Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell (page 8)

XXXI. HOW MARY PASSED THE NIGHT.

“To think
That all this long interminable night, Which I have passed in thinking on two words– ‘Guilty’–‘Not Guilty!’–like one happy moment O’er many a head hath flown unheeded by; O’er happy sleepers dreaming in their bliss Of bright to-morrows–or far happier still, With deep breath buried in forgetfulness. O all the dismallest images of death
Did swim before my eyes!”
–WILSON.

And now, where was Mary?

How Job’s heart would have been relieved of one of its cares if he could have seen her: for he was in a miserable state of anxiety about her; and many and many a time through that long night he scolded her and himself; her for her obstinacy, and himself for his weakness in yielding to her obstinacy, when she insisted on being the one to follow and find out Will.

She did not pass that night in bed any more than Job; but she was under a respectable roof, and among kind, though rough people.

She had offered no resistance to the old boatman, when he had clutched her arm, in order to insure her following him, as he threaded the crowded dock-ways, and dived up strange by-streets. She came on meekly after him, scarcely thinking in her stupor where she was going, and glad (in a dead, heavy way) that some one was deciding things for her.

He led her to an old-fashioned house, almost as small as house could be, which had been built long ago, before all the other part of the street, and had a country-town look about it in the middle of that bustling back-street. He pulled her into the house-place; and relieved to a certain degree of his fear of losing her on the way, he exclaimed–

“There!” giving a great slap of one hand on her back.

The room was light and bright, and roused Mary (perhaps the slap on her back might help a little too), and she felt the awkwardness of accounting for her presence to a little bustling old woman who had been moving about the fireplace on her entrance. The boatman took it very quietly, never deigning to give any explanation, but sitting down in his own particular chair, and chewing tobacco, while he looked at Mary with the most satisfied air imaginable, half triumphantly, as if she were the captive of his bow and spear, and half defying, as if daring her to escape.

The old woman, his wife, stood still, poker in hand, waiting to be told who it was that her husband had brought home so unceremoniously; but, as she looked in amazement, the girl’s cheek flushed, and then blanched to a dead whiteness; a film came over her eyes, and catching at the dresser for support in that hot whirling room, she fell in a heap on the floor.

Both man and wife came quickly to her assistance. They raised her up, still insensible, and he supported her on one knee, while his wife pattered away for some cold fresh water. She threw it straight over Mary; but though it caused a great sob, the eyes still remained closed, and the face as pale as ashes.

“Who is she, Ben?” asked the woman, as she rubbed her unresisting, powerless hands.

“How should I know?” answered her husband gruffly.

“Well-a-well!” (in a soothing tone, such as you use to irritated children), and as if half to herself, “I only thought you might, you know, as you brought her home. Poor thing! we must not ask aught about her, but that she needs help. I wish I’d my salts at home, but I lent ’em to Mrs. Burton, last Sunday in church, for she could not keep awake through the sermon. Dear-a-me, how white she is!”

“Here! you hold her up a bit,” said her husband.

She did as he desired, still crooning to herself, not caring for his short, sharp interruptions as she went on; and, indeed, to her old, loving heart, his crossest words fell like pearls and diamonds, for he had been the husband of her youth; and even he, rough and crabbed as he was, was secretly soothed by the sound of her voice, although not for worlds, if he could have helped it, would he have shown any of the love that was hidden beneath his rough outside.

“What’s the old fellow after?” said she, bending over Mary, so as to accommodate the drooping head. “Taking my pen, as I’ve had for better nor five year. Bless us, and save us! he’s burning it! Ay, I see now, he’s his wits about him; burnt feathers is always good for a faint. But they don’t bring her round, poor wench! Now what’s he after next? Well! he is a bright one, my old man! That I never thought of that, to be sure!” exclaimed she, as he produced a square bottle of smuggled spirits, labelled “Golden Wasser,” from a corner cupboard in their little room.

“That’ll do!” said she, as the dose he poured into Mary’s open mouth made her start and cough. “Bless the man. It’s just like him to be so tender and thoughtful!”

“Not a bit!” snarled he, as he was relieved by Mary’s returning colour, and opened eyes, and wondering, sensible gaze; “not a bit. I never was such a fool afore.”

His wife helped Mary to rise, and placed her in a chair.

“All’s right, now, young woman?” asked the boatman anxiously.

“Yes, sir, and thank you. I’m sure, sir, I don’t know rightly how to thank you,” faltered Mary softly forth.

“Be hanged to you and your thanks.” And he shook himself, took his pipe, and went out without deigning another word; leaving his wife sorely puzzled as to the character and history of the stranger within her doors.

Mary watched the boatman leave the house, and then, turning her sorrowful eyes to the face of her hostess, she attempted feebly to rise, with the intention of going away,–where she knew not.

“Nay! nay! whoe’er thou be’st, thou’rt not fit to go out into the street. Perhaps” (sinking her voice a little) “thou’rt a bad one; I almost misdoubt thee, thou’rt so pretty. Well-a-well! it’s the bad ones as have the broken hearts, sure enough; good folk never get utterly cast down, they’ve always getten hope in the Lord; it’s the sinful as bear the bitter, bitter grief in their crushed hearts, poor souls; it’s them we ought, most of all, to pity and help. She shanna leave the house to-night, choose who she is–worst woman in Liverpool, she shanna. I wished I knew where th’ old man picked her up, that I do.”

Mary had listened feebly to this soliloquy, and now tried to satisfy her hostess in weak, broken sentences.

“I’m not a bad one, missis, indeed. Your master took me out to see after a ship as had sailed. There was a man in it as might save a life at the trial to-morrow. The captain would not let him come, but he says he’ll come back in the pilot-boat.” She fell to sobbing at the thought of her waning hopes, and the old woman tried to comfort her, beginning with her accustomed–

“Well-a-well! and he’ll come back, I’m sure. I know he will; so keep up your heart. Don’t fret about it. He’s sure to be back.”

“Oh! I’m afraid! I’m sore afraid he won’t,” cried Mary, consoled, nevertheless, by the woman’s assertions, all groundless as she knew them to be.

Still talking half to herself and half to Mary, the old woman prepared tea, and urged her visitor to eat and refresh herself. But Mary shook her head at the proffered food, and only drank a cup of tea with thirsty eagerness. For the spirits had thrown her into a burning heat, and rendered each impression received through her senses of the most painful distinctness and intensity, while her head ached in a terrible manner.

She disliked speaking, her power over her words seemed so utterly gone. She used quite different expressions to those she intended. So she kept silent, while Mrs. Sturgis (for that was the name of her hostess) talked away, and put her tea-things by, and moved about incessantly, in a manner that increased the dizziness in Mary’s head. She felt as if she ought to take leave for the night and go. But where?

Presently the old man came back, crosser and gruffer than when he went away. He kicked aside the dry shoes his wife had prepared for him, and snarled at all she said. Mary attributed this to his finding her still there, and gathered up her strength for an effort to leave the house. But she was mistaken. By-and-by, he said (looking right into the fire, as if addressing it), “Wind’s right against them!”

“Ay, ay, and is it so?” said his wife, who, knowing him well, knew that his surliness proceeded from some repressed sympathy. “Well-a-well, wind changes often at night. Time enough before morning. I’d bet a penny it has changed sin’ thou looked.”

She looked out of her little window at a weathercock near, glittering in the moonlight; and as she was a sailor’s wife, she instantly recognised the unfavourable point at which the indicator seemed stationary, and giving a heavy sigh, turned into the room, and began to beat about in her own mind for some other mode of comfort.

“There’s no one else who can prove what you want at the trial to-morrow, is there?” asked she.

“No one!” answered Mary.

“And you’ve no clue to the one as is really guilty, if t’other is not?”

Mary did not answer, but trembled all over.

Sturgis saw it.

“Don’t bother her with thy questions,” said he to his wife. “She mun go to bed, for she’s all in a shiver with the sea-air. I’ll see after the wind, hang it, and the weathercock too. Tide will help ’em when it turns.”

Mary went upstairs murmuring thanks and blessings on those who took the stranger in. Mrs. Sturgis led her into a little room redolent of the sea and foreign lands. There was a small bed for one son bound for China; and a hammock slung above for another, who was now tossing in the Baltic. The sheets looked made out of sail-cloth, but were fresh and clean in spite of their brownness.

Against the wall were wafered two rough drawings of vessels with their names written underneath, on which the mother’s eyes caught, and gazed until they filled with tears. But she brushed the drops away with the back of her hand, and in a cheerful tone went on to assure Mary the bed was well aired.

“I cannot sleep, thank you. I will sit here, if you please,” said Mary, sinking down on the window-seat.

“Come, now,” said Mrs. Sturgis, “my master told me to see you to bed, and I mun. What’s the use of watching? A watched pot never boils, and I see you are after watching that weathercock. Why now, I try never to look at it, else I could do nought else. My heart many a time goes sick when the wind rises, but I turn away and work away, and try never to think on the wind, but on what I ha’ getten to do.”

“Let me stay up a little,” pleaded Mary, as her hostess seemed so resolute about seeing her to bed.

Her looks won her suit.

“Well, I suppose I mun. I shall catch it downstairs, I know. He’ll be in a fidget till you’re getten to bed, I know; so you mun be quiet if you are so bent upon staying up.”

And quietly, noiselessly, Mary watched the unchanging weathercock through the night. She sat on the little window seat, her hand holding back the curtain which shaded the room from the bright moonlight without; her head resting its weariness against the corner of the window-frame; her eyes burning and stiff with the intensity of her gaze.

The ruddy morning stole up the horizon, casting a crimson glow into the watcher’s room.

It was the morning of the day of trial!

XXXII. THE TRIAL AND VERDICT–“NOT GUILTY.”

“Thou stand’st here arraign’d, That with presumption impious and accurs’d, Thou hast usurp’d God’s high prerogative, Making thy fellow mortal’s life and death Wait on thy moody and diseased passions; That with a violent and untimely steel Hath set abroach the blood that should have ebbed In calm and natural current: to sum all In one wild name–a name the pale air freezes at, And every cheek of man sinks in with horror– Thou art a cold and midnight murderer.” –MILMAN’S “FAZIO.”

