“Jim, is the Colonel at home?—he ain’t, to be sure, but we wants to know particklar. Here,” in a slightly lowered voice, “his mother’s been took bad, and the parson’s sent for him. When is he agoing to be in to dinner? Ask Cookie; she’ll be sure to know.”
“The Colonel ain’t coming in to dinner, stoopid,” answered the unseen interlocutor; “he ain’t been here all day. Out o’ town. Couldn’t you say so, instead of jabbering? Out o’ town. It’s allays safe to say, and this time it’s true.”
“What’s he adoing of, in case the gen’leman should want to know?” said the fellow at the head of the stair.
“After mischief,” was the brief and emphatic answer. “You come along down to your work, and let the Colonel alone.”
“Any mischief in particklar?” continued the man, tossing a dirty napkin in his hand, and standing in careless contempt, with his back to the minister. “It’s a pleasant way the Colonel’s got, that is: any more particklars, Jim?—the gen’leman ’ll stand something if you’ll let him know.”
“Hold your noise, stoopid—it ain’t no concern o’ yours—my master’s my master, and I ain’t agoing to tell his secrets,” said the voice below. Vincent had made a step forward, divided between his impulse to kick the impertinent fellow who had admitted him down-stairs, and the equally strong impulse which prompted him to offer any bribe to the witness who knew his master’s secrets; but he was suddenly arrested in both by a step on the street outside, and the grating of a latch-key in the door. A long light step, firm and steady, with a certain sentiment of rapid silent progress in it. Vincent could not tell what strange fascination it was that made him turn round to watch this new-comer. The stranger’s approach thrilled him vaguely, he could not tell how. Then the door opened, and a man appeared like the footstep—a very tall slight figure, stooping forward a little; a pale oval face, too long to be handsome, adorned with a long brown beard; thoughtful eyes, with a distant gleam in them, now and then flashing into sudden penetrating glances—a loose dress too light for the season, which somehow carried out all the peculiarities of the long light step, the thin sinewy form, the thoughtful softness and keenness of the eye. Even in the height of his own suspense and excitement, Vincent paused to ask himself who this could be. He came in with one sudden glance at the stranger in the hall, passed him, and calling to the man, who became on the moment respectful and attentive, asked if there were any letters. “What name, sir?—beg your pardon—my place ain’t up-stairs,” said the fellow. What was the name? Vincent rushed forward when he heard it, and seized the new-comer by the shoulder with the fierceness of a tiger. “Fordham!” cried the young man, with boiling rage and hatred. Next moment he had let go his grasp, and was gazing bewildered upon the calm stranger, who looked at him with merely a thoughtful inquiry in his eyes. “Fordham—at your service—do you want anything with me?” he asked, meeting with undiminished calm the young man’s excited looks. This composure put a sudden curb on Vincent’s passion.
“My name is Vincent,” he said, restraining himself with an effort; “do you know now what I want with you? No? Am I to believe your looks or your name? If you are the man,” cried the young Nonconformist, with a groan out of his distracted heart, “whom Lady Western could trust with life, to death—or if you are a fiend incarnate, making misery and ruin, you shall not escape me till I know the truth. Where is Susan? Here is where her innocent letters came—they were addressed to your name. Where is she now? Answer me! For you, as well as the rest of us, it is life or death.”
“You are raving,” said the stranger, keeping his awakened eyes fixed upon Vincent; “but this is easily settled. I returned from the East only yesterday. I don’t know you. What was that you said about Lady—Lady—what lady? Come in: and my name?—my name has been unheard in this country, so far as I know, for ten years. Lady——?—come in and explain what you mean.”
The two stood together confronting each other in the little parlour of the house, where the striped jacket quickly and humbly lighted the gas. Vincent’s face, haggard with misery and want of rest, looked wild in that sudden light. The stranger stood opposite him, leaning forward with a strange eagerness and inquiry. He did not care for Vincent’s anxiety, who was a stranger to him; he cared only to hear again that name—Lady——? He had heard it already, or he would have been less curious; he wanted to understand this wonderful message wafted to him out of his old life. What did it matter to Herbert Fordham, used to the danger of the deserts and mountains, whether it was a maniac who brought this chance seed of a new existence to his wondering heart?
“A man called Fordham has gone into my mother’s house,” said Vincent, fixing his eyes upon those keen but visionary orbs which were fixed on him—“and won the love of my sister. She wrote to him here—to this house; yesterday he carried her away, to her shame and destruction. Answer me,” cried the young man, making another fierce step forward, growing hoarse with passion, and clenching his hands in involuntary rage—“was it you?”