Gwen Wynn: A Romance of the Wye

“But why should she assist in such a dangerous deception – at risk of her daughter’s life?”

“That’s easy answered. She did it partly o’ herself; but more at the biddin’ o’ the priest, whom she daren’t disobey – the weak-minded creature most o’ her time given up to sayin’ prayers and paternosters. They all knowed the girl loved me, and wor sure to be my wife, whatever they might say or do against it. Wi’ her willing I could a’ defied the whole lot o’ them. Bein’ aware o’ that their only chance wor to get her out o’ my way by some trick – as they ha’ indeed got her. Ye may think it strange their takin’ all that trouble; but if ye’d seen her ye wouldn’t. There worn’t on all Wyeside so good lookin’ a girl!”

Ryecroft again looks incredulous; not smilingly, but with a sad cast of countenance.

Despite its improbability, however, he begins to think there may be some truth in what the waterman says – Jack’s earnest convictions sympathetically impressing him.

“And supposing her to be alive,” he asks, “where do you think she is now? Have you any idea?”

“I have – leastways a notion.”

“Where?”

“Over the water – in France – the town o’ Bolone.”

“Boulogne!” exclaims the Captain, with a start. “What makes you suppose she is there?”

“Something, sir, I han’t yet spoke to ye about. I’d a’most forgot the thing, an’ might never a thought o’t again, but for what ha’ happened since. Ye’ll remember the night we come up from the ball, my tellin’ ye I had an engagement the next day to take the young Powells down the river?”

“I remember it perfectly.”

“Well; I took them, as agreed; an’ that day we went down’s fur’s Chepstow. But they wor bound for the Severn side a duck shootin’; and next mornin’ we started early, afore daybreak. As we were passin’ the wharf below Chepstow Bridge, where there wor several craft lyin’ in, I noticed one sloop-rigged ridin’ at anchor a bit out from the rest, as if about clearin’ to put to sea. By the light o’ a lamp as hung over the taffrail, I read the name on her starn, showin’ she wor French, an’ belonged to Bolone. I shouldn’t ha’ thought that anythin’ odd, as there be many foreign craft o’ the smaller kind puts in at Chepstow. But what did appear odd, an’ gied me a start too, wor my seein’ a boat by the sloop’s side wi’ a man in it, who I could a’most sweared wor the Rogue’s Ferry priest. There wor others in the boat besides, an’ they appeared to be gettin’ some sort o’ bundle out o’ it, an’ takin’ it up the man-ropes, aboard o’ the sloop. But I didn’t see any more, as we soon passed out o’ sight, goin’ on down. Now, Captain, it’s my firm belief that man must ha’ been the priest, and that thing, I supposed to be a bundle o’ marchandise, neyther more nor less than the body o’ Mary Morgan – not dead, but livin’!”

“You astound me, Wingate! Certainly a most singular circumstance! Coincidence too! Boulogne – Boulogne!”

“Yes, Captain; by the letterin’ on her starn the sloop must ha’ belonged there; an’ I’m goin’ there myself.”

“I too, Jack! We shall go together!”

Volume Three – Chapter Sixteen

A Strange Father Confessor

“He’s gone away – given it up! Be glad, madame!”

Father Rogier so speaks on entering the drawing-room of Llangorren Court, where Mrs Murdock is seated.

“What, Gregoire?” – were her husband present it would be “Père;” but she is alone – “Who’s gone away? And why am I to rejoice?”

“Le Capitaine.”

“Ha!” she ejaculates, with a pleased look, showing that the two words have answered all her questions in one.

“Are you sure of it? The news seems too good for truth.”

“It’s true, nevertheless; so far as his having gone away. Whether to stay away is another matter. We must hope he will.”

“I hope it with all my heart.”

“And well you may, madame; as I myself. We had more to fear from that chien de chasse than all the rest of the pack – ay, have still, unless he’s found the scent too cold, and in despair abandoned the pursuit; which I fancy he has, thrown off by that little rock-slide. A lucky chance my having caught him at his reconnaissance; and rather a clever bit of strategy so to baffle him! Wasn’t it, chérie?”

“Superb! The whole thing from beginning to end! You’ve proved yourself a wonderful man, Gregoire Rogier.”

“And I hope worthy of Olympe Renault?”

“You have.”

