Delphi Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu

by J. Sheridan le Fanu

  On a sudden a door, in its deep oak frame, one of many that surround the pannelled hall, opened. With an oblique glance, almost over his shoulder, this portly swain beheld it, turned, and with a sensation of delight and confusion, ready to sink rapturously into the earth, he saw his spirit.

  In the shadow she stood. Did she ever before look so lovely, melancholy, beautiful? What clear and wonderful tints! Her rich, wavy hair, and deep, large eyes; and those lips, for which honest Roger could find no comparison but in the glow of the scarlet geranium petals in Barbara’s garden, a discovery which, in a moment of romantic confidence, he had trusted, with a bashful sigh, to the ear of his sister — that admiring and sympathetic maiden — who assented thoughtfully and with energy, and then plucked a sprig of that flower, as they stood together in the sunset air, on the steps, and placed it in his buttonhole; whence the enamoured fellow disengaged it, and looked on it with a sigh and a smile, and kissed it with a gentle laugh and a blush, and replaced it, saying:

  “Ah, Raby! if she thought of me as you do — but I think it is all a foolish dream.”

  And now, in the deep, oak frame, behind a film of shadow, he saw his dream, and did not very well know for a moment or two what he said.

  With eyes lowered, she stood before him, and said in a low tone, such as people murmur in a church porch as they go out:

  “Oh, Mr. Temple, I’m so glad it is you! have they all gone away?”

  “All except Stour — my brother, you know — he’s upstairs, and I’ve been waiting here for him.”

  “Oh! And is it quite over, Mr. Temple?”

  “Yes, it is over, Miss Marlyn; I fear you have found it a very trying time — very agitating; you can’t think how much I have pitied you all this time.”

  “Very kind, Mr. Temple. It has, indeed, been a very awful time. Would you mind — I’ve been so unspeakably anxious — telling me just what happened?”

  “At the inquest?”

  “Yes, if you will; perhaps you’d come into this room for a moment, and I can listen.”

  She stepped in — a melancholy, rather dark room — the schoolroom, with a shelf, and some lesson books, and two dingy globes, and a very old piano, to indicate its old character; one tall window, never sufficient to make it cheerful, was darkened by three or four elms, standing very near, in a dump, which threw their gloom upon it.

  “The door is open, so you can hear when your brother is leaving,” said the young lady, standing by the old grand piano, leaning on it with her slender hand. “You will kindly tell me what passed?”

  “Only too happy — everything — as well as I can recollect it,” said he, and he looked at her, and sighed, and then, in a very tender voice, he told the story of the inquest. He told it carefully. It happened that it had interested him intensely, and he remembered everything, and knew the people. Before he had got very fax she asked him —

  “Mr. Shadwell was present, wasn’t he?”

  “Oh, dear, yes. You see, you are so innocent of the ways of — of the world. I may say,” he murmured, tenderly, “you don’t know about these things; but he was a witness.” And so he went on with his detailed narrative, now and then sighing, and looking at that enigmatical young lady who was listening, as they say, with all her ears, while her slow glance darkly travelled over the floor.

  When Roger came to the little altercation that had interrupted the quietude of the proceedings, she looked at him with a very odd expression. He saw it for a moment. It almost startled honest Roger, as, unexpectedly turning his eyes upon her, he met the glance. For so incontestable an angel, was it not the strangest look he could have imagined?

  “A snake’s small eye blinks dull and shy,

  And the lady’s eyes shrank in her head,

  Each shrunk up to a serpent’s eye,

  And with somewhat of malice and more of dread

  She looked askance.”

  Honest Roger had no turn for analysing phenomena or sensations; he simply saw that which dismayed him — felt there was something wrong, and stopped short, a little bewildered.

  With electric speed Miss Marlyn saw in his honest face the shock which her look had given him; and that look had disappeared, and Miss Marlyn was looking down, softly and sadly, as before.

  “Why do you stop?” she said, looking up sadly.

  “I forgot, I think, what I was saying, for a moment; and I was afraid, perhaps, that the account of all this horrid business might have frightened you. Did it?”

