Elster's Folly Part 19

"Oh, he is all right," confidently a.s.serted Percival. "The only question is, where he can be. The miller was out this afternoon, and left his place locked up; so that Hartledon could not get in, and had nothing for it but to start home with his lameness, or sit down on the bank until some one found him."

"He must have set off to walk."

"I should think so. But where has he walked to?" added Val. "I drove slowly home, looking on either side of the road, but could see nothing of him."

"What should bring him on the side of the road?" demanded the dowager.

"Do you think he would turn tramp, and take his seat on a heap of stones?

Where do you get your ideas from?"

"From common sense, ma'am. If he set out to walk, and his foot failed him half-way, there'd be nothing for it but to sit down and wait. But he is _not_ on the road: that is the curious part of the business."

"Would he come the other way?"

"Hardly. It is so much further by the river than by the road."

"You may depend upon it that is what he has done," said Dr. Ashton. "He might think he should meet some of you that way, and get an arm to help him."

"I declare I never thought of that," exclaimed Val, his face brightening.

"There he is, no doubt; perched somewhere between this and the mill, like patience on a monument, unable to put foot to the ground."

He turned away. Some of the men offered to accompany him: but he declined their help, and begged them to go on with their dinner, saying he would take sufficient servants with him, even though they had to carry Hartledon.

So Mr. Elster went, taking servants and lanterns; for in some parts of this road the trees overhung, and rendered it dark. But they could not find Lord Hartledon. They searched, and shouted, and waved their lanterns: all in vain. Very much perplexed indeed did Val Elster look when he got back again.

"Where in the world can he have gone to?" angrily questioned the countess-dowager; and she glared from her seat at the head of the table on the offender Val, as she asked it. "I must say all this is most unseemly, and Hartledon ought to be brought to his senses for causing it.

I suppose he has taken himself off to a surgeon's."

It was possible, but unlikely, as none knew better than Val Elster. To get to the surgeon's he would have to pa.s.s his own house, and would be more likely to go in, and send for Mr. Hillary, than walk on with a disabled foot. Besides, if he had gone to the surgeon's, he would not stay there all this time. "I don't know what to do," said Percival Elster; and there was the same blank, perplexed look on his face that was observed the first time he came in. "I don't much like the appearance of things."

"Why, you don't think anything's wrong with him!" exclaimed young Carteret, starting-up with an alarmed face. "He's safe to turn up, isn't he?"

"Of course he will turn up," answered Val, in a dreamy tone. "Only this uncertainty, as to where to look for him, is not pleasant."

Dr. Ashton motioned Val to his side. "Are you fearing an accident?" he asked in low tones.

"No, sir."

"I am. That current by the mill is so fearfully strong; and if your brother had not the use of his one arm--and the boat was drawn onwards, beyond his control--and upset--"

Dr. Ashton paused. Val Elster looked rather surprised.

"How could it upset, sir? The skiffs are as safe as this floor. I don't fear that in the least: what I do fear is that Edward may be in some out-of-the-way nook, insensible from pain, and won't be found until daylight. Fancy, a whole night out of doors, in that state! He might be half-dead with cold by the morning."

Dr. Ashton shook his head in dissent. His dislike of boating seemed just now to be rising into horror.

"What are you going to do now, Elster?" inquired Captain Dawkes.

"Go to the mill again, I think, and find out if any one saw Hartledon leave the skiff, and which way he took. One of the servants can run down to Hillary's the while."

Dr. Ashton rose, bowing for permission to Lady Kirton; and the gentlemen with one accord rose with him, the same purpose in the mind of all--that of more effectually scouring the ground between the mill and Hartledon.

The countess-dowager felt that she should like to box the ears of every one of them. The idea of danger in connection with Lord Hartledon had not yet penetrated to her brain.

At this moment, before they had left the room, there arose a strange wild sound from without--almost an unearthly sound--that seemed to come from several voices, and to be bearing round the house from the river-path.

Mrs. O'Moore put down her knife and fork, and rose up with a startled cry.

"There's nothing to be alarmed at," said the dowager. "It is those Irish harvesters. I know their horrid voices, and dare say they are riotously drunk. Hartledon ought to put them in prison for it."

The sounds died away into silence. Mrs. O'Moore took her hands from her eyes, where they had been pressed. "Don't you know what it is, Lady Kirton? It is the Irish death-wail!"

It rose again, louder than before, for those from whom it came were nearing the house--a horribly wailing sound, ringing out in the silence of the night. Mrs. O'Moore crouched into her chair again, and hid her terrified face. She was not Irish, and had never heard that sound but once, and that was when her child died.

"She is right," cried her husband, the O'Moore; "that is the death-wail.

Hark! it is for a chieftain; they mourn the loss of one high in the land.

And--they are coming here! Oh, Elster! can DEATH have overtaken your brother?"

The gentlemen had stood spell-bound, listening to the sound, their faces a mixture of surprise and credulity. At the words they rushed out with one accord, and the women stole after them with trembling steps and blanched lips.

"If ever I saw such behaviour in all my existence!" irascibly spoke the countess-dowager, who was left alone in her glory. "The death-wail, indeed! The woman's a fool. I'll get those Irishmen transported, if I can."

In the hall the servants were gathered, cowering almost as the ladies did. Their master had flown down the hall-steps, and the labourers were coming steadily up to it, bearing something in procession. Dr. Ashton came back as quickly as he had gone out, extending his arms before him.

"Ladies, I pray you go in," he urged, in strange agitation. "You must not meet these--these Irishmen. Go back to the dining-room, I entreat you, and remain in it."

But the curiosity of women--who can suppress it? They were as though they heard not, and were pressing on to the door, when Val Elster dashed in with a white face.

"Back, all of you! You must not stay here. This is no place or sight for you. Anne," he added, seizing Miss Ashton's hand in peremptory entreaty, "you at least know how to be calm. Get them away, and keep them out of the hall."

"Tell me the worst," she implored. "I will indeed try to be calm. Who is it those men are bringing here?"

"My dear brother--my dead brother. Madam," he continued to the countess-dowager, who had now come out, dinner-napkin in hand, her curls all awry, "you must not come here. Go back to the dining-room, all of you."

"Not come here! Go back to the dining-room!" echoed the outraged dowager.

"Don't take quite so much upon yourself, Val Elster. The house is Lord Hartledon's, and I am a free agent in it."

A shriek--an agonized shriek--broke from Lady Maude. In her suspense she had stolen out unperceived, and lifted the covering of the rude bier, now resting on the steps. The rays of the hall-lamp fell on the face, and Maude, in her anguish, with a succession of hysterical sobs, came shivering back to sink down at her mother's feet.

"Oh, my love--my love! Dead! dead!"

The only one who heard the words was Anne Ashton. The countess-dowager caught the last.

"Who is dead? What is this mystery?" she asked, unceremoniously lifting her satin dress, with the intention of going out to see, and her head began to nod--perhaps with apprehension--as if she had the palsy. "You want to force us away. No, thank you; not until I've come to the bottom of this."

"Let us tell them," cried young Carteret, in his boyish impulse, "and then perhaps they will go. An accident has happened to Lord Hartledon, ma'am, and these men have brought him home."

"He--_he's_ not dead?" asked the old woman, in changed tones.

Alas! poor Lord Hartledon was indeed dead. The Irish labourers, in pa.s.sing near the mill, had detected the body in the water; rescued it, and brought it home.

The countess-dowager's grief commenced rather turbulently. She talked and shrieked, and danced round, exactly as if she had been a wild Indian. It was so intensely ludicrous, that the occupants of the hall gazed in silence.