The old verger was still pottering about the grey quadrangle, sunning himself in such glimpses of the glorious light as found their way into that shadowy place, when one of the two gentlemen who had spoken to him returned. He was smoking a cigar, and swinging his gold-headed cane lightly as he came along.
“You may as well show me the cathedral,” he said to the verger; “I shouldn’t like to leave Winchester without having seen it; that is to say without having seen it again. I was here forty years ago, when I was a boy; but I have been in India five-and-thirty years, and have seen nothing but Pagan temples.”
“And very beautiful them Pagan places be, sir, bain’t they?” the old man asked, as he unlocked a low door, leading into one of the side aisles of the cathedral.
“Oh yes, very magnificent, of course. But as I was not a soldier, and had no opportunity of handling any of the magnificence in the way of diamonds and so forth, I didn’t particularly care about them.”
They were in the shadowy aisle by this time, and Mr. Dunbar was looking about him with his hat in his hand.
“You didn’t go on to the Ferns, then, sir?” said the verger.
“No, I sent my servant on to inquire if the old lady is at home. If I find that she is, I shall sleep in Winchester to-night, and drive over to-morrow morning to see her. Her husband was a very old friend of mine. How far is it from here to the Ferns?”
“A matter of two mile, sir.”
Mr. Dunbar looked at his watch.
“Then my man ought to be back in an hour’s time,” he said; “I told him to come on to me here. I left him half-way between here and St. Cross.”
“Is that other gentleman your servant, sir?” asked the verger, with unmitigated surprise.
“Yes, that gentleman, as you call him, is, or rather was, my confidential servant. He is a clever fellow, and I make a companion of him. Now, if you please, we will see the chapels.”
Mr. Dunbar evidently desired to put a stop to the garrulous inclinations of the verger.
He walked through the aisle with a careless easy step, and with his head erect, looking about him as he went along: but presently, while the verger was busy unlocking the door of one of the chapels, Mr. Dunbar suddenly reeled like a drunken man, and then dropped heavily upon an oaken bench near the chapel-door.
The verger turned to look at him, and found him wiping the perspiration from his forehead with his perfumed silk handkerchief.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he said, smiling at the man’s scared face; “my Indian habits have unfitted me for any exertion. The walk in the broiling afternoon sun has knocked me up: or perhaps the wine I drank at Southampton may have had something to do with it,” he added, with a laugh.
The verger ventured to laugh too: and the laughter of the two men echoed harshly through the solemn place.
For more than an hour Mr. Dunbar amused himself by inspecting the cathedral. He was eager to see everything, and to know the meaning of everything. He peered into every nook and corner, going from monument to monument with the patient talkative old verger at his heels; asking questions about every thing he saw; trying to decipher half-obliterated inscriptions upon long-forgotten tombs; sounding the praises of William of Wykeham; admiring the splendid shrines, the sanctified relics of the past, with the delight of a scholar and an antiquarian.
The old verger thought that he had never had so pleasant a task as that of exhibiting his beloved cathedral to this delightful gentleman, just returned from India, and ready to admire everything belonging to his native land.
The verger was still better pleased when Mr. Dunbar gave him half a sovereign as the reward for his afternoon’s trouble.
“Thank you, sir, and kindly, to be sure,” the old man cackled, gratefully. “It’s very seldom as I get gold for my trouble, sir. I’ve shown this cathedral to a dook, sir; but the dook didn’t treat me as liberal as this here, sir.”
Mr. Dunbar smiled.
“Perhaps not,” he said; “the duke mightn’t have been as rich a man as I am in spite of his dukedom.”
“No, to be sure, sir,” the old man answered, looking admiringly at the banker, and sighing plaintively. “It’s well to be rich, sir, it is indeed; and when one have twelve grand-children, and a bed-ridden wife, one finds it hard, sir; one do indeed.”
Perhaps the verger had faint hopes of another half sovereign from this very rich gentleman.
But Mr. Dunbar seated himself upon a bench near the low doorway by which he had entered the cathedral, and looked at his watch.
The verger looked at the watch too; it was a hundred-guinea chronometer, a masterpiece of Benson’s workmanship; and Mr. Dunbar’s arms were emblazoned upon the back. There was a locket attached to the massive gold chain, the locket which contained Laura Dunbar’s miniature.
“Seven o’clock,” exclaimed the banker; “my servant ought to be here by this time.”
“So he ought, sir,” said the verger, who was ready to agree to anything Mr. Dunbar might say; “if he had only to go to the Ferns, sir, he might have been back by this time easy.”
“I’ll smoke a cheroot while I wait for him,” the banker said, passing out into the quadrangle; “he’s sure to come to this door to look for me — I gave him particular orders to do so.”
Henry Dunbar finished his cheroot, and another, and the cathedral clock chimed the three-quarters after seven, but Joseph Wilmot had not come back from the Ferns. The verger waited upon his patron’s pleasure, and lingered in attendance upon him, though he would fain have gone home to his tea, which in the common course he would have taken at five o’clock.
“Really this is too bad,” cried the banker, as the clock chimed the three-quarters; “Wilmot knows that I dine at eight, and that I expect him to dine with me. I think I have a right to a little more consideration from him. I shall go back to the George. Perhaps you’ll be good enough to wait here, and tell him to follow me.”
Mr. Dunbar went away, still muttering, and the verger gave up all thoughts of his tea, and waited conscientiously. He waited till the cathedral clock struck nine, and the stars were bright in the dark blue heaven above him: but he waited in vain. Joseph Wilmot had not come back from the Ferns.
The banker returned to the George. A small round table was set in a pleasant room on the first floor; a bright array of glass and silver glittered under the light of five wax-candles in a silver candelabrum; and the waiter was beginning to be nervous about the fish.
“You may countermand the dinner,” Mr. Dunbar said, with evident vexation: “I shall not dine till Mr. Wilmot, who is my old confidential servant — my friend, I may say — returns.”
“Has he gone far, sir?”
“To the Ferns, about a mile beyond St. Cross. I shall wait dinner for him. Put a couple of candles on that writing-table, and bring me my desk.”
The waiter obeyed; he placed a pair of tall wax-candles upon the table; and then brought the desk, or rather despatch-box, which had cost forty pounds, and was provided with every possible convenience for a business man, and every elegant luxury that the most extravagant traveller could desire. It was like everything else about this man: it bore upon it the stamp of almost limitless wealth.
Mr. Dunbar took a bunch of keys from his pocket, and unlocked his despatch-box. He was some little time doing this, as he had a difficulty in finding the right key. He looked up and smiled at the waiter, who was still hovering about, anxious to be useful.
“I must have taken too much Moselle at luncheon to-day,” he said, laughing, “or, at least, my enemies might say so, if they were to see me puzzled to find the key of my own desk.”
He had opened the box by this time, and was examining one of the numerous packets of papers, which were arranged in very methodical order, carefully tied together, and neatly endorsed.
“I am to put off the dinner, then, sir?” asked the waiter.
“Certainly; I shall wait for my friend, however long he may be. I’m not particularly hungry, for I took a very substantial luncheon at Southampton. I’ll ring the bell if I change my mind.”
The waiter departed with a sigh; and Henry Dunbar was left alone with the contents of the open despatch-box spread out on the table before him under the light of the tall wax-candles.
For nearly two hours he sat in the same attitude, examining the papers one after the other, and re-sorting them.
Mr. Dunbar must have been possessed of the very spirit of order and precision; for, although the papers had been neatly arranged before, he re-sorted every one of them; tying up the packets afresh, reading letter after letter, and making pencil memoranda in his pocket-book as he did so.
He betrayed none of the impatience which is natural to a man who is kept waiting by another. He was so completely absorbed by his occupation, that he, perhaps, had forgotten all about the missing man: but at nine o’clock he closed and locked the despatch-box, jumped up from his seat and rang the bell.
“I am beginning to feel alarmed about my friend,” he said; “will you ask the landlord to come to me?”
Mr. Dunbar went to the window and looked out while the waiter was gone upon this errand. The High Street was very quiet, a lamp glimmered here and there, and the pavements were white in the moonlight. The footstep of a passer-by sounded in the quiet street almost as it might have sounded in the solemn cathedral aisle.
The landlord came to wait upon his guest.
“Can I be of any service to you, sir?” he asked, respectfully.
“You can be of very great service to me, if you can find my friend; I am really getting alarmed about him.”
Mr. Dunbar went on to say how he had parted with the missing man in the grove, on the way to St. Cross, with the understanding that Wilmot was to go on to the Ferns, and rejoin his old master in the cathedral. He explained who Joseph Wilmot was, and in what relation he stood towards him.
“I don’t suppose there is any real cause for anxiety,” the banker said, in conclusion; “Wilmot owned to me that he had not been leading a sober life of late years. He may have dropped into some roadside public-house and be sitting boozing amongst a lot of country fellows at this moment. It’s really too bad of him.”
The landlord shook his head.
“It is, indeed, sir; but I hope you won’t wait dinner any longer, sir?”
“No, no; you can send up the dinner. I’m afraid I shall scarcely do justice to your cook’s achievements, for I took a very substantial luncheon at Southampton.”
The landlord brought in the silver soup-tureen with his own hands, and uncorked a bottle of still hock, which Mr. Dunbar had selected from the wine-list. There was something in the banker’s manner that declared him to be a person of no small importance; and the proprietor of the George wished to do him honour.
Mr. Dunbar had spoken the truth as to his appetite for his dinner. He took a few spoonfuls of soup, he ate two or three mouthfuls of fish, and then pushed away his plate.
“It’s no use,” he said, rising suddenly, and walking to the window; “I am really uneasy about this fellow’s absence.”
He walked up and down the room two or three times, and then walked back to the open window. The August night was hot and still; the shadows of the queer old gabled roofs were sharply defined upon the moonlit pavement. The quaint cross, the low stone colonnade, the solemn towers of the cathedral, gave an ancient aspect to the quiet city.
The cathedral clock chimed the half-hour after nine while Mr. Dunbar stood at the open window looking out into the street.
“I shall sleep here to-night,” he said presently, without turning to look at the landlord, who was standing behind him. “I shall not leave Winchester without this fellow Wilmot. It is really too bad of him to treat me in this manner. It is really very much too bad of him, taking into consideration the position in which he stands towards me.”
The banker spoke with the offended tone of a proud and selfish man, who feels that he has been outraged by his inferior. The landlord of the George murmured a few stereotyped phrases, expressive of his sympathy with the wrongs of Henry Dunbar, and his entire reprobation of the missing man’s conduct.
“No, I shall not go to London to-night,” Mr. Dunbar said; “though my daughter, my only child, whom I have not seen for sixteen years, is waiting for me at my town house. I shall not leave Winchester without Joseph Wilmot.”
“I’m sure it’s very good of you, sir,” the landlord murmured; “it’s very kind of you to think so much of this — ahem — person.”
He had hesitated a little before the last word; for although Mr. Dunbar spoke of Joseph Wilmot as his inferior and dependant, the landlord of the George remembered that the missing man had looked quite as much a gentleman as his companion.
The landlord still lingered in attendance upon Mr. Dunbar. The dishes upon the table were still hidden under the glistening silver covers.
Surely such an unsatisfactory dinner had never before been served at the George Hotel.
“I am getting seriously uncomfortable about this man,” Mr. Dunbar exclaimed at last. “Can you send a messenger to the Ferns, to ask if he has been seen there?”
“Certainly, sir. One of the lads in the stable shall get a horse ready, and ride over there directly. Will you write a note to Mrs. Marston, sir?”
“A note? No. Mrs. Marston is a stranger to me. My old friend Michael Marston did not marry until after I left England. A message will do just as well. The lad has only to ask if any messenger from Mr. Dunbar has called at the Ferns; and if so, at what time he was there, and at what hour he left. That’s all I want to know. Which way will the boy go; through the meadows, or by the high road?”
“By the high road, sir; there’s only a footpath across the meadows. The shortest way to the Ferns is the pathway through the grove between here and St. Cross; but you can only walk that way, for there’s gates and stiles, and such like.”
“Yes, I know; it was there I parted from my servant — from this man Wilmot.”
“It’s a pretty spot, sir, but very lonely at night; lonely enough in the day, for the matter of that.”
“Yes, it seems so. Send your messenger off at once, there’s a good fellow. Joseph Wilmot may be sitting drinking in the servants’ hall at the Ferns.”
The landlord went away to do his guest’s bidding.
Mr. Dunbar flung himself into a low easy-chair, and took up a newspaper. But he did not read a line upon the page before him. He was in that unsettled frame of mind which is common to the least nervous persons when they are kept waiting, kept in suspense by some unaccountable event. The absence of Joseph Wilmot became every moment more unaccountable: and his old master made no attempt to conceal his uneasiness. The newspaper dropped out of his hand: and he sat with his face turned towards the door: listening.
He sat thus for more than an hour, and at the end of that time the landlord came to him.
“Well?” exclaimed Henry Dunbar.
“The lad has come back, sir. No messenger from you or any one else has called at the Ferns this afternoon.”
Mr. Dunbar started suddenly to his feet, and stared at the landlord. He paused for a few moments, watching the man’s face with a thoughtful countenance. Then he said, slowly and deliberately —
“I am afraid that something has happened.”
The landlord fidgeted with his ponderous watch-chain, and shrugged his shoulders with a dubious gesture.
“Well, it is strange, sir, to say the least of it. But you don’t think that ——”
He looked at Henry Dunbar as if scarcely knowing how to finish his sentence.
“I don’t know what to think,” exclaimed the banker. “Remember, I am almost as much a stranger in this country as if I had never set foot on British soil before to-day. This man may have played me a trick, and gone off for some purpose of his own, though I don’t know what purpose. He could have best served his own interests by staying with me. On the other hand, something may have happened to him. And yet what can have happened to him?”
The landlord suggested that the missing man might have fallen down in a fit, or might have loitered somewhere or other until after dark, and then lost his way, and wandered into a mill-stream. There was many a deep bit of water between Winchester Cathedral and the Ferns, the landlord said.
“Let a search be made at daybreak to-morrow morning,” exclaimed Mr. Dunbar. “I don’t care what it costs me, but I am determined this business shall be cleared up before I leave Winchester. Let every inch of ground between this and the Ferns be searched at daybreak to-morrow morning; let ——”
He did not finish the sentence, for there was a sudden clamour of voices, and trampling, and hubbub in the hall below. The landlord opened the door, and went out upon the broad landing-place, followed by Mr. Dunbar.
