“Ill again! Has she, Dally? Nay, nay, nay, my gel; you mustn’t talk like that.”
“Mustn’t I, gran’fa? but I will,” cried the girl. “I’m not going to be played with, and if Tom Candlish wants to drink himself into a coffin – ”
“Eh? What? – what?” cried Moredock, the last word making him prick up his ears. “Nay, nay; don’t you talk like that, my gel. He’s a young, strong man yet.”
“I say if Tom Candlish wants to drink himself into his coffin, he may. But he’s got to make me Lady Candlish first.”
“Lady Candlish of the Hall, eh, Dally? Lady Candlish of the Hall? Ay, ay! Let him make you Lady Candlish first, Dally.”
“Yes, and then he may drink himself into his coffin as soon as he likes.”
“And I’ll bury him, eh, Dally? In the old morslem, eh? And doctor can – ”
He stopped short with a chuckle, and rubbed his hands.
“Yes, the doctor can try and stop him from drinking, for I can’t,” said Dally acidly. “It’s of no use to talk to him.”
“And you wouldn’t break your heart, Dally, if he was to die, would you?” said the old man, with a chuckle.
“I should if he was to die now, gran’fa,” said the girl; “but when he marries me he can do what he likes.”
“Ay, when he’s married you, Dally, and you’ve got the Hall and all his money. But, look here, Dally; I want doctor to come and see me and bring me some of his stuff. You go up and tell him he must come – that I say he must come; I want him. Tell him I say he is to come, and that he is to bring some o’ that stuff he give me those nights. You say o’ those nights, and he’ll know. Rare stuff, Dally, as goes right down into your toes. Rare stuff, as sets you up and makes you have a good nap sometimes.”
Dally looked at the sexton searchingly.
“You’re not looking well, gran’fa,” she said.
“Nay, I look well enough, but I do want the doctor a bit.”
“You see you’re a very old man now.”
“Tchah! stuff! Old? I’m not an old man yet. Lots o’ go in me. Man takes care of himself, and he ought to live to two hundred.”
“Two hundred, gran’fa!” cried the girl, looking at him wonderingly.
“Ay. Why not? Look at the paytrarchs, seven and eight and nine hundred. I don’t mean to die yet, Dally,” he chuckled; “and you’ll have a long time to wait if you think you want the bit o’ money I’ve saved up.”
“Where do you keep that stuff now, gran’fa?”
“What stuff?” said the old man.
“That stuff you used to keep in the blue bottle in the corner cupboard.”
“How did you know I kept stuff in that corner cupboard?”
“Because I looked,” said the girl pertly. “Then I won’t have you look in my cupboards. I – ”
“Why not?” said Dally calmly. “There, I know, gran’fa, most everything you’ve got. Now, tell me, what have you done with that bottle that you used to use for your eyes?”
“Poured it away, and put the bottle in the fire.”
“Oh, gran’fa!”
“My eyes are right enough now, and I didn’t want to go some night in the dark – candles cost money, Dally – and take the wrong stuff. Doctor gives me some drops in a little bottle, and I shouldn’t ha’ liked to make a mistake.”
“And you’ve thrown it all away?” said the girl in a disappointed tone.
“Ay, my gel. It was poison, only to use outside, and you wouldn’t ha’ liked your poor old gran’fa to make a mistake?”
“Gone!” said Dally, to herself.
“Now, you go to doctor and say your gran’fa wants him. Tell him I say it’s all nonsense for him to be ill, and he must come.”
“Yes, gran’fa.”
“And you wait, Dally. I arn’t an old man yet, but I shall be sure to die some day, and then there’ll be a bit o’ money for you.”
“I don’t want your money, gran’fa,” she said sourly, as the old man grinned and rubbed his hands.
“That’s right. Good gel. Be independent,” he said. “Now go and tell doctor he must come.”
Dally did not stir, but stood gazing straight before her thoughtfully.
“How much does it cost to go to London, gran’fa?” she said, at last, as the old man beat upon the arm of his chair to take her attention.
“Heaps o’ money – heaps o’ money. What do you want to know for?”
“Because I’m going there.”
“Going? What for?”
“To find him and bring him back.”
“Whatcher talking about? You go and fetch doctor.”
