Chapter 23. Greatrakes At Work--Denouement

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_ CHAPTER XXIII. Greatrakes at Work--Denouement

Greatrakes was on his way from Birch Grove to Rathnllan House the next day when he was met by Barney Casey, who had been on the lookout for him. Barney, who knew not his person, was not capable of determining whether he was the individual whom he wanted or not. At all events he resolved at once to ascertain that fact. Accordingly, putting his hand to his hat, he said, with a respectful manner,--

"Pray, sir, are you the great Valentine Great Rooke, who prevents the people from dyin'?"

"I am Valentine Greatrakes," he replied, with a smile; "but I cannot prevent the people from dying."

"Begad, but you can prevent them from being sick, at any rate. I am myself sometimes subject to a colic, bad luck to it--(this was a lie, got up for the purpose of arresting the attention of Greatrakes)--and maybe if you would be kind enough to rub me down you would drive the wind out of me and cure me of it, for at least, by all accounts through the whole parish, it's a windy colic that haunts me."

Greatrakes, who was a man of great goodnature, and strongly susceptible of humor, laughed very heartily at Barney's account of his miserable state of health.

"Well," said he, "my good friend, let me tell you that the colic you speak of is one of the most healthy diseases we have. Don't, if you regard your constitution, and your health, ever attempt to get rid of it. Your constitution is a windy constitution, and that is the reason why you are graciously afflicted with a windy colic."

It was, in fact, diamond cut diamond between the two. Barney, who had never had a colic in his life, shrugged his shoulders very dolefully at the miserable character of the sympathy which was expressed for him; and Greatrakes, from his great powers of observation, saw that every word Barney uttered with respect to his besetting malady was a lie.

At length Barney's countenance assumed an expression of such honest sincerity and feeling that Greatrakes was at once struck by it, and he kept his eye steadily fixed upon him.

"Sir," said Barney, "I understand you are a distinguished gentleman and a magistrate besides?"

"I am certainly a magistrate," replied Greatrakes; "but what is your object in asking the question, my good fellow?"

"I understand you are going to our Masther Charles Lindsay. Now, I wish to give you a hint or two concerning him. His brother--he of the Evil Eye--according to my most solemn and serious opinion, is poisoning him by degrees. I think he has been dosing him upon a small scale, so as to make him die off by the effects of poison, without any suspicion being raised against himself; but when his father told him yesterday that you were to come this day to cure him, his brother insisted that he should sit up with him, and nurse-tend him himself. I was aware of this, and from a conversation I heard him have with an old herbalist, named Sol Donnel, I had suspicions of his design against his brother's life. He strove to kill Miss Goodwin by the damnable force and power of his Evil Eye, and would have done so had not you cured her."

"And are you sure," replied Greatrakes, "that it is not his Evil Eye that is killing his brother?"

"I don't know that," replied Barney; "perhaps it may be so."

"No," replied Greatrakes, "from all I have read and heard of its influence it cannot act upon persons within a certain degree of consanguinity."

"I would take my oath," said honest Barney, "that it is the poison that acts in this instance."

He then gave him a description of Woodward's having poured the poison--or at least what he suspected to be such--into the drink which was usually left at the bedside of his brother, and of its effect upon the dog.

Greatrakes, on hearing this, drew up his horse, and looking Barney sternly in the face, asked him,--

"Pray, my good fellow, did Mr. Woodward ever injure or offend you?"

"No, sir," replied Barney, "never in any instance; but what I say I say from my love for his brother, whose life, I can swear, he is tampering with. It is a weak word, I know, but I will use a stronger, for I say he is bent upon his murder by poison."

"Well," said Greatrakes, "keep your counsel for the present. I will study this matter, and examine into it; and I shall most certainly receive your informations against him; but I must have better opportunities for making myself acquainted with the facts. In the meantime keep your own secret, and leave the rest to me."

