Volume Three—Chapter Seventeen.
A Queer Catechist.
A boat upon the Wye, being polled upward, between Llangorren Court and Rugg’s Ferry. There are two men in it, not Vivian Ryecroft and Jack Wingate, but Gregoire Rogier and Richard Dempsey.
The ci-devant poacher is at the oars; for in addition to his new post as gamekeeper, he has occasional charge of a skiff, which has replaced the Gwendoline. This same morning he rowed his master up to Rugg’s, leaving him there; and now, at night, he is on return to fetch him home.
The two places being on opposite sides of the river, and the road round about, besides difficult for wheeled vehicles, Lewin Murdock moreover an indifferent horseman, he prefers the water route, and often takes it, as he has done to-day.
It is the same on which Father Rogier held that dialogue of sinister innuendo with Madame, and the priest, aware of the boat having to return to the Ferry, avails himself of a seat in it. Not that he dislikes walking, or is compelled to it. For he now keeps a cob, and does his rounds on horseback. But on this particular day he has left his roadster in its stable, and gone down to Llangorren afoot, knowing there would be the skiff to take him back.
No scheme of mere convenience dictated this arrangement to Gregoire Rogier. Instead, one of Satanic wickedness, preconceived, and all settled before holding that tête-à-tête with her he has called “chérie.”
Though requiring a boat for its execution and an oarsman of a peculiar kind—adroit at something besides the handling of oars—not a word of it has yet been imparted to the one who is rowing him. For all, the ex-poacher, accustomed to the priest’s moods, and familiar with his ways, can see there is something unusual in his mind, and that he himself is on the eve of being called upon for some new service or sacrifice. No supply of poached fish or game. Things have gone higher than that, and he anticipates some demand of a more serious nature. Still he has not the most distant idea of what it is to be; though certain interrogatories put to him are evidently leading up to it. The first is—
“You’re not afraid of water, are you, Dick?”
“Not partickler, your Reverence. Why should I?”
“Well, your being so little in the habit of washing your face—if I am right in my reckoning, only once a week—may plead my excuse for asking the question.”
“Oh, Father Rogier! That wor only in the time past, when I lived alone, and the thing worn’t worth while. Now, going more into respectable company, I do a little washin’ every day.”
“I’m glad to hear of your improved habits, and that they keep pace with the promotion you’ve had. But my inquiry had no reference to your ablutions; rather to your capabilities as a swimmer. If I mistake not, you can swim like a fish?”
“No, not equal to a fish. That ain’t possible.”
“An otter, then?”
“Somethin’ nearer he, if ye like,” answers Coracle, laughingly.
“I supposed as much. Never mind. About the degree of your natatory powers we needn’t dispute. I take it they’re sufficient for reaching either bank of this river, supposing the skiff to get capsized and you in it?”
“Lor, Father Rogier! That wouldn’t be nothin’! I could swim to eyther shore, if ’twor miles off.”
“But could you as you are now—with clothes on, boots, and everything?”
“Sartin could I, and carry weight beside.”
“That will do,” rejoins the questioner, apparently satisfied. Then lapsing into silence, and leaving Dick in a very desert of conjectures why he has been so interrogated.
The speechless interregnum is not for long. After a minute or two, Rogier, as if freshly awaking from a reverie, again asks—
“Would it upset this skiff if I were to step on the side of it—I mean bearing upon it with all the weight of my body?”
“That would it, your Reverence; though ye be but a light weight; tip it over like a tub.”
“Quite turn it upside down—as your old truckle, eh?”
“Well; not so ready as the truckle. Still ’twould go bottom upward. Though a biggish boat, it be one o’ the crankiest kind, and would sure capsize wi’ the lightiest o’ men standin’ on its gunn’l rail.”
“And surer with a heavier one, as yourself, for instance?”
“I shouldn’t like to try—your Reverence bein’ wi’ me in the boat.”
“How would you like, somebody else being with you in it—if made worth your while?”
Coracle starts at this question, asked in a tone that makes more intelligible the others preceding it, and which have been hitherto puzzling him. He begins to see the drift of the sub Jove confessional to which he is being submitted.
“How’d I like it, your Reverence? Well enough; if, as you say, made worth my while. I don’t mind a bit o’ a wettin’ when there’s anythin’ to be gained by it. Many’s the one I’ve had on a chilly winter’s night, as this same be, all for the sake o’ a salmon, I wor ’bleeged to sell at less’n half-price. If only showed the way to earn a honest penny by it, I wouldn’t wait for the upsettin’ o’ the boat, but jump overboard at oncst.”
“That’s game in you, Monsieur Dick. But to earn the honest penny you speak of, the upsetting of the boat might be a necessary condition.”
“Be it so, your Reverence. I’m willing to fulfil that, if ye only bid me. Maybe,” he continues in tone of confidential suggestion, “there be somebody as you think ought to get a duckin’ beside myself?”
“There is somebody, who ought,” rejoins the priest, coming nearer to his point. “Nay, must,” he continues, “for if he don’t the chances are we shall all go down together, and that soon.”
Coracle sculls on without questioning. He more than half comprehends the figurative speech, and is confident he will ere long receive complete explanation of it.
He is soon led a little way further by the priest observing—
“No doubt, mon ancien braconnier, you’ve been gratified by the change that’s of late taken place in your circumstances. But perhaps it hasn’t quite satisfied you, and you expect to have something more; as I have the wish you should. And you would ere this, but for one who obstinately sets his face against it.”
“May I know who that one is, Father Rogier?”
“You may, and shall; though I should think you scarce need telling. Without naming names, it’s he who will be in this boat with you going back to Llangorren.”
“I thought so. An’ if I an’t astray, he be the one your Reverence thinks would not be any the worse o’ a wettin’?”
