The streets of Helstonleigh, lying so still and quiet in the moonlight, were broken in upon by the noisy sound of a carriage, bowling through them. A carriage that was abroad late. It wanted very little of the time when the church clocks would boom out the two hours after midnight. Time, surely, for all sober people to be in bed!
The carriage contained Mr. Dare, his wife and daughter. They went, as you may remember, to a dinner party in the country. The dinner was succeeded by an evening gathering, and it was nearly one o'clock when they left the house to return. It wanted only five minutes to two when the carriage stopped at their own home, and sleepy Joseph opened the door to them.
"All in bed?" asked Mr. Dare, as he bustled into the hall.
"I believe so, sir," answered Joseph, as carelessly as he could speak. Mr. Dare, he was aware, alluded to his sons; and not being by any means sure upon the point, Joseph was willing to escape further questioning.
Two of the maids came forward—the lady's maid, as she was called in the family, and Betsy. Betsy was no other than our old friend Betsy Carter: once the little maid-of-all-work at Mrs. Halliburton's; risen now to be a very fine housemaid at Mrs. Dare's. They had sat up to attend upon Mrs. Dare and Adelaide.
Mr. Dare had been for a long while in the habit of smoking a pipe before he went to bed. He would have told you that he could not do without it. If business or pleasure took him out, he must have his pipe when he returned, however late it might be.
"How hot it is!" he exclaimed, throwing back his coat. "Leave the hall door open, Joseph: I'll sit outside. Bring me my pipe."
Joseph looked for the pipe in its appointed resting-place, and could not see it. It was a small, handsome pipe, silver-mounted, with an amber mouth-piece. The tobacco-jar was there, but Joseph could see nothing of the pipe.
"Law! I remember!" exclaimed Betsy. "Master left it in the dining-room last night, and I put it under the sideboard when I was doing the room this morning, intending to bring it away. I'll go and get it."
Taking the candle from Joseph's hand, she turned hastily into the dining-room. Not, however, as hastily as she came out of it. She rushed out, uttering a succession of piercing shrieks, and seized upon Joseph. The shrieks echoed through the house, upstairs and down, and Mr. Dare came in.
"Why, what on earth's the matter, girl?" cried he. "Have you seen a ghost?"
"Oh, sir! Oh, Joseph, don't let go of me; Mr. Anthony's lying in there, dead!"
"Don't be a simpleton," responded Mr. Dare, staring at Betsy.
Joseph gave a rather less complimentary reprimand, and shook the girl off. But suddenly, even as the words left his lips, there rose up before his mind's eye the vision of the past evening: the quarrel, the threats, the violence between Anthony and Herbert. A strange apprehension seated itself in the man's mind.
"Be still, you donkey!" he whispered to Betsy, his voice scarcely audible, his manner subdued. "I'll go in and see."
Taking the candle, he went into the dining-room. Mr. Dare followed. The worst thought that occurred to Mr. Dare was, that Anthony might have taken more wine than was good for him, and had fallen down, helpless, in the dining-room. Unhappily, Anthony had been known so to transgress. Only a week or two before——but let that pass: it has nothing to do with us now.
Mr. Dare followed Joseph in. At the upper end of the room, near the window, lay some one on the ground. It was surely Anthony. He was lying on his side, his head thrown back, his face up-turned. A ghastly face, which sent poor Joseph's pulses bounding on with a terrible fear as he looked down at it. The same face which had scared Betsy whenshelooked down.
"He is stark dead!" whispered Joseph, with a shiver, to Mr. Dare.
Mr. Dare, his own life-blood seeming to have stopped, bent over his son by the light of the candle. Anthony appeared to be not only dead, but cold. In his terrible shock, his agitation, he still remembered that it was well, if possible, to spare the sight to his wife and daughter. Mrs. Dare and Adelaide, alarmed by Betsy's screams, had run downstairs, and were now hastening into the room.
"Go back! go back!" cried Mr. Dare, fencing them away with his hands. "Adelaide, you must not come in! Julia," he added to his wife, in tones of imploring entreaty, "go upstairs, and keep back Adelaide."
He half led, half pushed them across the hall. Mrs. Dare had never in all her life seen his face as she saw it now—a face of terror. She caught the fear; vaguely enough, it must be confessed, for she had not heard Anthony's name, as yet, mentioned in connection with it.
"What is it?" she asked, holding on by the balustrades. "What is there in the dining-room?"
"I don't know what it is," replied Mr. Dare, from between his white lips. "Go upstairs! Adelaide, go up with your mother."
Mr. Dare was stopped by more screams. Whilst he was preventing immediate terror to his wife and daughter, the lady's maid, her curiosity excited beyond repression, had slipped into the dining-room, and peeped over Joseph's shoulder. What she had expected to see she perhaps could not have stated; what she did see was so far worse than her wildest fears, that she lost sense of everything, except the moment's fear; and shriek after shriek echoed from her.
A scene of confusion ensued. Mrs. Dare tried to force her way to the room; Adelaide followed her; Betsy began bewailing Mr. Anthony, by name, in wild words. And the sleepers, above, came flocking out of their chambers, with trembling limbs and white faces.
Mr. Dare put his back against the dining-room door. "Girls, go back! Julia, go back, for the love of Heaven! Mademoiselle, is that you? Be so good as to stay where you are, and keep Rosa and Minny with you."
"Mais, qu'est-ce que c'est, donc?" exclaimed mademoiselle, speaking, in her wonder, in her most familiar tongue, and, truth to say, paying little heed to Mr. Dare's injunction. "Y a-t-il du malheur arrivé?"
Betsy went up to her. Betsy recognised her as one not of the family, to whom she could ease her overflowing mind. The same thought had occurred to Betsy as to Joseph. "Poor Mr. Anthony's lying in there dead, mamzel," she whispered. "Mr. Herbert must have killed him."
Unheeding the request of Mr. Dare, unmindful of the deficiences or want of elegance in her costume, which consisted of what she called apeignoir, and a borderless calico nightcap, mademoiselle flew down to the hall and slipped into the dining-room. Some of the others slipped in also, and a sad scene ensued. What with wife, governess, servants, and children, Mr. Dare was powerless to end it. Mademoiselle went straight up, gave one look, and staggered back against the wall.
"C'est vrai!" she muttered. "C'est Monsieur Anthony."
"It is Anthony," shivered Mr. Dare, "I fear—I fear violence has been done him."
The governess was breathing heavily. She looked quite as ghastly as did that up-turned face. "But why should it be?" she asked, in English. "Who has done it?"
Ah, who had done it! Joseph's frightened face seemed to say that he could tell if he dared, Cyril bounded into the room, and clasped one of the arms. But he let it fall again. "It is rigid!" he gasped. "Is he dead? Father! he can't be dead!"
