Run to Earth by M. E. Braddon

M >> M. E. Braddon >> Run to Earth

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"After what I went through with standing over that roaring furnace of a
kitchen-range, it does seem hard to see my sole just turned over and
played with, like, and my chicking not so much as touched," said the
dame. "Oh, Miss Rosamond, Miss Rosamond, you've a deal to answer for!"

Captain Duncombe walked along the dark road between the cottage and
Ratcliff Highway at a rapid pace. He soon reached the flaring lights of
the sailors' quarter, through which he made his way as fast as he could
to a respectable and comfortable little tavern near the Tower, much
frequented by officers of the merchant service.

He had promised to meet an old shipmate at this house, and was very
glad of an excuse for spending his evening away from home.

In the little parlour he found the friend he expected to see, and the
two sailors took their glasses of grog together in a very friendly
manner, and then parted, the captain's friend going away first, as he
had a long distance to walk, in order to reach his suburban home.

The captain was sitting by the fire meditating, and sipping his last
glass of grog, when the door was opened, and some one came into the
room.

Joseph Duncombe looked up with a start as the new-comer entered, and,
to his intense astonishment, recognized George Jernam.

"Jernam!" he cried; "you in London? Well, this is the greatest surprise
of all."

"Indeed, Captain Duncombe," answered the other, coolly; "the
'Albatross' only entered the port of London this afternoon. This is the
first place I have come to, and of all men on earth I least expected to
meet you here."

"And from your tone, youngster, it seems as if the surprise were by no
means a pleasant one," cried Joseph Duncombe. "May I ask how Rosamond
Duncombe's husband comes to address his wife's father in the tone you
have just used to me?"

"You are Rosamond's father," answered George; "that is sufficient
reason that Valentine Jernam's brother should keep aloof from you."

"The man's mad," muttered Captain Duncombe; "undoubtedly mad."

"No," answered George Jernam, "I am not mad--I am only too acutely
conscious of the misery of my position. I love your daughter, Joseph
Duncombe; love her as fondly and truly as ever a man loved the wife of
his choice. And yet here am I skulking in London, alone and miserable,
at the hour when I should be hurrying back to the home of my darling.
Dear though she is to me--truly as I love her--I dare not go back to
her; for between her and me there rises the phantom of my murdered
brother Valentine!"

"What on earth has my daughter Rosamond to do with the wretched fate of
your brother?" asked the captain.

"In her own person, nothing; but it is her misfortune to be allied to
one who was in league with the assassin, or assassins, of my unhappy
brother."

"What, in heaven's name, do you mean?" asked the bewildered captain of
the "Vixen."

"Do not press me for my meaning, Captain Duncombe," answered George, in
a repellant tone; "you are my father-in-law. The knowledge which
accident revealed to me of one dark secret in your life of seeming
honesty came too late to prevent that tie between us. When the fatal
truth revealed itself to me I was already your daughter's husband. That
secures my silence. Do not force yourself upon me. I shall do my duty
to your daughter as if you and your crime had never been upon this
earth. But you and I can never meet again except as foes. The
remembrance of my brother Valentine is part and parcel of my life, and
a wrong done to him is twice a wrong to myself."

The captain of the "Vixen" had arisen from his chair. He stood before
his son-in-law, breathless, crimson with passion.

"George Jernam," he cried, "do you want me to knock you down? Egad, my
fine gentleman, you may consider yourself lucky that I have not done it
before this. What do you mean by all that balderdash you've been
talking? What does it all mean, I say? Are you drunk, or mad, or both?"

"Captain Duncombe," said George, calmly, "do you really wish me to
speak plainly?"

"It will be very much the worse for you if you don't," retorted the
infuriated captain.

"First, then, let me tell you that before I left River View Cottage
last July, your daughter pressed me to avail myself of the contents of
your desk one day when I was in want of foreign letter-paper."

"Well, what then?"

"Very much against my own inclination, I consented to open that desk
with a key in Rosamond's possession. I did not pry into the secrets of
its contents; but before me, in the tray intended for pens, I saw an
object which could not fail to attract my attention--which riveted my
gaze as surely as if I had 'lighted on a snake."

"What in the name of all that's bewildering could that object have
been?" cried the captain. "I don't keep many curiosities in my writing-
desk!"

"I will show you what I found that day," answered George. "The finding
of it changed the whole current of my life, and sent me away from that
once happy home a restless and miserable wanderer."

