“No violence, my good fellow, no violence; it’s not a light thing to shed the blood of a fellow-creature—besides, there’s a quiet way of managing these affairs. I shall warn the police to keep an eye on that man Hargrave; he looks dangerous; and you may as well put on another watcher, it won’t do to be shorthanded just now.” So saying, Coverdale turned away, and was soon deep in conversation with the inspector of the mounted rural police; after which, refusing to make one of a jovial party who were about to dine with Tom Rattleworth, and were tolerably certain to remain playing whist, and imbibing strong liquors till the small hours should be again upon the increase, he drove home to his solitary mansion.
It was the first time since his marriage that Coverdale had dined by himself, and he felt proportionably lonely; everything tended to remind him of Alice—her favourite dog, a little black-and-tan spaniel, with large loving eyes, not unlike her own, leaped on his knee after dinner, and gazing wistfully at the empty chair opposite, uttered a low whine, as though it would inquire, “Where’s my mistress?” The footstool, whereon her dainty little feet were wont to repose—the screen with which she was accustomed to shade her fair cheek from the too ardent advances of the fire—each object, animate or inanimate, recalled his thoughts to Alice; and feeling, even more strongly than he had ever yet felt, how deeply and tenderly he loved her, he for the first time perceived that love in its true light, and, in acknowledging its full reality, became conscious of the duties and responsibilities such an affection entailed upon him. Faintly and dimly at first the light broke in upon him; deeply did he feel the difficulties of the task, and his own inability to perform it; and bitterly, most bitterly, did he regret his own selfish carelessness, which had, as he was fain to confess, tended already to estrange his young wife’s affection, and to convert a gentle, yielding girl, into a wilful and exacting woman. And thus he sat, pondering over and regretting the past, and forming wise and good resolutions for the future, while minutes gliding by unobserved grew into hours, until the sudden restlessness of the little dog, which had been sleeping quietly upon his knees, roused him, and looking at his watch, he perceived it was nearly midnight. As he did so the dog, whose restlessness appeared to increase, uttered a short bark, while at the same moment a distant sound was faintly audible, which Harry’s practised ear instantly recognised as the report of a gun. To spring to the window, open the shutter, and fling up the sash, was the work of an instant; a like space of time sufficed to resolve doubt into certainty,—guns were being discharged in a favourite plantation about half a mile from the house—a plantation in which the pheasants were as well fed and tame as barn-door fowls; it was evident the poachers were taking their revenge, and that these sacred birds, the Lares and Penates of Harry’s sporting mythology, were being ruthlessly slaughtered on their roosts. Harry rang the bell furiously; then, before the alarmed Wilkins (who, having commenced his career in the service of an apoplectic alderman, laboured under a chronic impression that somebody was in a fit) had passed beyond the door of the servants’ hall, he rushed impetuously out of the dining-room, and meeting that bewildered domestic in full career, nearly frightened him into an attack of the malady he so much dreaded for others, by exclaiming, “Here, quick! Tell Saunders, or some of them, to saddle the shooting cob, and bring him round instantly; then find me a hat and pea-jacket. Quick, I say!”
As the butler vanished on his mission, Coverdale took down from a peg in the hall, a special constable’s staff which had been intrusted to him on behalf of her gracious Majesty, at a time when an extra dose of politics and strong beer had proved too potent for the dense agricultural pates of certain free and independent (alias bribed and tipsy) electors of the neighbouring county town. It was a stout piece of ash, about a foot and a half long, thicker than an ordinary broom-stick, and weighted with lead, for the benefit of any unusually opaque skull into which it might be deemed advisable to knock a respect for our glorious constitution. Harry felt its weight, and, as he passed his wrist through the leather thong attached to it, he thought to himself they would be bold men who could prevent him, with that in his hand, from going where he pleased. The instant the cob appeared he sprang into the saddle. “Do you and Marshal get a couple of stout sticks, and make the best of your way to the ash plantation!” he exclaimed hastily; “there are poachers out, and from their venturing to come so near the house, I should fancy there must be a strong gang of them, and Markum may want all the help we can give him.”