Mr. Dare hurried Joseph from the room—hurried him across the hall to the door. He, Mr. Dare, seemed so agitated as scarcely to know what he was about. "Make all haste," he said; "the nearest surgeon."
"Sir," whispered Joseph, turning when he was outside the door, his agitation as great as his master's: "I'm afraid it's Mr. Herbert who has done this."
"Why?" sharply asked Mr. Dare.
"They had a dreadful quarrel this evening, sir, after you left. Mr. Herbert drew a knife upon his brother. I got in just in time to stop bloodshed, or it might have happened then."
Mr. Dare suppressed a groan. "Go off, Joseph, and bring a doctor here. He may not be past reviving, Milbank is the nearest. If he is at home, bring him; if not, get anybody."
Joseph, without his hat, sped across the lawn, and gained the entrance gate at the very moment that a gig was passing. By the light of a lamp, Joseph saw that it contained Mr. Glenn, the surgeon, driven by his servant. He had been on a late professional visit into the country. Joseph shouted running before the horse in his excitement, and the man pulled up.
"What's the matter, Joseph?" asked Mr. Glenn. "Any one ill?"
Somewhat curious to say, Mr. Glenn was the usual medical attendant of the Dares. Joseph explained as well as he could. Mr. Anthony had been found lying on the dining-room carpet, to all appearance dead. Mr. Glenn descended.
"Anything up at your place?" asked a policeman, who had just come by, on his beat.
"I should think there is," returned Joseph. "One of the gentlemen's been found dead."
"Dead!" echoed the policeman. "Which of them is it?" he asked, after a pause.
"Mr. Anthony."
"Why, I saw him turn in here about half-past eleven!" observed the officer, "He is in a fit, perhaps."
"Why do you say that?" asked Joseph.
"Because he had been taking a drop too much. He could hardly walk. Somebody brought him as far as the gate."
Mr. Glenn had hastened on. The policeman followed with Joseph. Followed, possibly, to gratify his curiosity; possibly, because he thought his services might be in some way required. When the two entered the dining-room, Mr. Glenn was kneeling down to examine Anthony, and sounds of distress came on their ears from a distance. They were caused by the hysterics of Mrs. Dare.
"Is he dead, sir?" asked the policeman, in a low tone.
"He has been dead these two or three hours," was Mr. Glenn's reply.
But it was not a fit. It was not anything so innocent. Mr. Glenn found that the cause of death was a stab in the side. Death, he believed, must have been instantaneous: and the hemorrhage was chiefly internal. There were very few stains on the clothes.
"What's this!" cried Mr. Glenn.
He was pulling at some large substance on which Anthony had fallen. It proved to be a cloak. Cyril—and some others present—recognised it as Herbert's cloak. Where was Herbert? In bed? Was it possible that he could sleep through the noise and confusion that the house was in?
"Can nothing be done?" asked Mr. Dare of the surgeon.
Mr. Glenn shook his head. "He is stone dead, you see; dead, and nearly cold. He must have been dead more than two hours. I should say nearer three."
From two to three hours! Then that would bring the time of his death to about half-past eleven o'clock; close upon the time that the policeman saw him returning home. Some one turned to ask the policeman a question, but he had disappeared. Mr. Glenn went to see what he could do for Mrs. Dare, whose cries had been painful to hear, and Mr. Dare drew Joseph aside. Somehow he felt that hedarednot question him in the presence of witnesses, lest any condemnatory fact should transpire to bring the guilt home to his second son. In spite of the sight of Anthony lying dead before him, in spite of what he had heard of the quarrel, he could not bring his mind to believe that Herbert had been guilty of this most dastardly deed.
"What time did you let him in?" asked Mr. Dare, pointing to his ill-fated son.
Joseph answered evasively. "The policeman said it was about half after eleven, sir."
"And what time did Mr. Herbert come home?"
In point of fact, but for seeing the cloak where he did see it, Joseph would not have known whether Mr. Herbert was at home yet. He felt there was nothing for it but to tell the simple truth to Mr. Dare—that the gentlemen had been in the habit of letting themselves in at any hour they pleased, the dining-room window being left unfastened for them. Joseph made the admission, and Mr. Dare received it with anger.
"I did it by their orders, sir," the man said, with deprecation. "If you think it was wrong, perhaps you'll put things on a better footing for the future. But, to wait up every night till its pretty near time to rise again, is what I can't do, or anybody else. Flesh and blood is but mortal, sir, and couldn't stand it."
"But you were not kept up like that?" cried Mr. Dare.
"Yes, sir, I was. If one of the gentlemen wasn't out, the other would be. I told them it was impossible I could be up nearly all night and every night, and rise in the morning just the same, and do my work in the day. So they took to have the dining-room window left open, and came in that way, and I went to rest at my proper hour. Mr. Cyril and Mr. George, too, they are taking to stay out."
"The house might have been robbed over and over again!" exclaimed Mr. Dare.
"I told them so, sir. But they laughed at me. They said who'd be likely to come through the grounds and up to the windows and try them? At any rate, sir," added Joseph, as a last excuse, "theyorderedit done. And that's how it is, sir, that I don't know what time either Mr. Anthony or Mr. Herbert came in last night."
Mr. Dare said no more. The fruits of the way in which his sons had been reared were coming heavily home to him. He turned to go upstairs to Herbert's chamber. On the bottom stairs, swaying herself to and fro in herpeignoir, a staring print, all the colours of the rainbow, sat the governess. She lifted her white face as Mr. Dare approached.
"Is he dead?"
Mr. Dare shook his head. "The surgeon says he has been dead ever since the beginning of the night."
"And Monsieur Herbert? Ishedead?"
"Hedead!" repeated Mr. Dare in an accent of alarm, fearing possibly she might have a motive for the question. "What should bring him also dead? Mademoiselle, why do you ask it?"
"Eh, me, I don't know," she answered. "I am bewildered with it all. Why should he be dead, and not the other? Why should either be dead?"
Mr. Dare saw that she did look bewildered; scarcely in her senses. She had a white handkerchief in her hand, and was wiping the moisture from her scarcely less white face. "Did you witness the quarrel between them?" he inquired, supposing that she had done so by her words.
"If I did, I not tell," she vehemently answered, her English less clear than usual. "If Joseph say—I hear him say it to you just now—that Monsieur Herbert took a knife to his brother, I not give testimony to it. What affair is it of mine, that I should tell against one or the other? Who did it?—who killed him?"—she rapidly continued. "It was not Monsieur Herbert. No, I will say always that it was not Monsieur Herbert. He would not kill his brother."
