the glorious surprise of charley’s safety greeted hamish on his return home to dinner. in fact, he was just in time, having come in somewhat before one o’clock, to witness charley’s arrival from the college schoolroom, escorted by the whole tribe, from the first to the last. even gerald yorke made one, as did mr. william simms. gerald, the smart over, thought it best to put a light, careless face upon his punishment, disgraceful though it was considered to be for a senior. to give gerald his due, his own share in the day’s exploits faded into insignificance, compared with the shock of mortification which shook him, when he heard the avowal of his mother, respecting roland. he and tod had been the most eager of all the school to cast arthur’s guilt in tom channing’s cheek; they had proclaimed it as particularly objectionable to their feelings that the robbery should have taken place in an office where their brother was a pupil; and now they found that tom’s brother had been innocent, and their own brother guilty! it was well that gerald’s brow should burn. “but she’d no cause to come here and blurt it out to the lot, right in one’s face!” soliloquized gerald, alluding to lady augusta. “they’d have heard it soon enough, without that.”
mr. william simms, i have said, also attended charles. mr. william was hoping that the return of charley would put him upon a better footing with the school. he need not have hoped it: his offence had been one that the college boys never forgave. whether charley returned dead or alive, or had never returned at all, simms would always remain a sneak in their estimation. “sneak simms,” he had been called since the occurrence: and he had come to the resolution, in his own mind, of writing word home to his friends that the studies in helstonleigh college school were too much for him, and asking to be removed to a private one. i think he would have to do so still.
hamish lifted charley to him with an eager, fond movement. a weight was taken from his mind. although really irresponsible for the disappearance of charles, he had always felt that his father and mother might inwardly attach some blame to him—might think him to have been wanting in care. now, all was sunshine.
dinner over, mr. channing walked with hamish to the office. they were some time in getting there. every other person they met, stopped mr. channing to congratulate him. it seemed that the congratulations were never to end. it was not only mr. channing’s renewed health that people had to speak of. helstonleigh, from one end to the other, was ringing with the news of arthur’s innocence; and charley’s return was getting wind.
they reached guild street at last. mr. channing entered and shook hands with his clerks, and then took his own place in his private room. “where are we to put you, now, hamish?” he said, looking at his son with a smile. “there’s no room for you here. you will not like to take your place with the clerks again.”
“perhaps i had better follow roland yorke’s plan, and emigrate,” replied hamish, demurely.
“i wish mr. huntley—by the way, hamish, it would only be a mark of courtesy if you stepped as far as mr. huntley’s and told him of charles’s return,” broke off mr. channing; the idea occurring to him with mr. huntley’s name. “none have shown more sympathy than he, and he will be rejoiced to hear that the child is safe.”
“i’ll go at once,” said hamish. nothing loth was he, on his own part, to pay a visit to mr. huntley’s.
hamish overtook mr. huntley close to his own home. he was returning from the town. had he been home earlier, he would have heard the news from harry. but harry had now had his dinner and was gone again. he did not dine at the later hour.
“i have brought you some news, sir,” said hamish, as they entered together.
“news again! it cannot be very great, by the side of what we were favoured with last night from mr. roland,” was the remark of mr. huntley.
“but indeed it is. greater news even than that. we have found charley, mr. huntley.”
mr. huntley sprang from the chair he was taking. “found charley! have you really? where has he—hamish, i see by your countenance that the tidings are good. he must be alive.”
“he is alive and well. at least, well, comparatively speaking. a barge was passing down the river at the time he fell in, and the man leaped overboard and saved him. charley has been in the barge ever since, and has had brain fever.”
“and how did he come home?” wondered mr. huntley, when he had sufficiently digested the news.
“the barge brought him back. it is on its way up again. charley arrived under escort of the barge-woman, a red handkerchief on his head in lieu of his trencher, which, you know, he lost that night,” added hamish, laughing. “lady augusta, who was going out of the house as he entered, was frightened into the belief that it was his ghost, and startled them all with her cries to that effect, including the bishop, who was with my father in the drawing-room.”
“hamish, it is like a romance!” said mr. huntley.
