I certainly had every right to conclude that this would end my
adventures for the day. But I soon found that I was destined to have yet
another experience before returning to my home in New York.
The weather had changed during the last hour and at the moment I emerged
from the shadows of the hedge-row into the open space fronting the
Ocumpaugh dock, a gleam of lightning shot across the west and by it I
saw what looked like the dusky figure of a man leaning against a pile at
the extreme end of the boat-house. Something in the immobility
maintained by this figure in face of the quick flashes which from time
to time lit up the scene, reminded me of the presence I had come upon
hours before in front of Mrs. Carew's house; and moved by the instinct
of my calling, I took advantage of the few minutes yet remaining before
train time, to make my way in its direction, cautiously, of course, and
with due allowance for the possible illumination following those fitful
bursts of light which brought everything to view in one moment, only to
plunge it all back into the profoundest obscurity the next.
I had two motives for my proceeding. One, as I say, sprang from the
natural instinct of investigation; the other was kindlier and less
personal.
I did not understand the meaning of the posture which this person had
now assumed; nor did I like it. Why should this man--why should any man
stand like this at the dead of night staring into waters, which, if they
had their tale to tell, had not yet told it--unless his interest in the
story he read there was linked with emotions such as it was my business
to know? For those most openly concerned in Gwendolen's loss, the search
had ceased; why, then, this lone and lingering watch on the part of one
who might, for all I knew, be some over-zealous detective, but who I was
rather inclined to believe was a person much more closely concerned in
the child's fate, viz: the next heir-in-law, Mr. Rathbone. If it were
he, his presence there savored of mystery or it savored of the tragic.
The latter seemed the more likely hypothesis, judging from the
expression of his face, as seen by me under the lantern. It behooved me
then to approach him, but to approach him in the shadow of the
boat-house.
What passed in the next few minutes seemed to me unreal and dreamlike. I
was tired, I suppose, and so more than usually susceptible. Night had no
unfamiliar effects for me, even night on the borders of this great
river; nor was my occupation a new one, or the expectation I felt, as
fearful and absorbing as that with which an hour or two before I had
raised my lantern in that room in which the doleful mystery of half a
century back, trenched upon the still more moving mystery of to-day.
Yet, that experience had the sharpness of fact; while this had only the
vagueness of a phantasm.
I was very near him but the lightning had ceased to flash, and I found
it impossible to discern whether or not the form I had come there to
identify, yet lingered in its old position against the pile.
I therefore awaited the next gleam with great anxiety, an anxiety only
partly alleviated by the certainty I felt of hearing the faint, scarcely
recognizable sound of his breathing. Had the storm passed over? Would no
more flashes come? Ah, he is moving--that is a sigh I hear--no
detective's exclamation of impatience, but a sufferer's sigh of
depression or remorse. What was in the man's mind?
A steamboat or some equally brilliantly illuminated craft was passing,
far out in the channel; the shimmer of its lights gave sudden cheer to
the distant prospect; the churning of its paddles suggested life and
action and irresistibly drew my eyes that way. Would his follow? Would I
find his attitude changed?
Ah! the long delayed flash has come and gone. He is standing there yet,
but no longer in an attitude of contemplation. On the contrary, he is
bending over the waters searching with eager aspect, where so many had
searched before him, and, in the instant, as his face and form leaped
into sight, I beheld his clenched right hand fall on his breast and
heard on his lips the one word--
"Guilty!"