Читать книгу Cradock Nowell (Vol. 1-3) - R. D. Blackmore - Страница 25

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Mark Stote, the head–gamekeeper on the Nowelhurst estate, was a true and honest specimen of the West Saxon peasant—slow, tenacious, and dogged, faithful and affectionate, with too much deference, perhaps, to all who seemed “his betters”. He was now about fifty years old, but sturdy and active as ever, with a weather–beaten face and eyes always in quest of something. His home was a lonely cottage in one of the plantations, and there he had a tidy and very intelligent wife, and a host of little anxieties. His children, the sparrow–hawks, the weasels, the young fellows who “called theirselves under–keepers, and all they kept was theirselves, sir”—what with these troubles, and (worst, perhaps, of all) that nest of charcoal–burners by the bustle–headed oak, with Black Will at the head of them, sometimes, Mark Stote would assure us, his head was gone “all wivvery[1] like”, and he could get no sleep of night–time.

A mizzly, drizzly rain set in before the poor people got home that evening with the body of Clayton Nowell. Long mournful soughs of wind ensued, the boughs of the trees went heavily, and it blew half a gale before morning; but it takes a real storm to penetrate some parts of the forest. Once, however, let the storm get in, and it makes the most of the opportunity, raging with triple fury, as a lion does in a compound—the rage of the imperious blast, when it finds no exit.

In the grey of the morning, two men met, face to face, in the overhanging of the Coffin Wood. Which was the more scared of the two, neither could have said; although each felt a little pleased at the terror of the other. The one of strong nerves was superstitious; the other, though free from much superstition, was nervous under the circumstances. The tall and big man was Mark Stote, the little fellow who frightened him Dr. Rufus Hutton. The latter, of course was the first to recover presence of mind, for Mark Stoteʼs mental locomotion was of ponderous metal.

“What brings you here, Mr. Stote, at this time of the morning”?

“And what brings you here, Dr. Hutton”?

Mark might have asked with equal reason. He wondered afterwards why he did not; the wonder would have been if he had. As it was, he only said—

“To see the rights o’ my young meester, sir”.

“The wrongs, you mean”, said Rufus; “Mark Stote, there is more in this matter than any man yet has guessed at”.

“You be down upon the truth of it, my word for it but you be, sir. Iʼve a shot along o’ both of ’em, since ’em wor that haigh, and seeʼd how they thought of their guns, sir; Meester Clayton wor laike enough to shoot Meester Cradock ’xidentually; but never wicey warse, sir, as the parson sayeth, never wicey warse, sir, for I niver see no one so cartious laike”.

“Mark Stote, do you mean to say that Cradock shot his brother on purpose”?

Mark stared at Rufus for several moments, then he thrust forth his broad brown hand and seized him by the collar. Dr. Hutton felt that he was nothing in that big manʼs grasp, but he would not play the coward.

“Stote, let me go this instant. Iʼll have you discharged this very day unless you beg my pardon”.

“That you moy then, if you can, meester. A leetle chap coom fram Ingy, an’ we bin two hunner and feefty year ’long o’ the squire and his foregoers”! Nevertheless he let Rufus go, and looked over his hat indignantly.

“You are an honest fellow”, cried Hutton, when he got his breath again; “an uncommonly honest fellow, although in great need of enlightenment. It is not in my nature, my man”, here he felt like a patron, getting over his shaking, so elastic was his spirit; “I assure you, Luke—ah no, your name is Matthew; upon my word, I beg your pardon, I am almost sure it is Mark—Mr. Mark, I shall do my utmost for your benefit. Now talk no more, but act, Mark”.

“I oodnʼt a talked nothing, but for mating with your honour”.

“Then resume your taciturnity, which I see is habitual with you, and perhaps constitutional”.

Mark Stote felt sore all over. Dr. Hutton now was the collarer. Mark, in his early childhood, had been to school for a fortnight, and ran away with a sense of rawness, which any big word renewed.

“Mr. Stote, I will thank you to search in that direction, while I investigate this way”.

Mark Stote longed to suggest that possibly Dr. Hutton, being (as you might say) a foreigner, was not so well skilled in examining ground as a woodman of thirty years’ standing; and therefore that he, old Mark, should have the new part assigned to him, before it was trampled by Rufus. But the gamekeeper knew not how to express it; sure though he was (as all of us are, when truth hits the heart like a hammer) that something evil would come of slurring the matter so feebly. But who are we to blame him?—we who transport a poor ignorant girl for trying to hide her ignominy, while we throttle, before she can cry, babe Truth, who should be received in society with a “Welcome, little stranger”!

