a green cartridge into his gun at all; but it seemed very likely indeed that Cradock might have used a blue one, for a longer shot with his left barrel; and the blue ones, having wire round them, sometimes ball, though not so often as their verdant brothers. It only remains to be said that when a cartridge balls, it flies with the force, as well as in the compass, of a bullet. With three drachms of powder behind it, it will cut a hole at forty yards through a two–inch deal.Whether it were a balled cartridge or a charge of loose shot at six feet distance, was the momentous issue. In the former case, there would be fair reason to set it down as an accident; for the place where Cradock had first been seen was thirty yards from Clayton; and he might so have shot him thence, in the dusk, and through the thick of the covert. But if that poor boy haddied from a common charge of shot, “Murder” was the only verdict true men could return on the evidence set before them. For Cradock must have fired wilfully at the open throat of his brother, then flown to the hedge and acted horror when he saw John Rosedew. Where was Cradock? The jury trembled, and so did Rufus Hutton. The coroner repeated the question, although he had no right to do it, at that stage of the evidence.“Since it occurred he has not been seen”, whispered Rufus Hutton at last, knowing how men grow impatient and evil when unanswered.“Let us proceed with the rest of the evidence”, said his honour, grandly; “if the young man cares for his reputation, he will be here by–and–by. But I have ridden far to–day. Let us have some refreshment, gentlemen. Justice must not be hurried”.
Mark Stote, the head–gamekeeper on the Nowelhurst estate, was a true and honest specimen of the West Saxon peasant—slow, tenacious, and dogged, faithful and affectionate, with too much deference, perhaps, to all who seemed “his betters”. He was now about fifty years old, but sturdy and active as ever, with a weather–beaten face and eyes always in quest of something. His home was a lonely cottage in one of the plantations, and there he had a tidy and very intelligent wife, and a host of little anxieties. His children, the sparrow–hawks, the weasels, the young fellows who “called theirselves under–keepers, and all they kept was theirselves, sir”,—what with these troubles, and (worst, perhaps, of all) that nest of charcoal–burners by the bustle–headed oak, with Black Will at the head of them, sometimes, Mark Stote wouldassure us, his head was gone “all wivvery[1]like”, and he could get no sleep of night–time.
A mizzly, drizzly rain set in before the poor people got home that evening with the body of Clayton Nowell. Long mournful soughs of wind ensued, the boughs of the trees went heavily, and it blew half a gale before morning; but it takes a real storm to penetrate some parts of the forest. Once, however, let the storm get in, and it makes the most of the opportunity, raging with triple fury, as a lion does in a compound—the rage of the imperious blast, when it finds no exit.
In the grey of the morning, two men met, face to face, in the overhanging of the Coffin Wood. Which was the more scared of the two, neither could have said; although each felt a little pleased at the terror of the other. The one of strong nerves was superstitious; the other, though free from much superstition, was nervous under the circumstances. The tall and big man was Mark Stote, the little fellow who frightened him Dr. Rufus Hutton. The latter, of course was the first to recover presence of mind, for Mark Stoteʼs mental locomotion was of ponderous metal.
“What brings you here, Mr. Stote, at this time of the morning”?
“And what brings you here, Dr. Hutton”?
Mark might have asked with equal reason. He wondered afterwards why he did not; the wonder would have been if he had. As it was, he only said—
“To see the rights o’ my young meester, sir”.
“The wrongs, you mean”, said Rufus; “Mark Stote, there is more in this matter than any man yet has guessed at”.
“You be down upon the truth of it, my word for it but you be, sir. Iʼve a shot along o’ both of ’em, since ’em wor that haigh, and seeʼd how they thought of their guns, sir; Meester Clayton wor laike enough to shoot Meester Cradock ’xidentually; but never wicey warse, sir, as the parson sayeth, never wicey warse, sir, for I niver see no one so cartious laike”.
“Mark Stote, do you mean to say that Cradock shot his brother on purpose”?
Mark stared at Rufus for several moments, then he thrust forth his broad brown hand and seized him by the collar. Dr. Hutton felt that he was nothing in that big manʼs grasp, but he would not play the coward.
“Stote, let me go this instant. Iʼll have you discharged this very day unless you beg my pardon”.
“That you moy then, if you can, meester. A leetle chap coom fram Ingy, an’ we bin two hunner and feefty year ’long o’ the squire and his foregoers”! Nevertheless he let Rufus go, and looked over his hat indignantly.
“You are an honest fellow”, cried Hutton, when he got his breath again; “an uncommonly honest fellow, although in great need of enlightenment. It is not in my nature, my man”, here he felt like a patron, getting over his shaking, so elastic was his spirit; “I assure you, Luke—ah no, your name is Matthew; upon my word, I beg your pardon, I am almost sure it is Mark—Mr. Mark, I shall do my utmost for your benefit. Now talk no more, but act, Mark”.
“I oodnʼt a talked nothing, but for mating with your honour”.
“Then resume your taciturnity, which I see is habitual with you, and perhaps constitutional”.
Mark Stote felt sore all over. Dr. Hutton now was the collarer. Mark, in his early childhood, had been to school for a fortnight, and ran away with a sense of rawness, which any big word renewed.
“Mr. Stote, I will thank you to search in that direction, while I investigate this way”.
Mark Stote longed to suggest that possibly Dr. Hutton, being (as you might say) a foreigner, was not so well skilled in examining ground as a woodman of thirty years’ standing; and therefore that he, old Mark, should have the new part assigned to him, before it was trampled by Rufus. But the gamekeeper knew not how to express it; sure though he was (as all of us are, when truth hits the heart like a hammer) that something evil would come of slurring the matter so feebly.But who are we to blame him?—we who transport a poor ignorant girl for trying to hide her ignominy, while we throttle, before she can cry, babe Truth, who should be received in society with a “Welcome, little stranger”!
With the heavy rain–drops hanging like leeches, or running together, as they do, at every thorn or scale of the bark, seeking provocation to come down the nape of the neck of any man, Rufus Hutton went creeping under, trying not to irritate them, pretending that he was quite at home, and understood them like a jungle. Nevertheless he repented, and did not thoroughly search more than ten square yards. The things would knock him so in the face, and the stumps would stick in his trousers so, and the drops were so bad for his rheumatism; and, as it was quite impossible for any man to make way there, what on earth was there to look for?
In spite of all this, he did find something, and stowed it away in his waistcoat pocket, to be spoken of, or otherwise, according to the turn of events. And by this he meant no dishonesty, at least in his own opinion, only he pitied young Cradock most deeply, and would do all he could in his favour. At the side of the narrow by–path leading from that woodmanʼs track (by which John Rosedew had approached) into the far depth of the thicket, Dr. Hutton found, under a blackberry–bush, a little empty tube, unlike any tube he had seen before. It was about two inches and a half in length, and three–fourths of an inch indiameter. Sodden as it was with the rain, and opened partway along the seam, it still retained, unmistakably, the smell of exploded powder. It seemed to be made of mill–board, or some other form of paper, with a glaze upon the outside and some metal foil at the butt of it. What puzzled Rufus most of all was a little cylinder passing into and across the bottom, something like a boot–tag.
Dr. Hutton was not at this time skilled in modern gunnery. He knew how to load a fowling–piece, and what the difference was between a flint–gun and a percussion–gun; moreover, he had been out shooting once or twice in India, not from any love of the sport, but to oblige his neighbours. So he thought himself both acute and learned in arriving at the conclusion that this was a cartridge–case.
“Mark, does Mr. Cradock Nowell generally shoot with cartridges”?
“He laiketh mostways to be with a curtreege in his toard barryel, sir”.
“Oh, keeps a cartridge in his left barrel, does he; and fires first the right, I suppose”?
Leaving Mark to continue the search, Rufus returned to the Hall, after carefully taking the distances between certain important points. He was bound, as he felt, to lose no time in making the strictest examination of the poor youthʼs body. For now, in this great calamity, the management of everything seemed to fall upon Rufus Hutton. Sir Cradock, of course, was overwhelmed; JohnRosedew, although so deeply distressed, for the boys were like his own to him, was ready to do his utmost; but, as every one knew, except himself, he was not a man of the world. Unluckily, too, Mr. Garnet, always the leading spirit wherever he appeared, had not yet presented himself in this keen emergency. But his son came up, in the course of the day, to ask how Sir Cradock Nowell was, and to say that his father was quite laid up with a violent bilious attack.
Dr. Hutton worked very hard, kept his mind on the stretch continually, ordered every one right and left. He even contrived to repulse all the kindred, to the twentieth collateral, who were flocking in, that day, to rejoice at the manhood of the heir. From old Hogstaff, who knew all the family, kith and kin, and friends and enemies, he learned the names of the guests expected, and met them with laconic missives handed through the closed gates at the lodges. In many cases, it is to be feared, indignation overcame sympathy; “upstart insolence”! was heard through the clatter of carriage–windows, very nearly as often as, “most sad occurrence”! However, most of them were consoled by the prospect of learning everything at the inquest on the morrow. What could be clearer than that Cradock must be hanged for Claytonʼs murder? The disgrace would kill the old baronet. “And then, it would be very painful, but my wife would be bound, sir, for the sake of her poor children, to prove her directdescent from that well–known Sir Cradock Nowell, who shot a man in the New Forest. Ah, I fear it runs in the family”.
But their wrath was most unphilosophical, unworthy of any moralists, when they found that Rufus had cheated them all as to the time of the inquest. In every direction he spread a report that the coroner could not attend until three oʼclock on Friday, while he had arranged very quietly to begin the proceedings at noon. And he had taken good care to secure the presence of all the chief men in the neighbourhood—the magistrates, the old friends of the family, all who were interested in its honour rather than in its possessions. As none of the baffled cousins could solace themselves with outcry that the matter had been hushed up, they discovered that kind feeling had made the scene too sad for them.
The coroner sat in the principal room at the “Nowell Arms”; the jury had been to see the body lying at the Hall, and now were to hear the evidence. Six or seven of the county magistrates sat behind the coroner, and their clerk was with them. Of course they did not attend officially, their jurisdiction being entirely several from that of the present court. But there could be little doubt that their action would depend, in a great measure, upon what should now transpire.
The jury was chosen carefully to preclude, so far as might be, the charge of private influence. They were known, for the most part, as men ofindependence and probity, and two of them as consistent enemies to the influence of the Hall. As for general spectators, only a few of the village–folk allowed their curiosity to conquer their good feeling, or, perhaps, I should say their discretion; for all were tenants under Sir Cradock; and, though it was known by this time that Bull Garnet was ill and in bed, prostrated by one of his old attacks, everybody felt certain that he would find out who dared to be present, and visit them pretty smartly.
It would be waste of time to recount all the evidence given; for we know nearly all that Dr. Hutton and the clergyman would depose. Another medical man, Dr. Gall, had also examined poor Claytonʼs remains; and the healing profession, who cure us (like bacon) after they have killed us, are remarkable for agreeing in public, and quarrelling sadly in private life. So Dr. Gall deposed exactly asMr.Hutton had done. He was very emphatic towards Rufus, in the use of the proper prefix; but we who know the skill displayed presuppose the game certificate.
One part, however, of the medical evidence ought to be repeated. Poor Clayton had not died from an ordinary small–shot wound or wounds, but from a ghastly hole through his throat, cut as if by a bullet. As Dr. Gall, who knew something of guns, very concisely put it, the hole was like the hole in a door, when boys have fired, as they sometimes do, a tallow–candle through it. And yet itwas fluted at the exit, in the fleshy part of the neck, as no bullet could have marked it. That was caused by the shot diverging, beginning to radiate, perhaps from the opposition encountered.
“In two words”, said Dr. Gall, when they had badgered him in his evidence, “the deceased was killed either by a balled cartridge, or by a charge of loose shot fired within six feet of him”.
“Very good”, thought Rufus Hutton, who heard all Dr. Gall said; “Iʼll keep my cartridge–case to myself. Poor Crad shanʼt have that against him”.
Hereupon, lest any mist (which goddesses abound in,videHomerpassim) descend upon the eyes or mind of any gentle follower of my poor Craddyʼs fortunes, let me endeavour to explain Dr. Gallʼs obscurities.
Cartridges, as used by sportsmen with guns which load at the muzzle, are packages of shot compact, and rammed down in a body. Some of them have spiral cases of the finest wire, covered round with paper; others, used for shorter distance, have only cylinders of paper to enclose the shot. The interstices between the shots are solidified with sawdust. The only use of these things is—for they save little time in loading—to kill our brother bipeds, or quadrupeds, if such we are, at a longer distance. The shots are prevented from scattering so widely as they love to do, when freed from the barrelʼs repression. They fly in a closer body, their expansive instincts being checked, when first they leave the muzzle, by the constraint ofthe case and the tightness of their brotherhood. But it sometimes happens, mainly withwire–cartridges, that the shot can never burst its cerements, and flies in the compass of a slug, until it meets an obstacle. When this is so, the quarry escapes; unless a bullet so aimed would have hit it. This non–expansion is called, in good English, the “balling” of the cartridge. And those which are used for the longest distance, and for wild–fowl shooting—green cartridges, as they are called, containing larger shot—are especially apt to ball.
Dr. Gall was aware, of course, that no one beating for a woodcock would think of putting a green cartridge into his gun at all; but it seemed very likely indeed that Cradock might have used a blue one, for a longer shot with his left barrel; and the blue ones, having wire round them, sometimes ball, though not so often as their verdant brothers. It only remains to be said that when a cartridge balls, it flies with the force, as well as in the compass, of a bullet. With three drachms of powder behind it, it will cut a hole at forty yards through a two–inch deal.
Whether it were a balled cartridge or a charge of loose shot at six feet distance, was the momentous issue. In the former case, there would be fair reason to set it down as an accident; for the place where Cradock had first been seen was thirty yards from Clayton; and he might so have shot him thence, in the dusk, and through the thick of the covert. But if that poor boy haddied from a common charge of shot, “Murder” was the only verdict true men could return on the evidence set before them. For Cradock must have fired wilfully at the open throat of his brother, then flown to the hedge and acted horror when he saw John Rosedew. Where was Cradock? The jury trembled, and so did Rufus Hutton. The coroner repeated the question, although he had no right to do it, at that stage of the evidence.
