THE SIGNALMAN’S LOVE-STORY.
IN TWO CHAPTERS.—CHAP. I.
A song which was very popular when I was a boy, says, ‘Most folks fall in love, no doubt, some time or other.’ It might with equal truth have said that most folks fall in love two or three times over. I am sure it was the case with me. It was also my fate to do what, I am told, is one of the commonest things in the world—that is, to fall violently in love with a person entirely out of my own circle; not below it, like the king and the beggar-maid, but a great deal above me; with a girl, too, who was as proud and haughty and stony as Juno or a sphinx.
In the time to which I refer, nearly fifty years ago now—I am seventy-one next birthday—the railway system was in its infancy, but yet was spreading fast, and I was one of the earliest servants. It was in no exalted position that I served. My father was dead; my mother rented a small cottage on the land of the nobleman in whose service her husband had lived and died; and this nobleman recommended me to a railway Company which had just constructed a branch through his estates. I was at first a porter, but afterwards a signalman, and, as a great favour, I was assigned a post on the branch just mentioned, close to my own house. The signal was not far from the junction of the branch with the main line; a very lonely spot for a long way in either direction, although there was a thriving town some five miles down the branch; and there was a siding close by where the trucks used in the scanty local traffic were collected.
There were some cottages near my crossing—I ought to have said that there was a level crossing not far from my box—in one of these I lived; a sprinkling of farmhouses and several very good houses of a higher class were within sight. In one of these latter, not by any means the grandest, but handsome enough for all that, lived Squire Cleabyrn; and it was with his only daughter, Miss Beatrice, that I chose to fall in love. For that matter, I daresay a score of other young fellows as poor as myself were as earnestly in love with her as I was, but they probably had sufficient sense not to show their folly. I did show mine. I could not help it; and when I recall all I felt and suffered at the time, I feel I must retract my admission that others were as much in love with her as myself, but had the sense to conceal it; such a thing would have been impossible. They could not have concealed it; they might have refrained from talking about it. I did not talk; but had they seen the girl as often as I did, and looked into her face as closely as I did, they could not have hidden their infatuation from her. In return, she would have looked at them with the same haughty indifference—which yet had a something of contemptuous wonder in it—as I was treated with.
Not that my story has anything of the Lady of Lyons flavour about it; I was no Claude to an English Pauline; but this girl, this Miss Beatrice, was so amazingly beautiful that she was famed for full twenty miles around. In addition, she was one of the best horsewomen in the county, and this enabled me to see more of her than I should otherwise have done. She used to ride out, sometimes with a servant only, sometimes with a party, nearly every day; and nearly every day she came through the gates at my crossing. I tried not to look at her, feeling and knowing that there sparkled from my eager eyes more feeling than I should have allowed to escape me—but in vain. I could not withhold my gaze from that cold, dark face—she was not a blonde beauty; golden hair was not the rage in those days—or from her large, deep, unfathomable eyes, that looked through me and past me as though I had not been there, or was at best no more than a part of the barrier I swung open for her passage. Yet these eyes, as I even then knew but too well, read me to the core, while they seemed to ignore me.
I am almost ashamed to own it now, and even at this distance of time it makes my cheeks tingle to recall it, but I have wasted a whole afternoon, when I had a ‘turn off,’ in hope of seeing Miss Cleabyrn.
Her father’s house stood on a knoll, with smooth open lawns sloping down from it on all sides, so that from my signal-box I could see when any one was walking in the front of the mansion, and when a party assembled to ride out. Well, I have actually lingered, on some feeble pretence, for four or five hours about the signal-box, in hope that she might walk on the lawn, or that she might mount and ride through our gates.
I well remember that it was on one of these afternoons that Miss Beatrice rode through with a small party. Ah! I recall them easily enough. There was one other lady, and three gentlemen. To open the gate for them, for her, was the opportunity I had been longing, waiting for, and wasting my few hours of holiday for; so I offered to do this to assist my mate, who had relieved me, and who was glad enough to be spared the labour; and I caught a full glance from the eyes of Miss Beatrice. The look was one in which she seemed to exchange glances with me. I knew it meant nothing, that it was all a delusion, and yet it would be enough to haunt me for days. I knew that also. I had never seen her look so beautiful before, and I felt my cheeks and brow turn burning hot in the instant I met this glance.
