Three millions! or, The way of the world
“Don’t be too hard upon him, Dick,” added Julia, with a little of her
old playfulness towards him.
“I shall exhibit nothing but the truth.”
“What is the truth, Dick?” asked she.
“I would rather have others tell it.”
“I am under very great obligations to the doctor--I owe my life to
him,” added Julia. “I hope you will spare him as much as you can.”
“I cannot spare him at all; or rather he has not spared himself. If he
will speak the truth, I will be as gentle with him as possible.”
“That is all I ask.”
“If you will excuse me, Miss Hungerford, I think you had better remain
at home to-morrow.”
“Why, Mr. Birch?”
“You may hear something which will not be pleasant. As a friend of the
doctor, I think you had better not heal any more of the trial.”
“I thank you for your consideration. I will stay at home. But I would
rather know the worst. Your words are really quite terrible to me.
Won’t you tell me what you think the doctor’s motives were in coming
to Poppleton?” pleaded Julia, who could not resist the painful and
shocking conclusion that the demigod of Pine Hill was the cold,
calculating villain which Dick had described him to be.
“I am still under the shadow, Miss Hungerford,” replied Dick.
“Nonsense!” exclaimed Eugene. “I protest against your shadows. I have
never ceased to trust you.”
“But your sister has.”
“I have not, Mr. Birch. I confess that I was vexed at what you said in
relation to me in the court. That is all.”
“I could have made Dr. Lynch say all that I said,” added Dick, blushing
and confused. “Nothing but regard for your feelings prevented me from
doing so.”
“You were very kind,” replied Julia, coloring crimson.
“By the way, Hungerford, Lowe told me last night how he happened to
press me so hard on my relations with your family,” continued Dick,
trying to laugh off his confusion.
“How was it?”
“The doctor suggested the idea to him.”
“Impossible!”
“Lowe says so; he begins to see through the doctor, which was the
reason why he told me of a fact he was asked to conceal. By the way,
Ross Kingman has not a better friend than Lowe in the county, though,
of course, he must do his duty.”
“The doctor suggested it?” repeated Julia.
“That is but a trifle, Miss Hungerford, compared with other things he
has done.”
“You have not answered my question yet, Mr. Birch. What were the
doctor’s motives?”
“In my opinion he intended to obtain one third of John Hungerford’s
money!”
“One third!”
“One sixth in his own right, one sixth in yours,” replied Dick.
“But he advised Eugene to marry Mary Kingman; and he overcame all my
mother’s and my own objections to the marriage.”
Mary had gone to the jail with Dr. Lynch to see Ross, or, of course,
this could not have been said.
“I do not know by what means he intended to effect his purpose; but I
am satisfied that I have correctly stated his design.”
“It is quite impossible, Mr. Birch,” persisted Julia. “He has labored
to bring about the very event which would deprive him of his own share
of my uncle’s property.”
Dick could not answer this obstinate objection to his belief. Here
was an obstacle to his theory which all his investigations could not
explain away. So there was a saving element which still redeemed the
doctor from condemnation. Julia went home almost convinced that Dick
Birch was again mistaken, and the crown was not yet wrested from the
head of the demigod.
The carriage was driven over to the jail for Mary. Dr. Lynch had
important business, which would detain him in Summerville for an hour,
but he would call at Pine Hill on his return. Eugene offered to wait,
but the doctor would ride back with a friend. The party left him,
and Dr. Lynch hastened to the hotel, where they had just parted with
Dick Birch. He wished to see the lawyer, and he did see him. Might he
beg the favor of half an hour’s private conversation with Dick, who,
feeling that he was now on the winning side, was magnanimous enough to
grant it. They took a private parlor up stairs.
“You have begun to thorn me again, Mr. Birch,” the doctor said, with a
smile.
“No; the truth begins to thorn you.”
“We used to be friends, Mr. Birch.”
“That was before I knew you.”
“You are harsh.”
“I am only just.”
“What do you intend to prove?”
“That’s my business.”
“You understand my position in Poppleton?”
“Perfectly.”
“You have already placed me in an awkward situation.”
“You placed yourself there.”
“I took my mother’s name, instead of my father’s, for the reason I
mentioned. That is not a very heinous sin; but it will create very
strong prejudices against me.”
“I know it.”
“Groundless prejudices.”
“No.”
“Why should I suffer for so trivial an offence? My name wrongs no man.
Lynch is an Irish name.”
“It has been naturalized.”
“The name injured me in my profession, and I was about to take the
proper legal steps to have it changed,” whined the doctor.
“Why did you come to Poppleton, Dr. Lynch?”
“Why?”
“That’s the question.”
“To practise my profession, of course.”
“You were doing remarkably well in Dayton.”
“Dayton?”
The doctor was quite sure he had never mentioned the name of this place
to the lawyer, or any other person in Poppleton.
“Dayton, Ohio,” added Dick. “You had a large practice there, and
everybody was surprised when you abandoned it.”
“The climate did not agree with my health,” replied the doctor, with a
ghastly smile. “I find it necessary to keep near the salt water.”
“Precisely so; and you chose Poppleton.”
“I liked the place. I went there, as you are aware, to spend a month in
the summer. The locality suited me, and I decided to settle.”
“Of course your decision had nothing to do with the fact that Eugene
Hungerford lived there?”