“About Tom Candlish. I went to the Hall last night, and he was gone.”
“What, young squire? Well, you mustn’t go after him, gel.”
“Yes, I must,” said Dally, with a lurid look in her dark eyes. “I’m going after him to bring him back here, gran’fa. But are you sure you threw that stuff away?”
“Ay, I’m sure enough. Now go and fetch doctor, I tell you; and ask him to give you some more of it if your eyes are bad. Now go.”
Dally nodded shortly, neither displaying, nor being expected to display, any affection for her grandfather, as she left the cottage; when the old man relit his pipe and sat back thinking as he smoked.
“What does she want with that stuff?” he said thoughtfully; “’tis poison, and she knowed where it was. She wouldn’t want to take none herself. She wouldn’t do that; and she wouldn’t want to give none to Tom Candlish, because that wouldn’t make him marry her. I dessay she wants it – she wants it – to – ”
The old man’s drowsy head had sunk back, his pipe-holding hand fell in his lap, and he slept heavily, to wake, after a few hours, cold and shivering, ready to creep to bed, murmuring against the doctor for not coming, and forgetting all about Dally and her desire to get that bottle which used to stand in the corner cupboard.
Volume Three – Chapter Sixteen.
Moredock’s Medicine
“It’s like a shadow following me always,” muttered North, “and it is hopeless for me to try longer. I’ve fought and battled with it as bravely as a man could fight, and for what? I have failed; there is nothing to keep me here. Why should I stay?”
“Yes,” he repeated, “I have failed – failed in my daring attempt – failed in my love – and I want rest. I can bear it no longer; what I want is rest. Ah!”
He drew a long breath and then sighed, and went straight to the window, drew aside the curtain, and for the first time for many days spent about half-an-hour at his toilet, to stand at last, weak and ghastly pale, but looking, otherwise, more like the frank, manly young doctor of the past.
By this time his eyes had grown more accustomed to the light, and he went and stood gazing out of the window at the pleasant woodland landscape spread before him, thinking of his future, and ignorant of the fact that the sight was soothing to his troubled brain.
It seemed to him that his shadow slept, and turning from the window, after a final look across the meadows, where now and again he could see the sun glancing from the stream in the direction of the Rectory, he walked, with a fair amount of steadiness, across the floor, just as the figure of a woman appeared in the lower meadow walking hurriedly and keeping close to the hedges and clumps of trees, which gave the place the aspect of a park.
As North opened the door and made for the stairs he could see that the baize door at the foot, which cut off communication with the rest of the house, was ajar, and then it moved slightly and closed.
“Watched,” he said to himself; “poor old Milt! I must not forget her.”
He went slowly down into the hall, and as he reached it the dining-room door, which was also ajar, closed softly, and North knit his brow and bit his lip as he turned his back to it and entered the study.
He closed and locked the door after him; and, as he did so, the housekeeper’s face appeared at the baize door, and Cousin Thompson’s at that of the dining-room.
Mrs Milt noticed the movement of the dining-room door, and stole softly back with a sigh, while, after waiting for a few minutes, with a peculiarly low cunning expression of countenance, Cousin Thompson took a little brass wedge from his pocket, and stuck it beneath the door, so as to hold it a few inches open, sufficiently to enable him to hear when the study was opened again, and then seated himself watchfully by the window, where he could command a good view of the principal gate.
As soon as he was in the study, North looked sadly round at his books and tables, where everything was methodically arranged, and scrupulously neat and clean, the old housekeeper’s hand being visible on every side.
“Poor old woman!” muttered the doctor. “As if she felt sure that I should not be ill long.”
He walked to the French window, which looked out upon the green lawn with its shrubbery surroundings, beyond which were the meadows and the purling stream.
It was a scene of peace and beauty that should have been welcome to the most exacting, and it was not without its effect upon the doctor, who carefully closed and fastened the window before crossing to the door leading into his surgery, which he opened, and looked in to see that the outer door was closed.
Returning to the study table, the baize communication swung to, and North sat down, quite calm and collected now, and began to write.
He paused to think several times, but only to go on more earnestly, till he had done, when he read that which he had written, made a slight alteration or two, and then carefully folded and placed the papers in large envelopes, one of which he directed, “To my executors,” and laid in a prominent place upon the table, where it could not fail to be seen; the other to his London medical friend.