Of all the restless people who found that night’s hours agonising from excess of anxiety, the poor father of the murdered man was perhaps the most restless. He had slept but little since the blow had fallen; his waking hours had been too full of agitated thought, which seemed to haunt and pursue him through his unquiet slumbers.

And this night of all others was the most sleepless. He turned over and over again in his mind the wonder if everything had been done, that could be done, to insure the conviction of Jem Wilson. He almost regretted the haste with which he had urged forward the proceedings, and yet, until he had obtained vengeance, he felt as if there was no peace on earth for him (I don’t know that he exactly used the term vengeance in his thoughts; he spoke of justice, and probably thought of his desired end as such); no peace, either bodily or mental, for he moved up and down his bedroom with the restless incessant tramp of a wild beast in a cage, and if he compelled his aching limbs to cease for an instant, the twitchings which ensued almost amounted to convulsions, and he recommenced his walk as the lesser evil, and the more bearable fatigue.

With daylight increased power of action came; and he drove off to arouse his attorney, and worry him with further directions and inquiries; and when that was ended, he sat, watch in hand, until the courts should be opened, and the trial begin.

What were all the living,–wife or daughters,–what were they in comparison with the dead, the murdered son who lay unburied still, in compliance with his father’s earnest wish, and almost vowed purpose, of having the slayer of his child sentenced to death, before he committed the body to the rest of the grave?

At nine o’clock they all met at their awful place of rendezvous.

The judge, the jury, the avenger of blood, the prisoner, the witnesses–all were gathered together within the building. And besides these were many others, personally interested in some part of the proceedings, in which, however, they took no part; Job Legh, Ben Sturgis, and several others were there, amongst whom was Charley Jones.

Job Legh had carefully avoided any questioning from Mrs. Wilson that morning. Indeed, he had not been much in her company, for he had risen up early to go out once more to make inquiry for Mary; and when he could hear nothing of her, he had desperately resolved not to undeceive Mrs. Wilson, as sorrow never came too late; and if the blow were inevitable, it would be better to leave her in ignorance of the impending evil as long as possible, She took her place in the witness-room, worn and dispirited, but not anxious.

As Job struggled through the crowd into the body of the court, Mr. Bridgnorth’s clerk beckoned to him.

“Here’s a letter for you from our client!”

Job sickened as he took it. He did not know why, but he dreaded a confession of guilt, which would be an overthrow of all hope.

The letter ran as follows:–

“DEAR FRIEND,–I thank you heartily for your goodness in finding me a lawyer, but lawyers can do no good to me, whatever they may do to other people. But I am not the less obliged to you, dear friend. I foresee things will go against me–and no wonder. If I was a juryman I should say the man was guilty as had as much evidence brought against him as may be brought against me tomorrow. So it’s no blame to them if they do. But, Job Legh, I think I need not tell you I am as guiltless in this matter as the babe unborn, although it is not in my power to prove it. If I did not believe that you thought me innocent, I could not write as I do now to tell you my wishes. You’ll not forget they are the words of a man shortly to die. Dear friend, you must take care of my mother. Not in the money way, for she will have enough for her and Aunt Alice; but you must let her talk to you of me; and show her that (whatever others may do) you think I died innocent. I don’t reckon she’ll stay long behind when we are all gone. Be tender with her, Job, for my sake; and if she is a bit fractious at times, remember what she has gone through. I know mother will never doubt me, God bless her.

“There is one other whom I fear I have loved too dearly; and yet, the loving her has made the happiness of my life. She will think I have murdered her lover: she will think I have caused the grief she must be feeling. And she must go on thinking so. It is hard upon me to say this; but she MUST. It will be best for her, and that’s all I ought to think on. But, dear Job, you are a hearty fellow for your time of life, and may live many years to come; and perhaps you could tell her, when you felt sure you were drawing near your end, that I solemnly told you (as I do now) that I was innocent of this thing. You must not tell her for many years to come: but I cannot well bear to think on her living through a long life, and hating the thought of me as the murderer of him she loved, and dying with that hatred to me in her heart. It would hurt me sore in the other world to see the look of it in her face, as it would be, till she was told. I must not let myself think on how she must be viewing me now.

“So God bless you, Job Legh; and no more from yours to command,

“JAMES WILSON.”

Job turned the letter over and over when he had read it; sighed deeply; and then wrapping it carefully up in a bit of newspaper he had about him, he put it in his waistcoat pocket, and went off to the door of the witness-room to ask if Mary Barton was there.

As the door opened he saw her sitting within, against a table on which her folded arms were resting, and her head was hidden within them. It was an attitude of hopelessness, and would have served to strike Job dumb in sickness of heart, even without the sound of Mrs. Wilson’s voice in passionate sobbing, and sore lamentations, which told him as well as words could do (for she was not within view of the door, and he did not care to go in), that she was at any rate partially undeceived as to the hopes he had given her last night.

Sorrowfully did Job return into the body of the court; neither Mrs. Wilson nor Mary having seen him as he had stood at the witness-room door.

As soon as he could bring his distracted thoughts to bear upon the present scene, he perceived that the trial of James Wilson for the murder of Henry Carson was just commencing. The clerk was gabbling over the indictment, and in a minute or two there was the accustomed question, “How say you, Guilty or Not Guilty?”

Although but one answer was expected,–was customary in all cases,–there was a pause of dead silence, an interval of solemnity even in this hackneyed part of the proceeding; while the prisoner at the bar stood with compressed lips, looking at the judge with his outward eyes, but with far other and different scenes presented to his mental vision; a sort of rapid recapitulation of his life,–remembrances of his childhood,–his father (so proud of him, his first-born child),–his sweet little playfellow, Mary,–his hopes, his love, his despair,–yet still, yet ever and ever, his love,–the blank, wide world it had been without her love,–his mother,–his childless mother,–but not long to be so,–not long to be away from all she loved,–nor during that time to be oppressed with doubt as to his innocence, sure and secure of her darling’s heart;–he started from his instant’s pause, and said in a low firm voice

“Not guilty, my lord.”

The circumstances of the murder, the discovery of the body, the causes of suspicion against Jem, were as well known to most of the audience as they are to you, so there was some little buzz of conversation going on among the people while the leading counsel for the prosecution made his very effective speech.

“That’s Mr. Carson, the father, sitting behind Serjeant Wilkinson!”

“What a noble-looking old man he is! so stern and inflexible, with such classical features! Does he not remind you of some of the busts of Jupiter?”

“I am more interested by watching the prisoner. Criminals always interest me. I try to trace in the features common to humanity some expression of the crimes by which they have distinguished themselves from their kind. I have seen a good number of murderers in my day, but I have seldom seen one with such marks of Cain on his countenance as the man at the bar.”

“Well, I am no physiognomist, but I don’t think his face strikes me as bad. It certainly is gloomy and depressed, and not unnaturally so, considering his situation.”

“Only look at his low, resolute brow, his downcast eye, his white compressed lips. He never looks up,–just watch him.”

“His forehead is not so low if he had that mass of black hair removed, and is very square, which some people say is a good sign. If others are to be influenced by such trifles as you are, it would have been much better if the prison barber had cut his hair a little previous to the trial; and as for downcast eye, and compressed lip, it is all part and parcel of his inward agitation just now; nothing to do with character, my good fellow.”

Poor Jem! His raven hair (his mother’s pride, and so often fondly caressed by her fingers), was that, too, to have its influence against him?

The witnesses were called. At first they consisted principally of policemen; who, being much accustomed to giving evidence, knew what were the material points they were called on to prove, and did not lose the time of the court in listening to anything unnecessary.

“Clear as day against the prisoner,” whispered one attorney’s clerk to another.

“Black as night, you mean,” replied his friend; and they both smiled.

“Jane Wilson! who’s she? some relation, I suppose, from the name.”

“The mother,–she that is to prove the gun part of the case.”

“Oh, ay–I remember! Rather hard on her, too, I think.”

Then both were silent, as one of the officers of the court ushered Mrs. Wilson into the witness-box. I have often called her “the old woman,” and “an old woman,” because, in truth, her appearance was so much beyond her years, which could not be many above fifty. But partly owing to her accident in early life, which left a stamp of pain upon her face, partly owing to her anxious temper, partly to her sorrows, and partly to her limping gait, she always gave me the idea of age. But now she might have seemed more than seventy; her lines were so set and deep, her features so sharpened, and her walk so feeble. She was trying to check her sobs into composure, and (unconsciously) was striving to behave as she thought would best please her poor boy, whom she knew she had often grieved by her uncontrolled impatience. He had buried his face in his arms, which rested on the front of the dock (an attitude he retained during the greater part of his trial, and which prejudiced many against him).

The counsel began the examination.

“Your name is Jane Wilson, I believe?”

“Yes, sir.”

“The mother of the prisoner at the bar?”

“Yes, sir,” with quivering voice, ready to break out into weeping, but earning respect by the strong effort at self-control, prompted, as I have said before, by her earnest wish to please her son by her behaviour.

The barrister now proceeded to the important part of the examination, tending to prove that the gun found on the scene of the murder was the prisoner’s. She had committed herself so fully to the policeman, that she could not well retract; so without much delay in bringing the question round to the desired point, the gun was produced in court, and the inquiry made–

“That gun belongs to your son, does it not?”

She clenched the sides of the witness-box in her efforts to make her parched tongue utter words. At last she moaned forth–

“Oh! Jem, Jem! what mun I say?”

Every one bent forward to hear the prisoner’s answer; although, in fact, it was of little importance to the issue of the trial. He lifted up his head; and with a face brimming full of pity for his mother, yet resolved into endurance, said–

“Tell the truth, mother!”

And so she did, with the fidelity of a little child. Every one felt that she did; and the little colloquy between mother and son did them some slight service in the opinion of the audience. But the awful judge sat unmoved; and the jurymen changed not a muscle of their countenances; while the counsel for the prosecution went triumphantly through this part of the case, including the fact of Jem’s absence from home on the night of the murder, and bringing every admission to bear right against the prisoner.

