LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 207, 6 February 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

AN OLD MAN'S DARLING. In Two Chapters. Continued. 'Can I be of any service to you?' he asked, when his boat touched the side. 'Oh, you are an Englishman!' exclaimed the lady, exerting herself to make her feeble voice audible. 'ls it far from a town ? Can you get me a doctor. lam so ill.' For answer, Dr Antrobus pushed his boat along to the gangway, and stepped on board; a couple of Maltese sailors, who were seated on the deck, forwards, playing at cards, neither assisting nor hindering him. They him a keen look, and went on with their game. The lady, though dressed like a young woman, was certainly past fifty, probably a good many years past; but some faces age sooner than others, and she was suffering. * I am a medical man,' said Dr Antrobus ; ' what is the matter ?' 'A burning pain that never leaves me, and prevents my sleeping; sickness whenever I take food ; at times a dizziness as if I were dying.' ' How long have you had these symptoms? 'A month ago, at Naples, I first felt the burning after sickness ; but it passed off again at that time. Then it returned, and grew worse and worse. And you are really a medical man?' 'Certainly.' 'Pardon the question; your coming is such a direct answer to prayer! And you will save me, will you not ?' She became hysterical; when she got a little better, Dr Antrobus helped her down into the cabin, where he expected to find some female attendant ; but no ; except the two sailors who were playing at cards on deck, and themselves, there did not seem to be a soul on board. Yet the vessel, though of Genoese build and lateen rig, was fitted up like an English yacht, and as she was of about twenty tons' burden, her crew could hardly consist of two men only. After certain further inquiries and examination, Dr Antrobus asked if she had merely taken a passage in the vessel. * O no,' said she: 'we have hired it, with the crew, and have been cruising about in it for upwards of three weeks.' ' Then you first experienced these symptoms just before you sailed ?' ' Yes : we had engaged the yacht, and made all arrangements.' ' You say we; I conolude that the rest of your party has gone ashore ?' ' Yes.' 'Do you repose perfect confidence m all those who are constantly about you ?' 'Tell me the truth, sir, I adjure you!' cried the lady, grasping his arm: 'ami not—poisoned ?' 'Yes.' The sufferer wrung her hands, and fell forward on the table at which she was sitting, in an agony of fear and grief. When this had passed by a little, she broke out into violent exclamations. 'Fool that I was,'she cried, 'to believe in his repentance, his returning love! To be talked over again by his soft tongue after all my experience ! You asked if I have confidence in those about me, sir : there is only one about me, and he is my husband. I had confidence in him, God help me! though he squandered my money on his vices, and quarrelled with me when I refused him more. But when he owned himself in the wrong, and promised to reform I trusted him again, and came abroad alone with him, without a single attendant. And he has murdered me for my money—murdered me !—Ah!' she exclaimed, in a lower voice, as the splash of oars was heard, 'he has returned. Say nothing of this to him, I. implore you, or he will kill me out of hand. There is no Englishman on board; and these foreigners will believe anything he says, and do whatever he tells them.'

• Calm yourself,' said the doctor hurriedly, ' eat nothing but biscuit, drink nothing but water. I will apply to the authorities at Messina, and come to your rescue soon. What is your name '!' Before the lady could reply, a dark, handsome young man, dressed in yachting costume, sprang down the hatchway, and stood before them. It was not an easy task for Dr Antrobus to suppress his feelings and treat this man unconcernedly; but he had determined in his own mind the wiseßt course to take, and he adhered to it. The new-comer had considerable command over himself also, for though he was very pale, and his lips twitched slightly, he put on an expression of indignant surprise as he bowed slightly to the intruding stranger. ' Pardon my having boarded you in this unceremonious fashion,' said the doctor. ' I was deceived by the rig of your yacht, and thought it was some trading vessel in which I might get a passage to Italy. This lady has undeceived me, and I have but to apologise for the mistake.' ' Pray, do not mention it,' said the young man, with an evident effort to steady his voice. ' Won't you Can't I offer you something V 'No, thank you,' replied the dootor cheerfully. ' I must get on shore at once; it will be dark presently. Good evening, madam.' Chapter 11. ethel's second conquest. Dr Antrobus was a philosopher, and by no means easily flustered or excited ; but his pulse certainly throbbed faster than usual as he was leaving the felucca. He had no doubt whatever of the truth of the wife's ajiLjacitßifi; that she had taken oison for

