A Woman's Burden Part 52

"Man--you're mad!"

"Small wonder if I were--but I am not. These things that I tell you are true, friend. Your uncle was the criminal's comrade. He sheltered him and paid large sums of money to his kind. I was his tool in this as all through life. At Lesser Thorpe I used to visit him. I was there that Christmas night when Nemesis o'ertook him, and he met with death at the hand of one of those whom he so sought. No soul knew I was there. But I knew all--of Miriam Crane--of Jabez Crane--of Gerald Arkel, aye, and of yourself. For I had been set my task and had fulfilled it, and the secret of Miriam Crane's past life was in my keeping and in my master's.

I knew her brother for a murderer--he had killed a sergeant in your regiment."

"I know--I know all about that--go on."

"Softly, friend. As he had held me for so many years so did Barton hold Miriam Crane--in his power--in the hollow of his hand. So did he hold Jabez Crane, who too loved the drug. We met at Mother Mandarin's. And now I approach what you would know. The grandson of the woman Mandarin was a thief--an expert criminal. He heard speak of Lesser Thorpe, and Barton, and Jabez, and his sister. And he took himself down there to find what he could find. He made excuse of going at Jabez' bidding to warn his sister he would come. His name was Shorty. He was the genius of evil. He was the accomplice of Jabez in many crimes."

"I know they tried to rob my uncle one night on Waterloo Bridge," put in the Major, who, in spite of himself, was becoming excited. The man's narrative, strange as it was, was beginning to convince him.

"I watched this sinful youth, for I knew his l.u.s.t for gold. On Christmas night I took me to the Manor House to warn George Barton of that which I knew threatened him. But, as I learned, all too late, Shorty followed me. He concealed himself behind a b.u.t.tress near the library window and heard our converse there. And when I left he entered and hid himself away, for I left and entered always by the window on the terrace, so that no soul should know."

"But how, man?--how could he get into the library while you and my uncle were there without your seeing him?"

"In this way. Your uncle, deep in converse with me, came to the end of the terrace. He was wont to walk out there. It was then the lad got in.

When your uncle, unsuspecting of evil, returned, he returned alone and to his desk. I took my way down the steps into the village whence I had come. Before I had left him I had warned him that with Shorty in the village he knew not the hour he might be robbed. And he meant to act next day upon my warning. Then the boy came from his hiding-place and demanded money. Had I returned with your uncle the lad would have remained there till I left. Your uncle did not heed his demands, but cried for help. That cry it was that killed him. The lad threw himself upon him to silence him. He clutched at that old throat and clutched too hard. When he clutched no more your uncle was dead! Here, friend, is the verification of what I have told you."

He produced a dirty sheet of paper from his pocket. On it were written but three lines. But they were all sufficient to condemn the man who put his name to them.

"But the creature surely could not write," objected the Major.

"Mine is the writing, friend; his the signature. 'Twas Miriam Crane taught him to write that. Show it to her."

"But how did you get this confession out of him?--it's difficult to believe----"

"It was difficult to obtain, friend. No one but myself could have procured it. Myself alone did that boy fear. I had broken his nerve. In drink one night, not many weeks ago, he came to me, forgetting himself so far as to threaten me and demand of me money, accusing me of having killed your uncle. At once I knew then it was he who had killed him. I had suspected him for long. He told me he was there and had seen me in the library. But I was not to be thus threatened by this youth. We were alone. It was night. I locked the door and taxed him with the crime. He would not confess. But I knew the lad; I alone knew Shorty and the only way with him. In the grate there burned a fire, and by the hearth a poker stood--'twas easy made red-hot, and----"

"Good G.o.d, man, don't describe to me your loathsome horrors. Have done with your story and go."

"Well, that was how, friend, I came by this confession. I told him while he lived I would not use it for his undoing. In truth I could not, since my own past is not clean. But now that he is dead he cannot suffer in this world for his crimes. I alone am left. Your uncle ruined me, friend. I hated him. All my life I hated him. He sapped my soul; he was a vampire. I ask you now to help me to end my days in such peace as is left to me. I am without money. I wish to leave this country and return to the land of my exile. The Mark of the Beast is on me, and I am getting old. My end will come soon now, and I shall join your uncle, and Jabez Crane, and Shorty, and all our other kindred souls in h.e.l.l; down there, deep down in h.e.l.l. Already I have tasted of its fires--but they have not caught me yet; They chase me all the time, but They----"

The Major stopped him.

"If I give you money," he said, "I give it you in this way: fifty pounds and your pa.s.sage to Australia. Never again set foot in this country. I may be wrong; but I believe your story, and I would wipe out once for all the memory of it. I am sorry for you, Farren. Give me some address, and what I have promised you shall follow. But remember if I catch you in this country that's the end of you."

"Thanks be to you," he said. Then he scribbled a few words on a piece of paper, and took up his hat and cloak and vanished.

EPILOGUE.

John Dundas was as good as his word, and within a fortnight of his visit to Brampton the unhappy Farren was on board an Oriental liner bound for Melbourne.

As the Major read his name in the pa.s.senger list, he breathed a sigh of relief. For with him disappeared all record of the past. He felt convinced the creature--queer in the head as he undoubtedly was--had told him nothing but the truth. His life story was indeed a pitiful one, and the Major would not but admit that there was something of retributory justice about the fate which had overtaken his old uncle.

For that he had met his death by Shorty's hand there was not a doubt.