It was over. She was told to go down. But she could no longer compel her mother’s heart to keep silence, and suddenly turning towards the judge (with whom she imagined the verdict to rest), she thus addressed him with her choking voice–

“And now, sir, I’ve telled you the truth, and the whole truth, as he bid me; but don’t you let what I have said go for to hang him; oh, my lord judge, take my word for it, he’s as innocent as the child as has yet to be born. For sure, I, who am his mother, and have nursed him on my knee, and been gladdened by the sight of him every day since, ought to know him better than yon pack of fellows” (indicating the jury, while she strove against her heart to render her words distinct and clear for her dear son’s sake), “who, I’ll go bail, never saw him before this morning in all their born days. My lord judge, he’s so good I often wondered what harm there was in him; many is the time when I’ve been fretted (for I’m frabbit enough at times), when I’ve scold’t myself, and said: ‘You ungrateful thing, the Lord God has given you Jem, and isn’t that blessing enough for you?’ But He has seen fit to punish me. If Jem is–if Jem is–taken from me, I shall be a childless woman; and very poor, having nought left to love on earth, and I cannot say ‘His will be done.’ I cannot, my lord judge, oh, I cannot.”

While sobbing out these words she was led away by the officers of the court, but tenderly, and reverently, with the respect which great sorrow commands.

The stream of evidence went on and on, gathering fresh force from every witness who was examined, and threatening to overwhelm poor Jem. Already they had proved that the gun was his, that he had been heard not many days before the commission of the deed to threaten the deceased; indeed, that the police had, at that time, been obliged to interfere, to prevent some probable act of violence. It only remained to bring forward a sufficient motive for the threat and the murder. The clue to this had been furnished by the policeman, who had overheard Jem’s angry language to Mr. Carson; and his report in the first instance had occasioned the sub-poena to Mary.

And now she was to be called on to bear witness. The court was by this time almost as full as it could hold; but fresh attempts were being made to squeeze in at all the entrances, for many were anxious to see and hear this part of the trial.

Old Mr. Carson felt an additional beat at his heart at the thought of seeing the fatal Helen, the cause of all,–a kind of interest and yet repugnance, for was not she beloved by the dead; nay, perhaps, in her way, loving and mourning for the same being that he himself was so bitterly grieving over? And yet he felt as if he abhorred her and her rumoured loveliness, as if she were the curse against him; and he grew jealous of the love with which she had inspired his son, and would fain have deprived her of even her natural right of sorrowing over her lover’s untimely end: for you see it was a fixed idea in the minds of all, that the handsome, bright, gay, rich young gentleman must have been beloved in preference to the serious, almost stern-looking smith, who had to toil for his daily bread.

Hitherto the effect of the trial had equalled Mr. Carson’s most sanguine hopes, and a severe look of satisfaction came over the face of the avenger,–over that countenance whence the smile had departed, never more to return.

All eyes were directed to the door through which the witnesses entered. Even Jem looked up to catch one glimpse before he hid his face from her look of aversion. The officer had gone to fetch her.

She was in exactly the same attitude as when Job Legh had seen her two hours before through the half-open door. Not a finger had moved. The officer summoned her, but she did not stir. She was so still, he thought she had fallen asleep, and he stepped forward and touched her. She started up in an instant, and followed him with a kind of rushing rapid motion into the court, into the witness-box.

And amid all that sea of faces, misty and swimming before her eyes, she saw but two clear bright spots, distinct and fixed: the judge, who might have to condemn; and the prisoner, who might have to die.

The mellow sunlight streamed down that high window on her head, and fell on the rich treasure of her golden hair, stuffed away in masses under her little bonnet-cap; and in those warm beams the motes kept dancing up and down. The wind had changed–had changed almost as soon as she had given up her watching; the wind had changed, and she heeded it not.

Many who were looking for mere flesh and blood beauty, mere colouring, were disappointed; for her face was deadly white, and almost set in its expression, while a mournful bewildered soul looked out of the depths of those soft, deep, grey eyes. But others recognised a higher and a stranger kind of beauty; one that would keep its hold on the memory for many after years.

I was not there myself; but one who was, told me that her look, and indeed her whole face, was more like the well-known engraving from Guido’s picture of “Beatrice Cenci” than anything else he could give me an idea of. He added, that her countenance haunted him, like the remembrance of some wild sad melody, heard in childhood; that it would perpetually recur with its mute imploring agony.

With all the court reeling before her (always save and except those awful two), she heard a voice speak, and answered the simple inquiry (something about her name) mechanically, as if in a dream. So she went on for two or three more questions, with a strange wonder in her brain, at the reality of the terrible circumstances in which she was placed.

Suddenly she was roused, she knew not how or by what. She was conscious that all was real, that hundreds were looking at her, that true-sounding words were being extracted from her; that that figure, so bowed down, with the face concealed with both hands, was really Jem. Her face flushed scarlet, and then, paler than before. But in dread of herself, with the tremendous secret imprisoned within her, she exerted every power she had to keep in the full understanding of what was going on, of what she was asked, and of what she answered. With all her faculties preternaturally alive and sensitive, she heard the next question from the pert young barrister, who was delighted to have the examination of this witness.

“And pray, may I ask, which was the favoured lover? You say you knew both these young men. Which was the favoured lover? Which did you prefer?”

And who was he, the questioner, that he should dare so lightly to ask of her heart’s secrets? That he should dare to ask her to tell, before that multitude assembled there, what woman usually whispers with blushes and tears, and many hesitations, to one ear alone?

So, for an instant, a look of indignation contracted Mary’s brow, as she steadily met the eyes of the impertinent counsellor. But, in that instant, she saw the hands removed from a face beyond, behind; and a countenance revealed of such intense love and woe,–such a deprecating dread of her answer; and suddenly her resolution was taken. The present was everything; the future, that vast shroud, it was maddening to think upon; but NOW she might own her fault, but NOW she might even own her love. Now, when the beloved stood thus, abhorred of men, there would be no feminine shame to stand between her and her avowal. So she also turned towards the judge, partly to mark that her answer was not given to the monkeyfied man who questioned her, and likewise that the face might be averted from, and her eyes not gaze upon, the form that contracted with the dread of the words he anticipated.

“He asks me which of them two I liked best. Perhaps I liked Mr. Harry Carson once–I don’t know–I’ve forgotten; but I loved James Wilson, that’s now on trial, above what tongue can tell–above all else on earth put together; and I love him now better than ever, though he has never known a word of it till this minute. For you see, sir, mother died before I was thirteen, before I could know right from wrong about some things; and I was giddy and vain, and ready to listen to any praise of my good looks; and this poor young Mr. Carson fell in with me, and told me he loved me; and I was foolish enough to think he meant me marriage: a mother is a pitiful loss to a girl, sir: and so I used to fancy I could like to be a lady, and rich, and never know want any more. I never found out how dearly I loved another till one day, when James Wilson asked me to marry him, and I was very hard and sharp in my answer (for indeed, sir, I’d a deal to bear just then), and he took me at my word and left me; and from that day to this I’ve never spoken a word to him, or set eyes on him; though I’d fain have done so, to try and show him we had both been too hasty; for he’d not been gone out of my sight above a minute before I knew I loved–far above my life,” said she, dropping her voice as she came to this second confession of the strength of her attachment. “But, if the gentleman asks me which I loved the best, I make answer, I was flattered by Mr. Carson, and pleased with his flattery; but James Wilson, I–”

She covered her face with her hands, to hide the burning scarlet blushes, which even dyed her fingers.

There was a little pause; still, though her speech might inspire pity for the prisoner, it only strengthened the supposition of his guilt.

Presently the counsellor went on with his examination.

“But you have seen young Mr. Carson since your rejection of the prisoner?”

“Yes, often.”

“You have spoken to him, I conclude, at these times.”

“Only once, to call speaking.”

“And what was the substance of your conversation? Did you tell him you found you preferred his rival?”

“No, sir. I don’t think as I’ve done wrong in saying, now as things stand, what my feelings are; but I never would be so bold as to tell one young man I cared for another. I never named Jem’s name to Mr. Carson. Never.”

“Then what did you say when you had this final conversation with Mr. Carson? You can give me the substance of it, if you don’t remember the words.”

“I’ll try, sir; but I’m not very clear. I told him I could not love him, and wished to have nothing more to do with him. He did his best to over-persuade me, but I kept steady, and at last I ran off.”

“And you never spoke to him again?”

“Never!”

“Now, young woman, remember you are upon your oath. Did you ever tell the prisoner at the bar of Mr. Henry Carson’s attentions to you? of your acquaintance, in short? Did you ever try to excite his jealousy by boasting of a lover so far above you in station?”

“Never. I never did,” said she, in so firm and distinct a manner as to leave no doubt.

“Were you aware that he knew of Mr. Henry Carson’s regard for you? Remember you are on your oath!”

“Never, sir. I was not aware until I heard of the quarrel between them, and what Jem had said to the policeman, and that was after the murder. To this day I can’t make out who told Jem. O sir, may not I go down?”

For she felt the sense, the composure, the very bodily strength which she had compelled to her aid for a time, suddenly giving way, and was conscious that she was losing all command over herself. There was no occasion to detain her longer; she had done her part. She might go down. The evidence was still stronger against the prisoner; but now he stood erect and firm, with self-respect in his attitude, and a look of determination on his face, which almost made it appear noble. Yet he seemed lost in thought.

Job Legh had all this time been trying to soothe and comfort Mrs. Wilson, who would first be in the court, in order to see her darling, and then, when her sobs became irrepressible, had to be led out into the open air, and sat there weeping, on the steps of the court-house. Who would have taken charge of Mary, on her release from the witness-box, I do not know, if Mrs. Sturgis, the boatman’s wife, had not been there, brought by her interest in Mary, towards whom she now pressed, in order to urge her to leave the scene of the trial.

“No! no!” said Mary, to this proposition. “I must be here. I must watch that they don’t hang him, you know I must.”

“Oh! they’ll not hang him! never fear! Besides, the wind has changed, and that’s in his favour. Come away. You’re so hot, and first white and then red; I’m sure you’re ill. Just come away.”

