She returned, having filled my hat from the spring. But for the exquisite coolness of the water falling on my face, trickling down my throat, I should have lost my senses again. In a few minutes more, I could take that dear hand, and hold it to me as if I was holding to my life. We could only see each other obscurely, and in that very circumstance (as we confessed to each other afterwards) we found the needful composure before we could speak.
"Cristel! what does it mean?"
"Poison," she answered. "And he has suffered too."
To my astonishment, there was no anger in her tone: she spoke of him as quietly as if she had been alluding to an innocent man.
"Do you mean that he has been at death's door, like me?"
"Yes, thank God--or I should never have found you here. Poor old Gloody came to us, in search of help. "My master's in a swoon, and I can't bring him to." Directly I heard that, I remembered that you had drunk what he had drunk. What had happened to him, must have happened to you. Don't ask me how long it was before I found you, and what I felt when I did find you. I do so want to enjoy my happiness! Only let me see you safely home, and I ask no more."
She helped me to rise, with the encouraging words which she might have used to a child. She put my arm in hers, and led me carefully along through the wood, as if I had been an old man.
Cristel had saved my life--but she would hear of no allusion to it. She knew how the poisoner had plotted to get rid of me--but nothing that I could say induced her to tell me how she had made the discovery. In view of Trimley Deen, my guardian angel dropped my arm.
"Go on," she said, "and let me see the servant let you in, before I run home."
If she had not been once more wiser than I was, I should have taken her with me to the house; I should have positively refused to let her go back by herself. Nothing that I could say or do had the slightest effect on her resolution. Does the man live who could have taken leave of her calmly, in my place? She tore herself away from me, with a sigh of bitterness that was dreadful to hear.
"Oh, my darling," I said, "do I distress you?"
"Horribly," she answered; "but you are not to blame."
Those were her farewell words. I called after her. I tried to follow her. She was lost to me in the darkness.
CHAPTER XIV
GLOODY SETTLES THE ACCOUNT
A night of fever; a night, when I did slumber for a few minutes, of horrid dreams--this was what I might have expected, and this is what really happened. The fresh morning air, flowing through my open window, cooled and composed me; the mercy of sleep found me. When I woke, and looked at my watch, I was a new man. The hour was noon.
I rang my bell. The servant announced that a man was waiting to see me. "The same man, sir, who was found in the garden, looking at your flowers." I at once gave directions to have him shown up into my bedroom. The delay of dressing was more than I had patience to encounter. Unless I was completely mistaken, here was the very person whom I wanted to enlighten me.
Gloody showed himself at the door, with a face ominously wretched, as well as ugly. I instantly thought of Cristel.
"If you bring me bad news," I said, "don't keep me waiting for it."
"It's nothing that need trouble You, sir. I'm dismissed from my master's service--that's all."
It was plainly not "all." Relieved even by that guarded reply, I pointed to a chair by the bedside.
"Do you believe that I mean well by you?" I asked.
"I do, sir, with all my heart."
"Then sit down, Gloody, and make a clean breast of it."
He lifted his enormous fist, by way of emphasizing his answer.
"I was within a hair's breadth, sir, of striking him. If I hadn't kept my temper, I might have killed him."
"What did he do?"
"Flew into a furious rage. I don't complain of that; I daresay I deserved it. Please to excuse my getting up again. I can't look you in the face, and tell you of it." He walked away to the window. "Even a poor devil, like me, does sometimes feel it when he is insulted. Mr. Roylake, he kicked me. Say no more about it, sir! I would never have mentioned it, if I hadn't had something else to tell you; only I don't know how." In this difficulty, he came back to my bedside. "Look here, sir! What I say is--that kick has wiped out the debt of thanks I owe him. Yes. I say the account between us two is settled now, on both sides. In two words, sir, if you mean to charge him before the magistrates with attempting your life, I'll take my Bible oath he did attempt it, and you may call me as your witness. There! Now it's out."
What his master had no doubt inferred, was what I saw plainly too. Cristel had saved my life, and had been directed how to do it by the poor fellow who had suffered in my cause.
"We will wait a little before we talk of setting the law in force," I said. "In the meantime, Gloody, I want you to tell me what you would tell the magistrate if I called you as a witness."
He considered a little. "The magistrate would put questions to me--wouldn't he, sir? Very good. You put questions to me, and I'll answer them to the best of my ability."
The investigation that followed was far too long and too wearisome to be related here. If I give the substance of it, I shall have done enough.
Sometimes when he was awake, and supposed that he was alone--sometimes when he was asleep and dreaming--the Cur had betrayed himself. (It was a paltry vengeance, I own, to gratify a malicious pleasure--as I did now--in thinking of him and speaking of him by the degrading name which his morbid humility had suggested. But are the demands of a man's dignity always paid in the ready money of prompt submission?) Anyway, it appeared that Gloody had heard enough, in the sleeping moments and the solitary moments of his master, to give him some idea of the jealous hatred with which the Cur regarded me. He had done his best to warn me, without actually betraying the man who had rescued him from starvation or the workhouse--and he had failed.
But his resolution to do me good service, in return for my kindness to him, far from being shaken, was confirmed by circumstances.
When his master returned to the chemical studies which have been already mentioned, Gloody was employed as assistant, to the extent of his limited capacity for making himself useful. He had no reason to suppose that I was the object of any of the experiments, until the day before the tea-party. Then, he saw the dog enticed into the new cottage, and apparently killed by the administration of poison of some sort. After an interval, a dose of another kind was poured down the poor creature's throat, and he began to revive. A lapse of a quarter of an hour followed; the last dose was repeated; and the dog soon sprang to his feet again, as lively as ever. Gloody was thereupon told to set the animal free; and was informed at the same time that he would be instantly dismissed, if he mentioned to any living creature what he had just seen.
By what process he arrived at the suspicion that my safety might be threatened, by the experiment on the dog, he was entirely unable to explain.