John Greswold [A novel.] By the author of 'Paul Ferroll'

Chapter I

E lived a very secluded life in the country ; but it was one in which there was a great deal of enjoyment. Our degree of wealth enabled us to partake of all the occupations which country life affords — moderately indeed, but in rather a higher degree than our immediate neigh bours. We had large woods with a fair sprinkling of game, of which, as boys, we were always VOL. I. B in pursuit, more or less vain ; we had ponies, two amongst four, and we always persuaded the girls to give up their share. We were as free to wander as the hares and foxes ; and we shared in the hereditary popularity of a family which had lived for centuries among a moderate number of tenantry, with each of whom and their parlours and kitchen-hearths we were thoroughly and familiarly acquainted. Our family dates very far back, and there were influencing traditions of gentility which kept our habits above the level of the smaller gentry with whom we chiefly associated.

Our old place was beautiful, our old house large, our hall surrounded by pictures of our ancestors, and on the hearth blazed in the winter weather great logs of wood. Here took place the dances and sports of our JOHN GRESAVOLD. childhood and youth ; and from one cir cumstance and another we grew to think our home a place as much beyond all other places in its merits as it was beyond all others in our affections. While I was a young boy I was happy all the hours I was awake, but not at all happy all the hours of my sleep. I was tormented with dreadful dreams. The worst I ever had was this one. In my dream I was gazing with the nurse and the other children down on the large old high backed sofa, covered with a nankeen-coloured stuff, which, in fact, occupied a place in the nursery. We were looking intensely on the fiat cushions of the seat; our eyes could not get away, and suddenly in the middle of one of the cushions there appeared, j ust level with the surface, a human face, very dark from the b clotted blood upon it.

One eye crushed to a bloody jelly, the other malignantly fixed upon us ; the nose battered by some recent violence into the face. There was no expression of suffering, only hideous unearthly frightfulness and cruelty. In my dream I was in the nurse's arms and bowed down by her stooping position over the accursed face. I woke my self by screaming, and was not in the least appeased at finding myself safe in my accus tomed bed. Such ghostly visions appalled my childhood, and when they taught me to repeat " Teach me to dread My grave as little as my bed," I thought to myself, nOAV I'm praying to be very much afraid indeed of my grave. Very early I Avas sent to a cheap school in the neighbourhood. People Avith little money must embrace the penalties of their compara tive poverty; and whereas the rich man's sons go where the luxuries and watchfulness of home are repeated, the sons of the straitened must be sent where school and school cares are to be had for the smallest price.

At home, be it a rich or poor one, the mother's attentions are much the same in all degrees. She is equally alive to the first sign of illness ; equally tender to procure amusement and avoid pain ; equally careful of soul and body ; and mine was as anxious as any one, and as successful in tendering my disposi tion and hardening my constitution. But now I was cast on a sea, as short as ever received the traveller outside the harbour of Ostend ; as sick with its tossings I was as that same traveller, and longing for my dear easy home again, as a little fellow longs during the first half. It chanced that towards the much desired end of that period the boys were all indulged with a holiday to see a show of wild beasts at a neighbouring fair ; I remember one of the bigger boys, Hunter, who was ill at the time of sore throat, borrowing my woollen comforter, " because," said he, " at home my mother made me promise not to go out when there was a lump in my throat — but that's women's bosh, you know.'' At the fair there were temptations of bulls' eyes and gingerbread, and having some pence I ate till I made myself sick.

When we got back to the school my miserable white face and swollen eyes caused me to be sent to what is called the staying-out room, namely, the school infirmary, and here I lay in bed ill with indigestion. I was not the only occupant. There were eight beds ; and scarlet-fever being about, five boys who were suspected of it had already been deposited in as many beds. The next morning Hunter was brought in, and took up a sixth. He could scarcely arti culate ; but as well as he could, he declared to me that he was quite well, if it was not for that bit of a lump in his throat. In the remaining bed the housekeeper took up her post at night ; and, as was natural enough after the fatigue of each day, made but a poor night nurse. Hunter and all of us had the doctor ; he sent us potions, but Hunter soon gave up all attempts to swallow his; the pain being such as to baffle the power on his part to do so.

