THE incomprehensible submission of Scotchmen to the ecclesiastical
tyranny of their Established Church has produced--not unnaturally, as
I think--a very mistaken impression of the national character in the
popular mind.
Public opinion looks at the institution of “The Sabbath” in Scotland;
finds it unparalleled in Christendom for its senseless and savage
austerity; sees a nation content to be deprived by its priesthood of
every social privilege on one day in every week--forbidden to travel;
forbidden to telegraph; forbidden to eat a hot dinner; forbidden to
read a newspaper; in short, allowed the use of two liberties only,
the liberty of exhibiting one’s self at the Church and the liberty of
secluding one’s self over the bottle--public opinion sees this, and
arrives at the not unreasonable conclusion that the people who submit to
such social laws as these are the most stolid, stern and joyless people
on the face of the earth. Such are Scotchmen supposed to be, when viewed
at a distance. But how do Scotchmen appear when they are seen under a
closer light, and judged by the test of personal experience? There
are no people more cheerful, more companionable, more hospitable, more
liberal in their ideas, to be found on the face of the civilized globe
than the very people who submit to the Scotch Sunday! On the six days
of the week there is an atmosphere of quiet humor, a radiation of genial
common-sense, about Scotchmen in general, which is simply delightful
to feel. But on the seventh day these same men will hear one of their
ministers seriously tell them that he views taking a walk on the Sabbath
in the light of an act of profanity, and will be the only people in
existence who can let a man talk downright nonsense without laughing at
him.
I am not clever enough to be able to account for this anomaly in the
national character; I can only notice it by way of necessary preparation
for the appearance in my little narrative of a personage not frequently
seen in writing--a cheerful Scotchman.
In all other respects I found Mr. Playmore only negatively remarkable.
He was neither old nor young, neither handsome nor ugly; he was
personally not in the least like the popular idea of a lawyer; and he
spoke perfectly good English, touched with only the slightest possible
flavor of a Scotch accent.
“I have the honor to be an old friend of Mr. Macallan,” he said,
cordially shaking hands with me; “and I am honestly happy to become
acquainted with Mr. Macallan’s wife. Where will you sit? Near the light?
You are young enough not to be afraid of the daylight just yet. Is this
your first visit to Edinburgh? Pray let me make it as pleasant to you
as I can. I shall be delighted to present Mrs. Playmore to you. We are
staying in Edinburgh for a little while. The Italian opera is here, and
we have a box for to-night. Will you kindly waive all ceremony and dine
with us and go to the music afterward?”
“You are very kind,” I answered. “But I have some anxieties just now
which will make me a very poor companion for Mrs. Playmore at the opera.
My letter to you mentions, I think, that I have to ask your advice on
matters which are of very serious importance to me.”
“Does it?” he rejoined. “To tell you the truth, I have not read the
letter through. I saw your name in it, and I gathered from your message
that you wished to see me here. I sent my note to your hotel--and then
went on with something else. Pray pardon me. Is this a professional
consultation? For your own sake, I sincerely hope not!”
“It is hardly a professional consultation, Mr. Playmore. I find myself
in a very painful position; and I come to you to advise me, under very
unusual circumstances. I shall surprise you very much when you hear what
I have to say; and I am afraid I shall occupy more than my fair share of
your time.”
“I and my time are entirely at your disposal,” he said. “Tell me what I
can do for you--and tell it in your own way.”
The kindness of this language was more than matched by the kindness of
his manner. I spoke to him freely and fully--I told him my strange story
without the slightest reserve.
He showed the varying impressions that I produced on his mind without
the slightest concealment. My separation from Eustace distressed him.
My resolution to dispute the Scotch Verdict, and my unjust suspicions
of Mrs. Beauly, first amused, then surprised him. It was not, however,
until I had described my extraordinary interview with Miserrimus Dexter,
and my hardly less remarkable conversation with Lady Clarinda, that I
produced my greatest effect on the lawyer’s mind. I saw him change color
for the first time. He started, and muttered to himself, as if he
had completely forgotten me. “Good God!” I heard him say--“can it be
possible? Does the truth lie _that_ way after all?”
I took the liberty of interrupting him. I had no idea of allowing him to
keep his thoughts to himself.
