A Terrible Temptation: A Story of To-Day
The commissioners received Mrs. Marsh coldly. She was chilled, but not
daunted. She produced Suaby's letter and Rolfe's, and when they were
read she played the orator. She argued, she remonstrated, she
convinced, she persuaded, she thundered. Fire seemed to come out of the
woman.
Mr. Fawcett, on whom Mr. Rolfe had mainly relied, caught fire, and
declared he would go down next day and look into the matter on the
spot; and he kept his word. He came down; he saw Sir Charles and Suaby,
and penetrated the case.
Mr. Fawcett was a man with a strong head and a good heart, but rather
an arrogant manner. He was also slightly affected with official
pomposity and reticence; so, unfortunately, he went away without
declaring his good intentions, and discouraged them all with the fear
of innumerable delays in the matter.
Now if Justice is slow, Injustice is swift. The very next day a
thunder-clap fell on Sir Charles and his friends.
Arrived at the door a fly and pair, with three keepers from an asylum
kept by Burdoch, a layman, the very opposite of the benevolent Suaby.
His was a place where the old system of restraint prevailed, secretly
but largely: strait-waistcoats, muffles, hand-locks, etc. Here fleas
and bugs destroyed the patients' rest; and to counteract the insects
morphia was administered freely. Given to the bugs and fleas, it would
have been an effectual antidote; but they gave it to the patients, and
so the insects won.
These three keepers came with an order correctly drawn, and signed by
Richard Bassett, to deliver Sir Charles to the agents showing the
order.
Suaby, who had a horror of Burdoch, turned pale at the sight of the
order, and took it to Rolfe.
“Resist!” said that worthy.
“I have no right.”
“On second thoughts, do nothing, but gain time, while I--Has Bassett
paid you for Sir Charles's board?”
“No.”
“Decline to give him up till that is done, and be some time making out
the bill. Come what may, pray keep Sir Charles here till I send you a
note that I am ready.”
He then hastened to Sir Charles and unfolded his plans, to him.
Sir Charles assented eagerly. He was quite willing to run risks with
the hope of immediate liberation, which Rolfe held out. His own part
was to delay and put off till he got a line from Rolfe.
Rolfe then borrowed Vandeleur on parole and the doctor's dog-cart, and
dashed into the town, distant two miles.
First he went to the little theater, and found them just concluding a
rehearsal. Being a playwright, he was known to nearly all the people,
more or less, and got five supers and one carpenter to join him--for a
consideration.
He then made other arrangements in the town, the nature of which will
appear in due course.
Meantime Suaby had presented his bill. One of the keepers got into the
fly and took it back to the town. There, as Rolfe had anticipated,
lurked Richard Bassett. He cursed the delay, gave the man the money,
and urged expedition. The money was brought and paid, and Suaby
informed Sir Charles.
But Sir Charles was not obliged to hurry. He took a long time to pack;
and he was not ready till Vandeleur brought a note to him from Rolfe.
Then Sir Charles came down.
Suaby made Burdoch's keeper sign a paper to the effect that he had the
baronet in charge, and relieved Suaby of all further responsibility.
Then Sir Charles took an affectionate leave of Dr. Suaby, and made him
promise to visit him at Huntercombe Hall.
Then he got into the fly, and sat between two keepers, and the fly
drove off.
Sir Charles at that moment needed all his fortitude. The least mistake
or miscalculation on the part of his friends, and what might not be the
result to him?
As the fly went slowly through the gate he saw on his right hand a
light carriage and pair moving up; but was it coming after him, or only
bringing visitors to the asylum?
The fly rolled on; even his stout heart began to quake. It rolled and
rolled. Sir Charles could stand it no longer. He tried to look out of
the window to see if the carriage was following.
One of the keepers pulled him in roughly. “Come, none of that, sir?”
“You insolent scoundrel!” said Sir Charles.
“Ay, ay,” said the man; “we'll see about that when we get you home.”
Then Sir Charles saw he had offended a vindictive blackguard.
He sank back in his seat, and a cold chill crept over him.
Just then they passed a little clump of fir-trees.
In a moment there rushed out of these trees a number of men in crape
masks, stopped the horses, surrounded the carriage, and opened it with
brandishing of bludgeons and life-preservers, and pointing of guns.
CHAPTER XXX.
A BIG man, who seemed the leader, fired a volley of ferocious oaths at
the keepers, and threatened to send them to hell that moment if they
did not instantly deliver up that gentleman.
The keepers were thoroughly terrified, and roared for mercy.
“Hand him out here, you scoundrels!”
“Yes! yes! Man alive, we are not resisting: what is the use?”
“Hand down his luggage.”
It was done all in a flutter.
“Now get in again; turn your horses' heads the other way, and don't
come back for an hour. You with your guns take stations in those trees,
and shoot them dead if they are back before their time.”
These threats were interlarded with horrible oaths, and Burdoch's party
were glad to get off, and they drove away quickly in the direction
indicated.
However, as soon as they got over their first surprise they began to
smell a hoax; and, instead of an hour, it was scarcely twenty minutes
when they came back.
But meantime the supers were paid liberally among the fir-trees by
Vandeleur, pocketed their crape, flung their dummy guns into a
cornfield, dispersed in different directions, and left no trace.
