Greatrakes was on his way from Birch Grove to Rathnllan House the next
day when he was met by Barney Casey, who had been on the lookout for
him. Barney, who knew not his person, was not capable of determining
whether he was the individual whom he wanted or not. At all events he
resolved at once to ascertain that fact. Accordingly, putting his hand
to his hat, he said, with a respectful manner,--
“Pray, sir, are you the great Valentine Great Rooke, who prevents the
people from dyin'?”
“I am Valentine Greatrakes,” he replied, with a smile; “but I cannot
prevent the people from dying.”
“Begad, but you can prevent them from being sick, at any rate. I am
myself sometimes subject to a colic, bad luck to it--(this was a lie,
got up for the purpose of arresting the attention of Greatrakes)--and
maybe if you would be kind enough to rub me down you would drive the
wind out of me and cure me of it, for at least, by all accounts through
the whole parish, it's a windy colic that haunts me.”
Greatrakes, who was a man of great goodnature, and strongly susceptible
of humor, laughed very heartily at Barney's account of his miserable
state of health.
“Well,” said he, “my good friend, let me tell you that the colic you
speak of is one of the most healthy diseases we have. Don't, if you
regard your constitution, and your health, ever attempt to get rid of
it. Your constitution is a windy constitution, and that is the reason
why you are graciously afflicted with a windy colic.”
It was, in fact, diamond cut diamond between the two. Barney, who had
never had a colic in his life, shrugged his shoulders very dolefully at
the miserable character of the sympathy which was expressed for him; and
Greatrakes, from his great powers of observation, saw that every word
Barney uttered with respect to his besetting malady was a lie.
At length Barney's countenance assumed an expression of such honest
sincerity and feeling that Greatrakes was at once struck by it, and he
kept his eye steadily fixed upon him.
“Sir,” said Barney, “I understand you are a distinguished gentleman and
a magistrate besides?”
“I am certainly a magistrate,” replied Greatrakes; “but what is your
object in asking the question, my good fellow?”
“I understand you are going to our Masther Charles Lindsay. Now, I wish
to give you a hint or two concerning him. His brother--he of the Evil
Eye--according to my most solemn and serious opinion, is poisoning him
by degrees. I think he has been dosing him upon a small scale, so as to
make him die off by the effects of poison, without any suspicion being
raised against himself; but when his father told him yesterday that you
were to come this day to cure him, his brother insisted that he should
sit up with him, and nurse-tend him himself. I was aware of this, and
from a conversation I heard him have with an old herbalist, named Sol
Donnel, I had suspicions of his design against his brother's life. He
strove to kill Miss Goodwin by the damnable force and power of his Evil
Eye, and would have done so had not you cured her.”
“And are you sure,” replied Greatrakes, “that it is not his Evil Eye
that is killing his brother?”
“I don't know that,” replied Barney; “perhaps it may be so.”
“No,” replied Greatrakes, “from all I have read and heard of its
influence it cannot act upon persons within a certain degree of
consanguinity.”
“I would take my oath,” said honest Barney, “that it is the poison that
acts in this instance.”
He then gave him a description of Woodward's having poured the
poison--or at least what he suspected to be such--into the drink which
was usually left at the bedside of his brother, and of its effect upon
the dog.
Greatrakes, on hearing this, drew up his horse, and looking Barney
sternly in the face, asked him,--
“Pray, my good fellow, did Mr. Woodward ever injure or offend you?”
“No, sir,” replied Barney, “never in any instance; but what I say I say
from my love for his brother, whose life, I can swear, he is tampering
with. It is a weak word, I know, but I will use a stronger, for I say he
is bent upon his murder by poison.”
“Well,” said Greatrakes, “keep your counsel for the present. I will
study this matter, and examine into it; and I shall most certainly
receive your informations against him; but I must have better
opportunities for making myself acquainted with the facts. In the
meantime keep your own secret, and leave the rest to me.”
