Caught in a Trap Part 35

The lawyer's journey was a comparatively easy one in comparison with that which our old friend the doctor had taken some time before.

He travelled rapidly to Southampton by the express, which he caught at Bigton--only occasional trains stopped at Hartwood--and was in plenty of time to despatch sundry telegraphic instructions to his clerks in London before embarking in the night boat for Havre. At midnight, instead of going to his warm bed in his comfortable suburban retreat, as he usually did at that hour, Mr Trump had to pull on his nightcap between the rolls of the waves, and ensconce himself in the narrow bunk that fell to his share of the cabin in the channel-crossing steam-packet. However, Mr Trump was a man of the world besides being a man of business, and knew how to accommodate himself to circ.u.mstances, and make matters as comfortable as he could under unforeseen data. So there is little doubt that he went to sleep at last, in spite of the narrowness of his lodging, and just as probably, he snored harmoniously to the accompaniment of the steamboat's paddles.

The morning found him at Havre, prepared to set about his business as methodically as if he were only going down to his chambers in Bedford Row as usual, instead of being in a strange country.

He first went to the police office, and subsequently to the address given by Miss Kingscott. Mr Trump never trusted to individual evidence. With the governess and Monsieur le Chef, he proceeded to view the remains of what had been Susan Hartshorne, and identify them. The inspection was merely a work of detail, for the face was irrecognisable, even more so now than when it had been first taken out of the water.

The lawyer, to the best of his belief, thought it to be Susan. And then the corpse was buried in the cemetery with a single headstone above the grave, on which the name "Susan," alone was inscribed, and her age.

Mr Trump had already explained his position, and stated himself to be the representative of the deceased's family to the chief of the police, who was most cordial and polite to him on learning that he was _un avocat Anglais_. The chef, to the lawyer's astonishment, spoke English fluently, just as if he were a native, and told him he knew Bedford Row as well as the Palais Royal in Paris. From him also, Mr Trump learnt a more coherent, and less one-sided story than from Miss Kingscott, although her statements were confirmed. From the evidence of the one witness, the case was evidently strong against Markworth, both the chef and the lawyer determined; but then the one witness was, on her own testimony, and from Mr Trump's previous knowledge, strongly antagonistic to Markworth; and his legal mind compa.s.sed the probabilities of something to be said on the other side. Markworth's disappearance was the great thing against him, for the girl might have drowned herself, and the scene which Clara Kingscott described never have taken place at all. It is true her story was somewhat corroborated, and the doctors had said, on the examination of the dead girl's body, that death might have ensued from a jagged wound in the head which probably had been caused by a fall; but they had only said this when they had been asked their opinion on these points, and Miss Kingscott's revelations been told them.

Altogether, Mr Trump thought it better to let the French police pursue their own course in the matter, and not interfere with them by any proceedings of his own. He also gave up to their possession all the poor girl's things which had been left behind at the Rue Montmartre; and he had a kindly word to say to the Mere Cliquelle and her husband for their kindness and treatment towards the ill-fated Susan.

Miss Kingscott was in a rage of mortification at the lawyer's apparent apathy; but her words had no weight with him; he had conceived a species of aversion towards her ever since her disclosure to him that night in Bedford Row; and the avowal of her purpose since, to track Markworth to the death, had not increased his regard, although it heightened his judgment on her as a "woman with a purpose."

After an absence of three days or more, Mr Trump returned to England.

His hands drew up the advertis.e.m.e.nt of Susan's death, which he caused to be inserted in the _Times_. The circ.u.mstances of the mystery had not got abroad, and he did not wish to court public enquiry as yet, so he worded the announcement very simply:

At Havre, on the 27th ultimo, from an accident, Susan, wife of Allynne Markworth, and only daughter of Roger Hartshorne, Esq., of The Poplars, Suss.e.x.

The lawyer then went down to see how the old lady was getting on.

