THE KEEPERS OF THE DEAD.
Events, between the death of Lord Mount Severn and his interment,
occurred quickly; and to one of them the reader may feel inclined to
demur, as believing that it could have no foundation in fact, in the
actions of real life, but must be a wild creation of the author’s brain.
He would be wrong. The author is no more fond of wild creations than the
reader. The circumstance did take place.
The earl died on Friday morning at daylight. The news spread rapidly. It
generally does on the death of a peer, if he has been of note, whether
good or bad, in the world, and was known in London before the day was
over--the consequence of which was, that by Saturday morning, early, a
shoal of what the late peer would have called harpies, had arrived, to
surround East Lynne. There were creditors of all sorts; for small sums
and for great, for five or ten pounds up to five or ten thousand. Some
were civil, some impatient, some loud and rough and angry; some came to
put in executions on the effects, and some--to arrest the body!
This last act was accomplished cleverly. Two men, each with a remarkably
hooked nose, stole away from the hubbub of the clamorous, and peering
cunningly about, made their way to the side or tradesman’s entrance. A
kitchen-maid answered their gentle appeal at the bell.
“Is the coffin come yet?” said they.
“Coffin--no!” was the girl’s reply. “The shell ain’t here yet. Mr. Jones
didn’t promise that till nine o’clock, and it haven’t gone eight.”
“It won’t be long,” quoth they; “its on its road. We’ll go up to his
lordship’s room, please, and be getting ready for it.”
The girl called the butler. “Two men from Jones’, the undertaker’s,
sir,” announced she. “The shell’s coming on and they want to go up and
make ready for it.”
The butler marshaled them upstairs himself, and introduced them to the
room. “That will do,” said they, as he was about to enter with them, “we
won’t trouble you to wait.” And closing the door upon the unsuspicious
butler, they took up their station on either side of the dead, like a
couple of ill-omened mutes. They had placed an arrest upon the corpse;
it was theirs until their claim was satisfied, and they sat down to thus
watch and secure it. Pleasant occupation!
It may have been an hour later that Lady Isabel, leaving her own
chamber, opened noiselessly that of the dead. She had been in it several
times during the previous day; at first with the housekeeper; afterward,
when the nameless dread was somewhat effaced, alone. But she felt
nervous again this morning, and had gained the bed before she ventured
to lift her eyes from the carpet and encounter the sight. Then she
started, for there sat two strange-looking men--and not attractive men
either.
It darted through her mind that they must be people from the
neighborhood, come to gratify an idle and unpardonable curiosity. Her
first impulse was to summon the butler; her second, to speak to them
herself.
“Do you want anything here?” she quietly said.
“Much obleeged for the inquiry, miss. We are all right.”
The words and tone struck her as being singular in the extreme; and they
kept their seats, too, as though they had a right to be there.
“Why are you here?” she repeated. “What are you doing?”
“Well, miss, I don’t mind telling you, for I suppose you are his
daughter”--pointing his left thumb over his shoulder at the late peer--
“and we hear he have got no other relative anigh him. We have been
obleeged, miss, to perform an unpleasant dooty and secure him.”
The words were like Greek to her, and the men saw that they were.
“He unfortunately owed a slight amount of money, miss--as you, perhaps,
be aware on, and our employers is in, deep. So, as soon as they heard
what had happened, they sent us down to arrest the dead corpse, and we
have done it.”
Amazement, horror, fear, struggled together in the shocked mind of Lady
Isabel. Arrest the dead. She had never heard of a like calamity: nor
could she have believed in such. Arrest it for what purpose? What to do?
To disfigure it?--to sell it? With a panting heart and ashy lips, she
turned from the room. Mrs. Mason happened to be passing near the stairs,
and Isabel flew to her, laying hold of her with both hands, in her
terror, as she burst into a fit of nervous tears.
“Those men--in there!” she gasped.
“What men, my lady?” returned Mrs. Mason, surprised.