"I do not think he would," earnestly spoke Mr. Dare.
"No, no, no!" said mademoiselle, her voice rising with her emphasis. "He never kill his brother; he not enoughméchantfor that."
"Perhaps he has not come in?" cried Mr. Dare, catching at the thought.
Betsy Garter answered the words. She had stolen up in the general restlessness, and halted there. "He must be come in, sir," she said; "else how could his cloak be in the dining-room? They are saying that it's Mr. Herbert's cloak which was under Mr. Anthony."
"What has Mr. Herbert's cloak to do with his coming in or not coming in?" sharply asked Mr. Dare. "He would not be wearing his cloak this weather."
"But he does wear it, sir," returned Betsy. "He went out in it to-night."
"Did you see him?" sternly asked Mr. Dare.
"If I hadn't seen him, I couldn't have told that he went out in it," independently replied Betsy, who, like her mother, was fond of maintaining her own opinion. "I was looking out of the window in Miss Adelaide's room, and I saw Mr. Herbert go out by way of the dining-room window towards the entrance-gate."
"Wearing his cloak?"
"Wearing his cloak," assented Betsy, "I hoped he was hot enough in it."
The words seemed to carry terrible conviction to Mr. Dare's mind. Unwilling to believe the girl, he sought Joseph and asked him.
"Yes, for certain," Joseph answered. "Mr. Herbert, as he was coming downstairs to go out, stopped to speak to me, sir, and he was fastening his cloak on then."
Minny ran up, bursting with grief and terror as she seized upon Mr. Dare. "Papa! papa! is it true?" she sobbed.
"Is what true, child?"
"That it was Herbert? They are saying so."
"Hush!" said Mr. Dare. Carrying a candle, he went up to Herbert's room, his heart aching. That Herbert could sleep through the noise was surprising; and yet, not much so. His room was more remote from the house than were the other rooms, and looked towards the back. But, had he slept through it? When Mr. Dare went in, he was sitting up in bed, awaking, or pretending to awake, from sleep. The window, thrown wide open, may have contributed to deaden any sound in the house. "Can you sleep through this, Herbert?" cried Mr. Dare.
Herbert stared, and rubbed his eyes, and stared again, as one bewildered. "Is that you, father?" he presently cried. "What is it?"
"Herbert," said his father, in low tones of pain, of dread; "what have you been doing to your brother?"
Herbert, as if not understanding the drift of the question, stared more than ever. "I have done nothing to him," he presently said. "Do you mean Anthony?"
"Anthony is lying on the dining-room floor killed—murdered. Herbert,who did it?"
Herbert Dare sat motionless in bed, looking utterly lost. That he could not understand, or was affecting not to understand, was evident. "Anthony is—what do you say, sir?"
"He is dead; he ismurdered," replied Mr. Dare. "Oh, my son, my son, say you did not do it! for the love of heaven, say you did not do it!" And the unhappy father burst into tears and sank down on the bed, utterly unmanned.
The grey dawn of the early May morning was breaking over the world—over the group gathered in Mr. Dare's dining-room. That gentleman, his surviving sons, a stranger, a constable or two; and Sergeant Delves, who had been summoned to the scene. Sundry of the household were going in and out, of their own restless, curious accord, or by summons. The sergeant was making inquiries into the facts and details of the evening.
Anthony Dare—as may be remembered—had sullenly retired to his room, refusing to go out when the message came to him from Lord Hawkesley. It appeared, by what was afterwards learnt, that he, Anthony Dare, had made an appointment to meet Hawkesley and some other men at the Star-and-Garter hotel, where Lord Hawkesley was staying; the proposed amusement of the evening being cards. Anthony Dare remained in his chamber, solacing his chafed temper with brandy-and-water, until the waiter from the Star-and-Garter appeared a second time, bearing a note. This note Sergeant Delves had found in one of the pockets, and had it now open before him. It ran as follows:—
"Dear Dare,—We are all here waiting, and can't make up the tables without you. What do you mean by shirking us? Come along, and don't be a month over it.—Yours,"Hawkesley."
"Dear Dare,—We are all here waiting, and can't make up the tables without you. What do you mean by shirking us? Come along, and don't be a month over it.—Yours,
"Hawkesley."
This note had prevailed. Anthony, possibly repenting of the solitary evening to which he had condemned himself, put on his boots again and went forth: not—it is not pleasant to have to record it, but it cannot be concealed—not sober. He had taken ale with his dinner, wine after it, and brandy-and-water in his room. The three combined had told upon him.
On his arrival at the Star-and-Garter, he found six or seven gentlemen assembled. But, instead of sitting down there in Lord Hawkesley's room, it was suddenly decided to adjourn to the lodgings of a Mr. Brittle, hard by; a young Oxonian, who had been plucked in his Little Go, and was supposed to be reading hard to avoid a second similar catastrophe. They went to Mr. Brittle's and sat down to cards, over which brandy-and-water and other drinks were introduced. Anthony Dare, by way of quenching his thirst, did not spare them, and was not particular as to the sorts. The consequence was that he soon became most disagreeable company, snarling with all around; in short, unfit for play. Thiscontretempsput the rest of the party out of sorts, and they broke up. But for that, they might probably have sat on, until morning, and that poor unhappy life have been spared. There was no knowing what might have been. Anthony Dare was in no fit state to walk alone, and one of them, Mr. Brittle, undertook to see him home. Mr. Brittle left him at the gate, and Anthony Dare stumbled over the lawn and gained the house. After that, nothing further was known. So much as this would not have been known, but that, in hastening for Delves, the policeman had come across Mr. Brittle. It was only natural that the latter, shocked and startled, should bend his steps to the scene; and from him they gathered the account of Anthony's movements abroad.
But now came the difficulty. Who had let Anthony in? No one. There was little doubt that he had made his way through the dining-room window. Joseph had turned the key of the front door at eleven o'clock, and he had not been called upon to open it until the return of Mr. and Mrs. Dare. The policeman who happened to be passing when Anthony came home—or it may be more correct to say, was brought home—testified to the probable fact that he had entered by means of the dining-room window. The man had watched him: had seen that, instead of making for the front door, which faced the road and was in view, he had stumbled across the grass, and disappeared down by the side of the house. On this side the dining-room window was situated; therefore it was only reasonable to suppose that Anthony had so entered.
"Had you any motive in watching him?" asked Sergeant Delves of this man.
"None, except to see that he did not fall," was the reply. "When the gentleman who brought him home loosed his arm, he told him, in a joking way, not to get kissing the ground as he went in; and I thought I'd watch him that I might go to his assistance if he did fall. He could hardly walk: he pitched about with every step."
"Did he fall?"