The hall below was crowded by the servants of the place, and by eager strangers who had pressed in from outside; and the two men standing at the top of the stairs heard a hoarse murmur; which seemed all in one voice, though it was in reality a blending of many voices; and which grew louder and louder, until it swelled into the awful word “Murder!”
Henry Dunbar heard it and understood it, for his handsome face grew of a bluish white, like snow in the moonlight, and he leaned his hand upon the oaken balustrade.
The landlord passed his guest, and ran down the stairs. It was no time for ceremony.
He came back again in less than five minutes, looking almost as pale as Mr. Dunbar.
“I’m afraid your friend — your servant — is found, sir,” he said.
“You don’t mean that he is ——”
“I’m afraid it is so, sir. It seems that two Irish reapers, coming from Farmer Matfield’s, five mile beyond St. Cross, stumbled against a man lying in a little streamlet under the trees ——”
“Under the trees! Where?”
“In the very place where you parted from this Mr. Wilmot, sir.”
“Good God! Well?”
“The man was dead, sir; quite dead. They carried him to the Foresters’ Arms, sir, as that was the nearest place to where they found him; and there’s been a doctor sent for, and a deal of fuss: but the doctor — Mr. Cricklewood, a very respectable gentleman, sir — says that the man had been lying in the water hours and hours, and that the murder had been done hours and hours ago.”
“The murder!” cried Henry Dunbar; “but he may not have been murdered! His death may have been accidental. He wandered into the water, perhaps.”
“Oh, no, sir; it’s not that. He wasn’t drowned; for the water where he was found wasn’t three foot deep. He had been strangled, sir; strangled with a running-noose of rope; strangled from behind, sir, for the slip-knot was pulled tight at the back of his neck. Mr. Cricklewood the surgeon’s in the hall below, if you’d like to see him; and he knows all about it. It seems, from what the two Irishmen say, that the body was dragged into the water by the rope. There was the track of where it had been dragged along the grass. I’m sure, sir, I’m very sorry such an awful thing should have happened to the — the person who attended you here.”
Mr. Dunbar had need of sympathy. His white face was turned towards the landlord’s, fixed in a blank stare. He had not seemed to listen to the man’s account of the crime that had been committed, and yet he had evidently heard everything; for he said presently, in slow, thick accents —
“Strangled — and the body dragged down — to the water Who — who could — have done it?”
“Ah! that’s the question, indeed, sir. It must all have been done for the sake of a bit of money, I suppose; for there was an empty pocket-book found by the water’s edge. There are always tramps and such-like about the country at this time of year; and some of them will commit almost any crime for the sake of a few pounds. I remember — ah, as long ago as forty years and more — when I was a bit of a boy in pinafores, there was a gentleman murdered on the Twyford road, and they did say ——”
But Mr. Dunbar was in no humour to listen to the landlord’s reminiscences. He interrupted the man’s story with a long-drawn sigh —
“Is there anything I can do? What am I to do?” he said. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Nothing, sir, until to-morrow. The inquest will be held to-morrow, I suppose.”
“Yes — yes, to be sure. There’ll be an inquest.”
“An inquest! Oh, yes, sir; of course there will,” answered the landlord.
“Remember that I am a stranger to English habits. I don’t know what steps ought to be taken in such a case as this. Should there not be some attempt made to find — the — the murderer?”
“Yes, sir; I’ve no doubt the constables are on the look-out already. There’ll be every effort made, depend upon it; but I’m really afraid this is a case in which the murderer will escape from justice.”
“Why so?”
“Because, you see, sir, the man has had plenty of time to get off; and unless he’s a fool, he must be far away from here by this time, and then what is there to trace him by — that’s to say, unless you could identify the money, or watch and chain, or what not, which the murdered man had about him?”
Mr. Dunbar shook his head.
“I don’t even know whether he wore a watch and chain,” he said; “I only met him this morning. I have no idea what money he may have had about him.”
“Would you like to see the doctor, sir — Mr. Cricklewood?”
“Yes — no — you have told me all that there is to tell, I suppose?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I shall go to bed. I’m thoroughly upset by all this. Stay. Is it a settled thing that this man who has been found murdered is the person who accompanied me to this house to-day?”
“Oh, yes, sir; there’s no doubt about that. One of our people went down to the Foresters’ Arms, out of curiosity, as you may say, and he recognized the murdered man directly as the very gentleman that came into this house with you, sir, at four o’clock to-day.”
Mr. Dunbar retired to the apartment that had been prepared for him. It was a spacious and handsome chamber, the best room in the hotel; and one of the waiters attended upon the rich man.
“As you’ve been accustomed to have your valet about you, you’ll find it awkward, sir,” the landlord had said; “so I’ll send Henry to wait upon you.”
This Henry, who was a smart, active young fellow, unpacked Mr. Dunbar’s portmanteau, unlocked his dressing-case, and spread the gold-topped crystal bottles and shaving apparatus upon the dressing-table.
Mr. Dunbar sat in an easy-chair before the looking-glass, staring thoughtfully at the reflection of his own face, pale in the light of the tall wax-candles.
He got up early the next morning, and before breakfasting he despatched a telegraphic message to the banking-house in St. Gundolph Lane.
It was from Henry Maddison Dunbar to William Balderby, and it consisted of these words:—
“Pray come to me directly, at the George, Winchester. A very awful event has happened; and I am in great trouble and perplexity. Bring a lawyer with you. Let my daughter know that I shall not come to London for some days.”
All this time the body of the murdered man lay on a long table in a darkened chamber at the Foresters’ Arms.
The rigid outline of the corpse was plainly visible under the linen sheet that shrouded it; but the door of the dread chamber was locked, and no one was to enter until the coming of the coroner.
Meanwhile the Foresters’ Arms did more business than had been done there in the same space of time within the memory of man. People went in and out, in and out, all through the long morning; little groups clustered together in the bar, discoursing in solemn under-tones; and other groups straggled on the seemed as if every living creature in Winchester was talking of the murder that had been done in the grove near St. Cross.
Henry Dunbar sat in his own room, waiting for an answer to the telegraphic message.
While these things had been happening between London and Southampton, Laura Dunbar, the banker’s daughter, had been anxiously waiting the coming of her father.
She resembled her mother, Lady Louisa Dunbar, the youngest daughter of the Earl of Grantwick, a very beautiful and aristocratic woman. She had met Mr. Dunbar in India, after the death of her first husband, a young captain in a cavalry regiment, who had been killed in an encounter with the Sikhs a year after his marriage, leaving his young widow with an infant daughter, a helpless baby of six weeks old.
The poor, high-born Lady Louisa Macmahon was left most desolate and miserable after the death of her first husband. She was very poor, and she knew that her relations in England were very little better off than herself. She was almost as helpless as her six-weeks’ old baby; she was heart-broken by the loss of the handsome young Irishman, whom she had fondly loved; and ill and broken down by her sorrows, she lingered in Calcutta, subsisting upon her pension, and too weak to undertake the perils of the voyage home.
It was at this time that poor widowed Lady Louisa met Henry Dunbar, the rich banker. She came in contact with him on account of some money arrangements of her dead husband’s, who had always banked with Dunbar and Dunbar; and Henry, then getting on for forty years of age, had fallen desperately in love with the beautiful young widow.
There is no need for me to dwell upon the history of this courtship. Lady Louisa married the rich man eighteen months after her first husband’s death. Little Dorothea Macmahon was sent to England with a native nurse, and placed under the care of her maternal relatives; and Henry Dunbar’s beautiful wife became queen of the best society in the city of palaces, by the right of her own rank and her husband’s wealth.
Henry Dunbar loved her desperately, as even a selfish man can sometimes love for once in his life.
But Lady Louisa never truly returned the millionaire’s affection. She was haunted by the memory of her first and purest love; she was tortured by remorseful thoughts about the fatherless child who had been so ruthlessly banished from her. Henry Dunbar was a jealous man, and he grudged the love which his wife bore to his dead rival’s child. It was by his contrivance the girl had been sent from India.
Lady Louisa Dunbar held her place in Calcutta society for two years. But in the very hour when her social position was most brilliant, her beauty in the full splendour of its prime, she died so suddenly that the fashionables of Calcutta were discussing the promised splendour of a ball, for which Lady Louisa had issued her invitations, when the tidings of her death spread like wildfire through the city — Henry Dunbar was a widower. He might have married again, had he pleased to do so. The proudest beauty in Calcutta would have been glad to become the wife of the sole heir of that dingy banking-house in St. Gundolph Lane.
There was a good deal of excitement upon this subject in the matrimonial market for two or three years after Lady Louisa’s death. A good many young ladies were expressly imported from England by anxious papas and mammas, with a view to the capture of the wealthy widower.
But though Griselda’s yellow hair fell down to her waist in glossy, rippling curls, that shone like molten gold; though Amanda’s black eyes glittered like the stars in a midnight sky; though the dashing Georgina was more graceful than Diana, the gentle Lavinia more beautiful than Venus — Mr. Dunbar went among them without pleasure, and left them without regret.
The charms of all these ladies concentrated in the person of one perfect woman would have had no witchery for the banker. His heart was dead. He had given all the truth, all the passion of which his nature was capable, to the one woman who had possessed the power to charm him.
To seek to win love from him was about as hopeless as it would have been to ask alms of a man whose purse was empty. The bright young English beauties found this out by and by, and devoted themselves to other speculations in the matrimonial market.
Henry Dunbar sent his little girl, his only child, to England. He parted with her, not because of his indifference, but rather by reason of his idolatry. It was the only unselfish act of his life, this parting with his child; and yet even in this there was selfishness.
“It would be sweet to me to keep her here,” he thought; “but then, if the climate should kill her; if I should lose her, as I lost her mother? I will send her away from me now, that she may be my blessing by-and-by, when I return to England after my father’s death.”
Henry Dunbar had sworn when he left the office in St. Gundolph Lane, after the discovery of the forgery, that he would never look upon his father’s face again — and he kept his oath.
This was the father to whose coming Laura Dunbar looked forward with eager anxiety, with a heart overflowing with tender womanly love.
She was a very beautiful girl; so beautiful that her presence was like the sunlight, and made the meanest place splendid. There was a queenliness in her beauty, which she inherited from her mother’s high-born race. But though her beauty was queenlike, it was not imperious. There was no conscious pride in her aspect, no cold hauteur in her ever-changing face. She was such a woman as might have sat by the side of an English king to plead for all trembling petitioners kneeling on the steps of the throne. She would have been only in her fitting place beneath the shadow of a regal canopy; for in soul, as well as in aspect, she was worthy to be a queen. She was like some tall white lily, unconsciously beautiful, unconsciously grand; and the meanest natures kindled with a faint glow of poetry when they came in contact with her.
She had been spoiled by an adoring nurse, a devoted governess, masters who had fallen madly in love with their pupil, and servants who were ready to worship their young mistress. Yes, according to the common acceptation of the term, she had been spoiled; she had been allowed to have her own way in everything; to go hither and thither, free as the butterflies in her carefully tended garden; to scatter her money right and left; to be imposed upon and cheated by every wandering vagabond who found his way to her gates; to ride, and hunt, and drive — to do as she liked, in short. And I am fain to say that the consequence of all this foolish and reprehensible indulgence had been to make the young heiress of Maudesley Abbey the most fascinating woman in all Warwickshire.
She was a little capricious, just a trifle wayward, I will confess. But then that trifling waywardness gave just the spice that was wanting to this grand young lily. The white lilies are never more beautiful than when they wave capriciously in the summer wind; and if Laura Dunbar was a little passionate when you tried to thwart her; and if her great blue eyes at such times had a trick of lighting up with sudden fire in them, like a burst of lurid sunlight through a summer storm-cloud, there were plenty of gentlemen in Warwickshire ready to swear that the sight of those lightning-flashes of womanly anger was well worth the penalty of incurring Miss Dunbar’s displeasure.
She was only eighteen, and had not yet “come out.” But she had seen a great deal of society, for it had been the delight of her grandfather to have her perpetually with him.
She travelled from Maudesley Abbey to Portland Place in the company of her nurse — a certain Elizabeth Madden, who had been Lady Louisa’s own maid before her marriage with Captain Macmahon, and who was devotedly attached to the motherless girl.
But Mrs. Madden was not Laura Dunbar’s only companion upon this occasion. She was accompanied by her half-sister, Dora Macmahon, who of late years had almost lived at the Abbey, much to the delight of Laura. Nor was the little party without an escort; for Arthur Lovell, the son of the principal solicitor in the town of Shorncliffe, near Maudesley Abbey, attended Miss Dunbar to London.
This young man had been a very great favourite with Percival Dunbar and had been a constant visitor at the Abbey. Before the old man died, he told Arthur Lovell to act in everything as Laura’s friend and legal adviser; and the young lawyer was very enthusiastic in behalf of his beautiful client. Why should I seek to make a mystery of this gentleman’s feelings? He loved her. He loved this girl, who, by reason of her father’s wealth, was as far removed from him as if she had been a duchess. He paid a terrible penalty for every happy hour, every delicious day of simple and innocent enjoyment, that he had spent at Maudesley Abbey; for he loved Laura Dunbar, and he feared that his love was hopeless.
It was hopeless in the present, at any rate; for although he was handsome, clever, high-spirited, and honourable, a gentleman in the noblest sense of that noble word, he was no fit husband for the daughter of Henry Dunbar. He was an only son, and he was heir to a very comfortable little fortune: but he knew that the millionaire would have laughed him to scorn had he dared to make proposals for Laura’s hand.
But was his love hopeless in the future? That was the question which he perpetually asked himself.
He was proud and ambitious. He knew that he was clever; he could not help knowing this, though he was entirely without conceit. A government appointment in India had been offered to him through the intervention of a nobleman, a friend of his father’s. This appointment would afford the chance of a noble career to a man who knew how to seize the golden opportunity, which mediocrity neglects, but which genius makes the stepping-stone to greatness.
The nobleman who made the offer to Arthur Lovell had written to say that there was no necessity for an immediate decision. If Arthur accepted the appointment, he would not be obliged to leave England until the end of a twelvemonth, as the vacancy would not occur before that time.
“In the meanwhile,” Lord Herriston wrote to the solicitor, “your son can think the matter over, my dear Lovell, and make his decision with all due deliberation.”
