by Ellen Wood
At the first glance, it of course appeared to be proof positive that Arthur Channing was not guilty. But Mr. Galloway was not accustomed to take only the superficial view of things: and it struck him, as it would strike others, that this might be, after all, a refined bit of finessing on Arthur’s own part to remove suspicion from himself. True, the cost of doing so was twenty pounds: but what was that compared with the restoration of his good name?
The letter bore the London post-mark. There was not a doubt that it had been there posted. That betrayed nothing. Arthur, or any one else, could have a letter posted there, if wishing to do it. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way,” thought Mr. Galloway. But again, where was Arthur Channing to procure twenty pounds from? Mr. Galloway did not think that he could procure this sum from anywhere, or that he possessed, himself, a twentieth part of it. So far the probability was against Arthur’s being the author. Mr. Galloway quite lost himself in conjectures. Why should it have been addressed to his residence, and not to the office? He had been expecting a letter from one, that afternoon, who always did address to his residence: and that letter, it appeared, had not arrived. However, that had nothing to do with this. Neither paper nor writing afforded any clue to the sender, and the latter was palpably disguised.
He called in Roland Yorke, for the purpose of putting to him a few useless questions — as a great many of us do when we are puzzled — questions, at any rate, that could throw no light upon the main subject.
“What did John say when he brought this letter?”
“Only what I told you, sir. That you expected a letter addressed to the house, and ordered him to bring it round.”
“But this is not the letter I expected,” tapping it with his finger, and looking altogether so puzzled and astonished that Roland stared in his turn.
“It’s not my fault,” returned he. “Shall I run round, sir, and ask John about it?”
“No,” testily answered Mr. Galloway. “Don’t be so fond of running round. This letter — There’s some one come into the office,” he broke off. Roland turned with alacrity, but very speedily appeared again, on his best behaviour, bowing as he showed in the Dean of Helstonleigh.
Mr. Galloway rose, and remained standing. The dean entered upon the business which had brought him there, a trifling matter connected with the affairs of the chapter. This over, Mr. Galloway took up the letter and showed it to him. The dean read it, and looked at the bank-note.
“I cannot quite decide in what light I ought to take it, sir,” remarked Mr. Galloway. “It either refutes the suspicion of Arthur Channing’s guilt, or else it confirms it.”
“In what way confirms it? I do not understand you,” said the dean.
“It may have come from himself, Mr. Dean. A wheel within a wheel.”
The dean paused to revolve the proposition, and then shook his head negatively. “It appears to me to go a very great way towards proving his innocence,” he observed. “The impression upon my own mind has been, that it was not he who took it — as you may have inferred, Mr. Galloway, by my allowing him to retain his post in the cathedral.”
“But, sir, if he is innocent, who is guilty?” continued Mr. Galloway, in a tone of remonstrance.
“That is more than I can say,” replied the dean. “But for the circumstances appearing to point so strongly to Arthur Channing, I never could have suspected him at all. A son of Mr. Channing’s would have been altogether above suspicion, in my mind: and, as I tell you, for some time I have not believed him to be guilty.”
“If he is not guilty—” Mr. Galloway paused; the full force of what he was about to say, pressing strongly upon his mind. “If he is not guilty, Mr. Dean, there has been a great deal of injustice done — not only to himself—”
“A great deal of injustice is committed every day, I fear,” quietly remarked the dean.
“Tom Channing will have lost the seniorship for nothing!” went on Mr. Galloway, in a perturbed voice, not so much addressing the dean, as giving vent to his thoughts aloud.
“Yes,” was the answer, spoken calmly, and imparting no token of what might be the dean’s private sentiments upon the point. “You will see to that matter,” the dean continued, referring to his own business there, as he rose from his chair.
“I will not forget it, Mr. Dean,” said Mr. Galloway. And he escorted the dean to the outer door, as was his custom when honoured by that dignitary with a visit, and bowed him out.
