"Mr. Wilc.o.x, you remember our offer to place you in office in Alexandria?" he said.
"Certainly, sir," I answered.
"It has been a troublesome office," he continued, almost pettishly. "We sent out Mr. Forbes only six months ago, on account of his health, which required a warmer climate, and now his medical man reports that his life is not worth three weeks" purchase."
Upon Mr. Huntingdon"s face there rested an expression of profound anxiety; and as the secretary paused he addressed himself to me.
"Mr. Wilc.o.x," he said, "I have been soliciting, as a personal favour, that you should be sent out to take charge of the packet-agency, in order that my daughter may have some one at hand to befriend her, and manage her business affairs for her. You are not personally acquainted with her, but I know I can trust her with you."
"You may, Mr. Huntingdon," I said, warmly. "I will do anything I can to aid Mrs. Forbes. When do you wish me to start?"
"How soon can you be ready?" was the rejoinder.
"To-morrow morning."
I was not married then, and I antic.i.p.ated no delay in setting off. Nor was there any. I travelled with the overland mail through France to Ma.r.s.eilles, embarked in a vessel for Alexandria, and in a few days from the time I first heard of my destination set foot in the office there.
All the postal arrangements had fallen into considerable irregularity and confusion; for, as I was informed immediately on my arrival, Mr. Forbes had been in a dying condition for the last week, and of course the absence of a master had borne the usual results. I took formal possession of the office, and then, conducted by one of the clerks, I proceeded to the dwelling of the unfortunate postmaster and his no less unfortunate wife. It would be out of place in this narrative to indulge in any traveller"s tales about the strange place where I was so unexpectedly located. Suffice it to say, that the darkened sultry room into which I was shown, on inquiring for Mrs. Forbes, was bare of furniture, and dest.i.tute of all those little tokens of refinement and taste which make our English parlours so pleasant to the eye. There was, however, a piano in one of the dark corners of the room, open, and with a sheet of music on it. While I waited for Mrs. Forbes"s appearance, I strolled idly up to the piano to see what music it might be. The next moment my eye fell upon an antique red morocco workbox standing on the top of the piano-a workbox evidently, for the lid was not closely shut, and a few threads of silk and cotton were hanging out of it. In a kind of dream-for it was difficult to believe that the occurrence was a fact-I carried the box to the darkened window, and there, plain in my sight, was the device scratched upon the leather: the revolutionary symbol of a heart with a dagger through it. I had found the Premier"s despatch-box in the parlour of the packet-agent of Alexandria!
I stood for some minutes with that dream-like feeling upon me, gazing at the box in the dim obscure light. It could _not_ be real! My fancy must be playing a trick upon me! But the sound of a light step-for, light as it was, I heard it distinctly as it approached the room-broke my trance, and I hastened to replace the box on the piano, and to stoop down as if examining the music before the door opened. I had not sent in my name to Mrs. Forbes, for I did not suppose that she was acquainted with it, nor could she see me distinctly, as I stood in the gloom. But I could see her. She had the slight slender figure, the childlike face, and the fair hair of Miss Anne Clifton. She came quickly across the room, holding out both her hands in a childish appealing manner.
"O!" she wailed, in a tone that went straight to my heart, "he is dead!
He has just died!"
It was no time then to speak about the red morocco workbox. This little childish creature, who did not look a day older than when I had last seen her in my travelling post-office, was a widow in a strange land, far away from any friend save myself. I had brought her a letter from her father.
The first duties that devolved upon me were those of her husband"s interment, which had to take place immediately. Three or four weeks elapsed before I could, with any humanity, enter upon the investigation of her mysterious complicity in the daring theft practised on the government and the post-office.
I did not see the despatch-box again. In the midst of her new and vehement grief, Mrs. Forbes had the precaution to remove it before I was ushered again into the room where I had discovered it. I was at some trouble to hit upon any plan by which to gain a second sight of it; but I was resolved that Mrs. Forbes should not leave Alexandria without giving me a full explanation. We were waiting for remittances and instructions from England, and in the meantime the violence of her grief abated, and she recovered a good share of her old buoyancy and loveliness, which had so delighted me on my first acquaintance with her. As her demands upon my sympathy weakened, my curiosity grew stronger, and at last mastered me. I carried with me a netted purse which required mending, and I asked her to catch up the broken meshes while I waited for it.
"I will tell your maid to bring your workbox," I said, going to the door and calling the servant. "Your mistress has a red morocco workbox," I said to her, as she answered my summons.
"Yes, sir," she replied.
"Where is it?"
"In her bedroom," she said.
"Mrs. Forbes wishes it brought here." I turned back into the room. Mrs.
Forbes had gone deadly pale, but her eyes looked sullen, and her teeth were clenched under her lips with an expression of stubbornness. The maid brought the workbox. I walked, with it in my hands, up to the sofa where she was seated.