They passed. I watched them to the last—I always did—and I saw her turn her head towards the gentleman who rode by her side. The movement brought her profile so plainly in view that I could see she was smiling. As I watched her, the gentleman turned round and looked in my direction. He was smiling also; it was something beyond a smile with him, and I then reddened more with shame, than I had before done with excitement, for I knew he was laughing at me. So Miss Cleabyrn must have been laughing also; and at what? I was the subject of their ridicule, and it served me right. Yes; I knew that at the moment, but to know it did not make the bitter pang less painful.
I went back to my comrade at the signal-box. He, too, had noticed the group, and said, as I entered the hut: ‘That was the party from Elm Knoll, wasn’t it?—Ah! I thought so; and of course that was the celebrated Miss Cleabyrn. You know who that was riding by her side, I suppose?’
‘No,’ I said, answering as calmly as I could; I was almost afraid to trust my voice.
‘That’s a young fellow, a captain from somewhere,’ continued my mate, ‘who is going to marry Miss Cleabyrn. He has got a lot of money. So has she. Sam Powell, who drives the night-mail, knows him, and told me all about it.’
As the speaker had no idea of the absurd state I was in, he took no particular notice of me, but changed the subject, and went on with some indifferent topic.
I was glad he did so, for although I had an utter contempt for myself and for my folly in allowing the conduct or the future of Miss Cleabyrn to excite me, yet I could not have conversed on such a theme as her marriage; while the knowledge that the person to whom I had been ridiculed—I felt sure of that—was her avowed lover, seemed to increase the bitterness of the sting tenfold.
I had ample opportunity of seeing that the report which I had heard was likely, at anyrate, to be founded in fact, as the stranger, the ‘captain from somewhere,’ remained a guest at Elm Knoll for fully a fortnight, during which time not a day passed without my seeing both him and Miss Cleabyrn, and sometimes more than once each day. So I came to know him by sight as well as I did her. He was a frank, handsome, young fellow; that I could see, and was obliged to own; and in his speech he was pleasant. This was shown by his stopping on two or three occasions, when riding alone, to ask me some questions, as I opened the gate for him.
I was sure he made these occasions, and at first disliked him for it; but I could not continue to bear ill-will against a man of such kindly open manners, so I relented, and, ere he left the neighbourhood, used to look forward with pleasure to seeing him. This was a sad falling-off from my previous lofty mood, and so was my accepting a cigar from him as he rode through. In fact, although I have no doubt ‘written myself an ass,’ as our old friend Dogberry would have said, yet at the worst I was not without some glimmering of sense, which saved me from making an absolute example of myself.
Even during the short time in which the captain—I did not know his name—was visiting at Elm Knoll, the heat and surge of my absurd passion had perceptibly moderated, and just then several circumstances combined to restore me to a right frame of mind.
After the captain’s departure, Miss Beatrice left home on a prolonged visit, so that I did not see her; and at the same time I met Patty Carr, who was, in her way, quite as pretty as Beatrice Cleabyrn, although not nearly so haughty; and my heart being specially tender and open to impression just then, I suppose, I speedily thought more of her than of the young lady at Elm Knoll. Indeed we were married the next year.
At the time I speak of, a good many things were in vogue, or at least had not died out, which have quite vanished now, and among these was duelling. Every now and then, a duel was fought; but the ridicule which attended bloodless meetings, and the greater activity of the police in cases where harm was done, were diminishing them greatly; yet still, they did occasionally happen. A great stir was made by a violent quarrel among some officers of a regiment quartered in Lancashire, in which a challenge to fight a duel had been given and refused. It was called in the papers of the day, ‘The Great Military Scandal,’ and arose in the following manner. A certain Major Starley had offered a gross insult to a young lady, on whom, it appeared, he had been forcing his attentions for some time; and her only relative, a half-brother, was in the same regiment with the major. The details were not pleasant, and it was no wonder that Captain Laurenston challenged the major; but the latter declined the challenge on some professional grounds; and when the parties met, high words passed. These commenced, it appeared, with the captain; but each became violent in the dispute, until at last the captain thrashed his antagonist in the presence of several officers. This was not a make-believe beating; a ‘consider-yourself-horsewhipped’ affair, but a right-down ‘welting,’ the major being badly cut and bruised. This was serious enough, anyhow; but what made it worse was that the officers were on duty at the time; and by the strict letter of military law, the captain would certainly be punished with death.
