The Hallam Succession

"Who asks thee to waste thy life? Hev I iver grudged thee any thing to make it happy? Thou hes hed t' best o' educations. If ta wants to travel, there's letters o' credit waiting for thee. If ta wants work, I've told thee there's acres and acres o' wheat on the Hallam marshes, if they were only drained. I'll find ta money, if ta wants work."

"Father, I could not put gold in a marsh, and then sit down and wait for the wheat to grow; and all the wheat on Hallam, unless it bore golden ears, would not satisfy me. George and I are going into Sir Thomas Harrington's for a few months. Lord Eltham has spoken to him. Then George is to marry Selina Digby. She has fifty thousand pounds; and we are going to begin business."

"Wi' fifty thousand pounds o' Miss Digby's money! It's t' meanest scheme I iver heard tell on! I'm fair shamed o' thee!"

"I must put into the firm fifty thousand pounds also; and I want to speak to you about it."

"For sure! How does ta think to get it out o' me now?"

"I could get Jews to advance it on my inheritance, but I would do nothing so mean and foolish as that. I thought it would be better to break the entail. You give me fifty thousand pounds as my share of Hallam, and you can have the reversion and leave the estate to whom you wish."

The squire fairly staggered. Break the entail! Sell Hallam! The young man was either mad, or he was the most wicked of sons.

"Does ta know what thou is talking about! Hallam has been ours for a thousand years. O Antony! Antony!"

"We have had it so long, father, that we have grown to it like vegetables."

"Has ta no love for t' old place? Look at it. Is there a bonnier spot in t' wide world? Why-a! There's an old saying,

"'When a' t' world is up aloft, God's share will be fair Hallam-Croft.'

"Look at ta dear old home, and t' sweet old gardens, and t' great park full o' oaks that hev sheltered Saxons, Danes, Normans—ivery race that has gone to make up t' Englishman o' to-day."

"There are plenty of fairer spots than Hallam. I will build a house far larger and more splendid than this. There shall be a Lord Hallam, an Earl Hallam, perhaps. Gold will buy any thing that is in the market."

"Get thee out o' my sight! And I'll tell Lord Eltham varry plainly what I think o' his meddling in my affairs. In order to set up his youngest son I must give up t' bond on t' home that was my fathers when his fathers were driving swine, the born thralls of the Kerdics of Kerdic Forest. Thou art no Hallam. No son o' mine. Get out o' my sight wi' thee!"

Antony went without anger and without hurry. He had expected even a worse scene. He sat down by the hall fire to think, and he was by no means hopeless as to his demand. But the squire had received a shock from which he never recovered himself. It was as if some evil thing had taken all the sweetest and dearest props of love, and struck him across the heart with them. He had a real well-defined heart-ache, for the mental shock had had bodily sympathies which would have prostrated a man of less finely balanced physique.

All night long he sat in his chair, or walked up and down his room. The anger which comes from wronged love and slighted advantages and false friendship alternately possessed him. The rooms he occupied in the east wing had been for generations the private rooms of the masters of Hallam, and its walls were covered with their pictures—fair, large men, who had for the most part lived simple, kindly lives, doing their duty faithfully in the station to which it had pleased God to call them. He found some comfort in their pictured presence. He stood long before his father, and tried to understand what he would have done in his position. Toward daylight he fell into a chill, uneasy sleep, and dreamed wearily and sadly of the old home. It was only a dream, but dreams are the hieroglyphics of the other world if we had the key to them; and at any rate the influences they leave behind are real enough. "Poor Martha!" was the squire's first thought on rousing himself. "I know now what t' heart-ache she spoke of is like. I'm feared I heven't been as sorry as I might hev been for her."

Yet that very night, while the squire was suffering from the first shock of wounded, indignant amazement, God had taken Martha's case in his own hand. The turn in Ben's trouble began just when the preacher spoke to Martha. At that hour Bill Laycock entered the village ale-house and called for a pot of porter. Three men, whom he knew well, were sitting at a table, drinking and talking. To one of them Bill said, "It's a fine night," and after a sulky pause the man answered, "It ails nowt." Then he looked at his mates, put down his pot, and walked out. In a few minutes the others followed.

