Griffith Gaunt

“ You have found the body of Thomas Leicester, and Griffith Gaunt is hiding from the law that he hath broken, he is afeared of her and her friends if he shows his face in Cumberland; he is afeared of my folk if he be seen in Lancashire. Ah, Thomas, as if I would let them harm thee!"
Sir George Neville walked to and fro in grand excitement.
"Oh, blessed day that I came hither. Madam you are an angel. You will save an innocent broken-hearted lady from death and dishonor. Your good heart and rare wit have read in a moment the dark riddle that hath puzzled a county." ”

“ Gaunt. "Oh, sir, the sight of you—the thought of what you were to me once—till jealousy blinded you. Lend me your arm, if you are a man; my limbs do fail me."
The shock had been too much; a pallor over-spread her lovely features, her knees knocked together, and she was tottering like some tender tree cut down, when Griffith, who, with all his faults, was a man, put out his strong arm, and she clung to it, quivering all over, and weeping hysterically. ”

“ And now they all gathered in great excitement round the corpus delicti; and there, sure enough, was a long black mole.
Then was there a buzz of pity for Griffith Gaunt, followed by a stern murmur of execration.
"Gentlemen," said the coroner solemnly, "behold in this the finger of Heaven. The poor gentleman may well have put off his boots, since, it seems, he left his horse; but he could not take from his forehead his natal sign; and that, by God's will, hath strangely escaped mutilation, and revealed a most foul deed. We must now do our duty, gentlemen, without respect of persons." ”

“ It was an evil hour when Griffith attacked her saint with violence. The woman was too high-spirited, and too sure of her own rectitude, to endure that: so, instead of crushing her, it drove her to retaliation; and to imprudence.
These visits to console Father Leonard were quietly watched by Ryder, for one thing. But, worse than that, they placed Mrs. Gaunt in a new position with Leonard, and one that melts the female heart. She was now the protectress and the consoler of a man she admired and revered. I say if any thing on earth can breed love in a grand female bosom, this will. ”

“ Gaunt's heart by storm; she threw her arms round Father Francis's neck, and wept upon his shoulder.
"Ah!" she sobbed, "you are the only one left that loves me."
She could not understand justice praising her: it must be love.
"Ay," said Griffith, in a broken voice, "she writes like an angel: she speaks like an angel: she looks like an angel. My heart says she is an angel. But my eyes have shown me she is naught. I left her, unable to walk, by her way of it; I came back, and found her on that priest's arm, springing along, like a greyhound." ”

“ And now, Griffith Gaunt, it is your turn: you must withdraw your injurious terms, and end this superlative folly."
Griffith hesitated.
"Come," said Kate, "consider: Mr. Neville is esteemed by all the county: you are the only gentleman in it who has ever uttered a disparaging word against him. Are you sure you are more free from passion and prejudice and wiser than all the county? Oblige me, and do what is right. Come, Griffith Gaunt, let your reason unsay the barbarous words your passion hath uttered against a worthy gentleman whom we all esteem." ”

“ Under other circumstances I might decline to receive evidence at second hand that Griffith Gaunt is alive; but here such evidence is sufficient, for it lies on the Crown to prove the man dead; but you have only proved that he was alive on the fifteenth of October, and that, since then, somebody is dead with shoes on. This somebody appears on the balance of proof to be Thomas Leicester, the pedlar; and he has never been heard of since, and Griffith Gaunt has. Then I say you cannot carry the case farther. You have not a leg to stand on. What say you, brother Wiltshire? ”

“ You must know that forty years before our Griffith Gaunt saw the light, another Griffith Gaunt was born in Cumberland: a younger son, and the family estate entailed; but a shrewd lad, who chose rather to hunt fortune elsewhere, than to live in miserable dependence on his elder brother. His godfather, a city merchant, encouraged him, and he left Cumberland. He went into commerce, and in twenty years became a wealthy man, so wealthy that he lived to look down on his brother's estate, which he had once thought opulence. His life was all prosperity, with a single exception ”