When Greatrakes reached Rathfillan House the whole family attended him
to the sick bed of Charles. Woodward was there, and appeared to feel a
deep interest in the fate of his brother. Greatrakes, on looking at him,
said, before he applied the sanative power which God had placed in his
constitution,--
“This young man is dying of a slow and subtle poison, which some person
under the roof of this house has been administering to him in small
doses.”
As he uttered these words he fixed his eyes upon Woodward, whose face
quailed and blanched under the power and significance of his gaze.
“Sir,” replied Lindsay, “with the greatest respect for you, there is not
a single individual under this roof who would injure him. He is beloved
by every one. The sympathy felt for him through the whole parish is
wonderful--but by none more than by his brother Woodward.”
This explanation, however, came too late. Greatrakes's impressions were
unchanged.
“I think I will cure him,” he proceeded; “but after his recovery let him
be cautious in taking any drink unless from the hands of his mother or
his father.”
He then placed his hands over his face and chest, which he kept rubbing
for at least a quarter of an hour, when, to their utter astonishment,
Charles pronounced himself in as good health as he had ever enjoyed in
his lift.
“This, sir,” said he, “is wonderful; why, I am perfectly restored to
health. As I live, this man must have the power of God about him to
be able to effect such an extraordinary cure: and he has also cured my
darling Alice. What can I say? Father, give him a hundred--five hundred
pounds.”
Greatrakes smiled.
“You don't know, it seems,” he replied, “that I do not receive
remuneration for any cures I may effect. I am wealthy and independent,
and I fear that if I were to make the wonderful gift which God has
bestowed on me the object of mercenary gain, it might be withdrawn from
me altogether. My principle is one of humanity and benevolence. I will
remain in Rathfillan for a fortnight, and shall see you again,” he
added, addressing himself to Charles. “Now,” he proceeded, “mark me, you
will require neither drinks nor medicine of any description. Whatever
drinks you take, take them at the common table of the family. There are
circumstances connected with your case which, as a magistrate of the
county, I am I resolved to investigate.”
He looked sternly at Woodward as he uttered the last words, and then
took his departure to Rathfillan, having first told Barney Casey to call
on him the next day.
After Greatrakes had gone, Woodward repaired to the room of his mother,
in a state of agitation which we cannot describe.
“Mother,” said he, “unless we can manage that old peer and his niece, I
am a lost man.”
“Do not be uneasy,” replied his mother; “whilst you were at Ballyspellan
I contrived to manage that. Ask me nothing about it; but every
arrangement is made, and you are to be married this day week. Keep
yourself prepared for a settled case.”
What the mother's arguments in behalf of the match may have been, we
cannot pretend to say. We believe that Miss Riddle's attachment to his
handsome person and gentlemanly manners overcame all objections on the
part of her uncle, and nothing now remained to stand in the way of their
union.
The next day Barney Casey waited upon Greatrakes, according to
appointment, when the following conversation took place between them:--
“Now,” said Greatrakes, solemnly, “what is your name?”
As he put the question with a stern and magisterial air, his tablets and
pencil in hand, which he did with the intention of awing Barney into a
full confession of the exact truth--a precaution which Barney's romance
of the windy colic induced him to take,--“I say,” he repeated, “what's
your name?”
Barney, seeing the pencil and tablets in hand, and besides not being
much, or at all, acquainted with magisterial investigations, felt rather
blank, and somewhat puzzled at this query.
He accordingly resorted to the usage of the country, and commenced
scratching a rather round bullet head.
“My name, your honor,” he replied; “my name, couldn't you pass that by,
sir?”
“No,” said Greatrakes, “I cannot pass it by. In this business it is
essential that I should know it.”
“Ay,” replied Barney, “but maybe you have some treacherous design in it,
and that you are goin' to take the part of the wealthy scoundrel against
the poor man; and even if you did, you wouldn't be the first magistrate
who did it.”
Greatrakes looked keenly at him. The observation he expressed was
precisely in accordance with the liberality of his own feelings.
“Don't be alarmed,” he added; “if you knew my character, which it is
evident you do not, you would know that I never take the part of the
rich man against the poor man, unless when there is justice on the part
of the wealthy man, and crime, unjustifiable and cruel crime, on the
part of the poor man, which, I am sorry to say, is not an unfrequent
case. Now, I must insist, as a magistrate, that you give me your name.”