But Sir Charles was not detained for that: the moment he was recaptured
he and his luggage were whisked off in the other carriage, and, with
Rolfe and his secretary, dashed round the town, avoiding the main
street, to a railway eight miles off, at a pace almost defying pursuit.
Not that they dreaded it: they had numbers, arms, and a firm
determination to fight if necessary, and also three tongues to tell the
truth, instead of one.
At one in the morning they were in London. They slept at Mr. Rolfe's
house; and before breakfast Mr. Rolfe's secretary was sent to secure a
couple of prize-fighters to attend upon Sir Charles till further
notice. They were furnished with a written paper explaining the case
briefly, and were instructed to hit first and talk afterward should a
recapture be attempted. Should a crowd collect, they were to produce
the letter. These measures were to provide against his recapture under
the statute, which allows an alleged lunatic to be retaken upon the old
certificates for fourteen days after his escape from confinement, but
for no longer.
Money is a good friend in such contingencies as these.
Sir Charles started directly after breakfast to find his wife and
child. The faithful pugilists followed at his heels in another cab.
Neither Sir Charles nor Mr. Rolfe knew Lady Bassett's address: it was
the medical man who had written: but that did not much matter; Sir
Charles was sure to learn his wife's address from Mr. Boddington. He
called on that gentleman at 17 Upper Gloucester Place. Mr. Boddington
had just taken his wife down to Margate for her health; had only been
gone half an hour.
This was truly irritating and annoying. Apparently Sir Charles must
wait that gentleman's return. He wrote a line, begging Mr. Boddington
to send him Lady Bassett's address in a cab immediately on his return.
He told Mr. Rolfe this; and then for the first time let out that his
wife's not writing to him at the asylum had surprised and alarmed him;
he was on thorns.
Mr. Boddington returned in the middle of the night, and at breakfast
time Sir Charles had a note to say Lady Bassett was at 119 Gloucester
Place, Portman Square.
Sir Charles bolted a mouthful or two of breakfast, and then dashed off
in a hansom to 119 Gloucester Place.
There was a bill in the window, “To be let, furnished. Apply to Parker
& Ellis.”
He knocked at the door. Nobody came. Knocked again. A lugubrious female
opened the door.
“Lady Bassett?”
“Don't live here, sir. House to be let.”
Sir Charles went to Mr. Boddington and told him.
Mr. Boddington said he thought he could not be mistaken; but he would
look at his address-book. He did, and said it was certainly 119
Gloucester Place; “Perhaps she has left,” said he. “She was very
healthy--an excellent patient. But I should not have advised her to
move for a day or two more.”
Sir Charles was sore puzzled. He dashed off to the agents, Parker &
Ellis.
They said, Yes; the house was Lady Bassett's for a few months. They
were instructed to let it.
“When did she leave? I am her husband, and we have missed each other
somehow.”
The clerk interfered, and said Lady Bassett had brought the keys in her
carriage yesterday.
Sir Charles groaned with vexation and annoyance.
“Did she give you no address?”
“Yes, sir. Huntercombe Hall.”
“I mean no address in London?”
“No, sir; none.”
Sir Charles was now truly perplexed and distressed, and all manner of
strange ideas came into his head. He did not know what to do, but he
could not bear to do nothing, so he drove to the _Times_ office and
advertised, requesting Lady Bassett to send her present address to Mr.
Rolfe.
At night he talked this strange business over with Mr. Rolfe.
That gentleman thought she must have gone to Huntercombe; but by the
last post a letter came from Suaby, inclosing one from Lady Bassett to
her husband.
“119 Gloucester Place.
“DARLING--The air here is not good for baby, and I cannot sleep for the
noise. We think of creeping toward home to-morrow, in an easy carriage.
Pray God you may soon meet us at dear Huntercombe. Our first journey
will be to that dear old comfortable inn at Winterfield, where you and
I were so happy, but not happier, dearest darling, than we shall soon
be again, I hope.
“Your devoted wife.
“BELLA BASSETT.
“My heartfelt thanks to Mr. Rolfe for all he is doing.”
Sir Charles wanted to start that night for Winterfield, but Rolfe
persuaded him not. “And mind,” said he, “the faithful pugilists must go
with you.”
The morning's post rendered that needless. It brought another letter
from Suaby, informing Mr. Rolfe that the Commissioners had positively
discharged Sir Charles, and notified the discharge to Richard Bassett.
Sir Charles took leave of Mr. Rolfe as of a man who was to be his bosom
friend for life, and proceeded to hunt his wife.
She had left Winterfield; but he followed her like a stanch hound, and
when he stopped at a certain inn, some twenty miles from Huntercombe, a
window opened, there was a strange loving scream; he looked up, and saw
his wife's radiant face, and her figure ready to fly down to him. He
rushed upstairs, into the right room by some mighty instinct, and held
her, panting and crying for joy, in his arms.
That moment almost compensated what each had suffered.
CHAPTER XXXI.
So full was the joy of this loving pair that, for a long time, they sat
rocking in each other's arms, and thought of nothing but their sorrows
past, and the sea of bliss they were floating on.
But presently Sir Charles glanced round for a moment. Swift to
interpret his every look, Lady Bassett rose, took two steps, came back
and printed a kiss on his forehead, and then went to a door and opened
it.
“Mrs. Millar!” said she, with one of those tones by which these ladies
impregnate with meaning a word that has none at all; and then she came
back to her husband.
Soon a buxom woman of forty appeared, carrying a biggish bank of linen