With the wing of the dawn--that is, with the wing of the dawn for business in London--Mark Cray was at the offices in the City. Barker was there before him, and started forward to meet him as he entered. Mark had not succeeded in seeing Barker the previous night.
"Cray, it's all up. I'm afraid it's all up."
"Have you heard from Wales?"
"I got a telegram this morning. There's an irruption of water, in earnest this time. It's flowing in like so many pumps. Look here."
Mark's hands shook as he laid hold of the telegram. "I wasn't in bed till three o'clock," said he, as if he would give an excuse for the signs of agitation. But though he tried to account for his shaking hands, he could not for his scared face.
Yes Mr. Barker was no doubt right: it was "all up" with the Great Wheal Bang. Mark and he stood alone over the table in the board-room: in consultation as to what they could do, and what they might do.
Might they dare--allowing that the public still reposed in happy security--to take some shares into the market, and secure themselves something out of the wreck? Barker was all for doing it; at any rate fortryingit--"whether it would work," he said. Mark hung back in indecision: he thought there might be after-consequences. He told Barker the episode of Mr. Brackenbury's visit, and of his satisfying that gentleman with the cheque of Bracknell, Street, and Oswald Cray, which cheque was no doubt cashed by that time.
"Mean old idiot!" apostrophised Mr. Barker. "That's always the way with those petty people. They'll make more fuss over their paltry hundred pounds or two than others do over thousands. I'd not have paid him, Mark."
"I couldn't help it," said Mark. "You should have seen the work he made. Besides, if I had not, he'd have proclaimed the thing from one end of London to another."
"Well, about these shares," said Barker. "We must make as much as ever we can. Will you go, or shall I?"
"Perhaps it's known already," returned Mark, dubiously.
"Perhaps it isn't. Brackenbury gave you his word that he'd keep quiet, and who else is likely to know it? Letterscan'tget here till the afternoon post, and nobody at the mine would make it their business to telegraph up."
Mark stood in restless indecision. When annoyed, he was fidgety to a degree; could not be still. Perhaps he had inherited his mother's temperament He pushed back his hair incessantly; he fingered nervously the diamond studs in his shirt. Mark was not in the habit of wearing those studs by day, or the curiously fine embroidery they were adorning. Whether, in his confusion of faculties, he had put in the studs that morning, or had absently retired to rest in his shirt the previous night, studs and all, must be left to conjecture.
"Look here, Barker," said he. "If news had not come tousof the disaster, to you and to me, I'd willingly have taken every share we possess into the market, and got the money for them down, if I could. But the newshascome: and I don't think it would do."
"Who's to know it has come?" asked Barker.
"Well, things do often come out, you know; they nearly always do; especially if they are not wanted to. Perhaps the telegraph office could be brought up to prove it, or something of that."
"Well?" said Barker.
"Well," repeated Mark. "It mightn't do."
"Oh, bother, Cray! We must do it. We must stand out through thick and thin afterwards that the message never reached us. I could; and you are safe, for you have not had one at all. Look at our position. Wemustrealise. Of course we can't attempt to negotiate many shares; that would betray us; but a few we might, and must. We must, for our own sakes we can't stand naked, without a penny to fall back upon."
Mark still hesitated. "I'd have done it with all the pleasure in life but for this telegram," he reiterated. "For one thing, Oswald would never forgive me; my name's the same as his, you know; and I shall have to face him over this two hundred pounds: that will be bad enough. And there's my mother. And my wife, Barker; you forget her."
"I don't forget her. I am thinking of her," was Mr. Barker's answer. "It's for her sake, as much as ours, that you ought to secure a little ready money. You'll want it. I know that much, for I have been down in luck before."
Mark looked irresolute and pitiably gloomy. "I don't see my way clear," he resumed, after a pause. "Let's put the thing into plain black and white. I go out, and sell some shares, and get the money paid down for them, and pocket it. An hour afterwards the news spreads that the mine's destroyed, and the shares are consequently worthless. Well, Barker, my belief is that they could proceed against me criminally for disposing of those shares----"
"Not if you did not know the mine was wrong when you took them into the market."
"Nonsense," returned Mark, irritably, "they'd be sure to know it. I tell you it would be safe to come out by hook or by crook. They'd call it felony, or swindling, or some such ugly name. Do you suppose I'm going to put my head into that noose? I was born a gentleman."
"And do you suppose I wish either of us to do it?" retorted Barker. "I shouldn't be such a fool. I never go into a thing unless I know I can fight my way out of it. I shall take a few shares into the market, and feel my way. I shall sell them for money, if I can; and you shall share it, Mark. I suppose you won't object to that."
No, certainly, Mark would have no objection to that.
"I did not hear of the disaster until later, you know," said Barker, winking. "News of it came up to us by the afternoon post. If they do find out about the telegram, why, I never opened it. Nobody saw me open it," added Barker, with satisfaction. "I have had so many up from the mine at my lodgings that the servants sign and put them in my sitting-room as a matter of course. This one was put there this morning, and I found it when I came down, but nobody was in the room. Oh, it will be all right. And I say, Mark, if----"
Mr. Barker's smooth projects were stopped. Absorbed in their conversation, he and Mark had alike failed to notice a gradually gathering hum in the street outside. A very gentle, almost imperceptible hum at first, but increasing to a commotion now. With one bound they reached the window.
A concourse of people, their numbers being augmented every moment, had assembled beneath. They were waiting for the opening of the offices of the Great Wheal Bang at ten o'clock. And the hour was almost on the point of striking.
"It's all up," shouted Barker in Mark's ear. "The news is abroad, and they have heard of it. Look at their faces!"