When Greatrakes reached Rathfillan House the whole family attended him to the sick bed of Charles. Woodward was there, and appeared to feel a deep interest in the fate of his brother. Greatrakes, on looking at him, said, before he applied the sanative power which God had placed in his constitution,--

"This young man is dying of a slow and subtle poison, which some person under the roof of this house has been administering to him in small doses."

As he uttered these words he fixed his eyes upon Woodward, whose face quailed and blanched under the power and significance of his gaze.

"Sir," replied Lindsay, "with the greatest respect for you, there is not a single individual under this roof who would injure him. He is beloved by every one. The sympathy felt for him through the whole parish is wonderful--but by none more than by his brother Woodward."

This explanation, however, came too late. Greatrakes's impressions were unchanged.

"I think I will cure him," he proceeded; "but after his recovery let him be cautious in taking any drink unless from the hands of his mother or his father."

He then placed his hands over his face and chest, which he kept rubbing for at least a quarter of an hour, when, to their utter astonishment, Charles pronounced himself in as good health as he had ever enjoyed in his lift.

"This, sir," said he, "is wonderful; why, I am perfectly restored to health. As I live, this man must have the power of God about him to be able to effect such an extraordinary cure: and he has also cured my darling Alice. What can I say? Father, give him a hundred--five hundred pounds."

Greatrakes smiled.

"You don't know, it seems," he replied, "that I do not receive remuneration for any cures I may effect. I am wealthy and independent, and I fear that if I were to make the wonderful gift which God has bestowed on me the object of mercenary gain, it might be withdrawn from me altogether. My principle is one of humanity and benevolence. I will remain in Rathfillan for a fortnight, and shall see you again," he added, addressing himself to Charles. "Now," he proceeded, "mark me, you will require neither drinks nor medicine of any description. Whatever drinks you take, take them at the common table of the family. There are circumstances connected with your case which, as a magistrate of the county, I am I resolved to investigate."

He looked sternly at Woodward as he uttered the last words, and then took his departure to Rathfillan, having first told Barney Casey to call on him the next day.

After Greatrakes had gone, Woodward repaired to the room of his mother, in a state of agitation which we cannot describe.

"Mother," said he, "unless we can manage that old peer and his niece, I am a lost man."

"Do not be uneasy," replied his mother; "whilst you were at Ballyspellan I contrived to manage that. Ask me nothing about it; but every arrangement is made, and you are to be married this day week. Keep yourself prepared for a settled case."

What the mother's arguments in behalf of the match may have been, we cannot pretend to say. We believe that Miss Riddle's attachment to his handsome person and gentlemanly manners overcame all objections on the part of her uncle, and nothing now remained to stand in the way of their union.

The next day Barney Casey waited upon Greatrakes, according to appointment, when the following conversation took place between them:--

"Now," said Greatrakes, solemnly, "what is your name?"

As he put the question with a stern and magisterial air, his tablets and pencil in hand, which he did with the intention of awing Barney into a full confession of the exact truth--a precaution which Barney's romance of the windy colic induced him to take,--"I say," he repeated, "what's your name?"

Barney, seeing the pencil and tablets in hand, and besides not being much, or at all, acquainted with magisterial investigations, felt rather blank, and somewhat puzzled at this query.

He accordingly resorted to the usage of the country, and commenced scratching a rather round bullet head.

"My name, your honor," he replied; "my name, couldn't you pass that by, sir?"

"No," said Greatrakes, "I cannot pass it by. In this business it is essential that I should know it."

"Ay," replied Barney, "but maybe you have some treacherous design in it, and that you are goin' to take the part of the wealthy scoundrel against the poor man; and even if you did, you wouldn't be the first magistrate who did it."

Greatrakes looked keenly at him. The observation he expressed was precisely in accordance with the liberality of his own feelings.