“Well, then,” replied the other, “I'm one Barney Casey, sir, who lives
in Rathfillan House, as a servant to Mr. Lindsay, step-father to that
murtherin' blackguard.”
Greatrakes then examined him closely, and made him promise to come to
Rathfillan that night, in order that he might accompany him to the hut
of old Sol Donnel, the herbalist.
“I am resolved,” said he, “to investigate this matter, and in my
capacity of a magistrate to bring the guilty to justice.”
“Faith, sir,” replied Barney, “and I'm not the boy who is going to stand
in your way in such a business as that. You know that it was I that put
you up to it, and any assistance I can give you in it you may reckon on.
Although not a magistrate, as you are, maybe I'm just as fond of justice
as yourself. Of coorse I'll attend you to-night, and show you the
devil's nest in which Sol Donnel and his blessed babe of a niece, by
name Caterine Collins, live.”
Greatrakes took down the name of Caterine Collins, and after having
arranged the hour at which Barney was to conduct him to Sol Donnel's
hut, they separated.
About eleven o'clock that night Barney and Greatrakes reached the
miserable-looking residence in which this old viper lived.
“Now,” said Greatrakes, addressing the herbalist, “my business with you
is this: I have a bitter enemy who wants to establish a claim upon my
property, and I wish to put him out of my way. Do you understand me? I
am a wealthy man, and can reward you well.”
“I never talk of these things in the presence of a third party,” replied
the herbalist, looking significantly at Barney, whom he well knew.
“Well,” replied the other, “I dare say you are right. Casey, go out and
leave us to ourselves.”
There was a little hall in the house, which hall was in complete
obscurity. Barney availed himself of this circumstance, opened the door
and clapped it to as if he had gone out, but remained at the same time
in the inside.
“No, sir,” replied Sol Donnel, ignorant of the trick which Barney had
played upon him, “I never allow a third person to be present at any of
those conversations about the strength and power of my herbs. Now, tell
me, what it is that you want me to do for you.”
“Why, to tell you the truth,” replied Greatrakes, “I never heard of your
name until within a few days ago, that you were mentioned to me by Mr.
Henry Woodward, who told me that you gave him a dose to settle a dog
that was laboring under the first symptoms of hydrophobia. Well, the dog
is dead by the influence of the bottle you gave him; but now that we
are by ourselves I tell you at once that I want a dose for a man who is
likely, if he lives, to cut me out of a large property.”
“O, Cheernah!” exclaimed the old villain, “do you think that I who lives
by curin' the poor for nothing, or next to nothing, could lend myself to
sich a thing as that?”
“Very well,” replied the other, preparing to take his departure, “you
have lost fifty pounds by the affair at all events.”
“Fifty pounds!” exclaimed the other, whilst his keen and diabolical eyes
gleamed with the united spirit of avarice and villany. “Fifty pounds!
well how simple and foolish some people are. Why now, if you had a dog,
say a setter or a pointer, that from fear of madness you wished to get
rid of, and that you had mentioned it to me, I could give you a bottle
that would soon settle it; I don't go above a dog or the inferior
animals, and no man that has his senses about him ought to ask me to do
anything else.”
“Well, then, I tell you at once that, as I said, it is not for a dog,
but for a worse animal, a man, my own cousin, who, unless I absolutely
contrive to poison him, will deprive me of six thousand a year. Instead
of fifty I shall make the recompense a hundred, after having found that
your medicine is successful.”
The old villain's eye gleamed again at the prospect of such liberality.
“Well now,” said he, “see what it is for a pious man to forget his
devotions, even for one day. I forgot to say my Leadan Wurrah this
mornin', and that is the raison that your temptation has overcome me.
You must call then to-morrow night, because I have nothing now, barrin'
what 'ud excite the bowels, and it seems that isn't what you want; but
if you be down here about this same hour to-morrow night, you shall have
what will put your enemy out of the way.”
“That will do then,” replied Greatrakes, “and I shall depend on you.”
