|By this time darkness had fallen, though it was still early in the
afternoon. There was a high wind, moaning around among the leafless
trees; and, from time to time, flakes of snow were falling--large, and
far apart. As he descended the snow-clad steps, he stumbled and fell
among the drift, but rose again immediately, covered with patches of
whiteness, and pursued his way.
Was it the wind shrieking, or something in his own troubled brain? He
looked wildly around him, plunging this, way and that, like a blind man.
The darkness frothed before his eyes, and burst into spangled stars,
as when one receives a violent blow, or as when one is sinking in deep
water and choking for breath.
Presently he turned and looked back from the centre of the frozen lawn.
Behind him, blacker than the blackness of the night, lay the great
shadow of the Manor house; but from one window above the entrance came
a feeble light. He knew the window well. It was that of the chamber
wherein he had looked upon the dead.
Alone in the darkness, he threw up his arms and uttered a wail of
despair. As his voice rose upon the wind, other voices seemed to echo
him with sounds of mocking laughter. Haldane had told him that he had
lost his soul alive-Indeed it seemed so, and hell was already around,
and in him.
But he remembered his purpose, and hastened on. Whatever the issue might
be, he was determined to hand over that man to the law, to make him
expiate on the gallows his act of cowardly, treacherous vengeance. He
had not spared _her_, and he should, at least, pay the penalty. _Then_,
when he had avenged her death, he cared not what became of himself. He
could die, too; yes, and would.
Ah! but the man was right, when he had torn his soul open and showed the
cancerous sore within it. He had broken the laws of God, and he had lost
eternally what he loved. There was no justification for him--none. He
had been an adulterer in thought, if not in deed--a hypocrite, hiding a
loathsome lust under the garment of religion. Why had he not been warned
in time? He might, have known that the man he had to deal with--a man
who believed in nothing--would pause at nothing. He remembered, too
late, that monkish tale of jealousy and murder, which might have told
him, had he not been so mad, what was lurking so pitilessly in the man’s
mind. It was little comfort now to reflect that he was innocent in act.
The consequences had been the same, as horrible, as irrevocable; as if
he had sinned seventy times and seven. By his abominable solicitation,
he had betrayed the woman he adored. Yes, he had killed her! What hope
could there be for him, in this world or another, after that?
Nevertheless, he hastened on, fighting with his own thoughts in the
darkness stumbling through the drifted snow. He found the avenue and
entered it--passing into deeper darkness, hearing the wind shriek more
loudly on every side. The police barrack was at Omberley, five miles
distant. He would hasten there without delay, tell what had taken place,
and return with the officers that night. He would not rest until he
had the murderer bound and captured: for even yet, if he did come back
quickly, he might escape.
Then he thought of all the shame, the scandal, which must assuredly come
with the revelation of the truth. The women who had thought him almost
a sainted creature, the villagers who had watched him with simple
reverence--all who had respected him and heard the gospel of love from
his lips, would point at him as a shameless creature, a scandal to his
holy office. He could never mount the pulpit again, or walk in the sun.
They would strip the priestly raiment from his back, and hound him away
into the world. Even his own sister, who thought him the purest and best
of men, would shrink from him with loathing; nay, how could he look her,
or any pure creature, in the face?
All that, and more, he thought, could have been borne, could he only
have restored the dead to life. His own fall and degradation would have
been a trifle, if he had not sacrificed that sainted being--the woman of
his early love, the creature of his idolatry, the object of his insane
and fatal passion. She had suffered for his guilt, but she had not
atoned for it. Nothing could atone, nothing. How gladly that night would
he have died, if by death he could have restored her to the sunshine of
the world!
Then, in his despair, he reproached her God--the God who had made her so
beautiful, and him so weak. Why had God ever brought them together? Why,
having once separated them, had He ever caused them to meet again? It
was cruel, unmerciful, to tempt a man so much! He had only asked for a
little love, and without love life was so dark. And before temptation
came, had he not done God good service? More than one doubting heart had
been turned, by his persuasion, back to the faith of Christ; more than
one erring sinner had, through him, been led back, penitent and weeping,
to the Church’s fold! All men had respected him for his blameless life,
for his good deeds.
He had been kind to the suffering, generous to the poor. He had been an
example of Christian charity to his fellows. He had reflected honour on
the university which gave him to the Church, and on the Church which had
accepted him into her bosom. Though so young, he had risen high, by his
own talents, his intelligence, his own blameless character. And now
he had lost everything, because he had pined for a little sympathy, a
little love.
As these thoughts passed through his brain, his eyes were blinded with
tears, and, in utter self-pity, he sobbed aloud.
How dark it was! how miserably dark and cold! He could not see an inch
before him, could not even perceive the white ground beneath his feet;
but the wind wailed louder and louder on every side.
