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THE HOUSE BY THE CHURCHYARD
soon as look at her. She saw with half an eye she could frighten
you both, you poor things. Oh! ho! how I wish I was here. I’d a put
her across my knee and – no – do you say? Pooh! you don’t know
me, you poor innocent little creature; and, do ye mind now, you
must not be moping here. Sally Nutter, all alone, you’ll just come
down to us, and drink a cup of tea and play a round game and
hear the news; and look up now and give me a kiss, for I like you,
Sally, you kind old girl.’
And she gave her a hug, and a shake, and half-a-dozen kisses
on each cheek, and laughed merrily, and scolded and kissed her
again.
Little more than an hour after, up comes a little billet from
the good-natured Magnolia, just to help poor little Sally Nutter out of the vapours, and vowing that no excuse should stand
good, and that come she must to tea and cards. ‘And, oh! what
do you think?’ it went on. ‘Such a bit a newse, I’m going to tell
you, so prepare for a chock;’ at this part poor Sally felt quite sick,
but went on. ‘Doctor Sturk, that droav into town Yesterday, as
grand as you Please, in Mrs. Strafford’s coach, all smiles and Polightness – whood a bleeved! Well He’s just come back, with two
great Fractions of his skull, riding on a Bear, insensible into The
town – there’s for you. Only Think of poor Mrs. Sturk, and the
Chock she’s got o n sight of Him: and how thankful and Pleasant you should be that Charles Nutter is not a Corpes in the
Buchar’s wood, and jiggin Home to you like Sturk did. But well
in health, what I’m certain shure he is, taken the law of Mary
Matchwell – bless the Mark – to get her emprisind and Publickly wiped by the commin hangman.’ All which rhapsody conjured
up a confused and dyspeptic dream, full of absurd and terrifi c
images, which she could not well comprehend, except in so far as
it seemed clear that some signal disaster had befallen Sturk.
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JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU
That night, at nine o’clock, the great Doctor Pell arrived in
his coach, with steaming horses, at Sturk’s hall-door, where the
footman thundered a tattoo that might have roused the dead; for
it was the family’s business, if they did not want a noise, to muffl e
the knocker. And the doctor strode up, directed by the whispering awestruck maid, to Sturk’s bed-chamber, with his hands in
his muff, after the manner of doctors in his day, without asking
questions, or hesitating on lobbies, for the sands of his minutes
ran out in gold-dust. So, with a sort of awe and suppressed bustle
preceding and following him, he glided up stairs and straight to
the patient’s bedside, serene, saturnine, and rapid.
In a twinkling the maid was running down the street for Toole,
who had kept at home, in state costume, expecting the consultation with the great man, which he liked. And up came Toole, with
his brows knit, and his chin high, marching over the pavement in
a mighty fuss, for he knew that the oracle’s time and temper were
not to be trifl ed with.
In the club, Larry the drawer, as he set a pint of mulled claret
by old Arthur Slowe’s elbow, whispered something in his ear, with
a solemn wink.
‘Ho! – by Jove, gentlemen, the doctor’s come – Doctor Pell.
His coach stands at Sturk’s door, Larry says, and we’ll soon hear
how he fares.’ And up got Major O’Neill with a ‘hey! ho – ho!’ and
out he went, followed by old Slowe, with his little tankard in his
fi st, to the inn-door, where the major looked on the carriage, lighted up by the footman’s fl ambeau, beneath the old village elm – up
the street – smoking his pipe still to keep it burning, and communicating with Slowe, two words at a time. And Slowe stood gazing
at the same object with his little faded blue eyes, his disengaged
hand in his breeches’ pocket, and ever and anon wetting his lips
with his hot cordial, and assenting agreeably to the major’s conclusions.
362
THE HOUSE BY THE CHURCHYARD
‘Seize ace! curse it!’ cried Cluffe, who, I’m happy to say, had
taken no harm by his last night’s wetting; ‘another gammon, I’ll
lay you fi fty.’
‘Toole, I dare thay, will look in and tell us how poor Sturk
goes on,’ said Puddock, playing his throw.
‘Hang it, Puddock, mind your game – to be sure, he will.