“Ay,” replied the old villain, “but remember that the act is not mine
but your own. I simply furnish you with the necessary means--your own
act will be to apply them.”
On leaving the hut, Greatrakes was highly gratified on finding that
Barney Casey had overheard their whole conversation.
“You will serve as a corroborative evidence,” said he.
The herbalist, at all events, was entrapped, and not only his
disposition to sell botanical poisons, but his habit of doing so, was
clearly proved to the benevolent magistrate.
On the next night he got the poison, and having consulted with Casey, he
said he would not urge the matter for a few days, as he wished, in
the most private way possible, to procure further evidence against the
guilty parties.
In the meantime, every preparation was made in both families for
Woodward's wedding. The old peer, who had cross-examined his niece upon
the subject, discovered her attachment to Woodward; and as he wished
to see her settled before his death with a gentlemanly and respectable
husband--a man who would be capable of taking care of the property
which he must necessarily leave her, as she was his favorite and his
heiress--and besides, he loved her as a daughter--he was resolved that
Woodward and she should be united.”
“I don't care a fig,” said he, “whether this Woodward has property or
not. He is a gentleman, respectably connected, of accomplished manners,
handsome in person, and if he has no fortune, why you have; and I think
the best thing you can do is to accept him without hesitation. The
comical rascal,” said he, laughing heartily, “took me in so completely
during our first interview, that he became a favorite with me.”
“I think well of him,” replied his firm-minded niece; “and even I admit
that I love him, as far as a girl of such a cold constitution as mine
may; but I tell you, uncle, that if I discovered a taint of vice or want
of principle in his character, I could fling him off with contempt.”
“I wish to heaven,” replied the uncle, rather nettled, “that we could
have up one of the twelve apostles. I dare say some of them, if they
were disposed to marry, might come up to your mark.”
“Well, uncle, at all events I like him sufficiently to consent that he
should become my husband.”
“Well, and is not that enough; bless my heart, could you wish to go
beyond it?”
In the meantime, very important matters were proceeding, which bore
strongly upon Woodward's destiny. Greatrakes had collected--aided,
of course, by Barney Casey, who was the principal, but not the sole,
evidence against him--such a series of facts, as, he felt, justified him
in receiving informations against him.
At this crisis a discovery was made in connection with the Haunted
House, which was privately, through Casey, communicated to Greatrakes,
who called a meeting of the neighboring magistrates upon it. This he
did by writing to them privately to meet him on a particular day at his
little inn in Rathfillan. For obvious reasons, and out of consideration
to his feelings, Mr. Lindsay's name was omitted. At all events the night
preceding the day of Woodward's marriage with Miss Riddle had arrived,
but two circumstances occurred on that evening and on that night which
not only frustrated all his designs upon Miss Riddle, or rather upon her
uncle's property, but--however, we shall not anticipate.
It was late in the evening when Miss Riddle was told by a servant that a
young man, handsome and of fine proportions, wished to see her for a few
minutes.
“Not that I would recommend you to see him,” said the serving-woman who
delivered the message. “He is, to be sure, very handsome; but, then, he
is one of those wild people, and armed with a great mid-dogue or dagger,
and God knows what his object may be--maybe to take your life. As sure
as I live he is a tory.”
“That may be,” replied Miss Riddle; “but I know, by your description of
him, that he is the individual to whose generous spirit I and my dear
uncle owe our lives: let him be shown in at once to the front parlor.”
In a few minutes she entered, and found Shawn before her.
“O Shawn!” said she, “I am glad to see you. My uncle is using all his
interest to get you a pardon--that is, provided you are willing to
abandon the wild life to which you have taken.”
“I am willing to abandon it,” he replied; “but I have one task to
perform before I leave it. You have heard of the toir, or tory-hunt,
which was made after me and others; but chiefly after me, for I was the
object they wanted to shoot down, or rather that he, the villain, wanted
to murder under the authority of those cruel laws that make us tories.”
“Who do you mean by he?” asked Miss Riddle.
“I mean Harry Woodward,” he replied. “He hunted me, disguised by a black
mask.”
