St. Ronan's Well

“I shall willingly pay all reasonable charges which my disappearance may have occasioned,” answered her guest; “and I assure you, once for all, that my remaining for some time quiet at Marchthorn, arose partly from illness, and partly from business of a very pressing and particular nature.”

“At Marchthorn!” exclaimed Dame Dods, “heard ever man the like o' that! – And where did ye put up in Marchthorn, an ane may mak' bauld to speer?”

“At the Black Bull,” replied Tyrrel.

“Ay, that's auld Tam Lowrie's – a very decent man, Thamas – and a douce creditable house – nane of your flisk-ma-hoys – I am glad ye made choice of sic gude quarters, neighbour; for I am beginning to think ye are but a queer ane – ye look as if butter wadna melt in your mouth, but I sall warrant cheese no choke ye. – But I'll thank ye to gang your ways into the parlour, for I am no like to get muckle mair out o' ye, it's like; and ye are standing here just in the gate, when we hae the supper to dish.”

Tyrrel, glad to be released from the examination to which his landlady's curiosity had without ceremony subjected him, walked into the parlour, where he was presently joined by Mr. Touchwood, newly attired, and in high spirits.

“Here comes our supper!” he exclaimed. – “Sit ye down, and let us see what Mrs. Dods has done for us. – I profess, mistress, your plottie is excellent, ever since I taught you to mix the spices in the right proportion.”

“I am glad the plottie pleases ye, sir – but I think I kend gay weel how to make it before I saw your honour – Maister Tirl can tell that, for mony a browst of it I hae brewed lang syne for him and the callant Valentine Bulmer.”

This ill-timed observation extorted a groan from Tyrrel; but the traveller, running on with his own recollections, did not appear to notice his emotion.

“You are a conceited old woman,” said Mr. Touchwood; “how the devil should any one know how to mix spices so well as he who has been where they grow? – I have seen the sun ripening nutmegs and cloves, and here, it can hardly fill a peasecod, by Jupiter. Ah, Tyrrel, the merry nights we have had at Smyrna! – Gad, I think the gammon and the good wine taste all the better in a land where folks hold them to be sinful indulgences – Gad, I believe many a good Moslem is of the same opinion – that same prohibition of their prophet's gives a flavour to the ham, and a relish to the Cyprus. – Do you remember old Cogia Hassein, with his green turban? – I once played him a trick, and put a pint of brandy into his sherbet. Egad, the old fellow took care never to discover the cheat until he had got to the bottom of the flagon, and then he strokes his long white beard, and says, ‘Ullah Kerim,’ – that is, ‘Heaven is merciful,’ Mrs. Dods, Mr. Tyrrel knows the meaning of it. – Ullah Kerim, says he, after he had drunk about a gallon of brandy-punch! – Ullah Kerim, says the hypocritical old rogue, as if he had done the finest thing in the world!”

“And what for no? What for shouldna the honest man say a blessing after his drap punch?” demanded Mrs. Dods; “it was better, I ween, than blasting, and blawing, and swearing, as if folks shouldna be thankful for the creature comforts.”

“Well said, old Dame Dods,” replied the traveller; “that is a right hostess's maxim, and worthy of Mrs. Quickly herself. Here is to thee, and I pray ye to pledge me before ye leave the room.”

“Troth, I'll pledge naebody the night, Maister Touchwood; for, what wi' the upcast and terror that I got a wee while syne, and what wi' the bit taste that I behoved to take of the plottie while I was making it, my head is sair eneugh distressed the night already. – Maister Tirl, the yellow room is ready for ye when ye like; and, gentlemen, as the morn is the Sabbath, I canna be keeping the servant queans out of their beds to wait on ye ony langer, for they will mak it an excuse for lying till aught o'clock on the Lord's day. So, when your plottie is done, I'll be muckle obliged to ye to light the bedroom candles, and put out the double moulds, and e'en show yoursells to your beds; for douce folks, sic as the like of you, should set an example by ordinary. – And so, gude-night to ye baith.”

“By my faith,” said Touchwood, as she withdrew, “our dame turns as obstinate as a Pacha with three tails! – We have her gracious permission to finish our mug, however; so here is to your health once more, Mr. Tyrrel, wishing you a hearty welcome to your own country.”