“Oh! I don’t know about anything but that I must stay,” replied Mary, in a strange hurried manner, catching hold of some rails as if she feared some bodily force would be employed to remove her. So Mrs. Sturgis just waited patiently by her, every now and then peeping among the congregation of heads in the body of the court, to see if her husband were still there. And there he always was to be seen, looking and listening with all his might. His wife felt easy that he would not be wanting her at home until the trial was ended.

Mary never let go her clutched hold on the rails. She wanted them to steady her, in that heaving, whirling court. She thought the feeling of something hard compressed within her hand would help her to listen, for it was such pain, such weary pain in her head, to strive to attend to what was being said. They were all at sea, sailing away on billowy waves, and every one speaking at once, and no one heeding her father, who was calling on them to be silent, and listen to him. Then again, for a brief second, the court stood still, and she could see the judge, sitting up there like an idol, with his trappings, so rigid and stiff; and Jem, opposite, looking at her, as if to say, Am I to die for what you know your–. Then she checked herself, and by a great struggle brought herself round to an instant’s sanity. But the round of thought never stood still; and off she went again; and every time her power of struggling against the growing delirium grew fainter and fainter. She muttered low to herself, but no one heard her except her neighbour, Mrs. Sturgis; all were too closely attending to the case for the prosecution, which was now being wound up.

The counsel for the prisoner had avoided much cross-examination, reserving to himself the right of calling the witnesses forward again; for he had received so little, and such vague instructions, and understood that so much depended on the evidence of one who was not forthcoming, that in fact he had little hope of establishing anything like a show of a defence, and contented himself with watching the case, and lying in wait for any legal objections that might offer themselves. He lay back on the seat, occasionally taking a pinch of snuff in a manner intended to be contemptuous; now and then elevating his eyebrows, and sometimes exchanging a little note with Mr. Bridgnorth behind him. The attorney had far more interest in the case than the barrister, to which he was perhaps excited by his poor old friend Job Legh; who had edged and wedged himself through the crowd close to Mr. Bridgnorth’s elbow, sent thither by Ben Sturgis, to whom he had been “introduced” by Charley Jones, and who had accounted for Mary’s disappearance on the preceding day, and spoken of their chase, their fears, their hopes.

All this was told in a few words to Mr. Bridgnorth–so few, that they gave him but a confused idea, that time was of value; and this he named to his counsel, who now rose to speak for the defence.

Job Legh looked about for Mary, now he had gained, and given, some idea of the position of things. At last he saw her, standing by a decent-looking woman, looking flushed and anxious, and moving her lips incessantly, as if eagerly talking; her eyes never resting on any object, but wandering about as if in search of something. Job thought it was for him she was seeking, and he struggled to get round to her. When he had succeeded, she took no notice of him, although he spoke to her, but still kept looking round and round in the same wild, restless manner. He tried to hear the low quick mutterings of her voice, as he caught the repetition of the same words over and over again.

“I must not go mad. I must not, indeed. They say people tell the truth when they’re mad; but I don’t. I was always a liar. I was, indeed; but I’m not mad. I must not go mad. I must not, indeed.”

Suddenly she seemed to become aware how earnestly Job was listening (with mournful attention) to her words, and turning sharp round upon him, with upbraiding for his eavesdropping on her lips, she caught sight of something,–or some one,–who even in that state, had power to arrest her attention; and throwing up her arms with wild energy, she shrieked aloud–

“O Jem! Jem! you’re saved; and I AM mad” and was instantly seized with convulsions. With much commiseration she was taken out of court, while the attention of many was diverted from her, by the fierce energy with which a sailor forced his way over rails and seats, against turnkeys and policemen. The officers of the court opposed this forcible manner of entrance, but they could hardly induce the offender to adopt any quieter way of attaining his object, and telling his tale in the witness-box, the legitimate place. For Will had dwelt so impatiently on the danger in which his absence would place his cousin, that even yet he seemed to fear that he might see the prisoner carried off, and hung, before he could pour out the narrative which would exculpate him. As for Job Legh, his feelings were all but uncontrollable; as you may judge by the indifference with which he saw Mary borne, stiff and convulsed, out of the court, in the charge of the kind Mrs. Sturgis, who, you will remember, was an utter stranger to him.

“She’ll keep! I’ll not trouble myself about her,” said he to himself, as he wrote with trembling hands a little note of information to Mr. Bridgnorth, who had conjectured, when Will had first disturbed the awful tranquillity of the life-and-death court, that the witness had arrived (better late than never) on whose evidence rested all the slight chance yet remaining to Jem Wilson of escaping death. During the commotion in the court, among all the cries and commands, the dismay and the directions, consequent upon Will’s entrance, and poor Mary’s fearful attack of illness, Mr. Bridgnorth had kept his lawyer-like presence of mind; and long before Job Legh’s almost illegible note was poked at him, he had recapitulated the facts on which Will had to give evidence, and the manner in which he had been pursued, after his ship had taken her leave of the land.

The barrister who defended Jem took new heart when he was put in possession of these striking points to be adduced, not so much out of earnestness to save the prisoner, of whose innocence he was still doubtful, as because he saw the opportunities for the display of forensic eloquence which were presented by the facts; “a gallant tar brought back from the pathless ocean by a girl’s noble daring,” “the dangers of too hastily judging from circumstantial evidence,” etc. etc.; while the counsellor for the prosecution prepared himself by folding his arms, elevating his eyebrows, and putting his lips in the form in which they might best whistle down the wind such evidence as might be produced by a suborned witness, who dared to perjure himself. For, of course, it is etiquette to suppose that such evidence as may be given against the opinion which lawyers are paid to uphold, is anything but based on truth; and “perjury,” “conspiracy,” and “peril of your immortal soul,” are light expressions to throw at the heads of those who may prove (not the speaker, there would then be some excuse for the hasty words of personal anger, but) the hirer of the speaker to be wrong, or mistaken.

But when once Will had attained his end, and felt that his tale, or part of a tale, would be heard by judge and jury; when once he saw Jem standing safe and well before him (even though he saw him pale and careworn at the felons’ bar), his courage took the shape of presence of mind, and he awaited the examination with a calm, unflinching intelligence, which dictated the clearest and most pertinent answers. He told the story you know so well: how his leave of absence being nearly expired, he had resolved to fulfil his promise, and go to see an uncle residing in the Isle of Man; how his money (sailor-like) was all expended in Manchester, and how, consequently, it had been necessary for him to walk to Liverpool, which he had accordingly done on the very night of the murder, accompanied as far as Hollins Green by his friend and cousin, the prisoner at the bar. He was clear and distinct in every corroborative circumstance, and gave a short account of the singular way in which he had been recalled from his outward-bound voyage, and the terrible anxiety he had felt, as the pilot-boat had struggled home against the wind. The jury felt that their opinion (so nearly decided half-an-hour ago) was shaken and disturbed in a very uncomfortable and perplexing way, and were almost grateful to the counsel for the prosecution, when he got up, with a brow of thunder, to demolish the evidence, which was so bewildering when taken in connection with everything previously adduced. But if such, without looking to the consequences, was the first impulsive feeling of some among the jury, how shall I describe the vehemence of passion which possessed the mind of poor Mr. Carson, as he saw the effect of the young sailor’s statement? It never shook his belief in Jem’s guilt in the least, that attempt at an alibi; his hatred, his longing for vengeance, having once defined an object to itself, could no more bear to be frustrated and disappointed than the beast of prey can submit to have his victim taken from his hungry jaws. No more likeness to the calm stern power of Jupiter was there in that white eager face, almost distorted by its fell anxiety of expression.

The counsel to whom etiquette assigned the cross-examination of Will, caught the look on Mr. Carson’s face, and in his desire to further the intense wish there manifested, he over-shot his mark even in his first insulting question–

“And now, my man, you’ve told the court a very good and very convincing story; no reasonable man ought to doubt the unstained innocence of your relation at the bar. Still there is one circumstance you have forgotten to name; and I feel that without it your evidence is rather incomplete. Will you have the kindness to inform the gentlemen of the jury what has been your charge for repeating this very plausible story? How much good coin of Her Majesty’s realm have you received, or are you to receive, for walking up from the docks, or some less credible place, and uttering the tale you have just now repeated,–very much to the credit of your instructor, I must say? Remember, sir, you are upon oath.”

It took Will a minute to extract the meaning from the garb of unaccustomed words in which it was invested, and during this time he looked a little confused. But the instant the truth flashed upon him he fixed his bright clear eyes, flaming with indignation, upon the counsellor, whose look fell at last before that stern unflinching gaze. Then, and not till then, Will made answer–

“Will you tell the judge and jury how much money you’ve been paid for your impudence towards one who has told God’s blessed truth, and who would scorn to tell a lie, or blackguard any one, for the biggest fee as ever lawyer got for doing dirty work? Will you tell, sir?–But I’m ready, my lord judge, to take my oath as many times as your lordship or the jury would like, to testify to things having happened just as I said. There’s O’Brien, the pilot, in court now. Would somebody with a wig on please to ask him how much he can say for me?”

It was a good idea, and caught at by the counsel for the defence. O’Brien gave just such testimony as was required to clear Will from all suspicion. He had witnessed the pursuit, he had heard the conversation which took place between the boat and the ship; he had given Will a homeward passage in his boat. And the character of an accredited pilot, appointed by the Trinity House, was known to be above suspicion.

Mr. Carson sank back on his seat in sickening despair. He knew enough of courts to be aware of the extreme unwillingness of juries to convict, even where the evidence is most clear, when the penalty of such conviction is death. At the period of the trial most condemnatory to the prisoner, he had repeated this fact to himself, in order to damp his too certain expectation for a conviction. Now it needed not repetition, for it forced itself upon his consciousness, and he seemed to KNOW, even before the jury retired to consult, that by some trick, some negligence, some miserable hocus-pocus, the murderer of his child, his darling, his Absalom, who had never rebelled–the slayer of his unburied boy would slip through the fangs of justice, and walk free and unscathed over that earth where his son would never more be seen.

It was even so. The prisoner hid his face once more to shield the expression of an emotion he could not control, from the notice of the over-curious; Job Legh ceased his eager talking to Mr. Bridgnorth; Charley looked grave and earnest; for the jury filed one by one back into their box, and the question was asked to which such an awful answer might be given.