“But are you sure of that, Shawn?”
“I am sure of it,” he replied; “and it was not until yesterday that I
discovered his villany. I know the barber in Rathfillan where the black
mask was got for him, I believe, by his wicked mother.”
Miss Riddle, who was a strong-minded girl, paused, and was silent for a
time, after which she said,--
“I am glad you told me this, Shawn. I spoke to him in your favor, and he
pledged his honor to me previous to the terrible hunt you allude to, and
of which the whole country rang, that he would never take a step to
your prejudice, but would rather protect you as far as he could, in
consequence of your having generously saved my dear uncle's life and
mine.”
“The deeper villain he, then. He is upon my trail night and day. He
ruined Grace Davoren, who has disappeared, and the belief of the people
is that he has murdered her. He possesses the Evil Eye too, and would
by it have murdered Miss Goodwin, of Beech Grove, in order to get back
the property which his uncle left her, only for the wonderful power of
Squire Greatrakes, who cured her. And, besides, I have raison to know
that he will be arrested this very night for attempting to poison his
brother. I am a humble young man, Miss Riddle, but I am afeard that if
you marry him you will stand but a bad chance for happiness.”
“She was again silent, but, after a pause, she said--
“Shawn, do you want money?”
“I thank you, Miss Riddle,” he replied, “I don't want money: all I want
is, that you will not be desaved by one of the most damnable villains on
the face of the earth.”
There was an earnestness and force of truth in what the generous young
tory said that could not be mistaken. He arose, and was about to take
his leave, when he said,--
“Miss Riddle, I understand he is about to be married to you to-morrow.
Should he become your husband, he is safe from my hand--and that on your
account; but as it may not yet be too late to spake, I warn you
against his hypocrisy and villany--against the man who destroyed Grace
Davoren--who would have killed Miss Goodwin with his Evil Eye, in order
to get back the property which his uncle left her, and who would have
poisoned his own brother out of his way bekase his mother told him she
had changed her mind in leaving it to him (Woodward), and came to the
resolution of leaving it to his brother, and that was the raison why he
attempted to poison him. All these things have been proved, and I have
raison to believe that he will sleep--if sleep he can--in Waterford
jail before to-morrow mornin'. But,” he added, with a look which was so
replete with vengeance and terror, that it perfectly stunned the girl,
“perhaps he won't, though. It is likely that the fate of Grace Davoren
will prevent him from it.”
He did not give her time to reply, but instantly disappeared, and left
her in a state of mind which our readers may very well understand.
She immediately went to her uncle's library, where the following brief
dialogue occurred:
“Uncle, this marriage must not and shall not take place.”
“What!” replied the peer; “then he is none of the twelve apostles.”
“You are there mistaken,” said she; “he is one of them. Remember Judas.”
“Judas! What the deuce are you at, my dear niece?”
“Why, that he is a most treacherous villain: that's what I'm at,” and
her face became crimson with indignation.
“But what's in the wind? Don't keep me in a state of suspense. Judas!
Confound it, what a comparison! Well, I perceive you are not disposed to
become Mrs. Judas. You know me, however, well enough: I'm not going
to press you to it. Do you think, my dear niece, that Judas was a
gentleman?”
“Precisely such a gentleman, perhaps, as Mr. Woodward is.”
“And you think he would betray Christ?”
“He would poison his brother, uncle, because he stands between him and
his mother's property, which she has recently expressed her intention of
leaving to that brother--a fact which awoke something like compassion in
my breast for Woodward.”
“Well, then, kick him to hell, the scoundrel. I liked the fellow in
the beginning, and, indeed, all along, because he had badgered me so
beautifully,--which I thought few persons had capacity to,--and in
consequence, I entertained a high opinion of his intellect, and be
hanged to him; kick him to hell, though.”
“Well, my dear lord and uncle, I don't think I would be capable of
kicking him so far; nor do I think it will be at all necessary, as
my opinion is, that he will be able to reach that region without any
assistance.”
“Come, that's very well said, at all events--one of your touchers, as I
call them. There, then, is an end to the match and marriage, and so be
it.”