“None.”
“Wasn’t it a little singular you never mentioned the circumstance that
you were one of John Hungerford’s contingent legatees?”
“I deemed it best not to mention the fact; it might have bred
suspicion, and deprived me of the good will of Mr. Hungerford and the
family. I have done what I could to serve them.”
“You have done well for them; you saved Julia’s life, Dr. Lynch. She is
lost to me, but I am unselfish enough to be grateful for this, though
you may have done it for your own purposes.”
“It was not for me to save her; God only could do that.”
“None of that, if you please. When the devil quotes Scripture, I am not
one of his congregation. No cant.”
“I only intended to say that I did what any physician should have
done. No human hand could have saved her; though I think her life was
preserved by careful nursing, and, if you please, skilful medical
attendance.”
“I believe it; and I am willing to grant that she owes her life to you.”
“But you say I labored for my own purposes.”
“In a word, you intend to marry her.”
“I have never spoken to her on that subject. I will not deny that I
cherish a very warm regard for her; and herein I have crossed your
path, and excited your wrath against me.”
“I have nothing to say upon that point. The lady shall speak for
herself. On account of what you have done for her, I am disposed
to let you down as easily as possible, consistently with truth and
justice.”
“Let me down?” said the doctor, curiously.
“If you will confess your agency in the events which have transpired in
connection with the murder of Buckstone, I will do all that I can to
save you from disagreeable consequences, and even to protect your good
name,” said Dick, in a serious tone.
“Confess?”
“Why do you repeat my words after me? You know what I mean?”
“I have nothing to confess,” replied Dr. Lynch; but awful forebodings
were apparently creeping through his mind.
“If you have not, let us waste no more time.”
Dick rose from his chair, as if to terminate the interview.
“What could I have to confess?”
“First, that you sent for Buckstone, and that you went over to the
island with him.”
“But I did not.”
“We waste time; I have business with Mr. Darling to-night. You must
excuse me if I decline to say anything more about it.”
“Don’t be harsh, Mr. Birch.”
“I am not harsh. Confess, and I will spare you as much as I can.”
“I have nothing to confess. You are laboring under some mistake, Mr.
Birch.”
“Perhaps I am,” sneered Dick. “To-morrow will show whether I am or not.”
“To-morrow?”
“Don’t repeat my words, doctor.”
“You threaten me.”
“Did I seek this interview, or did you?”
“I did, of course, and I am grateful to you for your kindness in
granting it.”
“What do you want of me?” demanded Dick, impatiently.
“I wished merely to explain the matter about the name.”
“Well, you have done so.”
“But that opened other matters.”
“I do not wish to say another word. I prefer to let the trial take its
course. For your sake, I proposed that you should make a clean breast
of it.”
“Why for my sake?”
“Because we may be able to temper the facts so that they will not bear
so hard upon you.”
“What facts?”
“All the facts.”
“Mr. Birch, you assume that I have not told the truth.”
“I distinctly say that you have not.”
“That I have perjured myself?”
“You have.”
“Very well, Mr. Birch; and I thank you for your candor in stating just
what you mean. Now, grant for a moment that I have been base enough to
falsify the truth--assume it for a moment.”
“Assume it for a moment,” repeated Dick, with a significant smile.
“Should you expect a man who had made and sworn to certain statements,
to retract them, merely upon your invitation to do so?”
“Not unless he were to obtain some advantage by doing so.”
“Precisely, Mr. Birch. Now, assuming still that I have not told the
truth, what advantage should I gain by retracting?”
“Now I understand you, Dr. Lynch; and I am ready to meet your views.”
“Of course we only assume that I have not told the truth.”
“Of course; but I shall take the liberty to answer your question just
as though it were an actual state of things. What are you to gain?”
“What should I gain, if the case were real, instead of supposed?”
“Not much, perhaps. I must be vindicated; therefore you must confess,
on the stand, that you were the person with Buckstone just before he
was killed.”
“That would ruin me.”
“It will ruin me if you don’t. If you were there for a good purpose, it
will not injure you any more than it has me.”
“I should gain nothing by this.”
“If you tell the whole truth, voluntarily, you will gain much in
the estimation of honest men. And the lawyers will spare you. All
this matter is really foreign to Ross Kingman’s case. It has nothing
whatever to do with it.”
“Why was it brought in, then?”
“Because the person with Buckstone is an important witness. If I had
testified that I was the man, I should simply have been required to
tell what I knew of the murder. If I had known nothing, that would have
been the end. If you were the stranger, you can tell what you know
about it. If it implicates you in the murder, you need not criminate
yourself.”
“We are only assuming a case,” interposed the doctor.
“Certainly--if you please.”
“What questions would be asked of me?”
“Were you the person with Buckstone?”
“I was,” replied the doctor, with a sickly smile. “Let us suppose we
are in court; I am on the stand, and you are Mr. Lowe.”
“Did you see the murder committed?”
“I did not.”
“Did you know a murder had been committed?”
“I did. Of course you understand, Mr. Birch, that we are merely
supposing a case.”
“What did you do?”
“I went down to the cliff in the boat, and found the body.”
“Was life extinct?”
“It was.”
“What did you do with the body?”
“I took it back to the beach.”
“Did you remove the head?”
“I did.”