The verdict they had come to was unsatisfactory to themselves at last; neither being convinced of his innocence, nor yet quite willing to believe him guilty in the teeth of the alibi. But the punishment that awaited him, if guilty, was so terrible, and so unnatural a sentence for man to pronounce on man, that the knowledge of it had weighed down the scale on the side of innocence, and “Not Guilty” was the verdict that thrilled through the breathless court.

One moment of silence, and then the murmurs rose, as the verdict was discussed by all with lowered voice. Jem stood motionless, his head bowed; poor fellow, he was stunned with the rapid career of events during the last few hours.

He had assumed his place at the bar with little or no expectation of an acquittal; and with scarcely any desire for life, in the complication of occurrences tending to strengthen the idea of Mary’s more than indifference to him; she had loved another, and in her mind Jem believed that he himself must be regarded as the murderer of him she loved. And suddenly, athwart this gloom which made life seem such a blank expanse of desolation, there flashed the exquisite delight of hearing Mary’s avowal of love, making the future all glorious, if a future in this world he might hope to have. He could not dwell on anything but her words, telling of her passionate love; all else was indistinct, nor could he strive to make it otherwise. She loved him.

And life, now full of tender images, suddenly bright with all exquisite promises, hung on a breath, the slenderest gossamer chance. He tried to think that the knowledge of her love would soothe him even in his dying hours; but the phantoms of what life with her might be would obtrude, and made him almost gasp and reel under the uncertainty he was enduring. Will’s appearance had only added to the intensity of this suspense.

The full meaning of the verdict could not at once penetrate his brain. He stood dizzy and motionless. Some one pulled his coat. He turned, and saw Job Legh, the tears stealing down his brown furrowed cheeks, while he tried in vain to command voice enough to speak. He kept shaking Jem by the hand, as the best and necessary expression of his feeling.

“Here, make yourself scarce! I should think you’d be glad to get out of that!” exclaimed the gaoler, as he brought up another livid prisoner, from out whose eyes came the anxiety which he would not allow any other feature to display.

Job Legh pressed out of court, and Jem followed unreasoningly.

The crowd made way, and kept their garments tight about them, as Jem passed, for about him there still hung the taint of the murderer.

He was in the open air, and free once more! Although many looked on him with suspicion, faithful friends closed round him; his arm was unresistingly pumped up and down by his cousin and Job; when one was tired, the other took up the wholesome exercise, while Ben Sturgis was working off his interest in the scene by scolding Charley for walking on his head round and round Mary’s sweetheart, for a sweetheart he was now satisfactorily ascertained to be, in spite of her assertion to the contrary. And all this time Jem himself felt bewildered and dazzled; he would have given anything for an hour’s uninterrupted thought on the occurrences of the past week, and the new visions raised up during the morning; ay, even though that tranquil hour were to be passed in the hermitage of his quiet prison cell. The first question sobbed out by his choking voice, oppressed with emotion, was–

“Where is she?”

They led him to the room where his mother sat. They had told her of her son’s acquittal, and now she was laughing, and crying, and talking, and giving way to all those feelings which she had restrained with such effort during the last few days. They brought her son to her, and she threw herself upon his neck, weeping there. He returned her embrace, but looked around, beyond. Excepting his mother, there was no one in the room but the friends who had entered with him.

“Eh, lad!” she said, when she found voice to speak. “See what it is to have behaved thysel! I could put in a good word for thee, and the jury could na go and hang thee in the face of th’ character I gave thee. Was na it a good thing they did na keep me from Liverpool? But I would come; I knew I could do thee good, bless thee, my lad. But thou’rt very white, and all of a tremble.”

He kissed her again and again, but looking round as if searching for some one he could not find, the first words he uttered were still–

“Where is she?”

XXXIII. REQUIESCAT IN PACE.

“Fear no more the heat o’ th’ sun, Nor the furious winter’s rages;
Thou thy wordly task hast done,
Home art gone and ta’en thy wages. –Cymbeline.

“While day and night can bring delight, Or nature aught of pleasure give;
While joys above my mind can move, For thee, and thee alone I live:

“When that grim foe of joy below
Comes in between to make us part, The iron hand that breaks our band,
It breaks my bliss–it breaks my heart.” –BURNS.

She was where no words of peace, no soothing hopeful tidings could reach her; in the ghastly spectral world of delirium. Hour after hour, day after day, she started up with passionate cries on her father to save Jem; or rose wildly, imploring the winds and waves, the pitiless winds and waves, to have mercy; and over and over again she exhausted her feverish fitful strength in these agonised entreaties, and fell back powerless, uttering only the wailing moans of despair. They told her Jem was safe, they brought him before her eyes; but sight and hearing were no longer channels of information to that poor distracted brain, nor could human voice penetrate to her understanding.

Jem alone gathered the full meaning of some of her strange sentences, and perceived that, by some means or other, she, like himself, had divined the truth of her father being the murderer.

Long ago (reckoning time by events and thoughts, and not by clock or dial-plate), Jem had felt certain that Mary’s father was Harry Carson’s murderer; and although the motive was in some measure a mystery, yet a whole train of circumstances (the principal of which was that John Barton had borrowed the fatal gun only two days before) had left no doubt in Jem’s mind. Sometimes he thought that John had discovered, and thus bloodily resented, the attentions which Mr. Carson had paid to his daughter; at others, he believed the motive to exist in the bitter feuds between the masters and their work-people, in which Barton was known to take so keen an interest. But if he had felt himself pledged to preserve this secret, even when his own life was the probable penalty, and he believed he should fall execrated by Mary as the guilty destroyer of her lover, how much more was he bound now to labour to prevent any word of hers from inculpating her father, now that she was his own; now that she had braved so much to rescue him; and now that her poor brain had lost all guiding and controlling power over her words.

All that night long Jem wandered up and down the narrow precincts of Ben Sturgis’s house. In the little bedroom where Mrs. Sturgis alternately tended Mary, and wept over the violence of her illness, he listened to her ravings; each sentence of which had its own peculiar meaning and reference, intelligible to his mind, till her words rose to the wild pitch of agony, that no one could alleviate, and he could bear it no longer, and stole, sick and miserable, downstairs, where Ben Sturgis thought it his duty to snore away in an arm-chair instead of his bed, under the idea that he should thus be more ready for active service, such as fetching the doctor to revisit his patient.

Before it was fairly light, Jem (wide awake, and listening with an earnest attention he could not deaden, however painful its results proved) heard a gentle subdued knock at the house door; it was no business of his, to be sure, to open it, but as Ben slept on, he thought he would see who the early visitor might be, and ascertain if there was any occasion for disturbing either host or hostess. It was Job Legh who stood there, distinct against the outer light of the street.

“How is she? Eh! poor soul! is that her? No need to ask! How strange her voice sounds! Screech! screech! and she so low, sweet-spoken, when she’s well! Thou must keep up heart, old boy, and not look so dismal, thysel.”

“I can’t help it, Job; it’s past a man’s bearing to hear such a one as she is, going on as she is doing; even if I did not care for her, it would cut me sore to see one so young, and–I can’t speak of it, Job, as a man should do,” said Jem, his sobs choking him.

“Let me in, will you?” said Job, pushing past him, for all this time Jem had stood holding the door, unwilling to admit Job where he might hear so much that would be suggestive to one acquainted with the parties that Mary named.

“I’d more than one reason for coming betimes. I wanted to hear how yon poor wench was–that stood first. Late last night I got a letter from Margaret, very anxious-like. The doctor says the old lady yonder can’t last many days longer, and it seems so lonesome for her to die with no one but Margaret and Mrs. Davenport about her. So I thought I’d just come and stay with Mary Barton, and see as she’s well done to, and you and your mother and Will go and take leave of old Alice.”

Jem’s countenance, sad at best just now, fell lower and lower. But Job went on with his speech.

“She still wanders, Margaret says, and thinks she’s with her mother at home; but for all that, she should have some kith and kin near her to close her eyes, to my thinking.”

“Could not you and Will take mother home? I’d follow when”–Jem faltered out thus far, when Job interrupted–

“Lad! if thou knew what thy mother has suffered for thee, thou’d not speak of leaving her just when she’s got thee from the grave as it were. Why, this very night she roused me up, and ‘Job,’ says she, ‘I ask your pardon for wakening you, but tell me, am I awake or dreaming? Is Jem proved innocent? O Job Legh! God send I’ve not been only dreaming it!’ For thou see’st she can’t rightly understand why thou’rt with Mary, and not with her. Ay, ay! I know why; but a mother only gives up her son’s heart inch by inch to his wife, and then she gives it up with a grudge. No, Jem! thou must go with thy mother just now, if ever thou hopest for God’s blessing. She’s a widow, and has none but thee. Never fear for Mary! She’s young, and will struggle through. They are decent people, these folk she is with, and I’ll watch o’er her as though she was my own poor girl, that lies cold enough in London town. I grant ye, it’s hard enough for her to be left among strangers. To my mind, John Barton would be more in the way of his duty, looking after his daughter, than delegating it up and down the country, looking after every one’s business but his own.”

A new idea and a new fear came into Jem’s mind. What if Mary should implicate her father?

“She raves terribly,” said he. “All night long she’s been speaking of her father, and mixing up thoughts of him with the trial she saw yesterday. I should not wonder if she’ll speak of him as being in court next thing.”

“I should na wonder, either,” answered Job. “Folk in her way say many and many a strange thing; and th’ best way is never to mind them. Now you take your mother home, Jem, and stay by her till old Alice is gone, and trust me for seeing after Mary.”

Jem felt how right Job was, and could not resist what he knew to be his duty, but I cannot tell you how heavy and sick at heart he was as he stood at the door to take a last fond, lingering look at Mary. He saw her sitting up in bed, her golden hair, dimmed with her one day’s illness, floating behind her, her head bound round with wetted cloths, her features all agitated, even to distortion, with the pangs of her anxiety.

