Beauchamp's dinner was accordingly placed before him; and with his usual perversity of disposition, it must be acknowledged that, in a smuggler's cottage, with a lame leg, and disappointed in love, he ate a better dinner of mackerel in October, salted pork, and fried eggs, than he had done since he left the Grand St. Bernard. There's a hero! Ulysses was nothing to him, though dressed in a dishclout! The hero of the Odyssey did sit down with twenty fellows who were making love to his own wife, and supped heartily upon the "entrails, fat, enriched with blood," by which Homer undoubtedly meant black puddings.
When he had concluded--as Beauchamp could, when he liked it, cast off his reserve, mingle freely with all classes, and examine nature wherever he found it--he declared that, as the evening was somewhat chilly, he would come down and spend the rest of it by the kitchen fire; and, getting to the bottom of the stairs the best way he could, by the help of the old man and his son, he soon rendered himself familiar with the whole family, winning their love, while he made them more and more inclined to declare, that he was really a gentleman.
Nor did the time pass unpleasantly to himself. He had got a notion, in direct opposition to generally received opinions, that nature was to be found only in the highest and in the lowest classes--more especially indeed in the highest, because the persons of which it is constituted have little inducement to conceal their feelings or thoughts, and certainly no wish to affect the manners of any other cast. Nature, however, as modified by the education of the lower classes, was more interesting to him, from being less frequently before his eyes; and, though he certainly liked the nature of his own rank best, yet he was not sorry occasionally to observe the other a little nearer. Thus the time wore imperceptibly away; and the more tranquil passing of the night was only interrupted by the smuggler's son showing his father a powder-flask, which, he said, one of the gentlemen had dropped upon the beach that morning. Beauchamp took it carelessly in his hand, and returned it without observation; but a single glance had shown him that it was one which, from some fault in it construction, he had given to his servant, Harding, a few days before. The sight, though it but confirmed former suspicions, threw him into a fit of musing for several minutes; but he shook it off as fast as possible, and soon resumed the easy tone in which he had been previously conversing.
The next morning he woke earlier than the day before; but he found from the smuggler's son, that the old man, true to his word, had already set out to procure a post-chaise for him from the nearest town. Many an hour passed by, however, without his return, and it was again nearly four o'clock ere Beauchamp, whose sole amusement had been looking out upon the ever varying sea, beheld him walking sturdily along over the high grounds to the west. He was soon down the little path, and into the house; but Beauchamp remarked that he paused not below, as he naturally might have done, to speak with his wife; but, on the contrary, with a hurried pace proceeded straight up stairs, and entered the stranger's room at once. He was far too much agitated to think of ceremonies; and, leaning on the table without taking off his hat, he stood before Beauchamp, pale, trembling, and out of breath, for several moments before he could utter a word.
"Oh, your honour!" he cried at length. "Oh, your honour! I hope to God you will stand my friend--for this is a horrible business I have got into, and, without help, I shall sink--that's certain!"
"What is the matter? What has happened?" demanded Beauchamp, eagerly; but then, seeing the fearful state of agitation which shook the whole of the old man's powerful frame, he added, "Calm yourself! Calm yourself, Small! You have done nothing that I know of that can injure you! Let me hear what it is alarms you!"
"Thank you, sir, for that!" replied the smuggler, catching at Beauchamp's consolation. "Thank you for that! If you stand by me, I dare say I shall do--but what is it that alarms me? you ask. Why, what should it be? Why, when I went into the town of ----, what should I see but a number of people standing round the town-hall---just at a particular spot like; and something misgave me, so I went up, and there I saw stuck up against the wall a large sheet of paper, and at the top was printed, Five Hundred Pounds Reward; and then, when I looked below, I saw, in bigger letters still, Murder! At first I could not see any more, my brain turned round so; but when I could read on, I saw in the Blagard, as the people called it, how those infernal villains who were here the night afore last had murdered a poor old helpless man at a place they call Ryebury--It did not just say it was them indeed, but I am sure it was--Oh, I am quite sure it was them!"
The last declaration of his conviction was made more faintly, as if he entertained some slight hope that Beauchamp would contradict him; but, on the contrary, that gentleman replied, "I am afraid it was, indeed; for it was at that very place, Ryebury, and at the door of that old man's house, that they met me, and stunned me by a blow on the head.--But what more did the placard say?"
"Oh, it mentioned a Captain Somebody," replied the smuggler. "I forget the name. It was a Frenchified name, however. It was that black-looking ---- with the whiskers, I'll bet a puncheon!"
"Was it Harding?" demanded Beauchamp, fixing his eyes upon him eagerly, to catch his answer from his look, even before he had time to utter it.