Mad. A Story of Dust and Ashes

Front matter

M A D. LONDOM : ROB30N AND SON, GREAT NORTHERN PRINTING WORK-, PANCRA9 I-tOAD, N.W. M A D. A STORY OF DUST AND ASHES. BY GEORGE MANVILLE FENN, AUTHOR OF " BENT, NOT BROKEN," ETC. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: TINSLEY BROTHERS, 18 CATHERINE ST. STRAND. 1868. [ The right of translation and reproduction is reserved.'] PEEFACE. The author in olden times generally prefaced his work with an apology, or attempt to disarm criti cism — an act of ultra politesse, or else a flinching from an expected blow. Right or wrong, I follow the old custom, foreseeing that many of my readers may make the remark of a friend to whom I sub mitted my tale: "Mad? yes, a good title; but the thing is preposterous ! Just as if one man would be insane enough to attempt to obtain property by so shallow an artifice; and another sufficiently tame to submit to its loss !"

My reply is simple, and in it I quote the old saw, "Truth is stranger than fiction." A case based upon the facts I have adopted, and coloured to my fancy, was actually brought before the Court of Probate ; and I had more than one conversa- VI

Preface

. tion with the defendant touching his claim. I had the pleasure, too, of the personal acquaint ance of the late Mr. William Jarker, his wife, and their neighbour, "ma mire." As to the Rat's-hole, the time has now gone by, but the curious would have found some strange places beneath the old houses of the district, had they stood with me amongst the cellars of the court I have here called Bennett's-rents. CONTENTS OF VOL. I. CHAP. PAGE i. The thin End of the Wedge .... 1 n. Sep's Complaint 11 m. Further Introductions 20 iv. With the Dragon's Teeth 34 v. A Pair of Shoes 47 ti. The Sorrows of Septimus Hardon ... 70 vn. The Doctor and his Dame 84 viii. Mr. Pawley's Performance 100 ix. Old Matt on Manners 115 x. Brotherly Love 131 xi. Hard Times 157 xii. Friends from Town 176 xiii. At the County Arms 193 xiv. Matt makes a Discovery 205 xv. Another Visitor from Town .... 226 xvi. Seeking Hospitality 246 xvii. " Nothing like Leather" MAD.

Chapter I. The Thin End Of The Wedge

Septimus Hardon bore his Christian name from no numerical reason, for he was an only child ; but his father, Octavius Hardon, Esquire, of Some sham, thought that, like his own, the name had a good bold sound with it — a sonorous classical twang. There was a vibration with it that should impress people in the future life of the bearer and add importance denied by Nature ; but Mrs. Octavius, during her lifetime, was always in disgrace with her lord for shortening the name into Sep, which was decidedly not impressive ; while as for Septimus himself, he too was always in trouble with his father for being what he was — decidedly impressive, but not in VOL. I. B the way his father wished; for to look at Sep timus Hardon it might have been supposed that Nature, after trying her 'prentice hand on man, and then making "the lasses, 0," had had a quantity of rough stuff left — odds and ends, snips and scraps and awkward tags — when, sooner than there should be any waste of the precious material, she made Septimus Hardon.

You could not say that he was deformed, but there was an odd look about him ; his head seemed too big, and was badly thatched, while, by contrast, his body was too small; then his nose was a trifle on one side, and his mouth too wide, though it certainly disclosed an enviable set of teeth ; his arms were long, and swung about too much, while one leg was slightly shorter than the other, short enough to make him limp; but there was mildness written in his pitted face, and honesty peered at you from his clear bright eyes. And there was a true heart too in his breast, a large swelling heart, to which must have been due the obtrusiveness of his breast, and the decided roundness of his shoulders. And while Septimus Hardon had in some things most excellent taste — taste that his cousins sneered at, save when they wanted their music copied neatly, or their draw ings touched up — yet dress was not his forte, since he always made tbe worst of himself by wearing clothes that did not fit him, and bad as bis figure was, some tailor could have been found who would have guaranteed fit, if not style.

