Hunted down. Most of us see romances in life. In my capacity of
a chief manager of a life insurance office, I think I have, within
the last thirty years seen more romances than the generality of men. However unpromising
the opportunity may at first I have seen. As I have retired and live
at my ease, I possess the means that I used to want of considering
what I have seen at leisure. My experiences have a more remarkable aspect so
reviewed than they had when they were in progress. I have come home from
the plain now and can recall the scenes of the drama upon which curtain has
fallen, free from the glare, bewilderment, and bustle of the theater.
Let me recall one of these romances of the real world. There is nothing
truer than the physiognomy taken in connection with manner. The art of reading that
book of which eternal wisdom obliges every human creature to present his or her own
page with individual character written on it is a difficult one, perhaps, and
is little studied. It may require some natural aptitude, and it must require,
for everything does some patience, and some pains. That these are not
usually given to it. The number of people except a few stock commonplace expressions
of the face as the whole list of characteristics, and neither seek nor know
the refinements that are truest. That you, for instance, give a great
deal of time and attention to the reading of music Greek, Latin, French,
Italian, Hebrew, if you please, and do not qualify yourself to
read the face of the master or mistress looking over your shoulder teaching it to
you, I assume to be five hundred times more probable than improbable. Perhaps
so little self sufficiency may be at the bottom of this facial expression requires no
study from you. You think it comes by nature to you to know enough
about it, and you are not to be taken in. I confess for
my part that I have been taken in over and over again. I have
been taken in by acquaintances, and I have been taken in, of course
by friends, far oftener by friends than by any other class of persons.
How can I be so deceived? Had I quite misread their faces? No,
believe me, My first impression of those people, founded on face and
the manner alone, was invariably true. My mistake was in suffering them to
come nearer to me and explain themselves away. The partition which separated by own
office from our general outer office in the city was of thick plate glass.
Through it what passed in the outer office, without hearing a word. I
had it put in place of a wall that had been there for years,
ever since the house was built. It is no matter whether I did or
did not make the change in order that I might derive my first impression of
strangers who came to us on business from their faces alone, without being influenced
by anything. They said enough to mention that I turned my glass partition to
that account, and that a life assurance office is all times exposed to be
practiced upon by the most crafty and cruel of the human grace. It was
through my glass partition that I first saw the gentleman whose story I am going
to tell. He had come in without my observing it, and had put
his hat and his umbrella on the broad counter, and was bending over to
take some papers from one of the clerks. He was about forty or so,
dark, exceedingly well dressed in black, being in mourning, and the
hand he extended with a polite air had a particularly well fitting black kipped glove
upon it. His hair was elaborately brushed and oiled, was sparted straight up
the middle. And he presented this parting to the clerk exactly to my thinking,
as if he had said, in so many words, you must take
me, if you please, my friend, just as I show myself.
Come straight up here, follow the gravel path, keep up the grass.
I allow no trespassing. I conceived a very great aversion to that man the
moment I thus saw him. He had asked for some of her printed forms,
and the clerk was giving them to him and explaining them, and her
obliged and agreeable smile was on his face, and his eyes met those of
the clerk with a sprightly look. I have known a vast quantity of nonsense
being talked about, bad men not looking you in the face. Don't trust
that conventional idea. Dishonesty will stare honesty out of countenance any day in the
week, if there is anything to be cut by it. I saw in
the corner of his eyelash that he became aware of my looking at him.
Immediately he turned the parting in his head towards the glass partition as if he
said to me, with a sweet smile, straight up here, if you
please off the grass. In a few moments he had put on his hat
and taken up his umbrella, and was gone. I beckoned the clerk into
my room and asked who was there. He had a gentleman's card in his
hand, mister Julius Slington, Middle Temple, A barrister, mister Adams.
I think not, sir. I should have thought him a clergyman, but
for his having no reverend here, said I, probably from his appearance.
Mister Adams replied, he is reading for orders. I had mentioned that he
wore a dainty white cravat and a dainty linen altogether. What did he want,
mister Adams, merely a form of proposal, sir, and a form
of reference recommended here? Did he say? Yes? He said he was
recommended here by a friend of yours. He noticed you, but said that
as he had not the pleasure of your personal acquaintance, he would not trouble
you. Did you know my name? Oh, yes, sir, he
said, there is mister Sampson. I see a well spoken gentleman, apparently
remarkably so, sir. Insinuating manners apparently very much so. Indeed, Sir
Hah said, I, I were nothing at present, mister Adams. Within
a fortnight of that day, I went to dine with a friend of mine,
a merchant, a man of taste who buys pictures and books, And
the first man I saw among the company was mister Julius Slington. There he
was standing before the fire, with good large eyes and an open expression of
face. But still I thought, requiring everybody to come at him by the
prepared way he offered, and by no other I noticed him. Ask my
friend to introduce him to mister Samson, and my friend did so. Mister
Slington was very happy to see me, not too happy, there was no
overdoing of the matter, happy in a thoroughly well bred, perfectly unmeaning way.
