'Policeman'—Checkley pulled him aside and pointed to the little group at the window—'you see that old gentleman there—do you know him?'
'Certainly. Known him ever since I came to the Inn—two years ago. The people of the Inn have known him for ten years, I believe. That's Mr. Edmund Gray. He's not one of the regular residents, and he hasn't got an office. Comes here now and then when he fancies the place—Mr. Edmund Gray, that is. I wish all the gentlemen in the Inn were half as liberal as he is.'
'Oh! it's impossible! Say it again, Policeman. Perhaps I'm a little deaf—I'm very old, you know—a little deaf perhaps. Say it again.'
'What's the matter with the man?' For he was shaking violently, and his eyes stared. 'Of course that is Mr. Edmund Gray.'
'What does the girl do with him? Why are they both there together?'
'How should I know why she calls upon him? She's a young lady, and a sweet young thing too. He's her grandfather likely.'
Checkley groaned.
'I must go somewhere and think this out,' he said. 'Excuse me, Policeman. I am an old man, and—and— I've had a bit of a shock and—— Good-evening, Policeman.' He shaded his eyes again and looked up. Yes—there they were, talking. Then Elsie rose and he saw her putting on her hat. Then she retreated up the room. But still he stood watching.
'Not had enough yet, guv'nor?' asked the Policeman.
'Only a minute. I want to see her go out.—Yes—there they are—going out together. It is, after all—— Oh! there is no mistake.'
'There is no mistake, guv'nor,' said the Policeman. 'There goes Mr. Edmund Gray, and there goes that sweet young thing along of him.—Ah! there's many advantages about being a gentleman. No mistake, I say, about them two.—Now, old man, you look as if you'd had a surprise. Hadn't you better go home and take a drop of something?'
It was earlier than Checkley generally went to theSalutation. But he delayed no longer. He tottered across the Square, showing very much of extreme feebleness, looking neither to the right nor to the left, his cheek white, his eyes rolling. The people looked after him, expecting that he would fall. But he did not. He turned into the tavern, hobbled along the passage, and sank into an arm-chair in the parlour.
'Good gracious, Mr. Checkley!' cried the barmaid as he passed, 'whatever is the matter?'
Some of the usual company were already assembled, although it was as yet hardly eight. The money-lender was there, sitting in his corner, taking his tobacco and his grog in silence. The decayed Barrister was there, his glass of old and mild before him, reading the morning newspaper. The ex-M.P. was there. When Checkley tumbled into the room, they looked up in surprise. When he gazed about him wildly and gasped, they were astonished, for he seemed like unto one about to have a fit.
'Give me something, Robert—give me something,' he cried. 'Quick—something strong. I'll have it short. Quick—quick!'
Robert brought him a small glass of brandy, which he swallowed hastily.
'Oh!' he groaned, sitting up, 'I've seen— I've seen——'
'You look as if you had seen a ghost,' said the barmaid, who had come along with a glass of water. 'Shall I bathe your forehead?'
'No—no. I am better now—I am all right again.—Gentlemen'—he looked round the room solemnly—'I've seen this evening a good man—an old man—a great man—a rich man; gentlemen, wrecked and cast away and destroyed and ruined. With a little devil of a woman to laugh at him!'
'They don't generally laugh at the men when they are ruined,' said Mr. Langhorne. 'They laugh while they are ruining them. It's fun to them. So it is to the men. Great fun it is while it lasts. I daresay the little woman won't really laugh at him. In my case——'
His case was left untold, because he stopped and buried his head in his newspaper.
Then Shylock spoke. He removed his pipe from his lips and spoke, moved, after his kind, by the mention of the wordswreck and ruin, just as the vulture pricks up its feathers at the word death.
'To see a rich man wrecked and ruined, Mr. Checkley, is a thing which a man may see every day. The thing is not to lose by their wreck—to make money out of it. Rich men are always being wrecked and ruined. What else can you expect if men refuse to pay their interest and to meet their bills? The melancholy thing—ah! the real sadness—is the ruin of a man who has trusted his fellow creatures and got taken in for his pains. Only this morning I find that I've been let in by a swindler—a common swindler, gentlemen—who comes round and says he can't pay up—can't pay up—and I'm welcome to the sticks.—Which kind of man might your friend be, Mr. Checkley, the man who's trusted his neighbour and got left—or the neighbour who's ramped the man that trusted him?'
'It isn't money at all,' Checkley replied.
'Then, sir, if it isn't money,' said the money-lender, 'I don't know why you come in frightening this honourable company out of their wits. If it isn't money, how the devil can the gentleman be wrecked and ruined?'
For two hours Mr. Checkley sat in silence, evidently not listening to what was said. Then he turned to Mr. Langhorne the Barrister: 'You've known Mr. Edmund Gray a long time, I believe?'
'Nine years—ten years—since he came to the Inn.'
'Always the same man, I suppose?' said Checkley. 'Never another man—not sometimes a young man—or two young men—one rather a tall young man, looks as if the world was all his—supercilious beast?'
'Never more than one man at once,' replied the Barrister with a show of forensic keenness. 'He might have been two young men rolled into one; but not to my knowledge: always the same man to look at, so far as I know—and the same man to talk with.'
'Oh! yes—yes. There's no hope left—none. He's ruined and lost and cast away and done for.'
He rose and walked out. The company looked after him and shook their heads. Then they drew their chairs a little closer, and the gap made by his departure vanished.
When Mr. Dering arrived at his office next morning he observed that his table had not been arranged for him. Imagine the surprise of the housewife should she come down to breakfast and find the ham and the toast and the tea placed upon the table without the decent cloth! With such eyes did Mr. Dering gaze upon the pile of yesterday's letters lying upon his blotting-pad, the pens in disorder, the papers heaped about anyhow, the dust of yesterday everywhere. Such a thing had never happened before in his whole experience of fifty-five years. He touched his bell sharply.
'Why,' he asked, hanging up his coat without turning round, 'why is not my table put in order?' He turned and saw his clerk standing at the open door.—'Good Heavens! Checkley, what is the matter?'