Miriam had been shown the signature appended to those three lines of confession--confession absolute and unqualified--and she had recognised it instantly.

There remained no doubt in the Major's mind. As he had told Miriam, the whole affair was horribly repellent to him. The remotest connection with such men as Jabez, Shorty, and Farren ran counter to every instinct he possessed. He alone among his contaminated stock recoiled from the merest contact with the morbid. Gerald, in his bouts of alcoholism, had always shown that he was attracted in that direction. Even when most himself that side of him had been plainly apparent to any keen observer.

And so the Major thanked his stars that things were as they were. His hundred pounds had been well spent, indeed if it had purchased in the future complete immunity from all reference to the terrible past. So far as Farren was concerned he felt perfectly safe. It was not difficult to foretell his end. It would be speedy. And the Major knew enough of Melbourne even to localise it with some degree of accuracy. That fair city of the south possesses in its heart the foulest opium dens outside of China. It would be in one of them--in that foetid artery named Little Bourke Street--that Farren would die; and with him would disappear the last of what the Major was wont to refer to in his own mind always as the Lambeth gang.

From time to time he caught a glimpse of Miriam; anything from an hour to two hours const.i.tuting merely a glimpse in the eyes of the Major.

Each time he told himself she was more beautiful than before; and for the first time in his life a year seemed to contain at least twenty-four calendar months; and all the rifle practice or tactical manoeuvres in the world were of no avail to shorten it. Slowly, wearily, it dragged itself along, with now and then a spurt on such days as could furnish him with reasonable excuse for a run up to town--town being bounded on the east by Addison Road and on the west by Hammersmith.

In Mrs. Parsley, had he only known it, he possessed the strongest of allies. If he had needed anyone to plead his cause, he could not have chosen a better.

"My dear, I am just waiting for the day that shall see you Mistress of the Manor House. Won't that be a knock-me-down-staggerer for _her_?"

Such was Mrs. Parsley's leit-motive now, the "her" having, it is scarcely necessary to say, reference to Mrs. Darrow.

"But, my dear Mrs. Parsley," Miriam would remonstrate, "he hasn't----"

"Oh, don't tell me he _hasn't_ if he hasn't, you've only to hold up your little finger for him to _have_. Why any fool can see he just worships the ground you tread on--not that I ever believe altogether in that sort of thing myself; but my experience of them is they're all the same. It's either that or nothing. Take my word for it, my dear, unless a man's abject, he's not in love, and unless he's in love, he'll never make a good husband. Now the Major is in love--he is abject, horribly abject.

And of all the men I've known he's the most promising as a husband. I do believe he is a thoroughly good fellow."

"I know, I know, my dear Mrs. Parsley; there is no better fellow in the world. But you seem to take it quite as--well, what shall I say?--quite as necessary to my existence that I should have a husband. Does it not occur to you that I might like a little freedom--that my first experience of matrimony has not been altogether encouraging?"

"Freedom! Encouraging?--rubbish! What does a woman want with freedom, except to get into captivity again? As for encouragement, no one ought to require much encouragement to grab a good thing when they see it.

John Dundas, matrimonially speaking, is a good thing, and if it weren't for the Reverend Augustine, I tell you candidly I'd soon show you I mean what I say!"

"Oh, my dear friend, this love, this love!" sighed Miriam, "this keep the world a-whirling!--well, I suppose you're right. You know it is not that I underrate Major Dundas' good qualities. I do not. I know he is a good man, and I like him and respect him more than I can say; but--but----"

"But--but--there you go! you're thinking about that wretched past of yours again. Well, tell him, tell him everything; he'll think none the less of you for that!"

"Indeed I have; he knows everything of my wretched past. It is not that----"

"Well, what is it then?"

"Oh, I don't know--let us leave it. It will settle itself I expect if it's meant to be settled. Meanwhile, we're quite happy, you and I, aren't we?"

"Oh yes, we're very happy, Miriam, with our work. That reminds me that old Chinese Mandarin creature's dead at last."

"Really? Poor old thing! When did she die?"

"Yesterday morning. The place is becoming quite respectable now--a veritable land of promise. And that reminds me again I have to go down there in the morning to finish up one or two things, and in the afternoon, dear, you know I am going back to Thorpe. Augustine's got a cold, and you know what Augustine is with a cold!"

"Poor Mr. Parsley--he is very good. I sometimes think I should like to change places with you, and go down and look after him while you're looking after Lambeth," said Miriam, just to see how she would take it.

"Indeed, my dear, you'll do nothing of the kind. You'd spoil him altogether, that's what you'd do. I understand Augustine and he understands me. He'd break out in all sorts of fresh places with any other treatment than what I give him. Besides, he likes to be alone--he always says I'm the only woman he could stand. Not that he means it, you know--he doesn't. He thinks all women a nuisance, except when he's ill--then he's glad enough to have 'em, I can tell you. Now, dear, I must really go. I shall have tea at the Stores. Who's that at the door I wonder?--let me get out of sight. Good-bye, Miriam dear."

She kissed her and hurried off. They were in the dining-room. Miriam remained where she was, awaiting the announcement of her visitor whoever it might prove to be.

The name brought in to her was that of "Mrs. Latham."

"Mrs. Latham?" she repeated to herself. "I don't know any Mrs. Latham."

She went into the little drawing-room. Her visitor was closely veiled and in the deepest black. She looked at her.