Deep Moat Grange

  CHAPTER XXXIV

  JEREMY ORRIN, BREADWINNER

  "I had a younger brother, dear to me far above my life" (this was AphraOrrin's beginning). "He was the youngest of all--left to me in guardby a father who feared in him the wild blood of my mother. For myfather had married a gipsy girl whose beauty had taken him at a villagemerrymaking. In the Upper Ward they do not understand that kind of_mesalliance_ in a schoolmaster. And so, for my mother's sake, he hadto leave his schoolhouse, after fighting the battle against odds formany years.

  "He died rich in his new occupation of cotton spinner, but he knew thatthe blood of my mother ran in all of us. Once, in a great snowstormwhen the schoolhouse was cut off from all other houses--it was in thedays soon after Jeremy (the youngest of us all) was born, my fatherawakened to find my mother leaning over him, the wood axe in her hand,murder in her eye. He had only time to roll beneath the bed, and seizeher by the feet, pulling her down and so mastering her. He had to keephis mad wife, my mother, six days in the schoolhouse, with only himselffor guard, till she could be taken to the asylum, where she died.

  "After this shock my father soon followed her to the grave, and I wasleft with three poor girls on my hands, who could do nothing forthemselves in the world--hardly even what I told them--and with Jeremymy brother. If it had not been for Jeremy, I might have managedbetter. But he spoiled it all. He was wild from his youth. The leastopposition would arouse him to ungovernable fury. He would, like mymother, take up a knife, an axe, or whatever was at hand, and strikewith incredible swiftness and strength.

  "After we had lost our money--after _I_ had lost it, that is--my ownand my family's--it became my duty to provide for them more than ever.I had lost it, because richer people had revenged on me and on thesefour helpless ones my poor father's too rapid success. So I had noright to be squeamish as to means of vengeance on the rich.

  "But while we were in the midst of some sad dreamy days at Bristol,Jeremy began to bring home money, for which he either would or couldgive no account. Nevertheless, I could not be sure which of the two itwas. He was so wayward that if I ventured to ask for an explanationthat would be a sufficient reason for his refusing it.

  "I began, however, to notice that within a day or two after Jeremy'sflush periods, there was always a hue and cry in the papers--a sailorrobbed and his body found floating in the dock, a 'long course' captainknocked on the head, and the ship's money missing. Now Jeremy couldnever be kept away from the docks. Jeremy had plenty of money. Jeremyonly laughed when I asked him how he earned so much without a trade.

  "'I can play the fiddle!' he would answer, jeering at me.

  "Yet, because there was no other money, and I could not let my sisters(who at least had done no wrong) suffer, I used what he brought. Forneither, I was sure (and the thought comforted me), had Jeremy donewrong, _because the mad can do no crime_. The worst the law can do, isonly to shut them up. And in the meantime the money was mostconvenient."

  Here she paused, and a sort of groan ran all round the courthouse, asthe meaning and scope of the woman's revelation began to dawn upon thepacked audience. Aphra Orrin, being in her senses, had employed themadman, her brother, to murder right and left that the wants of herbrood might be met!

  There arose a hoarse mingled shout: "Tear her to pieces!" before which,however, Aphra never blanched. But the sheriff was on his feet in amoment. The fiscal commanded silence, ordering the court officer toapprehend all who disobeyed. For the wise lawyer could see well ahead,and knew that as yet they were only at the beginning of mysteries.

  When silence was restored Euphrasia Orrin continued without losing amoment, neither amazed nor alarmed at the manifestation.

  "At Bristol I perceived that all this would certainly end in anunpleasant discovery--yes, unpleasant" (she repeated the word as if inresponse to the threatening murmurs!). "I was not responsible for mypoor brother, but I thought it would be well to remove him to a placewhere there were no docks and fewer temptations. I bethought myself ofLeeds. We went there, but somehow Jeremy never took to Leeds. Hewandered off by himself to London, associating with horse-coupers andgipsies by the way. Suddenly he disappeared. I heard no more of himtill at our famine-bare garret a letter arrived containing a hundredpounds in Bank of England notes--and an address." Miss Orrin put herhand into a trim little reticule which was attached to her waist, anddrew out a single sheet of paper, on which was written in a sprawlinghand: "_H. Stennis, Pattern Designer and Weaver, Burnside Cottage,Breckonside, Bordershire, N.B._"

  At this moment I noticed that Mr. Ablethorpe had for the first timeleft the side of the speaker--though Mr. De la Poer continued to standon attention, his shoulder almost touching the dark veil which fellaway to one side of Aphra's face, and threw into relief her determinedchin. Mr. Ablethorpe was speaking to my father. My astonishment wasstill greater when I saw my father rise quietly and leave thecourthouse. With a crook of his finger he summoned Rob Kingsman, and,without either of them paying the least attention to me, both left theroom. Then I was certain that my father did not wish to attractattention by calling me away. Perhaps, also, he wanted first-handevidence of what happened after he was gone. Anyway, he did not puthimself at all out of the way at the thought of leaving me in the lurchat Longtown with the night falling. It was, of course, different fromwhat it had been before the burning of Deep Moat Grange. People beganto go the roads freely again.

  Once more Mr. Ablethorpe took up his position. The sheriff had stoppedtaking notes, so absorbed was he in what he heard. As for the fiscal,he had never attempted to take any. He was enjoying the situation.This confession in open court was a thing unknown in his experience,and he was chiefly afraid lest the sheriff, little accustomed to thissort of thing, and probably anxious to get home for dinner, should cutshort the sederunt.

  "At this point," said Mr. Ablethorpe, who in a way assumed the positionof counsel for his strange penitent. "I would put into your lordship'shands papers of some importance. They came from Dr. Hector, some ofthem, and some out of the safe in the cellar of the Grange."

  The sheriff was not in the best of humours.

  "I consider all this most irregular," he growled--"a court of justiceis not a scene in a theatre!"

  But Fiscal McMath, who was infinitely the stronger man of the two incharacter and conduct, turned upon him with a kind of snarl.

  "Don't sink the ship for the extra happorth of tar, skipper," he said,in a low voice (which, however, sitting near, I could just catch),"give them rope--give them rope! We have been a long time at the jobwithout hanging them!"

  At this the sheriff was silent, only motioning Mr. Ablethorpe to givethe papers to Mr. McMath.

  Our fiscal, next to my father the best-known man in the county, was agreyish, grave man with twinkling eyes, mutton-chop side whiskers, alittle, sly, tip-titled nose, with a dry bloom on the top of it, as ifhe liked his spirits neat. He never smiled, yet he was always smiling.His mouth, when about his duties, would be grave as that ofRhadamanthus, while within an inch of it a wrinkle twitched merrilyaway. His eyes could reprove a too light-hearted witness, or frowndown an improperly jovial defendant, all the while that amischief-loving sprite, hovering within, held his sides at theunseasonable jesting.

  On this occasion, however, it was gravely enough that Mr. McMathadjusted his gold-rimmed spectacles and proceeded to read.