Cleve reached the station, eight miles away from the dismal swamp I have described, in time to catch the mail train. From Llwynan he did not go direct to Ware, but drove instead to Cardyllian, and put up at the Verney Arms early next morning.
By ten o'clock he was seen, sauntering about the streets, talking with old friends, and popping into the shops and listening to the gossip of the town. Cleve had a sort of friendliness that answered all electioneering purposes perfectly, andthatwas the measure of its value.
Who should he light upon in Castle Street but Tom Sedley! They must have arrived by the same train at Llwynan. The sight of Tom jarred intensely upon Cleve Verney's nerves. There was something so strange in his looks and manner that Sedley thought him ill. He stopped for a while to talk with him at the corner ofChurch Street, but seemed so obviously disposed to escape from him, that Sedley did not press his society, but acquiesced with some disgust and wonder in their new relations.
Tom Sedley had been with Wynne Williams about poor Vane Etherage's affairs. Honest Wynne Williams was in no mood to flatter Lord Verney, the management of whose affairs he had, he said, "resigned." The fact was that he had been, little by little, so uncomfortably superseded in his functions by our good friend Jos. Larkin, and the fashion of Lord Verney's countenance was so manifestly changed, that honest Wynne Williams felt that he might as well do a proud thing, and resign, as wait a little longer for the inevitable humiliation of dismissal.
"I'm afraid my friend the admiral is in bad hands; worse hands than Larkin's he could hardly have fallen into. I could tell you things of that fellow, if we had time—of course strictly between ourselves, you know—that would open your eyes. And as to his lordship—well, I suppose most people know something of Lord Verney. I owe him nothing, you know; it's all ended between us, and I wash my hands of him and his concerns. You may talk to him, if you like; but you'll find you might as well argue with the tide in the estuary there. I'd bedevilish glad if I could be of any use; but you see how it is; and to tell you the truth, I'm afraid it must come to a regular smash, unless Lord Verney drops that nasty litigation. There are some charges, you know, upon the property already; and with that litigation hanging over it, I don't see how he's to get money to pay those calls. It's a bad business, I'm afraid, and an awful pity. Poor old fellow!—a little bit rough, but devilish good-hearted."
Tom Sedley went up to Hazelden. The Etherage girls knew he was coming, and were watching for him at the top of the steep walk.
"I've been talking, as I said I would, to Wynne Williams this morning," he said, after greetings and inquiries made and answered, "and he had not anything important to advise; but he has promised to think over the whole matter."
"And Wynne Williams isknownto bethecleverest lawyerin the world," exclaimed Miss Charity, exulting. "I was afraid, on account of his having been so lately Lord Verney's adviser, that he would not have been willing to consult with you. Andwillhe use his influence, which must be very great, with Lord Verney?"
"He has none; and he thinks it would be quite useless my talking to him."
"Oh! Is it possible? Well, if he saidthat,Ineverheardsuchnonsense in the course of my life. I think old Lord Verney was one of thevery nicestmen Ieverspoke to in the course of my life; and I'm certain it is all that horrid Mr. Larkin, and a great mistake; for Lord Verney is quite a gentleman, and would not do anything sodespicableas to worry and injure papa by this horrid business, if only you would make him understand it; and Idothink, Thomas Sedley, youmighttake that trouble for papa."
"I'll go over to Ware, and try to see Lord Verney, if you think my doing so can be of the least use," said Tom, who knew the vanity of arguing with Miss Charity.
"Oh,do," said pretty Agnes, and that entreaty was, of course, a command; so without going up to see old Etherage, who was very much broken and ill, his daughters said; and hoping possibly to have some cheering news on his return, Tom Sedley took his leave for the present, and from the pier of Cardyllian crossed in a boat to Ware.
On the spacious steps of that palatial mansion, as Mr. Larkin used to term it, stood Lord Verney, looking grandly seaward, with compressed eyes, like a near-sighted gentleman as he was.
"Oh! is she all right?" said Lord Verney.
"I—I don't know, Lord Verney," replied Tom Sedley. "I came to"—
"Oh—aw—Mr.—Mr.—how d'ye do, sir," said Lord Verney, with marked frigidity, not this time giving him the accustomed finger.
"I came, Lord Verney, hoping you might possibly give me five minutes, and a very few words, about that unfortunate business of poor Mr. Vane Etherage."
"I'm unfortunately just going out in a boat—about it; and I can't just now afford time, Mr.—a—Mr."—
"Sedleyis my name," suggested Sedley, who knew that Lord Verney remembered him perfectly.
"Sedley—Mr. Sedley; yes. As I mentioned, I'm going in a boat. I'm sorry I can't possibly oblige you; and it is very natural you, who are so intimate, I believe, with Mr. Etherage, should take that side of the question—about it; butI've no reason to call those proceedings unfortunate; and—and I don't anticipate—and, in fact, people usually look after their own concerns—about it." Lord Verney, standing on the steps, was looking over Sedley's head, as he spoke, at the estuary and the shipping there.
"I'm sure, Lord Verney, if you knew how utterly ruinous, how reallydeplorable, the consequences of pursuing this thing—I mean the lawsuit against him—may be—I amsure—you would stop it all."
Honest Tom spoke in the belief that in the hesitation that had marked the close of the noble lord's remarks there was a faltering of purpose, whereas there was simply a failure of ideas.
"I can't help your forming opinions, sir, though I have not invited their expression upon my concerns and—and affairs. If you have anything to communicate about those proceedings, you had better see Mr. Larkin, my attorney; he's the proper person. Mr. Etherage has taken a line in the county to wound and injure me, as, of course, he has a perfect right to do; he has taken that line, and I don't see any reason why I should not have what I'm entitled to. There's the principle of government by party, you're aware; and we're not to ask favours of those we seek to wound and injure—about it; and that's my view, and idea, and fixed opinion. I must wish you good morning, Mr. Sedley. I'm going down to my boat, and I decline distinctly any conversation upon the subject of my law business; I decline itdistinctly, Mr. Sedley—about it," repeated the peer peremptorily; and as he looked a good deal incensed, Tom Sedley wisely concluded it was time to retire; and so his embassage came to an end.
Lord Verney crossed the estuary in his yacht, consulting his watch from time to time, and reconnoitering the green and pier of Cardyllian through his telescope with considerable interest. A little group was assembled near the stair, among whose figures he saw Lady Wimbledon. "Why is not Caroline there?" he kept asking himself, and all the time searching that little platform for the absent idol of his heart.