some time back in increasing doses, ho knew for certain; no suicide has ever been known to kill him or herself painfully, by inches, when speedier methods were at hand. There wa« no one about her but her husband, he had a direct interest in her death, being almost a lad, tied up to an old woman he had married for money, which she withheld ; lastly, He had yet not quite stifled his conscience, and to a student of physiognomy his face proclaimed his guilt. Now, crime did not, as a rule, make the doctor's blood curdle; he was a little too apt to look upon it as a curious and interesting branch of social science, to be classified and experimented on, and treated as a disease rather than punished. But he oould not stand slow poisoning, that was the one sort of murder with which he had no patience. That a mortal being, framed like himself, belonging to the same species, having the same propensities, subject to similar emotions of love, pity, generosity, should be able to live on terms of daily friendliness with his victim, to soothe her fears with tender 1 words, to profess anxiety, to watch the effect of the doses, and increase, diminish, or temfiorarily stop them in the way best catenated to prevent suspicion, was to him a horror which made the most brutal cuttings, stabbings, strangling*, mild and venial by the contrast. In less than twenty-four hours his time was up, for the steamer which was to take him back to Gibraltar sailed on the following afternoon from Messina, which port was some ten miles distant by land from the small inn where he had been staying, and close to which he was presently landed. It had been his intention to go over in the morning, but he now felt that there was not a moment to be lost if the murderer was to be brought to justice, or his victim saved. Of the last, he had little hope—the poison had got too much hold of her already—still there was a chance. So he ordered a horse and guide, and packed his saddle-bags at once. In vain the innkeeper remonstrated ; the roads were bad, ana not entirely free from banditti. The doctor shewed his pistols, and replied that he had a better chance of making his way past any people who tried to intercept him in the dark than by daylight, for that matter. Besides, it was a question of life or death, and he had no choice but to go. Never had he felt so vexed and perturbed as during that gloomy ride ; he was thoroughly dissatisfied with himself for not having made inquiries concerning names, relatives, dates, residence in England, &c., before the husband's return. True that he had had very little time, and the poor lady's illness and hysterical emotion had rendered the task of questioning her a tedious one; but still he fancied now that he might have gleaned more information. At present, all the clue he had was a presumption that the yacht had been hired at Naples. He had questioned the fishermen whose boat he had hired, and his landlord; but they knew nothing beyond the fact that the felucca had come into the anchorage the evening before, and that the young Englishman had spent the day on shore with his gun. His disquietude culminated when a puff of air, which at first merely breathed upon his face, strengthened and strengthened till he had to press his hat on. If the owner of the yacht had the slightest suspicion of what had passed in his absence, he would up anchor and away at the first breath. Had he been over-cautious, after all 7 Would it not have been the better course to denounce the fellow to his face, and seek to carry off his victim ? The attempt must have faiied; four sailors had brought him back, which made a crew of six; he was armed, while the doctor, having no weapon, and unable to rely on the two fishermen, hired only for the hour to help him, would have been in the falsest position possible. No, he adopted the wisest, the only plan in seeking to keep the poisoner in ignorance that his crime was suspected until he could return armed with proper authority, and the power to interfere. And of this he had good hope, for he had a friend residing at Messina who was a man of j wealth and influence.

The innkeeper had exaggerated the difficulties of the road, and in two hours the doctor reached his frien's house. He was welcomed very heartily, but his business was not so well received. ' What! arrest an English subject on board his own yacht; take his own wife away from him, and accuse him of attempting to murder her ! Many a town had been bombarded for much less. Then suppose the charge could not be substantiated ?' While they were discussing the matter, the captain of a British frigate which wan cruising on the station came in, and when he was referred to, espoused the doctor's side. Ho saw perfectly that there was a chance of getting into a legal scrape, but agreed that it was worth some risk to save a woman from being poisoned like a rat, and said he was willing to take his share of it. The worst of the business was, that it was a hundred to one the yacht would be out of sight by daylight with that breeze. There is no use in detailing how they roused a Sicilian official from his slumbers, and persuaded him to take action in the matter, for the captain's surmise was correct and when the bay where the felucca had lain was visited in the morning, there was not a sail to be seen. It was with a heavy heart that Dr Autobus started that afternoon for Gibraltar. The house at Hawkshaw was dull for a long while after the owner left it. Dr Antrobus, though a reserved and silent man at dinner-parties and tea-fights, which he hated, was a delightful companion at home, and his aunt and his ward missed him terribly, the girl most; for though Granny believed in her nephew to any extent, hers was a blind faith. Whatever he said must be right, and any one who averred the contrary must be a wilful heretic, and wanted burning. But as for entering into the why or the wherefore, I do honestly think, without exaggeration, that such an idea, supposing the possibility of its getting into her head, would have turned all the brains. She did not even know the names of' the sciences for which he was distinguished, or the societies which honored him. Ethel, on the contrary, studied the newspaper for mention of his name, read the reports of associations and meetings connected with him that she found there, asked him for explanation of what she did not understand, and, in a word, enlisted her reason in the service of her love and admiration. She could not hope ever to comprehend all, but she did a part, and might include more and more. Girls are generally iar more intelligent than boys, but there can be no doubt that Ethel was very much in advance of her age.

To be continued.