A Changed Heart: A Novel

"She's killed, Rob Nettleby! She's murdered!" Midge cried, rushing headlong from the room; "but he can't have got far. I heard him going out. Come!"

She was down the stairs with wonderful speed, followed by the horrified Nettleby. Midge unlocked and flung open the hall-door, and rushed in the same headlong way out. There was a man under the trees, and he was running. With the spring of a tigress Midge was upon him, her hands clutching his collar, and her dreadful yell of "Murder!" piercing the stillness of the night. The grasp of those powerful hands was not to be easily shaken off, and Rob Nettleby laid hold of him on the other side. Their prisoner made no resistance; he was too utterly taken by surprise to do other than stand and stare at them both.

"You villain! you robber! you murderer!" screamed Midge, giving him a furious shake. "You'll hang for this night's work, if anybody hung yet! Hold him fast, Rob, while I go and send your brother to Speckport after the p'lice."

The address broke the spell that held their captive quiet. Indignantly endeavoring to shake off the hands that held him, he angrily demanded what they meant.

Rob Nettleby, with a shout of astonishment, released his hold – he had recognized the voice. Midge, too, loosed her grasp, and backed a step or two, and Charley Marsh, stepping from under the shadow of the trees into the moonlight, repeated his question with some asperity.

"Charley!" Midge gasped, more horror-stricken by the recognition than she had been by the murder.

"What the deuce is the matter, Nettleby?" Charley demanded, impatiently. "What is all this row about?"

"There has been a murder done," said the young man, so confounded by the discovery as to be scarcely able to speak.

"Mrs. Leroy has been murdered!"

Charley recoiled with a white face.

"Murdered! Good heavens! When? By whom?"

"To-night – just now."

He did not answer the last query – he thought it superfluous. To his mind, Charley Marsh was as good as caught in the act.

"And Nathalie! Where is she? Is she safe?"

"She is in Lady Leroy's room."

Charley only waited for the answer, and made a precipitate rush for the house. The other two followed, neither daring to look at the other or speak – followed him up-stairs and into the chamber of the tragedy. All was as it had been. The ghastly and discolored face of the murdered woman was there, even the pillow, horrible to look at. But going partly across a chair as she had fallen, all her golden hair tossed about in loose disorder, and her face white, and fixed, and cold as marble, Nathalie lay near the center of the room. There, by herself, where the dreadful sight had first struck her, she had fainted entirely away.

CHAPTER XVII.

FOUND GUILTY

Mr. Val Blake sat in his office, in that inner room sacred to his privacy. He sat at that littered table, writing and scissoring, for they went to press that day, and the editor of the Speckport Spouter was over head-and-ears in work. He had just completed an item and was slowly reperusing it. It begins in a startling manner enough:

"Mysterious murder! The night before last a most shocking tragedy occurred at Redmon House, being no less than the robbery and murder of a lady well known in our town, Mrs. Leroy. The deceased owned and occupied the house, together with her ward, Miss Nathalie Marsh, and one female servant. About eleven o'clock on the night of the 15th, this servant was alarmed by the sound of footsteps on the stairs, and aroused a young man, Robert Nettleby, who chanced to be staying in the house, and they proceeded together to discover the cause. On entering the chamber occupied by Mrs. Leroy, they found her dead; the protruding tongue and eyeballs, and purple visage, telling plainly her death had been caused by strangulation. A box, containing a large sum of money, eight thousand pounds, we believe, was found broken open and rifled. The assassin escaped, and no clue to him has as yet been discovered, but we trust the inquest which is to be held on the premises this morning will throw some light on the subject. It is a most inhuman affair, and, we are sure, no effort will be wanting on the part of the officials concerned to root out the heart of the matter, and punish the barbarous perpetrator as he deserves!"

Mr. Blake read this last neatly-rounded period with a complacent face, and then pulled out his watch.

"Ten o'clock!" he muttered, "and the inquest commences in half an hour. Busy or not busy, I must be present."

