FullReads

Never was man more relieved than the squire, and he slept better for a week after this than he had done for many weeks before.

It behooves us all to act promptly o
n our good resolutions. There is a determined gravitation towards evil, which, if left to itself, will bear down first intentions. If at one moment of superstitious fear the squire had made up his mind to a great sacrifice, and resolved in the matter of that deed so strangely recovered to act honestly by his brother, that resolution very soon gave place to the compromise with fraud which so conveniently postponed the restitution to the period when further enjoyment on his part was impossible. Then came more tidings of Scroope’s violent and minatory language, with always the same burthen  that he would leave no stone unturned to show that there had existed a deed which Charles had either secreted or destroyed, and that he would never rest till he had hanged him.

This of course was wild talk. At first it had only enraged him; but, with his recent guilty knowledge and suppression, had come fear. His danger was the existence of the deed, and little by little he brought himself to a resolution to destroy it. There were many falterings and recoils before he could bring himself to commit this crime. At length, however, he did it, and got rid of the custody of that which at any time might become the instrument of disgrace and ruin. There was relief in this, but also the new and terrible sense of actual guilt.

He had got pretty well rid of his supernatural qualms. It was a different kind of trouble that agitated him now.

But this night, he imagined, he was awakened by a violent shaking of his bed. He could see, in the very imperfect light, two figures at the foot of it, holding each a bedpost. One of these he half-fancied was his brother Scroope, but the other was the old squire  of that he was sure  and he fancied that they had shaken him up from his sleep. Squire Toby was talking as Charlie wakened, and he heard him say:

"Put out of our own house by you! It won’t hold for long. We’ll come in together, friendly, and stay. Forewarned, wi’ yer eyes open, ye did it; and now Scroope’ll hang you! We’ll hang you together! Look at me, you devil’s limb. "

And the old squire tremblingly stretched his face, tom with shot and bloody, and growing every moment more and more into the likeness of the dog, and began to stretch himself out and climb the bed over the footboard; and he saw the figure at the other side, little more than a black shadow, begin also to scale the bed; and there was instantly a dreadful confusion and uproar in the room, and such a gabbling and laughing; he could not catch the words; but, with a scream, he woke, and found himself standing on the floor. The phantoms and the clamor were gone, but a crash and ringing of fragments was in his ears. The great china bowl, from which for generations the Marstons of Gylingden had been baptized, had failed from the mantelpiece, and was smashed on the hearthstone.

"I’ve bin dreamin’ all night about Mr. Scroope, and I wouldn’t wonder, old Cooper, if he was dead," said the squire, when he came down in the morning.

"God forbid! I was adreamed about him, too, sir: I dreamed he was dammin’ and sinkin’ about a hole was burnt in his coat, and the old master, God be wi’ him! said  quite plain  I’d ‘a swore ’twas himself  Cooper, get up, ye d   land-loupin’ thief, and lend a hand to hang him  for he’s a daft cur, and no dog o’ mine. ‘ ‘Twas the dog shot over night, I do suppose, as was runnin’ in my old head. I thought old master gied me a punch wi’ his knuckles, and says I, wakenin’ up, At yer service, sir’; and for a while I couldn’t get it out o’ my head, master was in the room still. "