Birds of Prey Part 36

Before leaving George Sheldon, I told him of the fragmentary sentences I had heard uttered by Captain Paget and Philip Sheldon at the Lawn; but he pooh-poohed my suspicions.

"I'll tell you what it is, Valentine Hawkehurst," he said, fixing those hard black eyes of his upon me as if he would fain have pierced the bony covering of my skull to discover the innermost workings of my brain; "neither Captain Paget nor my brother Phil can know anything of this business, unless you have turned traitor and sold them my secrets.

And mark me, if you have, you've sold yourself and them into the bargain: my hand holds the doc.u.mentary evidence, without which all your knowledge is worthless."

"I am not a traitor," I told him quietly, for I despise him far too heartily to put myself into a pa.s.sion about anything he might please to say of me; "and I have never uttered a word about this business either to Captain Paget or to your brother. If you begin to distrust me, it is high time you should look out for a new coadjutor."

I had my Sheldon, morally speaking, at my feet in a moment.

"Don't be melodramatic, Hawkehurst," he said; "people sell each other every day of the week, and no one blames the seller, provided he makes a good bargain. But this is a case in which the bargain would be a very bad one."

After this I took my leave of Mr. Sheldon. He was to start for Calais by that night's mail, and return to town directly his investigation was completed. If he found me absent on his return, he would conclude that I had obtained the information I required and started for Yorks.h.i.+re. In this event he would patiently await the receipt of tidings from that county.

I went straight from Gray's Inn to Jewin-street. I had spent the greater part of the day in Sheldon's office, and when I presented myself before my complacent Sparsfield junior, Sparsfield senior's tea and toast were already in process of preparation; and I was again invited to step upstairs to the family sitting-room, and again treated with that Arcadian simplicity of confidence and friendliness which it has been my fate to encounter quite as often in the heart of this sophisticated city as in the most pastoral of villages. With people who were so frank and cordial I could but be equally frank.

"I am afraid I am making myself a nuisance to you, Mr. Sparsfield," I said; "but I know you'll forgive me when I tell you that the affair I'm engaged in is a matter of vital importance to me, and that your help may do a great deal towards bringing matters to a crisis."

Mr. Sparsfield senior declared himself always ready to a.s.sist his fellow-creatures, and was good enough further to declare that he had taken a liking to me. So weak had I of late become upon all matters of sentiment, I thanked Mr. Sparsfield for his good opinion, and then went on to tell him that I was about to test his memory.

"And it ain't a bad un," he cried, cheerily, clapping his hand upon his knee by way of emphasis. "It ain't a bad memory, is it, Tony?"

"Few better, father," answered the dutiful Anthony junior. "Your memory's better than mine, a long way."

"Ah," said the old man, with a chuckle, "folks lived different in my day. There weren't no gas, and there weren't no railroads, and London tradespeople was content to live in the same house from year's end to year's end. But now your tradesman must go on his foreign tours, like a prince of the royal family, and he must go here and go there; and when he's been everywhere, he caps it all by going through the Gazette.

Folks stayed at home in my day; but they made their fortunes, and they kept their health, and their eyesight, and their memory, and their hearing, and many of 'em have lived to see the next generation make fools of themselves."

"Why, father," cried Anthony junior, aghast at this flood of eloquence, "what an oration!"

"And it ain't often I make an oration, is it, Tony?" said the old man, laughing. "I only mean to say that if my memory's pretty bright, it may be partly because I haven't frittered it away upon nonsense, as some folks have. I've stayed at home and minded my own business, and left other people to mind theirs. And now, sir, if you want the help of my memory, I'm ready to give it."

"You told me the other day that you could not recall the name of the place where Christian Meynell's daughter married, but you said you should remember it if you heard it, and you also said that the name ended in Cross."

"I'll stick to that," replied my ancient friend. "I'll stick to that."

"Very well then. It is a settled thing that the place was in Yorks.h.i.+re?"

"Yes, I'm sure of that too."

"And that the name ended in Cross?"

"It did, as sure as my name is Sparsfield."

"Then in that case, as there are only six towns or villages in the county of York the names of which end in Cross, it stands to reason that the place we want must be one of those six."

Having thus premised, I took my list from my pocket and read aloud the names of the six places, very slowly, for Mr. Sparsfield's edification.

"Aylsey Cross--Bowford Cross--Callindale Cross--Huxter's Cross--Jarnam Cross--Kingborough Cross."

"That's him!" cried my old friend suddenly.

"Which?" I asked eagerly.

"Huxter's Cross; I remember thinking at the time that it must be a place where they sold things, because of the name Huxter, you see, p.r.o.nounced just the same as if it was spelt with a cks instead of an x.

And I heard afterwards that there'd once been a market held at the place, but it had been done away with before our time. Huxter's Cross; yes, that's the name of the place where Christian Meynell's daughter married and settled. I've heard it many a time from poor Sam, and it comes back to me as plain as if I'd never forgotten it."

There was an air of conviction about the old man which satisfied me that he was not deceived. I thanked him heartily for his aid as I took my leave.

"You may have helped to put a good lump of money in my pocket, Mr.

Sparsfield," I said; "and if you have, I'll get my picture taken, if it's only for the pleasure of bringing it here to be framed."

With this valedictory address I left my simple citizens of Barbican. My heart was very light as I wended my way across those metropolitan wilds that lay between Barbican and Omega-street. I am ashamed of myself when I remember the foolish cause of this elation of mind. I was going to Yorks.h.i.+re, the county of which my Charlotte was now an inhabitant. My Charlotte! It is a pleasure even to write that delicious possessive p.r.o.noun--the pleasure of poor Alnascher, the crockery-seller, dreaming his day-dream in the eastern market-place.

