CHAPTER LIII.
IN that curious compound, the human heart, a respectable motive issometimes connected with a criminal act. And it was so with Joseph Wylie.He had formed an attachment to Nancy Rouse, and her price was twothousand pounds.
This Nancy Rouse was a character. She was General Rolleston's servant formany years; her place was the kitchen. But she was a woman of suchrestless activity, and so wanting in the proper pride of a servant, thatshe would help a house-maid, or a lady's maid, or do anything almost,except be idle. To use her own words, she was one as couldn't abide tosit mum-chance. That fatal foe to domestic industry, the _LondonJournal,_ fluttered in vain down her area, for she could not read. Shesupported a sick mother out of her wages, aided by a few presents ofmoney and clothes from Helen Rolleston, who had a great regard for Nancy,and knew what a hard fight she had to keep a sick woman out of her twentypounds a year.
In love, Nancy was unfortunate; her buxom looks and sterling virtues werebalanced by a provoking sagacity, and an irritating habit of speaking hermind. She humbled her lovers' vanity, one after another, and they fled.Her heart smarted more than once.
Nancy was ambitious; and her first rise in life took place as follows:When the Rollestons went to Australia, she had a good cry at parting withHelen; but there was no help for it. She could not leave her mother.However, she told Helen she could not stomach any other service, and,since she must be parted, was resolved to better herself. This phrase issometimes drolly applied by servants, because they throw Independenceinto the scale. In Nancy's case it meant setting up as a washerwoman.Helen opened her hazel eyes with astonishment at this, the first round inthe ladder of Nancy's ambition; however, she gave her ten pounds, andthirty introductions, twenty-five of which missed fire, and with the oddfive Nancy set up her tub in the suburbs, and by her industry, genialityand frugality, got on tolerably well. In due course she rented a smallhouse backed by a small green, and advertised for a gentleman lodger. Shesoon got one; and soon got rid of him. However, she was never longwithout one.
Nancy met Joseph Wylie in company. And, as sailors are brisk wooers, hesoon became her acknowledged suitor, and made some inroad into her heart,though she kept on the defensive, warned by past experience.
Wylie's love-making had a droll feature about it; it was most of itcarried on in the presence of three washerwomen, because Nancy had notime to spare from her work, and Wylie had no time to lose in his wooing,being on shore for a limited period. And this absence of superfluousdelicacy on his part gave him an unfair advantage over thetallow-chandler's foreman, his only rival at present. Many a sly thrust,and many a hearty laugh, from his female auditors, greeted his amorouseloquence. But, for all that, they sided with him, and Nancy felt herimportance, and brightened along with her mates at the sailor's approach,which was generally announced by a cheerful hail. He was good company, touse Nancy's own phrase, and she accepted him as a sweetheart onprobation. But, when Mr. Wylie urged her to marry him, she demurred, andgave a string of reasons, all of which the sailor and his allies, thesubordinate washerwomen, combated in full conclave.
Then she spoke out: "My lad, the washtub is a saddle as won't carrydouble. I've seen poverty enough in my mother's house; it shan't come inat my door to drive love out o' window. Two comes together with justenough for two; next year instead of two they are three, and one of thethree can't work and wants a servant extra, and by and by there is half adozen, and the money coming in at the spigot and going out at thebung-hole."
One day, in the middle of his wooing, she laid down her iron, and said:"You come along with me. And I wonder how much work will be done while myback is turned, for you three gabbling and wondering what ever I'm agoing to do with this here sailor."
She took Wylie a few yards down the street, and showed him a large housewith most of the windows broken. "There," said she, "there's a sight fora seafaring man. That's in Chancery."
"Well, it's better to be there than in H--," said Wylie, meaning to besharper.
"Wait till you've tried 'em both," said Nancy.
Then she took him to the back of the house, and showed him a large gardenattached to it.