“Since it occurred he has not been seen”, whispered Rufus Hutton at last, knowing how men grow impatient and evil when unanswered.
“Let us proceed with the rest of the evidence”, said his honour, grandly; “if the young man cares for his reputation, he will be here by–and–by. But I have ridden far to–day. Let us have some refreshment, gentlemen. Justice must not be hurried”.
CHAPTER XXIII.It will have been perceived already that the coroner was by no means “the right man in the right place”. The legal firm, “Cole, Cole, and Son”, had been known in Southampton for many years, as doing a large and very respectable business. The present Mr. Cole, the coroner, who had been the “Son” in the partnership, became sole owner suddenly by the death of his father and uncle. Having brains enough to know that he was far from having too much, he took at once into partnership with him an uncommonly wide–awake, wary fellow, who had been head–clerk to the old firm, ever biding his time for this inevitable result. So now the firm was thriving under the style and title of “Cole, Chope, and Co”., Mr. Chope being known far and wide by the nickname of “Coleʼs brains”. Mr. Cole being appointed coroner, not many months ago, and knowing very little about his duties, took good care for a time not to attempttheir discharge without having “Coleʼs brains” with him. But this had been found to interfere so sadly with private practice, that little by little Cole plucked up courage, as the novelty of the thing wore off, and now was accustomed to play the coroner without the assistance of brains. Nevertheless, upon an occasion so important as this, he would have come with full cerebrum, but that Chope was gone for his holiday. Mr. Cole, however, was an honest man—which could scarcely be said of his partner—and meant to do his duty, so far as he could see it. In the present inquiry he had less chance of seeing it than usual, for he stood in great awe of Mr. Brockwood, a man of ability and high standing, who, as Sir Cradock Nowellʼs solicitor, attended to watch the case, at the suggestion of Rufus Hutton.Both the guns were produced to the coroner, in the condition in which they were found, except that John Rosedew, for safetyʼs sake, had lowered the right hammer of Claytonʼs to the half–cock, before he concealed it from Cradock. Cradockʼs own unlucky piece had been found, on the following morning, in a rushy pool, where he had cast it, as he fled so wildly. Both the barrels had been discharged, while both of Claytonʼs were loaded. It went to the heart of every man there who could not think Cradock a murderer, when in reply to a jurymanʼs question, what was the meaning of certain lines marked with a watch–spring file on the trigger–plate of his gun, it was explained that thetwins so registered the number and kind of the seasonʼs game.After this, Mark Stote was called, and came forward very awkwardly with a deal of wet on his velveteen cuffs, which he tried to keep from notice. His eyes were fixed upon the coroner, with a kind of defiance, but even while he was kissing the book, he was glad to sniff behind it.“Mr. Mark Stote”, said the coroner, duly prompted, “you have, I believe, been employed to examine the scene of this lamentable occurrence”?Mark Stote took a minute to understand this, and a minute to consider his answer.“Yees, my lard, I throwed a squoyle at ’un”.The representative of the Crown looked at Mark with amazement equal at least to that with which Mark was regarding him.“Gentlemen”, asked Mr. Cole, addressing the court in general, “what language does this man talk”?“West Saxon”, replied Mr. Brockwood, speaking apart to the coroner; “West Saxon of the forest. He can talk plain English generally, but whenever these people are nervous, they fall back unconsciously upon their native idiom. You will never be able to understand him: shall I act as interpreter”?“With all my heart; that is to say, with the consent of the jury. But what—I mean to say, how—— ”“How am I to be checked, you mean, unless Iam put upon oath; and how can you enter it as evidence? Simply thus—let your clerk take down the original answers. All the jury will understand them, and so, perhaps, will he”.The clerk, who was a fine young gentleman, strongly pronounced in attire, nodded a distinct disclaimer. It would be so unaristocratic to understand any peasant–tongue.“At any rate, most of the magistrates do. There are plenty of checks upon me. But I am not ambitious of the office. Appoint any one you please”.“Gentlemen of the jury”, said the coroner, glad to shift from himself the smallest responsibility, “are you content that Mr. Brockwood should do as he has offered”?“Certain, and most kind of him”, replied the jury, all speaking at once, “if his honour was unable to understand old English”.“Very good”, said Mr. Brockwood; “donʼt let us make a fuss about nothing. Mr. Stote says he ‘throwed a squoyle;’ that is to say, he looked at it”.“And in what state did you find the ground”? was the coronerʼs next question.“Twearable, twearable. Dwont ’e ax ov me vor gude now, dwont ’e”. And he put up his broad hand before his broad face.“Terrible, terrible”, said the coroner, going by the light of nature in his interpretation; “but Ido not mean the exact spot only where the body was found. I mean, how was the ground as regards dry and wet, for the purpose of retaining footmarks”?“Thar a bin zome rick–rack wather, ’bout a sannit back. But most peart on it ave a droud up agin. ’Twur starky, my lard, moor nor stoachy”. Here Mark felt that he had described things lucidly and powerfully, and looked round the room for approval.“Stiff rather than muddy, he means”, explained Mr. Brockwood, smiling at the coronerʼs dismay.“Were there any footprints upon it, in the part where the ground could retain them”?“ʼTwur dounted and full of stabbles, in the pearts whur the mulloch wur, but the main of ’un tuffets and stramots”.“That is to say”, Mr. Brockwood translated, “the ground was full of impressions and footmarks, where there was any dirt to retain them; but most of the ground was hillocky and grassy, and so would take no footprints”.“When you were searching, did you find anything that seemed to have been overlooked”?“Yees, my lard, I vound thissom”—producing Cradʼs stubby meerschaum—“and thissom”—a burnt felt–wad—“and a whaile vurther, ai vound thissom”. Here he slowly drew from his pocket a very fine woodcock, though not over fat, with its long bill tucked most carefully under its wing. He stroked the dead bird softly, and set its feathersprofessionally, but did not hand it about, as the court seemed to anticipate.“In what part, and from what direction, has that bird been shot”?“Ramhard of the head, my lard, as clane athert shat, and as vaine a bird as iver I wish to zee. But, ahʼs me, her be a wosebird, a wosebird, if iver wur wan”.Mark could scarcely control his tears, as he thought of the birdʼs evil omen, and yet he could not help admiring him. He turned him over and over again, and dropped a tear into his tail coverts. Mr. Brockwood saw it and gave him time; he knew that for many generations the Stotes had lived under the Nowells.“Oh, the bird was shot, you say, on the right side of the head, and clean through the head”.“Thank you”, proceeded the coroner. “Now, do you think that he could have moved after he touched the ground”?“Nivir a hinch, I allow, my lard. A vell as dead as a stwoun”.“Now inform the court, as nearly as you can, of the precise spot where you found it”.It took a long time to discover this, for Mr. Stote had not been taught the rudiments of topography. Nevertheless, they made out at last that the woodcock had been found, dead on his back, with his bill up, eight or ten yards beyond the place where Clayton Nowell fell dead, and in a direct line over his body from the gap in the hedgewhere Cradock stood. Dr. Hutton must have found the bird, if he had searched a little further.“Now”, said the coroner, forcibly. “Mr. Stote, I will ask you a question which is, perhaps, a little beyond the rules of ordinary evidence, I mean, at least, as permitted in a court of record”—here he glanced at the magistrates, who could not claim the rank of record—“which of these two unfortunate brothers caused, in your opinion, the death of—of that woodcock”?Mr. Brockwood glanced at the coroner sharply, and so did his own clerk. Even the jury knew, by intuition, that he had no right to tout for opinions.“Them crink–crank words is beyand me. Moy head be awl wivvery wi’ ’em, zame as if my old ooman was patchy”.“His honour asks you”, said Mr. Brockwood, with a glance not lost on the justices—for it meant, You see how we court inquiry, though the question is quite inadmissible—“which of the brothers in your opinion shot the bird which you found”?“Why, Meester Cradock, o’ course. Meester Cleaton ’ud needs a blowed un awl to hame, where a stwooud”.“Mr. Clayton must have blown him to pieces, if he shot him from the place where he stood, at least from the place where Mr. Clayton fell. And poor Mr. Clayton lay directly between his brother and the woodcock”?Mr. Brockwood in his excitement forgot that hehad no right to put this question, nor, indeed, any other, except as formally representing some one formally implicated. But the coroner did not check him.“By whur the blude wor, a moost have been naigh as cud be atwane the vern–patch and the wosebird”.“Very good. That fern–patch was the place where Mr. Cradock dropped from the gap in the hedge. Mr. Rosedew has proved that. Now let us have all you know, Mark Stote. Did you see anyothermarks, stabbles you call them, not, I mean, in the path Mr. Rosedew came along, nor yet in the patches of thicket through which poor Cradock fled, but in some other direction”?This was the very question the coroner ought to have put long ago. Thus much he knew when Brockwood put it, and now he was angry accordingly.“Mr. Brockwood, I will thank you—consider, sir, this is a court of record”!“Then donʼt let it record stupid humbug”! Mr. Brockwood was a passionate man, and his blood was up. “I will take the responsibility of anything I do. All we want to elicit the truth is a little skill and patience; and for want of that the finest young fellow I have ever known may be blasted for life, for this world and the other. Excuse me, Mr. Coroner, I have spoken precipitately; I have much reverence for your court, but far more for truth”.Here Mr. Brockwood sat down again, and all the magistrates looked at him with nods of approbation. Human passions and human warmth are sure to have their way, even in Areopagus. At last the question was put by the coroner himself. Of course it was a proper one.“Yees, I zeed wan”, said Mark Stote, scratching the back of his head (where at least the memoryoughtto be); “but a wadnʼt of no ’count much”.“Now tell us where that one was”.“Homezide of the rue, avore you coams to them hoar–witheys, naigh whur the bower–stone stanneth. ’Twur zumbawdy yaping about mebbe after nuts as had lanced fro’ the rue auver the water–tabble”.Before this could be translated, a great stir was heard in the outer–room, a number of people crying “Donʼt ’ee–now”! and a hoarse voice uttering “I will”. The coroner was just dismissing Mr. Stote with deep relief to both of them, and each the more respecting because he could not understand the other.“Mark Stote, you have given your evidence in a most lucid manner. There are few people more to be respected than the thorough Saxon gamekeeper”.“Moy un goo, my lard”? asked the patient Mark, with his neck quite stiff, as he at first had stuck it, and one eye cocked at the coroner, as along the bridge of a fowling–piece.“Mr. Stote, you may now depart. Your evidencedoes you the greatest credit, both as the father of a family, and as—as a conservator of game, and I may say—ah, yes—as a faithful family retainer”.“Thank ’ee, my lard, and vor my peart I dwoanʼt bʼleeve now as you manes all the ’arm as most volks says of ’ee”.Mark was louting low, trying to remember the fashion they taught him forty years since in the Sunday–school, when the door flew back, and the cold wind entered, and in walked Cradock Nowell.As regards the outer man, one may change in fifty ways in half of fifty hornʼs. Villainous ague, want of sleep, violent attacks of bile, inferior claret, love rejected, scarlet fever, small–pox, any of these may make a man lose memory in the looking–glass; but all combined could not have wrought such havoc, such appalment, such drought in the fountains of the blood, as that young face now told of. There was not one line of it like the face of Cradock Nowell. It struck the people with dismay, as they made room and let him pass; it would have struck the Roman senate, even with Cato speaking. Times there are when we forget even our sense of humour, absorbed in the power of passion, and the rush of our souls along with it. No one in that room could have laughed at the best joke ever was made, while he looked at Cradock Nowell.Utterly unconscious what any fellow thought of him (except perhaps in some under–current of electric sympathy, whose wires never can be cut, upto the drop of the gallows), Cradock crossed the chairs and benches, feeling them no more than the wind feels the hills it crosses. Yet with the inbred courtesy of natureʼs thorough gentleman, though he forgot all the people there as thinking of himself, he did not yet forget himself as bound to think of them. He touched no man on leg or elbow, be he baronet or cobbler, without apologizing to him. Then he stood in the foremost place, looking at the coroner, saying nothing, but ready to be arraigned of anything.Mr. Cole had never yet so acutely felt the loss of his “brains”; and yet it is likely that even Chope would have doubted how to manage it. The time a man of the world might pass in a dozen common–places, passed over many shrewd heads there, and none knew what to say. Cradockʼs deep grey eyes, grown lighter by the change of health, and larger from the misery, seemed to take in every one who had any feeling for him.“Here I am, and cannot be hurt, more than my own soul has hurt me. Charge me with murder if you please, I never can disprove it. Reputation is a thing my God thinks needless for me; and so it is, in the despair which He has sent upon me”.Not a word of this he spoke, but his eyes said every word of it, to those who have looked on men in trouble, and heard the labouring heart. As usual, the shallowest man there was the first to speak.“Mr. Nowell”, asked the coroner, blandly, as of a wealthy client, “am I to understand, sir, that you come to tender your evidence”?“Yes”, replied Cradock. His throat was tight, and he could not manage to say much.“Then, sir, I am bound to administer to you the caution usual on these occasions. Excuse me; in fact, I know you will; but your present deposition may be—I mean it is possible—— ”“Sir, I care for nothing now. I am here to speak the truth”.“Very laudable. Admirable! Gentlemen of the jury—Mr. Brockwood, perhaps you will oblige the court by examining in chief”?“No, your honour, I cannot do that; it would be a confusion of duties”.