"Bless you, sir, he's talked of nothing else! From what I can make out, Mr. Digby has been the life and soul of the party, and that everybody loved him you may guess from the fact that almost the first question of every one that has come to, has been about him. But I beg pardon for not asking before, sir; how is Mr. Digby, to-night?"
"Better, we hope. Certainly better than he was yesterday. He has not as yet shown any gleam of consciousness, but he has been able to take plenty of nourishment, and it is upon this that we ground a good hope. But see, yonder comes the doctor, and I hope he will report favorably of all." Never could a medical man have shown a greater interest in a patient than Dr. Henderson did in Digby. He had heard portions of his strange story from others of his patients who had been saved from the ill-fated ship, and the loving solicitude of all had drawn from him an answering tenderness.
"I shall stay with him to-night," said he, "if you will allow me, for I anticipate a change in him soon, and I am extremely anxious that at first he should receive enough information to satisfy him, and at the same time that he should have no clue as to where he is or by whom he is surrounded. After his intense excitement and the almost superhuman fatigue he has undergone,—for it was he who was the last to give up, and then not until the Hughsons were safe aboard the ship,—the least shock might prove fatal. So, you go away and leave me with him. But stay," added the doctor to Mr. Morton, who had now joined them; "just now one of the men gave me this book—a Bible—which he found on the ship; and as it bears the name of Howard Pemberton in the fly-leaf, I brought it with me, and with especial interest, for, inclosed in the cover, is a packet addressed to you, Mr. Morton."
Mr. Morton took the book with trembling hands, and when he had reached his own room he sat alone and read with deep emotion the strange story of his son's life. It ran as follows:
Baffin's Bay.
I know not into whose hands this paper will fall, but it is my earnest, perhaps dying entreaty that it may be placed in the hands of my parents, my sister, Dr. Brier, or Howard Pemberton, all of whose addresses will be found elsewhere.
I write this letter to the man whose name I bear and whom I have most deeply wronged.
Much sorrow, and anxiety, my dear father, must have resulted from my cruel conduct, and I would confess, without a wish to conceal one single fact, the sins which wrought such mischief and have brought such strange punishments. I can only do so by telling the story of how one sin led to another, until all culminated in that fearful fraud, the pretense of death.
For the first year that I was at Blackrock school I strove with all my strength to do and be what Dr. Brier and his kind, good wife would wish. Their influence over me was kind and gentle and good. I can never repay the debt of gratitude I owe them. But by degrees I grew to hate the restraints of school, and I was drifting, drifting, I knew not whither.
My best friends at school were Howard Pemberton and Martin Venables. I loved them at the first with all the enthusiasm a boy feels when he thinks he has found his ideal friends. They supplied to me the lack of brothers; they were true, manly, high-minded friends. But as soon as I began to drift away from the good I had ceased to strive after, I loosened my hold on them.
It was about a year before I left Blackrock school when my aversion to study and to all restraint became almost uncontrollable. During my holidays I once fell in with a young man, James Williams, who led a wild, reckless life. He had run away from home, had crossed the seas, and had raised money in various ways, which enabled him to indulge freely his wild fancies. His yarns about the sea, and the adventures he had met and dangers encountered, fired me with a mania to follow a similar career. The constant reading by stealth of pernicious books, of which smugglers and pirates were the heroes, stimulated the desire, and undermined the principle in which I had been educated; until, at length, when you informed me that I was to study under Mr. Vickers for the law, I determined to run away from school and seek my living by adventure. James Williams fostered the resolve, and often urged me to it; but my great difficulty was how to obtain money. By an accidental circumstance, Howard Pemberton became aware of my passion for the sea, and he upbraided me about it, kindly and honestly, but I could not brook it; my old friendship with him ceased, and I grew to hate him.
About this time, the reception was given at Dr. Brier's of which you have heard. But you have not heard, and never can know, what that evening was to me. Satan seemed to have entered into me as he did into Judas.
I took the miniature and snuff-box from the cabinet in which they were placed by Mrs. Brier, and resolved to cast the suspicion of the theft upon Howard.