I thought you had met our host, observed, No, said mister
Slington. I did look in at mister Sampson's office on your recommendation, but
I really did not feel justified in troubling mister Sampson himself on a point in
the everyday routine of an ordinary clerk. I said, I should have been
glad to show him any attention on our friend's introduction. I am sure of
that, said he, and I am much obliged. At another time,
perhaps I may be less delicate, only, however, if I had real
business. For I know, mister Sampson, how precious your business time is,
and what a vast number of impertinent people there are in the world.
I acknowledge this consideration with a slight bow. You were thinking, said I,
of affecting a policy on your life. Oh dear, no, I
am afraid I am not so prudent as you pay me the compliment of supposing
me to be. Mister Samson. I merely inquired for a friend, But
you know what friends are. In such matters, nothing may ever come of
it. I have the great reluctance to trouble men of business with inquiries for
friends, knowing the probabilities to be a thousand to one that the friends will
never follow them up. People are so facal, so selfish, so inconsiderate.
Don't you in your business find them? So, mister Samson. I
was going to give a qualified answer, but he turned his smooth white parting
on me with its straight up here if you please, and I answered,
yes, I hear, mister Sampson. He resumed presently for our friend had
a new cook, and dinner was not so punctual as usual. That your
profession has recently suffered a great loss in money, said I. He laughed
at my ready association of loss with money, and replied no, in talent
and vigor. Not at once, following out his illusion, I considered for
a moment, has it sustained the loss of that kind? Said I?
I was not aware of it. Understand me, mister Samson. I don't
imagine that you have retired. It's not so bad as that. But mister
Meltham, oh to be sure, said I. Yes, mister Meltham,
the young actuary of the inestimable. Just so, he returned in a concerning
way. He's a great loss. He was at once the most profound,
the most original, and the most energetic man I have ever known, connected
with life assurance. I spoke strongly, for I had a high esteem and
admiration for Malcolm, and my gentleman had indefinitely conveyed to me some suspicion that
he wanted to sneer at him. He recalled me to my guard by presenting
that trim pathway up his head with its infernal not on the grass. If
you pleased to gravel. You knew mister Slington only by reputation. To have
known him as an acquaintance or as a friend is an honor I should have
sought if he had remained in society, though I might never have had the
good fortune to attain it. Be a man of far inferior mark. He
was scarcely about thirty. I suppose about thirty. Ah, he signed in
his former consoling way, What creatures we are to break up, mister Samson
and become incapable of business at that time of life? Any reason assigned for
the melancholy fact? Humph, thought I as I looked at him. But
I won't go up the track, and I will go on the grass.
What reason have you heard assigned mister Slington, I asked, point blank,
Most likely a false one. You know what roomor raised, mister Samson.
I never repeat what I hear. It is the only way of bearing the
nails and shaving the head of rumor. But when you ask me what reason
I have heard assigned for mister Meltham's passing away from among men, it is
another thing I am not gratifying idle gossip. Then I was told mister Samson,
that mister Meltham had relinquished all his advocations and all its prospects. Dicourse,
he was in fact broken hearted, a disappointed attachment I heard, though
it hardly seems probable in the case of a man so distinguished and so attractive,
attractions and distinctions are no armor against death, said I, Oh,
she died, pray, pardon me. I did not hear that. That
indeed makes me very very sad, poor mister Malcolm. She died, Ah,
dear me, lamentable, lamentable. I still thought his pity was not
quite genuine, and I still suspected an unaccountable sneer under all this, until
he said, as we were parted like the other knots of talkers by the
announcement of dinner, Mister Samson, you are surprised to see me so moved
on behalf of a man whom I have never known. I am not so
disinterested as you may suppose. I have suffered, and recently too, from
death myself. I have lost one of my two charming nieces who were my
constant companions. She died young, barely three and twenty, and even her
remaining sister is far from strong. The world is grave. He said this
with deep feeling, and I feel reproached for the coldness of my manner.
Coldness and distrust have been engendered in me. I knew from my bad experiences
they were not natural to me, and I often thought how much I had
lost in life losing trustfulness, and how little I have gained gaining hard caution,
the state of mind being habitual to me. I troubled myself more about
this conversation than I might have troubled myself about a greater matter. I listened
to his talk at dinner and observed how readily other men responded to it,
and with what graceful instinct he adapted his subjects to the knowledge and habits of
those he talked with, as in talking with me, he had easily started
the subject I might have supposed to understand best and to be the most interested
in. So in talking with others he guided himself by the same rule.