She was still speechless--thoughtless--lying as it were on the brink of eternity; and Doctor Jolly, who had now returned, and was attending her, did not yet know whether she would recover or not. The doctor and Mr Trump had a long conversation together, and mutual explanations. The lawyer was more than ever glad that he had taken no further proceedings about Susan's death, although he wrote out to Tom Hartshorne, now among the heights of Abyssinia, telling him all about it.

Meanwhile, the old lady--struck down in her prime--was hovering on the edge of the grave, in her great, old solitary house at The Poplars. Her son had flown away, her daughter was among the departed, and she alone was left to struggle with the Mower's scythe, alone--although she neither seemed to think nor feel--Doctor Jolly and strangers ministering to her. It is sad being alone--sadder being alone at the last! May you, reader, never feel it!

Volume 3, Chapter VII.

BIGTON BEWITCHED.

The quiet, little unpretending, out-of-the-way and not-of-much-account watering place of Bigton, was emphatically upside-down and out of its mind.

Bigton was, in a word, bewitched--good reason, too, if all things were taken into consideration. It is not every day, according to our Hibernian friends, that "Morris kills a pig." Following out the a.n.a.logy, it was not every day that Bigton had a wedding--a wedding, moreover, where the bride was the daughter of a lady, "in her own right;" and the happy man, if not "a lord of high degree," a s.h.i.+ning light in the church, and closely related to a high and eminent political personage, such as Sir Boanerges Todhunter.

Besides, the nuptial ceremony was to be celebrated by the right reverend prelate, the Lord Bishop of Chumpchopster, who was renowned far and wide as the most imposing of confirmists in the annual laying on of hands; and distinguished, not only as being one of the most ornate of orators, but for having published the well-known refutation of Judaism on the part of the pork-consuming portion of the population. A treatise which proclaimed his unswerving adherence to the time-honoured thirty-nine articles and undoubted hostility to the pre-adamite theologians. The fact that he would be there was quite enough to set Bigton in a whirligig of wonder and expectation, quite apart from the contingent circ.u.mstances attending the auspicious event.

The engagement between the present contracting parties had not been a very long one, the campaigner being in favour of early marriages, she said--having daughters to dispose of; but her probable reason was to get the irrevocable knot tied so that there might be no backing-out and no backsliding on the part of _I promessi sposi_.

Lady Inskip took all the arrangements in her own hands. Having brought Pringle to book, she decided upon the length of the engagement, fixed the wedding day, and then told the languid Laura and her expectant son-in-law all about it. They had nothing whatever to do with the affair at all; they were to be married, and that was sufficient for them. She considered the pair as children in her hands, who had only to do as they were told. Hers be it to act, and plan, and settle everything; theirs to acquiesce in what she planned, and be thankful for the considerate forethought of their mamma-of-action.

Pringle glided readily and easily into such an improved order of things; he accepted the gifts the G.o.ds gave him with admirable complacency. He consented to every arrangement that was made; indeed, it was well that the campaigner took matters in her own hands, for the young inc.u.mbent was of such an easy-going temperament, that even if he had gone to the length of popping the question to the languid Laura on his own behalf, it might have been years before he summoned up resolution enough to take the final plunge into matrimony. All things considered, therefore, it was better for the campaigner to act; and act she did, with prompt.i.tude and despatch.

The Reverend Herbert Pringle, B.A., behaved, throughout, as a very decorous, about-to-be-married man, and expectant filial. Of course he paid a regular visit every day to the cottage on the esplanade to see his _fiancee_. He enjoyed her placid society, and went through all the formulas expected and required of him--even to the extent of going shopping for his presumptive mother-in-law, and selecting gaudy wools of many colours for mat manufacture, and purchasing garden seeds, besides attending to the redecoration and preparation of the parsonage for the reception of his bride, under the stern and uncompromising eye of the campaigner, who would have "this" done, and "that" altered, as she pleased: her word was already law to him.

The gloom that had fallen over the house of Hartshorne did not, in any way, affect the approaching marriage.

