The injury which Henry Langford had received was more severe than he had at first imagined. The extraction of the ball was very painful, and so much inflammation succeeded that he was confined to his room for several days. The delay and restraint, in truth, annoyed him as much as the pain and restlessness which he suffered, for at that time there were various important objects before him, which he was prevented from pursuing with the calm but rapid energy of his character. He had one great consolation, however: that the injury he had sustained was received in defence of Alice Herbert; he had one great pleasure in the midst of his sufferings: to feel sure that she was thinking of him, and thinking of him with interest. Alice Herbert did not attend him as a lady of romance; she neither dressed his wounds nor sung to lull him to repose. She did not even show him that care and attention, visiting his sick chamber often in the day, making cooling drinks with her own hand, and pressing him to take care of himself, and to follow exactly the surgeon's directions, which many a lady of that very age would have done. Nay more, strange as it may seem, she did not display half so much interest towards him as she might have done towards any person in whom she was not so deeply interested. She took care, indeed, that everything should be done for his comfort and convenience; but she did so seeming to do it as little as possible. She did give up ever thought to him, and to how he might be best brought back to health especially during the three first days, while the surgeon shook his grave and not very sapient head, and declared that the result was doubtful; but she took great care that nobody should know that her thoughts were so employed.
When at length he was permitted to leave his room, she received him with a degree of timidity that was not without its share of tenderness. It seemed as if she felt that towards him she was placed in a different relationship to that in which she stood towards any other human being, and the feeling was strange and new to her, but it was not without its pleasure. Langford's manner, too, soon dispelled everything that was in the least embarrassing in such feelings, and left them all their delight.
With fever and loss of blood he had been greatly weakened, and there was a degree of languor in his conversation during the first two or three days which rendered it perhaps more interesting to Alice Herbert even that it had been before. It was still bright and sparkling; it was still rich and deep; but there was a softness and a gentleness in it which were the more winning from the contrast between the power of the thought and the mildness of the manner. The mind of Alice, too, had undergone some change, from what reason she scarcely knew. She was becoming fonder of grave thoughts; she was more pensive; and once or twice, even when she was alone, she blushed deeply at finding herself guilty of some little act of absence of mind--a thing she never had accused herself of before. She blushed, because she was conscious that on these occasions she was thinking of Henry Langford; her meditations, indeed, were such as she needed not to have blushed for; they were all pure, and upright, and good; but it was for their intensity that she blushed, not for the matter of them.
There was in Langford's manner towards her, however, a tenderness, a gentleness, an appealingness, if we may use the term, which, without words, very soon told her that if she thought deeply of him, he thought no less deeply of her. Her father was about this time a good deal absent from home; for the attack upon his daughter, at the very gates of his own park, had raised his indignation to a high pitch; and he declared that he would not rest, night nor day, till he had rooted out of the country the band of villains who deprived it of its ancient peace and security. Meetings of the justices in the neighbourhood were accordingly held for the purpose of causing the apprehension of the offenders; and at all these Sir Walter, who was himself an active though kindly magistrate, was present, taking a prominent part; so that, as we have said, he was much from home, and Alice Herbert was left, not alone, but in company with Henry Langford.
Such circumstances seldom lead but to one result, and must have done so now, had not that result been long before reached by the heart of each. Langford, however, was extremely careful; he could not, indeed, so far govern his manner as to prevent it from betraying the growing tenderness, the daily-increasing love that he felt for Alice Herbert; but not a word ever escaped his lips to confirm what his manner told unwittingly. They spoke of all the various matters, on all the multitude of themes, which are to be found in the treasury of rich and well-cultivated minds; there was not one fine subject in all the mighty universe, there was not an object in all the tide of bright and beautiful things which the God of nature has poured through every channel of the immense creation, that might not become for them a topic of discourse, for in all they could find sources for enjoyment and admiration.
And thus they went on conversing upon different things, deriving amusement, and instruction, and employment for imagination from all. Yes! conversing of indifferent things, but conversing as people who were not indifferent to each other; speaking of matters which had no reference to themselves, yet each learning as they spoke but the more to admire, to esteem, to love the other.
There were looks, too--unintentional looks--that betrayed the secrets of the heart more than words. When Alice Herbert's eyes were turned away, Langford would look at her with long and tender earnestness till she turned towards him, and then he would immediately withdraw his gaze. But still, more than once, she caught his eyes fixed upon her, and felt sure that they had been so long. She, too, while working or drawing, and conversing at the same time on any passing subject that was before them, would occasionally, when his rich eloquence poured forth in a current of more than ordinary brightness, raise her eyes to his face with a look of deep eagerness which made her very heart thrill.
Thus it went on, as might be naturally expected, and before three weeks were over, Alice Herbert found that there was but one happiness for her on earth; and Henry Langford knew that his fate was decided, as far as intense, and true, and ardent love decides, for weal or woe, the fate of every man capable of feeling it.
For the last two or three days, however, Alice had remarked that he was more thoughtful, perhaps more grave, than usual. The magisterial labours of her father were now nearly at an end. Though none of the offenders had been taken, he had satisfied himself that their bad neighbours had been driven from the vicinity; and two or three daring robberies, which were committed about this time in the next county but one, confirmed him in the belief. He was therefore much more at home with Alice, and with him whom we may now call her lover, and the delight which he took in Langford's society was every day more and more apparent, and every day more sweet and reassuring to his daughter's heart. The regard of the old man and the young man was evidently reciprocal, for Langford was one of those who could feel and estimate to the full the beautiful and natural simplicity, the straightforward singlemindedness of the old Knight of Moorhurst.
However, during the two or three days which we have just mentioned, as having displayed an unusual degree of gravity in Langford's manner, his eyes would often rest with a sort of doubtful and inquiring look upon the face of Sir Walter; and Alice also fancied that her father was pale, thoughtful, and uneasy. Langford, too, though scarcely fully recovered, had been out several times alone, pleading urgent business; and, in short it was clear that, in the bosoms of many of the party tenanting the Manor-House, there were busy thoughts, which from some reason they concealed from each other.
