Then Mr. Jos. Larkin entered pointedly and briefly into Miss Lake's offer, which he characterised as 'wholly nugatory, illusory, and chimerical;' told him he had spoken on the subject, yesterday evening, to the young lady, who now saw plainly that there really was nothing in it, and that she was not in a position to carry out that part of her proposition, which contemplated a residence in the vicar's family.

This portion of his discourse he dismissed rather slightly and mysteriously; but he contrived to leave upon the vicar's mind a very painful and awful sort of uncertainty respecting the young lady of whom he spoke.

Then he became eloquent on the madness of further indecision in a state of things so fearfully menacing, freely admitting that it would have been incomparably better for the vicar never to have moved in the matter, than, having put his hand to the plough, to look back as he had been doing. If he declined his advice, there was no more to be said, but to bow his head to the storm, and that ponderous execution would descend in wreck and desolation.

So the vicar, very much flushed, in panic and perplexity, and trusting wildly to his protesting lawyer's guidance, submitted. Buggs and the bilious youngster entered with the deed, and the articles were duly executed, and the vicar signed also a receipt for the fanciful part of the consideration, and upon it and the deed he endorsed a solemn promise, in the terms I have mentioned before, that he would never take any step to question, set aside, or disturb the purchase, or any matter connected therewith.

Then the attorney, now in his turn flushed and very much elated, congratulated the poor vicar on his emanc.i.p.ation from his difficulties; and 'now that it was all done and over, told him, what he had never told him before, that, considering the nature of the purchase, he had got a _splendid_ price for it.'

The good man had also his agreement from Lake to sell Five Oaks.

The position of the good attorney, therefore, in a commercial point of view, was eminently healthy and convenient. For less than half the value of Five Oaks alone, he was getting that estate, and a vastly greater one beside, to be succeeded to on Mark Wylder's death.

No wonder, then, that the good attorney was more than usually bland and happy that day. He saw the pork-butcher in his back-parlour, and had a few words to say about the chapel-trust, and his looks and talk were quite edifying. He met two little children in the street, and stopped and smiled as he stooped down to pat them on the heads, and ask them whose children they were, and gave one of them a halfpenny. And he sat afterwards, for nearly ten minutes, with lean old Mrs. Mullock, in her little shop, where toffey, toys, and penny books for young people were sold, together with baskets, tea-cups, straw-mats, and other adult ware; and he was so friendly and talked so beautifully, and although, as he admitted in his lofty way, 'there might be differences in fortune and position,' yet were we not all members of one body? And he talked upon this theme till the good lady, marvelling how so great a man could be so humble, was called to the receipt of custom, on the subject of 'paradise'

and 'lemon-drops,' and the heavenly-minded attorney, with a celestial condescension, recognised his two little acquaintances of the street, and actually adding another halfpenny to his bounty--escaped, with a hasty farewell and a smile, to the street, as eager to evade the thanks of the little people, and the admiration of Mrs. Mullock.

It is not to be supposed, that having got one momentous matter well off his mind, the good attorney was to be long rid of anxieties. The human mind is fertile in that sort of growth. As well might the gentleman who shaves suppose, as his fingers glide, after the operation, over the polished surface of his chin--_factus ad unguem_--that he may fling his brush and strop into the fire, and bury his razor certain fathoms in the earth. No! One crop of cares will always succeed another--not very oppressive, nor in any wise grand, perhaps--worries, simply, no more; but needing a modic.u.m of lather, the looking gla.s.s, the strop, the diligent razor, delicate manipulation, and stealing a portion of our precious time every day we live; and this must go on so long as the state of man is imperfect, and plenty of possible evil in futurity.

The attorney must run up to London for a day or two. What if that mysterious, and almost illegible brute, James Dutton, should arrive while he was away. Very unpleasant, possibly! For the attorney intended to keep that gentleman very quiet. Sufficient time must be allowed to intervene to disconnect the purchase of the vicar's remainder from the news of Mark Wylder's demise. A year and a-half, maybe, or possibly a year might do.

For if the good attorney was cautious, he was also greedy, and would take possession as early as was safe. Therefore arrangements were carefully adjusted to detain that important person, in the event of his arriving; and a note, in the good attorney's hand, inviting him to remain at the Lodge till his return, and particularly requesting that 'he would kindly abstain from mentioning to _anyone_, during his absence, any matter he might intend to communicate to him in his professional capacity or otherwise.'

This, of course, was a little critical, and made his to-morrow's journey to London a rather anxious prospect.

In the meantime our friend, Captain Lake, arrived in a hired fly, with his light baggage, at the door of stately Brandon. So soon as the dust and ashes of railway travel were removed, the pale captain, in changed attire, snowy cambric, and with perfumed hair and handkerchief, presented himself before Dorcas.

'Now, Dorkie, darling, your poor soldier has come back, resolved to turn over a new leaf, and never more to reserve another semblance of a secret from you,' said he, so soon as his first greeting was over. 'I long to have a good talk with you, Dorkie. I have no one on earth to confide in but you. I think,' he said, with a little sigh, 'I would never have been so reserved with you, darling, if I had had anything pleasant to confide; but all I have to say is triste and tiresome--only a story of difficulties and petty vexations. I want to talk to you, Dorkie. Where shall it be?'

They were in the great drawing-room, where I had first seen Dorcas Brandon and Rachel Lake, on the evening on which my acquaintance with the princely Hall was renewed, after an interval of so many years.

'This room, Stanley, dear?'

'Yes, this room will answer very well,' he said, looking round. 'We can't be overheard, it is so large. Very well, darling, listen.'

CHAPTER LXII.

THE CAPTAIN EXPLAINS WHY MARK WYLDER ABSCONDED.

