Richard Marsh

“ I am afraid, Vicomte, that I do not remember having ever heard your name before."
"Ah! Is that so?" The stranger regarded his polished boots. He spoke as if he were addressing himself to them. "Is it possible that she can have given another name? No, it is not possible. She is capable of many things. I do not believe she is capable of that." He looked up again at Mr. Lovell. "My business with you, Mr. Lovell, is of rather a peculiar kind. You will think, perhaps, that mine is rather a singular errand. I have come to ask you to acquaint me with the residence of my wife." ”

“ You get me into a room, you lock the door, you come at me, the pair of you, with a revolver and a knife, when you know that I haven't got so much as a toothpick in my pocket! Why, you miserable brutes, I'll smash you both!"
Hubert brandished the chair about his head. The big man still hesitated. The shorter gentleman addressed this inquiry to his friend, "Shall I shoot him? Shall I put six shots into his carcass--shall I?"
Hubert did not wait to hear the other's answer. He turned to the door. "Cecil! Cecil! break down the door. The brutes will murder me! Break down the door!" ”

“ Fancy a dead man, of a bloated habit of body, taking his walks abroad in a suit of checks--each check twelve inches square! I was so uncomfortably conscious that Mr. Benyon did not look a clubbable kind of man that I faltered in my speech.
"You will excuse me, Mr. Benyon, if the question I am about to put to you appears to you even worse than absurd, but the members of my team have some ridiculous notion in their heads that you are a certain Tom Benyon who died twenty years ago, and who now lies buried in the churchyard. I am sure, therefore, you will forgive my asking, are you a ghost?" ”

“ The doctor ceased. Pybus's face had assumed a very singular hue. "I--I hope that I have said nothing----"
"No, you have said nothing. Laudanum poisoning?" He turned to Hughes. "So that is it." And then to me. "So that was 'Aunt Jane's Jalap.' It's--it's rather hard--that a man of my years--should--die of--jalap."
Pybus took a seat. The doctor stared at him.
"Mr. Pybus, I hope that nothing is the matter."
"Nothing, only--I'm the man--that's poisoned." ”

“ The speaker looked a gentleman. He sounded like one, too. Costume, appearance, manner were beyond reproach--even beyond the criticism of two such keen critics as were these. The glorious attire of a London dandy was surmounted with a beautiful white top-hat. In his button-hole was a magnificent gardenia.
In age the stranger was scarcely more than a boy, and a sunny-faced, handsome boy at that. His cheeks were hairless, his eyes were blue. His smile was not only innocent, it was bland. ”

“ My dear Duke, by all means act on Mr. Dacre's valuable suggestion. As I said before, why not? It would at least be interesting to see if the Duchess does or does not lose her arm--almost as interesting to you as to Mr. Dacre. Those blackmailing, kidnapping scoundrels do use such empty menaces. Besides, you would have the pleasure of seeing me locked up. My imprisonment for life would recompense you even for the loss of her Grace's arm. And five hundred pounds is such a sum to have to pay--merely for a wife! Why not, therefore, act on Mr. Dacre's suggestion? Here comes the constable. ”

“ He touched his hat to the governor--his honest, rubicund, somewhat pugnacious face, eloquent of the weight that was on his mind.
"Excuse me, sir. I said he was a witch."
"Your saying that he was a witch--or wizard," remarked the governor, dryly, "will not, I fear, be sufficient excuse, in the eyes of the commissioners, for your throwing a pail of water over the chaplain."
"But a man's not answerable for what he does when he's bewitched," persisted the chief warder, with characteristic sturdiness. ”

“ Murray, you threw a pail of water over me. If you assert that you did it under the influence of witchcraft, I, who have myself been under a spell, am willing to excuse you."
"Mr. Hewett, sir, you yourself know I was bewitched."
"I do; as I believe it of myself. Murray, give me your hand." The chaplain and the chief warder solemnly shook hands. "There is an end of the matter as it concerns us two. Major Hardinge, do I understand you to assert that you too were under the influence of witchcraft?" ”

