A Changed Heart: A Novel

"Do you know anything of this, Mr. Marsh?" the coroner repeated.

"No," Charley coldly and briefly said.

"You recognize the writing and the name?"

"Yes."

"The writer of this, Cherrie Nettleby, alludes to money which she says will do you and her more good than it ever did Lady Leroy. To what money does she refer?"

Charley thought of the bank-note he had taken from her through sheer necessity, and once more the blood rushed in a scarlet tide to his face, ebbing again, and leaving him white as ashes.

Coroner, jury, and spectators saw his changing face, and set it down to conscious guilt.

"To what money does she refer?" reiterated the coroner.

"Sir, I decline answering that question."

"Indeed! Are you aware, Mr. Marsh, such a refusal tells very much against you?"

Charley smiled coldly, contemptuously.

"I am quite aware, sir, every circumstance tells very much against me. Nevertheless, I refuse to answer that and any other question I choose."

"The boy is either mad," thought Val Blake, "or else guilty. In either case, his doom is sealed!"

The coroner now explained to his court how the letter came into the hands of Doctor Leach, and read it aloud, handing it over to the jury for their inspection when he had finished. The allusion to his taking state-rooms for them both puzzled all who knew of the girl's departure for Greentown; but was set down by them, as it had been by Val, as a blind to deceive her friends.

Ann Nettleby was next called, and, in a state of great trepidation, related Charley's call at the cottage and inquiry for Cherrie. Informed the coroner, in reply to his question, that Mr. Marsh was "after" Cherrie, a constant visitor at their house, and had asked Cherrie not long before to run away with him to the States. Had not heard from her sister since her departure, but supposed she was up in Greentown.

One or two other witnesses were called, who had nothing to relate concerning the murder, but a good deal about Mr. Marsh's late dissipated habits and gambling-debts. When these witnesses were gone, Mr. Marsh was called upon, and requested, if he had anything to say in his own behalf, to say it.

Mr. Marsh had but little to say, and said that little with a recklessness that quite shocked the assemblage. The secret of his bitter tone and fiercely-scornful indifference they had no clue to, and they set it down to the desperation of discovered guilt. He informed them, in that reckless manner, flinging his words at them like a defiance, that Ann Nettleby's testimony was correct, that he had called at the cottage between eight and nine on the night of the murder, and on leaving her had gone straight to the old house, and remained in the grounds until discovered by Midge and Rob Nettleby. What had taken him there, what his motive in lingering, was what Cherrie meant in her note, and all else concerning his motives and actions he refused to answer. He was a drunkard, he was a gambler, he was in debt – "his friends" with sneering emphasis, "have given his character with perfect correctness. But for all that, strange as it might seem, incredible as he knew they would think it, he had neither robbed nor murdered his sister's benefactress. Further than that he had nothing to say."

He returned to the window again, flashing fierce defiance on every hand, and the coroner summed up the evidence. He was an old man, and had known Charley Marsh since he was a pretty little fair-haired, frolicsome boy, and he would have given a good round sum in hard cash to be able to find him innocent. But he could not, and justice must be done. He recapitulated his irregular conduct on the evening of the murder, as related by his own mother, his lingering in the grounds from dark until discovered by Priscilla Short and Robert Nettleby, confessed by himself; his glove found at the bedside, as if dropped in his haste and alarm; his knowledge of the large sum of money paid the deceased that afternoon by Mr. Oaks; his knowledge, also, of the house, as proved by his entering the back-window, found open, and of its lonely and unprotected state; and lastly, this note of Cherrie Nettleby's, with its distinct allusion to the money of Mrs. Leroy, to benefit him. It was a pity this girl was not here – but she soon would be found; meantime, the case was perfectly clear without her. It was evident robbery, not murder, had been the primary instigation; but the unfortunate woman awakening, probably, had frightened him, and in the impulse of the moment he had endeavored to stifle her cries, and so – strangled her. Perhaps, too, his sister being her heiress, and inheritrix of all she possessed, he had persuaded himself, with the sophistry of guilt, that he had some right to this money, and that he was only defrauding his own sister, after all. His debts were heavy and pressing, no way of paying them open, and desperation had goaded him on. He (the coroner) trusted that the sad case of this young man, once so promising, until he had fallen into evil habits, would be a warning to others, and an inducement not to stray away from the path of rectitude into that broad road whose end was disgrace and ruin. The money stolen had not been found, but there had been ample time given him to conceal it. He begged the jury to reflect on the evidence they had heard, consult together, and return a verdict according to their conscience.