For the ancient servitor stood with drooping head and melancholy face and bent shoulders. His hands hung down in the attitude of one who waits to serve. But he did not serve. He stood still and he made no reply.
He understood now. Since the apparition of South Square he had had time to reflect. He now understood the whole business from the beginning to the end. One hand there was, and only one, concerned with the case. Now he understood the meaning of the frequent fits of abstraction, the long silences, this strange forgetfulness which made his master mix up days and hours, and caused him to wonder what he had done and where he had been on this and that evening. And somebody else knew. The girl knew. She had told her lover. She had told her brother. That was why the new Partner laughed and defied them. It was on his charge that young Arundel had been forced to leave the country. It was he who declared that he had seen him place the stolen notes in the safe. It was he who had charged young Austin and whispered suspicions into the mind of Sir Samuel. Now the truth would come out, and they would all turn upon him, and his master would have to be told. Who would tell him? Howcould they tell him? Yet he must be told. And what would be done to the jealous servant? And how could the old lawyer, with such a knowledge about himself, continue to work at his office? All was finished. He would be sent about his business. His master would go home and stay there—with an attendant. How could he continue to live without his work to do? What would he do all day? With whom would he talk? Everything finished and done with. Everything——
He stood, therefore, stricken dumb, humble, waiting for reproof.
'Are you ill, Checkley? asked Mr. Dering. 'You look ill. What is the matter?
'I am not ill,' he replied in a hollow voice, with a dismal shake of the head. 'I am not exactly ill. Yes, I am ill. I tried to put your table in order for you this morning, but I couldn't, I really couldn't. I feel as if I couldn't never do anything for you—never again. After sixty years' service, it's hard to feel like that.'
He moved to the table and began mechanically laying the papers straight.
'No one has touched your table but me for sixty years. It's hard to think that another hand will do this for you—and do it quite as well, you'll think. That's what we get for faithful service.' He put the papers all wrong, because his old eyes were dimmed with unaccustomed moisture. Checkley had long since ceased to weep over the sorrows of others, even in the most moving situations, when, for instance, he himself carried off the sticks instead of the rent. But no man is so old that he cannot weep over his own misfortunes. Checkley's eye was therefore dimmed with the tear of Compassion, which is the sister of Charity.
'I do not understand you this morning, Checkley. Have you had any unpleasantness with Mr. Austin—with any of the people?'
'No—no. Only that I had better go before I am turned out. That's all. That's all'—he repeated the words in despair. 'Nothing but that.'
'Who is going to turn you out? What do you mean, Checkley? What the devil do you mean by going on like this? Am I not master here? Who can turn you out?'
'You can, sir, and you will—and I'd rather, if you'll excusethe liberty, go out of my own accord. I'm a small man—only a very small man—but, thank God! I've got enough to give me a crust of bread and cheese to live upon.'
'I tell you what, Checkley: you had better go home and lie down and rest a little. You are upset. Now, at our age we can't afford to be upset. Go home, and be easy. Old friends don't part quite so easily as you think.' Mr. Dering spoke kindly and gently. One must be patient with so old a servant.
Checkley sobbed and choked. Like a child he sobbed. Like a child of four, Checkley choked and sniffed. 'You don't understand,' he said. 'Oh, no—you can't understand. It's what I saw last night.'
'This is very wonderful. What did you see? A ghost?'
'Worse than a ghost—who cares for a ghost? Ghosts can't turn a man out of his place and bring him to be a laughingstock. No—no. It was a man that I saw, not a ghost.'
'If you can find it possible to talk reasonably'—Mr. Dering took his chair and tore open an envelope—'when you can find it possible to talk reasonably, I will listen. Meantime, I really think that you had better go home and lie down for an hour or two. Your nerves are shaken; you hardly know what you are saying.'
'I was in Gray's Inn yesterday evening. By accident, at eight.' He spoke in gasps, watching his master curiously. 'By accident—not spying. No—by accident. On my way to my club—at theSalutation. Walking through South Square. Not thinking of anything. Looking about me—careless-like.'
'South Square, Gray's Inn. That is the place where the man Edmund Gray lives: the man we want to find and cannot find.'
'Oh! Lord! Lord!' exclaimed the clerk. 'Is it possible?' He lifted his hand and raised his eyes to heaven and groaned. Then he resumed his narrative.
'Coming through the passage, I looked up to the windows of No. 22—Mr. Edmund Gray's Chambers, you know.'
'I believe so.' Mr. Dering's face betrayed no emotion at all. 'Go on; I am told so.'
'In the window I saw Mr. Edmund Gray himself—himself.'
'Curious. You have seen him—but why not?'
'The man we've all been so anxious to find. The man who endorsed the cheque and wrote the letters and got the papers—there he was!'
'Question of identity. How did you know him, since you had never seen him before?'
This question Checkley shirked.
'He came down-stairs five minutes afterwards, while I was still looking up at the windows. Came down-stairs, and walked out of the Square—made as if he was going out by way of Raymond's Buildings—much as if he might be going to Bedford Row.'
'These details are unimportant. Again—how did you know him?'
'I asked the Policeman who the gentleman was. He said it was Mr. Edmund Gray. I asked the newspaper boy at the Holborn entrance. He said it was Mr. Edmund Gray, and that everybody knew him.'
'So everybody knows him. Well, Checkley, I see nothing so very remarkable about your seeing a man so well known in the Inn. It adds nothing to our knowledge. That he exists, we know already. What share, if any, he has had in this case of ours remains still a mystery. Unless, that is, you have found out something else.'
Checkley gazed upon his master with a kind of stupor. 'No—no,' he murmured. 'I can't.'
'What did you do, when you found out that it was the man?'
'Nothing.'
'You did nothing. Well—under the circumstances I don't know what you could have done.'
'And he walked away.'
'Oh! He walked away. Very important indeed.—But, Checkley, this story does not in the least account for your strange agitation this morning. Have you anything more to tell me? I see that you have, but you seem to experience more than usual difficulty in getting it out.'
The clerk hesitated. 'Do you,' he asked at last—'do you—happen—to know Gray's Inn?'
'I daresay I have been there—years ago. Why?'
