Kitabı oku: «The Man with a Shadow», sayfa 9
Chapter Twenty Four.
A Terrible Silence
“Serve him right,” muttered Tom. Then rising and pushing the door, which had swung to, he entered the dark billiard-room, where he felt his way to the spirit stand, and took a hearty draught. “Curse him! he’s as strong as a horse. I wish he had broken his neck.”
The brandy gave him nerve, and he returned through the baize door into the light.
“Must lend him a hand, I suppose,” he muttered, as he descended the stairs to where the squire lay in a heap, his head upon the mat, one leg doubled beneath him, and the other through the balustrade, which held it fast.
Tom Candlish stood peering down at him for a few moments, and then, as his brother did not move, he stooped towards him.
“Here,” he said roughly, as he took hold of his wrist; “don’t lie like that; you’ll have a blood-vessel burst.”
There was no reply; and, as the wrist was loosed, the arm fell in an absolutely nerveless way.
“Here, Luke!” he cried; “get up. Don’t fool. Get up, man!”
Still no reply, and, beginning to be startled, Tom Candlish went down upon one knee and tried to move his brother’s head into a more comfortable position.
As he did so, the light fell athwart so ghastly and strange a countenance, from whose lips the blood was slowly trickling, that he let the head glide from his hands, for it to sink suddenly with a dull thud upon the stairs.
“Good God!” ejaculated the young man, in a low, excited voice. “Here, Luke! Luke, old man: hold up!”
There was no movement – not even a sigh; and Tom Candlish ran to alarm the house; but, as he reached the swing-door at the end of the passage, and stood gazing into the hall, he stopped and ran back to lay his hand upon his brother’s heart; then caught his wrist, and afterwards thrust a hand right into his breast, but only to withdraw it quite aghast.
“Here! a doctor!” he gasped, his voice being like a hoarse whisper. “Smith! Somebody! Here!”
He rose and hurried to the door leading into the entrance hall once more, but stopped again as he reached it, and stood gazing back at the distorted figure at the foot of the stairs.
Then he turned and looked up the dimly-lit staircase, but all was perfectly still. No one appeared to have heard the altercation or the fall. All seemed to be sleeping; and, panting heavily, as wild thoughts full of wonder and dread flooded his brain, Tom Candlish closed the door softly, ran back along the passage, ascended the stairs, and gained the billiard-room, where he groped his way once more to the spirit stand, removed the stopper, and drank heavily from the brandy decanter.
“Hah!” he ejaculated, as he took a long breath, and turned to see that the oval pane in the baize door seemed to have assumed the aspect of a huge, dull eye glaring at him.
“Am I going mad?” he muttered, as he staggered to the door. “I must call help; perhaps – perhaps – he is seriously hurt.”
He stole softly down the stairs, and paused by the prostrate figure, still lying perfectly motionless, and in its hideously-distorted position.
“I must call help – call help!” whispered the young man, whose face was now ghastly; but though there were bells that might have been rung and people were within call, he only crept along the passage, without attempting to touch the fallen man, pushed the spring-door gently, so that it should make no noise, closed it again, stood listening, and then, in the midst of the dead silence, stole on tip-toe up the grand staircase to his bedroom, where he once more stopped to listen, and then crept softly in and closed the door.
The silence in the old Hall was as that of death for a few moments, before it was broken by a faint click, as of the bolt of a lock just shot.
Once more silence, and then on the dim staircase there was a musical purring noise, followed by the pleasant chimes of a clock, which rang out the half-hour after midnight.
Then once again the stillness as of death.
Chapter Twenty Five.
Smith Finds Something Wrong
“You heard nothing?” said the doctor.
“Nothing at all. I went to bed at the usual time, sir,” said the butler – “half-past ten – yes, sir, I’ve the chaise waiting; won’t you come in that, and I can tell you as we drive over?”
“Yes; all right,” said the doctor, and five minutes later they were rattling along the road towards the Hall.
“Now, go on,” said North. “Yes, sir; I went to bed as usual, and slept very soundly till about an hour ago, and then I suddenly woke. I don’t know what made me wake; but I did, and somehow began thinking, as I’ve often thought before, about the plate in the pantry, and whether it was safe.”
