BETWEEN BEDE AND HIS CLERK.
They stood near each other, Bede Greatorex and his managing clerk,
while Mr. Butterby paced the passage outside.
When interrupted, Bede had his elbow on the mantelpiece, his brow bent
on his thin fingers. A good blazing fire here, the coal crackling and
sparkling cheerily. Bede dropped his elbow.
"What is it, Mr. Brown?" he rather languidly asked.
Mr. Brown, closing the door, went straight up and said what it was:
Alletha Rye had been apprehended. But he looked anywhere, as he spoke,
rather than into the face of his master. A face that grew suddenly
white and cold: and Mr. Brown, in his delicacy of mind, would not
appear to see it.
"What a cursed meddler that Butterby is!" exclaimed Bede.
"I fancy he had no option in this, sir; that it was not left to his
choice."
"Who did it, then?"
"Mr. Greatorex. This must be remedied at once, sir."
By the authoritative manner in which he spoke, it might have been
thought that Bede Greatorex was the servant, Brown the master. Bede
put his elbow on the shelf again, and pushed back his hair in
unmistakable agitation. It was growing thin now, the once luxuriant
crop; and silver threads were interwoven with the black ones.
"She must be saved," repeated Mr. Brown.
"I suppose so. Who is to do it?"
"I must, sir. If no one else does."
Bede raised his eyes to glance at his clerk; but it was not a full
free glance, and they were instantly dropped again.
"You are the Godfrey Pitman, they tell me, who was in the house at the
time."
"Yes, I am. But have you not known it all along, Mr. Bede Greatorex?"
"All along from when?"
Mr. Brown hesitated. "From the time I came here as clerk."
"No; certainly I have not."
"There were times, sir, when I fancied it."
A long silence. Even now, whatever secret, or association, there might
be between these two men, neither was at ease with the other. Bede
especially seemed to shrink from farther explanation.
"I have known but for a short while of your identity with Godfrey
Pitman," he resumed. "And with George Winter. I have been waiting my
own time to confer with you upon the subject. We have been very busy."
We have been very busy! If Bede put that forth as an excuse, it
did not serve him: for his hearer knew it was not the true one. He
simply answered that they _had_ been very busy. Not by so much as a
look or a syllable would George Winter--let us at last give him his
true name--add to the terrible pain he knew his master to be
suffering.
"About Miss Rye, sir? She must be extricated from her unpleasant
position."
"Yes, of course."
"And her innocence proved."
"At the expense of another?" asked Bede, without lifting his eyes.
"No," answered the other in a low tone. "I do not think that need be."
Bede looked straight into the fire, his companion full at the
window-blind, drawn half way down; neither of them at one another.
"How will you avoid it?" asked Bede.
"I think it may be avoided, sir. For a little while past, I have
foreseen that some such a crisis as this would come: and I have dwelt
and dwelt upon it until I seem to be able to track out my way in it
perfectly clear."
Bede cracked the coal in the grate; which did not require cracking.
"Do you mean that you have foreseen Miss Rye would be taken? Such a
thought in regard to her never crossed my mind."
"Nor mine. I allude to myself, sir. If once I was discovered to be the
so-called Godfrey Pitman--and some instinct told me the discovery was
at last approaching--I knew that I should, in all probability, be
charged with the murder of Mr. Ollivera. I--an innocent man--would not
suffer for this, Mr. Greatorex; I should be obliged, in self-defence,
to repel the accusation: and I have been considering how it might be
done without compromising others. I think it can be."
"How?" repeated Bede shortly.
"By my not telling the whole truth. By not knowing--I mean not having
recognized the--the one--who would be compromised if I did tell it. I
think this is feasible, sir."
Just a momentary glance into each other's eyes; no more; and it spoke
volumes. Bede, facing the fire again, stood several minutes in deep
consideration. George Winter seemed occupied with one of his gloves
that had a refractory button.
"In any case it must now be known who you are," said Bede.
"That will not signify. In throwing the onus of the----" he seemed to
hesitate, as he had once hesitated in the last sentence--"the death
off Miss Rye, I throw it equally off my own shoulders. I have for some
months wished that I could declare myself."
"Why have you not done it?"
George Winter looked at his master, surprise in his eyes. "It is not
for my own sake that I have kept it concealed, sir."