The company was of varied character, but he was not at fault that I
could discover with any member of it. He knew just as much of each
man's pursuit as made him agreeable to that man in reference to it, and
just as little as made it natural in him to seek the modesty for information
when the theme was approached. As he talked and talked, but really not
too much for the rest of us, seemed to force it upon him.
I became quite angry with myself. I took his face to pieces in my
mind like a watch, and examined it in detail. I could not say
much against any of his features separately, I could say even less against them
when they were put together. Then is it not monstrous? I asked myself
that because a man happens to part his hair straight up the middle of his
head, I should permit myself to suspect and even to detest him. I
may stop to remark that this was no proof of my sense. An observer
of men, who finds himself steadily repelled by some apparent trifling thing in a
stranger is right to give it great weight. It may be the clue to
the whole mystery. A hair or two will show where the lion is hidden,
and a very little key will open a very heavy door. I took
part in the conversation with him after a time, and be got on remarkably
well. In the drawing room, I asked the host how long he had
known mister Slington. He answered not many months. He had met him at
the house of a celebrated painter then present, who had known him Bell when
he was traveling with his nieces in Italy for their help, his plans in
life being broken by the death of one of them. He was reading with
the intention of going back to college as a matter of form, taking his
degree and going into orders. I could not but argue with myself that here
was a true explanation of his interest in poor Meltholm, and that I had
been almost brutal in my distrust on that simple head. On the very next
day, but one, I was sitting behind my glass partition as before,
when he came into the outer office as before, the moment I saw him
again without hearing him, I hated him worse than ever. It was only
for a moment that I had this opportunity, for he waved his tight fitting
black glove the instant I looked at him and came straight in. Mister Samson
good, I presume you see upon your kind permission to intrude upon you.
I don't keep my word in being justified by business. For my business here,
if I may so abuse. The word is of the slightest nature,
I asked. Was it anything I could assist him in? I thank you.
No. I merely called to inquire outside whether my dilatory friend had been
so false to himself as to be practical and sensible. But of course he
has done nothing. I gave him your papers with my own hand, and
he was hot upon the intention. But of course he has done nothing,
apart from the general human disinincination to do anything that ought to be done.
I dare say that is a speciality about assuring one's life. You find it
like will making people are so superstitious and take it for granted that they will
die soon afterwards. Up Here, if you please, straight up here,
mister Samson, neither to the right nor to the left. I almost fancied
I could hear him breathe those words, as he sat smiling at me,
with that intolerable parting exactly opposite the bridge of my nose. There is such
a feeling sometimes, no doubt, I replied, But I don't think it
obtains to any great extent. Well, he said, with a shrug and
a smile. I wish some good angel would influence my friend in the right
direction. I rashly promised his mother and sister in Norfolk to see it done,
and he promised them that he would do it. But I suppose he
never will. He spoke for a minute or two in different topics, and
went away. I had scarcely unlocked the drawers of my writing table. Next
morning when he reappeared, I noticed he came straight to the door in the
glass partition and did not pause a single moment outside. Can you spare me
two minutes, my dear mister Sampson, by all means much obliged, laying
his hat an umbrella on the table. I came early not to interrupt you.
The fact is I am taken by surprise in the reference to this proposal
my friend has made. Has he made one? Said I? Yes,
he answered, deliberately, looking at me, and then a bright idea seemed
to strike him. Or he only tells me he has. Perhaps that may
be a new way of evading the matter. By Jupiter, I never thought
of that. Mister Adam was opening the morning's letters in the outer office.
What is his name, mister Slington, I asked, What is the name,
mister Slington, I asked Beck with. I looked out at the door
and requested mister Adams if there were a proposal in that name to bring it
in. He had already laid it out of his hand on counter. It
was easily selected from the rest, and he gave it to me. Alfred
beckwith proposal to effect the policy with us for two thousand pounds, dated yesterday
from Middle Temple. I see missus Slington. Yes, he lives in the
same staircas with me. His door is opposite. I never thought he would
make me his reference, though it seems natural enough that he would. It
seems natural enough that he should, quite so, mister Sampson, But I
never thought of it. Let me see. He took the printed paper from
his pocket. How am I to answer all these questions according to the truth,
of course? Said I? Oh, of course, he answered,
looking up from the paper with a smile. I meant there were so many.
But you do right to be particular. It stands to reason that you
must be particular. Will allow me to use your pen and ink certainly,
and your desk certainly. He had been hovering about between his hat and his
umbrella for a place to write. He now sat down in my chair at
my blotting paper, and instand with a long walk up his head in an
accurate perspective before me, as I stood with my back to the fire.