Septimus generally wore shabby fady black coats and vests, trousers of a dead leaf or baker's drab, blucher boots of the pattern known as contract — very bulgy and wrinkly ; and a real beaver hat, with a propensity for growing irritated under the brush, and becoming rough and startling. Born in London, Septimus had lived since childhood with his father at the Grange, a soli tary house about a couple of miles from Some sham town ; and for years past the amusement and toil of the father and son had been centred in a little amateur printing-office, fitted up in a side-room, where they laboriously printed, page by page, the work that Octavius Hardon called his brother Thomas — the doctor practising in the town — a fool for not appreciating, — a work upon political reform, one that was to astonish the world at large when it was completed ; and though Septimus owned to himself that the world would be easily astonished and its state rather startling if it accepted and acted upon the opinions there set forth, yet, at forty years of age, he was still working on day after day at his father's beck and call, obedient as a child, and never venturing an opinion of his own in presence of the irascible old man, who ahvays called him " boy."

It might have been supposed that living so secluded a life himself, and being so strange of aspect, the idle god would have spared him as an object for his shafts ; but for long years Septimus Hardon had loved in secret, loved and sorrowed, — for he was not happy in the choice* he had made. Mary Phillips was the betrothed of Tom Grey, the mate of an East Indiaman ; and Septimus Hardon had been divided between love for the fair girl and friendship for his old schoolfellow, who made him the repository, in his frank, sailorlike fashion, of all his secrets. So while the sailor had w-ooed and won, Sep timus Hardon had nursed his love for years, hardly realising the passion he had harboured, till one night when, after a woodside ramble, he stood leaning upon a stile, and glancing down with bitterness at his uncouth form.

The shadows were growing deeper, when, hearing approaching footsteps, he entered the wood, where before him lay many a dark mossy arcade — sit places for the sighs of a sorrowful heart ; and he thought as he entered one that he could wander here in peace for a while ; but the next instant the hot blood flushed up into his face, making his veins throb as he stood with clenched hands gazing through the thin screen of leaves at Mary, leaning lovingly upon his friend's arm, and listening with downcast eyes to his words. The listener could hardly see the looks of those who passed, but their words seemed to ring through the stillness of the summer eve, each one falling with a heavy impact upon his ear, and vi brating through his frame, as if a sharp blow had been struck upon sonorous metal. For a moment a wild fury seemed to blind him, and he stood trembling with passion till the footsteps died away; when, half wild with agony, he dashed headlong, deeper and deeper into the wood, crash ing through the light hazels, tripping over the tortuous roots ; and at last, stumbling over a fallen bough, he fell heavily, and lay insensible in the calm depths of the wood.

But thought soon dawned upon him again, and he lay and shuddered as the anguish of heart came slowly creep ing back ; for he now thoroughly understood his fate, and knew that the bright dreamy structures in which his imagination had revelled had crum bled before him into bitter dust. Time sped on, and after another voyage Tom Grey was back, and standing with his hand upon Septimus Hardon's shoulder. " Come ? AVhy, of course, my boy ; what should we do without you ? Mary begs that you won't refuse ; and, Sep, old fellow, I shall expect you to be her bodyguard when I'm far away at sea." Septimus Hardon was standing opposite to a tall pier-glass in his father's drawing-room when these words were spoken ; and he glanced at him self, and then, sighing bitterly, wondered whether, had he been as other men, he would have been chosen.

But the next moment the thought was crushed down, and he was returning the frank, handsome sailor's honest grasp. Septimus Hardon nursed his love, but he hid it, buried it in the deepest recesses of his heart ; and no one knew of the secret held by the bride groom's friend, who held by one of the pews when a swimming came upon him in the church, and he would have fallen bad not Tom Grey grasped his arm. But that soon passed, and the stricken man added his congratulations to those of the friends assembled to follow the couple, in whose path flowers were strewn — the couple joined to gether till death did them part. And that was soon — soon to the loving wife — soon to the husband whose journeyings were upon the great deep ; but years passed first, during which quiet, vacillating Septimus Hardon was the faithful friend of his schoolfellow's wife, and the patient slave of her bright -eyed child, at whose bidding he was always ready to attend, even to the neglect of his father's book.

