Salter Quick

“ But here are the names of Noah Quick, Salter Quick—set down as passengers! Nothing in the list of the crew strikes me but the two names I spoke of. The first will have an interest for Mr. Middlebrook. It's Netherfield.”
“Netherfield!” I exclaimed. “The name——”
“That Salter Quick asked you particular questions about when he met you on the headlands, Mr. Middlebrook,” answered Scarterfield, with a knowing look, “and that he was very anxious to get some news of William Netherfield, deck-hand, of Blyth, Northumberland—that's the name on the list of those who were aboard the Elizabeth Robinson.” ”

“ I answered.
"Well, that's a very easy point to settle, if it should ever come to it," he replied. "And I'll settle it, for your edification, just now. Noah and Salter Quick were done to death, one near Saltash, in Cornwall, the other near Alnwick, in Northumberland, several hundreds of miles apart, about the same hour of the same evening. Now, my friend and I, so far from being anywhere near either Saltash or Alnwick on that particular evening and night, spent them together at the North Eastern Railway Hotel at York. I went there that afternoon from London; he joined [249] me from Berwick. ”

“ John looked across at him, smiling faintly.
"You'll come, Jim?"
"I would go anywhere with ye, sir."
"And what about that little girl at Fittering?"
Salter blushed and stammered hopelessly.
"My dear fellow, since when have I been blind? Did you think I did not know?"
"Why, sir—well, sir—er—yes, sir!"
"Of course I knew! Can you leave her to come with me?"
"I couldn't leave ye to stay with her, sir."
"Are you sure? I do not want you to come against your inclinations."
"Women ain't everything, sir."
"Are they not? I think they are ... a great deal," said my lord wistfully. ”

“ But with what quick response of compassion such a relegation of the man himself made me privately sigh: "Ah, poor Saltram!" She instantly, with this, took the measure of all I didn't believe, and it enabled her to go on: "What can one do when a person has given such a lift to one's interest in life?"
"Yes, what can one do?" If I struck her as a little vague it was because I was thinking of another person. I indulged in another inarticulate murmur—"Poor George Gravener!" What had become of the lift he had given that interest? ”

“ Duff Salter said, with grave emphasis, "it is you father's old and obstinate spirit which is speaking. You are the ghost I thought was his at the door of my chamber. Mr. Magistrate, swear me!"
Duff Salter gravely kissed the Testament and stood ready to depose, when Calvin Van de Lear again interrupted.
"Are you not deaf?" asked the divinity student. "Where are your tablets that you carry every day? You seem to hear too well, I consider."
"You are right," cried Duff Salter, turning on his interrogator like a lion. "I am wholly cured of deafness, and my memory is as acute as my hearing." ”

“ It might be. Sir Karl might be paying these stealthy visits to Mrs. Grey, and yet be totally ignorant that any such person as Salter was at the Maze. They would hardly dare to tell him; and Salter would take care to conceal himself when Sir Karl was there. At any rate, he--Mr. Strange--must try and put the matter to rest with all speed, one way or the other. Perhaps, however, that resolution was more easy to make than to carry out. As a preliminary step he took a walk to the police station at Basham, and was seen in the street there by Sir Karl Andinnian. ”

“ But Saltren was not a man who could restrain himself under an over-mastering conviction, and he burst forth in a torrent of words, and as he spoke his sombre eyes gleamed with excitement, and sparks lit up and flashed in them. Soft they usually were, and dreamy, but now, all at once they kindled into vehement life.
"I tell you, Tubb, the Lord hath spoken. The last days are at hand. I read my Bible and I read my newspaper, and I know that the aristocracy are a scandal and a burden to the country. Now the long-suffering of heaven will not tarry. ”

“ John Salter was a vain, vulgar, selfish fool; in natural clumsiness a caricature of John Bull personified, yet so determined to be French and Frenchified, and so proud of his travels to and through Boulogne, that the young men about the rooms, to whom he afforded infinite amusement, called him the Marquis. Sir William Orm, though he had long since cut the other members of the Salter family, sometimes did the young man the honour to win his money; while Geoffery Arden, and several other fashionables, granted him the privilege of a limited portion of their acquaintance on the same liberal terms. ”

