STRANGE TURNS.
And yet this catastrophe rose out of a mistake. When the detective asked
Jem Davies to watch the lawn, he never suspected that the clergyman was
the villain who had been concerned in that explosion. But Davies, a man
of few ideas and full of his own wrong, took for granted, as such minds
will, that the policeman would not have spoken to him if this had not
been _his_ affair; so he and his fellows gathered about the steps and
watched the drawing-room. They caught a glimpse of Monckton, but that
only puzzled them. His appearance was inconsistent with the only
description they had got--in fact opposed to it. It was Grace Clifford's
denunciation, trumpet-tongued, that let loose savage justice on the
villain. Never was a woman's voice so fatal, or so swift to slay. She
would have undone her work. She screamed, she implored; but it was all in
vain. The fury she had launched she could not recall. As for Bartley,
words can hardly describe his abject terror. He crouched, he shivered, he
moaned, he almost swooned; and long after it was all over he was found
crouched in a corner of the little room, and his very reason appeared to
be shaken. Judge Lynch had passed him, but too near. The freezing shadow
of Retribution chilled him.
Colonel Clifford looked at him with contemptuous pity, and sent him home
with John Baker in a close carriage.
* * * * *
Lucy Monckton was in the parlor of the Dun Cow waiting for her master.
The detectives and some outdoor servants of Clifford Hall brought a short
ladder and paillasses, and something covered with blankets, to the door.
Lucy saw, but did not suspect the truth.
They had a murmured consultation with the landlady. During this Mark
Waddy came down, and there was some more whispering, and soon the
battered body was taken up to Mark Waddy's room and deposited on his
bed. The detectives retired to consult, and Waddy had to break the
calamity to Mrs. Monckton. He did this as well as he could; but it
little matters how such blows are struck. Her agony was great, and
greater when she saw him, for she resisted entirely all attempts to keep
her from him. She installed herself at once as his nurse, and Mark
Waddy retired to a garret.
A surgeon came by Colonel Clifford's order and examined Monckton's
bruised body, and shook his head. He reported that there were no bones
broken, but there were probably grave internal injuries. These, however,
he could not specify at present, since there was no sensibility in the
body; so pressure on the injured parts elicited no groans. He prescribed
egg and brandy in small quantities, and showed Mrs. Monckton how to
administer it to a patient in that desperate condition.
His last word was in private to Waddy. "If he ever speaks again, or even
groans aloud, send for me. Otherwise--" and he shrugged his shoulders.
Some hours afterward Colonel Clifford called as a magistrate to see
if the sufferer had any deposition to make. But he was mute, and his
eyes fixed.
As Colonel Clifford returned, one of the detectives accosted him and
asked him for a warrant to arrest him.
"Not in his present condition," said Colonel Clifford, rather
superciliously. "And pray, sir, why did not you interfere sooner and
prevent this lawless act?"
"Well, sir, unfortunately we were on the other side of the house."
"Exactly; you had orders to be in one place, so you must be in another.
See the consequence. The honest men have put themselves in the wrong, and
this fellow in the right. He will die a sort of victim, with his guilt
suspected only, not proved."
Having thus snubbed the Force, the old soldier turned his back on them
and went home, where Grace met him, all anxiety, and received his report.
She implored him not to proceed any further against the man, and declared
she should fly the country rather than go into a court of law as witness
against him.
"Humph!" said the Colonel; "but you are the only witness."
"All the better for him," said she; "then he will die in peace. My tongue
has killed the man once; it shall never kill him again."
About six next morning Monckton beckoned Lucy. She came eagerly to him;
he whispered to her, "Can you keep a secret?"
"You know I can," said she.
"Then never let any one know I have spoken."
"No, dear, never. Why?"
"I dread the law more than death;" and he shuddered all over. "Save me
from the law."
"Leonard, I will," said she. "Leave that to me."
She wired for Mr. Middleton as soon as possible.
The next day there was no change in the patient. He never spoke to
anybody, except a word or two to Lucy, in a whisper, when they were
quite alone.
In the afternoon down came Lawyer Middleton. Lucy told him what he knew,
but Monckton would not speak, even to him. He had to get hold of Waddy
before he understood the whole case.
Waddy was in Monckton's secret, and, indeed, in everybody's. He knew it
was folly to deceive your lawyer, so he was frank. Mr. Middleton learned
his client's guilt and danger, but also that his enemies had flaws in
their armor.
The first shot he fired was to get warrants out against a dozen miners,
Jem Davies included, for a murderous assault; but he made no arrests, he
only summoned. So one or two took fright and fled. Middleton had counted
on that, and it made the case worse for those that remained. Then, by
means of friends in Derby, he worked the Press.
An article appeared headed, "Our Savages." It related with righteous
indignation how Mr. Bartley's miners had burned the dead body of a miner
suspected of having fired the mine, and put his own life in jeopardy as
well as those of others; and then, not content with that monstrous act,
had fallen upon and beaten to death a gentleman in whom they thought they
detected a resemblance to some person who had been, or was suspected of
being that miner's accomplice; "but so far from that," said the writer,
"we are now informed, on sure authority, that the gentleman in question
is a large and wealthy landed proprietor, quite beyond any temptation to
crime or dishonesty, and had actually visited this part of the world only
in the character of a peace-maker, and to discharge a very delicate
commission, which it would not be our business to publish even if the
details had been confided to us."
The article concluded with a hope that these monsters "would be taught
that even if they were below the standard of humanity they were not
above the law."
Middleton attended the summonses, gave his name and address, and informed
the magistrate that his client was a large landed proprietor, and it
looked like a case of mistaken identity. His client was actually dying of
his injuries, but his wife hoped for justice.