She here detailed at further length, the conversation which she had with
Shawn-na-Middogue; mentioned the fact, which had somehow become well
known, of his having wrought the ruin of Grace Davoren, and concluded by
stating that, notwithstanding his gentlemanly manners and deportment, he
was unworthy either the notice or regard of any respectable female.
“Well,” said the peer, “from, all you have told me I must say you have
had a narrow escape; I did suspect him to be a fortune-hunter; but then
who the deuce can blame a man for striving to advance himself in life?
However, let there be an end to it, and you must only wait until a
better man comes.”
“I assure you, my dear uncle, I am in no hurry; so let that be your
comfort so far as I am concerned.”
“Well, then,” said the peer, “I shall write to him to say that the
marriage, in consequence of what we have heard of his character, is
off.”
“Take whatever steps you please,” replied his admirable niece; “for most
assuredly, so far as I am concerned, it is off. Do you imagine, uncle,
that I could for a moment think of marrying a seducer and a poisoner?”
“It would be a very queer thing if you did,” replied her uncle; “but
was it not a fortunate circumstance that you came to discover his
real character in time to prevent you from becoming the wife of such a
scoundrel?”
“It was the providence of God,” said his niece, “that would not suffer
the innocent to become associated with the guilty.”
Greatrakes, in the meantime, was hard at work. He and the other
magistrates had collected evidence, and received the informations
against Woodward, the herbalist, and the mysterious individual who
was in the habit of appearing about the Haunted House as the
_Shan-dhinne-dhuv_, or the Black Spectre. Villany like this cannot be
long concealed, and will, in due time, come to light.
During the dusk of the evening preceding Woodward's intended marriage,
an individual came to Mr. Lindsay's house and requested to see Mr.
Woodward. That gentleman came down, and immediately recognized the
person who had, for such a length of time, frightened the neighborhood
as the _Shan-dhinne-dhuv_ or the Black Spectre. He was shown into the
parlor, and, as there was no one present, the following dialogue took
place, freely and confidentially, between them:--
“You must fly,” said the Spectre, or, in other words, the conjurer, whom
we have already described,--“you must fly, for you are to be arrested
this night. Our establishment for the forgery of bad notes must also
be given up, and the Haunted House must be deserted. The magistrates,
somehow, have smelled out the truth, and we must change our lodgings. We
dodged them pretty well, but, after all, these things can't last long.
On to-morrow night I bid farewell to the neighborhood; but you cannot
wait so long, because on this very night you are to be arrested. It
is very well that you sent Grace Davoren, at my suggestion, from the
Haunted House to what is supposed to be the haunted cottage, in the
mountains, where Nannie Morrissy soon joined her. I supplied them with
provisions, and had a bed and other articles brought to them, according
to your own instructions, and I think that, for the present, the safest
place of concealment will be there.”
Woodward became terribly alarmed. It was on the eve of his marriage, and
the intelligence almost drove him into distraction.
“I will follow your advice,” said he, “and will take refuge in what is
called the haunted cottage, for this night.”
His mysterious friend now left him, and Woodward prepared to seek the
haunted cottage in the mountains. Poor Grace Davoren was in a painful
and critical condition, but Woodward had engaged Caterine Collins to
attend to her: for what object, will soon become evident to our readers.
Woodward, after night had set in,--it was a mild night with faint
moonlight,--took his way towards the cottage that was supposed to be
haunted, and which, in those days of witchcraft and. superstition,
nobody would think of entering. We have already described it, and that
must suffice for our readers. On entering a dark, but level moor, he
was startled by the appearance of the Black Spectre, which, as on two
occasions before, pointed its middogue three times at his heart. He
rushed towards it, but on arriving at the spot he could find nothing. It
had vanished, and he was left to meditate on it as best he might.
We now pass to the haunted cottage itself. There lay Grace Davoren,
after having given birth to a child; there she lay--the victim of the
seducer, on the very eve of dissolution, and beside her, sitting on the
bed, the unfortunate Nannie Morrissy, now a confirmed and dying maniac.