“ Man does not speak by words alone. A mute glance of reproach has ere now pierced the heart a tirade would have left untouched; and even an inarticulate cry may utter volumes.
Such an eloquent cry was that with which Griffith Gaunt turned his back upon the angelical face he adored, and the soft persuasive tongue. There was agony, there was shame, there was wrath, all in that one ejaculation.
It frightened Kate. She called him back. "Don't leave me so," she said. "I know I have affronted you; but I meant all for the best. Do not let us part in anger." ”

“ She blamed herself; she blamed Griffith; she blamed the Protestant heresy; she blamed everybody and everything—except Brother Leonard.
One Sunday afternoon Griffith sat on his own lawn, silently smoking his pipe. Mrs. Gaunt came to him, and saw an air of dejection on his genial face. Her heart yearned. She sat down beside him on the bench, and sighed; then he sighed too.
"My dear," said she, sweetly, "fetch out your viol da gambo, and we will sing a hymn or two together here this fine afternoon. We can praise God together, though we must pray apart; alas that it is so." ”

“ Pray do you desert your friends when ill luck falls on them?"
"Nay, Mistress Kate, I hope not."
"You only triumph over the misfortunes of your enemies, eh?" said the stinging beauty.
"Not even that. And, as for Mr. Gaunt, I am not his enemy."
"Oh no, of course not. You are his best friend. Witness his arm at this moment."
"I am his rival; but not his enemy: I'll give you a proof." Then he lowered his voice, and said in her ear: "You are grieved at his losing Bolton; and, as you are very generous, and noble-minded, you are all the more grieved because his loss is your gain." ”

“ George Neville.
Griffith Gaunt and he saluted and scanned each other curiously, They little thought to meet again so soon. The clerks saw nothing more than two polite gentlemen passing each other.
The more Griffith thought of the approaching duel the less he liked it. He was an impulsive man for one thing; and, with such, a cold fit naturally succeeds a hot one. And, besides, as his heat abated, Reason and Reflection made themselves heard, and told him that in a contest with a formidable rival he was throwing away an advantage: after all, Kate had shown him great favor ”

“ Gaunt until he had seen her safe home; but that done, he would ride back to Carlisle, and escort Mercy home.
Mrs. Gaunt sighed, and said she was abusing his friendship, and should kill him with fatigue, and he was a good creature. "If anything could make me easy, this would," said she: "you know how to talk to a woman, and comfort her. I wish I was a man: I'd cure her of Griffith before we reached the 'Packhorse.' And, now I think of it, you are a very happy man to travel eighty miles with an angel, a dove-eyed angel." ”

“ He was genial by nature, and could not live without sympathy. He sought it in the parlour of the "Red Lion."
Mrs. Gaunt's high-bred nostrils told her where he haunted, and it caused her dismay. Woman-like, instead of opening her battery at once, she wore a gloomy and displeased air, which a few months ago would have served her turn and brought about an explanation at once; but Griffith took it for a stronger dose of religious sentiment, and trundled off to the "Red Lion," all the more. ”

“ Gaunt, "Sir George is young and handsome: if he manages well, she will tell him more than she will you. All I beg of him is, to drop the chevalier, for this once, and see women with a woman's eyes and not a man's; see them as they are. Do not go telling a creature of this kind that she has had my money, as well as my husband, and ought to pity me lying here in prison. Keep me out of her sight as much as you can. Whether Griffith hath deceived her or not you will never raise in her any feeling but love for him, and hatred for his lawful wife. Dress like a yeoman ”

“ Old Griffith sent down Mr. Atkins, his solicitor, post haste, and snapped the estate out of that purchaser's hands.
When the lands and house had been duly conveyed to him, he came down, and his heart seemed to bud again, in the scenes of his childhood.
Finding the house small, and built in a valley instead of on rising ground, he got an army of bricklayers, and began to build a mansion with a rapidity unheard of in those parts; and he looked about for some one to inherit it.
The name of Gaunt had dwindled down to three since he left Cumberland; but a rich man never lacks relations. ”

