Well! what is the third reason?
Joey. Take a look at its colour first!
Vendale. I am looking at it.
Joey. Is it like clotted blood?
Vendale. Like enough, perhaps.
Joey. More than like enough, I think.
Vendale. Say it’s exactly like. What then?
Joey. Master George! They do say——
Vendale. Who?
Joey. How should I know who? Them as says pretty well everything! How can I give ’em a name, if you can’t?
Vendale. True. Go on.
(A momentary pause. OBENREIZER appears in the stream of daylight at the top of the steps. He advances into the cellar, now lost in the darkness, now visible again in the dim lamplight. Neither VENDALE nor JOEY notice him.)
Joey (very slowly and earnestly). They do say, that the man as gets by accident a piece of that dark growth right upon his breast——
Vendale. Right upon his breast——
Joey (as before). ——will for sure and certain——
Vendale. For sure and certain——
Joey. (in low warning tones). ——die by Murder. (Suddenly striking VENDALE on the breast, with a cry of horror.) By the Lord! you’ve got a bit of it on you!
Vendale. A bit of it on me? Yes! there it is on the ground.
Joey (holding up the cellar lamp, and disclosing a large red stain on the front of VENDALE’S shirt). And there’s the mark on your shirt—as red as blood!
(OBENREIZER suddenly appears before them.)
Vendale. (starting). What do you want here?
Obenreizer. (speaking with marked seriousness and restraint). I owe you an apology, Mr. Vendale—and I have come here to make it. I don’t alter the terms on which I give you my ward in marriage. But I regret the violence of language and manner with which those terms were imposed on you. I ask your pardon. (Holds out his hand.) Will you shake hands with me?
Vendale. Mr. Obenreizer, I accept your apology! (Takes his hand, and drops it, shuddering.) Excuse my noticing it—your hand is very cold.
Obenreizer. (gravely). A heavy heart makes a cold hand, Mr. Vendale. Another errand brings me here, besides my errand of apology. There is sad reason for my saying the words which have made us friends again.
Vendale. What is it?
Obenreizer. I have earned the right to offer you my sympathy—and I do offer it. A message came to my house, soon after you had left, summoning us both to Mr. Wilding’s presence. I presumed you had gone to him before me—I followed you, as I thought, to the house here. Nothing had been heard of you; and I came to the cellars to inquire for you myself. Mr. Vendale! rouse your courage. I bring miserable news.
Vendale. Wilding? Let me go to him directly!
Obenreizer. Wait! He has had a second fit.
Vendale. Dead?
Obenreizer. Dead!
Vendale. Oh, my poor Walter! My dear, dear friend! (A pause. VENDALE turns to JOEY, and points to the stain on the front of his shirt.) You said this was a warning of death. How little we thought that your superstition would come true!
Joey. I said more than that, Master George! Death was not the word.
Vendale. What was the word?
Joey. Murder.
THE END OF THE SECOND ACT.
ACT III.
(In Three Scenes.)
FIRST SCENE.—The Counting-house at Cripple Corner. A door at the side. A door in the flat scene, opening on the court-yard of the First Act. VENDALE and SALLY GOLDSTRAW discovered. They are both dressed in mourning.
Sally. Have you any more orders to give me, sir?
Vendale. No.—Stop! I have a question to ask you. Now that poor Wilding is buried, many things occur to me, which it was impossible to think of when we first felt the calamity of his death. How came Mr. Obenreizer to be present at his last moments?
Sally. Mr. Wilding insisted, sir, on sending for Mr. Obenreizer—I don’t know why.
Vendale. It seems strange, certainly! What could there be in common between them? On the first day of Mr. Obenreizer’s arrival in England, I remember poor Wilding looking at him with an appearance of extraordinary interest, and speaking to Mr. Bintrey in a very earnest way. My attention was occupied at the time; and I paid no heed to what passed between them.—Tell me exactly what happened, Sally, on the day of Mr. Wilding’s death.
Sally. I sent for Mr. Obenreizer, sir, and I sent for you—I did it to pacify my poor master. The messenger found Mr. Obenreizer at home; but nobody knew where to find you.
Vendale. I had bad news to tell my poor friend; and I purposely kept out of the way of telling it.—Go on.
Sally. Mr. Wilding got more and more disturbed in his mind, sir, while the messenger was gone. I sent for the doctor; and the doctor persuaded him to get to bed. But there was no quieting him that way. He insisted on knowing it, when Mr. Obenreizer came alone to the house. He declared he would leave his bed, and go down-stairs—unless Mr. Obenreizer was brought up to see him. The doctor said to me, “The risk of irritating him, in his present state, is the worst risk of all. Let the person come up.”
Vendale. Well?
Sally. The moment Mr. Obenreizer came into the room, sir, my poor master started up in his bed, and looked at his visitor with a dreadful eagerness, and fought and struggled for breath to speak. The doctor ordered Mr. Obenreizer out of the room again instantly. It was too late. The only sound that passed Mr. Wilding’s lips was the sound of your name, sir. The fit took him the moment after, and it was all over. He spoke in a thick, husky way—but I am sure he spoke your name.
Vendale. I don’t doubt it, Sally. I am charged by his will to accomplish the one object which we all know he had at heart—the finding of the lost namesake, whose place he had innocently usurped. The uppermost thought in his mind, when he felt death coming, was to rely on me. My poor dead friend—I will be true to your trust! If the lost man lives, you shall not have reckoned on my help in vain! (A knock is heard at the door leading into the yard.) Who’s there?
(JOEY LADLE opens the door. He carries a letter in his hand.)
Joey. Me, sir.
Vendale. Wait one moment. (JOEY waits at the door. VENDALE turns to SALLY.) One last question. Did Mr. Obenreizer make any remark, when he was first told of Wilding’s death?
Sally. He only said, sir, that he was shocked to hear of it; and that he would go and break the news to you.
Vendale. The mystery of what Wilding wanted with him remains as impenetrable as ever. Perhaps time may clear it up, Sally! (Turns to JOEY.) Well—what is it?
Joey (advancing). A letter, sir, from foreign parts.
Vendale. (taking the letter). From our correspondents in Switzerland! From Defresnier and Company, the wine-merchants of Neuchâtel! (Opens and reads the letter.)
Joey (to SALLY).