No. Bede Greatorex knew that it was for _his_; at least for his
interests; and he felt the obligation in his heart. He did not speak
it; pride and a variety of other unhappy feelings kept him silent. Of
all the miserable moments that the death of John Ollivera had entailed
upon him, this confidential interview with his clerk was not the least
of them. Forced though he was to hold it, he hated it with his whole
soul.
"You took that cheque from my desk," said Bede. "And wrote me the
subsequent letter."
"I did not take it from the desk, sir. Your expressed and continuous
belief--that you had put it in--was a mistaken one. It must have
slipped from your hands when about to lock up the other papers you
held, and fluttered under the desk table. Perhaps you will allow me to
give you the explanation now."
Bede nodded.
"In the morning of the day that the cheque was lost, you may remember
coming into the front room and seeing a stranger with me. His name was
Foster; a farmer and corn-dealer near Birmingham. I had been out on an
errand; and, on turning in again, a gentleman stopped me to enquire
the way. While I was directing him there ensued a mutual recognition.
In one sense I owed him some money: forty-four pounds. Samuel Teague,
of whom you may have heard----"
"I know," interrupted Bede.
"Samuel Teague, just before he ran away, had got me to put my name to
a bill for him; Mr. Foster, in all good faith, had let him have the
money for it. It had never been repaid. But upon Mr. Foster's meeting
me that morning, he gave me my choice--to find the money for him
before he left London, or be denounced publicly as George Winter. I
thought he would have denounced me then. He came into the office and
would not be got rid of: saying that he had looked for me too long to
let me go, now that I was found. What I was to do I did not know. _I_
had no objection to resume my own name, for I had cleared myself with
Johnson and Teague, but it must have involved the exposure relating to
the affair at Helstonleigh. The thought occurred to me of declaring
the dilemma to you, letting you decide whether that exposure should
come, or whether you would lend me the forty-four pounds to avert it.
But I shrank from doing that."
"Why?" again interposed Bede.
"Because I thought _you_ would dislike my entering upon the subject,
sir. I have shrunk from it always. Now that the necessity is forced
upon me, I am shrinking from it as I speak."
Ah, but not so much as Bede was. "Go on."
"While I sat at my desk, inwardly deliberating, Mr. Frank came in,
asking you to draw out a cheque for Sir Richard Yorke for forty-four
pounds. The strange coincidence between the sum and the money demanded
of me, struck me as being most singular. It strikes me so still. Later
in the morning, I came into this room with some deeds, and saw a piece
of paper lying under the table. Upon picking it up--which I did simply
to replace it on the desk--I found it was the cheque. My first thought
was that it must be a special, almost a supernatural, intervention in
my favour; my second, that it was just possible you had left it there
for me to take. Both ideas very far-fetched and imaginatory, as I saw
at once. But I used the cheque, Mr. Bede Greatorex. I went home, put
on the false hair I had worn as Godfrey Pitman, for I have it by me
still, and got the cheque cashed in gold. It was not for my sake I did
this; I hated it bitterly. And then I hesitated to use the money. At
night I went to Mr. Foster's hotel, and told him that I would get the
money for him by the following night _if I could_; if I could not, he
must carry out his threat of denouncing me to the public and Mr.
Greatorex. Foster consented to wait. I returned to my lodgings and
wrote that anonymous note to you, sir, not telling you who had taken
the cheque; merely saying that exposure was threatened of the private
circumstances, known only to one or two, attendant on Mr. Ollivera's
death at Helstonleigh; that the money had been taken to avert the
exposure, and would be applied to that purpose, provided you were
agreeable. If not, and you wished the money returned, you were
requested to drop a note without loss of a moment to a certain
address: if no such note were written, the money would be used in the
course of the day, and things kept silent as heretofore. You sent no
answer, and I paid it to Foster in the evening. I have never been able
to decide whether you suspected me as the writer, or not."
"No. I fancied it might be Hurst."
"Hurst!" exclaimed George Winter in great surprise.
Bede looked up for a moment. "I felt sure the cheque must have been
taken by one of you in the next room. Not knowing you then for Godfrey
Pitman, my thoughts fell on Hurst. His father was the attendant
surgeon, and might have made some critical discovery."
"I don't see how he could have done that, sir," was the dissenting
answer.
"Nor did I. But it is the doubt in these cases that causes the fear. I
should like to ask you a question--was it by accident or purposed
design that you came to our house as a clerk?"
