The Black Baronet; or, The Chronicles Of Ballytrain Part 29

The baronet grasped his wrist tightly with one hand--and both feeble and attenuated was that poor wrist--the baronet, we say, grasped it, and in an instant had regained possession of the mask, which he deliberately replaced on his face, after which he seized the unfortunate young man by the neck, and pressed it with such force as almost to occasion suffocation. Still he (Sir Thomas) uttered not a syllable, a circ.u.mstance which in the terrified mind of his unhappy victim caused his position as well as that of his companion to a.s.sume a darker, and consequently a more terrible mystery.

"Ah!" he exclaimed, in a low and trembling voice, "I know you now. You are the stranger who came to stop in the 'Mitre.' Yes, you came down to stop in the 'Mitre.' I know you by your strong grasp. I care not, however, for your attempt to strangle me. I forgive you--I pardon you; and I will tell you why--treat me as violently as you may--I feel that there is goodness in your face, and mercy in your heart. But I did see a face, one day, in the inn," he added, in a voice that gradually became quite frantic--"a face that was dark, d.a.m.nable, and demoniac--oh, oh!

may G.o.d of heaven ever preserve me from seeing that face again!" he exclaimed, shuddering wildly. "Open me up the shrouded graves, my friend; I will call you so notwithstanding what has happened, for I still think you are a gentleman; open me up, I say, the shrouded graves--set me among the hideous dead, in all their ghastly and loathsome putrefaction--lay me side by side with the sweltering carca.s.s of the gibbeted murderer--give me such a vision, and expose me to the anger of the Almighty when raging in his vengeance; or, if there be a pitch of horror still beyond this, then I say--mark me, my friend--then I say, open me up all h.e.l.l at full work--hissing, boiling, bubbling, scalding, roasting, frying, scorching, blazing, burning, but ever-consuming h.e.l.l, sir, I say, in full operation--the whole dark and penal machinery in full play--open it up--there they are--the yell, the scream, the blasphemy, the shout, the torture, the laughter of despair--with the pleasing consciousness that all this is to be eternal; hark ye, sir, open me up a view of this aforesaid spectacle upon the very brow of perdition, and having allowed me time to console myself by a contemplation of it, fling me, soul and body, into the uttermost depths of its howling tortures; do any or all of these things, sooner than let me have a sight of that face again--it bears such a terrible resemblance to that which blighted me."

He then paused for a little, and seemed as if about to sink into a calmer and more thoughtful mood--at least the baronet inferred as much from his silence. The latter still declined to speak, for he felt perfectly aware, from this incoherent outburst, that although Fenton had seen him only two or three times, many years ago, when the unfortunate young man was scarcely a boy, yet he had often heard his voice, and he consequently avoided every possibility of giving the former a clew to his ident.i.ty. At length Fenton broke silence.

"What was I saying?" he asked. "Did I talk of that mult.i.tudinous limbo called h.e.l.l? Well, who knows, perhaps there may be a general jail delivery there yet; but talking of the thing, I a.s.sure you, sir, I feel a portion of its tortures. Like Dives--no, not like the rich and hardened glutton--I resemble him in nothing but my sufferings. Oh! a drink, a drink--water, water--my tongue, my mouth, my throat, my blood, my brain, are all on fire?"

Oh, false ambition, to what mean and despicable resources, to what low and unscrupulous precautions dost thou stoop in order to accomplish thy selfish, dishonest, and heartless designs! The very gratification of this expected thirst had been provided for and antic.i.p.ated. As Fenton spoke, the baronet took from one of the coach pockets a large flask of spirits and water, which he instantly, but without speaking, placed in the scorching wretch's hands, who without a moment's hesitation, put it to his lips and emptied it at one long, luxurious draught.

"Thanks, friend," he then exclaimed; "I have been agreeably mistaken in you, I find. You are--you must be--no other than my worthy host of the 'Hedge.' Poor Dives! D--n the glutton; after all, I pity him, and would fain hope that he has got relief by this time. As for Lazarus, I fear that his condition in life was no better than it deserved. If he had been a trump, now, and anxious to render good for evil, he would have dropped a bottle of aquapura to the suffering glutton, for if worthy Dives did nothing else, he fed the dogs that licked the old fellow's sores. Fie, for shame, old Lazarus, d--n me, if I had you back again, but we'd teach you sympathy for Dives; and how so, my friend of the hawthorn--why, we'd send him to the poor-house,* or if that wouldn't do, to the mad-house--to the mad-house. Oh, my G.o.d--my G.o.d! what is this?

