Keep your eye on him,
The man avoids me--knows that I now know him
Watch him!--as you would watch the wild boar when
He make against you in the hunter’s gap--
Like him he must be speared.
*****
He stands
Between me and a brave inheritance.
I may depend on you?
’Twere too late
To doubt it.
Let no foolish pity shake
Your bosom!
Byron.
The flight of Helen Grahame from her home was not followed by a
convulsion of the household. Its internal economy proceeded with the
same regularity as before. Mrs. Grahame, _minus_ her grand and beautiful
eldest daughter--the pride of her family--would, it was only natural
to expect, have been overwhelmed by agony, distress, apprehension and
unutterable woe at her mysterious bereavement. Love of offspring is
the prominent element of maternity. A she-bear is a most loving
mother, though its nature is none of the tenderest. Mrs. Grahame might
reasonably be credited with much mental suffering, in consequence of the
flight of her child, considering too how elegant, how accomplished, how
handsome that child was.
To say that she remained unaffected by any of the emotions commonly
produced by such an event, would be, perhaps, advancing too much; to say
that she displayed none of them--no, not one, is only truth.
Whatever might have been stirred up in the inner recesses of a nature
whose depths no mortal, save herself, had plumbed, remained concealed.
She permitted no line of anxious care to invade the regularity of
her smooth brow, nor did she allow her coldly placid bearing, or the
existing arrangements governing her daily movements, to undergo any
change.
Miss Grahame had left her home. Whither she had gone, wherefore, or in
what manner, she considered, from her point of view, to be that young
lady’s business alone. She was herself the last person in the world to
offer explanations to any one upon domestic occurrences. As well might
such a surrender of dignity be expected from imperial majesty. To the
inquiries of friends, it would be enough to say that Miss Grahame was
absent, and that was the only decided step she determined upon taking in
the really terrible event. She would, it is true, have gladly plied her
servants with the waters of Lethe, so that the past, which in any
way took in Miss Grahame, might be forgotten by them; but she made
no allusion to her; and, discharging, at a moment’s notice, Chayter,
Helen’s maid, sternly forbade her own attendant, or any other member of
the household, to repeat her daughter’s name in her presence.
Margaret Grahame wasted not her powers of imagination in endeavouring
to divine why her sister Helen had fled. She rather looked upon the
circumstance as one that had rid her of a formidable rival, and she
fixed her sluggish, single thought yet more steadfastly upon the young
Duke of St. Allborne.
Malcolm, exclusively under the control of his mother, when he heard from
her his sister’s flight, at her desire, moved not with a view of tracing
the fugitive. He thought her departure “deuced odd,” and wondered what
it could all mean; but, beyond an undefined feeling of surprise, mingled
with a vague anxiety, he was not more affected than if some attendant
pertaining to the household from childhood had mysteriously disappeared.
He had been, from early boyhood, at public schools, and had met his
sister only in the vacations, at which periods their intercourse,
under the forms of domestic etiquette laid down by Mrs. Grahame for the
observance of her children, was not more affectionate in its nature than
if they had been ceremonious acquaintances.
It is the common and natural tendency of public education--that is the
system which removes a child from home influences--to detach or diminish
filial and fraternal love. The young heart, always seeking for something
to love, fastens upon objects with which it comes in daily contact. Love
of kindred is weakened in the personal attachments formed at school;
and as, during the progress to man or womanhood, the opportunities for
correcting this evil are rather lessened by the extra studies imposed,
the youth of both sexes usually terminate the educational career with
a strong impression that parents are exacting; on the boy’s side, the
_pater_ having a predominant passion for stinginess; and, on the girl’s,
that “ma” has a great many ridiculous notions, and is only another form
of the odious grim feminine tyrant, from whose rigorous despotism she
has been just emancipated.
Perhaps, therefore, it is not so surprising that Malcolm Grahame went
out to dine with some friends in the Guards on the day of his sister’s
flight, his equanimity being not much more disturbed than usual.