Then came the day when, after whispering of hope for many months, Septimus learned that his fears were but too well founded, and that his friend's ship had gone down with all on board. A bitter trial was his to break the fatal tidings to the widow, and he stood trembling as she, the woman he had for long years worshipped in se cret, reviled him and cursed him in her madness for the news — the blasting news that he had brought upon her home. Then two years glided away, when the widow, passing through many a phase of sorrow, siekness, and misery, sat hoping on that he whom she mourned would yet return, and all the while ignorant of the hand that supplied her wants, or of the good friend with so great a love for fancy work that she sent order after order, liberally paid for by the hands of Septimus Hardon.

The beauty of the past slowly faded, so that she became haggard and thin ; a lasting illness seemed to have her in its grasp; but still faithful to his trust, true to the love he bore her, Septimus Hardon set at naught the frowns of his father and the sneers of his cousins, while he devoted himselfto the alleviation of the widow's suffer ings, and kept her from the additional stings of want, for she had been left totally unprovided for by her young and hopeful husband. ' And what was the result? Such as might have been expected from such a nature as Sep timus Hardon's. Patient and true, the love he bore this woman was hidden for years, and then, when in her hopeless misery the widow turned her head upon the sick pillow and asked his advice, he told her to give him the right to protect her, to be to her child, little Lucy, a second father, and then shrank, crushed and trembling, from the room, affrighted at her look of horror, and the words accusatory which told him of faithlessness to his trust, to his school fellow, who she felt yet lived.

But it was only in her hopeful heart he lived, and six months after forbidding Septimus her house, Mary Grey, weeping bitterly over the disco very she had made of the hand that had so long sustained her, wrote these words and sent them to the Grange : "Forgive me!"

Chapter II. Sep's Complaint

Octavius Hardon's book was at a standstill, and the world still in the thick darkness of ignorance as regarded political reform upon his basis, for Septimus Hardon was ill, sick almost unto death. He had slowly grown listless and dull, careless of everything, daily becoming weaker, until, apparently without ailment, he had taken to his bed, over which his uncle, Doctor Hardon ; his assistant, Mr. Reston, a handsome, cynical-looking man, and the rival practitioner of the town, had all concurred in shaking their heads and de claring that nothing could be done, since Sep timus Hardon was suffering from the effects of an internal malformation. They were quite right ; the poor fellow had too much heart; and though the wise of this earth declare that people do not die of or for love, yet most assuredly Septimus Hardon would slowly have faded from his place among men, and before many months had passed over his head gone where there is rest.

But there was medicine of the right kind com ing, and the very perusal with lack-lustre eyes of the prescription brought to his bedroom sent a flash of light into the glassy orbs, and in the course of a few weeks Septimus disappointed the doctors by getting well, Nature baring arranged respecting the internal malformation. " I don't think you did him a bit of good, Mr. Brande ; not a bit — not a bit — not a bit," said Octavius to the rival practitioner. " He never took any of your stuffs. Now, come and set me up again, for I'm wrong." "Better, yes, he's better," said the old man to Mr. Reston. " Good-morning — good-morning — good-morning." Doctor Hardon had sent his assistant over ; but in place of seeing the patient he found himself bowed out ; and on loudly complaining to the doctor, not on account of missing his interview with the patient, but for reasons of his own, Doctor Hardon now called.

"AVell, Tom— well, Tom— well, Tom?" said Octavius, smiling cynically, and looking his younger brother well over from top to toe. "What is it, Tom?" " 0, about Septimus?" " There, be off; I'm busy. Septimus is getting on, and Mr. Brande will physic him if he wants any more. A man who can't morally physic his own children can't do other people's good." Doctor Hardon, portly and pompous, rose to speak ; but Octavius took hold of his arm and led him to the door, giving him his hat at the same time. ' ' Good - bye, Tom — good - bye — good - bye. Don't come till I send for you again. You always were a fool, and an ass, and an idiot, and a humbug, Tom — always — always — always." There was a slight storm at Doctor Hardon's that day, and neither his wife nor daughters ventured much into his presence; but when, some weeks afterwards, the doctor knew of a scene that took place in his brother's house, he smiled softly, and after a fashion of his own he purred, while that night he was graciousness itself.

