A Little World

“Here! hold a lanthorn here, somebody,” cried the sergeant; and one of the men who were holding D. Wragg darted eagerly forward, making the rays of his bull’s-eye fall full upon the straw, when, after parting it a little, the lid was dashed down again, and the sergeant sat upon it, wiping his hot forehead.

“Pooh! what a fool I am!” he ejaculated the next instant; “but really for a while I thought – . Well, Mr Wragg, I think we’ve done up here for the present; but ’pon my soul, if I had a lot of stolen hams in my attic, I don’t think I should tell the police quite so plainly as you did that every one of them belonged to some one else.”

End of Volume Two

Volume Three – Chapter One.

Disappointment

Five minutes after, his brain in a whirl from the reaction that had taken place, when – wound up to expect some great horror – he had found nothing but that which was trifling and absurd, Sir Francis Redgrave was seated in the Frenchman’s room; for he had turned sick and faint, and brandy had been procured for him, Patty eagerly bringing forward glass and water, for Janet seemed completely unnerved, and had sunk down on a low seat with her face in her hands, as if stunned.

“You look young, and good, and pure-minded,” said the old man, feebly, as he looked fixedly in Patty’s fair young face, as she gazed sympathisingly in his countenance. “Listen to me, my child – for you are quite a child to me. Perhaps you know I am seeking my boy, my only child. I can see through it now. In his folly he was attracted here by you. I don’t reproach you; I say nothing harsh, only pray you humbly, as his father, to tell me where they have placed him. Is he dead? Has he been inveigled into some den for the sake of his money? Only tell me – only let me be at peace, and I will bless you. Do you know? Do not be afraid to answer. You shall be protected, even if it were for life, should it prove necessary. The man below has sworn that my son entered this house, and did not come out again.”

“Yes – Jack Screwby,” said the sergeant, interposing, and nodding his head as he spoke.

“Tell me then, my child,” continued Sir Francis, “and I will bless you, pray for you, offer up an old man’s prayers for your happiness – only set me free from this horrible suspense. Tell me even if he is dead.”

Patty sobbed as she gazed in the old man’s face, and then with an effort she exclaimed —

“It’s all false, every word. That man is a bad, cruel fellow, and the enemy of my friends here. What he has said is not true, I am certain of it.”

“You are in league with these people,” said the old man, turning from her.

“No – no – no! What I said is true – quite true,” sobbed Patty.

But the old man refused to hear her, and turned to speak to Janet; but she shrank from him, cowering in a corner with a childlike display of fear, and only glancing at him from time to time, as if horror-stricken.

“You see,” said Sir Francis, “she knows all, and dare not approach to tell it. That there is some fearful mystery here, I feel more and more convinced; but, doubtless, in God’s good time all will be brought to light.”

He rose as he spoke, and approached Janet, who shrank from him more and more, waving her hand to keep him off her, and each moment growing more frightened and hysterical.

“Come, my friends,” said Sir Francis, drawing back with a bitter sigh, as he saw the uselessness of pressing inquiry in Janet’s case, “let us go. Constable, you will sift this matter to the very bottom.”

The sergeant nodded shortly, and Sir Francis turned towards the door; but Patty flew to him, and caught one of his hands.

“Oh, sir!” she cried, “can you not believe me? Indeed, indeed, I have spoken the truth. Your son did come many times, I know; but I hate him,” she cried, naïvely. “I would not, though, nor would any one here, hurt a hair of his head. We could not help his coming; and if he were here on that Tuesday night, I did not see him when I came. I am sorry – indeed I am; and I pity you from the bottom of my heart, for we have our feelings even as you rich people have.”

“But not feeling enough to ease a poor old man’s heart,” said Sir Francis, coldly, as thrusting her back, he took another step towards the door.

“He does not believe me – he does not believe me!” sobbed Patty, clasping her hands together, and then, excitedly, she exclaimed – “Does no one believe what I say?”

“I do, Miss Pellet, from my soul,” exclaimed a deep voice, and, stepping forward, Harry Clayton caught her clasped hands in his, as the young girl joyfully met his gaze.

But this was but for a moment; the next instant had hardly passed before her eyes fell, she hastily drew back her hands, and, with a heavy sigh, she shrank back to where Janet cowered in her chair, and stayed there until, one by one, the others went out, leaving the two friends the sole occupants of the room.

“Are they all gone?” whispered Janet at last, from where she had hidden her face in Patty’s breast.

“Yes; all – all,” said the agitated girl.

“I could not bear to look at the suffering old man,” said Janet, huskily. “It seemed to me as if he would be able to read in my face all that I felt, and so I acted like a frightened child, and he must have looked upon me as almost an idiot. But it is very horrible, Patty; and I seem to see the poor boy always before my eyes, with his white forehead all dabbled in blood, and his face pale and ghostlike. I dream of him so every night, and I know I feel as if something dreadful had happened. But what does it all mean?”

