Johnny Ludlow, Sixth Series

I

Dinner was over. Emma Paul had gone out to stroll in the shady garden and wait for the evening breeze that would soon come on, and was so delightful after the heat of the day. Her father remained at the table. He was slowly sipping at his one glass of port wine, which he took in a large claret glass, when the door opened and Thomas Chandler entered.

“Oh,” said Mr. Paul. “So you are back, are you, young man!”

“I went on to Worcester, sir,” explained Tom; who though he was now made Mr. Paul’s partner, could not get rid all at once of the old mode of addressing him. Managing clerks in these days, who are qualified solicitors, do not condescend to say “Sir” to their chief, no matter though he be their elder by half a life-time; but they did in the days gone by.

“When I got to Crabb Cot this morning, sir, Mr. Todhetley was on the point of starting for Worcester in the phaeton with his son and Johnny Ludlow,” went on Tom. “After listening to the news I took him, he naturally wished me to go also, and I did so. He was in a fine way about it.”

“But you need not have stayed at Worcester all day.”

“Well, being there, I thought—after I had conferred with Corles at his office upon this other matter—I should do well to go on to Oddingley and see William Smith about that troublesome business of his; so I hired a gig and went there; and I’ve just got back by train, walking from Crabb,” answered Tom Chandler.

“Had any dinner?”

“Oh, yes, thank you; and some tea also at Shrub Hill station, while waiting for the train: this weather makes one thirsty. No, thank you, sir,” as Mr. Paul pushed the decanter towards him; “wine would only make me still more thirsty than I am.”

“I never saw you looking so hot,” remarked the old lawyer.

Tom laughed, and rubbed his face. The walk from Crabb was no light one: and, of course, with Miss Emma at the end of it, he had come at a steaming pace.

“Well, and what did you and Todhetley make of the matter?”

It was the day, as may readily be understood, when we had gone to Worcester to have it out at the silversmith’s. Tom Chandler recounted all that passed, and repeated the description given to himself by Stephenson of the fellow who had changed the bank-note. Mr. Paul received it with an impatient and not at all orthodox word, meant for Richard MacEveril.

“But I cannot feel sure, no, nor half sure, that it was MacEveril,” said Tom Chandler.

“What have your feelings got to do with it?” asked old Paul, in his crusty way. “It seems to me, the description you give would be his very picture.”

“Stephenson says he had blue eyes. Now Dick’s are brown.”

“Eyes be sugared,” retorted the lawyer. “As if any man could swear to a chance customer’s eyes after seeing them for just a minute or two! It was Dick MacEveril; he caught up the letter as it lay on Hanborough’s desk in the office and decamped with it; and went off the next day to Worcester to get the note changed, as bold as though he had been Dick Turpin!”

Still Tom was not convinced. He took out the pencil he had bought and showed it to Mr. Paul.

“Ay,” said the old gentleman, “it’s a pretty thing, and perhaps he may get traced by it. Do you forget, Mr. Thomas, that the young rascal absented himself all that day from the office on pretext of going to the picnic at Mrs. Cramp’s, and that, as you told me, he never made his appearance at the picnic until late in the afternoon?”

“I know,” assented Tom. “He said he had been to the pigeon match.”

“If he said he had been to the moon, I suppose you’d believe it. Don’t tell me! It was Dick MacEveril who stole the note; every attendant circumstance helps to prove it. There: we’ll say no more about the matter, and you can be off to the garden if you want to; I know you are on thorns for it.”

From that day the matter dropped into oblivion, and nothing was allowed to transpire connecting MacEveril with the theft. Mr. Paul enjoined silence, out of regard for his old friend the captain, on Tom Chandler and Mr. Hanborough, the only two, besides himself, who suspected Dick. Some letters arrived at Islip about this time from Paris, written by Dick: one to Captain MacEveril, another to Mr. Paul, a third to his cousin Mary. He coolly said he was gone to Paris for a few weeks with Jim Stockleigh, and they were both enjoying themselves amazingly.

So, the ball of gossip not being kept up, the mysterious loss of the letter containing the bank-note was soon forgotten. Mr. Paul was too vexed to speak of it; it seemed a slur on his office; and he shielded Dick’s good name for his uncle’s sake; whilst Preen was silent because he did not wish the debt talked about.