“ The doctor kept glancing, perhaps unconsciously, at his hat. The chaplain, though conspicuously uneasy, seemed to have his wits about him most. It was he who, temporarily usurping the governor's functions, addressed the prisoner.
"Your name is Oliver Mankell?" The prisoner merely smiled. "You are sentenced to three months' hard labour?" The prisoner smiled again. "For--for pretending to tell fortunes?" The smile became more pronounced. The chaplain cleared his throat. "Oliver Mankell, I am a clergyman. I know that there are such things as good and evil. ”

“ Colson, he went purple. He showered on Mr. Johns a volley of that sort of language which I had found pretty fashionable at Ahmednugger. Mr. Johns listened to him in silence, while he pocketed the spoils. Then he had his say.
"You say I fluke? Why, my dear sir, you've no idea what a fluke is. You've no idea of any sort about billiards. You can no more play billiards than you can play the gentleman--you can't! You're the sort of person whom it is just as well, once in a way, to expose. You're a humbug, Mr. Colson, you're a humbug. ”

“ He stood bolt upright, his legs together, his feet drawn heel to heel; not at all in the fashion of a modern cricketer, who seeks to guard his wickets with his legs. His bat he held straight down in front of him, the blade swinging gently in the air.
I am afraid I wasted more time in preparing to deliver my first ball than I need have done; but if Mr. Benyon had not had a smack with a bat for twenty years it was a good fifteen since I had bowled a ball. After such a lapse of time one requires to pull oneself together before exhibiting one's powers to a cricketer of Mr. Benyon's calibre. ”

“ Brooks! Brooks! Run, Brooks, to the nearest doctor, and then to half-a-dozen others, and tell them there's a case of laudanum poisoning, and they're to come at once."
"Laudanum poisoning, sir! What, in the house?"
"Yes, in the house. Don't stand there like a pig in a fit. It's a question of life or death!"
"One moment, sir, while I get my hat."
"Go without your hat. Here; take mine. Now, run for your life. Remember, if anything happens through you, you will be held responsible in the eyes of the law. Come along, Lucas, let's go in to them. Keep yourself awake, old man; jump about. ”

“ The governor took the man by the shoulder, and tried to rouse him out of sleep.
"Hitchcock! Hitchcock! Come, wake up, my man! It's all right; he's coming to--he's waking up."
He did wake up, and that so suddenly as to take the party by surprise. He sprang upright on the plank, nothing on but an attenuated prison shirt, and glared at the officials with looks of unmistakable surprise.
"Holloa! What's up! What's the meaning of this?"
Major Hardinge replied, suspicion peeping from his eyes:
"That is what we want to know, and what we intend to know--what does it mean? Why aren't you in your cell?" ”

“ Mr. Pownceby wound up with one under the chin which lifted him off his feet and laid him on his back. He lay where he fell. The blow had knocked him senseless. Mr. Pownceby proceeded to revive him with the remains of the champagne.
"This," he murmured, opening his eyes and looking up, "is nice."
Mr. Pownceby propped him up upon a chair.
"You compelled me to rush the thing; but I hope I haven't hurt you much."
"Well," said Mr. Pratt, "you haven't killed me--quite. I never enjoyed whipping a man so much before. Say, stranger, is this the first little fight you've had?" ”

“ That you will get something to do is, therefore, the advice of your affectionate brother, Cecil Buxton."
"It would be an odd coincidence," reflected Hubert, "if that Miss Danvers is this Miss Danvers."
An idea occurred to his fertile--too fertile--brain. As the first glimmerings of the idea burst on him, Hubert smiled.
In giving birth to Cecil and Hubert Buxton, Nature had been indulging in one of her freaks. They were twins--born within a few seconds of each other. Cecil came first. Hubert came, with all possible expedition, immediately after. Babies are proverbially alike. ”

