Kitty's father

Front matter

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Prologue

Two miserable card-sharpers came at day-break to the brow of the hill overlooking the old town of Chichester. Just past the church and opposite the rectory was a gate opening into the glebe slopes ; there, by common accord, they halted, and, hanging over the gate, looked down in silence on the race-course. It lay beyond the town, within a wide semicircular reach of the river. In that half-light they could just make out the swings and roundabouts on the skirt of a gray patch of canvas tents and booths. There was no motion, no sound. Not a thread of smoke rose from the brown stretch of roofs below. The world seemed dead, and the leaden clouds, unbroken, hung over all like a pall.

The two men had been tramping all night — from the hour when they were turned out of the last beershop : they were dry, jaded, and surly. Neither had opened his lips to speak for an hour, too dejected even to curse the long dusty road. Now, at last, one of them spoke.

“ What are we a-stoppin’ here for ? ”

“ ’Tain’t no use a-goin’ on, as I see. Shan’t find e’er a corfee aouse nor nuffin open for free hours yet.”

‘‘ Well, we ain’t likely to find no corfee aouse open up here, are we ? ” retorted the other, turning round and looking about him.

“ ’Tain’t no treat a-goin’ down in that meader. It’ll be all amuck wid the fog off the river. I’m for doin’ a doss in the church porch or someres where it’s a bit dry.”

“ ’Enery,” said the one who had been looking around, in a lowered tone, “ that’s a bloomin’ fine aouse over there.”

KITTY'S FATHER.

He nodded toward the rectory house, where gables and upper windows rose beyond the high garden wall.

“ Parsonage or suffin.”

“ ’Tain’t likely they’ve left no doors open where a bloke could sneak a drop to drink.” He spoke in a still lower tone, yet with a hopeful inflection.

“ What do you fink — a clergyman’s aouse and race time an’ all ! ” He plucked a spike of grass and slowly chewed it, leaning against the gate with his elbow on the top bar, while his mate, not dissuaded by his reasoning, followed the hedge side for some distance, crossed the road, and putting his hands on the garden wall, drew himself up and looked over.

’Enery chewed on in moody silence until his mate hailed him with a low sibilant call. He crossed the road gingerly and joined him, still munching the grass in sceptical despondency.

“ Give us a bunnick up,” whispered the more energetic partner. “ Strawberries is in and there’s a bed on ’em down there, which I’m goin’ for.”

The other gave the required lift.

“ You are a-comin’ along.? ” asked ’Enery, from the top of the wall.

“Well, you don’t fink I’m goin’ to stop here, a-chewin’ grass while you’re a-wolfin’ strawberries in there, do you ? Give us a pull.”

In a few minutes both were “ wolfing ” the rector’s cherished fruit, and for half an hour they wolfed in silence ; then one of them, seized with a misgiving, spoke :

“ I don’t know how these is goin’ to agree with our in’ards. If we could on’y get a drop o’ sperrits to keep ’em from turnin’ of us up.”

“ ’Tain’t more’n half-past free yet awhile ; shan’t get no sperrits afone six.”

“ We might jest go and have a look at the doors, now we’re here.”

“ Ain’t no harm in lookin’, is there ? ”

Come on. We can mike round by the bloomin’ scrub bery.”

They got into the shrubbery and followed the path between the evergreens on tip-toe until they found an open lawn before them with the house beyond. They paused and looked. It was all right. The sombre house was as still as a tomb.

Skirting the dark evergreens they passed over the lawn and entered a similar alley to that which they had left, glad to be again where they were safe from observation. They had no wish to try the front of the house ; their hopes lay in the direction of the kitchens and offices at the back, towards which the shrubbery tended. But they had not gone a dozen stealthy steps from the open lawn, when they stopped suddenly, clutching at each other in alarm. They had both caught the sound of the click of a lock, which to their ears was ominously like the cocking of a gun. They waited a minute in breathless suspense, looking to the right and left in quick apprehension, for neither could say where the sound came from. Then they clutched at each other again, as the creaking of a hinge struck their ears. Without a doubt that came from the house across the lawn. What were they to do ? They had not the advantage of being professional burglars, but they stood a fair chance of suffering the disadvantage of such rascals if they were caught. To go back the way they came they must cross the lawn and expose themselves to discovery ; they were at sea as to their whereabouts, and knew no other way of escape. To make a dash for it was out of the question. There was the high wall to be scaled, and neither could depend on the help of his friend at such a time. Yet they must do something, if only to assure themselves that they were not being noiselessly crept upon by the enemy. With this consciousness they slowly and stealthily retraced their steps towards the lawn, bending low and seeking to find an opening through the evergreens by which to reconnoitre. Presently they both got a glimpse of the house. It had a door in the middle, and a veranda running to the right and left. Under the veranda one of the French windows was open ; in front of it the parson stood looking out over the lawn. They could tell he was the parson by his long black coat, close waistcoat, and shaven face. He looked like a phantom in the gray light ; his face was a white patch — nothing more.