"Now, Joseph," said she, "I've showed you a lodging-house and adrying-ground; and I'm a cook and a clear-starcher, and I'm wild to keeplodgers and do for 'em, washing and all. Then, if their foul linen goesout, they follows it. The same if they has their meat from the cook-shop.Four hundred pounds a year lies there a waiting for me. I've been at themoften to let me them premises. But they says no, we have got no horderfrom the court to let. Which the court would rather see 'em go to rackan' ruin for nothing, than let 'em to an honest woman as would pay therent punctual, and make her penny out of 'em, and nobody none the worse.And to sell them, the price is two thousand pounds, and if I had it I'dgive it this minit. But where are the likes of you and me to get twothousand pounds? But the lawyer he says, 'Miss Rouse, from _you_ onethousand down, and the rest on mortgige at forty-five pounds the year,'which it is dirt cheap, I say. So now, my man, when that house is mine,I'm yours. I'm putting by for it o' my side. If you means all you say,why not save a bit o' yours? Once I get that house and garden, youneedn't go to sea no more; nor you shan't. If I am to be bothered with aman, let me know where to put my finger on him at all hours, and not lieshivering and shaking at every window as creaks, and him out at sea. Andif you are too proud to drive the linen in a light cart, why, I could paya man." In short, she told him plainly she would not marry till she wasabove the world; and the road to above the world was through that greatbattered house and seedy garden in Chancery.
Now it may appear a strange coincidence that Nancy's price to Wylie wastwo thousand pounds, and Wylie's to Wardlaw was two thousand pounds. Butthe fact is it was a forced coincidence. Wylie, bargaining with Wardlaw,stood out for two thousand pounds, because that was the price of thehouse and garden and Nancy.
Now, when Wylie returned to England safe after his crime and his perils,he comforted himself with the reflection that Nancy would have her houseand garden, and he should have Nancy.
But young Wardlaw lay on his sick bed; his father was about to return tothe office, and the gold disguised as copper was ordered up to thecellars in Fenchurch Street. There, in all probability, the contentswould be examined ere long, the fraud exposed, and other unpleasantconsequences might follow over and above the loss of the promised 2,000pounds.
Wylie felt very disconsolate, and went down to Nancy Rouse depressed inspirits. To his surprise she received him with more affection than ever,and, reading his face in a moment, told him not to fret.
"It will be so in your way of life," said this homely comforter; "yoursort comes home empty-handed one day, and money in both pockets the next.I'm glad to see you home at all, for I've been in care about you. You'revery welcome, Joe. If you are come home honest and sober, why, that isthe next best thing to coming home rich."
Wylie hung his head and pondered these words; and well he might, for hehad not come home either so sober or so honest as he went out, but quiteas poor.
However, his elastic spirits soon revived in Nancy's sunshine, and hebecame more in love with her than ever.
But when, presuming upon her affection, he urged her to marry him andtrust to Providence, she laughed in his face.
"Trust to himprovidence, you mean," said she; "no, no, Joseph. If you areunlucky, I must be lucky, before you and me can come together."
Then Wylie resolved to have his 2,000 pounds at all risks. He had onegreat advantage over a landsman who has committed a crime. He couldalways go to sea and find employment, first in one ship, and then inanother. Terra firma was not one of the necessaries of life to him.
He came to Wardlaw's office to feel his way, and talked guardedly toMichael Penfold about the loss of the _Proserpine._ His apparent objectwas to give information; his real object was to gather it. He learnedthat old Wardlaw was very much occupied with fitting out a steamer; thatthe forty chests of copper had actually come up from the _Shannon_ an
dwere under their feet at that moment, and that young Wardlaw wasdesperately ill and never came to the office. Michael had not at thattime learned the true cause of young Wardlaw's illness. Yet Wyliedetected that young Wardlaw's continued absence from the office gaveMichael singular uneasiness. The old man fidgeted, and washed the airwith his hands, and with simple cunning urged Wylie to go and see himabout the _Proserpine,_ and get him to the office, if it was only for anhour or two. "Tell him we are all at sixes and sevens, Mr. Wylie; all atsixes and sevens."
"Well," said Wylie, affecting a desire to oblige, "give me a line to him;for I've been twice, and could never get in."
Michael wrote an earnest line to say that Wardlaw senior had beenhitherto much occupied in fitting out the _Springbok,_ but that he wasgoing into the books next week. What was to be done?
The note was received; but Arthur declined to see the bearer. Then Wylietold the servant it was Joseph Wylie, on a matter of life and death."Tell him I must stand on the staircase and hallo it out, if he won'thear it any other way."
This threat obtained his admission to Arthur Wardlaw. The sailor foundhim on a sofa, in a darkened room, pale and worn to a shadow.
