Captain Ryecroft

“ Thus his visit to Herefordshire has not only spoilt him as a salmon fisher, but put an end to his military career.
Fortunately he was not dependent on it; for Captain Ryecroft is a rich man. And yet he has no home he can call his own; the ten latest years of his life having been passed in Hindostan. Dublin is his native place; but what would or could he now do there? his nearest relatives are dead, his friends few, his schoolfellows long since scattered—many of them, as himself, waifs upon the world. Besides, since his return from India, he has paid a visit to the capital of the Emerald Isle ”

“ At short intervals one or other is seen starting to his feet, and rushing fore or aft—as if on an empty coal-waggon, instead of in a boat—and in such fashion, that were the craft at all crank it would certainly be upset!
On drawing nearer them Captain Ryecroft and his oarsman get the explanation of their seemingly eccentric behaviour—its cause made clear by a black bottle, which one of them is holding in his hand, each of the others brandishing tumbler, or teacup. ”

“ For he who now attends on her, not only inspires confidence, but excites her to the display of skill. Captain Ryecroft has taken George Shenstone’s place, as her aide-de-camp; and while he hands the arrows, she spending them, others of a different kind pass between—the shafts of Cupid—of which there is a full quiver in the eyes of both. ”

“ Captain Ryecroft has asked this question as his boat was rounding the end of the eyot, with another in the selfsame formulary of interrogation, of which but the moment before he was himself the subject:—“Who the deuce can he be?” Out upon the river, and drawing hard at his Regalia, he goes on:—
“Wonderfully familiar the fellow seemed! Can’t be a brother? I understood her to say she had none. Does he live at Llangorren? No. She said there was no one there in the shape of masculine relative—only an old aunt, and that little dark damsel, who is cousin or something of the kind. ”

“ A man guilty of aught illegal, much more one who has committed a capital crime, would not be acting thus. Besides, Captain Ryecroft has been journeying alone, unaccompanied by man or woman; no one seen with him until meeting his friend, Major Mahon, on the packet landing at Boulogne. ”

“ If Captain Ryecroft's sudden departure from Herefordshire brought suspicion upon him, his reappearance goes far to remove it. For that this is voluntary soon becomes known. The returned policeman has communicated the fact to his fellow-professionals, it is by them further disseminated among the people assembled outside.
From the same source other information is obtained in favour of the man they have been so rashly and gravely accusing. ”

“ Strange as it may seem, and a question for psychologists, a man thinks best upon his back. Better still with a cigar between his teeth—powerful help to reflection. Aware of this, Captain Ryecroft lights a “weed,” and looks around him. He is in his sleeping apartment, where, besides the bed, there is a sofa—horsehair cushion and squab hard as stones—the orthodox hotel article.
Along this he lays himself, and smokes away furiously. Spitefully, too; for he is not now thinking of either London or Paris. He cannot yet. ”

“ As in shining and with smiling faces, the bridal train ascends the steps two by two, disappearing within the portals of the church, the spectators on the nave and around the enclosure rails also looking joyous, as though each—even the raggedest—had a personal interest in the event, from the window opposite Captain Ryecroft observes it with very different feelings. For the thought is before his mind, how near he has been himself to making one in such a procession—at its head—followed by the bitter reflection, he now never shall. ”

“ There is one who, more than any other, reflects upon the sad fate of her whom he had so fondly loved, and differing from the rest as to how she came to her death; this one is Captain Ryecroft. He, too, might have yielded to the popular impression of its having been accidental, but for certain circumstances that have come to his knowledge, and which he has yet kept to himself. He has not forgotten what was, at an early period, communicated to him by the waterman Wingate, about the odd-looking old house up the glen ”

“ But not now rowed by its owner; for Captain Ryecroft has hold of the oars. In the haste, or the pleasurable moments succeeding, he has forgotten all about the salmon left struggling on his line, or caring not to return for it, most likely will lose rod, line, and all. What matter? If he has lost a fine fish, he may have won the finest woman on the Wye!
And she has lost nothing—risks nothing now—not even the chiding of her aunt! For now the pleasure-boat will be back in its dock in time to keep undisturbed the understanding with Joseph. ”