That night I placed the miniature in the hands of Williams, who gave me twenty pounds for it, and the snuff-box I placed in the ticking of Howard's bed.
Need I tell you all the catalogue of wrong? You can almost guess the rest. Williams procured for me a suit of clothes which would disguise me, and these were placed ready for me by arrangement with him. The early morning was very cold, and as I intended to travel far I thought I would take my great coat. In the hurry and excitement of the moment, I mistook Howard's for mine.
I left my clothes upon the river bank, and that afternoon I set sail for America.
In America I spent a few months, the remembrance of which I would gladly blot from my memory. Money came to me fast from gambling, and as quickly went. All the time I was restless, fearful, ill at ease and sick at heart. I had never heard one single word of how my disappearance might have afflicted those I left behind. I knew not whether you really thought me dead, or whether my secret had oozed out. At length I determined, with tears of penitence, to return, to confess all, to purchase back the miniature from Williams with money I had won. And, with this resolve, I started back to England. On arriving, I took up a newspaper, and you may judge the terror I felt as I read the account of Williams's awful death with the miniature upon him. It staggered me, but it did not melt my heart. I interpreted it that my plans were frustrated, as I found that Dr. Brier had obtained possession of the miniature. I dared not remain in the country, for fear of discovery and of identification with the crime of Williams; but I could not tear myself away until I had once more visited the neighborhood of the dear old school-house.
I cannot think without emotion of that moonlight night when I lay down beside the marble pillar which tender hearts had caused to be placed there, "In loving memory of D.M." Oh, my father, how true it is that "the way of transgressors is hard!" I thought my heart would break as I lay there on the cold earth and wept the bitterest tears I ever shed.
If I could but have caught sight of Dr. Brier, or felt the motherly touch of Mrs. Brier's hand upon my shoulder,—if I could but have heard the ring of Howard's or Martin's voice in the play-ground, I felt as if the evil within me would have taken flight and I should have risen up a regenerated man.
But I was alone. Dead! dead! And I went away with my heart cold and sad, and my future all dark and purposeless.
A twelvemonth ago I fell in with some Shetlanders who were about to start on a whaling cruise, and, as the expedition promised plenty of adventure and excitement, I joined them.
Three months after we left Shetland, we were fast in the ice. For nine months and more we have been almost starving, and have had to endure bodily suffering in other respects of a most severe kind.
I have written the foregoing part of my story at intervals, and I would now bring it to a conclusion, for the ice is breaking up, and we have before us our last chance.
Literature has been very scarce on board, and I had only brought one book with me. It was Howard Pemberton's Bible. I found it in the coat I had taken accidentally on the morning I left Blackrock school, and I never parted with it, hoping I might be able to restore it some day, for I found it was a sacred relic given to him by his father, and bearing in its cover his portrait and a copy of the dying words he spoke to Howard.
That book became my friend, and it led me to recognize a friend in its Divine author. I had striven in vain to save myself from myself. This book pointed me the way. I should never have read it, however if it had not been for the kind sympathy of our captain. A nobler man, or a truer Christian, I never met.
But our captain died, and my strength gradually failed from privation. I cannot tell you here all that happened, but I must refer you to a diary which I have daily kept posted, and that will explain more fully what I am unable to write now.
We are free from the ice at last, and are drifting we know not whither! My strength is well-nigh gone. Not a man on board can move a hand to touch a sail. Perhaps these will be the last words I shall ever write.
I crave from you, my dear father, and from all whom I have wronged, forgiveness for the sorrow, distress, and injury I have wrought. Return the Bible, please, if it ever comes into your possession, to Howard, and tell him how I thank God for its blessed teachings.
Land is in sight; we fancy it must be the Orkneys. A storm is gathering. Nine men lie dead upon the deck. There appears to be certain death for us all.
As Mr. Morton finished reading the letter, he paced the room to and fro, while the hot tears fell freely down his face; and his heart was full of thanksgiving and praise as he cried, "This, my son, was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found."
IN THE ICE.