I was stupefied with head ache, but still did take notice of the strange noise his throat made, and how at times he would raise himself on his elbow and gasp as if his breath would not come. The third night he was never still for a minute at a time. I slept, but Hunter's bed being next to mine, I was awakened out of very profound slumber by a sudden start or tumble that he made out of his bed ; his mouth open, as I could see by the fire-light, his fingers stretched out, he tottered up to the nurse, pulled at her, and before she was well awake fell like a stone on her bed and never stirred again. I lay quite still, half-terrified, half-asleep, as in some of my dreadful dreams, and saw the nurse fling herself out of bed, raise his his head, let it fall, then go out of the room and return with the man who waited on the house.

They whispered loud; the man took Hunter up in his arms, and both went out. I thought, confusedly perhaps, they were carrying him to the doctor. Next morning, when we were all awake, we saw Hunter's bed, made, as though nobody had slept in it. They told us he had been removed to the cottage, as an outside room was called, and a week after they said he Avas dead. But I knew that he died that moment I saw him fall on the nurse's bed. My mother, when the holidays came, and I related all this adventure, took fright. She thought that a careful nurse and the doctor summoned Avould have saved the boy's life; 'and she would not suffer me to be exposed to the like peril. I did not go again. My eldest brother undertook to teach me Latin, and one way or other this was the first and last experience I had of school life.

I was sixteen when our father was seized with the lingering illness which terminated his life, but which was never in our comprehen sion of it hopeless up to the very last day. With all the pure faith of unspotted youth, we made our prayers together and alone for his recovery. Every alleviation of his illness made us believe our prayers were granted ; every aggravation of it sent us to prolonged petitions, of which the fault was that we expected but one answer, namely, that the thing we asked must be given. One night of augmented suffering, after leaving the sick-room, where a youth's presence was useless, if not inconvenient, I went to my bedchamber, and for half an hour or more continued to repeat, in every varied form, my adjuration that the added pain and danger of the day might pass by.

I was pouring out in silence my unspoken words when in a moment they seemed to be interrupted by a voice equally soundless with my own, which took their place. This voice was at a little distance, distinctly producing silent words. The words were these : — " One week, two weeks, three weeks. A sacrifice." I instantly applied them to my father. I did not believe they were uttered by a super natural being, but I thought they arose in some way prophetically. I kept them to myself — constantly recalling how I had seemed called off from my own inward utter ances by the words which arose at a distance, but to which my ear was directed, as in common circumstances it is to speech heard suddenly, though the person speaking is not perceived. Being young, and not yet true to my self, I made more of the occurrence than I really felt.

I imagined to myself that I should pass the last minutes of these three weeks in a state the more vivid in that fears from every one. of nervous anxiety — I would conceal my The moments I had to came at last. The been looking forward last day of the three weeks was running into midnight. I stood alone in my room, acting terror, though I alone was my audience. Just as the clock was beginning to strike twelve, I heard the door of my father's room open, and some one run hastily along the passage. Then for the first time I believed Avhat I had persuaded myself I believed during the three past Aveeks ; my heart seemed to throb backward. I rushed to the door. The runner Avas gone. I went silently and swiftly to my father's room, which was open, and entered frightened at what I thought I was about to see.

My sister was watching. She put up her finger for silence, smiling at me. I cast my eyes on the bed, and there he was gently breathing in a good sleep. I made a friendly sign to my sister and withdreAV again. The voice Avas one of those queer growths of the mind, which I believe form our dreams, but which are as frequent in our waking hours as in our sleep, only outer objects generally prevent them Avhen we are awake from filling the attention. Towards the end of the autumn my father died. The happy home was broken up; my mother and my sister retired to a house in the county town; my eldest brother was already a soldier in India ; and the rest of us had to seek our fortunes wherever our friends could place us. It was a new epoch in our lives, and excited all the latent feelings and ideas which had been growing up within us, and which the great change suddenly matured.

We were all fain to be helpful — fain to take a part in life, and according to our bent make efforts towards that end. I had a vague genius for composition, and great faith in its success. I often speculated on the success obtained by this or that author, and knowing that a few thousand pounds would be extremely useful to my mother, I revolved schemes in my mind of which the end was to surprise her some not distant day with the desirable few thousands. I began in the following manner. At the bottom of a great oaken chest where ephe meral productions were thrown and accumu lated from year by year, I found a pamphlet which seemed to have been published in the time of the first French Empire, and it3 point consisted in the multitude of events which the author had seen accumulate in the career of one man.

