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JOHN CALDIGATE
Bolton? I thought he would! Bigamy! Euphemia Smith! Married before! Certainly not at the diggings.’
‘He wasn’t married up at Ahalala?’ asked the doctor.
‘To Euphemia Smith? I was there when they quarrelled,
and when she went into partnership with Crinkett. I am
sure there was no such marriage. John Caldigate in prison
for bigamy? And he paid them twenty thousand pounds?
The more fool he!’
‘They all say that.’
‘But it’s an infernal plant. As sure as my name is Richard
Shand, John Caldigate never married that woman.’
CHAPTER L
AGAIN AT SIR JOHN’S
CHAMBERS
And this was the man as to whom it had been acknowledged that his evidence, if it could be obtained, would be final.
The return of Dick himself was to the Shands an affair so much
more momentous than the release of John Caldigate from prison, that for some hours or so the latter subject was allowed to
pass out of sight. The mother got him up-stairs and asked after
his linen — vain inquiry — and arranged for his bed, turning
all the little Rewbles into one small room. In the long run,
grandmothers are more tender to their grand-children than
their own offspring. But at this moment Dick was predominant. How grand a thing to have her son returned to her, and
such a son — a teetotaller of two years’ growth, who had seen
all the world of the Pacific Ocean! As he could not take whisky-and-water, would he like ginger-beer before he went to
bed — or arrowroot? Dick decided in favour of ginger-beer,
and consented to be embraced again.
It was, I think, to Maria’s credit that she was the first to
bring back the conversation to John Caldigate’s marriage.
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JOHN CALDIGATE
‘Was she a very horrible woman?’ Maria asked, referring to
Euphemia Smith.
‘There were a good many of ’em out there, greedy after gold,’
said Dick; ‘but she beat ’em all; and she was awfully clever.’
‘In what way, Dick?’ asked Mrs. Rewble. Because she does
not seem to me to have done very well with herself.’
‘She knew more about shares than any man of them all.
But I think she just drank a little. It was that which disgusted
Caldigate.’
‘He had been very fond of her?’ suggested Maria.
‘I never knew a man so taken with a woman.’ Maria
blushed, and Mrs. Rewble looked round at her younger sisters as though desirous that they should be sent to bed. ‘All
that began on board the ship. Then he was fool enough to run
after her down to Sydney; and of course she followed him up
to the mines.’
‘I don’t know why of course,’ said Mrs. Posttlethwaite defending her sex generally.
‘Well, she did. And he was going to marry her. He did
mean to marry her; — there’s no doubt of that. But it was
a queer kind of life we lived up there.’
‘I suppose so,’ said the doctor. Mrs. Rewble again looked at
the girls and then at her mother; but Mrs. Shand was older and
less timid than her married daughter. Mrs. Rewble when a girl
herself had never been sent away, and was now a pattern of
female discretion.
‘And she,’ continued Dick, ‘as soon as she had begun to finger the scrip, thought of nothing but gold. She did not care
much for marriage just then, because she fancied the stuff
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ANTHONY TROLLOPE
wouldn’t belong to herself. She became largely concerned in
the “Old Stick-in-the-Mud.” That was Crinkett’s concern, and
there were times at which I thought she would marry him.
Then Caldigate got rid of her altogether. That was before
I went away.’
‘He never married her?’ asked the doctor.
‘He certainly hadn’t married her when I left Nobble in
June ‘73.’
‘You can swear to that, Dick?’
‘Certainly I can. I was with him every day. But there wasn’t
anyone round there who didn’t know how it was. Crinkett
himself knew it.’
‘Crinkett is one of the gang against him.’
‘And there was a man named Adamson. Adamson knew.’
‘He’s another of the conspirators,’ said the doctor.
‘They won’t dare to say before me,’ declared Dick, stoutly,
‘that Mrs. Smith and John Caldigate had become man and wife
before June ‘73. And they hated one another so much then
that it is impossible they should have come together since.
I can swear they were not married up to June ‘73.’
‘You’ll have to swear it,’ said the doctor, ‘and that with as
little delay as possible.’
