ABOUT THE RIGHTFUL MRS. NUTTER OF THE MILLS, AND HOW MR. MERVYN RECEIVED
THE NEWS.
Little Doctor Toole came out feeling rather queer and stunned from
Sturk's house. It was past three o'clock by this time, and it had
already, in his eyes, a changed and empty look, as his upturned eye for
a moment rested upon its gray front, and the window-panes glittering in
the reddening sun. He looked down the street towards the turnpike, and
then up it, towards Martin's-row and the Mills. And he bethought him
suddenly of poor Sally Nutter, and upbraided himself, smiting the point
of his cane with a vehement stab upon the pavement, for having forgotten
to speak to Lowe upon her case. Perhaps, however, it was as well he had
not, inasmuch as there were a few not unimportant facts connected with
that case about which he was himself in the dark.
Mr. Gamble's conducting clerk had gone up stairs to Mrs. Nutter's door,
and being admitted, had very respectfully asked leave to open, for that
lady's instruction, a little statement which he was charged to make.
This was in substance, that Archibald Duncan, Mary Matchwell's husband,
was in Dublin, and had sworn informations against her for bigamy; and
that a warrant having been issued for her arrest upon that charge, the
constables had arrived at the Mills for the purpose of executing it, and
removing the body of the delinquent, M. M., to the custody of the
turnkey; that measures would be taken on the spot to expel the persons
who had followed in her train; and that Mr. Charles Nutter himself would
arrive in little more than an hour, to congratulate his good wife,
Sally, on the termination of their troubles, and to take quiet
possession of his house.
You can imagine how Sally Nutter received all this, with clasped hands
and streaming eyes, looking in the face of the man of notices and
attested copies, unable to speak--unable quite to believe. But before he
came to the end of his dry and delightful narrative, a loud yell and a
scuffle in the parlour were heard; a shrilly clamour of warring voices;
a dreadful crash of glass: a few curses and oaths in basses and
barytones; and some laughter from the coachmen, who viewed the fray
from outside through the window; and a brief, wild, and garrulous
uproar, which made little Sally Nutter--though by this time used to
commotion--draw back with her hands to her heart, and hold her breath.
It was the critical convulsion; the evil spirit was being eliminated,
and the tenement, stunned, bruised, and tattered, about to be at peace.
Of Charles Nutter's doings and adventures during the terrible interval
between his departure on the night of Mary Matchwell's first visit to
the Mills, and his return on this evening to the same abode, there is a
brief outline, in the first person, partly in answer to questions, and
obviously intended to constitute a memorandum for his attorney's use. I
shall reprint it with your leave--as it is not very long--verbatim.
'When that woman, Sir, came out to the Mills,' says this document, 'I
could scarce believe my eyes; I knew her temper; she was always damnably
wicked; but I had found out all about her long ago; and I was amazed at
her audacity. What she said was true--we _were_ married; or rather, we
went through the ceremony, at St. Clement Danes, in London, in the year
'50. I could not gainsay that; but I well knew what she thought was
known but to herself and another. She had a husband living then. We
lived together little more than three months. We were not a year parted
when I found out all about him; and I never expected more trouble from
her.
'I knew all about him then. But seventeen years bring many changes; and
I feared he might be dead. He was a saddler in Edinburgh, and his name
was Duncan. I made up my mind to go thither straight. Next morning the
_Lovely Betty_, packet, was to sail for Holyhead. I took money, and set
out without a word to anybody. The wretch had told my poor wife, and
showed her the certificate, and so left her half mad.
'I swore to her 'twas false. I told her to wait a bit and she would see.
That was everything passed between us. I don't think she half understood
what I said, for she was at her wits' ends. I was scarce better myself
first. 'Twas a good while before I resolved on this course, and saw my
way, and worse thoughts were in my head; but so soon as I made up my
mind to this I grew cool. I don't know how it happened that my
foot-prints by the river puzzled them; 'twas all accident; I was
thinking of no such matter; I did not go through the village, but
through the Knockmaroon gate; 'twas dark by that time; I only met two
men with a cart--they did not know me--Dublin men, I think. I crossed
the park in a straight line for Dublin; I did not meet a living soul;
'twas dark, but not very dark. When I reached the Butcher's Wood, all on
a sudden, I heard a horrid screech, and two blows quick, one after the
other, to my right, not three score steps away--heavy blows--they
sounded like the strokes of a man beating a carpet.