Speckport was in a state of unprecedented excitement. A murder – and people did murder one another sometimes, even in Speckport – always set the town wild for a week. Even the civic elections were nothing to it; and there having been a dearth of bloodshed lately, the tragedy at Redmon was greedily devoured in all its details. Like a rolling snowball, small enough at first, but increasing as it goes along, the story of the robbery and murder had grown, until, had Midge heard the recital, as correctly received in the town, she would have stared aghast. Crowds had flocked up Redmon Road the whole of that livelong day following the murder, and gazed with open-mouthed awe on the gloomy and lonely old house – gloomier and lonelier than ever now. Crowds were pouring up still. One would think from their morbid curiosity they expected the old house to have undergone some wonderful transformation. The Speckport picnics were nothing to it.

Mr. Blake, going along at his customary swinging pace, speedily reached No. 14 Great St. Peter Street, and letting himself in with his latch-key, went up-stairs to his sleeping-apartment, to make some alteration in his toilet before proceeding to Redmon. There was no one in the house; for Miss Blake had been absent on a visit to some friend out of town for the past few days, and Val took his meals at a restaurant. Thinking himself alone, therefore, Mr. Blake, standing before the glass, adjusting an obstinate and painfully stiff collar, was not a little surprised to hear the street-door open and shut with a slam, then a rapid rush up-stairs, a strong rustling of silk in the passage, and his own door flung violently open. Mr. Blake turned round and beheld his sister, in a state of perspiration, her face red with heat and haste, anger in her eyes and in every rustle of her silk gown.

"It's not true, Val!" she burst out, before that gentleman could speak; "it can't be true! They never can have been such a pack of fools!"

"What can't be true? Who's a pack of fools?"

"All Speckport! Do you mean to say they've really gone and taken up Charley Marsh?"

"Oh, is that it?" said Mr. Blake, returning to his toilet. "They haven't taken him up that I know of. What brings you home? I thought you weren't coming until Saturday."

"And do you mean to say you thought I could stop one moment after I heard that poor old thing was dead, and Charley Marsh taken up for it. If you can be unfeeling and cold-blooded," said Miss Jo, turning from deep pink to brightest scarlet, "I can't."

"My dear Jo, don't make such a howling! Charley Marsh isn't taken up, I tell you."

"But he's suspected, isn't he? Doesn't all Speckport point at him as the murderer? Isn't he held to appear at the inquest? Tell me that."

"Yes," said Mr. Blake, looking critically at his cravat, "he is. Is that collar straight, Jo?"

Miss Jo's only answer was a withering look.

"And he can talk of collars at such a time! And he pretended he used to be a friend of that poor boy!"

"Don't be a fool, Jo," said Val, testily. "What can I do? I don't accuse him!"

"You don't accuse him!" retorted Miss Jo, with sneering emphasis. "That's very good of you, indeed, Mr. Blake! Oh no, you don't accuse, but you stand up there, like – like a cold-blooded kangaroo" (Miss Blake could think of no better simile in the heat of the moment) "fixing your collar, while all Speckport's down on him, and no one to take his part! You won't accuse him, indeed! Hadn't you better run up and do it now? Where's Natty? Answer me that."

Miss Jo turned so fiercely upon her brother with this query that Mr. Blake wilted at once.

"At home with her mother!"

"Poor dear girl!" and here Miss Jo softened into tears; "poor dear child! What a shock for her! How does she bear it?"

"She has been ill and hysterical ever since. They don't suppose she will be able to give evidence at the inquest."

"Poor dear Natty! And how does Mrs. Marsh take it?"

"Very hard. Betsy Ann had to run to the nearest druggist's for fourpence-worth of smelling-salts, and she has been rocking, and reading, and smelling at it ever since."

"Ah, poor dear!" said sympathetic Miss Jo, whose first fury had subsided. "Does she know they suspect Charley?"

"Of course not. Who would tell her that? Oh, I say, Joanna, you haven't heard that about Miss Rose, have you?"

"What about Miss Rose? Nobody suspects her of the murder, do they?"

"Not exactly! She is going away."

"Going where?"

"To England! – hand me that vest, Jo – with Mrs. Major Wheatly."

Miss Jo sat agape at the tidings.

"It is very sudden," said Val, getting into his Sunday waistcoat. "Miss Rose had notice of it day before yesterday – it was that night, the night of that terrible affair at Redmon, you know, that it was proposed to her. She declined then, although the terms were double what she gets now, and the work very much less; but yesterday afternoon she accepted."

"She did! What made her change her mind?"