He remembered how gladly, the previous day, he had proclaimed the good
tidings of the birth of Christ. The bells had rung, and from every side,
over the white landscape, cold, but cheerful and light with sunshine,
the people had come gathering in--rich and poor, old and young, all
gaily clad for Christmas-tide. He had stood away--stoled in the pulpit,
and had seen the shining faces upturned reverently to his, and had heard
the clear voices ring out in happiness and praise. Ah, it had been a
beautiful time! Only yesterday, and already it seemed so far away!
In his misery, he quite forgot how much and how often he had fretted
under the yoke of his priestly duties; how he had despised the ignoble
natures of his flock; how he had panted again and again for a freer
life and for more eventful days! What he had lost for ever now seemed
strangely dear. As he reviewed his life in the village, he remembered
none of its cares, none of its indignities; it seemed all peaceful,
all beautiful,’ _now!_ Yes, it was heaven, though he had not known it;
heaven, though he had fallen from it. And he could never return to it
again; never preach in the church, never minister to man or woman, never
know the blessing and the peace of a divine vocation any more!
Suddenly he paused, stumbling in bewilderment and terror He had stepped
into a deep snowdrift, which rose nearly to his knees. He looked wildly
round, but could discern nothing. He pressed his way forward, and
stumbled against the frozen root of a great tree. He turned and groped
another way; again something interposed. Gradually, straining his eyes
through the darkness, he discerned that he was surrounded by trees on
every side.
He had wandered from the avenue, and was long among the plantations--he
could not tell in what direction.
How long he wandered among the dreary woods he could not tell.
A mortal fever was upon him, and he struggled confusedly this way and
that, sometimes stumbling and falling amid the snow, sometimes coming
violently against the frozen tree-trunks, sometimes rushing among briers
and tangled underwoods which clutched him like fingers, and rent his
clothing as he tore himself away.
He shouted, thinking he might be heard. His shout rose faintly on the
wind, and was echoed by unearthly voices.
Then he seemed to see sheeted shapes passing before him; ghostly faces
flashing into his own, and fading away. He saw _her_ face, marble-white
as he had seen it in death, and with horrible rebuking eyes.
Ah, that night! that night! He passed an eternity of agony, in a few
hours!
At last he fell, half fainting, on the stump of a tree, and rested,
afraid to venture further. Pausing there, he clasped his hands together
and prayed.
For her; for himself. He prayed to Heaven for help and mercy. In his
abject fear and humiliation, he prostrated his soul before his God. His
strength seemed failing him, and he felt as if he were dying. Ah, the
horrible darkness! the nameless terror! Would he ever live to see the
light again?
The snow thickened and fell upon him; he shook it off again and again,
but still it fell, blinding and covering him. He became very cold,
despite the fever in his veins--cold as death. Afraid to perish that
way, he rose to his feet and struggled on.
At last, after wandering on and on for an indefinite space of time, he
saw a light breaking through the trees. He shouted, and ran forward.
The light came from the windows of some building, and streamed brightly
out into the darkness, lighting up the snowy ground, revealing the trees
and branches in silhouette. Wild and despairing, he approached nearer,
and saw a door, through the hinges of which shone a faint radiance. Then
he recognized the place. It was the ruined chapel of Foxglove Manor.
He did not hesitate, but pushed open the door. He found himself in the
building which George Haldane had turned from a temple of God into a
laboratory of science. In the centre of it, surrounded by books, papers,
and scientific implements of divers kinds, a man sat, calmly writing by
the light of a brilliant oil-lamp.
As Santley entered, he looked up. The master of Foxglove Manor.
Spectral and ghastly, his hair dishevelled, his dress torn and
disordered, covered with mud, the minister staggered into the chapel.
Who, in that frenzied apparition, would have recognized the sometime
spruce and comely Vicar of Omberley? In one of his falls he had cut his
forehead on a tree or stone, and blood was oozing from the wound. He was
a horrible sight--horrible and pitiable.
Haldane looked up, and nodded.
“So, it is _you!_” he said, pushing his papers aside.
A large meerschaum pipe lay on the table beside him, with a box
of lucifers. He struck a light, and quietly began to smoke, as he
continued--
“You have returned quickly. Pray, have you brought the police with
you?” Without answering him directly, Santley approached the table, and,
fixing his wild eyes upon him, demanded in a hollow voice--
“What are you doing?”
The philosopher leant back in his chair, and blew a cloud of smoke into
the air.
“Writing, as you see.”
“Writing!” echoed Santley.
“Yes; at my history. To-night’s experience has furnished me with
material for a new chapter--on ‘Spiritual Vivisection.’”
The man was inconceivable, even satanic. Santley was again dominated by
his supernatural _sang froid’_ his supreme self-control.
“Have you a heart, man?” he cried, gazing in horror upon him.
Haldane smiled diabolically.