'With the first alarm, I hollo'd, and ran in the direction shouting as
I went; 'twas as I ran I heard the second blow; I saw no one, and heard
no other sound; the noise I made myself in running might prevent it. I
can't say how many seconds it took to run the distance--not many; I ran
fast; I was not long in finding the body; his white vest and small
clothes showed under the shadow; he seemed quite dead. I thought when
first I took his hand, there was a kind of a quiver in his fingers; but
that was over immediately. His eyes and mouth were a bit open; the blood
was coming very fast, and the wounds on his head looked very
deep--frightful--as I conjectured they were done with a falchion (a name
given to a heavy wooden sword resembling a New Zealand weapon); there
was blood coming from one ear, and his mouth; there was no sign of life
about him, and I thought him quite dead. I would have lifted him against
a tree, but his head looked all in a smash, and I daren't move him. I
knew him for Dr. Sturk, of the Artillery; he wore his regimentals; I did
not see his hat; his head was bare when I saw him.
'When I saw 'twas Doctor Sturk, I was frightened; he had treated me
mighty ill, and I resented it, which I did not conceal; and I thought
'twould look very much against me if I were any way mixed up in this
dreadful occurrence--especially not knowing who did it--and being alone
with the body so soon after 'twas done. I crossed the park wall
therefore; but by the time I came near Barrack-street, I grew uneasy in
my mind, lest Doctor Sturk should still have life in him, and perish for
want of help. I went down to the river-side, and washed my hands, for
there was blood upon 'em, and while so employed, by mischance I lost my
hat in the water and could not recover it. I stood for a while by the
river-bank; it was a lonely place; I was thinking of crossing there
first, I was so frightened; I changed my mind, however, and went round
by Bloody-bridge.
'The further I went the more fearful I grew, lest Sturk should die for
want of help that I might send him; and although I thought him dead, I
got such a dread of this over me as I can't describe. I saw two soldiers
opposite the "Royal Oak" inn, and I told them I overheard a fellow speak
of an officer that lay wounded in the Butcher's Wood, not far from the
park-wall, and gave them half-a-crown to have search made, which they
promised, and took the money.
'I crossed Bloody-bridge, and got into a coach, and so to Luke Gamble's.
I told him nothing of Sturk; I had talked foolishly to him, and did not
know what even he might think. I told him all about M. M.'s, that is Mary
Duncan's turning up; she went by that name in London, and kept a
lodging-house. I took his advice on the matter, and sailed next morning.
The man Archie Duncan had left Edinburgh, but I traced him to Carlisle
and thence to York, where I found him. He was in a very poor way, and
glad to hear that Demirep was in Dublin, and making money. When I came
back I was in the _Hue-and-Cry_ for the assault on Sturk.
'I took no precaution, not knowing what had happened; but 'twas night
when we arrived, Duncan and I, and we went straight to Gamble's and he
concealed me. I kept close within his house, except on one night, when I
took coach. I was under necessity, as you shall hear, to visit
Chapelizod. I got out in the hollow of the road by the Knockmaroon pond,
in the park; an awful night it was--the night of the snow-storm, when
the brig was wrecked off the Black Rock, you remember. I wanted to get
some papers necessary to my case against Mary Duncan. I had the key of
the glass door; the inside fastening was broke, and there was no trouble
in getting in. But the women had sat up beyond their hour, and saw me. I
got the papers, however, and returned, having warned them not to speak.
I ventured out of doors but once more, and was took on a warrant for
assaulting Sturk. 'Twas the women talking as they did excited the
officer's suspicions.
'I have lain in prison since. The date of my committal and discharge
are, I suppose, there.'
And so ends this rough draft, with the initials, I think, in his own
hands, C. N., at the foot.
At about half-past four o'clock Nutter came out to the Mills in a coach.
He did not drive through Chapelizod; he was shy, and wished to feel his
way a little. So he came home privily by the Knockmaroon Park-gate. Poor
little Sally rose into a sort of heroine. With a wild cry, and 'Oh,
Charlie!' she threw her arms about his neck; and the 'good little
crayture,' as Magnolia was wont to call her, had fainted. Nutter said
nothing, but carried her in his arms to the sofa, and himself sobbed
very violently for about a minute, supporting her tenderly. She came to
herself very quickly, and hugged her Charlie with such a torrent of
incoherent endearments, welcomes, and benedictions as I cannot at all
undertake to describe. Nutter didn't speak. His arms were about her, and
with wet eyes, and biting his nether-lip, and smiling, he looked into
her poor little wild, delighted face with an unspeakable world of
emotion and affection beaming from the homely lines and knots of that
old mahogany countenance; and the maids smiling, blessing, courtesying,
and welcoming him home again, added to the pleasant uproar which amazed
even the tipsy coachman from the hall.
