by Ellen Wood
“The prisoner is remanded, and the magistrates will meet at ten o’clock to-morrow,” came forth the announcement, after the Bench had conferred together for a few moments.
“Of course your worships will take bail,” said Lawyer Billiter, boldly.
“Bail!” repeated the magistrates, wondering whether the demand in a parallel case had ever been made before to a Bench in its senses. “Not if the whole town offered it.”
The whole town apparently had no intention of doing anything of the sort. Rather the contrary. A certain portion of it — not the most respectable, you may be sure — were anticipating the pleasure of escorting Mr. Carlton to his abode for the night, and in a manner more emphatic than agreeable.
“Let the unwashed ruffians get off first,” whispered Lawyer Billiter to Mr. Carlton. “You shall stop here until the coast’s clear.”
The hall was emptying itself. Gentlemen, whether magistrates, audience, or lawyers, stood in groups to say a word on the marvels of that day. They were indeed scarcely credible, and half South Wennock held a latent impression that they should wake up in the morning and find the charge against Mr. Carlton to have been nothing more than a dream. One of that audience, however, gave himself no time to say a word to anybody. He escaped with all the speed he could, dashed into the Red Lion, and nearly into the arms of its landlady, who was as excited as any one.
“Has the omnibus started, Mrs. Fitch?”
“This ten minutes ago, sir.”
“There! I feared it would be so. Well, you must let me have a conveyance of some sort, a gig or carriage, anything that will go quickly.”
“Surely you are not going to London to-night, Mr. Frederick?”
“Not I. I shall stay now to see this unhappy play out. No; I’ll tell you a secret, but don’t go and let it out to the town. I have telegraphed for my father, and expect him down by the seven-o’clock train. It will be something, won’t it, to be cleared in the eyes of South Wennock?”
“You expect Sir Stephen down!” she exclaimed, in excitement. “I should think you do want a carriage for him. He shan’t come into the town obscurely on a joyful occasion like this — joyful to him. You shall have that new barouche and pair, Mr. Frederick, and if I had four horses—” —
“Just do be sensible,” interrupted Frederick with a laugh. “A barouche and four! you’d not get Sir Stephen into it. Look here, Mrs. Fitch,” he added gravely, “if Sir Stephen has cause to rejoice at his own clearing, think how sad the news will be to him for the sake of others! — how intimate he is with some of the Chesneys.”
“True, true; soon to be connected with them,” murmured Mrs. Fitch. “Well, you shall have the barouche out soberly, Mr. Frederick. And indeed it comes to that, or nothing, this evening, for every other vehicle is in use.”
Whether this was quite true, might be a question. Mrs. Fitch hurried off, and the barouche, with a pair of post-horses, came out. Too impatient to care much how he reached Great Wennock, provided he did reach it, Frederick Grey jumped in, and was driven off. He would not for the world have missed being the first to impart the tidings to his father.
The train came in, and Sir Stephen with it. “You are grand!” he exclaimed, surveying the barouche as his son hurried him into it.
“Mrs. Fitch had no other conveyance at liberty. At least she said so. Get in, sir.”
“And what have you to say for yourself, young gentleman — losing so much time down here?” inquired Sir Stephen as they drove off.
“I was coming up to-day, but for something that has happened,” returned Frederick. “I’ll go back when you go, if you like, sir.”
“And what business have you brought me down upon? What has turned up?”
“Your exoneration, sir, for one thing, has turned up. I hope the town won’t eat you, but it is on wild stilts to-night. And next, the real delinquent has turned up, and has been close at hand all the while. He who dropped the prussic acid into your wholesome mixture.”
“Dropped it purposely?”
“Purposely, without doubt; intending, I fear, to kill Mrs. Crane.”
“And where was it done?” again interrupted Sir Stephen, too eager to listen patiently. “Dick was not waylaid, surely, after all his protestations to the contrary?”
“Dick delivered the medicine safely, and what was added to it was added to it after it was in the house; whilst the bottle waited in the room adjoining the sick chamber.”