"No; he managed to keep up. But I should think he was a good five minutes getting over the grass plat."
"Did the gentleman remain to watch him?"
"No, not for above a minute. He just waited to see that he got safe over the gravel path on to the grass, and then he went back."
"Did you see anyone else come in? About that time?—or before it?—or after it?"
The man shook his head. "I didn't see anyone else at all. I shut the gate after Mr. Anthony, and I didn't see it opened again. Not but what plenty might have opened and shut it, and gone in, too, when I was higher up my beat."
Sergeant Delves called Joseph. "It appears uncommonly odd that you should have heard no noise whatever," he observed. "A man's movements are not generally very quiet when in the state described as being that of young Mr. Dare's. The probability is that he would enter the dining-room noisily. He'd be nearly sure to fall against the furniture, being in the dark."
"It's certain that I never did hear him," replied Joseph. "We was shut up in the kitchen, and I was mostly nodding from the time I locked up at eleven till master came home at two. The two girls was chattering loud enough; they was at the table, making-up caps, or something of that. The cook went to bed at ten; she was tired."
"Then, with the exception of you three, all the household were in bed?"
"All of 'em—as was at home," answered Joseph. "The governess had gone early, the two young ladies went about ten, Mr. Cyril and Mr. George went soon after ten. They came home from cricket 'dead beat' they said, had supper, and went to bed soon after it."
"It's not usual for them—the young men, I mean—to go to bed so early, is it?" asked Sergeant Delves.
"No, except on cricket nights," answered Joseph. "After cricket they generally come home and have supper, and don't go out again. Other nights they are mostly sure to be out late."
"And you did not hear Mr. Herbert come in?"
"Sergeant Delves, I say that I never heard nothing nor nobody from the time I locked the front door till master and missis came home," reiterated Joseph, growing angry. "Let me repeat it ten times over, I couldn't say it plainer. If I had heard either of the gentlemen come in, I should have gone to 'em to see if anything was wanted. Specially to Mr. Anthony, knowing that he was not sober when he went out."
Two points appeared more particularly to strike Sergeant Delves. The one was, that no noise should have been heard; that a deed like this could have been committed in, as it appeared, absolute silence. The other was, that the dining-room window should have been found fastened inside. The latter fact confirmed the strong suspicion that the offender was an inmate of the house. A person, not an inmate of the house, would naturally have escaped by the open dining-room window; but to do this,andto fasten it inside after him was an impossibility. Every other window in the house, every door, had been securely fastened; some in the earlier part of the evening, some at eleven o'clock by Joseph. Herbert Dare voluntarily acknowledged that it was he who had fastened the dining-room window. His own account was—and the sergeant looked at him narrowly while he gave it—that he had returned home late, getting on for two o'clock; that he had come in through the dining-room, and had put down the window fastening. He declared that he had not seen Anthony. If Anthony had been lying there, as he was afterwards found, he, Herbert, had not observed him. But, he said, so far as he remembered, he never glanced to that part of the room at all, but had gone straight through on the other side, between the table and the fireplace. And if he had glanced to it he could have seen nothing, for the room was dark. He had no light, and had to feel his way.
"Was it usual for the young gentlemen to fasten the window?" Sergeant Delves asked of Joseph. And Joseph replied that they sometimes did, sometimes did not. If by any chance Mr. Anthony and Mr. Herbert came in together, then they would fasten it; or if, when the one came in, he knew that the other was not out, he would equally fasten it. Mr. Cyril and Mr. George did not often come in that way; in fact, they were not out so late, generally speaking, as were their brothers.
"Precisely so," Herbert assented, with reference to the fastening. He had fastened it, believing his brother Anthony to be at home and in bed. When he went out the previous evening, Anthony had already gone to his room, expressing his intention not to leave it again that night.
Sergeant Delves inquired—no doubt for reasons of his own—whether this expressed intention on the part of Anthony could be testified to by any one besides Herbert. Yes. By Joseph, by the governess, by Rosa and Minny Dare; all four had heard him say it. The sergeant would not trouble the young ladies, but requested to speak to the governess.
The governess was indignant at the request being made. She was in and out amongst them with her white face, in her many-colouredpeignior. She had been upstairs and partially dressed herself; had discarded the calico nightcap and done her hair, put on thepeignioragain, and come down to see and to listen. But she did not like being questioned.
"I know nothing about it," she said to the sergeant, speaking vehemently. "What should I know about it? I will tell you nothing. I went to bed before it was well nine o'clock; I had a headache; and I never heard anything more till the commotion began. Why you ask me?"
"But you can surely tell, ma'am, whether or not you heard Mr. Anthony say he was going to his chamber for the night?" remonstrated the sergeant.
"Yes, he did say it," she answered vehemently. "He said it in the salon. He kicked off his boots, and told Joseph to bring his slippers, and to take brandy-and-water to his room, for he should not leave it again that night. I never thought or knew that he had left it until I saw him lying in the dining-room, and they said he was dead."
"Was Mr. Herbert present when he said he should go to his room for the night?"
"He was present, I think: I think he had come in then to the salon. That is all I know. I made the tea, and then my head got bad, and I went to bed. I can tell you nothing further."
"Did you hear any noise in the house, ma'am?"
"No. If there was any noise I did not notice it. I soon went to sleep. Where is the use of your asking me these things? You should ask those who sat up. I shall be sick if you make me talk about it. Nothing of this ever arrived in any family where I have been before."
The sergeant allowed her to retire. She went to the stairs and sat down on the lower step, and leaned her cheek upon her hand, all as she had done previously. Mr. Dare asked her why she did not go upstairs, away from the confusion and bustle of the sad scene; but she shook her head. She did not care to be in her chamber alone, she answered, and her pupils were shut in with Madame Dare and Mademoiselle Adelaide.
It is possible that one thing puzzled the sergeant: though what puzzled him and what did not puzzle him had to be left to conjecture, for he said nothing about it. No weapon had been found. The policemen had been searching the room thoroughly, had partly searched the house; but had come upon no instrument likely to have inflicted the wound. A carving-knife or common table-knife had been suggested, remembering the previous occurrences of the evening; but Mr. Glenn's decided opinion was, that it must have been a very different instrument; some slender, sharp-pointed, two-edged blade, he thought, about six inches in length.
The most suspicious evidence, referring to Herbert, was the cloak. The sergeant had examined it curiously, with compressed lips. Herbert disposed of this, so far as he was concerned—that is, if he was to be believed. He said that he had put his cloak on, had gone out in it as far as the entrance gate; but finding it warmer than was agreeable, he had turned back, and flung it on to the dining-room table, going in, as he had come out, through the window. He added, as a little bit of confirmatory evidence, that he remembered seeing the cloak begin to slide off the table again, that he saw it must fall to the ground; but, being in a hurry, he would not stop to prevent its doing so, or to pick it up.