Arthur Lovell had already made that decision.
“I will go to India,” he said; “for if ever I am to win Laura Dunbar, I must succeed in life. But before I go I will tell her that I love her. If she returns my love, my struggles will be sweet to me, for they will be made for her sake. If she does not ——”
He did not finish the sentence even in his own mind. He could not bear to think that it was possible he might hear his death-knell from the lips he worshipped. He had gladly seized upon the opportunity afforded by this visit to the town house.
“I will speak to her before her father returns,” he thought; “she will speak the truth to me now fearlessly; for it is her nature to be fearless and candid as a child. But his coming may change her. She is fond of him, and will be ruled by him. Heaven grant he may rule her wisely and gently!”
On the 17th of August, Laura and Mrs. Madden arrived in Portland Place.
Arthur Lovell parted with his beautiful client at the railway station, and drove off to the hotel at which he was in the habit of staying. He called upon Miss Dunbar on the 18th; but found that she was out shopping with Mrs. Madden. He called again, on the morning of the 19th; that bright sunny August morning on which the body of the murdered man lay in the darkened chamber at Winchester.
It was only ten o’clock when the young lawyer made his appearance in the pleasant morning-room occupied by Laura Dunbar whenever she stayed in Portland Place. The breakfast equipage was still upon the table in the centre of the room. Mrs. Madden, who was companion, housekeeper, and confidential maid to her charming young mistress, was officiating at the breakfast-table; Dora Macmahon was sitting near her, with an open book by the side of her breakfast-cup; and Miss Laura Dunbar was lounging in a low easy-chair, near a broad window that opened into a conservatory filled with exotics, that made the air heavy with their almost overpowering perfume.
She rose as Arthur Lovell came into the room, and she looked more like a lily than ever in her long loose morning-dress of soft semi-diaphanous muslin. Her thick auburn hair was twisted into a diadem that crowned her broad white forehead, and added a couple of inches to her height. She held out her little ringed hand, and the jewels on the white fingers scintillated in the sunlight.
“I am so glad to see you, Mr. Lovell,” she said. “Dora and I have been miserable, haven’t we, Dora? London is as dull as a desert. I went for a drive yesterday, and the Lady’s Mile is as lonely as the Great Sahara. There are plenty of theatres open, and there was a concert at one of the opera-houses last night; but that disagreeable Elizabeth wouldn’t allow me to go to any one of those entertainments. Grandpapa would have taken me. Dear grandpapa went everywhere with me.”
Mrs. Madden shook her head solemnly.
“Your gran’pa would have gone after you to the remotest end of this world, Miss Laura, if you’d so much as held your finger up to beckon of him. Your gran’pa spiled you, Miss Laura. A pretty thing it would have been if your pa had come all the way from India to find his only daughter gallivanting at a theaytre.”
Miss Dunbar looked at her old nurse with an arch smile. She was very lovely when she smiled; she was very lovely when she frowned. She was most beautiful always, Arthur Lovell thought.
“But I shouldn’t have been gallivanting, you dear old Madden,” she cried, with a joyous silver laugh, that was like the ripple of a cascade under a sunny sky. “I should only have been sitting quietly in a private box, with my rapid, precious, aggravating, darling old nurse to keep watch and ward over me. Besides, how could papa be angry with me upon the first day of his coming home?”
Mrs. Madden shook her head again even more solemnly than before.
“I don’t know about that, Miss Laura. You mustn’t expect to find Mr. Dunbar like your gran’pa.”
A sudden cloud fell upon the girl’s lovely face.
“Why, Elizabeth,” she said, “you don’t mean that papa will be unkind to me?”
“I don’t know your pa, Miss Laura. I never set eyes upon Mr. Dunbar in my life. But the Indian servant that brought you over, when you was but a bit of a baby, said that your pa was proud and passionate; and that even your poor mar, which he loved her better than any livin’ creature upon this earth, was almost afraid of him.”
The smile had quite vanished from Laura Dunbar’s face by this time, and the blue eyes filled suddenly with tears.
“Oh, what shall I do if my father is unkind to me?” she said, piteously. “I have so looked forward to his coming home. I have counted the very days; and if he is unkind to me — if he does not love me ——”
She covered her face with her hands, and turned away her head. “Laura,” exclaimed Arthur Lovell, addressing her for the first time by her Christian name, “how could any one help loving you? How ——”
He stopped, half ashamed of his passionate enthusiasm. In those few words he had revealed the secret of his heart: but Laura Dunbar was too innocent to understand the meaning of those eager words.
Mrs. Madden understood them perfectly; and she smiled approvingly at the young man.
Arthur Lovell was a great favourite with Laura Dunbar’s nurse. She knew that he adored her young mistress; and she looked upon him as a model of all that is noble and chivalrous.
She began to fidget with the silver tea-canisters; and then looked significantly at Dora Macmahon. But Miss Macmahon did not understand that significant glance. Her dark eyes — and she had very beautiful eyes, with a grave, half-pensive softness in their sombre depths — were fixed upon the two young faces in the sunny window; the girl’s face clouded with a look of sorrowful perplexity, the young man’s face eloquent with tender meaning. Dora Macmahon’s colour went and came as she looked at that earnest countenance, and the fingers which were absently turning the leaves of her book were faintly tremulous.
“Your new bonnet’s come home this morning, Miss Dora,” Elizabeth Madden said, rather sharply. “Perhaps you’d like to come up-stairs and have a look at it.”
“My new bonnet!” murmured Dora, vaguely.
“La, yes, miss; the new bonnet you bought in Regent Street only yesterday afternoon. I never did see such a forgetful wool-gathering young lady in all my life as you are this blessed morning, Miss Dora.”
The absent-minded young lady rose suddenly, bewildered by Mrs. Madden’s animated desire for an inspection of the bonnet. But she very willingly left the room with Laura’s old nurse, who was accustomed to have her mandates obeyed even by the wayward heiress of Maudesley Abbey; and Laura was left alone with the young lawyer.
Miss Dunbar had seated herself once more in the low easy-chair by the window. She sat with her elbow resting on the cushioned arm of the chair, and her head supported by her hand. Her eyes were fixed, and looked straight before her, with a thoughtful gaze that was strange to her: for her nature was as joyous as that of a bird, whose music fills all the wide heaven with one rejoicing psalm.
Arthur Lovell drew his chair nearer to the thoughtful girl.
“Laura,” he said, “why are you so silent? I never saw you so serious before, except after your grandfather’s death.”
“I am thinking of my father,” she answered, in a low, tremulous voice, that was broken by her tears: “I am thinking that, perhaps, he will not love me.”
“Not love you, Laura! who could help loving you? Oh, if I dared — if I could venture — I must speak, Laura Dunbar. My whole life hangs upon the issue, and I will speak. I am not a poor man, Laura; but you are so divided from the rest of the world by your father’s wealth, that I have feared to speak. I have feared to tell you that which you might have discovered for yourself, had you not been as innocent as your own pet doves in the dovecote at Maudesley.”
The girl looked at him with wondering eyes that were still wet with unshed tears.
“I love you, Laura; I love you. The world would call me beneath you in station, now; but I am a man, and I have a man’s ambition — a strong man’s iron will. Everything is possible to him who has sworn to conquer; and for your sake. Laura, for your love I should overcome obstacles that to another man might be invincible. I am going to India, Laura: I am going to carve my way to fame and fortune, for fame and fortune are slaves that come at the brave man’s bidding; they are only masters when the coward calls them. Remember, my beloved one, this wealth that now stands between you and me may not always be yours. Your father is not an old man; he may marry again, and have a son to inherit his wealth. Would to Heaven, Laura, that it might be so! But be that as it may, I despair of nothing if I dare hope for your love. Oh, Laura, dearest, one word to tell me that I may hope! Remember how happy we have been together; little children playing with flowers and butterflies in the gardens at Maudesley; boy and girl, rambling hand-in-hand beside the wandering Avon; man and woman standing in mournful silence by your grandfather’s deathbed. The past is a bond of union betwixt us, Laura. Look back at all those happy days and give me one word, my darling — one word to tell me that you love me.”
Laura Dunbar looked up at him with a sweet smile, and laid her soft white hand in his.
“I do love you, Arthur,” she said, “as dearly as I should have loved my brother had I ever known a brother’s love.”
The young man bowed his head in silence. When he looked up, Laura Dunbar saw that he was very pale.
“You only love me as a brother, Laura?”
“How else should I love you?” she asked, innocently.
Arthur Lovell looked at her with a mournful smile; a tender smile that was exquisitely beautiful, for it was the look of a man who is prepared to resign his own happiness for the sake of her he loves.
“Enough, Laura,” he said, quietly; “I have received my sentence. You do not love me, dearest; you have yet to suffer life’s great fever.”
She clasped her hands, and looked at him beseechingly.
“You are not angry with me, Arthur?” she said.
“Angry with you, my sweet one!”
“And you will still love me?”
“Yes, Laura, with all a brother’s devotion. And if ever you have need of my services, you shall find what it is to have a faithful friend, who holds his life at small value beside your happiness.”
He said no more, for there was the sound of carriage-wheels below the window, and then a loud double-knock at the hall-door.
Laura started to her feet, and her bright face grew pale.
“My father has come!” she exclaimed.
But it was not her father. It was Mr. Balderby, who had just come from St. Gundolph Lane, where he had received Henry Dunbar’s telegraphic despatch.
Every vestige of colour faded out of Laura’s face as she recognized the junior partner of the banking-house.
“Something has happened to my father!” she cried.
“No, no, Miss Dunbar!” exclaimed Mr. Balderby, anxious to reassure her. “Your father has arrived in England safely, and is well, as I believe. He is staying at Winchester; and he has telegraphed to me to go to him there immediately.”
“Something has happened, then?”
“Yes, but not to Mr. Dunbar individually; so far as I can make out by the telegraphic message. I was to come to you here, Miss Dunbar, to tell you not to expect your papa for some few days; and then I am to go on to Winchester, taking a lawyer with me.”
“A lawyer!” exclaimed Laura.
“Yes, I am going to Lincoln’s Inn immediately to Messrs. Walford and Walford, our own solicitors.”
“Let Mr. Lovell go with you,” cried Miss Dunbar; “he always acted as poor grandpapa’s solicitor. Let him go with you.”
“Yes, Mr. Balderby,” exclaimed the young man, “I beg you to allow me to accompany you. I shall be very glad to be of service to Mr. Dunbar.”
Mr. Balderby hesitated for a few moments.
“Well, I really don’t see why you shouldn’t go, if you wish to do so,” he said, presently. “Mr. Dunbar says he wants a lawyer; he doesn’t name any particular lawyer. We shall save time by your going; for we shall be able to catch the eleven o’clock express.”
He looked at his watch.
“There’s not a moment to lose. Good morning, Miss Dunbar. We’ll take care of your papa, and bring him to you in triumph. Come, Lovell.”
Arthur Lovell shook hands with Laura, murmured a few words in her ear, and hurried away with Mr. Balderby.
She had spoken the death-knell of his dearest hopes. He had seen his sentence in her innocent face; but he loved her still.
There was something in her virginal candour, her bright young loveliness, that touched the noblest chords of his heart. He loved her with a chivalrous devotion, which, after all, is as natural to the breast of a young Englishman in these modern days, miscalled degenerate, as when the spotless knight King Arthur loved and wooed his queen.
The coroner’s inquest, which had been appointed to take place at noon that day, was postponed until three o’clock in the afternoon, in compliance with the earnest request of Henry Dunbar.
When ever was the earnest request of a millionaire refused?
The coroner, who was a fussy little man, very readily acceded to Mr. Dunbar’s entreaties.
“I am a stranger in England,” the Anglo-Indian said; “I was never in my life present at an inquest. The murdered man was connected with me. He was last seen in my company. It is vitally necessary that I should have a legal adviser to watch the proceedings on my behalf. Who knows what dark suspicions may arise, affecting my name and honour?”
The banker made this remark in the presence of four or five of the jurymen, the coroner, and Mr. Cricklewood, the surgeon who had been called in to examine the body of the man supposed to have been murdered. Every one of those gentlemen protested loudly and indignantly against the idea of the bare possibility that any suspicion, or the shadow of a suspicion, could attach to such a man as Mr. Dunbar.
They knew nothing of him, of course, except that he was Henry Dunbar, chief of the rich banking-house of Dunbar, Dunbar, and Balderby, and that he was a millionaire.
Was it likely that a millionaire would commit a murder?
When had a millionaire ever been known to commit a murder? Never, of course!
The Anglo-Indian sat in his private sitting-room at the George Hotel, writing, and examining his papers — perpetually writing, perpetually sorting and re-sorting those packets of letters in the despatch-box — while he waited for the coming of Mr. Balderby.
The postponement of the coroner’s inquest was a very good thing for the landlord of the Foresters’ Arms. People went in and out, and loitered about the premises, and lounged in the bar, drinking and talking all the morning, and the theme of every conversation was the murder that had been done in the grove on the way to St. Cross.
Mr. Balderby and Arthur Lovell arrived at the George a few minutes before two o’clock. They were shown at once into the apartment in which Henry Dunbar sat waiting for them.
Arthur Lovell had been thinking of Laura and Laura’s father throughout the journey from London. He had wondered, as he got nearer and nearer to Winchester, what would be his first impression respecting Mr. Dunbar.
That first impression was not a good one — no, it was not a good one. Mr. Dunbar was a handsome man — a very handsome man — tall and aristocratic-looking, with a certain haughty pace in his manner that harmonized well with his good looks. But, in spite of all this, the impression which he made upon the mind of Arthur Lovell was not an agreeable one.
The young lawyer had heard the story of the forgery vaguely hinted at by those who were familiar with the history of the Dunbar family; and he had heard that the early life of Henry Dunbar had been that of a selfish spendthrift.
Perhaps this may have had some influence upon his feelings in this his first meeting with the father of the woman he loved.
Henry Dunbar told the story of the murder. The two men were inexpressibly shocked by this story.
“But where is Sampson Wilmot?” exclaimed Mr. Balderby. “It was he whom I sent to meet you, knowing that he was the only person in the office who remembered you, or whom you remembered.”
“Sampson was taken ill upon the way, according to his brother’s story,” Mr. Dunbar answered. “Joseph left the poor old man somewhere upon the road.”
“He did not say where?”
