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DAVID POINDEXTER'S DISAPPEARANCE _AND OTHER TALES_

BY JULIAN HAWTHORNE




CONTENTS.


  DAVID POINDEXTER'S DISAPPEARANCE
  KEN'S MYSTERY
  "WHEN HALF-GODS GO, THE GODS ARRIVE"
  "SET NOT THY FOOT ON GRAVES"
  MY FRIEND PATON




DAVID POINDEXTER'S DISAPPEARANCE.


Among the records of the English state trials are to be found many
strange stories, which would, as the phrase is, make the fortune of a
modern novelist. But there are also numerous cases, not less
stimulating to imagination and curiosity, which never attained more
than local notoriety, of which the law was able to take but
comparatively small cognizance, although they became subjects of much
unofficial discussion and mystification. Among these cases none,
perhaps, is better worth recalling than that of David Poindexter. It
will be my aim here to tell the tale as simply and briefly as
possible--to repeat it, indeed, very much as it came to my ears while
living, several years ago, near the scene in which its events took
place. There is a temptation to amplify it, and to give it a more
recent date and a different setting; but (other considerations aside)
the story might lose in force and weight more than it would thereby
gain in artistic balance and smoothness.

David Poindexter was a younger son of an old and respected family in
Sussex, England. He was born in London in 1785. He was educated at
Oxford, with a view to his entering the clerical profession, and in the
year 1810 he obtained a living in the little town of Witton, near
Twickenham, known historically as the home of Sir John Suckling. The
Poindexters had been much impoverished by the excesses of David's
father and grandfather, and David seems to have had few or no resources
beyond the very modest stipend appertaining to his position. He was, at
all events, poor, though possessed of capacities which bade fair to
open to him some of the higher prizes of his calling; but, on the other
hand, there is evidence that he chafed at his poverty, and reason to
believe that he had inherited no small share of the ill-regulated
temperament which had proved so detrimental to the elder generations of
his family.

Personally he was a man of striking aspect, having long, dark hair,
heavily-marked eyebrows, and blue eyes; his mouth and chin were
graceful in contour, but wanting in resolution; his figure was tall,
well knit, and slender. He was an eloquent preacher, and capable, when
warmed by his subject, of powerfully affecting the emotions of his
congregation. He was a great favorite with women--whom, however, he
uniformly treated with coldness--and by no means unpopular with men,
toward some of whom he manifested much less reserve. Nevertheless,
before the close of the second year of his incumbency he was known to
be paying his addresses to a young lady of the neighborhood, Miss Edith
Saltine, the only child of an ex-army officer. The colonel was a
widower, and in poor health, and since he was living mainly on his
half-pay, and had very little to give his daughter, the affair was
looked upon as a love match, the rather since Edith was a handsome
young woman of charming character. The Reverend David Poindexter
certainly had every appearance of being deeply in love; and it is often
seen that the passions of reserved men, when once aroused, are stronger
than those of persons more generally demonstrative.

Colonel Saltine did not at first receive his proposed son-in-law with
favor. He was a valetudinarian, and accustomed to regard his daughter
as his nurse by right, and he resented the idea of her leaving him
forlorn for the sake of a good-looking parson. It is very likely that
his objections might have had the effect of breaking off the match, for
his daughter was devotedly attached to him, and hardly questioned his
right to dispose of her as he saw fit; but after a while the worthy
gentleman seems to have thought better of his contrariness. Poindexter
had strong persuasive powers, and no doubt made himself personally
agreeable to the colonel, and, moreover, it was arranged that the
latter should occupy the same house with Mr. and Mrs. Poindexter after
they were married. Nevertheless, the colonel was not a man to move
rapidly, and the engagement had worn along for nearly a year without
the wedding-day having been fixed. One winter evening in the early part
of December, Poindexter dined with the colonel and Edith, and as the
gentlemen were sitting over their wine the lover spoke on the topic
that was uppermost in his thoughts, and asked his host whether there
was any good reason why the marriage should not be consummated at once.

