CHAPTER XIX.
There are few things in life so troublesome or so tedious as the turnings back which one is often obliged to make, as one journeys along over the surface of the world; the more especially because these turnings back happen, in an infinite proportion, oftener to the hasty and the impatient than to other men; and that, too, on account of their very haste and impatience, which makes them cast a shoe here, or drop their whip there, or ride off and forget their spurs at the other place. But yet it is not an unpleasant sight, to see some sedate old hound, when a whole pack of reckless young dogs have overrun the scent in their eagerness, get them all gently back again, under the sage direction of the huntsman and his whips, and with upturned nose, and tongue like a church bell, announce the recovery.
Know then, dear readers, that in our eagerness to get at the scene just depicted, we have somewhat overrun the scent, and must return, however unwillingly, to the time and circumstances, under which Henry Beauchamp left Mr. Tims of Ryebury, on the preceding night. It was, as may be remembered, fine, clear, autumn weather. The night, indeed, would have been dark, but for the moon, which poured a grand flood of light through the valleys, and over the plains; and Mr. Tims, who loved the light--not so much because his own ways were peculiarly good, as because it is known to be a great scarer of those whose ways are more evil still--remarked with satisfaction, as he ushered his guest to the door, that it was as clear as day.
"Sally, Sally!" he exclaimed, as soon as Mr. Beauchamp was gone, "are all the doors and windows shut?"
"Lord bless me, yes!" answered the dirty maid, shouting in return from the kitchen, like Achilles from the trenches. "As fast shut as hands can make them."
"What is that noise, then?" demanded the miser, suspiciously.
"Only me putting in the lower bolt of the back-door," answered the maid.
"Oh, Sally, Sally! you never will do things at the time you are bid!" cried the reproachful usurer. "I told you always to shut up at dusk. But come here, and put on your bonnet. I want you to run down to the town for a stamp."
Sally grumbled something about going out so late, and meeting impudent men in the lanes; but after a lapse of time, which the miser thought somewhat extraordinary in length, she appeared equipped for the walk, and received her master's written directions as to the stamp, or rather stamps, he wanted, and where they were to be found in Emberton. The miser then saw her to the door, locked, bolted, and barred it after her departure, and returning to the parlor, lifted the dim and long-wicked candle, bearing on its pale and sickly sides the evidence of many a dirty thumb and finger; and then with slow, and somewhat feeble steps, climbed, one by one, the stairs, and retired to a high apartment at the back of the house, for which he seemed to entertain a deep and reverential affection.
Well, indeed, might he love it; for it was the temple of his divinity, the place in which his riches and his heart reposed, and which contained his every feeling. There, shrined in a safe of iron, let into the wall, were the Lares and Penates of his house, bearing either the goodly forms of golden disks--with the face of the fourth George pre-eminent on one side, and of his namesake saint all saddleless and naked, on the other--or otherwise, the forms of paper parallelograms, inscribed with cabalistic characters, implying promises to pay. Here Mr. Tims sat down, after having closed the door, and placed the candle on a table; and, throwing one leg, clothed in its black worsted stockings, over the other, he sat in a sort of rapt and reverential trance, worshiping Mammon devoutly, in the appropriate forms of vulgar and decimal fractions, interest, simple and compound.
Scarcely had he gone up-stairs, however, when a change of scene came over the lower part of his house. A door, which communicated with the steps that led down to the kitchen, moved slowly upon its hinges, and the moonlight streaming through the grated fan window, above the outer door, fell upon the form of a man, emerging, with a careful and noiseless step, from the lower story into the passage. The beams, which were strong enough to have displayed the features of any one where this very suspicious visitor stood, now fell upon nothing like the human face divine, the countenance of the stranger being completely covered and concealed by a broad black crape, tied tightly behind his head. As soon as he had gained the passage, and stood firm in the moonlight, another form appeared, issuing from the mouth of the same narrow and somewhat steep staircase, with a face equally well concealed. A momentary conversation was then carried on in a whisper between the two, and the first apparition, looking sharply at the chinks of the several doors around, seemingly to discover whether there was any light within, replied to some question from the other, "No, no! He is gone upstairs, to hide it in the room where she told us he kept it. Go down and tell Wat to come up, and keep guard here; and make haste!"