The sergeant never seemed to take his sidelong glance from Herbert Dare. He had gone to work in his own way; hearing the different accounts and conjectures, sifting this bit of evidence, turning about that, holding a whispered colloquy with the man who had been sent to examine Herbert's room: holding a longer whispered colloquy with Herbert himself. On the departure of the surgeon and Mr. Brittle, who had gone away together, he had marched to the front and side doors of the house, locked them, and put the keys into his pocket. "Nobody goes out of this without my permission," quoth he.
Then he took Mr. Dare aside. "There's no mistake about this, I fear," said he gravely.
Mr. Dare knew what he meant. He himself was growing grievously faint-hearted. But he would not say so; he would not allow it to be seen that he cast, or could cast, a suspicion on Herbert. "It appears to me that—that—if poor Anthony was in the state they describe, that he may have sat down or laid down after entering the dining-room, and dropped asleep," observed Mr. Dare. "Easy, then—the window being left open—for some midnight housebreaker from the street to have come in and attacked him."
"Pooh!" said Sergeant Delves. "It is no housebreaker that has done this. We have a difficult line of duty to perform at times, us police; and all we can do to soften matters, is to go to work as genteelly as is consistent with the law. I'm sorry to have to say it, Mr. Dare, but I have felt obliged to order my men to keep a look-out on Mr. Herbert."
A chill ran through Mr. Dare. "It could not have been Herbert!" he rejoined, his tone one of pain, almost of entreaty. "Mr. Glenn says it could not have been done later than half-past eleven, or so. Herbert never came home until nearly two."
"Who is to prove that he was not at home till near two?"
"He says he was not. I have no doubt it can be proved. And poor Anthony was dead more than two hours before."
"Now, look you here," cried Sergeant Delves, falling back on a favourite phrase of his. "Mr. Glenn is correct enough as to the time of the occurrence: I have had some experience in death myself, and I'm sure he is not far out. But let that pass. Here are witnesses who saw him alive at half-past eleven o'clock, and you come home at two and find him dead. Now, let your son Herbert thus state where he was from half-past eleven till two. He says he was out: not near home at all. Very good. Only let him mention the place, so that we can verify it, and find, beyond dispute, that hewasout, and the suspicion against him will be at an end. But he won't do this."
"Not do it?" echoed Mr. Dare.
"He tells me point-blank that he can't and he won't. I asked him."
Mr. Dare turned impetuously to the room where he had left his second son—his eldest son now. "Here, Herbert"—he was beginning. But the officer cut short the words by drawing him back.
"Don't go and make matters worse," whispered he: "perhaps they'll be bad enough without it. Now, Lawyer Dare, you'll do well not to turn obstinate, for I am giving you a bit of friendly advice. You and I have had many a transaction together, and I don't mind going a bit out of my way for you, as I wouldn't do for other people. The worst thing your son could do, would be to say before those chattering servants that he can't or won't tell where he has been all night, or half the night. It would be self-condemnation at once. Ask him in private, if you must ask him."
Mr. Dare called his son to him, and Herbert answered to it. A policeman was sauntering after him, but the sergeant gave him a nod, and the man went back.
"Herbert, you say you did not come in until near two this morning."
"Neither did I. It wanted about twenty minutes to it. The churches struck half-past one as I came through the town."
"Where did you stay?"
"Well—I can't say," replied Herbert.
Mr. Dare grew agitated. "You must say, Herbert," he hoarsely whispered, "or take the consequences."
"I can't help the consequences," was Herbert's answer. "Where I was last night is no matter to any one, and I shall not say."
"Your not saying—if you can say—is just folly," interposed the sergeant. "It's the first question the magistrates will ask when you are placed before them."
Herbert looked up angrily. "Place me before the magistrates!" he echoed. "What do you mean? You will not dare to take me into custody!"
"You have been in custody this half-hour," coolly returned the sergeant.
Herbert looked terribly fierce.
"I will not submit to this indignity," he exclaimed. "I will not.Sergeant Delves, you are overstepping——"
"Look here," interrupted the sergeant, drawing something from some unseen receptacle; and Mr. Herbert, to his dismay, caught sight of a pair of handcuffs. "Don't you force me to use them," said the officer. "You are in custody, and must go before the magistrates; but now, you be a gentleman, and I'll use you as one."
"I protest upon my honour that I have had neither act nor part in this crime!" cried Herbert, in agitation. "Do you think I would stain my hand with the sin of Cain?"
"What is that on your hand?" asked the sergeant, bending forward to look more closely at Herbert's fingers.
Herbert held them out openly enough. "I was doing something last night which tore my fingers," he said. "I was trying to undo the fastenings of some wire. Sergeant Delves, I declare to you solemnly, that from the moment when my brother went to his chamber, as witnesses have stated to you, I never saw him until my father brought me down from my bed to see him lying dead."
"You drew a knife on him not many hours before, you know, Mr. Herbert!"
"It was done in the heat of passion. He provoked me very much; but I should not have used it. No, poor fellow! I should never have injured him."
"Well, you only make your tale good to the magistrates," was all the sergeant's answer. "It will be their affair as soon as you are before them—not mine."
Herbert Dare was handed back to the constable; and, as soon as the justice-room opened, was conveyed before the magistrates—all, as the sergeant termed it, in a genteel, gentlemanly sort of way. He was charged with the murder of his brother Anthony.
To describe the commotion that spread over Helstonleigh would be beyond any pen. The college boys were in a strange state of excitement: both Anthony and Herbert Dare had been college boys themselves not so very long ago. Gar Halliburton—who was no longer a college boy, but a supernumerary—went home full of it. Having imparted it there, he thought he could not do better than go in and regale Patience with the news, by way ofdivertissementto her sick bed. "May I come up, Patience?" he called out from the foot of the stairs. "I have something to tell you."
Receiving permission, up he flew. Patience, partially raised, was sewing with her hands, which she could just contrive to do. Anna sat by the window, putting the buttons on some new shirts.
"I have finished two," cried she, turning round to Gar in great glee. "And my father's coming home next week, he writes us word. Perhaps thy mother has had a letter from William. Look at the shirts!" she continued, exhibiting them.
"Never mind bothering about shirts, now, Anna," returned Gar, losing sight of his gallantry in his excitement. "Patience, the most dreadful thing has happened. Anthony Dare's murdered!"
Patience, calm Patience, only looked at Gar. Perhaps she did not believe it. Anna's hands, holding out the shirts, were arrested midway: her mouth and blue eyes alike opening.