  “Frighten me! Yes, it does — that is, rather — it horrifies me, I should say, although it certainly shouldn’t. If there were anything new to hear, indeed; but, you know, we had heard it all — all about poor, miserable Mr. Sherlock, who is mad, isn’t he? and everything about that frightful occurrence; and — and who is Mr. Mervyn?”

  “He is an old gentleman, with a very good estate. My brother likes him, and thinks him a useful man. I don’t know much of him.

  But you must have seen him at church two or three times, since you came here, though he usually goes to Maxton — a tall man, with a very white head.”

  “And — I don’t quite understand what he meant — do you?”

  “Mr. Shadwell thought he meant that two people might have been engaged in the murder.”

  “Oh? That is a very unpleasant idea; it makes one feel so unsafe. What do you think? what does the vicar say?”

  “Oh, he does not think it — no one does; Mr. Mervyn doesn’t, I’m sure; he seemed to have quite given up that idea before the inquiry ended. I should be sorry you were alarmed.”

  “But I’m not by any means; and I should be very much pained if you concealed the real state of the case through fear of frightening me. I hope you don’t think me a coward, Mr. Temple, or a fool; I should be vexed at your thinking so meanly of me.”

  “But I don’t — I couldn’t; I wish you knew how I really think of you — half what I “Then — oh, Mr. Temple, don’t deceive me! Do tell me, I entreat, what is really thought about it.”

  “Nothing more, I assure you, than that Carmel Sherlock was the assassin — in fact, there is no second opinion about it; and I am so delighted that I happened to be the person to relieve your mind of any apprehension that any dangerous person might be still in your neighbourhood.”

  “That is so kind of you.”

  “I wish — I only wish — I wish ever so much— “ said Roger, growing very hot, and tender, and hurried, and making a faint attempt to approach his short fat hand to her taper fingers.

  “Yes, you have been always very kind — and very kind taking the trouble of telling me all this; and do, pray, tell me all the rest, you tell it so interestingly.”

  Thus encouraged, he went on with his narrative. He saw no more that shrinking gaze that, for a moment, had scared him — only the beauty that he was so tenderly enamoured of.

  She listened, looking down, with a sharp and close attention, now and then fiddling nervously with a little black cross she wore; and at the end she said:

  “I’m so much obliged. One grows nervous and excited so near to so horrible a scene; sure of nothing, fancying everything. I was always accounted brave at school, and I’m sure I’m no coward — that is, in the foolish sense; but still, everyone has imagination — even you men feel its power sometimes, and can pity us whose nature it is to look up in danger, and in trouble, to your strength, and counsel, and compassion. I have two friends here, Mr. Temple,” she continued, a little incoherently, “two only — my pupil and companion, Rachel, and my dear Mrs. Shadwell — they are so good — otherwise I have none; and Madame de la Perriere — cruel to me when I was a little thing, a child, at her school, is my persecutrix still. I have discovered lately a cruelty of hers; and I cannot, as my dear Mrs. Shadwell advises, quite despise it. No, no! it is not for me that happy talent of contempt; falsehood and insult I can defy, for I am brave, but my heart is bleeding all the time. I think I shall leave Raby very soon. Perhaps, on earth, is some place where a po
or and very unhappy girl may toil and live in safety. There are some kind faces I shall miss, and long remember — perhaps always.”

  “But — but — you’re not going — you cant be thinking of going; what should they do — what should everyone do?” said Roger tumultuously.

  He had taken her hand, in a tremulous agitation; and, at the same time, the vicar’s step and voice were heard on the stairs talking to some one as he approached.

  Miss Marlyn withdrew her hand suddenly.

  “I’ve been speaking very foolishly — I have forgotten myself; pray, Mr. Temple, forgive me. Go, pray go — farewell, Mr. Temple; and a thousand very grateful thanks.”

  She placed her fingers to the open door, and drew it a little more open, so that honest Roger, who was lingering still in a happy confusion, could not fail to understand that he was dismissed.

  “Farewell, dear Miss Marlyn, but only for a day or two,” said he, with a great sigh, and a look of prodigious tenderness.

