In his new circumstances Bagot was, of course, a very different
personage from the Colonel Lee known to tradesmen and money-lenders of
old. There was no talk now of arresting him for small debts, no
hesitation in complying with his orders. The Jews, bill-brokers, and
other accommodating persons who had lately been open-mouthed against
him, now offered him unlimited credit, of which he did not fail to avail
himself. His creditor, Mr Dubbley, seeing the very different position
the Colonel would now occupy at the Heronry, and alive to the impolicy
of offending so important a neighbour, stopt all proceedings against
him, and, with the most abject apologies and assurances of regard,
entreated him to take his own leisure for the payment of the debt.
Apparently satisfied with these advantages, the Colonel showed no
eagerness to take upon him either the dignity or the emoluments that had
now devolved on him in the succession of inheritance.
The first lawyers in the kingdom were retained for him and Seager. A
considerable sum was placed at the disposal of the latter, who was to
employ it either in bribing that very important witness, Jim the groom,
who had charge of Goshawk, to perjure himself, or in getting him to
abscond. As he proved tractable, however, and agreed, for a sum which he
named, to swear anything that the gentlemen might wish, it was resolved
to produce him; and Seager was very sanguine of a favourable result.
In the mean time Bagot, anxious and gloomy, kept almost entirely in his
lodgings, and seldom spoke to anybody except on business. He did not
know what reports might be abroad about the coming trial; he did not
know how his associates would look upon him; and he feared at present to
put the matter to proof by going among them. This line of conduct Seager
thought highly impolitic, and told him so. “Put a good face on the
matter,” he said. “Go down to the club—play billiards—go to the opera.
If you go sneaking about with a hangdog face, as if you didn’t dare show
yourself, people will bring you in guilty before the trial, and the
legal acquittal will hardly serve to set you right again.”
So Bagot suffered himself to be persuaded, and went down to his club.
Here he had been, in days of yore, a prominent character, and had
enjoyed an extensive popularity among the members. He formed a sort of
connecting link between the fogies and the youngsters; his experience
allying him with the one class, his tastes and habits with the other.
Here he might formerly often have been seen entertaining a knot of
immoral old gentlemen with jokes improper for publication, or the centre
of an admiring circle of fledglings of the sporting world, who
reverenced him as an old bird of great experience and sagacity.
With doubtful and anxious feelings, he now revisited the scene of his
former glory. Putting on as composed a face as possible, he went
up-stairs and entered the library. There were several people in it whom
he knew. One well-known man-about-town, with whom the Colonel was rather
intimate, was seated opposite the door reading a newspaper, and, as
Bagot could have sworn, fixed his eye on him as he entered, but it was
instantaneously dropt on the paper. Another member—an old gentleman who
was strongly suspected of a happy knack of turning up honours at
critical movements of the game of whist—looked round at his entrance,
and the Colonel advanced to greet him, in perfect confidence that he, at
any rate, was not a likely person to cast the first stone at him; but
Bagot was mistaken. The old gentleman shifted his chair so as to place
his back towards Bagot, with a loud snort of virtuous indignation, and,
leaning forward, whispered to a neighbour some hurried words, of which
Bagot could distinguish—“Deuced bad taste!—don’t you think so?”
Crimson with rage and shame, Bagot bent down over a newspaper to recover
himself, and fumbled with trembling hands at his eye-glasses. He heard a
step behind him presently, but he dared not look up.
“Lee, my boy, how are you?” said a stout hearty man about fifty,
slapping the Colonel on the shoulder. “I’ve just come back from a tour,
and the first thing I saw in the paper was about you—about your”—the
stout gentleman stopt to sneeze, which he did four times, with terrible
convulsions of face and figure, during which Bagot was in horrible
suspense, while every ear in the room was pricked up—“about your good
fortune,” said the stout gentleman, after he had blown and wiped his
sonorous nose as carefully as if it were some delicate musical
instrument that he was going to put by in its case. “I congratulate you
with all my heart. Fine property, I’m told. Just wait while I ring the
bell, and we’ll have a chat together.”
He went to the bell and rung it; but, on his way back to Bagot, he was
stopped by a friend who had entered the library with him, and who now
drew him aside. Bagot stole a glance over his paper at them. He felt
they were talking about him. He heard his stout friend say—“God bless
me, who would have thought it!” and he perceived that, instead of
rejoining him, according to promise, he took a chair at the farther end
of the room.
Bagot still kept his own seat a little while, but he could not long
endure his position. He fancied every one was looking at him, though,
when, with this impression strong on him, he glared defiance around,
every eye was averted. He wished—he only wished—that some one would
offer him some gross tangible insult, that he might relieve himself by
an outburst—that he might hurl his scorn and defiance at them and the
whole world.
