by Ellen Wood
“How can you say it?” she rejoined, lifting her hands in a passionate sort of manner.
“It has been nothing else. Had they been reared more plainly, they would not have acquired those extravagant notions which have proved their bane. Without that inheritance and the style of living we allowed it to entail upon us, the boys must have understood that they would have to earn money before they spent it, and they would have put their shoulders to the wheel. Julia,” he continued, halting by her, and stretching forth his troubled face until it nearly touched hers, “it might have been well now, well with them and with us, had our children been obliged to battle with the poverty to which we condemned the Halliburtons.”
CHAPTER VIII.
AN UGLY VISION.
Mr. Dare had not taken upon himself the legal conduct of his son Herbert’s case. It had been intrusted to the care of a solicitor in Helstonleigh, Mr. Winthorne. This gentleman, more forcibly than any one else, urged upon Herbert Dare the necessity of declaring — if he could declare — where he had been on the night of the murder. He clearly foresaw that, if his client persisted in his present silence, there was no chance of any result but the worst.
He could obtain no response. Deaf to him, as he had been to others, Herbert Dare would disclose nothing. In vain Mr. Winthorne pointed to consequences; first, by delicate hints; next, by hints not delicate; then, by speaking out broadly and fully. It is not pleasant to tell your client, in so many words, that he will be hanged and nothing can save him, unless he compels you to it. Herbert Dare so compelled Mr. Winthorne. All in vain. Mr. Winthorne found he might just as well talk to the walls of the cell. Herbert Dare declared, in the most positive manner, that he had been out the whole of the time stated; from half-past eight o’clock, until nearly two; and from this declaration he never swerved.
Mr. Winthorne was perplexed. The prisoner’s assertions were so uniformly earnest, bearing so apparently the stamp of truth, that he could not disbelieve him; or rather, sometimes he believed and sometimes he doubted. It is true that Herbert’s declarations did wear an air of entire truth; but Mr. Winthorne had been engaged for criminal offenders before, and knew what the assertions of a great many of them were worth. Down deep in his heart he reasoned very much after the manner of Sergeant Delves: “If he had been absent, he’d confess it to save his neck.” He said so to Herbert.
Herbert took the matter, on the whole, coolly; he had done so from the beginning. He did not believe that his neck was really in jeopardy. “They’ll never find me guilty,” was his belief. He could not avoid standing his trial: that was a calamity from which there was no escape: but he steadily refused to look at its results in a sombre light.
“Can you tell me where you were?” Mr. Winthorne one morning impulsively asked him, when June was drawing to its close.
“I could if I liked,” replied Herbert Dare. “I suppose you mean by that, to throw discredit on what I say, Winthorne; but you are wrong. I could point out to you and to all Helstonleigh where I was that night; but I will not do so. I have my reasons, and I will not.”
“Then you will fall,” said the lawyer. “The very fact of there being no other quarter than yourself on which to cast a shadow of suspicion, will tell against you. You have been bred to the law, and must see these things as plainly as I can put them to you.”
“There’s the point that puzzles me — who it can have been that did the injury. I’d give half my remaining life to know.”
Mr. Winthorne thought that the whole of it, to judge by present appearances, might not be an inconveniently prolonged period; but he did not say so. “What is your objection to speak?” he asked.
“You have put the same question about fifty times, Winthorne, and you’ll never get any different answer from the one you have had already — that I don’t choose to state it.”
“I suppose you were not committing murder in another quarter of the town, were you?”
“I suppose I was not,” equably returned Herbert.
“Then, failing that crime, there’s no other in the decalogue that I’d not confess to, to save my life. Whether I was robbing a bank, or setting a church on fire, I’d tell it out rather than be hanged by the neck until I was dead.”
“Ah, but I was not doing either,” said Herbert.
“Then there’s the less reason for your persisting in the observance of so much mystery.”
“My doing so is my own business,” returned Herbert.
