Delphi Complete Works of Elizabeth Gaskell

by Elizabeth Gaskell

  Before she had finished the necessary morning business of dressing, and setting her house in some kind of order, she had disentangled her ravelled ideas, and arranged some kind of a plan for action. If Jem was innocent (and now of his guilt, even his slightest participation in, or knowledge of, the murder, she acquitted him with all her heart and soul), he must have been somewhere else when the crime was committed; probably with some others, who might bear witness to the fact, if she only knew where to find them. Everything rested on her. She had heard of an alibi, and believed it might mean the deliverance she wished to accomplish; but she was not quite sure, and determined to apply to Job, as one of the few among her acquaintance gifted with the knowledge of hard words, for to her, all terms of law, or natural history, were alike many-syllabled mysteries.

  No time was to be lost. She went straight to Job Legh’s house, and found the old man and his grand-daughter sitting at breakfast; as she opened the door she heard their voices speaking in a grave, hushed, subdued tone, as if something grieved their hearts. They stopped talking on her entrance, and then she knew they had been conversing about the murder; about Jem’s probable guilt; and (it flashed upon her for the first time) on the new light they would have obtained regarding herself: for until now they had never heard of her giddy flirting with Mr. Carson; not in all her confidential talk with Margaret had she ever spoken of him. And now, Margaret would hear her conduct talked of by all, as that of a bold, bad girl; and even if she did not believe everything that was said, she could hardly help feeling wounded, and disappointed in Mary.

  So it was in a timid voice that Mary wished her usual good-morrow, and her heart sunk within her a little, when Job, with a form of civility, bade her welcome in that dwelling, where, until now, she had been too well assured to require to be asked to sit down.

  She took a chair. Margaret continued silent.

  “I’m come to speak to you about this — about Jem Wilson.”

  “It’s a bad business, I’m afeard,” replied Job sadly.

  “Ay, it’s bad enough anyhow. But Jem’s innocent. Indeed he is; I’m as sure as sure can be.”

  “How can you know, wench? Facts bear strong again him, poor fellow, though he’d a deal to put him up, and aggravate him, they say. Ay, poor lad, he’s done for himself, I’m afeard.”

  “Job,” said Mary, rising from her chair in her eagerness, “you must not say he did it. He didn’t; I’m sure and certain he didn’t. Oh! why do you shake your head? Who is to believe me, — who is to think him innocent, if you, who know’d him so well, stick to it he’s guilty?”

  “I’m loth enough to do it, lass,” replied Job; “but I think he’s been ill-used, and — jilted (that’s plain truth, Mary, bare as it may seem), and his blood has been up — many a man has done the like afore, from like causes.”

  “O God! Then you won’t help me, Job, to prove him innocent? O Job,

  Job! believe me, Jem never did harm to no one.”

  “Not afore; — and mind, wench! I don’t over-blame him for this.” Job relapsed into silence.

  Mary thought a moment.

  “Well, Job, you’ll not refuse me this, I know. I won’t mind what you think, if you’ll help me as if he was innocent. Now suppose I know — I knew, he was innocent, — it’s only supposing, Job, — what must I do to prove it? Tell me, Job! Isn’t it called an alibi, the getting folk to swear to where he really was at the time?”

  “Best way, if you know’d him innocent, would be to find out the real murderer. Some one did it, that’s clear enough. If it wasn’t Jem who was it?”

  “How can I tell?” answered Mary, in agony of terror, lest Job’s question was prompted by any suspicion of the truth.

  But he was far enough from any such thought. Indeed, he had no doubt in his own mind that Jem had, in some passionate moment, urged on by slighted love and jealousy, been the murderer. And he was strongly inclined to believe, that Mary was aware of this, only that, too late repentant of her light conduct which had led to such fatal consequences, she was now most anxious to save her old playfellow, her early friend, from the doom awaiting the shedder of blood.