We left Crabb Cot for Dyke Manor, carrying our wonder with us. The next singular point to us was, how the changer of the note could have been so well acquainted with the circumstances attending the buying of the brooch. Mrs. Todhetley would talk of it by the hour together, suggesting now this person and now that; but never seeming to hit upon a likely one.

July passed away, August also, and September came in. On the Thursday in the first week of the latter month, Emma Paul was to become Emma Chandler.

All that while, through all those months and weeks, poor Oliver Preen had been having a bad time of it. No longer able to buoy himself up with the delusive belief that Emma’s engagement to Chandler was nothing but a myth, he had to accept it, and all the torment it brought him. He had grown pale and thin; nervous also; his lips would turn white if anyone spoke to him abruptly, his hot hand trembled when in another’s grasp. Jane thought he must be suffering from some inward fever; she did not know much about her brother’s love for Emma, or dream that it could be so serious.

“I’m sure I wish their wedding was over and done with; Oliver might come to his proper senses then,” Jane told herself. “He is very silly. I don’t see much in Emma Paul.”

September, I say, came in. It was somewhat singular that we should again be for just that one first week of it at Crabb Cot. Sir Robert Tenby had invited the Squire to take a few days’ shooting with him, and included Tod in the invitation—to his wild delight. So Mr. and Mrs. Todhetley went from Dyke Manor to Crabb Cot for the week, and we accompanied them.

On the Monday morning of this eventful week—and terribly eventful it was destined to be—Mr. Paul’s office had a surprise. Richard MacEveril walked into it. He was looking fresh and blooming, as if he had never heard of such a thing as running away. Mr. Hanborough gazed up at him from his desk as if he saw an apparition; Tite Batley’s red face seemed illumined by sudden sunshine.

“Well, and is nobody going to welcome me back?” cried Dick, as he put out his hand, in the silence, to Mr. Hanborough.

“The truth is, we never expected to see you back; we thought you had gone for good,” answered Hanborough.

Dick laughed. “The two masters in there?” he asked, nodding his head at the inner door.

Hearing that they were, he went in. Old Paul, in his astonishment, dropped a penful of ink upon a letter he was writing.

“Why, where do you spring from?” he cried.

“From my uncle’s now, sir; got home last night. Been having a rare time of it in Paris. I suppose I may take my place at the desk again?” added Dick.

The impudence of this supposition drove all Mr. Paul’s wisdom out of him. Motioning to Tom Chandler to close the doors, he avowed to Dick what he was suspected of, and accused him of taking the letter and the bank-note.

“Well, I never!” exclaimed Dick, meeting the news with equanimity. “Go off with a letter of yours, sir, and a bank-note! Steal it, do you mean? Why, you cannot think I’d be capable of such a dirty trick, Mr. Paul. Indeed, sir, it wasn’t me.”

And there was something in the genuine astonishment of the young fellow, a certain honesty in his look and tone, that told Mr. Paul his suspicion might be a mistaken one. He recounted a brief outline of the facts, Tom Chandler helping him.

“I never saw the letter or the note, sir,” persisted Dick. “I remember the Wednesday afternoon quite well. When I went out to get my tea I met Fred Scott, and he persuaded me into the Bull for a game at billiards. It was half-past five before I got back here, and Mr. Hanborough blew me up. He had not been able to get out to his own tea. Batley was away that afternoon. No, no, sir, I wouldn’t do such a thing as that.”

“Where did you get the money to go away to London with, young man?” questioned old Paul, severely.

Dick laughed. “I won it,” he said; “upon my word of honour, sir, I did. It was the day of the picnic, and I persisted in going straight to it the first thing—which put the office here in a rage, as it was busy. Well, in turning out of here I again met Scott. He was hastening off to the pigeon-shooting match. I went with him, intending to stay only half an hour. But, once there, I couldn’t tear myself away. They were betting; I betted too, though I had only half a crown in my pocket, and I won thirty shillings; and I never got to Mrs. Cramp’s till the afternoon, when it was close upon tea-time. Tom Chandler knows I didn’t.”

Tom Chandler nodded.