Such was the state of things just three weeks after the affray with the robbers; when one evening Alice had walked out alone, in order to think over all that she felt, and all that she had remarked, without having her thoughts interrupted even by the conversation of those who were the objects of her meditation. She had now learned not to go very far from the house when alone, and she sat down for a moment in a seat at the end of the bowling-green, which was a small oblong piece of ground, hollowed out between high banks on every side, which banks, like the flat little lawn that they surrounded, were covered with smooth green turf, and were surmounted on three sides by a range of fine yew trees, cut with exact precision into the form of a high wall. Her father, before she left the house, had seated himself in his arm-chair in the library, to take the afternoon nap in which he sometimes indulged; and Langford, whom she had not seen for nearly an hour, she believed to have gone to the village.
It was not so, however; and ere she remained long in that spot, thinking over her situation, and somewhat schooling herself for feelings which she could not suppress, she heard a rapid footfall coming from the direction of the house, and the thrill that went through her heart, the agitation that took possession of her whole frame, showed the quick memory of love. Had she yielded to her first impulse, though there was no one upon earth in whose society she felt so happy as in that of the person who now sought her, she would have risen and made her escape through the trees behind her. She restrained herself, however, and sat still, with a beating heart, indeed, and with her breath almost suppressed, while Langford with a quick step crossed the bowling-green, and approached her. Although she strove to do so, although she would have given worlds to appear unconcerned, she could not raise her eyes to welcome the visitor with her usual smile, and she suffered him to traverse the whole open space as if she had not seen him, only looking up with a glance of consciousness, and a deep blush when he came close to her.
Langford was agitated too: but the agitation showed itself merely in a great degree of paleness. His step was firm, his manner calm and decided.
"I have sought you," he said, as he came up; "I saw you go away from the house, and thought you had gone to the flower garden."
Alice strove hard to reply as usual, but all that she could say was, "I thought it would be cooler here;" and there she stopped: she could go no further.
"We shall be less likely to be interrupted, too," replied Langford, "and that, with me, is a great object at the present moment, for I wish much to speak with you--to detain you for half an hour--nay, perhaps, for a whole hour with me alone."
Alice could now reply nothing indeed; but with eyes bent down, and the tears ready to rise up in them, she suffered Langford to take her hand and to proceed.
He seldom did anything like other men, acting upon principles which we may hereafter pause upon for a moment; and he did not now come at once to the declaration which Alice felt was hanging upon his lips, but went on to speak of things apparently of far less interest. "You will give me this half hour, or this hour, I know, sweet lady; and afterwards you shall give me more or not as you please. I had some idea of detaining you before you went out; but I am glad I did not, because I think when one has anything of great importance to say--anything, I mean, which deeply interests and moves us, in which the whole feelings of our hearts are engaged--I think that there is no place we can so well choose as in the face of nature, under the free canopy of heaven. One's spirit feels confined and crushed in chambers built by hands; one's heart has not room to expand; one's soul has not space to breathe forth at liberty."
He saw that by this time Alice's emotion had a little subsided; she had even ventured, at the last words, to look up in his face; and he now went on, coming nearer to the matter of his thoughts. "Alice," he said, "dear Alice, I would beseech you not to agitate yourself, and yet I must speak to you on subjects which will create much emotion."
Did Alice think, even for a moment, that he was too confident--that he was too sure of possessing such great influence over her mind? She did not; but even if such an idea had presented itself for a moment, it would have vanished immediately, for he went on: "I know that I must greatly agitate and move you; for if my brightest and dearest hopes are true, that heart is too deep and too intense in all its feelings not to be agitated by the words you must hear, and the words you must speak; and if those hopes are not true, if, like so many other of life's illusions, they have given me a moment of brightness but to plunge me in the deeper night, that heart is too gentle and too kind to tell me that the whole of the rest of my life is misery, without feeling wrung and pained. Alice, I have sought you, not to tell you that I love you; for that you must have known long----"
"Oh no!" she cried, suddenly looking up through a flood of bright and happy tears, "Oh no! I might think so, but I could not be sure of it!"
Langford smiled, and pressed her hand to his lips. "Do not think me presumptuous," he answered; "do not think me presumptuous when I say, that those words and that look have already given a reply, and made me most happy. Oh no! I am not presumptuous, for I know Alice Herbert too well not to feel that such words, and such a look, may well spare my agitating her further, on one subject at least. Yet tell me, Alice, am I as happy as I dream myself to be?"
For a moment she made him no answer, and he added, "Oh speak!"
"What can I say, Langford?" she murmured, in a low voice; "you, who know the human heart so well, must have read mine perhaps too deeply."
He gave up a few moments to thanks and to expressions of his joy: but after that, a graver shade came upon his countenance, and he said, "There is much, much, my beloved, to be spoken of between us. With that bright confidence which you shall never find misplaced, you have yielded your heart and your happiness to one of whose rank and station, fortune and family, you know nothing."
"I know himself," replied Alice, gazing up in her lover's face, "and I know that he is everything that is noble and good."
"May I ever justify such feelings, Alice," replied Langford; "but still, my beloved, it is necessary that you should know something of me, especially as I may have to draw still more deeply upon your confidence, to call for trust and reliance such as are seldom justified. During the last three or four days, Alice, my mind has been in a state of hesitation and doubt as to what course I should pursue. I felt that under some points of view I ought, in propriety, to communicate my feelings to your father, in the very first place; and yet, Alice, as I was sure that you knew that I loved you, as I had determined to bind you by no promise till your father's full consent was obtained, and as I had to confide in you, to consult with you, to ask your advice even upon a matter that must affect the whole course of my life, my fortune, my station, and everything--a matter which, for many reasons, I do not wish to communicate to your father at present, I have judged it best, and determined, to open my whole heart to you at once."
Alice listened with a slight look of anxiety, for she had entertained some hopes that Langford had communicated his purpose to her father before he came to seek her; but still her apprehensions of opposition from one who loved her so much, and esteemed him so highly, were not great, and she only replied, "But, of course, you do not wish our engagements to be concealed from my father?"
