THE STORY OF THE MURDER.
Gerald Warburton had not been in London for some time, and two or
three days passed quickly and pleasantly away in hunting up old
acquaintances, and in seeing sights that he had never seen before.
Besides which, he wanted a little time to familiarize himself with the
thought of his new-found fortune. By nature and disposition, he was
one of the least worldly of men, and the wandering life he had led for
many years had tended to make him more unpractical than he might
otherwise have been. For money, as money, he cared nothing: nay, he
told himself that he thoroughly despised it: but that was probably an
exaggeration. He was one of those men who never think of saving--of
putting away for a "rainy day," as the phrase goes--and who never can
save, not even when their incomes are doubled or trebled, unless some
pressure of an extreme kind (a thrifty wife, for instance, who has a
will of her own) is brought to bear upon them.
As a matter of course, despite all Gerald's unpracticality, one of the
most frequent thoughts in his mind just now--a thought turned over and
over in his brain during his long solitary walks through London
streets--was what he should do with the ten thousand pounds that was
coming to him. He had quite made up his mind that the other ten
thousand should be handed over to his cousin Eleanor, as he could not
help still calling her to himself. Had anyone asked him a few days
previously whether ten thousand pounds would have satisfied all his
earthly wants from a monetary point of view, he would have laughed,
and answered that half that sum would satisfy his every wish. And yet,
now, when so much money was really coming to him, it was quite
remarkable what a long list of things that might almost be considered
indispensable he could count up in his mind. Instead of ten thousand,
thirty or forty would be needed before he could get through even the
first few pages of his mental catalogue.
But having got so far, Gerald was obliged to pull himself up suddenly.
He called to mind that it was not ten thousand a year that he was
coming into, but simply one sum of that value; and that, however
pleasant it might be to think how easily and agreeably to himself he
could have spent the whole of it in the course of a few days in London
or Paris, it would be the height of folly so to do; such an act would
indeed be killing the goose with the golden eggs. No: by judiciously
investing his ten thousand pounds, he might secure for himself a
comfortable little income of five hundred a year, which sum, when
added to the income he could already call his own, would serve to make
life tolerably pleasant in time to come. He would live in Paris, of
course: somehow he always felt more at home in Paris than in London.
He would be able to dabble a little more than heretofore among his
favourite bronzes, and coins, and old cups and saucers. He could
afford a stall rather oftener at the Opéra or the Français. He would
drink a choicer wine to his dinner, and honour his wine with a better
repast. A month or six weeks among the glaciers, or in the Black
Forest, need no longer be a serious question with him on the score of
expense. Altogether, he felt very well satisfied with the pleasant
future that seemed looming before him. That he was somewhat of an
Epicurean, addicted to self-indulgence, and hardly knowing the meaning
of self-sacrifice, cannot be denied; but it is to be hoped that we
shall not altogether lose our interest in him on that account. He had
many vague noble impulses, as most of us have at one time or another;
but, as yet, no necessity had arisen in his life for testing whether
those impulses were strong enough to bear chaining down to the hard
rough usages of everyday life.
Often in his solitary musings he would ask himself of what possible
use or service he was to the world in which he found himself; and now
and then a dim idea would trouble him for awhile that there were many
kinds of wheels turning in it, to one or other of which, if he were so
minded, he might put his shoulder with some little profit both to
himself and his fellows. But when next day came, it would find him
leading his old slip-shod far-niente kind of life. Amid the glitter
and bustle of the Boulevards, noble impulses and vague ideals seemed
of the stuff that poets rave about, and girls weave into the tissue of
their dreams.
The more Miss Bellamy saw of Gerald, the better she liked him. The
easy geniality of his disposition, and the soft courtesy of his
manner, were alike pleasing to her. Gerald, on his side, conceived a
very warm regard for the true-hearted lady who had been his dead
mother's dearest friend. He soon got into the way of calling her
"aunt"; the relationship seemed a natural one between them, and the
assumption was satisfactory to both.
Miss Bellamy's sitting-room was a pleasant apartment, with three
French windows that opened on a balcony and that looked out on the
grass and trees of the square. It was pleasantly furnished, too; in a
somewhat old-fashioned style it must be admitted; but then, Miss
Bellamy herself was somewhat old-fashioned, so that there was nothing
incongruous between the room and its mistress.
