THE OLD GUN.
MR. JORDAN was alone in his room. Evening had set in, the room was not
only chilly, it was dark. He sat in his leather-backed leather-armed
chair with his stick in his hands,—in both hands, held across him, and
now and then he put the stick up to his mouth and gnawed at it in the
middle. At others he made a sudden movement, slipping his hand down to
the ferule and striking in the air with the handle at the black spots
which floated in the darkness, of a blackness most intense. He was
teased by them, and by his inability to strike them aside. His stick
went through them, as through ink, and they closed again when cut, and
drifted on through his circle of vision unhurt, undisturbed.
Mr. Coyshe was gone; he had ordered the old man to be left as much in
quiet as might be, and he had taken a boy from the farm with him on a
horse, to bring back a soothing draught which he promised to send. Mr.
Jordan had complained of sleeplessness, his nerves were evidently in a
high and perilous state of tension. Before he left, Mr. Coyshe had said
to Barbara, ‘Keep an eye on your father, there is irritation somewhere.
He talks in an unreasoning manner. I will send him something to compose
him, and call again to-morrow. In the meantime,’ he coughed, ‘I—I—would
not allow him to shave himself.’
Barbara’s blood curdled. ‘You do not think—’ She was unable to finish
her sentence.
‘Do as I say, and do not allow him to suppose himself watched.’
Now Barbara acted with unfortunate indiscretion. Knowing that her
father was suspicious of her, and complained of her observing him,
knowing also that his suspicions extended to Jasper whom he disliked,
knowing also that he had taken a liking for Jane, she bade Jane remain
about her father, and not allow him to be many minutes unwatched.
Jane immediately went to the old gentleman, and told him the
instructions given her. ‘And—please your honour,’ she crept close to
him, ‘I’ve seen him. He is on the Raven Rock. He has lighted a fire and
is warming himself. I think it be the very man that was took here, but
I can’t say for certain, as I didn’t see the face of him as was took,
nor of him on the Rock, but they be both men, and much about a height.’
‘Jane! Is Joseph anywhere about?’
‘No sir,—not nigher than Tavistock.’
‘Go to him immediately. Bid him collect what men he can, and surround
the fellow and secure him.’
‘But, your honour! Miss Barbara said I was to watch you as a cat
watches a mouse.’
‘Who is master here, I or she? I order you to go; and if she is angry
I will protect you against her. I am to be watched, am I? By my own
children? By my servant? This is more than I can bear. The whole world
is conspiring against me. How can I trust anyone—even Jane? How can I
say that the police were not bribed before to let him go? And they may
be bribed again. Trust none but thyself,’ he muttered, and stood up.
‘Please, master,’ said Jane, ‘you may be certain I will do what you
want. I’m not like some folks, as is unnatural to their very parents.
Why, sir! what do y’ think? As I were a coming in, who should run by
me, looking the pictur’ of fear, but Miss Eve. And where do y’ think
her runned? Why, sir—I watched her, and her went as fast as a leaping
hare over the fields towards the Raven Rock—to where he be. Well, I’m
sure I’d not do that. I don’t mind a-going to love feasts in chapel
with Joseph, but I wouldn’t go seeking him in a wood. Some folks have
too much self-respect for that, I reckon.’ She muttered this looking up
at the old man, uncertain how he would take it.
‘Go,’ said he. ‘Leave me—go at once.’
Presently Barbara came in, and found her father alone.
‘What, no one with you, papa?’
‘No—I want to be alone. Do you grudge me quiet? Must I live under a
microscope? Must I have everything I do marked, every word noted? Why
do you peer in here? Am I an escaped felon to be guarded? Am I likely
to break out? Will you leave me? I tell you I do not want you here. I
desire solitude. I have had you and Coyshe and Eve jabbering here till
my head spins and my temples are bursting. Leave me alone.’ Then, with
the craftiness of incipient derangement, he said, ‘I have had two—three
bad nights, and want sleep. I was dozing in my chair when Jane came in
to light a fire. I sent her out. Then, when I was nodding off again,
I heard cook or Jasper tramping through the hall. That roused me, and
now when I hoped to compose myself again, you thrust yourself upon me;
are you all in a league to drive me mad, by forbidding me sleep? That
is how Hopkins, the witch-finder, got the poor wretches to confess.