“I will not be examined”, said Cradock, with a low hoarse voice; he had been in the woods for a day and two nights, and of course had taken cold,—“I donʼt think I could stand it. A woman who gave me some bread this morning told me what you were doing, and I came here as fast as I could, to tell you all I know. Let me do it, if you please, in the best way I can; and then do what you like with me”.The utter despair of those last words went cold to the heart of every one, and Mark Stote burst out crying so loud that a woman lent him her handkerchief. But Cradockʼs eyes were hard as flint, and the variety of their gaze was gone.The coroner hesitated a little, and whispered to his clerk. Then he said with some relief, and a look of kindness—“The court is ready, Mr. Nowell, to receive your statement. Only you must make it upon oath”.Cradock, being duly sworn, told all he knew, as follows:“It had been agreed between us, that my—my dear brother should go alone to look for a woodcock, which he had seen that day. I was to follow in about an hour, and meet him in the spire–bed just outside the covert. For reasons of my own, I did not mean to shoot at all, only to meet my brother, hear how he had got on, and come home with him. However, I took my gun, because my dog was going with me, and I loaded it from habit. Things had happened that afternoon which had rather upset me, and my thoughts were running upon them. When I got to the spire–bed, there was no one there, although it was quite dusk; but I thought I heard my brother shooting inside the Coffin Wood. So I climbed the hedge, with my gun half–cocked, and called him by his name”.Here Cradock broke down fairly, as the thought came over him that henceforth he might call and call, but none would ever answer.“By what name did you call him”? Mr. Brockwood looked at the coroner angrily. What difference could it make?“I called, ‘Viley, Viley, my boy!’ three times, at the top of my voice. I used to call him so in the nursery, and he always liked it. I canʼt make out why he did not answer, for he must have been close by—though the bushes were very thick, certainly. At that instant, before I had time to jump down into the covert, a woodcock, flushed, perhaps, by the sound of my voice, crossed a little clearing not thirty yards in front of me. I forgot all about my determination not to shoot that day, cocked both barrels in a moment, but missed him clean with the first, because a branch of the hedge flew back and jerked the muzzle sharply. But the bird was flying rather slowly, and I got a second shot at him, as he crossed a little path in the copse, too narrow to be called a ride. I felt quite sure that I shot straight at him, and I thought I saw him fall; but the light was very bad, and the trees were very thick, and he gave one of those flapping jerks at the moment I pulled the trigger, so perhaps I missed him”.“That ’ee doednʼt, Meester Craydock. Aiʼse larned ’ee a bit too much for thic. What do ’ee call thissom”? Here he held up the woodcock. “Meester Craydock, my lard, be the sprackest shat anywhur round these pearts”.Poor Mark knew not that in his anxiety to vindicate his favouriteʼs skill, he was making the case more black for him.“Mark Stote, no more interruptions, if youplease”, exclaimed the coroner; “Mr. Nowell, pray proceed”.“Dwoanʼt ’ee be haish upon un, my lard, dwoanʼt ’ee vaind un guilty. A coodnʼt no how ’ave doed it. A wor that naice and pertiklar, a woodnʼt shat iven toard a gipsy bwoy. And his oyes be as sprack as a merlinʼs. A cood zee droo a mokpieʼs neestie”.Cradockʼs face, so pale and haggard but a minute before, was now of a burning red. The jury looked at him with astonishment, and each, according to his bias, put his construction upon the change. Two of them thought it was conscious guilt; the rest believed it to be indignation at the idea of being found guilty. It was neither; it was hope. The flash and flush of sudden hope, leaping across the heart, like a rocket over the sea of despair. He could not speak, but gasped in vain, then glutched (to use a forest word, which means gulped down a sob), and fell back into John Rosedewʼs arms, faint, and stark, and rigid.The process of his mind which led him to the shores of light—but only for a little glimpse, a glimpse and then all dark again—was somewhat on this wise: “Only a bullet, or balled cartridge, at the distance I was from him, could have killed my darling Viley on the spot, as I saw him dead, with the hole cut through him. I amalmostsure that my cartridge was in the left barrel of the gun, where I always put it. And now it is clear that the left barrel killed that unlucky bird, and killedhim with shot flying separate, so the cartridge must have opened. Viley, too, was ten feet under the height the bird was flying. I donʼt believethat I hit him at all. I had loose shot in my right barrel; the one that sent so random, on account of the branch that struck it. I amalmostsure I had, and I fired quite straight with the left barrel. God is good, the great God is merciful, after all I thought of Him”. No wonder that he fainted away, in the sudden reaction.There is no need to dwell any longer on the misery of that inquest. The principal evidence has been given. The place where Cradock stood in the hedge, and the place where Clayton fell and died; how poor Cradock saw him first, in the very act of jumping, and hung like a nut–shuck, paralysed; how he ran back to his dead twin–brother and could not believe in his death, and went through the woods like a madman, with nothing warm about him except his brotherʼs blood,—all this, I think, is clear enough, as it had long been to the jury, and now was to the coroner. Only Cradock awoke from his hope—what did he care for their verdict? He awoke from his hope not in his moral—that there could be no doubt of—but in his manual innocence; when, to face all circumstances, he had nothing but weak habit. He could not swear, he could not even feel confident (and we want three times three for swearing, that barbarous institution) that he had rammed the cartridge down the left barrel, and the chargeof shot down the right. All he could say was this, that it was a very odd thing if he had not.The oddity of a thing is seldom enough to establish its contrary, in the teeth of all evidence. So the jury found that “Violet Clayton Nowell had died from a gunshot wound, inflicted accidentally by his brother Cradock Nowell, whom, after careful consideration, they absolved from all blame”.
It will have been perceived already that the coroner was by no means “the right man in the right place”. The legal firm, “Cole, Cole, and Son”, had been known in Southampton for many years, as doing a large and very respectable business. The present Mr. Cole, the coroner, who had been the “Son” in the partnership, became sole owner suddenly by the death of his father and uncle. Having brains enough to know that he was far from having too much, he took at once into partnership with him an uncommonly wide–awake, wary fellow, who had been head–clerk to the old firm, ever biding his time for this inevitable result. So now the firm was thriving under the style and title of “Cole, Chope, and Co”., Mr. Chope being known far and wide by the nickname of “Coleʼs brains”. Mr. Cole being appointed coroner, not many months ago, and knowing very little about his duties, took good care for a time not to attempttheir discharge without having “Coleʼs brains” with him. But this had been found to interfere so sadly with private practice, that little by little Cole plucked up courage, as the novelty of the thing wore off, and now was accustomed to play the coroner without the assistance of brains. Nevertheless, upon an occasion so important as this, he would have come with full cerebrum, but that Chope was gone for his holiday. Mr. Cole, however, was an honest man—which could scarcely be said of his partner—and meant to do his duty, so far as he could see it. In the present inquiry he had less chance of seeing it than usual, for he stood in great awe of Mr. Brockwood, a man of ability and high standing, who, as Sir Cradock Nowellʼs solicitor, attended to watch the case, at the suggestion of Rufus Hutton.
Both the guns were produced to the coroner, in the condition in which they were found, except that John Rosedew, for safetyʼs sake, had lowered the right hammer of Claytonʼs to the half–cock, before he concealed it from Cradock. Cradockʼs own unlucky piece had been found, on the following morning, in a rushy pool, where he had cast it, as he fled so wildly. Both the barrels had been discharged, while both of Claytonʼs were loaded. It went to the heart of every man there who could not think Cradock a murderer, when in reply to a jurymanʼs question, what was the meaning of certain lines marked with a watch–spring file on the trigger–plate of his gun, it was explained that thetwins so registered the number and kind of the seasonʼs game.
After this, Mark Stote was called, and came forward very awkwardly with a deal of wet on his velveteen cuffs, which he tried to keep from notice. His eyes were fixed upon the coroner, with a kind of defiance, but even while he was kissing the book, he was glad to sniff behind it.
“Mr. Mark Stote”, said the coroner, duly prompted, “you have, I believe, been employed to examine the scene of this lamentable occurrence”?
Mark Stote took a minute to understand this, and a minute to consider his answer.
“Yees, my lard, I throwed a squoyle at ’un”.
The representative of the Crown looked at Mark with amazement equal at least to that with which Mark was regarding him.
“Gentlemen”, asked Mr. Cole, addressing the court in general, “what language does this man talk”?
“West Saxon”, replied Mr. Brockwood, speaking apart to the coroner; “West Saxon of the forest. He can talk plain English generally, but whenever these people are nervous, they fall back unconsciously upon their native idiom. You will never be able to understand him: shall I act as interpreter”?
“With all my heart; that is to say, with the consent of the jury. But what—I mean to say, how—— ”
“How am I to be checked, you mean, unless Iam put upon oath; and how can you enter it as evidence? Simply thus—let your clerk take down the original answers. All the jury will understand them, and so, perhaps, will he”.
The clerk, who was a fine young gentleman, strongly pronounced in attire, nodded a distinct disclaimer. It would be so unaristocratic to understand any peasant–tongue.
“At any rate, most of the magistrates do. There are plenty of checks upon me. But I am not ambitious of the office. Appoint any one you please”.
“Gentlemen of the jury”, said the coroner, glad to shift from himself the smallest responsibility, “are you content that Mr. Brockwood should do as he has offered”?
“Certain, and most kind of him”, replied the jury, all speaking at once, “if his honour was unable to understand old English”.
“Very good”, said Mr. Brockwood; “donʼt let us make a fuss about nothing. Mr. Stote says he ‘throwed a squoyle;’ that is to say, he looked at it”.
“And in what state did you find the ground”? was the coronerʼs next question.
“Twearable, twearable. Dwont ’e ax ov me vor gude now, dwont ’e”. And he put up his broad hand before his broad face.
“Terrible, terrible”, said the coroner, going by the light of nature in his interpretation; “but Ido not mean the exact spot only where the body was found. I mean, how was the ground as regards dry and wet, for the purpose of retaining footmarks”?
“Thar a bin zome rick–rack wather, ’bout a sannit back. But most peart on it ave a droud up agin. ’Twur starky, my lard, moor nor stoachy”. Here Mark felt that he had described things lucidly and powerfully, and looked round the room for approval.
“Stiff rather than muddy, he means”, explained Mr. Brockwood, smiling at the coronerʼs dismay.
“Were there any footprints upon it, in the part where the ground could retain them”?
“ʼTwur dounted and full of stabbles, in the pearts whur the mulloch wur, but the main of ’un tuffets and stramots”.
“That is to say”, Mr. Brockwood translated, “the ground was full of impressions and footmarks, where there was any dirt to retain them; but most of the ground was hillocky and grassy, and so would take no footprints”.
“When you were searching, did you find anything that seemed to have been overlooked”?
“Yees, my lard, I vound thissom”—producing Cradʼs stubby meerschaum—“and thissom”—a burnt felt–wad—“and a whaile vurther, ai vound thissom”. Here he slowly drew from his pocket a very fine woodcock, though not over fat, with its long bill tucked most carefully under its wing. He stroked the dead bird softly, and set its feathersprofessionally, but did not hand it about, as the court seemed to anticipate.
“In what part, and from what direction, has that bird been shot”?
“Ramhard of the head, my lard, as clane athert shat, and as vaine a bird as iver I wish to zee. But, ahʼs me, her be a wosebird, a wosebird, if iver wur wan”.
Mark could scarcely control his tears, as he thought of the birdʼs evil omen, and yet he could not help admiring him. He turned him over and over again, and dropped a tear into his tail coverts. Mr. Brockwood saw it and gave him time; he knew that for many generations the Stotes had lived under the Nowells.
“Oh, the bird was shot, you say, on the right side of the head, and clean through the head”.
“Thank you”, proceeded the coroner. “Now, do you think that he could have moved after he touched the ground”?
“Nivir a hinch, I allow, my lard. A vell as dead as a stwoun”.
“Now inform the court, as nearly as you can, of the precise spot where you found it”.
It took a long time to discover this, for Mr. Stote had not been taught the rudiments of topography. Nevertheless, they made out at last that the woodcock had been found, dead on his back, with his bill up, eight or ten yards beyond the place where Clayton Nowell fell dead, and in a direct line over his body from the gap in the hedgewhere Cradock stood. Dr. Hutton must have found the bird, if he had searched a little further.
“Now”, said the coroner, forcibly. “Mr. Stote, I will ask you a question which is, perhaps, a little beyond the rules of ordinary evidence, I mean, at least, as permitted in a court of record”—here he glanced at the magistrates, who could not claim the rank of record—“which of these two unfortunate brothers caused, in your opinion, the death of—of that woodcock”?
Mr. Brockwood glanced at the coroner sharply, and so did his own clerk. Even the jury knew, by intuition, that he had no right to tout for opinions.
“Them crink–crank words is beyand me. Moy head be awl wivvery wi’ ’em, zame as if my old ooman was patchy”.
“His honour asks you”, said Mr. Brockwood, with a glance not lost on the justices—for it meant, You see how we court inquiry, though the question is quite inadmissible—“which of the brothers in your opinion shot the bird which you found”?
“Why, Meester Cradock, o’ course. Meester Cleaton ’ud needs a blowed un awl to hame, where a stwooud”.
“Mr. Clayton must have blown him to pieces, if he shot him from the place where he stood, at least from the place where Mr. Clayton fell. And poor Mr. Clayton lay directly between his brother and the woodcock”?
Mr. Brockwood in his excitement forgot that hehad no right to put this question, nor, indeed, any other, except as formally representing some one formally implicated. But the coroner did not check him.
“By whur the blude wor, a moost have been naigh as cud be atwane the vern–patch and the wosebird”.
“Very good. That fern–patch was the place where Mr. Cradock dropped from the gap in the hedge. Mr. Rosedew has proved that. Now let us have all you know, Mark Stote. Did you see anyothermarks, stabbles you call them, not, I mean, in the path Mr. Rosedew came along, nor yet in the patches of thicket through which poor Cradock fled, but in some other direction”?
This was the very question the coroner ought to have put long ago. Thus much he knew when Brockwood put it, and now he was angry accordingly.
“Mr. Brockwood, I will thank you—consider, sir, this is a court of record”!
“Then donʼt let it record stupid humbug”! Mr. Brockwood was a passionate man, and his blood was up. “I will take the responsibility of anything I do. All we want to elicit the truth is a little skill and patience; and for want of that the finest young fellow I have ever known may be blasted for life, for this world and the other. Excuse me, Mr. Coroner, I have spoken precipitately; I have much reverence for your court, but far more for truth”.
Here Mr. Brockwood sat down again, and all the magistrates looked at him with nods of approbation. Human passions and human warmth are sure to have their way, even in Areopagus. At last the question was put by the coroner himself. Of course it was a proper one.
