Under the cedar-trees at Laughton sat that accursed and abhorrent
being who sat there, young, impassioned, hopeful, as Lucretia
Clavering,--under the old cedar-trees, which, save that their vast
branches cast an imperceptibly broader shade over the mossy sward, the
irrevocable winters had left the same. Where, through the nether boughs
the autumn sunbeams came aslant, the windows, enriched by many a haughty
scutcheon, shone brightly against the western rays. From the flower-beds
in the quaint garden near at hand, the fresh yet tranquil air wafted
faint perfumes from the lingering heliotrope and fading rose. The
peacock perched dozily on the heavy balustrade; the blithe robin hopped
busily along the sun-track on the lawn; in the distance the tinkling
bells of the flock, the plaining low of some wandering heifer, while
breaking the silence, seemed still to blend with the repose. All images
around lent themselves to complete that picture of stately calm which is
the character of those old mansion-houses, which owner after owner has
loved and heeded, leaving to them the graces of antiquity, guarding them
from the desolation of decay.
Alone sat Lucretia under the cedar-trees, and her heart made dismal
contrast to the noble tranquillity that breathed around. From whatever
softening or repentant emotions which the scene of her youth might first
have awakened; from whatever of less unholy anguish which memory might
have caused when she first, once more, sat under those remembered
boughs, and, as a voice from a former world, some faint whisper of
youthful love sighed across the waste and ashes of her devastated
soul,--from all such rekindled humanities in the past she had now, with
gloomy power, wrenched herself away. Crime such as hers admits not long
the sentiment that softens remorse of gentler error. If there wakes one
moment from the past the warning and melancholy ghost, soon from that
abyss rises the Fury with the lifted scourge, and hunts on the frantic
footsteps towards the future. In the future, the haggard intellect of
crime must live, must involve itself mechanically in webs and meshes,
and lose past and present in the welcome atmosphere of darkness.
Thus while Lucretia sat, and her eyes rested upon the halls of her
youth, her mind overleaped the gulf that yet yawned between her and
the object on which she was bent. Already, in fancy, that home was hers
again, its present possessor swept away, the interloping race of Vernon
ending in one of those abrupt lines familiar to genealogists, which
branch out busily from the main tree, as if all pith and sap were
monopolized by them, continue for a single generation, and then shrink
into a printer’s bracket with the formal laconism, “Died without
issue.” Back, then, in the pedigree would turn the eye of some curious
descendant, and see the race continue in the posterity of Lucretia
Clavering.
With all her ineffable vices, mere cupidity had not, as we have often
seen, been a main characteristic of this fearful woman; and in her
design to endow, by the most determined guilt, her son with the heritage
of her ancestors, she had hitherto looked but little to mere mercenary
advantages for herself: but now, in the sight of that venerable and
broad domain, a covetousness, absolute in itself, broke forth. Could
she have gained it for her own use rather than her son’s, she would have
felt a greater zest in her ruthless purpose. She looked upon the scene
as a deposed monarch upon his usurped realm,--it was her right. The
early sense of possession in that inheritance returned to her.
Reluctantly would she even yield her claims to her child. Here, too,
in this atmosphere she tasted once more what had long been lost
to her,--the luxury of that dignified respect which surrounds the
well-born. Here she ceased to be the suspected adventuress, the
friendless outcast, the needy wrestler with hostile fortune, the
skulking enemy of the law. She rose at once, and without effort, to
her original state,--the honoured daughter of an illustrious house.