Before answering each question, he ran it over aloud and discussed it. How
long had he known mister Alfred Beckwith that he had decalculate by years upon his
fingers, what were his habits? Not difficulty about them? Temperate in the
last degree, and took a little too much exercise, if any All the
answers were satisfactory. When he had written them all, he looked them over
and finally signed them in a very pretty hand. He supposed he had now
done with the business. I told him he was not likely to be troubled
any further. Should he lead the papers there if he pleased, much obliged
good morning. I had had one other visitor before him, not at the
office, but at my own home. That visitor had come to my bedside
when it was not yet daylight, and had been seen by no one else
but my faithful confidential servant. A second reference paper, for we required always
two was sent down into Norfolk and was duly received back by post. This
likewise was satisfactorily answered. In every respect, our firms were all complied with.
We accepted the proposal, and the premium for one year was paid.
For six or seven months, I saw no more of mister Slington. He
called once at my house when I was not at home, and he once
asked me to dine with him in the temple, but I was engaged.
His friend's assurance was suffected. In March, late in September or early in
October, I was down at Scarborough for a breadth of sea air, where
I met him on the beach. It was a hot evening. He came
toward me with his hat in his hand, and there was a walk I
felt so strongly disinclined to take in perfect order again exactly in front of the
bridge of my nose. He was not alone, but had a young lady
on his arm. She was dressed in moaning and I looked at her with
great interest. She had the appearance of being extremely delicate, and her face
was remarkably pale and melancholy, but she was very pretty. He introduced her
as his niece, Miss Nina. Are you strolling, mister Samson? Is
it possible you can be idle it? Was possible, and I was strolling.
Shall we stroll together with pleasure? The young lady walked between us,
and we walked on the cools he sand in the direction of Philly. There
have been wheels here, said mister Slington. And now I look again,
the wheels up a hand carriage. Margaret, my love, your shadow,
without doubt, miss Niner's shadow, I repeated, looking down on the sand,
Not that one. Mister Slington returned, laughing, Maha, gareat my
dear tell mister Sampson. Indeed, said the young lady, turning to me,
there is nothing to tell except that I constantly see the same invalid old
gentleman at all times wherever I go. I have mentioned it to my uncle,
and he calls the gentleman my shadow. Does he live in Scarborough?
I asked, He is staying here? Do you live in Scarborough? No,
I'm staying here. My uncle has placed me with a family here for
my help, and your shadow, said I smiling. My shadow, she
answered, smiling too, is like myself, not very robust. I fear
for I lose my shadow sometimes as my shadow loses me at other times.
You both seemed liable to confinement to the house. I have not seen my
shadow for days and days, but it does oddly happen occasionally that wherever I
go for many days together, this gentleman goes. We have come together on
the most unfrequented nooks on this shore. Is this, he said I,
pointing before us the wheels had swept down the water's edge, and describing a
great loop on the sand, and turning, bringing the hoop back towards us,
and spinning it out. As it came. Was a hand carriage drawn
by a man. Yes, said miss Nina. This really is my shadow
uncle. As the carriage approached us, and we approached the carriage, I
saw within it an old man whose head was sunk on his breast, and
who was enveloped in a variety of wrappers. He was drawn by a very
quiet, but very keen looking man with iron gray hair, and who was
slightly lame. They had passed us when the scarriage stopped, and the old
gentleman within, putting out his arm, called to me by my name.
I went back and was absent from mister Slington and his niece for about five
minutes. When I rejoined them, missus Slington was the first to speak indeed,
he said to me in a raised voice, before I came up with
him. It is well you have not been longer, or my niece might
have died of curiosity to know who her shadow is. Mister Samson, an
old East India director, said, I an intimate friend of our friends at
whose I first had the pleasure of meeting you, A certain major banks.
You have heard of him. Never very rich, miss Diner, but very
old and very crippled, an amiable man, sensible, much interested in you.
He has just been expatiating on the affection that he has observed to exist
between you and your uncle. Mister Slington was holding his hat again, and
he passed his hand up the street walk as he himself went up it serenely
after me. Mister Samson, he said, tenderly pressing his niece's arm in
his Our affection was always a strong one, for we have had but few
near ties. We have still fewer now we have associations to bring us together
that are not of this world, Margaret. Dear uncle murmured the young lady
and turned her face aside to hide her tears. My niece and I had
such remembrances and regrets in common, mister Samson. He feelingly pursued that it
would be strange, indeed, if the relations between us were cold or indifferent.