“Yees, I zeed wan”, said Mark Stote, scratching the back of his head (where at least the memoryoughtto be); “but a wadnʼt of no ’count much”.
“Now tell us where that one was”.
“Homezide of the rue, avore you coams to them hoar–witheys, naigh whur the bower–stone stanneth. ’Twur zumbawdy yaping about mebbe after nuts as had lanced fro’ the rue auver the water–tabble”.
Before this could be translated, a great stir was heard in the outer–room, a number of people crying “Donʼt ’ee–now”! and a hoarse voice uttering “I will”. The coroner was just dismissing Mr. Stote with deep relief to both of them, and each the more respecting because he could not understand the other.
“Mark Stote, you have given your evidence in a most lucid manner. There are few people more to be respected than the thorough Saxon gamekeeper”.
“Moy un goo, my lard”? asked the patient Mark, with his neck quite stiff, as he at first had stuck it, and one eye cocked at the coroner, as along the bridge of a fowling–piece.
“Mr. Stote, you may now depart. Your evidencedoes you the greatest credit, both as the father of a family, and as—as a conservator of game, and I may say—ah, yes—as a faithful family retainer”.
“Thank ’ee, my lard, and vor my peart I dwoanʼt bʼleeve now as you manes all the ’arm as most volks says of ’ee”.
Mark was louting low, trying to remember the fashion they taught him forty years since in the Sunday–school, when the door flew back, and the cold wind entered, and in walked Cradock Nowell.
As regards the outer man, one may change in fifty ways in half of fifty hornʼs. Villainous ague, want of sleep, violent attacks of bile, inferior claret, love rejected, scarlet fever, small–pox, any of these may make a man lose memory in the looking–glass; but all combined could not have wrought such havoc, such appalment, such drought in the fountains of the blood, as that young face now told of. There was not one line of it like the face of Cradock Nowell. It struck the people with dismay, as they made room and let him pass; it would have struck the Roman senate, even with Cato speaking. Times there are when we forget even our sense of humour, absorbed in the power of passion, and the rush of our souls along with it. No one in that room could have laughed at the best joke ever was made, while he looked at Cradock Nowell.
Utterly unconscious what any fellow thought of him (except perhaps in some under–current of electric sympathy, whose wires never can be cut, upto the drop of the gallows), Cradock crossed the chairs and benches, feeling them no more than the wind feels the hills it crosses. Yet with the inbred courtesy of natureʼs thorough gentleman, though he forgot all the people there as thinking of himself, he did not yet forget himself as bound to think of them. He touched no man on leg or elbow, be he baronet or cobbler, without apologizing to him. Then he stood in the foremost place, looking at the coroner, saying nothing, but ready to be arraigned of anything.
Mr. Cole had never yet so acutely felt the loss of his “brains”; and yet it is likely that even Chope would have doubted how to manage it. The time a man of the world might pass in a dozen common–places, passed over many shrewd heads there, and none knew what to say. Cradockʼs deep grey eyes, grown lighter by the change of health, and larger from the misery, seemed to take in every one who had any feeling for him.
“Here I am, and cannot be hurt, more than my own soul has hurt me. Charge me with murder if you please, I never can disprove it. Reputation is a thing my God thinks needless for me; and so it is, in the despair which He has sent upon me”.
Not a word of this he spoke, but his eyes said every word of it, to those who have looked on men in trouble, and heard the labouring heart. As usual, the shallowest man there was the first to speak.
“Mr. Nowell”, asked the coroner, blandly, as of a wealthy client, “am I to understand, sir, that you come to tender your evidence”?
“Yes”, replied Cradock. His throat was tight, and he could not manage to say much.
“Then, sir, I am bound to administer to you the caution usual on these occasions. Excuse me; in fact, I know you will; but your present deposition may be—I mean it is possible—— ”
“Sir, I care for nothing now. I am here to speak the truth”.
“Very laudable. Admirable! Gentlemen of the jury—Mr. Brockwood, perhaps you will oblige the court by examining in chief”?
“No, your honour, I cannot do that; it would be a confusion of duties”.
“I will not be examined”, said Cradock, with a low hoarse voice; he had been in the woods for a day and two nights, and of course had taken cold,—“I donʼt think I could stand it. A woman who gave me some bread this morning told me what you were doing, and I came here as fast as I could, to tell you all I know. Let me do it, if you please, in the best way I can; and then do what you like with me”.
The utter despair of those last words went cold to the heart of every one, and Mark Stote burst out crying so loud that a woman lent him her handkerchief. But Cradockʼs eyes were hard as flint, and the variety of their gaze was gone.
The coroner hesitated a little, and whispered to his clerk. Then he said with some relief, and a look of kindness—
“The court is ready, Mr. Nowell, to receive your statement. Only you must make it upon oath”.
Cradock, being duly sworn, told all he knew, as follows:
“It had been agreed between us, that my—my dear brother should go alone to look for a woodcock, which he had seen that day. I was to follow in about an hour, and meet him in the spire–bed just outside the covert. For reasons of my own, I did not mean to shoot at all, only to meet my brother, hear how he had got on, and come home with him. However, I took my gun, because my dog was going with me, and I loaded it from habit. Things had happened that afternoon which had rather upset me, and my thoughts were running upon them. When I got to the spire–bed, there was no one there, although it was quite dusk; but I thought I heard my brother shooting inside the Coffin Wood. So I climbed the hedge, with my gun half–cocked, and called him by his name”.
Here Cradock broke down fairly, as the thought came over him that henceforth he might call and call, but none would ever answer.
“By what name did you call him”? Mr. Brockwood looked at the coroner angrily. What difference could it make?
“I called, ‘Viley, Viley, my boy!’ three times, at the top of my voice. I used to call him so in the nursery, and he always liked it. I canʼt make out why he did not answer, for he must have been close by—though the bushes were very thick, certainly. At that instant, before I had time to jump down into the covert, a woodcock, flushed, perhaps, by the sound of my voice, crossed a little clearing not thirty yards in front of me. I forgot all about my determination not to shoot that day, cocked both barrels in a moment, but missed him clean with the first, because a branch of the hedge flew back and jerked the muzzle sharply. But the bird was flying rather slowly, and I got a second shot at him, as he crossed a little path in the copse, too narrow to be called a ride. I felt quite sure that I shot straight at him, and I thought I saw him fall; but the light was very bad, and the trees were very thick, and he gave one of those flapping jerks at the moment I pulled the trigger, so perhaps I missed him”.
“That ’ee doednʼt, Meester Craydock. Aiʼse larned ’ee a bit too much for thic. What do ’ee call thissom”? Here he held up the woodcock. “Meester Craydock, my lard, be the sprackest shat anywhur round these pearts”.
Poor Mark knew not that in his anxiety to vindicate his favouriteʼs skill, he was making the case more black for him.
“Mark Stote, no more interruptions, if youplease”, exclaimed the coroner; “Mr. Nowell, pray proceed”.
“Dwoanʼt ’ee be haish upon un, my lard, dwoanʼt ’ee vaind un guilty. A coodnʼt no how ’ave doed it. A wor that naice and pertiklar, a woodnʼt shat iven toard a gipsy bwoy. And his oyes be as sprack as a merlinʼs. A cood zee droo a mokpieʼs neestie”.
Cradockʼs face, so pale and haggard but a minute before, was now of a burning red. The jury looked at him with astonishment, and each, according to his bias, put his construction upon the change. Two of them thought it was conscious guilt; the rest believed it to be indignation at the idea of being found guilty. It was neither; it was hope. The flash and flush of sudden hope, leaping across the heart, like a rocket over the sea of despair. He could not speak, but gasped in vain, then glutched (to use a forest word, which means gulped down a sob), and fell back into John Rosedewʼs arms, faint, and stark, and rigid.
The process of his mind which led him to the shores of light—but only for a little glimpse, a glimpse and then all dark again—was somewhat on this wise: “Only a bullet, or balled cartridge, at the distance I was from him, could have killed my darling Viley on the spot, as I saw him dead, with the hole cut through him. I amalmostsure that my cartridge was in the left barrel of the gun, where I always put it. And now it is clear that the left barrel killed that unlucky bird, and killedhim with shot flying separate, so the cartridge must have opened. Viley, too, was ten feet under the height the bird was flying. I donʼt believethat I hit him at all. I had loose shot in my right barrel; the one that sent so random, on account of the branch that struck it. I amalmostsure I had, and I fired quite straight with the left barrel. God is good, the great God is merciful, after all I thought of Him”. No wonder that he fainted away, in the sudden reaction.
There is no need to dwell any longer on the misery of that inquest. The principal evidence has been given. The place where Cradock stood in the hedge, and the place where Clayton fell and died; how poor Cradock saw him first, in the very act of jumping, and hung like a nut–shuck, paralysed; how he ran back to his dead twin–brother and could not believe in his death, and went through the woods like a madman, with nothing warm about him except his brotherʼs blood,—all this, I think, is clear enough, as it had long been to the jury, and now was to the coroner. Only Cradock awoke from his hope—what did he care for their verdict? He awoke from his hope not in his moral—that there could be no doubt of—but in his manual innocence; when, to face all circumstances, he had nothing but weak habit. He could not swear, he could not even feel confident (and we want three times three for swearing, that barbarous institution) that he had rammed the cartridge down the left barrel, and the chargeof shot down the right. All he could say was this, that it was a very odd thing if he had not.
The oddity of a thing is seldom enough to establish its contrary, in the teeth of all evidence. So the jury found that “Violet Clayton Nowell had died from a gunshot wound, inflicted accidentally by his brother Cradock Nowell, whom, after careful consideration, they absolved from all blame”.
CHAPTER XXIV.Rufus Hutton rode home that night to Geopharmacy Lodge. He had worked unusually hard, even for a man of his activity, during the last three days, and he wanted to see his Rosa again, and talk it all over with her. Of course he had cancelled her invitation, as well as that of all others, under the wretched circumstances. But before he went, he saw Cradock Nowell safe in the hands of the rector, for he could not induce him to go to the Hall, and did not think it fair towards his wife, now in her delicate health, to invite him to the Lodge. And even if he had done so, Cradock would not have gone with him.If we strike the average of mankind, we shall find Rufus Hutton above it. He had his many littlenesses—and which of us has few?—his oddities of mind and manner, even his want of charity, and his practical faith in selfishness; none the less for all of that there were many people who loved him.And those of us who are loved of any—save parents, wife, or daughter—loved, I mean, as the word is felt and not interpreted,—with warmth of heart, and moistened eyes (when good or ill befalls us); any such may have no doubt of being loved by God.All this while, Sir Cradock Nowell had been alone; and, as Homer has it, “feeding on his heart”. Ever since that fearful time, when, going home to his happy dinner with a few choice friends, he had overtaken some dark thing, which he would not let them hide from him—ever since that awful moment when he saw what it was, the father had not taken food, nor comfort of God or man.All they did—well–meaning people—was of no avail. It was not of disgrace he thought, of one son being murdered, and the other son his murderer; he did not count his generations, score the number of baronets, and weep for the slur upon them; rave of his painted scutcheon, and howl because this was a dab on it. He simply groaned and could not eat, because he had lost his son—his own, his sweet, his best–beloved son.As for Cradock, the father hoped—for he had not now the energy to care very much about it—that he might nothappenhenceforth to meet him (for all things now were of luck) more than once a month, perhaps; and then they need not say much. He never could care for him any more; of that he felt as sure as if his heart were become a tombstone.Young Cradock, though they coaxed and petted, wept before him at the parsonʼs, and still more behind him, and felt for him so truly deeply that at last he burst out crying (which did him Heavenʼs own good)—Cradock, on his part, would not go to his father, until he should be asked for. He felt that he could fall on his knees, and crawl along in abasement, for having robbed the old grey man of all he loved on earth. Only his father must ask for him, or at least give him leave to come.Perhaps he was wrong. Let others say. But in the depths of his grief he felt the need of a fatherʼs love; and so his agony was embittered because he got no signs of it. Let us turn to luckier people.“Rufus, why, my darling Rufus, how much more—— are you going to put on that little piece of ground, no bigger than my work–table”?Mrs. Hutton had been brought up to “call a spade a spade”; and she extended this wise nomenclature to the contents of the spade as well.“Rosa, why, my darling Rosa, that bed contains one hundred and twenty–five feet. Now, according to the great Justus Liebig, and his mineral theory—— ”“One hundred and twenty–five feet, Rue! And I could jump across it! I am sure it is not half so long as my silk measure in the shell, dear”!“Dearest Rosa, just consider: my pet, get out your tablets, for you are nothing at mental arithmetic”.“Indeed! Well, you never used to tell me things like that, Rufus”!“Well, perhaps I didnʼt, Roe. I would have forsworn to any extent, when I saw you among the candytuft. But now, my darling, I have got you; and from a lofty feeling, I am bound to tell the truth. Consider the interests, Rosa—— ”“Go along with your nonsense, Rue. You talk below your great understanding, because you think it suitsme”.“Perhaps I do”, said Rufus, “perhaps I do now and then, my dear: you always hit the truth so. But is it not better to do that than to talk Greek to my Rosa”?“I am sure I donʼt know; and I am sure I donʼt care either. When have I heard you say anything, Rufus, so wonderful, and so out of the way, that I,poor I, couldnʼt understand it? Please to tell me that, Rufus”.“My darling, consider. You are exciting yourself so fearfully. You make me shake all over”.“Then you should not say such things to me, Rufus. Why, Rue, you are quite pale”!—What an impossibility! She might have boiled him in soda without bringing him to a shrimp–colour.—“Come into the house this moment, I insist upon it, and have two glasses of sherry. And youdosay very wonderful things, much too clever for me, Rufus; and indeed, I believe, too clever for any woman in the world, even the one that wrote Homer”.Rosa Hutton ran into the house, and sought for the keys high and low; then got the decanter at last out of the cellaret, and brought out a bumper of wine. Crafty Rufus stopped outside, thoroughly absorbed in an autumn rose; knowing that she liked to do it for him, and glad to have it done for him.