Shrewsbury: A Romance Page 7

  CHAPTER VI

  But I was going to cry and did, breaking down like a child; and thatnot so much at the thought of the desperate strait to which she hadbrought me--though this was no other than the felon's dock, with theprospect of disgrace, and to be whipped or burned in the hand, at thebest, and if I had my benefit--but at the sudden conviction, whichcame upon me, perfect and overwhelming, that my mistress, for whom Ihad risked so much, did not love me! In no other way, and on no othertheory, could I explain callousness so complete, thoughtlessness socruel! Nor did her next words tend to heal the mischief, or give mecomfort.

  "Oh!" she exclaimed, flouncing from me with impatient contempt, andwalking on the other side of the way, "if you are going to be acry-baby, thank you for nothing! I thought you were a man!" And shebegan to hum an air.

  "My God! I don't think you care!" I sobbed, aghast at herinsensibility.

  "Care?" she retorted indifferently, swinging her visor in her hand."For what?"

  "For me! Or for anything!"

  With a coolness that appalled me, she finished the verse she washumming; then, "Your finger hurts, therefore you are going to die!"she said, with a sneer. "You see the fire and therefore you must beburned. Why, you have the courage of a hen! A flea! A mouse! You arenot worthy the name of a man."

  "I am man enough to be hanged," I answered miserably.

  "Hanged?" quoth she, quite cheerfully. "Do you think that man was everhanged for three guineas?"

  "Ay, scores," I said, "and for less!"

  "Then they must have been cravens like you!" she retorted, perfectlywell satisfied with her answer. "And spun their own ropes. Come,silly, cheer up! A great many things may happen in a week! And if thatvixen is back under a week, I will eat her!"

  "A week won't make three guineas," I said dolefully.

  "No, but a good heart will," she rejoined. "And not three but thirty!Only," she continued, looking askance at me, "you have not the spiritof a man. You are just Tumbledown Dick, as they say, and as well namedas nine-pence!"

  It seemed inconceivable to me that she could jest so merrily and carryherself so gaily, after such a loss; and I stopped short in suddenhope and new-born expectation; and peered at her, striving to read herthoughts. "I don't believe you have lost them!" I exclaimed at last.

  "Every groat, Dick!" she answered, curtly--yet still in the best ofspirits. "Never doubt that!"

  On which it was not wonderful that my disappointment and hercheerfulness agreed so ill, that we came to bitter words, andbeginning by calling one another "Thankless," and "Clutch-penny," rosepresently to "Fool," and "Jade"; and eventually parted on the latterat the garden fence; where Dorinda, so far from lingering as on theformer night, flounced from me in a passion, and left me without asingle word of regret. How miserably after that I stole to bed, andhow wakefully I tossed in the close garret, I cannot hope to convey tomy readers; suffice it that a hundred times I cursed the folly thathad led me to ruin, a hundred times went hot and cold at thought ofthe dock and the gallows; and yet amid all found in Dorinda'sheartlessness the sharpest pain. I felt sure now, and told myselfcontinually, that she had never loved me; therefore--at the time itseemed to follow--I deemed my own love at an end and cast her off; andheaping the sharpest reproaches on her head, found my one sweetconsolation--whereat I wept miserably--in composing a last dyingspeech and confession that should soften at length that obduratebosom, and break that unfeeling heart.

  But with the day, and the rising to imminent terrors and hourly fearof detection, came first regret, then self-reproach--lest I too shouldbe somewhat in fault--then a revival of passion; lastly, a franticyearning to be reconciled to the only person to whom I could speakfreely, or who knew the danger and strait in which I stood. My heartmelting like water at the thought, I was ready to do anything or sayanything, to abase myself to any depth, in order to regain her favourand have her advice; and the absence of Mr. and Mrs. D----, and Mrs.Harris's easiness rendering it a matter of no difficulty to seek her,in the course of the afternoon I took my courage in my hands and wentinto the next house. There I found only Mrs. Harris.

  "The little slut has stepped out," she said, looking up from the potover which she was stooping. "She asked leave for half an hour and hasbeen gone an hour. But it is the way of the wenches all the worldover. Do you beware of them, Mr. Price," she continued, eyeing me, andlaughing jollily.

