Elster's Folly Part 20

"Here to-day, and gone to-morrow!" she sobbed. "Oh--o--o--o--o--o--oh!"

"Nay," cried young Carteret, "here to-day, and gone _now_. Poor fellow!

it is awful."

"And you have done it!" she cried, turning her grief upon the astonished boy. "You! What business had you to allure him off again in that miserable boat, once he had got home?"

"Don't trample me down, please," he indignantly returned; "I am as cut up as you can be. Hedges, hadn't you better get Lady Kirton's maid here? I think she is going mad."

"And now the house is without a master," she bemoaned, returning to her own griefs and troubles, "and I have all the arrangements thrown upon myself."

"The house is not without a master," said young Carteret, who seemed inclined to have the last word. "If one master has gone from it, poor fellow! there's another to replace him; and he is at your elbow now."

He at her elbow was Val Elster. Lady Kirton gathered in the sense of the words, and gave a cry; a prolonged cry of absolute dismay.

"_He_ can't be its master."

"I should say he _is_, ma'am. At any rate he is now Lord Hartledon."

She looked from one to the other in helpless doubt. It was a contingency that had never so much as occurred to her. Had she wanted confirmation, the next moment brought it to her from the lips of the butler.

"Hedges," called out Percival sternly, in his embarra.s.sment and grief, "open the dining-room door. We _must_ get the hall cleared."

"The door is open, my lord."

"_He_ Lord Hartledon!" shrieked the countess-dowager, "why, I was going to recommend his brother to ship him off to Canada for life."

It was altogether an unseemly scene at such a time. But almost everything the Countess-Dowager of Kirton did was unseemly.

CHAPTER X.

MR. PIKE'S VISIT.

Percival Elster was in truth Earl of Hartledon. By one of those unexpected calamities, which are often inexplicable--and which most certainly was so as yet in the present instance--a promising young life had been snapped asunder, and another reigned in his place. In one short hour Val Elster, who had scarcely cross or coin to call his own, had been going in danger of arrest from one moment to another, had become a peer of the realm and a man of wealth.

As they laid the body down in a small room opening from the hall, and his late companions and guests crowded around in awe-struck silence, there was one amidst them who could not control his grief and emotion. It was poor Val. Pushing aside the others, never heeding them in his bitter sorrow, he burst into pa.s.sionate sobs as he leaned over the corpse. And none of them thought the worse of Val for it.

"Oh, Percival! how did it happen?"

The speaker was Dr. Ashton. Little less affected himself, he clasped the young man's hand in token of heartfelt sympathy.

"I cannot think _how_ it could have happened," replied Percival, when able to control his feelings sufficiently to speak. "It seems awfully strange to me--mysteriously so."

"If he found himself going wrong, why didn't he shout out?" asked young Carteret, with a rueful face. "I couldn't have helped hearing him."

It was a question that was pa.s.sing through the minds of all; was being whispered about. How could it have happened? The body presented the usual appearance of death from drowning; but close to the left temple was a wound, and the face was otherwise disfigured. It must have been done, they thought, by coming into contact with something or other in the water; perhaps the skiff itself. Arm and ankle were both much swollen.

Nothing was certainly known as yet of Lord Hartledon from the time Mr.

Carteret parted company with him, to the time when the body was found. It appeared that these Irish labourers were going home from their work, singing as they went, their road lying past the mill, when they were spoken to by the miller's boy. He stood on the species of estrade which the miller had placed there for his own convenience, bending down as far as his young head and shoulders could reach, and peering into the water attentively. "I think I see some'at in the stream," quoth he, and the men stopped; and after a short time, proceeded to search. It proved to be the dead body of Lord Hartledon, caught amongst the reeds.

It was rather a curious coincidence that Percival Elster and his servants in the last search should have heard the voices of the labourers singing in the distance. But they were too far off on their return to Hartledon to be within hearing when the men found the body.