Where are you bringing me, sir? but I know--I feel it--this destiny that's over me!"

* It is to be presumed, that Fenton speaks here from his English experience. We find no poor-houses at the time.

He again became silent for a time, but during the pause, we need scarcely say, that the pernicious draught began to operate with the desired effect.

"That mask," he then added, as if speaking to himself, "bodes me nothing but terror and persecution, and all this in a Christian country, where there are religion and laws--at least, they say so--as for raypart, I could never discover them. However, it matters not, let us clap a stout heart to a steep brae, and we may jink them and blink them yet; that's all.

There was a little bird, a very little bird, And a very little bird was he; And he sang his little song all the summer day long, On a branch of the fair green-wood tree.

Heigh ho!"

This little touch of melody, which he sang to a sweet and plaintive air, seemed to produce a feeling of mournfulness and sorrow in his spirit, for although the draught he had taken was progressing fast in its operations upon his intellect, still it only a.s.sumed a new and more affecting shape, and occasioned that singular form and ease of expression which may be observed in many under the influence of similar stimulants.

"Well," he proceeded, "I will soon go home; that is one consolation!

There is a sickness, my friend, whoever you are, at my heart here, and in what does that sickness consist? I will tell you--in the memory of some beautiful dreams that I had when a child or little-boy: I remember something about green fields, groves, dark mountains, and summer rivers flowing sweetly by. This now, to be sure, is a feeling which but few can understand. It is called homesickness, and a.s.sumes different aspects, my worthy friend. Sometimes it is a yearning after immortality, which absorbs and consumes the spirit, and then we die and go to enjoy that which we have pined for. Now, my worthy mute friend, mark me, in my case the malady is not so exalted. I only want my green fields, my dark mountains, my early rivers, with liberty to tread them for a brief s.p.a.ce. There lies over them in my imagination--there does, my worthy and most taciturn friend, upon my soul there does--a golden light so clear, so pure, so full of happiness, that I question whether that of heaven itself will surpa.s.s it in radiance. But now I am caged once more, and will never see anything even like them again."

The poor young man then wept for a couple of minutes, after which he added, "Yes, sir, this is at once my malady and my hope. You see, then, I am not worth a plot, nor would it be a high-minded or honorable act for any gentleman to conspire against one who is n.o.body's enemy, but appears to have all the world against him. Yes, and they thought when I used to get into my silent moods that I was mad. No, but I was in heaven, enjoying, as I said, my mountains, my rivers, and my green fields. I was in heaven, I say, and walked in the light of heaven, for I was a little boy once more, and saw its radiance upon them, as I used to do long ago. But do you know what occurs to me this moment, most taciturn?" He added, after a short pause, being moved, probably, by one of those quick and capricious changes to which both the intoxicated and insane are proverbially liable: "It strikes me, that you probably are descended from the man in the iron mask--ha--ha--ha! Or stay, was there ever such a thing in this benevolent and humane world of ours as a man with an iron heart? If so, who knows, then, but you may date your ancestry from him? Ay, right enough; we are in a coach, I think, and going--going--going to--to--to--ah, where to? I know--oh, my G.o.d--we are going to--to--to----" and here poor Fenton once more fell asleep, as was evident by his deep but oppressive breathing.

Now the baronet, although he maintained a strict silence during their journey, a silence which it was not his intention to break, made up for this cautious taciturnity by thought and those reflections which originated from his designs upon Fenton. He felt astonished, in the first place, at the measures, whatever they might have been, by which the other must have obtained means of escaping from the asylum to which he had been committed with such strict injunctions as to his secure custody. It occurred to him, therefore, that by an examination of his pockets he might possibly ascertain some clew to this circ.u.mstance, and as the man was not overburdened with much conscience or delicacy, he came to the determination, as Fenton was once more dead asleep, to search for and examine whatever papers he should find about him, if any.

For this purpose he ignited a match--such as they had in those days--and with this match lit up a small dark lantern, the same to which we have already alluded. Aided by its light, he examined the sleeping young man's pockets, in which he felt very little, in the shape of either money or papers, that could compensate him for this act of larceny. In a breast-pocket, however, inside his waistcoat, he found pinned to the lining a note--a pound note--on the back of which was jotted a brief memorandum of the day on which it was written, and the person from whom he had received it. To this was added a second memorandum, in the following words: "Mem. This note may yet be useful to myself if I could get a sincere friend that would find out the man whose name--Thomas Skipton--is written here upon it. He is the man I want, for I know his signature."