With the heavy rain–drops hanging like leeches, or running together, as they do, at every thorn or scale of the bark, seeking provocation to come down the nape of the neck of any man, Rufus Hutton went creeping under, trying not to irritate them, pretending that he was quite at home, and understood them like a jungle. Nevertheless he repented, and did not thoroughly search more than ten square yards. The things would knock him so in the face, and the stumps would stick in his trousers so, and the drops were so bad for his rheumatism; and, as it was quite impossible for any man to make way there, what on earth was there to look for?

In spite of all this, he did find something, and stowed it away in his waistcoat pocket, to be spoken of, or otherwise, according to the turn of events. And by this he meant no dishonesty, at least in his own opinion, only he pitied young Cradock most deeply, and would do all he could in his favour. At the side of the narrow by–path leading from that woodmanʼs track (by which John Rosedew had approached) into the far depth of the thicket, Dr. Hutton found, under a blackberry–bush, a little empty tube, unlike any tube he had seen before. It was about two inches and a half in length, and three–fourths of an inch in diameter. Sodden as it was with the rain, and opened partway along the seam, it still retained, unmistakably, the smell of exploded powder. It seemed to be made of mill–board, or some other form of paper, with a glaze upon the outside and some metal foil at the butt of it. What puzzled Rufus most of all was a little cylinder passing into and across the bottom, something like a boot–tag.

Dr. Hutton was not at this time skilled in modern gunnery. He knew how to load a fowling–piece, and what the difference was between a flint–gun and a percussion–gun; moreover, he had been out shooting once or twice in India, not from any love of the sport, but to oblige his neighbours. So he thought himself both acute and learned in arriving at the conclusion that this was a cartridge–case.

“Mark, does Mr. Cradock Nowell generally shoot with cartridges”?

“He laiketh mostways to be with a curtreege in his toard barryel, sir”.

“Oh, keeps a cartridge in his left barrel, does he; and fires first the right, I suppose”?

Leaving Mark to continue the search, Rufus returned to the Hall, after carefully taking the distances between certain important points. He was bound, as he felt, to lose no time in making the strictest examination of the poor youthʼs body. For now, in this great calamity, the management of everything seemed to fall upon Rufus Hutton. Sir Cradock, of course, was overwhelmed; John Rosedew, although so deeply distressed, for the boys were like his own to him, was ready to do his utmost; but, as every one knew, except himself, he was not a man of the world. Unluckily, too, Mr. Garnet, always the leading spirit wherever he appeared, had not yet presented himself in this keen emergency. But his son came up, in the course of the day, to ask how Sir Cradock Nowell was, and to say that his father was quite laid up with a violent bilious attack.

Dr. Hutton worked very hard, kept his mind on the stretch continually, ordered every one right and left. He even contrived to repulse all the kindred, to the twentieth collateral, who were flocking in, that day, to rejoice at the manhood of the heir. From old Hogstaff, who knew all the family, kith and kin, and friends and enemies, he learned the names of the guests expected, and met them with laconic missives handed through the closed gates at the lodges. In many cases, it is to be feared, indignation overcame sympathy; “upstart insolence”! was heard through the clatter of carriage–windows, very nearly as often as, “most sad occurrence”! However, most of them were consoled by the prospect of learning everything at the inquest on the morrow. What could be clearer than that Cradock must be hanged for Claytonʼs murder? The disgrace would kill the old baronet. “And then, it would be very painful, but my wife would be bound, sir, for the sake of her poor children, to prove her direct descent from that well–known Sir Cradock Nowell, who shot a man in the New Forest. Ah, I fear it runs in the family”.

But their wrath was most unphilosophical, unworthy of any moralists, when they found that Rufus had cheated them all as to the time of the inquest. In every direction he spread a report that the coroner could not attend until three oʼclock on Friday, while he had arranged very quietly to begin the proceedings at noon. And he had taken good care to secure the presence of all the chief men in the neighbourhood—the magistrates, the old friends of the family, all who were interested in its honour rather than in its possessions. As none of the baffled cousins could solace themselves with outcry that the matter had been hushed up, they discovered that kind feeling had made the scene too sad for them.

The coroner sat in the principal room at the “Nowell Arms”; the jury had been to see the body lying at the Hall, and now were to hear the evidence. Six or seven of the county magistrates sat behind the coroner, and their clerk was with them. Of course they did not attend officially, their jurisdiction being entirely several from that of the present court. But there could be little doubt that their action would depend, in a great measure, upon what should now transpire.