The homeliest welcome that greeted her from some aged but unforgotten
villager, the salutation of homage, the bated breath of humble
reverence,--even trifles like these were dear to her, and made her the
more resolute to retain them. In her calm, relentless onward vision she
saw herself enshrined in those halls, ruling in the delegated authority
of her son, safe evermore from prying suspicion and degrading need and
miserable guilt for miserable objects. Here, but one great crime, and
she resumed the majesty of her youth! While thus dwelling on the future,
her eye did not even turn from those sunlit towers to the forms below,
and more immediately inviting its survey. On the very spot where, at
the opening of this tale, sat Sir Miles St. John sharing his attention
between his dogs and his guest, sat now Helen Mainwaring; against the
balustrade where had lounged Charles Vernon, leaned Percival St. John;
and in the same place where he had stationed himself that eventful
evening, to distort, in his malignant sketch, the features of his
father, Gabriel Varney, with almost the same smile of irony upon his
lips, was engaged in transferring to his canvas a more faithful likeness
of the heir’s intended bride. Helen’s countenance, indeed, exhibited
comparatively but little of the ravages which the pernicious aliment,
administered so noiselessly, made upon the frame. The girl’s eye, it is
true, had sunk, and there was a languid heaviness in its look; but
the contour of the cheek was so naturally rounded, and the features so
delicately fine, that the fall of the muscles was less evident; and the
bright, warm hue of the complexion, and the pearly sparkle of the
teeth, still gave a fallacious freshness to the aspect. But as yet the
poisoners had forborne those ingredients which invade the springs of
life, resorting only to such as undermine the health and prepare the way
to unsuspected graves. Out of the infernal variety of the materials at
their command, they had selected a mixture which works by sustaining
perpetual fever; which gives little pain, little suffering, beyond that
of lassitude and thirst; which wastes like consumption, and yet puzzles
the physician, by betraying few or none of its ordinary symptoms. But
the disorder as yet was not incurable,--its progress would gradually
cease with the discontinuance of the venom.
Although October was far advanced, the day was as mild and warm as
August. But Percival, who had been watching Helen’s countenance with
the anxiety of love and fear, now proposed that the sitting should be
adjourned. The sun was declining, and it was certainly no longer safe
for Helen to be exposed to the air without exercise. He proposed that
they should walk through the garden, and Helen, rising cheerfully,
placed her hand on his arm. But she had scarcely descended the steps of
the terrace when she stopped short and breathed hard and painfully. The
spasm was soon over, and walking slowly on, they passed Lucretia with a
brief word or two, and were soon out of sight amongst the cedars.
“Lean more on my arm, Helen,” said Percival. “How strange it is that the
change of air has done so little for you, and our country doctor still
less! I should feel miserable indeed if Simmons, whom my mother always
considered very clever, did not assure me that there was no ground for
alarm,--that these symptoms were only nervous. Cheer up, Helen; sweet
love, cheer up!”
Helen raised her face and strove to smile; but the tears stood in her
eyes. “It would be hard to die now, Percival!” she said falteringly.
“To die--oh, Helen! No; we must not stay here longer,--the air is
certainly too keen for you. Perhaps your aunt will go to Italy. Why
not all go there, and seek my mother? And she will nurse you, Helen,
and--and--” He could not trust his voice farther.
Helen pressed his arm tenderly. “Forgive me, dear Percival, it is but at
moments that I feel so despondent; now, again, it is past. Ah, I so
long to see your mother! When shall you hear from her? Are you not
too sanguine? Do you really feel sure she will consent to so lowly a
choice?”
“Never doubt her affection, her appreciation of you,” answered Percival,
gladly, and hoping that Helen’s natural anxiety might be the latent
cause of her dejected spirits; “often, when talking of the future, under
these very cedars, my mother has said: ‘You have no cause to marry for
ambition,--marry only for your happiness.’ She never had a daughter: in
return for all her love, I shall give her that blessing.”
Thus talking, the lovers rambled on till the sun set, and then,
returning to the house, they found that Varney and Madame Dalibard
had preceded them. That evening Helen’s spirits rose to their natural
buoyancy, and Percival’s heart was once more set at ease by her silvery
laugh.
When, at their usual early hour, the rest of the family retired to
sleep, Percival remained in the drawing-room to write again, and at
length, to Lady Mary and Captain Greville. While thus engaged, his valet
entered to say that Beck, who had been out since the early morning, in
search of a horse that had strayed from one of the pastures, had just
returned with the animal, who had wandered nearly as far as Southampton.
“I am glad to hear it,” said Percival, abstractedly, and continuing his
letter.
The valet still lingered. Percival looked up in surprise. “If you
please, sir, you said you particularly wished to see Beck when he came
back.”
“I--oh, true! Tell him to wait; I will speak to him by and by. You need
not sit up for me; let Beck attend to the bell.”
The valet withdrew. Percival continued his letter, and filled page
after page and sheet after sheet; and when at length the letters, not
containing a tithe of what he wished to convey, were brought to a close,
he fell into a revery that lasted till the candles burned low, and the
clock from the turret tolled one. Starting up in surprise at the lapse
of time, Percival then, for the first time, remembered Beck, and rang
the bell.