No sooner had the baronet read these lines, than he examined the several names on the note, and on coming to one which was underlined evidently by the same ink that was used by Fenton in the memoranda, his eyes gleamed with delight, and he waved it to and fro with a grim and hideous triumph, such as the lurid light of his foul principles flashing through such eyes, and animating such features as his, could only express.

"Unhappy wretch," thought he, looking upon his unconscious victim, "it is evident that you are doomed; this man is the only individual living over whom I have no control, that could give any trace of you; neither of the other two, for their own sakes, dare speak. Even fate is against you; that fate which has consigned this beggarly representative of wealth to my hands, through your own instrumentality. I now feel confident; nay, I am certain that my projects will and must succeed.

The affairs of this world are regulated unquestionably by the immutable decrees of destiny. What is to be will be; and I, in putting this wretched, drunken, mad, and besotted being out of my way, am only an instrument in the hands of that destiny myself. The blame then is not mine, but that of the law which constrains--forces me to act the part I am acting, a part which was allotted to me from the beginning; and this reflection fills me with consolation."

He then re-examined the note, put it into a particular fold of his pocket-book which had before been empty, in order to keep it distinct, and once more thrusting it into his pocket, b.u.t.toned it carefully up, extinguished the lantern, and laid himself back in the corner of the carriage, in which position he reclined, meditating upon the kind partiality of destiny in his favor, the virtuous tendencies of his own ambition, and the admirable, because successful, means by which he was bringing them about.

In this manner they proceeded until they reached the entrance of the next town, when the baronet desired Gillespie to stop. "Go forward,"

said he, "and order a chaise and pair without delay. I think, however, you will find them ready for you; and if Corbet is there, desire him to return with you. He has already had his instructions. I am sick of this work, Gillespie; and I a.s.sure you it is not for the son of a common friend that I would forego my necessary rest, to sit at such an hour with a person who is both mad and drunk. What is friendship, however, if we neglect its duties? Care and medical skill may enable this unfortunate young man to recover his reason, and take a respectable position in the world yet. Go now and make no delay. I shall take charge of this poor fellow and the horses until you return. But, mark me, my name is not to be breathed to mortal, under a penalty that you will find a dreadful one, should you incur it."

"Never fear, your honor," replied Gillespie; "I am not the man to betray trust; and indeed, few gentlemen of your rank, as I said, would go so far for the son of an auld friend. I'll lose no time, Sir Thomas."

Sir Thomas, we have had occasion to say more than once, was quick and energetic in all his resolutions, and beyond doubt, the fact that Gillespie found Corbet ready and expecting him on this occasion, fully corroborates our opinion.

Indeed, it was his invariable habit, whenever he found that more than one agent or instrument was necessary, to employ them, as far as was possible, independently of each other. For instance, he had not at all communicated to Gillespie the fact of his having engaged Corbet in the matter, nor had the former any suspicion of it until he now received the first hint from Sir Thomas himself. A chaise and pair in less than five minutes drove gently, but with steady pace, back to the spot where the baronet stood at the head of his horses, watching the doors of the carriage on each side every quarter of a minute, lest by any possible chance his victim might escape him. Of this, however, there was not the slightest danger; poor Fenton's sleep, like that of almost all drunken men, having had in it more of stupor than of ordinary and healthful repose.

We have informed our readers that the baronet was not without a strong tinge of superst.i.tion, notwithstanding his religious infidelity, and his belief in the doctrine of fate and necessity. On finding himself alone at that dead and dreary hour of the night--half-past two--standing under a shady range of tall trees that met across the road, and gave a character of extraordinary gloom and solitude to the place, he began to experience that vague and undefined terror which steals over the mind from an involuntary apprehension of the supernatural. A singular degree of uneasiness came over him: he coughed, he hemmed, in order to break the death-like stillness in which he stood. He patted the horses, he rubbed his hand down their backs, but felt considerable surprise and terror on finding that they both trembled, and seemed by their snorting and tremors to partake of his own sensations. Under such terrors there is nothing that extinguishes a man's courage so much as the review of an ill-spent life, or the reproaches of an evil conscience. Sir Thomas Gourlay could not see and feel, for the moment, the criminal iniquity of his black and unG.o.dly ambition, and the crimes into which it involved him. Still, the consciousness of the flagitious project in which he was engaged against the unoffending son of his brother, the influence of the hour, and the solitude in which he stood, together with the operation upon his mind of some unaccountable fear apart from that of personal violence--all, when united, threw him into a commotion that resulted from such a dread as intimated that something supernatural must be near him. He was seized by a violent shaking of the limbs, the perspiration burst from every pore; and as he patted the horses a second time for relief, he again perceived that their terrors were increasing and keeping pace with his own. At length, his hair fairly stood, and his excitement was nearly as high as excitement of such a merely ideal character could go, when he thought he heard a step--a heavy, solemn, unearthly step--that sounded as if there was something denouncing and judicial in the terrible emphasis with which it went to his heart, or rather to his conscience. Without having the power to restrain himself, he followed with his eyes this symbolical tread as it seemed to approach the coach door on the side at which he stood. This was the more surprising and frightful, as, although he heard the tramp, yet he could for the moment see nothing in the shape of either figure or form, from which he could resolve what he had heard into a natural sound.

