Part 8 (2/2)
Marston made no reply, but shot two or three lurid glances from under his brow at the speaker.
”Well, then, at all events,” continued Skelton, indolently resuming his theme, ”if you decline your a.s.sistance, may I, at least, hope for your advice? Knowing nothing of this country, I would ask you whither you would recommend me to have the body conveyed?”
”I don't care to advise in the matter,” said Marston; ”but if I were directing, I should have the remains buried in Chester. It is not more than twenty miles from this; and if, at any future time, his family should desire to remove the body, it could be effected more easily from thence. But you can decide.”
”Egad! I believe you are right,” said Skelton, glad to be relieved of the trouble of thinking about the matter; ”and I shall take your advice.”
In accordance with this declaration the body was, within four-and-twenty hours, removed to Chester, and buried there, Mr. Skelton attending on behalf of Sir Wynston's numerous and afflicted friends and relatives.
There are certain heartaches for which time brings no healing; nay, which grow but the sorer and fiercer as days and years roll on; of this kind, perhaps, were the stern and bitter feelings which now darkened the face of Marston with an almost perpetual gloom. His habits became even more unsocial than before. The society of his son he no longer seemed to enjoy. Long and solitary rambles in his wild and extensive demesne consumed the listless hours or his waking existence; and when the weather prevented this, he shut himself up, upon pretence of business, in his study.
He had not, since the occasion we have already mentioned, referred to the intended departure of Mademoiselle de Barras. Truth to say, his feelings with respect to that young lady were of a conflicting and mysterious kind; and as often as his dark thoughts wandered to her (which, indeed, was frequently enough), his muttered exclamation seemed to imply some painful and horrible suspicions respecting her.
”Yes,” he would mutter, ”I thought I heard your light foot upon the lobby, on that accursed night. Fancy! Well, it may have been, but a.s.suredly a strange fancy. I cannot comprehend that woman. She baffles my scrutiny. I have looked into her face with an eye she might well understand, were it indeed as I sometimes suspect, and she has been calm and unmoved. I have watched and studied her; still--doubt, doubt, hideous doubt!--is she what she seems, or--a tigress?”
Mrs. Marston, on the other hand, procrastinated from day to day the painful task of announcing to Mademoiselle de Barras the stern message with which she had been charged by her husband. And thus several weeks had pa.s.sed, and she began to think that his silence upon the subject, notwithstanding his seeing the young French lady at breakfast every morning, amounted to a kind of tacit intimation that the sentence of banishment was not to be carried into immediate execution, but to be kept suspended over the unconscious offender.
It was now six or eight weeks since the hea.r.s.e carrying away the remains of the ill-fated Sir Wynston Berkley had driven down the dusky avenue; the autumn was deepening into winter, and as Marston gloomily trod the woods of Gray Forest, the withered leaves whirled drearily along his pathway, and the gusts that swayed the mighty branches above him were rude and ungenial. It was a bleak and somber day, and as he broke into a long and picturesque vista, deep among the most sequestered woods, he suddenly saw before him, and scarcely twenty paces from the spot on which he stood, an apparition, which for some moments absolutely froze him to the earth.
Travel-soiled, tattered, pale, and wasted, John Merton, the murderer, stood before him. He did not exhibit the smallest disposition to turn about and make his escape. On the contrary, he remained perfectly motionless, looking upon his former master with a wild and sorrowful gaze. Marston twice or thrice essayed to speak; his face was white as death, and had he beheld the specter of the murdered baronet himself, he could not have met the sight with a countenance of ghastlier horror.
”Take me, sir,” said Merton, doggedly.
Still Marston did not stir.
”Arrest me, sir, in G.o.d's name! here I am,” he repeated, dropping his arms by his side; ”I'll go with you wherever you tell me.”
”Murderer!” cried Marston, with a sudden burst of furious horror, ”murderer--a.s.sa.s.sin--miscreant--take that!”
And, as he spoke, he discharged one of the pistols he always carried about him full at the wretched man. The shot did not take effect, and Merton made no other gesture but to clasp his hands together, with an agonized pressure, while his head sunk upon his breast.
”Shoot me; shoot me,” he said hoa.r.s.ely; ”kill me like a dog: better for me to be dead than what I am.”
The report of Marston's pistol had, however, reached another ear; and its ringing echoes had hardly ceased to vibrate among the trees, when a stern shout was heard not fifty yards away, and, breathless and amazed, Charles Marston sprang to the place. His father looked from Merton to him, and from him again to Merton, with a guilty and stupefied scowl, still holding the smoking pistol in his hand.
”What--how! Good G.o.d--Merton!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Charles.
”Aye, sir, Merton; ready to go to gaol, or wherever you will,” said the man, recklessly.
”A murderer; a madman; don't believe him,” muttered Marston, scarce audibly, with lips as white as wax.
”Do you surrender yourself, Merton?” demanded the young man, sternly, advancing toward him.
”Yes, sir; I desire nothing more; G.o.d knows I wish to die,” responded he, despairingly, and advancing slowly to meet Charles.
”Come, then,” said young Marston, seizing him by the collar, ”come quietly to the house. Guilty and unhappy man, you are now my prisoner, and, depend upon it, I shall not let you go.”
”I don't want to go, I tell you, sir. I have traveled fifteen miles today, to come here and give myself up to the master.”
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