THE MURDER.
Maggie did as he desired her, in silence, and the two stood close
together in the seclusion of the spare galley. The wind roared and
howled outside, and lashed the waves into a murderous fury against the
proud ship that dared to plough her way through them, but Harland spoke
in low, incisive tones, and every word he uttered was audible to his
companion.
‘I have been thinking over what you said to me this morning,’ he
commenced, ‘and I felt it was quite necessary we should see each other
again. The fact is, you took me so completely aback by your unexpected
appearance and your vehement accusations, that I really did not know
what to say to you. But you are utterly mistaken in thinking I have
any _real_ intention to marry Miss Vansittart. How _can_ I have, when
I am married to you? The thing is too silly to be refuted. You say you
overheard me talking a lot of nonsense to her last night. I acknowledge
I did. The girl has taken an inordinate fancy for me, and I don’t quite
see my way out of it; and so--well you know what we men are,--bad hats,
the very best of us, when there is no one by to keep us straight,--but
I never meant anything serious by it, upon my word of honour. Don’t you
believe me?’
‘Yes,’ replied Maggie, in the lowest of whispers.
‘You needn’t be in the least afraid of our being overheard. It would
take a speaking-trumpet to make one’s self understood through this
gale. However, what I want to explain to you, Iris, is, that my
worst fault has been in concealing the fact of your existence from
the Vansittarts. _He_ made it a proviso that his agent should be an
unmarried man, and as I did not intend to take you out with me, I
thought there was no harm in holding my tongue on the subject, at all
events until I had made myself indispensable to him. And the deception
has entangled me in a dilemma, as deceptions generally do. But the
idea of my marrying Miss Vansittart is too utterly ridiculous. I have
let her talk as she pleased about it, and I have “chaffed” her back in
return, but she knows, as well as I do, that it can never be. Do you
understand?’
‘Yes,’ repeated Maggie, in the same tone.
‘Well, as that affair is settled, I’ll tell you what I think will be
best to do for both of us. I can’t afford to give up this appointment
(it’s six hundred a year, and will be raised by-and-by), and I should
not be able to support you if I did. So you must let me settle you
quietly at Canterbury in some respectable boarding-house, where you
will have society, and I will send you remittances monthly until it
is safe for you to join me again. It won’t be long first. Of course,
since you are in the country, it will be to my advantage to have you
with me, and I shall seize the very first opportunity to confess the
truth to Mr Vansittart, and ask his pardon for not having informed him
of my marriage from the first. I don’t think he will be hard upon me,
especially as he sees his daughter has taken a fancy to me, and is
anxious to put a stop to it. For, of course, I should never have been a
suitable match for her, even if I had been free. He will require money
with any suitor for her hand. Are you quite satisfied now?’
Again Maggie answered only by a monosyllable, and her reticence aroused
Harland’s suspicions.
‘What the deuce is the matter with you, that you can’t speak?’ he said,
irritably. ‘Are you trying some game on me? I warn you not, for I won’t
stand it. Now, look here. I can’t do as I have told you, unless I feel
that I am free from that brute Farrell. It’s of no use my trying to
make a position for myself in a new world, if he has the power to come
forward whenever it pleases him, and denounce me as a criminal. You say
he holds certain written proofs against me. Is this really the case?
Have you spoken to him about them? Have you got them with you?’
‘Yes,’ she said again.
‘Let me see them,’ replied Harland quickly; and as he spoke he struck
a match against the heel of his boot, and held it on a level with her
face.
The sickly blue flame flared up for a moment, and revealed the
features of Maggie Greet.
‘_Maggie!_ by all that’s holy!’ exclaimed Harland, starting backwards.
‘What do you mean by playing this trick upon me? Why was I not told of
this before?’
‘Told of _what_ before?’
‘That you were on board ship, in company with my wife. That I had been
tracked by a couple of you--confound you both!’
‘Oh, yes! I daresay you’d like to confound us both, very much. You’ve
tried your best to do it already, Mr Harland, but you ain’t clever
enough. That’s where the fault lies, you see!’ cried Maggie unabashed.
‘And now, what may you have to say to Mrs Harland, as you can’t say to
me?’
‘Be quiet, you baggage!’ returned Godfrey angrily, ‘and go back to your
berth. My business lies with your mistress, and not with you.’
‘Oh! well, then, you won’t see my mistress, and so you may do as best
you can without her. She has friends on board as won’t consent to her
being handed over, without protection, to the clutches of a brute like
you; and so if you have any message for her, you can send it through
me.’
