Again, I knew about this for I had overheard Vulliamy blackmailing Clothier about it the night the old man died.
Mr Barbellion went on: “Vulliamy bargained with your uncle for a share of your grandfather’s estate as the price of his silence — conduct which is inexcusable, I need hardly say — but he became frightened when an attempt was made by a pair of ruffians to kill him one night.”
I thought I could venture to put a name to at least one of the pair, but I listened in silence.
“In order to obviate the danger to himself, therefore, Vulliamy had to lay his evidence before the board of Quintard and Mimpriss. As a consequence Porteous fled abroad with his family to escape prosecution by his employer, and so his attempt to intimidate Vulliamy — for I assume it was he who was responsible — precipitated the very result he was trying to avert.”
I felt I knew where his words were tending.
“Your uncle having fled and been indicted for a felony by a grand jury, you are consequently the sole heir to your grandfather’s estate,” he continued. “It was because he knew of this turn of events that Vulliamy sent Ashburner to you.”
Here was an astonishing reversal of expectations! Instead of coming into the Hougham estate, I found that the Clothier inheritance was mine virtually for the asking. But what kind of inheritance was it? And in what sense was it mine? I could not bear to think that the father of my child had killed my Papa!
Mr Barbellion had been watching me closely and now said: “I understand that in addition to a large sum of money in securities and government bills, the estate is principally comprised of extensive properties in the metropolis, most of them in the poorer districts — though I believe them to be fairly remunerative. (There is also, incidentally, a large mortgage on the security of this very property which your grandfather had bought up through a nominee. You may know that he was very anxious that his descendants should possess this estate, for I understand that his mother was a Huffam by birth. And so — I hope — you will achieve his ambition.) Vulliamy is ready and willing to continue to manage the properties and other interests in Town on your behalf. If you accept the suggestion I have just made, then you will be a wealthy man, and on that assumption I will proceed with your suit to set up the purloined will.”
His words had stunned me. My ears rang and I felt dizzy at these successive revelations. My one idea was that I must do nothing in haste.
“I must think about what you have told me, Mr Barbellion,” I said.
He nodded, keeping his gaze closely upon me.
Wondering if my legs would support me, I rose and left the room. Without paying attention to where I was going I descended a flight of back-stairs and then, in search of the way out, traversed a series of long, gloomy passages with never a sight or a sound of another human being, constantly finding myself brought up by a dead-end or a locked door or a flight of stairs leading only upwards. One of the passages, wider than the others and hung with many chandeliers, was a picture-gallery and as I laboured down its length I wondered which of the portraits on the wall (all of them muffled in yellow muslin as if in mourning) represented Jeoffrey. When I came to this gallery a second time and realized I had been right round the great square of the central block, I admitted to myself at last that I was hopelessly lost in the huge house. And huge it was, even though it had not been completed according to the original design that Mrs Belflower had told me of so long ago. This, I mused, was the house whose building had cost Jeoffrey Huffam so much that he had fallen into debt to Nicholas Clothier and married his daughter to him, thereby inciting him and his son to the ambition to own the property that had brought such harm upon his (Jeoffrey’s) descendants.
It came to me now that a kind of justice was being offered to me. Could I not claim my Clothier inheritance — whether or not I felt entitled to it and despite my revulsion from it — and use it to restore the Hougham property? But could I convince myself that Vulliamy’s management of the loans and properties could be conducted in accordance with the principles of justice and fair dealing?
Then by good luck I ran across a service-door and at last left the house, finding myself in the stable-yard at its rear.
Someone suddenly spoke to me from behind:
“Master Johnnie!”
I looked round and found Sukey standing before me clad in a scarlet cloak and carrying a basket.
“Why, I couldn’t hardly credit my eyes!” she exclaimed.
I greeted her and she asked eagerly: “Are you here for Miss Henny?”
Preoccupied with what I had just learned I shook my head. I did not want to discuss Henrietta with her.