“ Carstares left off polishing his nails, yawned, and leaned back in his chair, a slim, graceful figure in cambric shirt and apricot satin breeches. He studied his cravat for some moments in the mirror, and lifted a hand to it. Salter held his breath. With extreme deliberation the hand moved a diamond and emerald pin the fraction of an inch to one side, and fell to his side again. Salter drew a relieved breath, which brought his master's eyes round to himself.
"No trouble, Jim?"
"None at all, sir."
"Neither had I. 'Twas most surprisingly easy. The birds had no more fight in them than sparrows. ”

“ In cases of such vital importance, thought Miss Salter, people mustn't stick at trifles. She then ran up stairs again and in breathless haste, with the assistance of a housemaid changed her dress, and throwing on all the gold chains and bracelets she could muster, made her appearance in the drawing-room, looking however, as might have been expected, after so much exertion both mental and corporeal, not quite so cool as she could have wished. ”

“ The mortified young ladies here rose, and tossing their heads and biting their lips, took their departure.
"Nothing would serve my daughters, when first we come to this vanity-fair," continued Mr. Salter, "but they must pass themselves off for ladies of high family, forsooth, and behave with impertinence to their betters, till they got themselves blown and cut too, as all that sail under false colours deserve to be. But let a man, I say, come forward with nothing but the truth in his mouth, and who shall despise him for having made his way in the world by honest industry?" ”

“ I know that sometimes I wake after having dreamed of some amiable and innocent person in an odious light, and though I fight against the impression all day, I cannot view that person without repugnance. Captain Saltren was aware that he had dreamed, that he had believed in the reality of the mirage conjured up by his fancy, had regarded that crimson-covered book as the revelation of the Everlasting Gospel, and though his mind assented to the fact that he had been deceived, he was unable to drive away the glamour of the delusion that clung to him. ”

“ A little while ago we saw Giles Saltren humiliated and crushed, passing through the flame of disappointment and disenchantment, the purgatorial flame that in this life tries every man. In that fire the young man's self-esteem and self-reliance had shrivelled up and been reduced to ash. ”

“ Then Marianne Saltren uttered a piercing shriek and tossed, and put her teeth to her husband's hand to bite at the fingers and force them to relax their grasp.
"There are people coming," she screamed, "I will tell them all that you killed him. Let me go. I cannot bear your touch."
"You accursed woman, you daughter of the old father of lies," said Saltren between his teeth, and the bubbles formed in his mouth as he spoke through his teeth, "I will not let you go till you have told me who was the father of Giles." ”

“ It went along the road to the Fens as if it would get out into the country; and then, once more turning, proceeded up the hill, this time by more devious ways to the left of the village, with fields on one side of it, and the glowing Fens below. To the right, below a wall, there was a deserted stone-pit, all covered and shrouded with ivy and trees, and beneath that wall crouched an unseen auditor, a young lad who lay and listened, but who dared not raise his head. The procession of men would have known him if he had shown his face; he was Nat Salter, who was Rob Salter’s son. ”

“ No one is perfect, she argued, and Saltren, who pinned his religion on the Bible, ought to have been the first to admit this. The just man falleth seven times a day, and she had tripped only once in forty-two years—over fifteen thousand days. If she could but raise the veil and look into her husband's past life, argued she, no doubt she would see comical things there. ”

“ Moore was dropped at his own house, and the groom--who had been sent on there--taken up; and then the gig went on to Basham.
"I must see him somehow," decided the detective--"and the less time lost over it, the better. Of course a man in the dangerously sick state this one is represented to be, cannot make himself scarce as quickly as one in health could; but Salter has not played at hide-and-seek so long to expose himself unnecessarily. He would make superhuman efforts to elude us, and rather get away dying than wait to be taken. Better strike while the iron is hot. ”