A rumour had got abroad that something was wrong at The Poplars, from the chattering of the villagers, but no real facts had leaked out; and everybody put down the old dowager's attack of paralysis and subsequent long illness to the news of her daughter Susan's sudden death, which they had read of in the necropolitan portion of the _Times_ newspaper.

Doctor Jolly, with the exception of such observations as, "Bless my soul! Sad pity! sad pity!" and "By Gad!" 'Twas a fearful "shock to the old woman!" kept a sealed tongue in his head; and the lawyer, who was the only other person that now had the _entree_ at The Poplars, was naturally and professionally reticent. At the parsonage, the calamities of the "big house" had, of course, created interest. Herbert Pringle thought, from his religious position, and Lizzie, from her sympathetic little heart, which naturally yearned towards anyone in affliction-- particularly now, and when the object of her sympathy was the mother of her lover--both made attempts to minister at The Poplars, and both were unsuccessful.

The old lady was, for weeks, speechless; and so ill, as not to be able to bear the sight of a new face. Doctor Jolly would not hear of the young inc.u.mbent seeing her; she could not understand anything said to her, and, for the present--the doctor told him gravely--any religious question which she wanted settled must rest between herself and her G.o.d!

The doctor thought that but little spiritual consolation could be imparted by a flippant young man, who only wore a ca.s.sock for temporal purposes: as the means of obtaining a living, to a woman old enough to be his mother, and who was already, even now, struggling, with the Infinite!

To Lizzie, however, the doctor spoke kindly. He recognised the spirit in which her sympathy was tendered; and he told her that as soon as the old lady got round a bit he would be glad of her services. When she recovered her consciousness, a brighter face around her than that of the old servant, who now attended her, would conduce to her recovery; and Lizzie, you may be sure, was very glad to hear this, and longed for the time when she could be of use to "Tom's mother."

Although the old dowager, therefore, lay sick unto death, the marriage preparations were not set aside. Pringle, indeed, had hinted to the campaigner that perhaps it would not be in good taste to celebrate the festival while the great proprietress of the county, his especial patroness, was in this state, but that intrepid lady had incontinently derided the notion, asking what was the dowager to them? following up the question with another and more potent one, as to whether he wished to postpone the marriage with her darling girl in a very aggrieved tone of voice. Upon this Pringle was hastily "shut up," and had to pour out a hundred apologies of, "Really, Lady Inskip, not for the world!" and so on.

The end of the old year came, and the beginning of the new ushered in the wedding morn.

Many things had been achieved before this, however, as may have been expected, from the great preparations which had been going on ever since Pringle's proposal, _ex parte_ the campaigner, and the settlement of the engagement.

The parsonage had been newly decorated and painted throughout from top to bas.e.m.e.nt; on the campaigner's express stipulation, the drawing-room had been refurnished in a gorgeous suite of velvet and gold; and, although Lizzie's special domain in the garden had not been interfered with, everything else about the young inc.u.mbent's mansion had been altered and duly prepared for the coming event. At Laburnum Cottage, too, the occasion was not disregarded.

To do her the justice, the campaigner was not stingy in her present expenditure. Whether it was the joy of marrying off one of her marriageable daughters opened her purse-strings in the same extent as it gladdened her heart, or that it arose from a desire to s.h.i.+ne amidst the thing, or that it was owing to a union of both sentiments, cannot be exactly decided: suffice it to say that the campaigner opened her purse with a lavish hand.

For many days large boxes had come down from various haberdashers--"dry goods establishments," the Americans call them--and milliners in London; and every little shop in Bigton had been ransacked to the same intent by Lady Inskip and her daughters. The languid Laura was provided with such a gigantic _trousseau_ that she would probably attain the rank of grandmother before she wore out one half the number of "dozens"

provided, while a perfect corps of needlewomen was kept in constant employment, basting, fitting, hemming, st.i.tching, cutting out, felling, "goring," and trying on, for upwards of a fortnight or more.

