Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu (Illustrated)

by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

  The talk turned, of course, a good deal on Charles Nutter; and Mr. Dangerfield, who was in great force, and, indeed, in particularly pleasant spirits, except when unfortunate Nutter was actually under discussion — when he grew grave and properly saddened — told, in his clear, biting way, a curious rosary of Newgate stories — of highwaymen’s disguises — of clever constables — of circumstantial evidence, marvellously elicited, and exquisitely put together — of monsters, long concealed, drawn from the deep by the finest tackle, into upper light, and dropped deftly into the landing-net of Justice. These curious anecdotes of Bow-street dexterity and Bagshot dodges — thrust and parry — mine and countermine — ending, for the most part, in the triumph of Bow-street, Justice crowned, and a Tyburn speech — tickled Lowe mightily, who quite enjoyed himself, and laughed more than his friend Colonel Stafford ever remembered to have heard him before, over some of the ingenious stratagems described so neatly by Dangerfield, and the gay irony with which he pointed his catastrophes. And Lowe actually, having obtained Colonel Stafford’s leave, proposed that gallant officer’s health in a bumper, and took occasion to mention their obligations to him for having afforded them the opportunity of enjoying Mr. Dangerfield’s sprightly and instructive sallies; and hoped, with all his heart, that the neighbourhood was long to enjoy the advantage and pleasure of his residence among them. And Mr. Dangerfield replied gaily, that all that was needed to make such sweet scenery and charming company as the place commanded absolutely irresistible, was the sense of safety conferred by the presence of such a magistrate as Mr. Lowe, and the convivial inspiration of such wine as their gallant host provided; and that, for his part, being somewhat of an old boy, and having had enough of rambling, nothing would better please him than to spend the residue of his days amidst the lively quietude of their virtuous and hilarious neighbourhood; and some more to the like purpose, which pleased the good company highly, who all agreed that the white gentleman — fluent, easy, and pointed in his delivery — was a mighty fine speaker, indeed. Though there was a lurking consciousness in each, which none cared to publish, that there was, at times, an indefinable flavour of burlesque and irony in Mr. Dangerfield’s compliments, which excited momentary suspicions and qualms, which the speaker waived off, however, easily with his jewelled fingers, and smiled mockingly away.

  Lowe was mightily taken with him. There was little warmth or veneration in that hard justice’s nature. But Mr. Dangerfield had a way with him that few men with any sort of taste for the knowledge of evil could resist; and the cold-eyed justice of the peace hung on his words with an attentive rapture, and felt that he was drinking deep and pleasant draughts from the sparkling fountains of knowledge; and was really sorry, and shook him admiringly by the hand, when Dangerfield, who had special business at home, rose up in his brisk way, and flashed a farewell over the company from his spectacles.

  ‘If Mr. Dangerfield really means to stay here, he must apply for the commission of the peace,’ said Mr. Lowe, so soon as the door shut. ‘We must put it upon him. I protest I never met a man so fitted by nature and acquirements to make a perfectly useful magistrate. He and I, Sir, between us, we’d give a good account of this part of the county; and there’s plenty of work, Sir, if ‘twere only between this and Dublin; and, by George, Sir, he’s a wonderful diverting fellow, full of anecdote. Wonderful place London, to be sure.’

  ‘And a good man, too, in a quiet way,’ said Colonel Strafford, who could state a fact. ‘’Tisn’t every rich man has the heart to part with his money as he does; he has done many charities here, and especially he has been most bountiful to poor Sturk’s family.’

  ‘I know that,’ said Lowe.

  ‘And he sent a fifty pound note by the major there to poor Sally Nutter o’ Monday last; he’ll tell you.’

  And thus it is, as the foul fiend, when he vanishes, leaves a smell of brimstone after him, a good man leaves a fragrance; and the company in the parlour enjoyed the aroma of Mr. Dangerfield’s virtues, as he buttoned his white surtout over his breast, and dropped his vails into the palms of the carbuncled butler and fuddled footman in the hall.

  It was a clear, frosty, starlit night. White and stern was the face which he turned upward for a moment to the sky. He paused for a second in the ray of candlelight that gleamed through Puddock’s window-shutter, and glanced on the pale dial of his large gold watch. It was only halfpast eight o’clock. He walked on, glancing back over his shoulder, along the Dublin road.