  “If Jem’s not done it, I don’t see as any on us can tell who did it. We might find out something if we’d time; but they say he’s to be tried on Tuesday. It’s no use hiding it, Mary; things looks strong against him.”

  “I know they do! I know they do! But, O Job! isn’t an alibi a proving where he really was at th’ time of the murder; and how must I set about an alibi?”

  “An alibi is that, sure enough.” He thought a little. “You mun ask his mother his doings, and his whereabouts that night; the knowledge of that will guide you a bit.”

  For he was anxious that on another should fall the task of enlightening Mary on the hopelessness of the case, and he felt that her own sense would be more convinced by inquiry and examination than any mere assertion of his.

  Margaret had sat silent and grave all this time. To tell the truth, she was surprised and disappointed by the disclosure of Mary’s conduct, with regard to Mr. Henry Carson. Gentle, reserved, and prudent herself, never exposed to the trial of being admired for her personal appearance, and unsusceptible enough to be in doubt even yet, whether the fluttering, tender, infinitely joyous feeling she was for the first time experiencing, at sight or sound, or thought of Will Wilson, was love or not, — Margaret had no sympathy with the temptations to which loveliness, vanity, ambition, or the desire of being admired, exposes so many; no sympathy with flirting girls, in short. Then, she had no idea of the strength of the conflict between will and principle in some who were differently constituted from herself. With her, to be convinced that an action was wrong, was tantamount to a determination not to do so again; and she had little or no difficulty in carrying out her determination. So she could not understand how it was that Mary had acted wrongly, and had felt too much ashamed, in spite of internal sophistry, to speak of her actions. Margaret considered herself deceived; felt aggrieved; and, at the time of which I am now telling you, was strongly inclined to give Mary up altogether, as a girl devoid of the modest proprieties of her sex, and capable of gross duplicity, in speaking of one lover as she had done of Jem, while she was encouraging another in attentions, at best of a very doubtful character.

  But now Margaret was drawn into the conversation. Suddenly it flashed across Mary’s mind, that the night of the murder was the very night, or rather the same early morning, that Margaret had been with Alice. She turned sharp round, with —

  “O Margaret, you can tell me; you were there when he came back that night; were you not? No! you were not; but you were there not many hours after. Did not you hear where he’d been? He was away the night before, too, when Alice was first taken; when you were there for your tea. Oh! where was he, Margaret?”

  “I don’t know,” she answered. “Stay! I do remember something about his keeping Will company, in his walk to Liverpool. I can’t justly say what it was, so much happened that night.”

  “I’ll go to his mother’s,” said Mary resolutely.

  They neither of them spoke, either to advise or dissuade. Mary felt she had no sympathy from them, and braced up her soul to act without such loving aid of friendship. She knew that their advice would be willingly given at her demand, and that was all she really required for Jem’s sake. Still her courage failed a little as she walked to Jane Wilson’s, alone in the world with her secret.

  Jane Wilson’s eyes were swelled with crying; and it was sad to see the ravages which intense anxiety and sorrow had made on her appearance in four-and-twenty hours. All night long she and Mrs. Davenport had crooned over their sorrows, always recurring, like the burden of an old song, to the dreadest sorrow of all, which was now impending over Mrs. Wilson. She had grown — I hardly know what word to use — but, something like proud of her martyrdom; she had grown to hug her grief; to feel an excitement in her agony of anxiety about her boy.

  “So, Mary, you’re here! O Mary, lass! He
’s to be tried on

  Tuesday.”

  She fell to sobbing, in the convulsive breath-catching manner which tells of so much previous weeping.

  “O Mrs. Wilson, don’t take on so! We’ll get him off, you’ll see.

  Don’t fret; they can’t prove him guilty!”

  “But I tell thee they will,” interrupted Mrs. Wilson, half-irritated at the light way, as she considered it, in which Mary spoke; and a little displeased that another could hope when she had almost brought herself to find pleasure in despair.

  “It may suit thee well,” continued she, “to make light o’ the misery thou hast caused; but I shall lay his death at thy door, as long as I live, and die I know he will; and all for what he never did — no, he never did; my own blessed boy!”

