Uncle Silas Part 93

Dudley walked to the window and stood there.

'Come, Dudley, you and Hawkes must use expedition. You know you must get that out of the way.'

'I've done too much. I won't do nout; I'll not touch it. I wish my hand was off first; I wish I was a soger. Do as ye like, you an' Hawkes. I won't go nigh it; d.a.m.n ye both--and _that_!' and he hurled the hammer with all his force upon the floor.

'Come, come, be reasonable, Dudley, dear boy. There's nothing to fear but your own folly. You won't make a noise?'

'Oh, oh, my G.o.d!' said Dudley, hoa.r.s.ely, and wiped his forehead with his open hand.

'There now, you'll be all well in a minute,' continued the old man.

'You said 'twouldn't hurt her. If I'd a known she'd a screeched like that I'd never a done it. 'Twas a d.a.m.n lie. You're the d.a.m.ndest villain on earth.'

'Come, Dudley!' said the old man under his breath, but very sternly, 'make up your mind. If you don't choose to go on, it can't be helped; only it's a pity you began. For _you_ it is a good deal--it does not much matter for _me_.'

'Ay, for _you_!' echoed Dudley, through his set teeth. 'The old talk!'

'Well, sir,' snarled the old man, in the same low tones, 'you should have thought of all this before. It's only taking leave of the world a year or two sooner, but a year or two's something. I'll leave you to do as you please.'

'Stop, will you? Stop here. I know it's a fixt thing now. If a fella does a thing he's d.a.m.ned for, you might let him talk a bit anyhow. I don't care much if I was shot.'

'There now--_there_--just stick to that, and don't run off again. There's a box and a bag here; we must change the direction, and take them away. The box has some jewels. Can you see them? I wish we had a light.'

'No, I'd rayther not; I can see well enough. I wish we were out o' this.

_Here's_ the box.'

'Pull it to the window,' said the old man, to my inexpressible relief advancing at last a few steps.

Coolness was given me in that dreadful moment, and I knew that all depended on my being prompt and resolute. I stood up swiftly. I often thought if I had happened to wear silk instead of the cachmere I had on that night, its rustle would have betrayed me.

I distinctly saw the tall stooping figure of my uncle, and the outline of his venerable tresses, as he stood between me and the dull light of the window, like a shape cut in card.

He was saying 'just to _there_,' and pointing with his long arm at that contracting patch of moonlight which lay squared upon the floor. The door was about a quarter open, and just as Dudley began to drag Madame's heavy box, with my jewel-case in it, across the floor from her room, inhaling a great breath--with a mental prayer for help--I glided on tiptoe from the room and found myself on the gallery floor.

I turned to my right, simply by chance, and followed a long gallery in the dark, not running--I was too fearful of making the least noise--but walking with the tiptoe-swiftness of terror. At the termination of this was a cross-gallery, one end of which--that to my left--terminated in a great window, through which the dusky night-view was visible. With the instinct of terror I chose the darker, and turned again to my right; hurrying through this long and nearly dark pa.s.sage, I was terrified by a light, about thirty feet before me, emerging from the ceiling. In spotted patches this light fell through the door and sides of a stable lantern, and showed me a ladder, down which, from an open skylight I suppose for the cool night-air floated in my face, came d.i.c.kon Hawkes notwithstanding his maimed condition, with so much celerity as to leave me hardly a moment for consideration.

He sat on the last round of the ladder, and tightened the strap of his wooden leg.

At my left was a door-case open, but no door. I entered; it was a short pa.s.sage about six feet long, leading perhaps to a backstair, but the door at the end was locked.

I was forced to stand in this recess, then, which afforded no shelter, while Pegtop stumped by with his lantern in his hand. I fancy he had some idea of listening to his master unperceived, for he stopped close to my hiding-place, blew out the candle, and pinched the long snuff with his h.o.r.n.y finger and thumb.