“No, it is not your own business,” objected Mr. Winthorne. “You assert that you are innocent of the crime with which you are charged — —”
“I assert nothing but the truth,” interrupted Herbert.
“Good. Then, if you are innocent, and if you can prove your innocence, it is your duty to your family to do it. A man’s duties in this life are not owing to himself alone: above all, a son’s. He owes allegiance to his father and mother; his consideration for them should be above his consideration for himself. If you can prove your innocence it will be an unpardonable sin not to do it; a sin inflicted on your family.”
“I can’t help it,” replied Herbert in his obstinacy. “I have my reasons for not speaking, and I shall not speak.”
“You will surely suffer the penalty,” said Mr. Winthorne.
“Then I must suffer it,” returned the prisoner.
But it is one thing to talk, and another to act. Many a brave spirit, ready and willing to undergo hanging in theory, would find his heart fail and his bravery altogether die out, were he really required to reduce it to practice.
Herbert Dare was only human. After July had come in and the time for the opening of the assizes might be counted by hours, then his courage began to flinch. He spent a night in tossing from side to side on his pallet (a wide difference between that and his comfortable bed at home), during which a certain ugly apparatus, to be erected for his especial use within the walls of the prison some fine Saturday morning, on which he might figure by no means gracefully, had mentally disturbed his rest.
He arose unrefreshed. The vision of that possible future was not a pleasant one. Herbert remembered once, when he had been a college boy, that the Saturday morning’s occasional drama had been enacted for the warning and edification of the town, and of the country people flocking into it for market. The college boys had determined for once in their lives to see the sight — if they could accomplish it. The ceremony was invariably performed at eight o’clock; the exhibition closed at nine; and the boys’ difficulty was, how to arrive at the scene in time, considering that it was only at the striking of the latter hour that they were let loose down the steps of the school. They had tried the time between the cloisters and the county prison; and found that by dint of taking the shorter way through the back streets, tearing along at the fleetest pace, and knocking over every obstruction — human, animal, or material — that might unfortunately be in their path, they could do the distance in four minutes. Arriving rather out of wind, it’s true: but that was nothing.
Four minutes! they did not see their way. If the curtain descended at nine, sharp, as good be forty minutes after the hour, as four, in point of practical effect. But the Helstonleigh college boys — as you may sometimes have heard remarked before — were not wont to allow difficulties to overmaster them. If there was a possible way of overcoming obstacles, they were sure to find it. Consultations had been anxious. To request the head-master to allow them as a favour to depart five or ten minutes before the usual time, would be worse than useless. It was a question whether he ever would have accorded it; but there was no chance of it on that morning. Neither could the whole school be taken summarily with spasms, or croup, or any other excruciating malady necessitating compassion and an early dismissal.
They came to the resolve of applying to the official who had the cathedral clock under his charge: or, as they phrased it, “coming over the clock-man.” By dint of coaxing, or bribery, or some other element of persuasion, they got this functionary to promise to pu
t the clock on eight minutes on that particular morning. And it was done. And at eight minutes before nine by the sun, the cathedral clock rang out its nine strokes. But, instead of the master lifting his finger — the signal for the boys to tear forth — the master sat quiet at his desk, and never gave it. He sat until the eight minutes had gone by, when the other churches in the town gave out their hour; he sat four minutes after that: and then he nodded them their dismissal.
The twelve minutes had seemed to the boys like twelve hours. Where the hitch was, they never knew; they never have known to this day; as they would tell you themselves. Whether the master had received an inkling of what was in the wind; or whether, by one of those extraordinary coincidences that sometimes occur in life, he, for that one morning, allowed the hour to slip by unheeded — had not heard it strike — they could not tell. He gave out no explanation, then or afterwards. The clock-man protested that he had been true; had not breathed a hint to any one living of the purposed advancement; and the boys had no reason to disbelieve him.