At length, as he stood almost dissolved in terror, he thought that an indistinct, or rather an unsubstantial figure stood at the carriage-door, looked in for a moment, and then bent his glance at him, with a severe and stem expression; after which, it began to rub out or efface a certain portion of the armorial bearings, which he had added to his heraldic coat in right of his wife. The noise of the chaise approaching now reached his ears, and he turned as a relief to ascertain if Gillespie and Corbet were near him. As far as he could judge, they were about a couple of hundred yards off, and this discovery recalled his departed courage; he turned his eyes once more to the carriage-door, but to his infinite relief could perceive nothing. A soft, solemn, mournful blast, however, somewhat like a low moan, amounting almost to a wail, crept through the trees under which he stood; and after it had subsided--whether it was fact or fancy cannot now be known--he thought he heard the same step slowly, and, as it were with a kind of sorrowful anger, retreating in the distance.

"If mortal spirit," he exclaimed as they approached, "ever was permitted to return to this earth, that form was the spirit of my mortal brother.

This, however," he added, but only in thought, when they came up to him, and after he had regained his confidence by their presence, "this is all stuff--nothing but solitude and its a.s.sociations acting upon the nerves; thus enabling us, as we think, to see the very forms created only by our fears, and which, apart from them, have no existence."

The men and the chaise were now with him--Gillespie on horseback, that is to say, he was to bring back the same animal on which Sir Thomas had secretly despatched Corbet from Red Hall to the town of ------, for the purpose of having the chaise ready, and conducting Fenton to his ultimate destination. The poor young man's transfer from the carriage to the chaise was quickly and easily effected. Several large flasks of strong spirits and water were also transferred along with him.

"Now, Corbet," observed Sir Thomas apart to him, "you have full instructions how to act; and see that you carry them out to the letter.

You will find no difficulty in keeping this person in a state of intoxication all the way. Go back to ------, engage old Bradbury to drive the chaise, for, although deaf and stupid, he is an excellent driver. Change the chaise and horses, however, as often as you can, so as that it may be difficult, if not impossible, to trace the route you take. Give Benson, who, after all, is the prince of mad doctors, the enclosure which you have in the blank cover; and tell him, he shall have an annuity to the same amount, whether this fellow lives or dies. Mark me, Corbet--whether his charge lives or dies. Repeat these words to him twice, as I have done to you. Above all things, let him keep him safe--safe--safe. Remember, Corbet, that our family have been kind friends to yours. I, therefore, have trusted you all along in this matter, and calculate upon your confidence as a grateful and honest man, as well as upon your implicit obedience to every order I have given you.

I myself shall drive home the carriage; and when we get near Red Hall, Gillespie can ride forward, have his horse put up, and the stable and coachhouse doors open, so that everything tomorrow morning may look as if no such expedition had taken place."

They then separated; Corbet to conduct poor Fenton to his dreary cell in a mad-house, and Sir Thomas to seek that upon which, despite his most ambitious projects, he had been doomed all his life to seek after in vain--rest on an uneasy pillow.

CHAPTER XVII. A Scene in Jemmy Trailcudgel's

--Retributive Justice, or the Robber robbed.

In the days of which we write, travelling was a very different process from what it is at present. Mail-coaches and chaises were the only vehicles then in requisition, with the exception of the awkward gingles, buggies, and other gear of that nondescript cla.s.s which were peculiar to the times, and princ.i.p.ally confined to the metropolis. The result of this was, that travellers, in consequence of the slow jog-trot motion of those curious and inconvenient machines, were obliged, in order to transact their business with something like due dispatch, to travel both by night and day. In this case, as in others, the cause produced the effect; or rather, we should say, the temptation occasioned the crime.