“Not a drop, unless you drink first, dear. Rosa, here under the weeping elm: you are not afraid of the girls who are making the bed, I hope”!“I should rather hope not, indeed! Rue, dear, my best love to you. Do you think Iʼd keep a girl in the house I was afraid to see through the window”?To prove her spirit, Mrs. Hutton tossed a glass of wine off, although she seldom took it, and it was not twelve oʼclock yet. Rufus looked on with some dismay, till he saw she had got the decanter.“Well done, Rosa! What good it does me to see you take a mere drop of wine! You are bound now to obey me. Roe, my love, your very best health, and that involves my own. Youʼre not heavy on my shoulder, love”.“No, dear, I know that: you are so very strong. But donʼt you see the boy coming? And that hole among the branches! And the leaves coming off too! Oh, do let me go in a moment, Rue!—— ”“Confound that boy! Iʼm blest if he isnʼt always after me”.The boy, however, or man as he called himself,was far too important a personage in their domestic economy to be confounded audibly. Gardener, groom, page, footman, knife–boy, and coachman, all in one; a long, loose, knock–kneed, big–footed, what they would call in the forest a “yaping, shammocking gally–bagger”. His name was Jonah, and he came from Buckinghamshire, and had a fine drawl of his own, quite different from that of Ytene, which he looked upon as a barbarism.“Plase, sir, Maister Reevers ave a zent them traases as us hardered”. Jonahʼs eyes, throughout this speech, which occupied him at least a minute, were fixed upon the decanter, with ineffable admiration at the glow of the wine now the sun was upon it.“Then, Jonah, my boy”, cried Rufus Hutton, all animation in a moment, “I have a great mind to give you sixpence. Rosa, give me another glass of sherry. Hereʼs to the health of the great horticulturist, Rivers! Most obliging of him to send my trees so early, and before the leaves are off. Come along, Roe, you love to see trees unpacked, and eat the fruit by anticipation. I believe youʼll expect them to blossom and bear by Christmas, as St. Anthony made the vines do”.“Well, darling, and so they ought, with such a gardener as you to manage them.—Jonah, you shall have a glass of wine, to drink the health of the trees. He has never taken his eyes off the decanter, ever since he came up, poor boy”.Rosa was very good–natured, and accustomedto farm–house geniality. Rufus laughed and whispered, “My love, my Indian sherry”!“Canʼt help it”, said Mrs. Hutton; “less chance of its disagreeing with him. Here, Jonah, you wonʼt mind drinking after your master”.“Here be vaine health to all on us”, said Jonah, scraping the gravel and putting up one finger as he had seen the militia men do (in imitation of the regulars); “and may us nayver know no taime warse than the prasent mawment”.“Hear, hear”! cried Rufus Hutton; “now, come along, and cut the cords, boy”.Dr. Hutton set off sharply, with Rosa on his arm, for he did not feel at all sure but what Jonahʼs exalted sentiment might elicit, at any rate, half a glass more of sherry. They found the trees packed beautifully; a long cone, like a giant lobster–pot, weighing nearly two hundred–weight, thatched with straw, and wattled round, and corded over that.“Out with your knife and cut the cords, boy”.“Well, Rufus, youareextravagant”!—“Rather fine, that”, thought Dr. Hutton, “after playing such pranks with my sherry”!—“Jonah, I wonʼt have a bit of the string cut. I want every atom of it. Whatʼs the good of your having hands if you canʼt untie it”?At last they got the great parcel open, and strewed all the lawn with litter. There were trees of every sort, as tight as sardines in a case, with many leaves still hanging on them, and the roots tied up in moss. Half a dozen standard apples;half a hundred pyramid pears, the prettiest things imaginable, furnished all round like a cypress, and thick with blossom–spurs; then young wall–trees, two years’ trained, tied to crossed sticks, and drawn up with bast, like the frame of a schoolboyʼs kite; around the roots and in among them were little roses in pots No. 60, wrapped in moss, and webbed with bast; and the smell of the whole was glorious.“Hurrah”! cried Rufus, dancing, “no nurseries in the kingdom, nor in the world, except Sawbridgeworth, could send out such a lot of trees, perfect in shape, every one of them, and every one of them true to sort. What a bore that Iʼve got to go again to Nowelhurst to–day! Rosa, dear; every one of these trees ought to be planted to–day. The very essence of early planting (which in my opinion saves a twelvemonth) is never to let the roots get dry. These peach–trees in a fortnight will have got hold of the ground, and be thinking of growing again; and the leaves, if properly treated, will never have flagged at all. Oh, I wish you could see to it, Rosa”.“Well, dear Rufus, and so I can. To please you, I donʼt mind at all throwing aside my banner–screen, and leaving my letter to cousin Magnolia”.“No, no. I donʼt mean that. I mean, how I wish you understood it”.“Understood it, Rue! Well, Iʼm sure! As if anybody couldnʼt plant a tree! And I, who hada pair of gardening gloves when I was only that high”!“Roe, now listen to me. Not one in a hundred even of professional gardeners, who have been at it all their lives, knows how to plant a tree”.“Well, then, Rufus, if that is the case, I think it very absurd of you to expect that I should. But Jonah will teach me, I dare say. Iʼll begin to learn this afternoon”.“No, indeed, you wonʼt. At any rate, you must not practise onmytrees; nor in among them, either. But you may plant the mop, dear, as often as you like, in that empty piece of ground where the cauliflowers were”.“Plant the mop, indeed! Well, Dr. Hutton, you had better ride back to Nowelhurst, where all the grand people are, if you only come home for the purpose of insulting your poor wife. It is there, no doubt, that you learn to despise any one who is not quite so fine as they are. And what are they, I should like to know? What a poor weak thing I am, to be sure; no wonder no one cares for me. I can have no self–respect. I am only fit to plant the mop”.Hereupon the blue founts welled, the carmine of the cheeks grew scarlet, the cherry lips turned bigarreaux, and a very becoming fur–edged jacket lifted, as if with a zephyr stealing it.Rufus felt immediately that he had been the lowest of all low brutes; and almost made up hismind on the spot that it would be decidedly wrong of him to go to Nowelhurst that evening. We will not enter into the scene of strong self–condemnation, reciprocal collaudation, extraordinary admiration, because all married people know it; and as for those who are single, let them get married and learn it. Only in the last act of it, Jonah, from whom they had retreated, came up again, looking rather sheepish—for he had begun to keep a sweetheart—and spake these winged words:“Plase, sir, if you be so good, it baint no vault o’ maine nohow”.“Get all those trees at once laid in by the heels. What is no fault of yours, pray? Are you always at your dinner”?“Baint no vault o’ maine, sir; but there coom two genelmen chaps, as zays they musten zee you”.“Must see me, indeed, whether I choose it or no! And with all those trees to plant, and the mare to be ready at three oʼclock”!“Zo I tould un, sir; but they zays as theymustzee you”.“In the name of the devil and all his works, but Iʼll give them a bitter reception. Let them come this way, Jonah”.“Oh dear, if you are going to be violent! You know what you are sometimes, Rue—enough to frighten any man”.“Never, my darling, never. You never findRufus Hutton formidable to any one who means rightly”.“No, no, to be sure, dear. But then, perhaps, they may not. And after all that has occurred to–day, I feel so much upset. Very foolish of me, I know. But promise me not to be rash, dear”.“Have no fear, my darling Rosa. I will never injure any man who does not insult you, dear”.While Rufus was looking ten feet high, and Mrs. Rufus tripping away, after a little sob and a whisper, Jonah came pelting down the walk with his great feet on either side of it, as if he had a barrow between them. At the same time a voice came round the corner past the arbutus–tree, now quivering red with strawberries, and the words thereof were these:“Perfect Paradise, my good sir! I knew it must be, from what I heard of him. Exactly like my friend the Dookʼs, but laid out still more tastefully. Bless me, why, his Grace must have copied it! Wonʼt I give him a poke in the ribs when he dines with me next Toosday! Sly bird, a sly bird, I say, though he is such a capital fellow. Knew where to come, Iʼm blest if he didnʼt, for taste, true science, and landscape”.“Haw! Yes; I quite agree with you. But his Grace has nothing so chaste, so perfect as this, in me opeenion, sir. Haw”!The cockles of the Rufine heart swelled warmly; for of course he heard every word of it, though, ofcourse, not intended to do so. “Now Rosa ought to have heard all that”, was passing in his mind, when two gentlemen stood before him, and were wholly amazed to see him. One of them was a short stout man, not much taller than Rufus, but of double his cubic contents; the other a tall and portly signor, fitted upon spindle shins, with a slouch in his back, grey eyebrows, long heavy eyes, and large dewlaps.The short gentleman, evidently chief spokesman and proud of his elocution, waved his hat most gracefully, when he recovered from his surprise, drew back for a yard or so, in his horror at intruding, and spoke with a certain flourish, and the air of a man above humbug.“Mr. Nowell Corklemore, I have the honour of making you known to the gentleman whose scientific fame has roused such a spirit among us. Dr. Hutton, sir, excuse me, the temptation was too great for us. My excellent friend, Lord Thorley, who has, I believe, the honour of being related to Mrs. Hutton, pressed his services upon us, when he knew what we desired. But, sir, no. ‘My lord’, said I, ‘we prefer to intrude without the commonplace of society; we prefer to intrude upon the footing of common tastes, my lord, and warm, though far more rudimental and vague pursuit of science’. Bless me, all this time my unworthy self, sir! I am too prone to forget myself, at least my wife declares so. Bailey Kettledrum, sir, is my name, of Kettledrum Hall, in Dorset. AndI have the enlightenment, sir, to aspire to the honour of your acquaintance”.Rufus Hutton bowed rather queerly to Mr. Nowell Corklemore and Mr. Bailey Kettledrum; for he had seen a good deal of the world, and had tasted sugar–candy. Moreover, the Kettledrum pattern was known to him long ago; and he had never found them half such good fellows as they pretend to think other people. Being, however, most hospitable, as are nearly all men from India, he invited them to come in at once, and have some lunch after their journey. They accepted very warmly; and Mrs. Hutton, having now appeared and been duly introduced, Bailey Kettledrum set off with her round the curve of the grass–plot, as if he had known her for fifty years, and had not seen her for twenty–five. He engrossed her whole attention by the pace at which he talked, and by appeals to her opinion, praising all things, taking notes, red–hot with admiration, impressively confidential about his wife and children, and, in a word, regardless of expense to make himself agreeable. Notwithstanding all this, he did not get on much, because he made one great mistake. He rattled and flashed along the high road leading to fifty other places, but missed the quiet and pleasant path which leads to a womanʼs good graces—the path, I mean, which follows the little brook called “sympathy”, a winding but not a shallow brook, over the meadow of soft listening.Mr. Nowell Corklemore, walking with RufusHutton, was, as he was forced to be by a feeble nature enfeebled, a dry and pompous man.“Haw! I am given to understand you have made all this yourself, sir. In me ’umble opeenion, it does you the greatest credit, sir; credit, sir, no less to your heart than to your head. Haw”!Here he pointed with his yellow bamboo at nothing at all in particular.“Everything is in its infancy yet. Wait till the trees grow up a little. I have planted nearly all of them. All except that, and that, and the weeping elm over yonder, where I sit with my wife sometimes. Everything is in its infancy”.“Excuse me; haw! If you will allow me, I would also say, with the exception of something else”. And he looked profoundly mystic.“Oh, the house you mean”, said Rufus. “No, the house is not quite new; built some seven years back”.“Sir, I do not mean the house—but the edifice, haw!—the tenement of the human being. Sir, I mean, except justthis”.He shut one eye, like a sleepy owl, and tapped the side of his head most sagely; and then he said “Haw”! and looked for approval.And he might have looked a very long time, in his stupidly confident manner, without a chance of getting it; for Rufus Hutton disliked allusions even to age intellectual, when you came to remember that his Rosa was more than twenty years younger.“Ah, yes, now it strikes me”, continued Mr. Corklemore, as they stood in front of the house, “that little bow–window—nay, I am given to understand, that bay–window is the more correct—haw! I mean the more architectural term—I think I should have felt inclined to make that nice bay–window give to the little grass–plot. A mere question, perhaps, of idiosyncrasy, haw”!“Give what”? asked Rufus, now on the foam. That his own pet lawn, which he rolled every day, his lawn endowed with manifold curves and sweeps of his own inventing, with the Wellingtonia upon it, and the plantain dug out with a cheese–knife—that all this should be called a “little grass–plot”, by a fellow who had no two ideas, except in his intonation of “Haw”!“Haw! It does not signify. But the term, I am given to understand, is now the correct and recognised one”.“I wish you were given to understand anything except your own importance”, Rufus muttered savagely, and eyed the yellow bamboo.“Have you—haw! excuse my asking, for you are a great luminary here; have you as yet made trial of the Spergula pilifera”?“Yes; and found it the biggest humbug that ever aped Godʼs grass”.Dr. Hutton was always very sorry when he had used strong language; but being a thin–skinned, irritable, cut–the–corner man, he could not be expected to stand Nowell Corklemoreʼs “haws”.And Mr. Corklemore had of “haw” no less than seven intonations. First, and most common of all, the haw of self–approval. Second, the haw of contemplation. Third, the haw of doubt and inquiry. Fourth, that of admiration. Fifth, that of interlude and hiatus, when words or ideas lingered. Sixth, the haw of accident and short–winded astonishment;e.g.he had once fallen off a hayrick, and cried “Haw”! at the bottom. Seventh, the haw of indignation and powerful remonstrance, in a totally different key from the rest; and this last he now adopted.“Haw—then!—haw!—I have been given to understand that the Spergula pilifera succeeds most admirably with people who have—haw!—have studied it”.“Very likely it does”, said Rufus, though he knew much better, but now he was on his own door–step, and felt ashamed of his rudeness; “but come in, Mr. Corklemore; our ways are rough in these forest outskirts, and we are behind you in civilization. Nevertheless, we are heartily glad to welcome our more intelligent neighbours”.At lunch he gave them home–brewed ale and pale sherry of no especial character. But afterwards, being a genial soul, and feeling still guilty of rudeness, he went to the cellar himself and fetched a bottle of the richest Indian gold. Mrs. Hutton withdrew very prettily; and the three gentlemen, all good judges of wine, began to warm over it luminously, more softly indeed thanthey would have done after a heavy dinner. Surely, noble wine deserves not to be the mere operculum to a stupidly mixed hot meal.