"Well, Mrs. Marsh told her, I believe, that now Lady Leroy was gone, and Nathalie come into her fortune, there would no longer be any need to keep the school, and that, in point of fact, it would break up. Of course, Miss Rose at once accepted the other offer, and leaves in a very few days."

"Direct for England?"

"Yes, that is to say, by way of Quebec. Mrs. Major Wheatly is a very great lady, and must have a companion for herself, and a governess for her little girl, and Miss Rose suits to a T. It's a very good thing for the little school-mistress, but she will be missed here. The poor looked upon her as an angel sent direct from heaven, to make their clothes and buy their blankets, and look after them when sick, and teach their young ones for nothing."

"Well, I am sure! I declare, Val, I'm sorry! She was the nicest little thing!"

"So she was," said Val, "and now I'm off! Don't you go howling about the town, Jo, and making a fuss about Marsh; if he is innocent, he will come out all square – don't you be afraid."

"If!" screamed Miss Blake; but her brother was clattering down-stairs half a dozen steps at a time, and already out of hearing.

Droves of people were still flocking out the Redmon road, raising blinding clouds of dust, and discussing the only subject proper to be discussed then in Speckport. Val's long strides outstripped all competitors; and arriving at the red brick house, presently ran the blockade of a group of some two hundred idlers, and strode into the house as one having authority. As Mr. Blake entered, Dr. Leach stepped forward and joined him, with a very grave face.

"How are they getting on?" Val asked.

"They are getting on fast enough," the doctor answered, in a dissatisfied tone. "They've been examining me. I had to describe that last interview with her," jerking his thumb toward the ceiling, "and prove to their satisfaction she came to her death by strangling, and in no other way. They had Natty up there, too."

"Oh, she is better, then."

"Not much! but she had very little to tell, and Laura Blair has driven her off again. They have detained Mrs. Marsh – she does not know for what, though – and will examine her presently."

"To find out the cause of Charley's absence from home that night! Do you know, doctor, I begin to think things look black for Charley."

"Ah! you might say so?" said Dr. Leach, with a significant nod, "if you knew what I do."

Val looked at him.

"What you do! Do you mean or pretend to say – "

"There! there! there! Don't speak so loud. I may tell you, Blake – you're a friend of his and would do nothing against him. Read that."

He handed him a note. Val read it with a blank face. It was the note sent by Cherrie to Charley, which Ann had told him of, and a verbatim copy of that given Cherrie by Captain Cavendish.

"How did you get this?" Val asked, with a still whiter face.

"It was sent by that gadfly, Cherrie, to the shop, the evening of the murder. Her sister brought it, and, Marsh being out, gave it to the boy. Now, what do you think the young rascal did? Why, sir, broke it open the minute the girl's back was turned, and read it. As luck would have it, I pounced in and caught him in the act. You ought to have seen his face, Blake! I took the note from him and read it myself, not knowing it was for Marsh, and I have it ever since. I meant to give it to him next day, and tell him what I have told you; but next day came the news of the murder, and underhand whispers of his guilt. Now, Val, what do you think of it? Isn't the allusion to Lady Leroy's money plain enough?"

"That bit of paper might hang him," Val emphatically said, handing it back. "What do you mean to do with it?"

"There is only one thing I can do with it, as a conscientious man – and that is, hand it over to the coroner. I like the boy, but I like justice more, and will do my duty. If we only had that Cherrie here, she might throw some light on the business."

"What can she mean by that allusion to state-rooms?" said Val. "Can they have meant to run off together in the steamer, and was Greentown only a ruse? I know Charley has been spooney about her this long time, and would be capable of marrying her at a moment's notice."

"Blake, do you know I have been thinking she is hiding somewhere not far off, and has the money. The police should be set on her track at once."

"They will, when that note is produced. But, doctor, you seem to take it for granted that Charley is guilty."

"How can I help it? Isn't the evidence strong enough?"

"Circumstantial, doctor, circumstantial. It seems hard to believe Charley Marsh a murderer."

"So it does, but Scripture and history, ever since the times of King David, are full of parallel cases. Think of the proof – think of this note, and tell me what you infer candidly yourself."

"The note is a staggerer, but still – Oh, hang it!" cried Mr. Blake, impatiently, "I won't believe him guilty as long as I can help it. Does he say nothing in is own defense?"