"You remember this mark?" I asked; "I think neither of us can ever forget it."
She did not answer by word, but there was a very intelligent gleam in her blue eyes.
"Now," I continued, softly, "I promised your father to befriend you, and I am not a man to forget a promise. But you must tell me the whole simple truth."
I was compelled to reason with her, and to urge her for some time. I confess I went so far as to remind her that there was an English consul at Alexandria, to whom I could resort. At last she opened her stubborn lips, and the whole story came out, mingled with sobs and showers of tears.
She had been in love with Alfred, she said, and they were too poor to marry, and papa would not hear of such a thing. She was always in want of money, she was kept so short; and they promised to give her such a great sum-a vast sum-five hundred pounds.
"But who bribed you?" I inquired.
A foreign gentleman whom she had met in London, called Monsieur Bonnard.
It was a French name, but she was not sure that he was a Frenchman. He talked to her about her father being a surveyor in the post-office, and asked her a great number of questions. A few weeks after, she met him in their own town by accident, she and Mr. Forbes; and Alfred had a long private talk with him, and they came to her, and told her she could help them very much. They asked her if she could be brave enough to carry off a little red box out of the travelling post-office, containing nothing but papers. After a while she consented. When she had confessed so much under compulsion, Mrs. Forbes seemed to take a pleasure in the narrative, and went on fluently.
"We required papa"s signature to the order, and we did not know how to get it. Luckily he had a fit of the gout, and was very peevish; and I had to read over a lot of official papers to him, and then he signed them. One of the papers I read twice, and slipped the order into its place after the second reading. I thought I should have died with fright; but just then he was in great pain, and glad to get his work over. I made an excuse that I was going to visit my aunt at Beckby, but instead of going there direct, we contrived to be at the station at Eaton a minute or two before the mail train came up. I kept outside the station door till we heard the whistle, and just then the postman came running down the road, and I followed him straight through the booking-office, and asked him to give you the order, which I put into his hand. He scarcely saw me. I just caught a glimpse of Monsieur Bonnard"s face through the window of the compartment next the van, when Alfred had gone. They had promised me that the train should stop at Camden-town, if I could only keep your attention engaged until then. You know how I succeeded."
"But how did you dispose of the box?" I asked. "You could not have concealed it about you; that I am sure of."
"Ah!" she said, "nothing was easier. Monsieur Bonnard had described the van to me, and you remember I put the box down at the end of the counter, close to the corner where I hid myself at every station. There was a door with a window in it, and I asked if I might have the window open, as the van was too warm for me. I believe Monsieur Bonnard could have taken it from me by only leaning through his window, but he preferred stepping out, and taking it from my hand, just as the train was leaving Watford-on the far side of the carriages, you understand. It was the last station, and the train came to a stand at Camden-town. After all, the box was not out of your sight more than twenty minutes before you missed it.
Monsieur Bonnard and I hurried out of the station, and Alfred followed us. The box was forced open-the lock has never been mended, for it was a peculiar one-and Monsieur Bonnard took possession of the papers. He left the box with me, after putting inside it a roll of notes. Alfred and I were married next morning, and I went back to my aunt"s; but we did not tell papa of our marriage for three or four months. That is the story of my red morocco workbox."
She smiled with the provoking mirthfulness of a mischievous child. There was one point still, on which my curiosity was unsatisfied.
"Did you know what the despatches were about?" I asked.
"O no!" she answered; "I never understood politics in the least. I knew nothing about them. Monsieur did not say a word; he did not even look at the papers while we were by. I would never, never, have taken a registered letter, or anything with money in it, you know. But all those papers could be written again quite easily. You must not think me a thief, Mr. Wilc.o.x; there was nothing worth money among the papers."
"They were worth five hundred pounds to you," I said. "Did you ever see Bonnard again?"
"Never again," she replied. "He said he was going to return to his native country. I don"t think Bonnard was his real name."
Most likely not, I thought; but I said no more to Mrs. Forbes. Once again I was involved in a great perplexity about this affair. It was clearly my duty to report the discovery at head-quarters, but I shrank from doing so. One of the chief culprits was already gone to another judgment than that of man; several years had obliterated all traces of Monsieur Bonnard; and the only victim of justice would be this poor little dupe of the two greater criminals. At last I came to the conclusion to send the whole of the particulars to Mr. Huntingdon himself; and I wrote them to him, without remark or comment.
The answer that came to Mrs. Forbes and me in Alexandria was the announcement of Mr. Huntingdon"s sudden death of some disease of the heart, on the day which I calculated would put him in possession of my communication. Mrs. Forbes was again overwhelmed with apparently heartrending sorrow and remorse. The income left to her was something less than one hundred pounds a year. The secretary of the post-office, who had been a personal friend of the deceased gentleman, was his sole executor; and I received a letter from him, containing one for Mrs.