“very nearly, taking one circumstance with another. my father’s return, cured; roland’s letter; and now charley’s resuscitation. their all happening together renders it the more remarkable. poor charley does look as much like a ghost as anything, and his curls are gone. they had to cut his hair close in the fever.”
mr. huntley paused. “do you know, hamish,” he presently said, “i begin to think we were all a set of wiseacres. we might have thought of a barge.”
“if we had thought of a barge, we should never have thought the barge would carry him off,” objected hamish. “however, we have him back now, and i thank god. i always said he would turn up, you know.”
“i must come and see him,” said mr. huntley. “i was at the college school this morning, therefore close to your house, but i did not call. i thought your father would have enough callers, without me.”
hamish laughed. “he has had a great many. the house, i understand, has been like a fair. he is in guild street this afternoon. it looks like the happy old times, to see him at his post again.”
“what are you going to do, now your place is usurped?” asked mr. huntley. “subside into a clerk again, and discharge the one who was taken on in your stead, when you were promoted?”
“that’s the question—what is to be done with me?” returned hamish, in his joking manner. “i have been telling my father that i had perhaps better pay port natal a visit, and join roland yorke.”
“i told your father once, that when this time came, i would help you to a post.”
“i am aware you did, sir. but you told me afterwards that you had altered your intention—i was not eligible for it.”
“believing you were the culprit at galloway’s.”
hamish raised his eyebrows. “the extraordinary part of that, sir, is, how you could have imagined such a thing of me.”
“hamish, i shall always think so myself in future. but i have this justification—that i was not alone in the belief. some of your family, who might be supposed to know you better than i, entertained the same opinion.”
“yes; constance and arthur. but are you sure, sir, that it was not their conduct that first induced you to suspect me?”
“right, lad. their conduct—i should rather say their manner—was inexplicably mysterious, and it induced me to ferret out its cause. that they were screening some one, was evident, and i could only come to the conclusion that it was you. but, master hamish, there were circumstances on your own part which tended to strengthen the belief,” added mr. huntley, his tone becoming lighter. “whence sprang that money wherewith you satisfied some of your troublesome creditors, just at that same time?”
once more, as when it was alluded to before, a red flush dyed the face of hamish. certainly, it could not be a flush of guilt, while that ingenuous smile hovered on his lips. but hamish seemed attacked with sudden shyness. “your refusal to satisfy me on this point, when we previously spoke of it, tended to confirm my suspicions,” continued mr. huntley. “i think you might make a confidant of me, hamish. that money could not have dropped from the clouds; and i am sure you possessed no funds of your own just then.”
“but neither did i steal it. mr. huntley”—raising his eyes to that gentleman’s face—“how closely you must have watched me and my affairs!”
mr. huntley drew in his lips. “perhaps i had my own motives for doing so, young sir.”
“i earned the money,” said hamish, who probably penetrated into mr. huntley’s “motives;” at any rate, he hoped he did so. “i earned it fairly and honourably, by my own private and special industry.”
mr. huntley opened his eyes. “private and special industry! have you turned shoemaker?”
“not shoemaker,” laughed hamish. “book-maker. the truth is, mr. huntley—but will you promise to keep my secret?”
“ay. honour bright.”
“i don’t want it to be known just yet. the truth is, i have been doing some literary work. martin pope gave me an introduction to one of the london editors, and i sent him some papers. they were approved of and inserted: but for the first i received no pay. i threatened to strike, and then payment was promised. the first instalment, i chiefly used to arrest my debts; the second and third to liquidate them. that’s where the money came from.”
mr. huntley stared at hamish as if he could scarcely take in the news. it was, however, only the simple truth. when martin pope paid a visit to hamish, one summer night, frightening hamish and arthur, who dreaded it might be a less inoffensive visitor; frightening constance, for that matter, for she heard more of their dread than was expedient; his errand was to tell hamish that in future he was to be paid for his papers: payment was to commence forthwith. you may remember the evening, though it is long ago. you may also remember martin pope’s coming hurriedly into the office in guild street, telling hamish some one was starting by the train; when both hastened to the station, leaving arthur in wonder. that was the very london editor himself. he had been into the country, and was taking helstonleigh on his way back to town; had stayed in it a day or two for the purpose of seeing martin pope, who was an old friend, and of being introduced to hamish channing. that shy feeling of reticence, which is the characteristic of most persons whose genius is worth anything, had induced hamish to bury all this in silence.