“I thank you, Mr. Touchwood,” answered Tyrrel; “and I return you the same good wishes, with, as I sincerely hope, a much greater chance of their being realized. – You relieved me, sir, at a time when the villainy of an agent, prompted, as I have reason to think, by an active and powerful enemy, occasioned my being, for a time, pressed for funds. – I made remittances to the Ragion you dealt with, to acquit myself at least of the pecuniary part of my obligation; but the bills were returned, because, it was stated, you had left Smyrna.”

“Very true – very true – left Smyrna, and here I am in Scotland – as for the bills, we will speak of them another time – something due for picking me out of the gutter.”

“I shall make no deduction on that account,” said Tyrrel, smiling, though in no jocose mood; “and I beg you not to mistake me. The circumstances of embarrassment, under which you found me at Smyrna, were merely temporary – I am most able and willing to pay my debt; and, let me add, I am most desirous to do so.”

“Another time – another time,” said Mr. Touchwood – “time enough before us, Mr. Tyrrel – besides, at Smyrna, you talked of a lawsuit – law is a lick-penny, Mr. Tyrrel – no counsellor like the pound in purse.”

“For my lawsuit,” said Tyrrel, “I am fully provided.”

“But have you good advice? – Have you good advice?” said Touchwood; “answer me that.”

“I have advised with my lawyers,” answered Tyrrel, internally vexed to find that his friend was much disposed to make his generosity upon the former occasion a pretext for prying farther into his affairs now than he thought polite or convenient.

“With your counsel learned in the law – eh, my dear boy? But the advice you should take is of some travelled friend, well acquainted with mankind and the world – some one that has lived double your years, and is maybe looking out for some bare young fellow that he may do a little good to – one that might be willing to help you farther than I can pretend to guess – for, as to your lawyer, you get just your guinea's worth from him – not even so much as the baker's bargain, thirteen to the dozen.”

“I think I should not trouble myself to go far in search of a friend such as you describe,” said Tyrrel, who could not affect to misunderstand the senior's drift, “when I was near Mr. Peregrine Touchwood; but the truth is, my affairs are at present so much complicated with those of others, whose secrets I have no right to communicate, that I cannot have the advantage of consulting you, or any other friend. It is possible I may be soon obliged to lay aside this reserve, and vindicate myself before the whole public. I will not fail, when that time shall arrive, to take an early opportunity of confidential communication with you.”

“That is right – confidential is the word – No person ever made a confidant of me who repented it – Think what the Pacha might have made of it, had he taken my advice, and cut through the Isthmus of Suez. – Turk and Christian, men of all tongues and countries, used to consult old Touchwood, from the building of a mosque down to the settling of an agio. – But come – Good-night – good-night.”

So saying, he took up his bedroom light, and extinguished one of those which stood on the table, nodded to Tyrrel to discharge his share of the duty imposed by Mrs. Dods with the same punctuality, and they withdrew to their several apartments, entertaining very different sentiments of each other.

“A troublesome, inquisitive old gentleman,” said Tyrrel to himself; “I remember him narrowly escaping the bastinado at Smyrna, for thrusting his advice on the Turkish cadi – and then I lie under a considerable obligation to him, giving him a sort of right to annoy me – Well, I must parry his impertinence as I can.”

“A shy cock this Frank Tyrrel,” thought the traveller; “a very complete dodger! – But no matter – I shall wind him, were he to double like a fox – I am resolved to make his matters my own, and if I cannot carry him through, I know not who can.”

Having formed this philanthropic resolution, Mr. Touchwood threw himself into bed, which luckily declined exactly at the right angle, and, full of self-complacency, consigned himself to slumber.

CHAPTER X.

MEDIATION

– So, begone!We will not now be troubled with reply;We offer fair, take it advisedly.King Henry IV. Part I.

It had been the purpose of Tyrrel, by rising and breakfasting early, to avoid again meeting Mr. Touchwood, having upon his hands a matter in which that officious gentleman's interference was likely to prove troublesome. His character, he was aware, had been assailed at the Spa in the most public manner, and in the most public manner he was resolved to demand redress, conscious that whatever other important concerns had brought him to Scotland, must necessarily be postponed to the vindication of his honour. He was determined, for this purpose, to go down to the rooms when the company was assembled at the breakfast hour, and had just taken his hat to set out, when he was interrupted by Mrs. Dods, who, announcing “a gentleman that was speering for him,” ushered into the chamber a very fashionable young man in a military surtout, covered with silk lace and fur, and wearing a foraging-cap; a dress now too familiar to be distinguished, but which at that time was used only by geniuses of a superior order. The stranger was neither handsome nor plain, but had in his appearance a good deal of pretension, and the cool easy superiority which belongs to high breeding. On his part, he surveyed Tyrrel; and, as his appearance differed, perhaps, from that for which the exterior of the Cleikum Inn had prepared him, he abated something of the air with which he had entered the room, and politely announced himself as Captain Jekyl, of the – Guards, (presenting, at the same time, his ticket.)