“Instead, all the better for it. It may cure him of his evil courses—drinking, card-playing, and the like. If he’s not cured of them by some means, and soon, there won’t be an acre left him of the Llangorren lands, nor a shilling in his purse. He’ll have to go back to beggary, as at Glyngog; while you, Monsieur Coracle, in place of being head-gamekeeper, with other handsome preferments in prospect, will be compelled to return to your shifty life of poaching, night-netting, and all the etceteras. Would you desire that?”
“Daanged if I would! An’ won’t do it if I can help. Shan’t if your Reverence’ll only show me the way.”
“There’s but one I can think of.”
“What may that be, Father Rogier?”
“Simply to set your foot on the side of this skiff, and tilt it bottom upwards.”
“It shall be done. When, and where?”
“When you are coming back down. The where you may choose for yourself—such place as may appear safe and convenient. Only take care you don’t drown yourself.”
“No fear o’ that. There an’t water in the Wye as’ll ever drown Dick Dempsey.”
“No,” jocularly returns the priest; “I don’t suppose there is. If it be your fate to perish by asphyxia—as no doubt it is—strong tough hemp, and not weak water, will be the agent employed—that being more appropriate to the life you have led. Ha! ha! ha!”
Coracle laughs too, but with the grimace of wolf baying the moon. For the moonlight shining full in his face, shows him not over satisfied with the coarse jest. But remembering how he shifted that treacherous plank bridging the brook at Abergann he silently submits to it. He may not much longer. He, too, is gradually getting his hand upon a lever, which will enable him to have a say in the affairs of Llangorren Court, that they dwelling therein will listen to him, or, like the Philistines of Gaza, have it dragged down about their ears.
But the ex-poacher is not yet prepared to enact the rôle of Samson; and however galling the jeu d’esprit of the priest, he swallows it without showing chagrin, far less speaking it.
In truth there is no time for further exchange of speech, at least in the skiff. By this they have arrived at the Rugg’s Ferry landing-place, where Father Rogier, getting out, whispers a few words in Coracle’s ear, and then goes off.
His words were—
“A hundred pounds, Dick, if you do it. Twice that for your doing it adroitly!”
Volume Three—Chapter Eighteen.
Almost a “Vert.”
Major Mahon is standing at one of the front windows of his house waiting for his dinner to be served, when he sees a fiacre driven up to the door, and inside it the face of a friend.
He does not stay for the bell to be rung, but with genuine Irish impulsiveness rushes forth, himself opening the door.
“Captain Ryecroft!” he exclaims, grasping the new arrival by the hand, and hauling him out of the hackney. “Glad to see you back in Boulogne.” Then adding, as he observes a young man leap down from the box where he has had seat beside the driver, “Part of your belongings, isn’t he?”
“Yes, Major; my old Wye waterman, Jack Wingate, of whom I spoke to you. And if it be convenient to you to quarter both of us for a day or two—”
“Don’t talk about convenience, and bar all mention of time. The longer you stay with me you’ll be conferring the greater favour. Your old room is gaping to receive you; and Murtagh will rig up a berth for your boatman. Murt!” to the ex-Royal Irish, who, hearing the fracas, has also come forth, “take charge of Captain Ryecroft’s traps, along with Mr Wingate here, and see all safety bestowed. Now, old fellow, step inside. They’ll look after the things. You’re just in time to do dinner with me. I was about sitting down to it solus, awfully lamenting my loneliness. Well; one never knows what luck’s in the wind. Rather hard lines for you, however. If I mistake not, my pot’s of the poorest this blessed day. But I know you’re neither gourmand nor gourmet; and that’s some consolation. In!”
In go they, leaving the old soldier to settle the fiacre fare, look after the luggage, and extend the hospitalities of the kitchen to Jack Wingate.
Soon as Captain Ryecroft has performed some slight ablutions—necessary after a sea voyage however short—his host hurries him down to the dining-room.
When seated at the table, the Major asks—
“What on earth has delayed you, Vivian? You promised to be back in a week at most. Its months now! Despairing of your return, I had some thought of advertising the luggage you left with me, ‘if not claimed within a certain time, to be sold for the payment of expenses.’ Ha! ha!”
Ryecroft echoes the laugh; but so faintly, his friend can see the cloud has not yet lifted; instead, lies heavy and dark as ever.
In hopes of doing something to dissipate it, the Major rolls on in his rich Hibernian brogue—
“You’ve just come in time to save your chattels from the hammer. And now I have you here I mean to keep you. So, old boy, make up your mind to an unlimited sojourn in Boulogne-sur-mer. You will, won’t you?”
“It’s very kind of you, Mahon; but that must depend on—”
“On what?”
“How I prosper in my errand.”
“Oh! this time you have an errand? Some business?”
“I have.”
“Well, as you had none before, it gives reason to hope that other matters may be also reversed, and instead of shooting off like a comet, you’ll play the part of a fixed star; neither to shoot nor be shot at, as looked likely on the last occasion. But speaking seriously, Ryecroft, as you say you’re on business, may I know its nature?”
“Not only may, but it’s meant you should. Nay, more, Mahon; I want your help in it.”
“That you can count upon, whatever it be—from pitch-and-toss up to manslaughter. Only say how I can serve you.”
“Well, Major, in the first place I would seek your assistance in some inquiries I am about to make.”
“Inquiries! Have they regard to that young lady you said was lost—missing from her home! Surely she has been found?”
“She has—found drowned!”
“Found drowned! God bless me!”
“Yes, Mahon. The home from which she was missing knows her no more. Gwendoline Wynn is now in her long home—in Heaven!”
The solemn tone of voice, with the woe-begone expression on the speaker’s face, drives all thoughts of hilarity out of the listener’s mind. It is a moment too sacred for mirth; and between the two friends, old comrades in arms, for an interval even speech is suspended; only a word of courtesy as the host presses his guest to partake of the viands before them.