"The man's mad," muttered Captain Duncombe to himself; "he must be
mad!"

George Jernam took from his waistcoat pocket a tiny parcel, and
unfolding the paper covering, revealed a gold coin--the bent Brazilian
coin--which he placed in the captain's hands.

"Why! heaven have mercy on us!" cried Joseph Duncombe, "if that isn't
the ghost's money!"

There was astonishment plainly depicted on his countenance; but no look
of guilt. George Jernam watched his face as he contemplated the token,
and saw that it was not the face of a guilty man.

"Oh, captain, captain!" he exclaimed, remorsefully, "if I have
suspected you all this time for nothing?"

"Suspected me of what?"

"Of being concerned, more or less, in my brother's murder. That piece
of gold which you now hold in your hand was a farewell token, given by
me to him; you may see my initials scratched upon it. I found it in
your desk."

"And therefore suspected that I was the aider and abettor of thieves
and murderers!" exclaimed the captain of the "Vixen." "George Jernam, I
am ashamed of you."

There was a depth of reproach in the words, common-place though they
were.

George Jernam covered his face with his hands, and sat with bent head
before the man he had so cruelly wronged.

"If I was a proud man," said Joseph Duncombe, "I shouldn't stoop to
make any explanation to you. But as I am not a proud man, and as you
are my daughter's husband, I'll tell you how that bit of gold came into
my keeping; and when I've told you my story, I'll bring witnesses to
prove that it's true. Yes, George, I'll not ask you to believe my word;
for how can you take the word of a man you have thought base enough to
be the accomplice of a murderer? Oh, George, it was too cruel--too
cruel!"

There was a brief silence; and then Captain Duncombe told the story of
the appearance of old Screwton's ghost, and the coin found in the
kitchen at River View Cottage after the departure of that apparition.

"I've faced many a danger in my lifetime, George Jernam," said Captain
Duncombe; "and I don't think there's any man who ever walked the ship's
deck beside me that would call me coward; and yet I'll confess to you I
was frightened that night. Flesh and blood I'll face anywhere and
anyhow; I'll stand up alone, and fight for my life, one against six--
one against twenty, if needs be; but when it comes to a visit from the
other world, Joseph Duncombe is done. He shuts up, sir, like an
oyster."

"And do you really believe the man you saw that night was a visitant
from the other world?"

"What else can I believe? I'd heard the description of old Screwton's
ghost, and what I saw answered to the description as close as could
be."

"Visitors from the other world do not leave substantial evidences of
their presence behind them," answered George. "The man who dropped that
gold coin was no ghost. We'll see into this business, Captain Duncombe;
we'll fathom it, mysterious as it is. I expect Joyce Harker back from
Ceylon in a month or so. He knows more of my brother's fate than any
man living, except those who were concerned in the doing of the deed.
He'll get to the bottom of this business, depend upon it, if any man
can. And now, friend--father, can you find it in your heart to forgive
me for the bitter wrong I have done you?"

"Well, George," answered Joseph Duncombe, gravely, "I'm not an
unforgiving chap; but there are some things try the easiest of men
rather hard, and this is one of them. However, for my little Rosy's
sake, and out of remembrance of the long night-watches you and I have
kept together out upon the lonesome sea, I forgive you. There's my hand
and my heart with it."

George's eyes were full of tears as he grasped his old captain's strong
hand.

"God bless you," he murmured; "and heaven be praised that I came into
this room to-night! You don't know the weight you've lifted off my
heart; you don't know what I've suffered."

"More fool you," cried Joe Duncombe; "and now say no more. We'll start
for Devonshire together by the first coach that leaves London to-morrow
morning."

* * * * *

CHAPTER XXXIII.

"TREASON HAS DONE HIS WORST."

Black Milsom, otherwise Mr. Maunders, kept a close watch on Raynham
Castle, through the agency of his friend, James Harwood, whose visits
he encouraged by the most liberal treatment, and for whom he was always
ready to brew a steaming jorum of punch.

Mr. Maunders showed a great deal of curiosity concerning the details of
life within the castle, and was particularly fond of leading Harwood to
talk about the excessive care taken of the baby-heiress, and the
precautions observed by Lady Eversleigh's orders. One day, when he had
led the conversation in the accustomed direction, he said:

"One would think they were afraid somebody would try to steal the
child."