"He was murdered in their dining-room in the night," went on Gar, intent only on his tale. "The town is all up in arms; you never saw such an uproar. When we came out of school just now, we thought the French must have come to invade us, by the crowds there were in the street. You couldn't get near the Guildhall, where the examination was going on. Not more than half a dozen of us were able to fight our way in. Herbert Dare looked so pale; he was standing there, guarded by three policemen——"
"Thee hast a fast tongue, Gar," interrupted Patience. "Dost thee mean to say Herbert Dare was in custody?"
"Of course, he was," replied Gar, faster than before. "It is he who has done it. At least, he is accused of it. He and Anthony had a quarrel yesterday, and it came to knives. They were parted then; but he is supposed to have laid wait for Anthony in the night and killed him."
"Is Anthony dead? Is he——Anna! what hast thee——?"
Anna had dropped the shirts and the buttons. Her blue eyes had closed, her lips and cheeks had grown white, her hands fell powerless. "She is fainting!" shouted Gar, as he ran to support her.
"Gar, dear," said Patience, "thee shouldst not tell ill news quite so abruptly. Thee hast made me feel queer. Canst thee stretch thy hands out to the bell? It will bring up Hester."
Helstonleigh could not recover its equanimity. Never had it been so rudely shaken. Incidents there had been as startling; crimes of as deep a dye; but, taking it with all its attendant circumstances, no occurrence, in the memory of the oldest inhabitant, had excited the interest that was attaching to the death and assumed murder of Anthony Dare.
The social standing of the parties, above that in which such unhappy incidents are more generally found; the conspicuous position they occupied in the town, and the very uncertainty—the mystery, it may be said—in which the affair was wrapped, wrought local curiosity to the highest point.
Scarcely a shadow of doubt rested on the public mind that the deed had been done by Herbert Dare. The Police force, actively engaged in searching out all the details, held the same opinion. In one sense, this was, perhaps, unfortunate; for, when strong suspicion, whether of the police or of the public, is especially directed to one isolated point, it inevitably tends to keep down doubts that might arise in regard to other quarters.
It seemed scarcely possible to hope that Herbert was not guilty. All the facts tended to the assumption that he was so. There was the ill-feeling known to have existed between himself and his brother: the quarrel and violence in the dining-room not many hours before, in which quarrel Herberthadraised a knife upon him. "But for the entrance of the servant Joseph," said the people, one to another, "the murder might have been done then." Joseph had stopped evil consequences at the time, but he had not stopped Herbert's mouth—the threat he had uttered in his passion—still to be revenged. Terribly those words told now against Herbert Dare.
Another thing that told against him, and in a most forcible manner, was the cloak. That he had put it on to go out; nay, had been seen to go out in it by the housemaid, was indisputable; and his brother was found lying on this very cloak. In vain Herbert protested, when before the magistrates and at the coroner's inquest, that he returned before leaving the gates, and had flung this cloak into the dining-room, finding it too hot that evening to wear. He obtained no credit. He had not been seen to do this; and the word of an accused man goes for little. All ominous, these things—all telling against him, but nothing, taking them collectively, as compared with his refusal to state where he was that night. He left the house between eight and nine, close upon nine, he thought; he was not sure of the exact time to a quarter of an hour; and he never returned to it until nearly two. Such was his account. But, where he had been in the interim, he positively refused to state.
It was only his assertion, you see, against the broad basis of suspicion. Anthony Dare's death must have taken place, as testified by Mr. Glenn, somewhere about half-past eleven; who was to prove that Herbert at that time was not at home? "I was not," Herbert reiterated, when before the coroner. "I did not return home till between half-past one and two. The churches struck the half-hour as I was coming through the town, and it would take me afterwards some ten minutes to reach home. It must have been about twenty minutes to two when I entered."
"But where were you? Where had you been? Where did you come from?" he was asked.
"That I cannot state," he replied. "I was out upon a little business of my own; business that concerns no one but myself; and I decline to make it public."
On that score nothing more could be obtained from him. The coroner drew his own conclusions; the jury drewtheirs; the police had already drawn theirs, and very positive ones.
These were the two facts that excited the ire of Sergeant Delves and his official colleagues: with all their searching, they could find no weapon likely to have been the one used; and they could not discover where Herbert Dare had gone to that evening. It happened that no one remembered to have seen him passing in the town, early or late; or, if they had seen him, it had made no impression on their memory. The appearance of Mr. Dare's sons was so common an occurrence that no especial note was likely to have been taken of it. Herbert declared that in passing through West Street, Turtle, the auctioneer, was leaning out at his open bedroom window, and that he, Herbert, had called out to him, and asked whether he was star-gazing. Mr. Turtle, when applied to, could not corroborate this. He believed that hehadbeen looking out at his window that night; he believed that it might have been about the hour named, getting on for two, for he was late going to bed, having been to a supper party; but he had no recollection whatever of seeing Mr. Herbert pass, or of having been spoken to by him, or by any one else. When pressed upon the point, Mr. Turtle acknowledged that his intellects might not have been in the clearest state of perception, the supper party having been a jovial one.
One of the jury remarked that it was very singular the prisoner could go through the dining-room, and not observe his brother lying in it. The prisoner replied that it was not singular at all. The room was in darkness, and he had felt his way through it on the opposite side of the table to that where his brother was afterwards found. He had gone straight through, and up to his chamber, as quietly as possible, not to disturb the house; and he dropped asleep as soon as he was in bed.
The verdict returned was "Wilful murder against Herbert Dare," and he was committed to the county gaol to take his trial at the assizes. Mr. Dare's house was beyond the precincts of the city. Sergeant Delves and his men renewed their inquiries; but they could discover no trace, either of the weapon, or of where Herbert Dare had passed the suspicious hours. The sergeant was vexed; but he would not allow that he was beaten. "Only give us time," said he, with a characteristic nod. "The Pyramids of Egypt were only built up stone by stone."
Tuesday morning—the morning fixed for the funeral of Anthony Dare. The curious portion of Helstonleigh wended its way up to the churchyard; as it is the delight of the curious portion of a town to do. What a sad sight it was! That dark object, covered by its pall, carried by its attendants, followed by the mourners; Mr. Dare, and his sons Cyril and George. He, the father, bent his face in his handkerchief, as he walked behind the coffin to the grave. Many a man in Helstonleigh enjoyed a higher share of esteem and respect than did Lawyer Dare; but not one present in that crowded churchyard that did not feel for him in his bitter grief. Not one, let us hope, that did not feel to his heart's core the fate of the unhappy Anthony, now, for weal or for woe, to answer before his Maker for his life on earth.
