IN WHICH AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR IS SEEN. IN THE CEDAR-PARLOUR OF THE
TILED HOUSE, AND THE STORY OF MR. BEAUCLERC AND THE 'FLOWER DE LUCE'
BEGINS TO BE UNFOLDED.
It was an awful night, indeed, on which all this occurred, and that
apparition had shown itself up at the Mills. And truly it would seem the
devil had business on his hands, for in the cedar-parlour of the Tiled
House another unexpected manifestation occurred just about the same
hour.
What gentleman is there of broken fortunes, undefined rights, and in
search of evidence, without a legal adviser of some sort? Mr. Mervyn, of
course, had his, and paid for the luxury according to custom. And every
now and then off went a despatch from the Tiled House to the oracular
London attorney; sometimes it was a budget of evidence, and sometimes
only a string of queries. To-night, to the awful diapason of the
storm--he was penning one of these--the fruit of a tedious study of many
papers and letters, tied up in bundles by his desk, all of them redolent
of ominous or fearful associations.
I don't know why it is the hours fly with such a strange celerity in the
monotony and solitude of such nightwork. But Mervyn was surprised, as
many a one similarly occupied has been, on looking at his watch, to find
that it was now long past midnight; so he threw himself back in his
chair with a sigh, and thought how vainly his life was speeding away,
and heard, with a sort of wonder, how mad was the roar of the storm
without, while he had quietly penned his long rescript undisturbed.
The wild bursts of supernatural fury and agony which swell and mingle in
a hurricane, I dare say, led his imagination a strange aërial journey
through the dark. Now it was the baying of hell hounds, and the long
shriek of the spirit that flies before them. Anon it was the bellowing
thunder of an ocean, and the myriad voices of shipwreck. And the old
house quivering from base to cornice under the strain; and then there
would come a pause, like a gasp, and the tempest once more rolled up,
and the same mad hubbub shook and clamoured at the windows.
So he let his Pegasus spread his pinions on the blast, and mingled with
the wild rout that peopled the darkness; or, in plainer words, he
abandoned his fancy to the haunted associations of the hour, the storm,
and the house, with a not unpleasant horror. In one of these momentary
lulls of the wind, there came a sharp, distinct knocking on the
window-pane. He remembered with a thrill the old story of the
supernatural hand which had troubled that house, and began its pranks at
this very window.
Ay, ay, 'twas the impatient rapping of a knuckle on the glass quite
indisputably.
It is all very well weaving the sort of dream or poem with which Mervyn
was half amusing and half awing himself, but the sensation is quite
different when a questionable sound or sight comes uninvited to take the
matter out of the province of our fancy and the control of our will.
Mervyn found himself on his legs, and listening in a less comfortable
sort of horror, with his gaze fixed in the direction of that small sharp
knocking. But the storm was up again, and drowning every other sound in
its fury.
If Mr. Mervyn had been sufficiently frightened, he would have forthwith
made good his retreat to his bed-room, or, if he had not been frightened
at all, he would have kept his seat, and allowed his fancies to return
to their old channel. But, in fact, he took a light in his hand, and
opened a bit of the window-shutter. The snow, however, was spread over
the panes in a white, sliding curtain, that returned the light of his
candle, and hid all without. 'Twas idle trying to peer through it, but
as he did, the palm of a hand was suddenly applied to the glass on the
outside, and began briskly to rub off the snow, as if to open a
peep-hole for distinct inspection.
It was to be more this time than the apparition of a hand--a human face
was immediately presented close to the glass--not that of Nutter
either--no--it was the face of Irons--pale, with glittering eyes and
blue chin, and wet hair quivering against the glass in the storm.
He nodded wildly to Mervyn, brushing away the snow, beckoning towards
the back-door, as he supported himself on one knee on the window-stone,
and, with his lips close to the glass, cried, 'let me in;' but, in the
uproar of the storm, it was by his gestures, imperfectly as they were
seen, rather than by his words, that Mervyn comprehended his meaning.
