for it,” cried Bill sharply, seizing the bound and helpless man by the throat, when, fancying that his last hour had come, the doctor opened his mouth to cry out, when the knife-handle was thrust between his teeth, and the cravat tightly tied behind his head, keeping the gag securely in its place, and thoroughly robbing him of the power of even crying out.
“Now t’other,” said Bill. “Get another knife out.”
“Ah! he’s all right,” said Number 2. “I’d leave him.”
“P’r’aps you would,” said Bill; “but we two don’t want to be blowed on, if you do.”
“But he’s a-most dead now,” said Number 2; “and if you stop his mouth that way, I’m blessed if I don’t think he will be quite afore morning.”
“And what then?” said Bill contemptuously; “what if he is? What’s the good of an old cove like him? Yah!”
However, that part of the ceremony was left undone. The doctor heard the door close, open again, for the key to be dragged out of the lock and replaced in the other side; when once more the door was closed and double-locked. Then followed the sound as of a whispered dispute, and again silence, till it was broken by a faint scream from upstairs; while, with every nerve on the stretch, the doctor listened for the next movement, as, still somewhat confused in mind, he kept fancying that the stertorous breathing of his brother was that of one of the ruffians on guard at the door.
An hour must have passed, during which time the doctor still fancied there was a man on guard, and dared not move, though at that time the three visitors were coolly taking their tickets of a sleepy porter, the only one of the railway company’s servants in charge of the station, and soon after they were being whirled up by the night mail which called at Somesham for the letter-bags at two o’clock. But at last, as the doctor’s mind became clearer, he made out that the breathing must be that of his brother; and rousing himself, he tried to free his hands. The cord only cut deeply into his plump flesh, though, and a sharp pain was the sole result, though he could tell that his arms and legs were swelling, and that the circulation was almost stopped. He tried to get rid of the gag in his mouth, but only made it press the harder upon his false teeth, so that the gold setting seemed almost to crush his gums. Then he waited awhile, to gain strength, and as his head grew clearer, he recalled how that the will had been destroyed, and thought of how, had he known what was to happen, he would have opened and read it. If now Octavius would neglect to make another! He was old and helpless, and no doubt getting to be imbecile – at least, in his doctorial eyes; and if he would but neglect to make another! Then he remembered how the villains had denuded his person, and he writhed with fury so that his chair cracked.
Back to the thoughts of the will and of Septimus Hardon; and for a time so deep was his musing, that the doctor almost forgot his own position till the pain recalled him, and he found he was fast growing numb and cold.
All at once a terrible shudder ran through his frame, for a rustling and squeaking behind the oak wainscot startled him.
“Rats!” he thought to himself; and he recalled how the house was said to swarm with them, and how that they had once attacked a child in bed. Started upon that train of thought, there were plenty of anecdotes to startle him with the reputed courage of the fierce little animals when hunger-driven.
Another hour passed in the darkness, as regularly and slow came the stertorous breathing of Octavius, interrupted at times by the fierce scratching of the rats behind the wainscot, or their scampering beneath the floor in their many galleries; and again and again the doctor shivered with fear, as he sat listening and longing for help.
But no help came – neither was it likely to come, since the lonely house might have been passed again and again without there being a suspicion excited of anything being wrong. Besides, late in the night it was a great chance if a soul passed. He knew, from his professional habits, that no surprise would be felt at home because of his absence, and he had not said where he was going.
Another hour passed, and the doctor sat listening eagerly for his brother’s breath, which, from being loud and stertorous, had now become so faint as to be hardly perceptible; indeed at times it appeared to have ceased, and in his then excited condition he began to dread that the overdose of laudanum, or the shock, had been too much for the old man, and that he was to pass the remainder of the night with a corpse. He dreaded the corpse horribly, but did he dread that such was the case – that his brother was dead? He was old and useless certainly, but he was rich, and his will was destroyed; and were there no Septimus, or could he be put aside, that property would come to him. But was his brother dead? Death was nothing new to him; he had stood by hundreds of deathbeds; but under these circumstances, bound down there, with nerves unstrung, numbed, cold, and in agony, Doctor Hardon had at times a difficult matter to contain himself, and he trembled fearfully with a new horror lest he should lose control over himself.
He listened, and the breathings had ceased; the only sounds he could hear were the horrible gnawings of the vermin. At last, though, he heard a breath; but he shuddered again, for his excited fancy told him that it was the harsh, rattling expiration that he had often heard – that last effort of the lungs ere stilled for ever.
The tearing and scratching of the vermin now grew louder, and the doctor asked himself why? as, beside himself with horror, he sat listening. His temples throbbed, the cold sweat stood upon his face, and he struggled again and again to free himself, but only to tighten the well-tied knots. At times he could hardly breathe, while at last a thrill ran through him – a thrill of indescribable terror – such a shock as would have made him yell, had he been able; for quickly, and with a sharp scratching, he felt something run up one of his bound legs, across his lap, and then he heard the soft “pat” as a rat leaped upon the carpet.
Doctor Hardon could bear no more; horrible, stifled groans burst from his breast, as, mad with dread, he leaped and bounded spasmodically in his seat, making the cords cut deeply into his flesh till, in one of his agonised convulsions, the chair went over backwards with a crash; when, stunned and helpless, the wretched man lay in a wild dream of horror, from which he only awoke to relapse again and again.
Volume One – Chapter Thirteen.
At the County Arms
The people of Somesham, whom Doctor Hardon regulated as to their internal economy, were of opinion that there was not such another town as theirs in the whole kingdom; and no doubt they were right. It was situated at the foot of a range of chalky wolds, and in dry weather always gave the visitors an idea that its inhabitants were a slovenly race, and had not dusted their town lately. There was a long, white, dusty road that led to it on one side, and a long, dusty road that led to or from it on the other side; there was one long, dusty street, with shops and private houses mixed up anyhow; there were a few dusty cross streets which led nowhere; a market-place where pigs squealed and butter was sold on Tuesdays; a town-hall, combined with a corn-exchange and an assembly-room, forming an ugly dust-coloured building, which was like the memoranda and papers in people’s pocket-books when they are advertised as lost – of no value to anyone but the owners; and the sole use it would have been to them was to sell it for old building-materials. There were public-houses, and, above all, a commercial inn, kept by one Mrs Lower, a stout, elderly lady, who had formerly occupied the post of nurse in Octavius Hardon’s house until such times as a nurse was no longer required, when she did needlework, and helped in the domestic concerns till her mistress died, and then acted as housekeeper up to the advent of Agnes Hardon, when one John Lower, keeper of the County Arms in Somesham market-place, persuaded her to say “Yes” to the question he had so many times asked her, and she became landlady of the goodly inn; nurse again to the failing old man her husband; and lastly, sole owner of the goods, chattels, and tenements of the said John Lower, who went to his long sleep with a blessing upon his lips for the good woman
