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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/7666.txt b/7666.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..893b27d --- /dev/null +++ b/7666.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2420 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook What Will He Do With It, by Lytton, V8 +#94 in our series by Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers***** + + +Title: What Will He Do With It, Book 8. + +Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton + +Release Date: March 2005 [EBook #7666] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on April 1, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHAT WILL HE DO WITH IT, V8 *** + + + +This eBook was produced by David Widger + + + + + +BOOK VIII. + + +CHAPTER I. + + "A LITTLE FIRE BURNS UP A GREAT DEAL OF CORN."--OLD PROVERB. + +Guy Darrell resumed the thread of solitary life at Fawley with a calm +which was deeper in its gloom than it had been before. The experiment of +return to the social world had failed. The resolutions which had induced +the experiment were finally renounced. Five years nearer to death, and +the last hope that had flitted across the narrowing passage to the grave, +fallen like a faithless torch from his own hand, and trodden out by his +own foot. + +It was peculiarly in the nature of Darrell to connect his objects with +posterity--to regard eminence in the Present but as a beacon-height from +which to pass on to the Future the name he had taken from the Past. All +his early ambition, sacrificing pleasure to toil, had placed its goal at +a distance, remote from the huzzas of bystanders; and Ambition halted +now, baffled and despairing. Childless, his line would perish with +himself--himself, who had so vaunted its restoration in the land! His +genius was childless also--it would leave behind it no offspring of the +brain. By toil he had amassed ample wealth; by talent he had achieved a +splendid reputation. But the reputation was as perishable as the wealth. +Let a half-century pass over his tomb, and nothing would be left to speak +of the successful lawyer the applauded orator, save traditional +anecdotes, a laudatory notice in contemporaneous memoirs--perhaps, at +most, quotations of eloquent sentences lavished on forgotten cases and +obsolete debates--shreds and fragments of a great intellect, which +another half-century would sink without a bubble into the depths of Time. +He had enacted no laws--he had administered no state--he had composed no +books. Like the figure on a clock, which adorns the case and has no +connection with the movement, he, so prominent an or nament to time, had +no part in its works. Removed, the eye would miss him for a while; but a +nation's literature or history was the same, whether with him or without. +Some with a tithe of his abilities have the luck to fasten their names to +things that endure; they have been responsible for measures they did not +not invent, and which, for good or evil, influence long generations. +They have written volumes out of which a couplet of verse, a period in +prose, may cling to the rock of ages, as a shell that survives a deluge. +But the orator, whose effects are immediate--who enthralls his audience +in proportion as he nicks the hour--who, were he speaking like Burke +what, apart from the subject-matter, closet students would praise, must, +like Burke, thin his audience, and exchange present oratorical success +for ultimate intellectual renown--a man, in short, whose oratory is +emphatically that of the DEBATER is, like an actor, rewarded with a loud +applause and a complete oblivion. Waife on the village stage might win +applause no less loud, followed by oblivion not more complete. + +Darrell was not blind to the brevity of his fame. In his previous +seclusion he had been resigned to that conviction--now it saddened him. +Then, unconfessed by himself, the idea that he might yet reappear in +active life, and do something which the world would not willingly let +die, had softened the face of that tranquil Nature from which he must +soon now pass out of reach and sight. On the tree of Time he was a leaf +already sear upon the bough--not an inscription graven into the rind. + +Ever slow to yield to weak regrets--ever seeking to combat his own +enemies within--Darrell said to himself one night, while Fairthorn's +flute was breathing an air of romance through the melancholy walls: "Is +it too late yet to employ this still busy brain upon works that will live +when I am dust, and make Posterity supply the heir that fails to my +house?" + +He shut himself up with immortal authors--he meditated on the choice of a +theme; his knowledge was wide, his taste refined;--words!--he could not +want words! Why should he not write? Alas; why indeed?--He who has +never been a writer in his youth, can no more be a writer in his age than +he can be a painter--a musician. What! not write a book! Oh, yes--as he +may paint a picture or set a song. But a writer, in the emphatic sense +of the word--a writer as Darrell was an orator--oh, no! And, least of +all, will he be a writer if he has been an orator by impulse and habit-- +an orator too happily gifted to require, and too laboriously occupied to +resort to, the tedious aids of written preparation--an orator as modern +life forms orators--not, of course, an orator like those of the classic +world, who elaborated sentences before delivery, and who, after delivery, +polished each extemporaneous interlude into rhetorical exactitude and +musical perfection. And how narrow the range of compositions to a man +burdened already by a grave reputation! He cannot have the self- +abandonment--he cannot venture the headlong charge--with which Youth +flings the reins to genius, and dashes into the ranks of Fame. Few and +austere his themes--fastidious and hesitating his taste. Restricted are +the movements of him who walks for the first time into the Forum of +Letters with the purple hem on his senatorial toga. Guy Darrell, at his +age, entering among authors as a novice!--he, the great lawyer, to whom +attorneys would have sent no briefs had he been suspected of coquetting +with a muse,--he, the great orator who had electrified audiences in +proportion to the sudden effects which distinguish oral inspiration from +written eloquence--he achieve now, in an art which his whole life had +neglected, any success commensurate to his contemporaneous repute;--how +unlikely! But a success which should outlive that repute, win the +"everlasting inheritance" which could alone have nerved him to adequate +effort--how impossible! He could not himself comprehend why, never at a +loss for language felicitously opposite or richly ornate when it had but +to flow from his thought to his tongue, nor wanting ease, even eloquence, +in epistolary correspondence confidentially familiar--he should find +words fail ideas, and ideas fail words, the moment his pen became a wand +that conjured up the Ghost of the dread Public! The more copious his +thoughts, the more embarrassing their selection; the more exquisite his +perception of excellence in others, the more timidly frigid his efforts +at faultless style. It would be the same with the most skilful author, +if the Ghost of the Public had not long since ceased to haunt him. While +he writes, the true author's solitude is absolute or peopled at his will. +But take an audience from an orator, what is he? He commands the living +public--the Ghost of the Public awes himself. + +"Surely once," sighed Darrell, as he gave his blurred pages to the +flames--" surely once I had some pittance of the author's talent, and +have spent it upon lawsuits!" + +The author's talent, no doubt, Guy Darrell once had--the author's +temperament never. What is the author's temperament? Too long a task to +define. But without it a man may write a clever book, a useful book, a +book that may live a year, ten years, fifty years. He will not stand out +to distant ages a representative of the age that rather lived in him than +he in it. The author's temperament is that which makes him an integral, +earnest, original unity, distinct from all before and all that may +succeed him. And as a Father of the Church has said that the +consciousness of individual being is the sign of immortality, not granted +to the inferior creatures--so it is in this individual temperament one +and indivisible, and in the intense conviction of it, more than in all +the works it may throw off, that the author becomes immortal. Nay, his +works may perish like those of Orpheus or Pythagoras; but he himself, in +his name, in the footprint of his being, remains, like Orpheus or +Pythagoras, undestroyed, indestructible. + +Resigning literature, the Solitary returned to Science. There he was +more at home. He had cultivated science, in his dazzling academical +career, with ardour and success; he had renewed the study, on his first +retirement to Fawley, as a distraction from tormenting memories or +unextin guished passions. He now for the first time regarded the +absorbing abstruse occupation as a possible source of fame. To be one in +the starry procession of those sons of light who have solved a new law in +the statute-book of heaven! Surely a grand ambition, not unbecoming to +his years and station, and pleasant in its labours to a man who loved +Nature's outward scenery with poetic passion, and had studied her inward +mysteries with a sage's minute research. Science needs not the author's +art--she rejects its gracess--he recoils with a shudder from its fancies. +But Science requires in the mind of the discoverer a limpid calm. The +lightnings that reveal Diespiter must flash in serene skies. No clouds +store that thunder + + "Quo bruta tellus, et vaga flumina, + Quo Styx, et invisi horrida Taenari + Sedes, Atlanteusque finis + Concutitur!" + +So long as you take science only as a distraction, science will not lead +you to discovery. And from some cause or other, Guy Darrell was more +unquiet and perturbed in his present than in his past seclusion. Science +this time failed even to distract. In the midst of august meditations-- +of close experiment--some haunting angry thought from the far world +passed with rude shadow between Intellect and Truth--the heart eclipsed +the mind. The fact is, that Darrell's genius was essentially formed for +Action. His was the true orator's temperament, with the qualities that +belong to it--the grasp of affairs--the comprehension of men and states +--the constructive, administrative faculties. In such career, and in +such career alone, could he have developed all his powers, and achieved +an imperishable name. Gradually as science lost its interest, he +retreated from all his former occupations, and would wander for long +hours over the wild unpopulated landscapes round him. As if it were his +object to fatigue the body, and in that fatigue tire out the restless +brain, he would make his gun the excuse for rambles from sunrise to +twilight over the manors he had purchased years ago, lying many miles off +from Fawley. There are times when a man who has passed his life in +cultivating his mind finds that the more he can make the physical +existence predominate, the more he can lower himself to the rude vigour +of the gamekeeper, or his day-labourer--why, the more he can harden his +nerves to support the weight of his reflections. + +In these rambles he was not always alone. Fairthorn contrived to +insinuate himself much more than formerly into his master's habitual +companionship. The faithful fellow had missed Darrell so sorely in that +long unbroken absence of five years, that on recovering him, Fairthorn +seemed resolved to make up for lost time. Departing from his own habits, +he would, therefore, lie in wait for Guy Darrell--creeping out of a +bramble or bush, like a familiar sprite; and was no longer to be awed +away by a curt syllable or a contracted brow. And Darrell, at first +submitting reluctantly, and out of compassionate kindness to the flute- +player's obtrusive society, became by degrees to welcome and relax in it. +Fairthorn knew the great secrets of his life. To Fairthorn alone on all +earth could he speak with out reserve of one name and of one sorrow. +Speaking to Fairthorn was like talking to himself, or to his pointers, or +to his favourite doe, upon which last he bestowed a new collar, with an +inscription that implied more of the true cause that had driven him a +second time to the shades of Fawley than he would have let out to Alban +Morley or even to Lionel Haughton. Alban was too old for that confidence +--Lionel much too young. But the Musician, like Art itself, was of no +age; and if ever the gloomy master unbent his outward moodiness and +secret spleen in any approach to gaiety, it was in a sort of saturnine +playfulness to this grotesque, grown-up infant. They cheered each other, +and they teased each other. Stalking side by side over the ridged +fallows, Darrell would sometimes pour forth his whole soul, as a poet +does to his muse; and at Fairthorn's abrupt interruption or rejoinder, +turn round on him with fierce objurgation or withering sarcasm, or what +the flute-player abhorred more than all else, a truculent quotation from +Horace, which drove Fairthorn away into some vanishing covert or hollow, +out of which Darrell had to entice him, sure that, in return, Fairthorn +would take a sly occasion to send into his side a vindictive prickle. +But as the two came home in the starlight, the dogs dead beat and poor +Fairthorn too,--ten to one but what the musician was leaning all his +weight on his master's nervous arm, and Darrell was looking with tender +kindness in the face of the SOMEONE left to lean upon him still. + +One evening, as they were sitting together in the library, the two +hermits, each in his corner, and after a long silence, the flute-player +said abruptly + +"I have been thinking--" + +"Thinking!" quoth Darrell, with his mechanical irony; "I am sorry for +you. Try not to do so again." + +FAIRTHORN.--"Your poor dear father--" + +DARRELL (wincing, startled, and expectant of a prickle).--"Eh? my +father--" + +FAIRTHORN.--"Was a great antiquary. How it would have pleased him could +he have left a fine collection of antiquities as an heirloom to the +nation!