Had he heard them ? His presence there seemed to prove that he had. There might be a dog in the house whose fine sense had caught the rustle of their feet in the bed of strawberries ; the parson had dressed and come down. That he suspected something was evident ; for, as they watched, he stepped out on to the lawn looking to the right and left ; then he stood still for some seconds in an attentive, listening attitude. Once more he came forward, and now the two unfor-

KITTY'S FA THER.

tunate marauders felt it was high time to retreat. A dozen steps would bring the parson to the alley, and within arms’ reach of them. They were peaceable rascals. To get into a row at the very beginning of the race week was the worst luck that could befall them, short of being made prisoners and delivered up to the police. To avoid an encounter they turned about, and in mortal dread crept along the alley. Happily the alley was disused and overgrown, so that they reached the end of the path without making any sound to betray them. But they were not at ease then.

The path abutted upon a quadrangular yard that seemed used for farm purposes. An irregular building enclosed it on three sides — possibly they were sheds for cows or stables for horses. There was a roofed well in the middle ; hard by was a heap of manure and a tumbrel with its shafts in the air. There seemed to be a gateway between two of the barn-like structures in front, but it was impossible to think of escaping that way. Barn doors were not in their line, and how they fastened and unfastened was a mystery they could not venture to solve. The only other exit was a narrow door on one side of the yard ; but that clearly opened upon the domestic offices, and might probably lead them into a trap from which escape was more difficult than their present position. A door of one of the sheds close at hand was open. They approached it and looked in. It was dark inside, beautifully dark, a few rough tools near the door, and an earthy smell encouraged the cockneys to believe that they might take refuge there without fear of being kicked by horses or tossed by bulls, and they crept in as far as they dared go in the dark. And here they waited with craned necks, watching the shrubbery, ready to draw back in an instant if the ghostly face of the parson suddenly appeared against the dark green of the brakes.

But he did not come. The slightest sound would have been caught by their strained ears ; the perfect stillness was unbroken. Gradually unbending from their cramped position as their courage revived, they rose to their feet and held a whispered consultation.

“ He ain’t come trough the scrubbery.”

“ Seems like he’s gone back agin.”

“ P’raps he’s gone tawake the servints.”

“ Or fetch a dawg — or a gun.”

“ Better clear out of this sharp. How about the door ? ”

KITTY'S FA THER.

£ I

“ We’ll have a look frough the bushes to see he ain’t hangin’ about afore we go messin’ along o’ doors what we don’t know nuffin about.”

“ Right y’are ; come on.”

They made their way back into the alley slowly, balancing first on one foot then on the other, until they came to a part of the shrubbery where the evergreens were sparsely planted, and they dropped on their hands and knees to peer under the lower branches, where the growth was thinnest. They were almost on a parallel with the fa9ade of the house ; a flower border lay between them and the lawn on the other side of the evergreens.

“ Can’t see nobody. Where’s the bloomin’ winder ? ” whispered one.

“ Lower side of the door. We must go farder round afore ”

He stopped abruptly, for at that moment both heard the rustle of a foot in the crisp grass of the lawn, and a minute afterwards the parson himself passed before them. He was so close to them that they could not see more than the skirt of his frock-coat and his legs. But the strange thing was that his knees were bent, and he planted one foot firmly before lifting the other, taking short, quick paces a's though he carried a heavy burden. They could not make it out. It was not with such a gait that he would skirt the lawn if he were on the look-out for depredators ! Yet it seemed as if he were simply making the tour of the lawn.

Suddenly a brusque movement of the evergreens and the scrunch of a heavy foot on the path indicated that the parson had quitted the lawn and entered the alley in the shrubbery. The two sharpers rose swiftly to their feet, and as rapidly as caution permitted, retraced their steps to the yard, for it was clear that the parson was coming down the path. At each moment they heard the quick, sharp crunch of his heavy step ; the rustling of the foliage was continued as though the way was too narrow for his passage. The rascals got back to the shed breathless with haste and fear, and crouched down in the obscurity beyond the half-closed door, looking intently at the opening in the shrubbery for the further development of the mystery. Nearer and nearer the heavy footstep came ; the brushing of the evergreens grew louder, and at length the parson came in sight, bent low and staggering under the load painfully poised upon his shoulder. What was the load he

KITTY^S FATHER.

bore ? — a man — another parson seemingly, by his dress — an old man with thin, silvery hair that shone in the gray light. And he was dead, for his limbs hung supine and his head swayed from side to side as his bearer staggered on.