“I don’t know; I don’t know. I think they are going to stop there; they
say they have taken papa.”
After a pause of bewildered astonishment, the housekeeper left her
standing where she was, and went to the earl’s chamber, to see if she
could fathom the mystery of the words. Isabel leaned against the
balustrades; partly for support, partly that she seemed afraid to stir
from them; and the ominous disturbances downstairs reached her ears.
Strangers, interlopers, appeared to be in the hall, talking vehemently,
and complaining in bitter tones. More and more terrified, she held her
breath to listen.
“Where’s the good of your seeing the young lady?” cried the butler, in a
tone of remonstrance. “She knows nothing about the earl’s affairs; she
is in grief enough just now, without any other worry.”
“I will see her,” returned a dogged voice. “If she’s too start-up and
mighty to come down and answer a question or two, why I’ll find my way
on to her. Here we are a shameful crowd of us, swindled out of our own,
told there’s nobody we can speak to; nobody here but the young lady, and
she must not be troubled. She didn’t find it trouble to help to spend
our money. She has got no honor and feelings of a lady, if she don’t
come and speak to us. There.”
Repressing her rebellious emotions, Lady Isabel glided partly down the
staircase, and softy called to the butler. “What is all this?” she
asked. “I must know.”
“Oh, my lady, don’t go amongst those rough men! You can’t do any good;
pray go back before they see you. I have sent for Mr. Carlyle, and
expect him here momentarily.”
“Did Papa owe them all money?” she said, shivering.
“I’m afraid he did, my lady.”
She went swiftly on; and passing through the few stragglers in the hall,
entered the dining-room, where the chief mass had congregated, and the
hubbub was loudest. All anger, at least external anger, was hushed at
her sight. She looked so young, so innocent, so childlike in her pretty
morning dress of peach-colored muslin, her fair face shaded by its
falling curls, so little fit to combat with, or understand their
business, that instead of pouring forth complaints, they hushed them
into silence.
“I heard some one calling out that I ought to see you,” she began, her
agitation causing the words to come forth in a jerking manner. “What did
you want with me?”
Then they poured forth their complaints, but not angrily, and she
listened till she grew sick. There were many and formidable claims;
promissory notes and I O Us, overdue bills and underdue bills; heavy
outstanding debts of all sorts, and trifles, comparatively speaking, for
housekeeping, servants’ liveries, out-door servants’ wages, bread and
meat.
What was Isabel Vane to answer? What excuse to offer? What hope or
promise to give? She stood in bewilderment, unable to speak, turning
from one to the other, her sweet eyes full of pity and contrition.
“The fact is, young lady,” spoke up one who bore the exterior of a
gentleman, “we should not have come down troubling you--at least, I can
answer for myself--but his lordship’s men of business, Warburton & Ware,
to whom many of us hastened last evening, told us there would not be a
shilling for anybody unless it could be got from furniture. When it
comes to that, it is ‘first come, first served,’ and I got down by
morning light, and levied an execution.”
“Which was levied before you came,” put in a man who might be brother to
the two upstairs, to judge by his nose. “But what’s such furniture as
this to our claims--if you come to combine ‘em? No more than a bucket of
water is to the Thames.”
“What can I do?” shivered Lady Isabel. “What is it you wish me to do? I
have no money to give you, I--”
“No, miss,” broke in a quiet, pale man; “if report tells me, you are
worse wronged than we are, for you won’t have a roof to put your head
under, or a guinea to call your own.”
“He has been a scoundrel to everybody,” interrupted an intemperate
voice; “he has ruined thousands.”
The speech was hissed down; even they were not men gratuitously to
insult a delicate young lady.
“Perhaps you’ll just answer us a question, miss,” persisted the voice,
in spite of the hisses. “Is there any ready money that can--”
But another person had entered the room--Mr. Carlyle. He caught sight of
the white face and trembling hands of Isabel, and interrupted the last
speaker with scant ceremony.