Let us deal mercifully with this antiquated romance; and if Miss Caroline Oldys forebore to say, "Go up, thou baldhead," let us also spare the amorous incongruity. Does any young man love with the self-abandonment of an old one? Is any romance so romantic as the romance of an old man? When Sancho looked over his shoulder, and saw his master in his shirt, cutting capers and tumbling head-over-heels, and tearing his hair in his love-madness, that wise governor and man of proverbs forgot the grotesqueness of the exhibition in his awe of that vehement adoration. So let us. When does this noble frenzy exhibit itself in such maudlin transports, and with a self-sacrifice so idolatrously suicidal, as in the old? Seeing, then, that the spirit is so prodigiously willing, let us bear with the spectacle of their infirmities, and when one of these sighing, magnanimous, wrinkled Philanders goes by, let us not hiss, but rather say kindly, "Vive la bagatelle!" or, as we say in Ireland, "More power!"
He was disappointed. Miss Caroline Oldys had a very bad headache, Lady Wimbledon said, and was in her room, in care of her maid,somiserable at losing the charming sail to Malory.
Well, the lover was sorely disappointed, as we have said; but there was nothing for it but submission, and to comfort himself with the assurances of Lady Wimbledon that Caroline's headaches never lasted long, and that she was always better for a long time, when they were over. This latter piece of information seemed to puzzle Lord Verney.
"Miss Oldys is always better after an attack than before it," said Cleve, interpreting for his uncle.
"Why, ofcourse. That's what Lady Wimbledon means, as I understand it," said Lord Verney, a little impatiently. "It's very sad; you must tell me all about it; but we may hope to find her, you say, quite recovered when we return?"
Cleve was not of the party to Malory. He returned to the Verney Arms. He went up to Lady Wimbledon's drawing-room with a book he had promised to lend her, and found Miss Caroline Oldys.
Yes, she was better. He was very earnest andtender in his solicitudes. He was looking ill, and was very melancholy.
Two hours after her maid came in to know whether she "pleased to want anything?" and she would have sworn that Miss Caroline had been crying. Mr. Cleve had got up from beside her, and was looking out of the window.
A little later in the day, old Lady Calthorpe, a cousin of Lady Wimbledon's, very feeble and fussy, and babbling in a querulous treble, was pushed out in her Bath-chair, Cleve and Miss Caroline Oldys accompanying, to the old castle of Cardyllian.
On the step of the door of the Verney Arms, as they emerged, whom should they meet, descending from the fly that had borne him from Llwynan, but the Rev. Isaac Dixie. That sleek and rosy gentleman, with flat feet, and large hands, and fascinating smile, was well pleased to join the party, and march blandly beside the chair of the viscountess, invigorating the fainting spirit of that great lady by the balm of his sympathy and the sunshine of his smile.
So into the castle they went, across the nearly obliterated moat, where once a drawbridge hung, now mantled with greenest grass, under the grim arches, where once the clanging portcullis rose and fell, and into the base court, and so underother arches into the inner court, surrounded by old ivy-mantled walls.
In this seclusion the old Lady Calthorpe stopped her chair to enjoy the sweet air and sunshine, and the agreeable conversation of the divine, and Cleve offered to guide Miss Caroline Oldys through the ruins, an exploration in which she seemed highly interested.
Cleve spoke low and eloquently, but I don't think it was about the architecture. Time passed rapidly, and at last Miss Oldys whispered—
"We've been too long away from Lady Calthorpe. I must go back. She'll think I have deserted her."
So they emerged from the roofless chambers and dim corridors, and Cleve wished from the bottom of his heart that some good or evil angel would put off his uncle's nuptials for another week, and all would be well—well!
Yes—what was "well," if one goes to moral ideals for a standard? We must run risks—we must set one side of the book against the other. What is the purpose and the justification of all morality but happiness? The course which involves least misery is alternatively the moral course. And take the best act that ever you did, and place it in that dreadful solvent, the light of God's eye, and how much of its motive will standthe test? Yes—another week, and all will be well; and has not a fertile mind like his, resource for any future complication, as for this, that may arise?
Captain Shrapnell was not sorry to meet this distinguished party as they emerged, and drew up on the grass at the side, and raised his hat with a reverential smile, as the old lady wheeled by, and throwing a deferential concern suddenly into his countenance, he walked a few paces beside Cleve, while he said—
"You've heard, of course, about your uncle, Lord Verney?"
"No?" answered Cleve, on chance.
"No?—Oh?—Why it's half an hour ago. I hope it's nothing serious; but his groom drove down from Malory for the doctor here. Something wrong with his head—suddenly, I understand, and Old Lyster took his box with him, and a bottle of leeches—that looks serious, eh?—along with him."
Shrapnell spoke low, and shook his head.
"I—I did not hear a word of it. I've been in the castle with old Lady Calthorpe. I'm very much surprised."
There was something odd, shrewd old Shrapnell fancied in the expression of Cleve's eye, which for a moment met his. But Cleve looked paleand excited, as he said a word in a very low tone to Miss Oldys, and walked across the street accompanied by Shrapnell, to the doctor's shop.
"Oh!" said Cleve, hastily stepping in, and accosting a lean, pale youth, with lank, black hair, who paused in the process of braying a prescription in a mortar as he approached. "My uncle's not well, I hear—Lord Verney—at Malory?"
The young man glanced at Captain Shrapnell.
"The doctor told me not to mention, sir; but ifyou'dcome into the back-room"——
"I'll be with you in a moment," said Cleve Verney to Shrapnell, at the same time stepping into the sanctum, and the glass door being shut, he asked, "Whatisit?"
"The doctor thought it must be apoplexy, sir," murmured the young man, gazing with wide open eyes, very solemnly, in Cleve's face.
"So I fancied," and Cleve paused, a little stunned; "and the doctor's there, at Malory,now?"
"Yes, sir; he'll be there a quarter of an hour or more by this time," answered the young man.
Again Cleve paused.
"It was notfatal—he was still living?" he asked very low.
"Yes, sir—sure."
Cleve, forgetting any form of valediction, passed into the shop.
"I must drive down to Malory," he said; and calling one of those pony carriages which ply in Cardyllian, he drove away, with a wave of his hand to the Captain, who was sorely puzzled to read the true meaning of that handsome mysterious face.