"Don't be alarmed," he added; "if you knew my character, which it is evident you do not, you would know that I never take the part of the rich man against the poor man, unless when there is justice on the part of the wealthy man, and crime, unjustifiable and cruel crime, on the part of the poor man, which, I am sorry to say, is not an unfrequent case. Now, I must insist, as a magistrate, that you give me your name."

"Well, then," replied the other, "I'm one Barney Casey, sir, who lives in Rathfillan House, as a servant to Mr. Lindsay, step-father to that murtherin' blackguard."

Greatrakes then examined him closely, and made him promise to come to Rathfillan that night, in order that he might accompany him to the hut of old Sol Donnel, the herbalist.

"I am resolved," said he, "to investigate this matter, and in my capacity of a magistrate to bring the guilty to justice."

"Faith, sir," replied Barney, "and I'm not the boy who is going to stand in your way in such a business as that. You know that it was I that put you up to it, and any assistance I can give you in it you may reckon on. Although not a magistrate, as you are, maybe I'm just as fond of justice as yourself. Of coorse I'll attend you to-night, and show you the devil's nest in which Sol Donnel and his blessed babe of a niece, by name Caterine Collins, live."

Greatrakes took down the name of Caterine Collins, and after having arranged the hour at which Barney was to conduct him to Sol Donnel's hut, they separated.

About eleven o'clock that night Barney and Greatrakes reached the miserable-looking residence in which this old viper lived.

"Now," said Greatrakes, addressing the herbalist, "my business with you is this: I have a bitter enemy who wants to establish a claim upon my property, and I wish to put him out of my way. Do you understand me? I am a wealthy man, and can reward you well."

"I never talk of these things in the presence of a third party," replied the herbalist, looking significantly at Barney, whom he well knew.

"Well," replied the other, "I dare say you are right. Casey, go out and leave us to ourselves."

There was a little hall in the house, which hall was in complete obscurity. Barney availed himself of this circumstance, opened the door and clapped it to as if he had gone out, but remained at the same time in the inside.

"No, sir," replied Sol Donnel, ignorant of the trick which Barney had played upon him, "I never allow a third person to be present at any of those conversations about the strength and power of my herbs. Now, tell me, what it is that you want me to do for you."

"Why, to tell you the truth," replied Greatrakes, "I never heard of your name until within a few days ago, that you were mentioned to me by Mr. Henry Woodward, who told me that you gave him a dose to settle a dog that was laboring under the first symptoms of hydrophobia. Well, the dog is dead by the influence of the bottle you gave him; but now that we are by ourselves I tell you at once that I want a dose for a man who is likely, if he lives, to cut me out of a large property."

"O, Cheernah!" exclaimed the old villain, "do you think that I who lives by curin' the poor for nothing, or next to nothing, could lend myself to sich a thing as that?"

"Very well," replied the other, preparing to take his departure, "you have lost fifty pounds by the affair at all events."

"Fifty pounds!" exclaimed the other, whilst his keen and diabolical eyes gleamed with the united spirit of avarice and villany. "Fifty pounds! well how simple and foolish some people are. Why now, if you had a dog, say a setter or a pointer, that from fear of madness you wished to get rid of, and that you had mentioned it to me, I could give you a bottle that would soon settle it; I don't go above a dog or the inferior animals, and no man that has his senses about him ought to ask me to do anything else."

"Well, then, I tell you at once that, as I said, it is not for a dog, but for a worse animal, a man, my own cousin, who, unless I absolutely contrive to poison him, will deprive me of six thousand a year. Instead of fifty I shall make the recompense a hundred, after having found that your medicine is successful."

The old villain's eye gleamed again at the prospect of such liberality.

"Well now," said he, "see what it is for a pious man to forget his devotions, even for one day. I forgot to say my Leadan Wurrah this mornin', and that is the raison that your temptation has overcome me. You must call then to-morrow night, because I have nothing now, barrin' what 'ud excite the bowels, and it seems that isn't what you want; but if you be down here about this same hour to-morrow night, you shall have what will put your enemy out of the way."