“Don’t you sleep in the pantry?”
“No, sir; it’s so damp. So I lay telling myself it was all nonsense and fancy; but the more I thought so, the more uncomfortable I grew, till I could stand it no longer, and I got up, slipped on my trousers and great-coat, and went to the top of the stairs, where I felt quite a chill, as I knew something was not as it should be, for the lamp was not turned out on the hall table.”
“What lamp?”
“The hall lamp that Sir Luke always puts out himself when he goes up to bed.”
“Where do you say you left him last night?”
“In the billiard-room, sir, playing with Mr Tom, sir.”
“Yes; go on.”
“So I went down, sir; and there saw through the baize door that the lamp was burning at the end of the passage at the foot of the billiard-room stairs.”
“Yes.”
“And as soon as I got through the baize door, there, under the lamp, lay my poor master, all like of a heap.”
“What did you do?”
“Ran to him, and tried to put him in a more comfortable position, sir; but – ”
“Yes; I understand.”
“Then I rushed up and called Mr Tom, sir; and we went to the squire together, and rang the bells and alarmed the house. Then, as soon as the boy had put the horse in the chaise, sir, I drove over to fetch you.”
“But did you do nothing to try and revive him?”
“Oh! yes, sir; but – ”
“I understand,” said the doctor. “And Mr Tom?”
“He couldn’t believe it, sir. He said he played billiards with the squire for some time, and then grew tired and went to bed, leaving him knocking the balls about, and it’s all very plain, sir. I tell you of course, though I wouldn’t say so to another soul, poor Sir Luke used to take a great deal too much. I filled the spirit stand only this morning, and the brandy decanter was quite empty. He had a deal too, at dinner, before.”
“And you think he pitched downstairs, Smith?”
“Yes, sir; that is my belief,” said the butler; “and Mr Tom seemed to think so too.”
They reached the Hall to find every one in a state of the most intense excitement, but an ominous silence reigning through the place.
“Thank goodness you’ve come at last,” cried a familiar voice, and Tom hurried to meet North. “Pray be quick; he is insensible still.”
The doctor looked at the young man curiously.
“Where is he?”
“We carried him into the dining-room, and laid him on a sofa; but he has not stirred since. I’m afraid something is broken.”
As he spoke he led North into the dining-room, where the candles were burning, the shutters were closed, and curtains drawn; and there, upon a couch in the middle of the room, lay Sir Luke Candlish, as his brother had said, without having moved since he had been borne carefully in.
The doctor’s examination was short, and Tom Candlish stood looking on, apparently too much overcome to speak.
“Well,” he said at last, “is he very bad? Is anything broken?”
The doctor raised his eyebrows, and could have replied “his neck,” but he said simply: “Bad, sir? Can you not see that he is dead?”
“Dead?” ejaculated Tom; and his jaw dropped, while his face assumed a look of intense horror.
“Yes, sir. The butler’s theory seems to be quite correct. Sir Luke must have pitched headlong from the top of the stairs to the bottom.”
“And there is no hope?”
The doctor shook his head, and laid his hand upon the young man’s arm, signing to him to quit the room.
Tom followed mechanically.
“So horrible!” he said, as soon as they were in the drawing-room. “We were playing billiards together till late last night, while now – Yes, what is it?”
“I beg pardon. Sir Thomas,” said the old butler softly, “the housekeeper said would you and Dr North like a cup of tea?”
“Sir Thomas!” The title made Tom Candlish thrill as he stood gazing at the speaker. So soon! Le Roi est mort! Vive le Roi!
He was Sir Thomas Candlish. The estate was his and the rent-roll of at least five thousand a year. Last night he was enraged at the possibility of trouble arising from Thompson. Now he was a free man: he was rich.
And his brother?
It was his secret. And why should he trouble about the sudden death? It was an accident, and his own counsel could easily be kept. There was none to reveal the truth. The dead could never speak.
As he mused like this, and the butler brought in the tea, Dr North was lost in a fit of musing, for, like a flash, the scientific fancy upon which he had so long pondered came to him, so that for the moment he stood breathless and gazing wildly at the door which seemed to open before him.