“I seem to have surprised you?” I said.
He started at the sound of my voice.
“I beg ten thousand pardons!” he exclaimed. “You have not only
surprised me--you have opened an entirely new view to my mind. I see
a possibility, a really startling possibility, in connection with the
poisoning at Gleninch, which never occurred to me until the present
moment. This is a nice state of things,” he added, falling back again
into his ordinary humor. “Here is the client leading the lawyer. My dear
Mrs. Eustace, which is it--do you want my advice? or do I want yours?”
“May I hear the new idea?” I asked.
“Not just yet, if you will excuse me,” he answered. “Make allowances for
my professional caution. I don’t want to be professional with you--my
great anxiety is to avoid it. But the lawyer gets the better of the
man, and refuses to be suppressed. I really hesitate to realize what
is passing in my own mind without some further inquiry. Do me a great
favor. Let us go over a part of the ground again, and let me ask you
some questions as we proceed. Do you feel any objection to obliging me
in this matter?”
“Certainly not, Mr. Playmore. How far shall we go back?”
“To your visit to Dexter with your mother-in-law. When you first asked
him if he had any ideas of his own on the subject of Mrs. Eustace
Macallan’s death, did I understand you to say that he looked at you
suspiciously?”
“Very suspiciously.”
“And his face cleared up again when you told him that your question was
only suggested by what you had read in the Report of the Trial?”
“Yes.”
He drew a slip of paper out of the drawer in his desk, dipped his pen
in the ink, considered a little, and placed a chair for me close at his
side.
“The lawyer disappears,” he said, “and the man resumes his proper place.
There shall be no professional mysteries between you and me. As your
husband’s old friend, Mrs. Eustace, I feel no common interest in you. I
see a serious necessity for warning you before it is too late; and I can
only do so to any good purpose by running a risk on which few men in my
place would venture. Personally and professionally, I am going to trust
you--though I _am_ a Scotchman and a lawyer. Sit here, and look over my
shoulder while I make my notes. You will see what is passing in my mind
if you see what I write.”
I sat down by him, and looked over his shoulder, without the smallest
pretense of hesitation.
He began to write as follows:
“The poisoning at Gleninch. Queries: In what position does Miserrimus
Dexter stand toward the poisoning? And what does he (presumably) know
about that matter?
“He has ideas which are secrets. He suspects that he has betrayed them,
or that they have been discovered in some way inconceivable to himself.
He is palpably relieved when he finds that this is not the case.”
The pen stopped; and the questions went on.
“Let us advance to your second visit,” said Mr. Playmore, “when you
saw Dexter alone. Tell me again what he did, and how he looked when you
informed him that you were not satisfied with the Scotch Verdict.”
I repeated what I have already written in these pages. The pen went back
to the paper again, and added these lines:
“He hears nothing more remarkable than that a person visiting him, who
is interested in the case, refuses to accept the verdict at the Macallan
Trial as a final verdict, and proposes to reopen the inquiry. What does
he do upon that?
“He exhibits all the symptoms of a panic of terror; he sees himself in
some incomprehensible danger; he is frantic at one moment and servile
at the next; he must and will know what this disturbing person really
means. And when he is informed on that point, he first turns pale and
doubts the evidence of his own senses; and next, with nothing said to
justify it, gratuitously accuses his visitor of suspecting somebody.
Query here: When a small sum of money is missing in a household, and
the servants in general are called together to be informed of the
circumstance, what do we think of the one servant in particular who
speaks first, and who says, ‘Do you suspect _me?_’”
He laid down the pen again. “Is that right?” he asked.
I began to see the end to which the notes were drifting. Instead of
answering his question, I entreated him to enter into the explanations
that were still wanting to convince my own mind. He held up a warning
forefinger, and stopped me.
“Not yet,” he said. “Once again, am I right--so far?”
“Quite right.”
“Very well. Now tell me what happened next. Don’t mind repeating
yourself. Give me all the details, one after another, to the end.”
I mentioned all the details exactly as I remembered them. Mr. Playmore
returned to his writing for the third and last time. Thus the notes
ended:
“He is indirectly assured that he at least is not the person suspected.
He sinks back in his chair; he draws a long breath; he asks to be left a
while by himself, under the pretense that the subject excites him.
