Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (1674 page)

“Is it like clotted blood, Master George?”

“Like enough, perhaps.”

“More than enough, I think,” muttered Joey Ladle, shaking his head solemnly.

“Well, say it is like; say it is exactly like.  What then?”

“Master George, they do say — ”

“Who?”

“How should I know who?” rejoined the Cellarman, apparently much exasperated by the unreasonable nature of the question.  “Them!  Them as says pretty well everything, you know.  How should I know who They are, if you don’t?”

“True.  Go on.”

“They do say that the man that gets by any accident a piece of that dark growth right upon his breast, will, for sure and certain, die by murder.”

As Vendale laughingly stopped to meet the Cellarman’s eyes, which he had fastened on his light while dreamily saying those words, he suddenly became conscious of being struck upon his own breast by a heavy hand.  Instantly following with his eyes the action of the hand that struck him — which was his companion’s — he saw that it had beaten off his breast a web or clot of the fungus even then floating to the ground.

For a moment he turned upon the Cellarman almost as scared a look as the Cellarman turned upon him.  But in another moment they had reached the daylight at the foot of the cellar-steps, and before he cheerfully sprang up them, he blew out his candle and the superstition together.

EXIT WILDING

On the morning of the next day, Wilding went out alone, after leaving a message with his clerk.  “If Mr. Vendale should ask for me,” he said, “or if Mr. Bintrey should call, tell them I am gone to the Foundling.”  All that his partner had said to him, all that his lawyer, following on the same side, could urge, had left him persisting unshaken in his own point of view.  To find the lost man, whose place he had usurped, was now the paramount interest of his life, and to inquire at the Foundling was plainly to take the first step in the direction of discovery.  To the Foundling, accordingly, the wine-merchant now went.

The once familiar aspect of the building was altered to him, as the look of the portrait over the chimney-piece was altered to him.  His one dearest association with the place which had sheltered his childhood had been broken away from it for ever.  A strange reluctance possessed him, when he stated his business at the door.  His heart ached as he sat alone in the waiting-room while the Treasurer of the institution was being sent for to see him.  When the interview began, it was only by a painful effort that he could compose himself sufficiently to mention the nature of his errand.

The Treasurer listened with a face which promised all needful attention, and promised nothing more.

“We are obliged to be cautious,” he said, when it came to his turn to speak, “about all inquiries which are made by strangers.”

“You can hardly consider me a stranger,” answered Wilding, simply.  “I was one of your poor lost children here, in the bygone time.”

The Treasurer politely rejoined that this circumstance inspired him with a special interest in his visitor.  But he pressed, nevertheless for that visitor’s motive in making his inquiry.  Without further preface, Wilding told him his motive, suppressing nothing.  The Treasurer rose, and led the way into the room in which the registers of the institution were kept.  “All the information which our books can give is heartily at your service,” he said.  “After the time that has elapsed, I am afraid it is the only information we have to offer you.”

The books were consulted, and the entry was found expressed as follows:

“3d March, 1836.  Adopted, and removed from the Foundling Hospital, a male infant, named Walter Wilding.  Name and condition of the person adopting the child — Mrs. Jane Ann Miller, widow.  Address — Lime-Tree Lodge, Groombridge Wells.  References — the Reverend John Harker, Groombridge Wells; and Messrs. Giles, Jeremie, and Giles, bankers, Lombard Street.”

“Is that all?” asked the wine-merchant.  “Had you no after-communication with Mrs. Miller?”

“None — or some reference to it must have appeared in this book.”

“May I take a copy of the entry?”

“Certainly!  You are a little agitated.  Let me make a copy for you.”

“My only chance, I suppose,” said Wilding, looking sadly at the copy, “is to inquire at Mrs. Miller’s residence, and to try if her references can help me?”

“That is the only chance I see at present,” answered the Treasurer.  “I heartily wish I could have been of some further assistance to you.”

With those farewell words to comfort him Wilding set forth on the journey of investigation which began from the Foundling doors.  The first stage to make for, was plainly the house of business of the bankers in Lombard Street.  Two of the partners in the firm were inaccessible to chance-visitors when he asked for them.  The third, after raising certain inevitable difficulties, consented to let a clerk examine the ledger marked with the initial letter “M.”  The account of Mrs. Miller, widow, of Groombridge Wells, was found.  Two long lines, in faded ink, were drawn across it; and at the bottom of the page there appeared this note: “Account closed, September 30th, 1837.”

So the first stage of the journey was reached — and so it ended in No Thoroughfare!  After sending a note to Cripple Corner to inform his partner that his absence might be prolonged for some hours, Wilding took his place in the train, and started for the second stage on the journey — Mrs. Miller’s residence at Groombridge Wells.

Mothers and children travelled with him; mothers and children met each other at the station; mothers and children were in the shops when he entered them to inquire for Lime-Tree Lodge.  Everywhere, the nearest and dearest of human relations showed itself happily in the happy light of day.  Everywhere, he was reminded of the treasured delusion from which he had been awakened so cruelly — of the lost memory which had passed from him like a reflection from a glass.