“I thank you for the money you sent by Clerk Advowson,” she said. “It was more nor I lent you.”
“Sukey,” I asked, “do you recall that piece of parchment that Harry made me sign when I borrowed that money from you?”
She nodded.
I began walking and Sukey accompanied me. I didn’t know where I was going so I allowed her to guide our steps.
“You know, when you brought it to me at the Old Hall the last time I was here, the parchment was so faded that it was almost illegible. And Harry forced me to sign it, really. So it would have no standing in a law-court.”
She nodded again, looking at me curiously. We were walking across the park now towards the head of the lake and the old house beyond it.
“Anyway, the property is worthless,” I concluded. “It’s weighted down by debts.”
She looked at me blankly.
“Do you understand what I’m saying to you? All of this,” and I waved my arm at the great house behind us and the park stretching before us, “is worth nothing.”
“Harry wouldn’t hold you to it, sir,” she said.
“Wouldn’t he?” I said. Then I added: “I don’t believe he could.”
“Besides, he’s at Chatham now,” she said sadly.
“The Hulks?”
She nodded and almost whispered: “Poaching. He’s to be transported, most like.”
“I’ll see you all right, Sukey,” I said. “You and your brothers and sisters.”
She thanked me and we walked on in silence. We reached the square of four ancient oaks at the foot of the hill on which the mausoleum stood, and she halted and looked around. I remembered how Miss Lydia had described this place and recalled that she had insisted that there were five trees when I had known that there were only four. Ahead of me now, however, I saw in the exact centre of the quincunx planted by Jeoffrey Huffam the decaying stump of a fifth. So we had both, in a sense, been right.
At that moment a figure glided from the direction of the ancient building to our right and came towards us. Then, too far away for me to make it out, it paused.
“She’s shy of you, sir,” Sukey whispered.
I turned to her in amazement and seeing this she said in surprise:
“Didn’t you know, sir? I believed you were come a purpose to see her.”
I shook my head.
“She has been living in the Old Hall ever since … since that time I last seen you.” She indicated the basket. “I’ve brung her food and so has some of the sarvints from the big house — at least, until they shut it up and turned ’most all on ’em away. The housekeeper will have nothing to do with her.”
“She spent the winter in that draughty old ruin?”
Sukey nodded. “She couldn’t be made to leave it.”
Was she so devoted, then, to the memory of Bellringer that she would not desert the place of his death? In that case, how would she regard me? Did she blame me for playing a part in bringing it about?
The distant figure slowly came on again and then halted about thirty feet away. Now that I saw her more clearly a new shock struck me. I looked at Sukey who met my gaze briefly and then lowered her eyes.
“Dear God!” I whispered.
“I don’t know that she’ll come no nearer with you here, sir,” Sukey said. “I’ll go to her. Shall I say you wish to spe
ak to her?”
“She can’t stay there alone!” I protested. “Not like that.”
“Do you wish to have a word of her?” Sukey asked again.
Unable to answer, I shook my head in bewilderment.
Sukey moved forward and handed her the basket. They exchanged a few words and then Sukey came back to me.
“She knows who you are. I b’lieve she’ll speak to you if you wish, sir.”
I reached into my pocket and took out all the money I had. Reserving a few shillings for necessities on the journey back, I pressed into her hand the remainder — nearly twenty shillings — saying: “Do what you can for her.”
Taking it without protest, she nodded and then set off in the direction from which we had come.
I walked slowly forward. As I had seen from a distance, her hair was down so that it hung upon her shoulders, she wore no bonnet, and her dress (the one she had been wearing the last time I had seen her) was patched where it had been let out. Her face was even paler and thinner than on that occasion so that it occurred to me that she looked once again — in respect of the countenance at least — like the little girl I had first met a few hundred yards from here more than ten years ago.
As I approached she was staring at me unsmilingly. I halted and for a moment did not know how to start.
Then I said: “No reproaches, Henrietta?”
“You have nothing to reproach me for,” she answered sullenly.