The faces were worth looking at, though not as a pleasant sight. Anger, rage, disappointment, above allimpatience, were depicted there. The impatience of a wolf waiting to spring upon its prey. One of the faces unluckily turned its gaze upwards and caught sight of Barker's. Barker saw it; he had not been quick enough in drawing away from the window.
"They'll not be kept out now, doors or no doors," said he quietly to Mark.
Mr. Barker was right. Ere the words had died away upon his lips a sound as if the walls of the house were being beaten in ensued. The bells commenced a perpetual peal the knocker knocked incessantly, the doors were pushed and kicked and thumped. In the midst of it rose the sound of human voices in a roar: disjointed words distinguishable amidst the tumult. "Let us in! Come out to us!"
Mr. Barker advanced to the stairs, and leaned over the balustrades. "Williams," he called out to an attendant official below, "you can open the doors. The gentlemen may come up."
It was curious to note the difference in the two men. Barker was as cool as a cucumber; self-possessed as ever he had been in his life; ready to make the best of everything, and quite equal to the emergency. Mark Cray, on the contrary, seemed to have parted alike with his wits and his nerves. Not more completely did he lose his presence of mind in that long past evening which had been so fatal to Lady Oswald. His hands shook as with terror; his faff was white as death.
"Will they pull us to pieces, Barker?"
"Pooh!" said Barker, with a laugh at the evident tremor. "What has taken you, Mark? Let them rave on a bit without answering, and they'll calm down. Putthatin your pocket," he continued. "It will be a trifle to fall back upon."
He had touched the diamond ring that glittered on Mark Cray's finger. Mark obeyed like a child. He took it from his hand and thrust it into his waistcoat pocket; next he buttoned his coat, some vague feeling perhaps prompting him to hide the studs; but he did it all mechanically, as one not conscious of his actions. Terror was holding its sway over him.
"Why should they be excited against us? Heaven knows we have not intentionally wronged them."
"That's just the question I shall ask them myself when they are cool enough to listen to it," rejoined Barker with a gay air. "Now then comes the tug of war."
In they came, thick and threefold, dashing up the stairs and pouring into the room like so many bees. And then it was found that Mark's apprehensions had been somewhat premature. For these shareholders had come flowing to the offices not so much to abuse the projectors of the company as to inquire the true particulars of the disaster. The news had gone forth in a whisper--and to this hour neither Mark nor Barker knows how, or through whom, it had oozed out--but that whisper was vague and uncertain. Naturally those interested flew to the offices for better information. Was the damage of great extent? and would the mine and the company stand it?
Barker was of course all suavity. He treated the matter more as a joke than anything else, making light of it altogether. An irruption of water? well, perhaps a little drop had got in, but they must wait for the afternoon's post. It would be all right.
He looked round for Mark, hoping that gentleman's face would not arouse suspicion; but he could not see him. Mark, as Barker learnt afterwards, had contrived to escape from the room as the throng entered, and got into the street unnoticed, and leaped into a cab. Mark was beside himself that morning.
The unfortunate news spread from one end of London to the other. It was carried to Oswald Cray; but the day was advancing then. "The Great Wheal Bang Company had exploded, and there was a run upon the office." Oswald was startled; and betook himself at once to the premises, as the rest had done. On his way he called in upon Henry Oswald, and spoke a word of caution.
"It may be a false rumour," said he; "I hope it is. But don't do anything in the shares until you know."
A false rumour! When Oswald reached the offices he found it all too true a one. The secretary to the company, without meaning to do ill--indeed he had let it out in his lamentation--had unwittingly disclosed the fact of the previous irruption of water in the summer: and the excited crowd were going wild with anger. Many of them had bought their shares at a period subsequent to that.
Oswald heard this, and went to Mr. Barker in the board-room. That gentleman, rather heated certainly, but with unchanged suavity of demeanour, was still doing his best to reassure everybody. Oswald drew him aside.
"What a dreadful thing this is! What is the real truth of it?"
"Hush!" interrupted Mr. Barker. "No need to tell the worst to them. You are one of us. I'm afraid it is all up with the mine; but we will keep it from them as long as we can. Anyway, it's no fault of ours."
"What is it that they are saying about an irruption of water having occurred in the summer?"
"Well, so it did," answered Mr. Barker, whose past few hours' temporising with the crowd caused him perhaps to throw off reserve to Mr. Oswald Cray as a welcome relief. "But it wasn't much, that; and we succeeded in keeping it dark."
"Did Mark know of it?"
"Mark know of it!" rejoined Barker; "of course he knew of it. What should hinder him? Why, the telegram bringing the news was given me at Mark's house; and, by the way, you were present, I remember. It was the evening that old doctor in the yellow trousers was there, with his two frights of daughters."
The scene rose as in a mirror before Oswald's memory. Dr. Ford and his daughters, Miss Davenal and Sara, Caroline Cray in her silks and her beauty. He remembered the telegram, he remembered that it appeared to disturb both Barker and Mark; and he remembered Mark's denial to him that anything was amiss with the mine.
"I do recollect it," he said aloud. "It struck me--perhaps it was rather singular it should do so--that something was wrong. Mark declared to me that it was not so."
The words seemed to tickle Barker uncommonly.
"Ah," said he, laughing, "Mark told me of it, and how he turned you off the scent. You'd not have put your thousand into it, perhaps, had you known of the water."
"Perhaps not," quietly replied Oswald. "And my thousand was wanted, I suppose."
"Law! you don't know the money that's been wanted," was the response. "And that irruption of water, slight as it was, made the demand for it worse. The mine has sucked it in like a sponge."
Oswald made no answering remark. "I suppose this irruption is worse than that?" he presently observed.
"Indeed I fear this is another thing altogether--ruin. But we ion% know anything certain until the post comes in this afternoon. We have had no letter yet."
"How did the news of it come to you?"