“ The stranger gave his shoulders that almost imperceptible shrug:
"Oh, my dear Dacre, I am in want of money! I believe that you sometimes are in want of money, too."
Everybody knows that nobody knows where Ivor Dacre gets his money from, so the illusion must have tickled him immensely.
"You're a cool hand," he said.
"Some men are born that way." ”

“ I have worked for, and earned, my little pile, such as it is, and until I set out upon that pleasure tour in the East, it had never occurred to me that a man could be regarded as an uneducated idiot if he could not, say, run into double figures every time he took up his cue at billiards. A suspicion that a man might be so regarded had been dawning upon me ever since I arrived in India; but until I came to Ahmednugger I had never quite realised how shockingly my education had been neglected on exactly those points on which it ought to have been most carefully attended to. ”

“ As I entered the tent the scorer cried out--
"What name?"
"Tom Benyon," replied the bowler.
Mr. Hedges, who was seated at the scorer's side, brought down his fist upon the trestle-table with a bang.
"I knew it was! I knowed him all along!" Mr. Hedges was in a state of odd excitement. "That chap who bowled you ain't a man, sir--he's a ghost."
"He manages to put a good deal of pace on the ball for a ghost," I answered.
"And so he ought to. Did you hear what name he said? He said Tom Benyon! There wasn't a better cricketer in all these parts than Tom Benyon used to be. ”

“ What the "lively family" would think of a perfect stranger arriving burdened with rubbish, as if he had known them all their lives, I did not dare to think. No doubt they would set him down as a lunatic right away.
It was a horrible journey. The trains were late, and, of course, overcrowded; there was enough luggage in our compartment to have filled it, and still there was one more passenger than there ought to have been; an ill-conditioned old fellow who wanted my hat-box put into the van because it happened to tumble off the rack on to his head. ”

“ During those fifteen years I do not remember once handling a bat, far less hitting at a cricket-ball with one; and yet, in this state of unpreparedness, I had the presumption last summer to captain a team, and to lead them on--well, not to victory but to disgrace. It's a fact. The match was Storwell v. Latchmere. Storwell was my team; and as I do not think a more remarkable match was ever known in the whole annals of cricketing history, I here venture to report it. ”

“ How are three hundred locks to be tampered with in the middle of the night by a man who is himself a prisoner? One moment--But even that is nothing compared to the feat of carrying three hundred men fast asleep in bed--bed and all--through three hundred closed doors, under the very noses of the officers on guard--think of doing all that singlehanded!"
"It was witchcraft."
When the chief warder said this, Major Hardinge exploded.
"Witchcraft! The idea of the chief warder of an English prison talking about witchcraft at this time of day! It's quite time you were superannuated, sir." ”

“ The doctor started back just in time to escape its teeth. The dog disappeared--there was the hat again. The appearance was but momentary, but it was none the less suggestive on that account. The doctor seemed particularly affected.
"We must have all been drinking, if we are taking to seeing things," he cried.
"I think," suggested the chaplain, almost in a whisper, "that we had better inquire what it is he wishes us to do." There was silence. "We--we have all clear consciences. There--there is no reason why we should be afraid."
"We're--we're not afraid," gasped the governor. ”

“ There was silence again, broken by Warder Slater taking off his cap and then his tunic, which he folded up carefully and placed upon the floor, and turning his shirt-sleeves up above his elbows, revealing as he did so a pair of really gigantic arms.
"If any man says I let them men out of the cells, I'm ready to fight that man, either for a gallon of beer or nothing. I don't care if it's the inspector, or who it is."
"I suspect," declared the chaplain, "that the inspector's too great a coward to take you on, but if he does I'm willing to back Slater for half-a-crown. ”

“ The prisoners, secure of a grievance, were practising step-dances in their heavy shoes on the stone floors: they made the narrow vaulted corridors ring.
"Silence those men!" shouted Mr. Jarvis, the second warder, who was tall and thin as the chief was short and stout. He might as well have shouted to the wind. Those in the cells just close at hand observed the better part of valour, but those a little distance off paid not the slightest heed. If they were locked in, the officers were locked out.
"I must go and see the governor." Mr. Murray pursed up his lips. ”