Octavius Hardon sat writing, and listening to the words of his son till, as he grew interested, the pen ceased to form letters, and at last he pushed back his chair, overturning the inkstand, so that the sable current streamed across a fresh paragraph of his book. He thrust up his glasses and sheltered his eyes to look at his son — the son who had obeyed his every word and look, who had never seemed to have a thought of his own — the son who was even now, in spite of his forty years, but a boy; and as he looked, he saw that he seemed inches taller, that there was an elate look in his countenance, which it would have been hard at that moment to have called plain. " Going to be what ?" gasped the father, " To be married," said the son firmly. " Married ?" " Married, father." " And to whom ? One of those hussies, your cousins ?"

" To Mrs. Grey," replied Septimus. "AVhat?" gasped the old man. "To a woman — a widow with a family — a proper inmate for the union — a pauper!" "Hush, father!" cried Septimus. "I love her ;" and he said those simple words with such reverence, such tenderness, that the old man paused and gazed almost wonderingly at the aspect worn by his son ; but by degrees his anger gained the ascendant, and a stormy scene ensued in which the father threatened and besought in turn, while the son remained calm and immov able. Once he shrunk back and held up his hands deprecatingly, when the old man spoke harshly of the stricken woman ; but directly after his face lit up with a pride and contentment which almost maddened the speaker. " You cannot keep a wife !" he gasped. Septimus smiled. SEP'S COMPLALNT. " You were always a helpless, vacillating fool, and you have nothing but the few hundreds from your mother."

Septimus bowed his head. "Dog!" roared the old man, "I'll leave every penny I have to your uncle's hussies if you dare to marry this woman." The son smiled sadly, but remained silent. " AVhy don't you speak?" roared Octavius, foaming with rage. " AVhat would you have me say, father?" said Septimus calmly. "Say!" gasped the old man; "why, that you are a thankless, graceless, unnatural scoun drel. But where do you mean to go ?" " To London," said Septimus. "To London!" sneered the old man; "and what for? No; go to Hanwell, or Colney Hatch, or sink your paltry money at a private asylum, if they will take you. To London, to leave me to my infirmities, with my book unfinished ! But you'll take my curse with you ; and may yon brazen, scheming woman — " "Hush!" cried Septimus fiercely, as he laid his hand upon his father's lips, when, beside him self with fury, Octavius struck his son heavily in the face, and then, as he fell back, the old man seized the poker, but only to throw it crashing back into the fender.

Just at that moment, the door opened, a tall, dark, handsome girl hurried into the room, and stood between father and son, gazing in an agitated way from one anger-wrought countenance to the other. " Septimus ! Uncle !" she cried, " what is the matter ?" "He's a villain, girl — an unnatural scoun drel. He's going to marry that woman — Grey's wife — widow — relict — curse her !" " AVhat, poor Mrs. Grey?" said the girl, with the tears springing to her eyes. " God bless you for that, Agnes !" cried Sep timus passionately, as he caught her in his arms, and kissed her affectionately. " Yes, poor Mrs. Grey," sneered the old man, looking savagely at the pair before him. "But vol. i. c there, let him go ; and mind you, or you won't have what I've got. But there, you will, and your sisters will have something to fleer and jeer at then, and your father will purr in my face, and spit and swear behind my back.