"Notourengagements, sweet Alice," replied Langford; "for while I hold myself bound for ever to you. I ask you to make no engagement, I suffer you to make none, till you have your father's full consent, and my love for you shall be told to him immediately. But let me first inform you how I am situated. The property which I actually possess is but small; sufficient, indeed, to maintain me in comfort and independence as a gentleman, but no more. My name and reputation, with my companions in the field, and with those under whom I have served, is, I have every cause to believe, fair--may I say it without vanity?--high. This small fortune, and this good reputation, are all that I absolutely have to offer; but, at the same time, I tell you that a much larger fortune, one that would at once place me on a level, in those respects, with yourself, is withheld from me unjustly, and cannot, I fear, be recovered by law."
"What matters it?" demanded Alice. "What matters it, Langford? My father's consent once given, will not his house, his fortune, be our own? What need of more?"
"To you, perhaps not, Alice," replied her lover. "But to me it would be painful--it would be the only painful part of my fate to know that a great disparity existed between your fortune and mine--to have any one insinuate that my Alice had married a mere adventurer. In regard, too, to your father's fortune, Alice, I have much, hereafter to say to you; I have something even to say to him. But of that we will not speak now. Suffice it that I could bear no great disparity. But, besides," he added, seeing her about to speak, "I have made a solemn promise, Alice, to pursue, without pause or hesitation, the recovery of this property."
"But you said," exclaimed Alice, "that it could not be recovered by law."
"It cannot," replied Langford, "for the papers by which it could be recovered are withheld from me by one who is both powerful and daring, and I cannot obtain them by any act which the law would justify."
"Then, give it up altogether," exclaimed Alice. "Do not, do not, Langford, attempt anything that is not justified by the law."
"But sometimes," replied her lover, "the law is in itself unjust, or else, as in the present instance, is impotent to work redress, and would justify the act if it proved successful. The papers are withheld from me by one, as I have said, who is both powerful and daring. What mandate of the law can make him give them up? While I, by force, if I chose to exert it, might take them for myself; and the possession of them would at once justify the deed by which they were acquired."
"Oh, no, no! do not attempt it, Langford," cried Alice. "Suppose you were to fail in obtaining them, what terrible consequences might ensue! He might resist force by force; blood might be spilt, and the man I love become a murderer."
Langford paused for a moment upon the words, "The man I love;" and, casting his eyes towards the ground, he fell into a sweet but short reverie. A moment after, however, he returned to the subject, saying, "But my promise, Alice, my promise to the dead?"
"Langford," said Alice gravely, and somewhat sadly, laying her right hand at the same time upon his, in which he had continued to hold her left, and gazing up in his face with a look of tenderness and regard: "Langford, I am no great casuist in such matters; but I have always heard that no promise to do what is unlawful can be binding upon any man. God forbid that I should hold that it is right to do any evil, even to the breaking of the slightest promise; but here, Langford, you are between two evils: the breaking of a promise, and the committing of an unlawful act. The breaking of that promise can do wrong to no one; the keeping it may bring misery on yourself, on me, on all who know you; may be followed by bloodshed, ay! and the loss of your good name."
"You are eloquent, my Alice," replied Langford, "and I believe that you are right; but still the temptation is so strong, the matter involved is so great and so important, the means of obtaining those papers without force so very doubtful----"
"Oh, if there be means," exclaimed Alice, "if there beanymeans employ them. Speak with my father upon it: take counsel with him."
"Alice," replied her lover, "it is impossible. I must not speak with him, I ought not to speak with him, upon this subject. For his sake, Alice, for yours, I ought not. Alice, forgive me if I am obliged to use some mystery for the present. That mystery shall soon pass away, and you shall know all."
"I seek not to know it, Langford!" she replied, gazing up in his face; "I am quite satisfied: I am quite sure! Now and for ever my trust is entirely in you. Tell me what you like: conceal from me what you like. I know that I shall never hear of your doing what is wrong; and as for all the rest, I care not."
Langford could not resist such words. He threw his arms round her, and pressed her to his heart. His lips met hers in the first kiss of love, and he set her heart at ease by promising to use none but lawful means to obtain even his right. He still held her gently with one arm thrown lightly round her, and her left hand locked in his, when the sound of a footstep met his ear, and he looked up. Alice's eyes were raised too, and her cheek turned very red and then very pale, for, at the aperture at the other end of the bowling-green, appeared no other than Lord Harold, advancing rapidly towards them.
The reader may have remarked that whenever we are interrupted in those seasons when the shy heart comes forth from the depths in which it lies concealed, and suns itself for a moment in the open daylight, the person who breaks in upon us is sure to be the one of all the world before whom we should least like to display the inmost feelings of our bosom. Had it been her father who now approached, Alice would have run up to him, placed her hand in his, hid her face upon his bosom, and told him all at once. But, both on her own account and on his, Alice would rather have beheld any other person on the earth than Lord Harold at that moment. He could not but have seen the half embrace in which Langford had held her; he could not but know and divine the whole; and Alice felt grieved that such knowledge must come upon him in so painful a manner; while--though not ashamed--she felt abashed and confused that any one should have been a witness to the first endearment of acknowledged love. Langford's proud nostril expanded and his head rose high; and drawing the arm of Alice through his own, he advanced with her direct towards Lord Harold, as if about to return to the house. The young nobleman's countenance was deadly pale, and he was evidently much moved, but he behaved well and calmly.
"Your father wishes to speak to you, Alice," he said; "I left him but now, just awake."
Langford saw that Alice could not reply, and he answered, "We are even now about to seek Sir Walter, my lord."
"I rather imagine that he has business which may require Mistress Alice's private attention," replied Lord Harold, in the same cold tone which both had used; "I have also to request a few moments' conversation with Captain Langford. I will not detain him long."
Alice suddenly raised her eyes, and looked from one to the other. "Langford," she said, aloud, "before I leave you, I have one word more to say."