“That face on the stairs!” exclaimed Sir Stephen in excitement. “I knew it was no illusion. A matter-of-fact, commonsense man, like Carlton, could not have fancied such a thing. It was her husband, I suppose?”
“It was her husband, sure enough, who tampered with the medicine; but that person on the stairs, a living breathing person, was not her husband. Father, I know I shall shock you. He who was, it’s to be feared, guilty — the husband — was Lewis Carlton himself.”
Sir Stephen roused up from his corner of the barouche, and stared at his son’s face, as well as he could in the starry night “What nonsense are you talking now, Frederick?”
“I wish it was nonsense, sir, for the sake of our common humanity. If this tale is true, one can’t help feeling that Carlton is a disgrace to it.”
“Let me hear the grounds of suspicion,” said Sir Stephen, when he had recovered from his astonishment. “It will take strong proof, I can tell you, Fred, before I shall believe this of Carlton.” Frederick Grey told the story as circumstantially as he could. It was scarcely ended when they reached South Wennock. Sir Stephen, whether he believed it or not, was most profoundly struck with it; it excited him in no common degree. It was only fit for a romance, he remarked, not for an episode in real life.
“One of the most remarkable features in it, Frederick, assuming the guilt of Mr. Carlton, is that he should never once have been suspected by any one!”
“I suspected him,” was the answer.
“You? Nonsense!”
“I did, indeed,” said Frederick in a low tone. “A suspicion arose in my mind at the moment when we stood round Mrs. Crane as she lay dead. And he saw that I doubted him too! Do you remember that he wanted to get me out of the room that night, but Uncle John spoke up and said I might be trusted?”
“Good gracious!” cried Sir Stephen in his simple way: “I can’t understand all this. What did you suspect him of?”
“I don’t know. I did not know at the time. What I felt sure of was, that he was not true in the matter: that he knew more about it than he would say. I saw it in his manner; I heard it in his voice; I was sure of it when he gave his evidence afterwards at the inquest. I told my mother this; but she wouldn’t listen to me.”
“You must have been a strange sort of young gentleman, Frederick!”
“So Mr. Carlton thought, when I told him. You know when he laid that cane about my shoulders, and you assured me, by way of consolation, that I must have brought it upon myself by some insolence? In one sense I had done so; for I had been telling him that I suspected him of having something to do with Mrs. Crane’s death. Lady Jane Chesney heard me say it, for the encounter took place at her garden gate, and she happened to be standing near. No wonder he raised his cane. The only marvel to me now, looking back, is that he did not three parts kill me. I know I was insolent. But there’s something worse than all behind, that I have not yet spoken of.”
“What’s that?” asked Sir Stephen.
“Well, it’s very dreadful: not altogether pleasant to talk about. That first wife, that poor Mrs. Crane, turns out to have been the lost daughter of the Earl of Oakburn,”
Sir Stephen felt confounded. “My boy! what is it that you are telling me?”
“Nothing but the miserable truth. She was Clarice Chesney. You may guess what this discovery is, altogether, for Lady Jane. So far, however, Mr. Carlton must be exonerated. From what can be gleaned, it would appear that he never knew she was connected with them, — never knew her for a Chesney, — only as Miss Beauchamp, and
she married him under that name alone.”
“I never heard anything so painful in my life,” exclaimed Sir Stephen. “But why should — Frederick, what in the world’s all this?”
He might well exclaim! They had turned into the street at South Wennock, and found themselves in the midst of a dense and excited crowd. The fact was, Mrs. Fitch, who was no more capable of keeping a secret than are ladies in general, had spread the news abroad that Sir Stephen Grey was arriving in a barouche and pair; and she hoped they’d cheer him.
The recommendation was needless. Gathered there waiting for the carriage, the mob broke out with one loud shout of acclamation when it came in sight. “Long live Sir Stephen Grey! Would he ever forgive them for having suspected him? — they’d never forgive themselves. Health, and joy, and long life to Sir Stephen Grey!”