  I made some trifling answer; and returning to my own domain, with allthe pangs of loneliness added to those of terror, sat down in thedingy, dreary taskroom and abandoned myself to bitter forebodings. Shedid not, she never could have loved me! I knew it and felt it now. YetI must think of her or go mad. I must think of her or of the cart andcord; and so, through the hours that followed, I had only eyes for thenext garden, and ears for her voice. The boys and their chattering,and the necessity I was under of playing my part before them,well-nigh mastered me. For, at any hour, on any day, while I sat thereamong them, Mr. and Mrs. D---- might return, and the loss bediscovered; and yet, and though time was everything, all the efforts Imade to see Jennie or get speech with her failed; and of myself Iseemed to be unable to think out any plan or way of escape.

  I am sure that the most ascetic, could he have weighed the tortures ofthose four days during which I sat surrounded by the boys, and nowmaking frantic efforts to appear myself, now sunk in a staring,pale-faced lethargy of despair, would have deemed them a punishmentmore than commensurate with my guilt. The unusual air of peace andquietness with which Mrs. D----'s absence invested the school had nomore power to soothe me than the presence of Mrs. Harris, nodding overher plain-stitch in the next garden, availed to banish the burninggusts of fear that at times parched my skin. At length, on the fifthday, the immediate warning of coming judgment arrived in the shape ofa letter announcing that my employer would return (D.V.) by the nightwaggon, which in the ordinary course was due to reach Ware about sixnext morning.

  At that I could stand the strain no longer, but flinging appearanceand deception to the winds, I rose from the class I was pretending toteach, and in a disorder I made no effort to suppress, followed Mrs.Harris; who, having declared the news, was already waddling back tothe next house. She started at sight of me in her train--as she wellmight, for it was the busiest time of the day; then asked if anythingailed me.

  "No," I said. "I want a word with Jennie."

  "Do you?" quoth she, looking hard at me. "So, it would seem, do a goodmany young fellows. She is a nice handful if ever there was one."

  "Why?" I stammered.

  "Why?" she answered in a tone very sharp for her. "Why, because--butwhat have you to do with Jennie, young man?"

  "Nothing," I said.

  "Then have nothing," she answered promptly, and shook her sidesat her sharpness. "That is no puzzle! And as it is no more thanhalf-past ten, and I hear your boys rampaging like so many wildIrishmen--suppose you go back to them, young man!"

  I obeyed; but whatever effect her warning might have had earlier--andI shrewdly suspect that it would have affected me as much as wateraffects a duck's back--it came too late; my one desire now being tosee the girl, even as my one hope lay in her advice. Nine had struckthat evening, however, and night had fallen, and I grown fairly sickwith fear, before my efforts were rewarded, and stealing into thegarden on a last desperate search--I think for the twentieth time--Icame on her standing in the dusk, beside the fence where I had sooften met her.

  I sprang to her side, relief at my heart, reproaches on my lips; butit was only to recoil at sight of her face, grown hard and old andpinched, and for the moment almost ugly. "Why, child!" I cried,forgetting my own trouble. "What is it?"

  She laughed without mirth, looking at me strangely. "What do yousuppose?" she said huskily, and I could see that fear was on her. "Doyou think that you are the only one in danger?"

  "How?" I exclaimed.

  "How?" she replied in a tone of mockery. "Why, do you suppose thatstockings and shoes are the only things
that cost money? Or that vizormasks, and gloves and hoods grow on bushes? Briefly, fool, if you cangive me four guineas, I am saved. If not----"

  "My God!" I cried, horror-stricken.

  "If not," she continued hardily, "you have taught me to read, and thatmay save my neck. I suppose I shall be sent to the plantations, to bebeaten weekly, and work in the sun, and----"

  "Four guineas!" I groaned.

  "Yes, seven in all!" she answered with a sneer."Have you got them?"

  "No, nor a groat!" I answered, overwhelmed by the discovery thatinstead of giving help she needed it. "Not a penny!"