'Oh! you haven't been there lately, have you?'
'Not lately—not for forty years, or some such inconsiderable period. Why?'
'I thought you might yourself have met Mr. Edmund Gray—been to his Chambers, perhaps.'
Mr. Dering sat upright and laid his hand upon his letters. 'Checkley,' he said, 'I am always willing to make allowance for people in mental distress, but I think I have made allowance enough. Come to the point. Have you lost any money?'
'No—no; not so bad as that—but bad enough. No, I couldn't afford to lose money. I haven't got enough to spare any. But I got a shock—a kind of stroke—partly because of the man I met, and partly because of the person with him.'
'Oh! who was that? Are we arriving at something?'
'I hadn't told you that. The person who was sitting at the open window with him, who came down-stairs with him, and walked out of the Square with him, was no other than your own ward, Miss Elsie Arundel herself!'
'Oh! why not?' asked Mr. Dering carelessly. 'She told me yesterday, was it? that she knows him.'
'If it had been anyone else she was with,' he replied, mixing up his grammar—'if it had been anyone else who was with her—I wouldn't have been surprised! But to see the two together. That gave me a turn that I can't get over.'
'Still—why not? Miss Elsie Arundel has already told me that she is acquainted with Mr. Edmund Gray.'
'What? She has told you—she has actually told you? Oh! what has she told you? Oh! Lord! Lord! What is a man to say or to do? She told you—what is best to do?' He wrung his hands in his distress and his perplexity.
'I cannot understand, Checkley,' said Mr. Dering with emphasis, 'the reason for this display of excitement. Why should she not tell me or anybody else? Do you suppose that my ward is doing anything clandestine? She has told me that she is acquainted with this man. She asserts further—that we have made a great mistake about him. What she means, I cannot understand. She says, in fact, that this gentleman is a perfectly honourable person. It is possible that he has deceived her. It is also possible that the name of Edmund Gray has been wrongfully used in the papers which belong to the case. Certainly it was an Edmund Gray who endorsed the first cheque; and an Edmund Gray having an address at 22 South Square whose name is connected with the later business. Well, we shall see presently.—When do you take outthe warrant for the arrest of this man? By the way, Elsie Arundel implores me not to allow that step. When are you going to do it?'
'This morning, I was going to do it. Everything is ready—but——'
'But what?'
'I can't do it now.'
'The man is clean gone off his head.'
'Leave it till to-morrow—only to-morrow, or Monday. Before then, something is certain to turn up. Oh! certain sure it is. Something must turn up.'
'There is certainly something that you are keeping behind, Checkley. Well—wait till Monday. To-day is Saturday. He can't do very much mischief between this and Monday.—That's enough about Edmund Gray. Now, here is another point, to which I want a direct answer from you. My brother asserts, I believe on your authority, that Athelstan Arundel has been living in a low and profligate manner in some London suburb, and that he was in rags and poverty early this year. What is your authority for this?'
'Why, I heard him confess—or not deny—that he'd been living in Camberwell in bad company. It was at theSalutationI heard it. He didn't see me. I'd got my head behind a paper. He never denied it.'
'Humph!—And about the rags?'
'I don't know anything about the rags.'
'Very likely there is as much foundation for the one charge as for the other. Three or four years ago, he was in America, to my knowledge. He wrote to me from America. I now learn, on the authority of his sister, that he only came back a month ago, and that he has been and is still in the service of an American paper. What have you got to say to that?'
'Nothing. I don't feel as if I could say anything. It's all turned upsy down. That won't do, I suppose, no more than the rest.'
'But, my friend, if that is true, your theory of conspiracy and confederacy, which you took so much pains to build up, falls to the ground as far as Athelstan is concerned.'
'Yes.— Oh! I haven't nothing to say.' It was a mark of the trouble which possessed him that his language reverted to that of his young days, before he had learned the art ofcorrect speech from the copying of legal documents. He preserved the same attitude with bent head and hanging hands, a sad and pitiful object.
'Since Athelstan was not in London during the months of March and April, he could have had no hand in the later forgeries. And it is acknowledged that the same hand was concerned both in the earlier and the later business.'
'Yes—yes—the same hand. Oh! yes—the same hand,' he repeated with pathos unintelligible to his master. 'The same hand—the same hand; yes—yes—the same hand—that's the devil of it—same hand done it all.'
'Then what becomes of your charge against my young Partner? You were extremely fierce about it. So was my brother. You had no proofs—nor had he. If the same hand was in both forgeries, it could not have been the hand of George Austin. What do you say to that?'
'Nothing. I'm never going'—still standing hands hanging—'to say anything again as long as I live.'
'But you were very fierce about it, Checkley. You must either find more proofs or withdraw your accusation.'
'Oh! if that's all, I withdraw— I withdraw everything.'
'Why did you bring that charge then, Checkley? You've been making yourself very busy over the character of my Partner. You have permitted yourself to say things in the office before the clerks about him. If it turns out that he has had nothing to do with the business, you will be in a very serious position.'
'I withdraw— I withdraw everything,' the old clerk replied, but not meekly. He was prepared to withdraw, but only because he was forced.
'Remember, too, that it was you who brought the charge against young Arundel.'
'I withdraw— I withdraw everything.'
'You went so far as to remember—the other day—having seen him replace the notes in the safe. What do you say to that?'
'I withdraw.'
'But it was a direct statement—the testimony of an eyewitness. Was it true or not?—I don't know you this morning, Checkley. First, you appear shaking and trembling: then you tell me things which seem in no way to warrant so much agitation. Next, you withdraw an accusation whichought never to have been made except with the strongest proof. And now you wish to withdraw an alleged fact.'
Checkley shook his head helplessly.
'I acknowledge that the business remains as mysterious as before. Nothing has been found out. But there remains an evident and savage animosity on your part towards two young gentlemen in succession. Why? What have they done to you?'
