Run to Earth, Mary Elizabeth Braddon [epub ebook reader .TXT] 📗

Haven as

soon as I can have a post-chaise got ready for me.”

 

“And I will go with you,” exclaimed Lady Eversleigh; “I shall feel as

if I were nearer my child if I go to the town where you hope to find

the clue to her hiding-place.”

 

“I, too, will accompany you,” said Captain Copplestone.

 

“Begging you pardon, sir,” remonstrated Mr. Larkspur, “if three of us

go, and one of those three a lady, we might attract attention, even in

such a busy place as Murford Haven. And if those that have got little

missy should hear of it, they’d smell a rat. No, my lady, you let me go

alone. I’m used to this sort of work, and you ain’t, and the captain

ain’t either. I can slip about on the quiet anywhere like an eel; and

I’ve got the eye to see whatever is to be seen, and the ear to pick up

every syllable that’s to be heard. You trust matters to me, and depend

upon it, I’ll do my duty. I’ve got a clue, and a clue is all I ever

want. You keep to this spot, my lady, and you, too, captain; for there

may come some kind of news in my absence, and you may have to act

without me. I shan’t waste time, you may rely upon it; and all you’ve

got to do, my lady, is to trust to me, and hope that I shall bring you

back good news from Murford Haven.”

 

Very little more was said, and half an hour after this interview, the

police-officer left Raynham in a post-chaise, on the first stage of the

journey to Murford Haven.

 

Words are too weak to describe the sufferings of the mother of the lost

child, and of the friends to whom she was hardly less dear. They waited

very quietly, with all outward show of calmness, but the pain of

suspense was not less keen. They sat silent, unoccupied, counting the

hours—the minutes even—during the period which must elapse before the

return of the police-officer.

 

He came earlier than Honoria had dared to expect him, and he brought

with him so much comfort that she could almost have fallen on her

knees, like Thetis at the feet of Jove, in the extremity of her

gratitude for his services.

 

“I’ve got the coverlet,” said Mr. Larkspur, dragging the little silken

covering from his carpet-bag, and displaying it before those to whom it

was so familiar. “That’s about the ticket, I think, my lady. Yes, just

so. I found a nice old hag waiting to claim her five pounds reward;

for, you see, the men at the police-office at Murford Haven contrived

to keep her dancing attendance backward and forwards—call again in an

hour, and so on—till I was there to cross-question her. A precious

deep one she is, too; and a regular jail-bird, I’ll wager. I soon

reckoned her up; and I was pretty sure that whatever she knew she’d

tell fast enough, if she was only paid her price. So, after a good deal

of shilly-shally, and handing her over five-and-twenty pounds in solid

cash, and telling her that she’d better beware how she trifled with a

gentleman belonging to Bow Street, she consented to tell me all about

the little girl. The man that stole little missy had been to her

precious hovel, and old Mother Brimstone had found a change of clothes

for little missy, in token of which, and on payment of another

sovereign, the old harpy gave me little missy’s own clothes; and there

they are.”

 

Hereupon Mr. Larkspur dragged from his capacious carpet-bag the

delicate little garments of lawn and lace which had been worn by the

cherished heiress of Raynham. Ah! who can describe the anguish of the

mother’s heart as she gazed upon those familiar garments, so associated

with the form of the lost one?

 

“Well,” gasped Honoria, “go on, I entreat! She told you the child had

been there. But with whom? Did she tell you that?”

 

“She did,” returned Andrew Larkspur. “She told me that the scoundrel

who holds little missy in his keeping is no other than the man

suspected of a foul murder—a man I have long been looking for—a man

who is well known amongst the criminal classes of London by the name of

Black Milsom.”

 

Black Milsom! the face of Lady Eversleigh, pale before, grew almost

ghastly in its pallor, as that hated name sounded in her ears, ominous

as a death-knell.

 

“Black Milsom!” she exclaimed at last. “If my child is in the power of

that man, she is, indeed, lost.”

 

“You know him, my lady?” cried Andrew Larkspur, with surprise. “Ah, I

remember, you seemed familiar with the details of the Jernam murder.

You know this man, Milsom?”

 

“I do know him,” answered Honoria, in a tone of utter despair. “Do not

ask me where or when that man and I have met. It is enough that I know

him. My darling could not be in worse hands.”

 

“He can have but one motive, and that to extort money,” said Captain

Copplestone. “No harm will come to our darling’s precious life. You

have reason to rejoice that your child has not fallen into the hands of

Sir Reginald Eversleigh.”

 

“Tell me more,” said Honoria to Mr. Larkspur. “Tell me all you have

discovered.”