“Have another bottle, gentlemen; now do have another bottle”.“Not one drop more for the world”, exclaimed they both, with their hands up. None the less for that, they did; and, what was very unwise of them, another after that, until I can scarcely write straight in trying to follow their doings. Meanwhile Jonah had prigged three glassfuls out of the decanter left under the elm–tree.“Now”, said Rufus, who alone wasalmostin a state of sobriety, “suppose we take a turn in the garden and my little orchard–house? I believe I am indebted to that for the pleasure of your very disagreeable—ahem, most agreeable company to–day”.Bailey Kettledrum sprang up with a flourish. “No, sir, no, sir! Permit me to defend myself and this most marketable—I—I mean remarkable gentleman here present, Mr. Nowell Corklemore, from any such dis—dish—sparagus, disparagizing imputations, sir. An orchard, sir, is very well, and the trees in it are very well, and the fruit of it is very good, sir; but an orchard can never appear, sir, to a man of exalted sentiments, and temporal—I mean, sir, strictly intemperate judgment, in the light of an elephant—irrelevant—no, sir, I mean of course an equilevant—for a man, sir, for a man”! Here Mr. Bailey Kettledrum hit himselfhard on the bosom, and broke the glass of his watch.“Mr. Kettledrum”, said Rufus, rising, “your sentiments do you honour. Mine, however, is not an orchard, but an orchard–house”.“Ha, ha, good again! House in an orchard! yes, I see. Corklemore, hear that, my boy? Our admirable host—no, thank you, not a single drop more wine—I always know when I have had enough. Sir, it is the proud privi—prilivege of a man—— Corklemore, get up, sir; donʼt you see we are waiting for you”?Mr. Corklemore stared heavily at him; his constitution was a sleepy one, and he thought he had eaten his dinner. His friend nodded gravely at Dr. Hutton; and the nod expressed compassion tempering condemnation.“Ah, I see how it is. Ever since that fall from the hayrick, the leastest little drop of wine, prej—prej—— ”“Prejudge the case, my lord”, muttered Mr. Corklemore, who had been a barrister.“Prejudicially affects our highly admired friend. But, sir, the fault is mine. I should have stretched forth long ago the restraining hand of friendship, sir, and dashed the si—si—silent bottle—— ”“Chirping bottle, possibly you mean”.“No, sir, I do not, and I will thank you not to interrupt me. Who ever heard a bottle chirp? I ask you, sir, as a man of the world, and a man of common sense, who ever heard a bottle chirp?What I mean, sir, is the siren—the siren bottle from his lips. What is it in the Latin grammar—or possibly in the Greek, for I have learned Greek, sir, in the faulchion days of youth;—is it not, sir, this:improba Siren desidia? Perhaps, sir, it may have been in your grammar, if you ever had one,improba chirping desidia”. As he looked round, in the glow and sparkle of lagenic logic, Rufus caught him by the arm, and hurried him out at the garden door, where luckily no steps were. The pair went straight, or, in better truth, went first, to the kitchen garden; Rufus did not care much for flowers; all that he left to his Rosa.“Now I will show you a thing, sir”, cried Rufus in his glory, “a thing which has been admired by the leading men of the age. Nowhere else, in this part of the world, can you see a piece of ground, sir, cropped in the manner of that, sir”.And to tell the plain, unvinous truth, the square to which he pointed was a triumph of high art. The style of it was wholly different from that of Mr. Garnetʼs beds. Bull Garnet was fond of novelties, but he made them square with his system; the result was more strictly practical, but less nobly theoretical. Dr. Hutton, on the other hand, travelled the entire porker; obstacles of soil and season were as nothing to him, and when the shape of the ground was wrong, he called in the navvies and made it right.A plot of land four–square, and measured to exactly half an acre, contained 2400 trees, cuttingeither way as truly as the spindles of machinery; there was no tree more than five feet high, the average height was four feet six inches. They were planted just four feet asunder, and two feet back from the pathway. There was every kind of fruit–tree there, which can be made by British gardeners to ripen fruit in Britain, without artificial heat. Pears especially, and plums, cherries, apples, walnuts (juglans præparturiens), figs, and medlars, quinces, filberts, even peaches, nectarines, and apricots—though only one row, in all, of those three; there was scarcely one of those miniature trees which had not done its duty that year, or now was bent upon doing it. Still the sight was beautiful; although far gone with autumn, still Coxʼs orange–pippin lit the russet leaves with gold, or Beurré Clairgeau and Capiaumont enriched the air with scarlet.Each little tree looked so bright and comely, each plumed itself so naturally, proud to carry its share of tribute to the beneficent Maker, that the two men who had been abusing His choice gift, the vine, felt a little ashamed of themselves, or perhaps felt that they ought to be.“Magnificent, magnificent”! cried Kettledrum, theatrically; “I must tell the Dook of this. He will have the same next year”.“Will he, though”? said Rufus, thinking of the many hours he had spent among those trees, and of his careful apprenticeship to the works of their originator; “I can tell you one thing. He wonʼt,unless he has a better gardener than I ever saw in these parts. Now let us go to the orchard–house”.The orchard–house was a span–roofed building, very light and airy; the roof and ends were made of glass, the sides of deal with broad falling shutters, for the sake of ventilation. It was about fifty feet in length, twenty in width, and fifteen in height. There was no ventilation at the ridge, and all the lights were fixed. The free air of heaven wandered through, among peaches, plums, and apricots, some of which still retained their fruit, crimson, purple, and golden. The little trees were all in pots, and about a yard apart. The pots were not even plunged in the ground, but each stood, as a tub should, on its own independent bottom. The air of the house was soft and pleasant, with a peculiar fragrance, the smell of ripening foliage. Bailey Kettledrum saw at once—for he had plenty of observant power, and the fumes of wine were dispersing—that this house must have shown a magnificent sight, a month or two ago. And having once more his own object in view, he tripled his true approval.“Dr. Hutton, this is fine. Fine is not the word for it; this is grand and gorgeous. What a triumph of mind! What a lot you must pay for wages”!“Thirteen shillings a week in summer, seven shillings a week in the winter”. This was one of his pet astonishments.“What! Iʼll never believe it. Sir, you must either be a conjuror, the devil, or—or—— ”“Or a liar”, said Rufus, placidly; “but I am none of the three. Jonah has twelve shillings a week, but half of that goes for housework. That leaves six shillings for gardening; but I never trust him inside this house, for he is only a clumsy dolt, who does the heavy digging. And besides him I have only a very sharp lad, at seven shillings a week, who works under my own eye. I have in some navvies, at times, it is true, when I make any alterations. But that is outlay, not working expense. Now come and see my young trees just arrived from Sawbridgeworth”.“Stop one moment. What is this stuff on the top of the pots here? What queer stuff! Why, it goes quite to pieces in my hands”.“Oh, only a little top–dressing, just to refresh the trees a bit. This way, Mr. Kettledrum”.“Pardon me, sir, if I appear impertinent or inquisitive. But I have learned so much this afternoon, that I am anxious to learn a little more. My friend, the Dook, will cross–examine me as to everything I have seen here. He knew our intention of coming over. I must introduce you to his Grace, before you are a week older, sir; he has specially requested it. In fact, it was only this morning he said to Nowell Corklemore—but Corklemore, though a noble fellow, a gem of truth and honour, sir, is not a man ofourintelligence; in one word, he is an ass”!“Haw! Nowell Corklemore, Nowell Corklemore is an ass, is he, in the wise opeenion of Mr. Bailey Kettledrum? Only let me get up, good Lord—and perhaps he told the Dook so. There, itʼs biting me again, oh Lord! Nowell Corklemore an ass”!By the door of the orchard–house grew a fine deodara, and behind it lay Mr. Corklemore, beyond all hope entangled. His snores had been broken summarily by the maid coming for the glasses, and he set forth, after a dozen “haws”, to look for his two comrades. With instinct ampeline he felt that his only chance of advancing in the manner of a biped lay or stood in his bamboo. So he went to the stick–stand by the back–door, where he muzzily thought it ought to be. Mrs. Hutton, in the drawing–room, was rattling on the piano, and that made his head ten times worse. His bamboo was not in the stick–stand; nevertheless he found there a gig–umbrella with a yellow handle, like the top of his fidus Achates. Relying upon this, he made his way out, crying “haw”! at every star in the oilcloth. He progged away all down the walk, with the big umbrella; but the button that held the cord was gone, and it flapped like a mutinous windmill. However, he carried on bravely, until he confronted a dark, weird tree, waving its shrouded arms at him. This was the deodara; so he made a tack to the left, and there was hulled between wind and water by an unsuspected enemy. This was Rufus Huttonʼs pet of all pet pear–trees, a perfect model of symmetry,scarce three feet six in height, sturdy, crisp, short–jointed, spurred from keel to truck, and carrying twenty great pears. It had been so stopped and snagged throughout, that it was stiffer than fifty hollies; and Rosa was dreadfully jealous of it, because Rufus spent so much time there. He used to go out in the summer forenoon, whenever the sun was brilliant, and draw lines down the fruit with a wet camelʼs hairbrush, as the French gardeners do. He had photographed it once or twice, but the wind would move the leaves so.Now he had the pleasure of seeing Nowell Corklemore flat on his back, with his pet Beurré Superfin (snapped at the stock), and the gig–umbrella between his legs, all a hideous ruin. The gig–umbrella flapped and flapped, and the agonised pear–tree scratched and scratched, till Nowell Corklemore felt quite sure that he was in the embrace of a dragon. The glorious pears were rolling about, some crushed under his frantic heels, the rest with wet bruises on them, appealing from human barbarism.“Well”! said Rufus Hutton. He was in such a rage, it would have choked him to say another word.“Haw! I donʼt call it well at all to be eaten up by a dragon. Pull him away for mercyʼs sake, pull him away! and Iʼll tell all about this business”.At last they got him out, for the matter wasreally serious, and Rufus was forced to hide his woe at the destruction of the pear–tree. And after all he had no one but himself to thank for it. Why did he almost force his guests to drink the third bottle of sherry?“Wonderful, perfectly wonderful”! exclaimed Mr. Bailey Kettledrum, as Rufus was showing them out at the gate, before having his own horse saddled. “The triumphs of horticulture in this age are really past belief. You beat all of us, Dr. Hutton, you may depend upon it; you beat all of us. I never would have believed that trees ought to be planted with their heads down, and their roots up in the air. Stupid of me, though, for I have often heard of root–pruning, and of course you could not prune the roots unless they grew in that way”.Rufus thought he was joking, or suffering from vinous inversion of vision.“Remember, my good friend Hutton—excuse my familiarity, I feel as if I had known you for years—remember, my dear friend, you have pledged your word for next Wednesday—and Mrs. Hutton too, mind—Mrs. Hutton with you. We waive formality, you know, in these country quarters. Kettledrum Hall, next Wednesday—honour bright, next Wednesday! You see I know the motto of your family”.“Thank you, all right”, said Rufus Hutton; “itʼs a deuced deal more than I know”, he added,going up the drive. “I didnʼt know we had a motto. Well, Iʼm done for at last”!No wonder he was done for. He saw what Kettledrum had taken in the purest faith. All those lovely little trees, dwarf pyramids, &c., were standing on the apex. Jonah, after all the sherry given to and stolen by him, had laid them in by the heels with a vengeance. All the pretty heads were a foot under ground, and the roots, like the locks of a mermaid, wooing the buxom air.
Rufus Hutton rode home that night to Geopharmacy Lodge. He had worked unusually hard, even for a man of his activity, during the last three days, and he wanted to see his Rosa again, and talk it all over with her. Of course he had cancelled her invitation, as well as that of all others, under the wretched circumstances. But before he went, he saw Cradock Nowell safe in the hands of the rector, for he could not induce him to go to the Hall, and did not think it fair towards his wife, now in her delicate health, to invite him to the Lodge. And even if he had done so, Cradock would not have gone with him.
If we strike the average of mankind, we shall find Rufus Hutton above it. He had his many littlenesses—and which of us has few?—his oddities of mind and manner, even his want of charity, and his practical faith in selfishness; none the less for all of that there were many people who loved him.And those of us who are loved of any—save parents, wife, or daughter—loved, I mean, as the word is felt and not interpreted,—with warmth of heart, and moistened eyes (when good or ill befalls us); any such may have no doubt of being loved by God.
All this while, Sir Cradock Nowell had been alone; and, as Homer has it, “feeding on his heart”. Ever since that fearful time, when, going home to his happy dinner with a few choice friends, he had overtaken some dark thing, which he would not let them hide from him—ever since that awful moment when he saw what it was, the father had not taken food, nor comfort of God or man.
All they did—well–meaning people—was of no avail. It was not of disgrace he thought, of one son being murdered, and the other son his murderer; he did not count his generations, score the number of baronets, and weep for the slur upon them; rave of his painted scutcheon, and howl because this was a dab on it. He simply groaned and could not eat, because he had lost his son—his own, his sweet, his best–beloved son.
As for Cradock, the father hoped—for he had not now the energy to care very much about it—that he might nothappenhenceforth to meet him (for all things now were of luck) more than once a month, perhaps; and then they need not say much. He never could care for him any more; of that he felt as sure as if his heart were become a tombstone.
Young Cradock, though they coaxed and petted, wept before him at the parsonʼs, and still more behind him, and felt for him so truly deeply that at last he burst out crying (which did him Heavenʼs own good)—Cradock, on his part, would not go to his father, until he should be asked for. He felt that he could fall on his knees, and crawl along in abasement, for having robbed the old grey man of all he loved on earth. Only his father must ask for him, or at least give him leave to come.
Perhaps he was wrong. Let others say. But in the depths of his grief he felt the need of a fatherʼs love; and so his agony was embittered because he got no signs of it. Let us turn to luckier people.
