‘And you’re not surprised to hear this, Varden?’ said Mr Haredale.
‘Well! You and she have always been the best friends, and you should
understand her if anybody does.’
‘I ask your pardon, sir,’ rejoined the locksmith. ‘I didn’t say I
understood her. I wouldn’t have the presumption to say that of any
woman. It’s not so easily done. But I am not so much surprised, sir, as
you expected me to be, certainly.’
‘May I ask why not, my good friend?’
‘I have seen, sir,’ returned the locksmith with evident reluctance,
‘I have seen in connection with her, something that has filled me with
distrust and uneasiness. She has made bad friends, how, or when, I don’t
know; but that her house is a refuge for one robber and cut-throat at
least, I am certain. There, sir! Now it’s out.’
‘Varden!’
‘My own eyes, sir, are my witnesses, and for her sake I would be
willingly half-blind, if I could but have the pleasure of mistrusting
‘em. I have kept the secret till now, and it will go no further than
yourself, I know; but I tell you that with my own eyes--broad awake--I
saw, in the passage of her house one evening after dark, the highwayman
who robbed and wounded Mr Edward Chester, and on the same night
threatened me.’
‘And you made no effort to detain him?’ said Mr Haredale quickly.
‘Sir,’ returned the locksmith, ‘she herself prevented me--held me, with
all her strength, and hung about me until he had got clear off.’ And
having gone so far, he related circumstantially all that had passed upon
the night in question.
This dialogue was held in a low tone in the locksmith’s little parlour,
into which honest Gabriel had shown his visitor on his arrival. Mr
Haredale had called upon him to entreat his company to the widow’s, that
he might have the assistance of his persuasion and influence; and out of
this circumstance the conversation had arisen.
‘I forbore,’ said Gabriel, ‘from repeating one word of this to anybody,
as it could do her no good and might do her great harm. I thought and
hoped, to say the truth, that she would come to me, and talk to me about
it, and tell me how it was; but though I have purposely put myself
in her way more than once or twice, she has never touched upon the
subject--except by a look. And indeed,’ said the good-natured locksmith,
‘there was a good deal in the look, more than could have been put into a
great many words. It said among other matters “Don’t ask me anything”
so imploringly, that I didn’t ask her anything. You’ll think me an old
fool, I know, sir. If it’s any relief to call me one, pray do.’
‘I am greatly disturbed by what you tell me,’ said Mr Haredale, after a
silence. ‘What meaning do you attach to it?’
The locksmith shook his head, and looked doubtfully out of window at the
failing light.
‘She cannot have married again,’ said Mr Haredale.
‘Not without our knowledge surely, sir.’
‘She may have done so, in the fear that it would lead, if known, to some
objection or estrangement. Suppose she married incautiously--it is not
improbable, for her existence has been a lonely and monotonous one for
many years--and the man turned out a ruffian, she would be anxious to
screen him, and yet would revolt from his crimes. This might be. It
bears strongly on the whole drift of her discourse yesterday, and would
quite explain her conduct. Do you suppose Barnaby is privy to these
circumstances?’
‘Quite impossible to say, sir,’ returned the locksmith, shaking his head
again: ‘and next to impossible to find out from him. If what you suppose
is really the case, I tremble for the lad--a notable person, sir, to put
to bad uses--’
‘It is not possible, Varden,’ said Mr Haredale, in a still lower tone of
voice than he had spoken yet, ‘that we have been blinded and deceived by
this woman from the beginning? It is not possible that this connection
was formed in her husband’s lifetime, and led to his and my brother’s--’
‘Good God, sir,’ cried Gabriel, interrupting him, ‘don’t entertain such
dark thoughts for a moment. Five-and-twenty years ago, where was there a
girl like her? A gay, handsome, laughing, bright-eyed damsel! Think what
she was, sir. It makes my heart ache now, even now, though I’m an old
man, with a woman for a daughter, to think what she was and what she is.
We all change, but that’s with Time; Time does his work honestly, and
I don’t mind him. A fig for Time, sir. Use him well, and he’s a hearty
fellow, and scorns to have you at a disadvantage. But care and suffering
(and those have changed her) are devils, sir--secret, stealthy,
undermining devils--who tread down the brightest flowers in Eden, and do
more havoc in a month than Time does in a year. Picture to yourself for
one minute what Mary was before they went to work with her fresh
heart and face--do her that justice--and say whether such a thing is
possible.’
‘You’re a good fellow, Varden,’ said Mr Haredale, ‘and are quite right.
I have brooded on that subject so long, that every breath of suspicion
carries me back to it. You are quite right.’