 

“All I could discover was that the man Milsom had taken the child to

London by a certain coach. I went to the inn from which that particular

coach always starts; and here, after much trouble and delay, I was

lucky enough to see the guard. From him I derived some valuable

information; or perhaps, I ought to say some information that I think

may turn up trumps. He perfectly remembered the man Milsom by my

description of him, I having got the description from old Mother

Brimstone; and he remembered the child, because of her crying a deal,

and the passengers pitying her, and being pleased with her pretty

looks, and trying to comfort her, and so on. The guard himself took a

deal of notice of the child, and thought the man was not much good; and

when they got to London, he felt curious like, he said, to know where

the two would go, and what would become of them.”

 

“And did he find out?” gasped Lady Eversleigh.

 

“As good luck would have it, he did. The man got into a hackney-coach,

and the guard heard the driver tell him to go to Ratcliff Highway—that

was all.”

 

“Then I will find him,” exclaimed Honoria, with feverish excitement. “I

know the place well—too well! I will go with you to London, Mr.

Larkspur, and I myself will help you to find my treasure.”

 

In the extremity of her excitement she was reckless what secrets she

betrayed. She had but one thought, one consideration, and that to her

was life or death.

 

“Don’t question me,” she said to Captain Copplestone, who stared at her

in amazement; “my girlhood was spent in a den of thieves—my womanhood

has been one long struggle against pitiless enemies. I will fight

bravely to the last. And now, in this most bitter trial of my life, the

experience of my miserable youth shall serve in the contest with that

villain.”

 

She would brook no delay; she would explain nothing.

 

“Do not question me,” she repeated. “You have counselled me to trust in

the experience of Mr. Larkspur, and I will confide myself to his

wisdom; but I must and will accompany him in his search for my child.

Let a post-chaise be ordered immediately. Can you dispense with rest,

and take a hurried dinner before you start, Mr. Larkspur?” she added,

turning to her ally.

 

“Dispense with rest? Bless your innocent heart, my lady, I don’t know

the meaning of rest when I’m in business; and as for dinner, a ham

sandwich and a glass of brandy out of a pocket-pistol is as much as I

ask for when my blood’s up.” “You shall be richly rewarded for your

exertions.”

 

“Thank you kindly, ma’am. The promise of a reward is very encouraging,

of course; but, upon my word, my heart’s more in this business than it

ever was before in anything under a murder; and I feel as if it was in

me to do wonders.”

 

No more was said. Andrew Larkspur hurried away to eat as good a dinner

as he could get through in ten minutes, and Honoria went to her

dressing-room to prepare herself for her journey.

 

“Pray for me, kind and faithful friend,” she said, earnestly, as she

bade adieu to the captain.

 

In a few minutes more she was once again speeding along the familiar

road which she had travelled under such different circumstances, and

with such different feelings. She remembered the first time she had

driven through those rustic villages, past those swelling uplands,

those woods and hills.

 

Then she had come as a bride, beloved, honoured, seated by the side of

an adoring husband—a happy future shining before her, a bright horizon

without one cloud.

 

Only one shadow to come between her and the sunshine, and that the

shadow of a cruel memory—the haunting recollection of that foul deed

which had been done beneath the shelter of the darkness, by the side of

the ever-flowing river. Even to-day, when her heart was full of her

child’s sweet image, that dark memory still haunted her. It seemed to

her as if some mystic influence obliged her to recall the horrors of

that night.

 

“The curse of innocent blood has been upon me,” she thought to herself.

“I shall never know rest or peace till the murder of Valentine Jernam

has been avenged.”

 

Lady Eversleigh went at once to her rooms in Percy Street, and Mr.

Andrew Larkspur betook himself to certain haunts, in which he expected

to glean some information. That he was not entirely unsuccessful will

appear from his subsequent conversation with Lady Eversleigh. After an

absence, in reality short, but which, to her suspense and impatience

appeared of endless duration, Mr. Larkspur presented himself before

her.

 

“Well, Mr. Larkspur, what news?” she cried, eagerly, as he entered the

room.

 

“Not much, my lady; but there’s something done, at any rate. I’ve found

out one fact.”

 

“And what is that?”

 

“That the little lady has not been taken out of the country. Now, you

seem to know something of the man Milsom, my lady. Have you any idea

whether there is any particular place where he’d be likely to take

little missy?”

 

For some minutes Lady Eversleigh remained silent, evidently lost in

thought.

 

“Yes,” she said, at last, “I do know something of that man’s past

career; so much, that the very mention of his name sends a thrill of

horror through my heart. Yes, Mr. Larkspur, it is my misfortune to have

known Black Milsom only too well in the bitter past.”

 

“If your ladyship wouldn’t consider it a liberty,” said the police-officer, with some hesitation, “I should very much like to put a

question.”

 

“You are free to ask me what questions you please.”

 

“What I should like to ask is this,” replied Mr. Larkspur, “when and

where did your ladyship happen to meet Black Milsom? If you would only

be so kind as to speak freely, it might be a great help to me in the

work I’ve got in hand.”

 

Honoria did not answer him for some moments. She had risen from her

chair, and was walking up and down the room in deep thought.

 

“Will it help you in your search for my child,” she said, at length,