CHAPTER XIV.

And sudden hurricanes sweep all around, That strip the tender leaves, and whirl amain, While dread convulsions heave the shuddering ground, And rocks, and caves, with hollow moan complain; For anger hight, the lord of this domain, Who when he fondly deems the ruin brought On others’ fame and fortunes, his dear gain, Finds that his own destruction he hath wrought, And on himself hath wreaked the vengeance that he sought.

_Manuscript Poem._

One other mode of vengeance Cresford was determined to pursue, namely, to call out Mr. Hamilton. He returned to the hotel, and there he sat down to write a challenge couched in language such as he thought must goad any man to give him the satisfaction for which he pined.

Having from the red-book ascertained the direction to Mr. Hamilton’s place, he sent it by the post, for there was no one to whom he could apply on this emergency. He had not yet communicated with any of the partners of his house; he had seen no one except Henry Wareham; he felt that all living beings were his foes, and he therefore could not bring himself to have recourse to any of those who formerly called themselves his friends. He fancied he should only thereby expose himself to meeting with fresh unkindness and want of sympathy.

When he had despatched his letter to Hamilton, he sent for his children into the room where he was sitting. They came pale and frightened. He tried to talk to them. He strove to adapt his conversation to their age. He asked them how they liked London, whether they had walked in the streets, and told them they should go to Kensington Gardens; but his eye was wild, his manner fierce and hurried, and they scarcely ventured to answer him. He soon sent them back to their attendant, his feelings rather embittered than softened by the interview.

When he was able to fix his mind to the consideration of any subject, he became aware that he ought to arrange something more proper and more advantageous for them than their present mode of life, and he resolved, provided he did not fall by the hand of Hamilton, to take a small house in the immediate vicinity of London, where they might reside with their _bonne_, who had been with them for some time, and where they might also have the advantage of masters.

He impatiently awaited Hamilton’s answer. It came; and in the first rage of disappointment he tore it into a thousand fragments. Hamilton distinctly and positively refused to meet Mr. Cresford, and told him that no taunts, no insults, should ever induce him to do so.

Cresford threw himself into a chaise, and in half an hour was on the Portsmouth road. When he arrived within sight of Belhanger, he gave a second letter to a messenger, and desired it to be instantly delivered to Mr. Hamilton. In this he branded him with the name of coward, and he flattered himself it was such as must secure to him the revenge he coveted.

Dismissing his chaise, he approached the scene of Ellen’s former happiness, and prowled around the precincts with redoubled feelings of jealousy. The loveliness of the place excited his envy—the venerable-looking manor house, the old oaks, the deer! Yet from these things he gleaned a momentary consolation. Perhaps it was the splendour of the connection that tempted her! But, oh no! the expression of her countenance, when she said her whole heart, soul, and affections were Algernon’s! Those words sounded again in his ears, and he longed to find himself in mortal struggle with the man of whom she could so speak.

He hurried back to the inn, hoping his last letter must have provoked an answer consonant to his wishes. He found an envelope containing his own despatch unopened.

There was no further redress to be sought; and he had but to retrace his steps to London, if possible more infuriated than before.

Algernon had not trusted himself to read this second letter. He had resolved that no earthly power should tempt him to lift his hand against her husband: he was determined to commit no act that would place a barrier between himself and Ellen, which neither time nor change of circumstances could remove. Cresford was mortal, as well as himself or Ellen; and if, although he might wait till extreme old age, there was a possibility of their ever being reunited, no act of his should have rendered their reunion impracticable.

Cresford returned to London, and he quickly put into execution the plan for the establishment of his children. It was necessary to enter into something like an arrangement with his partners. As yet he had taken no measures towards resuming his place among them; he had made himself known to none of his old acquaintances; he had communicated with no one, except those we have already mentioned.

But money now became necessary to him. He revisited the house, and begged he might be immediately put in possession of his share of the receipts. His place of residence became known, and many left their names for him at the hotel; but even with the few whom he occasionally saw, he preserved a moody silence—to none did he speak of his misfortunes or of his intentions.