They pressed round the barouche. Sir Stephen was not eaten up, but his hands were nearly shaken off. And before he was at all aware of what the mob were about, they had unharnessed the horses, sent them away with the post-boy, and were harnessing themselves to the carriage, squabbling and fighting which and how many should enjoy the honour. In this manner, shouting, hurrahing, and gesticulating, they commenced to draw Sir Stephen towards brother’s, Frederick did not admire being made much of. He opened the door to leap out, but, with the mob extending some yards round about, it could not be done without danger. He remonstrated, and Sir Stephen remonstrated, but only to draw forth fresh cheers and an increased rate of speed. So they were obliged, perforce, to resign themselves to their fate, the good-humoured Sir Stephen laughing and nodding incessantly.
Suddenly there was a halt, a stoppage, a check to the triumphal car. The mob had come into contact with another mob, who had been waiting round the town-hall for Mr. Carlton to emerge from it. That gentleman, escorted by the whole police force of South Wennock, consisting of about six, was in front, with the attendant mob dancing around. The two mobs joined voice, and the shouts for Sir Stephen Grey changed into yells of anger.
They were abreast, the barouche and the prisoner, and neither could stir one way or the other, for the mob had it all their own way. The few policemen were quite powerless.
“Down with him! Let’s have lynch law for once! What right had he, knowing what he’d done, to come into our houses, doctoring our wives and children? Let’s serve him out, as he served her out! Here goes!”
Another moment, and Mr. Carlton would have been in their hands, at their cruel mercy, but Sir Stephen Grey rose up to the rescue. He stood in the carriage and bared his head while he addressed the excited mob; the flaring light from a butcher’s shop shining full on his face.
“If you touch Mr. Carlton by so much as a finger, you are not my fellow-townsmen, my good old neighbours of South Wennock, and I will never again meet you as such. I thought you were Englishmen! If Mr. Carlton is accused of crime, is there not the law of his country to judge him? You are not the law; you are not his accusers; he has not injured you. My friends, in this moment, when you have made me happy by your welcome, don’t do anything to mar it; don’t make me ashamed of you!”
“It was he drove you from the town, Sir Stephen. It was he, with his lies against you, made us think ill of you, and turn our backs upon the truest friend we ever had.”
“That’s not your affair; that’s mine: he did not drive you from the town. If I forgive and forget the past, surely you can do it. Carlton,” he impulsively said, “I do forgive you heartily for any wrong they think you may have done me, and I wish you well, and I hope you’ll get off — that is, if you can feel that you ought to do so,” Sir Stephen added, unpleasant reminiscences of what his son had said intruding into his frank good nature. “I wish you no ill, I’m sure; I wish you hearty good luck. And, my men, as you have undertaken to escort me to my brother’s, I desire that you’ll go on with me, that I may wish you no ill. Come! don’t keep me here, perched in the cold.”
His half-careless, half-authoritative, and wholly kind tone had the desired effect. The barouche was dragged on again, and the mob, to a man, followed after it, setting up their cheers again.
“Thank you, Sir Stephen,” said Mr. Carlton, throwing back the words as he resumed his walk between the policemen.
A minute more, and there was another interruption; in the matter of sound, at any rate. A band, whence hunted up on the spur of the moment, the excited South Wennock natives, or perhaps Mrs. Fitch alone could tell, came into sight and hearing, to welcome Sir Stephen to his own town.
“A band!” he groaned, sinking into the corner of the carriage. “For me! What on earth do they take me for? People must have gone mad to-night.”
Frederick could not stand that. He had had enough, as it was. Jumping out at the risk of all consequences, he got away with a laugh, leaving Sir Stephen to make the best of it.
But the band had not come to a proper understanding with itself. In point of fact, it had been enjoying a sharp quarrel. The one half were of opinion that the welcoming strains to Sir Stephen should be of a personal character and significance, such as “See the Conquering Hero comes;” the other half held that the music should partake more of a national nature, and suggested “Rule Britannia.” As neither side would give way, each played its own air, an excellent way of showing independence. The result, as Sir Stephen’s ears testified, was unique: the more especially as each division played its loudest, hoping to drown the noise of the adversary.
