Roland Cashel, Volume II (of II)

“Yes, he passed the window full half an hour ago.”

“They are confoundedly tedious,” said Jennings, half suppressing a yawn. “I thought those kind of fellows just gave a look at the body, and pronounced their verdict at once.”

“So they do when it’s one of their own class; but in the case of a gentleman they take a prodigious interest in examining his watch and his purse and his pocket-book; and, in fact, it is a grand occasion for prying as far as possible into his private concerns.”

“I ‘ll double our bet, Upton, if you like,” said Frobisher, languidly.

The other shook his head negatively.

“Why, the delay is clearly in your favor, man. If they were strong in their convictions, they ‘d have brought him in guilty an hour ago.”

“That is my opinion too,” said Jennings.

“Well, here goes. Two fifties be it,” cried Upton.

Frobisher took out his memorandum-book and wrote something with a pencil.

“Is n’t that it?” said he, showing the lines to Upton.

“Just so. ‘Wilful murder,’” muttered the other, reading.

“You have a great ‘pull’ upon me, Upton,” said Frobisher; “by Jove! if you were generous, you’d give me odds.”

“How so?”

“Why, you saw his face since the affair, and I did n’t.”

“It would need a better physiognomist than I am to read it. He looked exactly as he always does; a thought paler, perhaps, but no other change.”

“Here comes a fellow with news,” said Jennings, throwing open the window. “I say, my man, is it over?”

“No, sir; the jury want to see one of Mr. Cashel’s boots.”

Jennings closed the sash, and, lighting a cigar, sat down in an easy-chair. A desultory conversation here arose among some of the younger military men whether a coroner’s verdict were final, and whether a “fellow could be hanged” when it pronounced him guilty; the astute portion of the debaters inclining to the opinion that although this was not the case in England, such would be “law” in Ireland. Then the subject of confiscation was entertained, and various doubts and surmises arose as to what would become of Tubbermore when its proprietor had been executed; with sly jests about the reversionary rights of the Crown, and the magnanimity of extending mercy at the price of a great landed estate. These filled up the time for an hour or so more, interspersed with conjectures as to Cashel’s present frame of mind, and considerable wonderment why he had n’t “bolted” at once.

At last Upton’s groom was seen approaching at a tremendous pace; and in a few minutes after he had pulled up at the door, and dismounting with a spring, hastened into the house.

“Well, Robert, how did it go?” cried Upton, as, followed by the rest, he met him in the hall.

“You ‘ve lost, sir,” said the man, wiping his forehead.

“Confound the rascals! But what are the words of the verdict?”

“‘Wilful murder,’ sir.”

“Of course,” said Frobisher, coolly; “they could give no other.”

“It’s no use betting against you,” cried Upton, pettishly. “You are the luckiest dog in Europe.”

“Come, I ‘ll give you a chance,” said Frobisher; “double or quit that they hang him.”

“No, no; I ‘ve lost enough on him. I ‘ll not have it.”

“Well, I suppose we’ve nothing to wait for now,” yawned Jennings. “Shall we start?”

“Not till we have luncheon, I vote,” cried an infantry sub.; and his suggestion met general approval. And while they are seated at a table where exquisite meats and rarest wines stimulated appetite and provoked excess, let us turn for a few brief moments to him who, still their entertainer, sat in his lone chamber, friendless and deserted.

So rapid had been the succession of events which occupied one single night, that Roland could not believe it possible months had not passed over. Even then, he found it difficult to disentangle the real circumstances from those fancied results his imagination had already depicted; many of the true incidents appearing far more like fiction than the dreamy fancies his mind invented. His meeting with Enrique, for instance, was infinitely less probable than that he should have fought a duel with Linton; and so, in many other cases, his faculties wavered between belief and doubt, till his very senses reeled with the confusion. Kennyfeck’s death alone stood out from this chaotic mass, clear, distinct, and palpable, and, as he sat brooding over this terrible fact, he was totally unconscious of its bearing upon his own fortunes. Selfishness formed no part of his nature; his fault lay in the very absence of self-esteem, and the total deficiency of that individuality which prompts men to act up to a self-created standard. He could sorrow for him who was no more, and from whom he had received stronger proofs of devotion than from all his so-called friends; he could grieve over the widowed mother and the fatherless girls, for whose destitution he felt, he knew not how, or wherefore, a certain culpability; but of himself and his own critical position, not a thought arose. The impressions that no effort of his own could convey fell with a terrific shock upon him when suggested by another.

He was seated at his table, trying, for the twentieth time, to collect his wandering thoughts, and determine what course to follow, when a tap was heard at his door, and it opened at the same instant.

