The man whom Tom Bristow had employed for the construction of the wardrobe which had proved of such essential service to Lionel Dering, was a cabinet-maker named Paul Wigley, who kept a small shop in the neighbourhood of Seven Dials, London. It was the very obscurity of this man, and the pettiness of his business, which had tempted Tom to employ him. It was not probable that a man in his position would ask any impertinent questions as to the purpose for which such a strange piece of workmanship was intended, so long as he was paid ready-money for his job. And so far Tom was right. Wigley made the wardrobe according to instructions, and treated the whole affair as though he were in the habit of making articles of furniture with false backs to them every day in the week. But Tom\'s first mistake lay in thinking that such a man would be less likely than a more reputable and well-to-do tradesman to connect in his own mind, as two links in a possible chain, the escape of a prisoner from Duxley gaol with the fact of having sent to that very town a wardrobe so constructed that a man might be hidden away in it with ease. Tom\'s second mistake lay in letting him know the destination of the wardrobe. "I ought to have had it sent to the railway-station addressed simply to my order," he said to himself, "and afterwards, when it was entirely out of Wrigley\'s hands, have re-addressed it myself to Alder Cottage."
Tom was quite aware that on this point he had committed an error of judgment; but he never apprehended that the slightest danger could spring therefrom.
Mr. Wigley, after working very hard for six days, generally devoted a portion of the seventh to posting himself up in the news of the week. After a hearty dinner, it was his delight on a Sunday afternoon to sit at ease and enjoy his newspaper and his pipe. He had taken great interest in the escape of Lionel Dering, as detailed in his favourite journal; and week after week he carefully culled whatever scraps of news he could find, that bore the remotest reference to that strange occurrence. One day he came across the following lines, which he read to his wife.
"We understand that up to the present time the police have obtained no clue to the whereabouts of Mr. Dering, the prisoner whose clever escape from Duxley gaol was duly chronicled in our columns a few weeks ago. It was thought at one time that the right track had been hit upon, but, when promptly followed up, it ended in nothing--or rather, in the capture and detention of an innocent person for several hours. So long a time has now elapsed since the escape, that the chances of the prisoner being recaptured would seem to be very problematical indeed."
"I hope, with all my heart, that he\'ll get safe away," said Mrs. Wigley. "What a strange thing it was, Paul, that that queer wardrobe which you made for a gentleman a month or two since should be for somebody in Duxley--the very town where this Mr. Dering broke out of prison. What a capital hiding-place that would make for him, Paul, dear! All the police in England would never think of looking for him there."
"You talk like a fool, Maria," growled Mr. Wigley between the puffs at his pipe.
But however foolishly Mrs. Wigley might talk, the idea originated by her was one which took such persistent hold on her husband\'s mind that, three days later, he found himself at Duxley, and telling the tale of the wardrobe in the office of the superintendent of police. Very fortunately indeed it happened that on this particular afternoon Mr. Drayton was away on business at a neighbouring town, and that Sergeant Tilley was acting as deputy in his stead. Tilley listened to the man\'s story with dismay. He had pocketed the six hundred pounds; and now he felt almost as much interested in Mr. Dering\'s getting safely away as Tom Bristow himself. What was to be done? His first thought was to pooh-pooh Wigley and his story, and to persuade the little cabinet-maker to return to town by the first up train. But Wigley was not a man to let himself be snuffed out in that way, and he quietly intimated that he would await the return of Mr. Drayton himself. Then Tilley\'s manner changed, and, while professing to agree with him in everything, he persuaded Wigley to take his leave for a couple of hours, by which time, he told him, Mr. Drayton would have returned and would be at liberty to see him.
No sooner was Wigley gone than, leaving the office in charge of a subordinate, Tilley hastened by back streets and unfrequented ways to Alder Cottage. He asked for Edith and told her his story in a few hurried words. His counsel was that, at every risk, Mr. Dering must be got away from the cottage before seven o\'clock that evening, as there was no doubt that shortly after that hour Mr. Drayton might be expected to pay a second domiciliary visit. He, Tilley, would take care that the policeman on duty on that particular beat should be withdrawn for a couple of hours on one pretext or another, so that there might be no fear of any interruption from him. Then, after a last word of warning, he went.
As it fell out, Tom Bristow was at the cottage at the very time of Tilley\'s visit. A council of war was immediately held. That Lionel must leave the cottage, and at once, was the one imperative necessity. Had it been mid-winter, instead of summer, he could easily have stolen away through the darkness, but at seven o\'clock on an August evening everything is almost as clearly visible as at mid-day.
However, go Lionel must; and the only question was--whither should he go? Where should he hide himself for a few hours?--or till the plan of action already decided upon by the two friends could be safely carried into effect?