Highway-robbery was frequent; and many a worthy man--fat farmer and wealthy commoner--was eased of his purse in despite of all his armed precautions and the most st.u.r.dy resistance. The poorer cla.s.ses, in every part of the country, were, with scarcely an exception, the friends of those depredators; by whom, it is true, they were aided against oppression, and a.s.sisted in their dest.i.tution, as a compensation for connivance and shelter whenever the executive authorities were in pursuit of them. Most of these robberies, it is true, were the result of a loose and disorganized state of society, and had their direct origin from oppressive and unequal laws, badly or partially administered.

Robbery, therefore, in its general character, was caused, not so much by poverty, as from a desperate hatred of those penal statutes which operated for punishment but not for protection. Our readers may not feel surprised, then, when we a.s.sure them that the burgler and highway-robber looked upon this infamous habit as a kind of patriotic and political profession, rather than a crime; and it is well known that within the last century the sons of even decent farmers were bound apprentices to this flagitious craft, especially to that of horse stealing, which was then reduced to a system of most extraordinary ingenuity and address.

Still, there were many poor wretches who, sunk in the deepest dest.i.tution, and contaminated by a habit which familiarity had deprived in their eyes of much of its inherent enormity, scrupled not to relieve their distresses by having recourse to the prevalent usage of the country.

Having thrown out these few preparatory observations, we request our readers to follow us to the wretched cabin of a man whose _nom de guerre_ was that of Jemmy Trailcudgel--a name that was applied to him, as the reader may see, in consequence of the peculiar manner in which he carried the weapon aforesaid. Trailcudgel was a man of enormous personal strength and surprising courage, and had distinguished himself as the leader of many a party and faction fight in the neighboring fairs and markets. He had been, not many years before, in tolerably good circ.u.mstances, as a tenant under Sir Thomas Gourlay; and as that gentleman had taken it into his head that his tenantry were bound, as firmly as if there had been a clause to that effect in their leases, to bear patiently and in respectful silence, the imperious and ribald scurrility which in a state of resentment, he was in the habit of pouring upon them, so did he lose few opportunities of making them feel, for the most-trivial causes, all the irresponsible insolence of the strong and vindictive tyrant. Now, Jemmy Trailcudgel was an honest man, whom every one liked; but he was also a man of spirit, whom, in another sense, most people feared. Among his family he was a perfect child in affection and tenderness--loving, playful, and simple as one of themselves. Yet this man, affectionate, brave, and honest, because he could not submit in silence and without vindication, to the wanton and overbearing violence of his landlord, was hara.s.sed by a series of persecutions, under the pretended authority of law, until he and his unhappy family were driven to beggary--almost to despair.

"Trailcudgel," said Sir Thomas to him one day that he had sent for him in a fury, "by what right and authority, sirra, did you dare to cut turf on that part of the bog called Berwick's Bank?"

"Upon the right and authority of my lease, Sir Thomas," replied Trailcudgel; "and with great respect, sir, you had neither right nor authority for settin' my bog, that I'm payin' you rent for, to another tenant."

The baronet grew black in the face, as he always did when in a pa.s.sion, and especially when replied to.

"You are a lying scoundrel, sirra," continued the other; "the bog does not belong to you, and I will set it to the devil if I like."

"I know n.o.body so fit to be your tenant," replied Trailcudgel. "But I am no scoundrel, Sir Thomas," added the independent fellow, "and there's very few dare tell me so but yourself."

"What, you villain! do you contradict me? do you bandy words and looks with me?" asked the baronet, his rage deepening at Trailcudgel's audacity in having replied at all.

"Villain!" returned his gigantic tenant, in a voice of thunder. "You called me a scoundrel, sirra, and you have called me a villain, sirra, now I tell you to your teeth, you're a liar--I am neither villain nor scoundrel; but you're both; and if I hear another word of insolence out of your foul and lying mouth, I'll thrash you as I would a shafe of whate or oats."

The black hue of the baronet's rage changed to a much modester tint; he looked upon the face of the st.u.r.dy yeoman, now flushed with honest resentment; he looked upon the eye that was kindled at once into an expression of resolution and disdain; and turning on his toe, proceeded at a pace by no means funereal to the steps of the hall-door, and having ascended them, he turned round and said, in a very mild and quite a gentlemanly tone,

"Oh, very well, Mr. Trailcudgel; very well, indeed. I have a memory, Mr.

Trailcudgel--I have a memory. Good morning!"

"Betther for you to have a heart," replied Trailcudgel; "what you never had."

Having uttered these words he departed, conscious at the same time, from his knowledge of his landlord's unrelenting malignity, that his own fate was sealed, and his ruin accomplished. And he was right. In the course of four years after their quarrel, Trailcudgel found himself, and his numerous family, in the scene of dest.i.tution to which we are about to conduct the indulgent reader.