"By telegram. But the first news came to Mark; in an odd manner, too. A curmudgeon of a shareholder, old Brackenbury, went up yesterday evening to Mark just as he was going out to dinner with his wife, and insisted upon his paltry money, only two hundred pounds, being returned to him. He was inclined to be nasty; and if Mark had not satisfied him he'd have gone over London proclaiming that the mine was overflowing with water. The odd thing is, who could have telegraphed the news to him. We must have a traitor in the camp. Mark told me--oh, ah," broke off Mr. Barker, interrupting himself as a recollection flashed upon him--"I think he got the two hundred from you."
"And Mark knew the mine was then ruined!" returned Oswald, drawing in his lips, but not losing his calm equanimity.
"Brackenburysaidit was. He didn't know it otherwise. Brackenbury--Halloa! what's that?"
It was a shout in the street. A shout composed of roars, and hisses, and groans. Drawing up to the door of the offices was the handsome carriage of Mark Cray; and the crowd had turned their indignation upon it.
One look, one glimpse of the white and terror-stricken faces of its inmates, and Oswald Cray bounded down the stairs. They were the faces of Mrs. Cray and Sara Davenal.
What could have brought them there?
Before a costly breakfast service of Sèvres porcelain, with its adjuncts of glittering silver, on the morning subsequent to the visit of Mr. Brackenbury, had sat Caroline Cray, in a charming morning robe of white muslin and blue ribbons, with what she would have called acoiffure, all blue ribbons and white lace, on her silky hair. A stranger, taking a bird's-eye view of the scene, of the elegant room, the expensive accessories, the recherché attire of its mistress, would have concluded that there was no lack of means, that the income supporting all this must at least be to the extent of some thousands a-year.
In truth Mark Cray and his wife were a practical illustration of that homely but expressive saying which must be so familiar to you all;they had begun at the wrong end of the ladder. When fortune has come; when it is actually realised, in the hands, then the top of the ladder, comprising its Sèvres porcelain and other costs in accordance, may be safe and consistent; but if webeginthere without first climbing to it, too many of us have an inconvenient fashion of slipping down again. The furniture surrounding Caroline Cray was of the most beautiful design, the most costly nature; the lace on that morning-robe, on that pretty "coiffure," would make a hole in a £20 bank-note, the silver ornaments on the table were fit for the first palace in the land, and Mr. and Mrs. Cray had got these things about them--and a great deal more besides which I have not time to tell you of--anticipatory of the fortune that wasto betheirs; not that alreadywas. And now their footing on that high ladder was beginning to tremble: just as that of the milkmaid did when she sent the milk out of her milk-pails, and so destroyed her dreams.
Caroline sat at her late breakfast, toying with a fashionable newspaper--that is, one giving notice of the doings of the fashionable world--sipping her coffee, flirting with some delicate bits of buttered roll, casting frequent glances at the mirror opposite to her, in whose polished plate was reflected that pretty face, which in her pardonable vanity she believed had not its compeer. All unconscious was she of that turbulent scene then being enacted in the City; of the fact that her husband was at that moment finding his way to her in a cab, into which he had jumped to hide himself in abject fear and dismay. Caroline had slept sound and late after her night's gaiety, and awoke in the morning to find her husband had gone out.
The French clock behind her struck eleven, and she finished her breakfast quickly, and began thinking over her plans for the day. Some excursion into the country had been spoken of for the afternoon, and now Mark was gone she was at an uncertainty. Mrs. Cray tapped her pretty foot in petulance on the carpet, and felt exceedingly angry with the tiresome stranger who had disturbed her husband when he was dressing on the previous evening, and kept him from going out with her to dinner.
"How long did that gentleman stop here last night, George!" she suddenly asked of the servant who was removing the breakfast things. "Mr.-- what was the name? Brackenbury, I think."
"He stopped a good while, ma'am. I think it was between nine and ten when he left."
"What a shame! Keeping Mr. Cray all that while. I wonder he stayed with him!Iwouldn't. I'd make people come to me in business hours, if I were Mark."
She sat on, after the departure of the breakfast things, leaning back in an easy chair and turning carelessly the leaves of a new novel, those that would open, for she did not exert herself to cut them. A very listless mood was she in that morning, tired and out of sorts. By and by her maid came in to ask about some alteration that was to be made in a dress, and Caroline told her to bring the dress to her.
That a little aroused her. It was a beautiful evening dress of flowered silk, and she stood over the table where the maid laid it consulting with her about some change in the colour of the trimmings. Becoming absorbed in this, she scarcely noticed that some one had come into the hall and opened the door of the room. Some expression in the maid's countenance as she looked up caught her attention, and she turned quickly round.
Mark was there, glancing into the room. Mark with a white aspect and a scared dreamy look on his face. Before Caroline had time to question, in fact almost before she looked, he was gone and had closed the door again. So quiet had been the movement, so transient the vision, that Caroline spoke in her surprise.
"Was not that your master?"
"Yes, ma'am. Something was the matter, I think. He looked ill."
"I will go and see. Mind, Long, I'll decide upon pink. It is the prettiest colour."
"Very well, ma'am. As you please, of course. I only think pink won't go so well with the dress as violet."
"I tell you, Long, that violetwill notlight up. You know it won't, without my having to reiterate it over to you. No colour lights up so bad as violet. Pink: and let the ruchings be very full and handsome."
Speaking the last words in a peremptory tone, she went in search of Mark. He was standing upright in the dining-room, in the midst of its floor, looking more like a man lost than a man in his composed senses.
"Mark, what's the matter?"
He turned to his wife,--he had been undecided whether to tell her or not. It was a question he debated with himself on his way down: that is, it had been floating through his mind in a sort of undercurrent. To concentrate his thoughts deliberately upon one point sufficiently to debate it was that day beyond the power of Mark Cray.
