Sir George sprang down, picked it up, and saw that it was Julia's; and still possessed by the idea that she was playing him a trick he kissed it, and looked sharply round, hoping to detect her laughing face. Without result; then at last he began to feel misgiving. The road under the downs was growing dim and shadowy; the ten minutes he had lingered had stolen away the warmth and colour of the day. The camps and tree-clumps stood black on the hills, the blacker for the creeping mist that stole beside the river where he stood. In another ten minutes night would fall in the valley. Sir George, his heart sinking under those vague and apparently foolish alarms which are among the penalties of affection, mounted his horse, stood in his stirrups, and called her name--'Julia! Julia!'--not loudly, but so that if she were within fifty yards of him she must hear.
He listened. His ear caught a confused babel of voices in the direction of Marlborough; but only the empty house, echoing 'Julia!' answered him. Not that he waited long for an answer; something in the dreary aspect of the evening struck cold to his heart, and touching his horse with the spur, he dashed off at a hand-gallop. Meeting the Bristol night-wagon beyond the bend of the road he was by it in a second. Nevertheless, the bells ringing at the horses' necks, the cracking whips, the tilt lurching white through the dusk somewhat reassured him. Reducing his pace, and a little ashamed of his fears, he entered the inn grounds by the stable entrance, threw his reins to a man--who seemed to have something to say, but did not say it--and walked off to the porch. He had been a fool to entertain such fears; in a minute he would see Julia.
Even as he thought these thoughts, he might have seen--had he looked that way--half a dozen men on foot and horseback, bustling out with lanterns through the great gates. Their voices reached him mellowed by distance; but immersed in thinking where he should find Julia, and what he should say to her, he crossed the roadway without heeding a commotion which in such a place was not unusual. On the contrary, the long lighted front of the house, the hum of life that rose from it, the sharp voices of a knot of men who stood a little on one side, arguing eagerly and all at once, went far to dissipate such of his fears as the pace of his horse had left. Beyond doubt Julia, finding herself in solitude, had grown alarmed and had returned, fancying him late; perhaps pouting because he had not forestalled the time!
But the moment he passed through the doorway his ear caught that buzz of excited voices, raised in all parts and in every key, that betokens disaster. And with a sudden chill at his heart, as of a cold hand gripping it, he stood, and looked down the hall. It was well perhaps that he had that moment of preparation, those few seconds in which to steady himself, before the full sense of what had happened struck him.
The lighted hall was thronged and in an uproar. A busy place, of much coming and going it ever was. Now the floor was crowded in every part with two or three score persons, all speaking, gesticulating, advising at once. Here a dozen men were proving something; there another group were controverting it; while twice as many listened, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, or in their turn dashed into the babel. That something very serious had happened Sir George could not doubt. Once he caught the name of Lord Chatham, and the statement that he was worse, and he fancied that that was it. But the next moment the speaker added loudly, 'Oh, he cannot be told! He is not to be told! The doctor has gone to him! I tell you, he is worse to-day!' And this, giving the lie to that idea, revived his fears. His eyes passing quickly over the crowd, looked everywhere for Julia; he found her nowhere. He touched the nearest man on the arm, and asked him what had happened.
The person he addressed was about to reply when an agitated figure, wig awry, cravat loosened, eyes staring, forced itself through the crowd, and, flinging itself on Sir George, clutched him by the open breast of his green riding-coat. It was Mr. Fishwick, but Mr. Fishwick transfigured by a great fright, his face grey, his cheeks trembling. For a moment such was his excitement he could not speak. Then 'Where is she?' he stuttered, almost shaking Sir George on his feet. 'What have you done with her, you--you villain?' Soane, with misgivings gnawing at his heart, was in no patient mood. In a blaze of passion he flung the attorney from him. 'You madman!' he said; 'what idiocy is this?'
Mr. Fishwick fell heavily against a stout gentleman in splashed boots and an old-fashioned Ramillies, who fortunately for the attorney, blocked the way to the wall. Even so the shock was no light one. But, breathless and giddy as he was the lawyer returned instantly to the charge. 'I denounce you!' he cried furiously. 'I denounce this man! You, and you,' he continued, appealing with frantic gestures to those next him, 'mark what I say! She is the claimant to his estates--estates he holds on sufferance! To-morrow justice would have been done, and to-night he has kidnapped her. All he has is hers, I tell you, and he has kidnapped her. I denounce him! I--'
'What Bedlam stuff is this?' Sir George cried hoarsely; and he looked round the ring of curious starers, the sweat standing on his brow. Every eye in the hall was upon him, and there was a great silence; for the accusation to which the lawyer gave tongue had been buzzed and bruited since the first cry of alarm roused the house. 'What stuff is this?' he repeated, his head giddy with the sense of that which Mr. Fishwick had said. 'Who--who is it has been kidnapped? Speak! D--n you! Will no one speak?'
'Your cousin,' the lawyer answered. 'Your cousin, who claims--'
'Softly, man--softly,' said the landlord, coming forward and laying his hand on the lawyer's shoulder. 'And we shall the sooner know what to do. Briefly, Sir George,' he continued, 'the young lady who has been in your company the last day or two was seized and carried off in a post-chaise half an hour ago, as I am told--maybe a little more--from Manton Corner. For the rest, which this gentleman says, about who she is and her claim--which it does not seem to me can be true and your honour not know it--it is news to me. But, as I understand it, Sir George, he alleges that the young lady who has disappeared lays claim to your honour's estates at Estcombe.'
'At Estcombe?'
'Yes, sir.'
Sir George did not reply, but stood staring at the man, his mind divided between two thoughts. The first that this was the solution of the many things that had puzzled him in Julia; at once the explanation of her sudden amiability, her new-born forwardness, the mysterious fortune into which she had come, and of her education and her strange past. She was his cousin, the unknown claimant! She was his cousin, and--
He awoke with a start, dragged away by the second thought--hard following on the first. 'From Manton Corner?' he cried, his voice keen, his eye terrible. 'Who saw it?'
'One of the servants,' the landlord answered, 'who had gone to the top of the Mound to clean the mirrors in the summer-house. Here, you,' he continued, beckoning to a man who limped forward reluctantly from one of the side passages in which he had been standing, 'show yourself, and tell this gentleman the story you told me.'
'If it please your honour,' the fellow whimpered, 'it was no fault of mine. I ran down to give the alarm as soon as I saw what was doing--they were forcing her into the carriage then--but I was in such a hurry I fell and rolled to the bottom of the Mound, and was that dazed and shaken it was five minutes before I could find any one.'
'How many were there?' Sir George asked. There was an ugly light in his eyes and his cheeks burned. But he spoke with calmness.
'Two I saw, and there may have been more. The chaise had been waiting in the yard of the empty house at the corner, the old Nag's Head. I saw it come out. That was the first thing I did see. And then the lady.'
'Did she seem to be unwilling?' the man in the Ramillies asked. 'Did she scream?'
'Ay, she screamed right enough,' the fellow answered lumpishly. 'I heard her, though the noise came faint-like. It is a good distance,