“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded, in a tone of authority.
“What do you want?”
“If you are a friend of the late peer’s, you ought to know what we
want,” was the response. “We want our debts paid.”
“But this is not the place to come to,” returned Mr. Carlyle; “your
coming here flocking in this extraordinary manner, will do no good. You
must go to Warburton & Ware.”
“We have been to them and received their answer--a cool assurance that
there’ll be nothing for anybody.”
“At any rate, you’ll get nothing here,” observed Mr. Carlyle, to the
assembly, collectively. “Allow me to request that you leave the house at
once.”
It was little likely that they would for him, and they said it.
“Then I warn you of the consequences of a refusal,” quietly said Mr.
Carlyle; “you are trespassing upon a stranger’s property. This house is
not Lord Mount Severn’s; he sold it some time back.”
They knew better. Some laughed, and said these tricks were stale.
“Listen, gentlemen,” rejoined Mr. Carlyle, in the plain, straightforward
manner that carried its own truth. “To make an assertion that could be
disproved when the earl’s affairs come to be investigated, would be
simply foolish. I give you my word of honor as a gentleman--nay, as a
fellow-man--that this estate, with the house and all it contains, passed
months ago, from the hands of Lord Mount Severn; and, during his recent
sojourn here, he was a visitor in it. Go and ask his men of business.”
“Who purchased it?” was the inquiry.
“Mr. Carlyle, of West Lynne. Some of you may possibly know him by
reputation.”
Some of them did.
“A cute young lawyer,” observed a voice; “as his father was before him.”
“I am he,” proceeded Mr. Carlyle; “and, being a ‘cute lawyer,’ as you do
me the honor to decide, you cannot suppose I should risk my money upon
any sale not perfectly safe and legal. I was not an agent in the affair;
I employed agents; for it was my own money that I invested, and East
Lynne is mine.”
“Is the purchase money paid over?” inquired more than one.
“It was paid over at the time--last June.”
“What did Lord Mount Severn do with the money?”
“I do not know,” replied Mr. Carlyle. “I am not cognizant of Lord Mount
Severn’s private affairs.”
Significant murmurs arose. “Strange that the earl should stop two or
three months at a place that wasn’t his.”
“It may appear so to you, but allow me to explain,” returned Mr.
Carlyle. “The earl expressed a wish to pay East Lynne a few days’ visit,
by way of farewell, and I acceded. Before the few days were over, he was
taken ill, and remained, from that time, too ill to quit it. This very
day--this day, gentlemen, as we stand here, was at length fixed for his
departure.”
“And you tell us you bought the furniture?”
“Everything as it stands. You need not doubt my word, for the proofs
will be forthcoming. East Lynne was in the market for sale; I heard of
it, and became the purchaser--just as I might have bought an estate from
any of you. And now, as this is my house, and you have no claim upon me,
I shall be obliged to you to withdraw.”
“Perhaps you’ll claim the horses and carriages next, sir,” cried the man
with the hooked nose.
Mr. Carlyle raised his head haughtily. “What is mine is mine, legally
purchased and paid for--a fair, just price. The carriages and horses I
have nothing to do with; Lord Mount Severn brought them down with him.”
“And I have got a safe watcher over them in the out premises, to see as
they don’t run away,” nodded the man, complacently; “and if I don’t
mistake, there’s a safe watcher over something else upstairs.”
“What a cursed scoundrel Mount Severn was.”
“Whatever he may have been, it does not give you the right to outrage
the feelings of his daughter,” warmly interrupted Mr. Carlyle; “and I
should have thought that men, calling themselves Englishmen, would have
disdained the shame. Allow me, Lady Isabel,” he added, imperatively
taking her hand to lead her from the room. “I will remain and deal with
this business.”