The only person whose house he frequented, was an old bachelor who had been a friend of the family, who was his godfather, and who had taken advantage of that sort of connection to lecture him, and to find fault with him, when he was a boy. He had always disliked him, and why he should now be the only person whose society he selected, was one of the strange and unaccountable freaks of a mind ill at ease with itself, to which the spectacle of content and cheerfulness is irksome, while it finds a kind of relief in the contemplation of another equally joyless.

Sir Stephenson Smith had in his youth esteemed himself a man of gallantry. He had never been handsome, but he had thought himself insinuating; and he had been made a fool of by many a fair one of his day. He had always professed to be on his guard against the machinations of the sex; and, as he fancied, had preserved his liberty up to the present day;—that is to say, he had been by turns the tyrant and the slave, of any woman who had art and vice enough to think it worth her while to dupe him. His conversation chiefly turned upon the coldness and the heartlessness of women. To most others it would have been a shocking sight; but Cresford found a strange satisfaction in watching the blind and helpless old man, as he sat in his arm-chair, surrounded by all the luxuries, which to him were of no avail, and receiving, with querulous impatience, the attentions of a bustling nurse, who, through evil report and good report, whether he was cross or not, conscientiously did her duty by him, and quietly performed the offices for which she was hired.

Cresford was one day paying Sir Stephenson his diurnal visit. He had sat for some time in silence; his two hands rested upon his two knees, his eyes looked vacantly, but fixedly, into the fire, when his meditations were broken in upon by the peevish lamentations of the old man.

“There! that tiresome woman has not given me my snuff-box!” and his feeble, palsied hands, strayed over the table in search of the snuff-box which was in his pocket. “She has no feeling for me! she does not care whether I am comfortable or uncomfortable, as long as she gets her money and her perquisites—that is the way of women! Talk of their kindliness! They care for nothing but themselves. They can pretend to care for one, when one is young and handsome—and when one has plenty of money in one’s pocket too; but I never knew one of them who had a grain of feeling! I have been a pretty fellow in my youth, and have had as many women make love to me as my neighbours, but hang me, if any one of them ever loved me for myself. There is this Sarah Purbeck, she cares no more for me——”

“What an infatuation it is,” exclaimed Cresford, “which can make us worship such fickle, heartless creatures! as variable as the weathercock, which changes with every wind that blows! But that time is past—I have awoke from my day-dream—I know what their love is worth now!”

“Ay! and so do I, my boy. I never thought it worth much; and now I know it is worth—nothing at all! However, if I have not given them much of a heart-ache,” he added, laughing a feeble, old, cracked laugh, “they have not given me much of a heart-ache either!”

“Do you think they are capable of loving truly and sincerely? Do you think they can love, though you and I may have lived unloved?”

“Yes; they can love themselves, and their clothes, and their opera-boxes, and, sometimes, some man they ought not to love.”

Cresford bit his lips, and knit his brows, and his fist lay clenched upon the table. A long silence ensued. At length the old man fidgeted about, rang the bell, and asked for his chocolate. He struck his watch: it was five minutes past the hour. He scolded Mrs. Purbeck for her inattention, and when she left the room, he said in a dejected tone—

“It is a sad thing to have nobody to care for one: that woman does not love me. Perhaps, after all, if I had married, I might, in a wife, have found an affectionate nurse.”

“Affection!” exclaimed Cresford—“affection in a wife! Have not I a wife?—and have I met with affection?” He several times paced up and down the apartment, and then hastily took his leave.

These visits did not tend to put him in good humour with human nature, or with womankind: they still more soured and embittered his temper; and when he had put his affairs in train, had resumed his situation as partner, and measures had been taken for Henry Wareham’s withdrawal from a concern in which he found himself frequently and painfully brought in contact with Cresford, he left London, his mind fully made up to pursue his unfortunate wife according to the rigour of the law.