“I am come, sir,” said Mr. Goring, with a voice full of feeling, “to bring you sad tidings; but for which events may have, in a measure, prepared you.” He paused, perhaps hoping that Cashel would spare him the pain of continuing; but Roland never spoke.

“The inquest has completed its labors,” said Goring, with increasing agitation; “and the verdict is one of ‘wilful murder.’”

“It was a foul and terrible crime,” said Cashel, shuddering; “the poor fellow was animated with kind intentions and benevolent views towards the people. In all our intercourse he displayed but one spirit – ”

“Have a care, sir,” said Goring, mildly. “It is just possible that, in the frankness of the moment something may escape you which hereafter you might wish unsaid; and standing in the position you now do – ”

“How so? What position, sir, do I occupy, that should preclude me from the open expression of my sentiments?”

“I have already told you, sir, that the verdict of the jury was wilful murder, and I hold here in my hand the warrant for your arrest.”

“As the criminal? as the murderer?” cried Cashel, with a voice almost like a shriek of agony. Goring bowed his head, and Roland fell powerless on the floor.

Summoning others to his aid, Goring succeeded in lifting him up and placing him on a bed. A few drops of blood that issued from his mouth, and his heavy snoring respiration, indicated an apoplectic seizure. Messengers were sent in various directions to fetch a doctor. Tiernay was absent, and it was some hours ere one could be found. Large bleeding and quiet produced the usual effects, and towards evening Cashel’s consciousness had returned; but memory was still clouded and incoherent, and he lay without speaking, and almost without thought.

After the lapse of about a week he was able to leave his bed and creep about his chamber, whose altered look contributed to recall his mind to the past. All his papers and letters had been removed; the window was secured with iron stanchions; and policemen stood sentry at the door. He remembered everything that had occurred, and sat down in patient thought to consider what he should do.

He learned without surprise, but not without a pang, that of all his friends not one had remained, – not one had offered a word of counsel in his affliction, or of comfort in his distress. He asked after Mr. Corrigan, and heard that he had quitted the country, with his granddaughter, on the day before the terrible event. Tiernay, it was said, had accompanied them to Dublin, and not since returned. Roland was, then, utterly friendless! What wonder if he became as utterly reckless, as indifferent to life, as life seemed valueless? And so was it: he heard with indifference the order for his removal to Limerick, although that implied a Jail! He listened to the vulgar but kindly meant counsels of his keepers, who advised him to seek legal assistance, with a smile of half-contempt. The obdurate energy of a martyrdom seemed to take possession of him; and, so far from applying his mind to disentangle the web of suspicion around him, he watched, with a strange interest, the convergence of every minute circumstance towards the proof of his guilt; a secret vindictiveness whispering to his heart that the day would come when his innocence should be proclaimed; and then, what tortures of remorse would be theirs who had brought him to a felon’s death!

Each day added to the number of these seeming proofs, and the newspapers, in paragraphs of gossiping, abounded with circumstances that had already convinced the public of Cashel’s guilt: and how often do such shadowy convictions throw their gloom over the prisoner’s dock! One day, the fact of the boot-track tallying precisely with Roland’s, filled the town; another, it was the pistol-wadding – part of a letter addressed to Cashel – had been discovered. Then, there were vague rumors afloat that the causes of Cashel’s animosity to Kennyfeck were not so secret as the world fancied; that there were persons of credit to substantiate and explain them; and, lastly, it was made known that among the papers seized on Cashel’s table was a letter, just begun by himself, but to whom addressed uncertain, which ran thus: —

“As these in all likelihood may be the last lines I shall eyer write – ”

Never, in all the gaudy glare of his prosperity, had he occupied more of public attention. The metaphysical penny-a-liners speculated upon the influence his old buccaneer habits might have exercised upon a mind so imperfectly trained to civilization; and amused themselves with guesses as to how far some Indian “cross” in blood might not have contributed to his tragic vengeance. Less scrupulous scribes invented deeds of violence: in a word, there seemed a kind of impulse abroad to prove him guilty; and it would have been taken as a piece of casuistry, or a mawkish sympathy with crime, to assume the opposite. Not, indeed, that any undertook so ungracious a task; the tide of accusation ran uninterrupted and unbroken. The very friendless desolation in which he stood was quoted and commented on to this end. One alone of all his former friends made an effort in his favor, and ventured to insinuate that his guilt was far from certain. This was Lord Charles Frobisher, who, seeing in the one-sidedness of public opinion the impossibility of obtaining a bet, tried thus to “get up” an “innocent party,” in the hope of a profitable wager.

But what became of Linton all this time? His game was a difficult one; and to enable him to play it successfully he needed reflection. To this end he affected to be so shocked by the terrible event as to be incapable of mixing in society. He retired, therefore, to his cottage near Dublin, and for some weeks lived a life of perfect seclusion. Mr. Phillis accompanied him; for Linton would not trust him out of his sight till – as he muttered in his own phrase – “all was over.”