Can any one know better than I that I shall be no nearer Charlotte Halliday in Yorks.h.i.+re than I am in London? No one. And yet I am glad my Sheldon's business takes me to the woods and wolds of that wide northern s.h.i.+re.

Huxter's Cross--some Heaven-forgotten spot, no doubt. I bought a railway time-table on my way home to-night, and have carefully studied the bearings of the place amongst whose mouldy records I am to discover the history of Christian Meynell's daughter and heiress.

I find that Huxter's Cross lies off the railroad, and is to be approached by an obscure little station--as I divine from the ignominious type in which its name appears--about sixty miles northward of Hull. The station is called Hidling; and at Hidling there seems to be a coach which plies between the station and Huxter's Cross.

Figure to yourself again, my dear, the heir-at-law to a hundred thousand pounds vegetating in the unknown regions of Huxter's Cross c.u.m Hidling, unconscious of his heritage!

Shall I find him at the plough-tail, I wonder, this mute inglorious heir-at-law? or shall I find an heiress with brawny arms meekly churning b.u.t.ter? or shall I discover the last of the Meynells taking his rest in some lonely churchyard, not to be awakened by earthly voice proclaiming the tidings of earthly good fortune?

I am going to Yorks.h.i.+re--that is enough for me. I languish for the starting of the train which shall convey me thither. I begin to understand the nostalgia of the mountain herdsman: I pine for that northern air, those fresh pure breezes blowing over moor and wold--though I am not quite clear, by the bye, as to the exact nature of a wold. I pant, I yearn for Yorks.h.i.+re. I, the c.o.c.kney, the child of Temple Bar, whose cradle-song was boomed by the bells of St. Dunstan's and St. Clement's Danes.

Is not Yorks.h.i.+re my Charlotte's birthplace? I want to see the land whose daughters are so lovely.

CHAPTER III.

ARCADIA.

_November 1st_. This is Huxter's Cross, and I live here. I have lived here a week. I should like to live here for ever. O, let me be rational for a few hours, while I write the record of this last blissful week; let me be reasonable, and business-like, and Sheldon-like for this one wet afternoon, and then I may be happy and foolish again. Be still, beating heart! as the heroines of Minerva-press romances were accustomed to say to themselves on the smallest provocation. Be still, foolish, fluttering, schoolboy heart, which has taken a new lease of youth and folly from a fair landlord called Charlotte Halliday.

Drip, drip, drip, O rain! "The day is dark and cold and dreary, and the vine still clings to the mouldering wall; and with every gust the dead leaves fall:" but thy sweet sad verse wakes no responsive echo in my heart, O tender Transatlantic Poet, for my heart is light and glad--recklessly glad--heedless of to-morrow--forgetful of yesterday--full to the very brim with the dear delight of to-day.

And now to business. I descend from the supernal realms of fancy to the dry record of commonplace fact. This day week I arrived at Hidling, after a tedious journey, which, with stoppages at Derby and Normanton, and small delays at obscurer stations, had occupied the greater part of the day. It was dusk when I took my place in the hybrid vehicle, half coach, half omnibus, which was to convey me from Hidling to Huxter's Cross. A transient glimpse at Hidling showed me one long straggling street and a square church-tower. Our road branched off from the straggling street, and in the autumn dusk I could just discover the dim outlines of distant hills encircling a broad waste of moor.

I have been so steeped in London that this wild barren scene had a charm for me which it could scarcely possess for others. Even the gloom of that dark waste of common land was pleasant to me. I shared the public vehicle with one old woman, who snored peacefully in the remotest corner, while I looked out at the little open window and watched the darkening landscape.

Our drive occupied some hours. We pa.s.sed two or three little cl.u.s.ters of cottages and homesteads, where the geese screamed and the c.o.c.ks crowed at our approach, and where a few twinkling tapers in upper windows proclaimed the hour of bed-time. At one of these cl.u.s.ters of habitation, a little island of humanity in the waste of wold and moor, we changed horses, with more yo-oh-ing and come-up-ing than would have attended the operation in a civilised country. At this village I heard the native tongue for the first time in all its purity; and for any meaning which it conveyed to my ear I might as well have been listening to the _patois_ of agricultural Carthage.

After changing horses, we went up hill, with perpetual groanings, and grumblings, and grindings, and whip-smacking and come-up-ing, for an indefinite period; and then we came to a cl.u.s.ter of cottages, suspended high up in the sharp autumn atmosphere as it seemed to me; and the driver of the vehicle came to my little peephole of a window, and told me with some slight modification of the Carthaginian _patois_ that I was "theer."

I alighted, and found myself at the door of a village inn, with the red light from within s.h.i.+ning out upon me where I stood, and a battered old sign groaning and creaking above my head. For me, who in all my life had been accustomed to find my warmest welcome at an inn, this was to be at home. I paid my fare, took up my carpet-bag, and entered the hostelry.

I found a rosy-faced landlady, clean and trim, though a trifle floury as to the arms and ap.r.o.n. She had emerged from a kitchen, an old-fas.h.i.+oned chamber with a floor of red brick; a chamber which was all in a rosy glow with the firelight, and looked like a Dutch picture, as I peeped at it through the open doorway. There were the most picturesque of cakes and loaves heaped on a wooden bench by the hearth, and the whole aspect of the place was delicious in its homely comfort.

"O," I said to myself, "how much better the northern winds blowing over these untrodden hills, and the odour of home-made loaves, than the booming bells of St. Dunstan's, and the greasy steam of tavern chops and steaks!"