Evangeline was the only one who appeared to feel acutely, and to see
the affair in its true light, but then she was considered to be of
weak intellect. It was a common thing for her to violate all “the
proprieties.” Her gentle, loving nature, her soft, womanly sympathies,
impelled her to do this, and her “puling absurdities,” as her mamma
styled the sweet evidences of her affectionate disposition, were allowed
to exhibit themselves only on sufferance. On this occasion, however,
she displayed such frantic, inconsolable grief, that she was dismissed
harshly to her own room, and was ordered to remain there until she
could quit it with a face serene and passionless, upon which remained no
traces of the suffering her sister’s flight had occasioned her.
Mr. Grahame had not been communicated with. His lady’s first impulse was
to telegraph to him to return instantly to London; upon second thoughts,
she decided to await his return.
With him she acted as with others--she simply expressed her will when
she adopted a course of action. It did not cross her that Mr.
Grahame might object to her mode of proceeding in respect to Helen’s
disappearance, but if it had, it would not have influenced her. It was
enough that she considered the course she had pursued the proper one.
Mr. Grahame stayed away from London longer than was expected. Freed from
embarrassments, he played the lord in his haughtiest and worst aspect.
His harshness and his despotic tyranny had obtained for him an outward
show of slavish deference, with a fierce under-current of mortal hatred.
This bowing down and worshipping had re-inflated him, and he returned
to his London mansion, swelled in feeling to the dimensions of a mighty
noble.
It was not until he presided at the dinner table that he noticed the
absence of his daughter Helen. It immediately occurred to him that she
was still too ill to leave her chamber. Nature asserting her right to
be heard, even in the icy dominion of pride’s stronghold, touched his
heart. He felt the twinge, and immediately-asked Mrs. Grahame respecting
her.
The servants waiting at table glanced at each other’s eyes; Margaret and
Malcolm sat coldly immovable; Evangeline’s gentle bosom heaved and fell;
she clasped her hands tightly together and looked down, striving to
restrain the hot tears which sprang up to her trembling lids. Mrs.
Grahame displayed not the slightest perceptible emotion, but replied to
her husband’s question by saying in a tone which he knew was intended to
preclude further inquiry at that time--
“Miss Grahame is from home.”
Mr. Grahame bent his head in acknowledgment, and removed the
conversation to the scene of his recent visit. He enlarged upon the
improved aspect of his estates, and upon the additions he intended to
make--what accession of territory, and what increase of tenantry he
had acquired, and was about to acquire. He described the torchlight
procession to welcome his arrival, and the vast assemblage gathered
to bid him farewell--nine-tenths of whom would have rejoiced at his
downfall with savage joy.
All the while he spoke, there was ringing in his brain the words--“Miss
Grahame is from home.” As he described the stately reception he gave his
tenants in the hall of his Scotch castle, feeling second to no monarch
in Europe, the words, “Miss Grahame is from home,” danced before his
eyes. Not one passage in his description, illustrative of his own
elevated position came gradually from his lips, but he heard those words
as if every one was a note in a death-peal.
“Miss Grahame is from home.” he thought, as he took wine with his wife.
Where? under what circumstances? Why should no place, no name be
mentioned? He dared not ask; he felt he durst not. He glanced furtively
at all the faces at table; from Evangeline’s only could he gather aught
to satisfy him that there was something unusual and unsatisfactory in
the disappearance of Helen. He said to her abruptly, but not austerely--
“A little wine, Evangeline. You do not look well, child.”
She turned her large, clear eyes, glittering with tears upon him; he saw
her small upper lip quiver, and he perceived that her heart was too full
for her to articulate a word, as she returned his salutation.
“There is something wrong!--something horrible has happened!” he
muttered to himself, and he became almost silent during the remainder of
the dinner.
When the cloth was cleared, the dessert spread upon the table, and the
servants had retired, he asked in a seemingly careless tone--
“How long has Helen been away? With whom is she staying?”