If I remember a conversation we have had together, you will understand the
reference I make. Cheer up, dear Margaret, don't droop. Don't droop,
my Margaret. I cannot bear to see you droop. The poor young
lady was very much affected, but controlled herself. His feelings, too,
were very acute. In a word, he found himself under such a great
need of a restorative that he presently went away to take a bath of sea
water, leaving the young lady and me sitting by a point of rock,
and probably presuming, but that you will say was a pardonable indulgence in her
luxury, that she would praise him with all her heart. She did poor
thing, with all her confiding heart. She praised him to me for his
care of her dead sister, and for his untiding devotion in her last illness.
The sister had wasted away very slowly, and wild and terrible fantasies had
come over her toward the end. But he had never been impatient with her
or at a loss, had always been gentle, watchful, and self possessed.
The sister had known him as she had known him, to the best
of men, the kindest of men, and yet a man of such admirable
strength of character as to be a very tower for the support of their weak
natures while their poor lives endured. I shall leave him, mister Samson,
very soon, said the young lady. I know my life is drawing to
an end, and when I am gone, I hope he will marry and
be happy. I am sure he has lived single so long only for my
sake and for my poor, poor sisters. The little hand carriage had made
another great loop on the damp sand and was coming back again, gradually,
spinning out a slim figure of eight half a mile long. Young lady said,
I, looking round, laying my hand upon her arm, and speaking
in a low voice. Time presses you hear the gentle murmur of that sea.
She looked at me with utmost wonder and alarm, saying, yes,
and you know what a voice is in it when the storm comes. Yes,
you see how quiet and peaceful it lies before us. And you know
what an awful side of power without pity it might be this very night.
Yes, But if you have never heard or seen it, or heard of
it in its cruelty? Could you believe that it beats every inanimate thing in
its way to pieces without mercy, and destroys life without remorse. You terrify
me so by these questions. To save you, young lady, To save
you for God's sake, Collect your strength and collect your firmness. If you
were here alone and hinden by the rising tide on the floor of fifty feet
above your head, you could not be in greater danger than the danger you
are now to be saved from. The figure in the sand was spun out
and straggled off into a crooked little jerk that ended the cliff very near us.
As I am before Heaven and the judge of all mankind, your friend
and your dear sister's friend, I solemnly entreat you, miss Nina, without
one moment's loss of time, to come to this gentleman with me. If
the little carriage had been less near to us, I doubt if I could
have got her way. But it was so near that we were there before
she had recovered the hurry of being urged from the rock. I had not
remained there with her two minutes certainly within five. I had the inexpressible satisfaction
of seeing her from the point we had sat on, to which I had
returned, half supported and half carried up some rude steps notched in the cliff
by the figure of an active man. With that figure beside her, I
knew she was safe anywhere. I sat alone in the rock awaiting mister Slington's
return. The twilight was deepening and the shadows were heavy when he came round
the point with his hat hanging at his button hole, smoothing his wet hair
with one of his hands and picking up the old path with the other and
a pocket comb. My niece not here, mister Sampson, he said,
looking round. Miss Nina seemed to feel a little chill in the air after
the sun was down, and has gone home. He looked surprised, as
though she were not accustomed to do anything without him, even to originate so
slight a proceeding. I persuaded Miss Niner, I explained, ah, said
he. She is easily persuaded for her good Thank you, mister Samson.
She is better within doors. The bathing place was further than I thought to
say. The truth, Missnner is very delicate, I observed. He shook
his head drew a deep sigh, very very very You may recollect me saying
so the time that has since intervened has not strengthened her. The gloomy shadow
that fell upon her sister so early in life seems, in my anxious eyes
to gather over her ever darker, ever darker. Dear Margaret, dear Margaret.
But we must hope. The hand carriage was spinning away before us at
most indecorous space for an invalid vehicle, and was making most irregular curves upon
the sand. Missus Slington, noticing it after he had put his handkerchief to
his eyes, said, if I may judge from appearances, your friend will
be upset. Mister Samson, it looks probable, certainly, said I.
The servant must be drunk. The servants of old gentlemen will get drunk sometimes,
said I. The major draws very light, mister Samson. The Major
does draw light, said I. By this time the carriage, much to
my relief, was lost in the darkness. He walked on for a little
side by side over the sand in silence. After a short while, he
said, in a voice still affected by the emotion, that his niece's state
of health had awakened him. Do you stay here long, mister Samson?