Bah ! a cursed tom-cat humbug !" "Hush, uncle dear!" whispered Agnes, laying one hand upon his arm and the other upon his breast, her lip quivering as she spoke, — "hush! you are angiy. — Don't say any more, Septimus." " No," replied Septimus sternly, " I have done." "No, no, no! you have not," roared the old man, firing up again. "You have to beg my pardon, and tell me that this folly is at an end." "I'll beg your pardon, father," said Septimus sternly, " and I do ask it for anything I have done amiss ; but I have pledged my word to the wo man I have loved these ten years." And again there was the look of proud elation on Septimus Hardon's countenance. "And you are going to London, eh?" said Octavius. " To London," said Septimus calmly. The old man frowned, pressed his lips tightly together, and, holding Agnes firmly by her shoul der, he stood pointing with one hand towards the door.

" Then go !" be said ; " go— go !" "0, Septimus!" cried Agnes in appealing tones, — " uncle !" "You're mad, Septimus Hardon," said the old man coldly. "Mad — stark mad: a private asylum, Septimus — an asylum — mad ! You're mad •stark mad ! Go !"

Chapter III. Further Introductions

In the faint light of early morning, some ten years after the scene described in the last chapter, at that cold dank hour when the struggle is going on between night and day, and the former is being slowly and laboriously conquered, — when Chancery lane looked at its worst, and the passed -away region of Bemiett's-rents more sordid and desolate than ever. The gas-lamps still glimmered in the street, while the solitary light at the end of the Rents yet burned dimly, and as if half-destroyed by mephitic vapour, when the door of No. 27 was opened, closed loudly, and a man clattered heavily over the broken pavement, creating an unnecessary amount of noise as he slowly made his way out through the narrow archway into the street, but watching on either side with observant eye the while. It seemed darker when he reached the Lane, where, after glancing hastily up and down for a minute, he softly thrust off his boots, — a pair of heavy lace-ups, — and then, taking them in his hand, he ran lightly back, with the stooping gait and eager hound -like air of some savage beast on the trail of its prey.

But the next moment he was at the door he had quitted, had opened it softly and slipped in, ignorant that a face at the third -floor window opposite was watching his movements with looks yet keener than his own. Holding his breath, the man stood in the passage of the old house for a few seconds ; then, passing along softly, he stole down the damp, half-rotten cellar-stairs, starting once and giving vent to a halfsuppressed ejaculation as a cat dashed hastily by him, when he paused to wipe the cold perspiration from his forehead with his sleeve. Then he stood at the bottom in front of the cellar-door, in the damp dark place where ashes gritted beneath his feet, and the foul smell FURTHER INTRODUCTIONS. of halfdecayed vegetable refuse arose. Appa rently guided by caution, he now carefully felt around him, letting his hands glide along the wall, while his feet probed every corner to insure that he was alone, before, after listening an in stant at the foot of the stairs, he slipped quickly through the door, and stood in the large front cellar.

It was lighter here, for the morning was struggling down through the grating; and now, after a careful tour of inspection, peering into. every dim corner, the man passed through a low archway and into a back - cellar, darker and damper than the first, — a place that had once been used for wine, and into every one of whose cobweb - hung and sawdust-floored bins the man looked in turn, as he made his way further from the light. He was a big, heavy man ; but there was something soft and cat-like in his movements as he passed along the dark cellar. The obscurity seemed to have but little effect upon him, for the way appeared familiar ; and when right at the end he stopped to listen attentively for a few moments before, going down upon hands and knees, he crawled rapidly, and more cat-like than ever, into one of the darkest bins.

Then there was a low grating noise heard, as if a heavy stone had been pushed aside ; there was a deep ex piration, as of one moving a weight ; a rustling, the grating sound once more, and then for a few minutes silence. The light descending the grating struggled hard to illumine the obscure place ; but this was one of the strongholds of darkness — a spot where it lurked through the bright hours of the day; and the efforts of the light only served to faintly illumine the front-cellar, where stood a huge water-butt with a pipe leading to it for the supply of the house; and here now began an echoing drip, drip, drip; while from the tap came a strange, sighing, hissing sound, as the air was forced by distant pressure along the pipe. Now came the sharp crack of a stair, the very faint rustle of a dress, and then slowly and cautiously appeared, coming forward, as it were, out FURTHER INTRODUCTIONS. of the gloom like one of the phantoms of a night mare, the face that had been gazing from the opposite window, an old, eager, hawk-like, pinched woman's face, peering through the opening of the ajar door, and followed directly by the shabbily clothed body.