“He presumed he spoke to Mr. Martigny?”

“To Mr. Francis Tyrrel, sir,” replied Tyrrel, drawing himself up – “Martigny was my mother's name – I have never borne it.”

“I am not here for the purpose of disputing that point, Mr. Tyrrel, though I am not entitled to admit what my principal's information leads him to doubt.”

“Your principal, I presume, is Sir Bingo Binks?” said Tyrrel. “I have not forgotten that there is an unfortunate affair between us.”

“I have not the honour to know Sir Bingo Binks,” said Captain Jekyl. “I come on the part of the Earl of Etherington.”

Tyrrel stood silent for a moment, and then said, “I am at a loss to know what the gentleman who calls himself Earl of Etherington can have to say to me, through the medium of such a messenger as yourself, Captain Jekyl. I should have supposed that, considering our unhappy relationship, and the terms on which we stand towards each other, the lawyers were the fitter negotiators between us.”

“Sir,” said Captain Jekyl, “you are misunderstanding my errand. I am come on no message of hostile import from Lord Etherington – I am aware of the connexion betwixt you, which would render such an office altogether contradictory to common sense and the laws of nature; and I assure you, I would lay down my life rather than be concerned in an affair so unnatural. I would act, if possible, as a mediator betwixt you.”

They had hitherto remained standing. Mr. Tyrrel now offered his guest a seat; and, having assumed one himself, he broke the awkward pause which ensued by observing, “I should be happy, after experiencing such a long course of injustice and persecution from your friend, to learn, even at this late period, Captain Jekyl, any thing which can make me think better, either of him, or of his purpose towards me and towards others.”

“Mr. Tyrrel,” said Captain Jekyl, “you must allow me to speak with candour. There is too great a stake betwixt your brother and you to permit you to be friends; but I do not see it is necessary that you should therefore be mortal enemies.”

“I am not my brother's enemy, Captain Jekyl,” said Tyrrel – “I have never been so – His friend I cannot be, and he knows but too well the insurmountable barrier which his own conduct has placed between us.”

“I am aware,” said Captain Jekyl, slowly and expressively, “generally, at least, of the particulars of your unfortunate disagreement.”

“If so,” said Tyrrel, colouring, “you must be also aware with what extreme pain I feel myself compelled to enter on such a subject with a total stranger – a stranger, too, the friend and confidant of one who – But I will not hurt your feelings, Captain Jekyl, but rather endeavour to suppress my own. In one word, I beg to be favoured with the import of your communication, as I am obliged to go down to the Spa this morning, in order to put to rights some matters there which concern me nearly.”

“If you mean the cause of your absence from an appointment with Sir Bingo Binks,” said Captain Jekyl, “the matter has been already completely explained. I pulled down the offensive placard with my own hand, and rendered myself responsible for your honour to any one who should presume to hold it in future doubt.”

“Sir,” said Tyrrel, very much surprised, “I am obliged to you for your intention, the more so as I am ignorant how I have merited such interference. It is not, however, quite satisfactory to me, because I am accustomed to be the guardian of my own honour.”

“An easy task, I presume, in all cases, Mr. Tyrrel,” answered Jekyl, “but peculiarly so in the present, when you will find no one so hardy as to assail it. – My interference, indeed, would have been unjustifiably officious, had I not been at the moment undertaking a commission implying confidential intercourse with you. For the sake of my own character, it became necessary to establish yours. I know the truth of the whole affair from my friend, the Earl of Etherington, who ought to thank Heaven so long as he lives, that saved him on that occasion from the commission of a very great crime.”

“Your friend, sir, has had, in the course of his life, much to thank Heaven for, but more for which to ask God's forgiveness.”

“I am no divine, sir,” replied Captain Jekyl, with spirit; “but I have been told that the same may be said of most men alive.”