Why I know I am going away to night so soon? But business always
holds you in request. Men like mister Samson are too important to others to
be spared to their own need of relaxation and enjoyment. I dun't know about
that, said I. However, I am going back to London. To
London, I shall be there too soon after you. I knew that as
well as he did, but I did not tell him so any more than
I told him what defensive weapon my right hand rested on in my pocket as
I walked by his side, any more than I told him why I did
not walk on the sea side of him. With the night closing in,
we left the beach, and our ways diverged. We exchanged good night and
had parted. Indeed, when he said, returning, mister Samson, May
I ask poor Melton, whom we spoke of, dead yet not when I
last heard of him, but too broken a man to live long and hopelessly
lost to his old calling. Dear, dear, dear, said he,
with great feeling. Sad, sad, sad. The world is grave and
so went his way. It was not his fault if the world were not
a grave. But I did not call that observation after him any more than
that I had mentioned those other things just now enumerated. He went his way,
and I went mine with all expedition. This happened, as I have
said, either at the end of September or beginning of October. The next
I saw him, and the last time was late in November. I had
a very particular engagement to breakfast in the temple. It was a bitter northeasterly
morning, and the sleet and slush lay inches deep in the streets. I
could get no conveyance, and was soon wet to the knee. But I
should have been true to that appointment, though I had to wade to it
up to my neck in the same impediments. The appointment took me to the
chambers in the temple. They were at the top of the lonely corner house,
overlooking the river. The name mister Alfred Beckwith was painted on the outer
door. On the door opposite on the same landing the name mister Julius Slington.
The doors of both sets of chambers stood open, so that anything said
aloud in one set, could be heard in the other. I had never
been in those chambers before. They were dismal, close, unwholesome, and
oppressive. The furniture, originally good and not yet old, was faded and
dirty. The rooms were in great disorder. There was a strong prevailing smell
of opium, brandy and tobacco. The great and fire irons were flashed all
over with unsightly blotches of rust. And on a sofa by the fire in
the room where breakfast had been prepared, lay the host, mister beckwith a
man with all appearances of the worst kind of drunkard, very far advanced upon
his shameful way to death. Slington is not come yet, said this creature,
staggering up when I went in. I'll call him Hulloa, Julius Caesar,
Come and drink. As he hoarsely roared this out, he beat the
poker and tongs together in a mad way, as if that were his usual
manner of summoning his associate. The voice mister Slington was heard through the clatter
from the opposite side of the staircase, and he came in. He had
not expected the pleasure of meeting me I have seen several artful men brought to
a stag, but I never saw a man so aghast as he was when
his eyes rested on mine. Julius Caesar cried, beck With staggering between us,
Miss Samson, missed Samson, Julius Caesar, Julius, mister Samson is
a friend of my soul. Julius keeps me piled with liquor morning, noon
and night. Julius is a real benefactor. Julius threw the tea and coffee
out of the window when I used to have any. Julius empties all the
water jugs of their content and fills them with spirits. Julius winds me up
and keeps me going. Boil the brandy, Julius. There was a rusty
and fury saucepan in the ashes. The ashes looked like the accumulation of weeks.
And beck With rolling and staggering between us as he were going to plunge
headlong into the fire, got the saucepan out and tried to force it into
Stington's hand. Boil the brandy, Julius Caesar, come do you usual office?
Boil the brandy. He became so fierce in his gesticulation with the sauceman
that I expected to see him lay open Slington's head with it. I therefore
put out my hand to check him. He reeled back to the sofa,
sat there, panting, shaking, and red eyed in his rags of a
dressing gown, looking at hers both. I noticed then that there was nothing
to drink on the table but brandy, and nothing to eat but salted herrings
and a heart sickly highly peppered stew At all events, mister Sampson, said
Slington, offering me the smooth gravel path for the last time. I thank
you for interfering between me and this unfortunate man's violence. However you came here,
mister Sampson, or with whatever motive you came here, at least,
I thank you for that boil. The brandy, muttered Beckward, without gratifying
his to know how I came there, I said, quietly, how is
your niece, mister Slington. He looked hard at me, and I looked
hard at him. I am sorry to say, mister Sampson, that my
niece has proved treacherous and ungrateful to her best friend. She left me without
a word of notice or explanation. She was misled, no doubt by some
designing rascal. Perhaps you may have heard of it. I did hear that
she was misled by a designing rascal. In fact, I have proof of
it. Are you sure of that? Said he quite boil The brandy muttered,
beckwith company to breakfast, Julius, Caesar, do your usual office,
provide the usual breakfast, dinner, tea and supper, boil the brandy.
The eyes of Slington looked from him to me, and he said, after
a moment's consideration, mister Samson, you're a man of the world, and
so am I. I will be plain with you. Oh no, you
won't, said I, shaking my head. I tell you, sir,
I will be plain with you, and I tell you you will not,
said I. I know all about you. You plain with any one.
Nonsense, nonsense, I plainly tell you, mister Samson. He went on,
with a manner almost composed, that I understand your object. You want
to save your funds and escape from your liabilities. These are old tricks of
the trade. With you off this, gentleman. But you will not do
it, sir, You will not succeed. You have not an easy adversary
to play against. When you play against me, we shall have to inquire
in due time when and how mister Beckwith fell into his present habits. With
that remark, Sir, I put this poor creature and his incoherent wanderings of
speech aside, and vish you a good morning and a better case next time.