Mark's true disposition was showing itself now. Vacillating and unstable by nature, utterly deficient in that moral courage which meets an evil when it comes, and looks it steadily in the face to see how it may be best dealt with, the blow of the morning had taken away what little sense Mark possessed. He was as a frightened child; a ship without a rudder; he was utterly unable to distinguish what his proper course ought to be: he did not know where to go or what to do; his chief thought was, to get away from the torrent that had broken loose. He must hide himself from the storm, but he could not face it.
When he jumped into the cab, and the driver had said, "Where to, sir?" he gave his home in Grosvenor Place in answer, simply because he could not think of another direction to give in that bewildering moment: so the cab drove on. But Mark did not want to go to Grosvenor Place. He had nothing to get from there: he had no business there, and a feeling came over him that he had rather not meet his wife just then. He wanted to hide himself and his bewildered mind and his scared face in some nook of remote shelter, far from the haunts of men, where that remorseless crowd, just escaped from, would not pounce upon him. Mark had not given himself time to ascertain that their disposition was pacificatory: he was wondering rather whether they had yet pulled the offices down. Neither Mark Cray nor Caroline was fitted to encounter the storms of life. So long as the sailing was smooth it was well; but when the waves arose, rough and turbulent, the one proved physically, the other morally, unable to breast them.
Mark stopped the cab as it was turning into Grosvenor Place; some vague feeling prompting him that it might be safer to steal quietly into his home than to dash up to it in a cab. The tidings had perhaps travelled far and wide, and people might be already there, as well as at the offices. Mark was half determined to make the best of his way at once to the scene of the Great Wheal Bang itself, the mine; and see with his own eyes whether things were so bad that they could not be mended. At least he should be away from his furious enemies in London. One more under the influence of reason than Mark Cray might have thought it well to ascertain whether those enemies were so furious, before running from them. When a man of no moral courage loses his presence of mind, he merits pity perhaps rather than condemnation.
"Mark, what's the matter?"
With her actual presence before him, with the pointed question on her lips, Mark Cray's indecision went completely out. He could no more have told her the truth at that moment, that the golden prospects so implicitly believed in had turned to ruin, and the offices yonder were being besieged by noisy shareholders, than he could have told it to the besiegers themselves.
"The matter?" repeated Mark, at a loss for any other answer.
"You look as if something were the matter, Mark. And what have you come back for?"
"Oh, I left some papers at home," answered Mark, speaking as carelessly as he could. "There's nothing the matter with me. The fellow drove fast, that's all. I gave him an extra sixpence."
Perhaps Caroline did not deem this communication particularly relevant to the subject. "What made you go away so early, Mark?" she asked. "You never settled anything about Hendon today."
"Well, I don't think I can go," said Mark. "I'll--I'll see later. Hark!"
Mark's "hark" was spoken in echo to a thundering knock at the door. A knock and a ring enough to shake the house down. He looked round at the walls for a moment as if he wanted to make a dash into them; he stepped towards the window, hesitated, and drew away again; finally he opened the door to escape, but too late, for voices were already in the hall. Caroline looked at her husband in wondering dismay.
"Mark, what has come to you?"
"Hush!" whispered Mark, the perspiration welling up to his forehead, as he bent his head to catch the sound from those voices. "Hark! hush!"
"Is Mr. Cray at home?"
"No, sir. He went to the City early this morning." How Mark Cray blessed his servant for the unconscious mistake, he alone could tell. The man had not seen his master come in, and had no idea he was in the house.
"Gone to the City, is he? Are you sure?"
"Quite sure, sir."
A pause. Mark's heart was beating.
"What time will he be home?"
"I don't know, sir."
Another pause. "I suppose Mr. Barker's not here?"
"Mr. Barker? O dear no, sir."
And that was followed by the closing of the hall-door. Mark Cray gave a great gasp of relief, and went upstairs to his own room.
He did not stay there above a minute. Caroline--she remembered it afterwards--heard a drawer or two opened and shut. She had been following him, but was momentarily detained by a question from her maid, who was coming out of the breakfast-room with the dress upon her arm. Caroline stopped while she answered it, and in going up the stairs she met Mark coming down.
"Who was that at the door, Mark? Did you think it was any one in particular?"
"I don't know who it was."
"You seemed alarmed. Or annoyed."
"Well," returned Mark, speaking rather fast, "and it is annoying to have business fellows corning after me to my house. Why can't they go to the offices?"
"To be sure," said Caroline, reassured. "I'd not see a soul here, if I were you."
He had been walking on towards the hall-door while he spoke. But ere he had well reached it, he turned, and drew his wife into one of the rooms.
"Look here, Caroline: I'm not sure but I shall have to go down to the mines tonight. If so, it is just possible I may not be able to come here first. So you won't be alarmed if you don't see me home."
"What a hurry you must be in!" exclaimed Caroline. "Not come home first!"
"But if I do go, mind, it will be on a little private matter that I don't want known," he continued, taking no notice of the remark. "So, if anybody should ask where I am, just answer that you can't tell, but that I shall be back in a day or two. Do you understand, Carine?"
"Quite well. But, Mark, you will come home first, won't you?"
"I only tell you this in case I don't come," he answered evasively. "I have a good deal to do today. Goodbye, Carine."
"But about Hendon?" she interrupted.
"Hendon? Oh, I am quite sure I shan't have time for Hendon today. If you don't like to go without me, we must put it off for a day or two." He stooped to kiss her. Opening the hall-door, he stood on the steps, looking right and left; carelessly, as it seemed; in reality, cautiously. Very timorous was Mark Cray in that hour; he did not like that people should have hunted him to his very home. Then he turned to the Victoria Station, perhaps as the nearest point of refuge. He would make his way to Wales, to the mine, as straightly and speedily as he could, consistent with precaution.