"I will rejoin you here in a moment, my lord," said Langford, calmly. Lord Harold bowed; and Langford, with Alice's arm still resting in his, walked on towards the house. Alice spoke to him, as they went, eagerly, and in a low voice. His reply, as he left her at the door of the Manor was, "On my honour!--Be quite at ease!--Nothing shall induce me."
As soon as he had left her, he returned at once to Lord Harold, whom he found standing, with his arms crossed upon his breast, in an attitude of deep thought.
"Your commands, sir?" said Langford, as soon as they met.
"By your leave, Captain Langford," replied Lord Harold, "we will walk a little further, where we are not likely to be interrupted."
Langford signified his assent, and they proceeded in silence for some way till they reached a small glade in the park, where Langford paused, saying, "This is surely far enough, Lord Harold, to prevent our being interrupted in anything you can have to say to me, or I to you."
"Perhaps it may be," replied Lord Harold. "I have a question to ask you, which may perhaps lead to other questions, and I beg you to give me a sincere and open answer, as it may prevent unpleasant consequences to us both."
"If I think fit to give you any answer at all, Lord Harold," replied Langford, "I will give you a sincere one; but I must first know what your question is before I even consider whether I shall answer it or not."
"The question is simply this," rejoined Lord Harold, in a somewhat bitter tone: "Who and what the gentleman is who visits this part of the country, introduces himself into our families, and calls himself Captain Langford?"
Langford smiled: "Had I, my lord," he said, "either visited your property, even as a sportsman, in answer to your lordship's own invitation, or had I introduced myself into your family, I might have thought myself bound to give some answer to your question; but, as I have done neither the one nor the other, I will beg you to excuse me from replying to it, and I will pardon you for putting it."
"This is all very good, sir," said Lord Harold; "but you do not escape me by an affectation of dignity. In the first place, sir, you cannot suppose that I shall conceal from Sir Walter Herbert what I remarked to-day between yourself and his daughter."
Langford turned very red, but he still replied calmly: "In regard to that, my lord, you may do as you please. To be a spy upon other people's actions, or a tale-bearer, in regard to a matter accidentally discovered, and not intended for his eye, is certainly a pleasant employment for a gentleman. But all these things depend upon taste; and if Lord Harold's taste lead him in such a way, Heaven forbid that I should stop him!"
Lord Harold bit his lip: "I shall not be put out of temper, sir," he replied, "by your sarcasm; and were Captain Langford known to me as a gentleman of honour and character, I should--whatever might be my own personal feelings in this matter--I should be far from betraying a secret which came accidentally to my knowledge; but when Captain Langford is totally unknown in this part of the country, when I have reason to believe that he is not always called by the same name, or seen in the same character--when, in short, Captain Langford is a very doubtful personage, and I find him introducing himself into the house of my oldest and best friend, and, apparently unknown to that friend, engaging the affections of his daughter--I feel myself bound in honour to be no party to such a transaction, but to bring the whole matter to light as soon as possible."
Langford had remained standing while the other spoke, in an attitude of attention, and with his eyes bent down upon the ground. The moment that Lord Harold had done, he raised them, and, with a degree of tranquillity which the young nobleman did not expect, replied, "Perhaps, my lord, you are in the right. I rather believe, in your situation. I should act in the same manner."
Lord Harold looked both surprised and confused. "This is very extraordinary," he said, "and I cannot but believe that there is some design under it. I must insist, sir, upon having an explanation on the spot, as to who and what you are; as to what is your title to be in the society in which I find you, and what are your claims to the hand of one of the first heiresses in this country."
"Your pardon, my lord," replied Langford; "you are now going too far. I shall give every explanation that I think fitting to the father of the lady in question; to you I shall give none, till you show me some right which you may have to interfere in the affairs of Mistress Alice Herbert, which, I rather suspect, you cannot do."
Lord Harold again bit his lip; but he replied, almost immediately: "The right I have, sir, is twofold; that of one of her oldest friends, and that of an applicant for her hand."
For a moment Langford was about to demand, in reply, whether Lord Harold meant an accepted or a rejected suitor; but he was generous, and refrained. "In neither quality," he said, "can I recognise in you any right to interfere; and you will pardon me if I say, that I will not only give you no explanation whatever on the subject, but will not condescend to hear you speak any further on a matter with which you have no title to meddle."
"Then, sir," replied Lord Harold, sharply, "nothing remains but to draw your sword. I do you honour in taking it for granted that you are worthy of mine;" and as he spoke he drew his weapon from the sheath, and with the point dropped, stood as if in expectation that Langford would follow his example.
Langford remained, however, with his arms crossed upon his chest, and a somewhat melancholy smile upon his countenance. "Once more," he said, "you must pardon me, Lord Harold: neither in this matter can I gratify you; not alone because it is a stupid and contemptible habit, only worthy of cowards, or of boys who have no other way of showing their courage, but--"
"Well said, Master Harry," cried a voice close beside them: "Well said, well said! I think, my little lordling, you had better put up your cold iron, and go your way home to your father. To think of a man wishing to bore a hole in his neighbour, like Smith, the house-carpenter, with his long gimlet! Let us look at your skewer in a handle, my lord;" and as he spoke. Silly John, the half-witted man of the village, whom we have before described, advanced, extending his hand to take hold of the blade of Lord Harold's sword. The young nobleman pushed him sharply aside, however, bidding him begone, with an angry frown.
"Well, I'll begone," replied the half-witted man; "but I'll be back again in a minute, with more hands to help me;" and away he ran in the direction of the stream and the village.
"Now, sir! quick!" exclaimed Lord Harold. "If you would not have me suppose you both a coward and an impostor, draw your sword, and give me satisfaction at once."
"Your lordship may suppose anything that you please," replied Langford; "having done nothing that can reasonably dissatisfy you, I shall certainly do nothing to give you any other sort of satisfaction." "Then, sir, I shall treat you as you deserve," replied Lord Harold, "and chastise you as a cowardly knave;" and putting up his sword, he advanced to strike his opponent.
