Bred in the Bone; Or, Like Father, Like Son Part 48

They stood and listened, peering down into the darkness beneath them; but there was no repet.i.tion of the cries. The wounded man had apparently spent his last strength, perhaps his last breath, in uttering them.

"He must be down here somewhere. Come on."

The situation was sufficiently appalling; but these men had lost half their terrors, now that they knew there was a fellow-creature needing help. They descended slowly; and he who was foremost presently cried out, "I see him; here he is."

The man was lying on his face quite still; and when they lifted him, each looked at the other with a grave significance--they had carried too many from the bowels of the earth to the pit's mouth not to know when a man was dead. Even a senseless body is not the same to an experienced bearer as a dead weight. The corpse was still warm, but the head fell back with a movement not of life.

"You were right, mate. His neck is broke; the poor gentleman pitched over on his head."

"Stop a bit," exclaimed the man addressed; "see here. Why, it ain't him at all--it's Solomon Coe."

An exclamation of astonishment burst involuntarily from the other three.

"Then where's the other?" cried they all together.

"I am here," answered a ghastly whisper.

Within but a few feet of Solomon, so that they could hardly have overlooked him had not the former monopolized their attention, lay Richard, grievously hurt. Some ribs were broken, and one of them was pressed in upon the lungs. Still he was alive, and the men turned their attention first to him, since Solomon was beyond their aid. By help of the two ladders, side by side, they bore him up the wall of rock; and so from level to level--a tedious and painful journey to the wounded man--to the upper air.

He was carried to the inn upon the mattress which his own care had provided for another; while the four miners, to the amazement of the throng, once more descended into the pit for a still more ghastly burden.

Richard could speak a little, though with pain. By his orders a messenger was dispatched that night to Plymouth to telegraph the news of the discovery of her husband's body to Mrs. Coe. His next anxiety was to hear the surgeon's report, not on his own condition, but on that of Solomon. This gentleman did not arrive for some hours, and Richard was secretly well pleased at his delay. It was his hope, for a certain reason, that he would not arrive until the body was stiff and cold.

He saw Richard first, of course. The case was very serious; so much so that he thought it right to mention the fact, in order that his patient might settle his worldly affairs if they needed settlement.

"There is no immediate danger, my good Sir; but it is always well in such cases to have the mind free from anxiety."

"I understand; it is quite right," said Richard, gravely. "Moreover, since the opportunity may not occur again, let me now state how it all happened."

"Nay, you must not talk. We know it all, or at least enough of it for the present."

"What do you know?" asked Richard, with his eyes half shut, but with eager ears.

"That in your benevolent attempt to seek after Mr. Coe you met with the same accident--though I trust it will not have the same ending--as that unfortunate gentleman himself. He pitched upon his head and broke his neck, while you fell upon your side."

"That is so," murmured Richard. "He and I were partners, you see--"

"There, there; not a word more," insisted the doctor; "your deposition can wait."

And having done what he could for his patient, he left him, in order to examine the unfortunate Solomon. His investigation corroborated all that he had already heard of the circ.u.mstances of his death, with which also Richard's evidence accorded. An observation made by one of the miners who had found the body, to the effect that it was yet warm when they had come upon it, excited the surgeon's ridicule.

"It is now Tuesday morning, my friend," said he, "and this poor fellow met with his death on Sat.u.r.day night for certain. He could not, therefore, have been much warmer when you found him than he is now."

"Well, me and my mate here we both fancied--"

"I dare say you did, my man," interrupted the doctor; "and fancy is a very proper word to apply to such an impression. If you take my advice, however, you will not repeat such a piece of evidence when put upon your oath, for the thing is simply impossible."

"Then I suppose we be in the wrong," said d.i.c.k to Jack; and on that supposition they acted.

In this way too self-reliant Science, whose mission it is to explode fallacies, occasionally a.s.sists in the explosion or suffocation of a fact, for Solomon Coe had not been dead half an hour when his body was found.

When Richard, alone on his errand of mercy, was approaching the brink of the third level, he could hear Solomon calling l.u.s.tily for help. Nay, it was not only "Help!" but "Murder!" that he cried out; and notwithstanding the menace that that word implied toward himself, Richard hurried on, well pleased to hear it; the vigor of the cry a.s.sured him that his enemy was not only living, but unhurt. As the light he carried grew more distinct to him, indeed, these shouts redoubled; but when it came quite near, and disclosed the features of its bearer, there was a dead silence. The two men stood confronting one another--the one in light, distinctly seen, looking down upon the other in shade, just as they had parted only eight-and-forty hours ago. To one of them, as we know, this s.p.a.ce had been eventful; but to the other it had seemed a lifetime--an age of hopes and fears, and latterly of cold despair, which had now been warmed once more to hope only to freeze again. For was not this man, to whom he had looked for aid, his cruel foe come back to taunt him--to behold him already half-way toward death, and to make its slow approach more bitter? But great as was his agony Solomon held his peace, nor offered to this monarch of his fate the tribute of a groan.

"I am come to rescue you," said Richard, in low but distinct tones; "to undo the evil that I have already done, although it was no less than you deserved, nor an overpayment of the debt I owed you. In return you will doubtless denounce me as having meant to murder you."

No answer. If Richard had not heard his cries, it would have seemed that this poor wretch had lost the power of speech. His huge head drooped upon his shoulder, and he leaned against the rocky wall as though his limbs could not have otherwise supported themselves; they shook, indeed--but was it with weakness or with hate?--as though he had the palsy.