But she hesitated and stopped. The injury her father had done these men
was telling painfully on her sense of right, and she essayed to speak a
word of apology, of sorrow; she thought she ought to do so; she did not
like them to deem her quite heartless. But it was a painful task, and
the color went and came in her pale face, and her breath was labored
with the excess of her tribulation.
“I am very sorry,” she stammered; and with the effort of speaking,
emotion quite got the better of her, and she burst into tears. “I did
not know anything of all this; my father’s affairs were not spoken of
before me. I believe I have not anything; if I had, I would divide it
amongst you as equally as I could. But, should the means ever be in my
power--should money ever be mine, I will thankfully pay all your
claims.”
All your claims! Lady Isabel little thought what that “all” would
comprise. However, such promises, made at such a moment, fell heedlessly
upon the ear. Scarcely one present but felt sympathy and sorrow for her,
and Mr. Carlyle drew her from the room. He closed the door upon the
noisy crew, and then sobs came forth hysterically.
“I am so grieved, Lady Isabel! Had I foreseen this annoyance, you should
have been spared it. Can you go upstairs alone, or shall I call Mrs.
Mason?”
“Oh, yes! I can go alone; I am not ill, only frightened and sick. This
is not the worst,” she shivered. “There are two men up--up--with papa.”
“Up with papa.” Mr. Carlyle was puzzled. He saw that she was shaking
from head to foot, as she stood before him.
“I cannot understand it, and it terrifies me,” she continued, attempting
an explanation. “They are sitting in the room, close to him: they have
taken him, they say.”
A blank, thunderstruck pause. Mr. Carlyle looked at her--he did not
speak; and then he turned and looked at the butler, who was standing
near. But the man only responded by giving his head a half shake, and
Mr. Carlyle saw that it was an ominous one.
“I will clear the house of these,” he said to Lady Isabel, pointing back
to the dining-room, “and then join you upstairs.”
“Two ruffians, sir, and they have got possession of the body,” whispered
the butler in Mr. Carlyle’s ear, as Lady Isabel departed. “They obtained
entrance to the chamber by a sly, deceitful trick, saying they were the
undertaker’s men, and that he can’t be buried unless their claims are
paid, if it’s for a month to come. It has upset all our stomachs, sir;
Mrs. Mason while telling me--for she was the first one to know it--was
as sick as she could be.”
At present Mr. Carlyle returned to the dining-room, and bore the brunt
of the anger of those savage, and it may be said, ill-used men. Not that
it was vented upon him--quite the contrary--but on the memory of the
unhappy peer, who lay overhead. A few had taken the precaution to insure
the earl’s life, and they were the best off. They left the house after a
short space of time; for Mr. Carlyle’s statement was indisputable, and
they knew the law better than to remain, trespassers on his property.
But the custodians of the dead could not be got rid of. Mr. Carlyle
proceeded to the death-chamber, and examined their authority. A similar
case had never occurred under his own observation, though it had under
his father’s, and Mr. Carlyle remembered hearing of it. The body of a
church dignitary, who had died deeply in debt, was arrested as it was
being carried through the cloisters to its grave in the cathedral. These
men, sitting over Lord Mount Severn, enforced heavy claims; and there
they must sit until the arrival of Mr. Vane from Castle Marling--now the
Earl of Mount Severn.
On the following morning, Sunday, Mr. Carlyle proceeded again to East
Lynne, and found, to his surprise, that there was no arrival. Isabel sat
in the breakfast-room alone, the meal on the table untouched, and she
shivering--as it seemed--on a low ottoman before the fire. She looked so
ill that Mr. Carlyle could not forbear remarking upon it.
“I have not slept, and I am very cold,” she answered. “I did not close
my eyes all night, I was so terrified.”
“Terrified at what?” he asked.
“At those men,” she whispered. “It is strange that Mr. Vane has not
come.”
“Is the post in?”
“I don’t know,” she apathetically replied. “I have received nothing.”