But Langford caught his hand in his own powerful grasp, and stopped him, saying, "Hold, Lord Harold, hold, Iwillgive you one word of explanation! If, after having heard that, you choose to draw your sword and seek my life, you shall do so; but remember, as you are a man of honour, to none--no, not to the nearest and dearest, must you reveal the import of these words;" and, drawing him closer to him, he whispered what seemed to be a single word in the young nobleman's ear. Langford then let go his hold; and, pale as ashes, with a quivering lip and a straining eye, Lord Harold staggered back. His companion turned upon his heel, and walked away; either not hearing, or not choosing to attend to the young nobleman's entreaty to speak with him one word more.
Langford took his way direct to the Manor House; but upon entering the door which stood open to the park, he perceived a good deal of bustle and confusion amongst the servants; and on asking if Sir Herbert were in the library, the reply was, "Yes," but it was added, that he and Mistress Alice were both busy with a gentleman, on matters of deep importance. "While he was speaking with the servant, Langford, through a door which stood open at the end of a long passage, and afforded a view into the court, perceived Lord Harold come in, with a quick step and a somewhat disordered air, and mounting his horse, which was held by one of Sir Walter's grooms, ride slowly away, without even attempting to enter the house.
"I am about to walk to the village," continued Langford, speaking to the servant. "Will you tell Sir Walter so, when he is visible; for I expect a messenger from London, and may not be back to supper, if I find letters which require an answer."
He then proceeded through the house, gained the road which led over the bridge, and was proceeding towards the village, in the twilight, which was now beginning to fall, when he thought he recognised a form that was advancing towards him, though still at some distance. It proved to be that of the same fair-haired boy, named Jocelyn, whom we have more than once had occasion to mention, he spoke not a word when he came near, but placed a letter in Langford's hands, which the other tore open, and read, though with some difficulty, from the obscurity of the light.
"There is scarcely time," he said, after he had made out the contents of the epistle, which was very short. "There is scarcely time. Nevertheless, tell him I will be there: but say also, good Jocelyn, that my resolution is the same as when we last met. I will not try it!"
"I will tell him," was the boy's only reply; and leaving Langford, he ran down the road by the stream, with a rapid pace.
The moon had not risen; the sun had gone down; the sky, which for near a month had been as calm and serene as a good mind, was covered over with long lines of dark grey cloud, heavy, and near the earth; when a solitary horseman took his station under a broad old tree upon the wide waste, called Uppington Moor, and gazed forth as well as the growing darkness would let him. It was a dim and sombre scene, unsatisfactory to the eye, but exciting to the imagination. Everything was vague and undefined in the shadows of that hour, and the long streaks of deeper and fainter brown which varied the surface of the moor, spoke merely of undulations in the ground, marking the great extent of the plain towards the horizon. A tall solitary mournful tree might be seen here and there, adding to the feeling of vastness and solitude; and about the middle of the moor, as one looked towards the west, was a small detached grove, or rather clump of large beeches, presenting a black irregular mass, at the side of which the lingering gleam of the north-western sky was reflected in some silvery lines upon what seemed a considerable piece of water. That was the only light which the landscape contained, and it would have cut harsh with the gloomy and ominous view around, had not a thin mist, rising over the whole, softened the features of the scene, and left them still more indistinct and melancholy.
It was an hour and a place fit for sad thoughts and dark forebodings, and the horseman sat upon his tall powerful gelding in the attitude of one full of meditation. He had suffered the bridle to drop, his head was slightly bent forward, and his eye strained upon the scene before him; while his mind seemed to drink in, from its solemn and cheerless aspect, feelings as dark and dismal as itself. He sat there about a quarter of an hour, and not a sound had been heard upon the moor but the deep sort of sobbing creaking of a neighbouring marsh, or the shrill cry of some bird of night, as it skimmed by with downy and noiseless wings. There was not a breath of air stirring; no change took place in the aspect of the sky or the earth; it was as if nature were dead, and the feeling seemed to become oppressive, for the horseman at length gently touched his beast with his heel, and made him move slowly out from under the branches of the tree.
Scarcely had he done so, however, when the distant sound of a horse's feet was heard, as if coming at a very tardy and heavy pace from the west. The sound, indeed, would not have been perceptible at that distance, but for the excessive stillness of all around, and the eagerness with which the traveller listened. His eye was now bent anxiously, too, upon the western gleam in the water, and in a few minutes the dark figure of another man on horseback was seen against the brighter background thus afforded, riding slowly on, as the road he followed wound round the mere.
It was like a scene in a phantasmagoria, and in a moment after, two more figures were added, and all three suddenly stopped. None of the minute part of their proceedings were visible, and it was impossible, at that distance, to discern how they were occupied; but a moment after, there seemed a sudden degree of agitation in the group, then came a bright flash, followed at a considerable interval by the report of a pistol, and immediately after all three horsemen disappeared.
"What may this mean?" said the stranger, aloud. "I fear there is mischief." The sound of his voice seemed strange in the midst of this solitude, but he had scarcely spoken when the stillness was again broken by the noise of a horse's feet; but this time it came from another direction, not exactly opposite, but much to the right hand of the spot whence the former sounds had proceeded, and the beast was evidently galloping as fast as he could, over turf. It came nearer and nearer, and the watcher went back under the tree.
At length, another powerful cavalier became visible, approaching at full speed; and as he drew nigh he looked round more than once, and pulled up his horse suddenly by the tree. "Are you there?" he asked, in a low voice: and the next moment the other came forth and joined him.
"Quick! quick! master Harry," continued the one who had joined him: "Put your horse into a gallop, and come on with all speed."
"But I told you, Franklin," replied the other, holding back, "I told you that I would have nothing to do with it! What I saw a month ago under the park wall was quite sufficient: and I would have no hand in such a business, were it to put a crown upon my head."
"Foolish boy! the business is done without you to a certain point," replied his companion. "I have served you whether you would or not; and I suppose, of course, you will be ungrateful. Come on with me, and you shall have the key of the chest, which I have ventured my neck to get for you. You have nothing to do but to walk in and take what is your own. But come on quickly! You would not have me taken, I suppose; and I have reason to think I am followed."