“but when have you found time to write?” exclaimed mr. huntley, unable to get over his surprise. “you could not find it during office hours?”
“certainly not. i have written in the evening, and at night. i have been a great rake, stopping up later than i ought, at this writing.”
“do they know of it at home?”
“some of them know that i sit up; but they don’t know what i sit up for. by way of a blind—i suppose it may be called a justifiable deceit,” said hamish, gaily—“i have taken care to carry the office books into my room, that their suspicions may be confined to the accounts. judy’s keen eyes detected my candle burning later than she considered it ought to burn, and her rest has been disturbed with visions of my setting the house on fire. i have counselled her to keep the water-butt full, under her window, so that she may be safe from danger.”
“and are you earning money now?”
“in-one sense, i am: i am writing for it. my former papers were for the most part miscellaneous—essays, and that sort of thing; but i am about a longer work now, to be paid for on completion. when it is finished and appears, i shall startle them at home with the news, and treat them to a sight of it. when all other trades fail, sir, i can set up my tent as an author.”
mr. huntley’s feelings glowed within him. none, more than he, knew the value of silent industry—the worth of those who patiently practise it. his heart went out to hamish. “i suppose i must recommend you to bartlett’s post, after all,” said he, affecting to speak carelessly, his eye betraying something very different.
“is it not gone?” asked hamish.
“no, it is not gone. and the appointment rests with me. how would you like it?”
“nay,” said hamish, half mockingly: “the question is, should i be honest enough for it?”
mr. huntley shook his fist at him. “if you ever bring that reproach up to me again, i’ll—i’ll—you had better keep friends with me, you know, sir, on other scores.”
hamish laughed. “i should like the post very much indeed, sir.”
“and the house also, i suppose, you would make no objection to?” nodded mr. huntley.
“none in the world. i must work away, though, if it is ever to be furnished.”
“how can you tell but that some good spirit might furnish it for you?” cried mr. huntley, quaintly.
they were interrupted before anything more was said. ellen, who had been out with her aunt, came running in, in excitement. “oh, papa! such happy news! charles channing is found, and—”
she stopped when she saw that she had another auditor. hamish rose to greet her. he took her hand, released it, and then returned to the fire to mr. huntley. ellen stood by the table, and had grown suddenly timid.
“you will soon be receiving a visit from my mother and constance,” observed hamish, looking at her. “i heard certain arrangements being discussed, in which miss ellen huntley’s name bore a part. we are soon to lose constance.”
ellen blushed rosy red. mr. huntley was the first to speak. “yorke has come to his senses, i suppose?”
“yorke and constance between them. in a short time she is to be transplanted to hazledon.”
“it is more than he deserves,” emphatically declared mr. huntley. “i suppose you will be for getting married next, mr. hamish, when you come into possession of that house we have been speaking of, and are your own master?”
“i always intended to think of it, sir, as soon as i could do so,” returned saucy hamish. and ellen ran out of the room.
that same afternoon arthur channing was seated at the organ in pursuance of his duty, when a message came up from the dean. he was desired to change the selected anthem, taken from the thirty-fifth psalm, for another: “o taste, and see, how gracious the lord is!”
it was not an anthem in the cathedral collection, but one recently composed and presented to it by a private individual. it consisted of a treble solo and chorus. why had the dean specially commanded it for that afternoon? very rarely indeed did he change the services after they were put up. had he had arthur in his mind when he decided upon it? it was impossible to say. be it as it would, the words found a strange echo in arthur’s heart, as bywater’s sweet voice rang through the cathedral. “o taste, and see, how gracious the lord is, blessed is the man that trusteth in him. o fear the lord, ye that are his saints, for they that fear him lack nothing. the lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they who seek the lord shall want no manner of thing that is good. the eyes of the lord are over the righteous: and his ears are open unto their prayers. great are the troubles of the righteous; but the lord delivereth him out of all. the lord delivereth the souls of his servants: and all they that put their trust in him shall not be destitute.”
every word told upon arthur’s heart, sending it up in thankfulness to the giver of all good.
he found the dean waiting for him in the nave, when he went down at the conclusion of the service. dr. gardner was with him. the dean held out his hand to arthur.