The bearer’s strength had almost given out. He made for the well in the middle of the yard with slow, short, struggling steps. The mouth of the well was surrounded by a brick wall rising three or four feet from the ground. Arrived at the edge, the parson steadied his legs and attempted to throw his burden on the well ; but his strength was not equal to the effort, and the body sliding from his shoulder fell to the earth, the upper part huddled up against the brickwork, the white head drooping forward in an attitude terribly grotesque. The living parson straightened himself up and looked round him with the same listening attention the men had observed when they first saw him on the lawn. He stood thus in the dead stillness for fully two minutes, then drawing a handkerchief from the tail pocket of his frock-coat he slowly wiped the sweat from his livid face. He was a man of medium height, with dark hair, and about forty — so much the men in the shed could make out in that uncertain light, but little more with certainty.

When he had wiped his face he slowly replaced the handkerchief in his pocket, looking down at the dead man by his feet. Then he bent down, and, clasping the body in his arms, endeavored to raise it up on the edge of the well ; but he could not lift it high enough, and after a struggle he let it slip from his arms, the body this time falling at full length, and the white old head striking the cobble pavement with a dull thud. The parson looked about him, and catching sight of the bucket hanging over the well by a chain running through a pulley in the cross-beam above, went to the windlass and slowly unwound it. Evidently the well was in disuse, for despite his slow and cautious movement the windlass and pulley squeaked and the rusted chain grated harshly as it descended. When a certain length was unwound he drew up the bucket from the well, unhooked it from the chain, and set it down softly. Then, taking the disengaged hook, he passed it under the dead man’s head, drew the chain tight round his throat, and slipped the hook round a limb. After pausing once more to look around and listen he went slowly to the windlass and began slowly again to wind it up. The winch squeaked, the pully grated ; but the chain held.

KITTY'S FATHER.

tightening upon the dead man’s throat and gradually dragging him up from the ground. Higher and higher it rose, that ghastly freight, the body hanging at an angle from the wall, the neck stretching under the weight and friction, as if the body must break away from the head. The fear of that seemed to impress the parson at the winch, for looking at it fixedly he turned slower and more slow, until at length the bulk having risen above the parapet, the long, thin legs slipped over and fell within the mouth of the well. The parson stopped, looking up at the dead man, as, released from the strain, it turned slowly round like a man hanging from a gallows. The two rascals in the shed, looking on at this scene with a horrid interest which no event in their criminal lives had ever so aroused, fancied that they saw a grin in the parson’s face as he regarded his brother churchman thus hanging.

Then he unwound the winch and the body slowly dropped out of sight. When the chain hung loose he left the windlass, bent over the wall, shaking the chain until the hook was disengaged, and then wound it up to its original position. The ratchet fastened, he hung the basket up as he found it, and with his chin in his hand, his shoulders bent, and walking on his toes he quietly crossed the yard and disappeared amongst the evergreens.

The two sharpers waited, breathing softly, still silent with a nameless fear, until a click, audible to them even at that distance, told that the parson had re-entered the house and shut the window. Then they whispered :

‘‘ My God, if that was one of us ! ”

“ What are we ought to do ? ”

“ Git out er this like a shot, and say nuffin to nobody. A bloke like that could swear our lives away. Who’d believe two free-card players if we told the truf and that cussed sleek vermin said he knowed nuffin about the job } ”

“ Right you are. It’ll be a lifer for us if we’re found here. We’ll get out by that ere gate and down to the race-course at a rush ! ”

“ If I ain’t all of a sweat ! I shall dream of that well and the pore old bloke a-swingin’ there.”

KITTY^S FATHER.

Chapter II. Kitty

Kitty had gone into the theatre, and I, standing by the stage door, was lighting my pipe, for there was yet a quarter of an hour before the orchestra was called, when a man leaning against the wall at a little distance approached me and said in a tone of familiarity —

“ After you, Mr. Holderness.”