Having listened for a few seconds, he stumped stealthily along the gallery which I had just traversed, and turned the corner in the direction of the chamber where the crime had just been committed, and the discovery was impending. I could see him against the broad window which in the daytime lighted this long pa.s.sage, and the moment he had pa.s.sed the corner I resumed my flight.

I descended a stair corresponding with that backstair, as I am told, up which Madame had led me only the night before. I tried the outer door. To my wild surprise it was open. In a moment I was upon the step, in the free air, and as instantaneously was seized by the arm in the gripe of a man.

It was Tom Brice, who had already betrayed me, and who was now, in surtout and hat, waiting to drive the carriage with the guilty father and son from the scene of their abhorred outrage.

CHAPTER LXV

_IN THE OAK PARLOUR_

So it was vain: I was trapped, and all was over.

I stood before him on the step, the white moon s.h.i.+ning on my face. I was trembling so that I wonder I could stand, my helpless hands raised towards him, and I looked up in his face. A long shuddering moan--'Oh--oh--oh!' was all I uttered.

The man, still holding my arm, looked, I thought frightened, into my white dumb face.

Suddenly he said, in a wild, fierce whisper--

'Never say another word' (I had not uttered one). 'They shan't hurt ye, Miss; git ye in; I don't care a d.a.m.n!'

It was an uncouth speech. To me it was the voice of an angel. With a burst of grat.i.tude that sounded in my own ears like a laugh, I thanked G.o.d for those blessed words.

In a moment more he had placed me in the carriage, and almost instantly we were in motion--very cautiously while crossing the court, until he had got the wheels upon the gra.s.s, and then at a rapid pace, improving his speed as the distance increased. He drove along the side of the back-approach to the house, keeping on the gra.s.s; so that our progress, though swaying like that of a s.h.i.+p in a swell, was very nearly as noiseless.

The gate had been left unlocked--he swung it open, and remounted the box.

And we were now beyond the spell of Bartram-Haugh, thundering--Heaven be praised!--along the Queen's highway, right in the route to Elverston. It was literally a gallop. Through the chariot windows I saw Tom stand as he drove, and every now and then throw an awful glance over his shoulder. Were we pursued? Never was agony of prayer like mine, as with clasped hands and wild stare I gazed through the windows on the road, whose trees and hedges and gabled cottages were chasing one another backward at so giddy a speed.

We were now ascending that identical steep, with the giant ash-trees at the right and the stile between, which my vision of Meg Hawkes had presented all that night, when my excited eye detected a running figure within the hedge. I saw the head of some one crossing the stile in pursuit, and I heard Brice's name shrieked.

'Drive on--on--on!' I screamed.

But Brice pulled up. I was on my knees on the floor of the carriage, with clasped hands, expecting capture, when the door opened, and Meg Hawkes, pale as death, her cloak drawn over her black tresses, looked in.

'Oh!--ho!--ho!--thank G.o.d!' she screamed. 'Shake hands, la.s.s. Tom, yer a good un! He's a good lad, Tom.'

'Come in, Meg--you must sit by me,' I said, recovering all at once.

Meg made no demur. 'Take my hand,' I said offering mine to her disengaged one.

'I can't, Miss--my arm's broke.'

And so it was, poor thing! She had been espied and overtaken in her errand of mercy for me, and her ruffian father had felled her with his cudgel, and then locked her into the cottage, whence, however, she had contrived to escape, and was now flying to Elverston, having tried in vain to get a hearing in Feltram, whose people had been for hours in bed.

The door being shut upon Meg, the steaming horses were instantly at a gallop again.

Tom was still watching as before, with many an anxious glance to rearward, for pursuit. Again he pulled up, and came to the window.

'Oh, what is it?' cried I.

''Bout that letter, Miss; I couldn't help. 'Twas d.i.c.kon, he found it in my pocket. That's a'.'

'Oh yes!--no matter--thank you--thank Heaven! Are we near Elverston?'