The Major does not question further, leaving the other to take up the broken thread of the conversation.
Which he at length does, holding it in hand, till he has told all that happened since they last sat at that table together.
He gives only the facts, reserving his own deductions from them. But Mahon, drawing them for himself, says searchingly—
“Then you have a suspicion there’s been what’s commonly called foul play?”
“More than a suspicion. I’m sure of it.”
“The devil! But who do you suspect?”
“Who should I, but he now in possession of the property—her cousin, Mr Lewin Murdock. Though I’ve reason to believe there are others mixed up in it; one of them a Frenchman. Indeed, it’s chiefly to make inquiry about him I’ve come over to Boulogne.”
“A Frenchman. You know his name?”
“I do; at least that he goes by on the other side of the Channel. You remember that night as we were passing the back entrance of the convent where your sister’s at school, our seeing a carriage there—a hackney, or whatever it was?”
“Certainly I do.”
“And my saying that the man who had just got out of it, and gone inside, resembled a priest I’d seen but a day or two before?”
“Of course I remember all that; and my joking you at the time as to the idleness of you fancying a likeness among sheep; where all are so nearly of the same hue—that black. Something of the sort I said. But what’s your argument?”
“No argument at all, but a conviction, that the man we saw that night was my Herefordshire priest. I’ve seen him several times since—had a good square look at him—and feel sure ’twas he.”
“You haven’t yet told me his name?”
“Rogier—Father Rogier. So he is called upon the Wye.”
“And, supposing him identified, what follows?”
“A great deal follows, or rather depends on his identification.”
“Explain, Ryecroft. I shall listen with patience.”
Ryecroft does explain, continuing his narrative into a second chapter, which includes the doings of the Jesuit on Wyeside, so far as known to him; the story of Jack Wingate’s love and loss—the last so strangely resembling his own—the steps afterwards taken by the waterman; in short, everything he can think of that will throw light upon the subject.
“A strange tale, truly!” observes the Major, after hearing it to the end. “But does your boatman really believe the priest has resuscitated his dead sweetheart and brought her over here with the intention of of shutting her up in a nunnery?”
“He does all that; and certainly not without show of reason. Dead or alive, the priest or some one else has taken the girl out of her coffin, and her grave.”
“’Twould be a wonderful story, if true—I mean the resuscitation, or resurrection; not the mere disinterment of a body. That’s possible, and probable where priests of the Jesuitical school are concerned. And so should the other be, when one considers that they can make statues wink, and pictures shed tears. Oh! yes; Ultramontane magicians can do anything!”
“But why,” asks Ryecroft, “should they have taken all this trouble about a poor girl—the daughter of a small Herefordshire farmer,—with possibly at the most a hundred pounds, or so, for her dowry? That’s what mystifies me!”
“It needn’t,” laconically observes the Major. “These Jesuit gentry have often other motives than money for caging such birds in their convents. Was the girl good looking?” he asks after musing a moment.
“Well, of myself I never saw her. By Jack’s description she must have been a superb creature—on a par with the angels. True, a lover’s judgment is not much to be relied on, but I’ve heard from others, that Miss Morgan was really a rustic belle—something beyond the common.”
“Faith! and that may account for the whole thing. I know they like their nuns to be nice looking; prefer that stripe; I suppose, for purposes of proselytising, if nothing more. They’d give a good deal to receive the services of my own sister in that way; have been already bidding for her. By Heavens! I’d rather see her laid in her grave!”
The Major’s strong declaration is followed by a spell of silence; after which, cooling down a little, he continues—
“You’ve come, then, to inquire into this convent matter, about—what’s the girl’s name?—ah! Morgan.”
“More than the convent matter; though it’s in the same connection. I’ve come to learn what can be learnt about this priest; get his character, with his antecedents. And, if possible, obtain some information respecting the past lives of Mr Lewin Murdock and his French wife; for which I may probably go on to Paris, if not further. To sum up everything, I’ve determined to sift this mystery to the bottom—unravel it to its last thread. I’ve already commenced unwinding the clue, and made some little progress. But I want one to assist me. Like a lone hunter on a lost trail, I need counsel from a companion—and help too. You’ll stand by me, Mahon?”
“To the death, my dear boy! I was going to say the last shilling in my purse. As you don’t need that, I say, instead, to the last breath in my body!”
“You shall be thanked with the last in mine.”
“I’m sure of that. And now for a drop of the ‘crayther,’ to warm us to our work. Ho! there, Murt! bring in the ‘matayreals.’”
Which Murtagh does, the dinner-dishes having been already removed.
Soon as punches have been mixed, the Major returns to the subject, saying—
“Now then; to enter upon particulars. What step do you wish me to take, first?”
“First, to find out who Father Rogier is, and what. That is, on this side; I know what he is on the other. If we can but learn his relations with the convent it might give us a key, capable of opening more than one lock.”
“There won’t be much difficulty in doing that, I take it. All the less, from my little sister Kate being a great pet of the Lady Superior, who has hopes of making a nun of her! Not if I know it! Soon as her schooling’s completed she walks out of that seminary, and goes to a place where the moral atmosphere is a trifle purer. You see, old fellow, I’m not very bigoted about our Holy Faith, and in some danger of becoming a ‘vert.’ As for my sister, were it not for a bit of a legacy left on condition of her being educated in a convent, she’d never have seen the inside of one, with my consent; and never will again when out of this one. But money’s money; and though the legacy isn’t a large one, for her sake I couldn’t afford to forfeit it. You comprehend?”
“Quite. And you think she will be able to obtain the information, without in any way compromising herself?”