Checkley made reply in bold words, but still standing with hanging hands: 'I withdraw the animosity. I withdraw everything. As for young Arundel, he was a supercilious beast. We were dirt beneath his feet. The whole earth belonged to him. He used to imitate my ways of speaking, and he used to make the clerks laugh at me. I hated him then. I hate him still. It was fun to him that an old man, nigh seventy, with no education, shouldn't speak like a young gentleman of Oxford and Cambridge College. He used to stick his hat on the back of his head as if it was a crown, and he'd slam the door after him as if he was a Partner. I hated him. I was never so glad as when he ran away in a rage. He was coming between you and me, too.—Oh! I saw it. Cunning he was. Laying his lines for to come between you and me.'
'Why—you were jealous, Checkley.'
'I was glad when he ran away. And I always thought he'd done it, too. As for seeing him put the cheque back in the safe, I perceive now that I never did see him do it. Yet I seemed to think at the time that I'd remembered seeing him do a kind of a sort of a something like it. I now perceive that I was wrong. He never done it. He hadn't the wits to contrive it. That sort is never half sharp. Too fine gentleman for such a trick.—Oh! I know what you are going to say next. How about the second young fellow? I hate him too. I hate him because he's the same supercilious beast as the other, and because he's been able to get round you. He's carneyed you—no fool like an old fool—and flattered you—till you've made him a Partner. I've worked for you heart and soul for sixty years and more, and this boy comes in and cuts me out in a twelvemonth.'
'Well! but Checkley—hang it!—I couldn't make you a Partner.'
'You didn't want no Partners. You could do your work,and I could do mine and yours too, even if you did want to go asleep of an afternoon.'
'This is grave, however. You hated Mr. Austin, and therefore you bring against him this foul charge. This is very grave, Checkley.'
'No— I thought he was guilty. I did, indeed. Everything pointed that way. And I don't understand about young Arundel, because he came into theSalutationwith the Cambridge gentleman who gets drunk there every night, and he said that he lived at Camberwell for eight years with bad company as I wouldn't name to you, sir. I thought he was guilty. I did, indeed.'
'And now?'
'Oh! now it is all over. Everything's upsy down. Nobody's guilty. I know now that he hasn't had anything to do with it. He's a young man of very slow intelligence and inferior parts. He couldn't have had anything to do with it. We ought to have known that.'
'Well—but who has done it, after all?'
'That's it.' Checkley was so troubled that he dropped into a chair in the presence of his master. 'That's it. Who's done it? Don't you know who done it? No— I see you don't so much as suspect. No more don't I. Else—what to do—what to say—Lord only knows!' He turned and ran—he scuttled out of the room, banging the door behind him.
'He's mad,' said Mr. Dering. 'Poor man! Age makes some men forgetful, but it has driven Checkley mad.'
On that same evening the three accomplices—probably on the proceeds of their iniquities—were dining together at theSavoy. After dinner they sat on the verandah overlooking the river and the embankment. 'Tis sweet, what time the evening shades prevail, while one is still in the stage of physical comfort and mental peace attendant upon an artistic little banquet, to view from the serene heights of a balcony at that hotel the unquiet figures of those who flit backwardsand forwards below. They—alas!—have not dined so well, or they could not walk so fast, or drag their limbs so hopelessly, or lean over the wall so sadly.
Elsie leaned her head upon her hands, looking down upon this scene, though not quite with these thoughts. Young ladies who are quite happy, and are going to be married next week, do not make these comparisons. Happiness is selfish. When one is quite happy, everybody else seems quite happy too—even Lazarus and the leper. We must never be happy if we do not wish to be selfish.
Coffee was on the table. Athelstan had a cigar. They were all three silent. During dinner they had talked gaily, because everybody knows that you cannot talk with strange people listening. After dinner they sat in silence, because it is only when the waiters are gone that one is free to talk.
'Elsie,' said George presently, 'you have something to tell us—something you have discovered. For my own part, since I handed the case over to anybody else, I feel as if I were not interested in it. But still, one would like to know—just for curiosity's sake—when Checkley is to be "run in."'
'Yes,' said Elsie, 'I must tell you. Perhaps I ought to have told you before. Yet there was a reason. Now—you will be greatly astonished, George.'
'Before you begin, Elsie '—Athelstan removed his cigar—'I must tell you that yesterday evening I, too, made a discovery—what the Americans call a pivotal discovery—a discovery that discovers everything. I should have told you last night, but you announced your communications for this evening, and I thought we would expose our discoveries at the same time.'
'You have found out too!' Elsie cried. 'I see by your face that you have. Well, Athelstan, so much the better. Now, tell your discovery first, and I will follow.'
'It is this. I have discovered Edmund Gray. I have sat with him and discoursed with him, in Freddy Carstone's Chambers. He came in, sat beside me, and conversed for more than an hour.'
'Oh!' said Elsie. 'Then you know all—as much as I know.'
'Observe,' George interposed, 'that I know nothing as yet.'
'Wait a moment, George. Learn that I have myself known Mr. Edmund Gray for a fortnight. You will think,perhaps, that I ought to have told you before. Well—but there is a reason—besides, the way, to begin with, did not lie quite clear before me. Now the time has come when you should advise as to the best course to follow.'
'You have certainly been more mysterious than any oracle, Elsie. Yet you will bear witness, if it comes to bearing witness, that I accepted your utterances and believed in them.'
'You certainly did, George.—And now, Athelstan, tell him the whole.'
'In one word then—Edmund Gray, the man we have been looking after so long, is none other than Edward Dering, of 12 New Square, Lincoln's Inn, Solicitor.'
'I don't understand,' said George, bewildered. 'Say it all again.'
Athelstan repeated his words.
'That is my discovery, too,' said Elsie. 'Now you know all, as you understand.'
'But I don't understand. How can one man be another man?'
'I sat beside one man,' Athelstan added, 'for an hour and more; and lo! all the time he was another man.'
'And still I am fogged. What does it mean?'
'It means, George, what you would never suspect. The one man received me as a stranger. He knew nothing about me: he had never heard my name, even. Yet the other man knows me so well. It was very odd at first. I felt as if I was talking to a sleep-walker.'
'Oh!' cried George, 'I know now. You have seen Mr. Dering in a kind of sleep-walking state— I too have seen him thus. But he said nothing.'