Cautiously, and with eyes peering in every direction, the woman advanced into the cellar, her head thrust forward, with her thin gray hair pushed behind her ears, which twitched and seemed on the alert to catch the faintest sound. Close behind her followed a cropped poodle-dog, which now ran forward, when at a menacing ges ture it half stood up, but the raised hand made it shrink down instantly, and crouching to the earth it crawled for a few moments and then lay motionless, while its mistress, as if walking in the steps of the man, nimbly examined the cellar, even peering behind and in the great butt, which her thrust-in hand showed her was nearly full of water. She then softly made her way to the dark arch, and with one hand holding by the side leaned in and tried to penetrate the darkness, but without avail; when, muttering softly to herself, she stepped in, but only to pass out the next moment shaking her head, as with one hand she busily searched her pocket, from which she drew forth a box of matches.

Stepping once more beneath the arch she struck a match upon the damp wall, and a long phosphorescent line of light shone feebly out, but the match did not blaze. Impatiently throwing down the splint of wood, the woman tried another and another, but with out effect, till she rubbed one upon the outside of the box, when it ignited silently, and illumined the place for a little distance round, when eagerly catching up the tiny splints thrown down she lit first one and then another, and as they burned their brief span a hasty examination was made. Everywhere the same features : old cobwebbed wine-bins, damp and fungoid growths, and though the woman peered even into the bin where the man had so lately crawled, nothing presented itself to her hurried gaze more than in the others, and as her last lit splint burned out she stepped lightly back to the entrance.

As she stood within the front cellar she turned once more to gaze down the dark place she had quitted, when a low grating noise struck her ear, and starting back she was about to run to the steps; but, making an effort over herself, she stood, trembling, and listened. The noise continued for a few seconds, then came the sound as of clothes rustling against a wall, then the heavy breathing, the grating once more, and then silence as, turning her back to both entrances, the woman stole softly to where her dog lay crouching upon the damp floor. The next moment a sharp yelp and a succes sion of howls came from the stricken dog as the woman caught it by the thick curled hair of its neck, and beat it savagely. "Ah, then, mechant chien, bad tog, how I have looked for you!" she cried. "Why do you steal down here ?

There, there, there !" and each word was followed by a blow, while the wretched little animal lay cowering and yelping on the ground, till, lifted by its ears, the skin seemed drawn out of place, the eyes elongated, and the poor brute, now silent, the most abject specimen of canine misery imaginable. There was a quick step behind the woman, and, as if surprised, she started, and turned to gaze at the evil face behind her, for the man had stepped close to the entrance-door. "Ah! Meester Jarker, but you did frighten me. My bad tog he runs away. What shall I do wis him ?" The man looked keenly at the speaker, and slowly drew a large clasp-knife, which he opened, and the woman could hardly repress a shudder as there in the dim light she saw him run his thumb along the edge. "Ah, yes!" she said with a half-laugh; "he deserves, but I cannot spare him ; I must teach him better than to come into uzzer people's house.

I look everywhere before I think of dis cellar." The man did not speak, but glanced first at the mistress, then at the dog, and then at his knife and the great butt, and then involuntarily his suspicious looks turned to the dark arch of the inner cellar, when once more their eyes met in a long penetrating stare. " I once knowed somethin' as got its throat cut for coming into this here cellar. I ain't sure, but I think that 'ere was a dawg," growled the man. " 0 yes, he must not come any more, Meester Jarker; but you will not cut my troat. 0, no," laughed the woman jeeringly, as sending her dog on first, and fixing her eyes upon the man, she slowly backed out of the cellar. " 0, no, for we will both be good and come no more." As she slowly made her way to the cellar stairs, the man stood looking after her ; but as she mounted them he followed softly, and listened till he heard her rustle along the pass age, when he slipped through the cellar and caught sight of her from the rusty grating as she crossed the court, when he once more went back to the dark arch and looked about him.