Part 34 (1/2)

With a sad shake of the head, as if she mistrusted my attempt to rea.s.sure her, she quitted the room, whilst I obeyed Ellis's instructions by preparing the bed; after which I unclosed the hall-door, and, despatching the gardener's boy to fetch the surgeon, stood anxiously awaiting the arrival of the party. I had not done so many minutes when the measured tramp of feet gave notice of their approach, and in another instant they came in sight.

CHAPTER XXVIII -- THE SUBSTANCE OF THE SHADOW

”Recovery, where art thou?

Daughter of Heaven, where shall we seek thy help?”

”Come thou and chase away Sorrow and Pain, the persecuting Powers, Who make the melancholy day so long, So long the anxious night.”

”I look for thy approach, O life-preserving Power! as one who strays Alone in darkness o'er the pathless marsh, Watches the dawn of day.”

--_Southey_.

”ALL well so far,” replied Ellis, in answer to my look of inquiry; ”the bleeding has ceased, and he is fast recovering consciousness. Where is the room? We must get him into bed at once.”

-221--When we had placed him in the bed Oaklands lay for a short s.p.a.ce with his eyelids closed, uttering a low groan at intervals; at length the quiet appeared in some measure to restore him, and, slowly opening his eyes, he gazed languidly around, asking in a low voice, ”Where am I?”

”Let me beg you not to speak, Mr. Oaklands,” said Ellis; ”your safety depends upon your keeping silence; you are at the cottage of your friend Fairlegh.”

As he heard these words Harry perceived me standing near the bed, and smiled faintly in token of recognition; then, making a sign for me to stoop down to him, he whispered, ”My father--you must break this to him--go, Frank”.

”This instant,” replied I, and I turned to leave the room, beckoning to Ellis, as I did so, to follow me. ”Tell me the truth,” exclaimed I, as he closed the door behind him, ”will he live or die?”

”It is too early in the business to p.r.o.nounce a decided opinion,” was the answer; ”nor can I venture as yet to do so; everything depends upon the course the ball may have taken, and that, as soon as the other surgeon arrives, we must endeavour to ascertain; all I can say at present is, that I have seen worse cases recover. There is one thing,”

he added, ”which may be a satisfaction for you to know--if you had not brought me, or some one in my profession, to the ground, he would have bled to death where he fell; no one but a surgeon could have stopped that bleeding.”

”If we had been too late I should never have forgiven myself, and we very nearly were so,” returned I. ”I cannot understand how it was.”

”I can explain it,” said Archer, who now joined us. ”You left me up at the village, you remember, Fairlegh, when you started to fetch Mr.

Ellis; well, just as I was leaving it to return to the Hall, a boy ran past me at the top of his speed, and began knocking at one of the cottage doors hard by; surprised to see any one about at so early an hour in the morning, I inquired what was the matter. 'Master's just had word brought him that some gem'men is a going to fight a jewel at five o'clock, and I be come to call the constable, for master to give him a warrant to take 'em hup.' 'And who is your master?' questioned I.

'Justice b.u.mbleby,' was the answer. This was enough for me; I made the best of my way to the Hall, woke Oaklands, who was sleeping as calmly as a child, poor fellow! and he immediately sent his own -222--groom, the lad who went with us to the field, to inform Wilford and his second of what I had heard, and to propose that the meeting should take place a quarter of an hour earlier than the time originally agreed on, to which they willingly consented.”

”This then,” thought I, ”is the reason why Coleman's scheme failed, and c.u.mberland arrived too late;--well, one good thing is, it will clearly prove that neither Archer nor Oaklands connived at the intended interruption.”

The deep, the agonising grief of Sir John Oaklands, on receiving from my lips the account of his son's danger, was most painful to witness, and I was obliged to yield to his desire to return with me to the cottage, although Ellis had strictly forbidden his being allowed to see Harry, lest the excitement should prove injurious to the patient in the precarious state in which he lay. On my return I found the surgeon of the neighbourhood, Mr. (or as he was more commonly styled Dr.) Probehurt, had arrived, and that they were endeavouring to extract the ball, which, after a long and painful operation, they succeeded in doing. From the marks on the coat and waistcoat, it appeared that Wilford had aimed straight for the heart; but his deadly intentions had been providentially frustrated by the accident of Oaklands having a half-crown piece in a small pocket in his waist-coat, against which the ball had struck, and, glancing off, pa.s.sed between two of the ribs, finally lodging amongst the muscles immediately under the shoulder-blade. The great effusion of blood had been occasioned by its having divided one of the smaller arteries, which Ellis had succeeded in securing on the spot. The wound was, therefore, a very severe one; but it was impossible to p.r.o.nounce upon the exact amount of danger at present, as the course which the ball had taken trenched closely on so many important organs, that time alone could show the extent of the injury sustained. With this opinion, in which (strange to say) both doctors agreed, we were fain to content ourselves, and we pa.s.sed the rest of the day in alternately watching by the wounded man and attempting to comfort and support Sir John, whom we had the greatest difficulty in keeping out of Harry's room, till Ellis asked him abruptly ”whether he wanted to murder his son?” after which nothing short of force could have induced him to enter it. One of his first acts, having consulted with Dr. Probehurt, who graciously approved of the measure, was to enter into an arrangement with -223--Ellis, to induce him to remain constantly with Harry till his health should be perfectly re-established, if, indeed, that happy event was ever destined to occur. As Sir John's liberality was unbounded, and Ellis's professional prospects rather hazy--his practice at Harley End being chiefly confined to the very poor, who went on the advice gratis system, and expected to have medicine given them into the bargain--the negotiation was soon concluded to the satisfaction of both parties.