No one, however, seemed likely to oblige him with an opportunity of this
kind, and, after a minute or two, Bagot rose, and, with as much
composure as he could command, quitted the room and the house. As he
walked—in no happy frame of mind with himself, with the world, or with
Seager, whose advice had entailed upon him this mortification—towards
his lodgings, along one of the small streets near St James’s, he saw
some one wave his hand to him, in a friendly manner, from the opposite
side of the way. Bagot was too short-sighted to recognise this
acquaintance; but, seeing him prepare to cross the road to him, and
reflecting that he could not afford to drop any acquaintances just then,
when all seemed deserting him, he stopped to see who it was.
Mr Jack Sharpe, the person who now drew near, had been intended for the
Church, but happening to be fast in everything except in his progress in
the different branches of university learning, in which he was
particularly slow, he never arrived at the dignity of orders. He had
formerly moved in the same circle as Bagot, but had lost his footing
there, in consequence of strong suspicions of dishonourable conduct on
the turf. These seemed the more likely to be just, as he had never
sought to rebut the charge against him; and it was rumoured that, since
the occurrence, he had allied himself—taking, at the same time, no great
precautions for secresy—with a certain swindling confederacy. Therefore
Bagot had, when last in town, in all the might and majesty of conscious
integrity, avoided Mr Jack Sharpe, sternly repelled all his attempts to
renew their acquaintance, and returned his greetings, when they chanced
to meet, with the most chilling and formal bows. Sharpe appeared to
think that late circumstances had bridged over the gulf between them,
for he not only saluted Bagot with unwonted familiarity, but took his
hand. The Colonel disengaged it, and, intrenching himself behind his
dignity, endeavoured to pass on. Jack Sharpe, nothing daunted, walked
cheerfully beside him.
“Well, Colonel, how goes the trial?” asked Mr Sharpe, who had managed,
notwithstanding his downfall, to preserve the appearance and manners of
a gentleman. “You’ll get a verdict, I hope.”
The Colonel inclined his head stiffly.
“Well, I hope so,” said Jack Sharpe. “It was a deuced clever thing, from
what I hear of it, and deserves success; and my opinion of the
cleverness of the thing will be exactly the same, whether you and Seager
get an acquittal or not.” And Mr Sharpe looked as if he expected to find
Bagot highly gratified by his approbation.
“Do you presume, for a moment, to insinuate a doubt of my innocence of
the charge?” asked Bagot sternly.
“Oh, certainly not,” returned Jack Sharpe, with a laugh. “Quite right to
carry it high, Colonel. Nothing like putting a good face on it.”
“Sir,” said Bagot, increasing his pace, “your remarks are offensive.”
“I didn’t mean them to be so,” answered the other. “But you’re quite
right to carry it off this way. You’ve come into a good property, I
hear, and that will keep you fair with the world, however this trial, or
a dozen other such, might go. Some people have the devil’s own luck.
Yes, Colonel, you’ll pull through it—you’ll never fall among thieves.
It’s only the _poor_ devils,” added Jack Sharpe bitterly, “that get
pitched into and kicked into outer darkness.”
Bagot was perfectly livid. By this time they had reached a corner of the
street, and, stopping short, the Colonel said—
“Oblige me by saying which way your road lies.”
“Well, well, good morning, Colonel. I’m not offended, for, I daresay, I
should do the same myself in your place. Politic, Colonel, politic! I
wish you good luck and good morning.” And Mr Jack Sharpe took himself
off.
This encounter grated on Bagot’s feelings more than any other incident
that had occurred to him. To be hailed familiarly as a comrade by a
swindler—to be prejudged as one who had forfeited his position in
society, and was to retain it only on new and accidental grounds—this
sunk deep, and shook that confidence of success which he had hitherto
never permitted himself to question.
Just afterwards he met Seager, who came gaily up to ask him how he had
got on at the club. Bagot told him something of the unpleasant treatment
he had met with, and the disgust and annoyance it had caused him to
feel. Seager grinned.
“You’re not hard enough, Lee—you think too much of these things. Now,
I’m as hard as a nail. I meet with exactly the same treatment as you do,
but what do I care for it? It doesn’t hurt me—they can’t put _me_ down,”
and Seager smiled at the thought of his own superiority. “What would you
do, I wonder, if a thing which just now happened to me were to happen to
you? I was looking on at a billiard match, and Crossley, (you know
Crossley?) who had been, like the rest of ’em, deuced distant and cool
to me, offered to bet on the game. I took him up—he declined. ‘Oh, you
back out, do you?’ says I. ‘Not at all,’ says Crossley; ‘but I don’t bet
with everybody.’ Now, what would you have done?”
“I should have desired him to apologise instantly,” said the Colonel.
“He’d have refused.”
