HATHERTON.
Charles Fairfield, in true Fairfield wrath, had ridden at a hard
pace, which helped to keep his blood up, all the way to the bridge of
Wykeford. He had expected to overtake the magistrate easily before he
reached that point, and if he had, who knows what might have happened
next.
Baulked at Wykeford, and learning there how long a ride interposed
before he could hope to reach him, he turned and followed in a
somewhat changed mood.
He would himself bail that woman. The question, felony or no
felony--bailable offence or not bailable--entered not his uninstructed
head. Be she what she might, assassin--devil, he could not and would
not permit her to lie in jail. Arrested in his own house, with many
sufferings and one great wrong to upbraid him with--with rights,
imaginary he insisted, but honestly believed in, perhaps, by her--with
other rights, which his tortured heart could not deny, the melancholy
rights which are founded on outlawry and disgrace, eleemosynary, but
quite irresistible when pleaded with natures not lost to all good, and
which proclaim the dreadful equity--that vice has its duties no less
than virtue.
Baulked in his first violent impulse, Charles rode his hot horse
quietly along the by-road that leads to Hatherton, over many a steep
and through many a rut.
Yes, pleasant it would have been to “lick” that rascal Rodney, and
upset his dog-cart into the ditch, and liberate the distressed damsel.
But even Charles Fairfield began to perceive consequences, and to
approve a more moderate course.
At Hatherton was there not Peregrine Hincks, the attorney who carried
his brother, Harry Fairfield, whose course, any more than that of true
love, did not always run smooth, through the short turns and breaks
that disturbed it?
He would go straight to this artist in all manner of quips and cranks
in parchment, and tell him what he wanted--the most foolish thing
perhaps in the world, to undo that which his good fortune had done for
him, and let loose again his trouble.
Scandal! What did the defiant soul of a Fairfield care for scandal?
Impulsive, reckless, affectionate, not ungenerous--all considerations
were lost in the one compunctious feeling.
Two hours later he was in the office of Mr. Peregrine Hincks, who
listened to his statement with a shrewd inflexibility of face. He knew
as much as Harry Fairfield did of the person who was now under the
turnkey’s tutelage. But Charles fancied him quite in the dark, and
treated the subject accordingly.
“We’ll send down to the jail, and learn what she’s committed for, but
_two_ will be necessary. Who will execute the recognizance with you?”
“I’m certain Harry will do it in a moment,” said Charles.
The attorney was very sure that Harry would do no such thing. But it
was not necessary to discuss that particular point, nor to insinuate
officiously his ideas about the county scandal which would follow his
interposition in favour of a prisoner committed upon a charge
involving an attempt upon the life of his wife, for the information
brought back from the prison was such as to convince the attorney that
bail could not be accepted in the case.
On learning this, Charles’ wrath returned. He stood for a time at the
chimney-piece, examining in silence a candlestick that stood there,
and then to the window he went, with a haggard, angry face, and looked
out for a while with his hands in his pockets.
“Very well. So much the worse for Rodney,” said he suddenly. “I told
you my sole motive was to snub that fellow. He chose to make an
arrest in my house--his d----d impertinence!--without the slightest
reference to me, and I made up my mind, if I could, to let his
prisoner go. That fellow wants to be kicked--I don’t care twopence
about anything else, but it’s all one--I’ll find some other way.”
“You’d better have a glass of sherry, sir; you’re a little tired, and
a biscuit.”
“I’ll have nothing, thanks, till I--till I--what was I going to say?
Time enough; I have lots to do at home--a great deal, Mr. Hincks--and
my head aches. I _am_ tired, but I won’t mind the wine, thank you, my
head is too bad. If I could just clear it of two or three things I’d
be all right, and rest a little. I’ve been overworked, and I’ll ride
over here to-morrow--that will do--and we’ll talk it over; and I don’t
choose the wretched, crazy woman to be shut up in prison, because that
stupid prig, Rodney, pleases to say she’s insane, and would like to
hang her, just because she was arrested at Carwell; and--and as you
say, of course, if she is insane she is best out of the way; but there
are ways of doing things, and I won’t be bullied by that vulgar snob.
By ---- if I had caught him to-day I’d have broken his neck, I
believe.”
“Glad you did _not_ meet him, sir--a row at any time brings one into
mischief, but an interference with the course of law--don’t you see--a
very serious affair, indeed!”
“Well, see--yes, I suppose so, and there was just another thing.
Believing, as I do, that wretched person quite mad--don’t you see?--it
would be very hard to let her--to let her half starve there where
they’ve put her--don’t you think?--and I don’t care to go down to the
place there, and all that; and if you’d just manage to let her have
this--it’s all I can do just now--but--but it’s happening at my
house--although I’m not a bit to blame, puts it on me in a way, and I
think I can’t do less than this.”
He handed a bank-note to the attorney, and was looking all the time on
a brief that lay on the table.
Mr. Hincks, the respectable attorney, was a little shy, also, as he
took it.
“I’m to say you sent it to--what’s her name, by-the-by?” he asked.
“Bertha Velderkaust, but you need not mention me--only say it was sent
to her--that’s all. I’m so vexed, because as you may suppose, I had
particular reasons for wishing to keep quiet, and I was staying there
at the Grange, you know--Carwell--and thought I might keep quiet for a
few weeks; and that wretched maniac comes down there while I was for a
few days absent, and in one of her fits makes an attack on a member of
my family; and so my little hiding-place is disclosed, for of course
such a fracas will be heard of,--it is awfully provoking--I’m rather
puzzled to know where to go.”
Charles ceased, with a faint, dreary laugh, and the attorney looked at
his bank-note, which he held by the corners, as the mate, in Mudford’s
fine story, might at the letter which Vanderdecken wished to send to
his long-lost wife in Amsterdam.
It was not, however, clear to him that he had any very good excuse for
refusing to do this trifling kindness for the brother of his
quarrelsome and litigious client, Harry Fairfield, who, although he
eschewed costs himself, laid them pretty heavily upon others, and was
a valuable feeder for Mr. Hincks’ office.
This little commission, therefore, accepted, the attorney saw his
visitor downstairs. He had already lighted a candle, and in its light
he thought he never saw a man upon his legs look so ill as Charles,
and the hand which he gave Mr. Hincks at the steps was dry and
burning.
“It’s a long ride, sir, to Carwell,” the attorney hesitated.
“The horse has had some oats, thanks, down here,” and he nodded toward
the Plume of Feathers at which he had put up his beast, “and I shan’t
be long getting over the ground.”
And without turning about, or a look over his shoulder, he sauntered
away, in the rising moonlight, toward the little inn.