When he was saying this, Beckwith filled a half pine glass with brandy.
At this moment he threw the brandy at his face and threw the glass
after it. Slington put up his hands, half blinded with the spirit,
and cut with the glass across the forehead. At the sound of the breakage,
a fourth person came into the room, closing the door and stood at
it. He was a very quiet, but very keen looking man, with
iron gray hair and slightly lame. Slington pulled out his handkerchief, assuaged the
pain in his sparting eyes, and dabbled the blood on his forehead. He
was a long time about it, and I saw that in doing of it
a tremendous change over him, occasioned by the change in Beckwith, who ceased
to pant and tremble, sat upright and never took his eyes off him I
never in my life saw a face in which aberance and determination was so forcibly
painted as in Beckwit's. Then look at me, you villain, said Beckwith,
and see me as I really am. I took these rooms to make
them a trap for you. I came into them as a drunkard, to
date the trap for you. You fell into the trap, and you will
never leave it alive. On the morning when you last went to see mister
Sampson's office, I had seen him first. Your plot had been known to
both of us all along, and you have been counterplotted all along. What
have you been cajoled into putting the prize of two thousand pounds in your power?
I was to be done to death with brain, and Randy not proving
quick enough with something quicker. Have I never seen you when you thought my
senses gone, pouring your little bottle into my glass? Why you, murderer
and forger, Alone here with you in the dead of night, as I
have so often been, I have had my hand upon the trigger of a
pistol twenty times to blow your brains out. This sudden starting up the thing
that he had supposed to be his imbecile victim into a determined man with a
subtled resolution to hunt him down and be the death of him, mercilessly expressed
from head to foot, was in the first shock too much for him.
Without any figure of speech, he staggered under it. But there is no
greater mistake than to suppose that a man who is a calculating criminal is in
any phase of his guilt otherwise than true to himself and perfectly consistent with his
whole character. Such a man commits murder, and murder is the natural culmination
of his course. Such a man has to outface murder, and will do
it with hardihood and effrontery. It is a sort of fashion to express surprise
that any notorious criminal, having such a crime upon his conscience can so brave
it out. Do you think that he had it in his conscience at all,
or had a conscience to have it upon he would ever have committed the
crime perfectly consistent with himself, as I believe all such monsters to be.
The Slington recovered himself and showed a defiance that was sufficiently cold and quiet.
He was white, he was haggard, and he was changed, but only
as a sharper who had played for a great stake, and had been outwitted
and had lost the game. Listen to me, you villain, said Beckwith,
And let every word you hear me say be a stab in your wicked
heart. When I took these rooms to throw myself in your way and lead
you on the scheme that I knew my appearance and supposed character and habits would
suggest to such a devil. How did I know that? Because you were
no stranger to me, I knew you to be the cruel wretch who,
for so much money, had killed one innocent girl while she trusted him implicitly,
and who was by inches killing another Slington took out a snuff box,
took a pinch of snuff and laughed. But see here, said Beckwith,
never looking away, never raising his voice, never relaxing his face, never
unclenching his hand. See what a dull wolf you have been, after all,
the infatuated drunkard who never drank a fiftieth part of liquor you plied him
with, but poured it away here, there, everywhere, almost before your
eyes, who brought over the fellow you said to watch him and to ply
him by outbidding you in his bribe before he had been at his work three
days, with whom you have observed no caution yet, who was so bent
on bridding the earth of you as a wild beast, that he would have
defeated you if you had been ever so prudent. That drunkard, whom you
have many a time left on the floor of this room, and who has
even let you go out of it alive and undeceived, when you had turned
him over with your foot, has almost as often on the same night,
within an hour, within a few minutes, watched you awake, had his
hand in at your pillow when you were asleep, turned over your papers,
taken samples from your bottles and packets of powder, changed their contents, rifled
every secret in your life life. He had had another pinch of snuff in
his hand, but had gradually let a drop from between his fingers to the
floor, where he now smoothed it out with his foot, looking down at
it. The while that drunkard said beckwith, who had free access to your
rooms at all times, that he might drink the strong drinks that you left
in his way, and be sooner ended holding no more terms with you that
he would hold with a tiger has had his master key for all your locks,
his tests for all your poisons, his clue to your cipher writing.