'You may call it sleep-walking if you like. But, George, there is another and a more scientific name for it. The old man is mad. He has fits of madness, during which he plays another part, under another name. Now, do you understand?'
'Yes—but—is it possible?'
'It is more than possible; it is an actual certainty. Wait. Let Elsie tell her story.'
Then Elsie began, with a little air of triumph, because it is not given to every young lady to find out what all the men have failed to find.
'Well—you see—I was always thinking over this business, and wondering why nothing was found out about it, and watching you look this way and that, and it occurred to me that the first thing of all was to find out this Mr. Edmund Gray and lay hands upon him. At first I thought I would just go and stand outside his door all day long and every day until he came. But that seemed a waste of time. So I remembered how you found his door open, and went in and spoke to the laundress. I thought that I would do the same thing, and sit down there and wait until he should come. But I was afraid to sit in the rooms of a strange man all alone—no, I could not do it. So I just found out the old woman—the laundress—as you did, George, and I gave her money, and she told me that Mr. Gray was at his Chambers almost every Saturday afternoon. Very well; if anybody chose to wait for him all Saturday afternoon, he would certainly be found. So on Saturday afternoon I took a cab and drove to Holborn, and got to the place before his arrival. But again, as it was not quite nice to stand at an open doorway in a public Square, I thought I would wait on the stairs. So I mounted—the doors were all closed—nobody was left in the place at all—I thought I should be perfectly safe and undisturbed, when I heard the noise of footsteps overhead—a tramp, tramp, tramp up and down, with every now and then a groan—like a hungry creature in a cage. This kept on for a long time, and frightened me horribly. I was still more frightened when a door overhead opened and shut and the footsteps came down-stairs. They belonged to a man—an elderly man—who seemed as much frightened at seeing me as I was at seeing him. He asked me whether I wanted any one; and when I said I wanted Mr. Edmund Gray, he said that he was a friend of Mr. Gray's, and that, since I was a friend too, I might act for Edmund Gray and lend him some money. He looked desperately poor and horribly hungry and thin and shabby, the poor old man!'
'So you acted for Edmund Gray. That was old Langhorne. He is a barrister, who lives in the garret, and is horribly down on his luck.—Go on.'
'Poor Elsie!' said George. 'Think of her, all alone on the staircase!'
'When he was gone, there was no sound at all. The place was perfectly quiet. The time passed so slowly—oh! soslowly. At last, however, I heard a step. It came up the stairs. Oh! my heart began to beat. Suppose it should be Mr. Edmund Gray. Suppose it was some other person. Suppose it was some horror of a man! But I had not long to wait, because Mr. Edmund Gray himself stood on the landing. He stared at me, rather surprised to find a young lady on the stairs, but he showed no sign of recognition whatever. I was a complete stranger to him.'
'And was the man Mr. Dering?'
'He was—Mr. Dering. There was just the least little change in him. He wore his coat open instead of buttoned. He had no gloves, his hat was not pulled over his eyes, and his face was somehow lighter and brighter than usual.'
'That is so,' said Athelstan. 'Exactly with these little changes he presented himself to me.'
'Perhaps there is another man in the world exactly like him.'
'Futile remark!—Go on, Elsie.'
'Then I guessed in a moment what it meant. I stepped forward and asked him if he was Mr. Edmund Gray. And then I followed him into his rooms.—George, there is no manner of doubt whatever. Mr. Dering has periods, whether regular or not I cannot tell, when he loses himself and becomes in imagination another man. He is mad, if you like, but there is method in his madness. The other man is just himself turned inside out. Mr. Dering believes in the possible wickedness of everybody: the other man believes in the actual goodness of every man. Mr. Dering considers Property the only stable foundation of Society: the other man considers Property the root of all evil. Mr. Dering is hard and jealous: the other man is full of geniality and benevolence. Mr. Dering is Justice: the other man is Mercy.'
'Very neatly put, Elsie. There is quite an eighteenth-century balance about your sentences and sentiments. So far'—Athelstan contributed his confirmation—'so far as I could judge, nothing could be more true. I found my man the exact opposite of himself.'
'Can such a thing be possible? If I were to speak to him, would he not know me?'
'You forget, George. You have seen him in that condition, and he did not know you.'
'Nothing is more common'—Athelstan the Journalistbegan to draw upon the encyclopædic memory which belongs to his profession—'than such a forgetfulness of self. Have you ever been into a Lunatic Asylum? I have—for professional purposes. I have discoursed with the patients, and been instructed by the physicians. Half the time many of the patients are perfectly rational: during the other half they seem to assume another mind with other memories. It is not real possession, as the ancients called it, because they never show knowledge other than what they have learned before. Thus, a sane man who cannot draw would never in insanity become an artist. So Mr. Dering, when he is mad, brings the same logical power and skill to bear upon a different set of maxims and opinions. Said a physician to me at this asylum of which I speak: "There are thousands of men and women, but especially men, who are mad every now and then, and don't know it. Most of the crimes are, I believe, committed in moments of madness. A young fellow steals money—it is because at the moment he is so mad that he even persuades himself that borrowing is not stealing: that he is only borrowing: that he can get it back, and put it back before it is found out. What is uncontrollable rage but sudden madness? There are the men who know that they are mad on some point or other, and cunningly hide it, and are never found out. And there are the men who are mad and don't know it. In their mad times they commit all kinds of extravagances and follies, yet somehow they escape detection." So he talked; and he told me of a man who was a lawyer in one town with a wife and family, and also a lawyer in another with a different wife and family. But one lawyer never found out the other; and the thing was only discovered when the man got a paralytic stroke and died in a kind of bewilderment, because, when the time came for him to be the other man, he found himself lying in a strange bedroom with a strange family round him. I had long forgotten the asylum. I did the place for my paper three or four years ago, and scored by the description. Since last night I have been recalling my experience and applying it. You see there can never be any physical change. This is no Hyde and Jekyll business. Whatever happens must be conducted with the same body and the same mind. The same processes of mind in which the man is trained remain, but his madness requires a new setting.'
'One cannot understand,' said Elsie.
