It was the evening of a beautiful day in February, when Chandos
Winslow returned by the lanes at the back of Northferry house towards
his gardener's cottage. The scene and the hour were peaceful; and
their tranquillity overspread his heart as if a balm were poured upon
it. Frosts had departed to the pole. A west wind, slightly veering to
the south, had brought the breath of summer from the distant lands.
The early-loving thrush was singing his first sweet song upon the top
of a bare tree. It was very pleasant. Chandos wished he had been born
a gardener. Nevertheless, he hurried his pace; for he had a rose to
tend. He fancied--he hoped that she might soon be by the little basin
of gold and silver fish; but he had only two ways of approaching it:
one by the gate near his own house, one by that at the other end of
the grounds, which would have brought him before the windows of the
mansion. He went into the cottage then for the key; and there good
dame Humphreys detained him, impatient, for a few minutes, telling him
how kind Miss Rose had been, coming down often to see little Tim; and
how the boy had been sent daily to the school in the village, from
which he had not yet come back, though it was late; and how the
gentleman, who had been there with him one night, (_i. e_. Lockwood,)
had been there the night before, and again, not ten minutes before,
asking about him, and exceedingly anxious to see him, and very much
provoked to find he had not come back; and how he had gone away
grumbling and mumbling, as the old woman called it, and saying to
himself, that as he, Mr. Acton, was not there, he must do it himself,
for there was no time to be lost.
Chandos did not mark her much; but merely telling her, if Lockwood
returned, to say that he would be back in half-an-hour, he took up a
light Dutch hoe, which stood in the corner of the cottage parlour, and
went out to the garden.
With a hand trembling with that sweet expectation which sometimes
shakes the powerful frame even more than the feeble one, he opened the
garden gate and went in. Close to the entrance he met one of the
labourers in the garden, who wished him good evening, and said he was
glad to see him, for the busy time was coming on. The man was going
home for the night, and Chandos soon got rid of him, and of one of the
boys who followed; for the sky was already very grey, and he feared
that any delay might deprive him of the sweet moments coveted. He felt
sure he should find Rose there. The very air seemed to breathe of
love. She could not be absent.
He was right. Rose was beside the marble basin, but her eyes were
dropping tears into it. He leaned the hoe against one of the pillars,
and her hand was soon in his. Chandos could not resist the impulse to
hold her for one moment to his heart.
"Oh, do not; do not, Chandos," she said. "I have much, very much to
tell you; and it is all sad."
"Speak, dear Rose," he answered; "let me hear it at once. Tell me
everything; tell me anything but that you are not mine--that you are
to be another's."
"Oh, no; it is not that," she said, with a faint smile. "I have not
time to tell you to-night, for you see it is growing quite dusk. Come
to-morrow. I must see you--I must speak with you."
"Oh, stay one minute!" cried her lover, detaining her; "let me know
something, at least, of what it is that grieves you--but a few words,
dear Rose."
"They must be very sad ones," she answered. "My father is ruined,
Chandos. My poor sister, dear, dear Emily, has consented, to save him
from immediate destruction, to wed, with terrible haste, a man she
does not, cannot love--your own brother, Chandos--and, oh!--what is
worse than all--I fear, I am sure, she loves another;" and Rose wept
bitterly.
Chandos was silent for an instant, holding her hand in his, and gazing
upon her with love and sympathy; but the next instant he heard voices
speaking, and steps advancing, in the narrow winding walk behind.
"Good Heaven, it is your brother!" cried Rose. "I hear his terrible
voice. Fly! fly! Where can I escape him?"
"Up that walk, dear girl," replied Chandos. "I will easily avoid him.
I will leap the hedge there. But let me see you safe first."
"No, no! Go at once, go at once," she cried; and Chandos, in obedience
to her wish, passed through between the pillars, and leaped the low
hedge which bordered a haw-haw that divided the grounds of Northferry
from the neighbouring fields. He had, at first, proposed to cross the
next enclosure at once, and return to his cottage; but it was lighter
beyond the precincts of the garden, than under the shadow of the
trees. He did not wish his brother to find him there; he wished to
assure himself that Rose got away unseen, and he remained on the other
side of the hedge, which, as he stood with his feet at the bottom of
the haw-haw, overtopped his head by about nine inches. He had no idea
that he would be witness to more than his brother passing by along the
walk, which approached within about ten paces of the haw-haw on one
side, and which skirted the little factitious ruin above the
fish-pond, within a foot or two, on the other. Had he had an idea of
the possibility even of his becoming an eves-dropper, he would not
have hesitated, but crossed the field at once; but the path was, as I
have said, at ten paces' distance, and unless the persons walking
along it spoke very loud, it was impossible for any one in the haw-haw
to hear more than an occasional word, unless the passers-by paused.