It was all over Cardyllian by this time that the viscount was very ill—dying perhaps—possibly dead. Under the transparent green shadow of the tall old trees, down the narrow road to Malory, which he had so often passed in other moods, more passionate, hardly perhaps less selfish, than his present, was Cleve now driving, with brain and heart troubled and busy—"walking, as before, in a vain shadow, and disquieting himself in vain." The daisies looked up innocently as the eyes of children, into his darkened gaze. Had fate after all taken pity on him, and was here by one clip of the inexorable shears a deliverance from the hell of his complication?
As Cleve entered the gate of Malory he saw the party from Cardyllian leaving in the yacht on their return. Lady Wimbledon, it turned out, had remained behind in charge of Lord Verney.On reaching the house, Cleve learned that Lord Verney wasalive—was better in fact.
Combining Lady Wimbledon's and the doctor's narratives, what Cleve learned amounted to this. Lord Verney, who affected a mysterious urgency and haste in his correspondence, had given orders that his letters should follow him to Malory that day. One of these letters, with a black seal and black-bordered envelope, proved to be a communication of considerable interest. It was addressed to him by the clergyman who had charge of poor old Lady Verney's conscience, and announced that his care was ended, and the Dowager Lady, Lord Verney's mother, was dead.
As the doctor who had attended her was gone, and no one but servants in the house, he had felt it a duty to write to Lord Verney to apprise him of the melancholy event.
The melancholy event was no great shock to Lord Verney, her mature son of sixty-four, who had sometimes wondered dimly whether she would live as long as the old Countess of Desmond, and go on drawing her jointure for fifty years after his own demise. He had been a good son; he had nothing to reproach himself with. She was about ninety years of age; the estate was relieved of £1,500 per annum. She had been a religious woman too, and was, no doubt,happy. On the whole the affliction was quite supportable.
But no affliction ever came at a more awkward time. Here was his marriage on the eve of accomplishment—a secret so well kept up to yesterday that no one on earth, he fancied, but half a dozen people, knew that any such thing was dreamed of. Lord Verney, like other tragedians in this theatre of ours, was, perhaps, a little more nervous than he seemed, and did not like laughter in the wrong place. He did not want to be talked over, or, as he said, "any jokes or things about it." And therefore he wished the event to take mankind unawares, as the Flood did. But this morning, with a nice calculation as to time, he had posted four letters, bound, like Antonio's argosies, to different remote parts of the world—one to Pau, another to Lisbon, a third to Florence, and a fourth for Geneva, to friends who were likely to spread the news in all directions—which he cared nothing about, if only the event came off at the appointed time. With the genius of a diplomatist, he had planned his remaining dispatches, not very many, so as to reach their less distant destinations at the latest hour, previous to that of his union. But the others were actually on their way, and he supposed a month or more must now pass before itcould take place with any decorum, and, in the meantime, all the world would be enjoying their laugh over his interesting situation.
Lord Verney was very much moved when he read this sad letter; he was pathetic and peevish, much moved and irritated, and shed some tears. He withdrew to write a note to the clergyman, who had announced the catastrophe, and was followed by Lady Wimbledon, who held herself privileged, and to her he poured forth his "ideas and feelings" about his "poor dear mother who was gone, about it;" and suddenly he was seized with a giddiness so violent that if a chair had not been behind him he must have fallen on the ground.
It was something like a fit; Lady Wimbledon was terrified; he looked so ghastly, and answered nothing, only sighed laboriously, and moved his white lips. In her distraction, she threw up the window, and screamed for the servants; and away went Lord Verney's open carriage, as we have seen, to Cardyllian, for the doctor.
By the time that Cleve arrived, the attack had declared itself gout—fixed, by a mustard bath "nicely" in the foot, leaving, however, its "leven mark" upon the head where it had flickered, in an angrily inflamed eye.
Here was another vexation. It might be overin a week, the doctor said; it might last a month. But for the present it was quite out of the question moving him. They must contrive, and make him as comfortable as they could. But at Malory he must be contented to remain for the present.
He saw Cleve for a few minutes.
"It's very unfortunate—your poor dear grandmother—and this gout; but we must bow to the will of Providence; we have every consolation in her case. She's, no doubt, gone to heaven, about it; but it's indescribably untoward the whole thing; you apprehend me—the marriage—you know—and things; we must pray to heaven to grant us patience under these cross-grained, unintelligible misfortunes that are always persecuting some people, and never come in the way of others, and I beg you'll represent to poor Caroline how it is. I'm not even to write for a day or two; and you must talk to her, Cleve, and try to keep her up, for I do believe she does like her old man, and does not wish to see the poor old fellow worse than he is; and, Cleve, I appreciate your attention and affection in coming so promptly;" and Lord Verney put out his thin hand and pressed Cleve's. "You're very kind, Cleve, and if they allow me I'll see you to-morrow, and you'll tell me what's in the papers,for they won't let me read; and there will be this funeral, you know—about it—your poor dear grandmother; she'll of course—she'll be buried; you'll have to see to that, you know; and Larkin, you know—he'll save you trouble, and—and—hey! ha, ha—hoo! Very pleasant! Good gracious, what torture! Ha!—Oh, dear! Well, I think I've made everything pretty clear, and you'll tell Caroline—its only a flying gout—about it—and—and things. So I must bid you good-bye, dear Cleve, and God bless you."
So Cleve did see Caroline Oldys at the Verney Arms, and talked a great deal with her, in a low tone, while old Lady Wimbledon dozed in her chair, and, no doubt, it was all about his uncle's "flying gout."
That night our friend Wynne Williams was sitting in his snuggery, a little bit of fire was in the grate, the air being sharp, his tea-things on the table, and the cozy fellow actually reading a novel, with his slippered feet on the fender.
It was half-past nine o'clock, a rather rakish hour in Cardyllian, when the absorbed attorney was aroused by a tap at his door.
I think I have already mentioned that in that town of the golden age, hall-doors stand open, in evidence of "ancient faith that knows no guile," long after dark.
"Come in," said Wynne Williams; and to his amazement who should enter, not with the conventional smile of greeting, but pale, dark, and wo-begone, but the tall figure of Mrs. Rebecca Mervyn.