He took the Plaideur's form J'ai vu; and in his first sentence he saw emperors, kings, crowns, and continents all crumble and change their shapes and natures at the presence of the conqueror. This idea I undertook to apply once more. My materials were yet to be found. I sought them in the yearly chronology at the end of an almanac, and my opening period was this : — " I saw a house burned doAvn in Conduit Street." How wonderfully stupid young people can be ! The success of my endeavour corre sponded to its deserts ; but I was not much disheartened, and my next production was a tragedy of whicii only seven-tenths of one infirm line remains as a specimen : — " Too much, too much ; much too much." With such talents budding within me, I was placed in an attorney's office in London, where nobody cared for our good county-name, our beautiful house and its great hall, nor thought the least consideration due to me as the younger son of the house of Greswold.

I was aware that this would be the case, and therefore did not run myself into any trouble by acting as if I could draw at all on those claims ; there was some pain to be gone through, but on the whole I adapted myself very quickly to my altered circumstances. My master was concerned with numerous clients in high life. He had I believe a most amusing business, if he could have enjoyed it as it might have been enjoyed. He had to work the worser puppets of the world so as to keep up their show of prosperity, happiness, and goodness. Those who had all these articles in their genuine state, did not come to him. I got only glances, but I argued the whole pictures from them. For instance, there was a great lady who visited his office occasionally, so beautiful and beautifully appointed that we clerks always contrived to open our door for a sight of her when her carriage appeared.

We read her name in the Morning Post at evening VOL I. C J parties, and also in the Times, when there were lists of patronesses to a bazaar or of contributions to the relief of distress. One evening our master's sister came in a state of excitement and told me and another of the clerks, that My Lady had proposed to take her daughter, my master's niece, to the country for a few days, and she was come to tell her brother. Accordingly, when he was disengaged she went into his room, but came out two minutes after, hiding her face behind her veil, and before she was fully out of the old gentleman's room I heard the words — " Let me hear no more of such folly ; no niece of mine shall ever associate with that woman." Among his clients was a young man of considerable rank, whose family belonged to our own county ; of it Mr. Pypps also was a native, and there was an hereditary connexion between the firm aud the family.

This young man got into difficulties from time to time; he had to raise money, and in all his troubles he came to my master. He had the most engaging manner a man can have, as well as the kindest face. He was very young, active, strong, and healthy; and Mr. Pypps really loved him. He had loved his father, and had known this young client ever since he was a boy ; and sometimes he would get one of his irreplaceable bottles of Madeira from his cellar, and a neck of venison on the table, and young Lord Ennavant* would come to dine in order to talk over his affairs; in fact, I believe they got on splendidly during the hour and * The motto of the family as " En avant." Hence, I daresay, the name. c a half spent in the comfortable parlour of the attorney. Our poor master was not happy ; he had dealt so much with money that it had bewildered him, I believe.

He was certainly rich, and when he was paying his bills, my opinion is that he was quite comfortable ; the reality of the payment giving him a tangible convic tion that he had plenty wherewith to pay. But at other times, I have evidence that he was occupied almost always, when he had no business on hand, with calculations as to whether his money would meet the calls upon it. He would stand still in the street, his lips moving as if in calculation; he would take out his purse and count it. I have seen him as soon as he was settled in a railroad car riage produce his memorandum-book, and jot down a whole page of figures. Once I met with the blank side of a letter, covered with debtor and creditor accounts, of which this beloAV is a copy : — CEEDITOE. £ s. d. In Bank 635 0 0 In purse ... ... ... ... 18 16 0 Due, one quarter from tenant in Chester Court 100 0 0 753 16 0 DEBTOB. £ S. d. Housekeeper's book 5 18 6 Rent, half year 105 0 0 Wages, Christmas 78 0 0 188 18 6 Christmas bills will come, I daresay, to £1000 1000 0 0 £1188 18 His Christmas bills Avere more likely to be bills of a single week ; but I imagine he put them down conjecturally at an imaginary thousand, in order to persuade himself that his balance was against instead of for him.

