"It is indeed, valuable--worth forty pounds at least," she replied.

"Well, then, here goes, it's worth a bit of a risk," and so saying he deposited it carefully in a corner of his waistcoat pocket, "give me the letter now, ma'am."

She handed him the letter, and he thrust it into the deepest abyss of his breeches pocket.

"Deliver that letter but safely," said she, "and what I have given you shall be but the earnest of what's to come, it is important--urgent--execute but the mission truly, and I will not spare rewards."

The man gave two short nods of huge significance, accompanied with a slight grunt.

"I say again, let me but have a.s.surance that the message has been done," repeated she, "and you shall have abundant reason to rejoice, above all things dispatch--and--and--_secrecy_."

The man winked very hard with one eye, and at the same time with his crooked finger drew his nose so much on one side, that he seemed intent on removing that feature into exile somewhere about the region of his ear; and having performed this elegant and expressive pantomime for several seconds, he stooped forward, and in an emphatic whisper said,--

"_Ne-ver fear._"

He then opened the door and abruptly made his exit, leaving poor Mary Ashwoode full of agitating hopes.

CHAPTER LV.

THE FEARFUL VISITANT.

Two or three days had pa.s.sed, during which Mary had ascertained the fact that every door affording egress from the house was kept constantly locked, and that the new servants, as well as Blarden and his companions, were perpetually on the alert, and traversing the lower apartments, so that even had the door of the mansion laid open it would have been impossible to attempt an escape without encountering some one of those whose chief object was to keep her in close confinement, perhaps the very man from whose presence her inmost soul shrank in terror--she felt, therefore, that she was as effectually and as helplessly a prisoner as if she lay in the dungeons of a gaol.

Often again had she endeavoured to see the man to whom she had confided her letter to Major O'Leary, but in vain; her summons was invariably answered by the others, and fearing to excite suspicion, she, of course, did not inquire for him, and so, after a time, desisted from her endeavours.

Her window commanded a partial view of the old shaded avenue, and hour after hour would she sit at her cas.e.m.e.nt, watching in vain for the longed-for appearance of her uncle, and listening, as fruitlessly, for the clang of his horse's hoofs upon the stony court.

"Oh! Flora, will he ever come?" she would exclaim, with a voice of anguish, "will he ever--ever come to deliver me from this horrible thraldom? I watch in vain, from the light of early dawn till darkness comes--I watch in vain, for the welcome sight of my friend--in vain--in vain I listen for the sound of his approach--heaven pity me, where shall I turn for hope--all--all have forsaken me--all that ever I loved have fallen from me, and left me desolate in this extremity--has he, too, my last friend, forsaken me--will they leave me here to misery--oh, that I might lay me down where head and heart are troubled no more, and be at rest in the cold grave. He'll never come--no--no--no--never."

Then she would wring her hands, still gazing from the cas.e.m.e.nt, and hopelessly sob and weep.

She knew not why it was that Nicholas Blarden had suffered her, for a day or two, to be exempt from the dreaded intrusions of his hated presence. But this afforded her little comfort; she knew not how soon--at what moment--the monster might choose to present himself before her under circ.u.mstances of horror so dreadful as those of her present friendless and forsaken abandonment to his mercy--and when these imminent fears were for an instant hushed, a thousand agonizing thoughts, arising from the partial revelations of her late servant, Carey, occupied her mind. That the correspondence between her and O'Connor had been falsified--she dreaded, yet she hoped it might be true--she feared, yet prayed it might be so--and while the thought that others had wrought their estrangement, and that the coolness of indifference had not touched the heart of him she so fondly loved visited her mind, a thousand bright, but momentary hopes, fluttered her poor heart, and, for an instant, her dangers and her fears were all forgotten.

The day had pa.s.sed, and its broad, clear light had given place to the red, dusky glow of sunset, when Mary Ashwoode heard the measured tread of several persons approaching her room. With an instinctive consciousness of her peril, she started to her feet, while every tinge of colour fled entirely from her cheeks.