The jury retired from the room, and in the awful silence which followed, you might have heard a pin drop. Charles Marsh, in this supreme crisis of his life, still stood looking out of the window. He neither moved nor spoke, nor looked at any one, nor betrayed the slightest sign of agitation; but his teeth were rigidly locked, and the palm of his strong right hand was bleeding where he had clenched it, in that silent agony, until the nails had sunk deep into the flesh. He had been reckless and defiant, and braved it out with a high hand; but Charles Marsh had had the misfortune to be born with a keenly sensitive heart, and a pride that had lain latent under all his careless life; and what he felt in that hour of disgrace and degradation, branded as a thief and a murderer before the friends who knew him all his life, was known only to Heaven and himself.

The jury were not long away. Evidently, his case had been settled in their minds before they had left their seats. And in that dread silence the foreman, Mr. Blair, with a grave, sad face, stood up to announce their verdict. It was only one word – the terrible word, "Guilty."

There was a swaying sound among the crowd, as if they had drawn breath for the first time. That dismal word fled from lip to lip like wildfire, until it passed from the room to the crowd in the hall, and from them to the swaying mob without. It was quite a lively scene, in fact, out there, where that big crowd of men stood broiling under the meridian sun, when the verdict was announced, and the inquiries as to how "young Marsh" behaved and looked were many and eager. The question was not very easily answered. Young Marsh, standing by that sunny window, was so screened by the towering figure of Mr. Valentine Blake, that the gaping and exasperated throng craned their throats and stood on tip-toe for nothing. They would see him, however, when he came out to enter the cab, already in waiting, that was to convey him in the custody of the constables into town, and it was worth while waiting even for that fleeting glimpse.

Five, ten, fifteen, twenty minutes passed. The expectant crowd were getting angry and impatient; it was shameful, this dallying. But two or three policemen are out now with their red batons and brass buttons of authority, clearing a way for the gentlemen who are coming out, and for the cab which is to draw up close to the front door. Still, the mob press forward, the coroner and jury are departing; and now the prisoner's coming. But a new disappointment is in store for them; for when he comes, he has his hat pulled so far over his eyes, and springs in so quickly, that they don't even get that fleeting glimpse of him they are crushing each other to death to obtain. The constables follow; it is pleasant even to see them; the blinds are pulled down; the cab drives off rapidly, and the crowd go home, ravenous for their dinner. And Charles Marsh is on his way to Speckport jail, to await his trial for the willful murder of Jane Leroy!

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE DARKENING SKY

The day after the inquest, the funeral took place. As the clock of Speckport cathedral chimed in sonorous sweetness the hour of ten, all that was earthly of Mrs. Leroy was placed in the hearse, and the gloomy cortege started. A great many carriages followed the mistress of Redmon to her last long home; and, in the foremost, two ladies, robed in sable, and vailed in crape, rode. The outward mourning was for the dead, the deeper deuil of the heart for the living – for him who, on this wretched August day, was a prisoner in Speckport jail, awaiting his trial for the greatest crime man can commit, doomed to suffer, perhaps, the greatest penalty man can inflict.

Nobody in all the long line of carriages talked; they crouched into corners, and shivered, and were silent, and sulky, and cross, and uncomfortable, and gaped, and wished the thing was well over, or that they had never come.