“Grace,” said Nannie, “you, like me, were ruined.”
“I was,” replied Grace, in a voice scarcely audible.
“Ay, but you didn't murder your father, though, as I did; that's one
advantage I have over you--ha! ha! ha!”
“I'm not so sure of that, Nannie,” replied the dying girl; “but where's
my baby?”
“O! yes, you have had a baby, but Caterine Collins took it away with
her.”
“My child! my child! where is my child?” she exclaimed in a low, but
husky voice; “where's my child? and besides, ever since I took that
bottle she gave me I feel deadly sick.”
“Will I go for your father and mother--but above all things for your
father? But then if he punished the villain that ruined you and brought
disgrace upon your name, he might be hanged as mine was.”
“Ah! Nannie,” replied poor Grace; “my father won't die of the gallows;
but he will of a broken heart.”
“Better to be hanged,” said the maniac, whose reason, after a lapse of
more than a year, was in some degree returning, precisely as life was
ebbing out, “bekase, thank God, there's then an end to it.”
“I agree with you, Nannie, it might be only a long life of suffering;
but I wouldn't wish to see my father hanged.”
“Do you know,” said Nannie, relapsing into a deeper mood of her
mania,--“do you know that when I saw my father last he wouldn't nor
didn't spake to me? The house was filled with people, and my little
brother Frank--why now isn't it strange that I feel somehow as if I will
never wash his face again nor comb his white head in order to prepare
him for mass?--but whisper, Grace, sure then I was innocent and had not
met the destroyer.”
The two unhappy girls looked at each other, and if ever there was a gaze
calculated to wring the human heart with anguish and with pity, it was
that gaze. Both of them were, although unconsciously, on the very eve of
dissolution, and it would seem as if a kind of presentiment of death had
seized upon both at the same time.
“Nannie,” said Grace, “do you know that I'm afeard we're both goin' to
die?”
“And why are you afeard of it?” asked Nannie. “Many a time I would 'a
given the world to die.”
“Why,” replied Grace, who saw the deep shadows of death upon her wild,
pale, but still beautiful countenance,--“why Nannie, you have your
wish--you are dying this moment.”
Just as Grace spoke the unfortunate girl seemed as if she had been
stricken by a spasm of the heart. She gave a slight start--turned up her
beautiful, but melancholy eyes to heaven, and exclaimed, as if conscious
of the moment that had come,--
“Forgive me, O God!” after which she laid herself calmly down by the
side of Grace and expired. Grace, by an effort, put her hand out and
felt her heart, but there was no pulsation there--it did not beat, and
she saw by the utter lifelessness of her features that she was dead, and
had been relieved at last from all her sorrows.
“Nannie,” she said, “your start before me won't be long. I do not wish
to live to show a shamed face and a ruined character to my family and
the world. Nannie, I am coming; but where is my child? Where is that
woman who took it away? My child! Where is my child?”
Whilst this melancholy scene was taking place, another of a very
different description was occurring near the cottage. Two poachers, who
were concealed in a hazel copse on the brow of a little glen beside
it, saw a woman advance with an infant, which, by its cries, they felt
satisfied was but newly born.
Its cries, however, were soon stilled, and they saw her deposit it in a
little grave which had evidently been prepared for it. She had covered
it slightly with a portion of clay, but ere she had time to proceed
further they pounced upon her.
“Hould her fast,” said one of them, “she has murdered the infant. At all
events, take it up, and I will keep her safe.”
This was done, and a handkerchief, the one with which she had strangled
it, was found tightly tied about its neck. That she was the instrument
of Woodward in this terrible act, who can doubt? In the meantime both
she and the dead body of the child were brought back to Rathfillan,
where, upon their evidence, he was at once committed to prison, the
handkerchief having been kept as a testimony against him, for it was at
once discovered to be her own property.
During all this time Grace Davoren lay dying, in a state of the most
terrible desolation, with the dead body of Nannie Morrissy on the bed
beside her. What had become of her child, and of Caterine Collins, she
could not tell. She had, however, other reflections, for the young,
but guilty mother was not without strong, and even tender, domestic
affections.