“Rufus, why, my darling Rufus, how much more—— are you going to put on that little piece of ground, no bigger than my work–table”?
Mrs. Hutton had been brought up to “call a spade a spade”; and she extended this wise nomenclature to the contents of the spade as well.
“Rosa, why, my darling Rosa, that bed contains one hundred and twenty–five feet. Now, according to the great Justus Liebig, and his mineral theory—— ”
“One hundred and twenty–five feet, Rue! And I could jump across it! I am sure it is not half so long as my silk measure in the shell, dear”!
“Dearest Rosa, just consider: my pet, get out your tablets, for you are nothing at mental arithmetic”.
“Indeed! Well, you never used to tell me things like that, Rufus”!
“Well, perhaps I didnʼt, Roe. I would have forsworn to any extent, when I saw you among the candytuft. But now, my darling, I have got you; and from a lofty feeling, I am bound to tell the truth. Consider the interests, Rosa—— ”
“Go along with your nonsense, Rue. You talk below your great understanding, because you think it suitsme”.
“Perhaps I do”, said Rufus, “perhaps I do now and then, my dear: you always hit the truth so. But is it not better to do that than to talk Greek to my Rosa”?
“I am sure I donʼt know; and I am sure I donʼt care either. When have I heard you say anything, Rufus, so wonderful, and so out of the way, that I,poor I, couldnʼt understand it? Please to tell me that, Rufus”.
“My darling, consider. You are exciting yourself so fearfully. You make me shake all over”.
“Then you should not say such things to me, Rufus. Why, Rue, you are quite pale”!—What an impossibility! She might have boiled him in soda without bringing him to a shrimp–colour.—“Come into the house this moment, I insist upon it, and have two glasses of sherry. And youdosay very wonderful things, much too clever for me, Rufus; and indeed, I believe, too clever for any woman in the world, even the one that wrote Homer”.
Rosa Hutton ran into the house, and sought for the keys high and low; then got the decanter at last out of the cellaret, and brought out a bumper of wine. Crafty Rufus stopped outside, thoroughly absorbed in an autumn rose; knowing that she liked to do it for him, and glad to have it done for him.
“Not a drop, unless you drink first, dear. Rosa, here under the weeping elm: you are not afraid of the girls who are making the bed, I hope”!
“I should rather hope not, indeed! Rue, dear, my best love to you. Do you think Iʼd keep a girl in the house I was afraid to see through the window”?
To prove her spirit, Mrs. Hutton tossed a glass of wine off, although she seldom took it, and it was not twelve oʼclock yet. Rufus looked on with some dismay, till he saw she had got the decanter.
“Well done, Rosa! What good it does me to see you take a mere drop of wine! You are bound now to obey me. Roe, my love, your very best health, and that involves my own. Youʼre not heavy on my shoulder, love”.
“No, dear, I know that: you are so very strong. But donʼt you see the boy coming? And that hole among the branches! And the leaves coming off too! Oh, do let me go in a moment, Rue!—— ”
“Confound that boy! Iʼm blest if he isnʼt always after me”.
The boy, however, or man as he called himself,was far too important a personage in their domestic economy to be confounded audibly. Gardener, groom, page, footman, knife–boy, and coachman, all in one; a long, loose, knock–kneed, big–footed, what they would call in the forest a “yaping, shammocking gally–bagger”. His name was Jonah, and he came from Buckinghamshire, and had a fine drawl of his own, quite different from that of Ytene, which he looked upon as a barbarism.
“Plase, sir, Maister Reevers ave a zent them traases as us hardered”. Jonahʼs eyes, throughout this speech, which occupied him at least a minute, were fixed upon the decanter, with ineffable admiration at the glow of the wine now the sun was upon it.
“Then, Jonah, my boy”, cried Rufus Hutton, all animation in a moment, “I have a great mind to give you sixpence. Rosa, give me another glass of sherry. Hereʼs to the health of the great horticulturist, Rivers! Most obliging of him to send my trees so early, and before the leaves are off. Come along, Roe, you love to see trees unpacked, and eat the fruit by anticipation. I believe youʼll expect them to blossom and bear by Christmas, as St. Anthony made the vines do”.
“Well, darling, and so they ought, with such a gardener as you to manage them.—Jonah, you shall have a glass of wine, to drink the health of the trees. He has never taken his eyes off the decanter, ever since he came up, poor boy”.
Rosa was very good–natured, and accustomedto farm–house geniality. Rufus laughed and whispered, “My love, my Indian sherry”!
“Canʼt help it”, said Mrs. Hutton; “less chance of its disagreeing with him. Here, Jonah, you wonʼt mind drinking after your master”.
“Here be vaine health to all on us”, said Jonah, scraping the gravel and putting up one finger as he had seen the militia men do (in imitation of the regulars); “and may us nayver know no taime warse than the prasent mawment”.
“Hear, hear”! cried Rufus Hutton; “now, come along, and cut the cords, boy”.
Dr. Hutton set off sharply, with Rosa on his arm, for he did not feel at all sure but what Jonahʼs exalted sentiment might elicit, at any rate, half a glass more of sherry. They found the trees packed beautifully; a long cone, like a giant lobster–pot, weighing nearly two hundred–weight, thatched with straw, and wattled round, and corded over that.
“Out with your knife and cut the cords, boy”.
“Well, Rufus, youareextravagant”!—“Rather fine, that”, thought Dr. Hutton, “after playing such pranks with my sherry”!—“Jonah, I wonʼt have a bit of the string cut. I want every atom of it. Whatʼs the good of your having hands if you canʼt untie it”?
At last they got the great parcel open, and strewed all the lawn with litter. There were trees of every sort, as tight as sardines in a case, with many leaves still hanging on them, and the roots tied up in moss. Half a dozen standard apples;half a hundred pyramid pears, the prettiest things imaginable, furnished all round like a cypress, and thick with blossom–spurs; then young wall–trees, two years’ trained, tied to crossed sticks, and drawn up with bast, like the frame of a schoolboyʼs kite; around the roots and in among them were little roses in pots No. 60, wrapped in moss, and webbed with bast; and the smell of the whole was glorious.
“Hurrah”! cried Rufus, dancing, “no nurseries in the kingdom, nor in the world, except Sawbridgeworth, could send out such a lot of trees, perfect in shape, every one of them, and every one of them true to sort. What a bore that Iʼve got to go again to Nowelhurst to–day! Rosa, dear; every one of these trees ought to be planted to–day. The very essence of early planting (which in my opinion saves a twelvemonth) is never to let the roots get dry. These peach–trees in a fortnight will have got hold of the ground, and be thinking of growing again; and the leaves, if properly treated, will never have flagged at all. Oh, I wish you could see to it, Rosa”.
“Well, dear Rufus, and so I can. To please you, I donʼt mind at all throwing aside my banner–screen, and leaving my letter to cousin Magnolia”.
“No, no. I donʼt mean that. I mean, how I wish you understood it”.
“Understood it, Rue! Well, Iʼm sure! As if anybody couldnʼt plant a tree! And I, who hada pair of gardening gloves when I was only that high”!
“Roe, now listen to me. Not one in a hundred even of professional gardeners, who have been at it all their lives, knows how to plant a tree”.
“Well, then, Rufus, if that is the case, I think it very absurd of you to expect that I should. But Jonah will teach me, I dare say. Iʼll begin to learn this afternoon”.
“No, indeed, you wonʼt. At any rate, you must not practise onmytrees; nor in among them, either. But you may plant the mop, dear, as often as you like, in that empty piece of ground where the cauliflowers were”.
“Plant the mop, indeed! Well, Dr. Hutton, you had better ride back to Nowelhurst, where all the grand people are, if you only come home for the purpose of insulting your poor wife. It is there, no doubt, that you learn to despise any one who is not quite so fine as they are. And what are they, I should like to know? What a poor weak thing I am, to be sure; no wonder no one cares for me. I can have no self–respect. I am only fit to plant the mop”.
Hereupon the blue founts welled, the carmine of the cheeks grew scarlet, the cherry lips turned bigarreaux, and a very becoming fur–edged jacket lifted, as if with a zephyr stealing it.
Rufus felt immediately that he had been the lowest of all low brutes; and almost made up hismind on the spot that it would be decidedly wrong of him to go to Nowelhurst that evening. We will not enter into the scene of strong self–condemnation, reciprocal collaudation, extraordinary admiration, because all married people know it; and as for those who are single, let them get married and learn it. Only in the last act of it, Jonah, from whom they had retreated, came up again, looking rather sheepish—for he had begun to keep a sweetheart—and spake these winged words:
“Plase, sir, if you be so good, it baint no vault o’ maine nohow”.
“Get all those trees at once laid in by the heels. What is no fault of yours, pray? Are you always at your dinner”?
“Baint no vault o’ maine, sir; but there coom two genelmen chaps, as zays they musten zee you”.
“Must see me, indeed, whether I choose it or no! And with all those trees to plant, and the mare to be ready at three oʼclock”!
“Zo I tould un, sir; but they zays as theymustzee you”.
“In the name of the devil and all his works, but Iʼll give them a bitter reception. Let them come this way, Jonah”.
“Oh dear, if you are going to be violent! You know what you are sometimes, Rue—enough to frighten any man”.
“Never, my darling, never. You never findRufus Hutton formidable to any one who means rightly”.
“No, no, to be sure, dear. But then, perhaps, they may not. And after all that has occurred to–day, I feel so much upset. Very foolish of me, I know. But promise me not to be rash, dear”.
“Have no fear, my darling Rosa. I will never injure any man who does not insult you, dear”.
While Rufus was looking ten feet high, and Mrs. Rufus tripping away, after a little sob and a whisper, Jonah came pelting down the walk with his great feet on either side of it, as if he had a barrow between them. At the same time a voice came round the corner past the arbutus–tree, now quivering red with strawberries, and the words thereof were these:
“Perfect Paradise, my good sir! I knew it must be, from what I heard of him. Exactly like my friend the Dookʼs, but laid out still more tastefully. Bless me, why, his Grace must have copied it! Wonʼt I give him a poke in the ribs when he dines with me next Toosday! Sly bird, a sly bird, I say, though he is such a capital fellow. Knew where to come, Iʼm blest if he didnʼt, for taste, true science, and landscape”.
“Haw! Yes; I quite agree with you. But his Grace has nothing so chaste, so perfect as this, in me opeenion, sir. Haw”!
The cockles of the Rufine heart swelled warmly; for of course he heard every word of it, though, ofcourse, not intended to do so. “Now Rosa ought to have heard all that”, was passing in his mind, when two gentlemen stood before him, and were wholly amazed to see him. One of them was a short stout man, not much taller than Rufus, but of double his cubic contents; the other a tall and portly signor, fitted upon spindle shins, with a slouch in his back, grey eyebrows, long heavy eyes, and large dewlaps.
The short gentleman, evidently chief spokesman and proud of his elocution, waved his hat most gracefully, when he recovered from his surprise, drew back for a yard or so, in his horror at intruding, and spoke with a certain flourish, and the air of a man above humbug.
“Mr. Nowell Corklemore, I have the honour of making you known to the gentleman whose scientific fame has roused such a spirit among us. Dr. Hutton, sir, excuse me, the temptation was too great for us. My excellent friend, Lord Thorley, who has, I believe, the honour of being related to Mrs. Hutton, pressed his services upon us, when he knew what we desired. But, sir, no. ‘My lord’, said I, ‘we prefer to intrude without the commonplace of society; we prefer to intrude upon the footing of common tastes, my lord, and warm, though far more rudimental and vague pursuit of science’. Bless me, all this time my unworthy self, sir! I am too prone to forget myself, at least my wife declares so. Bailey Kettledrum, sir, is my name, of Kettledrum Hall, in Dorset. AndI have the enlightenment, sir, to aspire to the honour of your acquaintance”.
Rufus Hutton bowed rather queerly to Mr. Nowell Corklemore and Mr. Bailey Kettledrum; for he had seen a good deal of the world, and had tasted sugar–candy. Moreover, the Kettledrum pattern was known to him long ago; and he had never found them half such good fellows as they pretend to think other people. Being, however, most hospitable, as are nearly all men from India, he invited them to come in at once, and have some lunch after their journey. They accepted very warmly; and Mrs. Hutton, having now appeared and been duly introduced, Bailey Kettledrum set off with her round the curve of the grass–plot, as if he had known her for fifty years, and had not seen her for twenty–five. He engrossed her whole attention by the pace at which he talked, and by appeals to her opinion, praising all things, taking notes, red–hot with admiration, impressively confidential about his wife and children, and, in a word, regardless of expense to make himself agreeable. Notwithstanding all this, he did not get on much, because he made one great mistake. He rattled and flashed along the high road leading to fifty other places, but missed the quiet and pleasant path which leads to a womanʼs good graces—the path, I mean, which follows the little brook called “sympathy”, a winding but not a shallow brook, over the meadow of soft listening.
Mr. Nowell Corklemore, walking with RufusHutton, was, as he was forced to be by a feeble nature enfeebled, a dry and pompous man.
“Haw! I am given to understand you have made all this yourself, sir. In me ’umble opeenion, it does you the greatest credit, sir; credit, sir, no less to your heart than to your head. Haw”!
Here he pointed with his yellow bamboo at nothing at all in particular.
“Everything is in its infancy yet. Wait till the trees grow up a little. I have planted nearly all of them. All except that, and that, and the weeping elm over yonder, where I sit with my wife sometimes. Everything is in its infancy”.
“Excuse me; haw! If you will allow me, I would also say, with the exception of something else”. And he looked profoundly mystic.
“Oh, the house you mean”, said Rufus. “No, the house is not quite new; built some seven years back”.
“Sir, I do not mean the house—but the edifice, haw!—the tenement of the human being. Sir, I mean, except justthis”.
He shut one eye, like a sleepy owl, and tapped the side of his head most sagely; and then he said “Haw”! and looked for approval.
And he might have looked a very long time, in his stupidly confident manner, without a chance of getting it; for Rufus Hutton disliked allusions even to age intellectual, when you came to remember that his Rosa was more than twenty years younger.