The campaigner had an additional motive in thus providing for her eldest darling. You see, Lady Inskip had no _dot_, as she elegantly phrased it, with which to endow her "poor, portionless darlings," and the fact of giving them a handsome "rig-out," as their brother Mortimer said, would perhaps blind the eyes of Caelebs in search of a wife. Be that as it may, however, the needlewomen worked apace, the _trousseau_ was fully provided, and Monday night, the eve of the wedding day, Tuesday, the seventh of January, anno domini 1868, found everything ready for the auspicious event.

Lizzie was necessarily one of the bridesmaids--that highly necessary _corps d'armee_, without which no bride of any pretensions will allow herself to be conducted to Hymen's sacrificial font. Carry, the bride's sister, was another; and the places of the two additional ladies-in-waiting (for espousal themselves) were supplied by two distant cousins of the Inskips, who had already officiated in a similar capacity so many times that they had most probably made up their maiden minds that this was the only problematical manner in which they would ever officiate at a wedding. Some people seem doomed always to play second fiddle through life, and bridesmaids are no exceptions to the rule.

The campaigner had spared no pains, as she had grudged no expense. All her influence, whether important or slight, was brought to bear on the contingent circ.u.mstances of the affair.

By back-stairs beseeching she so worked round the maternal aunt of the Bishop of Chumpchopster, that the right reverend prelate was persuaded-- inasmuch as he had temporal expectations from the said maternal aunt--to accompany her to Bigton, and officiate in the tying of the matrimonial noose between Herbert Pringle, of whom his lords.h.i.+p was pleased to take some considerable notice, and Laura. The prelate and his maternal aunt became the honoured guests of Lady Inskip for a day and a night in consequence; but how on earth they were stowed in Laburnum Cottage, and what accommodation was provided for them, remains to this day a puzzle.

"The blus.h.i.+ng orb of day at length gilded the sky," and "Phoebus"

announced the wedding morn.

Enormous dressings of bride and bridesmaids. White and scarlet were the colours adopted, if you've a fancy for knowing them, although the campaigner had a strong leaning, which she subsequently quenched, towards mauve and yellow. Mult.i.tudinous errands and scurryings to and fro of "slavies" and domestics, including "b.u.t.tons" and several hired menials, now addicted to Berlin gloves, although displaying raw, beefsteaky hands in every-day life. Manifold preparations for the _dejeuner_, and consequent encroachments of pastry-cook's boys with superinc.u.mbent trays and oblong covered boxes with horizontal S handles; Laburnum Cottage turned inside out, and outside in; Bigton church bells clanging "fit to bust 'emselves," as the villagers said; Bigton upside-down--in a word, bewitched.

In the early morning two cavaliers might have been seen wending their way towards the scene of the festivities; not "clad in Lincoln green,"

as the late lamented G.P.R. James would have described, but dressed _en regle_: these were Captain Miles and Lieutenant Harrowby, who had received pressing invitations from Lady Inskip to come over from Brighton in order to be present at the ceremony. Neither was averse to coming, and, indeed, Captain Miles had certain reasons of his own, which will be detailed presently, for jumping at the offer; so the two cavaliers set out early, and wended their way to Bigton, as already chronicled in the language of the ancient "romancist." The Americans will add an "ist" or a "cist" to every known trade or substantive under the sun, to describe the person or individual who practises or has any connection with the same: thus, a "paragraphist" is a man who writes a paragraph, and they carry it down to a "pipist," who uses a pipe-- whether for smoking or musical purposes it does not matter--and "chawist," he who masticates tobacco--a remarkably dirty habit!

Captain Miles and Lieutenant Harrowby, however, were not the only guests. Besides these were others, great and important too, although it must be observed that there was an especial lack of young men in the campaigner's "goodlie compagnie;" whether it was because she deprecated their presence or feared their worldly ways cannot be exactly decided.