Honest Wynne Williams never troubled himself about ghosts, but he had read of spectral illusions, and old Mrs. Mervyn unconsciously encouraged a fancy that the thing he greatly feared had come upon him, and that he was about to become a victim to that sort of hallucination. She stood just a step within the door, looking at him, and he, with his novel, on his knee, stared at her as fixedly.
"She's dead," said the old lady.
"Who?" exclaimed the attorney.
"The Dowager Lady Verney," she continued, rather than answered.
"I was so much astonished, ma'am, to see you here; you haven't been down in the town these twelve years, I think. I could scarce believe my eyes. Won't you come in, ma'am? Pray do." The attorney by this time was on his legs, and doing the honours, much relieved, and he placed a chair for her. "If it's any business, ma'am, I'll be most happy, or any time you like."
"Yes, she's dead," said she again.
"Oh, come in, ma'am—do—so is Queen Anne,"said the attorney, laughing kindly. "I heardthatearly to-day; weallheard it, and we're sorry, of course. Sit down, ma'am. But then she was not very far from a hundred, and we're all mortal. Can I do anything for you, ma'am?"
"She was good to me—a proud woman—hard, they used to say; but she was good to me—yes, sir—and so she's gone, at last. She was frightened at them—there was something in them—my poor head—you know—Icouldn't see it, and I did not care—for the little child was gone; it was only two months old, and she was ninety years; it's a long time, and now she's in her shroud, poor thing! and I may speak to you."
"Do, ma'am—pray; but it's growing late, and hadn't we better come to the point a bit?"
She was sitting in the chair he had placed for her, and she had something under her cloak, a thick book it might be, which she held close in her arms. She placed it on the table and it turned out to be a small tin box with a padlock.
"Papers, ma'am?" he inquired.
"Will you read them, sir, and see what ought to be done—there's the key?"
"Certainly, ma'am;" and having unlocked it, he disclosed two little sheaves of papers, neatly folded and endorsed.
The attorney turned these over rapidly, merelyreading at first the little note of its contents written upon each. "By Jove!" he exclaimed; he looked very serious now, with a frown, and the corners of his mouth drawn down, like a man who witnesses something horrible.
"And, ma'am, how long have you had these?"
"Since Mr. Sedley died."
"I know; that's more than twenty years, I think; did you show them to anyone?"
"Only to the poor old lady who's gone."
"Ay, I see."
There was a paper endorsed "Statement of Facts," and this the attorney was now reading.
"Now, ma'am, do you wish to place these papers in my hands, that I may act upon them as the interests of those who are nearest to you may require?"
She looked at him with a perplexed gaze, and said, "Yes, sir, certainly."
"Very well, ma'am; then I must go up to town at once. It's a very serious affair, ma'am, and I'll do my duty by you."
"Can you understand them, sir?"
"N—no—that is, I must see counsel in London; I'll be back again in a day or two. Leave it all to me, ma'am, and the moment I know anything for certain, you shall know all about it."
The old woman asked the question as onespeaks in their sleep, without hearing the answer. Her finger was to her lip, and she was looking down with a knitted brow.
"Ay, she was proud—Ipromised—proud—she was—very high—it will be in Penruthyn, she told me she would be buried there—Dowager Lady Verney! I wish, sir, it had been I."
She drew her cloak about her and left the room, and he accompanied her with the candle to the hall-door, and saw her hurry up the street.
Now and then a passenger looked at the tall cloaked figure gliding swiftly by, but no one recognised her.
The attorney was gaping after her in deep abstraction, and when she was out of sight he repeated, with a resolute wag of his head—
"Iwilldo my duty by you—and a serious affair, uponmy soul! Averyserious affair it is."
And so he closed the door, and returned to his sitting-room in deep thought, and very strange excitement, and continued reading those papers till one o'clock in the morning.
Clevewas assiduous in consoling Miss Caroline Oldys, a duty specially imposed upon him by the voluntary absence of Lady Wimbledon, who spent four or five hours every day at Malory, with an equally charitable consideration for the spirits of Lord Verney, who sat complaining in pain and darkness.
Every day he saw more or less of the Rev. Isaac Dixie, but never alluded to his midnight interview with him at Clay Rectory. Only once, a little abruptly, he had said to him, as they walked together on the green——
"I say, you must manage your duty for two Sundays more—youmuststay here for the funeral—that will be on Tuesday week."
Cleve said no more; but he looked at him with a fixed meaning in his eye, with which the clergyman somehow could not parley.
At the post-office, to which Miss Oldys hadbegged his escort, a letter awaited him. His address was traced in the delicate and peculiar hand of that beautiful being who in those very scenes had once filled every hour of his life with dreams, and doubts, and hopes; and now how did he feel as those slender characters met his eye? Shall I say, as the murderer feels when some relic of his buried crime is accidentally turned up before his eyes—chilled with a pain that reaches on to doomsday—with a tremor of madness—with an insufferable disgust?
Smiling, he put it with his other letters in his pocket, and felt as if every eye looked on him with suspicion—with dislike; and as if little voices in the air were whispering, "It is from his wife—from his wife—from his wife."
Tom Sedley was almost by his side, and had just got his letters—filling him, too, with dismay—posted not ten minutes before from Malory, and smiting his last hope to the centre.
"Look at it, Cleve," he said, half an hour later. "I thought all these things might have softened him—his own illness and his mother's death; and the Etherages—by Jove, I think he'll ruin them; the poor old man is going to leave Hazelden in two or three weeks, and—and he'sutterlyruined I think, and all by that d—d lawsuit, that Larkin knows perfectly well Lord Verney can never succeed in; but in the meantime it will be the ruin of that nice family, that were so happy there; and look—here it is—my own letter returned—so insulting—like a beggar's petition; and this note—not even signed by him."
"Lord Verney is indisposed; he has already expressed his fixed opinion upon the subject referred to in Mr. Sedley's statement, which he returns; he declines discussing it, and refers Mr. Sedley again to his solicitor."
So, disconsolate Sedley, having opened his griefs to Cleve, went on to Hazelden, where he was only too sure to meet with a thoroughly sympathetic audience.
A week passed, and more. And now came the day of old Lady Verney's funeral. It was a long procession—tenants on horseback, tenants on foot—the carriages of all the gentlemen round about.
On its way to Penruthyn Priory the procession passed by the road, ascending the steep by the little church of Llanderris, and full in view, through a vista in the trees, of the upper windows of the steward's house.