“That’s not what I meant,” I said, distressed that she should have interpreted my words amiss. I said gently: “You can’t stay here.”
“Have you come to take me away?” she asked calmly.
Where could I take her? She must have read my expression for she said: “I believe you wanted to marry me once.”
“Go to the big house,” I said. “Let the housekeeper there write to your guardian.” Then I added, though I doubted what I was saying even as I spoke: “I am sure Lady Mompesson would take you to live with her.”
She looked down.
How could I marry her, almost penniless as I was and with my prospects so uncertain? And my origins. The circumstances of my mother’s end. My paternity. For (to express myself with brutal clarity), if I was not the son of a man who had committed murder and then lived in a hell of near-madness until a hideous death for which I myself was to some extent responsible, then I was at least the grandson of such a one. Besides, I felt pity not love. Although she had hurt me, I would do for her what little lay in my power. I had so many difficulties facing me on my own behalf that I could not think of taking on responsibility for others. I would help her with what money I had, but by one means or another I had my own way to make in the world. As for marrying … It came to me that, all other considerations aside, I could not face the possibility that if I were to regain the Huffam estate, it should be inherited by anyone tainted with Mompesson blood.
“I must stay here,” she said dispassionately. “I am expecting a summons. He will send for me. He will expect me to be here.”
I felt a chill at these words for I took them as confirmation of what I had feared when I first saw her. It had been over six months since her elopement with Henry, since her journey north with him, since the night at the Blue Dragon inn, and since his death before her eyes. Had she been waiting all that time for her lost lover to communicate with her?
And yet as I looked at her now she seemed quite composed and sane. I felt a dizzying sense that there was something here that I did not understand and I suddenly wanted to leave that place.
“I have given Sukey some money for you,” I said. “I will try to send her a little more. I am still very poor now but I may be richer one day.”
She looked at me impassively and, deciding that it would not be wise to offer her my hand, I turned and walked away.
As for what became of her, she disappeared shortly after this and you have heard as much as I know of her later life when I described Helen Quilliam’s fate and that of her companion.
When I reached the first of the trees that surround the great house, I turned and looked back once and once only, just as on that summer’s day when as children we had exchanged love-tokens. At my last sight of her, she was still standing motionless holding her hands crossed in front of her in the centre of the square of trees beside the dead stump where Miss Lydia’s lover had died by my grandfather’s sword.
The End.
Characters who never appear directly in the narrative are in italics. Those who might possess the estate if Jeoffrey Huffam’s suppressed codicil were in force appear in bold typeface. Those who might possess it if his purloined will were laid before the court are in BOLD CAPITALS.
ALPHABETICAL LIST OF NAMES
Characters are listed under both first name and surname, with the full entry coming under the surname where one is mentioned. Some place-names and company-names are included.
Advowson: The vestry-clerk at Melthorpe.
Alabaster: A madhouse doctor.
Anna Mompesson: See under Mompesson.
Ashburner: Mrs Sackbutt’s rent-collector whom John meets in Chapter 124.
Assinder: The Mompessons’ steward.
Barbellion: The Mompessons’ solicitor and town-agent.
Barnards-inn: Henry’s lodgings.
Barney Digweed: See under Digweed.
Belflower, Mrs: The cook at Melthorpe.
Bellringer, Henry: The half-brother of Stephen Maliphant.
Bissett: John’s nurse at Melthorpe.
Blackfriars: Silas Clothier’s counting-house is at Edington’s-wharf.
Blue Dragon, The: An inn in Hertford.
Blueskin: A member of Isbister’s gang.
Bob: The Mompessons’ footman “Edward”.
Bob: A member of Barney’s gang.
Brook-street: The Mompessons’ house is at No. 48.
Cat’s-meat-man, the: See under Pulvertaft.
Charles Pamplin: See under Pamplin.
Clothier, Daniel: See under Porteous.
Clothier, Emma: See under Porteous.