The campaigner was acquainted with the truism that "young people will be young people," and fenced herself in accordingly, as she had fears on the subject of her youngest daughter Carry, who was far too frivolous to suit her more prudent expectations, and she wanted to put temptation out of the way of the "dear girl" that she might not be led to throw herself away on an "ineligible _parti_." The campaigner thought that she knew Captain Miles very well; he had nothing but his pay, and if he were younger she would not put him in the way of any young lady whom she wished to marry well, but she was certain that the captain was no fool to let his beautiful Dundreary whiskers be sold for nothing, so she had no fears for Carry with him. Lieutenant Harrowby was perfectly allowable too: he was a simpleton, and had a very snug little fortune of five "thou" per annum.

Besides the Bishop of Chumpchopster and his maternal aunt, the next most important guest who would grace the festal board at the wedding breakfast would be Sir Boanerges Todhunter, the great Conservative Reformer. He was stopping at the parsonage now with the Reverend Herbert Pringle, his distant cousin, but he had already accepted an invitation to the _dejeuner_, and had in fact come over for the purpose, on the grounds of his relations.h.i.+p with the bridegroom, to a.s.sist in the demolition of the Strasbourg _pate_, and propose the health of the about-to-be-newly-spliced pair.

In the list also of the fas.h.i.+onable world present might have been seen the names of Captain Curry Cuc.u.mber, of the Honorable and defunct East India Company's Service, Miss Blandish, Lady Sparrowhawk and sister, the Honorable Miss Bigges (pray be particular about the final e), the Reverend Jabez Heavieman--invited in virtue of his office more than on account of his convivial proclivities--and others.

Suppose the wedding over. Picture the bride in her orange blossoms, the bridegroom in his magpie dress--he could not adopt the time-honoured blue frock, being a cleric--the bridesmaids in their scarlet and white trains of tulle and tulips--the Bishop of Chumpchopster in his voluminous lawn sleeves p.r.o.nouncing the blessing in his well-known and to be-much-admired Alcaic manner. Imagine the bells of Bigton clanging out their merry peal in the frosty air: paint to yourself the gallant and gay a.s.semblage. Fancy, in a word, the marriage to be _un fait accompli_; the guests returned to Laburnum Cottage; the toast of the day proposed in that highly-declamatory style which makes the name of Sir Boanerges Todhunter synonymous with that of Cicero; thanks responded in the usual halting manner by the bridegroom; the happy pair started on their tour with the customary shower of shoes; the banquet concluded.

Imagine all this. Aha! and now I will a tale unfold.

The campaigner had been in ecstasies with the way in which everything had gone off. The Bishop and Sir Boanerges had just driven away, late in the evening, after partaking of a hasty dinner, which had been scrambled out of the remains of the previous feast; Captain Curry Cuc.u.mber was detailing some highly-spiced Indian anecdotes to Miss Blandish, who was in a holy state of maiden indignation at some of the particulars with which the captain thought it inc.u.mbent on him to furnish her, although she listened eagerly all the while; Lieutenant Harrowby was indulging in plat.i.tudes with the Hon. Miss Bigges, while poor Lizzie was being swamped by the veteran Lady Sparrowhawk, who was imparting to our little friend--who found the whole thing fearfully dreary--her views on the girls of the present day, contrasting them, sadly to the disadvantage of the former, with the time when she was young: all, in fact, was going on just as the campaigner wished.

When, suddenly, just as Lady Inskip proposed a carpet dance to break the monotony of the evening, she discovered that her darling girl Carry and Captain Miles were both missing!

Horror! Where could they be? Could her worst fears be realised? The skeleton which had lurked behind the banquet now stepped forth. Her _atra cura_ now confronted the campaigner! Uneasy was the head that wore the crown of manoeuvring triumph that day: Carry and the Captain had gone off _nulla vestigia retrorsum_, leaving not a trace behind.

Mortimer was first dispatched to search for the fugitives; but when he returned unsuccessfully, and no trace of the delinquents was to be found, either in and about the house or in the adjacent garden, the campaigner, whose nerves had been in a state of tension all day, fairly broke down. She proclaimed her calamities to her astonished company, bursting into a pa.s.sion of tears, as she threw her arms round the neck of her boy, that young imp, and exclaimed, "Oh! Morti-mer! Morti-mer!