"Christmas is at hand," the young man remarked; "why should it not be
rendered doubly memorable by granting this great boon?"

"For a parson, David, you are a deuced impatient man," the colonel said.

"Parsons are human," the other exclaimed with warmth.

"Humph! I suppose some of them are. In fact, David, if I didn't believe
that there was something more in you than texts and litanies and the
Athanasian creed, I'll be hanged if I'd ever have let you look twice at
Edith. That girl has got blood in her veins, David; she's not to be
thrown away on any lantern-jawed, white-livered doctor of souls, I can
tell you."

David held his head down, and seemed not to intend a reply; but he
suddenly raised his eyes, and fixed them upon the colonel's. "You know
what my father was," he said, in a low, distinct voice; "I am my
father's son."

"That idea has occurred to me more than once, David, and to say the
truth, I've liked you none the less for it. But, then, what the deuce
should a fellow like you want to do in a pulpit? I respect the cloth as
much as any man, I hope, but leaving theory aside, and coming down to
practice, aren't there fools and knaves enough in the world to carry on
that business, without a fellow of heart and spirit like you going into
it?"

"Theory or no theory, there have been as great men in the pulpit as in
any other position," said David, gloomily.

"I don't say to the contrary: ecclesiastical history, and all that: but
what I do say is, if a man is great in the pulpit, it's a pity he isn't
somewhere else, where he could use his greatness to more advantage."

"Well," remarked David, in the same somber tone, "I am not contented:
so much I can admit to the father of the woman I love. But you know as
well as I do that men nowadays are called to my profession not so much
by the Divine summons as by the accident of birth. Were it not for the
law of primogeniture, Colonel Saltine, the Church of England would be,
for the most part, a congregation without a clergyman."

"Gad! I'm much of your opinion," returned the colonel, with a grin;
"but there are two doors, you know, for a second son to enter the world
by. If he doesn't fancy a cassock, he can put on His Majesty's uniform."

"Neither the discipline nor the activity of a soldier's life would suit
me," David answered. "So far as I know my own nature, what it craves is
freedom, and the enjoyment of its capacities. Only under such
conditions could I show what I am capable of. In other words," he
added, with a short laugh, "ten thousand a year is the profession I
should choose."

"Ah," murmured the colonel, heaving a sigh, "I doubt that's a
profession we'd all of us like to practice as well as preach. What! no
more wine? Oh, ay, Edith, of course! Well, go to her, sir, if you must;
but when you come to my age you'll have found out which wears the
best--woman or the bottle. I'll join you presently, and maybe we'll see
what can be done about this marrying business."

So David went to Edith, and they had a clear hour together before they
heard the colonel's slippered tread hobbling through the hall. Just
before he opened the door, David had said: "I sometimes doubt whether
you wholly love me, after all." And she had answered:

"If I do not, it is because I sometimes feel as if you were not your
real self."

The colonel heard nothing of this odd bit of dialogue; but when he had
subsided, with his usual grunt, into his arm-chair beside the
fire-place, and Edith had brought him his foot-stool and his pipe, and
pat the velvet skull cap on his bald pate, he drew a long whiff of
tobacco smoke, and said:

"If you young folks want to set up housekeeping a month from to-day,
you can do it, for all I care."

Little did any one of the three suspect what that month was destined to
bring forth.