One of Miss Bellamy's most valued possessions was a portrait of her
uncle, the late Dean of Winstead. It was a three-quarter-length in
oils, with a very ornate frame, and it occupied a post of honour,
being hung immediately over the chimney-piece, where it at once
attracted the eyes of all who came into the room. The Dean, a
very atrabilious-looking gentleman, with a bald head, was represented
as seated at a table with one elbow resting on three thick volumes of
his own sermons, and with his thumb and forefinger pressed lightly
against his cheek. Pens and ink were upon the table, and the Dean was
presumably thinking out another of his discourses. Several copies of
his sermons, together with an income of three hundred a year, had come
to Miss Bellamy on the death of her reverend relative, so that she had
ample reasons for cherishing his memory. You could not pay Miss
Bellamy a higher compliment than to tell her that there was a strong
family likeness between herself and her uncle, and her admiration for
him rose almost to the height of hero-worship. She made a point of
reading one of his sermons through every Sunday of her life. Her firm
belief was that there were no such eloquent and soul-stirring appeals
to an unawakened conscience to be met with in the lukewarm religious
literature of to-day, and that you must go back to the days of Jeremy
Taylor to find anything like their equal. From long habit, when
sitting near a table, either thinking or working, she naturally fell
into the same pose as that of the Dean in his picture--her elbow
resting on the table, her thumb and forefinger pressed against her
cheek--and those who knew her weakness--her friends, her toadies, and
her pensioners--whenever they saw her sitting thus, would not fail to
remark to her how like she was to her Very Reverend Uncle.
However deeply Gerald's curiosity might be excited to hear the sequel
of the strange story which Miss Bellamy had promised to tell him, the
subject was evidently so painful a one to her that he could not
venture even to hint at his wishes in the matter. There was nothing
for it but to wait patiently till she should feel in the humour to
tell him what he wanted to know. He was in no particular hurry to take
the journey to Pembridge, and a few days more or less in London were
of no consequence to him. She had promised to tell him all about
Eleanor, and he felt sure that she would not break her promise. In so
thinking Gerald was quite right, but it was not until the evening of
the fourth day after his arrival in London that Miss Bellamy recurred
to the subject in any way.
"I will tell you to-morrow," she said to him that evening, as he shook
hands with her at parting. "And then you must get down to Pembridge as
quickly as you can. You have lingered in London quite long enough."
Miss Bellamy was a believer in suppers. In fact, she still stuck to
the old-fashioned hours for meals to which she had been accustomed
when a girl at home: dinner at half-past one, tea at six, and supper
at ten. In such a case supper is generally the pleasantest and most
sociable meal of all; people then seem more inclined for talking than
at any other time, and subjects that one hardly cares to mention
during the day seem to assimilate themselves quite naturally to the
time and place, and come to be discussed without much difficulty.
Supper was over, and the cloth removed. The night being cold, Miss
Bellamy had drawn her easy chair up close to the fire, and now sat
resting her chin in the palm of one hand, and gazing silently into the
glowing embers. Gerald, prepared to listen to a sad story, had thrown
himself into an easy chair opposite Miss Bellamy on the other side of
the fire. At length Miss Bellamy roused herself with a sigh, and
turned on Gerald a face that seemed suddenly to have grown five years
older.
"Twenty years ago, this very month," she said, "a terrible murder was
committed. All murders are terrible in a greater or a lesser degree,
but this one was terrible, not merely from the crime itself, but from
the after consequences that arose out of it. The name of the murdered
man was Paul Stilling; the place where he was murdered was the Pelican
Hotel, Tewkesbury; and the name of the man who was accused of the
crime was Ambrose Murray."
Gerald started.
"Stilling was a young man, the junior partner in a firm of Birmingham
jewellers. At the time he met with his death he had property on him of
the value of four thousand pounds. It was for the sake of this
property that he was murdered. He was found dead in his bed, stabbed
to the heart. In the portmanteau of Ambrose Murray, who was stopping
that night in the same hotel, was found a bracelet of the value of two
hundred pounds, which had belonged to Stilling. No other portion of
the property has, to my knowledge, ever been found from that day to
this.
"Ambrose Murray was arrested, committed for wilful murder,
subsequently tried, and condemned to death in due form," went on Miss
Bellamy. "Before, however, the time had come for carrying out the last
dread sentence of the law, symptoms of undoubted insanity manifested
themselves in the condemned man, and his sentence had to be commuted
into imprisonment for life."
Gerald sat lost in wonder.
"So far, I daresay, you see nothing uncommon in my story--nothing that
has any particular interest for you. But when I tell you that Ambrose
Murray's wife was my intimate friend, as well as being the intimate
friend of your mother and your aunt--when I tell you that Ambrose
Murray's wife died heart-broken within twelve months of the time her
husband was taken from her; when I tell you that the child adopted by
your uncle and aunt was none other than the child of a man condemned
to death for murder, and that Eleanor Lloyd is in reality Eleanor
Murray--when I tell you all this, you cannot say that my story has no
interest for you, you cannot say that I have claimed your attention
without sufficient warrant for so doing."
"What a strange chapter of family history you have opened for me,"
exclaimed Gerald. "What you told me the other night seemed to me
sufficiently wonderful, but this is stranger than all. Poor Eleanor
poor girl!" he added. "Although I have never seen her, I have always
felt that when we did meet I should come to regard her as a sister;
and now you tell me that I cannot even claim her as a cousin."