Clothier, Mary: John’s mother.
Clothier, Nicholas: Silas’ father.
Clothier, Peter: Mary’s husband.
Clothier, Silas: Peter’s father.
Coleman-street: Mrs Malatratt’s house is No. 26.
Consolidated Metropolitan Building Company: The company organising the building-speculation.
Cox’s-square: Mrs Sackbutt lives at No. 6.
Cursitor-street: Mr Barbellion’s office is at No. 35.
Dan’el Pulvertaft: See under Pulvertaft.
David Mompesson: See under Mompesson.
Delamater, Sir Thomas: A friend of David Mompesson.
Delamater, Sir William: The patron of Miss Quilliam’s father and the uncle of Sir Thomas.
Digweed, Barney: The man whom John meets in the half-built house in Pimlico.
Digweed, George: The husband of Mrs Digweed and father of Joey.
Digweed, Joey: The son of George.
Digweed, Mrs: The woman who comes begging in Chapter 18.
Digweed, Sally: The elder sister of Joey.
East-Harding-street: Mrs Purviance has a house at No. 12.
Edward: The Mompessons’ footman “Bob”.
Eliza Huffam née Umphraville: See under Huffam.
Emeris: The constable at Melthorpe.
Escreet, Jeoffrey: The old servant of the Huffam family who lives on in the house at Charing-cross.
Espenshade: The man whom John sees in Melthorpe talking to Bissett in Chapter 22.
Fortisquince, Elizabeth: The mother of Martin.
Fortisquince, Jemima: Mary’s cousin who has married “Uncle Martin”.
Fortisquince, Martin: An old friend of Mary’s father and the son of the Huffams’ land-agent.
George Digweed: See under Digweed.
Golden-square: Mrs Fortisquince lives at No. 27.
Gough-square: Mrs Purviance lives at No. 5.
Greenslad
e, Job: The young man whom Sukey walks out with.
Halfmoon: Mary’s false name when she pawns the locket.
Harry: The young man whom Miss Quilliam meets at the pleasure-gardens in Chapter 39. See also under Henry.
Harry Podger: See under Podger.
Henrietta Palphramond: See under Palphramond.
Henry Bellringer: See under Bellringer.
Hinxman, Jack: The extremely tall man who is Alabaster’s assistant.
Huffam, Eliza: The wife of James Huffam, née Umphraville.
Huffam, James: The father of John Huffam.
Huffam, Jeoffrey: The father of James Huffam.
Huffam, John: The father of Mary.
Isabella Mompesson: See under Mompesson.
Isbister, Jerry: The man John and his mother find in Bethnal-green who is a former associate of Barney.
Jack: A member of Barney’s gang and Sally Digweed’s fancy-man.
Jack Hinxman: See under Hinxman.
Jakeman: The Mompessons’ nightwatchman.
Jem: A member of Isbister’s gang.
Jemima Fortisquince: See under Fortisquince.
Jeoffrey Escreet: See under Escreet.
Jeoffrey Huffam: See under Huffam.
Jerry Isbister: See under Isbister.
Job Greenslade: See under Greenslade.
Joey Digweed: See under Digweed.
John Umphraville: See under Umphraville.
Liddy, Miss: See under Mompesson, Lydia.
Lillystone, Mrs: The parish layer-out whom John first encounters in Chapter 52.
Limpenny, Mr: The parish clerk whom John first encounters in Chapter 52.
Lizzie: The old woman who befriends John and Mary in Chapter 49.
Luke: The boy whom John meets at Covent-garden-market.
Lydia (“Aunt Liddy”) Mompesson: See under Mompesson.
Maggie Digweed: See under Digweed.
Malatratt, Mrs: Miss Quilliam’s former landlady.
Maliphant, Stephen: The boy whom John meets at Quigg’s school.
Marrables, Mrs: John and Mary’s first landlady.
Mary Clothier: See under Clothier.
Martin Fortisquince: See under Fortisquince.