‘Go to the d--l!’ cried Harland, turning on his heel. ‘I shall not stay
here a minute longer.’
‘Not even to get them papers?’
‘What do _you_ know about the papers?’
‘As much as yourself, I fancy, and p’r’aps more. You asked me just now
if I’d got ’em, and I said “_yes_;” but if they’re no use to you, I may
as well carry them back again.’
‘From whom did you get them?’ demanded Harland, retracing his steps.
‘From that brute Farrell?’
‘Don’t you call better men than yourself names,’ retorted Maggie
sharply. ‘Farrell’s worth fifty of you, any day. Yes, I did get them
from him. Who else?’
‘Your mistress showed you my letter, then?’
‘Yes, she did, and a pack of lies it was, into the bargain.’
‘Take care how you insult me!’ cried Harland.
‘Look here, Godfrey Harland,’ said Maggie, ‘don’t you try any nonsense
on me, for I’ll soon bring you to your marrow-bones. Will Farrell’s
papers is _my_ papers. Do you understand now? He is going to marry me
as soon as we land in New Zealand, and there’ll be _two_ against you
then, instead of one. What do you say to that?’
‘He’s welcome to my leavings: they’re good enough for him,’ returned
the man ironically.
Maggie’s hot blood rose to fever heat.
‘Oh, you blackguard,--you black-hearted villain!’ she exclaimed.
‘_This_ is the reward a woman gets for letting herself be trampled on
by men. You _know_ I was innocent enough when I first came to you. I
was a poor, ignorant, country girl, as hardly knew right from wrong,
and you left your sweet young wife, who’d never done you an unkindness,
to stoop to teach me how to sin. Lord forgive me!’ cried poor Maggie,
with a choking sob in her throat, ‘for I’ve never forgiven myself. Many
and many’s the time I’d have run away and drowned myself, for I didn’t
feel fit to live, except for _her_. But she wanted me, and I hadn’t
the heart to leave her alone with you. _I_ knew how cruel and wicked
you could be, when the first fancy had died out of you, and that you
weren’t fit to have the care of any woman. Oh, how cruel and false you
have been to her, and made me be too! Oh, my poor mistress! If I could
die to make her happy, I would. But nobody can be happy as has to do
with _you_.’
‘You’re pleased to be complimentary,’ sneered Harland.
‘I speak the truth, master, and you know it. You know you’ve been
her ruin, as well as mine. I’m only a poor girl, and don’t signify
p’r’aps so much. But _her_, so delicate and high-bred--sich a lady as
she is, from head to foot. You ought to be hung for what you’ve done
to _her_. Do you think _I_ believe all your palaver about not marrying
Miss Vansittart? Not I. _She_ might have, poor dear, but _I_ know you
better. It was all put on to deceive her, and get hold of the papers.
You’d have settled her in Canterbury, yes! and then she’d never have
heard of you, or your money, again. Don’t I know the liar you are?’
‘Have you got those papers?’ demanded Harland fiercely. ‘I suppose
they’re for sale. What’s their price?’
‘Oh, yes, they’re for sale--never fear; but I doubt if _you_ can buy
them. They’re going in exchange for my mistress being acknowledged
openly as your wife, and placed in her proper position, and treated
with kindness for the future, and _then_, p’r’aps, Will and I may talk
about letting you have the papers.’
‘D--n Will and you!’ exclaimed Harland, as his eyes gleamed with hate
and fury on her.
‘Will and I are much more likely to do that for _you_, Mr Harland. We
have neither of us much cause to love you. You have ruined both our
lives,--robbed us of our good names, and left a nasty stain behind you
which nothing will wipe out. I don’t think we owe you much--unless it
is revenge. And we’ll have our revenge, never fear, unless you buy us
off. Do your duty by the mistress, plain and above-board, or we’ll take
good care you don’t work mischief to any one else. It wouldn’t take
many words from us to get you locked up, and that’s what we mean to do,
both on us, as sure as your name’s Godfrey Harland.’
‘You _do_--do you?’ replied Harland, with clenched hands and teeth.