David Poindexter's father had been married twice, his second wife dying
within a year of her wedding-day, and two weeks after bringing David
into the world. This lady, whose maiden name was Lambert, had a brother
who was a gentleman farmer, and a tolerably successful one. His farm
was situated in the parish of Witton, and he owned a handsome house on
the outskirts of the town itself. He and David's father had been at one
time great friends, insomuch that David was named after him, and
Lambert, as his godfather as well as uncle, presented the child with
the usual silver mug. Lambert was never known to have married, but
there were rumors, dating as far as back David's earliest
recollections, to the effect that he had entertained a secret and
obscure passion for some foreign woman of great beauty, but of doubtful
character and antecedents. Nobody could be found who had ever seen this
woman, or would accept the responsibility of asserting that she
actually existed; but she afforded a convenient means of accounting for
many things that seemed mysterious in Mr. Lambert's conduct. At length,
when David was about eight years old, his godfather left England
abruptly, and without telling any one whither he was going or when he
would return. As a matter of fact he never did return, nor had any
certain news ever been heard of him since his departure. Neither his
house nor his farm was ever sold, however, though they were rented to
more than one tenant during a number of years. It was said, also, that
Lambert held possession of some valuable real estate in London.
Nevertheless, in process of time he was forgotten, or remembered only
as a name. And the new generation of men, though they might speak of
"the old Lambert House," neither knew nor cared how it happened to have
that title. For aught they could tell, it might have borne it ever
since Queen Elizabeth's time. Even David Poindexter had long ceased to
think of his uncle as anything much more substantial than a dream.

He was all the more surprised, therefore, when, on the day following
the interview just mentioned, he received a letter from the late David
Lambert's lawyers. It informed him in substance that his uncle had died
in Constantinople, unmarried (so far as could be ascertained),
intestate, and without blood-relations surviving him. Under these
circumstances, his property, amounting to one hundred and sixty
thousand pounds, the bulk of which was invested in land and houses in
the city of London, as well as the country-seat in Witton known as the
old Lambert House, and the farm lands thereto appertaining--all this
wealth, not to mention four or five thousand pounds in ready money,
came into possession of the late David Lambert's nearest of kin, who,
as it appeared, was none other than the Reverend David Poindexter.
"Would that gentleman, therefore be kind enough, at his convenience, to
advise his obedient servants as to what disposition he wished to make
of his inheritance?"

It was a Saturday morning, and the young clergyman was sitting at his
study table; the fire was burning in the grate at his right hand, and
his half-written sermon lay on the desk before him. After reading the
letter, at first hurriedly and amazedly, afterward more slowly, with
frequent pauses, he folded it up, and, still holding it in his hand,
leaned back in his chair, and remained for the better part of an hour
in a state of deep preoccupation. Many changing expressions passed
across his face, and glowed in his dark-blue eyes, and trembled on the
curves of his lips. At last he roused himself, sat erect, and smote the
table violently with his clinched hand. Yes, it was true it was real;
he, David Poindexter, an hour ago the poor imprisoned clergyman of the
Church of England--he, as by a stroke of magic, was free, powerful,
emancipated, the heir of seven thousand pounds a year! And what about
tomorrow's sermon?

He rose up smiling, with a vivid color in his cheeks and a bright
sparkle in his eyes. He stretched himself to his full height, threw out
his arms, and smote his chest with both fists. What a load was gone
from his heart! What a new ardor of life was this that danced in his
veins! He walked with long strides to the window, and threw it wide
open, breathing in the rush of bright icy air with deep inhalations.
Freedom! emancipation! Yonder, above the dark, level boughs of the
cedar of Lebanon, rose the square, gray tower of the church. Yesterday
it was the incubus of his vain hopes; to-day it was the tomb of a dead
and despised past. What had David Poindexter to do with calling sinners
to repentance? Let him first find out for himself what sin was like.
Then he looked to the right, where between the leafless trees Colonel
Saltine's little dwelling raised its red-tile roof above the high
garden-wall. And so, Edith, you doubted whether I were at all times my
real self? You shall not need to make that complaint hereafter. As for
to-morrow's sermon--I am not he who wrote sermons, nor shall I ever
preach any. Away with it, therefore!

He strode back to the table, took up the sheets of manuscript from the
desk, tore them across, and laid them on the burning coals. They
smoldered for a moment, then blazed up, and the draught from the open
window whisked the blackened ashes up the chimney. David stood,
meanwhile, with his arms folded, smiling to himself, and repeating, in
a low voice:

"Never again--never again--never again."