In this extremity, Tom\'s thoughts seemed to revert naturally to Jane Culpepper; in which direction, indeed, they had travelled very often of late. Why not appeal to her? Why not ask her to shelter Lionel for a night or two at Pincote? He knew, without asking, that Miss Culpepper would be ready and glad to befriend Lionel at every risk.
A few minutes past seven o\'clock, Tom Bristow walked leisurely out through the front door of Alder Cottage. A minute or two later Lionel Dering, dressed like a carpenter, with a paper cap on his head and a basket of tools slung over his left shoulder, walked leisurely out through the back door, and keeping Tom well in view, followed him at a distance of thirty or forty yards. Avoiding as much as possible the main thoroughfares of the little town, Tom dived through one back street after another, till after several twistings and turnings, he reached a lonely lane leading into some fields, through which ran a footpath in the direction of Pincote. Step for step, Lionel followed, smoking a short black pipe, and having the gait and manner of a man who is pretty well worn out with a long day\'s work. Through the fields they went thus in single file, without decreasing the distance between each other or speaking a word, till at length the path brought them to the outskirts of a tiny wood at one corner of the Pincote estate. There was not a soul to be seen, and the two men, overleaping the hedge, were soon buried among the tangled undergrowth of the plantation. Here they held a hurried consultation. It would not do for Lionel to venture any nearer to Pincote till after dark, and Tom had yet to contrive some means of seeing Miss Culpepper alone, and of explaining to her the position of Lionel and himself. The Squire, when at home, generally dined between six and seven, and the best time for seeing Jane would be while her father was taking his post-prandial nap before he joined her in the drawing-room. So, leaving the wood, Tom went slowly toward Pincote, wishing that the shades of evening would deepen twice as fast as they were doing just then; while Lionel, left alone, clambered up into the green recesses of a sturdy chestnut, and there, safely hidden from any chance passers by, awaited, with what patience was possible to him, the signal which would announce to him the return of his friend.
Once again Mr. Drayton\'s imperative summons echoed through Alder Cottage, but this time he was expected, and had not to wait so long for admission. As before, Martha Vince admitted him, and, as before, Edith came out of the little parlour at the first sound of his voice.
"Is the lady within whom I saw when I was here before?" asked the superintendent of Martha.
"Yes, I am here, as you see, Mr. Drayton," answered Edith. "To what circumstance do I owe the honour of a second visit from you?"
"Sorry to have to confess it, ma\'am, but there was one part of the house which we seem to have quite overlooked when we were here last. You won\'t, perhaps, object to our having a look at it now?"
"My objections, I am afraid, would be of little value. I have no option but to submit."
"I must do my duty, you know, ma\'am. Very disagreeable it is to do at times, I assure you."
"Doubtless, very. Martha, show these gentlemen whatever part of the house they may wish to see." With these words Edith went back into the parlour, but this time she did not shut the door.
Mr. Drayton was followed into the house by Wigley, the cabinet-maker; and the rear was brought up by a constable in plain clothes.
"Upstairs, if you please," said the superintendent to Martha. "I am quite satisfied with the downstairs part of the house."
So upstairs they all tramped, and without pausing, Drayton led the way into Edith\'s dressing-room. Wigley\'s first mention of the wardrobe had brought to his recollection the fact of there being such a piece of furniture as the one described in one of the upstairs rooms.
Now that the moment for making the grand discovery was at hand, it would have been difficult to say whether the excitement of Drayton or of Wigley was the more intense. The latter was lured on by the prospect of the glittering reward that would become his, if, through his instrumentality, the escaped prisoner should be recaptured. Drayton was led on by a purely professional ardour. To succeed where the great Whiffins from Scotland Yard had failed, even though that success were won by a fluke, and by no brilliant stroke of his own genius, was in itself something to be proud of--something that would bring his name prominently before the notice of his superiors.
"This is the article that I\'ve been speaking to you about," said Wigley, striking the polished surface of the wardrobe with his open palm.
"Open it, Mr. Wigley, if you please," said the superintendent. "This is a very curious piece of furniture, indeed, and I should like to examine it thoroughly."
So Wigley proceeded to open it slowly and lovingly, as a man having a deep admiration for the work of his own hands. First the outer doors were flung wide open, revealing a few empty garments drooping drearily from the pegs. But when Mr. Wigley, with a solemn finger, touched the secret spring, and the false back swung slowly open on its secret hinges, the three men pressed forward with beating pulses and staring eyes, feeling sure that in another moment the great prize would be in their grasp.
Drayton\'s fingers closed instinctively on the handcuffs in his pocket, while Martha Vince looked on from the background with a cynical smile.
The false back swung slowly open, and revealed the hiding-place behind. But it was empty.
"Flown!" said Wigley, with a deep sigh, all his golden visions vanishing like the shadow of a dream.