Thus much is necessary to the character of Chandos. He paused, but it
was to conceal himself, not to listen.
The moment after he had leapt the hedge, Sir William Winslow appeared
at the turn of the little path; but he was preceded a step by another.
His brother's figure Chandos recognised at once, notwithstanding the
growing obscurity; but, for an instant, he could not distinguish who
was his companion; for the short, slight-made man, who accompanied the
baronet, was wrapped in one of those loose formless sort of coats,
called paletôts. The next moment, however, the sound of their voices,
raised exceedingly high, and in angry tones, reached him as he stood
and gazed through the hedge; and he recognized that of Mr. Roberts.
None of the words were distinct; but it was evident that both were
highly excited; and, by the sharp and vehement gestures of Roberts, so
unlike his usual, quiet, and staid demeanour, and by the rapid pace at
which he walked, with the baronet following, Chandos judged that the
good steward was endeavouring to escape from provocation beyond
endurance, even to his tranquil and equable disposition. Just as they
came up to the little Greek temple, which had been built over the
fish-pond--that is to say, at the nearest point of the walk to the
spot where Chandos was concealed--Sir William Winslow laid a grasp
upon Roberts's collar, as if to stop him in his rapid advance,
exclaiming at the same moment, "Damn you, Sir, what do you mean?"
Roberts instantly shook off his grasp, and whirled round confronting
him. At the same moment he exclaimed vehemently, "I will not, Sir
William Winslow! If you will have it, I believe you burnt it."
The baronet instantly struck him with his fist, exclaiming, "You
damned rascal!" The next instant his eye seemed to light upon the
Dutch hoe, which Chandos had left leaning against the pillar. He
snatched it up, struck the steward a violent blow on the head with it,
which brought him instantly to the ground, and added another as he
fell.
Chandos sprang up, struggled over the hedge, and ran forward. But his
brother, hearing some one coming, darted away up the shrubbery walks,
and was out of sight in a moment. Kneeling down by poor Roberts's
side, the young gentleman raised his head. But what was his horror and
distress, when he found that the two middle fingers of his left hand
rested in a deep indentation in the skull, while a gaping wound in the
scalp, cut by the iron of the hoe, was pouring forth blood profusely!
Bending closely down, he saw a portion of the brain mingled with the
gray hair; and, with a feeling of sickening horror at his heart, he
laid the body gently on the ground again, and gazed at it for several
minutes, as if the sight had turned him into stone.
Oh, what a dark and terrible moment was that! What a whirlpool of
horrible thoughts did his brain become! What anguish of mind--what
wavering hesitation of purpose--what indignation--what sorrow did he
not feel! The first impulse was to run and call for assistance; but
then he shook his head, and murmured "He is dead! he is dead! No aid
can ever bring him back to life." Bending down again, he pressed his
hand upon the wrist, and then upon the heart. There was no pulsation.
All was still for ever! The complicated machine was broken, never to
be repaired again. The lamp drowned out, not to be re-lighted.
What should he do? How should he act? He had seen an honest, upright,
noble-minded man murdered before his eyes: but the murderer was his
own brother! They had lain in the same womb; they had hung at the same
breast; they had joyed in the same smiles; the same blood flowed in
their veins;--and yet one was a murderer, the other, the witness of
the crime. It was a terrible struggle. Duty called upon him to
denounce the criminal; indignation prompted him to the same course. By
that very brother's acts, brotherly love had long seemed extinguished
between them. Yet Chandos could not make up his mind to be his
brother's accuser, to give him up to trial and to death.
"I cannot--I cannot," he said, after a long and painful revery. "Poor
Roberts, I can do thee no good; and I cannot be a destroying angel to
my own race. 'Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, I will repay;'" and,
turning away from the fatal scene, he hurried back to the small gate
which led out towards his own cottage.