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Youre better than a doctor, Becky, said the old woman, a thousand times better. I was as young and merry as you once I was indeed. Pretty too eh, Becky?
Thats to be seen, said Becky, rubbing away. You have the remains now.
Have I, Becky, have I eh?
Indeed you have youre a good-looking old lady.
A gleam of vanity and delight lit up the old creatures eyes for a moment.
Am I, Becky eh? Youre a good girl listen; I shall leave you something in my will. Im going to make one by and bye, but I dont want any lawyers. You shall do it for me. I can trust you, eh, Becky?
Indeed you can, replied Becky, tucking the old woman in; you feel more comfortable now, dont you?
Yes, your soft hands rub the pain away. But it comes again, Becky, it comes again.
So will I, to rub it away again. I must go down now, I have so much to do. She patted the old womans shoulder, and reached the door, when she stopped and asked, in a careless tone,
Have you heard any more mice to-night scratching at the wall in the next house, Mrs. Bailey.
Not a sound, Becky. Its been as quiet as a churchyard.
As she left the room, Becky heard the old woman mumbling to herself, with the vanity of a child,
I was pretty once, and Ive got the remains now. Im a good-looking old lady a good-looking old lady a good-looking old lady! Beckys a clever girl I wont forget her.
As Becky descended to the kitchen, she heard a newsboy calling out a new edition of the Evening Moon. Becky went to the street door and asked the boy if there was anything fresh in the paper about the murder.
A lot, replied the boy; Ive only two copies left, and I thought I could sell em in the Square.
Becky bought the two copies, and the boy, whose only motive for coming into the Square was to look at No. 119, refreshed himself by running up and down the steps, and then, retreating to the garden railings, almost stared his eyes out in the endeavour to see the ghost that haunted the deserted house.
Once more in the kitchen, Becky sat down, and with a methodical air, opened last evenings paper, and read the Romance in Real Life which had caused so much excitement. The writer of the narrative would have been gratified had he witnessed the interest Becky took in his clever manipulation of his facts. The most thrilling romance could not have fascinated her as much as this story of to-day, formed as it was out of what may be designated ordinary newspaper material. Not once did she pause, but proceeded steadily on, column after column, every detail being indelibly fixed upon her mind. Only when she came to the concluding words did she raise her head, and become once more conscious of her surroundings.
She drew a long breath, and looked before her into the air, as though endeavouring to obtain from invisible space some connecting links between the new ideas formed by this romance in real life. The dominant thought in her mind as she read the narrative was whether she would be able to obtain from it any clue to connect Richard Manx with the murder. Her desire lay in this direction, without reference to its justice or injustice, and she would have felt better satisfied had such a clue been supplied. But she was compelled to confess that, as far as her knowledge of him went in their brief personal intercourse, he was not in the remotest way connected with the crime. Say that this was so say that he was as little implicated in it as she herself, what, then, was his motive in making his way secretly into the room in which the murder had been committed? Of the fact that he had done so, without having been an eye-witness of it, Becky was morally convinced. What was his motive for this proceeding?
But Richard Manx did not entirely monopolise her thoughts. With the threads of the story, as presented in the Supplement of the Evening Moon, she wove possibilities which occasioned her great distress, for in these possibilities she saw terrible trouble in the future. If there was a grain of truth in them, she could not see how this trouble was to be avoided.
Of the name of the murdered man, Mr. Holdfast, she was utterly ignorant. She had never heard of him, nor of Lydia Holdfast, his second wife, who, living now, and mourning for the dead, had supplied the facts of the case to the Special Reporter of the Evening Moon.
Had I been in her place, thought Becky, I should, for very shames sake, if not out of consideration for the dead, have been less free with my tongue. I would have run every risk rather than have allowed myself to be the talking-stock of the whole country. Lydia Holdfast must be a poor, weak creature. Can I do nothing, nothing?
Beckys lips quivered, and had she not been sustained by a high purpose, she might have sought relief in tears.
Let me set down my thoughts in plain words, she said aloud. I shall then be able to judge more clearly.
She produced pen, ink, and paper, and wrote the names:
Mr. Holdfast.
Lydia Holdfast.
Frederick Holdfast.
She gazed at the names and said,
My lovers name is Frederick.
It was as though the paper upon which she was writing represented a human being, and spoke the words she wrote.
She underlined the name Frederick, saying, as she did so, For reasons which I shall one day learn, he has concealed his surname.
The next words she wrote were: Frederick Holdfast was educated in Oxford.
To which she replied, My Frederick was educated in Oxford.
Then she wrote: Between Frederick Holdfast and his father there was a difference so serious that they quarrelled, and Frederick Holdfast left his fathers house.
My Frederick told me, said Becky aloud, that he and his father were separated because of a family difference. He could tell me no more, he said, because of a vow he had made to his father. He has repeated this in the letter I received from him this evening.
Becky took the letter from her dress, kissed it, and replaced it in her bosom. I do not need this, she said, to assure me of his worth and truth.
She proceeded with her task and wrote: Frederick Holdfast went to America. His father also went to America.
And answered it with, My Frederick went to America, and his father followed him.
Upon the paper then she wrote: Mr. Holdfast and his son Frederick both returned to England.
As my Frederick and his father did, she said.
And now Beckys fingers trembled. She was approaching the tragedy. She traced the words, however, From the day of his return to England until yesterday nothing was heard of Mr. Holdfast; and there is no accounting for his disappearance.
Fredericks father also has disappeared, she said, and there is no accounting for his disappearance.
These coincidences were so remarkable that they increased in strength tenfold as Becky gazed upon the words she had written. And now she calmly said,
If they are true, my Frederick is Frederick Holdfast. If they are true, Frederick Holdfast is a villain. Her face flushed, her bosom rose and fell. A lie! she cried. My lover is the soul of honour and manliness! He is either not Frederick Holdfast, or the story told in the newspaper is a wicked, shameful fabrication. What kind of woman, then, is this Lydia Holdfast, who sheds tears one moment and laughs the next? who one moment wrings her hands at the murder of her husband, and the next declares that if she had been born a man she might have been a dreadful rake? But Frederick Holdfast is dead; the American newspapers published the circumstances of his death and the identification of his body. Thousands of persons read that account, and believed in its truth, as thousands of persons read and are reading this romance of real life, and believe in its truth. Contempt and defiance were expressed in Beckys voice as she touched the copy of the newspaper which had so profoundly agitated her. Yet both may be false, and if they are false She paused for a few moments, and then continued: Lydia Holdfast is Frederick Holdfasts enemy. She believes him to be dead; there is no doubt of that. But if he is alive, and in England, he is in peril in deadlier peril than my Frederick was, when, as Antony Cowlrick, he was charged with the murder of an unknown man, and that man as now is proved his own father. What did I call Lydia Holdfast just now? a poor weak creature! Not she! An artful, designing, cruel woman, whose safety, perhaps, lies in my Fredericks death. If, without the suspicions which torture me, so near to the truth do they seem, it was necessary to discover the murderer of the poor gentleman who met his death in the next house, how much more imperative is it now that the mystery should be unravelled! Assist me, Eternal God, to bring the truth to light, and to punish the guilty!