“ You have belied and insulted me, sir; but I know you were under a delusion. I mean to remove that delusion, and make you see how little I am to blame: for, alas! I own I was imprudent. But, oh Griffith! as I hope to be saved, it was the imprudence of innocence and over-confidence."
"Mistress," said Griffith, in a stern, yet agitated voice, "be advised, and leave all this: rouse not a man's sleeping wrath. Let bygones be bygones."
Mrs. Gaunt rose, and said, faintly, "So be it. I must go, sir, and give some orders for your entertainment." ”

“ The man, as we know, was her tool, her creature: she had bought his wares for him, and set him up as a pedlar. She openly summoned him to her presence, and kept him there about half-an-hour.
"He went from her, and very soon after is seen, by Thomas Hayes, following Griffith Gaunt—at one o'clock in the morning—that Griffith Gaunt, who, after that hour, was never seen alive.
"Gentlemen, up to this point the evidence is clear, connected, and cogent; but it rarely happens in cases of murder that any human eye sees the very blow struck. ”

“ Griffith wrote to Caroline Ryder, and addressed the latter in a feigned hand, and took it himself to the nearest post town.
The letter came to hand, and will appear in that sequence of events on which I am now about to enter.
CHAPTER XIII.
If Griffith Gaunt suffered anguish, he inflicted agony. Mrs. Gaunt was a high-spirited, proud, and sensitive woman; and he crushed her with foul words. Leonard was a delicate, vain, and sensitive man, accustomed to veneration. Imagine such a man hurled to the ground, and trampled upon. ”

“ Griffith stood still awhile, benumbed as it were, by the cruel stroke; then cast one speaking look of anguish and reproach upon her, drew himself haughtily up, and stalked away like a wounded lion.
Well said the ancients that anger is a short madness. When we reflect in cold blood on the things we have said in hot, how impossible they seem! how out of character with our real selves! And this is one of the recognized symptoms of mania.
There were few persons could compare with Mrs. Gaunt in native magnanimity ”

“ They looked him all over, discussed his every feature learnedly, kissed his limbs and extremities after the manner of their sex, and comprehending at last that to have been both of them wronged by one man was a bond of sympathy, not hate, the two wives of Griffith Gaunt laid his child across their two laps, and wept over him together.
Mercy Vint took herself to task. "I am but a selfish woman," said she, "to talk, or think of anything but that I came here for." She then proceeded to show Mrs. Gaunt by what means she proposed to secure her acquittal, without getting Griffith Gaunt into trouble. ”

“ Griffith started up, and cried, "What is wrong, in God's name?"
"I am sorry to say there has been a sudden hemorrhage, and the patient is much exhausted."
"She is dying, she is dying!" cried Griffith, in anguish.
"Not dying. But she will infallibly sink unless some unusual circumstance occur to sustain vitality."
Griffith laid hold of him. "Oh, sir, take my whole fortune, but save her! save her! save her!"
"Mr. Gaunt," said the young doctor, "be calm, or you will make matters worse. There is one chance to save her ”

“ Griffith, with an effort he had not the skill to hide, stammered out, "Mistress Kate, I do wish you joy." Then with sudden and touching earnestness, "Never did good fortune light on one so worthy of it."
"Thank you, Griffith," replied Kate, softly. (She had called him 'Mr. Gaunt' in public till now.) "But money and lands do not always bring content. ”

“ If the fable teaches anything in Griffith Gaunt's case, it is this: Betray two noble women, and after some difficulty you shall get rid of one, be forgiven by the other, come into a handsome property, and have a large and interesting family. If the reader will take the fate of Griffith Gaunt and contrast it with that of Tito Melema, in "Romola," he shall see all the difference that passes between an artificial and an artistic solution of a moral problem.
Defective art is noticeable in the minor as well as the principal features of the dénouement of Griffith Gaunt. ”

“ She began timidly, after this fashion——"My dear, Brother Leonard is so grateful for your flowers," and then hesitated.
"I'm sure he is very welcome," said Griffith. "Why doesn't he sup with us and be sociable, as Father Francis used? Invite him; let him know he will be welcome."
Sirs. Gaunt blushed; and objected, "He never calls on us."
"Well, well, every man to his taste," said Griffith, indifferently, and proceeded to talk to her about his farm, and a sorrel mare with a white mane and tail, that he had seen, and thought it would suit her. ”