The ci-devant sweeper, in his smart livery, appeared at the door.
“Beck, my poor fellow, I am ashamed to have kept you waiting so long;
but I received a letter this morning which relates to you. Let me
see,--I left it in my study upstairs. Ah, you’ll never find the way;
follow me,--I have some questions to put to you.”
“Nothin’ agin my carakter, I hopes, your honour,” said Beck, timidly.
“Oh, no!”
“Noos of the mattris, then?” exclaimed Beck, joyfully.
“Nor that either,” answered Percival, laughing, as he lighted the
chamber candlestick, and, followed by Beck, ascended the grand staircase
to a small room which, as it adjoined his sleeping apartment, he had
habitually used as his morning writing-room and study.
Percival had, indeed, received that day a letter which had occasioned
him much surprise; it was from John Ardworth, and ran thus:--
MY DEAR PERCIVAL,--It seems that you have taken into your service
a young man known only by the name of Beck. Is he now with you at
Laughton? If so, pray retain him, and suffer him to be in readiness to
come to me at a day’s notice if wanted, though it is probable enough
that I may rather come to you. At present, strange as it may seem to
you, I am detained in London by business connected with that important
personage. Will you ask him carelessly, as it were, in the mean while;
the following questions:--
First, how did he become possessed of a certain child’s coral which he
left at the house of one Becky Carruthers, in Cole’s Building?
Secondly, is he aware of any mark on his arm,--if so, will he describe
it?
Thirdly, how long has he known the said Becky Carruthers?
Fourthly, does he believe her to be honest and truthful?
Take a memorandum of his answers, and send it to me. I am pretty
well aware of what they are likely to be; but I desire you to put the
questions, that I may judge if there be any discrepancy between his
statement and that of Mrs. Carruthers. I have much to tell you, and am
eager to receive your kind congratulations upon an event that has given
me more happiness than the fugitive success of my little book. Tenderest
regards to Helen; and hoping soon to see you, Ever affectionately yours.
P.S.--Say not a word of the contents of this letter to Madame Dalibard,
Helen, or to any one except Beck. Caution him to the same discretion. If
you can’t trust to his silence, send him to town.
When the post brought this letter, Beck was already gone on his errand,
and after puzzling himself with vague conjectures, Percival’s mind had
been naturally too absorbed with his anxieties for Helen to recur much
to the subject.
Now, refreshing his memory with the contents of the letter, he drew pen
and ink before him, put the questions seriatim, noted down the answers
as desired, and smiling at Beck’s frightened curiosity to know who could
possibly care about such matters, and feeling confident (from that very
fright) of his discretion, dismissed the groom to his repose.
Beck had never been in that part of the house before; and when he got
into the corridor he became bewildered, and knew not which turn to take,
the right or the left. He had no candle with him; but the moon came
clear through a high and wide skylight: the light, however, gave him no
guide. While pausing, much perplexed, and not sure that he should even
know again the door of the room he had just quitted, if venturing to
apply to his young master for a clew through such a labyrinth, he was
inexpressibly startled and appalled by a sudden apparition. A door
at one end of the corridor opened noiselessly, and a figure, at first
scarcely distinguishable, for it was robed from head to foot in a black,
shapeless garb, scarcely giving even the outline of the human form,
stole forth. Beck rubbed his eyes and crept mechanically close within
the recess of one of the doors that communicated with the passage. The
figure advanced a few steps towards him; and what words can describe
his astonishment when he beheld thus erect, and in full possession of
physical power and motion, the palsied cripple whose chair he had often
seen wheeled into the garden, and whose unhappy state was the common
topic of comment in the servants’ hall! Yes, the moon from above shone
full upon that face which never, once seen, could be forgotten. And it
seemed more than mortally stern and pale, contrasted with the sable
of the strange garb, and beheld by that mournful light. Had a ghost,
indeed, risen from the dead, it could scarcely have appalled him more.
Madame Dalibard did not see the involuntary spy; for the recess in which
he had crept was on that side of the wall on which the moon’s shadow
was cast. With a quick step she turned into another room, opposite
that which she had quitted, the door of which stood ajar, and vanished
noiselessly as she had appeared.
