“More fire than lustre had his eye, his form
Less grace than grandeur.”
“Why am I summoned here, to mix with thine
My secret words, within the horrid cave
Of Moma?”
Near one of the entrances to ⸺haven, the chimneys and slating of a
miserable looking row of houses, appear quite at the feet of the
traveller; consequently, on a level with the road which runs along the
brow of the hill, in the side of which the backs of the houses are sunk,
while their faces front the valley.
About an hour after the conclusion of the events related in our last
chapter, but still before day-break, a horseman approached at a rapid
pace along the road just described. He turned the animal suddenly down a
narrow rugged abrupt descent, which brought him immediately in front of
the said row of houses.
The rider stopped, and, loosing his foot from the stirrup at the side
nearest the miserable dwelling, close to which his horse now stood,
kicked the door. It opened, and a figure appeared, the outlines of which,
as shewn by the light from behind, were easily to be recognised, as those
of the female equestrian. From the length of time, however, which has
elapsed, it may not be quite so easy to trace in her that bold strolling
thief and beggar, whom we have seen in the very first chapter of this
history, treat poor Edmund so cruelly. Yet she is the same individual.
By origin she was, what in Cumberland is called, a bottom lass; the most
opprobrious of terms, meaning one of those creatures, found to swarm in
that region of darkness, denominated, in the country of which we speak,
“the bottom.” Creatures who, if they can claim a mother for the first
few weeks after their birth, rarely can a father.
We are not aware that the profligate being whose history we are thus
tracing back, was ever christened; yet, in some way or other, she had
obtained the appellation of Jin of the Gins.
Jin, notwithstanding her lack of noble birth, happened to possess,
in extreme youth, some natural beauty; and by that circumstance was
promoted, at the early age of seventeen, to the rank of nominal wife to
a travelling tinker. With him, for a few years, she travelled, begged,
pilfered, and drank.
During this period it was that Edmund had, for the sake of his fine
clothes, become her prey. Shortly after having abandoned him, she was
caught in the act of achieving a more than usually daring robbery, for
which she must have been hung, had she not escaped from the magistrates
before she could be committed to the county jail. On this occasion she
returned, at about three and twenty, to her old asylum, the bottom;
where, shrouded in coal-dust and darkness, she has, up to the present
period, which brings her to about the age of three or four and forty,
laboured at bottom-work in the bowels of the earth, and often beneath the
bed of the ocean, amid hundreds of her own description.
To account for the equestrian prowess of Jin of the Gins, we must here
remark, that near to ⸺haven, and not far from the row of houses just
described, there is a broad covered way, leading down to the works by a
descent so gradual, that horses, cars, and even waggons can enter by it;
while daily may be seen emerging from it troops of colliers, mounted on
such animals as in a late chapter we have described, accoutred too with
chains which, like the traces of a just-loosed carriage-horse, trail on
either side, ready to hook to cars, waggons, &c.
But to return to the scene which was just commencing. The rider, in
answer to whose summons we left Jin in the act of opening the door, on
the threshold of which she now stood, accosted her thus, “Well, Jin of
the Gins, how is it with you?”
“Nane the bether for yeer axin,” she retorted.
“Is Sir Sydney come?” continued the querist.
“Comed!” she repeated, “Aye, and maire nor him.”
Our traveller threw his bridle to the gentle groom, whistled, advanced
a foot over the threshold, and paused in the act, till he heard an
answering whistle from within. He then proceeded, and entering a
miserably small earthen-floored apartment, on the side of the passage,
stood before Julia’s late conductor. This mysterious personage was still
wrapped in his boat cloak. He sat leaning on a little rickety round
table, whereon was placed a lantern which suffered but little of the
light it contained to escape, having, in place of glass, sides of rusty
tin, perforated with small holes like those of a colander.
“You have secured her, then?” said the traveller, as he entered.
“Where is Lord L.?” inquired the stranger, without rising or noticing the
question put to him.
“Pursuing on a wrong track,” replied the traveller.
“Have you brought the title-deeds?” demanded the stranger, in a tone that
few would have liked to have answered with a negative. The traveller
unbuttoned his great coat and took off his hat. It was Henry!
“I have,” he replied, after a moment of hesitation, and slowly undoing a
button or two of the inner coat.
“Give them to me, then!” said the stranger fiercely.
Henry drew a parcel of parchments halfway from his breast, then paused.
“What do you hesitate about, Sir?” said the stranger.
“I do not mean,” commenced Henry, “to sell the Craigs at present.”
“What of that?” said the stranger.
“You shall have the half of the rents,” continued Henry, in an
expostulating tone, “and when, at Lord L.’s death, she inherits her
proportion of his estates, then the Scotch acres may go to the hammer,
and you shall have the whole of the money they bring.”
The stranger, while with his eyes fixed on the face of the speaker, he
listened, had been slowly extracting a brace of pistols from his pockets,
and laying them on the table.
“And pray what security have I for all this unless the title-deeds are in
my own possession?” he demanded scornfully, and with affected coolness.
Then, with a sudden yell of rage, resembling the neigh of a wild horse,
and grinning in a terrific manner, he vociferated, “Lay down the
parchments, Sir!” striking the table as he spoke so violently with his
clenched hand, that the lantern spun round like a child’s top; and one of
the pistols leaping to the ground, went off.
Henry took the packet from his breast, and laid it down in silence.