Apparently not satisfied, he took up the envelope, and placed it in another, after which he wrote upon a sheet of paper:
“Mrs Milt. Place this enclosure in my executors’ hands yourself.”
Then directing the outer envelope to the housekeeper, he smiled with satisfaction, and had just laid it upon the table, duly fastened down, when a faint chink made him turn his head in the direction of the surgery.
North listened, and the faint sound of a bottle touching another was repeated.
He rose and went softly to the door, which was not latched, opened it, and saw a hand dart down that was extended, as he stood face to face with Dally Watlock.
In his surprise North did not speak, for he had been under the impression that he had fastened the door, and this gave the girl time to recover herself.
“Oh, I beg your pardon, sir,” she said, with a smile; “I only pushed that bottle back in its place. It was nearly off the shelf.”
“What do you want?” said North sharply.
“Gran’fa, please sir, said I was to come on and tell you he wanted you.”
“Tell him I can’t come,” said North shortly. “Why did you come here, and not to the front?”
“Oh, wasn’t this right, sir?” said Dally apologetically. “I am so sorry, sir. But gran’fa said: ‘Go to Dr North’s surgery,’ and I came here. Please, sir, he says you’re to send him some of that same stuff you gave him before.”
North stood with his brows knit for a moment, and then went to a cupboard, took out a bottle of brandy, half full, and handed it to the girl.
“Take that,” he said, “and tell him to use it discreetly. I cannot come.”
“Oh, thank you, sir. Gran’fa ’ll be so pleased, sir; and master ’ll be so glad when I tell him you’re so much better; and Miss Mary, too.”
North winced, and then frowned, as he passed the girl to open the outer door, and feign her to go.
She smiled and curtsied as she passed out, the door being closed sharply behind her, and she heard a bolt shoot.
“Yes,” she muttered, with her countenance changing as she thrust the bottle carefully into her dress-pocket, with the result that there was another faint chink; “you may lock it now. I don’t care. But wasn’t it near?”
She hesitated for a moment, as if about to go out by the front, but Cousin Thompson was not puzzled by seeing her pass, for she returned by the way she came, down the kitchen garden to the meadows, and through them and down by the river till she reached the nearest point to the Rectory garden, through which she passed, after stopping to pick a handful of parsley to carry into the house.
Volume Three – Chapter Seventeen.
Besieged
Dally had not reached the Rectory, and Horace North had not sat long thinking over the girl’s words in a way which puzzled him, as it brought a curious feeling of rest and satisfaction to his brain, before a carriage came sharply along the King’s Hampton road, and passed Moredock’s cottage and Mrs Berens’ pretty villa-like home. North was seated, with his head resting upon his hand, thinking.
Miss Mary would be so pleased, the girl had said – pleased that he was better.
It seemed strange to him, but the words set him picturing Mary Salis in the old days at the Rectory; then her accident, and how he had tended her. Then he thought of the sweet, pale, patient face, as she passed through that long time of bodily suffering, to be followed by the lasting period of what must have been terrible mental anguish as she found herself to be a hopeless, helpless invalid – changed, as it were by one sad blow, from a young and active girl to a dependent cripple.
“Poor, gentle, patient Mary!” he said softly; and then, like a flash, his mind turned to the sister – her sick couch, her delirious declaration of her love, and his weak, blind folly in not grasping the fact that the tenderness she lavished upon him was meant for another.
“No, you can’t. Master’s better, and he’s engaged, and can’t see patients.”
North started up on his seat, rigid, and with a wild look in his eyes, as he heard these loudly uttered words, and then sprang to the door.
“Now, my dear Mrs Milt,” said a soft, unctuous voice, which he knew only too well, “pray do not be excited. How can you speak like that?”
“I speak what I think and feel, sir,” retorted the old lady sharply. “What do these people want with master?”
“To ask him to go and attend upon a patient who is in a dying state. There: pray come away. Really, Mrs Milt, you must not interfere like this.”
“I tell you, sir, master don’t want to see patients, and he can’t come out; so you must send them away.”
“Really, Mrs Milt,” said Cousin Thompson, “this is insufferable. My good woman, you forget yourself.”