He had expected, it seems, that after so public and such a painful humiliation, he would infallibly receive a challenge from the injured officer; but it was not so. He was placed in arrest in the barracks, and expected to be brought to a court-martial. He heard, however, from some friendly source that it was intended to hand him over to the civil power, when he would be charged with an assault with intent to kill.
In those days, almost anything was transportable, and as Major Starley belonged to one of the most influential families in the kingdom, there was no doubt that the captain would be sent to a convict settlement. There was also no doubt that the prosecution would be conducted in the most vindictive spirit and pushed to the bitterest end.
Terrified at such a prospect, the young officer escaped from the barracks, by connivance of the guard, there was reason to suppose, although this was never completely proved; at anyrate, he got clear away, and disappeared. Immediate advantage was taken of this fatal although very natural step, and a reward was at once offered for his apprehension. If he could get out of the country, he would be safe, as there were then no engagements for giving up criminals, so the ports were watched, an easier thing to do when there was not such a tremendous outflow of emigration as now.
Public sympathy was, naturally, strongly in favour of Captain Laurenston, and against the major, who would be compelled, it was generally said, to leave the service. But this would not save the captain from being cashiered, nor from fourteen years’ transportation, as he was certain to be made an example of, if only for the purpose of showing that officers would be protected when they refused to accept a challenge.
I had taken an interest in all these details, as my mates had done, and, as with them, my sympathies were on the side of Captain Laurenston, yet only as a stranger, for I had never, to my knowledge, heard of him before. But after a while it began to be said that the captain was the officer who had been so long a visitor at Elm Knoll, and was the accepted suitor of Miss Cleabyrn. This gave me more interest in the affair, and I sincerely hoped he might make good his escape.
Miss Beatrice had returned to Elm Knoll; but she rarely left the house, and still more rarely rode out, although it was the hunting season, so that I hardly ever saw her.
I was on night-duty at the signals; and when I went there one evening to relieve the day man, he told me that there were several London detectives ‘hanging about the place’—he knew this from one of the guards who had formerly been in the police, and so recognised them. I naturally asked if the Company suspected anything wrong among their people, and my mate said no, not at all. The detectives of course would not say anything about their business; but the guard suspected that they were after Captain Laurenston, who was likely to try to see Miss Cleabyrn before leaving England. This appeared feasible enough; and I was able heartily to echo the wish of my mate, to the effect that the young fellow might give his pursuers the slip.
I have said that my signals and crossing were on a branch, of no great traffic; so, when the last down passengers’ and first night goods’ trains had passed—they followed each other pretty closely—there was nothing stirring for several hours. Traffic through the gates at the level crossing after dark, there was little or none, so my berth was dull and lonely enough. I did not much mind this, for I was fond of reading, and on this night—a stormy one it was—I was reading a terrible ghost story. I laugh at such things now, but I know right well that they made me ‘creep’ then. I daresay every one knows the sensation, and has felt it over ghost stories. I was in the midst of the most terrible part, when I heard a slight noise, and lifting up my eyes, saw at my little window, quite close to me, that which startled me more than any ghostly appearance ever will. I thought it was a ghost. The glare of my lamp fell upon the panes, and I recognised the large deep eyes which had so often thrilled me. I saw, and knew to a certainty that Beatrice Cleabyrn was looking at me. She knew by my electric start that she was recognised. The face vanished from my window, and as I sprang from my seat, there was a tap at my door. I threw it open. The furious blast of wind which entered almost blew out my lamp, and I felt the driving rain even as I stood within the hut. It was Miss Cleabyrn, and she at once stepped over my threshold. She had on a large cloak, the cape of which was turned up so as to form a hood, and this was dripping with wet; great drops of rain were on her face too. I pushed my stool, the only seat in my hut, towards her, and strove to ask what had brought her to such a spot on such a night; but I could get out no intelligible words. She had closed the door after her, and in her very manner of doing so, there was something which suggested fear and danger, so that I caught my breath in sympathetic alarm.