"Well, you will have reason to do so," continued Richard, calmly, "for I did mean to murder you. In ten minutes hence you will find yourself among your neighbors, free to act as you please. I shall make no appeal to your mercy; it would, I know, be as fruitless as was yours to mine the other day; but if you abstain from molesting me, this mine, with all its hidden treasure, shall be your own. I have nothing more to say."

Solomon answered nothing. "Perhaps," thought Richard, "he still doubts me.--Well, here is the ladder;" and he suited the action to the word.

Solomon's great hand flew out from his side, and clutched a rung as a dog's teeth close upon a bone; a dog's growl, too, half triumph and half threat, came from his deep chest; then he began slowly to ascend, keeping his eyes fixed on Richard. The latter drew back a little to give him s.p.a.ce, and watched him with folded arms.

"Now," said Solomon, stepping off the ladder with the prolonged "Ha!" of one who breathes freely after long oppression, "it is _my_ turn!"

"What are you about to do?" asked Richard, calmly.

"What! you think we are quits, Richard Yorke, do you? or at least that when I had seen you hung it would seem so to me? You don't know what it is to die here slowly in the dark; you are about to learn that."

"Indeed."

"Yes. You complained the other day of my having used the law against you. Well, you shall not have to reproach me with that a second time. We are about to change places, you and I, that's all. You shall keep sentry down yonder till Death comes to relieve _you_. It was indiscreet in you to venture here alone to dictate terms, my friend."

Solomon's voice was grating and terrible; it had grown hoa.r.s.e with calling. His form was gaunt and pinched with hunger; his eyes flashed like those of some starving beast of prey.

"I swear to you I came here to rescue you, and with no other purpose,"

said Richard, earnestly. "I was not afraid of you when you were hale and strong, and much less now when you are weakened with privation; but I do not wish to have your blood upon my hands. I came here to-night--"

"Is it night?" interrupted the other, eagerly. "I did not know that it was night; how should I, in this place, where there is no day? Well, that was still more indiscreet of you, for I shall get away unseen, while you lie here unsought."

"Your scheme is futile. There are fifty men about the pit's mouth now. I have told them--"

"Liar!" Solomon darted forward; and Richard, throwing away the torch, as though disdaining to use any advantage in the way of weapon, grappled with him at once. At the touch of his foe his scruples vanished, and his hate returned with tenfold fury. But he was in the grasp of a giant.

Privation had doubtless weakened Solomon, but he had still the strength of a powerful man, and his rage supplied him for the time with all that he had lost. They clung to one another like snakes, and whirled about with frantic violence. Whichever fell undermost was a dead man for certain. For a few moments the expiring torch still showed them each other's hot, vindictive faces; then they battled in the dark, with laboring breath and eager strain, swaying they knew not whither. At last the huge weight of Solomon overbore his lesser antagonist. Richard's limbs gave way beneath him, and he fell, but fell through s.p.a.ce; for in their gyrations they had, without knowing it, returned to the top of the ladder. His foe, fast clutched, fell with him, but, pitching on his head, was killed, as we have seen, upon the instant.

This was the true history of what had occurred in the mine, as Richard, on his bed of pain, recalled it step by step, and strove to shape it to his ends.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

MAKING PEACE.

Whether Richard's own injuries proved fatal or not was with him a matter of secondary importance. His anxiety was to prove that they were received by misadventure; upon the whole, matters promised favorably for this, and were in other respects as satisfactory as could reasonably be expected. The blood of Solomon Coe was upon his own head. Richard had no need even to reproach himself with having struck in self-defense the blow that killed his enemy; and he did not reflect that he was still to blame for having, in the first instance, placed him in the mine. He had at least done his best to extricate him, and his conscience was (perhaps naturally) not very tender respecting the man who had repaid his attempt at atonement with such implacable animosity. At all events, Richard's mind was too much engaged in calculating the consequences of what had happened to entertain remorse. The question that now monopolized it was, what conclusion was likely to be arrived at by the coroner's inquest that would, of course, be held upon the body. The verdict was of the most paramount importance to him, not because upon it depended his own safety (for he valued his life but lightly, and, besides, his inward pain convinced him that it was already forfeited), but all that now made life worth having--the good regards of Harry and her son. He had no longer any scruple on his own part with respect to accepting or returning their affection. His fear was, lest, having been compelled to take so active a part in the rescue of the unhappy Solomon, something should arise to implicate him in his incarceration.

Fortunately he was far too ill to be summoned as a witness. His deposition alone could be taken, and that he framed with the utmost caution, and as briefly as was possible. His wounded lung defended him from protracted inquiries. Solomon himself had proposed the idea of a partners.h.i.+p in Wheal Danes, and his interest in the mine, the knowledge of which had suggested to Richard the place of his concealment, had evidently proved fatal to him. That he should have broken his neck just as Richard had broken his ribs on such a quest was by no means extraordinary; but how he ever reached the spot where he was found at all, without the aid of a ladder, was inexplicable. The line of evidence was smooth enough but for this ugly knot, and it troubled Richard much, though, as it happened, unnecessarily. Had the place of the calamity been a gravel-pit at Highgate, it would have been guarded by constabulary, and all things preserved as they were until after the official investigation. But Wheal Danes, from having been a deserted mine, had suddenly become the haunt of the curious and the morbid. There was nothing more likely than that Solomon's ladder had been carried off, and perhaps disposed of at a high price per foot as an interesting relic. The presence of the half-extinguished torch that Richard had flung away in the second level (and which should by rights have been found in the third) was still more easily explained: there were a score of such things now lying about the mine, which had been left there by visitors. In short, an "active" coroner and an "intelligent" jury could have come to no other conclusion than that of "accidental death;" and they came to it accordingly.