Our friend Mr. Dingwell, whose journey had cost him a cold, got his clothes on for this occasion, and was in the window, with a field-glass, which had amused him on the road from London.
He had called up Mrs. Mervyn's servant girlto help him to the names of such people as she might recognise.
As the hearse, with its grove of sable plumes, passed up the steep road, he was grave for a few minutes; and he said—
"That was a good woman. Well foryou, ma'am, if you have ever one-twentieth part of her virtues. She did not know how to make her virtues pleasant, though; she liked to have people afraid of her; and if you have people afraid of you, my dear, the odds are they'll hate you. We can't have everything—virtue and softness, fear and love—in this queer world. An excellent—severe—most ladylike woman. What are they stopping for now? Oh! There they go again. The only ungenteel thing she ever did is what she has begun to do now—to rot; but she'll do italone, in thedark, you see; and thereisa right and a wrong, and she did some good in her day."
The end of his queer homily he spoke in a tone a little gloomy, and he followed the hearse awhile with his glass.
In two or three minutes more the girl thought she heard him sob; and looking up, with a shock, perceived that his face was gleaming with a sinister laugh.
"What a precious coxcomb that fellow Cleve is—chief mourner, egad—and he does it prettywell. 'My inky cloak, good mother.' He looks so sorry, I almost believe he's thinking of his uncle's wedding. 'Thrift, Horatio, thrift!' I say, miss—I always forget your name. My dear young lady, be so good, will you, as to say I feel better to-day, and should be very happy to see Mrs. Mervyn, if she could give me ten minutes?"
So she ran down upon her errand, and he drew back from the window, suffering the curtain to fall back as before, darkening the room; and Mr. Dingwell sat himself down, with his back to the little light that entered, drawing his robe-de-chambre about him and resting his chin on his hand.
"Come in, ma'am," said Mr. Dingwell, in answer to a tap at the door, and Mrs. Mervyn entered. She looked in the direction of the speaker, but could see only a shadowy outline, the room was so dark.
"Pray, madam, sit down on the chair I've set for you by the table. I'm at last well enough to see you. You'll have questions to put to me. I'll be happy to tell you all I know. I was with poor Arthur Verney, as you are aware, when he died."
"I have but one hope now, sir—to see him hereafter. Oh, sir!didhe think of his unhappy soul—of heaven."
"Of the other place he did think, ma'am. I'veheard him wish evil people, such as clumsy servants and his brother here, in it; but I suppose you mean to ask was he devout—eh?"
"Yes, sir; it has been my prayer, day and night, in my long solitude. What prayers, what prayers, what terrible prayers, God only knows."
"Your prayers were heard, ma'am; he was a saint."
"Thank God!"
"The most punctual, edifying, self-tormenting saint I ever had the pleasure of knowing in any quarter of the globe," said Mr. Dingwell.
"Oh!thank God."
"His reputation for sanctity in Constantinople was immense, and at both sides of the Bosphorus he was the admiration of the old women and the wonder of the little boys, and an excellent Dervish, a friend of his, who was obliged to leave after having been bastinadoed for a petty larceny, told me he has seen even the town dogs and the asses hold down their heads, upon my life, as he passed by, to receive his blessing!"
"Superstition—but still it shows, sir"——
"To be sure it does, ma'am."
"It shows that his sufferings—my darling Arthur—had made a real change."
"Oh! acompletechange, ma'am. Egad, averycomplete change,indeed!"
"When he left this, sir, he was—oh! my darling! thoughtless, volatile"——
"An infidel and a scamp—eh? So he told me, ma'am."
"And I have prayed that his sufferings might be sanctified to him," she continued, "and that he might be converted, even though I should never see him more."
"So he was, ma'am;Ican vouch for that," said Mr. Dingwell.
Again poor Mrs. Mervyn broke into a rapture of thanksgiving.
"Vastly lucky you've been, ma'am;allyour prayers about him, egad, seem to have been granted. Pity you did not pray for something he might have enjoyed more. But all's for the best—eh?"
"All things work together for good—all for good," said the old lady, looking upward, with her hands clasped.
"And you're as happy at hisconversion, ma'am, as the Ulema who received him into the faith of Mahomet—happier, I really think. Lucky dog! what interest he inspires, what joy he diffuses, even now, in Mahomet's paradise, I dare say. It's worth while being a sinner for the sake of the conversion, ma'am."
"Sir—sir, I can't understand," gasped the old lady, after a pause.
"No difficulty, ma'am, none in the world."
"For God's sake,don't; I think I'm goingmad" cried the poor woman.
"Mad, my good lady! Not a bit. What's the matter? Is it Mahomet? You're not afraid ofhim?"
"Oh, sir, for theLord'ssake tell me what you mean?" implored she, wildly.
"I meanthat, to be sure; what Isay," he replied. "I mean that the gentleman complied with the custom of the country—don't you see?—and submitted to Kismet. It was his fate, ma'am; it's the invariable condition; and they'd have handed him over to his Christian compatriots to murder, according to Frank law, otherwise. So, ma'am, he shaved his head, put on a turban—they wore turbans then—and, with his Koran under his arm, walked into a mosque, and said his say about Allah and the rest, and has been safe ever since."
"Oh, oh, oh!" cried the poor old lady, trembling in a great agony.
"Ho!no, ma'am; 'twasn't much," said he, briskly.
"All, all; the last hope!" cried she, wildly.
"Don't run away with it, pray. It's a veryeasy and gentlemanlike faith, Mahometanism—except in the matter of wine; and even that you can have, under the rose, like other things here, ma'am, that aren't quite orthodox; eh?" said Mr. Dingwell.
"Oh, Arthur, Arthur!" moaned the poor lady distractedly, wringing her hands.
"Suppose, ma'am, we pray it may turn out to have been the right way. Very desirable, since Arthur died in it," said Mr. Dingwell.
"Oh, sir, oh! I couldn't have believed it. Oh, sir, this shock—this frightful shock!"
"Courage, madam! Console yourself. Let us hope he didn't believe this any more than the other," said Mr. Dingwell.
Mrs. Mervyn leaned her cheek on her thin clasped hands, and was rocking herself to and fro in her misery.
"I was with him, you know, in his last moments," said Mr. Dingwell, shrugging sympathetically, and crossing his leg. "It's always interesting, those last moments—eh?—and exquisitely affecting, even—particularlyif it isn't very clearwherethe fellow's going."