“O!” she exclaimed, in her woful solitude and utter desolation, “if I
only had the forgiveness of my father and mother I could die happy; but
now I feel that death is upon me, and I must die alone.”
A footstep was heard, and it relieved her. “Oh! this is Caterine,” she
said, “with the child.”
The door opened, and the young tory, Shawn-na-Middogue, entered. He
paused for a moment and looked about him.
“What is this?” said he, looking at the body of Nannie Morrissy; “is it
death?”
“It is death,” replied Grace, faintly; “there is one death, but, Shawn,
there will soon be another. Shawn, forgive me, and kiss me for the sake
of our early love.”
“I am an outlaw,” replied the stern young tory; “but I will never kiss
the polluted lips of woman as long as she has breath in her body.”
“But Caterine Collins has taken away my child, and has not returned with
it.”
“No, nor ever will,” replied the outlaw. “She was the instrument of
your destroyer. But I wish you to be consoled, Grace. Do you see that
middogue? It is red with blood. Now listen. I have avenged you; that
middogue was reddened in the heart of the villain that wrought your
ruin. As far as man can be, I am now satisfied.”
“My child!” she faintly said; “my child! where is it?”
Her words were scarcely audible. She closed her eyes and was silent. The
outlaw looked closely into her countenance, and perceived at once that
death was there. He felt her pulse, her heart, but all was still.
[Illustration: PAGE 774-- Kiss you for the sake of our early love]
“Now,” said he, “the penalty you have paid for your crime has taken away
the pollution from your lips, and I will kiss you for the sake of our
early love.”
He then kissed her, and rained showers of tears over her now unconscious
features. The two funerals took place upon the same day; and, what was
still more particular, they were buried in the same churchyard. Their
unhappy fates were similar in more than one point. The selfish and
inhuman seducer of each became the victim of his crime; one by the just
and righteous vengeance of a heart-broken and indignant father, and
the other by the middogue of the brave and noble-minded outlaw. Who the
murderer of Harry Woodward, or rather the avenger of Grace Davoren,
was, never became known. The only ears to which the outlaw revealed the
secret were closed, and her tongue silent for ever.
The body of Woodward was found the next morning lifeless upon the
moors; and when death loosened the tongues of the people, and when the
melancholy fate of Grace Davoren became known, there was one individual
who knew perfectly well, from moral conviction, who the avenger of her
ruin was.
“Uncle,” said Miss Riddle, while talking with him on the subject, “I
feel who the avenger of the unfortunate and beautiful Grace Davoren is.”
“And who is he, my dear niece?”
“It shall never escape my lips, my lord and uncle.”
“Egad, talking of escapes, I think you have had a very narrow one
yourself, in escaping from that scoundrel of the Evil Eye.”
“I thank God for it,” she replied, and this closed their conversation.
There is little now to be added to our narrative. We need scarcely
assure our readers that Charles Lindsay and Alice Goodwin were in due
time made happy, and that Ferdora O'Connor, who had been long attached
to Maria Lindsay, was soon enabled to call her his beloved wife.
The devilish old herbalist, and his equally devilish niece, together
with the conjurer and forger, who had assumed the character of the
Black Spectre, were all hanged, through the instrumentality of Valentine
Greatrakes, who had acquired so many testimonies of their villainy and
their crimes as enabled him, in conjunction with the other magistrates
of the county, to obtain such a body of evidence against them as no jury
could withstand. It was, probably, well for Woodward that the middogue
of the outlaw prevented him from sharing the same fate, and dying a
death of public disgrace.
Need we say that honest Barney Casey was rewarded by the love of Sarah
Sullivan, who, soon after their marriage, was made housekeeper in
Mr. Lindsay's family; and that Barney himself was appointed to the
comfortable situation of steward over his property?
Lord Cockletown exercised all his influence with the government of the
day to procure a pardon for Shawn-na-Middogue, but without effect. He
furnished him, however, with a liberal sum of money, with which he left
the country, but was never heard of more.
Miss Riddle was married to a celebrated barrister, who subsequently
became a judge.