“Ah, yes, now it strikes me”, continued Mr. Corklemore, as they stood in front of the house, “that little bow–window—nay, I am given to understand, that bay–window is the more correct—haw! I mean the more architectural term—I think I should have felt inclined to make that nice bay–window give to the little grass–plot. A mere question, perhaps, of idiosyncrasy, haw”!
“Give what”? asked Rufus, now on the foam. That his own pet lawn, which he rolled every day, his lawn endowed with manifold curves and sweeps of his own inventing, with the Wellingtonia upon it, and the plantain dug out with a cheese–knife—that all this should be called a “little grass–plot”, by a fellow who had no two ideas, except in his intonation of “Haw”!
“Haw! It does not signify. But the term, I am given to understand, is now the correct and recognised one”.
“I wish you were given to understand anything except your own importance”, Rufus muttered savagely, and eyed the yellow bamboo.
“Have you—haw! excuse my asking, for you are a great luminary here; have you as yet made trial of the Spergula pilifera”?
“Yes; and found it the biggest humbug that ever aped Godʼs grass”.
Dr. Hutton was always very sorry when he had used strong language; but being a thin–skinned, irritable, cut–the–corner man, he could not be expected to stand Nowell Corklemoreʼs “haws”.
And Mr. Corklemore had of “haw” no less than seven intonations. First, and most common of all, the haw of self–approval. Second, the haw of contemplation. Third, the haw of doubt and inquiry. Fourth, that of admiration. Fifth, that of interlude and hiatus, when words or ideas lingered. Sixth, the haw of accident and short–winded astonishment;e.g.he had once fallen off a hayrick, and cried “Haw”! at the bottom. Seventh, the haw of indignation and powerful remonstrance, in a totally different key from the rest; and this last he now adopted.
“Haw—then!—haw!—I have been given to understand that the Spergula pilifera succeeds most admirably with people who have—haw!—have studied it”.
“Very likely it does”, said Rufus, though he knew much better, but now he was on his own door–step, and felt ashamed of his rudeness; “but come in, Mr. Corklemore; our ways are rough in these forest outskirts, and we are behind you in civilization. Nevertheless, we are heartily glad to welcome our more intelligent neighbours”.
At lunch he gave them home–brewed ale and pale sherry of no especial character. But afterwards, being a genial soul, and feeling still guilty of rudeness, he went to the cellar himself and fetched a bottle of the richest Indian gold. Mrs. Hutton withdrew very prettily; and the three gentlemen, all good judges of wine, began to warm over it luminously, more softly indeed thanthey would have done after a heavy dinner. Surely, noble wine deserves not to be the mere operculum to a stupidly mixed hot meal.
“Have another bottle, gentlemen; now do have another bottle”.
“Not one drop more for the world”, exclaimed they both, with their hands up. None the less for that, they did; and, what was very unwise of them, another after that, until I can scarcely write straight in trying to follow their doings. Meanwhile Jonah had prigged three glassfuls out of the decanter left under the elm–tree.
“Now”, said Rufus, who alone wasalmostin a state of sobriety, “suppose we take a turn in the garden and my little orchard–house? I believe I am indebted to that for the pleasure of your very disagreeable—ahem, most agreeable company to–day”.
Bailey Kettledrum sprang up with a flourish. “No, sir, no, sir! Permit me to defend myself and this most marketable—I—I mean remarkable gentleman here present, Mr. Nowell Corklemore, from any such dis—dish—sparagus, disparagizing imputations, sir. An orchard, sir, is very well, and the trees in it are very well, and the fruit of it is very good, sir; but an orchard can never appear, sir, to a man of exalted sentiments, and temporal—I mean, sir, strictly intemperate judgment, in the light of an elephant—irrelevant—no, sir, I mean of course an equilevant—for a man, sir, for a man”! Here Mr. Bailey Kettledrum hit himselfhard on the bosom, and broke the glass of his watch.
“Mr. Kettledrum”, said Rufus, rising, “your sentiments do you honour. Mine, however, is not an orchard, but an orchard–house”.
“Ha, ha, good again! House in an orchard! yes, I see. Corklemore, hear that, my boy? Our admirable host—no, thank you, not a single drop more wine—I always know when I have had enough. Sir, it is the proud privi—prilivege of a man—— Corklemore, get up, sir; donʼt you see we are waiting for you”?
Mr. Corklemore stared heavily at him; his constitution was a sleepy one, and he thought he had eaten his dinner. His friend nodded gravely at Dr. Hutton; and the nod expressed compassion tempering condemnation.
“Ah, I see how it is. Ever since that fall from the hayrick, the leastest little drop of wine, prej—prej—— ”
“Prejudge the case, my lord”, muttered Mr. Corklemore, who had been a barrister.
“Prejudicially affects our highly admired friend. But, sir, the fault is mine. I should have stretched forth long ago the restraining hand of friendship, sir, and dashed the si—si—silent bottle—— ”
“Chirping bottle, possibly you mean”.
“No, sir, I do not, and I will thank you not to interrupt me. Who ever heard a bottle chirp? I ask you, sir, as a man of the world, and a man of common sense, who ever heard a bottle chirp?What I mean, sir, is the siren—the siren bottle from his lips. What is it in the Latin grammar—or possibly in the Greek, for I have learned Greek, sir, in the faulchion days of youth;—is it not, sir, this:improba Siren desidia? Perhaps, sir, it may have been in your grammar, if you ever had one,improba chirping desidia”. As he looked round, in the glow and sparkle of lagenic logic, Rufus caught him by the arm, and hurried him out at the garden door, where luckily no steps were. The pair went straight, or, in better truth, went first, to the kitchen garden; Rufus did not care much for flowers; all that he left to his Rosa.
“Now I will show you a thing, sir”, cried Rufus in his glory, “a thing which has been admired by the leading men of the age. Nowhere else, in this part of the world, can you see a piece of ground, sir, cropped in the manner of that, sir”.
And to tell the plain, unvinous truth, the square to which he pointed was a triumph of high art. The style of it was wholly different from that of Mr. Garnetʼs beds. Bull Garnet was fond of novelties, but he made them square with his system; the result was more strictly practical, but less nobly theoretical. Dr. Hutton, on the other hand, travelled the entire porker; obstacles of soil and season were as nothing to him, and when the shape of the ground was wrong, he called in the navvies and made it right.
A plot of land four–square, and measured to exactly half an acre, contained 2400 trees, cuttingeither way as truly as the spindles of machinery; there was no tree more than five feet high, the average height was four feet six inches. They were planted just four feet asunder, and two feet back from the pathway. There was every kind of fruit–tree there, which can be made by British gardeners to ripen fruit in Britain, without artificial heat. Pears especially, and plums, cherries, apples, walnuts (juglans præparturiens), figs, and medlars, quinces, filberts, even peaches, nectarines, and apricots—though only one row, in all, of those three; there was scarcely one of those miniature trees which had not done its duty that year, or now was bent upon doing it. Still the sight was beautiful; although far gone with autumn, still Coxʼs orange–pippin lit the russet leaves with gold, or Beurré Clairgeau and Capiaumont enriched the air with scarlet.
Each little tree looked so bright and comely, each plumed itself so naturally, proud to carry its share of tribute to the beneficent Maker, that the two men who had been abusing His choice gift, the vine, felt a little ashamed of themselves, or perhaps felt that they ought to be.
“Magnificent, magnificent”! cried Kettledrum, theatrically; “I must tell the Dook of this. He will have the same next year”.
“Will he, though”? said Rufus, thinking of the many hours he had spent among those trees, and of his careful apprenticeship to the works of their originator; “I can tell you one thing. He wonʼt,unless he has a better gardener than I ever saw in these parts. Now let us go to the orchard–house”.
The orchard–house was a span–roofed building, very light and airy; the roof and ends were made of glass, the sides of deal with broad falling shutters, for the sake of ventilation. It was about fifty feet in length, twenty in width, and fifteen in height. There was no ventilation at the ridge, and all the lights were fixed. The free air of heaven wandered through, among peaches, plums, and apricots, some of which still retained their fruit, crimson, purple, and golden. The little trees were all in pots, and about a yard apart. The pots were not even plunged in the ground, but each stood, as a tub should, on its own independent bottom. The air of the house was soft and pleasant, with a peculiar fragrance, the smell of ripening foliage. Bailey Kettledrum saw at once—for he had plenty of observant power, and the fumes of wine were dispersing—that this house must have shown a magnificent sight, a month or two ago. And having once more his own object in view, he tripled his true approval.
“Dr. Hutton, this is fine. Fine is not the word for it; this is grand and gorgeous. What a triumph of mind! What a lot you must pay for wages”!
“Thirteen shillings a week in summer, seven shillings a week in the winter”. This was one of his pet astonishments.
“What! Iʼll never believe it. Sir, you must either be a conjuror, the devil, or—or—— ”
“Or a liar”, said Rufus, placidly; “but I am none of the three. Jonah has twelve shillings a week, but half of that goes for housework. That leaves six shillings for gardening; but I never trust him inside this house, for he is only a clumsy dolt, who does the heavy digging. And besides him I have only a very sharp lad, at seven shillings a week, who works under my own eye. I have in some navvies, at times, it is true, when I make any alterations. But that is outlay, not working expense. Now come and see my young trees just arrived from Sawbridgeworth”.
“Stop one moment. What is this stuff on the top of the pots here? What queer stuff! Why, it goes quite to pieces in my hands”.
“Oh, only a little top–dressing, just to refresh the trees a bit. This way, Mr. Kettledrum”.
“Pardon me, sir, if I appear impertinent or inquisitive. But I have learned so much this afternoon, that I am anxious to learn a little more. My friend, the Dook, will cross–examine me as to everything I have seen here. He knew our intention of coming over. I must introduce you to his Grace, before you are a week older, sir; he has specially requested it. In fact, it was only this morning he said to Nowell Corklemore—but Corklemore, though a noble fellow, a gem of truth and honour, sir, is not a man ofourintelligence; in one word, he is an ass”!
“Haw! Nowell Corklemore, Nowell Corklemore is an ass, is he, in the wise opeenion of Mr. Bailey Kettledrum? Only let me get up, good Lord—and perhaps he told the Dook so. There, itʼs biting me again, oh Lord! Nowell Corklemore an ass”!
By the door of the orchard–house grew a fine deodara, and behind it lay Mr. Corklemore, beyond all hope entangled. His snores had been broken summarily by the maid coming for the glasses, and he set forth, after a dozen “haws”, to look for his two comrades. With instinct ampeline he felt that his only chance of advancing in the manner of a biped lay or stood in his bamboo. So he went to the stick–stand by the back–door, where he muzzily thought it ought to be. Mrs. Hutton, in the drawing–room, was rattling on the piano, and that made his head ten times worse. His bamboo was not in the stick–stand; nevertheless he found there a gig–umbrella with a yellow handle, like the top of his fidus Achates. Relying upon this, he made his way out, crying “haw”! at every star in the oilcloth. He progged away all down the walk, with the big umbrella; but the button that held the cord was gone, and it flapped like a mutinous windmill. However, he carried on bravely, until he confronted a dark, weird tree, waving its shrouded arms at him. This was the deodara; so he made a tack to the left, and there was hulled between wind and water by an unsuspected enemy. This was Rufus Huttonʼs pet of all pet pear–trees, a perfect model of symmetry,scarce three feet six in height, sturdy, crisp, short–jointed, spurred from keel to truck, and carrying twenty great pears. It had been so stopped and snagged throughout, that it was stiffer than fifty hollies; and Rosa was dreadfully jealous of it, because Rufus spent so much time there. He used to go out in the summer forenoon, whenever the sun was brilliant, and draw lines down the fruit with a wet camelʼs hairbrush, as the French gardeners do. He had photographed it once or twice, but the wind would move the leaves so.
Now he had the pleasure of seeing Nowell Corklemore flat on his back, with his pet Beurré Superfin (snapped at the stock), and the gig–umbrella between his legs, all a hideous ruin. The gig–umbrella flapped and flapped, and the agonised pear–tree scratched and scratched, till Nowell Corklemore felt quite sure that he was in the embrace of a dragon. The glorious pears were rolling about, some crushed under his frantic heels, the rest with wet bruises on them, appealing from human barbarism.
“Well”! said Rufus Hutton. He was in such a rage, it would have choked him to say another word.
“Haw! I donʼt call it well at all to be eaten up by a dragon. Pull him away for mercyʼs sake, pull him away! and Iʼll tell all about this business”.
At last they got him out, for the matter wasreally serious, and Rufus was forced to hide his woe at the destruction of the pear–tree. And after all he had no one but himself to thank for it. Why did he almost force his guests to drink the third bottle of sherry?
“Wonderful, perfectly wonderful”! exclaimed Mr. Bailey Kettledrum, as Rufus was showing them out at the gate, before having his own horse saddled. “The triumphs of horticulture in this age are really past belief. You beat all of us, Dr. Hutton, you may depend upon it; you beat all of us. I never would have believed that trees ought to be planted with their heads down, and their roots up in the air. Stupid of me, though, for I have often heard of root–pruning, and of course you could not prune the roots unless they grew in that way”.
Rufus thought he was joking, or suffering from vinous inversion of vision.
“Remember, my good friend Hutton—excuse my familiarity, I feel as if I had known you for years—remember, my dear friend, you have pledged your word for next Wednesday—and Mrs. Hutton too, mind—Mrs. Hutton with you. We waive formality, you know, in these country quarters. Kettledrum Hall, next Wednesday—honour bright, next Wednesday! You see I know the motto of your family”.
“Thank you, all right”, said Rufus Hutton; “itʼs a deuced deal more than I know”, he added,going up the drive. “I didnʼt know we had a motto. Well, Iʼm done for at last”!
No wonder he was done for. He saw what Kettledrum had taken in the purest faith. All those lovely little trees, dwarf pyramids, &c., were standing on the apex. Jonah, after all the sherry given to and stolen by him, had laid them in by the heels with a vengeance. All the pretty heads were a foot under ground, and the roots, like the locks of a mermaid, wooing the buxom air.