'Oh! Charlie, I have you fast, my darling. Oh! but it's wonderful; you,
yourself--my Charlie, your own self--never, never, oh! _never_ to part
again!' and so on.
And so for a rapturous hour, it seemed as if they had passed the dark
valley, and were immortal; and no more pain, sorrow, or separation for
them. And, perhaps, these blessed illusions are permitted now and again
to mortals, like momentary gleams of paradise, and distant views of the
delectable mountains, to cheer poor pilgrims with a foretaste of those
meetings beyond the river, where the separated and beloved shall
embrace.
It is not always that the person most interested in a rumour is first to
hear it. It was reported in Chapelizod, early that day, that Irons, the
clerk, had made some marvellous discovery respecting Lord Dunoran, and
the murder of which an English jury had found that nobleman guilty. Had
people known that Mervyn was the son of that dishonoured peer--as in
that curious little town they would, no doubt, long since have, at
least, suspected, had he called himself by his proper patronymic
Mordaunt--he would not have wanted a visitor to enlighten him
half-an-hour after the rumour had began to proclaim itself in the
streets and public haunts of the village. No one, however, thought of
the haughty and secluded young gentleman who lived so ascetic a life at
the Tiled House, and hardly ever showed in the town, except in church on
Sundays; and who when he rode on his black hunter into Dublin, avoided
the village, and took the high-road by Inchicore.
When the report did reach him, and he heard that Lowe, who knew all
about it, was at the Phoenix, where he was holding a conference with a
gentleman from the Crown Office, half wild with excitement, he hurried
thither. There, having declared himself to the magistrate and his
companion, in that little chamber where Nutter was wont to transact his
agency business, and where poor Sturk had told down his rent, guinea by
guinea, with such a furious elation, on the morning but one before he
received his death-blow, he heard, with such feelings as may be
imagined, the magistrate read aloud, not only the full and clear
information of Irons, but the equally distinct deposition of Doctor
Sturk, and was made aware of the complete identification of the
respectable and vivacious Paul Dangerfield with the dead and damned
Charles Archer!
On hearing all this, the young man rode straight to Belmont, where he
was closeted with the general for fully twenty minutes. They parted in a
very friendly way, but he did not see the ladies. The general, however,
no sooner bid him farewell at the door-steps than he made his way to the
drawing-room, and, big with his amazing secret, first, in a very grave
and almost agitated way, told little 'Toodie,' as he called his
daughter, to run away and leave him together with Aunt Rebecca, which
being done, he anticipated that lady's imperious summons to explain
himself by telling her, in his blunt, soldierly fashion, the wondrous
story.
Aunt Becky was utterly confounded. She had seldom before in her life
been so thoroughly taken in. What a marvellous turn of fortune! What a
providential deliverance and vindication for that poor young Lord
Dunoran! What an astounding exposure of that miscreant Mr. Dangerfield!
'What a blessed escape the child has had!' interposed the general with a
rather testy burst of gratitude.
'And how artfully she and my lord contrived to conceal their
engagement!' pursued Aunt Rebecca, covering her somewhat confused
retreat.
But, somehow, Aunt Rebecca was by no means angry. On the contrary,
anyone who knew her well would have perceived that a great weight was
taken off her mind.
The consequences of Dangerfield's incarceration upon these awful
charges, were not confined altogether to the Tiled House and the
inhabitants of Belmont.
No sooner was our friend Cluffe well assured that Dangerfield was in
custody of the gaoler, and that his old theory of a certain double plot
carried on by that intriguing personage, with the object of possessing
the hand and thousands of Aunt Rebecca, was now and for ever untenable,
than he wrote to London forthwith to countermand the pelican. The
answer, which in those days was rather long about coming, was not
pleasant, being simply a refusal to rescind the contract.
Cluffe, in a frenzy, carried this piece of mercantile insolence off to
his lawyer. The stout captain was, however, undoubtedly liable, and,
with a heavy heart, he wrote to beg they would, with all despatch, sell
the bird in London on his account, and charge him with the difference.
'The scoundrels!--they'll buy him themselves at half-price, and charge
me a per centage besides; but what the plague better can I do?