A tremulous moan escaped the old lady.
"And he called for some wine. That's comforting, and has a flavour of Christianity, eh? Arelapse, don't you think, very nearly?—at so unconvivial a moment. It must have beenprinciple; eh? Let us hope."
The old lady's moans and sighs were her answers.
"And now that I think on it, he must have died a Christian," said Mr. Dingwell, briskly.
The old lady looked up, and listened breathlessly.
"Because, after we thought he was speechless, there was one of those what-d'ye-call-'ems—begging dervish fellows—came into the room, and kept saying one of their long yarns about the prophet Mahomet, and my dying friend made me a sign; so I put my ear to his lips, and he said distinctly, 'He be d—d!'—I beg your pardon; but last words are always precious."
Here came a pause.
Mr. Dingwell was quite bewildering this trembling old lady.
"And the day before," resumed Mr. Dingwell, "Poor Arthur said, 'They'll bury me here under a turban; but I should like a mural tablet in old Penruthyn church. They'd be ashamed of my name, I think; so they can put on it the date of my decease, and the simple inscription, Check-mate.' But whether he meant to himself or his creditors I'm not able to say."
Mrs. Mervyn groaned.
"It's very interesting. And he had a message for you, ma'am. He called you by a name of endearment. He made me stoop, lest I should miss a word, and he said, 'Tell my little linnet,' said he"—
But here Mr. Dingwell was interrupted. A wild cry, a wild laugh, and—"Oh, Arthur, it'syou!"
He felt, as he would have said, "oddly" for a moment—a sudden flood of remembrance, of youth. The worn form of that old outcast, who had not felt the touch of human kindness for nearly thirty years, was clasped in the strain of an inextinguishable and angelic love—in the thin arms of one likewise faded and old, and near the long sleep in which the heart is fluttered and pained no more.
There was a pause, a faint laugh, a kind of sigh, and he said—
"So you've found me out."
"Darling, darling! you're not changed?"
"Change!" he answered, in a low tone. "There's a change, little linnet, from summer to winter; where the flowers were the snow is. Draw the curtain, and let us look on one another."
Ourfriend, Wynne Williams, made a much longer stay than he had expected in London. From him, too, Tom Sedley received about this time a mysterious summons to town, so urgent and so solemn that he felt there was something extraordinary in it; and on consultation with the Etherage girls, those competent advisers settled that he should at once obey it.
Tom wrote to Agnes on the evening of his arrival—
"I have been for an hour with Wynne Williams; you have no notion what a good fellow he is, and what a wonderfully clever fellow. There is somethingverygood in prospect for me, but not yet certain, and I am bound not to tell a human being. Butyou, I will, of course, the moment I know it for certain. It may turn out nothing at all; but we are working very hard all the same."
In the meantime, down at Malory, things weretaking a course of which the good people of Cardyllian had not a suspicion.
With a little flush over his grim, brown face, with a little jaunty swagger, and a slight screwing of his lips, altogether as if he had sipped a little too much brandy-and-water—though he had nothing of the kind that day—giggling and chuckling over short sentences; with a very determined knitting of his eyebrows, and something in his eyes unusually sinister, which a sense of danger gives to a wicked face, Mr. Dingwell walked down the clumsy stairs of the steward's house, and stood within the hatch.
There he meditated for a few moments, with compressed lips, and a wandering sweep of his eyes along the stone urns and rose bushes that stood in front of the dwarf wall, which is backed by the solemn old trees of Malory.
"In for a penny, in for a pound."
And he muttered a Turkish sentence, I suppose equivalent; and thus fortified by the wisdom of nations, he stepped out upon the broad gravel walk, looked about him for a second or two, as if recalling recollections, in a sardonic mood, and then walked round the corner to the front of the house, and up the steps, and pulled at the door bell; the knocker had been removed in tenderness to Lord Verney's irritable nerves.
Two of his tall footmen in powder and livery were there, conveyed into this exile from Ware; for calls of inquiry were made here, and a glimpse of state was needed to overawe the bumpkins.
"His lordship was better; was sitting in the drawing-room; might possibly see the gentleman; and who should he say, please?"
"Say, Mr. Dingwell, the great Greek merchant, who has a most important communication to make."
His lordship would see Mr. Dingwell. Mr. Dingwell's name was called to a second footman, who opened a door, and announced him.
Lady Wimbledon, who had been sitting at the window reading aloud to Lord Verney at a little chink of light, abandoned her pamphlet, and rustled out by another door, as the Greek merchant entered.
Dim at best, and very unequal was the light. The gout had touched his lordship's right eyeball, which was still a little inflamed, and the doctor insisted on darkness.
There was something diabolically waggish in Mr. Dingwell's face, if the noble lord could only have seen it distinctly, as he entered the room. He was full of fun; he was enjoying a coming joke, with perhaps a little spice of danger in it, and could hardly repress a giggle.
The Viscount requested Mr. Dingwell to take a chair, and that gentleman waited till the servant had closed the door, and then thanked Lord Verney in a strange nasal tone, quite unlike Mr. Dingwell's usual voice.
"I come here, Lord Verney, with an important communication to make. I could have made it to some of the people about you—and you have able professional people—or to your nephew; but it is a pleasure, Lord Verney, to speak instead to the cleverest man in England."
The noble lord bowed a little affably, although he might have questioned Mr. Dingwell's right to pay him compliments in his own house; but Mr. Dingwell's fiddlestick had touched the right string, and the noble instrument made music accordingly. Mr. Dingwell, in the dark, looked very much amused.
"I can hardly style myselfthat, Mr. Dingwell."
"I speak ofbusiness, Lord Verney; and I adopt the language of the world in saying the cleverest man in England."
"I'm happy to say my physician allows me to listen to reading, and to talk a little, and there can be no objection to a little business either," said Lord Verney, passing by the compliment this time, but, on the whole, good-humouredly disposed toward Mr. Dingwell.
"I've two or three things to mention, Lord Verney; and the first is money."
Lord Verney coughed drily. He was suddenly recalled to a consciousness of Mr. Dingwell's character.
"Money, my lord. The name makes you cough, as smoke does a man with an asthma. I've found it all my life as hard to keep, as you do to part with. If I had but possessed Lord Verney's instincts and abilities, I should have been at this moment one of the wealthiest men in England."