The news spread; people came up from far and near, and Hartledon was besieged. Mr. Hillary, the surgeon, gave it as his opinion that the wound on the temple, no doubt caused before death, had rendered Lord Hartledon insensible, and unable to extricate himself from the water. The mill and cottage were built on what might be called an arm of the river. Lord Hartledon had no business there at all; but the current was very strong; and if, as was too probable, he had become almost disabled, he might have drifted to it without being able to help himself; or he might have been making for it, intending to land and rest in the cottage until help could be summoned to convey him home. How he got into the water was not known.

Once in the water, the blow was easy enough to receive; he might have struck against the estrade.

There is almost sure to be some miserable coincidence in these cases to render them doubly unfortunate. For three weeks past, as the miller testified--a respectable man named Floyd--his mill had not been deserted; some one, man, boy, or woman, had always been there. On this afternoon it was closed, mill and cottage too, and all were away. What might have been simply a slight accident, had help been at hand, had terminated in an awful death for the want of it.

It was eleven o'clock before anything like order was restored at Hartledon, and the house left in quiet. The last person to quit it was Dr. Ashton. Hedges, the butler, had been showing him out, and was standing for a minute on the steps looking after him, and perhaps to cool, with a little fresh air, his perplexed brow--for the man was a faithful retainer, and the affair had shocked him in no common degree--when he was accosted by Pike, who emerged stealthily from behind one of the outer pillars, where he seemed to have been sheltering.

"Why, what have you been doing there?" exclaimed the butler.

"Mr. Hedges, I've been waiting here--hiding, if you like to call it so,"

was the answer; and it should be observed that the man's manner, quite unlike his usual rough, devil-may-care tone, was characterized by singular respect and earnestness. To hear him, and not see him, you might think you were listening to some staid and respectable friend of the family. "I have been standing there this hour past, keeping behind the pillar while other folk went in and out, and waiting my time to speak to you."

"To me?" repeated Hedges.

"Yes, sir. I want you to grant me a favour; and I hope you'll pardon my boldness in asking it."

Hedges did not know what to make of this. It was the first time he had enjoyed the honour of a personal interview with Mr. Pike; and the contrast between that gentleman's popular reputation and his present tone and manner struck the butler as exceedingly singular. But that the butler was in a very softened mood, feeling full of subdued charity towards all the world, he might not have condescended to parley with the man.

"What is the favour?" he inquired.

"I want you to let me in to see the poor young earl--what's left of him."

"Let you in to see the earl!" echoed Hedges in surprise. "I never heard such a bold request."

"It is bold. I've already said so, and asked you to pardon it."

"What can you want that for? It can't be for nothing but curiosity; and--"

"It's not curiosity," interrupted Pike, with an emphasis that told upon his hearer. "I have a different motive, sir; and a good motive. If I were at liberty to tell it--which I'm not--you'd let me in without another word. Lots of people have been seeing him, I suppose."

"Indeed they have not. Why should they? It is a bold thing for _you_ to come and ask it."

"Did he come by his death fairly?" whispered the man.

"Good heavens!" exclaimed the butler, stepping back aghast. "I don't think you know what you are talking about. Who would harm Lord Hartledon?"

"Let me see him," implored the man. "It can't hurt him or anybody else.

Only just for a minute, sir, in your presence. And if it's ever in my power to do you a good turn, Mr. Hedges, I'll do it. It doesn't seem likely now; but the mouse gnawed the lion's net, you know, and set him free."

Whether it was the strange impressiveness with which the request was proffered, or that the softened mood of Hedges rendered him incapable of contention, certain it was that he granted it; and most likely would wonder at himself for it all his after-life. Crossing the hall with silent tread, and taking up a candle as he went, he led the way to the room; Mr. Pike stepping after him with a tread equally silent.

"Take your hat off," peremptorily whispered the butler; for that worthy had entered the room with it on. "Is that the way to--"