All this took place towards the end of August, about five
weeks after the trial, and a day or two subsequent to the interview between Bagwax and the Attorney-General. Bagwax was
now vehemently prosecuting his inquiries as to that other idea
which had struck him, and was at this very moment glowing
with the anticipation of success, and at the same time broken-
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JOHN CALDIGATE
hearted with the conviction that he never would see the pleasant things of New South Wales.
On the next morning, under the auspices of his father, Dick
Shand wrote the following letter to Mr. Seely, the attorney.
‘POLLINGTON, 30th August, 187-.
Sir — I think it right to tell you that I reached my father’s
house in this town late yesterday evening. I have come direct
from one of the South Sea Islands via Honolulu and San Francisco, and have not yet been in England forty-eight hours. I am
an old friend of Mr. John Caldigate, and went with him from
England to the gold diggings in New South Wales. My name
will be known to you, as I am now aware that it was frequently
mentioned in the course of the late trial. It will probably seem
odd to you that I had never even heard of the trial till I reached
my father’s house last night. I did not know that Caldigate had
married Miss Bolton, nor that Euphemia Smith had claimed
him as her husband.
‘I am able and willing to swear that they had not become
man and wife up to June 1873, and that no one at Ahalala or
Nobble conceived them to be man and wife. Of course, they
had lived together. But everybody knew all about it. Some time
before June — early, I should say, in that autumn — there had
been a quarrel. I am sure they were at daggers drawn with
each other all that April and May in respect to certain mining shares, as to which Euphemia Smith behaved very badly.
I don’t think it possible that they should ever have come together again; but in May ‘73 — which is the date I have heard
named — they certainly were not man and wife.
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ANTHONY TROLLOPE
‘I have thought it right to inform you of this immediately
on my return, and am, your obedient servant,
‘RICHARD SHAND.’
Mr. Seely, when he received this letter, found it to be his
duty to take it at once to Sir John Joram, up in London. He did
not believe Dick Shand. But then he had put no trust in
Bagwax, and had been from the first convinced, in his own
mind, that Caldigate had married the woman. As soon as it
was known to him that his client had paid twenty thousand
pounds to Crinkett and the woman, he was quite sure of
the guilt of his client. He had done the best for Caldigate at
the trial, as he would have done for any other client; but he
had never felt any of that enthusiasm which had instigated
Sir John. Now that Caldigate was in prison, Mr. Seely thought
that he might as well be left there quietly, trusting to the verdict, trusting to Judge Bramber, and trusting still more strongly
on his own early impressions. This letter from Dick — whom
he knew to have been a ruined drunkard, a disgrace to his family, and an outcast from society — was to his thinking just such
a letter as would be got up in such a case, in the futile hope of
securing the succour of a Secretary of State. He was sure
that no Secretary of State would pay the slightest attention to
such a letter. But still it would be necessary that he should
show it to Sir John, and as a trip to London was not disagreeable to his professional mind, he started with it on the very
day of its receipt.
‘Of course we must have his deposition on oath,’ said
Sir John.
‘You think it will be worth while?’
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JOHN CALDIGATE
‘Certainly. I am more convinced than ever that there was
no marriage. That post-office clerk has been with me — Bagwax — and has altogether convinced me.’
‘I didn’t think so much of Bagwax, Sir John.’
‘I dare say not, Mr. Seely; — an absurdly energetic man —
one of those who destroy by their over-zeal all the credit which
their truth and energy ought to produce. But he has, I think,
convinced me that that letter could not have passed through
the Sydney post-office in May ‘73.’
‘If so, Sir John, even that is not much — towards upsetting
a verdict.’
‘A good deal, I think, when the characters of the persons
are considered. Now comes this man, whom we all should
have believed, had he been present, and tells this story. You
had better get hold of him and bring him to me, Mr. Seely.’
Then Mr. Seely hung up his hat in London for three or
four days, and sent to Pollington for Dick Shand. Dick Shand
obeyed the order, and both of them waited together upon Sir
John. ‘You have come back at a very critical point of time for
your friend,’ said the barrister.
Dick had laid aside the coat and waistcoat with the broad
checks, and the yellow trousers, and had made himself look as
much like an English gentleman as the assistance of a readymade-clothes shop at Pollington would permit. But still he
did not quite look like a man who had spent three years
at Cambridge. His experiences among the gold diggings then
his period of maddening desolation as a Queensland shepherd, and after that his life among the savages in a South Sea
island, had done much to change him. Sir John and Mr. Seely
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ANTHONY TROLLOPE
together almost oppressed him. But still he was minded to
speak up for his friend. Caldigate had, upon the whole, been
very good to him, and Dick was honest. ‘He has been badly
used any way,’ he said.
