The clerks received him very politely, and told him that they had little doubt of the truth of the evil tidings. Of course the fatality might have been considerably exaggerated, &c. &c., but as to the loss of the ship, they had taken measures to replace her. Would he mind waiting only ten minutes, though they saw that he was in a hurry? The Cape mail–ship had been telegraphed from Falmouth; they had sent to the office already, and expected to get the reply within a quarter of an hour. Every information in their power, &c.—we all know the form, though we donʼt always get the civility.
Bull Garnet waited heavily with his great back against a stout brass rail, having declined the chair they offered him; and in less than five minutes he received authentic detail of everything. He listened to nothing except one statement, “every soul on board was lost, sir.”
Then he went out, in a lumpish manner, from the noble room, and was glad to get hold of the iron rail in the bend of the dark stone staircase.
So now he was a double murderer. Finding it not enough to have killed one brother in his fury, he had slain the other twin through his cowardly concealment. Floating about in tropical slime, without a shark to eat him, leaving behind him the fair repute of a money–grabbing fratricide. And he, the man who had done it all, who had loved the boy and ruined him, miserably plotting for his own far inferior children. No, no! Not that at any rate,—good and noble children: and how they had borne his villainy! God in mercy only make him, try to make him, over again, and how different his life would be. All his better part brought out; all his lower kicked away to the devil, the responsible father of it. “Good God, how my heart goes! Death is upon me, well I know, but let me die with my children by—unless I turn hymn–writer——”
Quick as he was in his turns of thought—all of them subjective—he was scarcely a match for the situation, when Mr. Chope and Bailey Kettledrum brushed by the sleeves of his light overcoat, and entered the doors with “push—pull” on them, but, being both of the pushing order rather than the pulling, employed indiscriminate propulsion, and were out of sight in a moment. Still, retaining some little of his circumspective powers, Bull Garnet knew them both from a corner flash of his sad tear–laden eyes. There was no mistaking that great legal head, like the breech–end of a cannon. Mr. Kettledrum might have been overlooked, for little men of a fussy nature are common enough in London, or for that matter everywhere else. But Garnetʼs attention being drawn, he knew them both of course, and the errand they were come upon, and how soon they were likely to return, and what they would think of his being there, if they should happen to see him. Nevertheless, he would not budge. Nothing could matter much now. He must think out his thoughts.
When this puff of air was past which many breathe almost long enough to learn that it was “life,” some so long as to weary of it, none so long as to understand all its littleness and greatness—when that should be gone from him, and absorbed into a boundless region even more unknown, would not the wrong go with it, if unexpiated here, and abide there evermore? And not to think of himself alone—what an example now to leave to his innocent injured children! The fury hidden by treachery, the cowardice sheathed in penitence! D——n it all, he would have no more of it. His cursed mind was made up. A man can die in the flesh but once. His spirit had been dying daily, going to the devil daily, every day for months; and he found no place for repentance. As for his children, they must abide it. No man of any mind would blame them for their fatherʼs crime. If it was more than they could bear, let them bolt to America. Anywhither, anywhere, so long as they came home in heaven—if he could only get there—to the father who had injured, ruined, bullied, cursed, and loved them so.
After burning out this hell of thought in his miserable brain, he betook himself to natureʼs remedy,—instant, headlong action. He rushed down the stairs, forgetting all about Chope and Bailey Kettledrum, shouted to the driver of a hansom cab so that he sawed his horseʼs mouth raw, leaped in, and gave him half a sovereign through the pigeon–hole, to get to D——ʼs bank before the closing time. But at Temple Bar, of course, there was a regular Chubbʼs lock, after a minor Bramah one at the bottom of Ludgate Hill. Cabby was forced to cut it, and slash up Chancery Lane, and across by Kingʼs College Hospital, and back into the Strand by Wych Street. It is easy to imagine Bull Garnetʼs state of mind; yet the imagination would be that, and nothing more. He sat quite calmly, without a word, knowing that man and horse were doing their utmost of skill and speed, and having dealt enough with both to know that to worry them then is waste.
The Bank had been closed, the day–porter said, as he girded himself for his walk to Brixton, exactly—let him see—yes, exactly one minute and thirty–five seconds ago. Most of the gentlemen were still inside, of course, and if the gentlemanʼs business was of a confidential——Here he intimated, not by words, that there were considerations——
“Bow Street police–office,” Mr. Garnet cried to the driver, not even glancing again at the disappointed doorkeeper. In five minutes he was there. Man and horse seemed strung and nerved with his own excitement.
A stolid policeman stood at the door, as Bull Garnet leaped out anyhow, with his high colour gone away as in death, and his wiry legs cramped with vehemence. Then Bobby saw that he had met his master, the perception being a mental feat far beyond the average leap of police agility. Accordingly he touched his hat, and crinkled his eyes in a manner discovered by policemen, in consequence of the suggestion afforded by the pegging of their hats.