  She was too weak to be angry long; her wrath sank away to feeble sobbing and worn-out moans.

  Mary was most anxious to soothe her from any violence of either grief or anger; she did so want her to be clear in her recollection; and, besides, her tenderness was great towards Jem’s mother. So she spoke in a low gentle tone the loving sentences, which sound so broken and powerless in repetition, and which yet have so much power when accompanied with caressing looks and actions, fresh from the heart; and the old woman insensibly gave herself up to the influence of those sweet, loving blue eyes, those tears of sympathy, those words of love and hope, and was lulled into a less morbid state of mind.

  “And now, dear Mrs. Wilson, can you remember where he said he was going on Thursday night? He was out when Alice was taken ill; and he did not come home till early in the morning, or, to speak true, in the night: did he?”

  “Ay! he went out near upon five; he went out with Will; he said he were going to set* him a part of the way, for Will were hot upon walking to Liverpool, and wouldn’t hearken to Jem’s offer of lending him five shillings for his fare. So the two lads set off together. I mind it all now: but, thou seest, Alice’s illness, and this business of poor Jem’s, drove it out of my head; they went off together, to walk to Liverpool; that’s to say, Jem were to go a part o’ th’ way. But, who knows” (falling back into the old desponding tone) “if he really went? He might be led off on the road. O Mary, wench! they’ll hang him for what he’s never done.”

  *”To set,” to accompany.

  “No they won’t, they shan’t! I see my way a bit now. We mun get Will to help; there’ll be time. He can swear that Jem were with him. Where is Jem?”

  “Folk said he were taken to Kirkdale, i’ th’ prison van this morning, without my seeing him, poor chap! O wench! but they’ve hurried on the business at a cruel rate.”

  “Ay! they’ve not let grass grow under their feet, in hunting out the man that did it,” said Mary sorrowfully and bitterly. “But keep up your heart. They got on the wrong scent when they took to suspecting Jem. Don’t be afeard. You’ll see it will end right for Jem.”

  “I should mind it less if I could do aught,” said Jane Wilson; “but I’m such a poor weak old body, and my head’s so gone, and I’m so dazed like, what with Alice and all, that I think and think, and can do nought to help my child. I might ha’ gone and seen him last night, they tell me now, and then I missed it. O Mary, I missed it; and I may never see the lad again.”

  She looked so piteously in Mary’s face with her miserable eyes, that Mary felt her heart giving way, and, dreading the weakness of her powers, which the burst of crying she longed for would occasion, hastily changed the subject to Alice; and Jane, in her heart, feeling that there was no sorrow like a mother’s sorrow, replied —

  “She keeps on much the same, thank you. She’s happy, for she knows nothing of what’s going on; but th’ doctor says she grows weaker and weaker. Thou’lt maybe like to see her?”

  Mary went upstairs; partly because it is the etiquette in humble life to offer to friends a last opportunity of seeing the dying or the dead, while the same etiquette forbids a refusal of the invitation; and partly because she longed to breathe, for an instant, the atmosphere of holy calm, which seemed ever to surround the pious, good old woman. Alice lay, as before, without pain, or at least any outward expression of it; but totally unconscious of all present circumstances, and absorbed in recollections of the days of her girlhood, which were vivid enough to take the place of reality to her. Still she talked of green fields, and still she spoke to the long-dead mother and sister, low-lying in their graves this many a year, as if they were with her and about her, in the pleasant places where her youth had passed.

  But the voice was fainter, the motions were more languid; she was evidently passing away; but HOW happily!

  Mary stood for a time in silence, watching and listening. Then she bent down and reverently kissed Alice’s cheek; and drawing Jane Wilson away from the bed, as if the spirit of her who lay there were yet cognisant of present realities, she whispered a few words of hope to the poor mother, and kissing her over and over again in a warm, loving manner, she bade her good-bye, went a few steps, and then once more came back to bid her keep up her heart.