She had scarcely spoke when the butler entered with his salver full of
letters, most of them bearing condolence with Lady Isabel. She singled
out one and hastened to open it, for it bore the Castle Marling post-
mark. “It is Mrs. Vane’s handwriting,” she remarked to Mr. Carlyle.
CASTLE MARLING, Saturday.
“MY DEAR ISABEL--I am dreadfully grieved and shocked at the news
conveyed in Mr. Carlyle’s letter to my husband, for he has gone cruising
in his yacht, and I opened it. Goodness knows where he may be, round the
coast somewhere, but he said he should be home for Sunday, and as he is
pretty punctual in keeping his word, I expect him. Be assured he will
not lose a moment in hastening to East Lynne.
“I cannot express what I feel for you, and am too bouleversee to write
more. Try and keep up your spirits, and believe me, dear Isabel, with
sincere sympathy and regret, faithfully yours,
“EMMA MOUNT SEVERN.”
The color came into Isabel’s pale cheek when she read the signature. She
thought, had she been the writer, she should, in that first, early
letter, have still signed herself Emma Vane. Isabel handed the note to
Mr. Carlyle. “It is very unfortunate,” she sighed.
Mr. Carlyle glanced over it as quickly as Mrs. Vane’s illegible writing
allowed him, and drew in his lips in a peculiar manner when he came to
the signature. Perhaps at the same thought which had struck Isabel.
“Had Mrs. Vane been worth a rush, she would have come herself, knowing
your lonely situation,” he uttered, impulsively.
Isabel leaned her head upon her hand. All the difficulties and
embarrassments of her position came crowding on her mind. No orders had
been given in preparation for the funeral, and she felt that she had no
right to give any. The earls of Mount Severn were buried at Mount
Severn; but to take her father thither would involve great expense;
would the present earl sanction that? Since the previous morning, she
seemed to have grown old in the world’s experience; her ideas were
changed, the bent of her thoughts had been violently turned from its
course. Instead of being a young lady of high position, of wealth and
rank, she appeared to herself more in the light of an unfortunate pauper
and interloper in the house she was inhabiting. It has been the custom
in romance to present young ladies, especially if they be handsome and
interesting, as being entirely oblivious of matter-of-fact cares and
necessities, supremely indifferent to future prospects of poverty--
poverty that brings hunger and thirst and cold and nakedness; but, be
assured, this apathy never existed in real life. Isabel Vane’s grief for
her father--whom, whatever may have been the aspect he wore for others,
she had deeply loved and reverenced--was sharply poignant; but in the
midst of that grief, and of the singular troubles his death had brought
forth, she could not shut her eyes to her own future. Its blank
uncertainty, its shadowed-forth embarrassments did obtrude themselves
and the words of that plain-speaking creditor kept ringing in her ears:
“You won’t have a roof to put your head under, or a guinea to call your
own.” Where was she to go? With whom to live? She was in Mr. Carlyle’s
house now. And how was she to pay the servants? Money was owing to them
all.
“Mr. Carlyle, how long has this house been yours?” she asked, breaking
the silence.
“It was in June that the purchase was completed. Did Lord Mount Severn
never tell you he had sold it to me?”
“No, never. All these things are yours?” glancing round the room.
“The furniture was sold with the house. Not these sort of things,” he
added, his eye falling on the silver on the breakfast table; “not the
plate and linen.”
“Not the plate and linen! Then those poor men who were here yesterday
have a right to them,” she quickly cried.
“I scarcely know. I believe the plate goes with the entail--and the
jewels go also. The linen cannot be of consequence either way.”
“Are my clothes my own?”
He smiled as he looked at her; smiled at her simplicity, and assured her
that they were nobody’s else.
“I did not know,” she sighed; “I did not understand. So many strange
things have happened in the last day or two, that I seem to understand
nothing.”