Thus saying, he put his horse again into a gallop, and Langford followed at the same pace. Two or three times, as they rode on, Franklin Gray looked back over the moor; but no moving object of any kind was to be seen, except one of those creeping phosphoric lights which linger on the edges of an old marsh; no sound of any kind was to be heard, but the measured beating of their horses' feet upon the hollow-sounding turf.
At length, when they had gone about two miles further, Franklin Gray cheeked his horse's speed, saying, "There is no one following now--yet they made the signal from the hill! Did you not hear a pistol shot just before you came up?"
"Yes," replied Langford; "I heard it distinctly, and saw the flash. Was that a signal that some one was following you?"
"It was," answered Gray. "But how you could see the flash I don't understand, for they were down below the brow of the hill, where one can see both roads to the castle."
"Oh no!" said Langford. "The men who fired that shot were upon the moor close by Upwater Mere; and I very much fear, Gray, that some of these accursed evil companions of yours have been again committing an act that you neither knew of nor desired."
"If they have," exclaimed Gray, with a horrid imprecation, "I will shoot the first of them, were he my own brother."
"How many were there of them on the watch?" demanded Langford. "Two," replied his companion.
"Then I will tell you what I saw," answered Langford. "As I sat on my horse and looked out over the mere, which just caught a gleam from the sky, the figure of a horseman crossed the light, as if he were going to the castle. Just at that minute two more came out upon him--from amongst the beeches, it seemed to me; then came the pistol shot; and a minute after they all disappeared."
Gray gave utterance to another terrible oath; and then, after thinking a few minutes, he added, "But it can't be any of my people! They dared not, after the warning I gave them about that bad business under the park fence."
"At all events," cried Langford, reining up his horse entirely, "had we not better go back and see? I fear very much, Franklin, that they have shot the man, whoever he is."
"No, no," replied Franklin; "if they have shot him, he is shot, and there is no need of our meddling with the matter."
"But he may be merely wounded," replied Langford; "we had better go back."
"No!" thundered Franklin Gray--"I tell you no! It is mere madness! We are but half a mile from the house; when I have got there, we shall learn who has done this, and I will send out and see if there is any one hurt. Come on, come on!"
Langford followed his bidding; and renewing their quick pace, they rode on for about half a mile further, till, amid a clump of tall trees, at the very edge of the moor, where some poor thin unproductive fields connected it with the cultivated country, they perceived a light shining from a small window in a tall building before them.
At that period there still remained scattered over the face of England a number of those edifices which, fortified to a certain degree, combined the modern house with the ancient feudal hold, and had been rendered very serviceable to both parties in the progress of the great rebellion. These fortified houses were of every size, from that which really well merited the name of castle, to that which was no more than a mere tower; and many of them, either from being injured by the chances of war, or from having lost a great part of their utility when the scourge of civil contention was removed from the country, had gone to decay, or had been applied to the calmer and more homely uses of the barn, the grange, or the farm-house.
Such was the house which Langford and his companion now approached; and, as far as the darkness of the hour suffered its outline to appear, it seemed to the former to be a tall heavy tower of stonework, with four small windows on the side next to them. Beneath its protection, and attached to it on one side, with the gable end turned towards the road, was a lower building with a high peaked roof of slates; and close by, another mass of masonry, apparently the ruins of a church or chapel. The light that the horsemen had seen came from one of the upper windows of the tower; but there were lights also in the less elevated building by its side. A low wall stood before the whole, enclosing a little neglected garden; and through a gate which stood open in this wall, Franklin Gray led his companion in, and up to the door of the tower. There, beside the door, stood the ancient steps which many a burly cavalier in the Hudibrastic days, and in days long before that, had employed to mount his horse's back; and there, too, on either side of the entrance, was many a ring, staple, and hook, for the purpose of fastening up the troopers' horses, while their masters rested or caroused in the hall hard by.
Having attached their bridles to two of these hooks, Franklin Gray and his companion proceeded to seek admission into the tower. To gain this, Gray first struck the door three or four times distinctly with his heavy hand. The moment he had done so, a light step was heard running along within, and after manifold bolts and bars had been withdrawn, the boy Jocelyn threw open the door; and Langford followed his companion into a low narrow entrance hall, on the right of which was another door, and at the end a dim flight of stone steps leading apparently to the upper apartments.
Scarcely, however, had the foot of Franklin Gray fallen three times on that stone passage, when a light came gleaming down the stairs, and the next instant the flutter of a woman's garments was seen, as she descended with a step of joy. She was as lovely a creature as the eye of man ever rested upon, though the first years of youthful grace were passed, and though the sun of a warmer land than this had dyed her skin with a rich brown. Her eyes--her large full liquid eyes--were as black as jet, and the long dark fringe that edged both the upper and the under lid left but little of the white visible. The glossy black hair, divided on the forehead, was tied in a large massy knot behind, without any ornament whatsoever; but along the whole line might be traced a strong undulation, which told that, if free, it would have fallen in ringlets round her face; and even as it was, two or three thick curls escaped from the knot behind, and hung in glossy masses on her neck. Her age might be three or four and twenty, and her form had the fulness of that age, but without having lost any of the symmetry of youth.
She carried a lamp in her hand, and the light of it showed her dark eyes sparkling with joy as they rested upon Franklin Gray. Setting down the light upon the stairs, she darted forward at once, and cast herself upon his bosom, exclaiming, with a strong foreign accent, "You have come back! You have come back! Oh, I have been so uneasy about you!"
"But why, my Mona?" demanded Franklin Gray, with his whole tone and manner changed to one of the utmost gentleness, as soon as he addressed her. "Why more to-night than at other times, when I am obliged to leave you?"
"Oh, I do not well know," she replied; "but you kissed me twice before you went, and then you came back to kiss me once more, and bid me remember you; and I felt sure you were going on some dangerous expedition. I felt sad at heart myself, too, as if some evil would come of this night."
"Evil has come of it, I fear," replied Franklin Gray; but he then added quickly, seeing her turn pale at his words, "Evil not upon me, or of my doing, Mona. But go up again, beloved! and I will come to you directly. You see I have some one with me."