"That will do then," replied Greatrakes, "and I shall depend on you."

"Ay," replied the old villain, "but remember that the act is not mine but your own. I simply furnish you with the necessary means--your own act will be to apply them."

On leaving the hut, Greatrakes was highly gratified on finding that Barney Casey had overheard their whole conversation.

"You will serve as a corroborative evidence," said he.

The herbalist, at all events, was entrapped, and not only his disposition to sell botanical poisons, but his habit of doing so, was clearly proved to the benevolent magistrate.

On the next night he got the poison, and having consulted with Casey, he said he would not urge the matter for a few days, as he wished, in the most private way possible, to procure further evidence against the guilty parties.

In the meantime, every preparation was made in both families for Woodward's wedding. The old peer, who had cross-examined his niece upon the subject, discovered her attachment to Woodward; and as he wished to see her settled before his death with a gentlemanly and respectable husband--a man who would be capable of taking care of the property which he must necessarily leave her, as she was his favorite and his heiress--and besides, he loved her as a daughter--he was resolved that Woodward and she should be united."

"I don't care a fig," said he, "whether this Woodward has property or not. He is a gentleman, respectably connected, of accomplished manners, handsome in person, and if he has no fortune, why you have; and I think the best thing you can do is to accept him without hesitation. The comical rascal," said he, laughing heartily, "took me in so completely during our first interview, that he became a favorite with me."

"I think well of him," replied his firm-minded niece; "and even I admit that I love him, as far as a girl of such a cold constitution as mine may; but I tell you, uncle, that if I discovered a taint of vice or want of principle in his character, I could fling him off with contempt."

"I wish to heaven," replied the uncle, rather nettled, "that we could have up one of the twelve apostles. I dare say some of them, if they were disposed to marry, might come up to your mark."

"Well, uncle, at all events I like him sufficiently to consent that he should become my husband."

"Well, and is not that enough; bless my heart, could you wish to go beyond it?"

In the meantime, very important matters were proceeding, which bore strongly upon Woodward's destiny. Greatrakes had collected--aided, of course, by Barney Casey, who was the principal, but not the sole, evidence against him--such a series of facts, as, he felt, justified him in receiving informations against him.

At this crisis a discovery was made in connection with the Haunted House, which was privately, through Casey, communicated to Greatrakes, who called a meeting of the neighboring magistrates upon it. This he did by writing to them privately to meet him on a particular day at his little inn in Rathfillan. For obvious reasons, and out of consideration to his feelings, Mr. Lindsay's name was omitted. At all events the night preceding the day of Woodward's marriage with Miss Riddle had arrived, but two circumstances occurred on that evening and on that night which not only frustrated all his designs upon Miss Riddle, or rather upon her uncle's property, but--however, we shall not anticipate.

It was late in the evening when Miss Riddle was told by a servant that a young man, handsome and of fine proportions, wished to see her for a few minutes.

"Not that I would recommend you to see him," said the serving-woman who delivered the message. "He is, to be sure, very handsome; but, then, he is one of those wild people, and armed with a great mid-dogue or dagger, and God knows what his object may be--maybe to take your life. As sure as I live he is a tory."

"That may be," replied Miss Riddle; "but I know, by your description of him, that he is the individual to whose generous spirit I and my dear uncle owe our lives: let him be shown in at once to the front parlor."

In a few minutes she entered, and found Shawn before her.

"O Shawn!" said she, "I am glad to see you. My uncle is using all his interest to get you a pardon--that is, provided you are willing to abandon the wild life to which you have taken."

"I am willing to abandon it," he replied; "but I have one task to perform before I leave it. You have heard of the toir, or tory-hunt, which was made after me and others; but chiefly after me, for I was the object they wanted to shoot down, or rather that he, the villain, wanted to murder under the authority of those cruel laws that make us tories."

"Who do you mean by he?" asked Miss Riddle.

