No Name, Wilkie Collins [reading the story of the TXT] 📗

door closed, and the stranger hastened away in the direction of Coney Street.

On this occasion Captain Wragge made no attempt to follow him. The handbill revealed plainly enough that the man’s next object was to complete the necessary arrangements with the local solicitor on the subject of the promised reward.

Having seen and heard enough for his immediate purpose, the captain retraced his steps down the street, turned to the right, and entered on the Esplanade, which, in that quarter of the city, borders the riverside between the swimming-baths and Lendal Tower. “This is a family matter,” said Captain Wragge to himself, persisting, from sheer force of habit, in the old assertion of his relationship to Magdalen’s mother; “I must consider it in all its bearings.” He tucked the umbrella under his arm, crossed his hands behind him, and lowered himself gently into the abyss of his own reflections. The order and propriety observable in the captain’s shabby garments accurately typified the order and propriety which distinguished the operations of the captain’s mind. It was his habit always to see his way before him through a neat succession of alternatives⁠—and so he saw it now.

Three courses were open to him in connection with the remarkable discovery which he had just made. The first course was to do nothing in the matter at all. Inadmissible, on family grounds: equally inadmissible on pecuniary grounds: rejected accordingly. The second course was to deserve the gratitude of the young lady’s friends, rated at fifty pounds. The third course was, by a timely warning to deserve the gratitude of the young lady herself, rated⁠—at an unknown figure. Between these two last alternatives the wary Wragge hesitated; not from doubt of Magdalen’s pecuniary resources⁠—for he was totally ignorant of the circumstances which had deprived the sisters of their inheritance⁠—but from doubt whether an obstacle in the shape of an undiscovered gentleman might not be privately connected with her disappearance from home. After mature reflection, he determined to pause, and be guided by circumstances. In the meantime, the first consideration was to be beforehand with the messenger from London, and to lay hands securely on the young lady herself.

“I feel for this misguided girl,” mused the captain, solemnly strutting backward and forward by the lonely riverside. “I always have looked upon her⁠—I always shall look upon her⁠—in the light of a niece.”

Where was the adopted relative at that moment? In other words, how was a young lady in Magdalen’s critical position likely to while away the hours until Mr. Huxtable’s return? If there was an obstructive gentleman in the background, it would be mere waste of time to pursue the question. But if the inference which the handbill suggested was correct⁠—if she was really alone at that moment in the city of York⁠—where was she likely to be?

Not in the crowded thoroughfares, to begin with. Not viewing the objects of interest in the Minster, for it was now past the hour at which the cathedral could be seen. Was she in the waiting-room at the railway? She would hardly run that risk. Was she in one of the hotels? Doubtful, considering that she was entirely by herself. In a pastry-cook’s shop? Far more likely. Driving about in a cab? Possible, certainly; but no more. Loitering away the time in some quiet locality, out-of-doors? Likely enough, again, on that fine autumn evening. The captain paused, weighed the relative claims on his attention of the quiet locality and the pastry-cook’s shop; and decided for the first of the two. There was time enough to find her at the pastry-cook’s, to inquire after her at the principal hotels, or, finally, to intercept her in Mr. Huxtable’s immediate neighborhood from seven to eight. While the light lasted, the wise course was to use it in looking for her out-of-doors. Where? The Esplanade was a quiet locality; but she was not there⁠—not on the lonely road beyond, which ran back by the Abbey Wall. Where next? The captain stopped, looked across the river, brightened under the influence of a new idea, and suddenly hastened back to the ferry.

“The Walk on the Walls,” thought this judicious man, with a twinkle of his particolored eyes. “The quietest place in York; and the place that every stranger goes to see.”

In ten minutes more Captain Wragge was exploring the new field of search. He mounted to the walls (which enclose the whole western portion of the city) by the North Street Postern, from which the walk winds round until it ends again at its southernly extremity in the narrow passage of Rosemary Lane. It was then twenty minutes to seven. The sun had set more than half an hour since; the red light lay broad and low in the cloudless western heaven; all visible objects were softening in the tender twilight, but were not darkening yet. The first few lamps lit in the street below looked like faint little specks of yellow light, as the captain started on his walk through one of the most striking scenes which England can show.

On his right hand, as he set forth, stretched the open country beyond the walls⁠—the rich green meadows, the boundary-trees dividing them, the broad windings of the river in the distance, the scattered buildings nearer to view; all wrapped in the evening stillness, all made beautiful by the evening peace. On his left hand, the majestic west front of York Minster soared over the city and caught the last brightest light of heaven on the summits of its lofty towers. Had this noble prospect tempted the lost girl to linger and look at it? No; thus far, not a sign of her. The captain looked round him attentively, and walked on.

He reached the spot where the iron course of the railroad strikes its way through arches in the old wall. He paused at this place⁠—where the central activity of a great railway enterprise beats, with all the pulses of its loud-clanging life, side by side with the dead majesty