However it might have been, they could not alter it. It was four minutes past nine when they clattered pêle-mêle down the school-room steps. Away they tore, full of fallacious hope, out at the cloisters, through the cathedral precincts, along the nearest streets, and arrived within the given four minutes, rather than over it.
Alas, for human expectations! The prison was there, it is true, formidable as usual; but all trace of the morning’s jubilee had passed away. Not only had the chief actor been removed, but also that ugly apparatus which Herbert Dare had dreamt of. That might have afforded them some gratification to contemplate, failing the greater sight. The college boys, dumb in the first moment of their disappointment, gave vent to it at length with three dismal groans, the echoes of which might have been heard as far off as the cathedral. Groans not intended for the unhappy mortal, then beyond hearing of that or any other earthly sound; not for the officials of the county prison, all too quick-handed that morning; but given as a compliment to the respected gentleman at that time holding the situation of head-master.
Herbert Dare remembered this: it was rising up in his mind with strange distinctness. He himself had been one of the deputation chosen to “come over” the clock-man; had been the chief persuader of that functionary. Would the college boys hasten down if he were to —— In spite of his bravery, he broke off the speculation with a shudder; and, calling the turnkey to him, he despatched a message for Mr. Winthorne. Was it the remembrance of his old school-fellows, of what they would think of him, that brought about what no other consideration had been able to effect?
As much indulgence as it was possible to allow a prisoner was accorded to Herbert Dare. Indeed, it may be questioned whether any previous prisoner, incarcerated within the walls of the county prison, had ever enjoyed so much. The governor of the prison and Mr. Dare had lived on intimate terms. Mr. Dare and his two elder sons had been familiar, in their legal capacity, with both its civil and criminal prisoners; and the turnkeys had often bowed Herbert in and out of cells, as they now bowed out Mr. Winthorne. Altogether, what with the governor’s friendly feeling, and the turnkey’s reverential one, Herbert Dare obtained more privileges than the ordinary run of prisoners. The message was at once taken to Mr. Winthorne, and it brought that gentleman back again.
“I have made up my mind to tell,” was Herbert’s brief salutation when he entered.
“A very sensible resolution,” replied the lawyer. Doubts, however, crossed his mind as he spoke, whether the prisoner was not about to set up some plea which had never had place in fact. In like manner to Sergeant Delves, Mr. Winthorne had arrived at the firm belief that there was nothing to tell. “Well?” said he.
“That is, conditionally,” resumed Herbert Dare. “It would be of little use my saying I was at such and such a place, unless I could bring forward confirmatory evidence.”
“Of course it would not.”
“Well; there are witnesses who could give this satisfactory evidence: but the question is, will they be willing to do it?”
“What motive or excuse could they have for refusing?” returned Mr. Winthorne. “When a fellow-creature’s life is at stake, surely there is no man so lost to humanity as not to come forward and save it, if it be in his power.”
“Circumstances alter cases,” was the curt reply of Herbert Dare.
“Was it your doubt, as to whether they would come forward, that caused your hesitation to call on them to do so?” asked Mr. Winthorne, something not pleasant in his tones.
“Not altogether. I foresaw a difficulty in it; I foresee it still. Winthorne, you look at me with a face full of doubt. There is no need for it — as you will find.”
“Well, go on,” said the lawyer; for Herbert had stopped.
“The thing must be gone about in a very cautious manner; and I don’t quite see how it can be done,” resumed Herbert slowly. “Winthorne, I think I had better make a confidant of you, and tell you the whole story from beginning to end.”
“If I am to do you any good, I must hear it, I expect. A man can’t work in the dark.”
“Sit down then, and I’ll begin. Though, mind — I tell it you in confidence. It’s not for Helstonleigh. But you will see the expediency of being silent when you have heard it.”
CHAPTER IX.
SERGEANT DELVES “LOOKS UP.”