The injunction was soon complied with; and a third person being added to the party, was placed, with a pistol in his hand, between the outer door and the top of the stairs. Before he suffered his two companions to depart, however, on the errand on which they were bent, he seemed to ask two or three questions somewhat anxiously, to which the former speaker replied, "Hurt him! Oh, no! do not be afraid! Only tie him, man! I told you before that we would not. There is never any use of doing more than utility requires. He will cry when he is tied, of course; but do not you budge."
"Very well!" answered the other, in the same low tone, and his two comrades began to ascend the stairs. Before they had taken three steps, however, the first returned again to warn their sentinel not to use his pistol but in the last necessity; observing, that a pistol was a bad weapon, for it made too much noise. He then resumed his way, and in a moment after was hid from his companion. The whole topography of the house seemed well known to the leader of these nocturnal visitants; for, gliding on as noiselessly as possible, he proceeded direct toward the room where the miser sat.
Mr. Tims, little misdoubting that such gentry were already in possession of his house, had remained quietly musing over his gains, somewhat uneasy, indeed, at the absence of Sally, but not much more apprehensive than the continual thoughts of his wealth caused him always to be.
He had indeed once become so incautious, in the eagerness of his contemplations, as to draw forth his large key, and open the strong iron door which covered the receptacle of his golden happiness. But immediately reflecting that Sally was not in the house to give the alarm, if any cause of apprehension arose below, he relocked the chest, and was returning to the table, when a sudden creak of the stairs, as if one of the steps had yielded a little beneath a heavy but cautious foot, roused all his fears. His cheeks and his lips grew pale; his knees trembled; and, with a shaking hand, he raised the candle from the table, and advanced toward the door.
It was opened but too soon; and, ere the unhappy miser reached it, the light fell upon a figure which left him no doubt of the purport of the visit. It was not for his life the old man feared half so much as for his treasure, in the defense of which he would have fought an universe of thieves. A blunderbuss hung over the mantelpiece, and the pulley of an alarum-bell by the window, and the miser's mind vibrated for a single moment between the two. Dropping the candle almost at once, however, he sprang toward the bell, while one of the men shouted to the other near whom he passed, "Stop him! Stop him from the bell! By G--, he will have the whole country upon us!"
Both sprang forward. The candle, which had blazed a moment on the floor, was trampled out, and complete darkness succeeded. Then followed a fearful noise of eager running here and there--the overthrowing of chairs and tables--the dodging round every thing that could be interposed between people animated with the active spirit of flight and pursuit--but not a word was spoken. At length there was a stumble over something--then a heavy fall, and then a sound of struggling, as of two people rolling together where they lay. Another rushed forward, and seemed to grope about in the darkness. "D-- it, you have cut me, Stephen!" cried a low, deep voice.
"Murder! Murder! Murder!" screamed another. "Oh! Oh! Oh!" and all was silent.
Two men had fallen, and another had bent down over them; but only one of those who had rolled on the floor rose up, beside the other who had been kneeling. Both remained quite still, with nothing but the monosyllable, "Hush!" uttered by either.
After a pause of several minutes, the one observed, in a low voice, "You have done him, Stephen!"
"He would have it," replied the other. "Run down and get a light, and do not let the youngster know how it has turned out."
"But I am all bloody!" said the other. "He will see it in a minute. Besides, you have cut my hand to the bone."
"Well, you stay, and I will go down," replied the first.
"Not I!" was the answer, "I'll not stay here in the dark with him."
"Then go down, and do not waste more time," said the first, somewhat sharply. "Tell the boy, if he ask, that the old man cut your hand while you were tying him; but, at all events, make haste."
