Volume Two—Chapter Thirteen.
A Human Storm.
The woman who had been acting the part of nurse to old Gemp was seated by the table, busily knitting a pair of blue worsted stockings by the light of a tallow candle, and every few minutes the snuff had so increased, and began to show so fungus-like a head, that the needles had to be left, a pair of snuffers taken out of their home in a niche that ran through the stem of the tin candlestick, and used to cut off the light-destroying snuff, with the effect that the snuffers were not sufficiently pinched to, and a thread of pale blue smoke rose from the incandescence within, and certainly with no good effect as far as fragrance was concerned.
Old Gemp had become a great deal better. He had been up and dressed, and sat by the fireside for a couple of hours that afternoon, and had then expressed his determination not to go to bed.
But his opposition was very slight, and he was got to bed, where he seemed to be lying thinking, and trying to recall something which evidently puzzled him. In fact all at once he called his nurse.
“Mrs Preddle! Mrs Preddle!”
“Yes,” said that lady with a weary air.
“What was I thinking about when I was took badly?”
“I don’t know,” said the woman sourly. “About somebody else’s business, I suppose.”
Old Gemp grunted, and shook his head. Then he was silent, and lay staring about the room, passing his hand across his forehead every now and then, or shaving himself with one finger, with which all at once he would point at his nurse.
“I say!” he cried sharply.
“Bless the man! how you made me jump!” cried Mrs Preddle. “And, for goodness’ sake, don’t point at me like that! Easy to see you’re getting better, and won’t want me long.”
“No, no! don’t go away!” he exclaimed. “I can’t think about it.”
“Well, and no wonder neither! Why, bless the man! people don’t have bad fits o’ ’plexy and not feel nothing after! There, lie still, and go to sleep, there’s a good soul! It’ll do you good.”
Mrs Preddle snuffed the candle again, and made another unpleasant smell of burning, but paid no heed to it, fifty years of practice having accustomed her to that odour—an extremely common one in those days, when in every little town there was a tallow-melter, the fumes of whose works at certain times made themselves pretty well-known for some distance round.
The question was repeated by old Gemp at intervals all through the evening—“What was I thinking about when I was took badly?” and Mrs Preddle became irritated by his persistence.
But this made no difference whatever to the old man, who scraped his stubbly chin with his finger, and then pointed, to ask again. For the trouble that had been upon his mind when he was stricken hung over him like a dark cloud, and he was always fighting mentally to learn what it all meant.
“What was it?—what was it? What was I thinking about?” Over and over and over, and no answer would come. Mrs Preddle went on with her knitting, and ejaculated “Bless the man!” and dropped stitches, and picked them up again, and at last grew so angry, that, upon old Gemp asking her, for about the hundredth time that night, that same wearisome question, she cried out:
“Drat the man! how should I know? Look ye here, if you—Oh! I won’t stand no more of this nonsense?” She rose and went into the kitchen. “Doctor Luttrell said if he got more restless he was to have it,” she grumbled to herself, “and he’s quite unbearable to-night!”
She poured out a double dose from a bottle left in her charge, and chuckled as she said to herself, “That’ll quiet him for the night.”
Old Gemp was sitting up in bed when she returned to the bed-room; and once more his pointing finger rose, and he was about to speak, when Mrs Preddle interfered.
“There, that’ll do, my dear! and now you’ve got to take this here physic directly, to do you good.”
The old man looked at her in a vacant, helpless way for a few moments, and then his countenance grew angry, and he motioned the medicine aside.
“Oh, come now, it’s of no use! You’ve got to take it, so now then!”
She pressed the cup towards his lips; but the old man struck at it angrily, and it flew across the room, splashing the bed with the opium-impregnated liquid, and then shattering on the cemented floor.
“Well, of all the owd rips as ever I did see!” cried the woman. “Oh, you are better, then!”
“What was I thinking about when I was took badly?” cried Gemp, pointing as if nothing had happened.
“Oh, about your money in the bank for aught I know!” cried the woman.