Towards evening Harry became more restless; the pain of his wound increased, and feverish symptoms began to make their appearance. As the night advanced he grew delirious, and before morning was in a high state of fever. For many days his life was despaired of. Ellis never left his bedside, save to s.n.a.t.c.h an occasional hour's sleep on a sofa, when I took his place. Sir Benjamin Brodie was summoned from town, and held a consultation with Dr. Probehurt and Ellis.

Sir John's grief was something fearful to witness. Although naturally a strong-minded man, this unlooked-for blow and the subsequent anxiety had completely unnerved him. At times he would cry like a child; at others he would sit for hours without opening his lips, his head resting dejectedly on his hands, the image of despair: he could with difficulty be prevailed upon to take sufficient nourishment for his support, and appeared scarcely to notice anything that was going on. On these occasions f.a.n.n.y was the only person whose influence was of the slightest avail; with her own hands she would prepare some delicacy of which she knew he was fond, and when with a melancholy shake of the head he rejected it, she would seat herself at his feet, and, taking his hand within her own, whisper kind words of hope and consolation to him, till the old man's heart was softened, and he could refuse her nothing.

Sometimes even this failed, and then she would begin singing in a low sweet voice some plaintive simple air that he loved to hear, till the tears would steal down his grief-worn cheeks, and, laying his hand upon her fair young brow, he would bless her, and say that the G.o.d who was about to take his n.o.ble son from him, had sent an angel to be a daughter to him in his stead. And so the weary days wore on--still vibrating between life and death, the strong man, his matchless powers now reduced to the weakness of infancy, lay stretched upon the couch of suffering, whence it appeared too probable he might never be removed, save to the last sad resting-place of frail humanity--the grave.

-224--About the eighth day the ligature with which Ellis had tied the artery came away, and the wound a.s.sumed a rather more favourable appearance, but the fever remained unsubdued, and the delirium continued. Each day which pa.s.sed without improvement added to the length of Dr. Probehurt's solemn visage, and I could see that in his own mind he had little or no hope of the patient's recovery. Ellis was by far the most sanguine of the party, and, whenever we urged our gloomy forebodings upon him, invariably replied--”Yes, I know all that--it would have killed' any other man, but it won't kill him. Wait a bit, and you'll see.”

A fortnight had now elapsed, and the continued burden of his grief began to tell visibly upon Sir John. The ruddy hue of health faded from his cheeks; his eyes grew dim with weeping, his hands shook, and his firm manly step became feeble and uncertain; it seemed as if in that short s.p.a.ce of time he had grown ten years older. My mother also began to look ill and hara.s.sed, and f.a.n.n.y, though she still kept up wonderfully, and was the life and soul of us all, waxed paler and thinner every day, while, for my own part, I could neither eat, drink, nor sleep to any efficient purpose, and divided my time between watching in the sick-room and pacing up and down the garden, beyond the precincts of which I never ventured, from a nervous dread lest anything might go wrong in my absence.

On one occasion Ellis, completely wearied out, had thrown himself on a sofa to s.n.a.t.c.h an hour's repose, while I took his place by Harry's bedside. It was between two and three o clock in the morning, and the first rays of early dawn, stealing in through the partially closed shutters, and mingling with the faint glimmer of the night-lamp, threw a pale and ghastly light over the surrounding objects, when I fancied that I heard my name p.r.o.nounced in a low, scarcely audible voice. I glanced at Ellis, but his hard and regular breathing proved him to be sound asleep. I next turned towards the bed where Harry lay, and, carefully shading the lamp with my hand, advanced with noiseless step towards it. As I approached I perceived the patient's eyes were open, and, oh, happiness I once more animated by the mild light of reason.

”Harry,” whispered I, ”did you call? Do you know me?”