“ Gerald Lovell, an artist is supposed to be a gentleman."
"And so in England, Vicomte. And therefore, when an artist is interrupted at his work by another gentleman, he feels himself at liberty to beg that other gentleman--to excuse him." ”

“ As for John Roberts doubting if he could give you fifteen in a hundred--why, he could give you ninety-nine in a hundred, and beat you single-handed. I tell you what I will do, Mr. Colson. I will play you five hundred up, for five hundred rupees a side. I will give you four hundred start, and I will lay two to one against you with any gentleman who cares to back you. I don't think that's an unfair offer, Mr. Colson."
It struck me as, at any rate, a rash offer. Mr. Colson was not such a tyro as Mr. Johns made out. ”

“ Anyone looking less like a cricketer I have seldom seen. His costume was ridiculous. He had on a pair of large check trousers--a check of the kind which the Oxford tailor explained to the undergraduate was a leetle too large to be seen to advantage on a single pair of understandings. He had on a huge top hat, of a size and shape which would have made the fortune of a "lion comique." A red woollen muffler was wound several times round his neck, and his capacious person was enveloped in an enormous overcoat, the like of which I had never seen before. ”

“ For the matter of that, all our blood is upon your head. But we shall not die alone. You shall come, too, my friend."
"If you don't take your hands away, Lucas, I shall have to do you a mischief."
"Mr. Lucas! Mr. Hughes! Have you both of you gone mad? Are you aware that there are ladies present?"
The interference came from Pybus. He dragged us asunder. He showed more presence of mind, and more coolness, too, than I had credited him with. He was a great deal calmer than either Lucas or I.
"What is the meaning of this extraordinary behaviour? And what is the matter with Miss Hammond?" ”

“ Barnes turned to Moysey. Moysey brought his hand up to his brow in a sort of military salute--he had been a soldier in the regiment in which, once upon a time, the Duke had been a subaltern:
"She did. The Duchess came out of the shop. She seemed rather in a hurry, I thought. She got into the carriage, and she said, 'Home, Moysey!' I shut the door, and Barnes drove straight home. We never stopped anywhere, and we never noticed nothing happen on the way; and yet when we got home the carriage was empty." ”

“ The suggestion came from the doctor. The Major exploded.
"Don't talk stuff and nonsense! Give the man three days' bread and water. That is what he wants."
"You do not believe in magic, then?" Mankell turned to the Major with his laughing eyes.
"What's it matter to you what I believe? You may take my word for it that I don't believe in impudent mountebanks like you."
The only reply Mankell gave was to raise his hand--if that might be called a reply--in the way we sometimes do when we call for silence, and there was silence in the room. All eyes were fixed upon the prisoner. ”

“ Hewett, the Chaplain of Canterstone Jail, was not the wisest of men. He was in the uncomfortable--but not uncommon--position of being disliked by both the rival houses. He meant well, but he was not an apt interpreter of his own meaning. He blundered, sometimes on the prisoners' toes, and sometimes on the toes of the officials. Before the service began, the governor thought of giving him a hint, not--in the course of it--to touch on the events of the last two days. ”

“ Mankell, you are over hasty. I was about to explain that I should esteem it quite an honour to sign your testimonial."
"So should I--upon my soul, I should!" declared the Major.
"There's nothing I wouldn't do to oblige you, Mr. Mankell," stammered the chief warder.
"Same 'ere!" cried Warder Slater.
"You really are too rapid in arriving at conclusions, Mr. Mankell," remarked the governor. "I do beg you will not suppose there was any negative intention."
The darkness, the rumbling, and the shaking ceased as suddenly as they began. The prisoner smiled. ”

“ As I sauntered back to the hotel I was conscious of a slight feeling of exacerbation. As if I had been "got at," "had." No man likes to feel that he is a laughing-stock. I felt that I had been made a laughing-stock just then; that, indeed, the process of manufacture had been going on ever since I showed my face in Ahmednugger. The men I had met were nice enough--in their way. ”