"Flora--stay by me--oh, G.o.d, they are coming!" she said, and the words had hardly escaped her lips, when the door of the boudoir, in which she stood, was pushed open, and Nicholas Blarden, followed by Gordon Chancey, entered the room. There was in the countenance of Blarden none of his usual affectation of good humour; on the contrary, it wore a scowl of undisguised and formidable menace, the effect of which was enhanced by the baleful significance of the malignant glance which he fixed upon her, and as he stood there biting his lips in ominous silence, and gazing with savage, gloating eyes, upon the affrighted girl, it were not easy to imagine an apparition more intimidating and hideous. Even Chancey seemed a little uneasy in the antic.i.p.ation of what was coming, and the sallow face of the barrister looked more than usually sallow, and his glittering eyes more glossy than ever.

"Go out of the room, _you_--do you mind," said Blarden, grimly, addressing Flora Guy, who had placed herself a little in advance of her young mistress, and who stood mute and thunderstruck, looking upon the two intruders--"are you palsied, or what--quit the room when I command you, you brimstone fool;" and he clutched her by the shoulder, and thrust her headlong out of the chamber, flinging the door to, with a crash that made the walls ring again.

"Listen to me and mind me, and weigh my words, or you'll rue it," said he, with a tremendous oath, addressing himself to the speechless and terrified lady. "I have a bit of information to give you, and then a bit of advice after it; you must know it's my intention we shall be married; mind me, _married_ to-morrow evening; I know you don't like it; but _I_ do, and that's enough for my purpose; and whenever I make my mind up to a thing, there is not that power in earth, or heaven, or h.e.l.l, to turn me from it. I was always considered a tough sort of a chap when I was in earnest about anything; and I can tell you I'm mighty well in earnest here; and now you may as well know how completely I have you under my thumb; there is not a servant in the house that does not belong to me; there is not a door in the house but the key of it is in my keeping; there is not a word spoken in the house but I hear it, nor a thing done that I don't know of it, and _here's your letter for you_," he shouted, and flung her letter to Major O'Leary open before her on the table. "How dare you tamper with my servant's honesty? how _dare_ you?" thundered he, with a stamp upon the floor which made the ornaments on the cabinet dance and jingle; "but mind how you try it again--beware; mind how you offer to bribe them again; I give you fair warning; you're my property now--to do what I like with, just as much as my horse or my dog; and if you _won't_ obey me, why I'll find a way to _make_ you; to-morrow evening I'll have a parson here, and we'll be buckled; make no rout about it, and it will be better for you, for whatever you do or say, if I had to get you into a strait-waistcoat and clap a plaister over your mouth to keep you quiet, married we shall be; husband and wife, and plenty of witnesses to vouch for it; do you understand me, and no mistake; and if you're foolish enough to make a row about it, I'll tell you what I'll do in such a case," and he fixed his eyes with a still more horrible expression upon her. "I have a particular friend, do you mind--a very obliging, particular old friend that's a mad-doctor; do you hear me; not a very lucky one to be sure, for he has made devilish few cures; a mad-doctor, do you mind?--and I'll have him to reside here and superintend your treatment; do you hear me? don't stand gaping there like an idiot; do you hear me?"

Blarden during this address had advanced into the room and stood by the little table, leaning his knuckles upon it, and stooping forward and advancing his menacing and hideous face, so as to diminish still further the intervening distance, when, all on a sudden, like a startled bird, she darted across the room, and ere they had time to interpose, had opened the door, and was half-way across the lobby; she pa.s.sed Flora Guy, who was sobbing at the door with her ap.r.o.n to her eyes, and at the head of the stairs beheld Sir Henry Ashwoode, no less confounded at the rencounter than was she herself.

"My brother! my brother!" she shrieked, and threw herself fainting into his arms.

Spite of all that was base in his character, the young man was so shocked and confounded that he turned pale as death, and speech and recollection for a moment forsook him.

Almost at the same instant Chancey and Blarden were at his side.

"What the devil ails you?" said Blarden, furiously, addressing Ashwoode, "what do you stand there hugging her for, you white-faced idiot?"