Mr. Dingwell rose as he said this, and bowed towards Lord Verney.
"I said I should name it first; but as your lordship coughs, we had, perhaps, best discuss it last. Or, indeed, if it makes your lordship cough very much, perhaps we had better postpone it, or leave it entirely to your lordship's discretion—as I wouldn't for the world send this little attack into your chest."
Lord Verney thought Mr. Dingwell less unreasonable, but also more flighty, than he had supposed.
"You are quite at liberty, sir, to treat your subjects in what order you please. I wish you to understand that I have no objection to hear you; and—and you may proceed."
"The next is a question on which I presume we shall find ourselves in perfect accord. I had the honour, as you are very well aware, of an intimate acquaintance with your late brother, the Honourable Arthur Verney, and beyond measure I admired his talents, which were second in brilliancy only to your own. I admired even hisprinciples—but I see they make you cough also. They were, it is true, mephitic, sulphurous, such as might well take your breath, or that of any other moral man, quite away; but they had what I call the Verney stamp upon them; they were perfectly consistent, and quite harmonious. His, my lord, was the intense and unflinching rascality, if you permit me the phrase, of a man of genius, and I honoured it. Now, my lord, his adventures were curious, as you are aware, and I have them at my fingers' ends—his crimes, his escape, and, above all, his life in Constantinople—ha, ha, ha! It would make your hair stand on end. And to think he should have beenyour brother! Upon mysoul! Though, as I said, the genius—thegenius, Lord Verney—the inspiration was there. Inthathewasyour brother."
"I'm aware, sir, that he had talent, Mr. Dingwell, and could speak—about it. At Oxford he was considered the most promising young man of his time—almost."
"Yes, exceptyou; but you were two years later."
"Yes, exactly. I was precisely two years later about it."
"Yes, my lord, you were always about it; so he told me. No matter what it was—a book, or a boot-jack, or a bottle of port, you were always about it. It was a way you had, he said—about it."
"I wasn't aware that anyone remarked any such thing—about it," said Lord Verney, very loftily.
It dawned dimly upon him that Mr. Dingwell, who was a very irregular person, was possibly intoxicated. But Mr. Dingwell was speaking, though in a very nasal, odd voice, yet with a clear and sharp articulation, and in a cool way, not the least like a man in that sort of incapacity. Lord Verney concluded, therefore, that Mr. Dingwell was either a remarkably impertinent person, or most insupportably deficient in the commonest tact. I think he would have risen, even at the inconvenience of suddenly disturbing his flannelled foot, and intimated that he did not feel quite well enough to continue the conversation, had he not known something of Mr. Dingwell's dangerous temper, and equally dangerous knowledge and opportunities; for had they not subsidized Mr.Dingwell, in the most unguarded manner, and on the most monstrous scale, pending the investigation and proof before the Lords? "It was inevitable," Mr. Larkin said, "but also a little awkward; althoughtheyknew that the man had sworn nothing but truth."Veryawkward,Lord Verneythought, and therefore he endured Mr. Dingwell.
But the "great Greek merchant," as, I suppose half jocularly, he termed himself, not only seemed odious at this moment, by reason of his impertinence, but also formidable to Lord Verney, who, having waked from his dream that Dingwell would fly beyond the Golden Horn when once his evidence was given, and the coronet well fixed on the brows of the Hon. Kiffyn Fulke Verney, found himself still haunted by this vampire bat, which hung by its hooked wing, sometimes in the shadows of Rosemary Court—sometimes in those of the old Steward's House—sometimes hovering noiselessly nearer—always with its eyes upon him, threatening to fasten on his breast, and drain him.
The question of money he would leave "to his discretion." But what did his impertinence mean? Was it not minatory? And to what exorbitant sums in a choice of evils might not "discretion" point?
"This d—d Mr. Dingwell," thought LordVerney "will play the devil with my gout. I wish he was at the bottom of the Bosphorus."
"Yes. And your brother, Arthur—there were points in which he differed from you. Unless I'm misinformed, he was a first-rate cricketer, the crack bat of their team, and you werenothing; he was one of the best Grecians in the university, and you were plucked."
"I—I don't exactly see the drift of your rather inaccurate and extremely offensive observations, Mr. Dingwell," said Lord Verney, wincing and flushing in the dark.
"Offensive? Good heaven! But I'm talking to a Verney, to a man of genius; and I say, how the devil could I tell thattruthcould offend, either? With this reflection I forgivemyself, and I go on to say what will interest you."
Lord Verney, who had recovered his presence of mind, here nodded, to intimate that he was ready to hear him.
"Well, there were a few other points, but I need not mention them, in which you differed. You were both alike in this—each was a genius—you were an opaque and obscure genius, he a brilliant one; but each being a genius, there must have been a sympathy, notwithstanding his being a publican and you a—not exactly a Pharisee, but a paragon of prudence."
"I really, Mr. Dingwell, must request—you see I'm far from well, about it—that you'll be so good as a little to abridge your remarks; and I don't want to hear—you can easily, I hope, understand—my poor brother talked of in any but such terms as a brother should listen to."
"That arises, Lord Verney, from your not having had the advantage of his society for so very many years. Now, I knew him intimately, and I can undertake to say he did not care twopence what any one on earth thought of him, and it rather amused him painting infernal caricatures of himself, as a fiend or a monkey, and he often made me laugh by the hour—ha, ha, ha! he amused himself with revealed religion, and with everything sacred, sometimes even withyou—ha, ha, ha—hehadcertainly a wonderful sense of the ridiculous."
"May I repeat my request, if it does not appear to youveryunreasonable?" again interrupted Lord Verney, "and may I entreat to know what it is you wish me to understand about it, in as few words as you can, sir?"
"Certainly, Lord Verney; it is just this. As I have got materials, perfectly authentic, from my deceased friend, both about himself—horribly racy, you may suppose—ha, ha, ha—about your grand-uncle Pendel—you've heard of him, ofcourse—about your aunt Deborah, poor thing, who sold mutton pies in Chester,—I was thinking—suppose I write a memoir—Arthur alone deserves it; you pay the expenses; I take the profits, and I throw you in the copyright for a few thousand more, and call it, 'Snuffed-out lights of the Peerage,' or something of the kind? I think something is due to Arthur—don't you?"