“Pretty sure of it. Kate’s no simpleton, though she be but a child in years. She’ll manage it for me, with the instructions I mean giving her. After all, it may not be so much trouble. In these nunneries, things which are secrets to the world without, are known to every mother’s child of them—nuns and novices alike. Gossip’s the chief occupation of their lives. If there’s been an occurrence such as you speak of—a new bird caged there—above all an English one—it’s sure to have got wind—that is inside the walls. And I can trust Kate to catch the breath, and blow it outside. So, Vivian, old boy, drink your toddy, and take things coolly. I think I can promise you that, before many days, or it may be only hours, you shall know whether such a priest as you speak of, be in the habit of coming to that convent; and if so, what for, when he was there last, and everything about the reverend gentleman worth knowing.”
Kate Mahon proves equal to the occasion; showing herself quick witted, as her brother boasted her to be.
On the third day after, she is able to report to him; that some time previously, how long not exactly known, a young English girl came to the convent, brought thither by a priest named Rogier. The girl is a candidate for the Holy Sisterhood—voluntary of course—to take the veil, soon as her probation be completed. Miss Mahon has not seen the new novice; only heard of her as being a great beauty; for personal charms make noise even in a nunnery. Nor have any of the other pensionnaires been permitted to see or speak with her. All they as yet know is, that she is a blonde, with yellow hair—a grand wealth of it—and goes by the name of “Soeur Marie.”
“Sister Mary!” exclaims Jack Wingate, as Ryecroft at second-hand communicates the intelligence—at the same time translating the “Soeur Marie.”
“It’s Mary Morgan—my Mary! An’ by the Heavens of Mercy,” he adds, his arms angrily thrashing the air, “she shall come out o’ that convent, or I’ll lay my life down at its door.”
Volume Three—Chapter Nineteen.
The Last of Lewin Murdock.
Once more a boat upon the Wye, passing between Rugg’s Ferry and Llangorren Court, but this time descending. It is the same boat, and as before with two men in it; though they are not both the same who went up. One of them is—Coracle Dick, still at the oars; while Father Rogier’s place in the stern is now occupied by another; not sitting upright as was the priest, but lying along the bottom timbers with head coggled over, and somewhat uncomfortably supported by the thwart.
This man is Lewin Murdock, in a state of helpless inebriety—in common parlance, drunk. He has been brought to the boat landing by the landlord of the “Welsh Harp,” where he has been all day carousing; and delivered to Dempsey, who now at a late hour of the night is conveying him homeward. His hat is down by his feet, instead of upon his head; and the moonbeams, falling unobstructed on his face, show it of a sickly whitish hue; while his eyes, sunk deep in their sockets, have each a demi-lune of dark purplish colour underneath. But for an occasional twitching of the facial muscles, with a spasmodic movement of the lips, and at intervals, a raucous noise through his nostrils, he might pass for dead, as readily as dead drunk.
Verily, is the priest’s prognosis based upon reliable data; for by the symptoms now displayed Lewin Murdock is doing his best to destroy himself—drinking suicidally!
For all, he is not destined thus to die. His end will come even sooner, and it may be easier.
It is not distant now, but ominously near, as may be told by looking into the eyes of the man who sits opposite, and recalling the conversation late exchanged between him and Father Rogier. For in those dark orbs a fierce light scintillates, such as is seen in the eyes of the assassin contemplating assassination, or the jungle tiger when within springing distance of its prey.
Nothing of all this sees the sot, but lies unconscious, every now and then giving out a snore, regardless of danger, as though everything around were innocent as the pale moonbeams shimmering down upon his cadaverous cheeks.
Possibly he is dreaming, and if so, in all likelihood it is of a grand gas-lighted salon, with tables of tapis vert, carrying packs of playing cards, dice cubes, and ivory counters. Or the mise en scène of his visionary vagaries may be a drinking saloon, where he carouses with boon companions, their gambling limited to a simple tossing of odd and even, “heads or tails.”
But if dreaming at all, it is not of what is near him. Else, far gone as he is, he would be aroused—instinctively—to make a last struggle for life. For the thing so near is death!
The fiend who sits regarding him in this helpless condition—as it were holding Lewin Murdock’s life, or the little left of it, in his hand—has unquestionably determined upon taking it. Why he does not do so at once is not because he is restrained by any motive of mercy, or reluctance to the spilling of blood. The heart of the ci-devant poacher, counterfeiter, and cracksman, has been long ago steeled against such silly and sensitive scruples. The postponement of his hellish purpose is due to a mere question of convenience. He dislikes the idea of having to trudge over miles of meadow in dripping garments!
True, he could drown the drunken man, and keep himself dry—every stitch. But that would not do. For there will be another coroner’s inquest, at which he will have to be present. He has escaped the two preceding; but at this he will be surely called upon, and as principal witness. Therefore he must be able to say he was wet, and prove it as well. Into the river, then, will he go, along with his victim; though there is no need for his taking the plunge till he has got nearer to Llangorren.
So ingeniously contriving, he sits with arms mechanically working the oars; his eyes upon the doomed man, as those of a cat having a crippled mouse within easy reach of her claws, at any moment to be drawn in and destroyed!
Silently, but rapidly, he rows on, needing no steerer. Between Rugg’s Ferry and Llangorren Court he is as familiar with the river’s channel as a coachman with the carriage-drive to and from his master’s mansion; knows its every curve and crook, every purl and pool, having explored them while paddling his little “truckle.” And now, sculling the larger craft, it is all the same. And he pulls on, without once looking over his shoulder; his eyes alone given to what is directly in front of him; Lewin Murdock lying motionless at his feet.
As if himself moved by a sudden impulse—impatience, or the thought it might be as well to have the dangerous work over—he ceases pulling, and acts as though he were about to unship the oars.
But again he seems suddenly to change his intention; on observing a white fleck by the river’s edge, which he knows to be the lime-washed walls of the widow Wingate’s cottage, at the same time remembering that the main road passes by it.