When the visitor returns, Dexter has been drinking in the interval. The
visitor resumes the subject--not Dexter. The visitor is convinced that
Mrs. Eustace Macallan died by the hand of a poisoner, and openly says
so. Dexter sinks back in his chair like a man fainting. What is the
horror that has got possession of him? It is easy to understand if we
call it guilty horror; it is beyond all understanding if we call it
anything else. And how does it leave him? He flies from one extreme,
to another; he is indescribably delighted when he discovers that the
visitor’s suspicions are all fixed on an absent person. And then, and
then only, he takes refuge in the declaration that he has been of one
mind with his visitor, in the matter of suspicion, from the first. These
are facts. To what plain conclusion do they point?”
He shut up his notes, and, steadily watching my face, waited for me to
speak first.
“I understand you, Mr. Playmore,” I beg impetuously. “You believe that
Mr. Dexter--”
His warning forefinger stopped me there.
“Tell me,” he interposed, “what Dexter said to you when he was so good as
to confirm your opinion of poor Mrs. Beauly.”
“He said, ‘There isn’t a doubt about it. Mrs. Beauly poisoned her.’”
“I can’t do better than follow so good an example--with one trifling
difference. I say too, There isn’t a doubt about it. Dexter poisoned
her.
“Are you joking, Mr. Playmore?”
“I never was more in earnest in my life. Your rash visit to Dexter, and
your extraordinary imprudence in taking him into your confidence have
led to astonishing results. The light which the whole machinery of
the Law was unable to throw on the poisoning case at Gleninch has been
accidentally let in on it by a Lady who refuses to listen to reason and
who insists on having her own way. Quite incredible, and nevertheless
quite true.”
“Impossible!” I exclaimed.
“What is impossible?” he asked, coolly
“That Dexter poisoned my husband’s first wife.”
“And why is that impossible, if you please?” I began to be almost
enraged with Mr. Playmore.
“Can you ask the question?” I replied, indignantly. “I have told you
that I heard him speak of her in terms of respect and affection of
which any woman might be proud. He lives in the memory of her. I owe his
friendly reception of me to some resemblance which he fancies he sees
between my figure and hers. I have seen tears in his eyes, I have heard
his voice falter and fail him, when he spoke of her. He may be the
falsest of men in all besides, but he is true to _her_--he has not
misled me in that one thing. There are signs that never deceive a woman
when a man is talking to her of what is really near his heart: I saw
those signs. It is as true that I poisoned her as that he did. I am
ashamed to set my opinion against yours, Mr. Playmore; but I really
cannot help it. I declare I am almost angry with you.”
He seemed to be pleased, instead of offended by the bold manner in which
I expressed myself.
“My dear Mrs. Eustace, you have no reason to be angry with me. In one
respect, I entirely share your view--with this difference, that I go a
little further than you do.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“You will understand me directly. You describe Dexter’s feeling for the
late Mrs. Eustace as a happy mixture of respect and affection. I can
tell you it was a much warmer feeling toward her than that. I have
my information from the poor lady herself--who honored me with her
confidence and friendship for the best part of her life. Before she
married Mr. Macallan--she kept it a secret from him, and you had better
keep it a secret too--Miserrimus Dexter was in love with her. Miserrimus
Dexter asked her--deformed as he was, seriously asked her--to be his
wife.”
“And in the face of that,” I cried, “you say that he poisoned her!”
“I do. I see no other conclusion possible, after what happened during
your visit to him. You all but frightened him into a fainting fit. What
was he afraid of?”
I tried hard to find an answer to that. I even embarked on an answer
without quite knowing where my own words might lead me.
Mr. Dexter is an old and true friend of my husband, I began. “When he
heard me say I was not satisfied with the Verdict, he might have felt
alarmed--”
“He might have felt alarmed at the possible consequences to your husband
of reopening the inquiry,” said Mr. Playmore, ironically finishing
the sentence for me. “Rather far-fetched, Mrs. Eustace; and not very
consistent with your faith in your husband’s innocence. Clear your mind
of one mistake,” he continued, seriously, “which may fatally mislead you
if you persist in pursuing your present course. Miserrimus Dexter, you
may take my word for it, ceased to be your husband’s friend on the
day when your husband married his first wife. Dexter has kept up
appearances, I grant you, both in public and in private. His evidence
in his friend’s favor at the Trial was given with the deep feeling which
everybody expected from him. Nevertheless, I firmly believe, looking
under the surface, that Mr. Macallan has no bitterer enemy living than
Miserrimus Dexter.”