"I mean Harry Woodward," he replied. "He hunted me, disguised by a black mask."

"But are you sure of that, Shawn?"

"I am sure of it," he replied; "and it was not until yesterday that I discovered his villany. I know the barber in Rathfillan where the black mask was got for him, I believe, by his wicked mother."

Miss Riddle, who was a strong-minded girl, paused, and was silent for a time, after which she said,--

"I am glad you told me this, Shawn. I spoke to him in your favor, and he pledged his honor to me previous to the terrible hunt you allude to, and of which the whole country rang, that he would never take a step to your prejudice, but would rather protect you as far as he could, in consequence of your having generously saved my dear uncle's life and mine."

"The deeper villain he, then. He is upon my trail night and day. He ruined Grace Davoren, who has disappeared, and the belief of the people is that he has murdered her. He possesses the Evil Eye too, and would by it have murdered Miss Goodwin, of Beech Grove, in order to get back the property which his uncle left her, only for the wonderful power of Squire Greatrakes, who cured her. And, besides, I have raison to know that he will be arrested this very night for attempting to poison his brother. I am a humble young man, Miss Riddle, but I am afeard that if you marry him you will stand but a bad chance for happiness."

"She was again silent, but, after a pause, she said--

"Shawn, do you want money?"

"I thank you, Miss Riddle," he replied, "I don't want money: all I want is, that you will not be desaved by one of the most damnable villains on the face of the earth."

There was an earnestness and force of truth in what the generous young tory said that could not be mistaken. He arose, and was about to take his leave, when he said,--

"Miss Riddle, I understand he is about to be married to you to-morrow. Should he become your husband, he is safe from my hand--and that on your account; but as it may not yet be too late to spake, I warn you against his hypocrisy and villany--against the man who destroyed Grace Davoren--who would have killed Miss Goodwin with his Evil Eye, in order to get back the property which his uncle left her, and who would have poisoned his own brother out of his way bekase his mother told him she had changed her mind in leaving it to him (Woodward), and came to the resolution of leaving it to his brother, and that was the raison why he attempted to poison him. All these things have been proved, and I have raison to believe that he will sleep--if sleep he can--in Waterford jail before to-morrow mornin'. But," he added, with a look which was so replete with vengeance and terror, that it perfectly stunned the girl, "perhaps he won't, though. It is likely that the fate of Grace Davoren will prevent him from it."

He did not give her time to reply, but instantly disappeared, and left her in a state of mind which our readers may very well understand.

She immediately went to her uncle's library, where the following brief dialogue occurred:

"Uncle, this marriage must not and shall not take place."

"What!" replied the peer; "then he is none of the twelve apostles."

"You are there mistaken," said she; "he is one of them. Remember Judas."

"Judas! What the deuce are you at, my dear niece?"

"Why, that he is a most treacherous villain: that's what I'm at," and her face became crimson with indignation.

"But what's in the wind? Don't keep me in a state of suspense. Judas! Confound it, what a comparison! Well, I perceive you are not disposed to become Mrs. Judas. You know me, however, well enough: I'm not going to press you to it. Do you think, my dear niece, that Judas was a gentleman?"

"Precisely such a gentleman, perhaps, as Mr. Woodward is."

"And you think he would betray Christ?"

"He would poison his brother, uncle, because he stands between him and his mother's property, which she has recently expressed her intention of leaving to that brother--a fact which awoke something like compassion in my breast for Woodward."

"Well, then, kick him to hell, the scoundrel. I liked the fellow in the beginning, and, indeed, all along, because he had badgered me so beautifully,--which I thought few persons had capacity to,--and in consequence, I entertained a high opinion of his intellect, and be hanged to him; kick him to hell, though."

"Well, my dear lord and uncle, I don't think I would be capable of kicking him so far; nor do I think it will be at all necessary, as my opinion is, that he will be able to reach that region without any assistance."

"Come, that's very well said, at all events--one of your touchers, as I call them. There, then, is an end to the match and marriage, and so be it."

