Henry Dunbar (Mystery Classics Series). Mary Elizabeth Braddon

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СКАЧАТЬ I wait for him,” the banker said, passing out into the quadrangle; “he’s sure to come to this door to look for me — I gave him particular orders to do so.”

      Henry Dunbar finished his cheroot, and another, and the cathedral clock chimed the three-quarters after seven, but Joseph Wilmot had not come back from the Ferns. The verger waited upon his patron’s pleasure, and lingered in attendance upon him, though he would fain have gone home to his tea, which in the common course he would have taken at five o’clock.

      “Really this is too bad,” cried the banker, as the clock chimed the three-quarters; “Wilmot knows that I dine at eight, and that I expect him to dine with me. I think I have a right to a little more consideration from him. I shall go back to the George. Perhaps you’ll be good enough to wait here, and tell him to follow me.”

      Mr. Dunbar went away, still muttering, and the verger gave up all thoughts of his tea, and waited conscientiously. He waited till the cathedral clock struck nine, and the stars were bright in the dark blue heaven above him: but he waited in vain. Joseph Wilmot had not come back from the Ferns.

      The banker returned to the George. A small round table was set in a pleasant room on the first floor; a bright array of glass and silver glittered under the light of five wax-candles in a silver candelabrum; and the waiter was beginning to be nervous about the fish.

      “You may countermand the dinner,” Mr. Dunbar said, with evident vexation: “I shall not dine till Mr. Wilmot, who is my old confidential servant — my friend, I may say — returns.”

      “Has he gone far, sir?”

      “To the Ferns, about a mile beyond St. Cross. I shall wait dinner for him. Put a couple of candles on that writing-table, and bring me my desk.”

      The waiter obeyed; he placed a pair of tall wax-candles upon the table; and then brought the desk, or rather despatch-box, which had cost forty pounds, and was provided with every possible convenience for a business man, and every elegant luxury that the most extravagant traveller could desire. It was like everything else about this man: it bore upon it the stamp of almost limitless wealth.

      Mr. Dunbar took a bunch of keys from his pocket, and unlocked his despatch-box. He was some little time doing this, as he had a difficulty in finding the right key. He looked up and smiled at the waiter, who was still hovering about, anxious to be useful.

      “I must have taken too much Moselle at luncheon to-day,” he said, laughing, “or, at least, my enemies might say so, if they were to see me puzzled to find the key of my own desk.”

      He had opened the box by this time, and was examining one of the numerous packets of papers, which were arranged in very methodical order, carefully tied together, and neatly endorsed.

      “I am to put off the dinner, then, sir?” asked the waiter.

      “Certainly; I shall wait for my friend, however long he may be. I’m not particularly hungry, for I took a very substantial luncheon at Southampton. I’ll ring the bell if I change my mind.”

      The waiter departed with a sigh; and Henry Dunbar was left alone with the contents of the open despatch-box spread out on the table before him under the light of the tall wax-candles.

      For nearly two hours he sat in the same attitude, examining the papers one after the other, and re-sorting them.

      Mr. Dunbar must have been possessed of the very spirit of order and precision; for, although the papers had been neatly arranged before, he re-sorted every one of them; tying up the packets afresh, reading letter after letter, and making pencil memoranda in his pocket-book as he did so.

      He betrayed none of the impatience which is natural to a man who is kept waiting by another. He was so completely absorbed by his occupation, that he, perhaps, had forgotten all about the missing man: but at nine o’clock he closed and locked the despatch-box, jumped up from his seat and rang the bell.

      “I am beginning to feel alarmed about my friend,” he said; “will you ask the landlord to come to me?”

      Mr. Dunbar went to the window and looked out while the waiter was gone upon this errand. The High Street was very quiet, a lamp glimmered here and there, and the pavements were white in the moonlight. The footstep of a passer-by sounded in the quiet street almost as it might have sounded in the solemn cathedral aisle.

      The landlord came to wait upon his guest.

      “Can I be of any service to you, sir?” he asked, respectfully.

      “You can be of very great service to me, if you can find my friend; I am really getting alarmed about him.”

      Mr. Dunbar went on to say how he had parted with the missing man in the grove, on the way to St. Cross, with the understanding that Wilmot was to go on to the Ferns, and rejoin his old master in the cathedral. He explained who Joseph Wilmot was, and in what relation he stood towards him.

      “I don’t suppose there is any real cause for anxiety,” the banker said, in conclusion; “Wilmot owned to me that he had not been leading a sober life of late years. He may have dropped into some roadside public-house and be sitting boozing amongst a lot of country fellows at this moment. It’s really too bad of him.”

      The landlord shook his head.

      “It is, indeed, sir; but I hope you won’t wait dinner any longer, sir?”

      “No, no; you can send up the dinner. I’m afraid I shall scarcely do justice to your cook’s achievements, for I took a very substantial luncheon at Southampton.”

      The landlord brought in the silver soup-tureen with his own hands, and uncorked a bottle of still hock, which Mr. Dunbar had selected from the wine-list. There was something in the banker’s manner that declared him to be a person of no small importance; and the proprietor of the George wished to do him honour.

      Mr. Dunbar had spoken the truth as to his appetite for his dinner. He took a few spoonfuls of soup, he ate two or three mouthfuls of fish, and then pushed away his plate.

      “It’s no use,” he said, rising suddenly, and walking to the window; “I am really uneasy about this fellow’s absence.”

      He walked up and down the room two or three times, and then walked back to the open window. The August night was hot and still; the shadows of the queer old gabled roofs were sharply defined upon the moonlit pavement. The quaint cross, the low stone colonnade, the solemn towers of the cathedral, gave an ancient aspect to the quiet city.

      The cathedral clock chimed the half-hour after nine while Mr. Dunbar stood at the open window looking out into the street.

      “I shall sleep here to-night,” he said presently, without turning to look at the landlord, who was standing behind him. “I shall not leave Winchester without this fellow Wilmot. It is really too bad of him to treat me in this manner. It is really very much too bad of him, taking into consideration the position in which he stands towards me.”

      The banker spoke with the offended tone of a proud and selfish man, who feels that he has been outraged by his inferior. The landlord of the George murmured a few stereotyped phrases, expressive of his sympathy with the wrongs of Henry Dunbar, and his entire reprobation of the missing man’s conduct.

      “No, I shall not go to London to-night,” Mr. Dunbar said; “though my daughter, my only child, whom I have not seen СКАЧАТЬ