What if there be some one on the road, or the river’s bank, and be seen in the act of capsizing his own boat? True, it is after midnight, and not likely any one abroad—even the latest wayfarer. But there might be; and in such clear moonlight his every movement could be made out.
That place will not do for the deed of darkness he is contemplating; and he trembles to think how near he has been to committing himself!
Thus warned to the taking of precautions hitherto not thought of, he proceeds onward; summoning up before his mind the different turns and reaches of the river, all the while mentally anathematising the moon. For, besides convenience of place, time begins to press, even trouble him, as he recalls the proverb of the cup and the lip.
He is growing nervously impatient—almost apprehensive of failure, through fear of being seen—when rounding a bend he has before him the very thing he is in search of—the place itself. It is a short straight reach, where the channel is narrow, with high banks on both sides, and trees overhanging, whose shadows meeting across shut off the hated light, shrouding the whole water surface in deep obscurity. It is but a little way above the lone farm-house of Abergann, and the mouth of the brook which there runs in. But Coracle Dick is not thinking of either; only of the place being appropriate for his diabolical design.
And, becoming satisfied it is so, he delays no longer, but sets about its execution—carrying it out with an adroitness which should fairly entitle him to the double reward promised by the priest. Having unshipped the oars, he starts to his feet; and mounting upon the thwart, there for a second or two stands poised and balancing. Then, stepping to the side, he sets foot on the gunwale rail with his whole body’s weight borne upon it.
In an instant over goes the boat, careening bottom upwards, and spilling Lewin Murdock, as himself, into the mad surging river!
The drunken man goes down like a lump of lead; possibly without pain, or the consciousness of being drowned; only supposing it the continuation of his dream!
Satisfied he has gone down, the assassin cares not how. He has enough to think of in saving himself, enough to do swimming in his clothes, even to the boots.
He reaches the bank, nevertheless, and climbs up it, exhausted; shivering like a water spaniel, for snow has fallen on Plinlimmon, and its thaw has to do with the freshet in the stream.
But the chill of the Wye’s water is nought compared with that sent through his flesh, to the very marrow of his bones, on discovering he has crawled out upon the spot—the self-same spot—where the waves gave back another body he had consigned to them—that of Mary Morgan!
For a moment he stands horror-struck, with hair on end. The blood curdling in his veins. Then, nerving himself to the effort, he hitches up his dripping trousers, and hurries away from the accursed place—by himself accursed—taking the direction of Llangorren, but giving a wide berth to Abergann.
He has no fear of approaching the former in wet garments; instead knows that in this guise he will be all the more warmly welcomed—as he is!
Mrs Murdock sits up late for Lewin—though with little expectation of his coming home. Looking out of the window, in the moonlight she sees a man, who comes striding across the carriage sweep, and up into the portico.
Rushing to the door to receive him, she exclaims in counterfeit surprise—
“You, Monsieur Richard! Not my husband!”
When Coracle Dick has told his sad tale, shaped to suit the circumstances, her half-hysterical ejaculation might be supposed a cry of distress. Instead, it is one of ecstatic delight, she is unable to restrain, at knowing herself now sole owner of the house over her head, and the land for miles around it!
Volume Three—Chapter Twenty.
A Chapter Diplomatic.
Another day has dawned, another sun set upon Boulogne; and Major Mahon is again in his dining-room, with Captain Ryecroft, his sole guest.
The cloth has been removed, the Major’s favourite after-dinner beverage brought upon the table, and, with punches “brewed” and cigars set alight, they have commenced conversation upon the incidents of the day—those especially relating to Ryecroft’s business in Boulogne.
The Major has had another interview with his sister—a short one, snatched while she was out with her school companions for afternoon promenade. It has added some further particulars to those they had already learnt, both about the English girl confined within the nunnery and the priest who conveyed her thither. That the latter was Father Rogier is placed beyond a doubt by a minute description of his person given to Miss Mahon, well known to the individual who gave it. To the nuns within that convent the man’s name is familiar—even to his baptismal appellation, Gregoire; for although the Major has pronounced all the sacerdotal fraternity alike, in being black, this particular member of it is of a shade deeper than common—a circumstance of itself going a good way towards his identification. Even within that sacred precinct where he is admitted, a taint attaches to him; though what its nature the young lady has not yet been able to ascertain.
The information thus obtained tallies with the estimate of the priest’s character, already formed; in correspondence, too, with the theory that he is capable of the crime Captain Ryecroft believes him to have abetted, if not actually committed. Nor is it contradicted by the fact of his being a frequent visitor to the nunnery, and a favourite with the administration thereof; indeed an intimate friend of the Abbess herself. Something more, in a way accounting for all: that the new novice is not the first agneau d’Angleterre he has brought over to Boulogne, and guided into that same fold, more than one of them having ample means, not only to provision themselves, but a surplus for the support of the general sisterhood.
There is no word about any of these English lambs having been other than voluntary additions to the French flock; but a whisper circulates within the convent walls, that Father Rogier’s latest contribution is a recusant, and if she ever become a nun it will be a forced one; that the thing is contre coeur—in short, she protests against it.
Jack Wingate can well believe that; still under full conviction that “Soeur Marie” is Mary Morgan; and, despite all its grotesque strangeness and wild improbability, Captain Ryecroft has pretty nearly come to the same conclusion; while the Major, with less knowledge of antecedent circumstances, but more of nunneries, never much doubted it.
“About the best way to get the girl out. What’s your idea, Mahon?”
Ryecroft asks the question in no careless or indifferent way; on the contrary, with a feeling earnestness. For, although the daughter of the Wyeside farmer is nought to him, the Wye waterman is; and he has determined on seeing the latter through—to the end of the mysterious affair. In difficulties Jack Wingate has stood by him, and he will stand by Jack, coute-qui-coute. Besides, figuratively speaking, they are still in the same boat. For if Wingate’s dead sweetheart, so strangely returned to life, can be also restored to liberty, the chances are she may be the very one wanted to throw light on the other and alas! surer death. Therefore, Captain Ryecroft is not all unselfish in backing up his boatman; nor, as he puts the question, being anxious about the answer.