"Mr. Wardlaw," said Wylie, firmly, "you mustn't think I don't feel foryou; but, sir, we are gone too far to stop, you and me. There is twosides to this business; it is 150,000 pounds for you, and 2,000 poundsfor me, or it is--"
"What do I care for money now?" groaned Wardlaw. "Let it all go to theDevil, who tempted me to destroy her I loved better than money, betterthan all the world."
"Well, but hear me out," said Wylie. "I say it is 150,000 pounds to youand 2,000 pounds to me, or else it is twenty years' penal servitude toboth on us."
"Penal servitude!" And the words roused the merchant from his lethargylike a shower-bath.
"You know that well enough," said Wylie. "Why, 'twas a hanging matter afew years ago. Come, come, there are no two ways; you must be a man, orwe are undone."
Fear prevailed in that timorous breast, which even love of money hadfailed to rouse. Wardlaw sat up, staring wildly, and asked Wylie what hewas to do.
"First, let me ring for a bottle of that old brandy of yours."
The brandy was got. Wylie induced him to drink a wine-glassful neat, andthen to sit at the table and examine the sailors' declaration and thelogs. "I'm no great scholard," said he. "I warn't a going to lay thesebefore the underwriters till you had overhauled them. There, take anotherdrop now--'twill do you good--while I draw up this thundering blind."
Thus encouraged and urged, the broken-hearted schemer languidly comparedthe seamen's declaration with the logs; and, even in his feeble state ofmind and body, made an awkward discovery at once.
"Why, they don't correspond!" said he.
"What don't correspond?"
"Your men's statement and the ship's log. The men speak of one heavy galeafter another, in January, and the pumps going; but the log says, 'A puffof wind from the N.E.' And, here again, the entry exposes yourexaggeration. One branch of our evidence contradicts the other; thiscomes of trying to prove too much. You must say the log was lost, wentdown with the ship."
"How can I?" cried Wylie. "I have told too many I had got it safe athome."
"Why did you say that? What madness!"
"Why were you away from your office at such a time? How can I knoweverything and do everything? I counted on you for the head-work ashore.Can't ye think of any way to square the log to that part of our tale?might paste in a leaf or two, eh?"
"That would be discovered at once. You have committed an irremediableerror. What broad strokes this Hudson makes. He must have written withthe stump of a quill."
Wylie received this last observation with a look of contempt for the mindthat could put so trivial a question in so great an emergency.
"Are you quite sure poor Hudson is dead?" asked Wardlaw, in a low voice.
"Dead! Don't I tell you I saw him die!" said Wylie, trembling all of asudden.
He took a glass of brandy, and sent it flying down his throat.
"Leave the paper with me," said Arthur, languidly, "and tell Penfold I'llcrawl to the office to-morrow. You can meet me there; I shall see nobodyelse."
Wylie called next day at the office, and was received by Penfold, who hadnow learned the cause of Arthur's grief, and ushered the visitor in tohim with looks of benevolent concern. Arthur was seated like a lunatic,pale and motionless; on the table before him was a roast fowl and asalad, which he had forgotten to eat. His mind appeared to alternatebetween love and fraud; for, as soon as he saw Wylie, he gave himself asort of shake and handed Wylie the log and the papers.
"Examine them; they agree better with each other now."
Wylie examined the log, and started with surprise and superstitiousterror. "Why, Hiram's ghost has been here at work!" said he. "It is hisvery handwriting."
"Hush!" said Wardlaw; "not so loud. Will it do?"
"The writing will do first-rate; but any one can see this log has neverbeen to sea."
Inspired by the other's ingenuity, he then, after a moment's reflection,emptied the salt-cellar into a plate, and poured a little water over it.He wetted the leaves of the log with this salt water, and dog's-eared thewhole book.
Wardlaw sighed. "See what expedients we are driven to," said he. He thentook a little soot from the chimney, and mixed it with salad oil. Heapplied some of this mixture to the parchment cover, rubbed it off, andby such manipulation gave it a certain mellow look, as if it had beenused by working hands.
Wylie was armed with these materials, and furnished with money to keephis sailors to their tale, in case of their being examined.