'No. But then one cannot understand everything. That's the real beauty of this world: we are planted in the midst of things: we can give names to them—Adam began that way, didn't he?—but we can't understand any of them; and most people think that when we have given a name we have succeeded in understanding. Well, Elsie—we don't understand. But we may find out something. I take it that the other man grew up by degrees in his brain, so that there is no solution in the continuity of thought and recollection. The Edmund Gray developed himself. He has been developed for nearly ten years, since he has occupied the same Chambers all the time.'
'But about the forgeries?' George sprang to his feet. 'I declare,' he cried, 'that I had quite forgotten the real bearing on our case.'
'Edmund Gray,' said Elsie, 'says that his own lawyer who manages his affairs is Edward Dering. If he were to write letters while Edmund Gray, he would not impose upon Edward Dering.'
'He cannot write to two men,' said Athelstan. 'There must be a border-land between the waking and the dreaming, when the two spirits of Edmund Gray and Edward Dering contend for the mastery, or when they command each other—when Edmund Gray endorses cheques and Edward Dering writes letters and conducts transfers for his client—his double—himself.'
'I have seen him in such a state,' said George. 'At the time I never suspected anything but a passing trouble of mind, which caused him to be so wrapped up in his thoughts as not to be able to distinguish anything. He was then, I doubt not now, carrying out the instructions of Edmund Gray, or he was Edmund Gray acting for himself. Checkley whispered not to disturb him. He said that he had often seen him so.'
'I have never tried to understand,' said Elsie. 'But I saw that Edmund Gray was Mr. Dering gone mad, and that he himself, and nobody else, was the perpetrator of all these forgeries; and I have been trying to discover the best way—the kindest way to him—the surest way for us, of getting the truth known.—George, this is the secret of my mysterious movements. This is why I have not given you a single eveningfor a whole fortnight. Every evening—both Sundays—I have spent with this dear old man. He is the most delightful—the most gentle—the most generous—old man that you ever saw. He is full of ideas—oh! quite full—and they carry you out of yourself, until you awake next morning to find that they are a dream. I have fallen in love with him. I have had the most charming fortnight—only one was always rather afraid that he might come to himself, which would be awkward.'
'Well, Elsie, have you found a way?'
'I think I have. First, I have discovered that when he is surrounded with things that remind him of Edmund Gray, he remains Edmund Gray. Next, I have found out that I can, by talking to him even at his office, when he has his papers before him, turn him into Edmund Gray.'
'You are a witch, Elsie.'
'She is,' said George, looking at her in the foolish lover's way. 'You see what she has turned me into—a long time ago, and she has never turned me back again.'
'I have been thinking too,' said Athelstan. 'For our purposes, it would be enough to prove the identity of Edmund Gray and Edward Dering. That explains the resemblance of the handwriting and of the endorsement. My commissionaire's recollection of the man also identifies the cheque as drawn by himself for himself under another name. It explains the presence of the notes in the safe. It also shows that the long series of letters which passed between him and the broker were written by himself for himself. Here, however, is a difficulty. I can understand Edward Dering believing himself to be Edmund Gray, because I have seen it. But I cannot understand Edward Dering believing himself to be the Solicitor to Edmund Gray and writing at his command.'
'But I have seen him in that condition,' said Elsie. 'It was while he was changing from one to the other. He sat like one who listens. I think that Edmund Gray was at his elbow speaking to him. I think I could make him write a letter by instruction from Edmund Gray. That he should believe himself acting for a client in writing to the broker is no more wonderful than that he should believe himself another man altogether.'
'Show me, if you can, the old man acting for an imaginaryclient. Meantime, I mentioned the point as a difficulty. Prove, however, to Mr. Dering and to the others concerned that he is Edmund Gray, and all is proved. And this we can do by a host of witnesses.'
'I want more than this, Athelstan,' said Elsie. 'It would still be open to the enemy to declare that George, or you, or I, had made use of his madness for our own purposes. I want a history of the whole case written out by Edmund Gray himself—a thing that we can show to Mr. Dering and to everybody else. But I dread his discovery. Already he is suspicious and anxious. I sometimes think that he is half conscious of his condition. We must break it to him as gently as we can. But the shock may kill him. Yet there is no escape. If the forgeries were known only to ourselves, we might keep the discovery a secret; and only if necessary—but it would not be necessary—keep some sort of watch over him and warn the Bank. But Checkley has told the clerks and the people at the Bank, and there are ourselves to think of and my mother and Hilda.—No; we must let them all know.'
'And if one may mention one's self,' said Athelstan, 'my own little difficulty presses. Because, you see, I don't know how long I may be kept here. Perhaps to-morrow I might go on to St. Petersburg or to Pekin. Before I go, Elsie, I confess that I should like my mother to understand that—that she was a little hasty—that is all.'
'You are not going to St. Petersburg, brother.' Elsie took his hand. 'You are not going to leave us anymore. You are going to stay. I have made another discovery.'
'Pray, if one may ask——'
'Oh! you may ask. I saw a letter to-day—Mr. Dering showed it to me. It was written from the States three or four years ago. It showed where you were at that time and showed me more, Athelstan—it showed me how you lost the pile of money that you made over that silver mine—you remember, Athelstan?'
He made no reply.
'Oh! do you think that I am going to accept this sacrifice? George, you do not know. The donor of that great sum of money which Mr. Dering held for me—we have often wondered who it was. I have only found out to-day—it was Athelstan. He gave me all he had for such a trifling thing—only because I would not believe that he was a villain—allhe had in the world—and went out again into the cold. He said he dropped his money down a gully or a grating on the prairie—some nonsense. And he sent it all to me, George.—What shall we do?'
'Is this really true, Athelstan? Did you really give up all this money to Elsie?'
'She says so.'
'It is quite true, George. I saw the letter—Mr. Dering showed it to me—in which he sent that money home, and begged Mr. Dering to take care of it, and to give it to me on the day when I should be one-and-twenty. He cannot deny it. Look at him. He blushes—he is ashamed—he hangs his head—he blows tobacco-smoke about in clouds, hoping to hide his red cheeks. And he talks of going on to St. Petersburg, when we know this secret, and have got the money! What do you call this conduct, George?'