“A reference to the most rudimentary system of physiology,” he replied,
“would convince you that I could not exist without one.”
“Death in your house, murder in your heart, you can sit here so calmly,
still busy with your blasphemies? You cannot be human.”
“On the contrary, I am particularly human.”
“No, no; you are a devil! a devil!”
“If you were a philosopher, you would know that devils do not exist;
even your own not too intellectual Church has rejected demonology. I am
simply a physician; yours.”
“Mine! my physician.”
“I have opened your heart, to show you the canker existing within it.
I have shown you, in an interesting experiment, that the disease of
supersensuous desire, which with you is constitutional and inherited,
culminates in moral scrofula, imbecility, hysterical mania, and death.
It is, moreover, capable of spreading contagion--a sort of cancerous
cell, which, inhaled by the lips or from the polluted atmosphere, must
inevitably bring disease and death to others. The kiss of the leper,
reverend sir! For the future, I should recommend you to carry a clapper
with you, as they do in the East, to warn off the unwary.”
The comparison was a hideous one but indeed, at that moment, it did not
seem inappropriate. Wild, ghastly, dishevelled, bloody, and degraded,
Santley looked a creature to be avoided and even feared. He listened to
the cold periods of his torturer, fixed his pale eyeballs, which seemed
vacant of all light, upon his face; then suddenly, with a spasmodic
scream, he leapt upon him and seized him by the throat.
The attack was so unexpected and so sudden, that Haldane was taken by
surprise. He sprang to his feet, while the other clung around him like a
wild cat. But the struggle was only brief.
In another minute he had gripped the vicar with his powerful arms,
and pinned him against the wall of the chapel. There he writhed and
wrestled, impotent, furious, foaming at the mouth.
“If you don’t control yourself better,” said the philosopher, between
his set teeth, “you will soon want a strait-waistcoat. Be quiet, will
you?”
And he shook him as a wiry terrier shakes a rat.
“Let me go!”
“I have a good mind to give you your _coup de grâce?_” returned Haldane,
with a little less composure than before. “Why, I could strangle you if
I pleased.”
“Strangle me, then!”
“Bah! you are not worth the trouble,” said the other, throwing him off.
“Tell me, again, where are your police officers? Why did you not bring
them?”
Utterly conquered and helpless, Santley did not reply. Haldane pointed
to the door.
“At any rate, get out of this. I am going to close my studies and go to
bed.”
And he proceeded to turn down the lamp, previous to blowing it out.
Santley moved towards the door. As he did so, the lamp was extinguished,
and the chapel left in pitch darkness. He groped his way out, and stood
waiting on the threshold. The philosopher followed, and they stood
together in the open darkness. Then Haldane closed the door and turned
the key.
“Your way lies yonder, reverend sir,” he said, pointing towards the
avenue. “Take my advice and sleep upon it, before you return to arrest
me. I will keep your secret, if you will keep mine.”
“I will make no terms with you,” cried the vicar. “I will return, and
have you dragged to justice.”
“As you please,” was the reply. Haldane walked slowly in the direction
of the house. Santley, after a minute’s wild hesitation, rushed away
again into the night.
By this time the snow had ceased falling, and the air was a little
clearer. With little difficulty, Santley found the avenue, and, running
rather than walking, followed it till he reached the lodge.
As he did so, he heard voices singing in merry chorus. He waited, and
presently a light cart drove up, turning into the avenue. He called out,
and it stopped. He came close, and found that it contained five persons,
two men-and three women.
“Who are you?” he demanded. “Where are you going?”
Mrs. Feme, the lodge-keeper, who was one of the party, informed him that
they were Mr. Haldane’s servants, returning from their holiday excursion
to the neighbouring town.
“Go up to the house at once!” he cried. “Seize your master, detain him
till I return. Your mistress has been murdered!”
They cried out in terror and astonishment, asking for particulars.
“I cannot stay,” he answered wildly.
“Go on, and watch till I return. It is as I say; he has murdered your
mistress. I am going for the police.”
Then he fled on in the direction of the village. But as he went, his
pace seemed to fail him, and his head to go round and round.
At last he reached the village, where all was dark and desolate, and,
passing by the shadow of his own church, reached the Vicarage gate. Here
he paused, almost spent. He could not go any further. He would go in and
get a little brandy, then he would hasten on for assistance.
He staggered in through the gate, and across the garden. There was a
light in the window, for Miss Santley was sitting up for her brother,
wondering what had kept him so late. He crept close to the window and
tapped upon it.
“Mary! Mary!” he moaned.
She heard him, looked out, and then opened the door, standing on the
threshold with a lighted candle in her hand.
At the sight of his blood-stained face and disordered dress, she uttered
a cry of fear.
As she did so, he stretched out his hands, and fell like a corpse across
the threshold.