Roland just then looked a pattern of industry. He had resumed his seat, after rising in salutation as the dean passed through the office, and was writing away like a steam-engine. Mr. Galloway returned to his own room, and set himself calmly to consider all the bearings of this curious business. The great bar against his thinking Arthur innocent, was the difficulty of fixing upon any one else as likely to have been guilty. Likely! he might almost have said as possible to have been guilty. “I have a very great mind,” he growled to himself, “to send for Butterby, and let him rake it all up again!” The uncertainty vexed him, and it seemed as if the affair was never to have an end. “What, if I show Arthur Channing the letter first, and study his countenance as he looks at it? I may gather something from that. I don’t fancy he’d be an over good actor, as some might be. If he has sent this money, I shall see it in his face.”
Acting upon the moment’s impulse, he suddenly opened the door of the outer office, and there found that Mr. Roland’s industry had, for the present, come to an end. He was standing before the window, making pantomimic signs through the glass to a friend of his, Knivett. His right thumb was pointed over his shoulder towards the door of Mr. Galloway’s private room; no doubt, to indicate a warning that that gentleman was within, and that the office, consequently, was not free for promiscuous intruders. A few sharp words of reprimand to Mr. Roland ensued, and then he was sent off with a message to Arthur Channing.
It brought Arthur back with Roland. Mr. Galloway called Arthur into his own room, closed the door, and put the letter into his hand in silence.
He read it twice over before he could understand it; indeed, he did not do so fully then. His surprise appeared to be perfectly genuine, and so Mr. Galloway thought it. “Has this letter been sent to you, sir? Has any money been sent to you?”
“This has been sent to me,” replied Mr. Galloway, tossing the twenty-pound note to him. “Is it the one that was taken, Channing?”
“How can I tell, sir?” said Arthur, in much simplicity. And Mr. Galloway’s long doubts of him began to melt away.
“You did not send the money — to clear yourself?”
Arthur looked up in surprise. “Where should I get twenty pounds from?” he asked. “I shall shortly have a quarter’s salary from Mr. Williams: but it is not quite due yet. And it will not be twenty pounds, or anything like that amount.”
Mr. Galloway nodded. It was the thought which had struck himself. Another thought, however, was now striking Arthur; a thought which caused his cheek to flush and his brow to lower. With the word “salary” had arisen to him the remembrance of another’s salary due about this time; that of his brother Hamish. Had Hamish been making this use of it — to remove the stigma from him? The idea received additional force from Mr. Galloway’s next words: for they bore upon the point.
“This letter is what it purports to be: a missive from the actual thief; or else it comes from some well-wisher of yours, who sacrifices twenty pounds to do you a service. Which is it?”
Mr. Galloway fixed his eyes on Arthur’s face and could not help noting the change which had come over it, over his bearing altogether. The open candour was gone: and in its place reigned the covert look, the hesitating manner, the confusion which had characterized him at the period of the loss. “All I can say, sir, is, that I know nothing of this,” he presently said. “It has surprised me as much as it can surprise any one.”
“Channing!” impulsively exclaimed Mr. Galloway, “your manner and your words are opposed to each other, as they were at th
e time. The one gives the lie to the other. But I begin to believe you did not take it.”
“I did not,” returned Arthur.
“And therefore — as I don’t like to be played with and made sport of, like a cat tormenting a mouse — I think I shall give orders to Butterby for a fresh investigation.”
It startled Arthur. Mr. Galloway’s curiously significant tone, his piercing gaze upon his face, also startled him. “It would bring no satisfaction, sir,” he said. “Pray do not. I would far rather continue to bear the blame.”
A pause. A new idea came glimmering into the mind of Mr. Galloway. “Whom are you screening?” he asked. But he received no answer.
“Is it Roland Yorke?”
“Roland Yorke!” repeated Arthur, half reproachfully. “No, indeed. I wish every one had been as innocent of it as was Roland Yorke.”