“But for winning that thirty shillings I could not have got up to London, unless somebody had lent me some,” ran on Dick, who, once set going, was a rare talker. “You can ask anyone at that pigeon match, sir, whether I was not there the whole time: so it is impossible I could have been at Worcester, changing a bank-note.”

The words brought to Mr. Paul a regret that he had not thought to ask that question of some one of the sportsmen: it would have set the matter at rest, so far as MacEveril was concerned. And the suspicion had been so apparently well grounded, as to prevent suspicion in other quarters.

Tom Chandler, standing beside Dick at Mr. Paul’s table, quietly laid a pencil upon it, as if intending to write something down. Dick took it up and looked at it.

“What a pretty pencil!” he exclaimed. “Is it gold?”

It should be understood that in those past days, these ornamental pencils were rare. They may be bought by the bushel now. And Tom Chandler would have been convinced by the tone, had he still needed conviction, that Dick had not seen any pencil like it before.

“Well,” struck in old Paul, a little repentant for having so surely assumed Dick’s guilt, and thankful on the captain’s account that it was a mistake: “if you promise to be steady at your work, young man, I suppose you may take your place at the desk again. This gentleman here is going a-roving this week,” pointing the feather-end of his pen at Tom Chandler, “for no one knows how long; so you’ll have to stick to it.”

“I know; I’ve heard,” laughed Dick. “I mean to get a few minutes to dash into the church and see the wedding. Hope you’ll not dismiss me for it, sir!”

“There, there; you go to your desk now, young man, and ask Mr. Hanborough what you must do first,” concluded the lawyer.

It was not the only time on that same day that Thomas Chandler displayed his pencil. Finding his theory, that Dick MacEveril possessed the fellow one, to be mistaken, he at once began to take every opportunity of showing it to the world—which he had not done hitherto. Something might possibly come of it, he thought. And something did.

Calling in at Colonel Letsom’s in the evening, I found Jane Preen there, and one or two more girls. The Squire and Tod had not appeared at home yet, neither had Colonel Letsom, who made one at the shooting-party; we decided that Sir Robert must be keeping them to an unceremonious dinner. Presently Tom Chandler came in, to bring a note to the Colonel from Mr. Paul.

Bob Letsom proposed a round game at cards—Speculation. His sister, Fanny, objected; speculation was nothing but screaming, she said, and we couldn’t sit down to cards by daylight. She proposed music; she thought great things of her singing: Bob retorted that music might be shot, and they talked at one another a bit. Finally we settled to play at “Consequences.” This involves, as everyone knows, sitting round a table with pencils and pieces of writing-paper.

I sat next to Tom Chandler, Jane Preen next to me. Fanny was on the other side of Tom—but it is not necessary to relate how we all sat. Before we had well begun, Chandler put his pencil on the table, carelessly, and it rolled past me.

“Why, that is Oliver’s pencil!” exclaimed Jane, picking it up.

“Which is?” quietly said Tom. “That? No; it is mine.”

Jane looked at it on all sides. “It is exactly like one that Oliver has,” she said. “It fell out of a drawer in his room the other day, when I was counting up his collars and handkerchiefs. He told me he brought it from Tours.”

“No doubt,” said Tom. “I bought mine at Worcester.”

In taking the pencil from Jane, Tom’s eye caught mine. I did feel queer; he saw I did; but I think he was feeling the same. Little doubt now who had changed the note!

“You will not talk of it, will you?” I whispered to Tom, as we were dispersing about the room when the game was over.

“No,” said he, “it shall not come out through me. I’m afraid, though, there’s no mistake this time, Johnny. A half doubt of it has crossed my mind at odd moments.”

Neither would I talk of it, even to Tod. After all, it was not proof positive. I had never, never thought of Oliver.

The Letsoms had a fine old garden, as all the gardens at Crabb were, and we strolled out in the twilight. The sun had set, but the sky was bright in the west. Valentine Chandler, for he had come in, kept of course by Jane Preen’s side. Anyone might see that it was, as Tod called it, a gone case with them. It was no end of a pity, Val being just as unsteady and uncertain as the wind.

People do bolder things in the gloaming than in the garish daylight; and we fell to singing in the grotto—a semi-circular, half-open space with seats in it, surrounded at the back by the artificial rocks. Fanny began: she brought out an old guitar and twanged at it and sang for us, “The Baron of Mowbray;” where the false knight rides away laughing from the Baron’s door and the Baron’s daughter: that far-famed song of sixty years ago, which was said to have made a fortune for its composer.