“Ha!”
The old man clapped his hands to his forehead, and held them there for a few minutes, staring straight before him at the bed-room wall.
He had uttered that ejaculation so sharply that the woman started, and recoiled from him, in ignorance of the fact that she had touched the key-note that had set the fibres of his memory athrill.
“Why, what’s come to you?” she said. “Sakes, man, you’re not worse?”
Old Gemp did not reply for a few moments. Then, stretching out one hand, and pointing at his nurse:
“Go and fetch doctor. Go at once! Quick, I say, quick!”
The woman stared in alarm for a few moments, and then, catching her bonnet and shawl from a nail, she hurriedly put them on and went out.
“And I’ve been a-lying here,” panted Gemp, sliding his legs out of bed, and dressing himself quickly. “I remember now. I know. And perhaps all gone—deeds, writings—all gone. I knew there was something wrong—I knew there was something wrong!”
In five minutes he was out in the street, and had reached his friend the tailor, who stared aghast at him at first, but as soon as he heard his words blazed up as if fire had been applied to tow, and then subsided with a cunning look.
“Let’s keep it quiet, neighbour,” he said; “and go to-morrow morning, and see what we can do with Hallam. Ah!” he cried, as a thought flashed across his mind, “he has not been at the bank these three or four days. You’re right, neighbour, there is something wrong.”
Just at that moment, seeing the door open, another neighbour stepped in, heard the last words, and saw Gemp’s wild, miserly face agitated by the horror of his loss.
“What’s wrong?” he cried.
“Wrong? That scoundrel Hallam! that thief! that—”
The new-comer started.
“Don’t say there’s owt wrong wi’ Dixons’!” he panted.
“Yes, yes!” cried Gemp. “My deeds! my writings! I saw parson and Thickens busy together. They were tackling Hallam when I was took badly. Hallam’s a rogue! I warned you all—a rogue! a rogue! See how he has been going on!”
“Neighbour,” groaned the new-comer, “they’ve got all I have in the world up yonder in the bank.”
“Oh, but it can’t be true,” said the tailor, with a struggle to catch at a straw of hope.
“Ay, but it is true,” said the last comer, whose face was ghastly; “and I’m a ruined man.”
“Nay, nay, wait a bit. P’r’aps Hallam has only been ill.”
“Ill? It was he, then, I’ll swear, I saw to-night, walk by me in a cloak and cap. He were going off. Neighbours, are we to sit still and bear a thing like this?”
“I’ll hev my writings! I’ll hev my writings!” cried Gemp hoarsely, as he clawed at the air with his trembling hands.
“Is owt wrong?” said a fresh voice, and another of the Castor tradesmen sauntered in, pipe in mouth.
In another minute he knew all they had to tell and the light was indeed now applied to the tow. Reason and common-sense were thrown to the winds, and a wild, selfish madness took their place.
Dixons’, the stable, the most substantial house in the county, the stronghold where the essence of all the property for miles round was kept, was now a bank of straw; and the flame ran from house to house like the wildfire that it was. Had an enemy invaded the place, or the fire that burns, there could not have been greater consternation. The stability of the bank touched so many; while, as the news flew from mouth to mouth, hundreds who had not a shilling in the bank, never had, nor ever would have, took up the matter with the greatest indignation, and joined in the excitement, and seemed the most aggrieved.
There was nothing to go upon but the old man’s suspicion; but that spark had been enough to light the fire of popular indignation, and before long, in the midst of a score of different proposals, old Gemp started for the bank, supported by his two nearest neighbours, and across the dim market-place the increasing crowd made its way.
Mr Trampleasure was smoking his evening cigar on the step of the private door. The cigar, a present from Sir Gordon: the permission to smoke it there a present from Mrs Trampleasure.
He heard wonderingly the noise of tumult, saw the crowd approaching, and prudently went in and shut and bolted the doors, going up to a window to parley with the crowd, as the bell was rung furiously, and some one beat at the door of the bank with a stick.