Her lover’s eyes filled with tears. He could not hope. The elasticity of his heart had been crushed out of him by early sorrows; and now, especially, the dark side of everything seemed to be presented to him. What if she died, just when he knew the treasure, the untold treasure he possessed in her love! What if (worse than death) she remained a poor gibbering maniac all her life long (and mad people do live to be old sometimes, even under all the pressure of their burden), terror-distracted as she was now, and no one able to comfort her!

“Jem,” said Job, partly guessing the other’s feelings by his own. “Jem!” repeated he, arresting his attention before he spoke. Jem turned round, the little motion causing the tears to overflow and trickle down his cheeks. “Thou must trust in God, and leave her in His hands.” He spoke hushed, and low; but the words sank all the more into Jem’s heart, and gave him strength to tear himself away.

He found his mother (notwithstanding that she had but just regained her child through Mary’s instrumentality) half inclined to resent his having passed the night in anxious devotion to the poor invalid. She dwelt on the duties of children to their parents (above all others), till Jem could hardly believe the relative positions they had held only yesterday, when she was struggling with and controlling every instinct of her nature, only because HE wished it. However, the recollection of that yesterday, with its hair’s-breadth between him and a felon’s death, and the love that had lightened the dark shadow, made him bear with the meekness and patience of a true-hearted man all the worrying little acerbities of to-day; and he had no small merit in doing so; for in him, as in his mother, the reaction after intense excitement had produced its usual effect in increased irritability of the nervous system.

They found Alice alive, and without pain. And that was all. A child of a few weeks old would have had more bodily strength; a child of a very few months old, more consciousness of what was passing before her. But even in this state she diffused an atmosphere of peace around her. True, Will, at first, wept passionate tears at the sight of her, who had been as a mother to him, so standing on the confines of life. But even now, as always, loud passionate feeling could not long endure in the calm of her presence. The firm faith which her mind had no longer power to grasp, had left its trail of glory; for by no other word can I call the bright happy look which illumined the old earth-worn face. Her talk, it is true, bore no more that constant earnest reference to God and His holy Word which it had done in health, and there were no deathbed words of exhortation from the lips of one so habitually pious. For still she imagined herself once again in the happy, happy realms of childhood; and again dwelling in the lovely northern haunts where she had so often longed to be. Though earthly sight was gone away, she beheld again the scenes she had loved from long years ago! she saw them without a change to dim the old radiant hues. The long dead were with her, fresh and blooming as in those bygone days. And death came to her as a welcome blessing, like as evening comes to the weary child. Her work here was finished, and faithfully done.

What better sentence can an emperor wish to have said over his bier? In second childhood (that blessing clouded by a name), she said her “Nunc Dimittis”–the sweetest canticle to the holy.

“Mother, good-night! Dear mother! bless me once more! I’m very tired, and would fain go to sleep.” She never spoke again on this side heaven.

She died the day after their return from Liverpool. From that time, Jem became aware that his mother was jealously watching for some word or sign which should betoken his wish to return to Mary. And yet go to Liverpool he must and would, as soon as the funeral was over, if but for a simple glimpse of his darling. For Job had never written; indeed, any necessity for his so doing had never entered his head. If Mary died, he would announce it personally; if she recovered, he meant to bring her home with him. Writing was to him little more than an auxiliary to natural history; a way of ticketing specimens, not of expressing thoughts.

The consequence of this want of intelligence as to Mary’s state was, that Jem was constantly anticipating that every person and every scrap of paper was to convey to him the news of her death. He could not endure this state long; but he resolved not to disturb the house by announcing to his mother his purposed intention of returning to Liverpool, until the dead had been buried forth.

On Sunday afternoon they laid her low with many tears. Will wept as one who would not be comforted.

The old childish feeling came over him, the feeling of loneliness at being left among strangers.

By-and-by, Margaret timidly stole near him, as if waiting to console; and soon his passion sank down to grief, and grief gave way to melancholy, and though he felt as if he never could be joyful again, he was all the while unconsciously approaching nearer to the full happiness of calling Margaret his own, and a golden thread was interwoven even now with the darkness of his sorrow. Yet it was on his arm that Jane Wilson leant on her return homewards. Jem took charge of Margaret.

“Margaret, I’m bound for Liverpool by the first train to-morrow; I must set your grandfather at liberty.”

“I’m sure he likes nothing better than watching over poor Mary; he loves her nearly as well as me. But let me go! I have been so full of poor Alice, I’ve never thought of it before; I can’t do so much as many a one, but Mary will like to have a woman about her that she knows. I’m sorry I waited to be reminded, Jem,” replied Margaret, with some little self-reproach.

But Margaret’s proposition did not at all agree with her companion’s wishes. He found he had better speak out, and put his intention at once to the right motive; the subterfuge about setting Job Legh at liberty had done him harm instead of good.

“To tell truth, Margaret, it’s I that must go, and that for my own sake, not your grandfather’s. I can rest neither by night nor day for thinking on Mary. Whether she lives or dies, I look on her as my wife before God, as surely and solemnly as if we were married. So being, I have the greatest right to look after her, and I cannot yield it even to”–

“Her father,” said Margaret, finishing his interrupted sentence. “It seems strange that a girl like her should be thrown on the bare world to struggle through so bad an illness. No one seems to know where John Barton is, else I thought of getting Morris to write him a letter telling him about Mary. I wish he was home, that I do!”

Jem could not echo this wish.

“Mary’s not bad off for friends where she is,” said he. “I call them friends, though a week ago we none of us knew there were such folks in the world. But being anxious and sorrowful about the same thing makes people friends quicker than anything, I think. She’s like a mother to Mary in her ways; and he bears a good character, as far as I could learn just in that hurry. We’re drawing near home, and I’ve not said my say, Margaret. I want you to look after mother a bit. She’ll not like my going, and I’ve got to break it to her yet. If she takes it very badly, I’ll come back to-morrow night; but if she’s not against it very much, I mean to stay till it’s settled about Mary, one way or the other. Will, you know, will be there, Margaret, to help a bit in doing for mother.”

Will’s being there made the only objection Margaret saw to this plan. She disliked the idea of seeming to throw herself in his way, and yet she did not like to say anything of this feeling to Jem, who had all along seemed perfectly unconscious of any love-affair, besides his own, in progress.

So Margaret gave a reluctant consent.

“If you can just step up to our house to-night, Jem, I’ll put up a few things as may be useful to Mary, and then you can say when you’ll likely be back. If you come home to-morrow night, and Will’s there, perhaps I need not step up?”

“Yes, Margaret, do! I shan’t leave easy unless you go some time in the day to see mother. I’ll come to-night, though; and now good-bye. Stay! do you think you could just coax poor Will to walk a bit home with you, that I might speak to mother by myself?”

No! that Margaret could not do. That was expecting too great a sacrifice of bashful feeling.

But the object was accomplished by Will’s going upstairs immediately on their return to the house, to indulge his mournful thoughts alone. As soon as Jem and his mother were left by themselves, he began on the subject uppermost in his mind.

“Mother!”

She put her handkerchief from her eyes, and turned quickly round so as to face him where he stood, thinking what best to say. The little action annoyed him, and he rushed at once into the subject.

“Mother! I am going back to Liverpool to-morrow morning to see how Mary Barton is.”

“And what’s Mary Barton to thee, that thou shouldst be running after her in that-a-way?”

“If she lives, she shall be my wedded wife. If she dies–mother, I can’t speak of what I shall feel if she dies.” His voice was choked in his throat.

For an instant his mother was interested by his words; and then came back the old jealousy of being supplanted in the affections of that son, who had been, as it were, newly born to her, by the escape he had so lately experienced from danger. So she hardened her heart against entertaining any feeling of sympathy; and turned away from the face, which recalled the earnest look of his childhood, when he had come to her in some trouble, sure of help and comfort.

And coldly she spoke, in those tones which Jem knew and dreaded, even before the meaning they expressed was fully shaped.

“Thou’rt old enough to please thysel. Old mothers are cast aside, and what they’ve borne forgotten, as soon as a pretty face comes across. I might have thought of that last Tuesday, when I felt as if thou wert all my own, and the judge were some wild animal trying to rend thee from me. I spoke up for thee then; but it’s all forgotten now, I suppose.”

“Mother! you know all this while, YOU KNOW I can never forget any kindness you’ve ever done for me; and they’ve been many. Why should you think I’ve only room for one love in my heart? I can love you as dearly as ever, and Mary too, as much as man ever loved woman.”

He awaited a reply. None was vouchsafed.

“Mother, answer me!” said he, at last.

“What mun I answer? You asked me no question.”

“Well! I ask you this now. To-morrow morning I go to Liverpool to see her who is as my wife. Dear mother! will you bless me on my errand? If it please God she recovers, will you take her to you as you would a daughter?”

She could neither refuse nor assent.

“Why need you go?” said she querulously, at length. “You’ll be getting in some mischief or another again. Can’t you stop at home quiet with me?”

Jem got up, and walked about the room in despairing impatience. She would not understand his feelings. At last he stopped right before the place where she was sitting, with an air of injured meekness on her face.

“Mother! I often think what a good man father was! I’ve often heard you tell of your courting days; and of the accident that befell you, and how ill you were. How long is it ago?”

“Near upon five-and-twenty years,” said she, with a sigh.

“You little thought when you were so ill you should live to have such a fine strapping son as I am, did you now?”

She smiled a little and looked up at him, which was just what he wanted.

“Thou’rt not so fine a man as thy father was, by a deal,” said she, looking at him with much fondness, notwithstanding her depreciatory words.

He took another turn or two up and down the room. He wanted to bend the subject round to his own case.

“Those were happy days when father was alive!”

“You may say so, lad! Such days as will never come again to me, at any rate.” She sighed sorrowfully.

“Mother!” said he at last, stopping short, and taking her hand in his with tender affection, “you’d like me to be as happy a man as my father was before me, would not you? You’d like me to have some one to make me as happy as you made father? Now, would you not, dear mother?”

“I did not make him as happy as I might ha’ done,” murmured she, in a low, sad voice of self-reproach. “Th’ accident gave a jar to my temper it’s never got the better of; and now he’s gone where he can never know how I grieve for having frabbed him as I did.”