“No; and, strange to say, I forgot to ask him the question. The poor fellow amused me by old memories of the past on the road between Southampton and this place, and we therefore talked very little of the present.”
“Sampson must be very ill,” exclaimed Mr. Balderby, “or he would certainly have returned to St. Gundolph Lane to tell me what had taken place.”
Mr. Dunbar smiled.
“If he was too ill to go on to Southampton, he would, of course, be too ill to return to London,” he said, with supreme indifference.
Mr. Balderby, who was a good-hearted man, was distressed at the idea of Sampson Wilmot’s desolation; an old man, stricken with sudden illness, and abandoned to strangers.
Arthur Lovell was silent: he sat a little way apart from the two others, watching Henry Dunbar.
At three o’clock the inquest commenced. The witnesses summoned were the two Irishmen, Patrick Hennessy and Philip Murtock, who had found the body in the stream near St. Cross; Mr. Cricklewood, the surgeon; the verger, who had seen and spoken to the two men, and who had afterwards shown the cathedral to Mr. Dunbar; the landlord of the George, and the waiter who had received the travellers and had taken Mr. Dunbar’s orders for the dinner; and Henry Dunbar himself.
There were a great many people in the room, for by this time the tidings of the murder had spread far and wide. There were influential people present, amongst others, Sir Arden Westhorpe, one of the county magistrates resident at Winchester. Arthur Lovell, Mr. Balderby, and the Anglo-Indian sat in a little group apart from the rest.
The jurymen were ranged upon either side of a long mahogany table. The coroner sat at the top.
But before the examination of the witnesses was commenced, the jurymen were conducted into that dismal chamber where the dead man lay upon one of the long tap-room tables. Arthur Lovell went with them; and Mr. Cricklewood, the surgeon, proceeded to examine the corpse, so as to enable him to give evidence respecting the cause of death.
The face of the dead man was distorted and blackened by the agony of strangulation. The coroner and the jurymen looked at that dead face with wondering, awe-stricken glances. Sometimes a cruel stab, that goes straight home to the heart, will leave the face of the murdered as calm, as the face of a sleeping child.
But in this case it was not so. The horrible stamp of assassination was branded upon that rigid brow. Horror, surprise, and the dread agony of sudden death were all blended in the expression of the face.
The jurymen talked a little to one another in scarcely audible whispers, asked a few questions of the surgeon, and then walked softly from the darkened room.
The facts of the case were very simple, and speedily elicited. But whatever the truth of that awful story might be, there was nothing that threw any light upon the mystery.
Arthur Lovell, watching the case in the interests of Mr. Dunbar, asked several questions of the witnesses. Henry Dunbar was himself the first person examined. He gave a very simple and intelligible account of all that had taken place from the moment of his landing at Southampton.
“I found the deceased waiting to receive me when I landed,” he said. “He told me that he came as a substitute for another person. I did not know him at first — that is to say, I did not recognize him as the valet who had been in my service prior to my leaving England five-and-thirty years ago. But he made himself known to me afterwards, and he told me that he had met his brother in London on the sixteenth of this month, and had travelled with him part of the way to Southampton. He also told me that, on the way to Southampton, his brother, Sampson Wilmot, a much older man than the deceased, was taken ill, and that the two men then parted company.”
Mr. Dunbar had said all this with perfect self-possession, and with great deliberation. He was so very self-possessed, so very deliberate, that it seemed almost as if he had been reciting something which he had learned by heart.
Arthur Lovell, watching him very intently, saw this, and wondered at it. It is very usual for a witness, even the most indifferent witness, giving evidence about some trifling matter, to be confused, to falter, and hesitate, and contradict himself, embarrassed by the strangeness of his position. But Henry Dunbar was in nowise discomposed by the awful nature of the event which had happened. He was pale; but his firmly-set lips, his erect carriage, the determined glance of his eyes, bore witness to the strength of his nerves and the power of his intellect.
“The man must be made of iron,” Arthur Lovell thought to himself. “He is either a very great man, or a very wicked one. I almost fear to ask myself which.”
“Where did the deceased Joseph Wilmot say he left his brother Sampson, Mr. Dunbar?” asked the coroner.
“I do not remember.”
The coroner scratched his chin, thoughtfully.
“That is rather awkward,” he said; “the evidence of this man Sampson might throw some light upon this most mysterious event.”
Mr. Dunbar then told the rest of his story.
He spoke of the luncheon at Southampton, the journey from Southampton to Winchester, the afternoon stroll down to the meadows near St. Cross.
“Can you tell us the exact spot at which you parted with the deceased?” asked the coroner.
“No,” Mr. Dunbar answered; “you must bear in mind that I am a stranger in England. I have not been in this neighbourhood since I was a boy. My old schoolfellow, Michael Marston, married and settled at the Ferns during my absence in India. I found at Southampton that I should have a few hours on my hands before I could travel express for London, and I came to this place on purpose to see my old friend. I was very much disappointed to find that he was dead. But I thought that I would call upon his widow, from whom I should no doubt hear the history of my poor friend’s last moments. I went with Joseph Wilmot through the cathedral yard, and down towards St. Cross. The verger saw us, and spoke to us as we went by.”
The verger, who was standing amongst the other witnesses, waiting to be examined, here exclaimed —
“Ay, that I did, sir; I remember it well.”
“At what time did you leave the George?”
“At a little after four o’clock.”
“Where did you go then?”
“I went,” answered Mr. Dunbar, boldly, “into the grove with the deceased, arm-in-arm. We walked together about a quarter of a mile under the trees, and I had intended to go on to the Ferns, to call upon Michael Marston’s widow; but my habits of late years have been sedentary; the heat of the day and the walk together were too much for me. I sent Joseph Wilmot on to the Ferns with a message for Mrs. Marston, asking at what hour she could conveniently receive me to-day; and I returned to the cathedral. Joseph Wilmot was to deliver his message at the Ferns, and rejoin me in the cathedral.”
“He was to return to the cathedral?”
“Yes.”
“But why should he not have returned to the George Hotel? Why should you wait for him at the cathedral?”
Arthur Lovell listened, with a strange expression upon his face. If Henry Dunbar was pale, Henry Dunbar’s legal adviser was still more so. The jurymen stared aghast at the coroner, as if they had been awe-stricken by his impertinence towards the chief partner of the great banking-house of Dunbar, Dunbar, and Balderby. How dared he — a man with an income of five hundred a year at the most — how dared he discredit or question any assertion made by Henry Dunbar?
The Anglo-Indian smiled, a little contemptuously. He stood in a careless attitude, playing with the golden trinkets at his watch-chain, with the hot August sunshine streaming upon his face from a bare unshaded window opposite him. But he did not attempt to escape that almost blinding glare. He stood facing the sunlight; facing the gaze of the coroner and the jurymen; the scrutinizing glance of Arthur Lovell. Unabashed and nonchalant as if he had been standing in a ball-room, the hero of the hour, the admired of all who looked upon him, Mr. Dunbar stood before the coroner and jury, and told the broken history of his old servant’s death.
“Yes,” Mr. Lovell thought again, as he watched the rich man’s face, “his nerves must be made of iron.”
The coroner repeated his question:
“Why did you tell the deceased to join you at the cathedral, Mr. Dunbar?”
“Merely because it suited my humour at the time to do so,” answered the Anglo-Indian, coolly. “We had been very friendly together, and I had a fancy for going over the cathedral. I thought that Wilmot might return from the Ferns in time to go over some portion of the edifice with me. He was a very intelligent fellow, and I liked his society.”
“But the journey to the Ferns and back would have occupied some time.”
“Perhaps so,” answered Mr. Dunbar; “I did not know the distance to the Ferns, and I did not make any calculation as to time. I merely said to the deceased, ‘I shall go back and look at the cathedral; and I will wait for you there.’ I said this, and I told him to be as quick as he could.”
“That was all that passed between you?”
“It was. I then returned to the cathedral.”
“And you waited there for the deceased?”
“I did. I waited until close upon the hour at which I had ordered dinner at the George.”
There was a pause, during which the coroner looked very thoughtful.
“I am compelled to ask you one more question, Mr. Dunbar,” he said, presently, hesitating a little as he spoke.
“I am ready to answer any questions you may wish to ask,” Mr. Dunbar replied, very quietly.
“Were you upon friendly terms with the deceased?”
“I have just told you so. We were on excellent terms. I found him an agreeable companion. His manners were those of a gentleman. I don’t know how he had picked up his education, but he certainly had contrived to educate himself some how or other.”
“I understand you were friendly together at the time of his death; but prior to that time ——”
Mr. Dunbar smiled.
“I have been in India five-and-thirty years,” he said.
“Precisely. But before your departure for India, had you any misunderstanding, any serious quarrel with the deceased?”
Mr. Dunbar’s face flushed suddenly, and his brows contracted as if even his self-possession were not proof against the unpleasant memories of the past.
“No,” he said, with determination; “I never quarrelled with him.”
“There had been no cause of quarrel between you?”
“I don’t understand your question. I have told you that I never quarrelled with him.”
“Perhaps not; but there might have been some hidden animosity, some smothered feeling, stronger than any openly-expressed anger, hidden in your breast. Was there any such feeling?”
“Not on my part.”
“Was there any such feeling on the part of the deceased?”
Mr. Dunbar looked furtively at William Balderby. The junior partner’s eyelids dropped under that stolen glance.
It was clear that he knew the story of the forged bills.
Had the coroner for Winchester been a clever man, he would have followed that glance of Mr. Dunbar’s, and would have understood that the junior partner knew something about the antecedents of the dead man. But the coroner was not a very close observer, and Mr. Dunbar’s eager glance escaped him altogether.
“Yes,” answered the Anglo-Indian, “Joseph Wilmot had a grudge against me before I sailed for Calcutta, but we settled all that at Southampton, and I promised to allow him an annuity.”
“You promised him an annuity?”
“Yes — not a very large one — only fifty pounds a year; but he was quite satisfied with that promise.”
“He had some claim upon you, then?”
“No, he had no claim whatever upon me,” replied Mr. Dunbar, haughtily.
Of course, it could be scarcely pleasant for a millionaire to be cross-questioned in this manner by an impertinent Hampshire coroner.
The jurymen sympathized with the banker.
The coroner looked rather puzzled.
“If the deceased had no claim upon you, why did you promise him an annuity?” he asked, after a pause.
“I made that promise for the sake of ‘auld lang syne,’” answered Mr. Dunbar. “Joseph Wilmot was a favourite servant of mine five-and-thirty years ago. We were young men together. I believe that he had, at one time, a very sincere affection for me. I know that I always liked him.”
“How long were you in the grove with the deceased?”
“Not more than ten minutes.”
“And you cannot describe the spot where you left him?”
“Not very easily; I could point it out, perhaps, if I were taken there.”
“What time elapsed between your leaving the cathedral yard with the deceased and your returning to it without him?”
“Perhaps half an hour.”
“Not longer?”
“No; I do not imagine that it can have been longer.”
“Thank you, Mr. Dunbar; that will do for the present,” said the coroner.
The banker returned to his seat.
Arthur Lovell, still watching him, saw that his strong white hand trembled a little as his fingers trifled with those glittering toys hanging to his watch-chain.
The verger was the next person examined.
He described how he had been loitering in the yard of the cathedral as the two men passed across it. He told how they had gone by arm-in-arm, laughing and talking together.
“Which of them was talking as they passed you?” asked the coroner.
“Mr. Dunbar.”
“Could you hear what he was saying?”
“No, sir. I could hear his voice, but I couldn’t hear the words.”
“What time elapsed between Mr. Dunbar and the deceased leaving the cathedral yard, and Mr. Dunbar returning alone?”
The verger scratched his head, and looked doubtfully at Henry Dunbar.
That gentleman was looking straight before him, and seemed quite unconscious of the verger’s glance.
“I can’t quite exactly say how long it was, sir,” the old man answered, after a pause.
“Why can’t you say exactly?”
“Because, you see, sir, I didn’t keep no particular ‘count of the time, and I shouldn’t like to tell a falsehood.”
“You must not tell a falsehood. We want the truth, and nothing but the truth.”
“I know, sir; but you see I am an old man, and my memory is not as good as it used to be. I think Mr. Dunbar was away an hour.”
Arthur Lovell gave an involuntary start. Every one of the jurymen looked suddenly at Mr. Dunbar.
But the Anglo-Indian did not flinch. He was looking at the verger now with a quiet steady gaze, which seemed that of a man who had nothing to fear, and who was serene and undisturbed by reason of his innocence.
“We don’t want to know what you think,” the coroner said; “you must tell us only what you are certain of.”
“Then I’m not certain, sir.”
“You are not certain that Mr. Dunbar was absent for an hour?”
“Not quite certain, sir.”
“But very nearly certain. Is that so?”
“Yes, sir, I’m very nearly certain. You see, sir, when the two gentlemen went through the yard, the cathedral clock was chiming the quarter after four; I remember that. And when Mr. Dunbar came back, I was just going away to my tea, and I seldom go to my tea until it’s gone five.”
“But supposing it to have struck five when Mr. Dunbar returned, that would only make it three quarters of an hour after the time at which he went through the yard, supposing him to have gone through, as you say, at the quarter past four.”
The verger scratched his head again.
“I’d been loiterin’ about yesterday afternoon, sir,” he said; “and I was a bit late thinkin’ of my tea.”
“And you believe, therefore, that Mr. Dunbar was absent for an hour?”
“Yes, sir; an hour — or more.”
“An hour, or more?”
“Yes, sir.”
“He was absent more than an hour; do you mean to say that?”
“It might have been more, sir. I didn’t keep no particular ‘count of the time.”
Arthur Lovell had taken out his pocket-book, and was making notes of the verger’s evidence.
The old man went on to describe his having shown Mr. Dunbar all over the cathedral. He made no mention of that sudden faintness which had seized upon the Anglo-Indian at the door of one of the chapels; but he described the rich man’s manner as having been affable in the extreme. He told how Henry Dunbar had loitered at the door of the cathedral, and afterwards lingered in the quadrangle, waiting for the coming of his servant. He told all this with many encomiums upon the rich man’s pleasant manner.
The next, and perhaps the most important, witnesses were the two labourers, Philip Murtock and Patrick Hennessy, who had found the body of the murdered man.
Patrick Hennessy was sent out of the room while Murtock gave his evidence; but the evidence of the two men tallied in every particular.