“We’ll have to use strategy,” returns the Major; not immediately, but after taking a grand gulp out of his tumbler, and a vigorous draw at his regalia.
“But why should we?” impatiently demands the Captain. “If the girl have been forced in there, and’s kept against her will—which by all the probabilities she is—surely she can be got out, on demand being made by her friends?”
“That’s just what isn’t sure—though the demand were made by her own mother, with the father to back it. You forget, old fellow, that you’re in France, not England.”
“But there’s a British Consul in Boulogne.”
“Aye, and a British Foreign Minister, who gives that Consul his instructions; with some queer ideas besides, neither creditable to himself nor his country. I’m speaking of that jaunty diplomat—the ‘judicious bottle-holder,’ who is accustomed to cajole the British public with his blarney about ‘Civis Romanus sum.’”
“True, but does that bear upon our affair?”
“It does—almost directly.”
“In what way? I do not comprehend.”
“Because you’re not up to what’s passing over here—I mean at headquarters—the Tuilleries, or St. Cloud, if you prefer it. There the man—if man he can be called—is ruled by the woman; she in her turn the devoted partisan of Pio Nono and the unprincipled Antonelli.”
“I can understand all that; still I don’t quite see its application, or how the English Foreign Minister can be interested in those you allude to?”
“I do. But for him, not one of the four worthies spoken of would be figuring as they are. In all probability France would still be a republic instead of an empire, wicked as the world ever saw; and Rome another republic—it maybe all Italy—with either Mazzini or Garibaldi at its head. For, certain as you sit there, old boy, it was the judicious bottle-holder who hoisted Nap into an imperial throne, over that Presidential chair, so ungratefully spurned—scurvily kicked behind after it had served his purpose. A fact of which the English people appear to be yet in purblind ignorance! As they are of another, equally notable, and alike misunderstood: that it was this same civis Romanus sum who restored old Pio to his apostolic chair; those red-breeched ruffians, the Zouaves, being but so much dust thrown into people’s eyes—a bone to keep the British bull-dog quiet. He would have growled then, and will yet, when he comes to understand all these transactions; when the cloak of that scoundrelly diplomacy which screens them has rotted into shreds, letting the light of true history shine upon them.”
“Why, Mahon! I never knew you were such a politician! Much less such a Radical!”
“Nothing much of either, old fellow. Only a man who hates tyranny in every shape and form—whether religious or political. Above all, that which owes its existence to the cheapest—the very shabbiest chicanery the world was ever bamboozled with. I like open dealing in all things.”
“But you are not recommending it, now—in this little convent matter?”
“All! that’s quite a different affair! There are certain ends that justify certain means—when the Devil must be fought with his own weapons. Ours is of that kind, and we must either use strategy, or give the thing up altogether. By open measures there wouldn’t be the slightest chance of our getting this girl out of the convent’s clutches. Even then we may fail; but, if successful, it will only be by great craft, some luck, and possibly a good deal of time spent before we accomplish our purpose.”
“Poor fellow!” rejoins Ryecroft, speaking of the Wye waterman, “he won’t like the idea of long waiting. He’s madly, terribly impatient. This afternoon as we were passing the Convent I had a difficulty to restrain him from rushing up to its door, ringing the bell, and demanding an interview with the ‘Soeur Marie’—having his Mary, as he calls her, restored to him on the instant.”
“It’s well you succeeded in hindering that little bit of rashness. Had he done so, ’twould have ended not only in the door being slammed in his face, but another door shut behind his back—that of a gaol; from which he would never have issued till embarking on a voyage to New Caledonia or Cayenne. Aye, both of you might have been so served. For would you believe it Ryecroft, that you, an officer of the boasted H.B.R.A.; rich, and with powerful friends—even you could be not only here imprisoned, but déporté, without any one who has interest in you being the wiser; or, if so, having no power to prevent it. France, under the régime of Napoleon le Petit, is not so very different from what it was under the rule of Louis le Grand, and lettres de cachet are now rife as then. Nay, more of them now written, consigning men to a hundred Bastilles instead of one. Never was a people so enslaved as these Johnny Crapauds are at this present time; not only their speech fettered, but their very thoughts held in bondage, or so constrained, they may not impart them to one another. Even intimate friends forbear exchanging confidences, lest one prove false to the other! Nothing free but insincerity and sin; both fostered and encouraged from that knowledge intuitive among tyrants; that wickedness weakens a people, making them easier to rule and ride over. So, my boy, you perceive the necessity of our acting with caution in this business, whatever trouble or time it may take—don’t you?”
“I do.”
“After all,” pursues the Major, “it seems to me that time isn’t of so much consequence. As regards the girl, they’re not going to eat her up. And for the other matters concerning yourself, they’ll keep, too. As you say, the scent’s become cold; and a few days more or less can’t make any difference. Beside, the trails we intend following may in the end all run into one. I shouldn’t be at all surprised if this captive damsel has come to the knowledge of something connected with the other affair. Faith, that may be the very reason for their having her conveyed over here, to be cooped up for the rest of her life. In any case, the fact of her abduction, in such an odd outrageous way, would of itself be damning collateral evidence against whoever has done it, showing him or them good for anything. So, the first work on our hands, as the surest, is to get the waterman’s sweetheart out of the convent, and safe back to her home in Herefordshire.
“That’s our course, clearly. But have you any thoughts as to how we should proceed?”
“I have; more than thoughts—hopes of success—and sanguine ones.”
“Good! I’m glad to hear it. Upon what do you base them?”
