A Rival Embrace.
Sir Murray Gernon was right in his surmise, for when McCray, eager to secure the person of his supposed rival, hurried across the drawing-room, and in the darkness made a bound to where he had seen the lighted match fade out, his enemy had made a slight movement, so that he failed to obtain a good hold; and in the brief struggle which ensued close to the fireplace, McCray was thrown heavily upon the floor, and his adversary dashed through the drawing-room out into the hall, striking down Sir Murray in his effort to reach the library. But McCray was after him directly, and had no hesitation in leaving his master where he, too, had knocked him down; while, following the burglars example, he leaped, in his excitement, right through the broken window.
“Oh, my best pelargoniums!” groaned the gardener, as he picked himself up, after coming down crash into a flower-bed beneath the window. “Ye shall pay for this, though, Maister Gurdon, or my name’s not Sandy McCray!” And then, favoured by a break in the clouds, he caught sight of Gurdon running rapidly towards the bridge.
“Ye’ll not get there first, laddie,” muttered the Scot, as, exerting all his powers, he dashed over the lawn, to cut off his quarry’s retreat in that direction; and being the lustier man of the two, he soon had the satisfaction of seeing his foe double, and run along the brink of the lake, as if to get round the house; for it was growing each moment lighter, the wind springing up, and sweeping the heavy curtain of clouds from the face of the heavens.
“If ye think I canna rin ye doon, Jock Gurdon,” muttered McCray, “ye’re making a meestake. I’ll have ye, if I rin for a week!”
He pressed on, gaining so fast upon the burglar, that he once more doubled, and dodging round a thick plantation of shrubs, McCray was, for a minute, thrown off the scent; but his shrewd Scottish nature stood him in good stead.
“He’ll make again for the bridge,” he thought; and with a grim smile of determination upon his face, he ran in that direction; but, to his great disappointment, he seemed to be at fault, for there was no sign anywhere of the fugitive. But, for all that, Sandy’s idea was correct, as he found, after harking backwards and forwards two or three times. Gurdon—for it was indeed he who had, with his companions, attempted the burglary—had been making his way for the bridge, when his ear, sharpened by fright, told him that his enemy was coming in the same direction, and he directly crouched amidst a bed of laurels, to wait, panting, for an opportunity to escape. He knew that transportation must be his fate if taken; and that if, in revenge, he said anything respecting the character of Lady Gernon, it would merely be taken as the calumny of a discharged servant. No, he thought, he must not be taken—he could not afford yet to give up his liberty.
His breath came more freely at the end of a minute, for his heart had been labouring heavily. Wasted by drink and debauchery, he was in no training for such violent effort; and he was beginning to hope that an opportunity might yet offer for his reaching the bridge, and escaping through the park—the other way by the village he dared not try—when, with a rush, McCray came right through the thicket where he crouched; and, like a hare roused from its form, away he darted, and the pursuit commenced anew.
There was no hiding now: there was too much light, and pursuer and pursued were too close together. Making almost frantic efforts to get away, after dodging and doubling again and again, to the great injury of McCray’s long legs, which, when at speed, carried him again and again past his foe, Gurdon made a feint or two and then dashed fiercely for the bridge once more.
“If I’d only got one of those powdered loons to stop his gait there,” muttered McCray; and he made a furious effort, nearly catching his prey, and completely cutting off his retreat, for as the Scot shot by him, Gurdon doubled again, and ran along the lake, but only for a little way. There was a bend there, and the water was on both sides of him as he ran along the tongue of land: he must either face his enemy in another rush for the bridge, or take to the black water, gleaming below him.
But Gurdon had, to his cost, always been a hater of the limpid element, and, turning now like a beast at bay, he dashed, with clenched fists, at the gardener, intending to fell him, and then rush on for liberty. But he did not know his man: as he came down, with a fierce charge, McCray merely leaned a little on one side so as to avoid the blow, and the next instant his arms were wreathed tightly round the ex-butler’s body, and the two were struggling furiously upon the turf, rolling over and over, their muttered ejaculations and execrations mingling in a fierce growl as of two savage beasts of prey.
“Ah! would ye?” exclaimed McCray, at last. “Ye murderous-minded villin, would ye use a knife? Take that—and that, and—Save us, we shall be—”
McCray’s ejaculation was suddenly brought to an end, for in the fierce struggle made for the possession of the knife Gurdon had managed to draw and open, at a time when the gardener thought him about to succumb, they had, unnoticed, drawn nearer and nearer to the edge of the lake, and, perhaps to the saving then of the Scotchman’s life, suddenly plunged together into one of the deepest parts.
Gurdon dropped the knife as he rose to the surface, and, loosing his grasp of his pursuer, he struggled furiously to reach the bank; but McCray’s northern blood was up to a heat so fierce, that the water seemed only to make it hiss furiously instead of quenching his ardour, and he held on to his adversary like a bull-dog, when, with the fear of drowning before him, Gurdon uttered the wild appealing cry for help that had been heard at the Castle, and turned once more to struggle with his foe.
Once again only, as his head was above water, did Gurdon shriek, giving utterance to a yell of horror that was hardly human, for the feeling was strong upon him now, as they struggled farther and farther from the shore, that the gardener was trying to drown him. But no such thought was in McCray’s breast: his determination was to make a capture, and, unlike his enemy, a capital swimmer, the water had no terrors for him. Every one of Gurdon’s efforts was interpreted to mean escape, and, heedless of the peril and suffocation, the struggle was continued, the water being lashed into foam, till, at last, McCray, as they rose to the surface after a long immersion, awoke to the fact that his quarry was nearly exhausted, and that they were in deadly peril; for Gurdon’s arms were clutched round him in a deadly grip that there was no undoing. They were far from the bank, and, in the rapid glance he took around, he knew that they were in about twelve feet of water.
“There’ll be something for the big pike to go at, if it does come to it,” thought McCray, with a grim feeling of despair; “but, anyhow, he’ll trouble the puir lassie nae mair.”
The water, bubbling round his lips, checked McCray’s thoughts for a few moments, or rather gave them a new direction; but rising once more to the surface, with one arm at liberty, he struck out fiercely, to keep himself afloat.
“If I could get to the bridge-piles!” he thought, as through the darkness he could dimly make out the little green, slimy pier, not many yards from him. “Gude help me! I dinna want to die yet!”
He fought on for his life, beating the strangling water from his lips, and tearing furiously to reach the pile, where, perhaps, he might be able to hold on till help came. Once, through the darkness, he heard voices, and caught a glimpse of a light dancing about; but the next moment the water was thundering in his ears, and its blackness seemed to blot out all vision.
Another few moments of strangling horror, and he had once more fought his way to the surface; but he was yards away from the bridge-piles, and a feeling now of despair came upon him, dulling his tired faculties, and seeming to warn him that all was over. There was no help that he could see near at hand, for the servants with Sir Murray Gernon did not seem to know which direction to take. It seemed so hard, too, just as he had begun to feel hopeful about his love, to be dragged down by their common enemy to the depths of the lake; and at last, as he felt the water closing over him, he gave another fierce struggle, forcing himself up an instant, till he had uttered the hoarse, harsh, despairing cry of a dying man—dying in the hour of his full strength—and then there were a few bubbles and rings upon the surface of the water, where, locked still in their deadly embrace, the rivals had gone down.