The idea was bewildering. Leo had bidden her suitor distinguish himself as the price at which her love was to be won; and the more he thought, the more the idea shone out, dazzling him by its intense light – shining into the dark places of his soul.
What was his theory? That if a hale, hearty man were suddenly cut off by some accident, and apparently dead, could he arrest decay, Nature herself would repair the injury done, even as a fractured bone rapidly knits together and becomes stronger than before.
Here, then, was a hale, hearty man suddenly cut down; he was the medical man in attendance, and the opportunity served for restoring this man to life. Why should he not make his first essay now?
The idea grew more terrible in its intensity hour by hour. It was his chance if he would grasp it. Impious? No, not more so than performing an operation or trying to save a sufferer from death. But he was dead.
“What we call dead,” muttered North; “but why not suspended animation? For her sake, for my own fame, to achieve a success such as the world has not heard of before, I must – I will make the essay.”
“But how?”
“And suppose I make him live once more – what then?”
The idea blinded him, and he covered his eyes to think.
Chapter Twenty Six.
“Ah!”
“How horrible!” the curate said, when he heard the news from North, who came in at breakfast time.
As he spoke these words, Leo entered the room, and stopped short, gazing from one to the other.
She had come down looking happy and contented, with a satisfied smile upon her curved lips, heightened by a rather mocking light which danced in her eyes, as they encountered those of the doctor. There was a feeling of triumph, the satisfaction of a vain, weak woman at the sight of the slave ready to cast himself at her feet, and her manner was coquettish as she held out her hand.
But her brother’s ejaculation, the stern look on the doctor’s face, chilled her, and she stopped short, looking from one to the other, her lips parting as if for the utterance of words which would not come.
“What is it?” she said at last, wildly. “What is horrible?”
“Hush, Leo!” said the curate, taking her hand; “don’t be alarmed.”
“But you said – ”
“Yes; North has brought in terrible news from the Hall.”
Leo’s face turned ghastly, and she clung to her brother, while North hurriedly placed a chair, into which she sank, but only to sit up rigidly, as she stared with widely opened eyes at the doctor.
“Be calm,” he said tenderly. “You are still weak.”
“What is it?” she said, in a voice that did not sound like her own.
“It would be better that you should not know,” said North. “There has been a sad accident at the Hall.”
“I must know now,” panted Leo, as she opened and closed her hands in her excitement.
“It would be better to speak,” said the curate. “My sisters have been schooled to trouble, North. There has been a terribly sudden calamity at the Hall, Leo, dear. North was called up in the night, and – ”
“Is he dead?” she whispered hoarsely; and then reading her answer in the eyes of both, she uttered a long, low, “Ah!” and sat with her hand tightening upon her brother’s, while she closed her eyes, and an agonising spasm seemed to contract her beautiful face.
“A fit of giddiness seems to have seized Sir Luke, and he fell headlong from the top of the stairs to the bottom.”
“Ah!”
Once more that strange expiration of the breath, which sounded to the listeners precisely the same, for their senses were not attuned with sufficient keenness to detect the difference.
“I am sorry to have given you this terrible shock, Leo,” said North tenderly; “but I felt bound to come and let Salis know.”
She did not reply directly, but sat there spasmodically clinging to her brother’s hand with fingers that were damp and cold.
“I am better now,” she said at last, in a low whisper. “It is very terrible. Does Mary know?”
“Not yet,” said Salis. “I am going to fetch her down. Has the faintness passed away?”
“Yes – yes!” she said hastily. “It was the suddenness of the news. Try not to startle Mary, Hartley; but she is not such a coward as I am.”
“You have been so ill,” said North tenderly. “Your nerves are unstrung. Besides, it is a great shock to hear of so awfully sudden a death.”
“Go and tell Mary,” said Leo, rising. “I am quite well now. Speak gently.”
“Yes,” said the curate; and he left the room.
“Tell me,” said Leo, as soon as the door closed. “How was it? Was there any quarrel? It was an accident?”
She spoke in a hurriedly excited manner, and there was a wildly anxious look in her eyes.
“You are excited,” said North, taking her hand, half professionally, half with the anxious touch of a lover; but she snatched it away with an angry flash from her eyes.