They were Irishmen, reapers, and were returning from a harvest supper at a farm five miles from St. Cross, upon the previous evening. One of them had knelt down upon the edge of the stream to get a drink of water in the crown of his felt hat, and had been horrified by seeing the face of the dead man looking up at him in the moonlight, through the shallow water that barely covered it. The two men had dragged the body out of the streamlet, and Philip Murtock had watched beside it while Patrick Hennessy had gone to seek assistance.
The dead man’s clothes had been stripped from him, with the exception of his trousers and boots, and the other part of his body was bare. There was a revolting brutality in this fact. It seemed that the murderer had stripped his victim for the sake of the clothes which he had worn. There could be little doubt, therefore, that the murder had been committed for the greed of gain, and not from any motive of revenge.
Arthur Lovell breathed more freely; until this moment his mind had been racked in agonizing doubts. Dark suspicions had been working in his breast. He had been tortured by the idea that the Anglo-Indian had murdered his old servant, in order to remove out of his way the chief witness of the crime of his youth.
But if this had been so, the murderer would never have lingered upon the scene of his crime in order to strip the clothes from his victim’s body.
No! the deed had doubtless been done by some savage wretch, some lost and ignorant creature, hardened by a long life of crime, and preying like a wild beast upon his fellow-men.
Such murders are done in the world. Blood has been shed for the sake of some prize so small, so paltry, that it has been difficult for men to believe that one human being could destroy another for such an object.
Heaven have pity upon the wretch so lost as to be separated from his fellow-creatures by reason of the vileness of his nature! Heaven strengthen the hands of those who seek to spread Christian enlightenment and education through the land! for it is only those blessings that will thin the crowded prison wards, and rob the gallows of its victims.
The robbery of the dead man’s clothes, and such property as he might have had about him at the time of his death, gave a new aspect to the murder in the eyes of Arthur Lovell. The case was clear and plain now, and the young man’s duty was no longer loathsome to him; for he no longer suspected Henry Dunbar.
The constabulary had already been busy; the spot upon which the murder had been committed, and the neighbourhood of that spot, had been diligently searched. But no vestige of the dead man’s garments had been found.
The medical man’s evidence was very brief. He stated, that when he arrived at the Foresters’ Arms he found the deceased quite dead, and that he appeared to have been dead some hours; that from the bruises and marks on the throat and neck, some contusions on the back of the head, and other appearances on the body, which witness minutely described, he said there were indications of a struggle having taken place between deceased and some other person or persons; that the man had been thrown, or had fallen down violently; and that death had ultimately been caused by strangling and suffocation.
The coroner questioned the surgeon very closely as to how long he thought the murdered man had been dead. The medical man declined to give any positive statement on this point; he could only say that when he was called in, the body was cold, and that the deceased might have been dead three hours — or he might have been dead five hours. It was impossible to form an opinion with regard to the exact time at which death had taken place.
The evidence of the waiter and the landlord of the George only went to show that the two men had arrived at the hotel together; that they had appeared in very high spirits, and on excellent terms with each other; that Mr. Dunbar had shown very great concern and anxiety about the absence of his companion, and had declined to eat his dinner until nine o’clock.
This closed the evidence; and the jury retired.
They were absent about a quarter of an hour, and then returned a verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown.
Henry Dunbar, Arthur Lovell, and Mr. Balderby went back to the hotel. It was past six o’clock when the coroner’s inquest was concluded, and the three men sat down to dinner together at seven.
That dinner-party was not a pleasant one; there was a feeling of oppression upon the minds of the three men. The awful event of the previous day cast its dreadful shadow upon them. They could not talk freely of this subject — for it was too ghastly a theme for discussion — and to talk of any other seemed almost impossible.
Arthur Lovell had observed with surprise that Henry Dunbar had not once spoken of his daughter. And yet this was scarcely strange; the utterance of that name might have jarred upon the father’s feelings at such a time as this.
“You will write to Miss Dunbar to-night, will you not, sir?” the young man said at last. “I fear that she will have been very anxious about you all this day. She was alarmed by your message to Mr. Balderby.”
“I shall not write,” said the banker; “for I hope to see my daughter to-night.”
“You will leave Winchester this evening, then?”
“Yes, by the 10.15 express. I should have travelled by that train yesterday evening, but for this terrible event.”
Arthur Lovell looked rather astonished at this.
“You are surprised,” said Mr. Dunbar.
“I thought perhaps that you might stay — until ——”
“Until what?” asked the Anglo-Indian; “everything is finished, is it not? The inquest was concluded to-day. I shall leave full directions for the burial of this poor fellow, and an ample sum for his funeral expenses. I spoke to the coroner upon that subject this afternoon. What more can I do?”
“Nothing, certainly,” answered Arthur Lovell, with rather a hesitating manner; “but I thought, under the peculiar circumstances, it might be better that you should remain upon the spot, if possible, until some steps shall have been taken for the finding of the murderer.”
He did not like to give utterance to the thought that was in his mind; for he was thinking that some people would perhaps suspect Mr. Dunbar himself, and that it might be well for him to remain upon the scene of the murder until that suspicion should be done away with by the arrest of the real murderer.
The banker shook his head.
“I very much doubt the discovery of the guilty man,” he said; “what is there to hinder his escape?”
“Everything,” answered Arthur Lovell, warmly. “First, the stupidity of guilt, the blind besotted folly which so often betrays the murderer. It is not the commission of a crime only that is horrible; think of the hideous state of the criminal’s mind after the deed is done. And it is at that time, immediately after the crime has been perpetrated, when the breast of the murderer is like a raging hell; it is at that time that he is called upon to be most circumspect — to keep guard upon his every look, his smallest word, his most trivial action — for he knows that every look and action is watched; that every word is greedily listened to by men who are eager to bring his guilt home to him; by hungry men, wrestling for his conviction as a result that will bring them a golden reward; by practised men, who have studied the philosophy of crime, and who, by reason of their peculiar skill, are able to read dark meanings in words and looks that to other people are like a strange language. He knows that the scent of blood is in the air, and that the bloodhounds are at their loathsome work. He knows this; and at such a time he is called upon to face the world with a bold front, and so to fashion his words and looks that he shall deceive the secret watchers. He is never alone. The servant who waits upon him, or the railway guard who shows him to his seat in the first-class carriage, the porter who carries his luggage, or the sailor who looks at him scrutinizingly as he breathes the fresh sea-air upon the deck of that ship which is to carry him to a secure hiding-place — any one of these may be a disguised detective, and at any moment the bolt may fall; he may feel the light hand upon his shoulder, and know that he is a doomed man. Who can wonder, then, that a criminal is generally a coward, and that he betrays himself by some blind folly of his own?”
The young man had been carried away by his subject, and had spoken with a strange energy.
Mr. Dunbar laughed aloud at the lawyer’s enthusiasm.
“You should have been a barrister, Mr. Lovell,” he said; “that would have been a capital opening for your speech as counsel for the crown. I can see the wretched criminal shivering in the dock, cowering under that burst of forensic eloquence.”
Henry Dunbar laughed heartily as he finished speaking, and then threw himself back in his easy-chair, and passed his handkerchief across his handsome forehead, as it was his habit to do occasionally.
“In this case I think the criminal will be most likely arrested,” Arthur Lovell continued, still dwelling upon the subject of the murder; “he will be traced by those clothes. He will endeavour to sell them, of course; and as he is most likely some wretchedly ignorant boor, he will very probably try to sell them within a few miles of the scene of the crime.”
“I hope he will be found,” said Mr. Balderby, filling his glass with claret as he spoke; “I never heard any good of this man Wilmot, and, indeed, I believe he went to the bad altogether after you left England, Mr. Dunbar.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes,” answered the junior partner, looking rather nervously at his chief; “he committed forgery, I believe; fabricated forged bank notes, or something of that kind, and was transported for life, I heard; but I suppose he got a remission of his sentence, or something of that kind, and returned to England.”
“I had no idea of this,” said Mr. Dunbar.
“He did not tell you, then?”
“Oh, no; it was scarcely likely that he should tell me.”
Very little more was said upon the subject just then. At nine o’clock Mr. Dunbar left the room to see to the packing of his things, at a little before ten the three gentlemen drove away from the George Hotel, on their way to the station.
They reached the station at five minutes past ten; the train was not due until a quarter past.
Mr. Balderby went to the office to procure the three tickets. Henry Dunbar and Arthur Lovell walked arm-in-arm up and down the platform.
As the bell for the up-train was ringing, a man came suddenly upon the platform and looked about him.
He recognized the banker, walked straight up to him, and, taking off his hat, addressed Mr. Dunbar respectfully.
“I am sorry to detain you, sir,” he said; “but I have a warrant to prevent you leaving Winchester.”
“What do you mean?”
“I hold a warrant for your apprehension, sir.”
“From whom?”
“From Sir Arden Westhorpe, our chief county magistrate; and I am to take you before him immediately, sir.”
“Upon what charge?” cried Arthur Lovell.
“Upon suspicion of having been concerned in the murder of Joseph Wilmot.”
The millionaire drew himself up haughtily, and looked at the constable with a proud smile.
“This is too absurd,” he said; “but I am quite ready to go with you. Be good enough to telegraph to my daughter, Mr. Lovell,” he added, turning to the young man; “tell her that circumstances over which I have no control will detain me in Winchester for a week. Take care not to alarm her.”
Everybody about the station had collected on the platform, and made a circle about Mr. Dunbar. They stood a little aloof from him, looking at him with respectful interest: altogether different from the eager clamorous curiosity with which they would have regarded any ordinary man suspected of the same crime.
He was suspected; but he could not be guilty. Why should a millionaire commit a murder? The motives that might influence other men could have had no weight with him.
The bystanders repeated this to one another, as they followed Mr. Dunbar and his custodian from the station, loudly indignant against the minions of the law.
Mr. Dunbar, the constable, and Mr. Balderby drove straight to the magistrate’s house.
The junior partner offered any amount of bail for his chief; but the Anglo-Indian motioned him to silence, with a haughty gesture.
“I thank you, Mr. Balderby,” he said, proudly; “but I will not accept my liberty on sufferance. Sir Arden Westhorpe has chosen to arrest me, and I shall abide the issue of that arrest.”
It was in vain that the junior partner protested against this. Henry Dunbar was inflexible.
“I hope, and I venture to believe, that you are as innocent as I am myself of this horrible crime, Mr. Dunbar,” the baronet said, kindly; “and I sympathize with you in this very terrible position. But upon the information laid before me, I consider it my duty to detain you until the matter shall have been further investigated. You were the last person seen with the deceased.”
“And for that reason it is supposed that I strangled my old servant for the sake of his clothes,” cried Mr. Dunbar, bitterly. “I am a stranger in England; but if that is your English law, I am not sorry that the best part of my life has been passed in India. However, I am perfectly willing to submit to any examination that may be considered necessary to the furtherance of justice.”
So, upon the second night of his arrival in England, Henry Dunbar, chief of the wealthy house of Dunbar, Dunbar, and Balderby, slept in Winchester gaol.
Mr. Dunbar was brought before Sir Arden Westhorpe, at ten o’clock, on the morning after his arrest. The witnesses who had given evidence at the inquest were again summoned, and — with the exception of the verger, and Mr. Dunbar, who was now a prisoner — gave the same evidence, or evidence to the same effect.
Arthur Lovell again watched the proceedings in the interest of Laura’s father, and cross-examined some of the witnesses.
But very little new evidence was elicited. The empty pocket-book, which had been found a few paces from the body, was produced. The rope by which the murdered man had been strangled was also produced and examined.
It was a common rope, rather slender, and about a yard and a half in length. It was made into a running noose that had been drawn tightly round the neck of the victim.
Had the victim been a strong man he might perhaps have resisted the attack, and might have prevented his assailant tightening the fatal knot; but the surgeon bore witness that the dead man, though tall and stalwart-looking, had not been strong.
It was a strange murder, a bloodless murder; a deed that must have been done by a man of unfaltering resolution and iron nerve: for it must have been the work of a moment, in which the victim’s first cry of surprise was stifled ere it was half uttered.
The chief witness upon this day was the verger; and it was in consequence of certain remarks dropped by him that Henry Dunbar had been arrested.
Upon the afternoon of the inquest this official had found himself a person of considerable importance. He was surrounded by eager gossips, greedy to hear anything he might have to tell upon the subject of the murder; and amongst those who listened to his talk was one of the constables — a sharp, clear-headed fellow — who was on the watch for any hint that might point to the secret of Joseph Wilmot’s death. The verger, in describing the events of the previous afternoon, spoke of that one fact which he had omitted to refer to before the coroner. He spoke of the sudden faintness which had come over Mr. Dunbar.
“Poor gentleman!” he said, “I don’t think I ever see the like of anything as come over him so sudden. He walked along the aisle with his head up, dashing and millingtary-like; but, all in a minute, he reeled as if he’d been dead drunk, and he would have fell if there hadn’t been a bench handy. Down he dropped upon that bench like a stone; and when I turned round to look at him the drops of perspiration was rollin’ down his forehead like beads. I never see such a face in my life, as ghastly-like as if he’d seen a ghost. But he was laughin’ and smilin’ the next minute; and it was only the heat of the weather, he says.”
“It’s odd as a gentleman that’s just come home from India should complain of the heat on such a day as yesterday,” said one of the bystanders.
This was the substance of the evidence that the verger gave before Sir Arden Westhorpe. This, with the evidence of a boy who had met the deceased and Henry Dunbar close to the spot where the body was found, was the only evidence against the rich man.
To the mind of Sir Arden Westhorpe the agitation displayed by Henry Dunbar in the cathedral was a very strong point; yet, what more possible than that the Anglo-Indian should have been seized with a momentary giddiness? He was not a young man; and though his broad chest, square shoulders, and long, muscular arms betokened strength, that natural vigour might have been impaired by the effects of a warm climate.
There were new witnesses upon this day, people who testified to having been in the neighbourhood of the grove, and in the grove itself, upon that fatal afternoon and evening.
Other labourers, besides the two Irishmen, had passed beneath the shadow of the trees in the moonlight. Idle pedestrians had strolled through the grove in the still twilight; not one of these had seen Joseph Wilmot, nor had there been heard any cry of anguish, or wild shrieks of terror.
One man deposed to having met a rough-looking fellow, half-gipsy, half-hawker, in the grove between seven and eight o’clock.
Arthur Lovell questioned this person as to the appearance and manner of the man he had met.