“I’d have kicked him,” said the Colonel.
“’Twould have caused a row, and we’re quite conspicuous enough already,”
said Seager. “No; I turned coolly to him, and says I, ‘Very good; as
we’re going to close our accounts, I’ll thank you for that ten-pound
note I won from you on the Phœbe match.’ Crossley, you know, is poor and
proud, and he looked cursedly disgusted and cut up at this exposure of
his shortcomings. I’ll bet, he wishes he’d been civil now. You must take
these things coolly. Never mind how they look at you: go back to the
club, now, and brave it out—show ’em you don’t care for ’em.”
“No,” muttered Bagot, “I’d die first. I’ll go out no more till ’tis
over.”
In this resolution he shut himself up in his lodgings, only going out in
the dusk to walk in such thoroughfares as were not likely to be
frequented by any of his acquaintances. Never had a week passed so
dismally with him as this. His nerves were yet unstrung by his late
attack, and his anxiety was augmented as the day of the trial
approached, until he wondered how he could endure it. In spite of his
efforts, his thoughts were impelled into tracks the most repugnant to
him. The remembrance of his reception by the members of his club haunted
him incessantly, though it was what most of all he wished to forget; for
Bagot, being, as we have seen him, a weak-principled man of social
habits, though he had found no difficulty in quieting his own
conscience, was keenly alive to the horrors of disgrace.
He felt as he remembered to have often felt when a great race was
approaching, which was to make or mar him—only the interest now was more
painfully strong than ever before. There was an event of some sort in
store—why could he not divine it?—ah, if he were only as wise now as he
would be this day week, what anxiety would be saved him! He only dared
contemplate the possibility of one result—an acquittal. That would lift
the weight from his breast and reopen life to him. But a
conviction!—that he dared not think of—for that contingency he made no
provision.
During this week Harry Noble had come up from the Heronry on some
business connected with the stable there, in which the Colonel had been
interested; and Bagot, conceiving he might be useful in matters in which
he did not choose to trust his own servant Wilson, had desired him to
remain in town for the present. This Seager was glad of, for he knew
Harry was to be trusted, and he told him in a few words the nature of
the predicament the Colonel was in.
“You must have an eye to him,” said Seager; “don’t let him drink much,
if you can help it; and if it should be necessary for him to make a trip
to France for a time, you must go with him.”
“I’ll go with him to the world’s end, Mr Seager,” said Harry. He was
much attached to the Colonel, having known him since the time when
Noble, as a boy, entered the Heronry stables; and though he had then,
like the other stable-boys, found Bagot very severe and exacting, yet,
having once proved himself a careful and trustworthy servant and
excellent groom, the Colonel had honoured him since with a good deal of
his confidence.
Harry had the more readily agreed to this since, when leaving the
Heronry, he had parted in great wrath from Miss Fillett, who had found
time in the midst of her religious zeal to harrow up Noble’s soul with
fresh jealousies, and to flirt demurely, but effectually, with many
brethren who frequented the same chapel.
The day before the trial Seager came, and Bagot prevailed on him to stay
and dine, and play écarte. Seager was sanguine of the result of the
trial, which was to commence on the morrow, in the Court of Queen’s
Bench—spoke in assured terms of the excellence of their case, their
counsel, and their witnesses; and telling him to keep up his spirits,
wished him good night, promising to bring him back the earliest
intelligence of how the day had gone.
The Colonel’s eagerness for, and terror of, the result had now worked
him into a state of agitation little short of frenzy. The trial was
expected to last two days, but the first would probably show him how the
case was likely to terminate. Both Bagot and Seager preferred forfeiting
their recognisances to surrendering to take their trial, which would
have shut out all hope of escape in the event of an adverse verdict.
Finding it impossible to sit still while in this state, the Colonel
started for a long walk, resolving to return at the hour at which Seager
might be expected. Arriving a few minutes later than he intended, he
went up-stairs to his sitting-room, but started back on seeing a person
whom he did not recognise there. His first impression was, that it was a
man come to arrest him.
His visitor, on seeing his consternation, gave a loud laugh. It was Mr
Seager.
“Gad, Lee,” said that worthy, “it _must_ be well done, if it takes you
in. I was in court all day, and sat next a couple of our set, but they
hadn’t an idea who I was.”
Mr Seager was certainly well disguised, and it was no wonder the Colonel
had not recognised him. Low on his forehead came a black wig, and
whiskers of the same met under his chin. He had a mustache also; his
coat was blue, his waistcoat gorgeous, with two or three chains,
evidently plated, meandering over it, and his trousers were of a large
and brilliant check. In his elaborate shirt-front appeared several
studs, like little watches, and his neck was enveloped in a black satin
stock with gold flowers and a great pin.
“What d’ye think, Lee—don’t I look the nobby Israelite, eh?”