In good truth, Mr. Galloway had only mentioned Roland’s name as coming uppermost in his mind. He knew that no suspicion attached to Roland. Arthur resumed, in agitation:
“Let the matter drop, sir. Indeed, it will be better. It appears, now, that you have the money back again; and, for the rest, I am willing to take the blame, as I have done.”
“If I have the money back again, I have not other things back again,” crossly repeated Mr. Galloway. “There’s the loss of time it has occasioned, the worry, the uncertainty: who is to repay me all that?”
“My portion in it has been worse than yours, sir,” said Arthur, in a low, deep tone. “Think of my loss of time; my worry and uncertainty; my waste of character; my anxiety of mind: they can never be repaid to me.”
“And whose the fault? If you were truly innocent, you might have cleared yourself with a word.”
Arthur knew he might. But that word he had not dared to speak. At this juncture, Roland Yorke appeared. “Here’s Jenner’s old clerk come in, sir,” said he to his master. “He wants to see you, he says.”
“He can come in,” replied Mr. Galloway. “Are you getting on with that copying?” he added to Arthur, as the latter was going out.
“Yes, sir.”
The gentleman, whom Roland Yorke designated as “Jenner’s old clerk,” was shut in with Mr. Galloway; and Roland, who appeared to be on the thorns of curiosity, arrested Arthur.
“I say, what is it that’s agate? He has been going into fits, pretty near, over some letter that came, asking me five hundred questions about it. What have you to do with it? What does he want with you?”
“Some one has been sending him back the money, Roland. It came in a letter.”
Roland opened his eyes. “What money?”
“The money that was lost. A twenty-pound note has come. He asked me whether it was the veritable note that was taken.”
“A twenty-pound note come!” repeated puzzled Roland.
“It’s quite true, Roland. It purports to be sent by the stealer of the money for the purpose of clearing me.”
Roland stood for a few moments, profound surprise on his face, and then began to execute a triumphant hornpipe amidst the desks and stools of the office. “I said it would come right some time; over and over again I said it! Give us your hand, old fellow! He’s not such a bad trump after all, that thief!”
“Hush, Roland! you’ll be heard. It may not do me much good. Galloway seems to doubt me still.”
“Doubt you still!” cried Roland, stopping short in his dance, and speaking in a very explosive tone. “Doubt you still! Why, what would he have?”
“I don’t know;” sighed Arthur. “I have assured him I did not send it; but he fancies I may have done it to clear myself. He talks of calling in Butterby again.”
“My opinion then, is, that he wants to be transported, if he is to turn up such a heathen as that!” stamped Roland. “What would he have, I ask? Another twenty, given him for interest? Arthur, dear old fellow, let’s go off together to Port Natal, and leave him and his office to it! I’ll find the means, if I rob his cash-box to get them!”
But Arthur was already beyond hearing, having waved his adieu to Roland Yorke and his impetuous but warm-hearted championship. Anxious to get on with the task he had undertaken, he hastened home. Constance was in the hall when he entered, having just returned from Lady Augusta Yorke’s.
His confidant throughout, his gentle soother and supporter, his ever ready adviser, Arthur drew her into one of the rooms, and acquainted her with what had occurred. A look of terror rose to her face, as she listened.
“Hamish has done it!” she uttered, in a whisper. “This puts all doubt at an end. There are times — there have been times” — she burst into tears as she spoke— “when I have fondly tried to cheat myself that we were suspecting him wrongfully. Arthur! others suspect him.”
Arthur’s face reflected the look that was upon hers. “I trust not!”
“But they do. Ellen Huntley dropped a word inadvertently, which convinces me that he is in some way doubted there. She caught it up again in evident alarm, ere it was well spoken; and I dared not pursue the subject. It is Hamish who has sent this money.”
“You speak confidently, Constance.”
“Listen. I know that he has drawn money — papa’s salary and his own: he mentioned it incidentally. A few days ago I asked him for money for housekeeping purposes, and he handed me a twenty-pound note, in mistake for a five-pound. He discovered the mistake before I did, and snatched it back again in some confusion.”