Forbes, which recommended her, in terms not to be misunderstood, to fix upon some residence abroad, and not to return to England. She fancied she would like the seclusion and quiet of a convent; and I made arrangements for her to enter one in Malta, where she would still be under British protection. I left Alexandria myself on the arrival of another packet-agent; and on my return to London I had a private interview with the secretary. I found that there was no need to inform him of the circ.u.mstances I have related to you, as he had taken possession of all Mr. Huntingdon"s papers. In consideration of his ancient friendship, and of the escape of those who most merited punishment, he had come to the conclusion that it was quite as well to let bygones be bygones.
At the conclusion of the interview I delivered a message which Mrs.
Forbes had emphatically entrusted to me.
"Mrs. Forbes wished me to impress upon your mind," I said, "that neither she nor Mr. Forbes would have been guilty of this misdemeanour if they had not been very much in love with one another, and very much in want of money."
"Ah!" replied the secretary, with a smile, "if Cleopatra"s nose had been shorter, the fate of the world would have been different!"
NO. 5 BRANCH LINE THE ENGINEER
His name, sir, was Matthew Price; mine is Benjamin Hardy. We were born within a few days of each other; bred up in the same village; taught at the same school. I cannot remember the time when we were not close friends. Even as boys, we never knew what it was to quarrel. We had not a thought, we had not a possession, that was not in common. We would have stood by each other, fearlessly, to the death. It was such a friendship as one reads about sometimes in books: fast and firm as the great Tors upon our native moorlands, true as the sun in the heavens.
The name of our village was Chadleigh. Lifted high above the pasture flats which stretched away at our feet like a measureless green lake and melted into mist on the furthest horizon, it nestled, a tiny stone-built hamlet, in a sheltered hollow about midway between the plain and the plateau. Above us, rising ridge beyond ridge, slope beyond slope, spread the mountainous moor-country, bare and bleak for the most part, with here and there a patch of cultivated field or hardy plantation, and crowned highest of all with ma.s.ses of huge grey crag, abrupt, isolated, h.o.a.ry, and older than the deluge. These were the Tors-Druids" Tor, King"s Tor, Castle Tor, and the like; sacred places, as I have heard, in the ancient time, where crownings, burnings, human sacrifices, and all kinds of b.l.o.o.d.y heathen rites were performed. Bones, too, had been found there, and arrow-heads, and ornaments of gold and gla.s.s. I had a vague awe of the Tors in those boyish days, and would not have gone near them after dark for the heaviest bribe.
I have said that we were born in the same village. He was the son of a small farmer, named William Price, and the eldest of a family of seven; I was the only child of Ephraim Hardy, the Chadleigh blacksmith-a well-known man in those parts, whose memory is not forgotten to this day.
Just so far as a farmer is supposed to be a bigger man than a blacksmith, Mat"s father might be said to have a better standing than mine; but William Price, with his small holding and his seven boys, was, in fact, as poor as many a day-labourer; whilst the blacksmith, well-to-do, bustling, popular, and open-handed, was a person of some importance in the place. All this, however, had nothing to do with Mat and myself. It never occurred to either of us that his jacket was out at elbows, or that our mutual funds came altogether from my pocket. It was enough for us that we sat on the same school-bench, conned our tasks from the same primer, fought each other"s battles, screened each other"s faults, fished, nutted, played truant, robbed orchards and birds" nests together, and spent every half-hour, authorised or stolen, in each other"s society.
It was a happy time; but it could not go on for ever. My father, being prosperous, resolved to put me forward in the world. I must know more, and do better, than himself. The forge was not good enough, the little world of Chadleigh not wide enough, for me. Thus it happened that I was still swinging the satchel when Mat was whistling at the plough, and that at last, when my future course was shaped out, we were separated, as it then seemed to us, for life. For, blacksmith"s son as I was, furnace and forge, in some form or other, pleased me best, and I chose to be a working engineer. So my father by-and-by apprenticed me to a Birmingham iron-master; and, having bidden farewell to Mat, and Chadleigh, and the grey old Tors in the shadow of which I had spent all the days of my life, I turned my face northward, and went over into "the Black Country."
I am not going to dwell on this part of my story. How I worked out the term of my apprenticeship; how, when I had served my full time and become a skilled workman, I took Mat from the plough and brought him over to the Black Country, sharing with him lodging, wages, experience-all, in short, that I had to give; how he, naturally quick to learn and brimful of quiet energy, worked his way up a step at a time, and came by-and-by to be a "first hand" in his own department; how, during all these years of change, and trial, and effort, the old boyish affection never wavered or weakened, but went on, growing with our growth and strengthening with our strength-are facts which I need do no more than outline in this place.