“What is it?” he said.
“My deeds! my writings!” cried Gemp. “I want my deeds!”
“Who’s that? Mr Gemp? My dear sir, the bank’s closed, as you know. Come to-morrow morning.”
“No, no! Give the man his deeds. Here, break down the door!” cried a dozen voices; and the rough element that was to be found in King’s Castor, as well as elsewhere, uttered a shout, and began to kick at the panels.
“Come away, Gemp. We shall get nothing if these fellows break in.”
“Look here!” cried a shrill voice at the window; and there was a cessation of the noise, as Mrs Trampleasure leaned out. “We’ve got pistols and blunderbusses here, as you all know, and if you don’t be off, we shall fire.”
“Open the doors then,” cried a rough voice.
“We haven’t got the keys. Mr Thickens keeps them.”
There was a shout at this, for the crowd, like all crowds, was ready to snatch at a change, and away they ran towards the mill.
In five minutes though, they were tearing back, failing to find Thickens; and a cry had been raised by the man with the rough voice, and one of the poorest idlers of the town, the keenest redresser of wrong now.
“Hallam’s! To Hallam’s!” he yelled. “Hev him out, lads. We’ll hev him out. Hurray, lads, come on!”
The tradesmen and depositors at Dixons’ Bank looked aghast now at the mischief done. They saw how they had opened a crack in the dam, and that the crack had widened, the dam had given way, and the turbulent waters were about to carry all before them.
It was in vain to speak, for the indignant poor were in the front, and the tailor, Gemp, and others who had been the leaders in the movement found themselves in a pitiful minority, and were ready to retreat.
But that was impossible. They were in the crowd, and were carried with them across the market-place and down the street, to Hallam’s house, where they beat and thumped at the door.
There was no answer for a few minutes, and they beat and roared. Then some one threw a stone and smashed a pane of glass. This earned a cheer, and a shower of stones followed, the panes shivering and tinkling down inside and out of the house.
Millicent was wrong when she said that Thisbe had gone to bed, for that worthy was having what she called a quiet read in her room, and now as the windows were breaking, and Millicent was shielding Julie whom, half-awake, she had just dressed, there was an increase in the roar, for Thisbe had gone down, more indignant than alarmed, and thrown open the door.
Then there was a dead silence, the silence of surprise, as Thisbe stood in the doorway, and as a great hulking lad strove to push by her, struck him a sounding slap on the face.
There was a yell of laughter at this, and silence again, as the woman spoke.
“What do you want?” she cried boldly.
“Hallam! Hallam! In with you, lads: fetch him out.”
“No, no; stop! stop! My deeds, my writings!” shrieked Gemp; but his voice was drowned in the yelling of the mob, who now forced their way in, filling the hall, the dining and drawing-rooms, and then making for the old-fashioned staircase.
“He’s oop-stairs, lads; hev him down!” cried the leader, and the men pressed forward, with a yell, their faces looking wild and strange by the light of the lamp and the candle Thisbe had placed upon a bracket by the stairs.
But here their progress was stopped by Millicent, who, pale with dread, but with a spot as of fire in either cheek, stood at the foot of the staircase, holding the frightened child to her side, while Thisbe forced her way before her.
“What do you want?” she cried firmly.
“Thy master, missus. Stand aside, we won’t hurt thee. We want Hallam.”
“What do you want with him?” cried Millicent again.
“We want him to give oop the money he’s stole, and the keys o’ bank. Stand aside wi’ you. Hev him down.”
There was a rush, a struggle, and Millicent and her shrieking child were dragged down roughly, but good-humouredly, by the crowd that filled the hall, while others kept forcing their way in. As for Thisbe, as she fought and struck out bravely, her hands were pinioned behind her, and the group were held in a corner of the hall, while with a shout the mob rushed upstairs.
“Here, let go,” panted Thisbe to the men who held her. “I won’t do so any more. Let me take the bairn.”
The men loosed her at once, and they formed a ring about their prisoners.