A gust of wind blew out the lighted vesta as I offered it. I handed him the box. He was a middle-aged man of medium height, dressed in a long ulster, with a red handkerchief round his throat. He took off his bowler to shelter the match he struck. The flickering light from the lamp over the stage door fell on his head, and I saw that his closely-cropped hair was quite white, and that his face and lips were clean shaven. He raised his hand with the light in it to his pipe. The light dancing after each pull shone on his hollow cheeks and his high cheek bones, his grizzled eyebrows, the crows’ feet in the angles of his eyes, his pinched nostrils and his long upper lip ; but I couldn’t make out who he was. He seemed conscious of my perplexity, for, still holding the light before his face he turned his eyes towards me, amusement puckering the crows’ feet, and said between a couple of whiffs —

“ You don’t recognize me, I see ? ”

“ No,” said I, “but that’s not surprising — there’s such a lot of you about the place. Everyone knows the leader of the band, by sight, but I only know my band and half a dozen of the mummers.”

“ Ah, you set me down for a mummer.” He threw away the match and replaced his hat. “ Why ? ”

“ Because you’ve got a long upper lip, your face is shaved, and your hair’s close-cropped.” He gave a low chuckle, and replied —

“ Mummers are not the only people who have to wear their hair short.”

“ I recognized him in that instant. The chuckle did it — just as a chance note will return to one’s memory a longforgotten air.

KITTY'S FA THER.

“ Good God ! ” I exclaimed in astonishment and with bated breath. ‘‘ Is it you, Bob ? ”

He nodded in silence, and, pressing his arm under mine, led me away from the stage door. We paced slowly up to the end of the side street, turned and paced back without a word. I knew what he meant by saying that actors were not the only men who had to keep their hair clipped close, and understood now why I had heard nothing of him for so many years — he had been in a convict prison ; and as I thought of the reckless self-abandonment which had brought a decent man to this degradation, a feeling of resentment and anger chilled and silenced me.

“ You’re not very chatty,” he said, after a sigh, as if shaking off oppressive memories, “ considering it’s fifteen years since we met.”

“ I thought you were dead.”

“ And you don’t seem well pleased to find that I’m not yet. Well, I suppose I ought to have killed myself. It’s the quickest way of forgetting. Drink and dissipation don’t do' it. Time hardly does it. The short cut’s the best. I ought to have died.”

“ Nonsense, Bob ! A man ought to live down his troubles and do his duty, and that’s what you ought to have done. It would have been better for you and others.”

He tossed his head with a contemptuous exclamation, and said, nodding towards a wretched old cab-horse drawn up before the corner beer-shop, “ You might as well tell that poor old hack that if he’d been born with a little more stuff and go in him he’d have made the fortune of his owner, and better cared for than many a Christian.”

I could have continued the argument by showing him that he had strength and go in him, and that for the seven years that I had known him previous to the awful accident in which my poor sister Madge was killed he had resisted all those temptations to which a genial, lively, and good-looking young fellow in the profession is especially subjected — never giving cause for the slightest reproach, but the memory of him at that time, of the perfect happiness in which he lived with his wife, and of the fearful blow which unmanned him and for a time absolutely shook his reason, softened my heart and silenced my tongue. It was too terrible, too pathetic to talk about, even at this long distance of time.

“ We won’t continue the subject, Bob,” said I, pressing his arm with mine.

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KITTY'S FATHER.

‘‘ You may be sure I didn’t come round to be blown up,” said he.

“ No. I suppose you want a little assistance.”

“ Assistance ; no. I didn’t come round for that neither.”

“ I thought just coming out — ” I suggested with some hesition in approaching a delicate matter.

He gave another quick chuckle — that sign of a sense of humor which had helped me more than anything else to identify him, and said he had been out some time.

“ And what are you doing now for a living ? ” I asked.

“ Oh, horses — anything that comes to hand,” he answered evasively. “ But that isn’t what I want to talk to you about. I’ve come to call you to account. You’re not so strong as you might be, Mr. Holderness.

“ Why, what have I done ? ” I asked in astonishment, finding the tables thus turned upon me.

“ You promised me that Kitty should never go on the stage.”

“ That’s true. But she was only six then, and I could do what I liked with her ; now she’s twenty-one and has a will of her own.”

How long has she been on the boards ? ”

Four years. She would go on. She’s a born actress.” As my brother-in-law made no reply, I felt it necessary to continue — “The stage isn’t what it was fifteen years ago. Bob. We’ve got ladies of title on the boards, and they’re not above any business they can get. If you look at last week’s * Illustrated ’ you’ll see a picture of the Honorable Misses Thingummy doing a skirt dance in a burlesque, and if you go in the show to-ni^t, you’ll find Kitty’s skirts quite as long as theirs, and her business perfectly modest.”

“ That’s all right, I’ve seen her every night this week from the gallery.”

