Authors: J R Rain
He could only, therefore, look his vexation, and say,—
"If you are determined upon remaining, I cannot help it; but, when some one, as there assuredly will, comes from the Bannerworths, here, to me, or I shall be under the necessity of stating candidly that you are intruding."
"Very good. As the morning air is keen, and as we now are not likely to be as good company to each other as we were, I shall go inside the house."
This was a proposition which the doctor did not like, but he was compelled to submit to it; and he saw, with feelings of uneasiness, the hangman make his way into the Hall by one of the windows.
Then Dr. Chillingworth sat down to think. Much he wondered what could be the secret of the great desire which Varney, Marchdale, and even this man had, all of them to be possessors of the old Hall.
That there was some powerful incentive he felt convinced, and he longed for some conversation with the Bannerworths, or with Admiral Bell, in order that he might state what had now taken place. That some one would soon come to him, in order to bring fresh provisions for the day, he was certain, and all he could do, in the interim, was, to listen to what the hangman was about in the Hall.
Not a sound, for a considerable time, disturbed the intense stillness of the place; but, now, suddenly, Mr. Chillingworth thought he heard a hammering, as if some one was at work in one of the rooms of the Hall.
"What can be the meaning of that?" he said, and he was about to proceed at once to the interior of the building, through the same window which had enabled the hangman to gain admittance, when he heard his own name pronounced by some one at the back of the garden fence, and upon casting his eyes in that direction, he, to his great relief, saw the admiral and Henry Bannerworth.
"Come round to the gate," said the doctor. "I am more glad to see you than I can tell you just now. Do not make more noise than you can help; but, come round to the gate at once."
They obeyed the injunction with alacrity, and when the doctor had admitted them, the admiral said, eagerly,—
"You don't mean to tell us that he is here?"
"No, no, not Varney; but he is not the only one who has taken a great affection for Bannerworth Hall; you may have another tenant for it, and I believe at any price you like to name."
"Indeed!"
"Hush! creep along close to the house, and then you will not be seen. There! do you hear that noise in the hall?"
"Why it sounds," said the admiral, "like the ship's carpenter at work."
"It does, indeed, sound like a carpenter; it's only the new tenant making, I dare say, some repairs."
"D—n his impudence!"
"Why, it certainly does look like a very cool proceeding, I must admit."
"Who, and what is he?"
"Who he is now, I cannot tell you, but he was once the hangman of London, at a time when I was practising in the metropolis, and so I became acquainted with him. He knows Sir Francis Varney, and, if I mistake not, has found out the cause of that mysterious personage's great attachment to Bannerworth Hall, and has found the reasons so cogent, that he has got up an affection for it himself."
"To me," said Henry, "all this is as incomprehensible as anything can possibly be. What on earth does it all mean?"
"My dear Henry," said the doctor, "will you be ruled by me?"
"I will be ruled by any one whom I know I can trust; for I am like a man groping his way in the dark."
"Then allow this gentleman who is carpentering away so pleasantly within the house, to do so to his heart's content, but don't let him leave it. Show yourselves now in the garden, he has sufficient prudence to know that three constitute rather fearful odds against one, and so he will be careful, and remain where he is. If he should come out, we need not let him go until we thoroughly ascertain what he has been about."
"You shall command the squadron, doctor," said the admiral, "and have it all your own way, you know, so here goes! Come along, Henry, and let's show ourselves; we are both armed too!"
They walked out into the centre of the garden, and they were soon convinced that the hangman saw them, for a face appeared at the window, and was as quickly withdrawn again.
"There," said the doctor, "now he knows he is a prisoner, and we may as well place ourselves in some position which commands a good view of the house, as well as of the garden gate, and so see if we cannot starve him out, though we may be starved out ourselves."
"Not at all!" said Admiral Bell, producing from his ample pockets various parcels,—"we came to bring you ample supplies."
"Indeed!"
"Yes; we have been as far as the ruins."
"Oh, to release Marchdale. Charles told me how the villain had fallen into the trap he had laid for him."
"He has, indeed, fallen into the trap, and it's one he won't easily get out of again. He's dead."
"Dead!—dead!"
"Yes; in the storm of last night the ruins have fallen, and he is by this time as flat as a pancake."
"Good God! and yet it is but a just retribution upon him. He would have assassinated poor Charles Holland in the cruelest and most cold-blooded manner, and, however we may shudder at the manner of his death, we cannot regret it."
"Except that he has escaped your friend the hangman," said the admiral.
"Don't call him my friend, if you please," said Dr. Chillingworth, "but, hark how he is working away, as if he really intended to carry the house away piece by piece, as opportunity may serve, if you will not let it to him altogether, just as it stands."
"Confound him! he is evidently working on his own account," said the admiral, "or he would not be half so industrious."
There was, indeed, a tremendous amount of hammering and noise, of one sort and another, from the house, and it was quite clear that the hangman was too heart and soul in his work, whatever may have been the object of it, to care who was listening to him, or to what conjecture he gave rise.
He thought probably that he could but be stopped in what he was about, and, until he was so, that he might as well go on.