Indeed, she could not understand. She had no definite ideas on the
subject of this transfer of East Lynne to Mr. Carlyle; plenty of
indefinite ones, and they were haunting her. Fears of debt to him, and
of the house and its contents being handed over to him in liquidation,
perhaps only partial, were working in her brain.
“Does my father owe you any money?” she breathed in a timid tone.
“Not any,” he replied. “Lord Mount Severn was never indebted to me in
his life.”
“Yet you purchased East Lynne?”
“As any one else might have done,” he answered, discerning the drift of
her thoughts. “I was in search of an eligible estate to invest money in,
and East Lynne suited me.”
“I feel my position, Mr. Carlyle,” she resumed, the rebellious tears
forcing themselves to her eyes; “thus to be intruding upon you for a
shelter. And I cannot help myself.”
“You can help grieving me,” he gently answered, “which you do much when
you talk of obligation. The obligation is on my side, Lady Isabel; and
when I express a hope that you will continue at East Lynne while it can
be of service, however prolonged that period may be, I assure you, I say
it in all sincerity.”
“You are very kind,” she faltered; “and for a few days; until I can
think; until--Oh, Mr. Carlyle, are papa’s affairs really so bad as they
said yesterday?” she broke off, her perplexities recurring to her with
vehement force. “Is there nothing left?”
Now Mr. Carlyle might have given the evasive assurance that there would
be plenty left, just to tranquilize her. But to have used deceit with
her would have pricked against every feeling of his nature; and he saw
how implicitly she relied upon his truth.
“I fear things are not very bright,” he answered. “That is, so far as we
can see at present. But there may have been some settlement effected for
you that you do not know of. Warburton & Ware--”
“No,” she interrupted: “I never heard of a settlement, and I am sure
there is none. I see the worst plainly. I have no home, no home and no
money. This house is yours; the town house and Mount Severn go to Mr.
Vane; and I have nothing.”
“But surely Mr. Vane will be delighted to welcome you to your old home.
The houses pass to him--it almost seems as though you had the greater
right in them, than he or Mrs. Vane.”
“My home with them!” she retorted, as if the words had stung her. “What
are you saying, Mr. Carlyle?”
“I beg your pardon, Lady Isabel. I should not have presumed to touch
upon these points myself, but--”
“Nay, I think I ought to beg yours,” she interrupted, more calmly. “I am
only grateful for the interest you take in them--the kindness you have
shown. But I could not make my home with Mrs. Vane.”
Mr. Carlyle rose. He could do no good by remaining, and did not think it
well to intrude longer. He suggested that it might be more pleasant if
Isabel had a friend with her; Mrs. Ducie would no doubt be willing to
come, and she was a kind, motherly woman.
Isabel shook her head with a passing shudder. “Have strangers, here,
with--all--that--in papa’s chamber!” she uttered. “Mrs. Ducie drove over
yesterday, perhaps to remain--I don’t know; but I was afraid of
questions, and would not see her. When I think of--that--I feel thankful
that I am alone.”
The housekeeper stopped Mr. Carlyle as he was going out.
“Sir, what is the news from Castle Marling? Pound said there was a
letter. Is Mr. Vane coming?”
“He was out yachting. Mrs. Vane expected him home yesterday, so it is to
be hoped he will be here to-day.”
“Whatever will be done if he does not come?” she breathed. “The leaden
coffin ought to be soldered down, for you know, sir, the state he was in
when he died.”
“It can be soldered down without Mr. Vane.”
“Of course--without Mr. Vane. It’s not that, sir. Will those men allow
it to be done? The undertakers were here this morning at daybreak, and
those men intimated that they were not going to lose sight of the dead.
The words sounded significant to us, but we asked them no questions.
Have they a right to prevent it, sir?”
“Upon my word I cannot tell,” replied Mr. Carlyle. “The proceeding is so
rare a one, that I know little what right of law they have or have not.
Do not mention this to Lady Isabel. And when Mr. Va--when Lord Mount
Severn arrives, send down to apprise me of it.”