  “Do — do go, pray,” whispered the young lady, a little earnestly; and hearing his brother very near, with one longing, lingering look over his fat shoulder, he passed the threshold, and was established in the centre of the hall, and looking quite innocently, by the time the vicar stepped into its dark panelled area.

  CHAPTER XX.

  A DISTINGUISHED VISITOR LEAVES RABY.

  NEXT day Mr. Pepys Adderly arrived. The Master of Raby received him in his study, and saw a man of some five and forty years, with an air of fashion, and a kind of languor and puffiness that suggested the idea of self-indulgence, and what is called good living.

  He was, of course, properly concerned about poor dear Wycherly, because, in fact, he did not quite see, now that his patron was going to that formal and protracted supper, after the manner of Polonius, where the chief guest is not active but passive, how he — Pepys Adderly — was any longer to fare sumptuously every day; and, in fact, unless the baronet had done something for him in his will — a not very likely thoughtfulness, even if there was a will, which Adderly could not make out, and Sir Roke’s men of business in London bad not heard of — he might, before a year had passed, be very much puzzled to make out a dinner of any kind.

  The vicar had come over to Raby, at Shadwell’s request, to be present while inquisition was made for a will, in Sir Roke’s room.

  Mark Shadwell had placed seals upon the deceased baronet’s desk, dressing-case, despatch-box, and every other possible depository of such a document which his room contained.

  Mr. Pepys Adderly gave all the assistance in his power in this search; but it was totally unrewarded. There were not even letters. It was Sir Roke’s habit, except when there was some very special necessity for preserving them, to destroy his letters on answering them.

  Those which turned up were upon business accounts, memoranda of investments, an invoice of some pictures, bronze, and statuary — not a letter among them all but such as related strictly to business. Mark was relieved of an oppressive suspense when the search concluded without discovering one scrap of paper bearing the well-known handwriting of his secretary.

  “And now,” said Mark, who was looking very ill, so soon as they were again in his library, “what steps do you propose taking about the funeral? Where is he to be taken to?”

  “Drayton, who is to succeed him, you know, would be the natural person, but he’s yachting — in the Mediterranean — Lord knows where, and there’s no one to direct. We don’t know whether there’s a will, and there’s no one with authority.”

  “Well, you know, something must be done, and you and his solicitors can act — I won’t,” said Mark, harshly.

  “There may be directions — where he’s to be buried, and all that; it had better be quite private, I suppose?” said Pepys Adderly, patting the leg of his trousers with his walking-cane, and looking inquiringly at Mark, who merely nodded. “And where he’s laid for the present, poor fellow! isn’t of much importance, I should think. They’ll be removing him, I conjecture, to some place, don’t you think?”

  “I can’t tell at all any more than you,” said Shadwell.

  “No, quite uncertain; and I’m told there’s an old family burial-ground where some of his people, long ago, were buried — a place near this called Wynderfel, isn’t it? and it struck me it might lie there, as it were, provisionally — until — eh?”

  “No,” said Mark, peremptorily.

  “Oh! — I merely mentioned it; but you think it wouldn’t do?”

  “No. You don’t know, but it has been shut up as a burial-place for ever so long, and it isn’t to be thought of. The remains must be conveyed from this, and they can lie, as you say, provisionally, wherever you, or those people who have been acting for him, think best.”

  “There are cemeteries — yes — the undertakers will know?” suggested Mr. Adderly.

  “I dare say. You can have no difficulty; I decline taking any part in those arrangements, however. You’ll be good enough to arrange with Clewson, his servant, and about the things he has got in his room.”

  “Yes — yes — certainly; and there will be people here tomorrow — about the arrangements — undertaker-people, you know. I suppose they can get in when they arrive?”

  “Certainly,” said Mark. “I only wish I could offer you a bed here; but we are all in such confusion in consequence of this miserable occurrence, and you will be much more comfortable down at Raby.”

  Pepys Adderly, I dare say, mentally acquiesced in this conclusion. At the best, however, it was a dismal bore, and I think he would have had no hesitation in cutting his dead patron in this extremity if it had not been for some hopes of founding relations with young Drayton upon the melancholy duties he was now performing.