Taught suspicion by his earlier acquaintance with the “night-side” of
human nature, Beck had good cause for it here. This detection of an
imposture most familiar to his experience,--that of a pretended cripple;
the hour of the night; the evil expression on the face of the deceitful
guest; Madame Dalibard’s familiar intimacy and near connection with
Varney,--Varney, the visitor to Grabman, who received no visitors but
those who desire, not to go to law, but to escape from its penalties;
Varney, who had dared to brave the resurrection man in his den, and who
seemed so fearlessly at home in abodes where nought but poverty could
protect the honest; Varney now, with that strange woman, an inmate of a
house in which the master was so young, so inexperienced, so liable to
be duped by his own generous nature,--all these ideas, vaguely combined,
inspired Beck with as vague a terror. Surely something, he knew not
what, was about to be perpetrated against his benefactor,--some scheme
of villany which it was his duty to detect. He breathed hard, formed
his resolves, and stealing on tiptoe, followed the shadowy form of the
poisoner through the half-opened doorway. The shutters of the room of
which he thus crossed the threshold were not closed,--the moon shone
in bright and still. He kept his body behind the door, peeping in with
straining, fearful stare. He saw Madame Dalibard standing beside a
bed round which the curtains were closed,--standing for a moment or so
motionless, and as if in the act of listening, with one hand on a
table beside the bed. He then saw her take from the folds of her dress
something white and glittering, and pour from it what appeared to him
but a drop or two, cautiously, slowly, into a phial on the table, from
which she withdrew the stopper; that done, she left the phial where she
had found it, again paused a moment, and turned towards the door. Beck
retreated hastily to his former hiding-place, and gained it in time.
Again the shadowy form passed him, and again the white face in the white
moonlight froze his blood with its fell and horrible expression. He
remained cowering and shrinking against the wall for some time, striving
to collect his wits, and considering what he should do. His first
thought was to go at once and inform St. John of what he had witnessed.
But the poor have a proverbial dread of deposing aught against a
superior. Madame Dalibard would deny his tale, the guest would be
believed against the menial,--he would be but dismissed with ignominy.
At that idea, he left his hiding-place, and crept along the corridor,
in the hope of finding some passage at the end which might lead to the
offices. But when he arrived at the other extremity, he was only met
by great folding-doors, which evidently communicated with the state
apartments; he must retrace his steps. He did so; and when he came to
the door which Madame Dalibard had entered, and which still stood ajar,
he had recovered some courage, and with courage, curiosity seized him.
For what purpose could the strange woman seek that room at night thus
feloniously? What could she have poured, and with such stealthy caution,
into the phial? Naturally and suddenly the idea of poison flashed across
him. Tales of such crime (as, indeed, of all crime) had necessarily
often thrilled the ear of the vagrant fellow-lodger with burglars and
outlaws. But poison to whom? Could it be meant for his benefactor? Could
St. John sleep in that room? Why not? The woman had sought the chamber
before her young host had retired to rest, and mingled her potion with
some medicinal draught. All fear vanished before the notion of danger
to his employer. He stole at once through the doorway, and noiselessly
approached the table on which yet lay the phial. His hand closed on it
firmly. He resolved to carry it away, and consider next morning what
next to do. At all events, it might contain some proof to back his tale
and justify his suspicions. When he came once more into the corridor, he
made a quick rush onwards, and luckily arrived at the staircase. There
the blood-red stains reflected on the stone floors from the blazoned
casements daunted him little less than the sight at which his hair still
bristled. He scarcely drew breath till he had got into his own little
crib, in the wing set apart for the stable-men, when, at length, he
fell into broken and agitated sleep,--the visions of all that had
successively disturbed him waking, united confusedly, as in one picture
of gloom and terror. He thought that he was in his old loft in St.
Giles’s, that the Gravestealer was wrestling with Varney for his body,
while he himself, lying powerless on his pallet, fancied he should be
safe as long as he could retain, as a talisman, his child’s coral, which
he clasped to his heart. Suddenly, in that black, shapeless garb, in
which he had beheld her, Madame Dalibard bent over him with her stern,
colourless face, and wrenched from him his charm. Then, ceasing his
struggle with his horrible antagonist, Varney laughed aloud, and the
Gravestealer seized him in his deadly arms.