Laycock went back to his house and sat down to think. There was no use fighting popular ill-will any longer. Mary would not walk on the same side of the street with him. It was the evident intention of the whole village to drive him away. He remembered that Swale had told him there was "a feeling against him," and advised him to leave. But Swale had offered to buy his house and forge for half their value, and he imagined there was a selfish motive in the advice. "And it's Swale's doing, I know," he muttered; "he's been a-fighting for it iver since. Well, I'll tak t' L300 he offers, wi' t' L80 I hev in t' house, I can make shift to reach t' other side o' t' world, and one side is happen as good as t' other side. I'll go and see Swale this varry hour."

He was arrested by a peculiar sound in the cellar beneath his feet, a sound that made him turn pale to the very lips. In a few moments the door opened, and Tim Bingley stepped into the room.

"Thou scoundrel! What does ta want here?"

"Thou get me summat to eat and drink, and then I'll tell thee what I want."

His tone was not to be disputed. He was a desperate man, and Laycock obeyed him.

"Thou told me thou would go abroad."

"I meant to go abroad, but I didn't. I got drunk and lost my brass. Thou'll hev to give me some more. I'll go clean off this time."

"I've got none to give thee."

"Varry well, then I'll hev to be took up; and if I'm sent to York Castle, thou'lt hev lodgings varry close to me. Mak' up thy mind to that, Bill Laycock."

"I didn't kill Clough, and thou can't say I did."

Bingley did not answer. He sat munching his bread and casting evil glances every now and then at his wretched entertainer.

"What does ta want?"

"Thou hed better give me a fresh suit o' clothes; these are fair worn out—and L20. I'll be i' Hull early to-morrow, and I'll tak' t' varry first ship I can get."

"How do I know thou will?"

"Thou'lt hev to trust my word—it's about as good as thine, I reckon."

O but the way of the transgressor is hard! There was nothing else to be done. Hatefully, scornfully, he tossed him a suit of his own clothes, and gave him L20 of his savings. Then he opened the door and looked carefully all around. It was near midnight, and all was so still that a bird moving in the branches could have been heard. But Laycock was singularly uneasy. He put on his hat and walked one hundred yards or more each way.

"Don't be a fool," said Bingley, angrily; "when did ta iver know any body about at this time o' night, save and it might be at Hallam or Crossley feasts?"

"But where was ta a' day, Bingley? Is ta sure nobody saw thee? And when did ta come into my cellar?"

"I'll tell thee, if ta is bad off to know. I got into Hallam at three o'clock this morning, and I hid mysen in Clough's shut-up mill a' day. Thou knows nobody cares to go nigh it, since—"

"Thou shot him."

"Shut up! Thou'd better let that subject drop. I knew I were safe there. When it was dark and quiet, I came to thee. Now, if ta'll let me pass thee, I'll tak' Hull road."

"Thou is sure nobody has seen thee?"

"Ay, I'm sure o' that. Let be now. I hevn't any time to waste."

Laycock watched him up the Hull road till he slipped away like a shadow into shade. Then he sat down to wait for morning. He would not stay in Hallam another day. He blamed himself for staying so long. He would take any offer Swale made him in the morning. There would be neither peace nor safety for him, if Tim Bingley took it into his will to return to Hallam whenever he wanted money.

At daylight Dolly Ives, an old woman who cleaned his house and cooked his meals, came. She had left the evening before at six o'clock, and if any thing was known of Bingley's visit to Hallam, she would likely have heard of it. She wasn't a pleasant old woman, and she had not a very good reputation, but her husband had worked with Laycock's father, and he had been kind to her on several occasions when she had been in trouble. So she had "stuck up for Bill Laycock," and her partisanship had become warmer from opposition.