Miss Bellamy said nothing. She was gazing into the fire again, but
with thoughts that were far away. She was roused at last by a direct
question from Gerald.
"How much of the story you have just told me will be known to this Mr.
Kelvin, when he comes to open the sealed packet which you sent him by
my uncle's instructions?"
"He will know that Eleanor is no relation of your uncle, and that is
the news which he will have to break to her. Inside his own packet is
a second packet, sealed up and directed to Eleanor, and to be opened
by her alone. This packet will tell her everything."
"What a shock for a girl like her!"
"You are right, Gerald; it will be a terrible shock. I cannot tell you
how grateful I am that I have been spared the pain of enlightening
her."
"About her father. Did you believe him to be guilty or innocent?"
"I would stake my life on Ambrose Murray's innocence. No one who ever
knew him would for a single moment believe in his guilt. He was one of
the gentlest-hearted men I ever met. There was something almost
feminine about him. His was, indeed, a most lovable disposition."
"What was he by profession?"
"A doctor. He had been staying at Malvern for the benefit of his
health--he was always delicate--and was walking home by easy stages.
He had got as far as Tewkesbury, and happened to be stopping there on
that one particular night when Paul Stilling was murdered."
"Is he still alive?"
"He is. I saw him only a few months ago. In fact, I have been in
the habit of visiting him at intervals ever since his wife's death.
For many years he did not know me. But gradually--imperceptibly
almost--his reason has come back to him, and he is now, and has been
for the last five years, as sane as either you or I."
"Is there no prospect of his ever being released?"
"None whatever, I'm afraid. You see, the crime--assuming him for the
moment to have been guilty of it--was committed before his insanity
declared itself. It is not as though he had been a lunatic at the time
of the murder."
"What a terrible fate! Does he know that his daughter is alive?"
"He knows everything. It is at his own wish that Eleanor has been kept
in ignorance of her real parentage for so long a time; and, had Jacob
Lloyd lived, the secret would not have been told her even now."
"But how did it happen that none of the gossips of Pembridge found out
that Eleanor was not my uncle's child?"
"It was not till about a year after their adoption of the child that
your uncle, aunt, and Eleanor made their first appearance at
Pembridge, your uncle having just bought Bridgeley, where he lived
till he died. They had come from a town two hundred miles away, and
did not know a soul in the place."
"Has no rumour of the truth ever crept out?"
"Never, I am certain."
"And Eleanor herself has never had any suspicion?"
"Not the slightest, so far as I know. How should she? She was but
eleven months old when her mother died: far too young to have the
faintest recollection of anything that happened."
At this moment, they both heard a knock at the front door, but without
paying any heed to it. Miss Bellamy was never troubled with late
visitors. There were other lodgers in the house, and the knock could
come from no one in search of her.
But presently came the sound of footsteps on the stairs, followed by
Eliza's timid tap at the room door. "Come in," said Miss Bellamy, a
little more sharply than usual. She felt annoyed that her tête-à-tête
with Gerald should be thus interrupted.
The door opened, and Eliza's head was intruded. "A gentleman to see
you, ma'am. He won't give no name."
"A gentleman to see me!" said Miss Bellamy, as she started up in
surprise. She felt slightly scandalised to think that any gentleman
should be so indiscreet as to call upon her at such an hour as eleven
o'clock p.m.
But by this time the gentleman, who followed the girl upstairs, had
pushed himself into the room; and Eliza, a little frightened at his
audacity, slunk timidly out and shut the door quickly behind her.
"May I ask, sir----" began Miss Bellamy frigidly, and then something
in the stranger's face suddenly froze her into silence.
And yet not much of his face was to be seen, all the lower part of it
being hidden in the folds of a large plaid, and the upper part shaded
by the broad brim of a soft felt hat, from under which looked forth
two dark melancholy eyes of singular beauty. Miss Bellamy's hands
began to tremble, and she leaned against the table for support.
The stranger did not speak, but swiftly unrolling his plaid, let it
half drop to the ground and took off his hat. Miss Bellamy's face grew
as white as death. She started forward; and then she shrank back, all
a-tremble. Gerald Warburton's eyes turned from the stranger to her,
and then went back to the man; a tall, thin, frail-looking figure,
with a long white beard, and white hair that fell over the collar of
his coat.
"Sir--you--you are either Ambrose Murray or his ghost!" slowly gasped
Miss Bellamy. "In Heaven's name, what has brought you here?"
"I have escaped!" exclaimed the man in a low, hoarse voice. "Escaped
at last!"
He clasped his hands suddenly above his head, gave utterance to a
short, sharp, hysterical laugh, staggered forward a few steps, and
would have fallen to the ground had not Gerald Warburton caught him in
his arms.