And on he went, with a vengeance, vexing the admiral terribly, who proposed so repeatedly to go into the house and insist upon knowing what he was about, that his, wishes were upon the point of being conceded to by Henry, although they were combatted by the doctor, when, from the window at which he had entered, out stepped the hangman.
"Good morning, gentlemen! good morning," he said, and he moved towards the garden gate. "I will not trouble you any longer. Good morning!"
"Not so fast," said the admiral, "or we may bring you up with a round turn, and I never miss my mark when I can see it, and I shall not let it get out of sight, you may depend."
He drew a pistol from his pocket, as he spoke, and pointed it at the hangman, who, thereupon paused and said:—
"What! am I not to be permitted to go in peace? Why it was but a short time since the doctor was quarrelling with me because I did not go, and now it seems that I am to be shot if I do."
"Yes," said the admiral, "that's it."
"Well! but,—"
"You dare," said he, "stir another inch towards the gate, and you are a dead man!"
The hangman hesitated a moment, and looked at Admiral Bell; apparently the result of the scrutiny was, that he would keep his word, for he suddenly turned and dived in at the window again without saying another word.
"Well; you have certainly stopped him from leaving," said Henry; "but what's to be done now?"
"Let him be, let him be," said the doctor; "he must come out again, for there are no provisions in the place, and he will be starved out."
"Hush! what is that?" said Henry.
There was a very gentle ring at the bell which hung over the garden gate.
"That's an experiment, now, I'll be bound," said the doctor, "to ascertain if any one is here; let us hide ourselves, and take no notice."
The ring in a few moments was repeated, and the three confederates hid themselves effectually behind some thick laurel bushes and awaited with expectation what might next ensue.
Not long had they occupied their place of concealment, before they heard a heavy fall upon the gravelled pathway, immediately within the gate, as if some one had clambered to the top from the outside, and then jumped down.
That this was the case the sound of footsteps soon convinced them, and to their surprise as well as satisfaction, they saw through the interstices of the laurel bush behind which they were concealed, no less a personage that Sir Francis Varney himself.
"It is Varney," said Henry.
"Yes, yes," whispered the doctor. "Let him be, do not move for any consideration, for the first time let him do just what he likes."
"D—n the fellow!" said the admiral; "there are some points about him that like, after all, and he's quite an angel compared to that rascal Marchdale."
"He is,—he saved Charles."
"He did, and not if I know it shall any harm come to him, unless he were terribly to provoke it by becoming himself the assailant."
"How sad he looks!"
"Hush! he comes nearer; it is not safe to talk. Look at him."
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CHAPTER LXXVII.
VARNEY IN THE GARDEN.—THE COMMUNICATION OF DR. CHILLINGWORTH TO THE ADMIRAL AND HENRY.
Kind reader, it was indeed Varney who had clambered over the garden wall, and thus made his way into the garden of Bannerworth Hall; and what filled those who looked at him with the most surprise was, that he did not seem in any particular way to make a secret of his presence, but walked on with an air of boldness which either arose from a feeling of absolute impunity, from his thinking there was no one there, or from an audacity which none but he could have compassed.
As for the little party that was there assembled, and who looked upon him, they seemed thunderstricken by his presence; and Henry, probably, as well as the admiral, would have burst out into some sudden exclamation, had they not been restrained by Dr. Chillingworth, who, suspecting that they might in some way give an alarm, hastened to speak first, saying in a whisper,—
"For Heaven's sake, be still, fortune, you see, favours us most strangely. Leave Varney alone. You have no other mode whatever of discovering what he really wants at Bannerworth Hall."
"I am glad you have spoken," said Henry, as he drew a long breath. "If you had not, I feel convinced that in another moment I should have rushed forward and confronted this man who has been the very bane of my life."
"And so should I," said the admiral; "although I protest against any harm being done to him, on account of some sort of good feeling that he has displayed, after all, in releasing Charles from that dungeon in which Marchdale has perished."
"At the moment," said Henry, "I had forgotten that; but I will own that his conduct has been tinctured by a strange and wild kind of generosity at times, which would seem to bespeak, at the bottom of his heart, some good feelings, the impulses of which were only quenched by circumstances."
"That is my firm impression of him, I can assure you," said Dr. Chillingworth.
They watched Varney now from the leafy covert in which they were situated, and, indeed, had they been less effectually concealed, it did not seem likely that the much dreaded vampyre would have perceived them; for not only did he make no effort at concealment himself, but he took no pains to see if any one was watching him in his progress to the house.
His footsteps were more rapid than they usually were, and there was altogether an air and manner about him, as if he were moved to some purpose which of itself was sufficiently important to submerge in its consequences all ordinary risks and all ordinary cautions.
He tried several windows of the house along that terrace of which we have more than once had occasion to speak, before he found one that opened; but at length he did succeed, and stepped at once into the Hall, leaving those, who now for some moments in silence had regarded his movements, to lose themselves in a fearful sea of conjecture as to what could possibly be his object.
"At all events," said the admiral, "I'm glad we are here. If the vampyre should have a fight with that other fellow, that we heard doing such a lot of carpentering work in the house, we ought, I think, to see fair play."