It was a doctor that I fetched, and not the police, for Mr Barclay lay
there quite insensible, and smelling as if he had taken to eating opium,
while Ned Gunning had so awful a cut across his temple that he would
soon have bled to death.
The doctor came and dressed the rascal's wounds as he was laid in my
pantry; but he shook his head over Mr Barclay, and with reason; for two
months had passed away before we got him down to Dorking, and saw his
pale face beginning to get something like what it was, with Miss
Virginia, forgiving and gentle, always by his side.
But I'm taking a very big jump, and saying nothing about our going
across to the house opposite as soon as it was daylight, to find the
door open and no one there; while the state of that basement and what we
saw there, and the artfulness of the people, and the labour they had
given in driving that passage right under the road as true as a die,
filled me with horror, and cost Sir John five hundred pounds.
Why, their measurements and calculations were as true as true; and if it
hadn't been for me missing that paper--which, of course, it was Edward
Gunning who stole it--those scoundrels would have carried off that
golden incubus as sure as we were alive. But they didn't get it; and
they had gone off scot-free, all but our late footman, who had
concussion of the brain in the hospital where he was took, Sir John
saying that he would let the poor wretch get well before he handed him
over to the police.
But, bless you, he never meant to. He was too pleased to get Mr
Barclay back, and to find that he hadn't the least idea about the golden
incubus being in the cellar; while as to the poor lad's sorrow about his
madness and that wretched woman, who was Ned Gunning's wife, it was
pitiful to see.
The other scoundrels had got away; and all at once we found that Gunning
had discharged himself from the hospital; and by that time the house
over the way was put straight, the builder telling me in confidence that
he thought Sir John must have been mad to attempt to make such a passage
as that to connect his property without consulting a regular business
man. That was the morning when he got his cheque for the repairs, and
the passage--which he called "Drinkwater's Folly"--had disappeared.
Time went on, and the golden incubus went on too--that is, to a big bank
in the Strand, for we were at Dorking now, where those young people
spent a deal of time in the open air; and Mr Barclay used to say he
could never forgive himself; but his father did, and so did some one
else.
Who did?
Why, you don't want telling that. Heaven bless her sweet face! And
bless him, too, for a fine young fellow as strong--ay, and as weak, too,
of course--as any man.
Dear, dear, dear! I'm pretty handy to eighty now, and Sir John just one
year ahead; and I often say to myself, as I think of what men will do
for the sake of a pretty face--likewise for the sake of gold: "This is a
very curious world."