By-and-by he reseated himself at his desk, and hurriedly wrote two or
three notes, one of which was directed to Miss Saltine. He gave them to
his servant with an injunction to deliver them at their addresses
during the afternoon. Looking at his watch, he was surprised to find
that it was already past twelve o'clock. He went up-stairs, packed a
small portmanteau, made some changes in his dress, and came down again
with a buoyant step. There was a decanter half full of sherry on the
sideboard in the dining-room; he poured out and drank two glasses in
succession. This done, he put on his hat, and left the house with his
portmanteau in his hand, and ten minutes later he had intercepted the
London coach, and was bowling along on his way to the city.

There was a dramatic instinct in David, as in many eloquent men of
impressionable temperament, which caused him every now and then to look
upon all that was occurring as a sort of play, and to resolve to act
his part in a telling and picturesque manner. On that Saturday
afternoon he had an interview with the late Mr. Lambert's lawyers, and
they were struck by his calm, lofty, and indifferent bearing. He seemed
to regard worldly prosperity as a thing beneath him, yet to feel in a
half-impatient way the responsibility which the control of wealth
forced upon him.

"It is my purpose not to allow this legacy to interfere permanently
with my devotion to my higher duties," he remarked, "but I have taken
measures to enable myself to place these affairs upon a fixed and
convenient footing. I presume," he added, fixing his eyes steadily upon
his interlocutor, "that you have thoroughly investigated the
possibility of there being any claimant nearer than myself?"

"No such claimant could exist," the lawyer replied, "unless the late
Mr. Lambert had married and had issue."

"Is there, then, any reason to suppose that he contemplated the
contingency that has happened?"

"If he bestowed any thought at all upon the subject, that contingency
could hardly have failed to present itself to his mind," the lawyer
answered.

David consented to receive the draft for a thousand pounds which was
tendered him, and took his leave. He returned to his rooms at the
Tavistock Hotel, Covent Garden. In the evening, after making some
changes in his costume, he went to the theatre, and saw Kean play
something of Shakespeare's. When the play was over, and he was out in
the frosty air again, he felt it impossible to sleep. It was after
midnight before he returned to his hotel, with flushed cheeks, and a
peculiar brilliance in his eyes. He slept heavily, but awoke early in
the morning with a slight feeling of feverishness. It was Sunday
morning. He thought of his study in the parsonage at Witton, with its
bright fire, its simplicity, its repose. He thought of the church, and
of the congregation which he would never face again. And Edith--what
had been her thoughts and dreams during the night? He got up, and went
to the window. It looked out upon a narrow, inclosed court. The sky was
dingy, the air was full of the muffled tumult of the city. His present
state, as to its merely external aspect, was certainly not so agreeable
as that of the morning before. Ay, but what a vista had opened now
which then was closed! David dressed himself, and went down to his
breakfast. While sitting at his table in the window, looking out upon
the market-place, and stirring his cup of Mocha, a gentleman came up
and accosted him.

"Am I mistaken, or is your name Poindexter?"

David looked up, and recognized Harwood Courtney, a son of Lord
Derwent. Courtney was a man of fashion, a member of the great clubs,
and a man, as they say, with a reputation. He was a good twenty years
older than David, and had been the companion of the latter's father in
some of his wildest escapades. To David, at this moment, he was the
representative and symbol of that great, splendid, unregenerate world,
with which it was his purpose to make acquaintance.

"You are not mistaken, Mr. Courtney," he said, quietly. "Have you
breakfasted? It is some time since we have met."

"Why, yes, egad! If I remember right, you were setting out on another
road than that which I was travelling. However, we sinners, you know,
depend upon you parsons to pull us up in time to prevent any--er--any
_very_ serious catastrophe! Ha! ha!"

"I understand you; but for my part I have left the pulpit," said David,
uttering the irrevocable words with a carelessness which he himself
wondered at.

"By Jove!" exclaimed Courtney, with a little intonation of surprise and
curiosity, which his good breeding prevented him from formulating more
explicitly. As David made no rejoinder, he presently continued:
"Then--er--perhaps you might find it in your way to