They got their wish after a while. The last sod was beaten down, and the carriages rattled back into the foggy town – all but three or four; and they drove back to the eerie old house, never so lonely and desolate as now. One ceremony was yet to be gone through – that ceremony the reading of the last will and testament of Mrs. Leroy. Here, where it had been written, in the ghostly reception-room, where the inquest had taken place, and where the rats and black beetles had it all their own way, it was to be read. It was this that brought Mrs. Marsh, who had been ill and hysterical ever since she had heard the result of the inquest, to the funeral at all. To her it was a great and joyful thing this wealth that after to-day was to be theirs, and not even in her grief could she forego the pleasure of being present. Heaven knows, it was nothing of the sort brought her daughter – the silent agony she had endured since yesterday can never be told; but she had hope yet. She had hope in this very wealth that was to be hers to help him. Young as she was, she knew enough of the power of money to be aware it can do almost anything in this world, and smooth the road to the next; and she trusted in its magic power to free her imprisoned brother. They all went into the silent and forlorn house together; Mr. Darcy, who was to read the will, and whose face was distressed and troubled to the last degree; Mr. Blair, as an intimate friend of the family; Mr. McGregor, Senior, and Dr. Leach; Mrs. McGregor and Mrs. Blair were with Mrs. Marsh, and Miss McGregor and Miss Blair were deeply sympathetic with Miss Marsh – the heiress! – and Mr. Val Blake, with his sister on his arm; and Midge, who had been at the signing of the will, brought up the rear.

The shutters of the closed rooms had all been opened, and the casements raised, for the first time in many a day, and the pale light of the foggy morning poured in. Lawyer Darcy took his seat at a table, and laid out on it a legal-looking document tied with red tape. The others seated themselves around the apartment; and Nathalie Marsh, in her deep mourning-robes, and her thick black crape vail down over her face, took her seat beside one of the open windows, and leaned her forehead on her hand, as if it ached.

Long afterward, when she was gone from them forever, they remembered that drooping black figure and bowed young head, with one or two bright curls, like lost sunbeams, shimmering out from under her crape bonnet. Long afterward, they thought of how she had sat that dull and miserable day, suffering as these patient womanly martyrs only suffer, and making no sign.

Lawyer Darcy seemed strangely reluctant to commence his task. He lingered and lingered, his face pale and agitated, his lips twitching nervously, and the fingers that untied the document before him, trembling. His voice, too, when he spoke, was not quite steady.

"I am afraid," said the lawyer, in that unsteady voice, "that the reading of this will will be a shock – a disappointment! I know it must astonish all, as it did me, and I should like to prepare you for it, before it is read."

There was a surprised and alarmed murmur, but no one spoke.

"You are all aware," the lawyer went on, keeping his eyes resolutely from that drooping figure at the window, "that when Mrs. Leroy made her will after coming to Speckport she bequeathed all she possessed to her ward, Miss Marsh. I drew up the will, and she made no secret of her intentions."

There was another painful pause. Val Blake broke it.

"Of course," he said, impatiently, "we all know Mrs. Leroy left Miss Marsh heiress of Redmon."

"But you do not know," said Mr. Darcy, "that a short time ago – in fact, a few days before her tragical death, she revoked that first will and made a new one."

"What?" the cry was from Val Blake, but no one heeded him; every eye was strained upon the lawyer.

"Made a new one," the lawyer repeated, still averting his eyes from the black form at the window; "a new one, entirely different; leaving, I am sorry to say, Redmon away from Miss Marsh – in point of fact, disinheriting her."

There were two little feminine shrieks from the Misses Blair and McGregor, a hysterical cry from Mrs. Marsh, but the bowed figure at the window never stirred. In the unnatural stillness of her attitude, her face hidden behind her crape mask, there was something more fearful than any outbursts of wild womanly distress.

"The new will was made, as I told you," continued Mr. Darcy, "but a few days before her death; made whilst smarting under a sense of anger, and what she called ingratitude. Miss Marsh had offended her, disobeyed her in a matter on which she had set her heart, and for this she was going to disinherit her. I expostulated, entreated, did all I could, but in vain. She was obstinate, and this new will was made, which I now hold in my hand."

Mrs. Marsh's face had turned as white as that of a dead woman, and great beads of cold sweat stood on her forehead. But she sat rigidly still, listening, and feeling as though she were in some dreadful dream.

"I drew up the will," pursued Mr. Darcy, "and Midge yonder and old Nettleby signed it. I fancied when her first resentment cooled, she would see the injustice of her act, and retract it. I was right; the day preceding the night of her death, hearing she was ill, I called to see her, and she told me to come the next morning, and a third will should be made, leaving all to Nathalie as at first. Next morning she was dead."

To the dark form, whose drooping face was pitifully hidden by the black vail, did any memory come of the words spoken to her by the dead woman that fatal night, and which had then been so mysterious:

"I'll make it all right, Natty! I'll make it all right!" Did she know what was meant now?