“I, at least, cannot dispute it,” said Tyrrel; “but, to proceed. – Have you found yourself at liberty, Captain Jekyl, to deliver to the public the whole particulars of a rencontre so singular as that which took place between your friend and me?”

“I have not, sir,” said Jekyl – “I judged it a matter of great delicacy, and which each of you had the like interest to preserve secret.”

“May I beg to know, then,” said Tyrrel, “how it was possible for you to vindicate my absence from Sir Bingo's rendezvous otherwise?”

“It was only necessary, sir, to pledge my word as a gentleman and a man of honour, characters in which I am pretty well known to the world, that, to my certain personal knowledge, you were hurt in an affair with a friend of mine, the further particulars of which prudence required should be sunk into oblivion. I think no one will venture to dispute my word, or to require more than my assurance. – If there should be any one very hard of faith on the occasion, I shall find a way to satisfy him. In the meanwhile, your outlawry has been rescinded in the most honourable manner; and Sir Bingo, in consideration of his share in giving rise to reports so injurious to you, is desirous to drop all further proceedings in his original quarrel, and hopes the whole matter will be forgot and forgiven on all sides.”

“Upon my word, Captain Jekyl,” answered Tyrrel, “you lay me under the necessity of acknowledging obligation to you. You have cut a knot which I should have found it very difficult to unloose; for I frankly confess, that, while I was determined not to remain under the stigma put upon me, I should have had great difficulty in clearing myself, without mentioning circumstances, which, were it only for the sake of my father's memory, should be buried in eternal oblivion. I hope your friend feels no continued inconvenience from his hurt?”

“His lordship is nearly quite recovered,” said Jekyl.

“And I trust he did me the justice to own, that, so far as my will was concerned, I am totally guiltless of the purpose of hurting him?”

“He does you full justice in that and every thing else,” replied Jekyl; “regrets the impetuosity of his own temper, and is determined to be on his guard against it in future.”

“That,” said Tyrrel, “is so far well; and now, may I ask once more, what communication you have to make to me on the part of your friend? – Were it from any one but him, whom I have found so uniformly false and treacherous, your own fairness and candour would induce me to hope that this unnatural quarrel might be in some sort ended by your mediation.”

“I then proceed, sir, under more favourable auspices than I expected,” said Captain Jekyl, “to enter on my commission. – You are about to commence a lawsuit, Mr. Tyrrel, if fame does not wrong you, for the purpose of depriving your brother of his estate and title.”

“The case is not fairly stated, Captain Jekyl,” replied Tyrrel; “I commence a lawsuit, when I do commence it, for the sake of ascertaining my own just rights.”

“It comes to the same thing eventually,” said the mediator; “I am not called upon to decide upon the justice of your claims, but they are, you will allow, newly started. The late Countess of Etherington died in possession – open and undoubted possession – of her rank in society.”

“If she had no real claim to it, sir,” replied Tyrrel, “she had more than justice who enjoyed it so long; and the injured lady whose claims were postponed, had just so much less. – But this is no point for you and me to discuss between us – it must be tried elsewhere.”

“Proofs, sir, of the strongest kind, will be necessary to overthrow a right so well established in public opinion as that of the present possessor of the title of Etherington.”

Tyrrel took a paper from his pocketbook, and, handing it to Captain Jekyl, only answered, “I have no thoughts of asking you to give up the cause of your friend; but methinks the documents of which I give you a list, may shake your opinion of it.”

Captain Jekyl read, muttering to himself, “‘Certificate of marriage, by the Rev. Zadock Kemp, chaplain to the British Embassy at Paris, between Marie de Bellroche, Comptesse de Martigny, and the Right Honourable John Lord Oakendale – Letters between John Earl of Etherington and his lady, under the title of Madame de Martigny – Certificate of baptism – Declaration of the Earl of Etherington on his death-bed.’ – All this is very well – but may I ask you, Mr. Tyrrel, if it is really your purpose to go to extremity with your brother?”

“He has forgot that he is one – he has lifted his hand against my life.”

“You have shed his blood – twice shed it,” said Jekyl; “the world will not ask which brother gave the offence, but which received, which inflicted, the severest wound.”

“Your friend has inflicted one on me, sir,” said Tyrrel, “that will bleed while I have the power of memory.”

“I understand you, sir,” said Captain Jekyl; “you mean the affair of Miss Mowbray?”