"So you would, Mr. Maunders. But you see every situation in life has
its trials, and a child can't be a great heiress for nothing. One day,
when I was sitting in the rumble of the open carriage, I heard Captain
Copplestone let drop in his conversation with Mrs. Morden as how the
child has enemies--bitter enemies, he said, as might try to do her
harm, if she wern't looked after sharp."

"I've known you a good long time now, Mr. Harwood, and you've partaken
of many a glass of rum-punch in my parlour," said Black Milsom,
otherwise Mr. Maunders, of the "Cat and Fiddle "; "and in all that time
you've never once offered to introduce me to one of your fellow-
servants, or asked me to take so much as a cup of tea in your
servants'-hall."

"Begging your pardon, Mr. Maunders," said the groom, in an insinuating
tone; "as to askin' a friend to take a cup of tea, or a little bit of
supper, without leave from Mrs. Smithson, the housekeeper, is more than
my place is worth."

"But you might get leave I should think, eh, James Harwood?" returned
Milsom; "especially if your friend happened to be a respectable
householder, and able to offer a comfortable glass to any of your
fellow-servants."

"I'm sure if I had thought as you'd accept a invitation to the
servants'-'all, I'd have asked leave before now," replied James
Harwood; "but I'm sure I thought as you wouldn't demean yourself to
take your glass of ale, or your cup of tea, any-wheres below the
housekeeper's room--and she's a rare starched one is Mrs. Smithson."

"I'm not proud," said Mr. Milsom. "I like a convivial evening, whether
it's in the housekeeper's room or the servants'-hall."

"Then I'll ask leave to-night," answered James Harwood.

He sent a little scrawl to Milsom next day, by the hands of a stable-
boy, inviting that gentleman to a social rubber and a friendly supper
in the servants'-hall that evening at seven o'clock.

To spend a few hours inside Raynham Castle was the privilege which
Black Milsom most desired, and a triumphant grin broke out upon his
face, as he deciphered James Harwood's clumsy scrawl.

"How easy it's done," he muttered to himself; "how easy it's done, if a
man has only the patience to wait."

The servants'-hall was a pleasant place to live in, but if Mrs.
Smithson, the housekeeper, was liberal in her ideas she was also
strict, and on some points especially severe; and the chief of these
was the precision with which she required the doors of the castle to be
locked for the night at half-past ten o'clock.

On more than one occasion, lately, Mrs. Smithson had a suspicion that
there was one offender against this rule. The offender in question was
Matthew Brook, the head-coachman, a jovial, burly Briton, with
convivial habits and a taste for politics, who preferred enjoying his
pipe and glass and political discussion in the parlour of the "Hen and
Chickens" public-house to spending his evenings in the servants'-hall
at Raynham Castle.

He was rarely home before ten; sometimes not until half-past ten; and
one never-to-be-forgotten night, Mrs. Smithson had heard him, with her
own ears, enter the doors of the castle at the unholy hour of twenty
minutes to eleven!

There was one appalling fact of which Mrs. Smithson was entirely
ignorant. And that was the fact that Matthew Brook had entered the
castle by a little half-glass door on several occasions, half an hour
or more after the great oaken door leading into the servants'-hall had
been bolted and barred with all due solemnity before the approving eyes
of the housekeeper herself.

The little door in question opened into a small ground-floor bed-room,
in which one of the footmen slept; and nothing was more easy than for
this man to shelter the nightly misdoings of his fellow-servant by
letting him slip quietly through his bedroom, unknown to any member of
the household.

James Harwood, the groom was a confirmed gossip; and, of course, he had
not failed to inform his friend, Mr. Maunders, otherwise Black Milsom,
of Matthew Brook's little delinquencies. Mr. Maunders listened to the
account with interest, as he did to everything relating to affairs in
the household of which Harwood was a member.

It was some little time after this conversation that Mr. Milsom was
invited to sup at the castle.

Several friendly rubbers were played by Mrs. Trimmer, the cook; Matthew
Brook, the coachman; James Harwood, and Thomas Milsom, known to the
company as Mr. Maunders. Honest Matthew and he were partners; and it
was to be observed, by any one who had taken the trouble to watch the
party, that Milsom paid more attention to his partner than to his
cards, whereby he lost the opportunity of distinguishing himself as a
good whist-player.

The whist-party broke up while the cloth was being laid on a large
table for supper, and the men adjourned to the noble old stone
quadrangle, on which the servant's-hall abutted. James Harwood, Brook,
Milsom, and two of the footmen strolled up and down, smoking under a
cold starlit sky. The apartments occupied by the family were all on the
garden front, and the smoking of tobacco in the quadrangle was not
forbidden.