I am sure his reason fought against the phantom of indigence which appeared to haunt him, for he never changed his style of expenditure, nor refused any legitimate call on his bounty ; but ever when his intellect could withdraw itself from matter of fact, it took the false food of illusion, aud with more and more appetite as it continued to feed. l)uring the second Avinter that I was with him his health began to fail, and more obvious symptoms of what was going wrong in his mind presented themselves. He grew pro foundly melancholy, and could with difficulty prevail on himself to take an interest in any thing. One day an old friend called to ask how he was ; they were in habits of extreme familiarity, the friend a little below him in the world, and no kind of restraint between them. " It is very kind of you, Baker," he said, "to pay me a visit, but I'm not glad to see you."

Another time his sister and the niece he had forbidden to go to the beautiful " My Lady," were passing the evening with him, and being such near relations, he put no restraint on himself, but suffered their at tempts at amusing him without any corre sponding effort to be amused. "Well, brother, we must leave you now," said Mrs. Crump ; " I'm sure we've passed a delightful evening." JOHN GRESAArOLD. " You must love dulness very much, then," said he. " Is it duller in the grave, do you think ?" These things excited my attention very much, for I had my own reasons for being curious about them. I had read in books of medicine of epochs in a man's life when it becomes a matter of arithmetic that he should be hipped, ill, and out of love with himself. Mysterious figures bring about mental and bodily phenomena — 7, 14, 21, 49, 63.

This fact laid hold on my imagination prodigiously. I set it down that Mr. Pypps was approaching the last of these periods, and I Avatched him very curiously to see the sum total come out of him. There was a more important person inte rested in poor Mr. Pypps, and that was the kindly young Lord Ennavant. When he came on his own business to the office, he would stay a few minutes and tell some quaint story out of his own world, which amused the ailing man; and we clerks heard gladly the laugh which had been thus excited. He came several times to dinner, with usually the same cheering effect, but on the occasion I am about to record, I passed and repassed the door, vainly hoping to hear the even stream of conversation which used to flow between them. There were brief bursts; there was Lord Ennavant's hearty voice, aud Mr. Pypps trying to be hearty in reply ; but then talk fell off, there would be silence, and then a jerk of talk again.

At last came the sound of a dialogue, in the one pressed seemingly to obtain a point, which the other was reluctantly brought to yield. The two gentlemen came out of the dining-room, and my master seeing me, asked me if I would fetch his cloak from his bed room upstairs. I ran up to do so, and Lord Ennavant was very impatient for my return, calling to me before I could scarcely reach the top, and evidently afraid that auy delay would cost him the unwilling companion he had secured. " Thank you, Mr. Greswold," said my master, evidently wishing to distinguish me from a servant, in which rank Lord Ennavant, it seemed, supposed me to be. " I am sorry to give you the trouble." " Oh, I am sure Mr. Greswold does not mind," said Lord Ennavant, pretending he had thought me a gentleman all the time.

" I am very anxious to get our friend here out for a walk." I made a sign of acquiescence, and then my master said — " What if he went with us ?" " Humph," said Lord Ennavant, " it is not the best place in the world for him." " Why, where are we going ?" said my master. " Oh, it's very good for you and me, but not quite so well for such a young man." "Nay, if it's any harm — " began Mr, Pypps. " No harm in the world. Oh, let him come then. You must at all events. Now, here's your hat. Have you got your purse in your pocket?" " Yes ; my purse. There's not much in it, nor ought to be." " Enough, I daresay. Come along." So we all three sallied out of the house, and Lord Ennavant, making a few instants' delay on the door step, whispered to me, who was last — " I'm going to make him gamble, just to give him something to cry for ;" and away we went.

The house we came to had nothing exter nally to attract attention, but the door I observed on its opening was strongly defended by bars and locks. A few yards further in, another door had to be opened which was similarly defended ; and upon the staircase were no less than three more, each of which had a small barred window through it. We were reconnoitered before we were let through. When at last we had cleared all these barriers, we entered a room where a dozen men were standing about, and rather less than that number sitting round a table, the surface of which was divided by a line, on each side of which a word was written, I could not at first see what. One of the men wore a green shade over his eyes, and held a wooden rake in his hand ; and cards were thrown on either side of the line which was drawn on the table.

