He gazed in her face for a full minute; and when, at the last, he withdrew his glance, his eyes were filled with tears.
“Who shall question thy ways, O, thou most Highest?” he said, clasping his wrinkled hands. “The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away: blessed be the name of the Lord!”
When he ceased speaking, a thought struck him that, as he had found her alone, the dame might have died unattended, and might be supposed to be yet living by the inattentive household. Impressed with this belief, he determined to give the alarm, and took a step towards the door, which was only a few paces distant, with that view. But he quickly changed his resolution, and, retracing his step, turned to the bedside again. Here he looked once more at the corpse, and then, with a tenderness which his rugged appearance would hardly have prepared one to expect, placed his fingers on the dead matron’s eyelids, and fulfilled the last sad office of closing them.
He seemed now to recollect, for the first time since he had entered the chamber, what was the business that had brought him thither, and the recollection was certainly not calculated to soothe or console him. He had come in search of the paper which was to establish the legitimacy of Hildebrand Clifford; but the demise of Dame Shedlock, who alone could furnish him with that paper, and who had promised to place it in his hands, rendered the prospect of his achieving such an acquisition quite hopeless. What clue had he to the place in which it had been deposited? With his forefinger pressed against his forehead, he proceeded to recall, word by word, all that had passed at their last meeting, between him and the dame; and pondered deliberately on each syllable. At length, he recollected that, as she concluded her disclosures, she had seemed to point at something over her shoulders. Hastily glancing over the head of the bed, his eye fell on the wardrobe, with which, it may be borne in mind, the course of our history has shown him to have been connected heretofore. With a beating heart, he sprang a pace or two forward, and drew the wardrobe-door open. It revealed a small recess, having no shelves, but a row of pegs, some four or five in number, just below the ceiling, from which dangled several articles of female apparel. Bernard examined these separately, but, on the most searching investigation, they afforded him no clue, in any one particular, to the document he so earnestly sought.
Though he had scarcely expected a more favourable result, the conviction that further search would be fruitless, however closely he might pursue it, depressed him severely. Yet he felt thoroughly assured that the document was somewhere in the wardrobe. He was speculating where it could be concealed, when, happening to look downwards, he perceived that the floor of the wardrobe, from the door to the wall, was covered with a rush matting; and it suddenly occurred to him that the paper might be hidden beneath. On surveying it closer, he found that the matting was nailed down; but this circumstance, as may be supposed, offered him but a trifling obstacle. Once possessed of the idea that the paper was hidden under the matting, he stooped down; and, with the aid of a small clasp-knife (which, as he wore it at his girdle, was probably used generally for eating purposes), cut away the matting round the nails, and raised it up. There, indeed, was the paper, covered with dust, yet more precious to him than tissue of gold.
It was a leaf of the parish register; and was written over, in characters not very distinct, on both sides. Several marriages were recorded on it, but that which principally interested Bernard, and most concerned our history, was the first of all, and testified to the marriage of “Hildebrand Clifford, Esquire, and Mistress Philippa Gray.” But even the testimony to the other marriages was not unimportant, as many of the parties it referred to, Bernard well knew, were yet living, and their evidence to the fact of their having been married at the times set forth, while no record of the marriages could be found in the parish register (though they would be able to swear that it was so recorded), would establish the truth and authenticity of the whole document.
Bernard was overjoyed at its acquisition. Having glanced over it, he folded it carefully up, and placed it, with a circumspection commensurate with its value, within his vest, buttoning his jerkin above. He then replaced the matting, and turned to retire.
He lingered a moment at the side of the bed; but he was too anxious to get clear off, now that he held such an invaluable possession, to protract his pause. After one farewell glance at his deceased friend, he hastened on to the door, and thence passed to the outer passage.
No one was about; and, with a light and hasty step, he proceeded to the hall below, and onward to the porch. Thus he made his egress unobserved.