Cinque ace! well, curse it! the same throw over again! ‘ Tis too bad.
I missed taking you last time, with that stupid blot you’ve covered – and now, by Jove, it ruins me. There’s no playing when
fellows are getting up every minute to gape after doctors’ coaches, and leaving the door open – hang it, I’ve lost the game by it
– gammoned twice already. ‘Tis very pleasant. I only wish when
gentlemen interrupt play, they’d be good enough to pay the bets.’
It was not much, about fi ve shillings altogether, and little
Puddock had not often a run of luck.
‘If you’d like to win it back, Captain Cluffe, I’ll give you a
chance,’ said O’Flaherty, who was tolerably sober. ‘I’ll lay you an
even guinea Sturk’s dead before nine to-morrow morning; and
two to one he’s dead before this time to-morrow night.’
‘I thank you – no, Sir – two doctors over him, and his head
in two pieces – you’re very obliging, lieutenant, but I’ll choose a
likelier wager,’ said Cluffe.
Dangerfi eld, who was overlooking the party, with his back
to the fi re, appeared displeased at their levity – shook his head,
and was on the point of speaking one of those polite but cynical
reproofs, whose irony, cold and intangible, intimidated the less
potent spirits of the club-room. But he dismissed it with a little
shrug. And a minute after, Major O’Neill and Arthur Slowe became aware that Dangerfi eld had glided behind them, and was
looking serenely, like themselves, at the Dublin doctor’s carriage
and smoking team. The light from Sturk’s bed-room window,
and the red glare of the footman’s torch, made two little trem-
363
JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU
bling refl ections in the silver spectacles as he stood in the shade,
peering movelessly over their shoulders.
‘’Tis a sorry business, gentlemen,’ he said in a stern, subdued
tone. ‘Seven children and a widow. He’s not dead yet, though:
whatever Toole might do, the Dublin doctor would not stay with
a dead man; time’s precious. I can’t describe how I pity that poor
soul, his wife – what’s to become of her and her helpless brood
I know not.’
Slowe grunted a dismal assent, and the major, with a dolorous gaze, blew a thin stream of tobacco-smoke into the night air,
which fl oated off like the ghost of a sigh towards the glimmering
window of Sturk’s bed-room. So they all grew silent. It seemed
they had no more to say, and that, in their minds, the dark curtain had come down upon the drama of which the ‘noble Barney,’ as poor Mrs. Sturk called him, was hero.
364
CHAPTER LV.
IN WHICH DR. TOOLE, IN FULL
COSTUME, STANDS UPON THE
HEARTH-STONE OF THE CLUB,
AND ILLUMINATES THE COMPANY
WITH HIS BACK TO THE FIRE
Two or three minutes later, the hall-door of Sturk’s mansion opened wide, and the fi gure of the renowned doctor from
Dublin, lighted up with a candle from behind, and with the link
from before, glided swiftly down the steps, and disappeared into
the coach with a sharp clang of the door. Up jumps the footman,
and gives his link a great whirl about his head. The maid stands
on the step with her hand before the fl aring candle. ‘The Turk’s
Head, in Werburgh Street,’ shouts the footman, and smack goes
the coachman’s whip, and the clang and rattle begin.
‘That’s Alderman Blunkett – he’s dying,’ said the major, by
way of gloss on the footman’s text; and away went the carriage
with thundering wheels, and trailing sparks behind it, as if the
wild huntsman had furnished its fl eet and shadowy team.
‘He has ten guineas in his pocket for that – a guinea a minute, by Jove, coining, no less,’ said the major, whose pipe was out,
and he thinking of going in to replenish it. ‘We’ll have Toole
here presently, depend upon it.’
He had hardly spoken when Toole, in a halo of candle-light,
emerged from Sturk’s hall-door. With one foot on the steps, the
365
JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU
doctor paused to give a parting direction about chicken-broth
and white-wine whey.
These last injunctions on the door-steps had begun, perhaps
in a willingness to let folk see and even hear that the visit was professional; and along with the lowering and awfully serious countenance with which they were delivered, had grown into a habit,
so that, as now, he practised them even in solitude and darkness.