“i am very glad you are cleared,” he said. “you have behaved nobly.”
arthur winced. he did not like to take the faintest meed of praise that was not strictly his due. the dean might have thought he deserved less, did he know that he had been only screening hamish; but arthur could not avow that tale in public. he glanced at the dean with a frank smile.
“you see now, sir, that i only spoke the truth when i assured you of my innocence.”
“i do see it,” said the dean. “i believed you then.” and once more shaking arthur’s hand, he turned into the cloisters with dr. gardner.
“i have already offered my congratulations,” said the canon, good humouredly, nodding to arthur. this was correct. he had waylaid arthur as he went into college.
arthur suffered them to go on a few steps, and then descended to the cloisters. old ketch was shuffling along.
“what’s this i’ve been a hearing, about that there drownded boy having come back?” asked he of arthur, in his usual ungracious fashion.
“i don’t know what you may have heard, ketch. he has come back.”
“and he ain’t dead nor drownded?”
“neither one nor the other. he is alive and well.”
ketch gave a groan of despair. “and them horrid young wretches’ll escape the hangman! i’d ha’ walked ten miles to see em—”
“gracious, sir john, what’s that you are talking about?” interrupted bywater, as the choristers trooped up, “escaped you! so we have, for once. what an agony of disappointment it must be for you, mr. calcraft! such practice for your old hands, to topple off a dozen or so of us! besides the pay! how much do you charge a head, calcraft?”
ketch answered by a yell.
“now, don’t excite yourself, i beg,” went on aggravating bywater. “we are thinking of getting up a petition to the dean, to console you for your disappointment, praying that he’ll allow you to wear a cap we have ordered for you! it’s made of scarlet cloth, with long ears and a set of bells! its device is a cross beam and a cord, and we wish you health to wear it out! i say, let’s wish mr. calcraft health! what’s tripe a pound to-day, calcraft?”
the choristers, in various stages of delight, entered on their aggravating shouts, their mocking dance. when they had driven mr. ketch to the very verge of insanity, they decamped to the schoolroom.
i need not enlarge on the evening of thankfulness it was at mr. channing’s. not one, but had special cause for gratitude—except, perhaps, annabel. mr. channing restored to health and strength; mrs. channing’s anxiety removed; hamish secure in his new prospects-for mr. huntley had made them certain; heaviness removed from the heart of constance; the cloud lifted from arthur; tom on the pedestal he thought he had lost, sure also of the oxford exhibition; charley amongst them again! they could trace the finger of god in all; and were fond of doing it.
soon after tea, arthur rose. “i must drop in and see jenkins,” he observed. “he will have heard the items of news from twenty people, there’s little doubt; but he will like me to go to him with particulars. no one in helstonleigh has been more anxious that things should turn out happily, than poor jenkins.”
“tell him he has my best wishes for his recovery, arthur,” said mr. channing.
“i will tell him,” replied arthur. “but i fear all hope of recovery for jenkins is past.”
it was more decidedly past than even arthur suspected when he spoke. a young woman was attending to mrs. jenkins’s shop when arthur passed through it. her face was strange to him; but from a certain peculiarity in the eyes and mouth, he inferred it to be mrs. jenkins’s sister. in point of fact, that lady, finding that her care of jenkins and her care of the shop rather interfered with each other, had sent for her sister from the country to attend temporarily on the latter. lydia went up to jenkins’s sick-room, and said a gentleman was waiting: and mrs. jenkins came down.
“oh, it’s you!” quoth she. “i hope he’ll be at rest now. he has been bothering his mind over you all day. my opinion is, he’d never have come to this state if he had taken things easy, like sensible people.”
“is he in his room?” inquired arthur.
“he is in his room, and in his bed. and what’s more, young mr. channing, hell never get out of it alive.”
“then he is worse?”
“he has been worse this four days. and i only get him up now to have his bed made. i said to him yesterday, ‘jenkins, you may put on your things, and go down to the office if you like.’ ‘my dear,’ said he, ‘i couldn’t get up, much less get down to the office;’ which i knew was the case, before i spoke. i wish i had had my wits about me!” somewhat irascibly went on mrs. jenkins: “i should have had his bed brought down to the parlour here, before he was so ill. i don’t speak for the shop, i have somebody to attend to that; but it’s such a toil and a trapes up them two pair of stairs for every little thing that’s wanted.”