“Oh, hush – oh, hush!” said Patty; while Mrs Winks, who had just returned, buried her face in her apron, and seating herself upon the floor, as more lowly than a chair, she rocked herself to and fro, in the true sympathy she felt for the distressed girls.

“Why did they come here at all?” cried Janet, fiercely. “We were happy in our poor way before that; and now they have made us wretched for life. But Patty, Patty, this sight – this horrid vision – which I always have before me;” and as she spoke, she looked straight before her with hot and straining eyes. “What does it mean? I feel sometimes that I cannot bear it.”

Patty tried hard to soothe her companion; but her efforts seemed to be absolutely in vain, so wild and excited had Janet grown. At times her hearers shuddered as they listened to her exclamations, Mrs Winks even going so far as to glance over her shoulder to make sure that nothing of the kind described was really present.

Then for a time the poor girl calmed down, and Patty began to hope that her soothing words had taken effect; but soon there came a repetition, and Janet raised her head to stare straight before her, as she exclaimed: —

“It seems, at times, as if I could not bear it – as if it would send me mad; for he is in pain, I know – I feel. He is wounded – perhaps dead; and oh, Patty,” she whispered, her face, her voice softening as she leaned her forehead upon her companion’s shoulder, “I love him so – so dearly.”

Kissing her tenderly, smoothing her hair fondly the while, Patty tried to whisper comfort to the fluttering aching heart, beating so wildly within that deformed breast.

But all seemed in vain; the troubled spirit refused to be comforted, for it knew its desolation, and that even if Lionel Redgrave were found to be living and well, there was no hope, no rest for her.

“Try not to cry so much, dear,” said Patty, simply. “It will make your head ache.”

“Better the head than the heart, Patty,” cried Janet, passionately. “Oh, I wish I was dead – I wish I was dead!”

“Hush, hush, dear! how can you?” whispered Patty. “Try, do try to keep it back.”

“Yes, yes,” said Janet, with a sigh that was more like a groan. “I will be patient, I will try and bear it, and you will try and pray with me, Patty, that he may be safe and well, and restored to the good old man, his father. Oh! how I longed to be near him – to go on my knees by his side; and when he asked me to come, it was almost more than I could bear. Something seemed to be drawing me to him, and again something was dragging me back. Patty, how do people feel when they go mad? Is it anything like what I have been suffering these last few days?”

“Did you not promise me that you would be calm?” whispered Patty, soothingly.

“Yes, yes, I know I did, and I am trying; but you will pray too, Patty dear, will you not?”

“Yes,” answered Patty, as she clung close to the poor suffering girl. “I will pray too.”

“But he believed you, Patty,” Janet exclaimed, suddenly; “and came to your side then, like a lover should. I was in trouble, but all the same I could see his proud look. He loves you – he loves you!”

“Oh! hush, Janet, hush!” cried Patty, wearily. “Am I not unhappy enough? It can never – never be! And besides,” she added, proudly, as her pale cheeks flamed up, “does he not love somebody else?”

“Here’s somebody a-comin’,” cried Mrs Winks, suddenly starting into life from the bundle of collapsed clothes that seemed to be heaped the minute before upon the floor. “Most likely it’s Mr Pellet come to fetch you, my dear; and oh! what faces we three have got! – all swelled up with cryin’ so as was never seen. What’s goin’ to come of us all? for, dear me, if it ain’t for all the world like a scene in a play, with the lovers all going crosswise and the others crooked; and I declare once if I didn’t think as the curtain was going to come down in a minute, and I should have to fetch my basket. But there! do wipe your eyes, my dears – there’s somebody a-comin’; and it’s glad I shall be when it comes to the last act, and everybody’s made happy ever after – except Jack Screwby, as is the bad villin of the whole piece. Come, dry your eyes, do.”

Mrs Winks gave her own optics a most tremendous scrub with her apron as she spoke, drying them certainly, but at the same time making them far more red. Then she made an elephantine kind of movement towards the door, holding it to with one hand, signalling with the other to her young companions to remove the remaining traces of tears, and nodding and frowning till there was a gentle tap, and a voice said from the outside —

“May we come in?”

“Ah!” exclaimed the stout dame, smiling, “I’m glad you’ve come home, Mr Canau,” as, on her opening the door, the Frenchman entered the room, closely followed by Jared Pellet, who raised his eyebrows as he saw the traces of the tears the girls had shed.

“I only wish you’d been here, Mr Canau, I do!” exclaimed Mrs Winks; “for it’s dreadful, people coming and going on as they do and half fainting away for brandy.”

Jared looked serious as he heard the narrative of what had taken place, and then he glanced uneasily from one to the other, ending by sighing as he thought of how much trouble there was in the world; and soon after Patty and he were hurrying through the streets, with the poor-box uppermost in Jared’s thoughts, so that he had not a word for his child.

Volume Three – Chapter Two.

Confidential