'How delicious these violets are!' said Stanley, leaning for a moment over the fragrant purple dome that crowned a china stand on the marble table they were pa.s.sing. 'You love flowers, Dorkie. Every perfect woman is, I think, a sister of Flora's. You are looking pale--you have not been ill? No! I'm very glad you say so. Sit down for a moment and listen, darling. And first I'll tell you, upon my honour, what Rachel has been worrying me about.'

Dorcas sate beside him on the sofa, and he placed his slender arm affectionately round her waist.

'You must know, Dorkie, that before his sudden departure, Mark Wylder promised to lend William, his brother, a sum sufficient to relieve him of all his pressing debts.'

'Debts! I never knew before that he had any,' exclaimed Dorcas. 'Poor William! I am so sorry.'

'Well, he has, like other fellows, only he can't get away as easily, and he has been very much pressed since Mark went, for he has not yet lent him a guinea, and in fact Rachel says she thinks he is in danger of being regularly sold out. She does not say she knows it, but only that she suspects they are in a great fix about money.'

'Well, you must know that _I_ was the sole cause of Mark Wylder's leaving the country.'

'_You_, Stanley!'

'Yes, _I_, Dorkie. I believe I thought I was doing a duty; but really I was nearly mad with _jealousy_, and simply doing my utmost to drive a rival from _your_ presence. And yet, without hope for myself, _desperately_ in love.'

Dorcas looked down and smiled oddly; it was a sad and bitter smile, and seemed to ask whither has that desperate love, in so short a time, flown?

'I know I was right. He was a stained man, and was liable at any moment to be branded. It was villainous in him to seek to marry you. I told him at last that, unless he withdrew, your friends should know all. I expected he would show fight, and that a meeting would follow; and I really did not much care whether I were killed or not. But he went, on the contrary, rather quietly, threatening to pay me off, however, though he did not say how. He's a cunning dog, and not very soft-hearted; and has no more conscience than that,' and he touched his finger to the cold summit of a marble bust.

'He is palpably machinating something to my destruction with an influential attorney on whom I keep a watch, and he has got some fellow named Dutton into the conspiracy; and not knowing how they mean to act, and only knowing how utterly wicked, cunning, and b.l.o.o.d.y-minded he is, and that he hates me as he probably never hated anyone before, I must be prepared to meet him, and, if possible, to blow up that Satanic cabal, which without _money_ I can't. It was partly a mystification about the election; of course, it will be expensive, but nothing like the other.

Are you ill, Dorkie?'

He might well ask, for she appeared on the point of fainting.

Dorcas had read and heard stories of men seemingly no worse than their neighbours--nay, highly esteemed, and praised, and liked--who yet were haunted by evil men, who encountered them in lonely places, or by night, and controlled them by the knowledge of some dreadful crime. Was Stanley--her husband--whose character she had begun to discern, whose habitual mystery was, somehow, tinged in her mind with a shade of horror, one of this two-faced, diabolical order of heroes?

Why should he dread this cabal, as he called it, even though directed by the malignant energy of the absent and shadowy Mark Wylder? What could all the world do to harm him in free England, if he were innocent, if he were what he seemed--no worse than his social peers?

Why should it be necessary to buy off the conspirators whom a guiltless man would defy and punish?

The doubt did not come in these defined shapes. As a halo surrounds a saint, a shadow rose suddenly, and enveloped pale, scented, smiling Stanley, with the yellow eyes. He stood in the centre of a dreadful medium, through which she saw him, ambiguous and awful; and she sickened.

'Are you ill, Dorkie, darling?' said the apparition in accents of tenderness. 'Yes, you _are_ ill.'

And he hastily threw open the window, close to which they were sitting, and she quickly revived in the cooling air.

She saw his yellow eyes fixed upon her features, and his face wearing an odd expression--was it interest, or tenderness, or only scrutiny; to her there seemed a light of insincerity and cruelty in its pallor.

'You are better, darling; thank Heaven, you are better.'

'Yes--yes--a great deal better; it is pa.s.sing away.'

Her colour was returning, and with a shivering sigh, she said--

'Oh? Stanley, you must speak truth; I am your wife. Do they know anything very bad--are you in their power?'

'Why, my dearest, what on earth could put such a wild fancy in your head?' said Lake, with a strange laugh, and, as she fancied, growing still paler. 'Do you suppose I am a highwayman in disguise, or a murderer, like--what's his name--Eugene Aram? I must have expressed myself very ill, if I suggested anything so tragical. I protest before Heaven, my darling, there is not one word or act of mine I need fear to submit to any court of justice or of honour on earth.'

He took her hand, and kissed it affectionately, and still fondling it gently between his, he resumed--

'I don't mean to say, of course, that I have always been better than other young fellows; I've been foolish, and wild, and--and--I've done wrong things, occasionally--as all young men will; but for high crimes and misdemeanors, or for melodramatic situations, I never had the slightest taste. There's no man on earth who can tell anything of me, or put me under any sort of pressure, thank Heaven; and simply because I have never in the course of my life done a single act unworthy of a gentleman, or in the most trifling way compromised myself. I swear it, my darling, upon my honour and soul, and I will swear it in any terms--the most awful that can be prescribed--in order totally and for ever to remove from your mind so amazing a fancy.'

And with a little laugh, and still holding her hand, he pa.s.sed his arm round her waist, and kissed her affectionately.

'But you are perfectly right, Dorkie, in supposing that I _am_ under very considerable apprehension from their machinations. Though they cannot slur our fair fame, it is quite possible they may very seriously affect our property. Mr. Larkin is in possession of all the family papers. I don't like it, but it is too late now. The estates have been back and forward so often between the Brandons and Wylders, I always fancy there may be a screw loose, or a frangible link somewhere, and he's deeply interested for Mark Wylder.'