This was, indeed, the most eventful period of Linton’s life; and with consummate skill he saw that any move on his part would be an error. It is true that, through channels with whose workings he was long conversant, he contributed the various paragraphs to the papers by which Cashel’s guilt was foreshadowed; his knowledge of Roland suggesting many a circumstance well calculated to substantiate the charge of crime. If he never ventured abroad into the world, he made himself master of all its secret whisperings; and heard how he was himself commended for delicacy and good feeling, with the satisfaction of a man who glories in a cheat. And how many are there who play false in life, less from the gain than the gratification of vanity! – a kind of diabolical pride in outwitting and overreaching those whose good faith has made them weak! The polite world does not take the same interest in deeds of terror as do their more humble brethren; they take their “horrors” as they do their one glass of Tokay at dessert, – a something, of which a little more would be nauseating. The less polished classes were, therefore, those who took the greatest pleasure in following up every clew and tracing each circumstance that pointed to Roland’s guilt; and so, at last, his name was rarely mentioned among those with whom so lately he had lived in daily, almost hourly, companionship.

When Linton, then, deemed the time expired which his feelings of grief and shame had demanded for retirement, he reappeared in the world pretty much as men had always seen him. A very close observer, if he would have suffered any one to be such, might have perhaps detected the expression of care in certain wrinkles round his mouth, and in the extra blackness of his whiskers, where gray hairs had dared to show themselves; but to the world at large these signs were inappreciable. To them he was the same even-tempered, easy-mannered man they ever saw him. Nor was this accomplished without an effort; for, however Linton saw the hour of his vengeance draw nigh, he also perceived that all his personal plans of fortune and aggrandizement had utterly failed. The hopes he had so often cherished were all fled. His title to the cottage, his prospect of a seat in Parliament, the very sums he had won at play, and which to a large amount remained in Cashel’s hands, he now perceived were all forfeited to revenge. The price was, indeed, a heavy one! and already he began to feel it so. Many of his creditors had abstained from pressing him so long as his intimacy with Cashel gave promise of future solvency. That illusion was now dispelled, and each post brought him dunning epistles, and threatening notices of various kinds. Exposures menaced him from men whose vindictiveness he was well aware of; but far more perilous than all these were his relations with Tom Keane, who continued to address letter after letter to him, craving advice and pecuniary assistance, in a tone where menace was even more palpable than entreaty. To leave these unreplied to might have been dangerous in the extreme; to answer them even more perilous. No other course was, then, open than to return to Tubbermore, and endeavor, in secret, to confer with this man face to face. There was not any time to lose. Cashel’s trial was to take place at the ensuing assizes, which now were close at hand. Keane was to figure there as an important witness. It was absolutely necessary to see him, and caution him as to the nature of the evidence he should give, nor suffer him in the exuberance of his zeal to prove “too much.”

Under pretence, therefore, of a hurried trip to London, he left his house one evening, and went on board the packet at Kingstown, dismissing his carriage as if about to depart; then, suddenly affecting to discover that his luggage had been carried away by mistake, he landed, and set out with post-horses across country towards the western road. Before midnight he was safe in the mail, on his way to Limerick; and by daybreak on the following morning he was standing in the wood of Tubbermore, and gazing with a thoughtful head upon the house, whose shuttered windows and barred doors told of its altered destiny.

From thence he wandered onward towards the cottage – some strange, inexplicable interest over him – to see once more the spot he had so often fancied to be his own, and where, with a fervor not altogether unreal, he had sworn to pass his days in tranquil solitude. Brief as had been the interval since last he stood there, the changes were considerable. The flower-plots were trampled and trodden down, the palings smashed, the ornamental trees and shrubs were injured and broken by the cattle; traces of reckless haste and carelessness were seen in the broken gates and torn gate-posts; while fragments of packing-cases, straw, and paper littered the walks and the turf around.

Looking through the windows, broken in many places, he could see the cottage was perfectly dismantled. Everything was gone: not a trace remained of those who for so many years had called it home! The desolation was complete; nor was it without its depressing influence upon him who stood there to mark it; for, strange enough, there are little spots in the minds of those, where evil actions are oftenest cradled, that form the refuge of many a tender thought! Linton remembered the cottage as he saw it bright in the morning sun; or, more cheerful still, as the closed curtains and the blazing fire gave a look of homelike comfort to which the veriest wanderer is not insensible; and now it was cold and dark. He had no self-accusings as to the cause. It was, to him, one of those sad mutations which the course of fortune is ever effecting. He even went further, and fancied how different had been their fate if they had not rejected his own alliance.