She saw his pained look, and held out her hand the next moment.
“If the pulse beats quickly,” she said, smiling, “it is no wonder.”
“No, no, of course not,” he cried, taking her hand, and holding it in his.
“Now, tell me.”
“Oh, it was an accident,” he said, “undoubtedly. I’m afraid there was a reason for it.”
Leo was silent, looking at North searchingly.
“Oh, yes, I understand now,” she said quickly. “He drank very much, did he not?”
“I’m afraid so,” replied North, feeling half troubled at the intimate knowledge displayed by the woman he loved.
“It is very horrible,” said Leo, closing her eyes. “Hush! they are coming down. Say as little as you can. Mary is very weak.”
For the curate’s heavy step was heard upon the stairs, and directly after, as North hastened to open the door, Salis entered, carrying Mary in his arms, she looking white and anxious, and gazing quickly from her sister to North and back.
There was an interchange of glances all round, and then, as if by common consent, the subject of the past night was avoided for a time, and North turned to go.
“But you will stay breakfast?” said Mary. “You look tired and worn out.”
She coloured slightly, for the words, full of anxiety for North’s welfare, had escaped her inadvertently; and the colour deepened as, in his pleasantly frank way, he smiled in her face.
“It is very good of you,” he said. “You are always so thoughtful. If Leo will only endorse the invitation, I shall be very glad to stay.”
“I’m sure we shall be very pleased,” said Leo calmly; and he crossed to her side, bent down, and said, in low tone:
“I like that.”
“You like what?” she said coolly enough.
“The brave way in which you have mastered your weakness.”
She smiled and looked furtively at her sister, who was less successful in controlling her feelings.
The breakfast passed over without further allusion to the catastrophe at the Hall till towards the end, when Salis said suddenly:
“I have a very unpleasant duty to perform.”
Mary looked up anxiously.
“Yes, dear; I must go over and see Thomas Candlish.”
Leo bent over her cup.
“It is a duty that I must fulfil, North.”
“Yes,” said the doctor gravely; “especially at a time like this.”
“How horrible!”
And when the doctor left soon after, and he shook hands with his friend again, the latter once more exclaimed:
“How horrible!”
But it was in allusion to the sudden termination of the career of a man who drank heavily, and there was no arrière pensée as to the possibility of a quarrel between the two young men.
Chapter Twenty Seven.
The Doctor’s Opportunity
About midday, on his return from visiting his patients, North looked rather black.
Perhaps it was the reflection from the sleek, superfine garments of his cousin, for that gentleman was walking slowly up and down on the lawn in front of the old Manor House, and in no way adding to the attractions of the quaintly-cut, well-kept place. “You here, Thompson!”
“Yes, my dear Horace; I had to come down on business to-day, and I thought you would give me a bit of lunch before I went on.”
“To see Mrs Berens?”
“Well – er – perhaps I may give her a call; but my business was with – dear me, how strange that you should take any interest in social matters that have nothing to do with the body!”
“Am I such a very eccentric man, then, that I should study my profession hard?”
“Not at all, my dear fellow – not at all. I study mine hard, my dear Horace. Left almost penniless, it was a necessity, and I have, I am proud to say, been very successful, and am practically independent. But my visit here to-day was not to see the handsome widow – there, don’t blush, old fellow.”
“Don’t be a fool, Thompson,” said the doctor testily. “Now, then, what were you going to say?”
“I was going to tell you that my visit would be to the Hall.”
“To the Hall?” cried North excitedly. “Yes. Here, what’s the matter?” said Cousin Thompson excitedly. “He hasn’t given me the slip?”
“If you mean Sir Luke Candlish – ”
“No,” said Thompson harshly; “I don’t mean Luke Candlish. Here, why don’t you speak, man? Has Tom Candlish gone?”
“No; he is at the Hall; but – ”
“That’s all right, then,” said Cousin Thompson, drawing a breath of relief. “Oh, I see, you’ve been over.”
“Yes, I have been over.”
“And he is shamming illness again because he expected me to-day. But it won’t do, Horace – it won’t do. Come, now, he’s quite well, isn’t he? Don’t turn against your own cousin, and back him up.”