She here detailed at further length, the conversation which she had with Shawn-na-Middogue; mentioned the fact, which had somehow become well known, of his having wrought the ruin of Grace Davoren, and concluded by stating that, notwithstanding his gentlemanly manners and deportment, he was unworthy either the notice or regard of any respectable female.

"Well," said the peer, "from, all you have told me I must say you have had a narrow escape; I did suspect him to be a fortune-hunter; but then who the deuce can blame a man for striving to advance himself in life? However, let there be an end to it, and you must only wait until a better man comes."

"I assure you, my dear uncle, I am in no hurry; so let that be your comfort so far as I am concerned."

"Well, then," said the peer, "I shall write to him to say that the marriage, in consequence of what we have heard of his character, is off."

"Take whatever steps you please," replied his admirable niece; "for most assuredly, so far as I am concerned, it is off. Do you imagine, uncle, that I could for a moment think of marrying a seducer and a poisoner?"

"It would be a very queer thing if you did," replied her uncle; "but was it not a fortunate circumstance that you came to discover his real character in time to prevent you from becoming the wife of such a scoundrel?"

"It was the providence of God," said his niece, "that would not suffer the innocent to become associated with the guilty."

Greatrakes, in the meantime, was hard at work. He and the other magistrates had collected evidence, and received the informations against Woodward, the herbalist, and the mysterious individual who was in the habit of appearing about the Haunted House as the Shan-dhinne-dhuv, or the Black Spectre. Villany like this cannot be long concealed, and will, in due time, come to light.

During the dusk of the evening preceding Woodward's intended marriage, an individual came to Mr. Lindsay's house and requested to see Mr. Woodward. That gentleman came down, and immediately recognized the person who had, for such a length of time, frightened the neighborhood as the Shan-dhinne-dhuv or the Black Spectre. He was shown into the parlor, and, as there was no one present, the following dialogue took place, freely and confidentially, between them:--

"You must fly," said the Spectre, or, in other words, the conjurer, whom we have already described,--"you must fly, for you are to be arrested this night. Our establishment for the forgery of bad notes must also be given up, and the Haunted House must be deserted. The magistrates, somehow, have smelled out the truth, and we must change our lodgings. We dodged them pretty well, but, after all, these things can't last long. On to-morrow night I bid farewell to the neighborhood; but you cannot wait so long, because on this very night you are to be arrested. It is very well that you sent Grace Davoren, at my suggestion, from the Haunted House to what is supposed to be the haunted cottage, in the mountains, where Nannie Morrissy soon joined her. I supplied them with provisions, and had a bed and other articles brought to them, according to your own instructions, and I think that, for the present, the safest place of concealment will be there."

Woodward became terribly alarmed. It was on the eve of his marriage, and the intelligence almost drove him into distraction.

"I will follow your advice," said he, "and will take refuge in what is called the haunted cottage, for this night."

His mysterious friend now left him, and Woodward prepared to seek the haunted cottage in the mountains. Poor Grace Davoren was in a painful and critical condition, but Woodward had engaged Caterine Collins to attend to her: for what object, will soon become evident to our readers.

Woodward, after night had set in,--it was a mild night with faint moonlight,--took his way towards the cottage that was supposed to be haunted, and which, in those days of witchcraft and. superstition, nobody would think of entering. We have already described it, and that must suffice for our readers. On entering a dark, but level moor, he was startled by the appearance of the Black Spectre, which, as on two occasions before, pointed its middogue three times at his heart. He rushed towards it, but on arriving at the spot he could find nothing. It had vanished, and he was left to meditate on it as best he might.

We now pass to the haunted cottage itself. There lay Grace Davoren, after having given birth to a child; there she lay--the victim of the seducer, on the very eve of dissolution, and beside her, sitting on the bed, the unfortunate Nannie Morrissy, now a confirmed and dying maniac.