Then Toole was seen to approach the Phœnix, in full blow,
his cane under his arm. With his full-dressed wig on, he was always grand and Æsculapian, and reserved withal, and walked
with a measured tread, and a sad and important countenance,
which somehow made him look more chubby; and he was a good
deal more formal with his friends at the inn-door, and took snuff
before he answered them. But this only lasted some eight or ten
minutes after a consultation or momentous visit, and would melt
away insensibly in the glow of the club-parlour, sometimes reviving for a minute, when the little mirror that sloped forward from
the wall, showed him a passing portrait of his grand wig and toggery. And it was pleasant to observe how the old fellows unconsciously deferred to this temporary self-assertion, and would call
him, not Tom, nor Toole, but ‘doctor,’ or ‘Doctor Toole,’ when
the fi t was upon him.
And Devereux, in his day, won two or three wagers by naming
the doctor with whom Toole had been closeted, reading the secret
in the countenance and by-play of their crony. When it had been
with tall, cold, stately Dr. Pell, Toole was ceremonious and deliberate, and oppressively polite. On the other hand, when he had been
shut up with brusque, half-savage, energetic Doctor Rogerson,
Tom was laconic, decisive, and insupportably ill-bred, till, as we
have said, the mirage melted away, and he gradually acquiesced in
his identity. Then, little by little, the irrepressible gossip, jocularity, and ballad minstrelsy were heard again, his little eyes danced,
and his waggish smiles glowed once more, ruddy as a setting sun,
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THE HOUSE BY THE CHURCHYARD
through the nectarian vapours of the punch-bowl. The ghosts of
Pell and Rogerson fl ed to their cold dismal shades, and little Tom
Toole was his old self again for a month to come.
‘Your most obedient, gentlemen – your most obedient,’ said
Toole, bowing and taking their hands graciously in the hall – ’a
darkish evening, gentlemen.’
‘And how does your patient, doctor?’ enquired Major O’Neil.
The doctor closed his eyes, and shook his head slowly, with a
gentle shrug.
‘He’s in a bad case, major. There’s little to be said, and that
little, Sir, not told in a moment,’ answered Toole, and took snuff.
‘How’s Sturk, Sir?’ repeated the silver spectacles, a little
sternly.
‘Well, Sir, he’s not dead; but, by your leave, had we not better
go into the parlour, eh? – ’tis a little chill, and, as I said, ‘tis not
all told in a moment – he’s not dead, though, that’s the sum of
it – you fi rst, pray proceed, gentlemen.’
Dangerfi eld grimly took him at his word; but the polite
major got up a little ceremonious tussle with Toole in the hall.
However, it was no more than a matter of half-a-dozen bows and
waves of the hand, and ‘after you, Sir;’ and Toole entered, and after a general salutation in the style of Doctor Pell, he established
himself upon the hearth-stone, with his back to the fi re, as a legitimate oracle.
Toole was learned, as he loved to be among the laity on such
occasions, and was in no undue haste to bring his narrative to a
close. But the gist of the matter was this – Sturk was labouring under concussion of the brain, and two terrifi c fractures of the skull
– so long, and lying so near together, that he and Doctor Pell instantly saw ‘twould be impracticable to apply the trepan, in fact
that ‘twould be certain and instantaneous death. He was absolutely insensible, but his throat was not yet palsied, and he could swallow a spoonful of broth or sack whey from time to time. But he was
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JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU
a dead man to all intents and purposes. Infl ammation might set in
at any moment; at best he would soon begin to sink, and neither
he nor Doctor Pell thought he had the smallest chance of awaking from his lethargy for one moment. He might last two or three
days, or even a week – what did it signify? – what was he better
than a corpse already? He could never hear, see, speak, or think
again; and for any difference it could possibly make to poor Sturk,
they might clap him in his grave and cover him up to-night.
Then the talk turned upon Nutter. Every man had his theory
or his conjecture but Dangerfi eld, who maintained a discreet reserve, much to the chagrin of the others, who thought, not without reason, that he knew more about the state of his affairs, and
especially of his relations with Lord Castlemallard, than perhaps
all the world beside.