He turned me cold. I felt that here, at least, he was right. My husband
had wooed and won the woman who had refused Dexter’s offer of marriage.
Was Dexter the man to forgive that? My own experience answered me, and
said, No. “Bear in mind what I have told you,” Mr. Playmore proceeded.
“And now let us get on to your own position in this matter, and to the
interests that you have at stake. Try to adopt my point of view for the
moment; and let us inquire what chance we have of making any further
advance toward a discovery of the truth. It is one thing to be morally
convinced (as I am) that Miserrimus Dexter is the man who ought to have
been tried for the murder at Gleninch; and it is another thing, at this
distance of time, to lay our hands on the plain evidence which can alone
justify anything like a public assertion of his guilt. There, as I see
it, is the insuperable difficulty in the case. Unless I am completely
mistaken, the question is now narrowed to this plain issue: The public
assertion of your husband’s innocence depends entirely on the public
assertion of Dexter’s guilt. How are you to arrive at that result? There
is not a particle of evidence against him. You can only convict Dexter
on Dexter’s own confession. Are you listening to me?”
I was listening, most unwillingly. If he were right, things had indeed
come to that terrible pass. But I could not--with all my respect for his
superior knowledge and experience--I could not persuade myself that he
_was_ right. And I owned it, with the humility which I really felt.
He smiled good-humoredly.
“At any rate,” he said, “you will admit that Dexter has not freely
opened his mind to you thus far? He is still keeping something from your
knowledge which you are interested in discovering?”
“Yes. I admit that.”
“Very good. What applies to your view of the case applies to mine. I
say, he is keeping from you the confession of his guilt. You say, he is
keeping from you information which may fasten the guilt on some other
person. Let us start from that point. Confession, or information, how
are you to get at what he is now withholding from you? What influence
can you bring to bear on him when you see him again?”
“Surely I might persuade him?”
“Certainly. And if persuasion fail--what then? Do you think you can
entrap him into speaking out? or terrify him into speaking out?”
“If you will look at your notes, Mr. Playmore, you will see that I have
already succeeded in terrifying him--though I am only a woman and though
I didn’t mean to do it.”
“Very well answered. You mark the trick. What you have done once
you think you can do again. Well, as you are determined to try the
experiment, it can do you no harm to know a little more of Dexter’s
character and temperament than you know now. Suppose we apply for
information to somebody who can help us?”
I started, and looked round the room. He made me do it--he spoke as if
the person who was to help us was close at our elbows.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “The oracle is silent; and the oracle is
here.”
He unlocked one of the drawers of his desk; produced a bundle of
letters, and picked out one.
“When we were arranging your husband’s defense,” he said, “we felt some
difficulty about including Miserrimus Dexter among our witnesses. We had
not the slightest suspicion of him, I need hardly tell you. But we were
all afraid of his eccentricity; and some among us even feared that the
excitement of appearing at the Trial might drive him completely out of
his mind. In this emergency we applied to a doctor to help us. Under
some pretext, which I forget now, we introduced him to Dexter. And in
due course of time we received his report. Here it is.”
He opened the letter, and marking a certain passage in it with a pencil,
handed it to me.
“Read the lines which I have marked,” he said; “they will be quite
sufficient for our purpose.”
I read these words:
“Summing up the results of my observation, I may give it as my opinion
that there is undoubtedly latent insanity in this case, but that no
active symptoms of madness have presented themselves as yet. You may,
I think, produce him at the Trial, without fear of consequences. He
may say and do all sorts of odd things; but he has his mind under the
control of his will, and you may trust his self-esteem to exhibit him in
the character of a substantially intelligent witness.
“As to the future, I am, of course, not able to speak positively. I can
only state my views.