"Grace," said Nannie, "you, like me, were ruined."

"I was," replied Grace, in a voice scarcely audible.

"Ay, but you didn't murder your father, though, as I did; that's one advantage I have over you--ha! ha! ha!"

"I'm not so sure of that, Nannie," replied the dying girl; "but where's my baby?"

"O! yes, you have had a baby, but Caterine Collins took it away with her."

"My child! my child! where is my child?" she exclaimed in a low, but husky voice; "where's my child? and besides, ever since I took that bottle she gave me I feel deadly sick."

"Will I go for your father and mother--but above all things for your father? But then if he punished the villain that ruined you and brought disgrace upon your name, he might be hanged as mine was."

"Ah! Nannie," replied poor Grace; "my father won't die of the gallows; but he will of a broken heart."

"Better to be hanged," said the maniac, whose reason, after a lapse of more than a year, was in some degree returning, precisely as life was ebbing out, "bekase, thank God, there's then an end to it."

"I agree with you, Nannie, it might be only a long life of suffering; but I wouldn't wish to see my father hanged."

"Do you know," said Nannie, relapsing into a deeper mood of her mania,--"do you know that when I saw my father last he wouldn't nor didn't spake to me? The house was filled with people, and my little brother Frank--why now isn't it strange that I feel somehow as if I will never wash his face again nor comb his white head in order to prepare him for mass?--but whisper, Grace, sure then I was innocent and had not met the destroyer."

The two unhappy girls looked at each other, and if ever there was a gaze calculated to wring the human heart with anguish and with pity, it was that gaze. Both of them were, although unconsciously, on the very eve of dissolution, and it would seem as if a kind of presentiment of death had seized upon both at the same time.

"Nannie," said Grace, "do you know that I'm afeard we're both goin' to die?"

"And why are you afeard of it?" asked Nannie. "Many a time I would 'a given the world to die."

"Why," replied Grace, who saw the deep shadows of death upon her wild, pale, but still beautiful countenance,--"why Nannie, you have your wish--you are dying this moment."

Just as Grace spoke the unfortunate girl seemed as if she had been stricken by a spasm of the heart. She gave a slight start--turned up her beautiful, but melancholy eyes to heaven, and exclaimed, as if conscious of the moment that had come,--

"Forgive me, O God!" after which she laid herself calmly down by the side of Grace and expired. Grace, by an effort, put her hand out and felt her heart, but there was no pulsation there--it did not beat, and she saw by the utter lifelessness of her features that she was dead, and had been relieved at last from all her sorrows.

"Nannie," she said, "your start before me won't be long. I do not wish to live to show a shamed face and a ruined character to my family and the world. Nannie, I am coming; but where is my child? Where is that woman who took it away? My child! Where is my child?"

Whilst this melancholy scene was taking place, another of a very different description was occurring near the cottage. Two poachers, who were concealed in a hazel copse on the brow of a little glen beside it, saw a woman advance with an infant, which, by its cries, they felt satisfied was but newly born.

Its cries, however, were soon stilled, and they saw her deposit it in a little grave which had evidently been prepared for it. She had covered it slightly with a portion of clay, but ere she had time to proceed further they pounced upon her.

"Hould her fast," said one of them, "she has murdered the infant. At all events, take it up, and I will keep her safe."

This was done, and a handkerchief, the one with which she had strangled it, was found tightly tied about its neck. That she was the instrument of Woodward in this terrible act, who can doubt? In the meantime both she and the dead body of the child were brought back to Rathfillan, where, upon their evidence, he was at once committed to prison, the handkerchief having been kept as a testimony against him, for it was at once discovered to be her own property.

During all this time Grace Davoren lay dying, in a state of the most terrible desolation, with the dead body of Nannie Morrissy on the bed beside her. What had become of her child, and of Caterine Collins, she could not tell. She had, however, other reflections, for the young, but guilty mother was not without strong, and even tender, domestic affections.