Mark had been gone the best part of an hour, and it was hard upon midday. His wife was just deliberating whether to go shopping in the afternoon, or make calls, or pay a visit to the empty park, or take a drive out of town; which way, in short, would be the least tedious of killing the precious time that God had given her, when she was aroused by a formidable summons at the door, and a noise as of many steps and voices besieging the hall.
What next took place Caroline never clearly remembered. Confused recollections remained to her afterwards of angry demands for Mr. Cray, of indignant denials to the servant's assertion that his master was in the City; the hubbub was great, the voices were threatening. Caroline's first surprise was superseded by indignation; and that in its turn gave place to alarm.
You all know what it is to pour oil upon a spark of fire previously ready to burst forth into a flame. When the Great Wheal Bang's shareholders had flocked to the Great Wheal Bang's offices that morning they were on the balance, as may be said, between war and peace; somewhat uncertain in their own minds whether to treat Mark Cray and Mr. Barker as unfortunate fellow-sufferers with themselves, or to expend upon them their wrongs and their wrath. That mistake of the Great Wheal Bang's secretary--as alluded to in the last chapter--turned the scale. In his dismay and confusion he inadvertently referred to the former irruption of water, and the unlucky disclosure maddened the throng. They forthwith looked upon themselves as dreadfully injured people; in fact they jumped to the conclusion that the Great Wheal Bang itself was little better than a swindle; so apt are we all to rush into extremes. Barker did what he could to stem the torrent; but the crowd vociferously demanded to see Mark Cray. It was he they had known mostly in the affair, for Barker was usually at the mine. And, not finding Mark answer to their demands, some of them tore off on the spur of the moment in Hansom cabs to his residence.
Caroline stood the very image of dismay. She did not show herself; she was too much alarmed; she peeped from the half-closed dining-room door and listened, just as Mark had done a short while before. Confused words of "water" and "mine" and "swindle" and "ruin" saluted her ears; and the demands for Mr. Cray became more threateningly imperative. Some movement of the door occurred; she staggered against it; and it was observed from the hall. Perhaps it was only natural to the belligerents to conclude that Mark Cray was there. They pressed forward to the room; but upon seeing that the lady was its only occupant, the young and lovely lady in her gala morning dress and the roses chased from her cheeks by fear, they drew back and clustered outside it.
"What is it you want!" gasped Caroline from her trembling lips.
One of the foremost answered her. He was a gentleman, and he raised his hat, and made his tone as courteous as his sense of injury allowed. They were very sorry to disturb her, but they must see Mr. Cray. They had come to see him and they would see him.
"I assure you that he is not here," said Caroline, her earnest voice carrying truth with it. "He has been gone some time."
"He was at the offices this morning, madam, and disappeared. We were told he had no doubt come home."
"It is true," she answered. "He went to the offices very early, and came home again about eleven o'clock for something he had forgotten, papers I think he said. He did not stay two minutes; he got them and went back again. What is it that is the matter?"
"Back to the offices?" they asked, disregarding the question.
"Yes, back to the offices. He said he must make haste, for he had a great deal to do today. I am sure you will find him there." She had no suspicion that she was asserting what was not true. Whether they believed it or not--though most of them did believe it--they had no resource but to act upon it. Filing out again, they jumped into the cabs, and rattled back at the rate of nine-and-twenty miles an hour.
Leaving Mrs. Cray in a grievous state of perplexity and of distress: for they had spoken of "ruin" as connected with the mine. She was one of those who cannot bear suspense: she had no patience; no endurance, not even for an hour. In a tumult of hurry and emotion, she had her carriage brought round, called for Sara Davenal, to whom, however, she did not tell what had taken place, and drove on to the City almost as fast as those cabs had driven, to get an explanation of Mark.
The cabs had arrived previously, and their occupants found they had been deceived. No Mark Cray was at the offices, or had been there since his first departure from them. They burst bounds, in tongue at any rate, and talked of warrants and prosecutions and various inconvenient things. Other shareholders joined in the general fury, and it may perhaps be excused to them that when the carriage of Mark Cray suddenly appeared in the general melée, they turned their rage upon it.
That is, they pressed round it and saluted it with reproaches not at all soft or complimentary. Possibly in the moment's blind anger they did not see that Mark himself was not its occupant. They were, on the whole, men who knew how to behave themselves, and would have desisted, perhaps apologised, when they had had time and calmness to see that only ladies were there: but that time was not allowed them.
One came, with his tall strong form, his pale, resolute, haughty face, and pushed them right and left, as he laid his hand on the carriage door.
"Are youmen?" he asked. "Don't you see that you are terrifying these ladies? Stand back. I had thought----"
"Oh, Oswald, save us! save us!" came the interrupting cry, as Caroline Cray caught his hand. "What is it all? what has happened?"
He got her out of the carriage and into some adjacent offices, whose friendly doors were opened to them. Sara followed, unmolested, and Oswald went back to rescue, if might be, the carriage. But the gentlemen had been a little recalled to common-sense by the incident: and the carriage was no longer in danger. Smashing Mark Cray's carriage would not make good their losses, or bring forth him who was missing. Oswald returned to Mrs. Cray.
"It is all right again now," he said. "The carriage is waiting for you a little further off. Shall I take you to it?"
"But I want to go into the offices, Oswald," she feverishly rejoined. "I want to see Mark. I must see him."
"Mark is not at the offices. Neither would it be well that you should go there just now."
"Not at the offices! where is he then?"
"I don't know where he is. I should like to find him."