Mrs. Grahame’s brow slightly contracted. She produced a small,
beautifully finished pocket-book, and opening it, took from it her
daughter’s letter, which she handed to her husband.
“Miss Grahame’s room was one morning found by her nurse untenanted,”
she said; coldly; “that letter was discovered upon her toilette; such
explanation as it affords you have equally with myself; I know no more.”
Mr. Grahame’s eyes raced down the trembling characters penned by his
wretched child; and when he came to the conclusion; he looked up to his
wife in bewildered astonishment.
“What does all this mean?” he cried; almost fiercely Mrs. Grahame
shrugged her shoulders; a low sob burst from Evangeline’s lips.
“Mistress Grahame,” he exclaimed; with a strong Scottish accent; an
evidence of unusual feeling; “am I to understand that you are unable to
offer any further explanation than this miserable epistle affords?”
“You are, Mr. Grahame,” replied his wife; with cold sullenness.
“Did you make no effort to trace her?” he asked.
“None.”
“Have you no clue to the place of her flight?”
“None.”
“You have taken no steps in the matter whatever?”
“None.”
“Very extraordinary conduct; Mistress Grahame;” he cried; with a brow of
crimson--“a very unsatisfactory delay; madam.”
She glanced at him with her dull gray eyes.
“You are the head of the house; Grahame,” she replied. “You, as
such, will take the steps you deem expedient. For myself, I, as a
representative of a line whose annals are unstained, will never permit a
degenerate child to continue to move in the same circle, or breathe the
same air as myself. She has forgotten her position, her dignity, her
blood. She has forfeited her claim to her name; and, therefore, with her
own hand, has sundered the ties of affinity. In my eyes she is dead.”
Again a low cry of acute grief burst from Evangeline.
“Dead?”--repeated Mrs. Grahame, only a little more emphatically for the
interruption--“sunk into the depths of a grave from which there is
no earthly redemption. Mr. Grahame, your and my daughter, Margaret
Claverhouse, is now the eldest female representative of our name in your
family, and from this moment it will be so understood. Margaret we will
retire.”
She rose as she spoke, motioning to Margaret to follow her example.
As she did so, Evangeline flung herself wildly at her feet.
“Have mercy, madam!” she cried. “Helen is still your child. She is my
sister--my dear sister. Oh, in mercy, do not discard her! She is our
own flesh and blood. You are her mother. Oh, in the face of God, do not
forget that though she may have erred--she is but human. Christ forgave,
and came to save the erring. Mother, have mercy, as you hope for it at
the day of eternal judgment!”
Mrs. Grahame drew her dress angrily from the clutch of Evangeline. She
stepped back as the face of her half-swooning girl bowed itself upon her
feet, and she said sternly--
“Malcolm, raise this raving girl from her self-degradation. Unworthy of
her name, she pleads for one who has disgraced herself--and in vain;
Evangeline, retire to your room, and there remain until you can meet me
in a manner becoming your position as a Grahame.”
She turned to Mr. Grahame, and added haughtily, but emphatically--
“My path, you perceive, Mr. Grahame, has been selected. I shall pursue
it without swerving from it. I suggest this to you, that you may be able
to understand what I deem the proper course for you to adopt.”
She swept haughtily out of the room, closely followed by her daughter
Margaret.
Malcolm lifted his sister Evangeline up; he whispered to her not to make
herself a little fool about a thing that could not be helped; and was so
far animated by the common promptings of humanity, as to accompany’ her
to her chamber, seeing that she had hardly strength to get there alone.
Mr. Grahame, in the meanwhile, with contracted brow and in thoughtful
abstraction, made his way to his library.
He entered it slowly and moodily. The lamp which his servant had lighted
had been turned down; the whole of the further parts of the room were in
deep shadow.
“She has disgraced the name of Grahame,” he muttered between his set
teeth; “but how?--how? It is a black mystery; still she has gone--fled!
She must be discarded--disowned! How could _we_ receive her again? has
she not disgraced the name of Grahame?”