"O!" she exclaimed, in her woful solitude and utter desolation, "if I only had the forgiveness of my father and mother I could die happy; but now I feel that death is upon me, and I must die alone."

A footstep was heard, and it relieved her. "Oh! this is Caterine," she said, "with the child."

The door opened, and the young tory, Shawn-na-Middogue, entered. He paused for a moment and looked about him.

"What is this?" said he, looking at the body of Nannie Morrissy; "is it death?"

"It is death," replied Grace, faintly; "there is one death, but, Shawn, there will soon be another. Shawn, forgive me, and kiss me for the sake of our early love."

"I am an outlaw," replied the stern young tory; "but I will never kiss the polluted lips of woman as long as she has breath in her body."

"But Caterine Collins has taken away my child, and has not returned with it."

"No, nor ever will," replied the outlaw. "She was the instrument of your destroyer. But I wish you to be consoled, Grace. Do you see that middogue? It is red with blood. Now listen. I have avenged you; that middogue was reddened in the heart of the villain that wrought your ruin. As far as man can be, I am now satisfied."

"My child!" she faintly said; "my child! where is it?"

Her words were scarcely audible. She closed her eyes and was silent. The outlaw looked closely into her countenance, and perceived at once that death was there. He felt her pulse, her heart, but all was still.

"Now," said he, "the penalty you have paid for your crime has taken away the pollution from your lips, and I will kiss you for the sake of our early love."

He then kissed her, and rained showers of tears over her now unconscious features. The two funerals took place upon the same day; and, what was still more particular, they were buried in the same churchyard. Their unhappy fates were similar in more than one point. The selfish and inhuman seducer of each became the victim of his crime; one by the just and righteous vengeance of a heart-broken and indignant father, and the other by the middogue of the brave and noble-minded outlaw. Who the murderer of Harry Woodward, or rather the avenger of Grace Davoren, was, never became known. The only ears to which the outlaw revealed the secret were closed, and her tongue silent for ever.

The body of Woodward was found the next morning lifeless upon the moors; and when death loosened the tongues of the people, and when the melancholy fate of Grace Davoren became known, there was one individual who knew perfectly well, from moral conviction, who the avenger of her ruin was.

"Uncle," said Miss Riddle, while talking with him on the subject, "I feel who the avenger of the unfortunate and beautiful Grace Davoren is."

"And who is he, my dear niece?"

"It shall never escape my lips, my lord and uncle."

"Egad, talking of escapes, I think you have had a very narrow one yourself, in escaping from that scoundrel of the Evil Eye."

"I thank God for it," she replied, and this closed their conversation.

There is little now to be added to our narrative. We need scarcely assure our readers that Charles Lindsay and Alice Goodwin were in due time made happy, and that Ferdora O'Connor, who had been long attached to Maria Lindsay, was soon enabled to call her his beloved wife.

The devilish old herbalist, and his equally devilish niece, together with the conjurer and forger, who had assumed the character of the Black Spectre, were all hanged, through the instrumentality of Valentine Greatrakes, who had acquired so many testimonies of their villainy and their crimes as enabled him, in conjunction with the other magistrates of the county, to obtain such a body of evidence against them as no jury could withstand. It was, probably, well for Woodward that the middogue of the outlaw prevented him from sharing the same fate, and dying a death of public disgrace.

Need we say that honest Barney Casey was rewarded by the love of Sarah Sullivan, who, soon after their marriage, was made housekeeper in Mr. Lindsay's family; and that Barney himself was appointed to the comfortable situation of steward over his property?

Lord Cockletown exercised all his influence with the government of the day to procure a pardon for Shawn-na-Middogue, but without effect. He furnished him, however, with a liberal sum of money, with which he left the country, but was never heard of more.

Miss Riddle was married to a celebrated barrister, who subsequently became a judge.

[THE END]
William Carleton's novel: Evil Eye; or, The Black Spector

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