Arthur begged, in his present affliction, to be excused from goingpersonally into the matter of the _Proserpine;_ and said that Penfold hadthe ship's log, and the declaration of the survivors, which the insurerscould inspect, previously to their being deposited at Lloyd's.
The whole thing wore an excellent face, and nobody found a peg to hangsuspicion on so far.
After this preliminary, and the deposit of the papers, nothing washurried; the merchant, absorbed in his grief, seemed to be forgetting toask for his money. Wylie remonstrated; but Arthur convinced him they werestill on too ticklish ground to show any hurry without excitingsuspicion.
And so passed two weary months, during which Wylie fell out of NancyRouse's good graces, for idling about doing nothing.
"Be you a waiting for the plum to fall into your mouth, young man?" saidshe.
The demand was made on the underwriters, and Arthur contrived that itshould come from his father. The firm was of excellent repute and hadpaid hundreds of insurances, without a loss to the underwriters. The_Proserpine_ had foundered at sea; several lives had been lost, and ofthe survivors one had since died, owing to the hardships he had endured.All this betokened a genuine calamity. Nevertheless, one ray of suspicionrested on the case at first. The captain of the _Proserpine_ had lost agreat many ships; and, on the first announcement, one or two wereresolved to sift the matter on that ground alone. But when fiveeye-witnesses, suppressing all mention of the word "drink," declared thatCaptain Hudson had refused to leave the vessel, and described his goingdown with the ship, from an obstinate and too exalted sense of duty,every chink was closed; and, to cut the matter short, the insurance moneywas paid to the last shilling, and Benson, one of the small underwriters,ruined. Nancy Rouse, who worked for Mrs. Benson, lost eighteen shillingsand sixpence, and was dreadfully put out about it.
Wylie heard her lamentations, and grinned; for now his 2,000 pounds wasas good as in his pocket, he thought. Great was his consternation whenArthur told him that every shilling of the money was forestalled, andthat the entire profit of the transaction was yet to come; viz., by thesale of the gold dust.
"Then sell it," said Wylie.
"I dare not. The affair must cool down before I can appear as a seller ofgold; and even then I must dribble it out with great caution. ThankHeaven, it is no longer in those cellars."
"Where is it, then?"
"That is my secret. You will get your two thousand all in good time; and,if it makes you one-tenth part as wretched as it has made me, you willthank me for all these delays."
At last Wylie lost all patience, and began to show his teeth; and thenArthur Wardlaw paid him his two thousand pounds in forty crisp notes.
He crammed them into a side pocket, and went down triumphant to NancyRouse. Through her parlor window he saw the benign countenance of MichaelPenfold. He then remembered that Penfold had told him some time beforethat he was going to lodge with her as soon as the present lodger shouldgo.
This, however, rather interrupted Wylie's design of walking in andchucking the two thousand pounds into Nancy's lap. On the contrary, heshoved them deeper down in his pocket, and resolved to see the oldgentleman to bed, and then produce his pelf, and fix the wedding-day withNancy.
He came in and found her crying, and Penfold making weak efforts toconsole her. The tea-things were on the table, and Nancy 's cup halfemptied.
Wylie came in, and said, "Why, what is the matter now?"
He said this mighty cheerfully, as one who carried the panacea for allills in his pocket, and a medicine peculiarly suited to Nancy Rouse'sconstitution. But he had not quite fathomed her yet.
As soon as ever she saw him she wiped her eyes, and asked him, grimly,what he wanted there. Wylie stared at the reception; but replied stoutly,that it was pretty well known by this time what he wanted in thatquarter.
"Well, then," said Nancy, "Want will be your master. Why did you nevertell me Miss Helen was in that ship? my sweet, dear mistress as was, thatI feel for like a mother. You left her to drown, and saved your own greatuseless carcass, and drowned she is, poor dear. Get out o' my sight, do."
"It wasn't my fault, Nancy," said Wylie, earnestly. "I didn't know whoshe was, and I advised her to come with us; but she would go with thatparson chap."
"What parson chap? What a liar you be! She is Wardlaw's sweetheart, anddon't care for no parsons. If you didn't know you was to blame, whydidn't you tell me a word of your own accord? You kep' dark. Do you callyourself a man, to leave my poor young lady to shift for herself?"
"She had as good a chance to live as I had," said Wylie, sullenly.