"I think you can hardly be serious, Mr.—Mr.——"
"Perfectly serious, upon my soul, my lord. Could anything be more curious? Eccentricity's the soul of genius, and you're proud of your genius, Ihope."
"What strikes me, Mr. Dingwell, amounts, in short, to something like this. My poor brother, he has been unfortunate, about it, and—andworse, and he has done things, and I ask myselfwhythere should be an effort to obtrude him, and I answer myself, there's no reason, about it, and therefore I vote to have everything as it is, and I shall neither contribute my countenance, about it, nor money to any such undertaking, or—or—undertaking."
"Then my book comes to the ground, egad."
Lord Verney simply raised his head with a little sniff, as if he were smelling at a snuff-box.
"Well, Arthur must have something, you know."
"My brother, the Honourable Arthur Kiffyn Verney, is past receiving anything at my hands, and I don't think he probably looked for anything, about it, at any time fromyours."
"Well, but it's just the time for what I'm thinking of. You wouldn't give him a tombstone in his lifetime, I suppose, though youarea genius. Now, I happen to know he wished a tombstone.You'd like a tombstone, though not now—time enough in a year or two, when you're fermenting in your lead case."
"I'm not thinking of tombstones at present, sir, and it appears to me that you are giving yourself a very unusual latitude—about it."
"I don't mean in the mausoleum at Ware. Of course that's a place where people who have led a decorous life putrify together. I meant at the small church of Penruthyn, where the scamps await judgment."
"I—a—don't see that such a step is properly for the consideration of any persons—about it—outside the members of the Verney family, or more properly, of any but the representatives of that family," said Lord Verney, loftily, "and you'll excuse my not admitting, or—or, in fact, admitting any right in anyone else."
"He wished it immensely."
"I can't understand why, sir."
"Nor I; but I suppose you all get them—all ticketed—eh? and I'd write the epitaph, only putting in essentials, though, egad! in such a life it would be as long as a newspaper."
"I've already expressed my opinion, and—and things, and I have nothing to add."
"Then the tombstone comes to the ground also?"
"Anythingmore, sir?"
"But, my lord, he showed an immense consideration for you."
"I don't exactly recollecthow."
"Bydying—you've got hold of everything, don't you see, and you grudge him a tablet in the little church of Penruthyn, by gad! I told your nephew he wished it, and I tell you he wished it; it's not stinginess, it's your mean pride."
"You seem, Mr. Dingwell, to fancy that there's no limit to the impertinence I'll submit to."
"I'm sure there's none almost—you better not ring the bell—you better think twice—he gave me that message, and he also left me a mallet—quite a toy—but a single knock of it would bring Verney House, or Ware, or this place, about your ears."
The man was speaking in quite another voicenow, and in the most awful tones Lord Verney had ever heard in his life, and to his alarmed and sickly eyes it seemed as if the dusky figure of his visitor were dilating in the dark like an evoked Genii.
"I—I think about it—it's quite unaccountable—all this." Lord Verney was looking at the stranger as he spoke, and groping with his left hand for the old-fashioned bell-rope which used to hang near him in the library in Verney House, forgetting that there was no bell of any sort within his reach at that moment.
"I'm not going to take poor dear Arthur's mallet out of my pocket, for the least tap of it would make all England ring androar, sir. No, I'll make no noise; you and I, sir,tête-à-tête. I'll have no go-between; no Larkin, no Levi, no Cleve; you and I'll settle it alone. Your brother was a great Grecian, they used to call him Οδυσσευσ --Ulysses. Do you remember? I said I was the great Greek merchant? We have made an exchange together. You must pay. What shall I call myself, for Dingwell isn't my name. I'll take a new one--To μεν πρωτον Ουτιν ῾εαυτον επικαλει--επειδανδε διεφεuγε και εξω ην βελους Οδυσσυν ονομαζεσθαι εφη. In English--at first he called himself Outis--Nobody; but so soon as he had escaped, and was out of the javelin's reach, he said that he was named Odusseus--Ulysses, and here he is. This is the return of Ulysses!"
There had been a sudden change in Mr. Dingwell's Yankee intonation. The nasal tones were heard no more. He approached the window, and said, with a laugh, pulling the shutter more open—
"Why, Kiffyn, you fool, don't you know me?"
There was a silence.
"My great God! my great God of heaven!" came from the white lips of Lord Verney.
"Yes; God's over all," said Arthur Verney, with a strange confusion, between a sneer and something more genuine.
There was a long pause.
"Ha, ha, ha! don't make a scene! Not such a muff?" said Dingwell.
Lord Verney was staring at him with a face white and peaked as that of a corpse, and whispering still—"My God! my great God!" so that Dingwell, as I still call him, began to grow uneasy.
"Come; don't you make mountains of molehills. What the devil's all this fuss about? Here, drink a little of this." He poured out some water, and Lord Verney did sip a little, and then gulped down a good deal, and then he looked at Arthur again fixedly, and groaned.
"That's right—never mind. I'll not hurt you.Don't fancy I mean to disturb you. Ican't, you know, if I wished iteverso much. I daren'tshow—Iknowit. Don't suppose I want tobullyyou; the idea'simpracticable. I looked in merely to tell you, in a friendly way, who I am. You must do something handsome for me, you know. Devil's in it if a fellow can't get a share of his own money, and, as I said before, we'll have no go-betweens, no Jews or attorneys. D—n them all—but settle it between ourselves, like brothers. Sip a little more water."
"Arthur, Arthur, I say,yes; good God, I feel I shall have a good deal to say; but—my head, and things—I'm a little perplexed still, and I must have a glass of wine, about it, and I can't do it now; no, I can't."
"I don't live far away, you know; and I'll look in to-morrow—we're not in a hurry."
"It was a strange idea, Arthur. Good Lord, have mercy on me!"
"Not a bad one; eh?"
"Very odd, Arthur!—God forgive you."
"Yes, my dear Kiffyn, and you, too."
"The coronet—about it? I'm placed in a dreadful position, but you shan't be compromised, Arthur. Tell them I'm not very well, and somewine, I think—a little chill."
"And to-morrow I can look in again, quietly,"said the Greek merchant, "or whenever you like, and I shan't disclose our little confidence."
"It's going—everything, everything; I shall see it by-and-by," said Lord Verney, helplessly.
And thus the interview ended, and Mr. Dingwell in the hall gave the proper alarm about Lord Verney.