“On that very near relative of mine—Sister Kate. As I’ve told you, she’s a pet of the Lady Superior; admitted into the very arcana of the establishment. And with such privilege, if she can’t find a way to communicate with any one therein closeted, she must have lost the mother wit born to her, and brought thither from the ‘brightest gem of the say.’ I don’t think she has, or that it’s been a bit blunted in Boulogne. Instead, somewhat sharpened by communion with these Holy Sisters; and I’ve no fear but that ’twill be sharp enough to serve us in the little scheme I’ve in part sketched out.”
“Let me hear it, Mahon?”
“Kate must obtain an interview with the English girl; or, enough if she can slip a note into her hand. That would go some way towards getting her out—by giving her intimation that friends are near.”
“I see what you mean,” rejoins the Captain, pulling away at his cigar, the other left to finish giving details of the plan he has been mentally projecting.
“We’ll have to do a little bit of burglary, combined with abduction. Serve them out in their own coin; as it were hoisting the priest on his own petard!”
“It will be difficult, I fear.”
“Of course it will; and dangerous. Likely more the last than the first. But it’ll have to be done; else we may drop the thing entirely.”
“Never, Mahon! No matter what the danger, I for one am willing to risk it. And we can reckon on Jack Wingate. He’ll be only too ready to rush into it.”
“Ah! there might be more danger through his rashness. But it must be held in check. After all, I don’t apprehend so much difficulty if things be dexterously managed. Fortunately there’s a circumstance in our favour.”
“What is it?”
“A window.”
“Ah! Where?”
“In the Convent of course. That which gives light—not much of it either—to the cloister where the girl is confined. By a lucky chance my sister has learnt the particular one, and seen the window from the outside. It looks over the grounds where the nuns take recreation, now and then allowed intercourse with the school girls. She says it’s high up, but not higher than the top of the garden wall; so a ladder that will enable us to scale the one should be long enough to reach the other. I’m more dubious about the dimensions of the window itself. Kate describes it as only a small affair, with an upright bar in the middle—iron, she believes. Wood or iron, we may manage to remove that; but if the Herefordshire bacon has made your farmer’s daughter too big to screw herself through the aperture, then it’ll be all up a tree with us. However, we must find out before making the attempt to extract her. From what sister has told me, I fancy we can see the window from the Ramparts above. If so, we may make a distant measurement of it by guess work. Now,” continues the Major, coming to his programme of action, “what’s got to be done first is that your Wye boatman write a billet doux to his old sweetheart—in the terms I shall dictate to him. Then my sister must contrive, in some way, to put it in the girl’s hands, or see that she gets it.”
“And what after?”
“Well, nothing much after; only that we must make preparations for the appointment the waterman will make in his epistle.”
“It may as well be written now—may it not?”
“Certainly; I was just thinking of that. The sooner the better. Shall I call him in?”
“Do as you think proper, Mahon. I trust everything to you.”
The Major, rising, rings a bell; which brings Murtagh to the dining-room door.
“Murt, tell your guest in the kitchen, we wish a word with him.”
The face of the Irish soldier vanishes from view, soon after replaced by that of the Welsh waterman.
“Step inside, Wingate!” says the Captain; which the other does, and remains standing to hear what the word was wanted.
“You can write, Jack—can’t you?”
It is Ryecroft who puts the inquiry.
“Well, Captain; I ain’t much o’ a penman; but I can scribble a sort o’ rough hand after a fashion.”
“A fair enough hand for Mary Morgan to read it, I dare say.”
“Oh, sir, I only weesh there wor a chance o’ her gettin’ a letter from me!”
“There is a chance. I think we can promise that. If you’ll take this pen and put down what my friend Major Mahon dictates to you, it will in all probability be in her hands ere long.”
Never was pen more eagerly laid hold of than that offered to Jack Wingate. Then, sitting down to the table as directed, he waits to be told what he is to write.
The Major, bent over him, seems cogitating what it should be. Not so, however. Instead, he is occupied with an astronomical problem which is puzzling him. For its solution he appeals to Ryecroft, asking:—
“How about the moon?”
“The moon?”
“Yes. Which quarter is she in? For the life of me, I can’t tell.”
“Nor I,” rejoins the Captain. “I never think of such a thing.”
“She’s in her last,” puts in the boatman, accustomed to take note of lunar changes.
“It be an old moon now shining all the night, when the sky an’t clouded.”
“You’re right, Jack!” says Ryecroft. “Now I remember; it is the old moon.”
“In which case,” adds the Major, “we must wait for the new one. We want darkness after midnight—must have it—else we cannot act. Let me see; when will that be?”
“The day week,” promptly responds the waterman. “Then she’ll be goin’ down, most as soon as the sun’s self.”
“That’ll do,” says the Major. “Now to the pen!”
Squaring himself to the table, and the sheet of paper spread before him, Wingate writes to dictation. No words of love, but what inspires him with a hope he may once more speak such in the ears of his beloved Mary!
Volume Three—Chapter Twenty One.
A Quick Conversion.
“When is this horror to have an end? Only with my life? Am I, indeed, to pass the remainder of my days within this dismal cell? Days so happy, till that the happiest of all—its ill-starred night! And my love so strong, so confident—its reward seeming so nigh—all to be for nought—sweet dreams and bright hopes suddenly, cruelly extinguished! Nothing but darkness now; within my heart, in this gloomy place, everywhere around me! Oh, it is agony! When will it be over?”
It is the English girl who thus bemoans her fate—still confined in the convent, and the same cloister. Herself changed, however. Though but a few weeks have passed, the roses of her cheeks have become lilies, her lips wan, her features of sharper outline, the eyes retired in their sockets, with a look of woe unspeakable. Her form, too, has fallen away from the full ripe rounding that characterised it, though the wreck is concealed by a loose drapery of ample folds. For Soeur Marie now wears the garb of the Holy Sisterhood—hating it, as her words show.