--his name thus preserved for ages, and connected with the studies +of his life. There are the Elgin Marbles. The parson was talking to me +yesterday of a new Vernon Gallery; why not in the British Museum an +everlasting Darrell room? Plenty to stock it mouldering yonder in the +chambers which you will never finish." + +"My dear Dick," Said Darrell, starting up, "give me your hand. What a +brilliant thought! I could do nothing else to preserve my dear father's +name. Eureka! You are right. Set the carpenters at work to-morrow. +Remove the boards; open the chambers; we will inspect their stores, and +select what would worthily furnish 'A Darrell Room.' Perish Guy Darrell +the lawyer! Philip Darrell the antiquary at least shall live!" + +It is marvellous with what charm Fairthorn's lucky idea seized upon +Darrell's mind. The whole of the next day he spent in the forlorn +skeleton of the unfinished mansion slowly decaying beside his small and +homely dwelling. The pictures, many of which were the rarest originals +in early Flemish and Italian art, were dusted with tender care, and hung +from hasty nails upon the bare ghastly walls. Delicate ivory carvings, +wrought by the matchless hand of Cellini-early Florentine bronzes, +priceless specimens of Raffaele ware and Venetian glass--the precious +trifles, in short, which the collector of mediaeval curiosities amasses +for his heirs to disperse amongst the palaces of kings and the cabinets +of nations--were dragged again to unfamiliar light. The invaded +sepulchral building seemed a very Pompeii of the /Cinque Cento/. +To examine, arrange, methodise, select for national purposes, such +miscellaneous treasures would be the work of weeks. For easier access, +Darrell caused a slight hasty passage to be thrown over the gap between +the two edifices. It ran from the room nicked into the gables of the old +house, which, originally fitted up for scientific studies, now became his +habitual apartment, into the largest of the uncompleted chambers which +had been designed for the grand reception-gallery of the new building. +Into the pompous gallery thus made contiguous to his monk-like cell, he +gradually gathered the choicest specimens of his collection. The damps +were expelled by fires on grateless hearthstones; sunshine admitted from +windows now for the first time exchanging boards for glass; rough iron +sconces, made at the nearest forge, were thrust into the walls, and +sometimes lighted at night-Darrell and Fairthorn walking arm-in-arm along +the unpolished floors, in company with Holbein's Nobles, Perugino's +Virgins. Some of that highbred company displaced and banished the next +day, as repeated inspection made the taste more rigidly exclusive. +Darrell had found object, amusement, occupation--frivolous if Compared +with those lenses, and glasses, and algebraical scrawls which had once +whiled lonely hours in the attic-room hard by; but not frivolous even to +the judgment of the austerest sage, if that sage had not reasoned away +his heart. For here it was not Darrell's taste that was delighted; it +was Darrell's heart that, ever hungry, had found food. His heart was +connecting those long-neglected memorials of an ambition baffled and +relinquished--here with a nation, there with his father's grave! How his +eyes sparkled! how his lip smiled! Nobody would have guessed it--none of +us know each other; least of all do we know the interior being of those +whom we estimate by public repute;--but what a world of simple, fond +affection lay coiled and wasted in that proud man's solitary breast! + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + THE LEARNED COMPUTE THAT SEVEN HUNDRED AND SEVEN MILLIONS OF + MILLIONS OF VIBRATIONS HAVE PENETRATED THE EYE BEFORE THE EYE CAN + DISTINGUISH THE TINTS OF A VIOLET. WHAT PHILOSOPHY CAN CALCULATE + THE VIBRATIONS OF THE HEART BEFORE IT CAN DISTINGUISH THE COLOURS OF + LOVE? + +While Guy Darrell thus passed his hours within the unfinished fragments +of a dwelling builded for posterity, and amongst the still relics of +remote generations, Love and Youth were weaving their warm eternal idyll +on the sunny lawns by the gliding river. + +There they are, Love and Youth, Lionel and Sophy, in the arbour round +which her slight hands have twined the honeysuckle, fond imitation of +that bower endeared by the memory of her earliest holiday--she seated +coyly, he on the ground at her feet, as when Titania had watched his +sleep. He has been reading to her, the book has fallen from his hand. +What book? That volume of poems so unintelligibly obscure to all but the +dreaming young, who are so unintelligibly obscure to themselves. But to +the merit of those poems, I doubt if even George did justice. It is not +true, I believe, that they are not durable. Some day or other, when all +the jargon so feelingly denounced by Colonel Morley about "esthetics," +and "objective," and "subjective," has gone to its long home, some critic +who can write English will probably bring that poor little volume fairly +before the public; and, with all its manifold faults, it will take a +place in the affections, not of one single generation of the young, but +--everlasting, ever-dreaming, ever-growing youth. But you and I, reader, +have no other interest in these poems, except this--that they were +written by the brother-in-law of that whimsical, miserly Frank Vance, who +perhaps, but for such a brother-in-law, would never have gone through the +labour by which he has cultivated the genius that achieved his fame; and +if he had not cultivated that genius, he might never have known Lionel; +and if he had never known Lionel, Lionel might never perhaps have gone to +the Surrey village, in which he saw the Phenomenon: And, to push farther +still that Voltaireian philosophy of ifs--if either Lionel or Frank Vance +had not been so intimately associated in the minds of Sophy and Lionel +with the golden holiday on the beautiful river, Sophy and Lionel might +not have thought so much of those poems; and if they had not thought so +much of those poems, there might not have been between them that link of +poetry without which the love of two young people is a sentiment, always +very pretty it is true, but much too commonplace to deserve special +commemoration in a work so uncommonly long as this is likely to be. And +thus it is clear that Frank Vance is not a superfluous and episodical +personage amongst the characters of this history, but, however +indirectly, still essentially, one of those beings without whom the +author must have given a very different answer to the question, "What +will he do with it?" + +Return we to Lionel and Sophy. The poems have brought their hearts +nearer and nearer together. And when the book fell from Lionel's hand, +Sophy knew that his eyes were on her face, and her own eyes looked away. +And the silence was so deep and so sweet! Neither had yet said to the +other a word of love. And in that silence both felt that they loved and +were beloved. Sophy! how childlike she looked still! How little she is +changed!--except that the soft blue eyes are far more pensive, and that +her merry laugh is now never heard. In that luxurious home, fostered +with the tenderest care by its charming owner, the romance of her +childhood realised, and Lionel by her side, she misses the old crippled +vagrant. And therefore it is that her merry laugh is no longer heard! +"Ah!" said Lionel, softly breaking the pause at length, "do not turn your +eyes from me, or I shall think that there are tears in them!" Sophy's +breast heaved, but her eyes were averted still. Lionel rose gently, and +came to the other side of her quiet form. "Fie! there are tears, and you +would hide them from me. Ungrateful!" + +Sophy looked at him now with candid, inexpressible, guileless affection +in those swimming eyes, and said with touching sweetness: "Ungrateful! +Should I not be so if I were gay and happy?" + +And in self-reproach for not being sufficiently unhappy while that young +consoler was by her side, she too rose, left the arbour, and looked +wistfully along the river. George Morley was expected; he might bring +tidings of the absent. And now while Lionel, rejoining her, exerts all +his eloquence to allay her anxiety and encourage her hopes, and while +they thus, in that divinest stage of love, ere the tongue repeats what +the eyes have told, glide along-here in sunlight by lingering flowers- +there in shadow under mournful willows, whose leaves are ever the latest +to fall, let us explain by what links of circumstance Sophy became the +great lady's guest, and Waife once more a homeless wanderer. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + COMPRISING MANY NEEDFUL EXPLANATIONS ILLUSTRATIVE OF WISE SAWS; AS + FOR EXAMPLE, "HE THAT HATH AN ILL NAME IS HALF HANGED." "HE THAT + HATH BEEN BITTEN BY A SERPENT IS AFRAID OF A ROPE." "HE THAT LOOKS + FOR A STAR PUTS OUT HIS CANDLES;" AND, "WHEN GOD WILLS, ALL WINDS + BRING RAIN." + +The reader has been already made aware how, by an impulse of womanhood +and humanity, Arabella Crane had been converted from a persecuting into a +tutelary agent in the destinies of Waife and Sophy. That evolution in +her moral being dated from the evening on which she had sought the +cripple's retreat, to warn him of Jasper's designs. We have seen by what +stratagem she had made it appear that Waife and his grandchild had sailed +beyond the reach of molestation; with what liberality she had advanced +the money that freed Sophy from the manager's claim; and how +considerately she had empowered her agent to give the reference which +secured to Waife the asylum in which we last beheld him. In a few stern +sentences she had acquainted Waife with her fearless inflexible resolve +to associate her fate henceforth with the life of his lawless son; and, +by rendering abortive all his evil projects of plunder, to compel him at +last to depend upon her for an existence neither unsafe nor sordid, +provided only that it were not dishonest. The moment that she revealed +that design, Waife's trust in her was won. His own heart enabled him to +comprehend the effect produced upon a character otherwise unamiable and +rugged, by the grandeur of self-immolation and the absorption of one +devoted heroic thought. In the strength and bitterness of passion which +thus pledged her existence to redeem another's, he obtained the key to +her vehement and jealous nature; saw why she had been so cruel to the +child of a rival; why she had conceived compassion for that child in +proportion as the father's unnatural indifference had quenched the anger +of her own self-love; and, above all, why, as the idea of reclaiming and +appropriating solely to herself the man who, for good or for evil, had +grown into the all-predominant object of her life, gained more and more +the mastery over her mind, it expelled the lesser and the baser passions, +and the old mean revenge against an infant faded away before the light of +that awakening conscience which is often rekindled from ashes by the +sparks of a single better and worthier thought. And in the resolute +design to reclaim Jasper Losely, Arabella came at once to a ground in +common with his father, with his child. Oh what, too, would the old man +owe to her, what would be his gratitude, his joy, if she not only guarded +his spotless Sophy, but saved from the bottomless abyss his guilty son! +Thus when Arabella Crane had, nearly five years before, sought Waife's +discovered hiding-place, near the old bloodstained Tower, mutual +interests and sympathies had formed between them a bond of alliance not +the less strong because rather tacitly acknowledged than openly +expressed. Arabella had written to Waife from the Continent, for the +first half-year pretty often, and somewhat sanguinely, as to the chance +of Losely's ultimate reformation. Then the intervals of silence became +gradually more prolonged, and the letters more brief. But still, whether +from the wish not unnecessarily to pain the old man, or, as would be more +natural to her character, which, even in its best aspects, was not +gentle, from a proud dislike to confess failure, she said nothing of the +evil courses which Jasper had renewed. Evidently she was always near +him. Evidently, by some means or another, his life, furtive and dark, +was ever under the glare of her watchful eyes. + +Meanwhile Sophy had been presented to Caroline Montfort. As Waife had so +fondly anticipated, the lone childless lady had taken with kindness and +interest to the fair motherless child. Left to herself often for months +together in the grand forlorn house, Caroline soon found an object to her +pensive walks in the basket-maker's cottage. Sophy's charming face and +charming ways stole more and more into affections which were denied all +nourishment at home. She entered into Waife's desire to improve, by +education, so exquisite a nature; and, familiarity growing by degrees, +Sophy was at length coaxed up to the great house; and during the hours +which Waife devoted to his rambles (for even in his settled industry he +could not conquer his vagrant tastes, but would weave his reeds or osiers +as he sauntered through solitudes of turf or wood), became the docile +delighted pupil in the simple chintz room which Lady Montfort had +reclaimed from the desert of her surrounding palace. Lady Montfort was +not of a curious turn of mind; profoundly indifferent even to the gossip +of drawing-rooms, she had no rankling desire to know the secrets of +village hearthstones. Little acquainted even with the great world- +scarcely at all with any world below that in which she had her being, +save as she approached humble sorrows by delicate charity--the contrast +between Waife's calling and his conversation roused in her no vigilant +suspicions. A man of some education, and born in a rank that touched +upon the order of gentlemen, but of no practical or professional culture +--with whimsical tastes--with roving eccentric habits--had, in the course +of life, picked up much harmless wisdom, but, perhaps from want of +worldly prudence, failed of fortune. Contented with an obscure retreat +and a humble livelihood, he might naturally be loth to confide to others +the painful history of a descent in life. He might have relations in a +higher sphere, whom the confession would shame; he might be silent in the +manly pride which shrinks from alms and pity and a tale of fall. Nay, +grant the worst--grant that Waife had suffered in repute as well as +fortune--grant that his character had been tarnished by some plausible +circumstantial evidences which he could not explain away to the +satisfaction of friends or the acquittal of a short-sighted world--had +there not been, were there not always, many innocent men similarly +afflicted? And who could hear Waife talk, or look on his arch smile, and +not feel that he was innocent? So, at least, thought Caroline Montfort. +Naturally; for if, in her essentially woman-like character, there was one +all-pervading and all-predominant attribute, it was PITY. Lead Fate +placed her under circumstances fitted to ripen into genial development +all her exquisite forces of soul, her true post in this life would have +been that of the SOOTHER. What a child to some grief-worn father! What +a wife to some toiling, aspiring, sensitive man of genius! What a mother +to some suffering child! It seemed as if it were necessary to her to +have something to compassionate and foster. She was sad when there was +no one to comfort; but her smile was like a sunbeam from Eden when it +chanced on a sorrow it could brighten away. Out of this very sympathy +came her faults--faults of reasoning and judgment. Prudent in her own +chilling path through what the world calls temptations, because so +ineffably pure--because, to Fashion's light tempters, her very thought +was as closed, as + + "Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave," + +was the ear of Sabrina to the comrades of Comus,--yet place before her +some gentle scheme that seemed fraught with a blessing for others, and +straightway her fancy embraced it, prudence faded--she saw not the +obstacles, weighed not the chances against it. Charity to her did not +come alone, but with its sister twins, Hope and Faith. + +Thus, benignly for the old man and the fair child, years rolled on till +Lord Montfort's sudden death, and his widow was called upon to exchange +Montfort Court (which passed to the new heir) for the distant jointure +House of Twickenham. By this time she had grown so attached to Sophy, +and Sophy so gratefully fond of her, that she proposed to Waife to take +his sweet grandchild as her permanent companion, complete her education, +and assure her future. This had been the old man's cherished day-dream; +but he had not contemplated its realisation until he himself were in the +grave. He turned pale, he staggered, when the proposal which would +separate him from his grandchild was first brought before him. But he +recovered ere Lady Montfort could be aware of the acuteness of the pang +she inflicted, and accepted the generous offer with warm protestations of +joy and gratitude. But Sophy! Sophy consent to leave