‘Possibly, poor fellow, he was not in a condition to have his
accounts overhauled, and on changing an agency things sometimes come out that otherwise might have kept quiet. He was
the sort of fellow who would go through with a thing; and if he
thought the best way on going out of the agency was to go out of
the world also, out he’d go. They were always a resolute family
– Nutter’s great uncle, you know, drowned himself in that little
lake – what do you call it? – in the county of Cavan, and ‘twas
mighty coolly and resolutely done too.’
But there was a haunting undivulged suspicion in the minds
of each. Every man knew what his neighbour was thinking of,
though he did not care to ask about his ugly dreams, or to relate
his own. They all knew what sort of terms Sturk and Nutter had
been on. They tried to put the thought away, for though Nutter
was not a joker, nor a songster, nor a story-teller, yet they liked
him. Besides, Nutter might possibly turn up in a day or two, and in
that case ‘twould go best with those who had not risked an atrocious conjecture about him in public. So every man waited, and
held his tongue upon that point till his neighbour should begin.
368
CHAPTER LVI.
DOCTOR WALSINGHAM
AND THE CHAPELIZOD CHRIST IANS
MEET TO THE SOUND OF THE HOLY
BELL, AND A VAMPIRE SITS IN THE
CHURCH
The next day the Sabbath bell from the ivied tower of
Chapelizod Church called all good church-folk round to their
pews and seats. Sturk’s place was empty – already it knew him
no more – and Mrs. Sturk was absent; but the little fi le of children, on whom the neighbours looked with an awful and a tender curiosity, was there. Lord Townshend, too, was in the viceregal seat, with gentlemen of his household behind, splendid
in star and peruke, and eyed over their prayer-books by many
inquisitive Christians. Nutter’s little pew, under the gallery, was
void like Sturk’s. These sudden blanks were eloquent, and many,
as from time to time the dismal gap opened silent before their
eyes, felt their thoughts wander and lead them away in a strange
and dismal dance, among the nodding hawthorns in the Butcher’s Wood, amidst the damps of night, where Sturk lay in his leggings, and powder and blood, and the beetle droned by unheeding, and no one saw him save the guilty eyes that gleamed back
as the shadowy shape stole swiftly away among the trees.
Dr. Walsingham’s sermon had reference to the two-fold tragedy of the week, Nutter’s supposed death by drowning, and the
369
JOSEPH SHERIDAN LE FANU
murder of Sturk. In his discourses he sometimes came out with a
queer bit of erudition. Such as, while it edifi ed one portion of his
congregation, fi lled the other with unfeigned amazement.
‘We may pray for rain,’ said he on one occasion, when the
collect had been read; ‘and for other elemental infl uence with
humble confi dence. For if it be true, as the Roman annalists relate, that their augurs could, by certain rites and imprecations,
produce thunder-storms – if it be certain that thunder and
lightning were successfully invoked by King Porsenna, and as
Lucius Piso, whom Pliny calls a very respectable author, avers
that the same thing had frequently been done before his time by
King Numa Pompilius, surely it is not presumption in a Christian congregation,’ and so forth.
On this occasion he warned his parishioners against assuming that sudden death is a judgment. ‘On the contrary, the ancients held it a blessing; and Pliny declares it to be the greatest
happiness of life – how much more should we? Many of the Roman worthies, as you are aware, perished thus suddenly, Quintius Æmilius Lepidus, going out of his house, struck his great toe
against the threshold and expired; Cneius Babius Pamphilus, a
man of prætorian rank, died while asking a boy what o’clock it
was; Aulus Manlius Torquatus, a gentleman of consular rank,
died in the act of taking a cheese-cake at dinner; Lucius Tuscius
Valla, the physician, deceased while taking a draught of mulsum;
Appius Saufeius, while swallowing an egg: and Cornelius Gallus,
the prætor, and Titus Haterius, a knight, each died while kissing
the hand of his wife. And I might add many more names with
which, no doubt, you are equally familiar.’
The gentlemen of the household opened their eyes; the offi cers of the Royal Irish Artillery, who understood their man,
winked pleasantly behind their cocked hats at one another; and
his excellency coughed, with his perfumed pocket-handkerchief
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