He had ascertained from Mr. M‘Leod that the trial would take place at the assizes of the county in which the second marriage had been celebrated, the very one in which she at present resided. He took up his abode in a neighbouring village. His first care was to obtain the certificate of his own marriage at the cathedral church of ——. He proceeded to procure that of the second marriage at Longbury, for which purpose he sent to the minister of that place, a regular application for the extract from the parish register.

Mr. Allenham had no option—he was obliged to comply; but he was inexpressibly alarmed at the application, and lost no time in informing Captain Wareham of the circumstance, while Caroline wearied herself in conjectures, and hopes, and fears as to what Cresford might meditate.

This communication did not render Captain Wareham more easy and comfortable in his mind; and although the kindness of his heart prompted him to conceal his fears from Ellen, the additional weight of care rendered him more than usually difficult to be pleased. The Allenhams had returned to their own home soon after Ellen’s arrival, and her two poor elder children having been removed, the last few weeks had been passed in melancholy quiet. Still Matilda found her task more than usually difficult, and she was so subdued herself by the misfortunes of her sister, that she had no longer the buoyancy of spirit which enabled her, half gaily, half resolutely, to bear up against the daily worries of her father’s temper. To Ellen he never, on any occasion, spoke with captiousness; but he often appeared annoyed with the little Agnes, who was old enough to toddle about the room, to pull away grandpapa’s toast, to stumble over his foot as it was extended towards the fire, to frighten him lest she might fall against the fender, and to do the hundred things which are charming and attractive to those whose hearts are light, and who can give themselves up to watching the graceful awkwardnesses, the winning _espiégleries_ of infancy, but which are inexpressibly wearisome when the mind is oppressed with deep and serious care.

Ellen saw that her child, her only remaining child, was often troublesome to her father, and she kept it out of the room as much as possible. He was then vexed that the child should not be with them, and his good-nature made him fear he might have hurt Ellen’s feelings.

Cresford having obtained the two certificates, now waited upon Mr. Turnbull, a country gentleman and a magistrate, and producing the two documents, informed him that he wished to indict his wife, Ellen Cresford, for bigamy, and required him to issue a warrant for her apprehension.

Mr. Turnbull, although not personally acquainted with the parties, knew the respectability of their situations, and had heard under what circumstances the second marriage had been contracted. He attempted to dissuade Mr. Cresford from carrying matters to such an extremity; to which Cresford sternly replied, as he had previously done to Mr. M‘Leod’s remonstrances, that he did not apply to him for advice, that he simply waited upon him to demand the performance of his duty as a magistrate—that the case was clearly made out before him, and he was not to counsel, but to act.

Mr. Turnbull, although he did so most unwillingly, had no choice but to grant the desired warrant. It was with a feeling of triumph that Cresford seized the paper, and, bowing to Mr. Turnbull, abruptly quitted him, before he had time to adduce any arguments in favour of delay.

Cresford proceeded to the county town, and delivering the warrant to the constable, desired him to perform his duty.

It so happened, that the constable to whom he addressed himself, was the very Will Pollard who had once lived as gardener with Captain Wareham, and who had known Ellen from her childhood. He had inherited a little money, and had set up for himself, as nurseryman and seedsman. He stood aghast when the paper was placed in his hand, and declared in round terms, that nothing should induce him to be the bearer of such a thing, “to Miss Ellen that was.”

“Take back your paper, sir! If you are for taking the law of her, sir, you must find somebody else—I’ll have nothing to say to it,” and he shoved the paper back to Cresford in no very civil manner.

“You cannot help yourself,” Cresford replied with an exulting calmness. “You must execute a magistrate’s warrant—you cannot help yourself.”

“I a’n’t bound to do such a thing as this?” asked Pollard the gardener, of Simpson the shoemaker, who happened to be present.

“I don’t know what right you have to refuse,” answered Simpson, who was a man of wisdom, and read all the newspapers.