“Nay, mother, we don’t know that!” said Jem, with gentle soothing. “Anyhow, you and father got along with as few rubs as most people. But for HIS sake, dear mother, don’t say me nay, now that I come to you to ask your blessing before setting out to see her, who is to be my wife, if ever woman is; for HIS sake, if not for mine, love her whom I shall bring home to be to me all you were to him: and, mother! I do not ask for a truer or a tenderer heart than yours is, in the long run.”

The hard look left her face; though her eyes were still averted from Jem’s gaze, it was more because they were brimming over with tears, called forth by his words, than because any angry feeling yet remained. And when his manly voice died away in low pleadings, she lifted up her hands, and bent down her son’s head below the level of her own; and then she solemnly uttered a blessing.

“God bless thee, Jem, my own dear lad. And may He bless Mary Barton for thy sake.”

Jem’s heart leapt up, and from this time hope took the place of fear in his anticipations with regard to Mary.

“Mother! you show your own true self to Mary, and she’ll love you as dearly as I do.”

So with some few smiles, and some few tears, and much earnest talking, the evening wore away.

“I must be off to see Margaret. Why, it’s near ten o’clock! Could you have thought it? Now don’t you stop up for me, mother. You and Will go to bed, for you’ve both need of it. I shall be home in an hour.”

Margaret had felt the evening long and lonely; and was all but giving up the thoughts of Jem’s coming that night, when she heard his step at the door.

He told her of his progress with his mother; he told her his hopes and was silent on the subject of his fears.

“To think how sorrow and joy are mixed up together. You’ll date your start in life as Mary’s acknowledged lover from poor Alice Wilson’s burial day. Well! the dead are soon forgotten!”

“Dear Margaret! But you’re worn-out with your long evening waiting for me. I don’t wonder. But never you, nor any one else, think because God sees fit to call up new interests, perhaps right out of the grave, that therefore the dead are forgotten. Margaret, you yourself can remember our looks, and fancy what we’re like.”

“Yes! but what has that to do with remembering Alice?”

“Why, just this. You’re not always trying to think on our faces, and making a labour of remembering; but often, I’ll be bound, when you’re sinking off to sleep, or when you’re very quiet and still, the faces you knew so well when you could see, come smiling before you with loving looks. Or you remember them, without striving after it, and without thinking it’s your duty to keep recalling them. And so it is with them that are hidden from our sight. If they’ve been worthy to be heartily loved while alive, they’ll not be forgotten when dead; it’s against nature. And we need no more be upbraiding ourselves for letting in God’s rays of light upon our sorrow, and no more be fearful of forgetting them, because their memory is not always haunting and taking up our minds, than you need to trouble yourself about remembering your grandfather’s face, or what the stars were like–you can’t forget if you would, what it’s such a pleasure to think about. Don’t fear my forgetting Aunt Alice.”

“I’m not, Jem; not now, at least; only you seemed so full about Mary.”

“I’ve kept it down so long, remember. How glad Aunt Alice would have been to know that I might hope to have her for my wife! that’s to say, if God spares her!”

“She would not have known it, even if you could have told her this last fortnight–ever since you went away she’s been thinking always that she was a little child at her mother’s apron-string. She must have been a happy little thing; it was such a pleasure to her to think about those early days, when she lay old and grey on her deathbed.”

“I never knew any one seem more happy all her life long.”

“Ay! and how gentle and easy her death was! She thought her mother was near her.”

They fell into calm thought above those last peaceful, happy hours.

It struck eleven.

Jem started up.

“I should have been gone long ago. Give me the bundle. You’ll not forget my mother. Good-night, Margaret.”

She let him out and bolted the door behind him. He stood on the steps to adjust some fastening about the bundle. The court, the street, was deeply still. Long ago all had retired to rest on that quiet Sabbath evening. The stars shone down on the silent deserted streets, and the clear soft moonlight fell in bright masses, leaving the steps on which Jem stood in shadow.

A footfall was heard along the pavement; slow and heavy was the sound. Before Jem had ended his little piece of business, a form had glided into sight; a wan, feeble figure, bearing with evident and painful labour a jug of water from a neighbouring pump. It went before Jem, turned up the court at the corner of which he was standing, passed into the broad, calm light; and there, with bowed head, sinking and shrunk body, Jem recognised John Barton.

No haunting ghost could have had less of the energy of life in its involuntary motions than he, who, nevertheless, went on with the same measured clockwork tread until the door of his own house was reached. And then he disappeared, and the latch fell feebly to, and made a faint and wavering sound, breaking the solemn silence of the night. Then all again was still.

For a minute or two Jem stood motionless, stunned by the thoughts which the sight of Mary’s father had called up.

Margaret did not know he was at home: had he stolen like a thief by dead of night into his own dwelling? Depressed as Jem had often and long seen him, this night there was something different about him still; beaten down by some inward storm, he seemed to grovel along, all self-respect lost and gone.

Must he be told of Mary’s state? Jem felt he must not; and this for many reasons. He could not be informed of her illness without many other particulars being communicated at the same time, of which it were better he should be kept in ignorance; indeed, of which Mary herself could alone give the full explanation. No suspicion that he was the criminal seemed hitherto to have been excited in the mind of any one. Added to these reasons was Jem’s extreme unwillingness to face him, with the belief in his breast that he, and none other, had done the fearful deed.

It was true that he was Mary’s father, and as such had every right to be told of all concerning her; but supposing he were, and that he followed the impulse so natural to a father, and wished to go to her, what might be the consequences? Among the mingled feelings she had revealed in her delirium, ay, mingled even with the most tender expressions of love for her father, was a sort of horror of him; a dread of him as a blood-shedder, which seemed to separate him into two persons,–one, the father who had dandled her on his knee, and loved her all her life long; the other, the assassin, the cause of all her trouble and woe.

If he presented himself before her while this idea of his character was uppermost, who might tell the consequence?

Jem could not, and would not, expose her to any such fearful chance: and to tell the truth, I believe he looked upon her as more his own, to guard from all shadow of injury with most loving care, than as belonging to any one else in this world, though girt with the reverend name of Father, and guiltless of aught that might have lessened such reverence.

If you think this account of mine confused, of the half-feelings, half-reasons, which passed through Jem’s mind, as he stood gazing on the empty space, where that crushed form had so lately been seen,–if you are perplexed to disentangle the real motives, I do assure you it was from just such an involved set of thoughts that Jem drew the resolution to act as if he had not seen that phantom likeness of John Barton; himself, yet not himself.

XXXIV. THE RETURN HOME.

“DIXWELL. Forgiveness! Oh, forgiveness, and a grave! MARY. God knows thy heart, my father! and I shudder To think what thou perchance hast acted. DIXWELL. Oh!
MARY. No common load of woe is thine, my father.” –ELLIOT’S Kerhonah.

Mary still hovered between life and death when Jem arrived at the house where she lay; and the doctors were as yet unwilling to compromise their wisdom by allowing too much hope to be entertained. But the state of things, if not less anxious, was less distressing than when Jem had quitted her. She lay now in a stupor, which was partly disease, and partly exhaustion after the previous excitement.

And now Jem found the difficulty which every one who has watched by a sick-bed knows full well; and which is perhaps more insurmountable to men than it is to women,–the difficulty of being patient, and trying not to expect any visible change for long, long hours of sad monotony.

But after a while the reward came. The laboured breathing became lower and softer, the heavy look of oppressive pain melted away from the face, and a languor that was almost peace took the place of suffering. She slept a natural sleep; and they stole about on tiptoe, and spoke low, and softly, and hardly dared to breathe, however much they longed to sigh out their thankful relief.

She opened her eyes. Her mind was in the tender state of a lately born infant’s. She was pleased with the gay but not dazzling colours of the paper; soothed by the subdued light; and quite sufficiently amused by looking at all the objects in the room–the drawing of the ships, the festoons of the curtain, the bright flowers on the painted backs of the chairs–to care for any stronger excitement. She wondered at the ball of glass, containing various coloured sands from the Isle of Wight, or some other place, which hung suspended from the middle of the little valance over the window. But she did not care to exert herself to ask any questions, although she saw Mrs. Sturgis standing at the bedside with some tea, ready to drop it into her mouth by spoonfuls.

She did not see the face of honest joy, of earnest thankfulness,–the clasped hands, the beaming eyes,–the trembling eagerness of gesture, of one who had long awaited her awakening, and who now stood behind the curtains watching through some little chink her every faint motion; or if she had caught a glimpse of that loving, peeping face, she was in too exhausted a state to have taken much notice, or have long retained the impression that he she loved so well was hanging about her, and blessing God for every conscious look which stole over her countenance.

She fell softly into slumber, without a word having been spoken by any one during that half-hour of inexpressible joy. And again the stillness was enforced by a sign and whispered word, but with eyes that beamed out their bright thoughts of hope. Jem sat by the side of the bed, holding back the little curtain, and gazing as if he could never gaze his fill at the pale, wasted face, so marbled and so chiselled in its wan outline.

She wakened once more; her soft eyes opened, and met his overbending look. She smiled gently, as a baby does when it sees its mother tending its little cot; and continued her innocent, infantine gaze into his face, as if the sight gave her much unconscious pleasure. But by-and-by a different expression came into her sweet eyes; a look of memory and intelligence; her white flesh flushed the brightest rosy red, and with feeble motion she tried to hide her head in the pillow.

It required all Jem’s self-control to do what he knew and felt to be necessary, to call Mrs. Sturgis, who was quietly dozing by the fireside; and that done, he felt almost obliged to leave the room to keep down the happy agitation which would gush out in every feature, every gesture, and every tone.

From that time forward Mary’s progress towards health was rapid.

There was every reason, but one, in favour of her speedy removal home. All Jem’s duties lay in Manchester. It was his mother’s dwelling-place, and there his plans for life had been to be worked out; plans which the suspicion and imprisonment he had fallen into, had thrown for a time into a chaos, which his presence was required to arrange into form. For he might find, in spite of a jury’s verdict, that too strong a taint was on his character for him ever to labour in Manchester again. He remembered the manner in which some one suspected of having been a convict was shunned by masters and men, when he had accidentally met with work in their foundry; the recollection smote him now, how he himself had thought it did not become an honest upright man to associate with one who had been a prisoner. He could not choose but think on that poor humble being, with his downcast conscious look; hunted out of the workshop, where he had sought to earn an honest livelihood, by the looks, and half-spoken words, and the black silence of repugnance (worse than words to bear), that met him on all sides.