"No, she hadn't; you took care o' yourself. Well, since you are so fondof yourself, keep yourself _to_ yourself, and don't come here no more.After this, I hate the sight on ye. You are like the black dog in myeyes, and always will be. Poor, dear Miss Helen! Ah, I cried when sheleft--my mind misgave me; but little I thought she would perish in thesalt seas, and all for want of a man in the ship. If you had gone outagain after in the steamboat--Mr. Penfold have told me all about it--I'dbelieve you weren't so much to blame. But no; lolloping and looking aboutall day for months. There's my door, Joe Wylie; I can't cry comfortablebefore you as had a hand in drowning of her. You and me is partedforever. I'll die as I am, or I'll marry a _man;_ which you ain't one,nor nothing like one. Is he waiting for you to hold the door open, Mr.Penfold? or don't I speak plain enough? Them as I gave the sack to aforeyou didn't want so much telling."
"Well, I'm going," said Wylie, sullenly. Then, with considerable feeling,"This is hard lines."
But Nancy was inexorable, and turned him out, with the 2,000 pounds inhis pocket.
He took the notes out of his pocket, and flung them furiously down in thedirt.
Then he did what everybody does under similar circumstances, he pickedthem up again, and pocketed them, along with the other dirt they hadgathered.
Next day he went down to the docks and looked out for a ship; he soon gotone, and signed as second mate. She was to sail in a fortnight.
But, before a week was out, the banknotes had told so upon him that hewas no longer game to go to sea. But the captain he had signed with was aTartar, and not to be trifled with. He consulted a knowing friend, andthat friend advised him to disguise himself till the ship had sailed.Accordingly he rigged himself out with a long coat, and a beard, andspectacles, and hid his sea-slouch as well as he could, and changed hislodgings. Finding he succeeded so well, he thought he might as well havethe pleasure of looking at Nancy Rouse, if he could not talk to her. Sohe actually had the hardihood to take the parlor next door; and by thismeans he heard her move about in her room, and caught a sight of her atwork on her little green; and he was shrewd enough to observe she did notsing and whistle as she used to do. The dog chuckled at that. Hisbank-notes worried him night and day. He was afraid to put them in abank; afraid to take them about with him into his haunts; afraid to leavethem at home; and out of this his perplexity arose some incidents worthrelating in their proper order.
Arthur Wardlaw returned to business; but he was a changed man. All zestin the thing was gone. His fraud set him above the world; and that wasnow enough for him, in whom ambition was dead, and, indeed, nothing leftalive in him but deep regrets.
He drew in the horns of speculation, and went on in the old safe routine;and to the restless activity that had jeopardized the firm succeeded astrange torpidity. He wore black for Helen, and sorrowed without hope. Hefelt he had offended Heaven, and had met his punishment in Helen's death.Wardlaw senior retired to Elmtrees, and seldom saw his son. When they didmeet, the old man sometimes whispered hope, but the whisper was faint andunheeded.
One day Wardlaw senior came up express, to communicate to Arthur a letterfrom General Rolleston, written at Valparaiso. In this letter, GeneralRolleston deplored his unsuccessful search; but said he was goingwestward, upon the report of a Dutch whaler, who had seen an islandreflected in the sky, while sailing between Juan Fernandez and NorfolkIsle.
Arthur only shook his head with a ghastly smile. "She is in heaven," saidhe, "and I shall never see her again, not here or hereafter."
Wardlaw senior was shocked at this speech; but he made no reply. Hepitied his son too much to criticise the expressions into which hisbitter grief betrayed him. He was old, and had seen the triumphs of timeover all things human, sorrow included. These, however, as yet, had donenothing for Arthur Wardlaw. At the end of six months, his grief was assomber and as deadly as the first week.
But one day, as this pale figure in deep mourning sat at his table, goinglistlessly and mechanically through the business of scraping moneytogether for others to enjoy, whose hearts, unlike his, might not be inthe grave, his father burst in upon him, with a telegram in his hand, andwaved it over his head in triumph.
"She is found! she is found!" he roared. "Read that!" and thrust thetelegram into his hands.
Those hands trembled, and the languid voice rose into shrieks ofastonishment and delight, as Arthur read the words, "We have got her,alive and well. Shall be at Charing Cross Hotel, 8 P. M."