  And when she had fairly left the house, Jane Wilson felt as if a sunbeam had ceased shining into the room.

  Yet oh! how sorely Mary’s heart ached; for more and more the fell certainty came on her that her father was the murderer! She struggled hard not to dwell on this conviction; to think alone on the means of proving Jem’s innocence; that was her first duty, and that should be done.

  XXIII. THE SUB-POENA.

  ”And must it then depend on this poor eye

  And this unsteady hand, whether the bark,

  That bears my all of treasured hope and love,

  Shall find a passage through these frowning rocks

  To some fair port where peace and safety smile, —

  Or whether it shall blindly dash against them,

  And miserably sink? Heaven be my help;

  And clear my eye and nerve my trembling hand!”

  — ”THE CONSTANT WOMAN.”

  Her heart beating, her head full of ideas, which required time and solitude to be reduced into order, Mary hurried home. She was like one who finds a jewel of which he cannot all at once ascertain the value, but who hides his treasure until some quiet hour when he may ponder over the capabilities its possession unfolds. She was like one who discovers the silken clue which guides to some bower of bliss, and secure of the power within his grasp, has to wait for a time before he may thread the labyrinth.

  But no jewel, no bower of bliss was ever so precious to miser or lover as was the belief which now pervaded Mary’s mind that Jem’s innocence might be proved, without involving any suspicion of that other — that dear one, so dear, although so criminal — on whose part in this cruel business she dared not dwell even in thought. For if she did there arose the awful question, — if all went against Jem the innocent, if judge and jury gave the verdict forth which had the looming gallows in the rear, what ought she to do, possessed of her terrible knowledge? Surely not to inculpate her father — and yet — and yet — she almost prayed for the blessed unconsciousness of death or madness, rather than that awful question should have to be answered by her.

  But now a way seemed opening, opening yet more clear. She was thankful she had thought of the alibi, and yet more thankful to have so easily obtained the clue to Jem’s whereabouts that miserable night. The bright light that her new hope threw over all seemed also to make her thankful for the early time appointed for the trial. It would be easy to catch Will Wilson on his return from the Isle of Man, which he had planned should be on the Monday; and on the Tuesday all would be made clear — all that she dared to wish to be made clear.

  She had still to collect her thoughts and freshen her memory enough to arrange how to meet with Will — for to the chances of a letter she would not trust; to find out his lodgings when in Liverpool; to try and remember the name of the ship in which he was to sail: and the more she considered these points, the more difficulty she found there would be in ascertaining these minor but importa
nt facts. For you are aware that Alice, whose memory was clear and strong on all points in which her heart was interested, was lying in a manner senseless: that Jane Wilson was (to use her own word, so expressive to a Lancashire ear) “dazed”; that is to say, bewildered, lost in the confusion of terrifying and distressing thoughts; incapable of concentrating her mind; and at the best of times Will’s proceedings were a matter of little importance to her (or so she pretended), she was so jealous of aught which distracted attention from her pearl of price, her only son Jem. So Mary felt hopeless of obtaining any intelligence of the sailor’s arrangements from her.

  Then, should she apply to Jem himself? No! she knew him too well. She felt how thoroughly he must ere now have had it in his power to exculpate himself at another’s expense. And his tacit refusal so to do, had assured her of what she had never doubted, that the murderer was safe from any impeachment of his. But then neither would he consent, she feared, to any steps which might tend to prove himself innocent. At any rate, she could not consult him. He was removed to Kirkdale, and time pressed. Already it was Saturday at noon. And even if she could have gone to him, I believe she would not. She longed to do all herself; to be his liberator, his deliverer; to win him life, though she might never regain his lost love by her own exertions! And oh! how could she see him to discuss a subject in which both knew who was the bloodstained man; and yet whose name might not be breathed by either, so dearly with all his faults, his sins, was he loved by both.

  All at once, when she had ceased to try and remember, the name of

  Will’s ship flashed across her mind. The John Cropper.