Laid to his Rest.
Foxwood heard the news. Mrs. Grey's shakey old gardener was dead,
James Hopley. Mr. Moore, when applied to for particulars, went into a
learned dissertation on chronic rheumatism, and said that he was not
able to save him.
Ann Hopley astonished the undertaker. She gave orders for three
coffins: and they must be of the best, she said, if it cost her a
hundred pounds. Her poor husband and she had saved money, and she
should like to spend it on him.
There was again a battle with the clerk. It had been bad enough when
Ann Hopley chose the ground for Mrs. Grey's little child, within the
precincts of that belonging to the Andinnian family; but to insist
upon it that her own husband, a servant, should also lie there, was a
piece of presumption the equal of which the clerk had never before
heard of. However, Sir Karl, not waiting to be appealed to this time,
called on the clerk, and said the woman might bury her husband there
if she pleased; he did not think it right in people to assume
exclusiveness after death, whatever they might do in life. The clerk
lifted his hands when Sir Karl's back was turned: radical notions such
as these would tend to demoralize the best conservative community.
It was while his brother was lying dead, that Sir Karl--truly Sir Karl
now--heard from his wife. She was ready to come to Foxwood, as Mrs.
Cleeve was about to return to Winchester, and she appointed the
following day, Tuesday, for Sir Karl to fetch her. It happened to be
the day fixed for the funeral, and Karl wrote back to say that he
could not leave home that day, but would fetch her on the Wednesday
instead. To this he received no reply; and he of course intended to
abide by it.
Tuesday came. About twelve o'clock in the day the funeral turned out
of the Maze gates; sundry curious ones amid the juveniles being
assembled to witness the exit. A funeral was not an every-day event at
Foxwood: and, besides, the Maze had been exciting interest of late. It
was a simple funeral. The plumed hearse and one mourning coach; the
undertaker and carriers walking. In the coach went Ann Hopley,
smothered in a hood, with Hewitt to bear her company. Foxwood said it
was very neighbourly and civil of the butler: but Miss Blake felt sure
he had received private orders from Sir Karl, and she wondered what
Sir Karl was coming to.
Now Lucy, Lady Andinnian, looking at things as she had been looking,
poor wife, for some time past, was very resentful that Sir Karl would
not fetch her on the day she named. She reasoned with herself that his
refusal must arise from one of two causes: either he was neglectfully
indifferent; or else he had some engagement with Mrs. Grey: for, of
deterring occupation, she believed he possessed none. Proudly angry,
she determined to take her own way, and return home without him.
Accordingly, on the Tuesday she started with her maid from London.
But, like many a one who does things in off-hand inexperience, she
made a mistake, and took the wrong train. That is, she took one that
did not stop at Foxwood. Lucy discovered this after she was in the
carriage, and found they must get out at Basham. Leaving Aglaé and the
luggage to wait for the next train, which would not be up for two
hours, Lucy took one of the waiting flies, and drove on.
Lucy was full of thoughts and anticipations. She wondered where her
husband was, what she should find him doing, and what excuse he would
make. It lasted her all the way: and they were close on Foxwood
village before anything occurred to arouse her. She woke up to find
the driver, who was a Foxwood man, had come very nearly to a
standstill, and was staring at a funeral procession just then entering
the churchyard.
The first object that caught Lucy's eye was Hewitt. Hewitt attired as
a mourner, and following the coffin. For a moment Lucy's heart beat
quicker, and her gaze was strained: who could it be that was inside
Gradually her eyes took in the whole of the scene: the spectators
collected in the distance, watching; the person enveloped in a silk
hood and cloak at Hewitt's side: Mr. Sumnor in his surplice.
All in a moment, as it seemed, just as the clergyman began to read,
springing she could not tell from whence, there advanced Sir Karl
Andinnian. He was in black attire, but wore neither crape band nor
scarf; and it might have been thought he was only an ordinary
spectator. Hewitt, however, drew a step back to give his master the
place of precedence, as though out of proper respect, as did Ann
Hopley: and Sir Karl took off his hat and stood there, close to the
coffin, his head bent low.
"How very strange it is!" thought Lucy. "Who can be in the
coffin?--and who is the woman in the black silk cloak and hood? There
is Mr. Smith, the agent, too!--he is standing near with his hat off
now."
"Lucy! Can it be you? We did not expect you until to-morrow."
The voice was Miss Blake's. St. Jerome's devotees were no more free
from curiosity than their inferiors; and a few of them had chanced to
be taking a walk past the churchyard just at the critical moment; of
whom Miss Blake was one.
"I thought I would come to-day, and not give Sir Karl the trouble of
fetching me," replied Lucy. "Aglaé is coming on from Basham by the
next train with the luggage. How are you, Theresa? Will you come
inside?"