But the witness declared that there was nothing peculiar in the man’s manner. He had not seemed confused, or excited, or hurried, or frightened. He was a coarse-featured, sunburnt ruffianly-looking fellow; and that was all.
Mr. Balderby was examined, and swore to the splendid position which Henry Dunbar occupied as chief of the house in St. Gundolph Lane; and then the examination was adjourned, and the prisoner remanded, although Arthur Lovell contended that there was no evidence to justify his detention.
Mr. Dunbar still protested against any offer of bail; he again declared that he would rather remain in prison than accept his liberty on sufferance, and go out into the world a suspected man.
“I will never leave Winchester Gaol,” he said, “until I leave it with my character cleared in the eyes of every living creature.”
He had been treated with the greatest respect by the prison officials, and had been provided with comfortable apartments. Arthur Lovell and Mr. Balderby were admitted to him whenever he chose to receive them.
Meanwhile every voice in Winchester was loud in indignation against those who had caused the detention of the millionaire.
Here was an English gentleman, a man whose wealth was something fabulous, newly returned from India, eager to embrace his only child; and before he had done more than set his foot upon his native soil, he was seized upon by obstinate and pig-headed officials, and thrown into a prison.
Arthur Lovell worked nobly in the service of Laura’s father. He did not particularly like the man, though he wished to like him; but he believed him to be innocent of the dreadful crime imputed to him, and he was determined to make that innocence clear to the eyes of other people.
For this purpose he urged on the police upon the track of the strange man, the rough-looking hawker, who had been seen in the grove on the day of the murder.
He himself left Winchester upon another errand. He went away with the determination of discovering the sick man, Sampson Wilmot. The old clerk’s evidence might be most important in such a case as this; as he would perhaps be able to throw much light upon the antecedents and associations of the dead man.
The young lawyer travelled along the line, stopping at every station. At Basingstoke he was informed that an old man, travelling with his brother, had been taken ill; and that he had since died. An inquest had been held upon his remains some days before, and he had been buried by the parish.
It was upon the 21st of August that Arthur Lovell visited Basingstoke. The people at the village inn told him that the old man had died at two o’clock upon the morning of the 17th, only a few hours after his brother’s desertion of him. He had never spoken after the final stroke of paralysis.
There was nothing to be learned here, therefore. Death had closed the lips of this witness.
But even if Sampson Wilmot had lived to speak, what could he have told? The dead man’s antecedents could have thrown little light upon the way in which he had met his death. It was a common murder, after all; a murder that had been done for the sake of the victim’s little property; a silver watch, perhaps; a few sovereigns; a coat, waistcoat, and shirt.
The only evidence that tended in the least to implicate Henry Dunbar was the fact that he had been the last person seen in company with the dead man, and the discrepancy between his assertion and that of the verger respecting the time during which he had been absent from the cathedral yard.
No magistrate in his senses would commit the Anglo-Indian for trial upon such evidence as this.
While these things were taking place at Winchester, Margaret waited for the coming of her father. She waited until her heart grew sick, but still she did not despair of his return. He had promised to come back to her by ten o’clock upon the evening of the 16th; but he was not a man who always kept his promises. He had often left her in the same manner, and had stayed away for days and weeks together.
There was nothing extraordinary, therefore, in his absence; and if the girl’s heart grew sick, it was not with the fear that her father would not return to her; but with the thought of what dishonest work he might be engaged in during his absence.
She knew now that he led a dishonest life. His own lips had told her the cruel truth. She would no longer be able to defend him when people spoke against him. Henceforth she must only plead for him.
The poor girl had been proud of her father, reprobate though he was; she had been proud of his gentlemanly bearing, his cleverness, his air of superiority over other men of his station; and the thought of his acknowledged guilt stung her to the heart. She pitied him, and she tried to make excuses for him in her own mind: and with every thought of the penniless reprobate there was intermingled the memory of the wrong that had been done him by Henry Dunbar.
“If my father has been guilty, that man is answerable for his guilt,” she thought perpetually.
Meanwhile she waited, Heaven only knows how anxiously, for her father’s coming. A week passed, and another week began, and still he did not come; but she was not alarmed for his personal safety, she was only anxious about him; and she expected his return every day, every hour. But he did not come.
And all this time, with her mind racked by anxious thoughts, the girl went about the weary duties of her daily life. Her thoughts might wander away into vague speculations about her father’s absence while she sat by her pupil’s side; but her eyes never wandered from the fingers it was her duty to watch. Her life had been a hard one, and she was better able to hide her sorrows and anxieties than any one to whom such a burden had been a novelty. So, very few people suspected that there was anything amiss with the grave young music-mistress.
One person did see the vague change in her manner; but that person was Clement Austin, who had already grown skilled in reading the varying expressions of her face, and who saw now that she was changed. She listened to him when he talked to her of the books or the music she loved; but her face never lighted up now with a bright look of pleasure; and he heard her sigh now and then as she gave her lesson.
He asked her once if there was anything in which his services, or his mother’s, could be of any assistance to her; but she thanked him for the kindness of his offer, and told him, “No, there was nothing in which he could help her.”
“But I am sure there is something on your mind. Pray do not think me intrusive or impertinent for saying so; but I am sure of it.”
Margaret only shook her head.
“I am mistaken, then?” said Clement, interrogatively.
“You are indeed. I have no special trouble. I am only a little uneasy about my father, who has been away from home for the last week or two. But there is nothing strange in that; he is often away. Only I am apt to be foolishly anxious about him. He will scold me when he comes home and hears that I have been so.”
Upon the evening of the 27th August, Margaret gave her accustomed lesson, and lingered a little as usual after the lesson, talking to Mrs. Austin, who had taken a wonderful fancy to her granddaughter’s music-mistress; and to Clement, who somehow or other had discontinued his summer evening walks of late, more especially on those occasions on which his niece took he music-lesson. They talked of all manner of things, and it was scarcely strange that amongst other topics they should come by and-by to the Winchester murder.
“By the bye, Miss Wentworth,” exclaimed Mrs. Austin, breaking in upon Clement’s disquisition on his favourite Carlyle’s “Hero-Worship,” “I suppose you’ve heard about this dreadful murder that is making such a sensation?”
“A dreadful murder — no, Mrs. Austin; I rarely hear anything of that kind; for the person with whom I lodge is old and deaf. She troubles herself very little about what is going on in the world, and I never read the newspapers myself.”
“Indeed,” said Mrs. Austin; “well, my dear, you really surprise me. I thought this dreadful business had made such a sensation, on account of the great Mr. Dunbar being mixed up in it.”
“Mr. Dunbar!” cried Margaret, looking at the speaker with dilated eyes.
“Yes, my dear, Mr. Dunbar, the rich banker. I have been very much interested in the matter, because my son is employed in Mr. Dunbar’s bank. It seems that an old servant, a confidential valet of Mr. Dunbar’s, has been murdered at Winchester; and at first Mr. Dunbar himself was suspected of the crime — though, of course, that was utterly ridiculous; for what motive could he possibly have had for murdering his old servant? However, he has been suspected, and some stupid country magistrate actually had him arrested. There was an examination about a week ago, which was adjourned until to-day. We shan’t know the result of it till to-morrow.”
Margaret sat listening to these words with a face that was as white as the face of the dead.
Clement Austin saw the sudden change that had come over her countenance.
“Mother,” he said, “you should not talk of these things before Miss Wentworth; you have made her look quite ill. Remember, she may not be so strong-minded as you are.”
“No, no!” gasped Margaret, in a choking voice. “I— I— wish to hear of this. Tell me, Mrs. Austin, what was the name of the murdered man?”
“Joseph Wilmot.”
“Joseph Wilmot!” repeated Margaret, slowly. She had always known her father by the name of James Wentworth; but what more likely than that Wilmot was his real name! She had good reason to suspect that Wentworth was a false one.
“I’ll lend you a newspaper,” Mrs. Austin said, good-naturedly, “if you really want to learn the particulars of this murder.”
“I do, if you please.”
Mrs. Austin took a weekly paper from amongst some others that were scattered upon a side-table. She folded up this paper and handed it to Margaret.
“Give Miss Wentworth a glass of wine, mother,” exclaimed Clement Austin; “I’m sure all this talk about the murder has upset her.”
“No, no, indeed!” Margaret answered, “I would rather not take anything. I want to get home quickly. Good evening, Mrs. Austin.”
She tried to say something more, but her voice failed her. She had been in the habit of shaking hands with Mrs. Austin and Clement when she left them; and the cashier had always accompanied her to the gate, and had sometimes lingered with her there in the dusk, prolonging some conversation that had been begun in the drawing-room; but to-night she hurried from the room before the widow could remonstrate with her. Clement followed her into the hall.
“Miss Wentworth,” he said, “I know that something has agitated you. Pray return to the drawing-room, and stop with us until you are more composed.”
“No — no — no!”
“Let me see you home, then?”
“Oh! no! no!” she cried, as the young man barred her passage, to the door; “for pity’s sake don’t detain me, Mr. Austin; don’t detain me, or follow me!”
She passed by him, and hurried out of the house. He followed her to the gate, and watched her disappear in the twilight; and then went back to the drawing-room, sighing heavily as he went.
“I have no right to follow her against her own wish,” he said to himself. “She has given me no right to interfere with her; or to think of her, for the matter of that.”
He threw himself into a chair, and took up a newspaper; but he did not read half-a-dozen lines. He sat with his eyes fixed upon the page before him, thinking of Margaret Wentworth.
“Poor girl!” he said to himself, presently; “poor lonely girl! She is too pure and beautiful for the hard struggles of this world.”
Margaret Wentworth walked rapidly along the road that led her back to Wandsworth. She held the folded newspaper clutched tightly against her breast. It was her death-warrant, perhaps. She never paused or slackened her pace until she reached the lane leading down to the water.
She, opened the gate of the simple cottage-garden — there was no need of bolts or locks for the fortification of Godolphin Cottages — and went up to her own little sitting-room — the room in which her father had told her the secret of his life — the room in which she had sworn to remember the Henry Dunbar. All was dark and quiet in the house, for the mistress of it was elderly-and old-fashioned in her ways; and Margaret was accustomed to wait upon herself when she came home after nightfall.
She struck a lucifer, lighted her candle, and sat down with the newspaper in her hand. She unfolded it, and examined the pages. She was not long finding what she wanted.
“The Winchester Murder. Latest Particulars.”
Margaret Wentworth read that horrible story. She read the newspaper record of the cruel deed that had been done — twice — slowly and deliberately. Her eyes were tearless, and there was a desperate courage at her heart; that miserable, agonized heart, which seemed like a block of ice in her breast.
“I swore to remember the name of Henry Dunbar,” she said in, a low, sombre voice; “I have good reason to remember it now.”
From the first she had no doubt in her mind — from the very first she had but one idea: and that idea was a conviction. Her father had been murdered by his old master. The man Joseph Wilmot was her father: the murderer was Henry Dunbar. The newspaper record told how the murdered man had, according to his own account, met his brother at the Waterloo station upon the afternoon of the 16th of August. That was the very afternoon upon which James Wentworth had left his daughter to go to London by rail.
He had met his old master, the man who had so bitterly injured him; the cold-hearted scoundrel who had so cruelly betrayed him. He had been violent, perhaps, and had threatened Henry Dunbar: and then — then the rich man, treacherous and cold-hearted in his age as in his youth, had beguiled his old valet by a pretended friendship, had lured him into a lonely place, and had there murdered him; in order that all the wicked secrets of the past might be buried with his victim.
As to the robbery of the clothes — the rifling of the pocketbook — that, of course, was only a part of Henry Dunbar’s deep laid scheme.
The girl folded the paper and put it in her breast. It was a strange document to lie against that virginal bosom: and the breast beneath it ached with a sick, cold pain, that was like the pain of death.
Margaret took up her candle, and went into a neatly-kept little room at the back of the house — the room in which her father had always slept when he stayed in that house.
There was an old box, a battered and dilapidated hair-trunk, with a worn rope knotted about it. The girl knelt down before the box, and put her candle on a chair beside it. Then with her slender fingers she tried to unfasten the knots that secured the cord. This task was not an easy one, and her fingers ached before she had done. But she succeeded at last, and lifted the lid of the trunk.
There were worn and shabby garments, tumbled and dusty, that had been thrown pell-mell into the box: there were broken meerschaum-pipes; old newspapers, pale with age, and with passages here and there marked by thick strokes in faded ink. A faint effluvium that arose from the mass of dilapidated rubbish — the weeds which the great ocean Time casts up upon the shore of the present — testified to the neighbourhood of mice: and scattered about the bottom of the box, amongst loose shreds of tobacco — broken lumps of petrified cavendish — and scraps of paper, there were a few letters.
Margaret gathered together these letters, and examined them. Three of them — very old, faded, and flabby — were directed to “Joseph Wilmot, care of the Governor of Norfolk Island,” in a prim, clerk-like hand.
It was an ominous address. Margaret Wentworth bowed her head upon her knees and sobbed aloud.
“He had been very wicked, and had need of a long life of penitence,” she thought; “but he has been murdered by Henry Dunbar.”
There was no shadow of doubt now in her mind. She had in her own hand the conclusive proof of the identity between Joseph Wilmot and her father; and to her this seemed quite enough to prove that Henry Dunbar was the murderer of his old servant. He had injured the man, and it was in the man’s power to do him injury. He had resolved, therefore, to get rid of this old accomplice, this dangerous witness of the past.
This was how Margaret reasoned. That the crime committed in the quiet grove, near St. Cross, was an every-day deed, done for the most pitiful and sordid motives that can tempt a man to shed his brother’s blood, never for a moment entered into her thoughts. Other people might think this in their ignorance of the story of the past.
At daybreak the next morning she left the house, after giving a very brief explanation of her departure to the old woman with whom she lodged. She took the first train to Winchester, and reached the station two hours before noon. She had her whole stock of money with her, but nothing else. Her own wants, her own necessities, had no place in her thoughts. Her errand was a fearful one, for she went to tell so much as she knew of the story of the past, and to bear witness against Henry Dunbar.
The railway official to whom she addressed herself at the Winchester station treated her with civility and good-nature. The pale beauty of her pensive face won her friends wherever she went. It is very hard upon pug-nosed merit and red-haired virtue, that a Grecian profile, or raven tresses, should be such an excellent letter of introduction; but, unhappily, human nature is weak; and while beauty appeals straight to the eye of the frivolous, merit requires to be appreciated by the wise.