Down went Mr. Mervyn, without a moment's hesitation, leaving the candle
standing on the passage table, drew the bolts, opened the door, and in
rushed Irons, in a furious gust, his cloak whirling about his head
amidst a bitter eddying of snow, and a distant clapping of doors
throughout the house.
The door secured again, Mr. Irons stood in his beflaked and dripping
mantle, storm-tossed, dishevelled, and alone once again in the shelter
of the Tiled House, to explain the motive of his visit.
'Irons! I could hardly believe it,' and Mervyn made a pause, and then,
filled with the one idea, he vehemently demanded, 'In Heaven's name,
have you come to tell me all you know?'
'Well, maybe--no,' answered the clerk: 'I don't know; I'll tell you
something. I'm going, you see, and I came here on my way; and I'll tell
you more than last time, but not all--not all yet.'
'Going? and where?--what are your plans?'
'Plans?--I've _no_ plans. Where am I going!--nowhere--anywhere. I'm
going away, that's all.'
'You're leaving this place--eh, to return no more?'
'I'm leaving it to-night; I've the doctor's leave, Parson Walsingham.
What d'ye look at, Sir? d'ye think it's what I murdered any one? not but
if I stayed here I might though,' and Mr. Irons laughed a frightened,
half maniacal sort of laugh. 'I'm going for a bit, a fortnight, or so,
maybe, till things get quiet--(lead us not into temptation!)--to
Mullingar, or anywhere; only I won't stay longer at hell's door, within
stretch of that devil's long arm.'
'Come to the parlour,' said Mervyn, perceiving that Irons was chilled
and shivering.
There, with the door and window-shutters closed, a pair of candles on
the table, and a couple of faggots of that pleasant bog-wood, which
blazes so readily and fragrantly on the hearth, Irons shook off his
cloak, and stood, lank and grim, and, as it seemed to Mervyn, horribly
scared, but well in view, and trying, sullenly, to collect his thoughts.
'I'm going away, I tell you, for a little while; but I'm come to see
you, Sir, to think what I may tell you now, and above all, to warn you
again' saying to any living soul one word of what passed between us when
I last was here; you've kept your word honourable as yet; if you break
it I'll not return,' and he clenched it with an oath, 'I _daren't_
return.'
'I'll tell you the way it happened,' he resumed. ''Tis a good while now,
ay twenty-two years; your noble father's dead these twenty-two years and
upwards. 'Twas a bad murdher, Sir: they wor both bad murdhers. I look on
it, _he's_ a murdhered man.'
'He--who?' demanded the young man.
'Your father, Sir.'
'My father murdered?' said Mervyn.
'Well, I see no great differ; I see none at all. I'll tell you how it
was.'
And he looked over his shoulder again, and into the corners of the room,
and then Mr. Irons began--
'I believe, Sir, there's no devil like a vicious young man, with a hard
heart and cool courage, in want of money. Of all the men I ever met
with, or heard tell of, Charles Archer was the most dreadful. I used
sometimes to think he _was_ the devil. It wasn't long-headed or cunning
he was, but he knew your thoughts before you half knew them yourself. He
knew what _every_ one was thinking of. He made up his mind at a glance,
and struck like a thunderbolt. As for pity or fear, he did not know what
they were, and his cunning was so deep and sure there was no catching
him.
'He came down to the Pied Horse Inn, where I was a drawer, at Newmarket,
twice.'
Mervyn looked in his face, quickly, with a ghastly kind of a start.
'Ay, Sir, av coorse you know it; you read the trial; av coorse you did.
Well, he came down there twice. 'Twas a good old house, Sir, lots of
room, and a well-accustomed inn. An' I think there was but two bad men
among all the servants of the house--myself and Glascock. He was an
under hostler, and a bad boy. He chose us two out of the whole lot, with
a look. He never made a mistake. He knew us some way like a crow knows
carrion, and he used us cleverly.'
And Irons cursed him.