Jem felt that his own character had been attainted; and that to many it might still appear suspicious. He knew that he could convince the world, by a future as blameless as his past had been, that he was innocent. But at the same time he saw that he must have patience, and nerve himself for some trials; and the sooner these were undergone, the sooner he was aware of the place he held in men’s estimation, the better. He longed to have presented himself once more at the foundry; and then the reality would drive away the pictures that would (unbidden) come of a shunned man, eyed askance by all, and driven forth to shape out some new career.

I said every reason “but one” inclined Jem to hasten Mary’s return as soon as she was sufficiently convalescent. That one was the meeting which awaited her at home.

Turn it over as Jem would, he could not decide what was the best course to pursue. He could compel himself to any line of conduct that his reason and his sense of right told him to be desirable; but they did not tell him it was desirable to speak to Mary, in her tender state of mind and body, of her father. How much would be implied by the mere mention of his name! Speak it as calmly, and as indifferently as he might, he could not avoid expressing some consciousness of the terrible knowledge she possessed.

She, for her part, was softer and gentler than she had even been in her gentlest mood; since her illness, her motions, her glances, her voice were all tender in their languor. It seemed almost a trouble to her to break the silence with the low sounds of her own sweet voice, and her words fell sparingly on Jem’s greedy, listening ear.

Her face was, however, so full of love and confidence, that Jem felt no uneasiness at the state of silent abstraction into which she often fell. If she did but love him, all would yet go right; and it was better not to press for confidence on that one subject which must be painful to both.

There came a fine, bright, balmy day. And Mary tottered once more out into the open air, leaning on Jem’s arm, and close to his beating heart. And Mrs. Sturgis watched them from her door, with a blessing on her lips, as they went slowly up the street.

They came in sight of the river. Mary shuddered.

“O Jem! take me home. Yon river seems all made of glittering, heaving, dazzling metal, just as it did when I began to be ill.”

Jem led her homewards. She dropped her head as searching for something on the ground.

“Jem!” He was all attention. She paused for an instant. “When may I go home? To Manchester, I mean. I am so weary of this place; and I would fain be at home.”

She spoke in a feeble voice; not at all impatiently, as the words themselves would seem to intimate, but in a mournful way, as if anticipating sorrow even in the very fulfilment of her wishes.

“Darling! we will go whenever you wish; whenever you feel strong enough. I asked Job to tell Margaret to get all in readiness for you to go there at first. She’ll tend you and nurse you. You must not go home. Job proffered for you to go there.”

“Ah! but I must go home, Jem. I’ll try and not fail now in what’s right. There are things we must not speak on” (lowering her voice), “but you’ll be really kind if you’ll not speak against my going home. Let us say no more about it, dear Jem. I must go home, and I must go alone.”

“Not alone, Mary!”

“Yes, alone! I cannot tell you why I ask it. And if you guess, I know you well enough to be sure you’ll understand why I ask you never to speak on that again to me, till I begin. Promise, dear Jem, promise!”

He promised; to gratify that beseeching face, he promised. And then he repented, and felt as if he had done ill. Then again he felt as if she were the best judge, and knowing all (perhaps more than even he did), might be forming plans which his interference would mar.

One thing was certain! it was a miserable thing to have this awful forbidden ground of discourse; to guess at each other’s thoughts, when eyes were averted, and cheeks blanched, and words stood still, arrested in their flow by some casual allusion.

At last a day, fine enough for Mary to travel on, arrived. She had wished to go, but now her courage failed her. How could she have said she was weary of that quiet house, where even Ben Sturgis’s grumblings only made a kind of harmonious bass in the concord between him and his wife, so thoroughly did they know each other with the knowledge of many years! How could she have longed to quit that little peaceful room where she had experienced such loving tendence! Even the very check bed-curtains became dear to her under the idea of seeing them no more. If it was so with inanimate objects, if they had such power of exciting regret, what were her feelings with regard to the kind old couple, who had taken the stranger in, and cared for her, and nursed her, as though she had been a daughter? Each wilful sentence spoken in the half- unconscious irritation of feebleness came now with avenging self-reproach to her memory, as she hung about Mrs. Sturgis, with many tears, which served instead of words to express her gratitude and love.

Ben bustled about with the square bottle of Goldenwasser in one of his hands, and a small tumbler in the other; he went to Mary, Jem, and his wife in succession, pouring out a glass for each, and bidding them drink it to keep their spirits up; but as each severally refused, he drank it himself; and passed on to offer the same hospitality to another, with the like refusal, and the like result.

When he had swallowed the last of the three draughts, he condescended to give his reasons for having done so.

“I cannot abide waste. What’s poured out mun be drunk. That’s my maxim.” So saying, he replaced the bottle in the cupboard.

It was he who, in a firm commanding voice, at last told Jem and Mary to be off, or they would be too late. Mrs. Sturgis had kept up till then; but as they left her house, she could no longer restrain her tears, and cried aloud in spite of her husband’s upbraiding.

“Perhaps they’ll be too late for the train!” exclaimed she, with a degree of hope, as the clock struck two.

“What! and come back again! No! no! that would never do. We’ve done our part, and cried our cry; it’s no use going over the same ground again. I should ha’ to give ’em more out of yon bottle when next parting time came, and them three glasses they ha’ made a hole in the stuff, I can tell you. Time Jack was back from Hamburg with some more.”

When they reached Manchester, Mary looked very white, and the expression of her face was almost stern. She was in fact summoning up her resolution to meet her father if he were at home. Jem had never named his midnight glimpse of John Barton to human being: but Mary had a sort of presentiment, that wander where he would, he would seek his home at last. But in what mood she dreaded to think. For the knowledge of her father’s capability of guilt seemed to have opened a dark gulf in his character, into the depths of which she trembled to look. At one moment she would fain have claimed protection against the life she must lead, for some time at least, alone with a murderer! She thought of his gloom, before his mind was haunted by the memory of so terrible a crime; his moody, irritable ways. She imagined the evenings as of old; she, toiling at some work, long after houses were shut, and folks abed; he, more savage than he had ever been before with the inward gnawing of his remorse. At such times she could have cried aloud with terror, at the scenes her fancy conjured up.

But her filial duty, nay, her love and gratitude for many deeds of kindness done to her as a little child, conquered all fear. She would endure all imaginable terrors, although of daily occurrence. And she would patiently bear all wayward violence of temper; more than patiently would she bear it–pitifully, as one who knew of some awful curse awaiting the blood-shedder. She would watch over him tenderly, as the innocent should watch over the guilty; awaiting the gracious seasons, wherein to pour oil and balm into the bitter wounds.

With the untroubled peace which the resolve to endure to the end gives, she approached the house that from habit she still called home, but which possessed the holiness of home no longer. “Jem!” said she, as they stood at the entrance to the court, close by Job Legh’s door, “you must go in there and wait half-an-hour. Not less. If in that time I don’t come back, you go your ways to your mother. Give her my dear love. I will send by Margaret when I want to see you.”

She sighed heavily.

“Mary! Mary! I cannot leave you. You speak as coldly as if we were to be nought to each other. And my heart’s bound up in you. I know why you bid me keep away, but”–

She put her hand on his arm, as he spoke in a loud agitated tone; she looked into his face with upbraiding love in her eyes, and then she said, while her lips quivered, and he felt her whole frame trembling–

“Dear Jem! I often could have told you more of love, if I had not once spoken out so free. Remember that time, Jem, if ever you think me cold. Then, the love that’s in my heart would out in words; but now, though I’m silent on the pain I’m feeling in quitting you, the love is in my heart all the same. But this is not the time to speak on such things. If I do not do what I feel to be right now, I may blame myself all my life long! Jem, you promised”–

And so saying she left him. She went quicker than she would otherwise have passed over those few yards of ground, for fear he should still try to accompany her. Her hand was on the latch, and in a breath the door was opened.

There sat her father, still and motionless–not even turning his head to see who had entered; but perhaps he recognised the footstep– the trick of action.

He sat by the fire; the grate, I should say, for fire there was none. Some dull grey ashes, negligently left, long days ago, coldly choked up the bars. He had taken the accustomed seat from mere force of habit, which ruled his automaton body. For all energy, both physical and mental, seemed to have retreated inwards to some of the great citadels of life, there to do battle against the Destroyer, Conscience.

His hands were crossed, his fingers interlaced; usually a position implying some degree of resolution, or strength; but in him it was so faintly maintained, that it appeared more the result of chance; an attitude requiring some application of outward force to alter– and a blow with a straw seemed as though it would be sufficient.

And as for his face, it was sunk and worn–like a skull, with yet a suffering expression that skulls have not! Your heart would have ached to have seen the man, however hardly you might have judged his crime.

But crime and all was forgotten by his daughter, as she saw his abashed look, his smitten helplessness. All along she had felt it difficult (as I may have said before) to reconcile the two ideas, of her father and a blood-shedder. But now it was impossible. He was her father! her own dear father! and in his sufferings, whatever their cause, more dearly loved than ever before. His crime was a thing apart, never more to be considered by her.

And tenderly did she treat him, and fondly did she serve him in every way that heart could devise, or hand execute.

She had some money about her, the price of her strange services as a witness; and when the lingering dusk grew on she stole out to effect some purchases necessary for her father’s comfort.

For how body and soul had been kept together, even as much as they were, during the days he had dwelt alone, no one can say. The house was bare as when Mary had left it, of coal, or of candle, of food, or of blessing in any shape.

She came quickly home; but as she passed Job Legh’s door, she stopped. Doubtless Jem had long since gone; and doubtless, too, he had given Margaret some good reason for not intruding upon her friend for this night at least, otherwise Mary would have seen her before now.

But to-morrow,–would she not come in to-morrow? And who so quick as blind Margaret in noticing tones, and sighs, and even silence?

She did not give herself time for further thought, her desire to be once more with her father was too pressing; but she opened the door, before she well knew what to say.