“ She was bound to do something for a living. I’m not getting younger, and salaries on my side of the footlights haven’t gone up like those on the other. Since the old management at Liverpool broke up I’ve had to put up with what I could get — provincials, tours, and that sort of thing, so my means are short. Well, I didn’t like to send Kitty out as a governess, and she hated the idea. It’s a bad thing to force young people into occupations they dislike, and she would have been quite beyond my control unless I could have got a fixed engagement ; whereas, now, you see, she’s never out of

KITTY'S FA THER.

my sight, though I will say this for the dear girl, she’s never given me reason to believe that she needs looking after, for a more open, honest, affectionate soul never lived. It’s Madge living again in her daughter, and ”

I stopped, for a convulsive twitch of the man’s fingers on my arm warned me that he could not think as calmly of the lost wife as I of the dead sister.

“Yes, yes, yes — I’ve got eyes,” he said abruptly, and breaking away from the line of thought he asked, “ Has she any sweetheart ? ”

“ She’s had sweethearts since she was in short frocks — dozens. Everyone falls in love with her.”

“ Yes ; but has she fallen in love with anyone } ” he asked sternly.

“ Not seriously.”

“ So much the worse,” he said, gloomily ; and then in a still harder tone he asked, “ That fellow in the O. P. omnibus box every night ? ”

“ Oh, that’s Lord Strathsay,” I replied, scratching my cheek, uneasily.

“ I know, d him. Why is he there every night ? ”

“ It isn’t likely the management would refuse to let the box, is it. Bob ? ”

“ Does he go behind } ”

“ He did. Bob. He spoke to Kitty. What he said I don’t know, but she told the stag-mag. that if ever he came behind again she’d quit the stage the same minute and break her engagement, whatever it cost her.” Bob chuckled, and I went on — “ There’s nothing to fear ; Kitty shows me every letter he sends, and to-night the engagement ends.”

“ You open at Nottingham -on Monday ? ”

“ Yes, but it isn’t likely this fool will follow us.”

“ That depends. If he were a young fellow he might give up the chase ; but these middle-aged blackguards, when they take to hunting down a girl — you know what they are as well as I do. They get bets on, and there’s no knowing how their devilry will end. However, I’ll look after that. He won’t go to Nottingham.”

At that moment the call boy came to the stage door and seeing me, called out —

“ The orchestry’s rung, Mr. Holderness.”

“ One minute,” said Bob, holding my hand as I offered to say good-night. “ There are two things I want to say. If

KITTY'S FATHER.

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Kitty thinks I’m dead don’t undeceive her. That’s one. The next is I should like to see her married and off the boards. If a decent fellow comes along, and the only impediment is money, just write to me and I may be able to get over that difficulty. This address will find me.”

Looking at the envelope he put in my hand I read — “John Evans, Deacon’s Reading Rooms, Leadenhall Street.” John Evans was his present alias.

There was no time to ask for explanation, but all through the overture I kept saying to myself, “ How on earth is he going to prevent Lord Strathsay following us to Nottingham, and how can a man just out of prison make enough money to provide for Kitty if necessary ? ” The only answer I could find to these questions was — by violence and robbery.

As soon as the curtain rose on the dark scene of the pantomime opening, I turned my head and glanced up at the gallery. In the prompt-side corner I saw Bob, his elbows over the iron rail, his chin in his hands. That allayed my apprehension for the moment ; nevertheless, his presence there did not prevent the fulfilment of my conclusion that he intended by violence to stop Lord Strathsay’s pursuit of Kitty.

About half-way through the opening his lordship, with a couple of friends, came into the O. P. omnibus box, all in correct evening dress. Lord Strathsay seated himself in the front and nodded to Kitty, who at that moment happened to be facing him, with an air of insolent assurance that made my blood boil. Kitty went on with her business, taking no more notice of him than of anyone else in the house. Her performance ended with the scene before the transformation, but Lord Strathsay remained in his box as usual, for after changing her dress, my niece invariably took a seat in the manager’s box on the prompt-side to wait for me. She came down that night just at the beginning of the second scene of the harlequinade as we were playing the lilt for harlequin and columbine. The lilt ended, and the croaking voice of the pantaloon was heard in the wings calling — “ Where are you, Joey ; where are you ? ” to which the clown from the other wing replied — “ Here we are, old man. Oh, sich abit of fun ! See what I’ve got,” and he staggered on from the prompt-side with a hod of bricks on his shoulder, as the pantaloon hobbled on from the O. P. side. Now this was quite a new piece of business on the part of the pair who usually have the management of the harlequinade, and I watched its develop-