her grandfather +afar and aged in his solitary cottage! Little did either of them know +Sophy, with her soft heart and determined soul, if they supposed such +egotism possible in her. Waife insisted--Waife was angry--Waife was +authoritative--Waife was imploring--Waife was pathetic--all in vain! But +to close every argument, the girl went boldly to Lady Montfort, and said: +"If I left him, his heart would break--never ask it." Lady Montfort +kissed Sophy tenderly as mother ever kissed a child for some sweet loving +trait of a noble nature, and said simply "But he shall not be left--he +shall come too." + +She offered Waife rooms in her Twickenham house--she wished to collect +books--he should be librarian. The old man shivered and refused--refused +firmly. He had made a vow not to be a guest in any house. Finally, the +matter was compromised; Waife would remove to the neighbourhood of +Twickenham; there hire a cottage; there ply his art; and Sophy, living +with him, should spend part of each day with Lady Montfort as now. + +So it was resolved. Waife consented to occupy a small house on the verge +of the grounds belonging to the jointure villa, on the condition of +paying rent for it. And George Morley insisted on the privilege of +preparing that house for his old teacher's reception, leaving it simple +and rustic to outward appearance, but fitting its pleasant chambers with +all that his knowledge of the old man's tastes and habits suggested for +comfort or humble luxury; a room for Sophy, hung with the prettiest +paper, all butterflies and flowers, commanding a view of the river. +Waife, despite his proud scruples, could not refuse such gifts from a man +whose fortune and career had been secured by his artful lessons. Indeed, +he had already permitted George to assist, though not largely, his own +efforts to repay the L100 advanced by Mrs. Crane. The years he had +devoted to a craft which his ingenuity made lucrative, had just enabled +the basketmaker, with his pupil's aid, to clear off that debt by +instalments. He had the satisfaction of thinking that it was his +industry that had replaced the sum to which his grandchild owed her +release from the execrable Rugge. + +Lady Montfort's departure (which preceded Waife's by some weeks) was more +mourned by the poor in her immediate neighbourhood than by the wealthier +families who composed what a province calls its society; and the gloom +which that event cast over the little village round the kingly mansion +was increased when Waife and his grandchild left. + +For the last three years, emboldened by Lady Montfort's protection, and +the conviction that he was no longer pursued or spied, the old man +relaxed his earlier reserved and secluded habits. Constitutionally +sociable, he had made acquaintance with his humbler neighbours; lounged +by their cottage palings in his rambles down the lanes; diverted their +children with Sir Isaac's tricks, or regaled them with nuts and apples +from his little orchard; giving to the more diligent labourers many a +valuable hint how to eke out the daily wage with garden produce, or bees, +or poultry; doctored farmer's cows; and even won the heart of the stud- +groom by a mysterious sedative ball, which had reduced to serene docility +a highly nervous and hitherto unmanageable four-year-old. Sophy had been +no less popular. No one grudged her the favour of Lady Montfort--no one +wondered at it. They were loved and honoured. Perhaps the happiest +years Waife had known since his young wife left the earth were passed in +the hamlet which he fancied her shade haunted; for was it not there-- +there, in that cottage--there, in sight of those green osiers, that her +first modest virgin replies to his letters of love and hope that soothed +his confinement and animated him--till then little fond of sedentary +toils--to the very industry which, learned in sport, now gave +subsistence, and secured a home. To that home persecution had not +come--gossip had not pryed into its calm seclusion--even chance, when +threatening disclosure, had seemed to pass by innocuous. For once +--a year or so before he left--an incident had occurred which alarmed him +at the time, but led to no annoying results. The banks of the great +sheet of water in Montfort Park were occasionally made the scene of rural +picnics by the families of neighbouring farmers or tradesmen. One day +Waife, while carelessly fashioning his baskets on his favourite spot, was +recognised, on the opposite margin, by a party of such holiday-makers to +whom he himself had paid no attention. He was told the next day by the +landlady of the village inn, the main chimney of which he had undertaken +to cure of smoking, that a "lady" in the picnic symposium of the day +before had asked many questions about him and his grandchild, and had +seemed pleased to hear they were both so comfortably settled. The +"lady" had been accompanied by another "lady," and by two or three young +gentlemen. They had arrived in a "buss," which they had hired for the +occasion. They had come from Humberston the day after those famous races +which annually filled Humberston with strangers--the time of year in +which Rugge's grand theatrical exhibition delighted that ancient town. +From the description of the two ladies Waife suspected that they belonged +to Rugge's company. + +But they had not claimed Waife as a ci-devant comrade; they had not +spoken of Sophy as the Phenomenon or the Fugitive. No molestation +followed this event; and, after all, the Remorseless Baron had no longer +any claim to the Persecuted Bandit or to Juliet Araminta. + +But the ex-comedian is gone from the osiers--the hamlet. He is in his +new retreat by the lordly river--within an hour of the smoke and roar of +tumultuous London. He tries to look cheerful and happy, but his repose +is troubled--his heart is anxious. Ever since Sophy, on his account, +refused the offer which would have transferred her, not for a few daily +hours, but for habitual life, from a basketmaker's roof to all the +elegancies and refinements of a sphere in which, if freed from him, her +charms and virtues might win her some such alliance as seemed impossible, +while he was thus dragging her down to his own level,--ever since that +day the old man had said to himself, "I live too long." While Sophy was +by his side he appeared busy at his work and merry in his humour; the +moment she left him for Lady Montfort's house, the work dropped from his +hands, and he sank into moody thought. + +Waife had written to Mrs. Crane (her address then was at Paris) on +removing to Twickenhain, and begged her to warn him should Jasper +meditate a return to England, by a letter directed to him at the General +Post-office, London. Despite his later trust in Mrs. Crane, he did not +deem it safe to confide to her Lady Montfort's offer to Sophy, or the +affectionate nature of that lady's intimacy with the girl now grown into +womanhood. With that insight into the human heart, which was in him not +so habitually clear and steadfast as to be always useful, but at times +singularly if erratically lucid, he could not feel assured that Arabella +Crane's ancient hate to Sophy (which, lessening in proportion to the +girl's destitution, had only ceased when the stern woman felt, with a +sentiment bordering on revenge, that it was to her that Sophy owed an +asylum obscure and humble) might not revive, if she learned that the +child of a detested rival was raised above the necessity of her +protection, and brought within view of that station so much Loftier than +her own, from which she had once rejoiced to know that the offspring of a +marriage which had darkened her life was excluded. For indeed it had +been only on Waife's promise that he would not repeat the attempt that +had proved so abortive, to enforce Sophy's claim on Guy Darrell, that +Arabella Crane had in the first instance resigned the child to his care. +His care--his--an attainted outcast! As long as Arabella Crane could see +in Sophy but an object of compassion, she might haughtily protect her; +but, could Sophy become an object of envy, would that protection last? +No, he did not venture to confide in Mrs. Crane further than to say that +he and Sophy had removed from Montfort village to the vicinity of London. +Time enough to say more when Mrs. Crane returned to England; and then, +not by letter, but in personal interview. + +Once a month the old man went to London to inquire at the General Post- +office for any communications his correspondent might there address to +him. Only once, however, had he heard from Mrs. Crane since the +announcement of his migration, and her note of reply was extremely brief, +until in the fatal month of June, when Guy Darrell and Jasper Losely had +alike returned, and on the same day, to the metropolis; and then the old +man received from her a letter which occasioned him profound alarm. It +apprised him not only that his terrible son was in England--in London; +but that Jasper had discovered that the persons embarked for America were +not the veritable Waife and Sophy whose names they had assumed. Mrs. +Crane ended with these ominous words: "It is right to say now that he has +descended deeper and deeper. Could you see him, you would wonder that I +neither abandon him nor my resolve. He hates me worse than the gibbet. +To me and not to the gibbet he shall pass--fitting punishment to both. +I am in London, not in my old house, but near him. His confidant is my +hireling. His life and his projects are clear to my eyes--clear as if he +dwelt in glass. Sophy is now of an age in which, were she placed in the +care of some person whose respectability could not be impunged, she could +not be legally forced away against her will; but if under your roof, +those whom Jasper has induced to institute a search, that he has no means +to institute very actively himself, might make statements which (as you +are already aware) might persuade others, though well-meaning, to assist +him in separating her from you. He might publicly face even a police- +court, if he thus hoped to shame the rich man into buying off an +intolerable scandal. He might, in the first instance, and more probably, +decoy her into his power through stealth; and what might become of her +before she was recovered? Separate yourself from her for a time. It is +you, notwithstanding your arts of disguise, that can be the more easily +tracked. She, now almost a woman, will have grown out of recognition. +Place her in some secure asylum until, at least, you hear from me again." + +Waife read and re-read this epistle (to which there was no direction that +enabled him to reply) in the private room of a little coffee-house to +which he had retired from the gaze and pressure of the street. The +determination he had long brooded over now began to take shape--to be +hurried on to prompt decision. On recovering his first shock, he formed +and matured his plans. That same evening he saw Lady Montfort. He felt +that the time had come when, for Sophy's sake, he must lift the veil from +the obloquy on his own name. To guard against the same concession to +Jasper's authority that had betrayed her at Gatesboro', it was necessary +that he should explain the mystery of Sophy's parentage and position to +Lady Montfort, and go through the anguish of denouncing his own son as +the last person to whose hands she should be consigned. He approached +this subject not only with a sense of profound humiliation, but with no +unreasonable fear lest Lady Montfort might at once decline a charge which +would possibly subject her retirement to a harassing invasion. But, to +his surprise as well as relief, no sooner had he named Sophy's parentage +than Lady Montfort evinced emotions of a joy which cast into the shade +all more painful or discreditable associations. "Henceforth, believe +me," she said, "your Sophy shall be my own child, my own treasured +darling!--no humble companion--my equal as well as my charge. Fear not +that any one shall tear her from me. You are right in thinking that my +roof should be her home--that she should have the rearing and the station +which she is entitled as well as fitted to adorn. But you must not part +from her. I have listened to your tale; my experience of you supplies +the defence you suppress--it reverses the judgment which has aspersed +you. And more ardently than before, I press on you a refuge in the Home +that will shelter your grandchild." Noble-hearted woman! and nobler for +her ignorance of the practical world, in the proposal which would have +blistered with scorching blushes the cheek of that Personification of all +"Solemn Plausibilities," the House of Vipont! Gentleman Waife was not +scamp enough to profit by the ignorance which sprang from generous +virtue. But, repressing all argument, and appearing to acquiesce in the +possibility of such an arrangement, he left her benevolent delight +unsaddened--and before the morning he was gone. Gone in stealth, and by +the starlight, as he had gone years ago from the bailiff's cottage-gone, +for Sophy, in waking, to find, as she had found before, farewell lines, +that commended hope and forbade grief. "It was," he wrote, "for both +their sakes that he had set out on a tour of pleasant adventure. He +needed it; he had felt his spirits droop of late in so humdrum and +settled a life. And there was danger abroad--danger that his brief +absence would remove. He had confided all his secrets to Lady Montfort; +she must look on that kind lady as her sole guardian till he return--as +return he surely would; and then they would live happy ever afterwards as +in fairy tales. He should never forgive her if she were silly enough to +fret for him. He should not be alone; Sir Isaac would take care of him. +He was not without plenty of money-savings of several months; if he +wanted more, he would apply to George Morley. He would write to her +occasionally; but she must not expect frequent letters; he might be away +for months--what did that signify? He was old enough to take care of +himself; she was no longer a child to cry her eyes out if she lost a +senseless toy, or a stupid old cripple. She was a young lady, and he +expected to find her a famous scholar when he returned." And so, with +all flourish and bravado, and suppressing every attempt at pathos, the +old man went his way, and Sophy, hurrying to Lady Montfort's, weeping, +distracted, imploring her to send in all directions to discover and bring +back the fugitive, was there detained a captive guest. But Waife left a +letter also for Lady Montfort, cautioning and adjuring her, as she valued +Sophy's safety from the scandal of Jasper's claim, not to make any +imprudent attempts to discover him. Such attempt would only create the +very publicity from the chance of which he was seeking to escape. The +necessity of this caution was so obvious that Lady Montfort could only +send her most confidential servant to inquire guardedly in the +neighbourhood, until she had summoned George Morley from Humberston, +and taken him into counsel. Waife had permitted her to relate to him, +on strict promise of secrecy, the tale he had confided to her. George +entered with the deepest sympathy into Sophy's distress; but he made her +comprehend the indiscretion and peril of any noisy researches. He +promised that he himself would spare no pains to ascertain the old man's +hiding-place, and see, at least, if he could not be persuaded either to +return or suffer her to join him, that he was not left destitute and +comfortless. Nor was this an idle promise. George, though his inquiries +were unceasing, crippled by the restraint imposed on them, was so acute +in divining, and so active in following up each clue to the wanderer's +artful