And he looked around him loftily and proudly.
He uttered a cry of horror.
Up on the shadowed cornice he saw written, in letters of lambent flame,
the frightful word--forgery!
He covered his eyes with his hands; and still, in fiery
characters--leaping, coruscating, glittering--he saw the
word--_forgery!_
He dared not look into either of the murky corners of the apartment, for
in one he expected to see sitting, grinning and gibbering at him like a
fiend, his arch accomplice, Chewkle.
Disgraced the name of Grahame! What, then, had _he_ done? In what
immaculate position did he stand, that he should close his door upon
his child--discard, disown her, upon a mere suspicion of error? He
slunk into a chair. He felt how hollow was his pride, how contemptible
himself. With an impatient and trembling hand he turned up the lamp,
until the room was one glare of light.
He rang his bell violently.
The summons was answered by Whelks.
“Tell me,” said Mr. Grahame, resuming his cold, austere manner, “has any
person been here desiring to see me privately during my absence?”
He alluded to Chewkle. He fully expected to be told that he had called
three or four times; he was, therefore, surprised to hear ‘Whelks answer
him negatively.
“Are you sure?” he said, pointedly.
“I am sure no person ’ave been of that deskripshun, sir,” the man
replied. “Oh! stay; there was one--yes, there was one, sir.”
“Who was that?” inquired Mr. Grahame, sharply.
“It was the small, little dwarf, who ’ave ’ad the janders offul,
sir--Mr. Gummy, sir,” responded Whelks.
“Mr. Gomer,” corrected Mr. Grahame, thoughtfully. Presently he said--
“Did that individual--that person named Chewkle not call in my absence?”
“No, sir,” returned Whelks, who had traced, to the best of his belief,
his missing sovring to him. “But Mr. Gummy asked me if he had called
lately, which I told him no; and he asked me if I know where I could
find him, which I tell him I ’ave not a idee.”
Mr. Whelks would have availed himself of it rather promptly if he had.
This absence of Chewkle in connection with the loss of the document
with Wilton’s forged signature, was both mysterious and disturbingly
perplexing. The painful doubts it gave birth to in his mind were not
relieved by the information that Nathan Gomer had been making inquiries
respecting him. He saw, however, that it would not do for him to appear
to seek Chewkle; he was likely to prove sufficiently a locust without
his taking such a step. He, therefore, determined to await his
appearance. Seeming to dismiss the subject from his mind, he turned over
a few letters which lay upon his table, and said in a deliberate, but
apparently apathetic tone----
“Send Miss Grahame’s maid to me.”
“A--a--Miss Grahame’s, sir,” said Whelks, with an air of embarrassment,
“A--a--Stalker, sir?”
“No,” returned Mr. Grahame, with a frown “Miss Grahame’s maid,
Chayter--that is her name, I think.”
“Oh--oh, yaas--yaas, sir. She ’ave gone sir.”
“Discharged?”
“A--yaas, sir, yaas.”
“Do you know where she is to be found?”
“I think I ’ave a impression it is--at least her hadver-tisement come
out at----”
“Find her and bring her to me instantly--quietly, you understand.”
Whelks bowed and retired; he guessed his master’s object, and very
quickly unkennelled Chayter, who likewise suspected the reason why Mr.
Grahame sent for her, and prepared herself accordingly.
Within a short time from receiving his instructions,
Whelks introduced Chayter into the library, and stationed himself
outside the door, with his ear to the keyhole, to put himself in
possession of what transpired at the interview, but a current of air so
sharp and so steady poured through the small opening into his ear, that
he was compelled to retire, to avoid another onslaught of his ear-ache.
Chayter’s quick eye detected, as soon as she was alone with Mr. Grahame,
a little pile of sovereigns, some eight or ten, upon the table. Mr.
Grahame pointed to them.
“They shall be yours,” he said, “if you afford me any satisfactory
information respecting the disappearance of Miss Grahame.”
“I can only tell you what I know sir,” replied the girl, regarding the
sovereigns with a wishful eye.