Pollard hesitated. He had not long been established in a concern of his own, he was new in office, and he looked up to Simpson for advice and guidance: after having scratched his head, brushed his hat with his sleeve, and pruned a thriving young shrub considerably more than it required, he said,

“Maybe if ’tis to be done, I may be able to speak kinder to her than another, and she always was partial to me from a child.” So he took the paper and held it doubtingly and distrustfully in his hand. “No,” he said, again scratching his head, “I don’t half like the job; you had better get Mr. Clarke the carpenter, on the left-hand side, to do it for you, sir. He is a constable as well as me.”

“Mr. Pollard, the law must have its course. You know that, as well as I do. You had better take the warrant I have now given you, and bring the person therein mentioned before the magistrate, as the law directs.”

“Well,” said Pollard, “what must be, must be, and it don’t signify argufying. And when is it to be served?”

“To-day, sir! Now!” answered Cresford in a stentorian voice. “I expect to meet you at Mr. Turnbull’s with—with the person specified in that warrant, in your custody. In three hours I shall be there.”

Cresford departed, leaving poor Pollard perplexed and confounded. It went against him sadly to do what was required of him. He turned in his head how he might open the business to Miss Ellen “just easy like, without putting her in a fluster;” and in the first place he resolved to change his dress. “He wasn’t no ways tidy to appear before Captain Wareham and his family. He would look clean and decent at least. He would do nothing as was not respectful by the family.” So Pollard retired to repair his toilette, feeling that he thereby softened the blow which was hanging over poor Ellen.

His wife was surprised to see him all in his Sunday’s best.

“Why, what merry-making are you ever going to, Will?” said she: “is it your club day?”

“No, ’tan’t my club day, woman; you know well enough that a’n’t till next week?”

“Why, in the name of fortune, where are you going to, then? You are not going to Tharford fair, sure!”

“No! I a’n’t going to no fair, nor no merry-making,” and he stood brushing his hat round and round with the sleeve of his coat; “I am going where I have no mind to go.”

“Why, Will, you quite fright me! You can’t have done any thing wrong?”

“No! But I’ve got a warrant to sarve.”

“Why, Lord bless us, this is not the first warrant you have had to sarve! But I never knew you dress yourself out so fine to sarve a warrant before,” and Peggy smiled.

“You would not laugh, if you knew who that warrant was made out for—It’s for my Miss Ellen as you have heard me talk of, many and many’s the time. She’s the one, as I’ve often told you, was as quick up the ladder as I was myself—and such a one as she was to sow seeds! and she could make cuttings almost as well as I could myself! Miss Caroline, she was always for walking in the streets, and looking out for the beaux, but Miss Ellen, she would hoe and rake for me all her play-time, if they would let her.”

“A warrant for her, Will? You are dreaming.”

“No, I a’n’t; But hold you tongue, and mind your business. There’s no good in prating—we must all do what is appointed us.”

Will marched out at the door with a tear called up by his own eloquence gathering in his eye.

He proceeded to Captain Wareham’s. He knocked at the door.

“If you please, James,” said he, “if you please, I want to have a word with Mrs. Hamilton—that is—Mrs. Cres—Miss Ellen that was—my Miss Ellen.”

“Step in, Master Pollard, I’ll tell her directly.”

Pollard stood twirling his hat, and debating within himself how he was to open his business, when James came back, and bade him walk up.

“Mrs. Cresford is alone—she bids us all say Mrs. Cresford now,” he whispered; “she says there’s no use in standing out about a name,—and yet she takes her letters every morning as if she did not half like to touch them.”

Pollard entered the room where Ellen sat, meek and dejected, with little Agnes in her lap playing at the table—she looked up with a faint smile.

“I have not seen you a long time, Pollard; I hear you are become a married man since you left my father.”

“Yes, ma’am, so I am, an’t please you.”

“I hope you are quite comfortable; I should have been to call on you, but I have not been out lately.”