He had made up his mind how to act whilst she was speaking. The dose
he had obtained for Iris would do just as well for Maggie, and he
pressed closer to her with it in his hand. She, foreseeing meditated
violence in his action, raised her fist and struck him in the face,
then turned and rushed out of the spare galley on to the darkness of
the quarter-deck. It was still deserted, the passengers were in the
saloon, the seamen in the forecastle, and the howling of the gale
permitted only itself to be heard. As Maggie tried to stem her way
against the driving wind, which seemed to push her backwards with every
step, she stumbled against the steam-winch, and in another moment
Harland had caught and held her from behind.
A murderous hand was placed upon her throat, a handkerchief, which
exhaled a sickly, sweet, intoxicating fume, was pressed tightly over
her mouth and nostrils, and her body was held by his against the main
rail. She could not move; she could not scream; she could not even
think. For a moment she struggled feebly, and clutched with her dying
grasp at Harland’s garment. But the next, all things seemed growing
dim--the memory of her wrongs--the fear for her safety--even the
knowledge of the presence of Death faded from her as the fumes of the
chloroform mounted to her very brain, and her breath came in gasps,
which grew shorter and shorter until they ceased altogether. Then her
body was lifted quickly in strong arms from the deck, and thrust over
the mainrail, and it hit the bumpkin with a dull thud, as it dropped
silently into the seething deep.
It plunged beneath the surface and rose again, and the _Pandora_ passed
ahead of it, scattering banks of white foam in her wake, like a sea
shroud for the dying. For in that moment Maggie Greet’s senses had
returned to her. She felt the icy water flowing over her head, and into
her ears and mouth.
Oh, what was this? What had happened to her?
‘Is it some awful dream? Where am I? Who put me here? Oh, Will, Will,
save me!’ But the wind roared to prevent all chance of her feeble cry
being overheard, and the merciless waves flowed over her head again,
and sucked her body down. ‘Oh, to die like this! My poor mistress! God
in heaven! forgive me.’
Again her body disappeared, and after an agonising struggle for life,
poor Maggie rose once more, feebly murmuring, ‘I forgive--forgive,’ and
then sunk beneath the waves for ever.
* * * * *
Meanwhile, Godfrey Harland leant against the mainrail, sick and dizzy
with horror at the deed which he had done, and staring with blank eyes
at the boiling sea, in which the girl he had ruined had disappeared.
The handkerchief he had pressed against her nose and mouth, reeking
with chloroform, was still held in his hand. In his confusion, he did
not even know that it was there. He had never meant to go so far as
this. He had prepared the chloroform to use in case of his experiencing
any trouble in getting the papers into his possession, but when he saw
Maggie so completely unconscious, and realised the danger of being
caught in the act of searching her body, it seemed so much easier to
throw her overboard, and get rid of her dangerous tongue and the proofs
of his forgery at the same time. And now it was over, and there was
no help for it. He gazed at the boiling foam as it dashed past the
vessel, in a vacant manner, as though he half expected Maggie’s face
to rise from it and confront him, Maggie who was already miles away,
drifting without sense or motion in the under-current of the sea. And
as he gazed, strange to say, Godfrey Harland did not think of her as he
had seen her last, but as she had been when they first met--a pretty
country girl, all faith in him and eagerness to obey his will--and his
limbs shook under him as he remembered it.
‘Hullo! Harland! what are you doing here? It’s a rough night for
musing,’ shouted a voice behind him. ‘We’re going to the smoke-room!
Come along and spin us a yarn! The ladies have beat a retreat, and
there’s not much to be done below.’
Godfrey Harland turned round to confront Captain Lovell and the doctor.
‘All right,’ he said unsteadily. ‘I’ll go with you. It’s the beastliest
night we’ve had for a long time.’
As the three men ensconced themselves in the smoke-room, and took their
seats, Dr Lennard snuffed the air.
‘Who’s got chloroform?’ he asked curiously. Lovell looked amused, and
Harland started. ‘Why, it’s _you_!’ continued the doctor. ‘It’s on your
handkerchief.’
‘Oh, yes,’ he stammered; ‘chloroform, of course. I’ve been using it
for a toothache. It generally does me good.’
‘Have you a toothache now?’
‘No, it’s gone!’ replied Harland, with an unquiet look round the cabin.
‘Well! stow your handkerchief away, for goodness’ sake, for it’s too
strong to be agreeable. I hate the smell of chloroform. It recalls
unpleasant operations to me. You must have a sound heart, to be able to
inhale it at that rate. I should think you must have had enough to kill
two people on that handkerchief.’
And with a ghastly grin, that was intended for a smile, Harland thrust
it deep into the pocket of his coat.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]