“If there is anything I can do for you, miss,” the railway official said, politely, “I shall be very happy, I’m sure.”
“I want to know about the murder,” the girl answered, in a low, tremulous voice, “the murder that was committed ——”
“Yes, miss, to be sure. Everybody in Winchester is talking about it; a most mysterious event! But,” cried the official, brightening suddenly, “you ain’t a witness, miss, are you? You don’t know anything about —— eh?”
He was quite excited at the bare idea that this pretty girl had something to say about the murder, and that he might have the privilege of introducing her to his fellow-citizens. To know anybody who knew anything about Joseph Wilmot’s murder was to occupy a post of some distinction in Winchester just now.
“Yes,” Margaret said; “I want to give evidence against Henry Dunbar.”
The railway official started, and stared aghast.
“Evidence against Mr. Dunbar, miss?” he said; “why, Mr. Henry Dunbar was dismissed from custody only yesterday afternoon, and is going up to town by the express this night, and everybody in Winchester is full of the shameful way in which he has been treated. Why, as far as that goes, there was no more ground for suspecting Mr. Dunbar — not that has come out yet, at any rate — than there is for suspecting me!” And the porter snapped his fingers contemptuously. “But if you know anything against Mr. Dunbar, why, of course, that alters the case; and it’s yer bounden dooty, miss, to go before the magistrate directly-minute and make yer statement.”
The porter could hardly refrain, from smacking his lips with an air of relish as he said this. Distinction had come to him unsought.
“Wait a minute, miss,” he said; “I’ll go and ask lief to take you round to the magistrate’s. You’ll never find your way by yourself. The next up isn’t till 12.7 — I can be spared.”
The porter ran away, presented himself to a higher official, told his story, and obtained a brief leave of absence. Then he returned to Margaret.
“Now, miss,” he said, “if you’ll come along with me I’ll take you to Sir Arden Westhorpe’s house. Sir Arden is the gentleman that has taken so much trouble with this case.”
On the way through the back-streets of the quiet city the porter would fain have extracted from Margaret all that she had to tell. But the girl would reveal nothing; she only said that she wanted to bear witness against Henry Dunbar.
The porter, upon the other hand, was very communicative. He told his companion what had happened at the adjourned examination.
“There was a deal of applause in the court when Mr. Dunbar was told he might consider himself free,” said the porter; “but Sir Arden checked it; there was no need for clapping of hands, he says, or for anything but sorrow that such a wicked deed had been done, and that the cruel wretch as did it should escape. A young man as was in the court told me that them was Sir Arden’s exack words.”
They had reached Sir Arden’s house by this time. It was a very handsome house, though it stood in a back sweet; and a grave man-servant, in a linen jacket, admitted Margaret into the oak-panelled hall.
She might have had some difficulty perhaps in seeing Sir Arden, had not the railway porter immediately declared her business. But the name of the murdered man was a passport, and she was ushered at once into a low room, which was lined with book-shelves, and opened into an old-fashioned garden.
Here Sir Arden Westhorpe, the magistrate, sat at a table writing. He was an elderly man, with grey hair and whiskers, and with rather a stern expression of countenance. Rut he was a good and a just man; and though Henry Dunbar had been the emperor of half Europe instead of an Anglo-Indian banker, Sir Arden would have committed him for trial had he seen just cause for so doing.
Margaret was in nowise abashed by the presence of the magistrate. She had but one thought in her mind, the thought of her father’s wrongs; and she could have spoken freely in the presence of a king.
“I hope I am not too late, sir,” she said; “I hear that Mr. Dunbar has been discharged from custody. I hope I am not too late to bear witness against him.”
The magistrate looked up with an expression of surprise. “That will depend upon circumstances,” he said; “that is to say, upon the nature of the statement which you may have to make.”
The magistrate summoned his clerk from an adjoining room, and then took down the girl’s information.
But he shook his head doubtfully when Margaret had told him all she had to tell. That which to the impulsive girl seemed proof positive of Henry Dunbar’s guilt was very little when written down in a business-like manner by Sir Arden Westhorpe’s clerk.
“You know your unhappy father to have been injured by Mr. Dunbar, and you think he may have been in the possession of secrets of a damaging nature to that gentleman; but you do not know what those secrets were. My poor girl, I cannot possibly move in this business upon such evidence as this. The police are at work. This matter will not be allowed to pass off without the closest investigation, believe me. I shall take care to have your statement placed in the hands of the detective officer who is entrusted with the conduct of this affair. We must wait — we must wait. I cannot bring myself to believe that Henry Dunbar has been guilty of this fearful crime. He is rich enough to have bribed your father to keep silence, if he had any reason to fear what he might say. Money is a very powerful agent, and can buy almost anything. It is rarely that a man, with almost unlimited wealth at his command, finds himself compelled to commit an act of violence.”
The magistrate read aloud Margaret Wilmot’s deposition, and the girl signed it in the presence of the clerk; she signed it with her father’s real name, the name that she had never written before that day.
Then, having given the magistrate the address of her Wandsworth lodging, she bade him good morning, and went out into the unfamiliar street.
Nothing that Sir Arden Westhorpe had said had in any way weakened her rooted conviction of Henry Dunbar’s guilt. She still believed that he was the murderer of her father.
She walked for some distance without knowing where she went, then suddenly she stopped; her face flushed, her eyes grew bright, and an ominous smile lit up her countenance.
“I will go to Henry Dunbar,” she said to herself, “since the law will not help me; I will go to my father’s murderer. Surely he will tremble when he knows that his victim left a daughter who will rest neither night nor day until she sees justice done.”
Sir Arden had mentioned the hotel at which Henry Dunbar was staying; so Margaret asked the first passer-by to direct her to the George.
She found a waiter lounging in the doorway of the hotel.
“I want to see Mr. Dunbar,” she said.
The man looked at her with considerable surprise.
“I don’t think it’s likely Mr. Dunbar will see you, miss,” he said; “but I’ll take your name up if you wish it.”
“I shall be much obliged if you will do so.”
“Certainly, miss. If you’ll please to sit down in the hall I’ll go to Mr. Dunbar immediately. Your name is ——”
“My name is Margaret Wilmot.”
The waiter started as if he had been shot.
“Wilmot!” he exclaimed; “any relation to ——”
“I am the daughter of Joseph Wilmot,” answered Margaret, quietly. “You can tell Mr. Dunbar so if you please.”
“Yes, miss; I will, miss. Bless my soul! you really might knock me down with a feather, miss. Mr. Dunbar can’t possibly refuse to see you, I should think, miss.”
The waiter went up-stairs, looking back at Margaret as he went. He seemed to think that the daughter of the murdered man ought to be, in some way or other, different from other young women.
Mr. Dunbar was sitting in a luxurious easy-chair, with a newspaper lying across his knee. Mr. Balderby had returned to London upon the previous evening, but Arthur Lovell still remained with the Anglo-Indian.
Henry Dunbar was a good deal the worse for the close confinement which he had suffered since his arrival in the cathedral city. Everybody who looked at him saw the change which the last ten days had made in his appearance. He was very pale; there were dark purple rings about his eyes; the eyes themselves were unnaturally bright: and the mouth — that tell-tale feature, over whose expression no man has perfect control — betrayed that the banker had suffered.
Arthur Lovell had been indefatigable in the service of his client: not from any love towards the man, but always influenced more or less by the reflection that Henry Dunbar was Laura’s father; and that to serve Henry Dunbar was in some manner to serve the woman he loved.
Mr. Dunbar had only been discharged from custody upon the previous evening, after a long and wearisome examination and cross-examination of the witnesses who had given evidence at the coroner’s inquest, and that additional testimony upon which the magistrate had issued his warrant. He had slept till late, and had only just finished breakfast, when the waiter entered with Margaret’s message.
“A young person wishes to see you, sir,” he said, respectfully.
“A young person!” exclaimed Mr. Dunbar, impatiently; “I can’t see any one. What should any young person want with me?”
“She wants to see you particularly, sir; she says her name is Wilmot — Margaret Wilmot; and that she is the daughter of ——”
The sickly pallor of Mr. Dunbar’s face changed to an awful livid hue: and Arthur Lovell, looking at his client at this moment, saw the change.
It was the first time he had seen any evidence of fear either in the face or manner of Henry Dunbar.
“I will not see her,” exclaimed Mr. Dunbar; “I never heard Wilmot speak of any daughter. This woman is some impudent impostor, who wants to extort money out of me. I will not see her: let her be sent about her business.”
The waiter hesitated.
“She is a very respectable-looking person, sir,” he said; “she doesn’t look anything like an impostor.”
“Perhaps not!” answered Mr. Dunbar, haughtily; “but she is an impostor, for all that. Joseph Wilmot had no daughter, to my knowledge. Pray do not let me be disturbed about this business. I have suffered quite enough already on account of this man’s death.”
He sank back in his chair, and took up his newspaper as he finished speaking. His face was completely hidden behind the newspaper.
“Shall I go and speak to this girl?” asked Arthur Lovell. “On no account! The girl is an impostor. Let her be sent about her business!”
The waiter left the room.
“Pardon me, Mr. Dunbar,” said the young lawyer; “but if you will allow me to make a suggestion, as your legal adviser in this business, I would really recommend you to see this girl.”
“Why?”
“Because the people in a place like this are notorious gossips and scandal-mongers. If you refuse to see this person, who, at any rate, calls herself Joseph Wilmot’s daughter, they may say ——”
“They may say what?” asked Henry Dunbar.
“They may say that it is because you have some special reason for not seeing her.”
“Indeed, Mr. Lovell. Then I am to put myself out of the way — after being fagged and harassed to death already about this business — and am to see every adventuress who chooses to trade upon the name of the murdered man, in order to stop the mouths of the good people of Winchester. I beg to tell you, my dear sir, that I am utterly indifferent to anything that may be said of me: and that I shall only study my own ease and comfort. If people choose to think that Henry Dunbar is the murderer of his old servant, they are welcome to their opinion: I shall not trouble myself to set them right.”
The waiter re-entered the room as Mr. Dunbar finished speaking.
“The young person says that she must see you, sir,” the man said. “She says that if you refuse to see her, she will wait at the door of this house until you leave it. My master has spoken to her, sir; but it’s no use: she’s the most determined young woman I ever saw.”
Mr. Dunbar’s face was still hidden by the newspaper. There was a little pause before he replied.
“Lovell,” he said at last, “perhaps you had better go and see this person. You can find out if she is really related to that unhappy man. Here is my purse. You can let her have any money you think proper. If she is the daughter of that wretched man, I should, of course, wish her to be well provided for. I will thank you to tell her that, Lovell. Tell her that I am willing to settle an annuity upon her; always on condition that she does not intrude herself upon me. But remember, whatever I give is contingent upon her own good conduct, and must not in any way be taken as a bribe. If she chooses to think and speak ill of me, she is free to do so. I have no fear of her; nor of any one else.”
Arthur Lovell took the millionaire’s purse and went down stairs with the waiter. He found Margaret sitting in the hall. There was no impatience, no violence in her manner: but there was a steady, fixed, resolute look in her white face. The young lawyer felt that this girl would not be easily put off by any denial of Mr. Dunbar.
He ushered Margaret into a private sitting-room leading out of the hall, and then closed the door behind him. The disappointed waiter lingered upon the door-mat: but the George is a well-built house, and that waiter lingered in vain.
“You want to see Mr. Dunbar?” he said.
“Yes, sir!”
“He is very much fatigued by yesterday’s business, and he declines to see you. What is your motive for being so eager to see him?”
“I will tell that to Mr. Dunbar himself.”
“You are really the daughter of Joseph Wilmot? Mr. Dunbar seems to doubt the fact of his having had a daughter.”
“Perhaps so. Mr. Dunbar may have been unaware of my existence until this moment. I did not know until last night what had happened.”
She stopped for a moment, half-stifled by a hysterical sob, which she could not repress: but she very quickly regained her self-control, and continued, slowly and deliberately, looking earnestly in the young man’s face with her clear brown eyes, “I did not know until last night that my father’s name was Wilmot; he had called himself by a false name — but last night, after hearing of the — the — murder”— the horrible word seemed to suffocate her, but she still went bravely on —“I searched a box of my father’s and found this.”
She took from her pocket the letter directed to Norfolk Island, and handed it to the lawyer.
“Read it,” she said; “you will see then how my father had been wronged by Henry Dunbar.”
Arthur Lovell unfolded the worn and faded letter. It had been written five-and-twenty years before by Sampson Wilmot. Margaret pointed to one passage on the second page.
“Your bitterness against Henry Dunbar is very painful to me, my dear Joseph; yet I cannot but feel that your hatred against my employer’s son is only natural. I know that he was the first cause of your ruin; and that, but for him, your lot in life might have been very different. Try to forgive him; try to forget him, even if you cannot forgive. Do not talk of revenge. The revelation of that secret which you hold respecting the forged bills would bring disgrace not only upon him, but upon his father and his uncle. They are both good and honourable men, and I think that shame would kill them. Remember this, and keep the secret of that painful story.“
Arthur Lovell’s face grew terribly grave as he read these lines. He had heard the story of the forgery hinted at, but he had never heard its details. He had looked upon it as a cruel scandal, which had perhaps arisen out of some trifling error, some unpaid debt of honour; some foolish gambling transaction in the early youth of Henry Dunbar.
But here, in the handwriting of the dead clerk, here was the evidence of that old story. Those few lines in Sampson Wilmot’s letter suggested a motive.
The young lawyer dropped into a chair, and sat for some minutes silently poring over the clerk’s letter. He did not like Henry Dunbar. His generous young heart, which had yearned towards Laura’s father, had sunk in his breast with a dull, chill feeling of disappointment, at his first meeting with the rich man.
Still, after carefully sifting the evidence of the coroner’s inquest, he had come to the conclusion that Henry Dunbar was innocent of Joseph Wilmot’s death. He had carefully weighed every scrap of evidence against the Anglo-Indian; and had deliberately arrived at this conclusion.
But now he looked at everything in a new light. The clerk’s letter suggested a motive, perhaps an adequate motive. The two men had gone down together into that silent grove, the servant had threatened his patron, they had quarrelled, and —
No! the murder could scarcely have happened in this way. The assassin had been armed with the cruel rope, and had crept stealthily behind his victim. It was not a common murder; the rope and the slip-knot, the treacherous running noose, hinted darkly at Oriental experiences: somewhat in this fashion might a murderous Thug have assailed his unconscious victim.