So saying, Coverdale gathered up the reins, and without waiting the groom’s reply, rode off at a brisk canter. As he approached the wood, he drew in and paused, uncertain whether Markum might yet have reached the scene of action: as he listened, the sound of men crashing through the dry underwood became distinctly audible; then shouts and a clamour of angry voices, and finally, the unmistakeable noise of a conflict met his ear. Pausing no longer, he put his horse into a gallop, and dashed on till he reached a hand-gate leading into the wood. This, to his annoyance, he found locked; true, he had a master-key, which he had fortunately brought with him, but he was forced to dismount in order to unfasten the padlock. While thus engaged, the sounds proved that the affray was still raging fiercely, and, as he flung the gate open, a gun was discharged, followed almost instantaneously by the report of two others. Fearing mischief might occur before he could reach the combatants, Coverdale remounted hastily, and heedless alike of obstacles and darkness, galloped down one of the grass rides through the plantation, avoiding collision with the trunks and branches of trees by, as it appeared, a succession of miracles. Before, however, he could arrive at the scene of action, the sound of blows, the shouts and imprecations, had ceased, and nothing but a confused hum of voices, together with a low moaning, as of some person ill or in pain, met his ear. Forcing his horse through the tangled underwood, Coverdale came suddenly upon a group of men, amongst whom he recognised several of his own farm labourers, while two under-keepers were kneeling beside the prostrate figure of a man who, from the stiff, unnatural attitude in which he lay, appeared either dead or dying. To leap to the ground, and snatch a lantern from one of the bystanders, was Harry’s first act; then bending over the fallen man, he recognised in the ghastly features, distorted and convulsed with agony, the well-known countenance of honest, sturdy Markum, while from a gun-shot wound in his right side the dark life-blood was slowly flowing.
“How has this happened?” was Coverdale’s hurried inquiry. “Is it an accident, or have any of those scoundrels dared to shoot him?”
There was a moment’s pause, and then one of the elder men replied, “It wor no accident, Mr. Coverdale; but Giles there can tell you best, squire; he wor nearest to un when he dropped.”
The under-keeper thus appealed to—a tall, strapping young fellow, who was vainly attempting to staunch the blood which still continued to flow—turned to reply, while Coverdale, kneeling beside the wounded man, endeavoured to arrange a more effectual bandage.
“All as I know, sir,” he said, “is that I wor a watching nigh down by the warren, when up cum poor Master Markum here, and ‘Giles,’ says he, ‘ye’re wanted, lad; there’s them out as didn’t oughter be.’ So him and I, and the rest o’ our mates here, which master had appinted to meet at eleven o’clock—for I expect he’d had some hint give him of what was to be up, made for the ash spinney, and laid us down in a ditch. Well, it warn’t long afore we heard the blackguards at work among the pheasants, a banging away like blazes. We waited till they got near us, and then we up and at ’em like good uns. There was more of ’em nor there was o’ we, so they showed light a bit. Poor master there he jest wor real savage; he hit out hard and straight, and rolled ’em over like nine-pins; they worn’t o’ no manner o’ use again him, not none on ’em. Well, they soon got enough of that sort of fun, and one arter another cut away, till at last they all fairly turned tail and bolted—that is, all but one, and him master collared, and says he, ‘Stop a bit, Jack; I’m agoin’ to send you to see your brother in H———— gaol; I’m afeard Tom should be dull for want o’ cumpany, poor chap!’ Well, Jack Hargrave, for him it wor, fit sharp for his liburty, but master wor too good a man for him; and he’d a took him as safe as mutton, only Jack hollard arter one of his mates as had a gun, and told him to shoot the ———— keeper, and not let him be took. The fellow stopped and faced round—he wor a young chap as I knows well—I’d cotched sight of his face afore he cut away, a soft young feller, as anybody might bully into anything; and when Jack rapped out a volley of oaths, and told him to let fly, and chance hittin’ him, shoot he did, and poor master let go his hold o’ Jack’s collar, and rolled over and over like I’ve seen many a hare and rabbid roll over afore his gun.”
“But there was more than one barrel discharged,” interposed Coverdale; “I heard three shots in succession—how was that?”
“Why, when I see poor Master Markum fall, I was jest agoin’ to kneel down to raise him a bit, when I ketched sight o’ Jack Hargrave and his pal a cutting away like lamplighters, and I felt mad like to think he should get off scotfree arter what he’d been and done, and having my gun in my hand, I give ’em the contents of both barrels; it worn’t right, I knows, Mr. Coverdale, but if you’d been in my place, squire, I’m blessed if I don’t think you’d ha done the same, axing your pardon.”