As next morning's sun rises over Llangorren Court, it shows a mansion
without either master or mistress!
Not long to remain so. If the old servants of the establishment had
short notice of dismissal, still more brief is that given to its latest
retinue. About meridian of that day, after the departure of their
mistress, while yet in wonder where she has gone, they receive another
shock of surprise, and a more unpleasant one, at seeing a hackney
carriage-drive up to the hall door, out of which step two men, evidently
no friends to her from whom they have their wages. For one of the men
is Captain Ryecroft, the other a police superintendent; who, after the
shortest possible parley, directs the butler to parade the complete
staff of his fellow domestics, male and female. This with an air and in
a tone of authority, which precludes supposition that the thing is a
jest.
Summoned from all quarters, cellar to garret, and out doors as well,
their names, with other particulars, are taken down; and they are told
that their services will be no longer required at Llangorren. In short,
they are one and all dismissed, without a word about the month's wages
or warning! If they get either, 'twill be only as a grace.
Then they receive orders to pack up and be off; while Joseph Preece,
ex-Charon, who has crossed the river in his boat, with appointment to
meet the hackney there, is authorised to take temporary charge of the
place; Jack Wingate, similarly bespoke, having come down in his skiff,
to stand by him in case of any opposition.
None arises. However chagrined by their hasty _sans facon_ discharge,
the outgoing domestics seem not so greatly surprised at it. From what
they have observed for some time going on, as also something whispered
about, they had no great reliance on their places being permanent. So,
in silence all submit, though somewhat sulkily; and prepare to vacate
quarters they had found fairly snug.
There is one, however, who cannot be thus conveniently, or
unceremoniously, dismissed--the head-gamekeeper, Richard Dempsey. For,
while the others are getting their _mandamus_ to move, the report is
brought in that he is lying on his death-bed! So the parish doctor has
prognosticated. Also, that he is just then delirious, and saying queer
things; some of which repeated to the police "super," tell him his
proper place, at that precise moment, is by the bedside of the sick man.
Without a second's delay he starts off towards the lodge in which
Coracle has been of late domiciled--under the guidance of its former
occupant Joseph Preece--accompanied by Captain Ryecroft and Jack
Wingate.
The house being but a few hundred yards distant from the Court, they are
soon inside it, and standing over the bed on which lies the fevered
patient; not at rest, but tossing to and fro--at intervals, in such
violent manner as to need restraint.
The superintendent at once sees it would be idle putting questions to
him. If asked his own name, he could not declare it. For he knows not
himself--far less those who are around.
His face is something horrible to behold. It would but harrow sensitive
feelings to give a portraiture of it. Enough to say, it is more like
that of demon than man.
And his speech, poured as in a torrent from his lips, is alike
horrifying--admission of many and varied crimes; in the same breath
denying them and accusing others; his contradictory ravings garnished
with blasphemous ejaculations.
A specimen will suffice, omitting the blasphemy.
"It's a lie!" he cries out, just as they are entering the room. "A lie,
every word o't! I didn't murder Mary Morgan. Served her right if I
had, the jade! She jilted me; an' for that wasp Wingate--dog--cur! I
didn't kill her. No; only fixed the plank. If she wor fool enough to
step on't that warn't my fault. She did--she did! Ha! ha! ha!"
For a while he keeps up the horrid cachinnation, as the glee of Satan
exulting over some feat of foul _diablerie_. Then his thoughts changing
to another crime, he goes on:--
"The grand girl--the lady! She arn't drowned; nor dead eyther! The
priest carried her off in that French schooner. I had nothing to do
with it. 'Twar the priest and Mr Murdock. Ha! Murdock! I _did_
drown _him_. No, I didn't. That's another lie! 'Twas himself upset
the boat. Let me see--was it? No! he couldn't, he was too drunk. I
stood up on the skiff's rail. Slap over it went. What a duckin' I had
for it, and a devil o' a swim too! But I did the trick--neatly! Didn't
I, your Reverence? Now for the hundred pounds. And you promised to
double it--you did! Keep to your bargain, or I'll peach upon you--on
all the lot of you--the woman, too--the French woman! She kept that
fine shawl, Indian they said it wor. She's got it now. She wanted the
diamonds, too, but daren't keep _them_. The shroud! Ha! the shroud!
That's all they left _me_. I ought to a' burnt it. But then the devil
would a' been after and burned me! How fine Mary looked in that grand
dress, wi' all them gewgaws, rings,--chains, an' bracelets, all pure
gold! But I drownded her, an' she deserved it. Drownded her twice--
ha--ha--ha!"
Again he breaks off with a peal of demoniac laughter, long continued.
More than an hour they remain listening to his delirious ramblings, and
with interest intense. For despite its incoherence, the disconnected
threads joined together make up a tale they can understand; though so
strange, so brimful of atrocities, as to seem incredible.
All the while he is writhing about on the bed; till at length,
exhausted, his head droops over upon the pillow, and he lies for a while
quiet--to all appearance dead!
But no; there is another throe yet, one horrible as any that has
preceded. Looking up, he sees the superintendent's uniform and silver
buttons; a sight which produces a change in the expression of his
features, as though it had recalled him to his senses. With arms flung
out as in defence, he shrieks:--
"Keep back, you--policeman! Hands off, or I'll brain you! Hach!
You've got the rope round my neck! Curse the thing! It's choking me.
Hach!"
And with his fingers clutching at his throat, as if to undo a noose, he
gasps out in husky voice:
"Gone by God."
At this he drops over dead, his last word an oath, his last thought a
fancy, that there is a rope around his neck!
What he has said in his unconscious confessions lays open many seeming
mysteries of this romance, hitherto unrevealed. How the pseudo-priest,
Father Rogier, observing a likeness between Miss Wynn and Mary Morgan--
causing him that start as he stood over the coffin, noticed by Jack
Wingate--had exhumed the dead body of the latter, the poacher and
Murdock assisting him. Then how they had taken it down in the boat to
Dempsey's house; soon after, going over to Llangorren, and seizing the
young lady, as she stood in the summer-house, having stifled her cries
by chloroform. Then, how they carried her across to Dempsey's, and
substituted the corpse for the living body--the grave clothes changed
for the silken dress with all its adornments--this the part assigned to
Mrs Murdock, who had met them at Coracle's cottage. Then, Dick himself
hiding away the shroud, hindered by superstitious fear from committing
it to the flames. In fine, how Gwendoline Wynn, drugged and still kept
in a state of coma, was taken down in a boat to Chepstow, and there put
aboard the French schooner _La Chouette_; carried across to Boulogne, to
be shut up in a convent for life! All these delicate matters, managed
by Father Rogier, backed by _Messieurs les Jesuites_, who had furnished
him with the means!
One after another, the astounding facts come forth as the raving man
continues his involuntary admissions. Supplemented by others already
known to Ryecroft and the rest, with the deductions drawn, they complete
the unities of a drama, iniquitous as ever enacted.
Its motives declare themselves; all wicked save one. This a spark of
humanity that had still lingered in the breast of Lewin Murdock; but for
which Gwendoline Wynn would never have seen the inside of a nunnery.
Instead, while under the influence of the narcotic, her body would have
been dropped into the Wye, just as was that wearing her ball dress! And
that same body is now wearing another dress, supposed to have been
prepared for her--another shroud--reposing in the tomb where all
believed Gwen Wynn to have been laid!
This last fact is brought to light on the following day; when the family
vault of the Wynns is re-opened, and Mrs Morgan--by marks known only to
herself--identifies the remains found there as those of her own
daughter!
Volume Three, Chapter XXVI.