‘You have had no intercourse with any of his friends since
you have been home, I think?’ This question Sir John asked because Mr. Seely had suggested that this appearance of the man
at this special moment might not improbably be what he
called a ‘plant.’
‘I have had no intercourse with anybody, sir. I came here
last Friday, and I hadn’t spoken a word to anybody before that.
I didn’t know that Caldigate had been in trouble at all. My
people at Pollington were the first to tell me about it.’
‘Then you wrote to Mr. Seely? You have heard of Mr. Seely?’
‘The governor — that’s my father — he had heard of Mr.
Seely. I wrote first as he told me. They knew all about it at Pollington as well as you do.’
‘You were surprised, then, when you heard the story?’
‘Knocked off my pins, sir. I never was so much taken
aback in my life. To be told that John Caldigate had married
Euphemia Smith after all that I had seen — and that he had
been married to her in May ‘73! I knew of course that it was all
a got-up thing. And he’s in prison?’
‘He is in prison, certainly.’
‘For bigamy?’
‘Indeed he is, Mr. Shand.’
‘And how about his real wife?’
‘His real wife, as you call her ——’
‘She is, as sure as my name is Richard Shand.’
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JOHN CALDIGATE
‘It is on behalf of that lady that we are almost more anxious
than for Mr. Caldigate himself. In this matter she has been
perfectly innocent; and whoever may have been the culprit —
or culprits — she has been cruelly ill-used.’
‘She’ll have her husband back again, of course,’ said Dick.
‘That will depend in part upon what faith the judge who
tried the case may place in your story. Your deposition shall
be taken, and it will be my duty to submit it to the Secretary of
State. He will probably be actuated by the weight which this
further evidence will have upon the judge who heard the former evidence. You will understand, Mr. Shand, that your word
will be opposed to the words of four other persons.’
‘Four perjured scoundrels,’ said Dick, with energy.
‘Just so — if your story be true.’
‘It is true, sir,’ said Dick, with much anger in his tone.
‘I hope so — with all my heart. You are on the same side
with us, you know. I only want to make you understand how
much ground there may be for doubt. It is not easy to upset
a verdict. And, I fear, many righteous verdicts would be upset if the testimony of one man could do it. Perhaps you will
be able to prove that you only arrived at Liverpool on Saturday night.’
‘Certainly I can.’
‘You cannot prove that you had not heard of the case
before.’
‘Certainly I can. I can swear it.’ Sir John smiled. ‘They all
knew that at Pollington. They told me of it. The governor told
me about Mr. Seely, and made me write the letter.’
‘That would not be evidence,’ said Sir John.
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ANTHONY TROLLOPE
‘Heavens on earth! I tell you I was struck all on a heap
when I heard it, just as much as if they had said he’d been hung
for murder. You put Crinkett and me together and then you’ll
know. I suppose you think somebody’s paying me for this —
that I’ve got a regular tip.’
‘Not at all, Mr. Shand. And I quite understand that it should
be difficult for you to understand. When a man sees a thing
clearly himself he cannot always realise the fact that others do
not see it also. I think I perceive what you have to tell us, and
we are very much obliged to you for coming forward so immediately. Perhaps you would not mind sitting in the other room
for five minutes while I say a word to Mr. Seely.’
‘I can go away altogether.’
‘Mr. Seely will be glad to see you again with reference to
the deposition you will have to make. You shall not be kept
waiting long.’ Then Dick returned, with a sore heart, feeling
half inclined to blaze out in wrath against the great advocate.
He had come forward to tell a plain story, having nothing to
gain, paying his railway fare and other expenses out of his
own — or rather out of his father’s pocket, and was told he
would not be believed! It is always hard to make an honest witness understand that it may be the duty of others to believe
him to be a liar, and Dick Shand did not understand it now.
‘There was no Australian marriage,’ Sir John said as soon as
he was alone with Mr. Seely.
‘You think not?’
‘My mind is clear about it. We must get that man out, if it
be only for the sake of the lady.’
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