"Not a syllable, and the coroner and jury are all in his favor, too. He stands there like a sulky lion, and says nothing. They'll bring him in guilty without a doubt."

"Who have been examined?"

"All who saw Lady Leroy that day – Miss Marsh, Midge, myself, Lawyer Darcy, and Tom Oaks, who swore roundly when asked that Marsh knew of his paying the money that day, for he had told him himself. He also swore that he knew Charley to be over head and ears in debt – debts of honor, he called them. Debts of dishonor, I should say."

"I think I'll go in! Can we speak to Charley, I wonder?"

"Of course. He is not held precisely as a prisoner, as yet. They have Midge up again. I never knew her name was Priscilla Short, until to-day."

"What do they want with her a second time?"

"She was the first to discover the murder. Her evidence goes clear against Marsh, though she gives it with the greatest reluctance. Come, I'll go in with you."

The two gentlemen went in together, and found the assemblage smiling at some rebut of Midge's. That witness, with a very red and defiant face, was glaring at the coroner, who, in rather a subdued tone, told her that would do, and proceeded to call the next witness, Robert Nettleby.

Robert Nettleby took his place, and was sworn. In reply to the questions put to him, he informed his hearers that he had heard nothing until the yells of Midge aroused him from sleep, and, following her up-stairs, he found her in Miss Marsh's room.

"Had Miss Marsh retired?" the coroner wanted to know.

Mr. Nettleby was not sure. If, by retiring, the coroner meant going to bed, no; but if he meant going asleep, yes. She was sitting by the window, dressed, but asleep, until Midge aroused her by her screams. Then she started up, and followed them into the room of Mrs. Leroy, whom they found dead, and black in the face, as if she had been choked. Midge had run down stairs, and he had run after her, and they saw some one running under the trees, when they got out. Midge had flown out and collared him, and it proved to be Mr. Charley Marsh.

Here the coroner struck in.

"He was running, you say: in what direction?"

Mr. Nettleby couldn't say positively – was inclined to think he was running toward, not from them. Couldn't swear either way, for it was a queer, shadowy kind of a night, half moonlight, half darkness. They had all three gone back to the house, Mr. Marsh appearing very much shocked at hearing of the murder; and on returning to the room of the deceased, had found Miss Marsh in a fainting-fit. They brought her to with water, and then her brother had taken her to her mother's house in Speckport, in a gig. He and Midge had gone to his father's cottage, where they had remained all night. Further than that Mr. Nettleby knew nothing, except – and here he hesitated.

"Except what, sir?" the coroner sharply inquired. "Remember you are upon oath."

"Well, sir," said Bob, "it isn't much, except that when we came back to the room, I picked this up close to the bed. It looked as if it belonged to a man, and I put it in my pocket. Here it is."

He produced from his coat-pocket, as he spoke, a glove. A gentleman's kid glove, pale-brown in color, and considerably soiled with wear. Val started as he saw it, for those were the kind of gloves Charley Marsh always wore – he had them made to order in one of the stores of the town. The coroner examined it with a very grave face – there were two letters inside, "C. M."

"Do you know to whom this glove belongs?" the coroner asked.

"I know I found it," said Nettleby, not looking at it, and speaking sulkily, "that's all I know about it."

"Does any one you know wear such gloves?"

"Plenty of gentlemen I've seen wear brown kid gloves."

"Have you seen the initials, 'C. M.,' inside this glove?"

"I have."

"And – on your oath, recollect – are you not morally certain you know its owner?"

Nettleby was silent.

"Speak, witness," the coroner cried; "answer the question put to you. Who do you suspect is the owner of this glove?"

"Mr. Marsh! Them letters stands for his name, and he always wears them kind of gloves."

"Had Mr. Marsh been near the bed, after your return to the room together, before you found this glove?"

"No; I found it lying close by the bedside, and he had never been nearer than the middle of the room, where he was trying to fetch his sister to."

Robert Nettleby was told he might stand down, and Mr. Marsh was called upon to identify his property. Charley, who had been standing at one of the windows listening, in gloomy silence, and closely watched by two policemen, stepped forward, took the glove, examined it, handed it back, and coldly owned it was his.

How was he going to account for its being found by the bedside of the murdered woman?