The other obeyed, and, after a long and silent interval, returned with the light. It flashed upon a ghastly spectacle. There, on the floor, at a short distance from the bell-rope, which he had been endeavoring to reach, lay the figure of the unhappy miser, in the midst of a pool of gore, which was still flowing slowly from two deep gashes in his throat. His mouth was open, and seemed in the very act of gasping. His eyes were unclosed, and turned up, with a cold, dull, meaningless stare; and his gray hair, long, lank, and untrimmed, lay upon his ashy cheeks, dabbled with his own blood. By his side, exactly on the very spot where he had stood when the other left him, appeared the murderer. His features could not be seen, for they were still concealed by the crape over his face; but the attitude of his head and whole person evinced that his eyes were fixed, through the black covering, upon the spot where his victim lay, now first made visible to his sight by the entrance of the light. In his hand was a long clasp-knife, hanging laxly, with the point toward the ground, and a drop or two of blood had dripped from it upon the floor. The disarrayed chamber, the overturned furniture, and a small stream of blood that was winding its way amidst the inequalities of an old-fashioned floor, toward the doorway, where the beams had sunk a little, made up the rest of the scene--and a fearful scene it was.
"Is he quite dead!" demanded the man who entered, after a momentary pause.
"As dead as Adam!" replied the other; "and, as the business is done, there is no use of thinking more about it!" But the very words he used might seem to imply that he had already been thinking more of what had passed than was very pleasing. "Such obstinate fools will have their own way--I never intended to kill him, I am sure; but he would have it; and he is quiet enough now!"
The other approached, and though, perhaps, the less resolute ruffian of the two, he now gazed upon the corpse, and spoke of it with that degree of vulgar jocularity which is often affected to conceal more tremor and agitation then the actors in any horrid scenes may think becoming. Perhaps it was the same feelings that attempted to mask themselves in the overdone gayety which Cromwell displayed on the trial and death of Charles Stuart.
"The old covey is quiet enough now, as you say!" remarked the inferior ruffian, drawing near with the light. "His tongue will never put you or I into the stone pitcher, Stephen."
"His blood may," replied the other, "if we do not make haste. She said the key of the chest was always upon him. There it is in his hand, as I live! We must make you let go your hold, sir; but you grasp it as tight in death as you did in life."
With some difficulty the fingers of the dead man were unclosed, and the large key of the iron safe wrenched from his grasp. The freshly stimulated thirst of plunder did away, for the moment, all feelings of remorse and awe; and the two ruffians hastened to unlock the iron door in the wall, the one wielding the key, while the other held the light, and gazed eagerly over his shoulder. The first drawer they opened caused them both to draw a long, deep breath of self-gratulation, so splendid was the sight of the golden rows of new sovereigns and old guineas it displayed. A bag was instantly produced, and the whole contents emptied in uncounted. The hand of the principal plunderer was upon the second drawer, when a loud ring at the house-bell startled them in their proceedings.
"He will not open the door, surely?" cried the one.
"No, no; I told him not," answered the other. "But let us go down, to make sure."
Setting the light on the floor, they both glided down the stairs, and arrived just in time to prevent their comrade, whom they had left upon guard below, from making an answer, as he was imprudently about to do. The bell was again rung violently, and after a third application of the same kind, some heavy blows of a stick were added. Again and again the bell was rung; and as the visitor seemed determined not to go away without effecting an entrance, the man who seemed to have led throughout the terrible work of that night, put his hand slowly into his pocket, and, drawing forth a pistol, laid his hand upon the lock of the door.
"He will ring there till Sally comes up," observed the other, in a whisper, "and then we shall be all blown."
Just as the click of cocking the pistol announced that the determination of the first ruffian was taken, a receding step was heard, and, calmly replacing the weapon, he said, "He is gone! now let us back to our work quick, Tony!"
"All is very silent up-stairs," said the young man who had been keeping watch, in a low and anxious tone.