"Purely by accident. When the misfortunes fell upon me in Birmingham,
and I was unwise enough to follow Samuel Teague's example and run
away, I retained one friend, who stood by me. After quitting
Helstonleigh on the Monday night, I concealed myself elsewhere for
three or four days, and then went to him in Essex, where he lived. He
procured me a clerkship in a lawyer's office in the same county, Mr.
Cale's, with whom I stayed about a year. Mr. Cale found me very
useful, and when his health failed, and he retired in consequence from
practice, he sent me up here to Mr. Greatorex with a strong
recommendation."
"You have served us well," said Bede. "Was not your quitting
Birmingham a mistake?"
"The worst I ever made. I solemnly declare that I was entirely
innocent. Not only innocent myself, but unsuspicious of anything wrong
on the part of Samuel Teague. He took me in, as he took in everybody
else. Johnson and Teague know it now, and have at length done me the
justice to acknowledge it. I knew of young Teague's profuse
expenditure: he used to tell me he had the money from his uncle old
Mr. Teague, and it never occurred to me to doubt it. Where I erred,
was in going to the old man and blurting out the truth. He died of the
shock. I shall never forgive myself for that: it seemed to me always
as though I had murdered him. With his dead form, as it seemed,
pursuing me, with the knowledge that I was to be included in the
charge of forgery, I lost my sober senses. In my fright, I saw no
escape but in flight; and I got away on the Sunday afternoon as far as
Helstonleigh. It was in the opposite direction to the one Samuel
Teague was thought to have taken, and I wanted to see Alletha Rye, if
it were practicable, and assure her before we finally parted, that,
though bad enough, I was not quite the villain people were making me
out to be. There--there are strange coincidences in this life, Mr.
Bede Greatorex."
"You may well say that," answered Bede.
"And one of the strangest was that of my accidentally meeting Alletha
Rye five minutes after I reached Helstonleigh. Forgetting my disguise,
I stopped to accost her--and have not forgotten her surprise yet. But
I had not courage then to tell her the truth: I simply said I was in
trouble through false friends, and was ill--which was really the
case--and I asked her if she could shelter me for a day or two, or
could recommend me to a place where I might be private and to myself.
The result was, that I went to Mrs. Jones's house, introduced as a
stranger, one Godfrey Pitman. I hit upon the name haphazard. And
before I left it I was drawn into that business concerning Mr.
Ollivera."
Bede Greatorex made no answer. A coincidence! one of heaven's sending.
"Why so much ill-luck should have fallen upon me I cannot tell,"
resumed George Winter. "I started in life, hoping and intending to do
my duty as conscientiously as most men do it; and I've tried to,
that's more. Fate has not been kind to me."
"There are others that it has been less kind to," spoke Bede, his tone
marked with ill-suppressed agitation. "Your liabilities in Birmingham?
Are they wiped out?"
"Others' liabilities you mean, sir; I had none of my own. Yes, I have
scraped, and saved, and paid; paid all. I am saving now to repay _you_
the forty-four pounds, and have about twenty pounds towards it. But
for having my good old mother on my hands--she lives in Wales--I
should have been clear earlier."
"You need not trouble yourself about the forty-four pounds," said
Bede, recognising the wondrous obligations he and his were under to
this silent, self-denying man.
"If it were forty-four hundred, sir, I should work on until I paid it,
life being granted me."
"Very well," replied Bede. "I may be able to recompense you in another
way."
If Bede Greatorex thought that any simple order of his would release
Miss Rye from custody, he found himself mistaken. Butterby, called
into the conference, was almost pleasantly derisive.
"You'll assure me she was not guilty! and Mr. Brown there can assure
me she was not guilty! And, following them words up, you say, 'Let her
go, Butterby!' Why, you might about as well tell me to let the stars
drop out of the sky, Mr. Bede Greatorex. I've no more power over one
than I have over the other."
"But she is innocent," reiterated Bede. "Mr. Brown here--you know who
he is--can testify to it."
Butterby gave a careless nod in the direction of Mr. Brown--as much as
to say that his knowing who he was went for a matter of course. But he
was sternly uncompromising.