“ That the young waterman is no prating fellow he has already had proof, while of his loyalty he never doubted.
First, to find out what Jack’s own thoughts are about the whole thing. For since their last being in a boat together, on that fatal night, little speech has passed between them. Only a few words on the day of the inquest; when Captain Ryecroft himself was too excited to converse calmly, and before the dark suspicion had taken substantial shape in his mind.
Once more opposite the poplar he directs the skiff to be brought to. ”

“ An engagement angrily broken off—an actual quarrel—Gwendoline Wynn never afterwards seen alive! That quarrel, too, by the water’s edge, on a cliff at whose base her body has been found! Strange—altogether improbable—that she should have drowned herself. Far easier to believe that he, her fiancé, in a moment of mad, headlong passion, prompted by fell jealousy, had hurled her over the high bank.
Against this returned current of adverse sentiment, Captain Ryecroft is called upon to give his account, and state all he knows. What he will say is weighted with heavy consequences to himself. ”

“ Thus helped in his housekeeping, the young waterman is enabled to put away almost every shilling he earns by his oar, and this same summer all through till autumn, which it now is, has been more than usually profitable to him, by reason of his so often having Captain Ryecroft as his fare; for although the Hussar officer no longer goes salmon fishing—he has somehow been spoilt for that—there are other excursions upon which he requires the boat, and as ever generously, even lavishly, pays for it. ”

“ Intuitively, as if whispered by an angel in his ear, he says, or thinks to himself: "This man knows nothing of Gwendoline Wynn. If she has been carried off, it has not been by him; if murdered, he is not her murderer."
"Captain Ryecroft," he at length cries out in hoarse voice, the revulsion of feeling almost choking him, "if I've been wronging you, I ask forgiveness, and you'll forgive ”

“ There is more of the same sort, but Captain Ryecroft does not hear it; the men have moved off beyond ear shot. In all likelihood he would not have listened had they stayed. For again he seems to hear those other words—that last spiteful rejoinder, "Yes; let it."
His own spleen returning, in all its keen hostility, he springs upon his feet, hastily steps back to the table, and writes on the slip of parchment,—
Mr. ”

“ With the gentlemen inside the house, equally complete is the revolution of sentiment in his favour. For, after the first violent outburst of grief, young Shenstone, in a few whispered words, makes known to them the particulars of his expedition to Boulogne, with that interview in the house of Major Mahon. Himself convinced of his rival's innocence, he urges his conviction on the others.
But before their eyes is a sight almost confirmatory of it. That look of concentrated anguish in Captain Ryecroft's eyes cannot be counterfeit. A soldier who sheds tears could not be an assassin ”

“ As the latter appears probable enough, he once more blames Captain Ryecroft, the rain, the river flood, the beefsteak—above all, that long yarn about the canwyll corph, muttering anathemas against the ghostly superstition.
Still she may come yet. It may be but the darkness that’s delaying her. Besides, she is not likely to have the fixing of her time. She said she would “find a way;” and having the will—as he believes—he flatters himself she will find it, despite all obstructions. ”

“ So reasons the world at large, naturally enough.
For all, there are a few who still cling to a suspicion of there having been foul play; but not now with any reference with Captain Ryecroft. Nor are they the same who had suspected him. Those yet doubting the accidental death are the intimate friends of the Wynn family, who knew of its affairs relating to the property with the conditions on which the Llangorren estates were held. Up to this time only a limited number of individuals has been aware of their descent to Lewin Murdock. ”

“ Before deciding they had taken boat, and from below more minutely inspected them. But with their first impression unaltered—or only strengthened—that the abrasions on the soft sandstone rock were made by a falling body, and the bush borne down by the same. And what but the body of Gwendoline Wynn? Living or dead, springing off, or pitched over, they could not determine. Hence the ambiguity of their verdict.
Very different the result reached by Captain Ryecroft after viewing the same. In his Indian campaigns the ex-cavalry officer, belonging to the “Light,” had his share of scouting experience. ”