‘You are Philip Waltress, are you not?’ she said.
I had never heard her speak before, and either I was still under the influence of my old enchantment, or she really had the most melodious, most thrilling voice in the world; assuredly I thought so. Of course I replied in the affirmative.
‘We—I have heard you spoken of,’ she continued; ‘and always favourably. I am sure you may be trusted; I am sure you will be faithful.’
‘If I can serve you in any manner, Miss Cleabyrn,’ I managed to say, ‘I will be faithful to any promise I may give—faithful to death.’ This was a rather strong speech, but I could not help it. As I made it, I felt that she knew right well, without being led by any report or mention of me—even if she had heard anything of the sort—why I might be trusted.
She smiled as I said this. I knew how fascinating was her smile, but I had never seen it with such sadness in it; it was a thousand times more enthralling than before. ‘I will confide in you,’ she went on. ‘I will tell you why I am here in such a tempest; to do this, will be to confide in you most fully.—I will not sit down’—this was called forth by another offer of the only seat already mentioned—‘I will stand here’—she was standing in an angle behind the door, much screened by my desk and some books which were heaped upon it—‘then no chance or prying passer-by can see me.’
‘None will pass here for some time, Miss Cleabyrn,’ I said; ‘on such a night as this, on any night, indeed, the place is deserted; but take the precaution, if it will give you a feeling of greater safety.’
She did so; and then proceeded, firmly and collectedly—I was enabled afterwards to judge how much the effort cost her—to tell me what had brought her to my station. ‘You have heard of Captain Laurenston?’ she began.
I signified that I had done so.
‘You know that he is pursued by the police; and you know, I have no doubt, that he is the gentleman who was here in the early part of the summer?—I thought so. He is in this neighbourhood; is not far from here. He dares not enter our house at Elm Knoll, as that is not only under special watch, but we have reason to think that one or more of our servants are bought over, and would act as spies and informers. He cannot get away without assistance; and you, he thinks, are the only man he can trust.’
‘I am!’ I exclaimed. ‘Why, what can I do?’
‘Perhaps nothing; perhaps everything,’ replied Miss Cleabyrn. ‘He has been seen and recognised here, and every hour makes it more dangerous for him to linger. He knows he can trust you. I am sure of it too,’ she added, after a moment’s hesitation; ‘your very look justifies me in saying so much.’
Ah! she knew what my poor stupid looks had revealed, months before, and speculated rightly that I would have been taken out and shot dead on the line, rather than have betrayed her slightest confidence.
I told her that I would do anything to assist her, and the captain too. ‘In what way,’ I continued, ‘do you——?’
‘You must get him away in one of the carriages,’ she interrupted—‘some carriage which leaves here; for if he ventures to the station, he will certainly be arrested. You can, for the present, conceal him in your cottage, where, as I know, nobody lives but your mother and yourself. We leave all to you. He will come here to-morrow night. The rest is in your hands.—These are all I can give you now,’ she continued. ‘What ready money we can command, he will want; but in a short time you shall be properly rewarded.’ As she spoke, I saw her hands were busy under her cloak; and in the next instant she laid on the desk before me a handsome gold watch and chain.
‘Miss Cleabyrn!’ I gasped at last; ‘you do not think—do not suppose for a moment that I want—would take from you anything to buy my aid! I am only too willing to give it. I shall be proud’——
‘They are yours!’ she interrupted. ‘Watch for the captain to-morrow night.—Do not follow me.—No; keep them! All we can do will be but trifling to show our undying gratitude, if you aid us now.’ She opened the door as she said this, and in a moment was lost in the darkness of the night, leaving me standing with the watch and chain in my hand.