Inquiring here, inquiring there, he could hear of no such place as Lime-Tree Lodge.  Passing a house-agent’s office, he went in wearily, and put the question for the last time.  The house-agent pointed across the street to a dreary mansion of many windows, which might have been a manufactory, but which was an hotel.  “That’s where Lime-Tree Lodge stood, sir,” said the man, “ten years ago.”

The second stage reached, and No Thoroughfare again!

But one chance was left.  The clerical reference, Mr. Harker, still remained to be found.  Customers coming in at the moment to occupy the house-agent’s attention, Wilding went down the street, and entering a bookseller’s shop, asked if he could be informed of the Reverend John Harker’s present address.

The bookseller looked unaffectedly shocked and astonished, and made no answer.

Wilding repeated his question.

The bookseller took up from his counter a prim little volume in a binding of sober gray.  He handed it to his visitor, open at the title-page.  Wilding read:

“The martyrdom of the Reverend John Harker in New Zealand.  Related by a former member of his flock.”

Wilding put the book down on the counter.  “I beg your pardon,” he said thinking a little, perhaps, of his own present martyrdom while he spoke.  The silent bookseller acknowledged the apology by a bow.  Wilding went out.

Third and last stage, and No Thoroughfare for the third and last time.

There was nothing more to be done; there was absolutely no choice but to go back to London, defeated at all points.  From time to time on the return journey, the wine-merchant looked at his copy of the entry in the Foundling Register.  There is one among the many forms of despair — perhaps the most pitiable of all — which persists in disguising itself as Hope.  Wilding checked himself in the act of throwing the useless morsel of paper out of the carriage window.  “It may lead to something yet,” he thought.  “While I live, I won’t part with it.  When I die, my executors shall find it sealed up with my will.”

Now, the mention of his will set the good wine-merchant on a new track of thought, without diverting his mind from its engrossing subject.  He must make his will immediately.

The application of the phrase No Thoroughfare to the case had originated with Mr. Bintrey.  In their first long conference following the discovery, that sagacious personage had a hundred times repeated, with an obstructive shake of the head, “No Thoroughfare, Sir, No Thoroughfare.  My belief is that there is no way out of this at this time of day, and my advice is, make yourself comfortable where you are.”

In the course of the protracted consultation, a magnum of the forty-five year old port-wine had been produced for the wetting of Mr. Bintrey’s legal whistle; but the more clearly he saw his way through the wine, the more emphatically he did not see his way through the case; repeating as often as he set his glass down empty.  “Mr. Wilding, No Thoroughfare.  Rest and be thankful.”

It is certain that the honest wine-merchant’s anxiety to make a will originated in profound conscientiousness; though it is possible (and quite consistent with his rectitude) that he may unconsciously have derived some feeling of relief from the prospect of delegating his own difficulty to two other men who were to come after him.  Be that as it may, he pursued his new track of thought with great ardour, and lost no time in begging George Vendale and Mr. Bintrey to meet him in Cripple Corner and share his confidence.

“Being all three assembled with closed doors,” said Mr. Bintrey, addressing the new partner on the occasion, “I wish to observe, before our friend (and my client) entrusts us with his further views, that I have endorsed what I understand from him to have been your advice, Mr. Vendale, and what would be the advice of every sensible man.  I have told him that he positively must keep his secret.  I have spoken with Mrs. Goldstraw, both in his presence and in his absence; and if anybody is to be trusted (which is a very large IF), I think she is to be trusted to that extent.  I have pointed out to our friend (and my client), that to set on foot random inquiries would not only be to raise the Devil, in the likeness of all the swindlers in the kingdom, but would also be to waste the estate.  Now, you see, Mr. Vendale, our friend (and my client) does not desire to waste the estate, but, on the contrary, desires to husband it for what he considers — but I can’t say I do — the rightful owner, if such rightful owner should ever be found.  I am very much mistaken if he ever will be, but never mind that.  Mr. Wilding and I are, at least, agreed that the estate is not to be wasted.  Now, I have yielded to Mr. Wilding’s desire to keep an advertisement at intervals flowing through the newspapers, cautiously inviting any person who may know anything about that adopted infant, taken from the Foundling Hospital, to come to my office; and I have pledged myself that such advertisement shall regularly appear.  I have gathered from our friend (and my client) that I meet you here to-day to take his instructions, not to give him advice.  I am prepared to receive his instructions, and to respect his wishes; but you will please observe that this does not imply my approval of either as a matter of professional opinion.”

Thus Mr. Bintrey; talking quite is much
at
Wilding as
to
Vendale.  And yet, in spite of his care for his client, he was so amused by his client’s Quixotic conduct, as to eye him from time to time with twinkling eyes, in the light of a highly comical curiosity.

“Nothing,” observed Wilding, “can be clearer.  I only wish my head were as clear as yours, Mr. Bintrey.”

“If you feel that singing in it coming on,” hinted the lawyer, with an alarmed glance, “put it off. — I mean the interview.”

“Not at all, I thank you,” said Wilding.  “What was I going to — ”

“Don’t excite yourself, Mr. Wilding,” urged the lawyer.

“No; I
wasn’t
going to,” said the wine-merchant.  “Mr. Bintrey and George Vendale, would you have any hesitation or objection to become my joint trustees and executors, or can you at once consent?”

“
I
consent,” replied George Vendale, readily.

“
I
consent,” said Bintrey, not so readily.