“ Some of the poachers and night-netters may be astir. If so, they are abroad, and not about the place, since it is just at such hours they are away from it.
For all, two men are near by, seemingly moving with as much stealth as any trespassers after fish or game, and with even more mystery in their movements. The place occupied by them is the shadowed corner under the wall of the chapel cemetery, where Captain Ryecroft saw three men embarking on a boat. ”

“ There's a Frenchy thing among 'em as wor gone nigh three sheets i' the wind 'fores I left. I think, Captain, we may as well keep on."
The waterman has an eye to the threatening rain, and dreads getting a wet jacket.
But his words are thrown away; for, meanwhile, the boat, left to itself, has drifted downward, nearly back to the entrance of the byway, and they are once more within sight of the kiosk on the cliff. There all is darkness—no figure distinguishable. The lamps have burnt out, or been removed by some of the servants.
"She has gone away from it," is Ryecroft's reflection to himself. ”

“ For the life of me, I can't tell."
"Nor I," rejoins the Captain. "I never think of such a thing."
"She's in her last," puts in the boatman, accustomed to take note of lunar changes. "It be an old moon now shining all the night, when the sky an't clouded."
"You're right, Jack!" says Ryecroft. "Now I remember; it is the old moon."
"In which case," adds the Major, "we must wait for the new one. We want darkness after midnight—must have it—else we cannot act. Let me see; when will that be?"
"The day week," promptly responds the waterman. "Then she'll be goin' down, most as soon as the sun's self." ”

“ They are drinking; and that they have been so occupied for some time is evident by their loud shouts and grotesque gesturing.
"They look an ugly lot!" observes the young waterman, viewing them over his shoulder; for, seated at the oars, his back is towards them. "Coal fellows, from the Forest o' Dean, I take it."
Ryecroft, with a cigar between his teeth, dreamily thinking of a boat with people in it so dissimilar, simply signifies assent with a nod. ”

“ He even forgets a woman, for whom he was waiting at the summer-house, and who there without finding him has flitted off again.
At length rising to his feet, and going a little way, he too gets into a boat—one he finds, with oars aboard, down in the dock. It is not the Gwendoline—she is gone.
Seating himself on the mid thwart, he takes up the oars, and pulls towards the place lately occupied by the skiff of the waterman. When inside the cove, he lights a match, and holds it close to the face of the rock where Ryecroft held his lamp. It burns out, and he draws a second across the sand-paper ”

“ Withal, a vague story has currency in the neighbourhood, of a boat, with two young ladies, in danger of being capsized—by some versions actually upset—and the ladies rescued from drowning by a stranger who chanced to be salmon-fishing near by—his name, Ryecroft. ”

“ It comes o' the bridges bein' so few and far between. There's the ferry boats, true; but people don't take to 'em more'n they can help 'specially women—seein' there be some danger at all times, and a good deal o't when the river's aflood. That's frequent, summer well as winter."
The explanation is reasonable; and, satisfied with it, Ryecroft remains for a time wrapt in a dreamy reverie, from which he is aroused as his eyes rest upon a house—a quaint antiquated structure, half timber, half stone, standing not on the river's edge, but at some distance from it up a dingle. ”

“ Almost simultaneously they see a boat sweeping round the bend, with another close in its wake, evidently in chase, as told by the attitudes and gestures of those occupying both—in the one pursued two young ladies, in that pursuing four rough men readily recognisable. At a glance the Hussar officer takes in the situation—the waterman as well. The sight saves a salmon's life, and possibly two innocent women from outrage. Down goes Ryecroft's rod, the boatman simultaneously dropping his gaff; as he does so hearing thundered in his ears—
"To your oars, Jack! Make straight for them! ”