  ‘The drunken beast. My mind misgives me he’ll disappoint,’ muttered the silver spectacles, gliding briskly onward.

  When he reached the main street he peered curiously before him under the village tree, in quest of carriage lights.

  ‘A lawless brute like that may be before his time as well as after.’ So he walked briskly forward, and up Sturk’s doorsteps, and knocked.

  ‘The Dublin doctor hasn’t come, eh?’ — he asked.

  ‘No, Sir, he isn’t come yet— ’twas nine o’clock, the mistress told me.’

  ‘Very good. Tell Mrs. Sturk, pray, that I, Mr. Dangerfield, you know, will call, as I promised, at nine o’clock precisely.’

  And he turned again and walked briskly over the bridge, and away along the Inchicore road overhanging the river. All was silent there. Not a step but his own was stirring, and the road in places so overhung with old trees that it was difficult to see a yard before one.

  He slackened his pace, and listened, like a man who keeps an assignation, and listened again, and laughed under his breath; and sure enough, before long, the clink of a footstep was heard approaching swiftly from the Dublin direction.

  Mr. Dangerfield drew aside under the deep shadow of a high hawthorn hedge, overhung by trees; and watching intently, he saw a tall, lank figure, with a peculiar gait and stoop of its own, glide stealthily by. He smiled after it in the dark.

  The tall figure was that of our old friend, Zekiel Irons, the clerk. A sable form, as beseemed his ecclesiastical calling — and now a white figure was gliding without noise swiftly after him.

  Suddenly, as he reached an open part of the road, a thin hand was laid on his shoulder, and, with a start, and a ‘hollo,’ he sprung round.

  ‘Hey! why, you’re as frightened as if you had seen Charles — Charles Nutter. Hey? — don’t be uneasy. I heard from the parson yesterday morning you were to be with him tonight before nine o’clock, about that money you left in his hands, and I’ve chanced to meet you; and this I want you to understand, Charles Nutter is in gaol, and we must not let him get out — do you see? That business settled, we’re at rest. So, Mr. Irons, you must not show the white feather. Be bold — speak out what you know — now’s the time to strike. I’ll put your evidence, as you reported it to me, into shape, and you come to me tomorrow morning at eight o’clock; and mind you, I’ll reward you this time, and better than ever you’ve fared before. Go on. Or stay — I’ll go before.’

  And Mr. Dangerfield laughed one of his chilly laughs — and, with a nod to Irons, repeated— ‘eight o’clock’ — and so walked on a little bit.

  The clerk had not said a word. A perspiration broke forth on his forehead, and, wiping the drops away, he said —

  ‘Lord have mercy upon us — Lord deliver us — Lord have mercy upon us,’ like a man dying.

  Mr. Dangerfield’s bold proposition seemed quite to overpower and unman him.

  The white figure turned short, facing the clerk, and said he —

  ‘See you, Mr. Irons, I’m serious — there must be no shirking. If you undertake, you must go through; and, hark! in your ear — you shall have five hundred pounds. I put no constraint — say yes or no — if you don’t like you needn’t. Justice, I think, will be done even without your help. But till he’s quiet — you understand — nothing sure. He has been dead and alive again — curse him; and till he’s at rest, and on the surgeon’s table — ha! ha! — we sha’n’t feel quite comfortable.’

  ‘Lord have mercy upon us!’ muttered Iro
ns, with a groan.

  ‘Amen,’ said Dangerfield, with a sneering imitation.

  ‘There, ’tis enough — if you have nerve to speak truth and do justice, you may have the money. We’re men of business — you and I. If not, I sha’n’t trouble you any more. If you like it, come to me at eight o’clock in the morning; if not, why, stay away, and no harm’s done.’

  And with these words, Mr. Dangerfield turned on his heel once more, and started at a lively pace for Chapelizod.

  CHAPTER LXXXVI.

  IN WHICH MR. PAUL DANGERFIELD MOUNTS THE STAIRS OF THE HOUSE BY THE CHURCHYARD, AND MAKES SOME ARRANGEMENTS.