“Tom Candlish is as well as a man can be under such horrible circumstances. His brother is dead.”
“Phew!” whistled the lawyer – a long-drawn, low, deep whistle. “Then he is now Sir Thomas Candlish.”
“Yes, and if you have lent him money at usury it will be all right.”
“At usury!” snarled the lawyer; “don’t you be so fond of using that word. I must make money, and lending at interest is fair enough.”
“Where are you going?”
“Going down to the Hall at once.”
“You said you had come to lunch.”
“Hang your lunch! I must see Tom Candlish.”
“Impossible. It would not be decent to go on business now.”
“Decent or indecent, I must see him at once.”
“My cousin; and how cordially I do dislike him!” muttered the doctor, as he watched the sleek, black back of his visitor as he went down towards the gate. “To go at a time like this! Well, thank goodness, I am not a money-grubber.”
He sat down in his study, and took a manuscript book from his drawer. Over this book he began to pore, but the words danced before his eyes, and he could think of nothing but Luke Candlish, the hale, strong man, suddenly cut off by accident, and of Leo’s words bidding him distinguish himself.
“No rest last night,” he said, throwing the book back into the drawer; “I can’t read, or think, or do anything.”
“Are you ready for your lunch, sir?” said Mrs Milt. “Mr Thompson will join you, I suppose?”
“No; but I dare say he will come to dinner.”
“Ho! Lunch is quite ready, sir,” said the old lady, in an ill-used tone, as the doctor moved towards the door.
“Never mind; I can’t eat to-day. Going out,” said North hastily; and he hurriedly left the house, and passed down the village, where every one was discussing the accident at the Hall, and longed to question him, if such a thing could have been ventured upon.
He had not seen Moredock for two or three days, and almost immediately, to avoid the torture of his thoughts, and what was rapidly approaching the stage of a great temptation, he walked to the old sexton’s cottage.
The door was ajar, and he tapped, but there was no reply, and the only sound within was the regular beat of the great clock as the heavy pendulum swung to and fro.
“Asleep, perhaps,” he said to himself, and pushing the door, he walked in; but the big arm-chair was vacant, and after a glance round, in which his eyes rested for a moment upon the old carved oak coffer, the doctor went slowly out, and, without considering which way he should go, walked straight on towards the church.
A sound, as of something falling, made him raise his eyes, and he saw that the chancel door was open.
“What’s Salis doing there?” he said to himself; and, entering the gate, he walked up the steps to the open doorway.
“You here, Salis?” he said.
“Nay, sir,” came back, in a harsh, familiar tone; “parson’s been and gone. Things is looking up again, doctor.”
“Looking up?”
“Ay. Been trebble quiet lately: only a bit of a child as hasn’t been chrissen’ this month past. Horrible healthy place, Dook’s Hampton.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Doing? Here? Why, haven’t you heard as the young squire – why, of course you have; you were called up this morning. Well, he’s got to be buried, hasn’t he?”
“Buried? Yes, of course,” said the doctor thoughtfully.
“Yes; he’s got to be buried,” said Moredock. “Some says it arn’t decent and like Christians, as ought to be buried tight in the brown earth. But they don’t know, doctor. They can’t tell what a lot o’ water there is in the ground o’ winters. I know, and I know what ’matics is. Nobody knows how damp that there churchyard is better than I do, doctor.”
North stood looking at the sexton, but his thoughts were far away.
“Ay, Squire Luke ’ll be buried in the morslem – he’ll lie with his fathers, as Scripter says; and when I die, which won’t be this twenty year, that’s how I’d like to lie with my fathers. Stretched out nice and warm in his lead coffin, that’s how he’s going to be, and put on a nice dry shelf. Ay, it’s a nasty damp old churchyard, doctor, and well they folk in Church Row know it. He, he, he! their wells is allus full o’ nice clean water, but I allus goes to the fur pump.”
North did not seem to hear a word, but stood holding on by the rail of the Candlish tomb, thinking. His head swam with the dazzling light that blazed into his understanding. He was confused, and full of wonder, hesitation, and doubt.
Luke Candlish – dead – the mausoleum – the hale, hearty young man – struck down.
“Good heavens!” he ejaculated; “has my opportunity come – at last?”