Bagot shortly admitted the excellence of his disguise, and then asked,
“What news?—is it over?”
“Only the prosecution—that’s finished,” returned the metamorphosed
Seager.
“Well,” said Bagot breathlessly, “and how—how did it go?”
“Sit down,” said Seager; “give me a cigar, and I’ll tell you all about
it.”
Nothing could be more strongly contrasted than the anxiety of Bagot with
the composure of Seager. No one would have imagined them to be both
equally concerned in the proceedings that the latter now proceeded to
relate; while Bagot glared at him, gnawing his nails and breathing hard.
“The court,” said Seager, throwing himself back in the chair after he
had lit his cigar, with his hands in his trousers’ pockets, and his feet
stretched to the fire—“the court was crowded. Sloperton’s counsel opened
the ball by giving a sketch of the whole affair—little personal
histories of you and me and Sloperton, the sort of things that might be
prefixed to our poetical works after we’re dead—you know the style of
thing, Lee, birth, parentage, breeding, so forth. Then came out
Sloperton’s meeting with us at the Bush at Doddington—the adjournment to
Oates’s room—the broiled bones, cards, and betting, and the terms of the
wager with Sloperton.
“Our friend Sloper was the first witness, and had got himself up a most
awful swell, as you may suppose, on such a grand occasion, and there
wasn’t a young lady in court who didn’t sympathise with him. I could see
by his way of giving evidence he was as vindictive as the devil. Our
fellows went at him, but they didn’t damage his evidence much. He told
about the bet—how, by your advice, he had sent to me to offer to
compromise it—and how he had perfectly depended all was fair till he
heard the mare was lame. Oates followed, and corroborated the whole
story. Then came one of the vets who attended the mare, and he swore, in
his opinion, she’d got navicular disease. Then came a new actor” (Bagot
listened more eagerly than ever), “one Mr Chick, who saw us return to
the stable that morning we gave Goshawk the trial; and he swore the mare
was lame then.”
Bagot drew a long breath, and fell back in his chair.
“Against all this,” Seager went on, “we’ve got to-morrow the evidence of
Jim, who’ll swear the mare never was lame while in his charge, and of
the other vet, who’ll swear she was and is sound. So cheer up, old boy;
it may go all right yet. Never say die.”
Seager paused, and looked at Bagot, who had covered his face with his
hands. Both were silent for a space.
“By the by,” said Seager presently, in an indifferent tone, yet eyeing
Bagot with a keenness that showed his interest in the question—“by the
by, where’s Lady Lee now?”
Bagot did not answer, and Seager repeated the question.
“What’s Lady Lee to you, sir?” said Bagot, removing his hands from his
face, the colour of which was very livid.
“O, nothing particular; but she might be something to you, you know, in
case of the business going against us to-morrow. You said she had left
the Heronry, didn’t you?”
Bagot did not reply.
“It’s no use blinking the matter,” said Seager testily. “Things may go
against us to-morrow, in which case I’m off, and so are you, I suppose.
I’ve made all my arrangements; but I think we had better take different
roads, and appoint a place to meet on the Continent. But I’m short of
money for a long trip, and, of course, you’ll accommodate me. We row in
the same boat, you know. Come, what will you come down with?”
“Not a penny,” said Bagot in a low thick voice.
“Eh! what?” said Seager, looking up at him.
“Not a penny,” said Bagot, raising his voice. “You devil,” he cried,
starting from his chair, “don’t you know you’ve ruined me?” and, seizing
the astonished Seager by the throat, he shook him violently.
“You cursed old lunatic!” cried Seager, as soon as he had struggled
himself free from Bagot’s grasp. “You’re mad, you old fool. Only raise a
finger again, and I’ll brain you with the poker. What d’ye mean, ha? We
must talk about this, and you shall apologise, or give me satisfaction.”
“What, an affair of _honour_, eh?” sneered Bagot between his ground
teeth. “Between two _gentlemen_! That sounds better than convicted
swindlers. Curse you,” he added, in a hoarse whisper, “you’ve been my
destruction.”
“He’s dangerous,” thought Seager, as he looked at him. “Come, Lee,” said
he, “listen to reason; lend me a supply, and we’ll say no more about
this queer behaviour. I know you’ve been drinking.”
“You have my answer, sir,” said Bagot. “Not a penny, I repeat. I wish
you may starve—rot in a jail.”
Seager looked at him keenly for a minute. “He’s been at the brandy
bottle,” he thought. “Well, let him drink himself mad or dead, if he
likes. But, no!—that won’t do either—he may be useful yet. The old
fool!” he muttered as he departed, “he doesn’t know how far he has let
me into his secrets. Well, he’ll change his note, perhaps;” so saying,
he left the room and the house.