She turned her eyes upon Langford, whom she appeared not to have noticed before; and then bowing her head gracefully and slowly, she raised the lamp again, and disappeared up the steps.
When she was gone, Franklin Gray turned round and gazed upon Langford for a moment, with a proud yet melancholy smile. There was a world of meaning in his look, and Langford could only reply to it by exclaiming, with a glance still more sorrowful, "Oh, Gray, this is very sad!"
"Come, come," cried his companion; "it shall be amended some day, Harry. Come, Jocelyn," he continued, turning to the boy, "tell me, master page, who are in the hall, and how many?"
The boy's brow became grave at the question. "There are but three, sir," he replied; "there is James of Coventry, and there is Doveton and little Harvey."
"Indeed!" said Gray, shutting his teeth close, as if to keep down angry feelings that were rising fast--"indeed!" and with his right hand he threw open the door which led into a small dark room. That again he strode across, giving Langford a sign to follow, and then opened another door, which admitted them into a much larger chamber, well lighted, in the midst of which was a large table furnished with a flagon and some drinking cups. At the further end sat two men playing with dice, while a third, a short smart-looking personage, was standing behind, observing their game. They ceased when Gray and his companion appeared; and the merriment which they evidently had been enjoying, was over in a moment.
"But you three left!" said Gray, as he entered, "but you three left! Where are Hardcastle and Wiley?"
"They went out shortly after you, Captain Gray," replied one of the men who were playing; "I can't tell where they are."
"Doveton," replied Gray, in a calm grave tone, "you are a gentleman and a soldier; so are you, James; and Master Harvey, too, though he did not serve with us either in Germany or in the New World, has had the honour of serving in Ireland, and is a man of honour. Now, I ask you all, straightforwardly, where are these two men gone to? Marcham and Henry of the Hill I took with me; all the others I know about also; but where are Wiley and Hardcastle, and what are they about?"
"Why, really, sir," replied the man called Doveton, "we can only tell by guess; for since that business down in the green lane they have kept very much by themselves, and don't seem to deal fairly with us, especially Wiley."
"I'll tell you what, captain," said the man who was standing behind, and whom they called amongst themselves Little Harvey, "I wish Wiley was out from amongst us; he will get us all into mischief some day. He does not do things in a gentlemanlike way. I guess what he has gone after, but he has not succeeded, I see." And as he spoke, he gave a significant glance towards Langford, as if he were in some degree connected with the matter in question.
"Indeed!" said Gray; "I suspect your meaning, Harvey; but let us hear more plainly what you think. Though I direct and guide, and am always willing to take the greatest dangers on myself, still we are comrades, and should treat each other as such. What is it you think, Harvey?"
"I won't say what I think," replied the man; "but I'll say what I saw. When you sent the boy Jocelyn down to the Manor, Wiley cross-questioned him both before he went and when he came back; and when he heard him give you a message about a gentleman meeting you on the moor, he whispered a good dead to Hardcastle, who came up and asked me if I would go along with them upon an enterprise which must be quite secret, and which must be done without your knowing it. I refused; and told him, I thought that after the business down in the lane, he had better not let Wiley lead him; but to that he answered, that this was a matter which could not fail as the other had done, and that it would be over in five minutes. I said I would not go, however, and they went without me."
"Hark, they are coming!" said Gray, as the sound of horses' feet was heard stopping opposite the house. "Let them in the back way, Jocelyn, and bring in supper. Here! Come with me, Master Harry." And he led the way back into the hall by which they had at first entered, and in which there still remained the lamp that the boy Jocelyn had carried when he gave them admittance. Gray carefully shut the doors behind him; and when he stood alone in the passage with Langford, he unbuttoned his vest, and took from an inner pocket a key of a very peculiar and extraordinary form.
"There is the key, Master Harry," he said, speaking quickly, and with, strong passions of some kind evidently struggling in his breast. "Your own fate is now in your power! Manage it as you will!"
"But tell me how this has been obtained," said Langford.
"I have no time for long stories," replied his companion sharply. "There it is! that is sufficient. But I will tell you so far, I--I alone--though directed by one who knew the house well, walked through it this night, from one end to the other; and within six yards of the old man himself, with nothing but a door between us, took this key from the hiding place where he thought it so safe, and brought it away undiscovered. Now, Harry, leave me! I am not in a humour to speak much. I have matters before me that may well make me silent. Mount your horse, and be gone with all speed. Why do you linger? Oh! I will send out ere ten minutes be over, and if there be a possibility of undoing what has been done amiss, it shall be undone, on my honour. Take the back road," he added, as he opened the door for Langford; "and for worlds go no more upon the moor to-night! I ask you for my own sake," he added, seeing his companion hesitate; "not for yours, but for mine!"
Langford made no reply, but mounting his horse, rode away with feelings of a nature the most mingled and the most painful.
Those of the man he left behind were of a different character, but still terrible. With Langford there were feelings which he seldom experienced, doubt and hesitation as to his own course of action, mingling with vague apprehension of evil, and deep regret to see a man possessed of many noble qualities, who had been his friend, his companion, and even his protector in the early days of youth, now plunged into a current, terrible in itself, and terrible in its consequences--following a course which he had long suspected that Gray did really follow, but without having conviction forced upon him till that night.
With Franklin Gray it was very different; his whole feelings, for the time, were swallowed up in one stern and gloomy resolution.
There was anger, indeed, at the bottom of that resolution; wrath of the most bitter and deadly kind; but even that was almost lost in the effort to exclude from his thoughts everything that might shake, even in the least degree, the dark and terrible determination he had formed.
As soon as Langford had quitted him he returned to the hall in which he had left his comrades, and there, as he expected, he found the party increased by the presence of the two men, Wiley and Hardcastle, whose names we have mentioned more than once, and whom we have seen busy in the attack upon Alice Herbert.
