SUSPICIONS.
Yes--Jonathan Floyd was beginning to speak out boldly certain
strange suspicions he had entertained of Jennings. It was a courageous,
a rash, a dangerous thing to do: he did not know but what it might have
jeoparded his life, say nothing of his livelihood: but Floyd did it.
Ever since that inquest, contrived to be so quickly and so quietly got
over, he had noticed Simon's hurried starts, his horrid looks, his
altered mien in all he did and said, his new nervous ways at
nightfall--John Page to sleep in Mr. Jennings's chamber, and a
rush-light perpetually--his shudder whenever he had occasion to call at
the housekeeper's room, and his evident shrinking from the frequent
phrase "Mrs. Quarles's murder."
Then again, Jonathan would often lie awake at nights, thinking over
divers matters connected with his own evidence before the coroner, which
he began to see might be of great importance. Jennings said, he had gone
out to still the dog by the front door--didn't he?--"How then, Mr.
Jennings, did you contrive to push back the top bolt? The Hall chairs
had not come then, and you are a little fellow, and you know that nobody
in the house could reach, without a lift, that bolt but me. Besides,
before Sir John came down, the hinges of that door creaked, like a
litter o' kittens screaming, and the lock went so hard for want of use
and oil, that I'll be sworn your gouty chalkstone fingers could never
have turned it: now, I lay half awake for two hours, and heard no creak,
no key turned; but I tell you what I did hear though, and I wish now I
had said it at that scanty, hurried inquest; I heard what I now believe
were distant screams (but I was so sleepy), and a kind of muffled
scuffling ever so long: but I fancied it might be a horse in the stable
kicking among the straw in a hunter's loose box. I can guess what it was
now--cannot you, Mr. Simon?--I say, butler, you must have gone out to
quiet Don--who by the way can't abear the sight of you--through Mrs.
Quarles's room: and, for all your threats, I'm not afeard to tell you
what I think. First answer me this, Mr. Simon Jennings:--where were you
all that night, when we were looking for you?--Oh! you choose to forget,
do you? I can help your memory, Mr. Butler; what do you think of the
shower-bath in Mother Quarles's room?"
As Jonathan, one day at dinner in the servants' hall, took occasion to
direct these queries to the presiding Simon, the man gave such a horrid
start, and exclaimed, "Away, I say!" so strangely, that Jonathan could
doubt no longer--nor, in fact, any other of the household: Jennings gave
them all round a vindictive scowl, left the table, hastened to his own
room, and was seen no more that day.
Speculation now seemed at an end, it had ripened into probability;--but
what evidence was there to support so grave a charge against this rigid
man? Suspicions are not half enough to go upon--especially since Roger
Acton seemed to have had the money. Therefore, though the folks at
Hurstley, Sir John, his guests, and all the house, could not but think
that Mr. Jennings acted very oddly--still, he had always been a strange
creature, an unpopular bailiff; nobody understood him. So, Floyd, to his
own no small danger, stood alone in accusing the man openly.