The next to take up the singing was Valentine Chandler: and in listening to him you forgot all his short-comings. Never man had sweeter voice than he; and in his singing there was a singular charm impossible to be described. In his voice also—I mean when he spoke—there was always melody, and in his speech, when he chose to put it forth, a persuasive eloquence. This might have been instrumental in winning Jane Preen’s heart; we are told that a man’s heart is lost through his eye, a woman’s through her ear. Poor Valentine! he might have been so nice a fellow—and he was going to the bad as fast as he could go.

The song he chose was a ridiculous old ditty all about love; it went to the tune of “Di tanti palpiti.” Val chose it for Miss Jane and sung it to her; to her alone, mind you; the rest of us went for nothing.

Now, as you perceive, it is a most ridiculous song, foolish as love-songs in general are. But had you been sitting there with us in all the subtle romance imparted by the witching hour of twilight, the soft air floating around, the clear sky above, one large silver star trembling in its blue depths, you would have felt entranced. The wonderful melody of the singer’s voice, his distinct enunciation, the tender passion breathing through his soft utterance, and the slight yet unmistakable emphasis given to the avowal of his love, thrilled us all. It was as decided a declaration of what he felt for Jane Preen as he could well make in this world. Once he glanced at her, and only once throughout; it was where I have placed the pause, as he placed it himself, “like thee—and me.” As if his glance drew hers by some irresistible fascination, Jane, who had been sitting beneath the rock just opposite to him, her eyes cast down—as he made that pause and glanced at her, I say, she lifted them for a moment, and caught the glance. I may live to be an old man, but I shall never forget Val’s song that night, or the charm it held for us. What, then, must it have held for Jane? And it is because that song and its charm lie still fresh on my memory, though many a year has since worn itself out, that I inscribe it here.

As the singing came to an end, dying softly away, no one for a moment or two broke the hushed silence that ensued. Valentine was the first to do it. He got up from his seat; went round to a ledge of rock and stood upon it, looking out in the distance. Had the sea been near, one might have thought he saw a ship, homeward bound.

II

Had the clerk of the weather been bribed with a purse of gold, he could not have sent a finer day than Thursday turned out to be. The sun shone, the air sparkled, and the bells of Islip church rang out from the old steeple. Islip was much behind other churches in many respects; so primitive, indeed, in some of its ways, that had an edifice of advanced views come sailing through the air to pay it a visit, it would have turned tail again and sailed away; but Islip could boast of one thing few churches can boast of—a delightful peal of bells.

The wedding took place at eleven o’clock, and was a quiet one. Its attendants were chiefly confined to the parties themselves and their immediate relatives, but that did not prevent other people from flocking in to see it.

I and Dick MacEveril went in together, and got a good place close up; which was lucky, for the old church is full of pillars and angles that obstruct the view. Emma was in white silk; her bridesmaid, Mary MacEveril, the same; it was the custom in those days. Tom looked uncommonly well; but he and she were both nervous. Old Paul gave her away; and a thin aunt, with a twisted nose, who had come on a visit to superintend the wedding, in place of Emma’s dead mother, did nothing but weep. She wore an odd gown, pink one way, blue another; you might have thought she had borrowed its colours from their copper teakettle. Mrs. Chandler, Tom’s mother, in grey silk, was smarter than she had ever been in her life; and his aunt, Mrs. Cramp, was resplendent in a dress bordering upon orange.

The ceremony came to an end very quickly, I thought—you do think so at most simple weddings; and Tom and his wife went away together in the first carriage. Next came the breakfast at Mr. Paul’s; the aunt presiding in a gentle stream of tears. Early in the afternoon the bride and bridegroom left for London, on their way to the Continent.

Everyone does not care to dash to a church to see a marriage: some would as soon think of running to look on at a funeral. Mr. Preen was one of these insensible people, and he, of course, did not care to go near it. He made game of Jane for doing so; but Jane wanted to see the dresses and the ceremony. Oliver had not the opportunity of going; and would not have gone though he had had it. Just about eleven o’clock, when the gay doings were in full swing, Mr. Preen took Oliver off to Worcester in the gig.