He can tell you, as well as you can tell him, how long
it took to complete the deed, What doses there were, what intervals,
What signs of gradual decay upon mind and body? What distempered fancies were produced,
what observable changes, what physical pain? He can tell you as well
as you can tell tell him. That all this was recorded day by day
as a lesson of experience for future service. He can tell you better than
you can tell him where that journal is. At this moment, Slington stopped
the action of his foot and looked at Beckwith. No, said the latter,
as if answering a question from him. Not in the drawer of the
writing desk that opens with the spring, it is not there, and it
never will be there again. Then you are a thief, said Slington,
without any change whatever in the inflexible purpose which it was quite terrific even to
me to contemplate, and from the power of which I had always felt convinced
it was impossible for this wretch to escape. Beckwith returned, and I am
your niece's shadow too. With an imprecation. Slington put his hand to his
head, tore out some hair, and flung it to the ground. It
was the end of the smooth walk. He destroyed it in the action,
and will soon be seen that his use for it was past. Beckworth went
on whenever you left here, I left here, although I understood that you
found it necessary to pause in the completion of that purpose to avert suspicion.
Still, I watched you close with that poor confiding girl. When I had
the diary and I could read it word by word. It is only about
the night before your last visit to Scarborough. You remember the night you slept
with a small flat while tied to your wrist. I sent to mister Samson,
who was kept out of view. This is mister Samson's trusty servants standing
by the door. We three saved your niece among us. Slington looked at
us all, took an uncertain step or two from the place where he had
stood, returned to it, and glanced about him in a very curious way,
as one of the meaner reptiles might looking for a hole to hide in.
I noticed at the same time that a singular change took place in the
figure of the man as if it collapsed within his clothes, and they consequently
became ill, shapen and ill fitting. You shall know, said Beckwid,
for I hope the knowledge will be bitter and terrible to you. Why you
have been pursued by one man, and why when the whole interest that mister
Sampson represents would have expended any money in hunting you down, you have been
tracked to death at a single individual's charge. I hear you have had the
name of Melthem on your lips. Sometimes I saw, in addition to those
other changes, a sudden stoppage came upon his breathing. When you send the
sweet girl whom you murdered, you know with what artfully made out surroundings and
probabilities you sent her to Meltham's office before taking her abroad to originate the transaction
that doomed her to the grave. It fell to Meltham's lot to see her
and to speak with her. It did not fall to his lot to save
her. Though I knew he would freely give up his own life to have
done it. He admired her. I would say he loved her deeply.
If I thought it possible that you could understand the word. When she was
sacrificed, he was thoroughly assured of your guilt. Having lost her, he
had but one object left in life, and that was to avenge her and
destroy you. I saw the villain's nostril rise and fall convulsively, but I
saw no moving at his mouth. That man meltham Beck, with steadily pursued,
was as absolutely certain that you could never him in this world if he
devoted himself to a destruction with his utmost fidelity and earnestness, and if he
divided the sacred duty with no other duty in life, as he was certain
that in achieving it he would be a poor instrument in the hand of Providence,
and would do well before Heaven in striking you out from among living men.
I am that man, and I thank God that I have done my
work. If Slington had been running for his life from swift footed savages a
dozen miles, he could not have shown more empathetic signs of being oppressed at
heart and laboring for breath than he showed now when he looked at the pursuer
who had so relentlessly hunted him down. You never saw me under my right
name before you see me under my right name. Now you shall see me
once again in the body, when you are tried for your life. You
shall see me once again in the spirit, when the cord is around your
neck and the crowds are crying against you. When Maltam had spoken these last
words, the miscreen suddenly turned his face away and seemed to strike his mouth
with his open hand. At the same instant, the room was filled with
a new and powerful odor, and almost at the same time he broke into
a crooked run, leap start. I have no name for the spasm,
and fell with a dull weight that shook the heavy old doors and windows in
their frames. That was a fitting end of him. When we saw that
he was dead, we drew away from the room, and Melton, giving
me his hands, said with a weary air, I have no more work
on earth, my friend, but I shall see her again elsewhere. It
was in vain that I tried to rally him. He might have saved her.
He said he had not saved her, and he reproached himself. He
had lost her, and he was broken hearted. The purpose that has sustained
me over Samson, and there is nothing now to hold to life. I
am not fit for life. I am weak and spiritless. I have no
hope and no object. My day is done. In truth, I could
hardly have believed that a broken man who then spoke to me was the man
who had so strongly and so differently impressed me when his purpose was before him.
I used such entries with him as I could, But he still said,
and always said, in a patient, undemonstrative way, nothing could avail
him. He was broken hearted. He died early in the next spring.
He was buried by the side of the poor young lady for whom he had
cherished those tender and unhappy regrets, and he left all he had to his
sister. She lived to be a happy wife and mother. She married my
sister's son, who succeeded poor Malcolm. She is living now, and her
children ride about the garden on my walking stick when I go to see her
and off. Hunted down by Charles Dickens