“ Then, as for his alienation, he didn't, pardonably enough, grasp the lift Frank Saltram had given her interest in life. If a mere spectator could ask that last question, with what rage in his heart the man himself might! ”

“ I, who write this, know full well that I shall find readers, and encounter critics who will pronounce the case of Captain Saltren impossible; because in the London clubs and in country houses no such delusions are found. What! are we not all engaged in blowing soap-bubbles, in painting mirages, in spinning cobwebs? But then our soap-bubbles, our mirages, our cobwebs, in which we, unlike spiders, entangle ourselves, are not theological, but social and political. Do we not weave out of our own bowels vast webs, and hang them up in the sight of all as substantial realities? ”

“ Tatton," he began, calling the man by his true name--"that you have been again searching the Maze? My butler informs me that he saw you and two policemen quit it but now."
"It is true enough, Sir Karl. Salter is there. At least, he was there yesterday. There cannot be the slightest doubt that the sick man to whom Dr. Cavendish was called was Salter. I obtained a description of him from the doctor, and should have recognized it anywhere." ”

“ My joke probably cost Saltram a subscription or two, but it helped me on with my interlocutress. "She says he drinks like a fish," she sociably continued, "and yet she admits that his mind is wonderfully clear." It was amusing to converse with a pretty girl who could talk of the clearness of Saltram's mind. I tried to tell her—I had it almost on my conscience—what was the proper way to regard him; an effort attended perhaps more than ever on this occasion with the usual effect of my feeling that I wasn't after all very sure of it. ”

“ To the added amazement of everyone in the room, Seth Salter burst into a loud laugh, and said, without moving out of the line of fire:
"Waal, boss, I did think you had a better eye for klips than that. D'you fancy I'd be such an almighty sucker as to—good Lord, man, can't you see they're all schlenters? There's no law agin carrying them round, I reckon. Here, take 'em, and see for yourself. There's plenty of good judges in the room to help you."
A very brief examination satisfied the disgusted inspector that the astute Yankee had once more turned the laugh against him. ”

“ Swiftly back through Shady Path and Lover's Lane ran Sally, her frowsly head full of the strange, sweet fragment of fairy song that she had heard.
"Now, where've you been?" cried Mistress Cory Ann, as Sally came panting into the Row. "Not up to Ingleside, I hope! I had to run way up the path to make you hear. Haven't I told you more'n a hundred times you'd better keep away from there? Just let the people up at the big house catch you pokin' around, and back you'll come faster'n ever you went. Do you hear, Sally Dukeen?" ”

“ Captain Stephen Saltren, master of the manganese mine, was a tall man, rather gaunt and thin, and loosely compacted at the joints, with dark hair, high cheek-bones and large, deeply-sunken eyes. His features were irregular and ill cut—yet it was impossible to look at his face without being impressed with the thought that he was no ordinary man. His hands, though roughened and enlarged by work, had long fingers, the indication of a nervous temperament. He had, moreover, one of those flexible voices which go far towards making a man an orator. ”

“ The mere thought of Sally made him feel happier and more awake than he had felt for years. Better than the fortnight’s cure of silence and diet at Crippenham was one look at Sally, one minute spent with Sally. And she was so kind and intelligent, as well as so beautiful—listening to every word he said with the most obvious interest, and not once fidgeting or getting sleepy, as people nowadays seemed to have got into the habit of doing. It was like sitting in the sun to be with her; like sitting in the sun on a warm spring morning, and freshness everywhere, and flowers, and hope. ”

“ You do? You are sure?"
"Back to his earth, I'll lay my life; 'tis ever his custom." He strode to the door, flung it wide and shot clear, crisp directions at the footman. "See to it that my mare is saddled in ten minutes and Blue Devil harnessed to your master's curricle! Don't stand staring—go! And send Salter to me!"
The footman scuttled away, pausing only to inform my lord that Salter was not in.
Carstares remembered that he had given Jim leave to visit his Mary at Fittering, and crushed out another oath. He sprang up the stairs, Mr. Beauleigh following breathlessly. ”