‘It isn’t, sir,’ cried the locksmith with brightened eyes, and sturdy,
honest voice; ‘it isn’t because I courted her before Rudge, and failed,
that I say she was too good for him. She would have been as much too
good for me. But she WAS too good for him; he wasn’t free and frank
enough for her. I don’t reproach his memory with it, poor fellow; I only
want to put her before you as she really was. For myself, I’ll keep her
old picture in my mind; and thinking of that, and what has altered her,
I’ll stand her friend, and try to win her back to peace. And damme,
sir,’ cried Gabriel, ‘with your pardon for the word, I’d do the same if
she had married fifty highwaymen in a twelvemonth; and think it in the
Protestant Manual too, though Martha said it wasn’t, tooth and nail,
till doomsday!’
If the dark little parlour had been filled with a dense fog, which,
clearing away in an instant, left it all radiance and brightness, it
could not have been more suddenly cheered than by this outbreak on the
part of the hearty locksmith. In a voice nearly as full and round as his
own, Mr Haredale cried ‘Well said!’ and bade him come away without more
parley. The locksmith complied right willingly; and both getting into a
hackney coach which was waiting at the door, drove off straightway.
They alighted at the street corner, and dismissing their conveyance,
walked to the house. To their first knock at the door there was no
response. A second met with the like result. But in answer to the third,
which was of a more vigorous kind, the parlour window-sash was gently
raised, and a musical voice cried:
‘Haredale, my dear fellow, I am extremely glad to see you. How very much
you have improved in your appearance since our last meeting! I never saw
you looking better. HOW do you do?’
Mr Haredale turned his eyes towards the casement whence the voice
proceeded, though there was no need to do so, to recognise the speaker,
and Mr Chester waved his hand, and smiled a courteous welcome.
‘The door will be opened immediately,’ he said. ‘There is nobody but
a very dilapidated female to perform such offices. You will excuse her
infirmities? If she were in a more elevated station of society, she
would be gouty. Being but a hewer of wood and drawer of water, she
is rheumatic. My dear Haredale, these are natural class distinctions,
depend upon it.’
Mr Haredale, whose face resumed its lowering and distrustful look the
moment he heard the voice, inclined his head stiffly, and turned his
back upon the speaker.
‘Not opened yet,’ said Mr Chester. ‘Dear me! I hope the aged soul has
not caught her foot in some unlucky cobweb by the way. She is there at
last! Come in, I beg!’
Mr Haredale entered, followed by the locksmith. Turning with a look of
great astonishment to the old woman who had opened the door, he inquired
for Mrs Rudge--for Barnaby. They were both gone, she replied, wagging
her ancient head, for good. There was a gentleman in the parlour, who
perhaps could tell them more. That was all SHE knew.
‘Pray, sir,’ said Mr Haredale, presenting himself before this new
tenant, ‘where is the person whom I came here to see?’
‘My dear friend,’ he returned, ‘I have not the least idea.’
‘Your trifling is ill-timed,’ retorted the other in a suppressed tone
and voice, ‘and its subject ill-chosen. Reserve it for those who
are your friends, and do not expend it on me. I lay no claim to the
distinction, and have the self-denial to reject it.’
‘My dear, good sir,’ said Mr Chester, ‘you are heated with walking. Sit
down, I beg. Our friend is--’
‘Is but a plain honest man,’ returned Mr Haredale, ‘and quite unworthy
of your notice.’
‘Gabriel Varden by name, sir,’ said the locksmith bluntly.
‘A worthy English yeoman!’ said Mr Chester. ‘A most worthy yeoman, of
whom I have frequently heard my son Ned--darling fellow--speak, and have
often wished to see. Varden, my good friend, I am glad to know you. You
wonder now,’ he said, turning languidly to Mr Haredale, ‘to see me here.
Now, I am sure you do.’
Mr Haredale glanced at him--not fondly or admiringly--smiled, and held
his peace.
‘The mystery is solved in a moment,’ said Mr Chester; ‘in a moment. Will
you step aside with me one instant. You remember our little compact in
reference to Ned, and your dear niece, Haredale? You remember the list
of assistants in their innocent intrigue? You remember these two people
being among them? My dear fellow, congratulate yourself, and me. I have
bought them off.’
‘You have done what?’ said Mr Haredale.
‘Bought them off,’ returned his smiling friend. ‘I have found it
necessary to take some active steps towards setting this boy and girl
attachment quite at rest, and have begun by removing these two agents.
You are surprised? Who CAN withstand the influence of a little money!
They wanted it, and have been bought off. We have nothing more to fear
from them. They are gone.’
‘Gone!’ echoed Mr Haredale. ‘Where?’
‘My dear fellow--and you must permit me to say again, that you never
looked so young; so positively boyish as you do to-night--the Lord knows
where; I believe Columbus himself wouldn’t find them. Between you and
me they have their hidden reasons, but upon that point I have pledged
myself to secrecy. She appointed to see you here to-night, I know, but
found it inconvenient, and couldn’t wait. Here is the key of the door.
I am afraid you’ll find it inconveniently large; but as the tenement is
yours, your good-nature will excuse that, Haredale, I am certain!’