"Look here, Mr. Bede Greatorex. It's all very well for you to say to
me Miss Rye's innocent; and for that there clever gentleman by your
side to say she's innocent--and himself too, I suppose he'd like to
add; but you, as a lawyer, must know that all that is of no manner of
use. If you two will bring forward the right party, and say, 'This is
the one that was guilty,' and _prove_ it to the satisfaction of the
law and Mr. Greatorex, that would be another thing. Only in that case
can Miss Rye be set at liberty."
"You--you do not know what family interests are involved in this, Mr.
Butterby," Bede said, in a tone of pain.
"Can guess at 'em," responded Butterby.
Bede inwardly thought the boast was a mistaken one, but he let it
pass.
"If my father were acquainted with the true facts of the case," spoke
he, "he would never bring it to a public trial; I tell you this on my
honour."
"You know yourself who the party was; I see that," said Butterby.
"I do--Heaven spare me!"
There was a strange tone of helplessness mingling with the anguish of
the avowal, as if Bede could contend with fate no longer. Even the
officer felt for him. George Winter looked round at him with a glance
of caution, as much as to say there was no necessity to avow too much.
Bede bent his head, and strove to see, as well as the hour's trouble
and perplexity would allow him, what might and what might not be done.
Butterby, responsible to the magistrates at Helstonleigh who had
granted the warrant, would have to be satisfied, as well as Mr.
Greatorex.
Another minute, and Bede went forth to seek an interview with his
father, who was alone in his room. Bede, almost as though he were
afraid of his courage leaving him, entered upon the matter before he
had well closed the door. Not in any torrent of words: he spoke but a
few, and those with almost painful calmness: but his breath was
laboured, himself perceptibly agitated.
"Give my authority to Butterby to release Alletha Rye from custody,
because you happen to know that she is innocent!" exclaimed Mr.
Greatorex in surprise. "Why, what can you mean, Bede?"
Bede told his tale. Hampered by various doubting fears lest he might
drop an unsafe word, it was rather a lame one. Mr. Greatorex leaned
back in his chair, and looked up at Bede as he listened. They held,
unconsciously, much the same position as they had that March day
nearly five years ago in another room, when the tale of the death was
first told, Bede having then just got up with it from Helstonleigh Mr.
Greatorex sitting, Bede standing with his arm on the mantelpiece, his
face partly turned away. Bede had grown quite into the habit of
standing thus, to press his hand to his brow: it seemed as though some
weight or pain were always there.
"I don't understand you, Bede," spoke Mr. Greatorex frankly. "You tell
me that you know of your own cognisance Alletha Rye was innocent? That
you knew it at the time?"
"Almost of my own cognisance," corrected Bede.
"Which must be equivalent to saying that you know who was guilty."
"No; I don't know that," murmured Bede, his face growing damp with the
conscious lie.
"Then what do you know, that you should wish to interfere? You have
always said it was a case of suicide."
"It was not that, father," was Bede's low, shrinking answer. But he
looked into his father's eyes with thrilling earnestness as he gave
it.
Mr. Greatorex began to feel slightly uncomfortable. He detested
mystery of all kinds; and there was something unpleasantly mysterious
in Bede's voice and looks and words and manner.
"Did you know at the time that it was not suicide?" pursued Mr.
Greatorex.
_How_ should Bede get through this? say what he must say, and yet not
say too much? He inwardly asked himself the question.
"There was just a suspicion of it on my mind, sir. Anyway, Alletha Rye
must be set at liberty."
"I do not understand what you say, Bede; I do not understand _you_.
Your manner on this subject has always been an enigma. William
Ollivera holds the opinion that you must be screening someone."
A terrible temptation, hard to battle with, assailed Bede Greatorex at
the charge--to avow to his father who and what he had been screening
ever since the death. He forced himself to silence until it had
passed.
"What is troubling you, Bede?"
Mr. Greatorex might well ask it; with that sad countenance in front of
him, working with its pain. In his grievous perplexity, Bede gave the
true answer.
"I was thinking if it were possible for Pitman's explanation to be
avoided, father."
"What! Is Pitman found?"
"Yes, he is found," quietly answered Bede. "He----"
The room door was opening to admit some visitors, and Bede turned.
Surely the propitious star to the House of Greatorex could not be in
the ascendant. For they were Judge Kene and Henry William Ollivera.
And the concealment that he had striven and toiled for, and worn out
his health and life to keep; fighting ever, mentally or bodily,
against Fate's relentless hand, was felt to be at an end by Bede
Greatorex.