doublings, that more than once he had actually come upon the +track, and found the very spot where Waife or Sir Isaac had been seen a +few days before. Still, up to the day on which Morley had last reported +progress, the ingenious ex-actor, fertile in all resources of stratagem +and disguise, had baffled his research. At first, however, Waife had +greatly relieved the minds of these anxious friends, and cheered even +Sophy's heavy heart, by letters, gay though brief. These letters having, +by their postmarks, led to his trace, he had stated, in apparent anger, +that reason for discontinuing them. And for the last six weeks no line +from him had been received. In fact, the old man, on resolving to +consummate his self-abnegation, strove more and more to wean his +grandchild's thoughts from his image. He deemed it so essential to her +whole future that, now she had found a home in so secure and so elevated +a sphere, she should gradually accustom herself to a new rank of life, +from which he was an everlasting exile; should lose all trace of his very +being; efface a connection that, ceasing to protect, could henceforth +only harm and dishonour her,--that he tried, as it were, to blot himself +out of the world which now smiled on her. He did not underrate her grief +in its first freshness; he knew that, could she learn where he was, all +else would be forgotten--she would insist on flying to him. But he +continually murmured to himself: "Youth is ever proverbially short of +memory; its sorrows poignant, but not enduring; now the wounds are +already scarring over--they will not reopen if they are left to heal." + +He had, at first, thought of hiding somewhere not so far but that once +a-week, or once a-month, he might have stolen into the grounds, looked at +the house that held her--left, perhaps, in her walks some little token of +himself. But, on reflection, he felt that that luxury would be too +imprudent, and it ceased to tempt him in proportion as he reasoned +himself into the stern wisdom of avoiding all that could revive her grief +for him. At the commencement of this tale, in the outline given of that +grand melodrama in which Juliet Araminta played the part of the Bandit's +Child, her efforts to decoy pursuit from the lair of the persecuted Mime +were likened to the arts of the skylark to lure eye and hand from the +nest of his young. More appropriate that illustration now to the parent- +bird than then to the fledgling. Farther and farther from the nest in +which all his love was centred fled the old man. What if Jasper did +discover him now; that very discovery would mislead the pursuit from +Sophy. Most improbable that Losely would ever guess that they could +become separated; still more improbable, unless Waife, imprudently +lurking near her home, guided conjecture, that Losely should dream of +seeking under the roof of the lofty peeress the child that had fled from +Mr. Rugge. + +Poor old man! his heart was breaking; but his soul was so brightly +comforted that there, where many, many long miles off, I see him +standing, desolate and patient, in the corner of yon crowded market- +place, holding Sir Isaac by slackened string with listless hand--Sir +Isaac unshorn, travel-stained, draggled, with drooping head and +melancholy eyes--yea, as I see him there, jostled by the crowd, to whom, +now and then, pointing to that huge pannier on his arm, filled with some +homely pedlar wares, he mechanically mutters, "Buy"--yea, I say, verily, +as I see him thus, I cannot draw near in pity--I see what the crowd does +not--the shadow of an angel's wing over his grey head; and I stand +reverentially aloof, with bated breath and bended knee. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + A WOMAN TOO OFTEN REASONS FROM HER HEART--HENCE TWO-THIRDS OF HER + MISTAKES AND HER TROUBLES. A MAN OF GENIUS, TOO, OFTEN REASONS FROM + HIS HEART-WENCE, ALSO, TWO-THIRDS OF HIS TROUBLES AND MISTAKES. + WHEREFORE, BETWEEN WOMAN AND GENIUS THERE IS A SYMPATHETIC AFFINITY; + EACH HAS SOME INTUITIVE COMPREHENSION OF THE SECRETS OF THE OTHER, + AND THE MORE FEMININE THE WOMAN, THE MORE EXQUISITE THE GENIUS, THE + MORE SUBTLE THE INTELLIGENCE BETWEEN THE TWO. BUT NOTE WELL THAT + THIS TACIT UNDERSTANDING BECOMES OBSCURED, IF HUMAN LOVE PASS ACROSS + ITS RELATIONS. SHAKESPEARE INTERPRETS ARIGHT THE MOST INTRICATE + RIDDLES IN WOMAN. A WOMAN WAS THE FIRST TO INTERPRET ARIGHT THE ART + THAT IS LATENT IN SHAKESPEARE. BUT DID ANNE HATHAWAY AND + SHAKESPEARE UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER? + +Unobserved by the two young people, Lady Montfort sate watching them as +they moved along the river banks. She was seated where Lionel had first +seen her--in the kind of grassy chamber that had been won from the +foliage and the sward, closed round with interlaced autumnal branches, +save where it opened towards the water. If ever woman's brain can +conceive and plot a scheme thoroughly pure from one ungentle, selfish +thread in its web, in such a scheme had Caroline Montfort brought +together those two fair young natures. And yet they were not uppermost +in her thoughts as she now gazed on them; nor was it wholly for them that +her eyes were filled with tears at once sweet, yet profoundly mournful-- +holy, and yet intensely human. + +Women love to think themselves uncomprehended--nor often without reason +in that foible; for man, howsoever sagacious, rarely does entirely +comprehend woman, howsoever simple. And in this her sex has the +advantage over ours. Our hearts are bare to their eyes, even though they +can never know what have been our lives. But we may see every action of +their lives, guarded and circumscribed in conventional forms, while their +hearts will have many mysteries to which we can never have the key. But, +in more than the ordinary sense of the word, Caroline Montfort never had +been a woman uncomprehended. Nor even in her own sex did she possess one +confidante. Only the outward leaves of that beautiful flower opened to +the sunlight. The leaves round the core were gathered fold upon fold +closely as when life itself was in the bud. + +As all the years of her wedded existence her heart had been denied the +natural household vents, so by some strange and unaccountable chance her +intellect also seemed restrained and pent from its proper freedom and +play. During those barren years, she had read--she had pondered--she had +enjoyed a commune with those whose minds instruct others, and still her +own intelligence, which in early youth had been characterised by singular +vivacity and brightness, and which Time had enriched with every womanly +accomplishment, seemed chilled and objectless. It is not enough that a +mind should be cultured--it should have movement as well as culture. +Caroline Montfort's lay quiescent like a beautiful form spellbound to +repose, but not to sleep. Looking on her once, as he stood amongst a +crowd whom her beauty dazzled, a poet said abruptly: "Were my guess not a +sacrilege to one so spotless and so haughty, I should say that I had hit +on the solution of an enigma that long perplexed me; and in the core of +that queen of the lilies, could we strip the leaves folded round it, we +should find Remorse." + +Lady Montfort started; the shadow of another form than her own fell upon +the sward. George Morley stood behind her, his finger on his lips." +Hush," he said in a whisper, see, Sophy is looking for me up the river. +I knew she would be--I stole this way on purpose--for I would speak to +you before I face her questions." + +"What is the matter? you alarm me," said Lady Montfort, on gaining a part +of the grounds more remote from the river, to which George had silently +led the way. + +"Nay, my dear cousin, there is less cause for alarm than for anxious +deliberation, and that upon more matters than those which directly relate +to our poor fugitive. You know that I long shrunk from enlisting the +police in aid of our search. I was too sensible of the pain and offence +which such an application would occasion Waife--(let us continue so to +call him)--and the discovery of it might even induce him to put himself +beyond our reach, and quit England. But his prolonged silence, and my +fears lest some illness or mishap might have befallen him, together with +my serious apprehensions of the effect which unrelieved anxiety might +produce on Sophy's health, made me resolve to waive former scruples. +Since I last saw you I have applied to one of the higher police-officers +accustomed to confidential investigations of a similar nature. The next +day he came to tell me that he had learned that a friend of his, who had +been formerly a distinguished agent in the detective police, had been +engaged for months in tracking a person whom he conjectured to be the +same as the one whom I had commissioned him to discover, and with +somewhat less caution and delicacy than I had enjoined. The fugitive's +real name had been given to this ex-agent--the cause for search, that he +had abducted and was concealing his granddaughter from her father. It +was easy for me to perceive why this novel search had hitherto failed, no +suspicion being entertained that Waife had separated himself from Sophy, +and the inquiry being therefore rather directed towards the grandchild +than the grandfather. But that inquiry had altogether ceased of late, +and for this terrible reason--a different section of the police had fixed +its eye upon the father on whose behalf the search had been instituted. +This Jasper Losely (ah! our poor friend might well shudder to think Sophy +should fall into his hands!) haunts the resorts of the most lawless and +formidable desperadoes of London. He appears to be a kind of authority +amongst them; but there is no evidence that as yet he has committed +himself to any participation in their habitual courses. He lives +profusely, for a person in such society (regaling Daredevils whom he awes +by a strength and courage which are described as extraordinary), but with +out any visible means. It seems that the ex-agent, who had been thus +previously employed in Jasper Losely's name, had been engaged, not by +Jasper himself, but by a person in very respectable circumstances, whose +name I have ascertained to be Poole. And the ex-agent deemed it right to +acquaint this Mr. Poole with Jasper's evil character and ambiguous mode +of life, and to intimate to his employer that it might not be prudent to +hold any connection with such a man, and still less proper to assist in +restoring a young girl to his care. On this Mr. Poole became so much +agitated, and expressed himself so incoherently as to his relations with +Jasper, that the ex-agent conceived suspicions against Poole himself, and +reported the whole circumstances to one of the chiefs of the former +service, through whom they reached the very man whom I myself was +employing. But this ex-agent, who had, after his last interview with +Poole, declined all further interference, had since then, through a +correspondent in a country town, whom he had employed at the first, +obtained a clue to my dear old friend's wanderings, more recent, and I +think more hopeful, than any I had yet discovered. You will remember +that when questioning Sophy as to any friends in her former life to whom +it was probable Waife might have addressed himself, she could think of no +one so probable as a cobbler named Merle, with whom he and she had once +lodged, and of whom he had often spoken to her with much gratitude as +having put him in the way of recovering herself, and having shown him a +peculiar trustful kindness on tha+ occasion. But you will remember also +that I could not find this Merle; he had left the village, near this very +place, in which he had spent the greater part of his lifehis humble trade +having been neglected in consequence of some strange superstitious +occupations in which, as he had gown older, he had become more and more +absorbed. He had fallen into poverty, his effects had been sold off; he +had gone away no one knew whither. Well, the ex-agent, who had also been +directed to this Merle by his employer, had, through his correspondent, +ascertained that the cobbler was living at Norwich, where he passed under +the name of the Wise Man, and where he was in perpetual danger of being +sent to the house of correction as an impostor, dealing in astrology, +crystal-seeing, and such silly or nefarious practices. Very odd, indeed, +and very melancholy, too," quoth the scholar, lifting up his hands and +eyes, "that a man so gifted as our poor friend should ever have +cultivated an acquaintance with a cobbler who deals in the Black Art!" + +"Sophy has talked to me much about that cobbler," said Lady Montfort, +with her sweet half-smile. "It was under his roof that she first saw +Lionel Haughton. But though the poor man may be an ignorant enthusiast, +he is certainly, by her account, too kind and simple-hearted to be a +designing impostor." + +GEORGE.--"Possibly. But to go on with my story: A few weeks ago, an +elderly lame man, accompanied by a dog, who was evidently poor dear Sir +Isaac, lodged two days with Merle at Norwich. On hearing this, I myself +went yesterday to Norwich, saw and talked to Merle, and through this man +I hope, more easily, delicately, and expeditiously than by any other +means, to achieve our object. He evidently can assist us, and, as +evidently, Waife has not told him that he is flying from Sophy and +friends, but from enemies and persecutors. For Merle, who is impervious +to bribes, and who at first was churlish and rude, became softened as my +honest affection for the fugitive grew clear to him, and still more when +I told him how wretched Sophy was at her grandfather's disappearance, and +that she might fret herself into a decline. And we parted with this +promise on his side, that if I would bring "down to him either Sophy +herself (which is out of the question) or a line from her, which, in +referring to any circumstances while under his roof that could only be +known to her and himself, should convince him that the letter was from +her hand, assuring him that it was for Waife's benefit and at her prayer +that he should bestir himself in search for her grandfather, and that he +might implicitly trust to me, he would do all he could to help us. So +far, then, so good. But I have now more to say, and that is in reference +to Sophy herself. While we are tracking her grandfather, the peril to +her is not lessened. Never was that peril thoroughly brought before my +eyes until I had heard actually from the police agent the dreadful +character and associations of the man who can claim her in a fathers +name. Waife, it is true, had told you that his son was profligate, +spendthrift, lawless--sought her, not from natural affection, but as an +instrument to be used, roughly and coarsely, for the purpose of extorting +money from Mr. Darrell. But this stops far short of the terrible +reality. Imagine the effect on her nerves, so depressed as they now are, +nay, on her very life, should this audacious miscreant force himself here +and say, 'Come with me, you are my child.' And are we quite sure that +out of some refining ncbleness of conscience she might not imagine it her +duty to obey, and to follow him? The more abject and friendless his +condition, the more she might deem it her duty to be by his side. I have +studied her from her childhood. She is capable of any error in judgment, +if it be made to appear a martyr's devoted self-sacrifice. You may well +shudder, my dear cousin. But grant that she were swayed by us and by the +argument that so to act would betray and kill her beloved grandfather, +still, in resisting this ruffian's paternal authority, what violent and +painful scenes might