She is seated on the pallet’s edge while giving utterance to her sombre soliloquy; and without change of attitude continues it:—
“Imprisoned I am—that certain! And for no crime. It may be without hostility on the part of those who have done it. Perhaps, better it were so? Then there might be hope of my captivity coming to an end. As it is, there is none—none! I comprehend all now—the reason for bringing me here—keeping me—everything. And that reason remains—must, as long as I am alive! Merciful heaven!”
The exclamatory phrase is almost a shriek; despair sweeping through her soul, as she thinks of why she is there shut up. For hingeing upon that is the hopelessness, almost a dead, drear certainty, she will never have deliverance!
Stunned by the terrible reflection, she pauses—even thought for the time stayed. But the throe passing, she again pursues her soliloquy, now in more conjectural strain:—
“Strange that no friend has come after me? No one caring for my fate—even to inquire! And he—no, that is not strange—only sadder, harder to think of. How could I expect, or hope, he would?
“But surely it is not so? I may be wronging them all—friends—relatives—even him? They may not know where I am? Cannot! How could they? I know not myself! Only that it is France, and in a nunnery. But what part of France, and how I came to it, likely they are ignorant as I.
“And they may never know! Never find out! If not, oh! what is to become of me? Father in Heaven! Merciful Saviour! help me in my helplessness!”
After this frenzied outburst a calmer interval succeeds; in which human instincts as thoughts direct her. She thinks:—
“If I could but find means to communicate with my friends—make known to them where I am, and how, then—Ah! ’tis hopeless. No one allowed near me but the attendant and that Sister Ursule. For compassion from either, I might just as well make appeal to the stones of the floor! The Sister seems to take delight in torturing me—every day doing or saying some disagreeable thing. I suppose, to humble, break, bring me to her purpose—that the taking of the veil. A nun! Never! It is not in my nature, and I would rather die than dissemble it!”
“Dissemble!” she repeats in a different accent. “That word helps me to a thought. Why should I not dissemble? I will.”
Thus emphatically pronouncing, she springs to her feet, the expression of her features changing suddenly as her attitude. Then paces the floor to and fro, with hands clasped across her forehead, the white attenuated fingers writhingly entwined in her hair.
“They want me to take the veil—the black one! So shall I; the blackest in all the convent’s wardrobe if they wish it—aye, crape if they insist on it? Yes, I am resigned now—to that—anything. They can prepare the robes, vestments, all the adornments of their detested mummery; I am prepared, willing, to put them on. It’s the only way—my only hope of regaining liberty. I see—am sure of it!”
She pauses, as if still but half resolved, then goes on—
“I am compelled to this deception! Is it a sin? If so, God forgive me! But no—it cannot be! ’Tis justified by my wrongs—my sufferings!”
Another and longer pause, during which she seems profoundly to reflect. After it—saying:
“I shall do so—pretend compliance. And begin this day—this very hour, if the opportunity arise. What should be my first pretence? I must think of it; practice, rehearse it. Let me see. Ah! I have it. The world has forsaken, forgotten me. Why then should I cling to it! Instead, why not in angry spite fling it off—as it has me. That’s the way!”
A creaking at the cloister door tells of its key turning in the lock. Slight as is the sound, it acts on her as an electric shock, suddenly and altogether changing the cast of her countenance. The instant before half angry, half sad, it is now a picture of pious resignation! Her attitude different also. From striding tragically over the floor she has taken a seat, with a book in her hand, which she seems industriously perusing. It is that “Aid to Faith” recommended, but hitherto unread.
She is to all appearance so absorbed in its pages as not to notice the opening of the door, nor the footsteps of one entering. How natural her start, as she hears a voice, and looking up beholds Soeur Ursule!
“Ah!” ejaculates the latter, with an exultant air, as of a spider that sees a fly upon the edge of its web, “Glad, Marie, to find you so employed! It promises well, both for the peace of your mind and the good of your soul. You’ve been foolishly lamenting the world left behind: wickedly too. What is to compare with that to come? As dross-dirt, to gold or diamonds! The book you hold in your hand will tell you so. Doesn’t it?”
“It does, indeed.”
“Then profit by its instructions; and be sorry you have not sooner taken counsel from it.”
“I am sorry, sister Ursule.”
“It would have comforted you—will now.”
“It has already. Ah! so much! I would not have believed any book could give me the view of life it has done. I begin to understand what you’ve been telling me—to see the vanities of this earthly existence, how poor and empty they are in comparison with the bright joys of that other life. Oh! why did I not know it before?”
At this moment a singular tableau is exhibited within that Convent cell—two female figures, one seated, the other standing—novice and nun; the former fair and young, the latter ugly as old. And still in greater contrast, the expression upon their faces. That of the girl’s downcast, demure, lids over the eyes less as if in innocence than repentant of some sin, while the glances of the woman show pleased surprise, struggling against incredulity!
Her suspicion still in the ascendant, Soeur Ursule stands regarding the disciple, so suddenly converted, with a look which seems to penetrate her very soul. It is borne without sign of quailing, and she at length comes to believe the penitence sincere, and that her proselytising powers have not been exerted in vain. Nor is it strange she should so deceive herself. It is far from being the first novice contre coeur she has broken upon the wheel of despair and made content to taking a vow of life-long seclusion from the world.
Convinced she has subdued the proud spirit of the English girl, and gloating over a conquest she knows will bring substantial reward to herself, she exclaims prayerfully, in mock pious tone:
“Blessed be Holy Mary for this new mercy! On your knees ma fille, and pray to her to complete the work she has begun!”
And upon her knees drops the novice, while the nun as if deeming herself de trop in the presence of prayer, slips out of the cloister, silently shutting the door.