“And what you may have reason to assume,” he added.
He then put a variety of questions to her, some of which she answered
truthfully, and others by mere invention. It was not much that he
ascertained, yet enough to know that Helen was in the habit of meeting
some person at night in the garden; that whoever he was, he frequently
addressed letters to her, and was no doubt the person who, being
discovered suddenly by the Honorable Lester Vane, had felled that
gentleman to the earth.
Mr. Grahame racked his brain to no purpose to fix upon some one likely
to be the man who had so singularly beguiled his daughter from her high
place, and at length he handed the money to Chayter, and bade her, if
she could obtain any further information upon the strange subject, to
communicate it to him, and she should be liberally rewarded.
“I’ll find her out,” said Chayter, when she left. “It will be worth my
while. She’ll be clever if she keeps herself hidden from me!”
Chayter was premature in her conclusions.
Mr. Grahame sat alone to reflect upon his situation. A cloud had once
more risen upon his fair sky, and threatened a storm. The flight, and
possible _mésalliance_ of his daughter Helen would certainly become
known, and prove humbling to the pride of his house. The arrangements
between himself and Wilton had yet to be completed. He had received
large sums of money, for which he had given acknowledgments, and should
anything arise to destroy the present understanding, his position would
be frightful. Utter ruin and beggary must at one blow ensue.
But there was no reason to presume that the proposition made by Nathan
Gomer, and acceded to by Wilton, would not be completed: there was a
possibility of his son Malcolm marrying Flora Wilton. Still there was
the possible contingency of something arising to prevent either being
accomplished. Ah! if old Wilton had but perished in the fire which had
consumed his house, or had died in prison, the whole of the wealth in
dispute would have come to him, Grahame.
If the old man were to die now--before the arrangement was completed
the same result would take place, for the existence of Mark Wilton was a
problem, so far as Grahame’s knowledge of him went.
If he were to die now!
Safety, wealth, and a future secure from the fears that now tortured
him, would be the consequence to him.
If he were to die now!
Grahame’s heart throbbed, and he felt cold as ice. He threw his eyes
stealthily round the library. He was alone!
The man was old. How small a thing might rob him of life; a common
accident--a potion administered in mistake--a subtle poison in fruit.
Mr. Grahame rose from his chair. Could he have seen the aspect of his
own features at this moment in the glass, he would have almost screamed
with horror. He tottered rather than walked to a book-case, and ran his
eye down the back of his books; presently he clutched at one, drew it
out, and moved back with it to the immediate vicinity of the lamp.
The book was labelled _On Poisons_.
With a hand which shook as if it was smitten with the palsy, he turned
over a few of the leaves, and began reading with some avidity, an
article on “Strychnos Tieuté, &c.”
Deeply interested in the revelations, he became unconscious of all else,
until the pressure of a heavy hand upon his shoulder caused him to start
with fright, and to spring back several feet.
Just where he had been standing, he beheld a grim, dirty-looking man,
whose clothes where shabby, greasy, and dusty; whose face was pale, and
whose eyes were red; whose matted hair was straggling over his forehead,
and whose thick, stubbly beard, rendered his grimy visage yet more foul
in its aspect.
Mr. Grahame stretched his hand towards the bell.
A sudden motion on the part of the stranger arrested his attention, and
then he saw, for the first time, that his visitor was no other than Mr.
Chewkle.
He gazed upon him with an emotion which partook of offended pride,
uneasy wonder, and a lurking, darkly foreboding fear.
Mr. Chewkle now present was not, at least in appearance, the Mr.
Chewkle first introduced to our readers. Then he was the decently-clad
commission agent; now he was the dirty ruffian. The change was so
remarkable as to extort an immediate remark from Mr. Grahame, who, with
knitted brows, demanded of him how he came to visit him in such filthy
guise.