There was money on the table, which changed owners frequently ; often being raked up to himself by the man with the shade, and often pushed over by him to one or other of the players ; but let what would happen to the money, nobody made the least remark or exclamation. They only uttered in unvarying tones, from time to time, one of the two words " Rouge" or " Noir." Lord Ennavant spoke to one of the men who were standing round, and who, smiling as at some good jest, proceeded to make room for Pypps at the table. " There, old friend," said Lord Ennavant, " sit down and take your chance. All you have got to do is to choose a card on either side of the line ; if ou this side, call it rouge, if on the other, noir; and put your money on it. You will win or lose, that's quite certain. And, mind me : don't lose more money than you've got in your purse.

It can't ruin you; and it will do your health good." " Sad folly, my lord," said Pypps ; but he sat down, and named five shillings for his stake on noir. Nobody seemed to take any notice whether the stake was large or small ; the cards continued to be laid down on the table, and presently, by no volition of his own, double the amount of his venture was pushed over to Mr. Pypps. " Leave it alone," said Lord Ennavant, interfering to prevent him from touching the money. "As long as you win, and say no thing, your stake and your gains double every time." Mr. Pypps said nothing, but he lost. He immediately put down ten shillings for a new stake on the noir. That time he won ; and now he rose and was willing to leave off, having gained nothing, as he said, nor lost. " Nay, don't finish yet," said Lord Enna vant.

" I have got something to do. Play as if you were just beginning. It's not worth while to rise as you sat down." He went into another part of the room, where I believe he played at cards, and I stayed, watching my master. Again the latter took his place, winning on the whole, and by degrees caring very much whether the event was or was not favourable. Lord Ennavant came to him in about half an hour, ready to go home. " Stay five minutes," said Pypps. " I want to see the issue of this venture." It went against him. " Confound it," he cried ; " what luck ! I must get that back again;" and now he named a stake the amount of which would have frightened him half an hour before. " Come, never mind," said Lord Ennavant. " Do come now ; I can't stay here all night." " Go then, my dear lord ; don't wait for me on any account.

I must stay a little longer. I begin to feel some life." " Poor devil !" said his friend. What a word ! " But don't talk so loud, my beloved Pypps. Nobody is ever glad or sorry here. Take my first advice, and stick to one colour; whichever you will. If you win, your money will be pushed over to you ; and if you lose it will be raked away from you. Only say nothing, for you disgrace both yourself and me by this acuteness of sensibility." He turned away again, engaging in some new game, and left old Pypp3 playing, and me gazing. Fortune was very favourable to Pypps. He obeyed the injunction of his friend as far as he Avas able, but he could not altogether avoid some bodily expression of his feelings. His face was flushed ; he pulled off his cravat, and flung it on the floor; the rapid influx of money to him who had made it by driblets appeared intoxicating.

In a very short time Lord Ennavant's vol. i. n attention was caught by the buzz in the room of people interested in this wonderful run of luck. He and all the rest of the spectators came up, surrounding the table. Pypps cast one glance at them, and then seeming to be conscious that he must make no appeal to sympathy, concentred himself, and supporting his head on his hands, stooped it over the table where his winnings were accu mulating by a stake that doubled every time. The sum became hundreds. It rose to thousands. One change of luck would swallow up half his fortune. Another stroke of it in a favourable direction would go hard to ruin his opponent. The banker at the table went on doggedly, but there was a dumb fury in his abrupt movements which was as intelligible as though it had been expressed in words.

His ruin was imminent. If Pypps cried content, he had to pay a terrible amount of thousands, but the next turn of the cards might redeem all. Fortune must change at last, but to venture it might only double his destruction. He looked hard at Pypps, not knowing what he himself desired. Suddenly he sprung up, breaking the normal silence of the table — " Not fair," he cried ; " the dead don't play." Then a little lower — "The man's dead." We rushed up ; we pulled at the hands. The head fell lower ; the wide eyes were staring at the card table. There was no breath — no pulse. Yes, the man was dead ! d2

Chapter II Ord Ennavant

was shaken out of all his habitual health and spirits by the terrible death of which he had been the involuntary cause. He could not raise himself to the level of the scenes around him, and rather than expose to others the sunken condition of his nerves, or endure the effort of attempting to conceal it, he hastily resolved to go abroad. I was little better than he, and the good natured young man, perceiving his state and mine to be pretty much the same, offered to take me with him, saying carelessly, " You have got no employment just now, so you may as well take a run between times." Nothing could be more agreeable to me than this proposal. I had not known how I should be able to set myself down to another desk under another master, so soon after I had lost the kind one whose last look I could not get out of my head.