ensue! What dreadful publicity to be attached for +ever to her name! Nor is this all. Grant that her father does not +discover her, but that he is led by his associates into some criminal +offence, and suffers by the law--her relationship, both to him from whom +you would guard her, and to him whose hearth you have so tenderly reared +her to grace, suddenly dragged to day--would not the shame kill her? And +in that disclosure how keen would be the anguish of Darrell!" + +"Oh, heavens!" cried Caroline Montfort, white as ashes and wringing her +hands, "you freeze me with terror. But this man cannot be so fallen as +you describe. I have seen him--spoken with him in his youth--hoped then +to assist in a task of conciliation, pardon. Nothing about him then +foreboded so fearful a corruption. He might be vain, extravagant, +selfish, false--Ah, yes! he was false indeed! but still the ruffian you +paint, banded with common criminals, cannot be the same as the gay, +dainty, perfumed, fair-faced adventurer with whom my ill-fated playmate +fled her father's house. You shake your head--what is it you advise?" + +"To expedite your own project--to make at once the resolute attempt to +secure to this poor child her best, her most rightful protector--to let +whatever can be done to guard her from danger or reclaim her father from +courses to which despair may be driving him--to let, I say, all this be +done by the person whose interest in doing it effectively is so +paramount--whose ability to judge of and decide on the wisest means is so +immeasurably superior to all that lies within our own limited experience +of life." + +"But you forget that our friend told me that he had appealed to--to Mr. +Darrell on his return'to England: that Mr. Darrell had peremptorily +refused to credit the claim; and had sternly said that, even if Sophy's +birth could be proved, he would not place under his father's roof the +grandchild of William Losely." + +"True; and yet you hoped reasonably enough to succeed where he, poor +outcast, had failed." + +"Yes, yes; I did hope that Sophy--her manners formed, her education +completed--all her natural exquisite graces so cultured and refined, as +to justify pride in the proudest kindred--I did so hope that she should +be brought, as it were by accident, under his notice; that she would +interest and charm him; and that the claim, when made, might thus be +welcomed with delight. Mr. Darrell's abrupt return to a seclusion so +rigid forbids the opportunity that ought easily have been found or made +if he had remained in London. But suddenly, violently to renew a claim +that such a man has rejected, before he has ever seen that dear child- +before his heart and his taste plead for her--who would dare to do it? +or, if so daring, who could hope success?" + +"My dear Lady Montfort, my noble cousin, with repute as spotless as the +ermine of your robe--who but you?" + +"Who but I? Any one. Mr. Darrell would not even read through a letter +addressed to him by me." + +George stared with astonishment. Caroline's face was downcast--her +attitude that of profound humiliated dejection. + +"Incredible!" said he at length. "I have always suspected, and so indeed +has my uncle, that Darrell had some cause of complaint against your +mother. Perhaps he might have supposed that she had not sufficiently +watched over his daughter, or had not sufficiently inquired into the +character of the governess whom she recommended to him; and that this had +led to an estrangement between Darrell and your mother, which could not +fail to extend somewhat to yourself. But such misunderstandings can +surely now be easily removed. Talk of his not reading a letter addressed +to him by you! Why, do I not remember, when I was on a visit to my +schoolfellow, his son, what influence you, a mere child yourself, had +over that grave, busy man, then in the height of his career--how you +alone could run without awe into his study--how you alone had the +privilege to arrange his books, sort his papers--so that we two boys +looked on you with a solemn respect, as the depositary of all his state +secrets--how vainly you tried to decoy that poor timid Matilda, his +daughter, into a share of your own audacity!--Is not all this true?" + +"Oh yes, yes--old days gone for ever!" + +"Do I not remember how you promised that, before I went back to school, +I should hear Darrell read aloud--how you brought the volume of Milton +to him in the evening--how he said, 'No, to-morrow night; I must now +go to the House of Commons'--how I marvelled to hear you answer boldly, +'To-morrow night George will have left us, and I have promised that he +shall hear you read'--and how, looking at you under those dark brows with +serious softness, he said: 'Right: promises once given, must be kept. +But was it not rash to promise in another's name?'--and you answered, +half gently, half pettishly, 'As if you could fail me!' He took the book +without another word, and read. What reading it was too! And do you not +remember another time, how--" + +LADY MONTFORT (interrupting with nervous impatience).--"Ay, ay--I need +no reminding of all--all! Kindest, noblest, gentlest friend to a giddy, +heedless child, unable to appreciate the blessing. But now, George, I +dare not, I cannot write to Mr. Darrell." + +George mused a moment, and conjectured that Lady Montfort had, in the +inconsiderate impulsive season of youth, aided in the clandestine +marriage of Darrell's daughter, and had become thus associated in his +mind with the affliction that had embittered his existence. Were this +so, certainly she would not be the fitting, intercessor on behalf of +Sophy. His thoughts then turned to his uncle, Darrell's earliest friend, +not suspecting that Colonel Morley was actually the person whom Darrell +had already appointed his adviser and representative in all transactions +that might concern the very parties under discussion. But just as he was +about to suggest the expediency of writing to Alban to return to England, +and taking him into confidence and consultation, Lady Montfort resumed, +in a calmer voice and with a less troubled countenance: + +"Who should be the pleader for one whose claim, if acknowledged, would +affect his own fortunes, but Lionel Haughton?--Hold!--look where yonder +they come into sight--there by the gap in the evergreens. May we not +hope that Providence, bringing those two beautiful lives together, gives +a solution to the difficulties which thwart our action and embarrass our +judgment? I conceived and planned a blissful romance the first moment I +gathered fran Sophy's artless confidences the effect that had been +produced on her whole train of thought and feeling by the first meeting +with Lionel in her childhood; by his brotherly, chivalrous kindness, and, +above all, by the chance words he let fall, which discontented her with a +life of shift and disguise, and revealed to her the instincts of her own +holiest truthful nature. An alliance between Lionel Haughton and Sophy +seemed to me the happiest possible event that could befall Guy Darrell. +The two branches of his family united--a painful household secret +confined to the circle of his own kindred--granting Sophy's claim never +perfectly cleared up, but subject to a tormenting doubt--her future +equally assured--her possible rights equally established--Darrell's +conscience and pride reconciled to each other. And how, even but as +wife to his young kinsman, he would learn to love one so exquisitely +endearing!" [Lady Montfort paused a moment, and then resumed.] "When +I heard that Mr. Darrell was about to marry again, my project was +necessarily arrested." + +"Certainly," said George, "if he formed new ties, Sophy would be less an +object in his existence, whether or not he recognised her birth. The +alliance between her and Lionel would lose many of its advantages; and +any address to him on Sophy's behalf would become yet more ungraciously +received." + +LADY MONTFORT.--"In that case I had resolved to adopt Sophy as my own +child; lay by from my abundant income an ample dowry for her; and whether +Mr. Darrell ever know it or not, at least I should have the secret joy to +think that I was saving him from the risk of remorse hereafter--should +she be, as we believe, his daughter's child, and have been thrown upon +the world destitute;--yes, the secret joy of feeling that I was +sheltering, fostering as a mother, one whose rightful home might be with +him who in my childhood sheltered, fostered me!" + +GEORGE (much affected).--"How, in proportion as we know you, the beauty +which you veil from the world outshines that which you cannot prevent the +world from seeing! But you must not let this grateful enthusiasm blind +your better judgment. You think these young persons are beginning to be +really attached to each other. Then it is the more necessary that no +time should be lost in learning how Mr. Darrell would regard such a +marriage. I do not feel so assured of his consent as you appear to do. +At all events, this should be ascertained before their happiness is +seriously involved. I agree with you that Lionel is the best +intermediator to plead for Sophy; and his very generosity in urging her +prior claim to a fortune that might otherwise pass to him is likely to +have weight with a man so generous himself as Guy Darrell is held to be. +But does Lionel yet know all? Have you yet ventured to confide to him, +or even to Sophy herself, the nature of her claim on the man who so +proudly denies it?" + +"No--I deemed it due to Sophy's pride of sex to imply to her that she +would, in fortune and in social position, be entitled to equality with +those whom she might meet here. And that is true, if only as the child +whom I adopt and enrich. I have not said more. And only since Lionel +has appeared has she ever seemed interested in anything that relates to +her parentage. From the recollection of her father she naturally +shrinks--she never mentions his name. But two days ago she did ask +timidly, and with great change of countenance, if it was through her +mother that she was entitled to a rank higher than she had hitherto +known; and when I answered 'yes,' she sighed, and said 'But my dear +grandfather never spoke to me of her; he never even saw my mother.'" + +GEORGE.--"And you, I suspect, do not much like to talk of that mother. +I have gathered from you, unawares to yourself, that she was not a person +you could highly praise; and to me, as a boy, she seemed, with all her +timidity, wayward and deceitful." + +LADY MONTFORT.--"Alas! how bitterly she must have suffered--and how young +she was! But you are right; I cannot speak to Sophy of her mother, the +subject is connected with so much sorrow. But I told her 'that she +should know all soon,' and she said, with a sweet and melancholy +patience, 'When my poor grandfather will be by to hear; I can wait.'" + +GEORGE.--"But is Lionel, with his quick intellect and busy imagination, +equally patient? Does he not guess at the truth? You have told him that +you do meditate a project which affects Guy Darrell, and required his +promise not to divulge to Darrell his visits in this house." + +LADY MONTFORT--"He knows that Sophy's paternal grandfather was William +Losely. From your uncle he heard William Losely's story, and--" + +GEORGE.--"My uncle Alban?" + +LADY MOSTFORT.--"Yes; the Colonel was well acquainted with the elder +Losely in former days, and spoke of him to Lionel with great affection. +It seems that Lionel's father knew him also, and thoughtlessly involved +him in his own pecuniary difficulties. Lionel was not long a visitor +here before he asked me abruptly if Mr. Waife's real name was not Losely. +I was obliged to own it, begging him not at present to question me +further. He said then, with much emotion, that he had an hereditary debt +to discharge to William Losely, and that he was the last person who ought +to relinquish belief in the old man's innocence of the crime for which +the law had condemned him, or to judge him harshly if the innocence were +not substantiated. You remember with what eagerness he joined in your +search, until you positively forbade his interposition, fearing that +should our poor friend hear of inquiries instituted by one whom he could +not recognise as a friend, and might possibly consider an emissary of +his son's, he would take yet greater pains to conceal himself. But from +the moment that Lionel learned that Sophy's grandfather was William +Losely, his manner to Sophy became yet more tenderly respectful. He has +a glorious nature, that young man! But did your uncle never speak to you +of William Losely?" + +"No. I am not surprised at that. My uncle Alban avoids 'painful +subjects.' I am only surprised that he should have revived a painful +subject in talk to Lionel. But I now understand why, when Waife first +heard my name, he seemed affected, and why he so specially enjoined me +never to mention or describe him to my friends and relations. Then +Lionel knows Losely's story, but not his son's connection with Darrell?" + +"Certainly not. He knows but what is generally said in the world, that +Darrell's daughter eloped with a Mr. Hammond, a man of inferior birth, +and died abroad, leaving but one child, who is also dead. Still Lionel +does suspect,--my very injunctions of secrecy must make him more than +suspect, that the Loselys are somehow or other mixed up With Darrell's +family history. Hush! I hear his voice yonder--they approach." + +"My dear cousin, let it be settled between us, then, that you frankly and +without delay communicate to Lionel the whole truth, so far as it is +known to us, and put it to him how best and most touchingly to move Mr. +Darrell towards her, of whom we hold him to be the natural protector. +I will write to my uncle to return to England that he may assist us in +the same good work. Meanwhile, I shall have only good tidings to +communicate to Sophy in my new hopes to discover her grandfather through +Merle." + +Here, as the sun was setting, Lionel and Sophy came in sight,--above +their heads, the western clouds bathed in gold and purple. Sophy, +perceiving George, bounded forwards, and reached his side, breathless. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + LIONEL HAUGHTON HAVING LOST HIS HEART, IT IS NO LONGER A QUESTION OF + WHAT HE WILL DO WITH IT. BUT WHAT WILL BE DONE WITH IT IS A VERY + GRAVE QUESTION INDEED. + +Lionel forestalled Lady Montfort in the delicate and embarrassing subject +which her cousin had urged her to open. For while George, leading away +Sophy, informed her of his journey to Norwich, and his interview with +Merle, Lionel drew. Lady Montfort into the house, and with much +agitation, and in abrupt hurried accents, implored her to withdraw the +promise which forbade him to inform his benefactor how and where his time +had been spent of late. He burst forth with a declaration of that love +with which Sophy had inspired him, and which Lady Montfort could not be +but prepared to hear. "Nothing," said he, "but a respect for her more +than filial anxiety at this moment could have kept my heart thus long +silent. But that heart is so deeply pledged--so utterly hers--that it +has grown an ingratitude, a disrespect--to my generous kinsman, to +conceal from him any longer the feelings which must colour my whole +future existence. Nor can I say to her, 'Can you return my affection?-- +will you listen to my vows?--will you accept them at the altar?'--until I +have won, as I am sure to win, the approving consent of my more than +father." + +"You feel sure to win that consent, in spite of the stain on her +grandfather's name?" + +"When Darrell learns that, but for my poor father's fault, that name +might be spotless now!