In due course, however, came an answer, informing Captain Cluffe that
his letter had arrived too late, as the bird, pursuant to the tenor of
his order, had been shipped for him to Dublin by the _Fair Venus_, with
a proper person in charge, on the Thursday morning previous. Good Mrs.
Mason, his landlady, had no idea what was causing the awful commotion in
the captain's room; the fitful and violent soliloquies; the stamping of
the captain up and down the floor; and the contusions, palpably,
suffered by her furniture. The captain's temper was not very pleasant
that evening, and he was fidgety and feverish besides, expecting every
moment a note from town to apprise him of its arrival.
However, he walked up to Belmont a week or two after, and had a very
consolatory reception from Aunt Becky. He talked upon his old themes,
and upon the subject of Puddock, was, as usual, very friendly and
intercessorial; in fact, she showed at last signs of yielding.
'Well, Captain Cluffe, tell him if he cares to come, he _may_ come, and
be on the old friendly footing; but be sure you tell him he owes it all
to _you_.'
And positively, as she said so, Aunt Rebecca looked down upon her fan;
and Cluffe thought looked a little flushed, and confused too; whereat
the gallant fellow was so elated that he told her all about the pelican,
discarding as unworthy of consideration, under circumstances so
imminently promising, a little plan he had formed of keeping the bird
privately in Dublin, and looking out for a buyer.
Poor little Puddock, on the other hand, had heard, more than a week
before this message of peace arrived, the whole story of Gertrude's
engagement to Lord Dunoran, as we may now call Mr. Mervyn, with such
sensations as may be conjectured. His heart, of course, was torn; but
having sustained some score of similar injuries in that region upon
other equally harrowing occasions, he recovered upon this with all
favourable symptoms, and his wounds healed with the first intention. He
wore his chains very lightly, indeed. The iron did not enter into his
soul; and although, of course, 'he could never cease but with his life
to dwell upon the image of his fleeting dream--the beautiful nymph of
Belmont,' I have never heard that his waist grew at all slimmer, or that
his sleep or his appetite suffered during the period of his despair.
The good little fellow was very glad to hear from Cluffe, who patronised
him most handsomely, that Aunt Rebecca had consented to receive him once
more into her good graces.
'And the fact is, Puddock, I think I may undertake to promise you'll
never again be misunderstood in that quarter,' said Cluffe, with a
mysterious sort of smile.
'I'm sure, dear Cluffe, I'm grateful as I ought, for your generous
pleading on my poor behalf, and I do prize the good will of that most
excellent lady as highly as any, and owe her, beside, a debt of
gratitude for care and kindness such as many a mother would have failed
to bestow.'
'Mother, indeed! Why, Puddock, my boy, you forget you're no chicken,'
said Cluffe, a little high.
'And to-morrow I will certainly pay her my respects,' said the
lieutenant, not answering Cluffe's remark.
So Gertrude Chattesworth, after her long agitation--often despair--was
tranquil at last, and blessed in the full assurance of the love which
was henceforth to be her chief earthly happiness.
'Madam was very sly,' said Aunt Becky, with a little shake of her head,
and a quizzical smile; and holding up her folded fan between her finger
and thumb, in mimic menace as she glanced at Gertrude. 'Why, Mr.
Mordaunt, on the very day--the day we had the pleasant luncheon on the
grass--when, as I thought, she had given you your quietus--'twas quite
the reverse, and you had made a little betrothal, and duped the old
people so cleverly ever after.'
'You have forgiven me, dear aunt,' said the young lady, kissing her very
affectionately, 'but I will never quite forgive myself. In a moment of
great agitation I made a hasty promise of secrecy, which, from the
moment 'twas made, was to me a never-resting disquietude, misery, and
reproach. If you, my dearest aunt, knew, as _he_ knows, all the
anxieties, or rather the terrors, I suffered during that agitating
period of concealment--'
'Indeed, dear Madam,' said Mordaunt--or as we may now call him, Lord
Dunoran--coming to the rescue, ''twas all my doing; on me alone rests
all the blame. Selfish it hardly was. I could not risk the loss of my
beloved; and until my fortunes had improved, to declare our situation
would have been too surely to lose her. Henceforward I have done with
mystery. _I_ will never have a secret from her, nor she from you.'
He took Aunt Becky's hand. 'Am I, too, forgiven?'
He held it for a second, and then kissed it.