'Athelstan—there is no word for it. But you must have it back. You must, and shall. There can be no discussion about it. And there is not another man in the world, I believe, who would have done it.'
'Nonsense. I should only have lost it, if I had kept it,' Athelstan replied after the Irish fashion.
'You hear, Athelstan. It is yours. There can be no discussion. That's what I like a man for. While we women are all talking and disputing, the man puts down his foot and says: "There can be no discussion." Then we all stop, and the right thing is done. It is yours, brother; and you shall have it, and you shall stay at home with us always and always.' She laid her hand upon his shoulder, and her arm round his neck, caressing him with hand and voice.
The man who had wandered alone for eight years was not accustomed to sisterly caresses. They moved him. The thing itself moved him.
'All this belongs to another chapter,' he said huskily. 'We will talk of it afterwards, when the business in hand is despatched.
'Well, then—that is agreed. You are to have your money back: my mother is to take her suspicions back: Mr. Dering is to have his certificates back and his dividends: Checkley is to take his lies back: Sir Samuel is to have his charges back: George and I are going to have our peace of mind back. And we are all going to live happy ever afterwards.'
'As for Wednesday now,' said George. 'It is not an unimportant day for us, you know.'
'Everything is ready. On Sunday morning my mother is always at home before Church. I will see her then, and acquaint her with the news that the wedding will take place as originally proposed, at her house. This will astonish her very much, and she will become angry and polite and sarcastic. Then I shall tell her to prepare not only for a wedding feast, but also for a great, a very great surprise. And I shall also inform her that I shall be given away by my brother. And then—then—if I know my mother aright, she will become silent. I shall do that to-morrow morning.—In the evening, George, you will get your best-man, and I will get your sisters, my bridesmaids, and we will come here, or go to Richmond or somewhere—and have dinner and a cheerful evening.—Am I arranging things properly?'
'Quite properly. Pray go on.'
'Sunday afternoon I have promised to spend with my master—Edmund Gray. He is going to read me a new Paper he has just finished, in which he shows that Property can be destroyed by a painless process—Athelstan, put all your money into your pocket and keep it there—in less than a twelvemonth, and with it all crime—all sweating, all injustice.—No, Athelstan, he is not mad. When he argues on this theme he is persuasive and eloquent. He convinces everybody. I shall hear him out, and then I shall try to make him write down all that has happened. If we can only get such a confession, it would be better than anything else. But it may be difficult. He does not like being questioned about himself. If I do succeed—I don't know quite what I ought to do next. He must be told. Some time or other he must have the truth. I thought of asking all the people mentioned to meet at his office on Monday morning at noon when Mr. Dering is always himself. On Sunday I would not. He has to address his people on Sunday evening. Let him do so undisturbed. I will leave him in happiness that one night longer. But you two—you will be anxious. Come on Sunday evening—between eight and nine—to the Hall of Science. Then you will hear him and see me. And I will let you know how I have prospered.'
'Sunday evening,' said George. 'Monday comes next, then Tuesday, and before Wednesday, my Elsie, the characterof these two convicts has to be completely whitewashed, even to the satisfaction of Hilda herself. Are we not running it pretty close?'
'Unbeliever! Doubter! I tell you that you shall be married with all your friends round you, and that Athelstan shall give me away. And you shall go away on your holiday with a quiet heart and nothing to trouble you. What a foolish boy not to be able to trust his bride even for such a simple thing as getting a confession out of a madman!'
'Do you sport a crest, old man?' asked Athelstan.
'I believe there is some kind of a sort of a thing somewhere around. But crests are foolishness.'
'Not always. Take a new one, George—a real one. Stamp it on your spoons and forks and in your books and on your carriage. Let it be simply the words, "Dux Femina Facti."'
'Can you spare me a few minutes, mother?'
Mrs. Arundel looked up from the desk where she was writing a letter, and saw her daughter standing before her. She started and changed colour, but quickly recovered, and replied coldly: 'I did not hear you come in, Elsie. What do you want with me?'
Outside, the bells were ringing for Church: it was a quarter to eleven: Mrs. Arundel was already dressed for Church. She was one of those who do not see any incongruity between Church and a heart full of animosities. She was bitter against her daughter, and hard towards her son, and she hated her son-in-law elect with all the powers of her passionate nature. But, my brothers, what an array of bare benches should we see in every place of worship were those only admitted who came with hearts of charity and love!
'Do you wish to keep me long, Elsie? If so, we will sit down. If not, I am ready for Church, and I do not like to arrive late. People in our position should show a good example.'
'I do not think that I shall keep you very long. But if you sit down, you will be so much more comfortable.'
'Comfort, Elsie, you have driven out of this house.'
'I will bring it back with me, then. On Monday evening, mother, I am coming back.'
'Oh! What do you mean, child? Has the blow really fallen? I heard that it was impending. Is the young man—is he—a prisoner?'
'No, mother. You are quite mistaken. You have been mistaken all along. Yet I shall come back on Monday.'
'Alone, then?'
'I shall leave it to you whether I come back alone, or with the two men whom I most regard of all the world—my lover and my brother.'
'You know my opinions, Elsie. There has been no change in them. There can be none.'
'Wednesday is my wedding day.'
'I am not interested in that event, Elsie. After your wedding with such a man, against the opinions, the wishes, the commands of all whom you are bound to respect, I can only say that you are no longer my daughter.'
'Oh! How can you be so fixed in such a belief? Mother, let me make one more appeal to your better feelings. Throw off these suspicions. Believe me, they are baseless. There is not the shadow of a foundation for this ridiculous structure they have raised. Consider. It is now—how long?—three weeks since they brought this charge, and they have proved nothing—absolutely nothing. If you would only be brought to see on what false assumptions the whole thing rests.'
'On solid foundations—hard facts—I want no more.'
'If I could prove to you that Athelstan was in America until a month ago.'
'Unhappy girl! He is deceiving you. He has been living for eight years in profligacy near London. Elsie, do not waste my time. It should be enough for me that my son-in-law, Sir Samuel Dering, a man of the clearest head and widest experience, is convinced that it is impossible to draw any other conclusions.'