Milsom, who had until this time devoted his attention exclusively to
the coachman, now contrived to place himself next to James Harwood, as
the party paced to and fro before the servants' quarters.

"Which is the little door Brook slips in at when he's past his time?"
he asked, carelessly, of Harwood, taking care, however, to drop his
voice to a whisper.

"We're just coming to it," answered the groom; "that little glass door
on my right hand. Steph's a good-natured fellow, and always leaves his
door unfastened when old Mat is out late. The room he sleeps in was
once a lobby, and opens into the passage; so it comes very convenient
to Brook. Everybody likes old Mat Brook, you see; and there isn't one
amongst us would peach if he got into trouble."

"And a jolly old chap he is as ever lived," answered Black Milsom, who
seemed to have taken a wonderful fancy to the convivial coachman.

"You come down to my place whenever you like, Mr. Brook," he said,
presently, putting his arm through that of the coachman, in a very
friendly manner. "You shall be free and welcome to everything I've got
in my house. And I know how to brew a decent jorum of punch when I give
my mind to it, don't I, Jim?"

Mr. James Harwood protested that no one else could brew such punch as
that concocted by the landlord of the "Cat and Fiddle."

The supper was a very cheery banquet; ponderous slices of underdone
roast beef disappeared as if by magic, and the consumption of pickles,
from a physiological or sanitary point of view, positively appalling.
After the beef and pickles came a Titanic cheese and a small stack of
celery; while the brown beer pitcher went so often to the barrel that
it is a matter of wonder that it escaped unbroken.

At a quarter past ten Mr. Maunders bade his new acquaintance good
night; but before departing he begged, as a great favour, to be
permitted one peep at the grand oak hall.

"You shall see it," cried good-natured Matthew Brook. "It's a sight
worth coming many a mile to see. Step this way."

He led the way along a dark passage to a door that opened into the
great entrance-hall. It was indeed a noble chamber. Black Milsom stood
for some moments contemplating it in silence, with a reverential stare.

"And which may be the back staircase, leading to the little lady's
rooms?" he asked, presently.

"That door opens on to the foot of it," replied the coachman. "Captain
Coppletone sleeps in the room you come to first, on the first floor;
and the little missy's rooms are inside his'n."

Gertrude Eversleigh, the heiress of Raynham, was one of those lovely
and caressing children who win the hearts of all around them, and in
whose presence there is a charm as sweet as that which lurks in the
beauty of a flower or the song of a bird. Her mother idolized her, as
we know, even though she could resign herself to a separation from this
loved child, sacrificing affection to the all-absorbing purpose of her
life. Before leaving Raynham Castle, Honoria had summoned the one only
friend upon whom she could rely--Captain Copplestone--the man whose
testimony alone had saved her from the hideous suspicion of murder--the
man who had boldly declared his belief in her innocence.

She wrote to him, telling him that she had need of his friendship for
the only child of his dead friend, Sir Oswald; and he came promptly in
answer to her summons, pleased at the idea of seeing the child of his
old comrade.

He had read the announcement of the child's birth in the newspapers,
and had rejoiced to find that Providence had sent a consolation to the
widow in her hour of desolation.

"She is like her father," he said, softly, after he had taken the child
in his arms, and pressed his shaggy moustache to her pure young brow."
Yes, the child is like my old comrade, Oswald Eversleigh. She has your
beauty, too, Lady Eversleigh, your dark eyes--those wonderful eyes,
which my friend loved to praise."

"I wish to heaven that he had never seen them!" exclaimed Honoria;
"they brought him only evil fortune--anguish--untimely death."

"Come, come!" cried the captain, cheerily; "this won't do. If the
workings of two villains brought about a breach between you and my poor
friend, and resulted in his untimely end, the sin rests on their guilty
heads, not on yours."

"And the sin shall not go unpunished even upon this earth!" exclaimed
Honoria, with intensity of feeling. "I only live for one purpose,
Captain Copplestone, and that is to strip the masks from the faces of
the two hypocrites and traitors, who, between them, compassed my
disgrace and my husband's death; and I implore you to aid me in the
carrying out of my purpose."