It was evident that some conversation had passed between them and the others regarding the indignation which they had excited in their leader, and while, in the rough countenance of Hardcastle, might be traced a great deal of shame and apprehension, in the more cunning face of Wiley appeared a degree of hesitating uncertainty, mingling strangely with dogged defiance, and making him look like an ill-tempered hound about to receive the lash, but not very sure whether to lie down and howl, or fly at the throat of the huntsman. The boy Joselyn was busily bringing in some dishes, and setting them on the table; but he glanced at Franklin Gray from time to time, seeming to know better than any one present the character of the man with whom they had to deal, and to divine what was likely to be the issue.
Franklin Gray said not a word in regard to the matter which was in all their thoughts; but sitting down at the head of the table he made some observation upon the bread, which was not good; and then added, speaking to the others--"Begin, begin! Marcham and Henry of the Hill won't be long."
"I heard them coming over the hill but now," said the boy Jocelyn.
Gray made no reply, and the rest began their meal in silence; but he ate nothing, looking curiously at the knife in his hand, as if there was something very interesting in the blade. He made the boy give him a silver cup, indeed, full of wine from the tankard; and as he was drinking it, the two others, whom he had mentioned, came in laughing, and seemed surprised to see the grave and stern manner in which the supper was passing.
The matter was soon explained, however; for no sooner had they sat down in the places left for them, than Franklin Gray fixed his eyes upon Wiley, and said, "Now, my masters Wiley and Hardcastle, we are all present but two: be so good as to tell me where you have been to-night?"
The time which had elapsed, the indifference, and even carelessness, which had hitherto appeared in Gray's manner, and a cup or two of wine which he himself had drunk, had removed the degree of apprehension which at first mingled with the sullen determination of Wiley; and he replied at once, with a look of effrontery, "I don't think that at all necessary, Captain! I rather believe that I have as much right to ride my horse over any common in the kingdom as you have, without giving you any account of it either."
"You hear!" said Franklin Gray, looking round calmly to the rest, "you hear!"
"Come, come, Master Wiley," cried the man, called Doveton, "that won't do, after what we all swore, when we came down here. Come, Hardcastle, you are the best of the two; come, you tell Captain Gray at once what you have been about. We must know, if it be but for our own safety."
"Oh! I'll tell at once," said Hardcastle. "Devilish sorry am I that I ever went; and I certainly would not have gone had I known how it would turn out. I'll never go again with Wiley as long as I live: I told him so, as we came over the common."
Wiley muttered something not very laudatory of his companion; but it was drowned in the stern voice of Franklin Gray, who exclaimed, "Go on, Hardcastle!"
"Why, we went out to the beeches by Upwater Mere," replied Hardcastle; "and we had not been there long, when up came some one on horseback, going along slowly towards the castle. It was not the person we were looking for, however----"
"Pray, who were you looking for?" interrupted Franklin Gray.
"Why, I think that is scarcely fair, Captain," said Hardcastle.
"It matters not," replied Gray; "I know without your telling me. Go on!"
"Well, as the young man came up," continued the other, "Wiley said we might as well have what he had upon him. So we rode up, and asked him to stop, quite civilly; but, instead of doing so, he drew his sword, and spurred on his horse upon Wiley, and----"
"Well," exclaimed Gray, impatiently; "what then? I heard the pistol fired," he said, seeing the man hesitate; "so tell the truth."
"Well," said Hardcastle, "well;" and as he spoke he turned somewhat pale: "well, then Wiley fired, you know, and brought him down; and we pulled him under the beeches, and took what we could get. We have not divided it yet, but it seems a good sum."
As his companion had been detailing the particulars of their crime, the changes which had come over Wiley's countenance were strange and fearful. He had watched with eager anxiety the countenance of Franklin Gray, who sat nearly opposite to him at the other end of the table; but, being able to gather nothing from those stern dark features, he ran his eye rapidly round the faces of the rest, and after several changes of expression, resumed, as well as he could, the look of cunning and daring impudence which he had at first put on. The entrance of the boy Jocelyn with some plates, just behind him, however, made him give a sharp start and look round. Franklin Gray fixed his eyes upon the boy, and waved his hand; and Jocelyn immediately went round to the other side of the table.
"Hardcastle," said their leader, "I shall find some means of punishing you. As for you, Wiley----"
"You shall not punish me, Captain Gray!" interrupted Wiley, knitting his brows and speaking through his teeth; "for by----, if you don't mind what you're about, I'll hang you all."
Franklin Gray sat and heard him calmly, keeping his eyes fixed upon him with stern unchanging gaze till he had done speaking. He then looked round once more, saying, "You hear!" and, at the same moment, he drew a pistol from under his coat. Every face around turned pale but his own; and Wiley started up from the table. But before he could take a single step, and while yet, with agony of approaching fate upon him, he gazed irresolute in the face of his leader, the unerring hand of Franklin Gray had levelled the pistol and fired.
The ball went right through his head; the unhappy man bounded up two or three feet from the ground, and then fell dead at the end of the table. Franklin Gray sat perfectly still, gazing through the smoke for about a minute; and through the whole hall reigned an awful silence. He then laid the pistol calmly down on the table before him, and drew forth a second.
Hardcastle crossed his arms upon his breast, and looked him full in the face, saying, "Well, Captain, I'm ready."
"You mistake me," said Gray, laying down the pistol on the table, with the muzzle towards himself. "My friends, if I have done wrong by the shot I have fired, any of you that so pleases, has but to take up that pistol and use it as boldly as I have done its fellow. What say you; am I right or wrong?"
"Right, right!" replied every voice.
"Well, then," said Gray, putting up the weapons again, "some of you take him down; and you, Doveton and Marcham, hark ye;" and he spoke a few words to them apart. "Take Hardcastle with you," he added; "that shall be his punishment!" so saying, he turned, took up a lamp that stood near, and quitted the hall.
Franklin Gray mounted the steps in the tower that we have mentioned, slowly and sadly; paused halfway up, and fell into deep thought. His reverie lasted but a minute: he then proceeded, and reached the room where the fair being whom he called Mona was watching anxiously for his coming. Her eyes questioned him; but he made no reply in words. He threw his right arm round her, however and rested his face upon her bosom for several minutes, with his eyes shut; then pressed her to his heart, kissed her cheek, and said "Come my Mona, come and see our babe sleeping."