"Sold I most infernally sold!" exclaimed. Drayton, his face a picture of blank discomfiture. "It\'s no good waiting here any longer," he added, as he turned on his heel. "He\'s got clear away, never fear."
Downstairs the three men tramped, without another word, and, marching out, banged the front door behind them with a force that made every window in the little cottage rattle in its frame.
"Gone at last, thank Heaven!" exclaimed Edith, as the echo of the retreating footsteps died away. "If only I had tidings that my darling is safe, then I almost think that I should be quite happy." Unbidden tears were in her eyes as she stood for a moment with clasped hands and upturned face, while from her heart a silent prayer of thankfulness winged its way on high.
Tom Bristow lingered about the grounds and shrubberies at Pincote till the dusky evening was deepening into night, and the lamps in the drawing-room were alight. Then, with cautious footsteps, he stole nearer the house, and at last found himself ensconced behind a clump of holly, and close to one of the three French windows which opened from the drawing-room on to the lawn. The venetians were down, but between the interstices he could obtain a clear view of the room and its inmates. The inmates were only two in number--Miss Culpepper and another young lady whom Tom had never seen before. The Squire, if at home, had not left the dining-room. How pretty Jane looked as she sat there in the lamplight, in her soft flowing dress of white and mauve, plying her needle swiftly--for Jane\'s fingers were rarely unemployed--while her companion read to her aloud! Her every look, her every gesture, went direct to Tom\'s heart. He was caught in the toils at last--this cold, self-willed, unimaginative man of the world--and he began to find that, even for such as he, such bonds are not easily broken.
"This is either love or something very much like it," he muttered to himself. "I find that I am just as great an ass as my fellow-men. What is it in this that fascinates me so strangely? She is not particularly clever, or handsome, or witty, or accomplished. I have been in the society of women who could outshine her in every way: and yet, for me, she is the one woman whom the world holds--the one woman whom I ever felt that I could love. It is easy to talk about dying for a woman, and not very difficult to do so, I dare say. The grand test of love, as it seems to me, is to live with a woman and to love her at the end of twenty years as well as you loved her on your wedding-day. Now, of all the women I have ever met, yonder fairy is the only one with whom I should care to try the experiment. Her I fancy I could love as well at the end of a hundred years as of twenty: and yet of what the charm consists that draws me to her--whence it comes, and how she exercises it--I know no more than the man in the moon."
But Tom\'s love-reveries did not absorb him to the extent of making him oblivious of the particular object which had brought him to Pincote. It was requisite that he should see Jane alone, and nothing could be done so long as Jane\'s companion was in the room with her. Besides which, the squire might come in at any moment, and then his last chance would be gone. Should the worst come to the worst, he was prepared to go up to the front door, knock like any ordinary visitor, and ask to see Miss Culpepper openly and boldly. But it was only as a last resource that he would adopt a measure which, should it come to the squire\'s ears, could only lead to inquiry; and inquiry on the squire\'s part was what Tom was particularly wishful to avoid. Not that the old man would not have been as stanch as steel in such a case, and would have done anything and everything to assist Lionel. But, unfortunately, he had a garrulous tongue, which could not always be trusted to keep a secret--which often betrayed secrets without knowing that it had done so; and in a matter so grave as the one in which he was now engaged, Tom was careful to avoid the slightest unnecessary risk. It would be far better for every one that the squire should rest in happy ignorance, till the future should bring its own proper time for revealing everything.
Whenever any particular question pressed itself strongly on Tom\'s mind for solution, he had a habit of looking at it, not from one or two points of view only, but from several; and if nineteen ways out of a difficulty proved, from one cause or another, to be unavailable, he generally found the twentieth to be the very mode of egress for which he had been seeking. So it was in the present case. After considerable cudgelling of his brains, he hit on a simple expedient which seemed to him to be worth trying, but which might or might not prove successful in the result.
On the occasion of Tom\'s first visit to Pincote, among other pieces played by Jane in the drawing-room after dinner, was a plaintive little waltz, entitled "Venez à Moi," which took his fancy more than anything he had heard for a long time. Later on in the evening he had asked Jane to play it again, and for days afterwards the air clung to his memory, and seemed in some strange way to mix itself up in his musings whenever he thought of Jane. As if Jane had some faint divination that such was the case, the next time Tom was at Pincote she played the waltz again--this time without being asked; and so also on the third and last time he spent an evening with her. It was on this third occasion, as the final bars of the waltz were dying away in slow-breathed sweetness, that the eyes of Tom and Jane met across the piano--met for a moment only; but that one moment sufficed to reveal a secret which, as yet, they had hardly ventured to whisper to themselves. From that day forth, never so long as they lived, could that simple French melody be fo............