But then, on the other hand, there was one circumstance that always remained in Henry Dunbar’s favour — that circumstance was the robbery of the dead man’s clothes. The Anglo-Indian might very well have rifled the pocket-book, and left it empty upon the scene of the murder, in order to throw the officers of justice upon a wrong scent. That would have been only the work of a few moments.
But was it probable — was it even possible — that the murderer would have lingered in broad daylight, with every chance against him, long enough to strip off the garments of his victim, in order still more effectually to hoodwink suspicion? Was it not a great deal more likely that Joseph Wilmot had spent the afternoon drinking in the tap-room of some roadside public-house, and had rambled back into the grove after dark, to meet his death at the hands of some every-day assassin, bent only upon plunder?
All these thoughts passed through Arthur Lovell’s mind as he sat with Sampson’s faded letter in his hands. Margaret Wilmot watched him with eager, scrutinizing eyes. She saw doubt, perplexity, horror, indecision, all struggling in his handsome face.
But the lawyer felt that it was his duty to act, and to act in the interests of his client, whatever vaguely-hideous doubts might arise in his own breast. Nothing but his conviction of Henry Dunbar’s guilt could justify him in deserting his client. He was not convinced; he was only horror-stricken by the first whisper of doubt.
“Mr. Dunbar declines to see you,” he said to Margaret; “and I do not really see what good could possibly arise out of an interview between you. In the meantime, if you are in any way distressed — and you must most likely need assistance at such a time as this — he is quite ready to help you: and he is also ready to give you permanent help if you require it.”
He opened Henry Dunbar’s purse as he spoke, but the girl rose and looked at him with icy disdain in her fixed white face.
“I would sooner crawl from door to door, begging my bread of the hardest strangers in this cruel world — I would sooner die from the lingering agonies of starvation — than I would accept help from Henry Dunbar. No power on earth will ever induce me to take a sixpence from that man’s hand.”
“Why not?”
“You know why not. I can see that knowledge in your face. Tell Mr. Dunbar that I will wait at the door of this house till he comes out to speak to me. I will wait until I drop down dead.”
Arthur Lovell went back to his client, and told him what the girl said.
Mr. Dunbar was walking up and down the room, with his head bent moodily upon his breast.
“By heavens!” he cried, angrily, “I will have this girl removed by the police, if ——”
He stopped abruptly, and his head sank once more upon his breast.
“I would most earnestly advise you to see her,” pleaded Arthur Lovell; “if she goes away in her present frame of mind, she may spread a horrible scandal against you. Your refusing to see her will confirm the suspicions which ——”
“What!” cried Henry Dunbar; “does she dare to suspect me?”
“I fear so.”
“Has she said as much?”
“Not in actual words. But her manner betrayed her suspicions. You must not wonder if this girl is unreasonable. Her father’s miserable fate must have been a terrible blow to her.”
“Did you offer her money?”
“I did.”
“And she ——”
“She refused it.”
Mr. Dunbar winced, as if the announcement of the girl’s refusal had stung him to the quick.
“Since it must be so,” he said, “I will see this importunate woman. But not to-day. To-day I must and will have rest. Tell her to come to me to-morrow morning at ten o’clock. I will see her then.”
Arthur Lovell carried this message to Margaret.
The girl looked at him with an earnest questioning glance.
“You are not deceiving me?” she said.
“No, indeed!”
“Mr. Dunbar said that?”
“He did.”
“Then I will go away. But do not let Henry Dunbar try to deceive me! for I will follow him to the end of the world. I care very little where I go in my search for the man who murdered my father!”
She went slowly away. She went down into the cathedral yard, across which the murdered man had gone arm-in-arm with his companion. Some boys, loitering about at the entrance to the meadows, answered all her questions, and took her to the spot upon which the body had been found.
It was a dull misty day, and there was a low wind wailing amongst the wet branches of the old trees. The rain-drops from the fading leaves fell into the streamlet, from whose shallow waters the dead man’s face had looked up to the moonlit sky.
Later in the afternoon, Margaret found her way to a cemetery outside the town, where, under a newly-made mound of turf, the murdered man lay.
A great many people had been to see this grave, and had been very much disappointed at finding it in no way different from other graves.
Already the good citizens of Winchester had begun to hint that the grove near St. Cross was haunted; and there was a vague report to the effect that the dead man had been seen there, walking in the twilight.
Punctual to the very striking of the clock, Margaret Wilmot presented herself at the George at the time appointed by Mr. Dunbar.
She had passed a wretched night at a humble inn a little way put of the town, and had been dreaming all night of her meeting with Mr. Dunbar. In those troubled dreams she had met the rich man perpetually: now in one place, now in another: but always in the most unlikely places: yet she had never seen his face. She had tried to see it; but by some strange devilry or other, peculiar to the incidents of a dream, it had been always hidden from her.
The same waiter was lounging in the same attitude at the door of the hotel. He looked up with an expression of surprise as Margaret approached him.
“You’ve not gone, then, miss?” he exclaimed.
“Gone! No! I have waited to see Mr. Dunbar!”
“Well, that’s queer,” said the waiter; “did he tell you he’d see you?”
“Yes, he promised to see me at ten o’clock this morning.”
“That’s uncommon queer.”
“Why so?” asked Margaret, eagerly.
“Because Mr. Dunbar, and that young gent as was with him, went away, bag and baggage, by last night’s express.”
Margaret Wilmot gave no utterance to either surprise or indignation. She walked quietly away, and went once more to the house of Sir Arden Westhorpe. She told him what had occurred; and her statement was written down and signed, as upon the previous day.
“Mr. Dunbar murdered my father!” she said, after this had been done; “and he’s afraid to see me!”
The magistrate shook his head gravely.
“No, no, my dear,” he said; “you must not say that. I cannot allow you to make such an assertion as that. Circumstantial evidence often points to an innocent person. If Mr. Dunbar had been in any way concerned in this matter, he would have made a point of seeing you, in order to set your suspicions at rest. His declining to see you is only the act of a selfish man, who has already suffered very great inconvenience from this business, and who dreads the scandal of some tragical scene.”
Henry Dunbar and Arthur Lovell slept at the same hotel upon the night of their journey from Winchester to London; for the banker refused to disturb his daughter by presenting himself at the house in Portland Place after midnight.
In this, at least, he showed himself a considerate father.
Arthur Lovell had made every effort in his power to dissuade the banker from leaving Winchester upon that night, and thus breaking the promise that he had made to Margaret Wilmot. Henry Dunbar was resolute; and the young lawyer had no alternative. If his client chose to do a dishonourable thing, in spite of all that the young man could say against it, of course it was no business of his. For his own part, Arthur Lovell was only too glad to get back to London; for Laura Dunbar was there: and wherever she was, there was Paradise, in the opinion of this foolish young man.
Early upon the morning after their arrival in London, Henry Dunbar and the young lawyer breakfasted together in their sitting-room at the hotel. It was a bright morning, and even London looked pleasant in the sunshine. Henry Dunbar stood in the window, looking out into the street below, while the breakfast was being placed upon the table. The hotel was situated in a new street at the West End.
“You find London very much altered, I dare say, Mr. Dunbar?” said Arthur Lovell, as he unfolded the morning paper.
“How do you mean altered?” asked the banker, absently.
“I mean, that after so long an absence you must find great improvements. This street for instance — it has not been built six years.”
“Oh, yes, I remember. There were fields upon this spot when I went to India.”
They sat down to breakfast. Henry Dunbar was absent-minded, and ate very little. When he had drunk a cup of tea, he took out the locket containing Laura’s miniature, and sat silently contemplating it.
By-and-by he unfastened the locket from the chain, and handed it across the table to Arthur Lovell.
“My daughter is very beautiful, if she is like that,” said the banker; “do you consider it a good likeness?”
The young lawyer looked at the portrait with a tender smile. “Yes,” he said, thoughtfully, “it is very like her — only ——”
“Only what?”
“The picture is not lovely enough.”
“Indeed! and yet it is very beautiful. Laura resembles her mother, who was a lovely woman.”
“But I have heard your father say, that the lower part of Miss Dunbar’s face — the mouth and chin — reminded him of yours. I must own, Mr. Dunbar, that I cannot see the likeness.”
“I dare say not,” the banker answered, carelessly; “you must allow something for the passage of time, my dear Lovell. and the wear and tear of a life in Calcutta. I dare say my mouth and chin are rather harder and sterner in their character than Laura’s.”
There was nothing more said upon the subject of the likeness; by-and-by Mr. Dunbar got up, took his hat, and went towards the door.
“You will come with me, Lovell,” he said.
“Oh, no, Mr. Dunbar. I would not wish to intrude upon you at such a time. The first interview between a father and daughter, after a separation of so many years, is almost sacred in its character. I——”
“Pshaw, Mr. Lovell! I did not think a solicitor’s son would be weak enough to indulge in any silly sentimentality. I shall be very glad to see my daughter; and I understand from her letters that she will be pleased to see me. That is all! At the same time, as you know Laura much better than I do, you may as well come with me.”
Mr. Dunbar’s looks belied the carelessness of his words. His face was deadly pale, and there was a singularly rigid expression about his mouth.
Laura had received no notice of her father’s coming. She was sitting at the same window by which she had sat when Arthur Lovell asked her to be his wife. She was sitting in the same low luxurious easy-chair, with the hot-house flowers behind her, and a huge Newfoundland dog — a faithful attendant that she had brought from Maudesley Abbey — lying at her feet.
The door of Miss Dunbar’s morning-room was open: and upon the broad landing-place outside the apartment the banker stopped suddenly, and laid his hand upon the gilded balustrade. For a moment it seemed almost as if he would have fallen: but he leaned heavily upon the bronze scroll-work of the banister, and bit his lower lip fiercely with his strong white teeth. Arthur Lovell was not displeased to perceive this agitation: for he had been wounded by the careless manner in which Henry Dunbar had spoken of his beautiful daughter. Now it was evident that the banker’s indifference had only been assumed as a mask beneath which the strong man had tried to conceal the intensity of his feelings.
The two men lingered upon the landing-place for a few minutes; while Mr. Dunbar looked about him, and endeavoured to control his agitation. Everything here was new to him: for neither the house in Portland Place, nor Maudesley Abbey, had been in the possession of the Dunbar family more than twenty years.
The millionaire contemplated his possessions. Even upon that landing-place there was no lack of evidence of wealth. A Persian carpet covered the centre of the floor, and beyond its fringed margin a tessellated pavement of coloured marbles took new and brighter hues from the slanting rays of sunlight that streamed in through a wide stained-glass window upon the staircase. Great Dresden vases of exotics stood on pedestals of malachite and gold: and a trailing curtain of purple velvet hung half-way across the entrance to a long suite of drawing-rooms — a glistening vista of light and splendour.
Mr. Dunbar pushed open the door, and stood upon the threshold of his daughter’s chamber. Laura started to her feet.
“Papa! — papa!” she cried; “I thought that you would come to-day!”
She ran to him and fell upon his breast, half-weeping, half-laughing. The Newfoundland dog crept up to Mr. Dunbar with his head down: he sniffed at the heels of the millionaire, and then looked slowly upward at the man’s face with sombre sulky-looking eyes, and began to growl ominously.
“Take your dog away, Laura!” cried Mr. Dunbar, angrily.
It happened thus that the very first words Henry Dunbar said to his daughter were uttered in a tone of anger. The girl drew herself away from him, and looked up almost piteously in her father’s face. That face was as pale as death: but cold, stern, and impassible. Laura Dunbar shivered as she looked at it. She had been a spoiled child; a pampered, idolized beauty; and had never heard anything but words of love and tenderness. Her lips quivered, and the tears came into her eyes.
“Come away, Pluto,” she said to the dog; “papa does not want us.”
She took the great flapping ears of the animal in her two hands, and led him out of the room. The dog went with his young mistress submissively enough: but he looked back at the last moment to growl at Mr. Dunbar.
Laura left the Newfoundland on the landing-place, and went back to her father. She flung herself for the second time into the banker’s arms.
“Darling papa,” she cried, impetuously; “my dog shall never growl at you again. Dear papa, tell me you are glad to come home to your poor girl. You would tell me so, if you knew how dearly I love you.”
She lifted up her lips and kissed Henry Dunbar’s impassible face. But she recoiled from him for the second time with a shudder and a long-drawn shivering sigh. The lips of the millionaire were as cold as ice.
“Papa,” she cried, “how cold you are! I’m afraid that you are ill!”
He was ill. Arthur Lovell, who stood quietly watching the meeting between the father and daughter, saw a change come over his client’s face, and wheeled forward an arm-chair just in time for Henry Dunbar to fall into it as heavily as a log of wood.
The banker had fainted. For the second time since the murder in the grove near St. Cross he had betrayed violent and sudden emotion. This time the emotion was stronger than his will, and altogether overcame him.
Arthur Lovell laid the insensible man flat upon his back on the carpet. Laura rushed to fetch water and aromatic vinegar from her dressing-room: and in five minutes Mr. Dunbar opened his eyes, and looked about him with a wild half-terrified expression in his face. For a moment he glared fiercely at the anxious countenance of Laura, who knelt beside him: then his whole frame was shaken by a convulsive trembling, and his teeth chattered violently. But this lasted only for a few moments. He overcame it: grinding his teeth, and clenching his strong hands: and then staggered heavily to his feet.
“I am subject to these fainting fits,” he said, with a wan, sickly smile upon his white face; “and I dreaded this interview on that account: I knew that it would be too much for me.”
He seated himself upon the low sofa which Laura had pushed towards him, resting his elbows on his knees, and hiding his face in his hands. Miss Dunbar placed herself beside her father, and wound her arm about his neck.
“Poor papa,” she murmured, softly; “I am so sorry our meeting has agitated you like this: and to think that I should have fancied you cold and unkind to me, at the very time when your silent emotion was an evidence of your love!”
Arthur Lovell had gone through the open window into the conservatory: but he could hear the girl talking to her father. His face was very grave: and the same shadow that had clouded it once during the course of the coroner’s inquest rested upon it now.
“An evidence of his love! Heaven grant this may be love,” he thought to himself; “but to me it seems a great deal more like fear!”