He spoke in a cold, proud, bitter tone, and it struck dismay to the heart of Mrs. Cray. Indeed Oswald's frame of mind was one of the most intense bitterness. He had been plausibly defrauded out of his money: his pride, his sensitive honour, his innate justice, had been wounded to the core. All this disgrace Mark Cray had been earning for himself; Mark, his half-brother!
"But I must see Mark," she reiterated in a helpless manner. "Don't you know where I can go to find him, Oswald?"
"I do not indeed."
"I want to know what has happened. I heard them speak of ruin; of water in the mine. Canyoutell me?"
"News has come up that an irruption of water has taken place. I find it is not the first: but the other, they say, was not serious."
"And this is?"
"I fear so."
"But what right have those men to be so angry, so excited against Mark? He did not let the water in." Oswald made no answer. If Mark had treated those shareholders with the duplicity that he had treated him, they had certainly a very good right to be angry and excited.
Mrs. Cray turned towards the door in her restlessness to take a reconnoitring glimpse of the state of affairs outside. Mark might have come up! might be in the midst of the mob! Sara, who had waited for the opportunity, drew near to Oswald Cray, and spoke in a whisper.
"Is it ruin?"
"Irretrievable--as I believe," he answered, his voice unconsciously assuming a strange tenderness as he looked at her pale, sad face. "Ruin for Mark Cray, perhaps for many others." And the words fell like a shock of ice on her heart. What would become of the engagement that she had made to repay the two hundred pounds to Mr. Wheatley from the money owing her by Mark?
It was the peculiarity of Miss Bettina Davenal to be more especially deaf when suddenly surprised or annoyed. Possibly it is the same with other deaf people. Sara Davenal stood before her in her drawing-room striving to make her comprehend the state of affairs relative to the Great Wheal Bang; and not at first successfully. Miss Bettina had not understood why Mrs. Cray had driven round in hurried agitation that morning and carried off Sara by storm: Caroline would not explain why, and Sara could not. Sara had returned home now, willing to afford every explanation; indeed believing it to be her duty so to do; but Miss Bettina, offended at the morning's slight, was keeping her heart closed; and whenthatwas shut, the ears would not open.
"Whatd'you say? You went up to the offices? I should like to know what took you and Caroline to the offices? Young ladies don't require to go to such places."
"She went to try to see Mark, aunt."
"Ugh!" growled Miss Bettina. "Mark told her, indeed! If Mark Cray told her to go down the mine amidst the lead, she'd do it. Doesn't he see enough of her at home?"
"She went to try to see Mark, Aunt Bettina," repeated Sara, more slowly. "I--I am afraid they are ruined."
"Serve them right," returned Miss Bettina, catching the last word, but attaching no importance to it.
"Some disastrous news has been received from Wales, from the mine. Caroline says a Mr. Brackenbury called in Grosvenor Place last night----"
"Mr. who?"
"Mr. Brackenbury. She did not know then why he called, but Mr. Oswald Cray has now told her that he brought the first news of it to Mark. It had come up to him by telegram."
Miss Bettina Davenal bent her ear. "He came up by telegram! What do you mean by that? Have they got a new invention that brings up people, pray? Why are you not more careful how you speak, Miss Sara Davenal?"
"I said the news came up by telegram, aunt. It came to Mr. Brackenbury; and that's why he called on Mark last night. At least so Mr. Oswald Cray told Caroline. Caroline had been surprised or annoyed at his visit; she did not understand it; and she mentioned it to Mr. Oswald Cray."
Miss Bettina lifted her hands helplessly. "What's any Mr. Brackenbury to me?--or Oswald Cray either? I want to know why Caroline took you to those offices today?"
"I am trying to tell you, aunt," said poor Sara. "Mark went up to the offices early this morning before Caroline was awake; he came home again about eleven, saying he had forgotten something, but Caroline thought his manner absent and strange. He left again, and soon after the house was invaded by quite a crowd of men, gentlemen, demanding to see him----"
"Had they got an organ with them?"
Miss Bettina's interruption took Sara rather aback. "An organ, aunt? I don't know what you mean."
"Not know what I mean!" was the wrathful answer. "Crowds don't collect round houses unless there's a cause; organs or monkeys, or some such nonsense. What did they collect there for?"
Sara bent her head lower and strove to speak with even more distinctness. "It was a crowd of gentlemen, aunt; gentlemen from the City; though perhaps I ought not to have said a crowd, but it was what Caroline called it to me. They came down in Hansom cabs, she said, and they were fierce in their demands to see Mark, and they'd hardly go away again, and they said the mine was ruined. Caroline was alarmed, and she went up herself to try to see Mark, but she did not like to go alone, and came round for me."
The words were as a hopeless jumble in Miss Bettina's ear; their sense nowhere. "I wish you'd be clear," she said, tartly. "If you want to tell me a thing, tell it in a straightforward manner. Why do you mix up crowds and organs with it?"
"Dear aunt, I never said a word about an organ. The--mine--is--ruined," she added, almost out of heart with her task.
"What's ruined?" shrieked Miss Bettina.
"The mine. The Great Wheal Bang." Miss Bettina heard this time. She had lived in expectation of the news ever since the Great Wheal Bang first jumped into existence. Nevertheless it scared her; and an expression of dismay sat on her refined features as she turned them on Sara with a questioning gaze.
"I believe the water has got in. They say it is utter ruin. And Mark Cray can't be found."
"What has Mark Cray found?"
"Hecan't be found, aunt. He was not at the offices when we got there, and the shareholders--as I suppose the people were--attacked the carriage: some of them have sunk a great deal of money in the mine. There was no real danger, of course; but Mr. Oswald Cray got us out of it."
Miss Bettina stared hopelessly. "Oswald Cray got you out of the mine! Whatareyou talking of?"
"Out of the carriage, aunt; not out of the mine. That's in Wales."