Ashwoode's lips moved; but he could not speak, and the senseless burden still lay in his arms.

"Let her go, will you, you d----d oaf? take hold of the girl, Chancey, and you, you idiot, come here and lend a hand; carry her into her room, and mind, sweet lips, keep the key in your pocket; and if you want help tatter the bells; get down, will you, you moon-struck fool?" he continued, addressing Ashwoode; "what do you stand there for, with your whitewashed face?"

Ashwoode, scarcely knowing what he did, staggered down the stairs and made his way to the parlour, where he sat gasping, with his face buried in his hands. Meanwhile, with many a meek expression of pity, the lawyer a.s.sisted Flora Guy in bearing the inanimate body of her mistress into the chamber, where, in happy unconsciousness, she lay under the tender care of her humble friend and servant. Blarden and Chancey having accomplished the object of their mission, departed to the lower regions to enjoy whatever good cheer Morley Court afforded.

CHAPTER LVI.

EBENEZER SHYc.o.c.k.

In pursuance of the arrangements which Mr. Blarden had, on the evening before, announced to his intended victim, Gordon Chancey was despatched early the next morning to engage the services of a clergyman for the occasion. He knew pretty well how to choose his man, and for the most part, when a plot was to be executed, in theatrical phrase, _cast_ the parts well. He proceeded leisurely to the city, and sauntering through the streets, found himself at length in Saint Patrick's Close; beneath the shadow of the old Cathedral he turned down a narrow and deserted lane and stopped before a dingy, miserable little shop, over whose doorway hung a panel with the dusky and faded similitude of two great keys crossed, now scarcely discernible through the ancient dust and soot. The shop itself was a chaotic depository of old locks, holdfasts, chisels, crowbars, and in short, of rusty iron in almost every conceivable shape. Chancey entered this dusky shop, and accosting a very grimed and rusty-looking little boy who was, with a file, industriously employed in converting a kitchen candlestick into a cannon, inquired,--

"I say, my good boy, does the Reverend Doctor Ebenezer Shyc.o.c.k stop here yet?"

"Aye, does he," said the youth, inspecting the visitor with a broad and leisurely stare, while he wiped his forehead with his shirt sleeve.

"Up the stairs, is it?" demanded Chancey.

"Aye, the garrets," replied the boy. "And mind the hole in the top lobby," he shouted after him, as he pa.s.sed through the little door in the back of the shop and began to ascend the narrow stairs.

He did "mind the hole in the top lobby" (a very necessary caution, by the way, as he might otherwise have been easily engulfed therein and broken either his neck or his leg, after descending through the lath and plaster, upon the floor of the landing-place underneath); and having thus safely reached the garret door, he knocked thereupon with his knuckles.

"Come in," answered a female voice, not of the most musical quality, and Chancey accordingly entered. A dirty, s.l.u.ttish woman was sitting by the window, knitting, and as it seemed, she was the only inmate of the room.

"Is the Reverend Ebenezer at home, my dear?" inquired the barrister.

"He is, and he isn't," rejoined the female, oracularly.

"How's that, my good girl?" inquired Chancey.

"He's in the house, but he's not good for much," answered she.

"Has he been throwing up the little finger, my dear?" said Chancey, "he used to be rayther partial to brandy."

"Brandy--brandy--who says brandy?" exclaimed a voice briskly from behind a sheet which hung upon a string so as to screen off one corner of the chamber.

"Ay, ay, that's the word that'll waken you," said the woman. "Here's a gentleman wants to speak with you."

"The devil there is!" exclaimed the clerical worthy, abruptly, while with a sudden chuck he dislodged the sheet which had veiled his presence, and disclosed, by so doing, the form of a stout, short, bull-necked man, with a mulberry-coloured face and twinkling grey eyes--one of them in deep mourning. He wore a greasy red night-cap and a very tattered and sad-coloured shirt, and was sitting upright in a miserable bed, the covering of which appeared to be a piece of ancient carpet. With one hand he scratched his head, while in the other he held the sheet which he had just pulled down.