  Mr. Adderly had no difficulty in presenting a very becoming melancholy upon this funereal occasion to the people of Raby; for, as we know, “nothing dies, but something mourns,” and here in this out-of-the-way part of the world, Pepys Adderly’s soft raiment and sumptuous fare had been suddenly abolished by a madman. The claret, hock, and Madeira of his serene perspective had been smashed. The haunch he loved had been pitched into Tartarus by Carmel Sherlock — that most selfish of murderers. Mr. Adderly devoutly hoped he would be caught, and grudged him so quick and easy an exit as that through the drop.

  But his practical ruminations were chiefly concerned with the rising star. He knew little of Drayton — less he now felt than, considering his past opportunities, was at all justifiable. His passion for yachting he could make nothing of. Adderly could not abide that recreation. To him it was simply being in a floating hospital, and he knew nothing about luffing and larboard, and all their horrid lingo. He had nothing for it, then, but to be sharp about these funeral expenses; to take on himself to discharge all the servants who would go at his bidding; to see that the cellar-books were all right, and to get up exact inventories of everything, and constitute himself the conscientious guardian and incorruptible agent of the unconscious heir, and by mastering detail, and cultivating for him a Spartan frugality during his absence, to lay the best foundation he could for a continuance, under the new régime, of his privileges and his office.

  The next day came, and something was smuggled into the house, and people treading softly and speaking low were busy in Sir Roke’s room.

  When next Mr. Clewson saw his old master his dress was changed to white, and a border of white was round his face, and he was extended in a deep coffin lined with white quilted satin — robed, and fringed, and cased in the emblematic purity of white.

  Mr. Clewson looked down on the familiar face of the baronet — more sharp, more sunken, more of the earth, earthy it had grown — a little streak of the sightless eye showed white in the shadow. Mr. Clewson saw the lines about the nostril and mouth that used to express themselves so dangerously when he snarled and cursed at him pretty regularly every night and morning. He had often made the phlegmatic Clewson intensely angry, and driven him to the verge of his self-command; but, on the w
hole, Mr. Clewson had been very sufficiently afraid of him.

  Now Mr. Clewson was looking upon that mechanism, the spring of which was taken away, with a stolid but decent curiosity. He had now decidedly the advantage of that great gentleman whom he had feared, and a good deal hated, and in some sort admired. Mr. Clewson could see, and hear, and stand, and, after his fashion, think. A latent sense of the value of life communicated, as he looked on this odd image, a serene self-satisfaction and a tranquil glow.

  As he looked on the mask that lay in the shadow of the coffin, a good many indistinct thoughts and feelings were also moving to and fro within the not very refined or active mind of Mr. Clewson, whose parents had been religious people; and left there some shadowy ideas of hell, which occasionally came into view like things traced in sympathetic ink, which show themselves only in certain temperatures.

  “That’s a really beautiful suit, it is!” said the soft diapason of Mr. Clothey, the eminent undertaker, as he gently brushed away some dust from the edge of the coffin with his handkerchief. “You never saw nothink of the kind more tasteful nor luxurious nowhere? That satt’n, sir, has stood us in fifteen four the yard, and heider down stuffin’ and pillow. The style is the same which the hobsequeies of the late Marquis of — . You’ve ‘eard of that, no doubt, sir. We had that, you’ve ‘eard — very beautiful thing it was. If he was the Dook of Wellington he couldn’t ‘av been got up more tasteful — the whole world ‘card of that, sir; we were in the papers, and spoke very high of indeed, and there wasn’t no other ‘ouse in England could ‘av turned him out with the same finish and hellegance. This ‘ere is one of the sweetest bits of cedar you hever seed, and this un’s lead.” He scratched it a little with the nail with which he indicated the successive rinds, as it were, in which the kernel of Sir Roke was enclosed. “Then the meeogny — the shell being hoak — we’ve turned out nothink prettier, and the family has reason to be gratified, which I say, is our principle; we never put in nothink but the very best of every thing, and spares nothink to give satisfaction.”