"Do you suppose I thought it was in London?" retorted offended Miss Bettina. "You'll be obligingly informing me where London is next. WhereisMark Cray?"
"No one seems to know. His wife does not; except that he said to her he might have to go down to Wales this evening, and she was not to mention it. She is in great uncertainty and distress."
"What's she in?"
"Uncertainty, distress," repeated Sara. "She is as frightened as a child. I fear she will not be a good one to bear misfortune. I went home with her and remained some time; it was that made me so late. When I came away she was growing very angry with Mark: she says he ought to have told her of it this morning."
"And so he ought," said Miss Bettina. "Ah! I never cordially approved that match for Caroline, and the doctor knew it. She'll see what he's made of now. You say you came in contact with the shareholders: what did they say?"
Sara hesitated. "They were saying very disagreeable things, Aunt Bettina."
"That's not telling me what they said."
"They talked of deceit and--and swindling. They seem dreadfully bitter against Mark Cray."
"Dreadfully what against him?"
"Bitter."
"Oh," said Miss Bettina. "Mark Cray's a fool in more ways than one; but they should blame themselves, not him. Mark told them the mine was of gold, I daresay; but it was their fault if they believed it. A man might come to me and say, If you will give me a ten-pound note I'll bring it you back tomorrow doubled, and if I fell into the trap I ought not to turn my anger on him. Mark Craybelievedin the mine: those schemers are so sanguine."
Sara bent her head until her lips almost touched her aunt's ear, and lowered her voice to a cautious tone: but somehow it was terribly distinct to Miss Bettina.
"Aunt, I fear it is not quite so straightforward as you think. There was an irruption of water in the summer--a slight one, I fancy--and Mark and Mr. Barker concealed it. It is this which makes the shareholders so angry, and, they say--they say they can prosecute him for it."
"Who said this?" asked Miss Bettina, after a pause.
"I can hardly tell who. We heard a great deal of talking altogether. One gentleman came up to Mr. Oswald Cray as he was taking us to the carriage again, and asked him if he was not Mark's brother. Oswald replied that he was Mark's half-brother; and then the gentleman said harsh things, and Oswald could not stop him, and could not get us by."
Miss Bettina poured forth question upon question. Incensed as she had been against Mark Cray and his wife for the past months, much as she had blamed their folly, sharp as were her prophecies of the final results, perhaps this was worse than she had bargained for. She had looked for ruin, but not for criminal disgrace.
"And Mark can't be found, you say?" she asked, her tone a shrill one.
"No."
She sat down to the dinner-table, for the day had gone on to evening, despatching Neal for a fly while she ate a bit, and then she went out, taking Sara. "Grosvenor Place," she said to Neal And that observant domestic knew by the compressed lips, the clasped hands, the rigid head, how inwardly flurried was his mistress.
They found Caroline in a state of emotion, bordering upon hysteria. Fear, anger, perplexity, and despair, succeeding each other so rapidly that her mood may have been said to savour of the whole at once. Poor Caroline Cray knew nothing of either endurance or reticence; her anger against Mark was great at the present moment, and she gave way to it loudly.
"Where is he?" was the first pointed question of Miss Davenal.
"I don't know where he is. He might have trusted me. It's not his fault if the water has come into the mine, and he had no cause to go away; but if he had gone, he might have taken me. Barker has been down here in a dreadful passion, and says Mark was not a good fellow to steal a march on him and leave him alone all day to fight the battle with the shareholders. A hundred people, about, have been here after Mark, and it's a shame that I should be left to hear all the remarks."
"Is Oswald Cray with you?" asked Miss Bettina.
"Oh, my goodness, I don't suppose he'll come here again," returned poor Caroline, half beside herself. "I thought him cold and queer in his manner today. Barker says he is vexed at losing his thousand pounds; and that Mark got two hundred more from him last night after he knew the mine had gone. Oswald said nothing to me, but of course he is incensed at it."
Miss Davenal had been listening with her hand to her ear, and she heard pretty well. "Do you know the particulars of the calamity?" she asked. "Is the mine irretrievably ruined!"
"I don't know anything, except that I'm fit to go mad," she answered, beginning to sob like a petulant child.
In that one first moment of the blow Miss Davenal was generous enough to spare reproaches for all the folly of the past, though she had plenty at her tongue's end. She had not sat down since she entered; she had stood rigid and upright; and when she went out to the fly she ordered it to Mr. Oswald Cray's.
"Tell the man to drive quickly," said Miss Bettina to Neal. "What do you say, Sara? Let you stop with Caroline? Caroline wants neither you nor me; I can see that. There'll be trouble over this."
Mrs. Cray had not chosen an inapt word when she said Oswald must be incensed against Mark. It was precisely Oswald's present state of feeling. He saw that the thousand pounds had been nothing but a stopgap; not drawn from him for his own good and benefit, as Mark so largely boasted, but for Mark's own necessities. And as to the two hundred pounds of the previous night, the money of the firm--Oswald did boil over at the thought of that. Oh, why could not Mark have been upright and open! why could he not have gone to Oswald with the truth upon his lip, and said, Let me have this two hundred pounds in my dire necessity, and I will repay you when I can! Oswald was not the brother to refuse him.
Oswald had had a battle with himself. When he returned home after that scene in the city, feeling that his money, the twelve hundred pounds, was irretrievably lost, he sat down and thought. Should he cancel the offer made to Frank Allister to go out to Spain, and take the appointment himself, as at first intended? Was he justified in foregoing it, under this unexpected loss? The same considerations swayed him now as previously; his own interest versus Frank's health, perhaps life; but how weighty a balance was now thrown into his own scale!
If ever Oswald had need of a better guidance than his own, he had need now. And he was conscious of it. He had many failings, as we all have; and his pride often stood in his way; but he had one great and good gift--a conscience that was ever prompting him on the upward way.