'He's a hard master, like his own,' said Irons; 'his wages come to
nothing, and his services is hell itself. He could sing, and talk, and
drink, and keep things stirring, and the gentlemen liked him; and he
was, 'twas said, a wonderful fine player at whist, and piquet, and
ombre, and all sorts of card-playing. So you see he could afford to play
fair. The first time he came down, he fought three duels about a tipsy
quarrel over a pool of Pope Joan. There was no slur on his credit,
though; 'twas just a bit of temper. He wounded all three; two but
trifling; but one of them--Chapley, or Capley, I think, was his
name--through the lungs, and he died, I heard, abroad. I saw him
killed--'twasn't the last; it was done while you'd count ten. Mr. Archer
came up with a sort of a sneer, pale and angry, and 'twas a clash of the
small swords--one, two, three, and a spring like a tiger--and all over.
He was frightful strong; ten times as strong as he looked--all a
deception.'
'Well, Sir, there was a Jew came down, offering wagers, not, you see, to
gentlemen, Sir, but to poor fellows. And Mr. Archer put me and Glascock
up to bite him, as he said; and he told us to back Strawberry, and we
did. We had that opinion of his judgment and his knowledge--you see, we
thought he had ways of finding out these things--that we had no doubt of
winning, so we made a wager of twelve pounds. But we had no money--not a
crown between us--and we must stake gold with the host of the "Plume of
Feathers;" and the long and the short of it was, I never could tell how
he put it into our heads, to pledge some of the silver spoons and a gold
chain of the master's, intending to take them out when we won the money.
Well, Strawberry lost, and we were left in the lurch. So we told Mr.
Archer how it was; for he was an off-handed man when he had anything in
view, and he told us, as we thought, he'd help us if we lost. "Help
you," says he, with a sort of laugh he had, "I want help myself; I
haven't a guinea, and I'm afraid you'll be hanged: and then," says he,
"stay a bit, and I'll find a way."
'I think he _was_ in a bad plight just then himself; he was awful
expensive with horses and--and--other things; and I think there was a
writ, or maybe more, out against him, from other places, and he wanted a
lump of money in his hand to levant with, and go abroad. Well, listen,
and don't be starting, or making a row, Sir,' and a sulky, lowering,
hang-dog shadow, came over Irons. 'Your father, Lord Dunoran, played
cards; his partner was Mr. Charles Archer. Whist it was--with a
gentleman of the name of Beauclerc, and I forget the other--he wore a
chocolate suit, and a black wig. 'Twas I carried them their wine. Well,
Mr. Beauclerc won, and Mr. Archer stopped playing, for he had lost
enough; and the gentleman in the chocolate--what was his name?--Edwards,
I think--ay, 'twas--_yes_, Edwards, it was--was tired, and turned
himself about to the fire, and took a pipe of tobacco; and my lord, your
father, played piquet with Mr. Beauclerc; and he lost a power of money
to him, Sir; and, by bad luck, he paid a great part of it, as they
played, in rouleaus of gold, for he had won at the dice down stairs.
Well, Mr. Beauclerc was a little hearty, and he grew tired, and was for
going to bed. But my lord was angry, and being disguised with liquor
too, he would not let him go till they played more; and play they did,
and the luck still went the same way; and my lord grew fierce over it,
and cursed and drank, and that did not mend his luck you may be sure;
and at last Mr. Beauclerc swears he'd play no more; and both kept
talking together, and neither heard well what t'other said; but there
was some talk about settling the dispute in the morning.
'Well, Sir, in goes Mr. Beauclerc, staggering--his room was the Flower
de luce--and down he throws himself, clothes an' all, on his bed; and
then my lord turned on Mr. _Edwards_, I'm sure that was his name, and
persuades him to play at piquet; and to it they went.
'As I was coming in with more wine, I meets Mr. Archer coming out, "Give
them their wine," says he, in a whisper, "and follow me." An' so I did.
"You know something of Glascock, and have a fast hold of him," says he,
"and tell him quietly to bring up Mr. Beauclerc's boots, and come back
along with him; and bring me a small glass of rum." And back he goes
into the room where the two were stuck in their cards, and talking and
thinking of nothing else.'