That same day, Tuesday, witnessed the return of Samuel Lynn and William Halliburton. They arrived in the evening, and of course the first news they were greeted with was the prevailing topic. Few things caused the ever-composed Quaker to betray surprise; but William was half-stunned with the news. Anthony Dare dead—murdered—buried that very day; and Herbert in prison, awaiting his trial for the offence! To William the whole affair seemed more incredible than real.
"Sir," he said to his master, when, the following morning, they were alone together in the counting-house at the manufactory, "do you believe Herbert Dare can be guilty?"
Mr. Ashley had been gazing at William, lost in thought. The change we often see, or fancy we see, in a near friend, after a few weeks' absence, was apparent in William. He had improved in looks; and yet those looks, with their true nobility, both of form and intellect, had been scarcely capable of improvement. Nevertheless, it was there, and Mr. Ashley had been struck with it.
"I cannot say," he replied, aroused by the question. "Facts appear conclusively against him; but it seems incredible that he should so have lost himself. To be suspected and committed on such a charge is grief enough, without the reality of guilt."
"So it is," acquiesced William.
"We feel the disgrace very keenly—as all must who are connected with the Dares in ever so remote a degree.Ifeel it, William; feel it as a blow; Mrs. Ashley is the cousin of Anthony Dare."
"They are relatives of ours also," said William in a low tone. "My father was first cousin to Mrs. Dare."
Mr. Ashley looked at him with surprise. "Your father first cousin to Mrs. Dare!" he repeated. "What are you saying?"
"Her first cousin, sir. You have heard of old Mr. Cooper, of Birmingham?"
"From whom the Dares inherited their money. Well?"
"Mr. Cooper had a brother and a sister. Mrs. Dare was the daughter of the brother; the sister married the Reverend William Halliburton, and my father was their son. Mrs. Dare, as Julia Cooper, and my father, Edgar Halliburton, both lived together for some time under their uncle's roof at Birmingham."
A moment's pause, and then Mr. Ashley laid his hand on William's shoulder. "Then that brings a sort of relationship between us, William. I shall have a right to feel pride in you now."
William laughed. But his cheek flushed with the pleasure of a more earnest feeling. His greatest earthly wish was to be appreciated by Mr. Ashley.
"How is it I never heard of this relationship before?" cried Mr. Ashley. "Was it purposely concealed?"
"It is only within a year or two that I have known of it," replied William. "Frank and Gar are not aware of it yet. When we first came to Helstonleigh, the Dares were much annoyed at it; and they made it known to my mother in so unmistakable a manner, that she resolved to drop all mention of the relationship; she would have dropped the relationship itself if she could have done so. It was natural, perhaps, that they should feel annoyed," continued William, seeking to apologize for them. "They were rich and great in the eyes of the town; we were poor and obscure."
Mr. Ashley was casting his recollections backwards. A certain event, which had always somewhat puzzled him, was becoming clear now. "William, when Anthony Dare—acting, as he said, for me—put that seizure into your house for rent, it must have been done with the view of driving you from the town?"
"My mother says she has always thought so, sir."
"I see; I see. Why, William, half the inheritance, enjoyed by the Dares, ought justly to have been your father's!"
"We shall do as well without it, in the long-run, sir," replied William, a bright smile illumining his face. "Hard though the struggle was at the beginning!"
"Ay, that you will!" warmly returned Mr. Ashley. "The ways of Providence are wonderful! Yes, William—and I know you have been taught to think so—what men call the chances of the world, are all God's dealings. Reflect on the circumstances favouring the Dares; reflect on your own drawbacks and disadvantages! They had wealth, position, a lucrative profession; everything, in fact, to help them on, that can be desired by a family in middle-class life; whilst you had poverty, obscurity, and toil to contend with. But now, look at what they are! Mr. Dare's money is dissipated; he is overwhelmed with embarrassment—I know it to be a fact, William; but this is for your ear alone. Folly, recklessness, irreligion, reign in his house; his daughters lost in pretentious vanity; his sons in something worse. In a few years they will have gone down—down. Yes," added Mr. Ashley, pointing with his finger to the floor of his counting-house, "down to the dogs. I can see it coming, as surely as that the sun is in the heavens. You and they will have exchanged positions, William; nay, you and yours, unless I am greatly mistaken, will be in a far higher position than they have ever occupied; for you will have secured the favour of God, and the approbation of all good men."
"That Frank and Gar will attain to a position in time, I should be worse than a heathen to doubt, looking back on the wonderful manner in which we have been helped on," thoughtfully observed William. "For myself I am not sanguine."
"Do you never cherish dreams on your own account?" inquired Mr. Ashley.
"If I do, sir, they are vague dreams. My position affords no scope for ambition."
"I don't know that," said Mr. Ashley. "Would you not be satisfied to become one of the great manufacturers of this great city?" he continued, laughing.
"Not unless I could be one of the greatest. Such as——" William stopped.
"Myself, for instance?" quietly put in Mr. Ashley.
"Yes, indeed," answered William, lifting his earnest eyes to his master. "Were it possible that I could ever attain to be as you are, sir, in all things—in character, in position, in the estimation of my fellow-citizens—it would be sufficient ambition for me, and I should sit down content."
"Not you," cried Mr. Ashley. "You would then be casting your thoughts to serving your said fellow-citizens in Parliament, or some such exalted vision. Man's nature is to soar, you know; it cannot rest. As soon as one object of ambition is attained, others are sought after."
"So far as I go, we need not discuss it," was William's answer. "There's no chance of my ever becoming even a second-rate manufacturer; let alone what you are, sir."
"The next best thing to being myself, would perhaps be that of being my partner, William."
The voice in which his master spoke was so significant, that William's face flushed to crimson. Mr. Ashley noticed it.
"Did that ambition ever occur to you?"
"No, sir, never. That honour is looked upon as being destined for Cyril Dare."
"Indeed!" calmly repeated Mr. Ashley. "If you could transform your nature into Cyril, I do not say but that it might be so in time."
"He expects it himself, sir."
"Would he be a worthy associate for me, think you?" inquired Mr. Ashley, bending his gaze full on William.
William made no reply. Perhaps none was expected, for his master resumed:
"I do not recommend you to indulge that particular dream of ambition; I cannot see sufficiently into the future. It is my intention to push you somewhat on in the world. I have no son to advance," he added, an expression of sadness crossing his face. "All I can do for my boy is to leave him at ease after me. Therefore I may, if I live, advance you in his stead. Provided, William, you continue to deserve it."
A smile parted William's lips. That, he would ever strive for, heaven helping him.
Mr. Ashley again laid his hand on William, and gazed into his face. "I have had a wonderful account of you from Samuel Lynn. And it is not often the Friend launches into decided praise."