"No, I will not hesitate," he said to himself. "The necessity for Allister's going remains the same, and he shall go. I must overget this other loss as I best can, though it may be years first, but I'll not set my own interest against Allister's life."
And so Frank Allister and his sister received no countermand, and they proceeded to Mr. Oswald Cray's that evening, to talk over arrangements, as it had been decided they should; and they never knew the sacrifice that had been made for them, or had the least suspicion that Mr. Oswald Cray had yielded up the appointment.
When Miss Davenal and Sara arrived, Mrs. Benn received them. That errant husband of hers and valued servant of the firm, was out again. This wasnotMrs. Benn's cleaning-day; but any little extra duty, though it was but the receiving a visitor at unusual hours, put her out excessively; and it was not usual for a levee of ladies to attend the house in an evening. She appeared at the door with the ordinary crusty face and a candle in her hand.
"Is Mr. Oswald Cray at home?" was Neal's demand.
"Yes, he is," returned Mrs. Benn, speaking as if the question injured her very much indeed.
Neal stepped back to the fly, and opened the door for the ladies to alight. Mrs. Benn stared at the proceedings with all her eyes.
"Well, if this don't bang everything!" she ejaculated, partly to herself, partly to the street. "If he was agoing to have a party tonight, he might have told me, I think. And that there Benn to go out, and never light the hall-lamp first! It cracks my arms to do it: a nasty, high, awk'ard thing! Will he be for ordering tea for 'em, I wonder I when there ain't nothing but a hot loaf in the house, and one pat o' but--"
"Show me to Mr. Oswald Cray's private rooms," came the interrupting voice of Miss Davenal, as she entered.
"This way," returned sulky Mrs. Benn; "there's one of them there already."
The "one of 'em" must have applied to the assumed evening party, for in the sitting-room sat Jane Allister. Her bonnet was off, her shawl was unpinned; her fair face was serene and contented, as though she were in her own home. Miss Davenal bowed stiffly in her surprise, and the rebellious jealousy rose up in Sara's heart.
"Is Mr. Oswald Cray not here?" asked Miss Davenal, halting on the threshold.
Jane Allister came forward with her good and candid face, and Miss Davenal's reserved tone relaxed. "Mr. Oswald Cray is downstairs with my brother and another gentleman. They are settling some business together; I don't think they will be long."
Miss Davenal did not hear, but Sara repeated the words to her. They sat down; and Miss Allister, finding the elder lady was deaf, took her seat by Sara.
"I came here tonight to settle particulars about our Spanish journey," explained Jane Allister, as if in apology for being found there. "I am going to live in Spain."
Sara heard it as one in a dream. Oswald Cray was going to Spain for a lengthened residence: he had told her so when she was in that room a fortnight ago. If Jane Allister was going with him, why then, it must be that they were going to be married immediately.
Her face flushed, her brow grew moist. In a sort of desperation, in her eager wish to know the worst at once, she turned to Jane Allister.
"Are you going with Mr. Oswald Cray?"
"I am going with my brother."
"With--your--brother! Andnotwith Mr. Oswald Cray?"
"No, surely not. How could I go with Mr. Oswald Cray? It would not be proper," she simply added.
"I--I thought--I meant as his wife," said poor Sara, all confused in her heart sickness. "I beg your pardon."
"As his wife!--Mr. Oswald Cray's! Nay, but that is an unlikely thing to fancy. I am not suitable to Mr. Oswald Cray. Do you know him?
"O yes."
"Then you might have been sure he'd not cast his thoughts to a plain body like me. Why should he? I am not his equal in position. He has been a brother to Frank, and I reverence him beyond any one I know as a good and true friend. That's all."
Why did her heart give a great bound of hope at the words, when she knew--when sheknewthat he was lost to her? Oswald Cray came bounding up the stairs, but a mist had gathered before Sara's eyes, and she saw nothing clearly.
"Frank is waiting for you, Jane. He will not come upstairs again."
"Does he know about everything?"
"Everything, I think. We have discussed it all, and he will tell you. But he is coming again in the morning."
Oswald had spoken as he shook hands with Miss Davenal. Another moment and they were alone together: the young Scotch lady had left the room.
"Mr. Oswald Cray, you must tell me all you know of this unhappy business, from beginning to end," said Miss Davenal. "I have come to you for the information, and I beg you to conceal nothing. Is Mark Cray in danger?"
Oswald scarcely knew in what sense to take the word. He hesitated as he looked at Miss Davenal.
"How has it all come about? Let me hear the whole of it; the best and the worst. His wife professes to know nothing, and it was of no use my asking her. The water has got into the mine."
"It is said to be overflowing it; but particulars are not ascertained yet," replied Oswald, as he proceeded to speak of what he knew.
It was not much, for he was nearly as much in the dark as they were. Miss Davenal listened with compressed lips.
At the conclusion of the interview, Oswald took Miss Davenal out to the fly upon his arm, placed her in it, and turned to Sara.
"The last time I saw you I had a journey in my head," he said in a low tone; "I told you I was going to Spain."
"Yes."
"I am not going now. I have given up the idea. We shall send out a gentleman instead; my friend, Frank Allister. Goodnight; goodnight, Miss Davenal."
Severely upright in the carriage sat Miss Davenal, her countenance one picture of condemnation for the absent Mark. Only once did she open her lips to Sara opposite to her, and that was as the carriage turned out of the glare and gas of the more populous streets to the quiet one which contained their home.
"What would your brother Edward say to this, were he at home?"
What would he say to something else? As the carriage drew up to the door, a female figure was slowly pacing before it, as if in waiting. And Sara shrank into the remotest corner of the carriage with a shiver of dread, for she recognised her for the stranger. Catherine Wentworth.