The jury was chosen carefully to preclude, so far as might be, the charge of private influence. They were known, for the most part, as men of independence and probity, and two of them as consistent enemies to the influence of the Hall. As for general spectators, only a few of the village–folk allowed their curiosity to conquer their good feeling, or, perhaps, I should say their discretion; for all were tenants under Sir Cradock; and, though it was known by this time that Bull Garnet was ill and in bed, prostrated by one of his old attacks, everybody felt certain that he would find out who dared to be present, and visit them pretty smartly.

It would be waste of time to recount all the evidence given; for we know nearly all that Dr. Hutton and the clergyman would depose. Another medical man, Dr. Gall, had also examined poor Claytonʼs remains; and the healing profession, who cure us (like bacon) after they have killed us, are remarkable for agreeing in public, and quarrelling sadly in private life. So Dr. Gall deposed exactly as Mr. Hutton had done. He was very emphatic towards Rufus, in the use of the proper prefix; but we who know the skill displayed presuppose the game certificate.

One part, however, of the medical evidence ought to be repeated. Poor Clayton had not died from an ordinary small–shot wound or wounds, but from a ghastly hole through his throat, cut as if by a bullet. As Dr. Gall, who knew something of guns, very concisely put it, the hole was like the hole in a door, when boys have fired, as they sometimes do, a tallow–candle through it. And yet it was fluted at the exit, in the fleshy part of the neck, as no bullet could have marked it. That was caused by the shot diverging, beginning to radiate, perhaps from the opposition encountered.

“In two words”, said Dr. Gall, when they had badgered him in his evidence, “the deceased was killed either by a balled cartridge, or by a charge of loose shot fired within six feet of him”.

“Very good”, thought Rufus Hutton, who heard all Dr. Gall said; “Iʼll keep my cartridge–case to myself. Poor Crad shanʼt have that against him”.

Hereupon, lest any mist (which goddesses abound in, vide Homer passim) descend upon the eyes or mind of any gentle follower of my poor Craddyʼs fortunes, let me endeavour to explain Dr. Gallʼs obscurities.

Cartridges, as used by sportsmen with guns which load at the muzzle, are packages of shot compact, and rammed down in a body. Some of them have spiral cases of the finest wire, covered round with paper; others, used for shorter distance, have only cylinders of paper to enclose the shot. The interstices between the shots are solidified with sawdust. The only use of these things is—for they save little time in loading—to kill our brother bipeds, or quadrupeds, if such we are, at a longer distance. The shots are prevented from scattering so widely as they love to do, when freed from the barrelʼs repression. They fly in a closer body, their expansive instincts being checked, when first they leave the muzzle, by the constraint of the case and the tightness of their brotherhood. But it sometimes happens, mainly with wire–cartridges, that the shot can never burst its cerements, and flies in the compass of a slug, until it meets an obstacle. When this is so, the quarry escapes; unless a bullet so aimed would have hit it. This non–expansion is called, in good English, the “balling” of the cartridge. And those which are used for the longest distance, and for wild–fowl shooting—green cartridges, as they are called, containing larger shot—are especially apt to ball.

Dr. Gall was aware, of course, that no one beating for a woodcock would think of putting a green cartridge into his gun at all; but it seemed very likely indeed that Cradock might have used a blue one, for a longer shot with his left barrel; and the blue ones, having wire round them, sometimes ball, though not so often as their verdant brothers. It only remains to be said that when a cartridge balls, it flies with the force, as well as in the compass, of a bullet. With three drachms of powder behind it, it will cut a hole at forty yards through a two–inch deal.

Whether it were a balled cartridge or a charge of loose shot at six feet distance, was the momentous issue. In the former case, there would be fair reason to set it down as an accident; for the place where Cradock had first been seen was thirty yards from Clayton; and he might so have shot him thence, in the dusk, and through the thick of the covert. But if that poor boy had died from a common charge of shot, “Murder” was the only verdict true men could return on the evidence set before them. For Cradock must have fired wilfully at the open throat of his brother, then flown to the hedge and acted horror when he saw John Rosedew. Where was Cradock? The jury trembled, and so did Rufus Hutton. The coroner repeated the question, although he had no right to do it, at that stage of the evidence.

“Since it occurred he has not been seen”, whispered Rufus Hutton at last, knowing how men grow impatient and evil when unanswered.

“Let us proceed with the rest of the evidence”, said his honour, grandly; “if the young man cares for his reputation, he will be here by–and–by. But I have ridden far to–day. Let us have some refreshment, gentlemen. Justice must not be hurried”.