Every word reached North as he stood close to the door and realised that there was one woman ready to fight in his defence.
North stood there, with his hands clenched and his brow rugged, glaring angrily, for he well knew what this meant. The voices were heard retiring, and the sound of the dining-room door closing, and muffling them suddenly, told him as plainly as if he had seen that the housekeeper had followed Cousin Thompson into that room, where an angry altercation seemed to be in progress.
“Hah!” ejaculated the miserable man; “canting and unscrupulous to the end. He is keeping her in parley while his people do their work.”
He laughed bitterly, for at that moment the door was tried softly, and then there was a gentle tapping on the panel.
“May my money prove a curse to him, and the whole place constantly remind him of his treachery,” he muttered, as the soft tapping was repeated, and a low voice, which he did not recognise, said:
“Dr North – Dr North! Can I speak to you a minute?”
He made no answer, but drew back to the table.
“Will they dare to break in?” he said to himself, as his face wore a look of bitter scorn and contempt.
Just then Mrs Milt’s voice could be heard raised loudly in protest; but it was in vain. Cousin Thompson, under the pretext of holding a parley, had entrapped her in the dining-room, and then interposed his person whenever she attempted to leave by door or window.
The tapping at the door ceased, and there was a sound of whispering; whilst a minute after a stoutly-built, rather hard-faced man, with a determined look, suddenly appeared at the French window looking on the garden, and tried the handle.
It was fast on the inside.
He passed on and went round to the surgery door, which he tried, too; but North had fastened this when he let Dally out, and the man came back, looked in and tapped gently on the pane to take North’s attention. Then seeing that he did not stir from where he stood at the table, the man smiled and beckoned to him.
This he repeated again and again, but North did not stir. Then his lips moved, and he involuntarily repeated Hamlet’s words:
“I am but mad north-north-west. When the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a hernshaw.”
The man nodded and smiled again, and passed away.
There was another low murmuring outside the door, and a fresh tapping, as a persuasive voice said:
“Dr North, will you be kind enough to open the door, and come into the dining-room? Mrs Milt, the housekeeper, would like to speak to you.”
“What a child – what a weak lunatic they must think me!” muttered North; but he did not move, and, as he fully expected, the last speaker, as he supposed, went round to the window and tapped softly.
The fresh comer might have been twin brother of the first, so similar was his expression, so exactly a repetition were his acts.
They were of as much avail, and he returned to the hall, when a few words were exchanged in a low tone of voice, followed by a sharp tapping at the dining-room door.
This was opened, and Mrs Milt’s voice rose loudly:
“Stop me if you dare, any of you! and I’ll have the law of you.”
This was followed by a sharp, rustling noise, and the dull thud made by the banging of the baize door.
Then there was the sound of the gravel as some one walked over it hurriedly, and the clicking of the swing-gate before it caught.
“Give the word, sir, and it’s done,” said a deep voice.
“Quick, then!” said Cousin Thompson sharply. “Quick, before that cursed woman returns with help.”
Volume Three – Chapter Eighteen.
One Way of Escape
North drew a deep breath as one of the men stationed himself at the study window and looked in.
He strode towards him, and the man smiled and beckoned to him to come out; but the smile became a scowl as the cord was seized and the blind drawn down.
Just then the door cracked as some one pressed it hard, and then a whispering penetrated to where North stood looking round before crossing to the surgery, entering, and locking himself in.
His first act was to go to the window, where he expected to find that there was another sentry; but window and outer door faced in another direction, and were shut off from the part of the garden where the man stood by a dense patch of ancient shrubbery and a tall yew hedge.
North felt perfectly calm now, but his soul was full of a terrible despair.
He told himself that for him hope was dead; that in dealing with the occult secrets of Nature he had nearly mastered that which he wished to discover, but had failed, and must pay the penalty; while in the future some more fortunate student would profit by that which he had done; and, avoiding the pitfall into which he had fallen, take another turning and triumph.
To this end in the hours of his misery – when it had seemed to him that the strange essence which pervaded him slept – he had committed to paper the whole history of his experiments, from the first start to the time when he had awakened to the fact that he could no longer arrest the decomposition of the important organs, or do more than make a kind of mummy of his subject; but the essence or spirit was, as it were, taken captive, and at the same time held him in thrall.