  The white figure glided duskily over the bridge. The river rushed beneath in Egyptian darkness. The air was still, and a thousand celestial eyes twinkled down brightly through the clear deep sky upon the actors in this true story. He kept the left side, so that the road lay between him and the Phœnix door, which gaped wide with a great hospitable grin, and crimsoned the night air with a glow of candlelight.

  The white figure turned the corner, and glided onward in a straight, swift line — straight and swift as fate — to the door of Doctor Sturk.

  He knocked softly at the hall-door, and swiftly stepped in and shut it.

  ‘How’s your master?’

  ‘Jist the same way, plaze yer honour; jist sleepin’ — still sleepin’ — sleepin’ always,’ answered the maid.

  ‘Has the Dublin doctor come?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘The mistress — where’s she?’

  ‘In the room, Sir, with the masther.’

  ‘Present my service to her — Mr. Dangerfield’s compliments, you know — and say I await her permission to come up stairs.’

  Presently the maid returned, with poor Mrs. Sturk’s invitation to Mr. Dangerfield to walk up.

  Up he went, leaving his white surtout and cocked hat in the hall, and entered the chamber where pale little Mrs. Sturk, who had been crying a great deal, sat in a dingy old tabby saque, by the light of a solitary mould-candle at the bedside of the noble Barney.

  The mutton-fat wanted snuffing; but its light danced and splintered brilliantly over Mr. Dangerfield’s resplendent shoebuckles, and up and down his cut-steel buttons, and also glimmered in a more phosphoric way upon his silver spectacles, as he bowed at the door, arrayed in a puce cut velvet coat, lined with pink, long embroidered satin waistcoat, fine lace ruffles and cravat, his well-shaped leg gleaming glossily in silk, and altogether, in his glimmering jewellery, and purple and fine linen, resembling Dives making a complimentary visit to the garret of Lazarus.

  Poor little Mrs. Sturk felt her obligations mysteriously enlarged by so much magnificence, and wondered at the goodness of this white-headed angel in point, diamonds, and cut velvet, who had dropped from the upper regions upon the sad and homely floor of her Barney’s sick chamber.

  ‘Dr. Dillon not yet arrived, Madam? Well, ’tis precisely his hour; we shall have him soon. How does the patient? Ha! just as usual. How? — why there’s a change, isn’t there?’

  ‘As how, Sir?’ enquired Mrs. Sturk, with a scared look.

  ‘Why, don’t you see? But you mustn’t be frightened; there’s one coming in whom I have every confidence.’

  ‘I don’t see, Sir. What is it, Mr. Dangerfield? Oh, pray, Sir?’

  ‘Why — a — nothing very particular, only he looks more languid than when I saw him last, and discoloured somewhat, and his face more sunk, I think — eh?’

  ‘Oh, no, Sir— ’tis this bad light — nothing more, indeed, Sir. This evening, I assure you, Mr. Dangerfield, at three o’clock, when the sun was shining, we were all remarking how well he looked. I never saw — you’d have said so — such a wonderful improvement.’

  And she snuffed the candle, and held it up over Barney’s grim features.

  ‘Well, Madam, I hope we soon may find it. ‘Twill be a blessed sight — eh? — when he sits up in that bed, Madam, as I trust he may this very night, and speak — eh?’

  ‘Oh! my precious Barney!’ and the poor little woman began to cry, and fell into a rhapsody of hopes, thanksgiving, anecdote and prayer.

  In the meanwhile Dangerfield was feeling his pulse, with his watch in the hollow of his hand.

  ‘And aren’t they better — his pulse, Sir — they were stronger this morning by a great deal than last night — it was just at ten o’clock — don’t you perceive, Sir?’

  ‘H’m — well, I hope, Ma’am, we’ll soon find all better. Now, have you got all things ready — you have, of course, a sheet well aired?’

  ‘A sheet — I did not know ’twas wanted.’

  ‘Hey, this will never do, my dear Madam — he’ll be here and nothing ready; and you’ll do well to send over to the mess-room for a lump of ice. ’Tis five minutes past nine. If you’ll see to these things, I’ll sit here, Madam, and take the best care of the patient — and, d’ye see, Mistress Sturk, ‘twill be necessary that you take care that Toole hears nothing of Dr. Dillon’s coming.’