"Oh, have you, sir?" returned William with animation. "I am glad he was pleased with me."
"He was more than pleased. But I must not forget that I was charged with a message from Henry. He is outrageous at your not having gone to him last night. I shall be sending him to France one of these days, under your escort, William. It may do him good, in more ways than one."
"I will come to Henry this evening, sir. I must leave him, though, for half an hour, to go round to East's."
"Your conscience is engaged, I see. You know what Henry accused you of, the last time you left him to go to East's?"
"Of being enamoured of Charlotte," said William, laughing in answer to Mr. Ashley's smile. "I will come, at any rate, sir, and battle the other matter out with Henry."
If it were a hopeless task to attempt to describe the consternation of Helstonleigh at the death of Anthony Dare, far more difficult would it be to picture that of Anna Lynn. Believe Herbert guilty, Anna did not; she could scarcely have believed that, had an angel come down from heaven to affirm it. Her state of mind was not to be envied; suspense, sorrow, anxiety filled it, causing her to be in a grievous state of restlessness. She had to conceal this from the eyes of Patience; from the eyes of the world. For one thing, she could not get at the correct particulars; newspapers did not come in her way, and she shrank, in her self-consciousness, from asking. Her whole being—if we may dare to say it here—was wrapt in Herbert Dare; father, friends, home, country; she could have sacrificed them all to save him. She would have laid down her life for his. Her good sense was distorted, her judgment warped; she saw passing events, not with the eye of dispassionate fact, or with any fact at all, but through the unhealthy tinge of fond, blind prejudice. The blow had almost crushed her; the dread suspense was wearing out her heart. She seemed no longer the same careless child as before; in a few hours she had overstepped the barrier of girlish timidity, and had gained the experience which is bought with sorrow.
On the evening mentioned in the last chapter, just before William went out to keep his appointment with Henry Ashley, he saw from the window Anna in his mother's garden, bending over the flowers, and glancing up at him. Glancing, as it struck William, with a strangely wistful expression. He went out to her.
"Tending the flowers, Anna?"
She turned to him, her fair young face utterly colourless. "I have been so wanting to see thee, William! I came here, hoping thee wouldst come out. At dinner time I was here, and thee only nodded to me from the window. I did not like to beckon to thee."
"I am sorry to have been so stupid, Anna. What is it?"
"Thee hast heard what has happened—that dreadful thing! Hast thee heard it all?"
"I believe so. All that is known."
"I want thee to tell it me. Patience won't talk of it; Hester only shakes her head; and I am afraid to ask Gar.Theetell it to me."
"It would not do you good to know, Anna," he gravely said. "Better try and not think——"
"William, hush thee!" she feverishly exclaimed. "Thee knew there was a—a friendship between me andhim. If I cannot learn all there is to be learnt, I shall die."
William looked down at the changing cheek, the eyes full of pain, the trembling hands, clasped in their eagerness. It might be better to tell her than to leave her in this state of suspense.
"William, there is no one in the wide world that knows he cared for me, but thee," she imploringly resumed. "Thee must tell me; theemusttell me!"
"You mean that you want to hear the particulars of—of what took place on Thursday night?"
"Yes. All. Then, and since. I have but heard snatches of the wicked tale."
He obeyed her: telling her all the broad facts, but suppressing a few of the details. She leaned against the garden-gate, listening in silence; her face turned from him, looking through the bars into the field.
"Why do they not believe him?" was her first comment, spoken sharply and abruptly. "He says he was not near the house at the time the act must have been done: why do they not believe him?"
"It is easy to assert a thing, Anna. But the law requires proof."
"Proof? That he must declare to them where he has been?"
"Undoubtedly. And corroborative proof must also be given."
"But what sort of proof? I do not understand their laws."
"Suppose Herbert Dare asserted that he had spent those hours with me, for instance; then I must go forward at the trial and confirm his assertion. Also any other witnesses who may have seen him with me, if there were any. It would be establishing what is called analibi."
"And would they acquit him then? Suppose there were only one witness to speak for him? Would one be sufficient?"
"Certainly. Provided the witness were trustworthy."
"If a witness went forward and declared it now, would they release him?"
"Impossible. He is committed to take his trial at the assizes, and he cannot be released beforehand. It is exceedingly unwise of him not to declare where he was that evening—if he can do so."
"Where do the public think he was? What do they say?"
"I am afraid the public, Anna, think that he was not out anywhere. At any rate, after eleven or half-past."
"Then they are very cruel!" she passionately exclaimed. "Do theyallthink that?"
"There may be a few who judge that it was as he says; that he was really away, and is, consequently, innocent."
"And where dotheythink he was?" eagerly responded Anna again. "Do they suspect any place where he might have been?"
William made no reply. It was not at all expedient to impart to her all the gossip or surmises of the town. But his silence seemed to agitate her more than any reply could have done. She turned to him, trembling with emotion, the tears streaming down her face.
"Oh, William! tell me what is thought! Tell me, I implore thee! Thee cannot leave me in this trouble. Where is it thought he was?"
He took her hands; he bent over her as tenderly as any brother could have done; he read all too surely how opposite to the truth had been her former assertion to him—that she did not care for Herbert Dare.
"Anna, child, you must not agitate yourself in this way: there is no just cause for doing so. I assure you I do not know where it is thought Herbert Dare may have been that night; neither, so far as can be learnt, does any one else know. It is the chief point—where he was—that is puzzling the town."
She laid her head down on the gate again, closing her eyes, as in very weariness. William's heart ached for her.
"He may not be guilty, Anna," was all the consolation he could find to offer.
"Maynot be guilty!" she echoed in a tone of pain. "Heisnot guilty. William, I tell thee he is not. Dost thee think I would defend him if he could do so wicked a thing?"
He did not dispute the point with her; he did not tell her that her assumption of his innocence was inconsistent with the facts of the case. Presently Anna resumed.
"Why must he remain in gaol till the trial? There was that man who stole the skins from Thomas Ashley—they let him out, when he was taken, until the sessions came on, and then he went up for trial."
"That man was out on bail. But they do not take bail in cases so grave as this."
"I may not stay longer. There's Hester coming to call me in. I rely upon thee to tell me anything fresh that may arise," she said, lifting her beseeching eyes to his.
"One word, Anna, before you go. And yet, I see how worse than useless it is to say it to you now. You must forget Herbert Dare."
"I shall forget him, William, when I cease to have memory," she whispered. "Never before. Thee wilt keep my counsel?"
"Truly and faithfully."
"Fare thee well, William; I have no friend but thee."
She ran swiftly into their own premises. William turned to pursue his way to Mr. Ashley's, the thought of Henry Ashley's misplaced attachment lying on his mind as an incubus.