"And do you mean to say, Mr. Darcy," Val Blake cried, astonished and indignant, "that Nathalie Marsh is not the heiress of Redmon?"

"I do! this will disinherits her! It is a crying wrong, but no fault of mine."

"And who, then, is the heir?" asked Mr. McGregor.

"She bequeaths all she possesses, unconditionally, to her brother, Philip Henderson, or, in case of his death, to his children. I will read the will."

Amid that profound and impressive stillness, the lawyer read the last will and testament of Jane Leroy. It was concise enough, and left the whole of her property, real and personal, without conditions, to her brother, Philip Henderson, and his heirs, with the exception of five pounds to Miss Nathalie Marsh, to buy a mourning-ring.

Mr. Darcy hesitated over this last cruel passage, and felt inclined to leave it out; but he did not, and there was a suppressed murmur of indignation from every lip on hearing it.

Poor Mrs. Marsh was catching her breath in hysterical gasps, and being fanned and sprinkled with cold water, and the palms of her hands slapped by Miss Jo and the two married ladies. And still the vailed figure at the window sat rigidly there, uttering no cry, shedding no tears.

There are griefs too deep for words, too intense for tears, when we can only sit in mute and stony despair, while the world reels under our feet, and the light of the sun is blackness. To Nathalie Marsh, the loss of fortune was the loss of everything – brother, lover, home, happiness – the loss of all to which she had looked forward so long, for which she had endured so much. And now, she sat there, like a figure carved in ebony; and only for the ghastly pallor of her face in the indistinct glimpses of it they could catch through the vail, could they tell that she even heard.

It was Val Blake who again broke the silence that followed the reading of the will.

"I protest against this will!" he indignantly cried. "It is unjust and ungrateful! You should never have produced it, Mr. Darcy. You should have read the former will."

"You are jesting, Mr. Blake! While regretting as much as you can possibly do this unfortunate change, my duty is sacred, and by this will we must abide. Mrs. Marsh seems very ill; I think she had better be conveyed home."

No one ventured to speak to Nathalie, her unnatural manner awed them; but when her mother was supported from the room, and she arose to follow, good natured Miss Jo was beginning a homily on resignation, and on its being all for the best, perhaps, in the end. Her brother, however, cut her short with very little ceremony, and handed Miss Marsh in after her mother, and seating himself by the coachman, they started off rapidly. He might have spared himself the trouble; good Miss Jo might have preached for an hour, and Nathalie would not have heard one word of it. She sat looking straight before her, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, conscious of nothing, save only that dull and dark despair at her heart. Midge, who had come with them in the carriage, waited on Mrs. Marsh, and cried quietly all the way, bestowing anything but blessings on the memory of her late mistress.

Mr. Blake assisted both ladies into the house when they reached Cottage Street. Mrs. Marsh, who was very ill and in a state of hysterics, he carried in his arms and laid on the sofa. Nathalie entered the parlor, closed the door, and, still wearing her bonnet and mantle, sat down by the window that looked out on the blurred and misty street. She had flung back her vail, and in her white and ghastly face and dilated violet eyes you could read a waiting look. Nathalie was waiting for one, who, by some secret prescience, she knew would soon come.

Doctor Leach entered the cottage soon after their return, prescribed for Mrs. Marsh, and departed again. Had he been able to minister to a mind diseased, he might have prescribed for Nathalie, too; but that not coming within his pharmacopœia, he left without seeing her.

It was dusk when he for whom she waited came. The dull wet day was ending in a duller and wetter evening, and the tramp, tramp of the long-roaring waves on the shore made a dull bass for the high, shrill soprano shrieks of the wind. The lamps were flaring through the foggy twilight in the bleak streets, when Captain Cavendish, in a loose overcoat, and bearing an umbrella, wended his way to that house of mourning. He had not been two hours in Speckport, but he had heard all that had transpired. Was there one in the town, from the aristocratic denizens of Golden Row and Park Lane to the miserable dwellers in filthy back-alleys and noisome water-side streets, that did not know, and were not discussing these unhappy events with equal gusto? The robbery and murder of Mrs. Leroy, the inquest, the sentence and imprisonment of Charley Marsh, the will, and the disinheriting of Nathalie, all were as well known in the obscurest corner of Speckport as in that unhappy home to which he was going.