And thus, amidst cheering, shouting, running, laughing, and remonstrating, Sir Stephen Grey was chaired in state to his brother’s house — Sir Stephen, who had been hunted from the town only a few short years before.
And Mr. Carlton, who had been the original cause of it all, and had certainly done his part in the hunting, was conducted by his attendants to his sojourn for the night — a place, popularly called in South Wennock the Lock-up.
CHAPTER XXIV.
MR. POLICEMAN BOWLER’S SELF-DOUBT.
THE lock-up in South Wennock was one of the institutions of the days gone by. The new police-station — new, speaking by comparison — was a small, confined place, and prisoners on remand were still conveyed to the lock-up until they should be consigned to the county prison. The lock-up, on the contrary, was a goodly-sized habitation, containing five or six rooms — one of them an ugly cell enough — and all on the ground-floor; for it was built somewhat after the manner of a huge barn, which had been divided into compartments afterwards. The building had never had any other name than the “lock-up” in the memory of South Wennock, and it was situated at the end of the town, near Mr. Carlton’s residence.
He, Mr. Carlton, was conducted to this place. In the days gone by he had occasionally been called into it to visit sick prisoners; from his nearness to the spot he was almost always sent for when a doctor was required, in preference to Mr. Grey, who lived further off. What a contrast between then and now! The police, still deferential to Mr. Carlton, but feeling their responsibility, marshalled him into the identical cell spoken of, and bowed to him as he went in. Mr. Carlton knew the room, and drew in his lips, but he said nothing. Only criminals accused of very heinous crimes were ever put into it. It was called “the strong room,” and was supposed to be secure against any chance of escape, from the fact of its possessing no windows. In fact, once locked into this compartment, there was no chance of it.
The first thing the police did was to search Mr. Carlton, apologizing as they did so for its being the “custom.” He offered no resistance; seemed rather inclined to joke than otherwise. Barely was this done, when Lawyer Billiter arrived, and was allowed to be closeted with the prisoner.
“And now,” said Mr. Carlton, beginning upon the subject that, to his mind, was the greatest puzzle of all, as he sat down on the only chair the room contained, and the lawyer contented himself with the edge of the iron bedstead, “be so good as tell me, in the first place, where that letter came from.”
“I did tell you when we were in the hall. It was found in your iron
safe.”
“That’s impossible,” returned Mr. Carlton. “It never was in the safe.”
“Look here, Carlton,” returned the lawyer; “it’s of no good mincing matters to me. I can never pull a client out of any mess whatever if I am kept in the dark.”
“It is I who am kept in the dark,” said Mr. Carlton. “I am telling you the truth when I say that the letter never was in my safe at all, and that its production is to me utterly incomprehensible.”
“But it was in your safe,” persisted Lawyer Billiter. “If you did not know of it, that’s another matter: it was certainly there; your wife, Lady Laura, found it there.”
“Lady Laura!”
“The tale is this,” said the lawyer, speaking without any reserve, for he could not divest himself of the idea that Mr. Carlton did know the facts. “Her ladyship has had some jealous feeling upon her lately with regard to — but I needn’t go into that. She suspected you of some escapade or other, it seems, and thought she should like to see what you kept in that safe. She went down one night — only a night or so ago — and got it open, and fished out this letter, and recognized it for the handwriting of her lost sister Clarice. She had no conception of its meaning; supposed it had got into one of your envelopes by some unaccountable mistake; but she showed it to Lady Jane Chesney, and Lady Jane showed it to the woman Smith. And it is she, Smith, who has done all the mischief.”
Mr. Carlton gazed with open eyes, in which there was now more of speculative reminiscence than of wonder. For the first time it occurred to him that there was a possibility of his having put up the wrong letter that long-past night; that he might have burnt the letter from his father, and have kept the dangerous one. A strange pang shot through his heart. Was it his wife, then, who had been the traitor? — his wife whom he had, in his fashion, certainly loved.