Aunt Becky smiled, with one of her pleasant little blushes, and looked
down on the carpet, and was silent for a moment; and then, as they
afterwards thought a little oddly, she said,
'That censor must be more severe than I, who would say that concealment
in matters of the heart is never justifiable; and, indeed, my dear,' she
added, quite in a humble way, 'I almost think you were right.'
Aunt Becky's looks and spirits had both improved from the moment of this
_eclaircissement_. A load was plainly removed from her mind. Let us hope
that her comfort and elation were perfectly unselfish. At all events,
her heart sang with a quiet joy, and her good humour was unbounded. So
she stood up, holding Lord Dunoran's hand in hers, and putting her white
arm round her niece's neck, she kissed her again and again, very
tenderly, and she said--
'How very happy, Gertrude, you must be!' and then she went quickly from
the room, drying her eyes.
Happy indeed she was, and not least in the termination of that secrecy
which was so full of self-reproach and sometimes of distrust. From the
evening of that dinner at the King's House, when in an agony of jealousy
she had almost disclosed to poor little Lily the secret of their
engagement, down to the latest moment of its concealment, her hours had
been darkened by care, and troubled with ceaseless agitations.
Everything was now going prosperously for Mervyn--or let us call him
henceforward Lord Dunoran. Against the united evidence of Sturk and
Irons, two independent witnesses, the crown were of opinion that no
defence was maintainable by the wretch, Archer. The two murders were
unambiguously sworn to by both witnesses. A correspondence, afterwards
read in the Irish House of Lords, was carried on between the Irish and
the English law officers of the crown--for the case, for many reasons,
was admitted to be momentous--as to which crime he should be first tried
for--the murder of Sturk, or that of Beauclerc. The latter was, in this
respect, the most momentous--that the cancelling of the forfeiture which
had ruined the Dunoran family depended upon it.
'But are you not forgetting, Sir,' said Mr. Attorney in consultation,
'that there's the finding of _felo de se_ against him by the coroner's
jury?'
'No, Sir,' answered the crown solicitor, well pleased to set Mr.
Attorney right. 'The jury being sworn, found only that he came by his
death, but whether by gout in his stomach, or by other disease, or by
poison, they had no certain knowledge; there was therefore no such
coroner's verdict, and no forfeiture therefore.'
'And I'm glad to hear it, with all my heart. I've seen the young
gentleman, and a very pretty young nobleman he is,' said Mr. Attorney.
Perhaps he would not have cared if this expression of his good will had
got round to my lord.
The result was, however, that their prisoner was to be first tried in
Ireland for the murder of Doctor Barnabas Sturk.
A few pieces of evidence, slight, but sinister, also turned up. Captain
Cluffe was quite clear he had seen an instrument in the prisoner's hand
on the night of the murder, as he looked into the little bed-chamber of
the Brass Castle, so unexpectedly. When he put down the towel, he raised
it from the toilet, where it lay. It resembled the butt of a whip--was
an inch or so longer than a drumstick, and six or seven inches of the
thick end stood out in a series of circular bands or rings. He washed
the thick end of it in the basin; it seemed to have a spring in it, and
Cluffe thought it was a sort of loaded baton. In those days robbery and
assault were as common as they are like to become again, and there was
nothing remarkable in the possession of such defensive weapons.
Dangerfield had only run it once or twice hastily through the water,
rolled it in a red handkerchief, and threw it into his drawer, which he
locked. When Cluffe was shown the whip, which bore a rude resemblance to
this instrument, and which Lowe had assumed to be all that Cluffe had
really seen, the gallant captain peremptorily pooh-poohed it. 'Twas no
such thing. The whip-handle was light in comparison, and it was too long
to fit in the drawer.
Now, the awful fractures which had almost severed Sturk's skull
corresponded exactly with the wounds which such an instrument would
inflict, and a tubular piece of broken iron, about two inches long,
exactly corresponding with the shape of the loading described by Cluffe,
was actually discovered in the sewer of the Brass Castle. It had been in
the fire, and the wood or whalebone was burnt completely away. It was
conjectured that Dangerfield had believed it to be lead, and having
burnt the handle, had broken the metal which he could not melt, and made
away with it in the best way he could. So preparations were pushed
forward, and Sturk's dying declaration, sworn to, late in the evening
before his dissolution, in a full consciousness of his approaching
death, was, of course, relied on, and a very symmetrical and logical
bill lay, neatly penned, in the Crown Office, awaiting the next
commission for the county.