“i suppose i can go up, mrs. jenkins?”
“you can go up,” returned she; “but mind you don’t get worrying him. i won’t have him worried. he worries himself, without any one else doing it gratis. if it’s not about one thing, it’s about another. sometimes it’s his master and the office, how they’ll get along; sometimes it’s me, what i shall do without him; sometimes it’s his old father. he don’t need any outside things to put him up.”
“i am sorry he is so much worse,” remarked arthur.
“so am i,” said mrs. jenkins, tartly. “i have been doing all i could for him from the first, and it has been like working against hope. if care could have cured him, or money could have cured him, he’d be well now. i have a trifle of savings in the bank, young mr. channing, and i have not spared them. if they had ordered him medicine at a guinea a bottle, i’d have had it for him. if they said he must have wine, or delicacies brought from the other ends of the earth, they should have been brought. jenkins isn’t good for much, in point of spirit, as all the world knows; but he’s my husband, and i have strove to do my duty by him. now, if you want to go up, you can go,” added she, after an imperceptible pause. “there’s a light on the stairs, and you know his room. i’ll take the opportunity to give an eye to the kitchen; i don’t care to leave him by himself now. finely it’s going on, i know!”
mrs. jenkins whisked down the kitchen stairs, and arthur proceeded up. jenkins was lying in bed, his head raised by pillows. whatever may have been mrs. jenkins’s faults of manner, her efficiency as a nurse and manager could not be called into question. a bright fire burnt in the well-ventilated though small room, the bed was snowy white, the apartment altogether thoroughly comfortable. but—jenkins!
fully occupied with his work for mr. galloway, it was several days since arthur had called on jenkins, and the change he now saw in his face struck him sharply. the skin was drawn, the eyes were unnaturally bright, the cheeks had fallen in; certainly there could not be very many hours of life left to jenkins. a smile sat on his parched lips, and his eyelashes became moist as he looked up to arthur, and held out his feeble hand.
“i knew you would be cleared, sir! i knew that god would surely bring the right to light! i have been humbly thanking him for you, sir, all day.”
arthur’s eyes glistened also as he bent over him. “you have heard it, then, jenkins? i thought you would.”
“yes, sir, i heard it this morning, when it was getting towards mid-day. i had a visit, sir, from his lordship the bishop. i had, indeed! he came up as he has done before—as kindly, and with as little ceremony, as if he had been a poor body like myself. it was he who first told me, mr. arthur.”
“i am glad he came to see you, jenkins.”
“he talked so pleasantly, sir. ‘it is a journey that we must all take, jenkins,’ he said; ‘and for my part, i think it matters little whether we take it sooner or later, so that god vouchsafes to us the grace to prepare for it.’ for affability, sir, it was just as if it had been a brother talking to me; but he said things different from what any poor brother of mine could have said, and they gave me comfort. then he asked me if i had taken the sacrament lately; and i thanked him, and said i had taken it on sunday last; our clergyman came round to me after service. mr. arthur”—and poor jenkins’s eyes wore an eager look of gratitude—“i feel sure that his lordship would have administered it to me with his own hands. i wonder whether all bishops are like him!”
arthur did not answer. jenkins resumed, quitting the immediate topic for another.
“and i hear, sir, that mr. channing has come home restored, and that the little boy is found. his lordship was so good as to tell me both. oh, mr. arthur, how merciful god has been!”
“we are finding him so, just now,” fervently spoke arthur.
“and it is all right again, sir, with you and mr. galloway?”
“quite right. i am to remain in the office. i am to be in your place, jenkins.”
“you’ll occupy a better position in it, sir, than i ever did. but you will not be all alone, surely?”
“young bartlett is coming to be under me. mr. galloway has made final arrangements to-day. we shall go on all right now.”
“ay,” said jenkins, folding his thin hands upon the counterpane, and speaking as in self-commune; “we must live near to god to know his mercy. it does seem almost as if i had asked a favour of any earthly person, so exactly has it been granted me! mr. arthur, i prayed that i might live to see you put right with mr. galloway and the town, and i felt as sure as i could feel, by some inward evidence which i cannot describe, but which was plain to me, that god heard me, and would grant me my wish. it seems, sir, as if i had been let live for that. i shan’t be long now.”