“Merci! So far that’s satisfactory; and your slave feels he has not been toiling in vain. But there’s a good deal more to be done before we can take our ship safe into port. And it must be done quickly, too. I pine to cast off this priestly garb – in which I’ve been so long miserably masquerading – and enter into the real enjoyments of life. But there’s another, and more potent reason, for using despatch; breakers around us, on which we may be wrecked, ruined any day – any hour. Le Capitaine Ryecroft was not, or is not, the only one.”

“Richard —le braconnier– you’re thinking of?”

“No, no, no! Of him we needn’t have the slightest fear. I hold his lips sealed, by a rope around his neck; whose noose I can draw tight at the shortest notice. I am far more apprehensive of Monsieur, votre mari!”

“In what way?”

“More than one; but for one, his tongue. There’s no knowing what a drunken man may do or say in his cups; and Monsieur Murdock is hardly ever out of them. Suppose he gets to babbling, and lets drop something about – well, I needn’t say what. There’s still suspicion abroad – plenty of it, – and like a spark applied to tinder, a word would set it ablaze.”

“C’est vrai!”

“Fortunately, Mademoiselle had no very near relatives of the male sex, nor any one much interested in her fate, save the fiancé and the other lover – the rustic and rejected one – Shenstone fils. Of him we need take no account. Even if suspicious, he hasn’t the craft to unravel a clue so cunningly rolled as ours; and for the ancien hussard, let us hope he has yielded to despair, and gone back whence he came. Luck too, in his having no intimacies here, or I believe anywhere in the shire of Hereford. Had it been otherwise, we might not so easily have got disembarrassed of him.”

“And you do think he has gone for good?”

“I do; at least it would seem so. On his second return to the hotel – in haste as it was – he had little luggage; and that he has all taken away with him. So I learnt from one of the hotel people, who professes our faith. Further, at the railway station, that he took ticket for London. Of course that means nothing. He may be en route for anywhere beyond – round the globe, if he feel inclined to circumnavigation. And I shall be delighted if he do.”

He would not be much delighted had he heard at the railway station of what actually occurred – that in getting his ticket Captain Ryecroft had inquired whether he could not be booked through for Boulogne. Still less might Father Rogier have felt gratification to know, that there were two tickets taken for London; a first-class for the Captain himself, and a second for the waterman Wingate – travelling together, though in separate carriages, as befitted their different rank in life.

Having heard nothing of this, the sham priest – as he has now acknowledged himself – is jubilant at the thought that another hostile pawn in the game he has been so skilfully playing has disappeared from the chess-board. In short, all have been knocked over, queen, bishops, knights, and castles. Alone the king stands, he tottering; for Lewin Murdock is fast drinking himself to death. It is of him the priest speaks as king: —

“Has he signed the will?”

“Oui.”

“When?”

“This morning, before he went out. The lawyer who drew it up came, with his clerk to witness – ”

“I know all that,” interrupts the priest, “as I should, having sent them. Let me have a look at the document. You have it in the house, I hope?”

“In my hand,” she answers, diving into a drawer of the table by which she sits, and drawing forth a folded sheet of parchment; “Le voilà!”

She spreads it out, not to read what is written upon it, only to look at the signatures, and see they are right. Well knows he every word of that will, he himself having dictated it. A testament made by Lewin Murdock, which, at his death, leaves the Llangorren estate – as sole owner and last in tail he having the right so to dispose of it – to his wife Olympe —née Renault – for her life; then to his children, should there be any surviving; failing such, to Gregoire Rogier, Priest of the Roman Catholic Church; and in the event of his demise preceding that of the other heirs hereinbefore mentioned, the estate, or what remains of it, to become the property of the Convent of – , Boulogne-sur-mer, France.

“For that last clause, which is yours, Gregoire, the nuns of Boulogne should be grateful to you, or at all events, the abbess, Lady Superior, or whatever she’s called.”

“So she will,” he rejoins with a dry laugh, “when she gets the property so conveyed. Unfortunately for her the reversion is rather distant, and having to pass through so many hands there may be no great deal left of it, on coming into hers. Nay!” he adds in exclamation, his jocular tone suddenly changing to the serious, “if some step be not taken to put a stop to what’s going on, there won’t be much of the Llangorren estate left for any one – not even for yourself, madame. Under the fingers of Monsieur, with the cards in them, it’s being melted down as snow on the sunny side of a hill. Even at this self-same moment it may be going off in large slices – avalanches!”

“Mon Dieu!” she exclaims, with an alarmed air, quite comprehending the danger thus figuratively portrayed.