  "Then it must be got!" she answered fiercely. "It must be got!" and asshe repeated the words, she dropped her mocking tone, and spoke withfeverish energy. "It must be got, Dick!" and she seized my hands andheld them. "It must be, and can be, if you have a spark of spirit, ifyou are not the poor mean thing I sometimes think you. Listen! Listen!In the old man's room upstairs--the door is locked and double-locked,I have tried it--are sixty guineas, in a bag! Sixty guineas, in adrawer of the old bureau by the bed!"

  "It is death," I cried feebly, recoiling from her as I spoke. "It isdeath! I dare not! I dare not do it!"

  "Then we hang! We hang, man!" she answered fiercely. "You and I! Willit be better to hang for a lamb than a sheep? For seven guineas thanfor sixty?"

  "But if we take it, what shall we be the better for it?" I saidweakly. "He returns in the morning."

  "By the morning, given the money, we shall be a score of miles away!"she answered, flinging her arms round my neck, and hanging on mybreast, while her hot breath fanned my cheek. No wonder I felt mybrain reel, and my will melt. "Away from here, Dick," she repeatedsoftly. "Away---and together!"

  Yet I made an effort to withstand her. "You forget the door," I said."If the door is locked, and Mrs. Harris sleeps in the next room, howcan it be done?"

  "Not by the door, but by the window," she replied. "There is a ladderin the second garden from this; and the latch of the window is weak.The old fool indoors sleeps like a hog. By eleven she will be sound.And oh, Dick!" my mistress cried, breaking down on a sudden andsnatching my hands to her bosom, "will you see me shamed? Play the manfor ten minutes only--for ten minutes only, and by morning we shall besafe, and far from here! And--and together, Dick! Together!"

  Was it likely, I ask, was it possible that I should long resistpleading such as this? That holding her in my arms, in the warm summernight, with her hair on my breast, while the moon sailed overhead anda cricket chirped in the wall hard by--was it likely or possible, Isay, that I should steel my heart against her; that I should turn fromthe cup of pleasure, who had tasted as yet so few delights, anddrudged and been stinted all my life? Whose appetite had known nodaintier relish than the dull round of dumpling and bacon, or at thebest salt meat and spinach; and who for sole companionship had beenshut in, June days and December nights alike, with a band ofmischievous boys, whom the ancients justly called _genus improbum_. Atany rate I did not; to my shame, great or small, according as I shallbe harshly or charitably judged--I did not; but with a beating heartand choked voice, I gave my word and left her; and an hour later Icrept down the creaking stairs for the last time, guilty andshivering, a bundle in my hand, and found her waiting for me in theold place.

  I confess that the flurry of my spirits in this crisis was such as todisturb my judgment; and my passion for my mistress being no longer ofthe higher kind, these two things may account for the fact that I feltno wonder or repulsion when she explained to me, coolly and in detail,where the bureau stood, and in what part of it lay the money; evenadding that I had better bring away a pair of silver candlestickswhich I should find in another place. By the time she had made thesethings clear to me, the favourable moment was come; the lights of thetown had long been extinguished, and the house obscuring the moon casta black shadow on the garden, that greatly seconded our movements. Yetfor myself, and though all went well with us, I trembled at thefaintest sound, and started if a leaf stirred; nay, to this day Iwillingly believe that the smallest trifle, a light at a window or adistant voice, would have deterred me from the adventure. But nothingoccurred to hinder or alarm; and the darkness cloaking us only tooeffectually, and my accomplice directing me where to find the ladder,I fetched it, and with her help thrust it over the fence and climbedover after it.

  This was a small thing, the worst being to come. The part of thegarden under the wall of the house was paved; it was only with thegreatest exertion therefore and the utmost care that we could raisethe ladder on it without noise; and but for the surprising strengthwhich Jennie showed, I doubt if we should have succeeded, my handstrembled so violently. In the end we raised it, however; the upperpart fell lightly beside the second floor casement, and Jenniewhispered to me to ascend.

  I had gone too far now to retreat, and I obeyed, and had mounted twosteps, when I heard distinctly--the sound coming sharp and clearthrough the night--the shod hoof of a horse paw the ground, apparentlyin the road beyond the house. Scared by such a sound at such a time, Islid rapidly down into Jennie's arms. "Hush!" I cried. "Did you hearthat? There is someone there!"

