"Can't you?" said Sampson; "then I'll give you a couple. Say he is touched in the upper story for one.""What do you mean? Mad?""Oh: there are degrees of Phrinzy. Here is th' inconsistency of conduct that marks a disturbance of the reason: and, to tell the truth, I once knew a young fellow that played this very prank at a wedding, and the nixt thing we hard, my lorrd was in Bedlam."Edward shook his head: "It is the villain's heart, not his brain."Sampson then offered another solution, in which he owned he had more confidence--"He has been courting some other wumman first: she declined, or made believe; but, when she found he had the spirit to go and marry an innocent girl, then the jade wrote to him and yielded. It's a married one, likely. I've known women go further for hatred of a wumman than they would for love of a man and here was a temptation! to snap a lover off th' altar, and insult a rival, all at one blow. He meant to marry: he meant to sign that deed: ay and at his age, even if he had signed it, he would have gone off at passion's call, and beggared himself. What enrages me is that we didn't let him sign it, and so nail the young rascal's money.""Curse his money," said Edward, "and him too. Wait till I can lay my hand on him: I'll break every bone in his skin.""And I'll help you."In the morning, Mrs. Dodd left Julia for a few minutes expressly to ask Sampson's advice. After Alfred's conduct she was free, and fully determined, to defend herself and family against spoliation by any means in her power: so she now showed the doctor David's letter about the L.
14,000; and the empty pocket-book; and put together the disjointed evidence of Julia, Alfred, and circumstances, in one neat and luminous statement. Sampson was greatly struck with the revelation: he jumped off his chair and marched about excited: said truth was stranger than fiction, and this was a manifest swindle: then he surprised Mrs. Dodd in her turn by assuming that old Hardie was at the bottom of yesterday's business. Neither Edward nor his mother could see that, and said so: his reply was characteristic: "Of course you can't; you are Anglosaxins; th'
Anglosaxins are good at drawing distinctions: but they can't gineralise.
I'm a Celt, and gineralise--as a duck swims. I discovered th' unity of all disease: it would be odd if I could not trace the maniform iniquities you suffer to their one source.""But what is the connecting link?" asked Mrs. Dodd, still incredulous.
"Why, Richard Hardie's interest."
"Well, but the letter?" objected Edward.
"There goes th' Anglosaxin again," remonstrated Sampson: "puzzling his head over petty details; and they are perhaps mere blinds thrown out by the enemy. Put this and that together: Hardie senior always averse to this marriage; Hardie senior wanting to keep L. 14,000 of yours: if his son, who knows of the fraud, became your mother's son, the swinidle would be hourly in danger (no connection? y' unhappy Anglosaxins; why the two things are interwoven). And so young Hardie is got out of the way: old Hardie's doing, or I'm a Dutchman."This reasoning still appeared forced and fanciful to Edward but it began to make some little impression on Mrs. Dodd, and encouraged her to own that her poor daughter suspected foul play.
"Well, that is possible, too: whativer tempted man has done, tempted man will do: but more likely he has bribed Jezebel to write and catch the goose by the heart. Gintlennen, I'm a bit of a physiognomist: look at old Hardie's lines; his cords, I might say: and deeper every time I see him.
Sirs, there's an awful weight on that man's mind. Looksee! I'll just send a small trifle of a detective down to watch his game, and pump his people: and, as soon as it is safe, we'll seize the old bird, and, once he is trapped the young one will reappear like magic: th' old one will disgorge; we'll just compound the felony--been an old friend--and recover the cash."A fine sketch; but Edward thought it desperately wild, and Mrs. Dodd preferred employing a respectable attorney to try and obtain justice in the regular way. Sampson laughed at her; what was the use of attacking in the regular way an irregular genius like old Hardie? "Attorneys are too humdrum for such a job," said he; "they start with a civil letter putting a rogue on his guard; they proceed t' a writ and then he digs a hole in another county and buries the booty; or sails t' Australia with it.
N'list'me; I'm an old friend, and an insane lover of justice--I say insane, because my passion is not returned, or the jade wouldn't keep out of my way so all these years--you leave all this to me.""Stop a minute," said Edward; "you must not go compromising us: and we have no money to pay for luxuries like detectives.""I won't compromise any one of you: and my detective shan't cost y' a penny.""Ah, my dear friend," said Mrs. Dodd, "the fact is, you do not know all the difficulties that beset us. Tell him, Edward. Well, then, let _me._The poor boy is attached to this gentleman's daughter, whom you propose to treat like a felon: and he is too good a son and too good a friend for me to--what, what, shall I do?"Edward coloured up to the eyes. "Who told you that, mother?" said he.
"Well, yes, I do love her, and I'm not ashamed of it. Doctor," said the poor fellow after a while, "I see now I am not quite the person to advise my mother in this matter. I consent to leave it in your hands."And in pursuance of this resolution, he retired to his study.