It was at best a rude kind of liking, for she never failed to tell any unkind thing she heard about him. She had, however, nothing fresh to say, and Bill felt relieved. He ate his breakfast and went to his forge until ten o'clock. Then he called at Swale's. He fancied the lawyer was "a bit offish," but he promised him the money that night, and with this promise Bill had to be content. Business had long been slack; his forge was cold when he got back, and he had no heart to rekindle it. Frightened and miserable, he was standing in the door tying on his leather apron, when he saw Dolly coming as fast as she could toward him.

He did not wait, but went to meet her. "Whativer is ta coming here for?"

"Thou knows. Get away as fast as ta can. There hev been men searching t' house, and they hev takken away t' varry suit Bingley wore at Ben Craven's trial. Now, will ta go? Here's a shilling, it's a' I hev."

Terrified and hurried, he did the worst possible thing for his own case—he fled, as Dolly advised, and was almost immediately followed and taken prisoner. In fact, he had been under surveillance, even before Bingley left his house at midnight. Suspicion had been aroused by a very simple incident. Mary Clough had noticed that a stone jar, which had stood in one of the windows of the mill ever since it had been closed, was removed. In that listless way which apparently trivial things have of arresting the attention, this jar had attracted Mary until it had become a part of the closed mill to her. It was in its usual place when she looked out in the morning; at noon it had disappeared.

Some one, then, was in the mill. A strong conviction took possession of her. She watched as the sparrow-hawk watches its prey. Just at dusk she saw Bingley leave the mill and steal away among the alders that lined the stream. She suspected where he was going, and, by a shorter route, reached a field opposite Laycock's house, and, from behind the hedge, saw Bingley push aside the cellar window and crawl in. He had tried the door first, but it was just at this hour Laycock was in the ale-house. The rector was a magistrate; and she went to him with her tale, and he saw at once the importance of her information. He posted the men who watched Laycock's house; they saw Bingley leave it, and when he was about a mile from Hallam they arrested him, and took him to Leeds. Laycock's arrest had followed as early as a warrant could be obtained. He sent at once for Mr. North, and frankly confessed to him his share in the tragedy.

"It was a moment's temptation, sir," he said, with bitter sorrow, "and I hev been as miserable as any devil out o' hell could be iver since. T' night as Clough were shot, I had passed his house, and seen Mary Clough at t' garden gate, and she hed been varry scornful, and told me she'd marry Ben Craven, or stay unmarried; and I were feeling bad about it. I thought I'd walk across t' moor and meet Clough, and tell him what Mary said, and as I went along I heard a shot, and saw a man running. As he came near I knew it was Bingley i' Ben Craven's working clothes. He looked i' my face, and said, 'Clough thinks Ben Craven fired t' shot. If ta helps me away, thou'lt get Mary. Can I go to thy cottage?' And I said, 'There's a cellar underneath.' That was all. He had stole Ben's overworker's brat and cap from t' room while Ben was drinking his tea, and Ben nivver missed it till Jerry Oddy asked where it was. At night I let him burn them i' my forge. I hev wanted to tell t' truth often; and I were sick as could be wi' swearing away Ben's life; indeed I were!"

Before noon the village was in an uproar of excitement. Laycock followed Bingley to Leeds, and both were committed for trial to York Castle. Both also received the reward of their evil deed: Bingley forfeited his life, and Laycock went to Norfolk Island to serve out a life sentence.

The day of Ben's release was a great holiday. Troubled as the squire was, he flung open the large barn at Hallam, and set a feast for the whole village. After it there was a meeting at the chapel, and Ben told how God had strengthened and comforted him, and made his prison cell a very gate of heaven. And Martha, who had so little to say to any human being for weeks, spoke wondrously. Her heart was burning with love and gratitude; the happy tears streamed down her face; she stood with clasped hands, telling how God had dealt with her, and trying in vain to express her love and praise until she broke into a happy song, and friends and neighbors lifted it with her, and the rafters rang to