“Thank you, ma’am, all the same for thinking of me. ’Twould be a pride and a pleasure to me, to show you how nice and comfortable I’ve got every thing about me—but——”

“Speak out, Pollard; you are a very old friend: you were a great play-mate of mine in my childhood. If you have any little favour to ask of me, I shall be glad to do my best, though I am not quite so rich now as I once was.” Her eyes dropped, and a paler hue stole over her cheek.

“No, ’tisn’t that, bless your kind heart, ’tisn’t that. I had rather by half ask a favour of you, for I know ’twould be a pleasure to you to grant it. But I’ve got a bit of paper here, ma’am. You see, ma’am, I’m a constable, and they have put this upon me. They say as I must give you this here bit of paper, and I scarce know what will come of it.”

Ellen received the paper from Pollard’s trembling hand, while with the back of the other he brushed off a tear. She still thought some misfortune had befallen his family,—that most likely it was a petition,—and it took her some moments to collect her thoughts so as to comprehend the full purport of the warrant.

The idea that she could be prosecuted for bigamy had never before crossed her imagination. The misfortune of no longer being the wife of Algernon, and the disgrace and shame of having lived with him for two years, had completely occupied her whole soul. She had not been able to imagine any misery beyond this. No one had ever hinted at such a possibility, nor indeed had any one believed that Cresford, however keenly he might himself suffer from the consequences of his own imprudence, would have wreaked his useless vengeance upon his unfortunate wife.

Ellen was thunder-struck! The poor constable begged her pardon, entreated her to believe it was no fault of his; that he was bound to obey the law. “We can’t help ourselves, ma’am; we must do what the law directs,—them as have to execute the laws, and them as have to obey them,—’tis all one for us both.”

Poor Ellen begged him to find her father, and to bid him come to her. She was scared, frightened. She could not be more completely separated from Algernon,—her children were already torn from her. She was, therefore, simply, vaguely frightened.

Captain Wareham came. She gave him the paper. He guessed the purport but too well, and turned deadly pale: “When is this summons to be attended, Pollard?”

“Why, sir, Mr. Cresford said we must meet him at Squire Turnbull’s in three hours from the time he was at my house, and that was at two o’clock, just as I had done dinner.”

“Meet him! Am I to meet Mr. Cresford? Oh, father! any thing but that!”

“Dearest child, there is no avoiding it. You must exert all your strength of mind: you must not give way. Mr. Turnbull is a good sort of man, and there will be no one else present. Cresford is a brute, an unmanly brute! If you could feel half as angry with him as I do, your anger would give you strength to go through the interview.”

“I am too miserable to feel angry, father. Besides, I am sorry for him:—I have made him very unhappy. I know what pain it is to be separated from what one loves, even when one knows one is loved in return. What am I to do, father?” she meekly added.

“The sooner we get this unpleasant business over, the better, my dearest child. Go and put on your things; I will order a chaise immediately.” He hurried Ellen out of the room; he longed to be for a moment freed from her presence; he knew that this summons was the prelude to a prosecution; he knew that the punishment of bigamy might be transportation. Though he had no idea matters would ever be brought to such an extremity, he felt awed and nervous in the extreme, and he paced the apartment in the greatest agitation. Pollard stood still, perplexed and grieved. “Get along, Pollard,” exclaimed Captain Wareham, angrily; “can’t you wait down-stairs? Why do you stand here watching me?” He rang the bell violently, and ordered the hack chaise to be instantly procured.

Captain Wareham kept no carriage. Ellen had strictly conformed to her father’s mode of life: she would not consent to live in splendour upon the money Mr. Hamilton would fain have forced upon her.

The hack chaise came to the door. The lovely, the graceful Ellen, who, as the wife of Mr. Cresford, had been used to all the luxuries of life, and, as the wife of Algernon Hamilton, to all its refinements, ascended the jingling steps, and, rustling through the straw, seated herself at the farther corner of the narrow seat, while the constable of the parish, mounted on the bar before, conveyed her like a common culprit before the magistrate.