  But angered by my sudden descent which had come near to knocking herdown, she whispered in a rage that I was either the biggest fool orthe poorest craven in the world. "Go up! Go up!" she continuedfiercely, almost striking me in her excitement. "There are sixtyguineas awaiting us up there--sixty guineas, man, and you budge,because a horse stirs."

  "But what is it doing there?" I remonstrated. "A horse, Jennie--atthis time of night!"

  "God knows!" she answered. "What is it to us?"

  Still I lingered a moment, unwilling to ascend; but hearing nothing,and thinking I might have been mistaken, I was ashamed to hang backlonger, and I went up, though my legs trembled under me, and a birddarting suddenly out of the ivy glued me to the ladder by both hands,with the sweat standing out on my face. Alone, nothing on earth wouldhave persuaded me to it; but with Jennie below I dared not flinch, andthe latch of the window proving as weak as she had described it, in amoment the lattice swung open and I climbed over the sill.

  Feeling the floor with my feet, I stood an instant in the dark stuffyroom, and listened. It smelled strongly of herbs, on which account Ihate that smell to this day. I could hear Mrs. Harris snoring nextdoor; and the pendulum of the fine new clock on the stairs, which wasMrs. D----'s latest pride, was swinging to and fro regularly; and Iknew that at the slightest alarm the house would be awake. But I hadgone too far to recede; and though I feared and sweated, and at thetouch of a hand must have screamed aloud, I went forward and gropingmy way across the floor, found the bureau, and tried the drawer.

  It was locked, but crazily; and Jennie foreseeing the obstacle hadgiven me a chisel. Inserting the point, I listened awhile to assuremyself that all was quiet, and then with the resolution of despairforced the drawer open with a single wrench. Probably the noise was nogreat one, but to my ears it rang through the night loud as the crackof laden ice. I heard the sleeper in the next room cease her snoringand turn in the bed; and cowering down on the floor I gave up all forlost. But in a moment she began to breathe again, and encouraged bythat and the silence in the house, I drew the drawer open, and feelingfor the bag, discovered it, and clutching it firmly, turned to thewindow.

  I found that Jennie had mounted the ladder, and was looking into theroom, her hands on the sill, her head dark against the sky. "Have yougot it?" she whispered, thrusting in her arm and groping for me. "Thengive it me while you get the candlesticks. They are wrapped inflannel, and are under the bed."

  I gave her the bag, which chinked as it passed from hand to hand; thenI turned obediently, and groping my way to the bed which stood besidethe bureau, I felt under it. I found nothing, but did not at once giveup. The candlesticks might lie on the farther side, and accordingly Irose and climbed over the bed and tried again, passing my handsthrough the flue and dust which had gathered under Mrs. D----'s bestfeather-bed.

  How long I might hav
e searched in the dark, and vainly, I cannot say;for my efforts were brought to a premature end by a dull thud thatcame to my ears apparently from the next room. Certain that it couldbe caused by nothing less than Mrs. Harris getting out of bed, Icrawled out, and got to my feet in a panic, and stood in the darkquaking and listening; so terrified that I am sure if the good womanhad entered at that moment, I should have fallen on my knees beforeher, and confessed all. Nothing followed, however; the house remainedquiet; I heard no second sound. But my nerve was gone. I wantednothing so much now as to be out of the place; not for a thousandguineas would I have stayed; and without giving another thought to thecandlesticks, I groped my way to the window, and passing one leg overthe sill, felt hurriedly for the ladder.

  I failed to find it, and tried again; then peering down called Jennieby name. She did not answer. A second time I called, and felt aboutwith my foot; still without success. Then as it dawned upon me at lastthat the ladder was really gone, and I a prisoner, I thought ofprudence no longer, but I called frantically, at first in a whisper,and then as loudly as I dared; called and called again, "Jennie!Jennie!" And yet again, "Jennie!"

  Still no answer came; but listening intently, in one of the intervalsof silence, I caught the even beat of hoofs, receding along the road,and growing each moment less marked. They held me; scarcely breathing,I listened to them, until they died away in the distance of the summernight, and only the sharp insistent chirp of the cricket, singing inthe garden below, came to my ears.