“Never mind about that,” returned Mr. Chewkle, evincing by the tone of
his voice, his intention to dispense with ceremony and with deferential
respect. “I ain’t come here on a holiday visit, I can tell you. I came
about that forger----”
“Hush--hush, man! are you mad that you speak so loud?” interrupted Mr.
Grahame excitedly.
“Almost mad, and no mistake,” cried Mr. Chewkle, drawing the dirty cuff
of his coat across his parched and blackened lips. “I’ve been hunted
like a dog by the hofiicers, but I ain’t been run down yet, and I shan’t
be, if you does the thing that’s rights and you must, or by----”
“No threats, man,” again interposed Mr. Grahame, attempting to assume a
firm and haughty manner. “Tell me how it is you appear before me in this
disreputable condition, and for what you wish, in thus forcing upon me
an interview at so unseasonable an hour?”
Chewkle glared at him with red tiger-like eyes. He perused the features
of Mr. Grahame, as though to read in their expression the line of
conduct he intended to adopt with him.
“Lookee here,” he said, his beetling brows descending low enough to
hide the upper lids of his glittering eyes; “there can’t be no mistake
between us. That dockyment----”
“What document?”
“Oh! forgotten it so soon? That dockyment, bearing old Wilton’s name,
which you forged in my presence; that dockyment which you think to be
lost, but which isn’t, because I knows where it is, and can have it
brought forard at a minute’s notice; that dockyment which you would
swear, I dessay, that you’d never seen before, only you forget that
you made a davy, when it went to be registered, that the signature was
genuine, and was done in your presence--and in _mine_; that dockyment
which, a few years ago, would a’ hanged you at Newgate, and which now,
if I likes--mind, if _I likes_--will drag you before a judge and jury,
and turn you, mighty proud as you are, into a con-vick----”
“Silence, wretch! silence, or I’ll strangle you!” cried Mr. Grahame,
springing upon him in a paroxysm of rage and fright--Chewkle’s
volubility, urged by his irritation, having resisted all extravagant
signs and motions to check it.
He struck down Mr. Grahame’s vulture-like hands, and said--
“No, you don’t; and, mark me; take my advice, and be quiet, or I’ll make
your own ’ouse too ’ot to ’old you!”
“What do you want with me?” growled Mr. Grahame, in anxious fear.
Seeing that it would be useless to expostulate with, or threaten, such a
determined ruffian, he formed a hasty resolve to give him the money, or
some portion off it, that he expected he would require, and get rid of
him.
“I wants this of you--money?”
“I expected as much.”
“Ah! but not without earning it. I’ve got something to tell as will
startle you. Listen, and see whether it won’t be worth while to open
your purse to me, Old Wilton wants one link of evidence to make him
master of all that property you have been trying to get--don’t he?”
“He does.” replied Mr. Grahame, with a half-presentiment of what was to
follow.
“Well, that link I’ve found.”
“You?”
“I! I know where to clap my hand on it, and bring it to light; or--if
liberally renoomerated--to keep it dark.”
“Is this truth?” cried Mr. Grahame, petrified.
Mr. Chewkle immediately took a terrific oath to confirm its assertion.
“The link’s a man,” he added; “and his name is Josh Maybee, eh?”
“The same--the same--where is he?”
“Ah; that’s jest what I shall keep for the present to myself. I don’t
mind telling you that he does not know his own vally; and that I does;
and I means to make a trifle by him; either out of you or Mr. Wilton;
for if you don’t think it worth while to pay to keep the man dark; Mr.
Wilton will; I daresay; think very little of a hundred or two to have
him turn up.”
“Your intelligence is, indeed; important,” murmured Grahame with
colourless features; “you swear that he is living; and can easily be
produced?”
“I do.”
“I confess, if you are able to keep him out of the way, you are entitled
to a handsome sum from me.”
“I thought you’d hear reason.”
“A-hem--when--when you say that you--that you will keep the man
_dark_--those were yonr words, I think?”
Chewkle nodded.