Mr. Marsh was not going to account for it at all – he knew nothing about it. He always had two or three such pairs of gloves at once, and had never missed this. Amid an ominous silence, he resumed his place at the window, staring out at the broad green fields and waving trees, bathed in the golden August sunshine, and seeing them no more than if he had been stone-blind.

Mrs. Marsh was the next witness called, and came from an adjoining room, dressed in black, and simpering at finding herself the cynosure of so many eyes. Mrs. Marsh folded one black-kid-gloved hand over the other after being sworn, with a mild sigh, and prepared to answer the catechism about to be propounded. The coroner began wide of the mark, and asked her a good many questions, that seemed to have little bearing on the matter in hand, all of which the lady answered very minutely, and at length. Presently, in a somewhat roundabout fashion, he inquired if her son had been at home on the night of the murder.

"No; he not been at home, at least not until he had come driving home with Natty, both of them as pale as ghosts, and no wonder, though they quite made her scream to look at them; but when she had heard the news, she had such a turn, it was a mercy she hadn't fainted herself, and she hadn't half got over it yet."

Here Mrs. Marsh took a sniff at a smelling-bottle she carried, and the ammonia being strong, brought a tear into each eye, which she wiped away with a great show of pocket-handkerchief.

"What time had her son left the house before returning with his sister?"

"After tea. He had been home to tea, which in itself was so unusual a circumstance, that she, Mrs. Marsh, felt sure something was going to happen. She had had a feeling on her all day, and Charley's conduct had increased that feeling until she was perfectly convinced something dreadful was going to happen."

"In what manner had her son's conduct augmented her presentiments?"

"Well, she did not know exactly, but Charley had behaved odd. He had come over and talked to her before going out, telling her he had been bad, but meant to be good, and turn over a new leaf for the future; and, bidding her take his part if ever she heard him run down, which she meant to do, for Charley was a good boy as ever lived, in the main, only he had been foolish lately; but mothers, it is well known, can forgive anything, and she meant to do it; and if he, the coroner, was a mother, she would do it herself."

"Was her son in the habit of stopping out nights?"

"Not until lately; that is, within the last two weeks, since when he used to come home in a dreadful state of drink, worrying her nearly to death, and letting all her advice go in one ear and out of the other."

Mrs. Marsh was shown the glove, and asked if she knew it. Yes, of course she did; it was one of Charley's; he always wore those kind, and his initials were inside. The coroner examined her further, but only got wordy repetitions of what she had already said. Everything was telling terribly against Charley, who stood, like a dark ghost, still moodily staring out of the window. Val Blake crossed over and laid his hand heavily on his shoulder as Mrs. Marsh left the room.

"Charley, old boy! have you nothing at all to say for yourself?"

Charley lifted his gloomy eyes, but turned away again in sullen silence.

"You know they will charge you with this crime, and you know you are not guilty. Can you not prove yourself innocent?"

"How? Will they take my word for it?"

"Explain why you were found in the grounds at that hour of the night."

"They have already asked me to do so, and I have already declined."

"But this is folly – this is madness! What motive could you possibly have for being there at such an hour?"

Charley was silent. Val laid his hand on his shoulder with a kindly look.

"Charley, will you not tell me?"

"No."

"You know I am your friend."

"You will not be so long. Those fellows over there will settle the matter shortly to their own satisfaction, and I am not going to spoil their sport."

"Charley," said Val, looking him steadily in the face, "where is Cherrie?"

Charley Marsh's face, white and haggard an instant previously, turned scarlet, and from scarlet whiter than before. But he lifted his eyes fearlessly to Val's face, roused to eagerness at last.

"Where is she?" he repeated. "Do you know?"

"No; but I think you do."

"Why do you think so?"

"That's not the question! Where is she?"

"I don't know."

"What!"

"I don't know. I tell you I don't! She is a false-hearted, lying, treacherous – "

His face was white with fury. His name, called by the coroner, restored him to himself. Turning round, he saw that gentleman holding out to him a letter. It was Charley's fatal note, given to him by Dr. Leach, while Val and Charley had been speaking.

"Do you know this, Mr. Marsh?" the coroner asked.

Charley glanced over the note, the coroner still holding it. It was all written on the first page, in a pothook-and-hanger fist; and Charley turned crimson for the second time, as he finished it and read the name at the bottom.