“Let me have her, Miss Milly,” she whispered, and she took Julie in her arms, while Millicent, freed from this charge, made an effort to get to the stairs.
“Nay, nay, missus. Thou’rt better down here,” said one of her gaolers roughly; and the trembling woman was forced to stay, but only to keep imploring the men to let her pass.
Meanwhile the mob were running from room to room without success; and at each shout of disappointment a throb of hope and joy made Millicent’s heart leap.
She exchanged glances with Thisbe.
“He has escaped,” she whispered.
“More shame for him then,” cried Thisbe. “Why arn’t he here to protect his wife and bairn?”
At that moment a fierce yelling and cheering was heard upstairs, where the mob had reached the attic door and detected that it was locked on the inside.
The door was strong, but double the strength would not have held it against the fierce onslaught made, and in another minute, amidst fierce yelling, the tide began to set back, as the word was passed down, “They’ve got him.”
Millicent’s brain reeled, and for a few moments she seemed to lose consciousness; but as she saw Hallam, pale, bleeding, his hair torn and dishevelled, dragged down the stairs by the infuriated mob, her love gave her strength. Wresting herself from those who would have restrained her, she forced her way to her husband’s side, flung her arms about him as he was driven back against the wall, and, turning her defiant face to the mob, made of her own body a shield.
There was a moment’s pause, then a yell, and the leader’s voice cried:
“Never mind her. Hev him out, lads, and then clear the house.”
There was a fresh roar at this, and then blows were struck right and left in the dim light; the lamp was dashed over; while the curtains by the window, where it stood, blazed up, and cast a lurid light over the scene. For a moment the crowd recoiled as they saw the flushed and bleeding face of Christie Bayle, as he struck out right and left till he had fought his way to where he could plant himself before Millicent and her husband, and try to keep the assailants back.
The surprise was only of a few minutes’ duration.
“You lads, he’s only one. Come on! Hallam: Let’s judge and jury him.”
“You scoundrels!” roared Bayle, “a man must be judged by his country, and not by such ruffians as you.”
“Hev him out, lads, ’fore the place is burnt over your heads.”
“Back! stand back, cowards!” cried Bayle; “do you not see the woman and the child? Back! Out of the place, you dogs!”
“Dogs as can bite, too, parson,” cried the leader. “Come on.”
He made a dash at Hallam, getting him by the collar, but only to collapse with a groan, so fierce was the blow that struck him on the ear.
Again there was a pause—a murmur of rage, and the wooden support of the valance of the curtains began to crackle, while the hall was filling fast with stifling smoke.
One leader down, another sprang in his place, for the crowd was roused.
“Hev him out, lads! Quick, we have him now.”
There was a rush, and Hallam was torn from Millicent’s grasp—from Christie Bayle’s protecting arms, and with a yell the crowd rushed out into the street, lit now by the glow from the smashed hall windows and the fire that burned within.
“My husband! Christie—dear friend—help, oh, help!” wailed Millicent, as she tottered out to the front, in time to see Bayle literally leap to Hallam’s side and again strike the leader down.
It was the last effort of his strength; and now a score of hands were tearing and striking at the wretched victim, when there was the clattering of horses’ hoofs and a mounted man rode right into the crowd with half-a-dozen followers at his side.
“Stop!” he roared. “I am a magistrate. Constables: your duty.”
The mob fell back, and as five men, with whom was Thickens, seized upon Hallam, Millicent tottered into the circle and sank at her husband’s knees.
“Saved!” she sobbed, “saved!”
For the first time Hallam found his voice, and cried, as he tried to shake himself free:
“This—this is a mistake—constables. Loose me. These men—”
“It is no mistake, Mr Hallam, you are arrested for embezzlement,” said the mounted man sternly.
“Three cheers for Sir Gordon Bourne and Dixons’,” shouted one in the crowd.
Christie Bayle had just time to catch Millicent Hallam in his arms as her senses left her, and with a piteous moan she sank back utterly stunned.