'It is enough for me,' Elsie rejoined quickly, 'that my heart tells me that my brother and my lover cannot be such creatures.'
'You have something more to say, I suppose.' Mrs.Arundel buttoned her gloves. The clock was now at five minutes before eleven.
'Yes. If it is no use at all trying to appeal to——'
'No use at all,' Mrs. Arundel snapped. 'I am not disposed for sentimental nonsense.'
'I am sorry, because you will be sorry afterwards. Well, then, I have come to tell you that I have made all the preparations, with George's assistance, for Wednesday.'
'Oh!'
'Yes. The wedding cake will be sent in on Tuesday. My own dress—white satin, of course, very beautiful—is finished and tried on. It will be sent in on Monday evening. The two bridesmaids' dresses will also come on Monday. George has arranged at the Church. He has ordered the carriages and the bouquets and has got the ring. The presents you have already in the house. We shall be married at three. There will be a little gathering of the cousins after the wedding, and you will give them a little simple dinner in the evening, which will, I daresay, end with a little dance. George has also seen to the red cloth for the steps and all that. Oh! And on Tuesday evening you will give a big dinner party to everybody.'
'Are you gone quite mad, Elsie?'
'Not mad at all, my dear mother. It is Sir Samuel who is mad, and has driven you and Hilda mad. Oh! everything will come off exactly as I tell you. Perhaps you don't believe it.'
'You are mad, Elsie. You are certainly mad.'
'No, my dear mother, I am not mad. Oh! it is so absurd, if it were not so serious. But we are determined, George and I, not to make this absurdity the cause of lasting bitterness. Therefore, my dear mother, I do not want to be married from my brother's lodgings, but from your house. You will come to my wedding, I prophesy, full of love—full of love'—her eyes filled with tears—'for me and for George—and for Athelstan—full of love and of sorrow and of self-reproach. I am to be given away by my brother—you will come, I say, with a heart full of love and of pity for him.'
Mrs. Arundel gazed at her stonily.
'Everybody will be there, and you will receive all your friends after the wedding. I have taken care of the invitations. Hilda will be there too, horribly ashamed of herself. It will be a lovely wedding; and we shall go away with such good wishes from yourself as you would not in your presentstate of mind believe possible. Go now to Church, my dear mother, prepared for a happy and a joyful day.'
'I sometimes believe, Elsie,' said Mrs. Arundel, more coldly still, 'that you have been deprived of your senses. So far from this, I shall not be present at your wedding. I will not interfere with your holding your marriage here, if you like; you may fill the house with your friends, if you please. I shall myself take shelter with my more dutiful daughter. I refuse to meet my unhappy son; I will not be a consenting party to the tie which will entail a lifelong misery——'
'My dear mother—you will do everything exactly as I have prophesied.—Now, do not say any more, because it will only make our reconciliation a little more difficult. I ought to go to Church on the Sunday before my wedding if any day in the week. If you would only recover your trust in my lover's honour, I could go to Church with you and kneel beside you. But without that trust—— Oh! go, my dear mother. You will find my prophecy come true, word for word—believe me or not.'
Mrs. Arundel went to Church. During the service she felt strange prickings of foreboding and of compunction and of fear, anxiety, and hope, with a little sadness, caused by the communication and the assurances of her daughter. Even in such a case as this, the thinker of evil is sometimes depressed by the arrival of the prophet of good. When Mrs. Arundel came away from Church, she became aware that she had not heard one single word of the sermon. Not that she wanted very much to hear the sermon, any more than the First or Second Lesson—all three being parts of the whole which every person of respectability must hear once a week. Only it was disquieting to come away after half an hour's discourse with the feeling that she did not remember a single syllable of it. She took her early dinner with the other daughter, to whom she communicated Elsie's remarkable conduct, and her prediction and her invitation. It was decided between them that her brain was affected—no doubt, only for a time—and that it was not expedient for them to interfere; that it was deplorable, but a part of what might have been expected; and that time would show. Meanwhile, Sir Samuel reported that it had been resolved to get a warrant for the arrest of the man Edmund Gray, who hitherto had eluded all attempts to find him.
'He appears to be a real person,' the knight concluded—'an elderly man, whose character, so far as we can learn, is good. It is, however, significant that nothing has been discovered concerning his profession or calling. That is mysterious. For my own part, I like to know how a man earns his daily bread. I have even consulted a person connected with the Police. Nothing is known or suspected about him. But we shall see as soon as he is before the magistrate.'
'And Wednesday is so close! Oh! my dear Sir Samuel, hurry them up. Even at the last moment—even at the risk of a terrible scandal—if Elsie could be saved!'
'Well,' said Sir Samuel, 'it is curious—I don't understand it—we had arranged for the application for a warrant for Friday morning. Would you believe it? That old donkey Checkley won't go for it—wants it put off—says he thinks it will be of no use. What with this young man Austin at first, and this old man Checkley next, we seem in a conspiracy to defeat the ends of justice. But to-morrow I shall go myself to my brother. It is time this business was finished.'
'Yes—yes,' said Mrs. Arundel. 'And my dear Sir Samuel, before Wednesday—let it be before Wednesday, I implore you, for all our sakes!'
'My dear Madam, it shall be to-morrow.'
At noon, Elsie returned to Half Moon Street, where George was waiting for her.
'I have made one more attempt,' she said, with tears; 'but it was useless. Her heart is as hard about you as ever it was about Athelstan. It is wonderful that she should have so little faith. I suppose it comes of going into the City and trying to make money. Edmund Gray would say so. I would have told her all, but for the old man's sake. He knows nothing: he suspects nothing; and I want to make the case so complete that there shall be no doubt—none whatever—possible in the minds of the most suspicious. Even Checkley must be satisfied. I shall finish the work, I hope, this afternoon— Oh! George—is it possible? Is our wedding day next Wednesday—actually next Wednesday? And the hateful cloud shall be blown away, and—and—and——'
For the rest of this chapter look into the book of holy kisses, where you will very likely find it.