  It struck me, when originally reading the correspondence which is digested in these pages, as hardly credible that Doctor Sturk should have continued to live for so long a space in a state of coma. Upon this point, therefore, I took occasion to ask the most eminent surgeon of my acquaintance, who at once quieted my doubts by detailing a very remarkable case cited by Sir A. Cooper in his lectures, Vol. I., p. 172. It is that of a seaman, who was pressed on board one of his Majesty’s ships, early in the revolutionary war; and while on board this vessel, fell from the yardarm, and was taken up insensible, in which state he continued living for thirteen months and some days!

  So with a little more talk, Mrs. Sturk, calling one of her maids, and leaving the little girl in charge of the nursery, ran down with noiseless steps and careworn face to the kitchen, and Mr. Dangerfield was left alone in the chamber with the spellbound sleeper on the bed.

  In about ten seconds he rose sharply from his chair and listened: then very noiselessly he stepped to the door and listened again, and gently shut it.

  Then Mr. Dangerfield moved to the window. There was a round hole in the shutter, and through it he glanced into the street, and was satisfied.

  By this time he had his white-pocket-handkerchief in his hands. He folded it deftly across and across into a small square, and then the spectacles flashed coldly on the image of Dr. Sturk, and then on the door; and there was a pause.

  ‘What’s that?’ he muttered sharply, and listened for a second or two.

  It was only one of the children crying in the nursery. The sound subsided.

  So with another long silent step, he stood by the capriole-legged old mahogany table, with the scallop shell containing a piece of soap and a washball, and the basin with its jug of water standing therein. Again he listened while you might count two, and dipped the handkerchief, so folded, into the water, and quietly squeezed it; and stood white and glittering by Sturk’s bedside.

  People moved very noiselessly about that house, and scarcely a minute had passed when the door opened softly, and the fair Magnolia Macnamara popped in her glowing face and brilliant glance, and whispered.

  ‘Are you there, Mrs. Sturk, dear?’

  At the far side of the bed, Dangerfield, with his flashing spectacles and snowy aspect, and a sort of pant, rose up straight, and looked into her eyes, like a white bird of prey disturbed over its carrion.

  She uttered a little scream — quite pale on a sudden — for she did not recognise the sinister phantom who glimmered at her over the prostrate Sturk.

  But Dangerfield laughed his quiet hollow ‘ha! ha! ha!’ and said promptly,

  ‘A strange old nurse I make, Miss Macnamara. But what can I do? Mrs. Sturk has left me in charge, and faith I believe our patient’s looking mighty badly.’

  He had observed Miss Mag glancing from him to the dumb figure in the bed with a puzzled kind of horror.

  The fact is, Sturk’s face had a leaden tint; he looked, evidently enough, even in that dim candle
light, a great deal worse than the curious Miss Mag was accustomed to see him.

  ‘He’s very low, tonight, and seems oppressed, and his pulse is failing; in fact, my dear young lady, he’s plainly worse tonight than I like to tell poor Mrs. Sturk, you understand.’

  ‘And his face looks so shiny and damp-like,’ said Miss Mag, with a horrible sort of scrutiny.

  ‘Exactly so, Miss, ’tis weakness,’ observed Dangerfield.

  ‘And you were wiping it with your pockethandkerchief when I looked in,’ continued Miss Mag.

  ‘Was I — ha, ha— ’tis wonderful how quick we learn a new business. I vow I begin to think I should make a very respectable nursetender.’

  ‘And what the dickens brings him up here?’ asked Miss Mag of herself; so soon as the first shock was over, the oddity of the situation struck her as she looked with perplexed and unpleasant sort of enquiry at Mr. Dangerfield.

  Just then up came the meek little Mrs. Sturk, and the gentleman greeted her with a ‘Well, Madam, I have not left his bedside since you went down; and I think he looks a little better — just a little — eh?’

  ‘I trust and pray, Sir, that when the doctor— ‘ began Mrs. Sturk, and stopped short, for Mr. Dangerfield frowned quickly, and pointed towards Miss Mag, who was now, after her wont, looking round the room for matter of interest.

  ‘And is Pell comin’ out tonight?’ asked Miss Mag quickly.