The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (little readers .TXT) š
- Author: Wilkie Collins
- Performer: -
Book online Ā«The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (little readers .TXT) šĀ». Author Wilkie Collins
I took Betteredge by the arm, and led him out into the garden. There was no help for it. I was obliged to tell him the truth. Between his attachment to Rachel, and his attachment to me, he was sorely puzzled and distressed at the turn things had taken. His opinion, when he expressed it, was given in his usual downright manner, and was agreeably redolent of the most positive philosophy I knowāthe philosophy of the Betteredge school.
āMiss Rachel has her faultsāIāve never denied it,ā he began. āAnd riding the high horse, now and then, is one of them. She has been trying to ride over youāand you have put up with it. Lord, Mr. Franklin, donāt you know women by this time better than that? You have heard me talk of the late Mrs. Betteredge?ā
I had heard him talk of the late Mrs. Betteredge pretty oftenāinvariably producing her as his one undeniable example of the inbred frailty and perversity of the other sex. In that capacity he exhibited her now.
āVery well, Mr. Franklin. Now listen to me. Different women have different ways of riding the high horse. The late Mrs. Betteredge took her exercise on that favourite female animal whenever I happened to deny her anything that she had set her heart on. So sure as I came home from my work on these occasions, so sure was my wife to call to me up the kitchen stairs, and to say that, after my brutal treatment of her, she hadnāt the heart to cook me my dinner. I put up with it for some timeājust as you are putting up with it now from Miss Rachel. At last my patience wore out. I went downstairs, and I took Mrs. Betteredgeāaffectionately, you understandāup in my arms, and carried her, holus-bolus, into the best parlour where she received her company. I said āThatās the right place for you, my dear,ā and so went back to the kitchen. I locked myself in, and took off my coat, and turned up my shirt-sleeves, and cooked my own dinner. When it was done, I served it up in my best manner, and enjoyed it most heartily. I had my pipe and my drop of grog afterwards; and then I cleared the table, and washed the crockery, and cleaned the knives and forks, and put the things away, and swept up the hearth. When things were as bright and clean again, as bright and clean could be, I opened the door and let Mrs. Betteredge in. āIāve had my dinner, my dear,ā I said; āand I hope you will find that I have left the kitchen all that your fondest wishes can desire.ā For the rest of that womanās life, Mr. Franklin, I never had to cook my dinner again! Moral: You have put up with Miss Rachel in London; donāt put up with her in Yorkshire. Come back to the house!ā
Quite unanswerable! I could only assure my good friend that even his powers of persuasion were, in this case, thrown away on me.
āItās a lovely evening,ā I said. āI shall walk to Frizinghall, and stay at the hotel, and you must come tomorrow morning and breakfast with me. I have something to say to you.ā
Betteredge shook his head gravely.
āI am heartily sorry for this,ā he said. āI had hoped, Mr. Franklin, to hear that things were all smooth and pleasant again between you and Miss Rachel. If you must have your own way, sir,ā he continued, after a momentās reflection, āthere is no need to go to Frizinghall tonight for a bed. Itās to be had nearer than that. Thereās Hotherstoneās Farm, barely two miles from here. You can hardly object to that on Miss Rachelās account,ā the old man added slily. āHotherstone lives, Mr. Franklin, on his own freehold.ā
I remembered the place the moment Betteredge mentioned it. The farm-house stood in a sheltered inland valley, on the banks of the prettiest stream in that part of Yorkshire: and the farmer had a spare bedroom and parlour, which he was accustomed to let to artists, anglers, and tourists in general. A more agreeable place of abode, during my stay in the neighbourhood, I could not have wished to find.
āAre the rooms to let?ā I inquired.
āMrs. Hotherstone herself, sir, asked for my good word to recommend the rooms, yesterday.ā
āIāll take them, Betteredge, with the greatest pleasure.ā
We went back to the yard, in which I had left my travelling-bag. After putting a stick through the handle, and swinging the bag over his shoulder, Betteredge appeared to relapse into the bewilderment which my sudden appearance had caused, when I surprised him in the beehive chair. He looked incredulously at the house, and then he wheeled about, and looked more incredulously still at me.
āIāve lived a goodish long time in the world,ā said this best and dearest of all old servantsāābut the like of this, I never did expect to see. There stands the house, and here stands Mr. Franklin Blakeāand, Damme, if one of them isnāt turning his back on the other, and going to sleep in a lodging!ā
He led the way out, wagging his head and growling ominously. āThereās only one more miracle that can happen,ā he said to me, over his shoulder. āThe next thing youāll do, Mr. Franklin, will be to pay me back that seven-and-sixpence you borrowed of me when you were a boy.ā
This stroke of sarcasm put him in a better humour with himself and with me. We left the house, and passed through the lodge gates. Once clear of the grounds, the duties of hospitality (in Betteredgeās code of morals) ceased, and the privileges of curiosity began.