--yes! I am not Mr. Darrell's son--the transmitter +of his line. I believe yet that he will form new ties. By my mother's +side I have no ancestors to boast of; and you have owned to me that +Sophy's mother was of gentle birth. Alban Morley told me, when I last +saw him, that Darrell wishes me to marry, and leaves me free to choose my +bride. Yes; I have no doubt of Mr. Darrell's consent. My dear mother +will welcome to her heart the prize so coveted by mine; and Charles +Haughton's son will have a place at his hearth for the old age of William +Losely. Withdraw your interdict at once, dearest Lady Montfort, and +confide to me all that you have hitherto left unexplained, but have +promised to reveal when the time came. The time has come." + +"It has come," said Lady Montfort, solemnly; "and Heaven grant that it +may bear the blessed results which were in my thoughts when I took Sophy +as my own adopted daughter, and hailed in yourself the reconciler of +conflicting circumstance. Not under this roof should you woo William +Losely's grandchild. Doubly are you bound to ask Guy Darrell's consent +and blessing. At his hearth woo your Sophy--at his hands ask a bride in +his daughter's child." + +And to her wondering listener, Cayoline Montford told her grounds for the +belief that connected the last of the Darrells with the convict's +grandchild. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + CREDULOUS CRYSTAL-SEERS, YOUNG LOVERS, AND GRAVE WISE MEN--ALL IN + THE SAME CATEGORY. + +George Morley set out the next day for Norwich, in which antique city, +ever since the 'Dane peopled it, some wizard or witch, star-reader, or +crystal-seer' has enjoyed a mysterious renown, perpetuating thus through +all change in our land's social progress the long line of Vala and Saga, +who came with the Raven and Valkyr from Scandinavian pine shores. +Merle's reserve vanished on the perusal of Sophy's letter to him. He +informed George that Waife declared he had plenty of money, and had even +forced a loan upon Merle; but that he liked an active, wandering life; +it kept him from thinking, and that a pedlar's pack would give him a +license for vagrancy, and a budget to defray its expenses; that Merle had +been consulted by him in the choice of light popular wares, and as to the +route he might find the most free from competing rivals. Merle willingly +agreed to accompany George in quest of the wanderer, whom, by the help of +his crystal, he seemed calmly sure he could track and discover. +Accordingly, they both set out in the somewhat devious and desultory road +which Merle, who had some old acquaintances amongst the ancient +profession of hawkers, had advised Waife to take. But Merle, unhappily +confiding more in his crystal than Waife's steady adherence to the chart +prescribed, led the Oxford scholar the life of a will-of-the-wisp; +zigzag, and shooting to and fro, here and there, till, just when George +had lost all patience, Merle chanced to see, not in the crystal, a +pelerine on the neck of a farmer's daughter, which he was morally certain +he had himself selected for Waife's pannier. And the girl stating in +reply to his inquiry that her father had bought that pelerine as a +present for her, not many days before, of a pedlar in a neighbouring +town, to the market of which the farmer resorted weekly, Merle cast an +horary scheme, and finding the Third House (of short journeys) in +favourable aspect to the Seventh House (containing the object desired), +and in conjunction with the Eleventh House (friends), he gravely informed +the scholar that their toils were at an end, and that the Hour and the +Man were at hand. Not over-sanguine, George consigned himself and the +seer to an early train, and reached the famous town of Oazelford, +whither, when the chronological order of our narrative (which we have so +far somewhat forestalled) will permit, we shall conduct the inquisitive +reader. + +Meanwhile Lionel, subscribing without a murmur to Lady Montfort's +injunction to see Sophy no more till Darrell had been conferred with and +his consent won, returned to his lodgings in London, sanguine of success, +and flushed with joy. His intention was to set out at once to Fawley; +but on reaching town he found there a few lines from Dairell himself, in +reply to a long and affectionate letter which Lionel had written a few +days before asking permission to visit the old manor-house; for amidst +all his absorbing love for Sophy, the image of his lonely benefactor in +that gloomy hermitage often rose before him. In these lines, Darrell, +not unkindly, but very peremptorily, declined Lionel's overtures. + +"In truth, my dear young kinsman," wrote the recluse--"in truth I am, +with slowness, and with frequent relapses, labouring through +convalescence from a moral fever. My nerves are yet unstrung. I am as +one to whom is prescribed the most complete repose;--the visits, even of +friends the dearest, forbidden as a perilous excitement. The sight of +you--of any one from the great world--but especially of one whose rich +vitality of youth and hope affronts and mocks my own fatigued exhaustion, +would but irritate, unsettle, torture me. When I am quite well I will +ask you to come. I shall enjoy your visit. Till then, on no account, +and on no pretext, let my morbid ear catch the sound of your footfall on +my quiet floor. Write to me often, but tell me nothing of the news and +gossip of the world. Tell me only of yourself, your studies, your +thoughts, your sentiments, your wishes. Nor forget my injunctions. +Marry young, marry for love; let no ambition of power, no greed of gold, +ever mislead you into giving to your life a companion who is not the half +of your soul. Choose with the heart of a man; I know that you will +choose with the self-esteem of a gentleman; and be assured beforehand of +the sympathy and sanction of your 'CHURLISH BUT LOVING KINSMAN.'" + +After this letter, Lionel felt that, at all events, he could not at once +proceed to the old manor-house in defiance of its owner's prohibition. +He wrote briefly, entreating Darrell to forgive him if he persisted in +the prayer to be received at Fawley, stating that his desire for a +personal interview was now suddenly become special and urgent; that it +not only concerned himself, but affected his benefactor. By return of +post Darrell replied with curt frigidity, repeating, with even sternness, +his refusal to receive Lionel, but professing himself ready to attend to +all that his kinsman might address to him by letter. "If it be as you +state," wrote Darrell, with his habitual irony, "a matter that relates to +myself, I claim, as a lawyer for my own affairs--the precaution I once +enjoined to my clients--a written brief should always precede a personal +consultation." + +In fact, the proud man suspected that Lionel had been directly or +indirectly addressed on behalf of Jasper Losely; and cerainly that was +the last subject on which he would have granted an interview to his young +kinsman. Lionel, however; was not perhaps sorry to be thus compelled to +trust to writing his own and Sophy's cause. Darrell was one of those men +whose presence inspires a certain awe--one of those men whom we feel, +upon great occasions, less embarrassed to address by letter than in +person. Lionel's pen moved rapidly--his whole heart and soul suffused +with feeling--; and, rushing over the page, he reminded Darrell of the +day when he had told to the rich man the tale of the lovely wandering +child, and how, out of his sympathy for that child, Darrell's approving, +fostering tenderness to himself had grown. Thus indirectly to her +forlorn condition had he owed the rise in his own fortunes. He went +through the story of William Losely as he had gathered it from Alban +Morley, and touched pathetically on his own father's share in that dark +history. If William Losely really was hurried into crime by the tempting +necessity for a comparatively trifling sum, but for Charles Haughton +would the necessity have arisen? Eloquently then the lover united +grandfather and grandchild in one touching picture--their love for each +other, their dependence on each other. He enlarged on Sophy's charming, +unselfish, simple, noble character; he told how he had again found her; +he dwelt on the refining accomplishments she owed to Lady Montfort's +care. How came she with Lady Montfort? Why had Lady Montfort cherished, +adopted her? Because Lady Montfort told him how much her own childhood +had owed to Darrell; because, should Sophy be, as alleged, the offspring +of his daughter, the heiress of his line, Caroline Montfort rejoiced to +guard her from danger, save her from poverty, and ultimately thus to fit +her to be not only acknowledged with delight, but with pride. Why had he +been enjoined not to divulge to Darrell that he had again found, and +under Lady Montfort's roof, the child whom, while yet unconscious of her +claims, Darrell himself had vainly sought to find, and benevolently +designed to succour? Because Lady Montfort wished to fulfil her task- +complete Sophy's education, interrupted by grief for her missing +grandfather, and obtain indeed, when William Losely again returned, +some proofs (if such existed) to corroborate the assertion of Sophy's +parentage. "And," added Lionel, "Lady Montfort seems to fear that she +has given you some cause of displeasure--what I know not, but which might +have induced you to disapprove of the acquaintance I had begun with her. +Be that as it may, would you could hear the reverence with which she ever +alludes to your worth--the gratitude with which she attests her mother's +and her own early obligations to your intellect and heart!" Finally, +Lionel wove all his threads of recital into the confession of the deep +love into which his romantic memories of Sophy's wandering childhood had +been ripened by the sight of her graceful, cultured youth. "Grant," he +said, "that her father's tale be false--and no doubt you have sufficient +reasons to discredit it--still, if you cannot love her as your daughter's +child, receive, know her, I implore--let her love and revere you--as my +wife! Leave me to protect her from a lawless father--leave me to redeem, +by some deeds of loyalty and honour, any stain that her grandsire's +sentence may seem to fix upon our union. Oh! if ambitious before, how +ambitious I should be now--to efface for her sake, as for mine, her +grandsire's shame, my father's errors! But if, on the other hand, she +should, on the requisite inquiries, be proved to descend from your +ancestry--your father's blood in her pure veins--I know, alas! then that +I should have no right to aspire to such nuptials. Who would even think +of her descent from a William Losely? Who would not be too proud to +remember only her descent from you? All spots would vanish in the +splendour of your renown; the highest in the land would court her +alliance. And I am but the pensioner of your bounty, and only on my +father's side of gentle origin. But still I think you would not reject +me--you would place the future to my credit; and I would wait, wait +patiently, till I had won such a soldier's name as would entitle me to +mate with a daughter of the Darrells." + +Sheet upon sheet the young eloquence flowed on--seeking, with an art of +which the writer was unconscious, all the arguments and points of view +which might be the most captivating to the superb pride or to the +exquisite tenderness which seemed to Lionel the ruling elements of +Darrell's character. + +He had not to wait long for a reply. At the first glance of the address +on its cover, his mind misgave him; the hopes that bad hitherto elated +his spirit yielded to abrupt forebodings. Darrell's handwriting was +habitually in harmony with the intonations of his voice-singularly clear, +formed with a peculiar and original elegance, yet with the undulating +ease of a natural, candid, impulsive character. And that decorous care +in such mere trifles as the very sealing of a letter, which, neglected by +musing poets and abstracted authors, is observable in men of high public +station, was in Guy Darrell significant of the Patrician dignity that +imparted a certain stateliness to his most ordinary actions. + +But in the letter which lay in Lionel's hand the writer was scarcely +recognisable--the direction blurred, the characters dashed off from a pen +fierce yet tremulous; the seal a great blotch of wax; the device of the +heron, with its soaring motto, indistinct and mangled, as if the stamping +instrument had been plucked wrathfully away before the wax had cooled. +And when Lionel opened the letter, the handwriting within was yet more +indicative of mental disorder. The very ink looked menacing and angry- +blacker as the pen had been forcibly driven into the page. "Unhappy +boy!" began the ominous epistle, "is it through you that the false and +detested woman who has withered up the noon-day of my life seeks to +dishonour its blighted close? Talk not to me of Lady Montfort's +gratitude and reverence! Talk not to me of her amiable, tender, holy +aim, to obtrude upon my childless house the grand-daughter of a convicted +felon! Show her these lines, and ask her by what knowledge of my nature +she can assume that ignominy to my name would be a blessing to my hearth? +Ask her, indeed, how she can dare to force herself still upon my +thoughts--dare to imagine she can lay me under obligations--dare to think +she can be something still in my forlorn existence! Lionel Haughton, I +command you in the name of all the dead whom we can claim as ancestors in +common, to tear from your heart, as you would tear a thought of disgrace, +this image which has bewitched your reason. My daughter, thank Heaven, +left no pledge of an execrable union. But a girl who has been brought up +by a thief--a girl whom a wretch so lost to honour as Jasper Losely +sought to make an instrument of fraud to my harassment and disgrace, be +her virtues and beauty what they may, I could not, without intolerable +anguish, contemplate as the wife of Lionel Haughton. But receive her as +your wife! + +"Admit her within these walls! Never, never; I scorn to threaten you with +loss of favour, loss of fortune. Marry her if you will. You shall have +an ample income secure to you. But from that moment our lives are +separated--our relation ceases. You will never again see nor address me. +But oh, Lionel, can you--can you inflict upon me this crowning sorrow? +Can you, for the sake of a girl of whom you have seen but little, or in +the Quixotism of atonement for your father's fault, complete the +ingratitude I have experienced from those who owed me most? I cannot +think it. I rejoice that you wrote--did not urge this suit in person. +I should not have been able to control my passion; we might have parted +foes. As it is, I restrain myself with difficulty! That woman, that +child, associated thus to tear from me the last affection left to my +ruined heart. No! You will not be so cruel! Send this, I command you, +to Lady Montfort. See again neither her nor the impostor she has been +cherishing for my disgrace. This letter will be your excuse to break off +with both--with both. GUY DARRELL." + +Lionel was stunned. Not for several hours could he recover self- +possession enough to analyse his own emotions, or discern the sole course +that lay before him. After such a letter from such a benefactor, no +option was left to him. Sophy must be resigned; but the sacrifice +crushed him to the earth--crushed the very manhood out of him. He threw +himself on the floor, sobbing--sobbing as if body and soul were torn, +each from each, in convulsive spasms. + +But send this letter to Lady Montfort? A letter so wholly at variance +with Darrell's dignity of character--a letter in which rage seemed lashed +to unreasoning frenzy. Such bitter language of hate and scorn, and even +insult to a woman, and to the very woman who had seemed to Lionel so +reverently to cherish the writer's name--so tenderly to scheme for the +writer's happiness! Could he obey a command that seemed to lower Darrell +even more than it could humble her to whom it was sent? + +Yet disobey! What but the letter itself could explain? Ah--and was +there not some strange misunderstanding with respect to Lady Montfort, +which the letter itself, and nothing but the letter, would enable her to +dispel; and if dispelled, might not Darrell's whole mind undergo a +change? A flash of joy suddenly broke on his agitated, tempestuous +thoughts. He forced himself again to read those blotted impetuous lines. +Evidently--evidently, while writing to Lionel--the subject Sophy--the +man's wrathful heart had been addressing itself to neither. A suspicion +seized him; with that suspicion, hope. He would send the letter, and +with but few words from himself--words that revealed his immense despair +at the thought of relinquishing Sophy--intimated his belief that Darrell +here was, from some error of judgment which Lionel could not comprehend, +avenging himself on Lady Montfort; and closed with his prayer to her, if +so, to forgive lines coloured by hasty passion, and, for the sake of all, +not to disdain that self-vindication which might perhaps yet soften a +nature possessed of such depths of sweetness as that which appeared now +so cruel and so bitter. He would not yet despond--not yet commission her +to give his last farewell to Sophy. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + THE MAN-EATER CONTINUES TO TAKE HIS QUIET STEAK OUT OF DOLLY POOLE; + AND IS IN TURN SUBJECTED TO THE ANATOMICAL KNIFE OF THE DISSECTING + AUTHOR. TWO TRAPS ARE LAID FOR HIM--ONE BY HIS FELLOW MAN-EATERS-- + ONE BY THAT DEADLY PERSECUTRIX, THE WOMAN WHO TRIES TO SAVE HIM IN + SPITE OF ALL HE CAN DO TO BE HANGED. + +Meanwhile the unhappy Adolphus Poole had been the reluctant but unfailing +source from which Jasper Losely had weekly drawn the supplies to his +worthless and workless existence. Never was a man more constrainedly +benevolent, and less recompensed for pecuniary sacrifice by applauding +conscience, than the doomed inhabitant of Alhambra Villa. In the utter +failure of his attempts to discover Sophy, or to induce Jasper to accept +Colonel Morley's proposals, he saw this parasitical monster fixed upon +his entrails, like the vulture on those of the classic sufferer in +mythological tales. Jasper, indeed, had accommodated himself to this +regular and unlaborious mode of gaining "/sa pauvre vie/." To call once +a week upon his old acquaintance, frighten him with a few threats, or +force a deathlike smile from agonising lips by a few villanous jokes, +carry off his four sovereigns, and enjoy himself thereon till pay-day +duly returned, was a condition of things that Jasper did not greatly care +to improve; and truly had he said to Poole that his earlier energy had +left him. As a sensualist of Jasper's stamp grows older and falls lower, +indolence gradually usurps the place once occupied by vanity or ambition. +Jasper was bitterly aware that his old comeliness was gone; that never +more could he ensnare a maiden's heart or a widow's gold. And when this +truth was fully brought home to him, it made a strange revolution in all +his habits. He cared no longer for dress and gewgaws--sought rather to +hide himself than to parade. In the neglect of the person he had once so +idolised--in the coarse roughness which now characterised his exterior-- +there was that sullen despair which the vain only know when what had +made them dainty and jocund is gone for ever. The human mind, in +deteriorating, fits itself to the sphere into which it declines. Jasper +would not now, if he could, have driven a cabriolet down St. James's +Street. He had taken more and more to the vice of drinking as the +excitement of gambling was withdrawn from him. For how gamble with those +who had nothing to lose, and to whom he himself would have been pigeon, +not hawk? And as he found that, on what he thus drew regularly from +Dolly Poole, he could command all the comforts that his embruted tastes +now desired, so an odd kind of prudence for the first time in his life +came with what he chose to consider "a settled income." He mixed with +ruffians in their nightly orgies; treated them to cheap potations; +swaggered, bullied, boasted, but shared in no project of theirs which +might bring into jeopardy the life which Dolly Poole rendered so +comfortable and secure. His energies, once so restless, were lulled, +partly by habitual intoxication, partly by the physical pains which had +nestled themselves into his robust fibres, efforts of an immense and +still tenacious vitality to throw off diseases repugnant to its native +magnificence of health. The finest constitutions are those which, when +once seriously impaired, occasion the direst pain; but they also enable +the sufferer to bear pain that would soon wear away the delicate. And +Jasper bore his pains stoutly, though at times they so exasperated his +temper, that woe then to any of his comrades whose want of caution or +respect gave him the occasion to seek relief in wrath! His hand was as +heavy, his arm as stalwart as ever. George Morley had been rightly +informed. Even by burglars and cut-throats, whose dangers he shunned, +while fearlessly he joined their circle, Jasper Losely was regarded with +terror. To be the awe of reckless men, as he had been the admiration of +foolish women, this was delight to his vanity, the last delight that was +left to it. But he thus provoked a danger to which his arrogance was +blind. His boon companions began to grow tired of him. He had been +welcomed to their resort on the strength of the catchword or passport +which confederates at Paris had communicated to him, and of the +reputation for great daring and small scruple which he took from Cutts, +who was of high caste amongst their mysterious tribes, and who every now +and then flitted over the Continent, safe and accursed as the Wandering +Jew. But when they found that this Achilles of the Greeks would only +talk big, and employ his wits on his private exchequer and his thews +against themselves, they began not only to tire of his imperious manner, +but to doubt his fidelity to the cause. And, all of a sudden, Cutts, who +had at first extolled Jasper as one likely to be a valuable acquisition +to the Family of Night, altered his tone, and insinuated that the bravo +was not to be trusted; that his reckless temper and incautious talk when +drunk would unfit him for a safe accomplice in any skilful project of +plunder; and that he was so unscrupulous, and had so little sympathy with +their class, that he might be quite capable of playing spy or turning +king's evidence; that, in short, it would be well to rid themselves of +his domineering presence. Still there was that physical power in this +lazy Hercules--still, if the Do-nought, he was so fiercely the Dread- +nought--that they did not dare, despite the advantage of numbers, openly +to brave and defy him. No one would bell the cat--and such a cat! They +began to lay plots to get rid of him through the law. Nothing could be +easier to such knowing adepts in guilt than to transfer to his charge any +deed of violence one of their own gang had committed--heap damning +circumstances round him--privily apprise justice--falsely swear away his +life. In short, the man was in their way as a wasp that has blundered +into an ants' nest; and, while frightened at the size of the intruder, +these honest ants were resolved to get him out of their citadel alive or +dead. Probable it was that Jasper Losely would meet with his deserts at +last for an offence of which he was as innocent as a babe unborn. + +It is at this juncture that we are re-admitted to the presence of +Arabella Crane. + +She was standing by a window on the upper floor of a house situated in +a narrow street. The blind was let down, but she had drawn it a little +aside, and was looking out. By the fireside was seated a thin, vague, +gnome-like figure, perched comfortless on the edge of a rush-bottomed +chair, with its shadowy knees drawn up till they nearly touched its +shadowy chin. There was something about the outline of this figure so +indefinite and unsubstantial, that you might have taken it for an optical +illusion, a spectral apparition on the point of vanishing. This thing +was, however, possessed of voice, and was speaking in a low but distinct +hissing whisper. As the whisper ended, Arabella Crane, without turning +her face, spoke, also under her breath. + +"You are sure that, so long as Losely draws this weekly stipend from the +man whom he has in his power, he will persist in the same course of life. +Can you not warn him of the danger?" + +"Peach against pals! I dare not. No trusting him." + +"He would come down, mad with brandy, make an infernal row, seize two or +three by the throat, dash their heads against each other, blab, bully, +and a knife would be out, and a weasand or two cut, and a carcase or so +dropped into the Thames--mine certainly--his perhaps." + +"You say you can keep back this plot against him for two or three days?" + +"For two days--yes. I should be glad to save General Jas. He has the +bones of a fine fellow, and if he had not destroyed himself by brandy, he +might have been at the top of the tree-in the profession. But he is fit +for nothing now." + +"Ah! and you say the brandy is killing him?" + +"No, he will not be killed by brandy, if he continues to drink it among +the same jolly set." + +"And if he were left without the money to spend amongst these terrible +companions, he would no longer resort to their meetings? You are right +there. The same vanity that makes him pleased to be the great man in +that society would make him shrink from coming amongst them as a beggar." + +"And if he had not the wherewithal to pay the weekly subscription, there +would be an excuse to shut the door in his face. All these fellows wish +to do is to get rid of him; and if by fair means, there would be no +necessity to resort to foul. The only danger would be that from which +you have so often saved him. In despair, would he not commit some +violent rash action--a street robbery, or something of the kind? He has +courage for any violence, but no longer the cool head to plan a scheme +which would not be detected. You see I can prevent my pals joining in +such risks as he may propose, or letting him (if he were to ask it) into +an adventure of their own, for they know that I am a safe adviser; they +respect me; the law has never been able to lay hold of me; and when I say +to them, 'That fellow drinks, blabs, and boasts, and would bring us all +into trouble,' they will have nothing to do with him; but I cannot +prevent his doing what he pleases out of his own muddled head, and with +his own reckless hand." + +"But you will keep in his confidence, and let me know till that he +proposes!" + +"Yes." + +"And meanwhile, he must come to me. And this time I have more hope than +ever, since his health gives way, and he is weary of crime itself. Mr. +Cutts, come near--softly. Look-nay, nay, he cannot see you from below, +and you are screened by the blind. Look, I say, where he sits." + +She pointed to a room on the ground-floor in the opposite house, where +might be dimly seen a dull red fire in a sordid grate, and a man's form, +the head pillowed upon arms that rested on a small table. On the table a +glass, a bottle. + +"It is thus that his mornings pass," said Arabella Crane, with a wild +bitter pity in the tone of her voice. "Look, I say, is he formidable +now? can you fear him?" + +"Very much indeed," muttered Cutts. "He is only stupefied, and he can +shake off a doze as quickly as a bulldog does when a rat is let into his +kennel." + +"Mr. Cutts, you tell me that he constantly carries about him the same old +pocket-book which he says contains his fortune; in other words, the +papers that frighten his victim into giving him the money which is now +the cause of his danger. There is surely no pocket you cannot pick or +get picked, Mr. Cutts? Fifty pounds for that book in three hours." + +"Fifty pounds are not enough; the man he sponges on would give more to +have those papers in his power." + +"Possibly; but Losely has not been dolt enough to trust you sufficiently +to enable you to know how to commence negotiations. Even if the man's +name and address be amongst those papers, you could not make use of the +knowledge without bringing Jasper himself upon you; and even if Jasper +were out of the way, you would not have the same hold over his victim; +you know not the circumstances; you could make no story out of some +incoherent rambling letters; and the man, who, I can tell you, is by +nature a bully, and strong, compared with any other man but Jasper, would +seize you by the collar; and you would be lucky if you got out of his +house with no other loss than the letters, and no other gain but a broken +bone. Pooh! YOU know all that, or you would have stolen the book, and +made use of it before. Fifty pounds for that book in three hours; and if +Jasper Losely be safe and alive six months hence, fifty pounds more, Mr. +Cutts. See! he stirs not must be fast asleep. Now is the moment." + +"What, in his own room!" said Cutts with contempt. "Why, he would know +who did it; and where should I be to-morrow? No--in the streets; any one +has a right to pick a pocket in the Queen's highways. In three hours you +shall have the book." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + MERCURY IS THE PATRON DEITY OF MERCANTILE SPECULATORS, AS WELL AS OF + CRACK-BRAINED POETS; INDEED, HE IS MUCH MORE FAVOURABLE, MORE A + FRIEND AT A PINCH, TO THE FORMER CLASS OF HIS PROTEGES THAN HE IS TO + THE LATTER. + + "Poolum per hostes mercurius celer, + Denso paventem sustulit aere." + +Poole was sitting with his wife after dinner. He had made a good +speculation that day; little Johnny would be all the better for it a few +years hence, and some other man's little Johnnys all the worse--but each +for himself in this world! Poole was therefore basking in the light of +his gentle helpmate's approving smile. He had taken all extra glass of a +venerable port-wine, which had passed to his cellar from the bins of +Uncle Sam. Commercial prosperity without, conjugal felicity within, the +walls of Alhambra Villa; surely Adolphus Poole is an enviable man! Does +he look so? The ghost of what he was but a few months ago! His cheeks +have fallen in; his clothes hang on him like bags; there is a worried, +haggard look in his eyes, a nervous twitch in his lips, and every now and +then he looks at the handsome Parisian clock on the chimneypiece, and +then shifts his posture, snubs his connubial angel, who asks "what ails +him?" refills his glass, and stares on the fire, seeing strange shapes in +the mobile aspects of the coals. + +To-morrow brings back this weekly spectre! To-morrow Jasper Losely, +punctual to the stroke of eleven, returns to remind him of that past +which, if revealed, will blast the future. And revealed it might be any +hour despite the bribe for silence which he must pay with his own hands, +under his own roof. Would he trust another with the secret of that +payment?--horror! Would he visit Losely at his own lodging, and pay him +there?--murder! Would he appoint him somewhere in the streets--run the +chance of being seen with such a friend? Respectability confabulating +with offal?