In the course of that long afternoon Midge had only once ventured into the parlor, and that was in fear and trembling, to ask her young mistress to take a cup of tea and some toast which she brought.

Nathalie had tasted nothing since the day before; and poor Midge, with tears in her fretful eyes, urged it upon her now. The girl looked at her out of a pair of hollow eyes, unnaturally large and bright, in a vague way, as if trying to comprehend what she said; and when she did comprehend, refusing. Midge ventured to urge; and then Nathalie broke out of her rigid, despairing stillness, into passionate impatience.

"Take it away!" she cried, "and leave me alone! Leave me alone, I tell you!"

Midge could do nothing but obey. As she quitted the room with the tray, there came a knock at the front door. She set down the tray and opened it, and the tall form of the young English officer confronted her. Midge had no especial love for Captain Cavendish, as we know; but she was aware her young lady had, and was, for the first time in her life, glad to see him. It was good of him to come, she thought, knowing what had happened; and perhaps his presence might comfort her poor Miss Natty, and restore her to herself.

"Yes," Midge said, in answer to his inquiry; "Miss Marsh was at home, and would see him, she thought. If he would wait one minute she would ascertain."

She returned to the parlor to ask. But Nathalie had already heard his voice, and was sitting up, with a strained white face, and her poor wasted hands pressed hard over her heart. She only made an assenting motion to Midge's question, should she show him in, and a negative one when she spoke of bringing a lamp. Through all her torpor of utter misery, she was dimly conscious of a change in herself; that she was haggard and ghastly, and the beauty which had won him first to her side, utterly gone. That gloomy twilight hour was best befitting the scene so soon to take place; for her prophetic heart told her, as surely as if she had read it in the Book of Fate, that this meeting was to be their last.

Midge admitted him, and closing the door behind him, retired into a distant corner of the hall, and throwing her apron over her head, cried quietly, as she had done all day. She would have given a good deal if the white painted panels of the parlor door had been clear glass, and that she could have seen this man comforting her beloved young lady. Much as she had disliked him, she could have knelt down in her gratitude, and kissed the dust off his feet.

Even in the pale, sickly half-twilight of the dark evening, Captain Cavendish could see the haggard cheeks, the sunken eyes, and the death-like livid pallor of the girl's face, and was shocked to see it. He had expected to find her changed, but not like this; and there was real pity for the moment in his eyes as he bent over her and took her hand. He started to find it cold as ice, and it lay in his passive, and like a bit of marble.

"Nathalie," he said, "my darling! I am sorry; I cannot tell you how sorry I am for you. You have suffered indeed since I saw you last."

She did not speak. She had not looked at him once. Her dilated eyes were fixed on the blackening night-sky.

"I only reached Speckport an hour ago," he went on, "and I can never tell you how deeply shocked I was to hear of the dreadful events that have taken place since my departure. Is it all true?"

"Yes – all!" she said. Her voice sounded strange and far-off, even to herself, and she was aware it must sound hollow and unnatural to him.

"All is true! My brother is in prison, accused of murder, and I am a beggar!"

Her hand felt so icily deathlike in his, that he dropped it with a shiver. She still sat looking out into the deepening gloom, her white, set face gleaming marble-white against her black dress and the darkening room.

Captain Cavendish rose up from the seat he had taken, and began pacing rapidly up and down, heartily wishing the scene was over.

"I know," said the hollow voice, so unlike – so unlike the melodious voice of Nathalie, "that all between us must end now. Disgrace and poverty must be my portion from henceforth, and you will hardly care to marry so fallen and degraded a creature as I am. From all that binds you to me, Captain Cavendish, I free you now!"

In the depths of her heart, unseen in the darkness of despair even by herself, did any feeble ray of hope – that great gift of a merciful God – still linger? If so, the deep and prolonged silence that followed her words must have extinguished the feeble glimmer forever. When Captain Cavendish spoke, and it was some time before he did so, there was a quiver of shame in his tones, all unusual there. Very few ever had a better opinion of their own merits, or were less inclined to judge hardly of themselves, than George Percy Cavendish, but she made him despise himself now, and he almost hated her for it.