“That he will end in madness (if he live), I entertain little or no
doubt. The question of _when_ the madness will show itself depends
entirely on the state of his health. His nervous system is highly
sensitive, and there are signs that his way of life has already damaged
it. If he conquer the bad habits to which I have alluded in an earlier
part of my report, and if he pass many hours of every day quietly in the
open air, he may last as a sane man for years to come. If he persist in
his present way of life--or, in other words, if further mischief
occur to that sensitive nervous system--his lapse into insanity must
infallibly take place when the mischief has reached its culminating
point. Without warning to himself or to others, the whole mental
structure will give way; and, at a moment’s notice, while he is acting
as quietly or speaking as intelligently as at his best time, the man
will drop (if I may use the expression) into madness or idiocy. In
either case, when the catastrophe has happened, it is only due to his
friends to add that they can (as I believe) entertain no hope of his
cure. The balance once lost, will be lost for life.”
There it ended. Mr. Playmore put the letter back in his drawer.
“You have just read the opinion of one of our highest living
authorities,” he said. “Does Dexter strike you as a likely man to give
his nervous system a chance of recovery? Do you see no obstacles and no
perils in your way?”
My silence answered him.
“Suppose you go back to Dexter,” he proceeded. “And suppose that the
doctor’s opinion exaggerates the peril in his case. What are you to do?
The last time you saw him, you had the immense advantage of taking him
by surprise. Those sensitive nerves of his gave way, and he betrayed the
fear that you aroused in him. Can you take him by surprise again? Not
you! He is prepared for you now; and he will be on his guard. If you
encounter nothing worse, you will have his cunning to deal with
next. Are you his match at that? But for Lady Clarinda he would have
hopelessly misled you on the subject of Mrs. Beauly.”
There was no answering this, either. I was foolish enough to try to
answer it, for all that.
“He told me the truth so far as he knew it,” I rejoined. “He really saw
what he said he saw in the corridor at Gleninch.”
“He told you the truth,” returned Mr. Playmore, “because he was
cunning enough to see that the truth would help him in irritating your
suspicions. You don’t really believe that he shared your suspicions?”
“Why not?” I said. “He was as ignorant of what Mrs. Beauly was really
doing on that night as I was--until I met Lady Clarinda. It remains to
be seen whether he will not be as much astonished as I was when I tell
him what Lady Clarinda told me.”
This smart reply produced an effect which I had not anticipated.
To my surprise, Mr. Playmore abruptly dropped all further discussion
on his side. He appeared to despair of convincing me, and he owned it
indirectly in his next words.
“Will nothing that I can say to you,” he asked, “induce you to think as
I think in this matter?”
“I have not your ability or your experience,” I answered. “I am sorry to
say I can’t think as you think.”
“And you are really determined to see Miserrimus Dexter again?”
“I have engaged myself to see him again.”
He waited a little, and thought over it.
“You have honored me by asking for my advice,” he said. “I earnestly
advise you, Mrs. Eustace, to break your engagement. I go even further
than that--I _entreat_ you not to see Dexter again.”
Just what my mother-in-law had said! just what Benjamin and Major
Fitz-David had said! They were all against me. And still I held out.
I wonder, when I look back at it, at my own obstinacy. I am almost
ashamed to relate that I made Mr. Playmore no reply. He waited, still
looking at me. I felt irritated by that fixed look. I arose, and stood
before him with my eyes on the floor.
He arose in his turn. He understood that the conference was over.
“Well, well,” he said, with a kind of sad good-humor, “I suppose it is
unreasonable of me to expect that a young woman like you should share
any opinion with an old lawyer like me. Let me only remind you that our
conversation must remain strictly confidential for the present; and then
let us change the subject. Is there anything that I can do for you? Are
you alone in Edinburgh?”
“No. I am traveling with an old friend of mine, who has known me from
childhood.”
“And do you stay here to-morrow?”
“I think so.”
“Will you do me one favor? Will you think over what has passed between
us, and will you come back to me in the morning?”
“Willingly, Mr. Playmore, if it is only to thank you again for your
kindness.”
On that understanding we parted. He sighed--the cheerful man sighed, as
he opened the door for me. Women are contradictory creatures. That sigh
affected me more than all his arguments. I felt myself blush for my own
head-strong resistance to him as I took my leave and turned away into
the street.