He dropped back, so as to let me get on a level with him. āFine evening for a walk, Mr. Franklin,ā he said, as if we had just accidentally encountered each other at that moment. āSupposing you had gone to the hotel at Frizinghall, sir?ā
āYes?ā
āI should have had the honour of breakfasting with you, tomorrow morning.ā
āCome and breakfast with me at Hotherstoneās Farm, instead.ā
āMuch obliged to you for your kindness, Mr. Franklin. But it wasnāt exactly breakfast that I was driving at. I think you mentioned that you had something to say to me? If itās no secret, sir,ā said Betteredge, suddenly abandoning the crooked way, and taking the straight one, āIām burning to know whatās brought you down here, if you please, in this sudden way.ā
āWhat brought me here before?ā I asked.
āThe Moonstone, Mr. Franklin. But what brings you now, sir?ā
āThe Moonstone again, Betteredge.ā
The old man suddenly stood still, and looked at me in the grey twilight as if he suspected his own ears of deceiving him.
āIf thatās a joke, sir,ā he said, āIām afraid Iām getting a little dull in my old age. I donāt take it.ā
āItās no joke,ā I answered. āI have come here to take up the inquiry which was dropped when I left England. I have come here to do what nobody has done yetāto find out who took the Diamond.ā
āLet the Diamond be, Mr. Franklin! Take my advice, and let the Diamond be! That cursed Indian jewel has misguided everybody who has come near it. Donāt waste your money and your temperāin the fine spring time of your life, sirāby meddling with the Moonstone. How can you hope to succeed (saving your presence), when Sergeant Cuff himself made a mess of it? Sergeant Cuff!ā repeated Betteredge, shaking his forefinger at me sternly. āThe greatest policeman in England!ā
āMy mind is made up, my old friend. Even Sergeant Cuff doesnāt daunt me. By-the-bye, I may want to speak to him, sooner or later. Have you heard anything of him lately?ā
āThe Sergeant wonāt help you, Mr. Franklin.ā
āWhy not?ā
āThere has been an event, sir, in the police-circles, since you went away. The great Cuff has retired from business. He has got a little cottage at Dorking; and heās up to his eyes in the growing of roses. I have it in his own handwriting, Mr. Franklin. He has grown the white moss rose, without budding it on the dog-rose first. And Mr. Begbie the gardener is to go to Dorking, and own that the Sergeant has beaten him at last.ā
āIt doesnāt much matter,ā I said. āI must do without Sergeant Cuffās help. And I must trust to you, at starting.ā
It is likely enough that I spoke rather carelessly.
At any rate, Betteredge seemed to be piqued by something in the reply which I had just made to him. āYou might trust to worse than me, Mr. FranklināI can tell you that,ā he said a little sharply.
The tone in which he retorted, and a certain disturbance, after he had spoken, which I detected in his manner, suggested to me that he was possessed of some information which he hesitated to communicate.
āI expect you to help me,ā I said, āin picking up the fragments of evidence which Sergeant Cuff has left behind him. I know you can do that. Can you do no more?ā
āWhat more can you expect from me, sir?ā asked Betteredge, with an appearance of the utmost humility.
āI expect moreāfrom what you said just now.ā
āMere boasting, Mr. Franklin,ā returned the old man obstinately. āSome people are born boasters, and they never get over it to their dying day. Iām one of them.ā
There was only one way to take with him. I appealed to his interest in Rachel, and his interest in me.
āBetteredge, would you be glad to hear that Rachel and I were good friends again?ā
āI have served your family, sir, to mighty little purpose, if you doubt it!ā
āDo you remember how Rachel treated me, before I left England?ā
āAs well as if it was yesterday! My lady herself wrote you a letter about it; and you were so good as to show the letter to me. It said that Miss Rachel was mortally offended with you, for the part you had taken in trying to recover her jewel. And neither my lady, nor you, nor anybody else could guess why.
āQuite true, Betteredge! And I come back from my travels, and find her mortally offended with me still. I knew that the Diamond was at the bottom of it, last year, and I know that the Diamond is at the bottom of it now. I have tried to speak to her, and she wonāt see me. I have tried to write to her, and she wonāt answer me. How, in Heavenās name, am I to clear the matter up? The chance of searching into the loss of the Moonstone, is the one chance of inquiry that Rachel herself has left me.ā
Those words evidently put the case before him, as he had not seen it yet. He asked a question which satisfied me that I had shaken him.
āThere is no ill-feeling in this, Mr. Franklin, on your sideāis there?ā
āThere was some anger,ā I answered, āwhen I left London. But that is all worn out now. I want to make Rachel come to an understanding with meāand I want nothing more.ā
āYou donāt feel any fear, sirāsupposing you make any discoveriesāin regard to what you may find out about Miss Rachel?ā
I understood the jealous belief in his young mistress which prompted those words.
āI am as certain of her as you are,ā I answered. āThe fullest disclosure of her secret will reveal nothing that can alter her place in your estimation, or in mine.ā
Betteredgeās last-left scruples vanished at that.
āIf I am doing wrong to help you, Mr. Franklin,ā he exclaimed, āall I can say isāI am as innocent of seeing it as the babe unborn! I can put you on the road to discovery, if you can only go on by yourself. You remember that poor girl of oursāRosanna Spearman?ā
āOf course!ā
āYou always thought she had some sort of confession in regard
Comments (0)