But the detectives had taken care to be present, and so they put in their
word. They said that they were prepared to prove, at a proper time, that
the wounded man was really the person who had been heard by Mrs. Walter
Clifford to bribe Ben Burnley to fire the mine.
"We have nothing to do with that now," said the magistrate. "One thing at
a time, please. I can not let these people murder a convicted felon, far
less a suspected criminal that has not been tried. The wounded man
proceeds, according to law, through a respectable attorney. These men,
whom you are virtually defending, have taken the law into their own
hands. Are your witnesses here, Mr. Middleton?"
"Not at present, sir; and when I was interrupted, I was about to ask
your worship to grant me an adjournment for that purpose. It will not be
a great hardship to the accused, since we proceed by summons. I fear I
have been too lenient, for two or three of them have absconded since the
summons was served."
"I am not surprised at that," said the magistrate; "however, you know
your own business."
Then the police applied for a warrant of arrest against Monckton.
"Oh!" cried Middleton, with the air of a man thoroughly shocked and
scandalized.
"Certainly not," said the magistrate; "I shall not disturb the course of
justice; there is not even an _exparte_ case against this gentleman at
present. Such an application must be supported by a witness, and a
disinterested one." So all the parties retired crest-fallen except Mr.
Middleton; as for him, he was imitating a small but ingenious specimen of
nature--the cuttle-fish. This little creature, when pursued by its
enemies, discharges an inky fluid which obscures the water all around,
and then it starts off and escapes.
One dark night, at two o'clock in the morning, there came to the door of
the Dun Cow an invalid carriage, or rather omnibus, with a spring-bed and
every convenience. The wheels were covered thick with India-rubber;
relays had been provided, and Monckton and his party rolled along day and
night to Liverpool. The detectives followed, six hours later, and traced
them to Liverpool very cleverly, and, with the assistance of the police,
raked the town for them, and got all the great steamers watched,
especially those that were bound westward, ho! But their bird was at sea,
in a Liverpool merchant's own steamboat, hired for a two months' trip.
The pursuers found this out too, but a fortnight too late.
"It's no go, Bill," said one to the other. "There's a lawyer and a pot
of money against us. Let it sleep awhile."
The steamboat coasted England in beautiful weather; the sick man began to
revive, and to eat a little, and to talk a little, and to suffer a good
deal at times. Before they had been long at sea Mr. Middleton had a
confidential conversation with Mrs. Monckton. He told her he had been
very secret with her for her good. "I saw," said he, "this Monckton had
no deep regard for you, and was capable of turning you adrift in
prosperity; and I knew that if I told you everything you would let it out
to him, and tempt him to play the villain. But the time is come that I
must speak, in justice to you both. That estate he left your son half in
joke is virtually his. Fourteen years ago, when he last looked into the
matter, there _were_ eleven lives between it and him; but, strange to
say, whilst he was at Portland the young lives went one after the other,
and there were really only five left when he made that will. Now comes
the extraordinary part: a fortnight ago three of those lives perished in
a single steamboat accident on the Clyde; that left a woman of eighty-two
and a man of ninety between your husband and the estate. The lady was
related to the persons who were drowned, and she has since died; she had
been long ailing, and it is believed that the shock was too much for her.
The survivor is the actual proprietor, Old Carruthers; but I am the
London agent to his solicitor, and he was reported to me to be _in
extremis_ the very day before I left London to join you. We shall run
into a port near the place, and you will not land; but I shall, and
obtain precise information. In the meantime, mind, your husband's name is
Carruthers. Any communication from me will be to Mrs. Carruthers, and you
will tell that man as much, or as little, as you think proper; if you
make any disclosure, give yourself all the credit you can; say you shall
take him to his own house under a new name, and shield him against all
pursuers. As for me, I tell you plainly, my great hope is that he will
not live long enough to turn you adrift and disinherit your boy."
To cut short for the present this extraordinary part of our story, Lewis
Carruthers, _alias_ Leonard Monckton, entered a fine house and took
possession of eleven thousand acres of hilly pasture, and the undivided
moiety of a lake brimful of fish. He accounted for his change of name by
the favors Carruthers, deceased, had shown him. Therein he did his best
to lie, but his present vein of luck turned it into the truth. Old
Carruthers had become so peevish that all his relations disliked him, and
he disliked them. So he left his personal estate to his heir-at-law
simply because he had never seen him. The personality was very large. The
house was full of pictures, and China, and cabinets, etc. There was a
large balance at the banker's, a heavy fall of timber not paid for, rents
due, and as many as two thousand four hundred sheep upon that hill, which
the old fellow had kept in his own hands. So, when the new proprietor
took possession as Carruthers, nobody was surprised, though many were
furious. Lucy installed him in a grand suite of apartments as an invalid,
and let nobody come near him. Waddy was dismissed with a munificent
present, and could be trusted to hold his tongue. By the advice of
Middleton, not a single servant was dismissed, and so no enemies were
made. The family lawyer and steward were also retained, and, in short,
all conversation was avoided. In a month or two the new proprietor began
to improve in health, and drive about his own grounds, or be rowed on his
lake, lying on soft beds.
But in the fifth month of his residence local pains seized him, and he
began to waste. For some time the precise nature of the disorder was
obscure; but at last a rising surgeon declared it to be an abscess in the
intestines (caused, no doubt, by external violence).
By degrees the patient became unable to take solid food, and the drain
upon his system was too great for a mere mucilaginous diet to sustain
him. Wasted to the bone, and yellow as a guinea, he presented a pitiable
spectacle, and would gladly have exchanged his fine house and pictures,
his heathery hills dotted with sheep, and his glassy lake full of spotted
trout, for a ragged Irishman's bowl of potatoes and his mug of
buttermilk--and his stomach.