Some days had elapsed since Oakley’s condemnation. Returning weary and dispirited from a final attempt to interest an influential personage in his behalf, I was startled by a smart tap upon the shoulder, and looking round, beheld the shrewd, good-humoured countenance of Mr Anthony Scrivington, a worthy man and excellent lawyer, who had long had entire charge of my temporal affairs. Upon this occasion, however, I felt small gratification at sight of him, for I had a lawsuit pending, on account of which I well knew I ought to have been in England a month previously, and should have been but for this affair of Oakley’s, which had interested and occupied me to the exclusion of my personal concerns. My solicitor’s unexpected appearance made me apprehend serious detriment from my neglect. He read my alarm, upon my countenance.
“Ah!” said he, “conscience pricks you, I see. You know I have been expecting you these six weeks. No harm done, however; we shall win the day, not a doubt of it.”
“Then you are not come about my business?”
“Not the least, although I shall take you back with me, now I have found you. A very different affair brings me over. By the by, you may perhaps help me. You know all Paris. I am come to look for an Englishman.”
“You need not look long,” said I, glancing at a party of unmistakable Britons, who stood talking broad Cockney on the Boulevard.
“Ay, but not any Englishman. I want one in particular, the heir to a pretty estate of eight or ten thousand a-year. He was last heard of in Paris three years ago, and since then all trace of him is lost. ’Tis an odd affair enough. No one could have expected his coming to the estate. A couple of years since, there were two young healthy men in his way. Both have died off,—and he is the owner of Oakley Manor.”
“Of what?” I exclaimed, in a tone of voice that made Scrivington stagger back, and for a moment drew the eyes of the whole street upon us. “What did you say?”
“Oakley Manor,” stammered the alarmed attorney, settling his well-brushed hat, which had almost fallen from his head with the start he had given. “Old Valentine Oakley died the other day, and his nephew Francis comes into the estate. But what on earth is the matter with you?”
For sole reply I grasped his arm, and dragged him into my house, close to which we had arrived. There, five minutes cleared up everything, and convinced Scrivington and myself that the man he sought now languished, a condemned criminal, in a French military prison.
It is unnecessary to dwell upon what all will conjecture; superfluous to detail the active steps that were at once taken in Oakley’s behalf, with very different success, now that the unknown sergeant had suddenly assumed the character of an English gentleman of honourable name and ample fortune. Persons of great influence and diplomatic weight, who before had refused to espouse the cause of an obscure adventurer in a foreign service, suffered themselves to be prevailed upon, and interceded efficaciously for the master of Oakley Manor. It was even said that a letter was written on the subject by an English general of high distinction to an old opponent in arms. Be that as it may, all difficulties were at length overcome, and Oakley received his free pardon and discharge from the French service. And that equal measure of clemency might be shown, De Berg, upon the same day, was allowed to resume his place in his regiment.