The Greatest Works of Anna Katharine Green. Анна Грин
fact?” I urged.
“Well, the fact is this. You see—I would tell Mr. Gryce,” he resumed, unconscious of my anxiety, “but I have my fears of detectives, sir; they catch you up so quick at times, and seem to think you know so much more than you really do.”
“But this fact,” I again broke in.
“O yes, sir; the fact is, that that night, the one of the murder you know, I saw Mr. Clavering, Robbins, or whatever his name is, enter the house, but neither I nor any one else saw him go out of it; nor do I know that he did.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, sir, what I mean is this. When I came down from Miss Eleanore and told Mr. Robbins, as he called himself at that time, that my mistress was ill and unable to see him (the word she gave me, sir, to deliver) Mr. Robbins, instead of bowing and leaving the house like a gentleman, stepped into the reception room and sat down. He may have felt sick, he looked pale enough; at any rate, he asked me for a glass of water. Not knowing any reason then for suspicionating any one’s actions, I immediately went down to the kitchen for it, leaving him there in the reception room alone. But before I could get it, I heard the front door close. ‘What’s that?’ said Molly, who was helping me, sir. ‘I don’t know,’ said I, ‘unless it’s the gentleman has got tired of waiting and gone.’ ‘If he’s gone, he won’t want the water,’ she said. So down I set the pitcher, and up-stairs I come; and sure enough he was gone, or so I thought then. But who knows, sir, if he was not in that room or the drawing-room, which was dark that night, all the time I was a-shutting up of the house?”
I made no reply to this; I was more startled than I cared to reveal.
“You see, sir, I wouldn’t speak of such a thing about any person that comes to see the young ladies; but we all know some one who was in the house that night murdered my master, and as it was not Hannah——”
“You say that Miss Eleanore refused to see him,” I interrupted, in the hope that the simple suggestion would be enough to elicitate further details of his interview with Eleanore.
“Yes, sir. When she first looked at the card, she showed a little hesitation; but in a moment she grew very flushed in the face, and bade me say what I told you. I should never have thought of it again if I had not seen him come blazoning and bold into the house this evening, with a new name on his tongue. Indeed, and I do not like to think any evil of him now; but Molly would have it I should speak to you, sir, and ease my mind,—and that is all, sir.”
When I arrived home that night, I entered into my memorandum-book a new list of suspicious circumstances, but this time they were under the caption “C” instead of “E.”
Chapter XIX.
In My Office
“Something between an hindrance and a help.”
Wordsworth.
The next day as, with nerves unstrung and an exhausted brain, I entered my office, I was greeted by the announcement:
“A gentleman, sir, in your private room—been waiting some time, very impatient.”
Weary, in no mood to hold consultation with clients new or old, I advanced with anything but an eager step towards my room, when, upon opening the door, I saw—Mr. Clavering.
Too much astounded for the moment to speak, I bowed to him silently, whereupon he approached me with the air and dignity of a highly bred gentleman, and presented his card, on which I saw written, in free and handsome characters, his whole name, Henry Ritchie Clavering. After this introduction of himself, he apologized for making so unceremonious a call, saying, in excuse, that he was a stranger in town; that his business was one of great urgency; that he had casually heard honorable mention of me as a lawyer and a gentleman, and so had ventured to seek this interview on behalf of a friend who was so unfortunately situated as to require the opinion and advice of a lawyer upon a question which not only involved an extraordinary state of facts, but was of a nature peculiarly embarrassing to him, owing to his ignorance of American laws, and the legal bearing of these facts upon the same.
Having thus secured my attention, and awakened my curiosity, he asked me if I would permit him to relate his story. Recovering in a measure from my astonishment, and subduing the extreme repulsion, almost horror, I felt for the man, I signified my assent; at which he drew from his pocket a memorandum-book from which he read in substance as follows:
“An Englishman travelling in this country meets, at a fashionable watering-place, an American girl, with whom he falls deeply in love, and whom, after a few days, he desires to marry. Knowing his position to be good, his fortune ample, and his intentions highly honorable, he offers her his hand, and is accepted. But a decided opposition arising in the family to the match, he is compelled to disguise his sentiments, though the engagement remained unbroken. While matters were in this uncertain condition, he received advices from England demanding his instant return, and, alarmed at the prospect of a protracted absence from the object of his affections, he writes to the lady, informing her of the circumstances, and proposing a secret marriage. She consents with stipulations; the first of which is, that he should leave her instantly upon the conclusion of the ceremony, and the second, that he should intrust the public declaration of the marriage to her. It was not precisely what he wished, but anything which served to make her his own was acceptable at such a crisis. He readily enters into the plans proposed. Meeting the lady at a parsonage, some twenty miles from the watering-place at which she was staying, he stands up with her before a Methodist preacher, and the ceremony of marriage is performed. There were two witnesses, a hired man of the minister, called in for the purpose, and a lady friend who came with the bride; but there was no license, and the bride had not completed her twenty-first year. Now, was that marriage legal? If the lady, wedded in good faith upon that day by my friend, chooses to deny that she is his lawful wife, can he hold her to a compact entered into in so informal a manner? In short, Mr. Raymond, is my friend the lawful husband of that girl or not?”
While listening to this story, I found myself yielding to feelings greatly in contrast to those with which I greeted the relator but a moment before. I became so interested in his “friend’s” case as to quite forget, for the time being, that I had ever seen or heard of Henry Clavering; and after learning that the marriage ceremony took place in the State of New York, I replied to him, as near as I can remember, in the following words:
“In this State, and I believe it to be American law, marriage is a civil contract, requiring neither license, priest, ceremony, nor certificate—and in some cases witnesses are not even necessary to give it validity. Of old, the modes of getting a wife were the same as those of acquiring any other species of property, and they are not materially changed at the present time. It is enough that the man and woman say to each other, ‘From this time we are married,’ or, ‘You are now my wife,’ or, ‘my husband,’ as the case may be. The mutual consent is all that is necessary. In fact, you may contract marriage as you contract to lend a sum of money, or to buy the merest trifle.”
“Then your opinion is——”
“That upon your statement, your friend is the lawful husband of the lady in question; presuming, of course, that no legal disabilities of either party existed to prevent such a union. As to the young lady’s age, I will merely say that any fourteen-year-old girl can be a party to a marriage contract.”
Mr. Clavering bowed, his countenance assuming a look of great satisfaction. “I am very glad to hear this,” said he; “my friend’s happiness is entirely involved in the establishment of his marriage.”
He appeared so relieved, my curiosity was yet further aroused. I therefore said: “I have given you my opinion as to the legality of this marriage; but it may be quite another thing to prove it, should the same be contested.”
He started, cast me an inquiring