--disgrace! And Jasper had on the last two or three visits +been peculiarly disagreeable. He had talked loud. Poole feared that his +wife might have her ear at the keyhole. Jasper had seen the parlour-maid +in the passage as he went out, and caught her round the waist. The +parlour-maid had complained to Mrs. Poole, and said she would leave if so +insulted by such an ugly blackguard. Alas! what the poor lady-killer has +come to! Mrs. Poole had grown more and more inquisitive and troublesome +on the subject of such extraordinary visits; and now, as her husband +stirred the fire-having roused her secret ire by his previous unmanly +snubbings, and Mrs. Poole being one of those incomparable wives who have +a perfect command of temper, who never reply to angry words at the +moment, and who always, with exquisite calm and self-possession, pay off +every angry word by an amiable sting at a right moment--Mrs. Poole, I +say, thus softly said: + +"Sammy, duck, we know what makes oo so cross; but it shan't vex oo long, +Sammy. That dreadful man comes to-morrow. He always comes the same day +of the week." + +"Hold your tongue, Mrs. Poole." + +"Yes, Sammy, dear, I'll hold my tongue. But Sammy shan't be imposed upon +by mendicants; for I know he is a mendicant--one of those sharpers or +blacklegs who took oo in, poor innocent Sam, in oo wild bachelor days, +and oo good heart can't bear to see him in distress; but there must be an +end to all things." + +"Mrs. Poole--Mrs. Poole-will you stop your fool's jaw or not?" + +"My poor dear hubby," said the angel, squeezing out a mild tear, "oo will +be in good hands to advise oo; for I've been and told Pa!" + +"You have," faltered Poole, "told your father--you have!" and the +expression of his face became so ghastly that Mrs. Poole grew seriously +terrified. She had long felt that there was something very suspicious in +her husband's submission to the insolence of so rude a visitor. But she +knew that he was not brave; the man might intimidate him by threats of +personal violence. The man might probably be some poor relation, or some +one whom Poole had ruined, either in bygone discreditable sporting 'days, +or in recent respectable mercantile speculations. But at that ghastly +look a glimpse of the real truth broke upon her; and she stood speechless +and appalled. At this moment there was a loud ring at the street-door +bell. Poole gathered himself up, and staggered out of the room into the +passage. + +His wife remained without motion; for the first time she conceived a fear +of her husband. Presently she heard a harsh female voice in the hall, +and then a joyous exclamation from Poole himself. Recovered by these +unexpected sounds, she went mechanically forth into the passage, just in +time to see the hems of a dark-grey dress disappearing within Poole's +study, while Poole, who had opened the study-door, and was bowing-in the +iron-grey dress obsequiously, turned his eye towards his wife, and +striding towards her for a moment, whispered, "Go up-stairs and stir +not," in a tone so unlike his usual gruff accents of command, that it +cowed her out of the profound contempt with which she habitually +received, while smilingly obeying, his marital authority. + +Poole, vanishing into his study, carefully closed his door, and would +have caught his lady visitor by both her hands; but she waived him back, +and, declining a seat, remained sternly erect. + +"Mr. Poole, I have but a few words to say. The letters which gave Jasper +Losely the power to extort money from you are no longer in his +possession; they are in mine. You need fear him no more--you will fee +him no more." + +"Oh!" cried Poole, falling on his knees, "the blessing of a father of a +family--a babe not six weeks born--be on your blessed, blessed head!" + +"Get up, and don't talk nonsense. I do not give you these papers at +present, nor burn them. Instead of being in the power of a muddled, +irresolute drunkard, you are in the power of a vigilant, clear-brained +woman. You are in my power, and you will act as I tell you." + +"You can ask nothing wrong, I am sure," said Poole, his grateful +enthusiasm much abated. "Command me; but the papers can be of no use to +you; I will pay for them handsomely." + +"Be silent and listen. I retain these papers-first, because Jasper +Losely must not know that they ever passed to my hands; secondly, because +you must inflict no injury on Losely himself. Betray me to him, or try +to render himself up to the law, and the documents will be used against +you ruthlessly. Obey, and you have nothing to fear, and nothing to pay. +When Jasper Losely calls on you tomorrow, ask him to show you the +letters. He cannot; he will make excuses. Decline peremptorily, but not +insultingly (his temper is fierce), to pay him farther. He will perhaps +charge you with having hired some one to purloin his pocket-book; let him +think it. Stop--your window here opens on the ground--a garden without: +--Ah! have three of the police in that garden, in sight of the window. +Point to them if he threaten you; summon them to your aid, or pass out to +them, if he actually attempt violence. But when he has left the house, +you must urge no charge against him; he must be let off unscathed. You +can be at no loss for excuse in this mercy; a friend of former times-- +needy, unfortunate, whom habits of drink maddened for the moment-- +necessary to eject him--inhuman to prosecute--any story you please. The +next day you can, if you choose, leave London for a short time; I advise +it. But his teeth will be drawn; he will most probably never trouble you +again. I know his character. There, I have done; open the door, sir." + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + THE WRECK AND THE LIFE-BOAT IN A FOG. + +The next day, a little after noon, Jasper Losely, coming back from +Alhambra Villa--furious, desperate, knowing not where to turn for bread, +or on whom to pour his rage--beheld suddenly, in a quiet, half-built +street, which led from the suburb to the New Road, Arabella Crane +standing right in his path. She had emerged from one of the many +straight intersecting roads which characterise that crude nebula of a +future city; and the woman and the man met thus face to face; not another +passer-by visible in the thoroughfare;--at a distance the dozing hack +cab-stand; round and about them carcases of brick and mortar--some with +gaunt scaffolding fixed into their ribs, and all looking yet more weird +in their raw struggle into shape through the living haze of a yellow fog. + +Losely, seeing Arabella thus planted in his way, recoiled; and the +superstition in which he had long associated her image with baffled +schemes and perilous hours sent the wrathful blood back through his veins +so quickly that be heard his heart beat! + +MRS. CRANE.--"SO! You see we cannot help meeting, Jasper dear, do what +you will to shun me." + +LOSELY." I--I--you always startle me so!--you are in town, then?--to +stay?--your old quarters?" + +MRS. CRANE.--"Why ask? You cannot wish to know where I am--you would not +call. But how fares it?--what do you do?--how do you live? You look +ill--Poor Jasper." + +LOSELY (fiercely).--"Hang your pity, and give me some money." + +MRS. CRANE (calmly laying her lean hand on the arm which was darted +forward more in menace than entreaty, and actually terrifying the +Gladiator as she linked that deadly arm into her own).--"I said you would +always find me when at the worst of your troubles. And so, Jasper, it +shall be till this right hand of yours is powerless as the clay at our +feet. Walk--walk; you are not afraid of me?--walk on, tell me all. +Where have you just been?" + +Jasper, therewith reminded of his wrongs, poured out a volley of abuse on +Poole, communicating to Mrs. Crane the whole story of his claims on that +gentleman--the loss of the pocket-book filched from him, and Poole's +knowledge that he was thus disarmed. + +"And the coward," said he, grinding his teeth, "got out of his window +--and three policemen in his garden. He must have bribed a pickpocket-- +low knave that he is. But I shall find out--and then--" + +"And then, Jasper, how will you be better off?--the letters are gone; and +Poole has you in his power if you threaten him again. Now, hark you; you +did not murder the Italian who was found stabbed in the fields yonder a +week ago; L100 reward for the murderer?" + +"I--no. How coldly you ask! I have hit hard in fair fight; murdered-- +never. If ever I take to that, I shall begin with Poole." + +"But I tell you, Jasper, that you are suspected of that murder; that you +will be accused of that murder; and if I had not thus fortunately met +you, for that murder you would be tried and hanged." + +"Are you serious? Who could accuse me?" + +"Those who know that you are not guilty--those who could make you appear +so--the villains with whom you horde, and drink and brawl! Have I ever +been wrong in my warnings yet?" + +"This is too horrible," faltered Losely, thinking not of the conspiracy +against his life, but of her prescience in detecting it. "It must be +witchcraft, and nothing else. How could you learn what you tell me?" + +"That is my affair; enough for you that I am right. Go no more to those +black haunts; they are even now full of snares and pitfalls for you. +Leave London, and you are safe. Trust to me." + +"And where shall I go?" + +"Look you, Jasper; you have worn out this old world no refuge for you but +the new. Whither went your father, thither go you. Consent, and you +shall not want. You cannot discover Sophy. You have failed in all +attempts on Darrell's purse. But agree to sail to Australasia, and I +will engage to you an income larger than you say you extorted from Poole, +to be spent in those safer shores." + +"And you will go with me, I suppose," said Losely, with ungracious +sullenness. + +"Go with you, as you please. Be where you are--yes." The ruffian +bounded with rage and loathing. + +"Woman, cross me no more, or I shall be goaded into--" + +"Into killing me--you dare not! Meet my eye if you can--you dare not! +Harm me, yea a hair of my head, and your moments are numbered!--your doom +sealed. Be we two together in a desert--not a human eye to see the deed +--not a human ear to receive my groan, and still I should stand by your +side unharmed. I, who have returned the wrongs received from you, by +vigilant, untiring benefits--I, who have saved you from so many enemies, +and so many dangers--I, who, now when all the rest of earth shun you-- +when all other resource fails-I, who now say to you, 'Share my income, +but be honest!' I receive injury from that hand. No; the guilt would be +too unnatural--Heaven would not permit it. Try, and your arm will fall +palsied by your side!" + +Jasper's bloodshot eyes dropped beneath the woman's fixed and scorching +gaze, and his lips, white and tremulous, refused to breathe the fierce +curse into which his brutal nature concentrated its fears and its hate. +He walked on in gloomy silence; but some words she had let fall suggested +a last resort to his own daring. + +She had urged him to quit the old world for the new, but that had been +the very proposition conveyed to him from Darrell. If that proposition, +so repugnant to the indolence that had grown over him, must be embraced, +better at least sail forth alone, his own master, than be the dependent +slave of this abhorred and persecuting benefactress. His despair gave +him the determination he had hitherto lacked. He would seek Darrell +himself, and make the best compromise he could. This resolve passed into +his mind as he stalked on through the yellow fog, and his nerves +recovered from their irritation, and his thoughts regained something of +their ancient craft as the idea of escaping from Mrs. Crane's vigilance +and charity assumed a definite shape. + +"Well," said he at length, dissimulating his repugnance, and with an +effort at his old half-coaxing, half-rollicking tones, "you certainly are +the best of creatures; and, as you say, + + 'Had I a heart for falsehood framed, I ne'er could injure you,' + +ungrateful dog though I may seem, and very likely am. I own I have a +horror of Australasia--such a long sea-voyage! New scenes no longer +attract me; I am no longer young, though I ought to be; but if you insist +on it, and will really condescend to accompany me in spite of all my sins +to you, why, I can make up my mind. And as to honesty, ask those +infernal rascals, who, you say, would swear away my life, and they will +tell you that I have been as innocent as a lamb since my return to +England; and that is my guilt in their villanous eyes. As long as that +infamous Poole gave me enough for my humble wants, I was a reformed man. +I wish to keep reformed. Very little suffices for me now. As you say, +Australasia may be the best place for me. When shall we go?" + +"Are you serious?" + +"To be sure." + +"Then I will inquire the days on which the vessels sail. You can call on +me at my own old home, and all shall be arranged. Oh, Jasper Losely, do +not avoid this last chance of escape from the perils that gather round +you." + +"No; I am sick of life--of all things except repose. Arabella, I suffer +horrible pain." + +He groaned, for he spoke truly. At that moment the gnaw of the monster +anguish, which fastens on the nerves like a wolf's tooth, was so keen +that he longed to swell his groan into a roar. The old fable of Hercules +in the poisoned tunic was surely invented by some skilled physiologist, +to denote the truth that it is only in the strongest frames that pain can +be pushed into its extremest torture. The heart of the grim woman was +instantly and thoroughly softened. She paused; she made him lean on her +arm; she wiped the drops from his brow; she addressed him in the most +soothing tones of pity. The spasm passed away suddenly as it does in +neuralgic agonies, and with it any gratitude or any remorse in the breast +of the sufferer. + +"Yes," he said, "I will call on you; but meanwhile I am without a +farthing. Oh, do not fear that if you helped me now, I should again shun +you. I have no other resource left; nor have I now the spirit I once +had. I no longer now laugh at fatigue and danger." + +"But will you swear by all that you yet hold sacred--if, alas! there be +aught which is sacred to you--that you will not again seek the company of +those men who are conspiring to entrap you into the hangman's hands?" + +"Seek them again, the ungrateful cowardly blackguards! No, no; I promise +you that--solemnly; it is medical aid that I want; it is rest, I tell +you--rest, rest, rest." Arabella Crane drew forth her purse. "Take what +you will," said she gently. Jasper, whether from the desire to deceive +her, or because her alms were so really distasteful to his strange kind +of pride that he stinted to bare necessity the appeal to them, contented +himself with the third or fourth of the sovereigns that the purse +contained, and after a few words of thanks and promises, he left her +side, and soon vanished in the fog that grew darker and darker as the +night-like wintry day deepened over the silenced thoroughfares. + +The woman went her way through the mists, hopeful--through the mists went +the man, hopeful also. Recruiting himself by slight food and strong +drink at a tavern on his road, he stalked on to Darrell's house in +Carlton Gardens; and, learning there that Darrell was at Fawley, hastened +to the station from which started the train to the town nearest to the +old Manor-house; reached that town safely, and there rested for the +night. + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHAT WILL HE DO WITH IT, V8 *** + +******** This file should be named 7666.txt or 7666.zip ******** + +This eBook was produced by David Widger + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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