The following Saturday was the day fixed for the opening of the commission at Helstonleigh. It soon came round, and the streets in the afternoon wore their usual holiday appearance. The high sheriff’s procession went out to meet the judges, and groups stood about, waiting and watching for its return. Amongst other people blocking up the way, might be observed the portly person of Sergeant Delves. He strolled along, seeming to look at nothing, but his keen eye was everywhere. It suddenly fell upon Mr. Winthorne, who was picking his way through the crowd as fast as he could do so, apparently in a hurry. Hurry or not, Sergeant Delves stopped him, and drew him to a safe spot beyond the reach of curious ears.
“I was looking for you, Mr. Winthorne,” said Delves in a confidential tone. “I say — this tale, that Dare will succeed in establishing an alibi, is it reliable?”
“Why — who the mischief can have been setting that afloat?” returned the lawyer, in tones of the utmost astonishment, not unmixed with vexation.
“Dare himself was my informant,” replied the sergeant. “I was in the prison just now, and saw him in the yard with the turnkey. He called me aside, and told me he was as good as acquitted.”
“Then he is an idiot for his pains. He had no right to talk of it, even to you.”
“I am dark,” carelessly returned Delves. “I don’t wish ill to the Dares, and wouldn’t work it to them; as perhaps some of them could tell you,” he added significantly. “What about this acquittal that he talks of?”
“There’s no doubt he will be acquitted. He will prove an alibi.”
“Is it a got-up alibi?” asked the plain-speaking sergeant.
“No. And as far as I go, I would not lend myself to getting up anything false,” observed the solicitor. “He has said from the first, you know, that he was not near the house at the time, and so it will turn out.”
“Has he confessed where he was, after all his standing out?”
“Yes; to me: it will be disclosed at the trial.”
“He was after no good, I know,” nodded the sergeant oracularly.
Mr. Winthorne raised his eyebrows, and slightly jerked his shoulders. The movement may have meant anything or nothing. He did not reply in words.
Sergeant Delves fell into a reverie. He roused himself from it to take a searching gaze at the lawyer. “Sir,” said he, and he could hardly have spoken more earnestly had his life depended on it, “tell me the truth out-and-out. Do you, yourself, from the depths of your own judgment, believe Herbert Dare to have been innocent?”
“Delves, as truly as that you and I now stand here, I honestly believe that he had no more to do with hi
s brother’s death than we had.”
“Then I’m blest if I don’t take up the other scent!” exclaimed Mr. Delves, slapping his thigh. “I did think of it once, but I dropped it again, so sure was I that it was Master Herbert.”
“What scent is that?”
“Look here,” said the sergeant— “but now it’s my turn to warn you to be dark. There was a young woman met Anthony Dare the night of the murder, when he was going down to the Star and Garter. It’s a young woman he did not behave genteel to some time back, as the ghost says in the song. She met him that night, and she gave him a bit of her tongue; not much, for he wouldn’t stop to listen. But now, Mr. Winthorne, it has crossed my mind many times whether she might not have watched for his going home again, and followed him; followed him right into the dining-room, and done the mischief. I’ll lay a guinea it was her!” added the sergeant, arriving at a hasty conclusion. “I shall look up again now.”
“Do you mean that young woman in Honey Fair?” asked Mr. Winthorne.
“Just so. Her, and nobody else. The doubt has crossed me; but, as I say, I was so certain it was the brother, that I did not follow it up.”
“Could a woman’s feeble hand inflict such injuries?” debated the solicitor.
“‘Feeble’ be hanged!” politely rejoined the sergeant. “Some women have the fists of men; and the strength of ‘em, too. You don’t know ’em as we do. A desperate woman will do anything. And Anthony Dare, remember, had not his strength in him that night.”
Mr. Winthorne shook his head. “That girl has no look of ferocity about her. I should question it being her. Let’s see — what is her name?”
“Listen!” returned the sergeant. “When you have had half as much to do with people as I have, you’ll have learnt not to go by looks. Her name is Caroline Mason.”