"How can I do that?" cried the captain. "When I begged you to let me
challenge that scoundrel, Carrington, and fight him--in spite of our
cowardly modern fashion, which has exploded duelling--you implored me
not to hazard my life. I was your only friend, you told me, and if my
life were sacrificed you would be helpless and friendless. I gave way
in order to satisfy you, though I should have liked to send a bullet
through that French scoundrel's plotting brains."

"And I thank you for your goodness," answered Lady Eversleigh. "It is
not by the bullet of a brave soldier that Victor Carrington should die.
I will pursue the two villains silently, stealthily, as they pursued
me; and when the hour of my triumph comes, it shall be a real triumph,
not a defeat like that which ended their scheming. But if I stoop to
wear a mask, I ask no such service from you, Captain Copplestone. I ask
you only to take up your abode in this house, and to protect my child
while I am away from home."

"You are really going to leave home?"

"For a considerable time."

"And you will tell me nothing about the nature of your schemes?"

"Nothing. I shall do no wrong; though I am about to deal with men so
base that the common laws of honour can scarcely apply to any dealings
with them."

"And your mind is set upon this strange scheme?"

"My mind is fixed. Nothing on earth can alter my resolution--not even
my love for this child."

Captain Copplestone saw that her determination was not to be reasoned
away, and he made no further attempt to shake her resolve. He promised
that, during her absence from the castle, he would guard Sir Oswald's
daughter, and cherish her as tenderly as if she had been his own child.

It was by the captain's advice that Mrs. Morden was engaged to act as
governess to the young heiress during her mother's absence. She was the
widow of one of his brother-officers--a highly accomplished woman, and
a woman of conscientious feelings and high principle.

"Never had any creature more need of your protection than my child
has," said Honoria. "This young life and mine are the sole obstacles
that stand between Sir Reginald Eversleigh and fortune. You know what
baseness and treachery he and his ally are capable of committing. You
cannot, therefore, wonder if I imagine all kinds of dangers for my
darling."

"No," replied the captain; "I can only wonder that you consent to leave
her."

"Ah, you do not understand. Can you not see that, so long as those two
men exist, their crimes undiscovered, their real nature unsuspected in
the world in which they live, there is perpetual danger for my child?
The task which I have set myself is the task of watching these two men;
and I will do it without flinching. When the hour of retribution
approaches, I may need your aid; but till then let me do my work alone,
and in secret."

This was the utmost that Lady Eversleigh told Captain Copplestone
respecting the motive of her absence from the castle. She placed her
child in his care, trusting in him, under Providence, for the
guardianship of that innocent life; and then she tore herself away.

Nothing could exceed the care which the veteran soldier bestowed upon
his youthful charge.

It may be imagined, therefore, that nothing short of absolute necessity
would have induced him to leave the neighbourhood of Raynham during the
absence of Lady Eversleigh.

Unhappily this necessity arose. Within a fortnight after the night on
which Black Milsom had been invited to supper in the servants'-hall,
Captain Copplestone quitted Raynham Castle for an indefinite period,
for the first time since Lady Eversleigh's departure.

He was seated at breakfast in the pretty sitting-room in the south
wing, which he occupied in common with the heiress and her governess,
when a letter was brought to him by one of the castle servants.

"Ben Simmons has just brought this up from the 'Hen and Chickens,'
sir," said the man. "It came by the mail-coach that passes through
Raynham at six o'clock in the morning."

Captain Copplestone gazed at the superscription of the letter with
considerable surprise. The handwriting was that of Lady Eversleigh, and
the letter was marked _Immediate and important_.

In those days there was no electric telegraph; and a letter conveyed
thus had pretty much the same effect upon the captain's mind that a
telegram would now-a-days exercise. It was something special--out of
the common rule. He tore open the missive hastily. It contained only a
few lines in Honoria's hand; but the hand was uncertain, and the letter
scrawled and blotted, as if written in extreme haste and agitation of
mind.

"_Come to me at once, I entreat. I have immediate need of your help.
Pray come, my dear friend. I shall not detain you long. Let the child
remain in the castle during your absence. She will be safe with Mrs.
Morden_.

"_Clarendon Hotel, London_."

This, and the date, was all.

Captain Copplestone sat for some moments staring at this document with
a look of unmitigated perplexity.

"I can't make it out," he muttered to himself.

Presently he said aloud to Mrs. Morden--

"What a pity it is you women all write so much alike that it's
uncommonly difficult to swear to your writing. I'm perplexed by this
letter. I can't quite understand being summoned away from my pet. I
think you know Lady Eversleigh's hand?"