“Spare me on that subject, sir!” said Tyrrel. “Hitherto I have disputed my most important rights – rights which involved my rank in society, my fortune, the honour of my mother – with something like composure; but do not say more on the topic you have touched upon, unless you would have before you a madman! – Is it possible for you, sir, to have heard even the outline of this story, and to imagine that I can ever reflect on the cold-blooded and most inhuman stratagem, which this friend of yours prepared for two unfortunates, without” – He started up, and walked impetuously to and fro. “Since the Fiend himself interrupted the happiness of perfect innocence, there was never such an act of treachery – never such schemes of happiness destroyed – never such inevitable misery prepared for two wretches who had the idiocy to repose perfect confidence in him! – Had there been passion in his conduct, it had been the act of a man – a wicked man, indeed, but still a human creature, acting under the influence of human feelings – but his was the deed of a calm, cold, calculating demon, actuated by the basest and most sordid motives of self-interest, joined, as I firmly believe, to an early and inveterate hatred of one whose claims he considered as at variance with his own.”

“I am sorry to see you in such a temper,” said Captain Jekyl, calmly; “Lord Etherington, I trust, acted on very different motives than those you impute to him; and if you will but listen to me, perhaps something may be struck out which may accommodate these unhappy disputes.”

“Sir,” said Tyrrel, sitting down again, “I will listen to you with calmness, as I would remain calm under the probe of a surgeon tenting a festered wound. But when you touch me to the quick, when you prick the very nerve, you cannot expect me to endure without wincing.”

“I will endeavour, then, to be as brief in the operation as I can,” replied Captain Jekyl, who possessed the advantage of the most admirable composure during the whole conference. “I conclude, Mr. Tyrrel, that the peace, happiness, and honour of Miss Mowbray, are dear to you?”

“Who dare impeach her honour!” said Tyrrel, fiercely; then checking himself, added, in a more moderate tone, but one of deep feeling, “they are dear to me, sir, as my eyesight.”

“My friend holds them in equal regard,” said the Captain; “and has come to the resolution of doing her the most ample justice.”

“He can do her justice no otherwise, than by ceasing to haunt this neighbourhood, to think, to speak, even to dream of her.”

“Lord Etherington thinks otherwise,” said Captain Jekyl; “he believes that if Miss Mowbray has sustained any wrong at his hands, which, of course, I am not called upon to admit, it will be best repaired by the offer to share with her his title, his rank, and his fortune.”

“His title, rank, and fortune, sir, are as much a falsehood as he is himself,” said Tyrrel, with violence – “Marry Clara Mowbray? never!”

“My friend's fortune, you will observe,” replied Jekyl, “does not rest entirely upon the event of the lawsuit with which you, Mr. Tyrrel, now threaten him. – Deprive him, if you can, of the Oakendale estate, he has still a large patrimony by his mother; and besides, as to his marriage with Clara Mowbray, he conceives, that unless it should be the lady's wish to have the ceremony repeated to which he is most desirous to defer his own opinion, they have only to declare that it has already passed between them.”

“A trick, sir!” said Tyrrel, “a vile infamous trick! of which the lowest wretch in Newgate would be ashamed – the imposition of one person for another.”

“Of that, Mr. Tyrrel, I have seen no evidence whatever. The clergyman's certificate is clear – Francis Tyrrel is united to Clara Mowbray in the holy bands of wedlock – such is the tenor – there is a copy – nay, stop one instant, if you please, sir. You say there was an imposition in the case – I have no doubt but you speak what you believe, and what Miss Mowbray told you. She was surprised – forced in some measure from the husband she had just married – ashamed to meet her former lover, to whom, doubtless, she had made many a vow of love, and ne'er a true one – what wonder that, unsupported by her bridegroom, she should have changed her tone, and thrown all the blame of her own inconstancy on the absent swain? – A woman, at a pinch so critical, will make the most improbable excuse, rather than be found guilty on her own confession.”

“There must be no jesting in this case,” said Tyrrel, his cheek becoming pale, and his voice altered with passion.

“I am quite serious, sir,” replied Jekyl; “and there is no law court in Britain that would take the lady's word – all she has to offer, and that in her own cause – against a whole body of evidence direct and circumstantial, showing that she was by her own free consent married to the gentleman who now claims her hand. – Forgive me, sir – I see you are much agitated – I do not mean to dispute your right of believing what you think is most credible – I only use the freedom of pointing out to you the impression which the evidence is likely to make on the minds of indifferent persons.”