"It's very good of Oliver to comfort me, saying he could not in any case have lived long--and I suppose it was so," murmured Bessy; "but that does not make it any the less shocking. He was killed. Cut off without warning by that wicked, anonymous letter. And I don't believe the writer will be ever traced now: even Richard seems to have cooled in the pursuit, since he discovered it was not the man he had suspected."
Close upon the return of Dr. and Mrs. Rane after their marriage, the tall, thin stranger who had been seen with Timothy Wilks the night before the anonymous letter was sent, and whom Richard North and others fully believed to have been the writer, was discovered. It proved to be a poor artist, travelling the country to take sketches--who was sometimes rather too fond of being a boon companion with whatever company he might happen to fall into. Hovering here some days, hovering there, in pursuit of his calling, he at length made his headquarters at Whitborough. Hearing he was suspected, he came forward voluntarily, and convinced Richard North that he at least had had nothing to do with the letter. Richard's answer was that he quite believed him. And perhaps it was Richard North's manner at this time, coupled with a remark he made to the effect that "it might be better to allow all speculation on the point to rest," that first gave Dr. Rane the idea of Richard's suspicion of himself. Things had been left at rest since then: and oven Bessy, as we see, thought her brother was growing cold.
Turning from the window with a sigh, given to the memory of her dead brother, she passed through the ante-room to the landing on her way downstairs. Mrs. Cumberland's landing opposite gave forth a brilliant light as usual--for that lady liked to burn many lamps in her hall and staircases--and Ann, the housemaid, was drawing down the window blind. Mrs. Rane's window had never had a blind.
Molly Green was taking the supper-tray into the dining-room when she went down. Bessy hovered about it, seeing that things were as her husband liked them. She put his slippers ready, she drew his arm-chair forward; ever solicitous for his comfort. To wait on him and make things pleasant for him was the great happiness of her life. After that she sat down and worked by lamplight, awaiting his return.
Whilst Dr. Rane, walking forth to see his patient and walking home again, was buried in an unpleasant reverie, like a man in a dream. That one dreadful mistake lay always with heavier weight upon him at the solitary evening hour. Now and again he would almost fancy he should see Edmund North looking out at him from the roadside hedges or behind trees. At any sacrifice he must get away from the place, and then perhaps a chance of peace might come to him: at least from this ever-haunting dread of discovery. He would willingly give the half of his remaining life to undo that past dark night's work.
[CHAPTER II.]
MRS. GASS AMID THE WORKMEN
There was trouble amongst the Dallory workpeople. It had been looming in the distance for some time before it came. No works throughout the kingdom had been more successfully carried on than the North Works. The men were well paid; peace and satisfaction had always reigned between them and their employers. But when certain delegates, or emissaries, or whatever they may please to call themselves, arrived stealthily at Dallory from the Trades' Unions, and took up stealthy abode in the place, and whispered stealthy whispers into the ears of the men, peace was at an end.
It matters not to trace the working of these insidious whispers, or how the poison spread. Others have done it far more effectively and to the purpose than I could do it. Sufficient to say that the Dallory workpeople caught the infection prevailing amongst other bodies of men--which the public, to its cost, has of late years known too much of--and they joined the ranks of the disaffected. First there had been doubt, and misgiving, and wavering; then agitation; then dissatisfaction; then parleying with their master, Richard North; then demands to be paid more and do less work. In vain Richard, with his strong sense, argued and reasoned: showing them, in all kindness, how mistaken was the course they were entering on, and what must come of it. They listened with respect, for he was liked and esteemed; but they would not give in. It had been privately told Richard that much argument and holding-out had been carried on with the Trades' Union emissaries, some of whom were ever hovering over Dallory like birds of prey: the workmen wanting to insist on the sense of Richard North's views of things, the others speciously disproving it. But it came to nothing. The workmen yielded to their despotic rulers as submissively as others have done, and Richard's words were set at nought. They were like so many tame sheep blindly following their leader. The agitation, beginning about the time of Bessy North's marriage, continued for many months; it then came to an issue; and for several weeks now, the works had been shut up.
For the men had struck. North and Gass had large contracts on hand, and they could not be completed. Unless matters took a speedy turn, masters and men would alike be ruined. The ruin of the first involved that of the last.