The stranger drew it towards him, unfolded it, and corrected its tendency
to relapse into its former folds, by laying his pistols on either margin,
picking up for the purpose the one which had fallen. He then proceeded
to open the door of the lantern, whence poured a powerful but partial
light on the writings, and on his own countenance, as he bent over them
in the act of examining their contents. A fur travelling cap, with a band
tight to the forehead, displayed, fully, features of terrific strength,
and which, at the same time, presented a horrible sort of caricature of
manly beauty, distorted almost to wildness by the habitual exaggeration
of every desperate feeling. The scrutiny of the documents occupied some
time, during the whole of which Henry stood, and was silent. The stranger
having completed his task, refolded the parchments, and placed them in
his breast; then, closing the lantern, and restoring thus the scene of
conference to its former state of twilight, he re-charged the pistol,
which had gone off in its fall, placing it with its companion in his
pockets, and while doing so, said in a somewhat pacified tone: “These
deeds will not enable me to sell the estate without your concurrence;
though, their being in my hands, will secure me against your doing so
without mine. I shall be perfectly satisfied, at present, with half the
rents; but, that I may have no doubt or difficulty in receiving the said
moiety, you must, as soon as the marriage shall be proved——.”
“Have you procured witnesses?” interrupted Henry.
“I have: they are to meet us at ⸺.”
“Will they swear direct, that the ceremony was performed without
unwillingness on her part, or compulsion on ours?”
“Certainly! What else are they paid for?”
“And that will be sufficient?”
“Together with the certificate of the clergyman and clerk.”
“The clergyman is my old chum—of course?” said Henry. “He would, I know,
have no scruples, were she gagged and handcuffed at the altar!”
“Of course not,” replied the stranger. “But, to return to my subject: As
soon as the marriage shall have been proved, so as to entitle you to a
legal controul over the property, you must employ a proper agent, give
him sufficient powers and directions, to one-half of each year’s rent to
an address through which I can receive it without reference to you, and
the other half to an address by which you can receive it, without making
your actual residence known (that is, should concealment long continue
necessary). Have you any hope of reconciling Julia herself?”
“Not the slightest!” returned Henry. “When, indeed, she has been my
wife,” he continued, “long enough to be, perhaps, a mother, she may
not choose the publicity of a trial. Indeed, by that time, neither my
aunt, nor even Lord L. himself, could wish, I should think, to go to
extremities with so near a relation: even were the whole truth to come
out. In short, it could answer no desirable purpose! Lord L. must know
that his daughter would be more respectable in the eyes of the world as
my wife, and supposed to be willingly so, than by seeking any redress
the law could then give her, were it even possible to procure full
evidence that the marriage was compulsory, which I expect we shall render
impossible: so that I have no fears on that score. The three notes this
evening (for I left my fellow behind on pretext of bringing my luggage)
passed examination. I shall, therefore, have no difficulty, while
abroad, in keeping up a regular correspondence in her name with all her
friends. In short, when the numberless circumstances, however trivial in
themselves, which I have now for so long caused to bear on the one point,
receive this last crowning evidence, there will not remain the shadow
of a doubt on the mind of any one, that Julia has only waited to be of
age to elope with me. I expect, in fact, that the conviction on the mind
of every one will be so strong, that they will not think it necessary
to examine into any thing; and that one-half the precautions we have
taken will prove quite unnecessary. It is not at all unlikely, too, that
after a time she may, for the sake of being permitted to return to this
country, and reside near her friends, consent to declare, personally, I
mean, to her own family, that she married me willingly; in which case, we
could take up our residence at the Craigs.”
“In short,” continued Henry, “once she is in my power, I can compel her
to do any thing! How is she to help herself I’d be glad to know?”
“Fitz-Ullin is expected in the Sound, I find,” said the stranger, “what
a confounded untimely blow that old beldam’s confession was! By the bye,
I shall expect to be repaid the sums I have been obliged to give Jin
of the Gins, to keep her silent till after your marriage; and now that
she has been forestalled, (which was always what she feared,) and can
never get any thing from either party, her demands for compensation will
be exorbitant. Those, however, you must satisfy, now that you will have
funds.”
“How long is it now,” said Henry, “since she first consulted you on the
possibility of making a market of her secret, without getting hanged.”
“A few weeks,” replied the stranger, “previous to that cursed masquerade
at Arandale, when I wrote to you on the subject of the admission ticket.”
“That then was the first intimation you had,” said Henry, musing. “Had it
not been,” he added, after a short silence, “for the fortunate chance of
Ormond shooting himself, all must certainly have been lost.”
“There was too much left to chance in that business,” retorted the
stranger. “That night at Arandale should have rid us of all anxiety on
the subject. I ought to have answered his first question by blowing
out his brains! And that, before I palsied my arm with that cursed
fencing! Never, certainly, were there time and place so well calculated
for committing an act of the kind with perfect impunity. Since then, it
has never been possible to get near him, with any thing like a chance
of escape. I deserved, however, to fail for using such pitiful half
measures, where so much was at stake.”
“I never thought his removal so very necessary,” observed Henry.
“Fool!” replied the stranger, “How, if the public disclosure had been
made under almost any other circumstances? When can you come to ⸺?” he
added.
“I must first,” replied Henry, “join the Euphrasia, to avoid, in case of
failure, any thing like proof against me. It is impossible for her to
have the most remote guess who you are, so that were she even to escape,
while she had not yet seen me, all would still be safe! In short, we had
better not meet even for a moment, till we meet at the altar.”
The stranger paused, as if considering the subject; then, standing up,
said, “True! you set out immediately.”
Henry replied in the affirmative; and thus they parted.