"Oh, the old man is tied and gagged sufficiently. Do not be afraid, Wat," replied the other. "Only you keep quite quiet--if any one comes, make no answer; but if they try to force a way in by the back door, which is on the latch, give them a shot. You have good moonlight to take aim;" and mounting the stairs with the same quiet steps, he once more entered the chamber of the miser.
The young man who remained below listened attentively; and though the footfalls of his two comrades were as light as they well could be, yet he heard them distinctly enter the room where they had left the candle. As their steps receded, however, and no other sound followed, he suffered the hand which held the pistol to drop heavily by his side.
"They have killed the old man!" he muttered. "He would never lie still like a lubber, and see them pillage his chests, without making some noise, if he were not dead! I thought that cold-blooded rascal would do it, if it suited his cursed utility. I wish to God I had never--"
But the vain wish was interrupted by the sound of a door, gently opened below; and, in a moment after, the form of Sally, the miser's maid, appeared gliding up with a sort of noiseless step, which showed her not unconscious of all that was proceeding within her master's, dwelling. A low and hasty conversation now took place between her and the man upon watch, who told her his suspicions of the extent to which his companions had pushed their crime, notwithstanding a promise which they had made, it seems, to abstain from hurting their victim. Somewhat to his surprise and disgust, however, he found, that though the woman was trembling in every limb, from personal agitation and fear of discovery, yet she felt little of the horror which he himself experienced, when he reflected on the murder of the poor defenseless old man. She replied in a low, but flippant tone, that dead men tell no tales; and added, that she dared to say Mr. Harding would not have done it, if the old fool had not resisted.
At that moment the light from above began to glimmer upon the stairs, and the two murderers soon after appeared, the one carrying a candle, and the other a heavy bag, with which they at once proceeded into the little parlor, where the old man had so lately sat with Mr. Beauchamp. The other two followed, and the one who had remained below immediately taxed the principal personage in the tragedy, whom we may now call Harding, with the act he had just committed.
"Hush, hush!" cried Harding, in a stern tone, but one, the sternness of which was that of remorse. "Hush, hush, boy! I would not have done it, if I could have helped it. But there," he added, putting the heavy bag upon the table; "there is enough to make your mother easy for the rest of her days."
"And shall I be ever easy again for the rest of mine?" demanded the youth.
"I hope so," answered his companion, drily. "But come, we must not lose time. This is too heavy for one of us to carry; and yet we have not found a quarter of what we expected. Sally, my love, fetch us some cloths, or handkerchiefs, or something. We may as well divide the money now, and each man carry his own."
So saying, he poured the mingled heap of gold and silver on the table; and as soon as some cloths were procured to wrap it in, he proceeded to divide it with his hand into four parts, saying, "Share and share alike!"
Some opposition was made to this by the man who had accompanied him in the more active part of the night's work, and who declared that he did not think that the person who only kept watch, or the woman either, deserved to be put on the same footing with themselves, who had encountered the whole danger. He was at once, however, sternly overruled by Harding whose character seemed to have undergone a strange change amidst the fiery, though brief period of intense passions through which he had just passed. The softer metal had been tempered into hard steel; but when for a moment he removed the crape from his face, to give himself more air, it was pale, anxious, and haggard; and had a look of sickened disgust withal, that was not in harmony with his tone.
Carefully though rapidly, he rendered the several lots as nearly equal as the mere measurement of the eye would permit, bade his comrades each take that which he liked, and contented himself with the one they left. The necessity of haste, or rather the apprehensiveness of guilt, made them all eager to abridge every proceeding; and the money being tied up, and a large sum in notes divided, they prepared to depart.
"Had we better go out by the back door or the front?" demanded Harding, turning to the woman.
"Oh, la! by the front, to be sure!" she replied. "The hind who lives in the cottage on the lea opposite, might see us if we went out by the back. Nobody can see us come out in the lane, unless some one be wandering about."
"We must take our chance of that!" replied Harding and putting out the light, he led the way to the door.