“‘I can’t give you that,’ he said in a laughing manner, when he recovered himself. ‘That has a different destination.’ Arthur! that note, rely upon it, was going to Mr. Galloway.”
“When was this?” asked Arthur.
“Last week. Three or four days ago.”
Trifling as the incident was, it seemed to bear out their suspicions, and Arthur could only come to the same conclusion as his sister: the thought had already crossed him, you remember.
“Do not let it pain you thus, Constance,” he said, for her tears were falling fast. “He may not call in Butterby. Your grieving will do no good.”
“I cannot help it,” she exclaimed, with a burst of anguish. “How God is trying us!”
Ay! even as silver, which must be seven times purified, ere it be sufficiently refined.
CHAPTER XLVII. — DARK CLOUDS.
Constance Channing sat, her forehead buried in her hands. How God was trying them! The sentence, wrung from her in the bitterness of her heart, but expressed the echo of surrounding things. Her own future blighted; Arthur’s character gone; Tom lost the seniorship; Charley not heard of, dead or alive! There were moments, and this was one of them, when Constance felt almost beyond the pale of hope. The college school, meanwhile existed in a state of constant suspense, the sword of terror ever hanging over its head. Punishment for the present was reserved; and what the precise punishment would be when it came, none could tell. Talkative Bywater was fond of saying that it did not matter whether Miss Charley turned up or not, so far as their backs were concerned: they would be made to tingle, either way.
Arthur, after communicating to Constance the strange fact of the return of the money to Mr. Galloway, shut himself up in the study to pursue his copying. Tea-time arrived, and Sarah brought in the tea-things. But neither Hamish nor Tom had come in, and Constance sat alone, deep in unpleasant thoughts.
That it was Hamish who had now returned the money to Mr. Galloway, Constance could not entertain the slightest doubt. It had a very depressing effect upon her. It could not render worse what had previously happened, indeed, it rather mended it, insomuch as that it served to show some repentance, some good feeling; but it made the suspicion against Hamish a certainty; and there had been times when Constance had been beguiled into thinking it only a suspicion. And now came this new fear of Mr. Butterby again!
Hamish’s own footstep in the hall. Constance roused herself. He came in, books under his arm, as usual, and his ever-gay face smiling. There were times when Constance almost despised him for his perpetual sun
shine. The seriousness which had overspread Hamish at the time of Charley’s disappearance had nearly worn away. In his sanguine temperament, he argued that not finding the body was a proof that Charley was yet alive, and would come forth in a mysterious manner one of these days.
“Have I kept you waiting tea, Constance?” began he. “I came home by way of Close Street, and was called into Galloway’s by Roland Yorke, and then got detained further by Mr. Galloway. Where’s Arthur?”
“He has undertaken some copying for Mr. Galloway, and is busy with it,” replied Constance in a low tone. “Hamish!” raising her eyes to his face, as she gathered resolution to speak of the affair: “have you heard what has happened?”
“That some good fairy has forwarded a bank-note to Galloway on the wings of the telegraph? Roland Yorke would not allow me to remain in ignorance of that. Mr. Galloway did me the honour to ask whether I had sent it.”
“You!” uttered Constance, regarding the avowal only from her own point of view. “He asked whether you had sent it?”
“He did.”
She gazed at Hamish as if she would read his very soul. “And what did — what did you answer?”
“Told him I wished a few others would suspect me of the same, and count imaginary payments for real ones.”
“Hamish!” she exclaimed, the complaint wrung from her: “how can you be so light, so cruel, when our hearts are breaking?”
Hamish, in turn, was surprised at this. “I, cruel! In what manner, Constance? My dear, I repeat to you that we shall have Charley back again. I feel sure of it; and it has done away with my fear. Some inward conviction, or presentiment — call it which you like — tells me that we shall; and I implicitly trust to it. We need not mourn for him.”