This, to the most extreme point, he had carefully written out, showing, in addition, the time when he felt that he must have gone wrong, as that where a different course must be pursued by the daring scientist who would venture so much in the great cause.
For he wrote clearly and impressively: failure meant such a fate as his, the constant presence of the spirit of the person who had died, and with it the being compelled to suffer for every wild act or speech this essence would do or make. He told how helpless he was, how he had striven to bring scientific knowledge to bear, fought with his position as a man should who was in the full possession of his faculties, but that he could do no more.
Success meant a crown of triumphant honour; failure, a kind of sane madness, whose only end could be death – a death he was compelled to seek to save himself at once – to save himself from being treated as a maniac, and then to spend a few weeks or months of torture which he knew he could not bear.
In his last paragraphs he pointed out his position. He was believed to be mad, and to clear himself he would have to explain his experiment and his abnormal position, which he owned that no one would or could be expected to believe, save such a savant as the one he addressed – a man who had made the brain his study, and who could feel for the sufferings of the writer.
This letter was enclosed in the packet addressed to his executors for delivery to Mr Delton, and lay in the study, waiting till those executors should receive the last commands.
All was at an end now, and with a feeling of calmness approaching to content, Horace North looked round his surgery with its many familiar objects; and without the slightest feeling of dread took down a small medicine glass from the set standing all ready upon a shelf, and then lifted a large bottle from one particular spot at the end where it always stood, veiling a little recess wherein were a couple of smaller bottles, carefully labelled and marked as to their degree of strength.
“Is it cowardly?” he said quietly. “Is it a sin? Surely not, when I know my position, and – yes, that is my fate.”
For at that moment there was a sharp crack: the door had yielded, and he knew that his cousin’s emissaries – the people from some private asylum – had forced their way into the study, and their next step would be to make their way to where he was.
He could have opened the door, and fled by way of the meadows; but where? To whom? Perhaps at the moment when he made his first appeal for help, the living shadow that he had, as it were, taken to him, would utter some wild cry or absurd jest, and people would believe his pursuers in spite of all that he could declare.
No, it was not cowardice, this hastening of his end; and, withdrawing the stopper, he began pouring out the liquid contents of the little bottle, as the handle of the surgery door was turned, and the panel gave an ominous crack.
“You shall let me pass away in peace,” he said quietly, as he drew away a chair which propped back an inner door of baize, let it swing to, and thrust in both its bolts.
“Cousin Thompson,” he said bitterly, “you were always a miserable wretch, but I withdraw my curse. Take all, and enjoy your wretched life as well as such a reptile can.”
He paused for a few moments, with his lips moving slowly, and a calm look of resignation softening the harsh austerities of his face.
“To forgiveness!” he said softly. “To oblivion!” and he raised the glass to his lips.
Volume Three – Chapter Nineteen.
Vision or Real
The shivering of glass as the fragments of a pane fell tinkling upon the carpet.
The shivering of glass as the little crystal fell from Horace North’s hand, and a pungent odour filled the room.
“Mary Salis! or am I mad indeed?” ejaculated the wretched man.
He stood motionless, staring at the window as a white arm was forced through the broken glass, and the catch thrust back, but not so quickly but that a deep red stain had time to show; for the jagged glass made an ugly gash above the white wrist, though it was unheeded, and the casement was flung open.
“The door – open that door!” North did not stir, but stood gazing wildly at the pallid face before him, and then he passed his hands across his eyes and tottered to the window, as if drawn there by the eyes which gazed into his.
“Quick! the door – open this door!” was panted forth.
He obeyed mechanically without taking his eyes from the window, feeling his way to the door, and slowly opening it, to stand gazing at Mary Salis, as she caught his hands in hers.
“What were you going to do?” she cried piteously. “You, too, of all men! You must be mad – you must be mad!”
“Yes,” he said vacantly; “they say so. I must be mad, or is – is it past – a dream? Mary Salis – you!”
“What’s that?” cried Mary excitedly, as the sound of the breaking door was heard. North uttered a sigh.
“They are coming,” he cried, “and I shall be too late. Loose my arm – loose my arm!”