Miss Blake's answer was to open the fly door, seat herself by Lady
Andinnian, and turn her gaze on the churchyard. The scene bore a charm
for her as well as for Lucy.
"Why, that's Sir Karl there!" she exclaimed in surprise, the
spectators' heads having intercepted her view while on the ground.
"Yes," assented Lucy. "And there's Hewitt--and Sir Karl's agent--and a
mourner with her face hidden. Who is it that is being buried,
Theresa?"
"Why, it's only the old gardener at the Maze. As to Hewitt, I suppose
he had to go to keep the woman in countenance. The old man was her
husband, you know."
"But what should bring Sir Karl there?"
"And standing first, as though he were chief mourner!" commented Miss
Blake, devouring the scene with her condemning eyes, and giving the
reins to her thoughts. "_I_ don't know why he is there, Lucy. There
are several things that I have not attempted to understand for some
time past."
"Is not that the part of the churchyard where the Andinnians lie?--
where their vault is?"
"It is. But Hopley is being buried there, you see: and that infant,
that you know of, was buried there. The clerk is in a fine way over
it, people say: but Sir Karl ruled that it should be so."
Thoughts connected with Mrs. Grey, and the inexplicable manner in
which Sir Karl seemed to yield to her humours, even to the honouring
of her servants, flashed into Lucy's brain. It did not tend to appease
her previous anger against him.
"Why could not Sir Karl come for me to-day, Theresa?"
"It is of no use to ask me, Lucy. Sir Karl does not explain his
motives to me. This funeral perhaps kept him," added Miss Blake,
sarcastically, unconscious how very near she was to the truth. "After
you left he seemed almost to live at the Maze. Last week he was there,
as I believe, for a whole day and a whole night. I _must_ speak, Lucy.
Out of regard to decency that girl ought to quit the Maze, or you quit
Foxwood."
"Drive on," cried Lucy to the coachman, in a tone as though the world
and all things in it were grating on her. And the man did not dare to
disobey the sharp command.
But Miss Blake preferred to get out; and did so. She had said what she
did say from good motives: and she took credit for not making worse of
the account--as she might have done. Not a word would she say about
his being called up in the night--and she knew now that it was to the
Maze he was summoned. With her whole heart she pitied Lucy.
"May I be forgiven if my duty ought to lie in silence!" she muttered
as she joined the Miss St. Henrys and others in the crowd. "Lucy seems
to have no friend about her in the World but me."
The interment was over. The procession--what was left of it--went its
way back again, Hewitt and Ann Hopley side by side in the coach. Sir
Karl strolled away over the fields, and presently found himself joined
by Mr. Smith.
"So your mission at Foxwood is over," he sadly cried to the latter. "I
have no more need to make believe I want an agent now."
"Ay, it's over, Sir Karl. Better for him almost that he had fallen in
the fray off Weymouth; that I had never saved him; than have lived to
what his life has since been."
"Better for him had he never come to the Maze," rejoined Sir Karl.
"It was none of my doing. As you know, sir."
"No: but you opposed his leaving it."
"As he was here, I did. I had but his interest at heart, Sir Karl:
although I know you have thought the contrary. The chances were that
he could not have got away in safety. In his own person he dared not
have risked it; and a decrepid figure like Old Hopley's must have
attracted attention. But for that detective's pitching upon Foxwood to
make a hunting place of, I believe Sir Adam would have been most
secure here."
"Well, it is over, with all its risks and chances," sighed Karl. "He
did not forget you when he was dying. His wish was that you should
enjoy a moderate annuity during your life: which I have undertaken to
pay."
The agent's thanks, and they appeared very heartfelt and genuine, were
cut short by the approach of Mr. Moore. He joined them as they walked
along; and the conversation fell on the illness of the deceased.
"There was no real hope from the beginning, once the disease had set
fairly in," cried the surgeon. "There never is. In Sir Adam's case,
the terrible anxiety he endured day and night brought it on, and
caused it to develop with unusual rapidity: there was not a shadow of
chance for him."
"You did not tell me that," said Karl.
"I was not quite sure of it myself at first: though I suspected it. I
did not tell you, you say, Sir Karl: well, no, not in so many words:
but your own eyes might have seen it as its progress went on. Sir Adam
knew it himself, I fancy, as surely as I."
"Do you remember saying you wished he could have further advice?"
asked Karl. "Did not that prove that you had hope!"
"I wished it chiefly for the satisfaction of those connected with him.
All the advice in the world could not--as I suspected then, and soon
saw--have availed to save his life. We sometimes say of people, death
has been a happy release for them. In his case, Sir Karl, it has been
most unquestionably so: he is at rest."