“I feel I don’t precisely understand yonr meaning. Am I to be assured
that you will--will so arrange matters that--this man--this Maybee--can
_never_ appear again, either to disturb my peace, or--or to substantiate
Wilton’s claim to the estate?”
Mr. Grahame looked into Chewkle’s eyes with a strange meaning; Chewkle
read the expression correctly instantly, and he instinctively shuddered
and looked over his shoulder.
Then he whispered--
“Murder is it?”
Mr. Grahame threw his eyes slowly round the library, and then fastened
them again on Chewkle’s inflamed orbs--
“It would be the source of unceasing torture to me to know the evidence
of which you speak to be living, and that at any moment it might be
forthcoming.”
“That’s true,” muttered Chewkle.
“It would be to my interest to pay handsomely--very handsomely, if I
knew the evidence was”----
“Destroyed!”
“Exactly, Chewkle, my good fellow.”
“I wants money.”
“Pressingly?”
“Werry, werry pressingly.”
“How much at this moment?”
“Well, my position is jes’ this; I was a’pointed secretary and treasurer
to a benefit society, and a little while ago they wanted money in a
hurry, and I couldn’t let ’em ’ave it.”
“Embezzled their funds, I presume.”
“No, you speaks plain but not correctly. I had _borrowed_ ’em, and it
was inconvenient to return ’em jest when they wanted ’em. They was
rash, and wouldn’t listen to explanations, and set the police on me. I
have been hiding and seeking, and starving ever since. But I can square
it by paying the sum they lent me.”
“Or you lent yourself. What is its amount?”
“Just forty pun’--that’s all.”
“You want that sum now?”
“Or Josh Maybee must turn up to-morrow, in Wilton’s favour; the bobbies
are too close upon my heels to waste any time in parleying about it.”
Mr. Grahame drew forth his pocket-book, and from it selected a fifty
pound note. He opened it to the greedy eyes of Chewkle, but he retained
it while he spoke.
“I will give you this note now,” he said, slowly, and in a marked
manner, “to relieve you from your present difficulties. But I will give
you twice ten times that amount when I know that the evidence we have
spoken of cannot at any time--mind! at any time--be produced.”
“Give me the note,” said Chewkle. “You shall be made easy in a few days,
and I shall be as--as jolly as a sandboy again.”
Mr. Grahame gave him the note. He took it, and, after carefully reading
it, put it away into his pocket.
“Twenty o’ them will be worth fingering,” he said, with a grin, and
added abruptly, “and, perhaps, if old Wilton was to die _very_ suddenly,
it might be something in my pocket.”
A sickly smile passed over Mr. Grahame’s face.
“There is no telling what happens to old men,” he replied. “I have no
desire to harm the old fellow, but I would give a magnificent douceur
to the man who brought me tidings that he had been gathered to his
ancestors.” Then he added quickly--“Haste away, I expect some of my
family here--cannot you contrive to slip out unobserved?”
“Rather,” responded Chewkle, with a knowing look, “I came in by the
garding, and up the hanging staircase. Luckily, the winder was half
open, though the blind was down; I shall go back the same way.”
Mr. Grahame now understood the secret of his sudden and noiseless
appearance. He was not sorry to know that the man could retire from the
house without being seen, but he resolved that a like opportunity to
enter at unbidden moments should not be afforded him.
He watched him descend into the garden, listened to his stealthy tread
upon the smooth gravel path, and remained motionless until his intent
ear could detect no other sound than the rustle of leaves, stirred by
the soft breath of a gentle night breeze.
Then he returned to his table.
He took up the work “On Poisons.” He had hastily thrown it from him when
startled by the unexpected appearance of Chewkle.
He gazed with a self-possessed aspect at the book, opened it, closed it
with a smart clap, and then, walking with a firm step to his bookcase,
he replaced it.
“I shall not now need its aid,” he muttered.
Then he sat himself by his library table. After musing a moment or two,
he jerked his head once or twice, and ejaculated--
“What a scoundrel that fellow Chewkle is!”
Then he calmly applied himself to the perusal of some letters.