“while there is life there is hope, you know, jenkins,” replied arthur, unable to say anything more cheering in the face of circumstances.
“mr. arthur, the hope for me now is, to go,” said jenkins. “i would not be restored if i could. how can i tell, sir, but i might fall away from god? if the call comes to-night, sir, it will find me ready. oh, mr. arthur, if people only knew the peace of living close to god—of feeling that they are ready! ready for the summons, let it come in the second or third watch!”
“jenkins!” exclaimed arthur, as the thought struck him: “i have not heard you cough once since i came in! is your cough better!”
“oh, sir, there’s another blessing! now that i have grown so weak that the cough would shatter me—tear my frame to pieces—it is gone! it is nearly a week, sir, since i coughed at all. my death-bed has been made quite pleasant for me. except for weakness, i am free from pain, and i have all things comfortable. i am rich in abundance: my wife waits upon me night and day—she lets me want for nothing; before i can express a wish, it is done. when i think of all the favours showered down upon me, and how little i can do, or have ever done, for god, in return, i am overwhelmed with shame.”
“jenkins, one would almost change places with you, to be in your frame of mind,” cried arthur, his tone impassioned.
“god will send the same frame of mind to all who care to go to him,” was the reply. “sir,” and now jenkins dropped his voice, “i was grieved to hear about mr. roland. i could not have thought it.”
“ay; it was unwelcome news, for his own sake.”
“i never supposed but that the post-office must have been to blame. i think, mr. arthur, he must have done it in a dream; as one, i mean, who has not his full faculties about him. i hope the earl of carrick will take care of him. i hope he will live to come back a good, brave man! if he would only act less on impulse and more on principle, it would be better for him. little master charles has been ill, i hear, sir? i should like to see him.”
“i will bring him to see you,” replied arthur.
“will you, sir?” and jenkins’s face lighted up. “i should like just to set eyes on him once again. but—it must be very soon, mr. arthur.”
“you think so?” murmured arthur.
“i know it, sir—i feel it. i do not say it before my wife, sir, for i don’t think she sees herself that i am so near the end, and it would only grieve her. it will grieve her, sir, whenever it comes, though she may not care to show people that it does. i shall see you again, i hope, mr. arthur?”
“that you shall be sure to do. i will not miss a day now, without coming in. it will do me good to see you, jenkins; to hear you tell me, again, of your happy state of resignation.”
“it is better than resignation, mr. arthur, it is a state of hope. not but that i shall leave some regrets behind me. my wife will be lone and comfortless, and must trust to her own exertions only. and my poor old father—”
“if i didn’t know it! if i didn’t know that, on some subject or other, he’d be safe to be worrying himself, or it would not be him! i’d put myself into my grave at once, if i were you, jenkins. as good do it that way, as by slow degrees.”
of course you cannot fail to recognize the voice. she entered at that unlucky moment when jenkins was alluding to his father. he attempted a defence—an explanation.
“my dear, i was not worrying. i was only telling mr. arthur channing that there were some things i should regret to leave. my poor old father for one; he has looked to me, naturally, to help him a little bit in his old age, and i would rather, so far as that goes, have been spared to do it. but, neither that nor anything else can worry me now. i am content to leave all to god.”
“was ever the like heard?” retorted mrs. jenkins, “not worrying! i know. if you were not worrying, you wouldn’t be talking. isn’t old jenkins your father, and shan’t i take upon myself to see that he does not want? you know i shall, jenkins. when do i ever go from my word?”
“my dear, i know you will do what’s right,” returned jenkins, in his patient meekness: “but the old man will feel it hard, my departing before him. are you going, sir?”
“i must go,” replied arthur, taking one of the thin hands. “i will bring charley in to-morrow.”
jenkins pressed arthur’s hand between his. “god bless you, mr. arthur,” he fervently said. “may he be your friend for ever! may he render your dying bed happy, as he has rendered mine!” and arthur turned away—never again to see jenkins in life.
“blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching.”
as jenkins was, that night, when the message came for him.