He would not suffer them to sleep, and at last, in sheer madness and
hunger for rest, they confessed whatever was desired of them. You want
to force something out of me. That is why you will not let me sleep.’
‘Papa dear, I shall be so glad if you can sleep. I promise you shall be
left quite alone for an hour.’
‘O—an hour! limited to sixty minutes.’
‘Dear papa, till you rap on the wall, to intimate that you are awake.’
‘You will not pry and peer?’
‘No one shall come near you. I will forbid everyone the hall, lest a
step on the pavement should disturb you.’
‘What are you doing there?’
‘Taking away your razor, papa.’
Then he burst into a shrill, bitter laugh—a laugh that shivered through
her heart. He said nothing, but remained chuckling in his chair.
‘I dare say Jasper will sharpen them for you, papa, he is very kind,’
said Barbara, ashamed of her dissimulation. So it came about that the
old half-crazy squire was left in the gathering gloom entirely alone
and unguarded. Nothing could do him more good than a refreshing sleep,
Barbara argued, and went away to her own room, where she lit a candle,
drew down her blind, and set herself to needlework.
She had done what she could. The pantry adjoined the room of her
father. Jane would hear if he knocked or called. She did not know that
Jane was gone.
Ignatius Jordan sat in the armchair, biting at his stick, or beating
in the air with it at the blots which troubled his vision. These black
spots took various shapes; sometimes they were bats, sometimes falling
leaves. Then it appeared to him as if a fluid that was black but with a
crimson glow in it as of a subdued hidden fire was running and dripped
from ledge to ledge—invisible ledges they were—in the air before him.
He put his stick out to touch the stream, and then it ran along the
stick and flowed on his hand and he uttered a cry, because it burned
him. He held his hand up open before him, and thought the palm was
black, but with glowing red veins intersecting the blackness, and he
touched the lines with the finger of his left hand.
‘The line of Venus,’ he said, ‘strong at the source, fiery and broken
by that cross cut—the line of life—long, thin, twisted, tortured,
nowhere smooth, and here—What is this?—the end.’
Then he looked at the index finger of his left hand, the finger that
had traced the lines, and it seemed to be alight or smouldering with
red fire.
He heard a strange sound at the window, a sound shrill and unearthly,
close as in his ear, and yet certainly not in the room. He held his
breath and looked round. He could see nothing through the glass but the
grey evening sky, no face looking in and crying at the window. What
was it? As he looked it was repeated. In his excited condition of mind
he did not seek for a natural explanation. It was a spirit call urging
him on. It was silent. Then again repeated. Had he lighted the candle
and examined the glass he would have seen a large snail crawling up
the pane, creating the sound by the vibration of the glass as it drew
itself along.
Then Mr. Jordan rose out of his chair, and looking cautiously from side
to side and timorously at the window whence the shrill sound continued,
he unlocked a cupboard in the panelling and drew from it powder and
shot.
Barbara had taken away his razors. She feared lest he should do himself
an injury; but though he was weary of his life, he had no thought
of hastening his departure from it. His mind was set with deadly
resolution of hate on Martin—Martin, that man who had robbed him, who
escaped from him as often as he was taken. Everyone was in league to
favour Martin. No one was to be trusted to punish him. He must make
sure that the man did not escape this time. This time he would rely
on no one but himself. He crossed the room with soft step, opened the
door, and entered the hall. There he stood looking about him. He could
hear a distant noise of servants talking in the kitchen, but no one was
near, no eye observed him. Barbara, true to her promise, was upstairs,
believing him asleep. The hall was dark, but not so dark that he could
not distinguish what he sought. Some one passed with a light outside,
a maid going to the washhouse. The light struck through the transomed
window of the hall, painting a black cross against the wall opposite,
a black cross that travelled quickly and fell on the old man, creeping
along to the fireplace, holding the wall. He remembered the Midsummer
Day seventeen years ago when he had stood there against that wall with
arms extended in the blaze of the setting sun as a crucified figure
against the black shadow of the cross. His life had been one long
crucifixion ever since, and his cross a shadow. Then he stood on a hall
chair and took down from its crooks an old gun.
‘Seventeen years ago,’ he muttered. ‘My God! it failed not then, may it
not fail me now!’