Henry Wood - A Life's Secret

Mr. Henry Hunter was walking rapidly down Daffodil's Delight. He encountered John Baxendale as the man went out of his gate.

'Not back at work yet, Baxendale?'

'The missis has been taken worse, sir,' was the man's reply. 'She fainted dead off just now, and I declare I didn't know what to think about her. She's all right again, and I am going round.'

At that moment there was heard a tapping at the window panes, and a pretty little head was pushed out beneath them, nodding and laughing, 'Uncle Henry! How do you do, Uncle Henry?'

Mr. Henry Hunter nodded in reply, and pursued his way, unconscious that the lynx eye of Miss Gwinn was following him, like a hawk watching its prey.

It happened that she had penetrated Daffodil's Delight, hoping to catch Austin Clay at his dinner, which she supposed he might be taking about that hour. She held his address at Peter Quale's from Mrs. Thornimett. Her object was to make a further effort to get from him what he knew of the man she sought to find. Scarcely had she turned into Daffodil's Delight, when she saw Mr. Henry Hunter at a distance. Away she tore after him, and gained upon him considerably. She reached the house of John Baxendale just as he, Baxendale, was re-entering it; for he had forgotten something he must take with him to the yard. Turning her head upon Baxendale for a minute as she passed, Miss Gwinn lost sight of Mr. Henry Hunter.

How had he disappeared? Into the ground? or into a house? or down any obscure passage that might be a short cut between Daffodil's Delight, and some other Delight? or into that cab that was now whirling onwards at such a rate? That he was no longer visible, was certain: and Miss Gwinn was exceeding wroth. She came to the conclusion that he had seen her, and hid himself in the cab, though she had not heard it stop.

But she had seen him spoken to from the window of that house, where the workman had just gone in, and she determined to make inquiries there, and so strode up the path. In the Shucks' kitchen there were only three or four children, too young to give an answer. Miss Gwinn picked her way through them, over the dirt and grease of the floor, and ascended to the sitting-room above. She stood a minute to take in its view.

John Baxendale was on his knees, hunting among some tools at the bottom of a closet; Mary was meekly exhibiting the progress of the nightgowns to Dobson, who sat in state, sour enough to turn milk into curd; the invalid was lying, pale, in her chair; while the young lady appeared to be assisting at the tool-hunting, on her knees also, and chattering as fast as her tongue could go. All looked up at the apparition of the stranger, who stood there gazing in upon them.

'Can you tell me where a gentleman of the name of Lewis lives?' she began, in an indirect, diplomatic, pleasant sort of way, for she no doubt deemed it well to discard violence for tact. In the humour she was in yesterday, she would have said, sharply and imperiously, 'Tell me the name of that man I saw now pass your gate.'

John Baxendale rose. 'Lewis, ma'am? I don't know anybody of the name.'

A pause. 'It is very unfortunate,' she mildly resumed. 'I am in search of the gentleman, and have not got his address. I believe he belongs to this neighbourhood. Indeed, I am almost sure I saw him talking to you just now at the gate—though my sight is none of the clearest from a distance. The same gentleman to whom that young lady nodded.'

'That was my uncle Henry,' called out the child.

'Who?' cried she, sharply.

'It was Mr. Henry Hunter, ma'am, that was,' spoke up Baxendale.

'Mr. Henry Hunter!' she repeated, as she knit her brow on John Baxendale. 'That gentleman is Mr. Lewis.'

'No, that he is not,' said John Baxendale. 'I ought to know, ma'am; I have worked for him for some years.'

Here the mischief might have ended; there's no telling; but that busy little tongue of all tongues—ah! what work they make!—began clapping again.

'Perhaps you mean my papa? Papa's name is Lewis—James Lewis Hunter. But he is never called Mr. Lewis. He is brother to my uncle Henry.'

A wild flush of crimson flashed over Miss Gwinn's sallow face. Something within her seemed to whisper that her search was over. 'It is possible I mistook the one for the other in the distance,' she observed, all her new diplomacy in full play. 'Are they alike in person?' she continued to John Baxendale.

'Not so much alike now, ma'am. In years gone by they were the very model of one another; but Mr. Hunter has grown stout, and it has greatly altered him. Mr. Henry looks just like what Mr. Hunter used to look.'

'And who are you, did you say?' she asked of Florence with an emphasis that would have been quite wild, but that it was in a degree suppressed. 'You are not Mr. Lewis Hunter's daughter?'

'I am,' said Miss Florence.

'And–you have a mother?'

'Of course I have,' repeated the child.

A pause: the lady looked at John Baxendale. 'Then Mr. Lewis Hunter is a married man?'

'To be sure he is,' said John, 'ever so many years ago. Miss Florence is twelve.'

'Thank you,' said Miss Gwinn abruptly turning away. 'Good morning.'

She went down the stairs at a great rate, and did not stay to pick her steps over the grease of the Shucks' floor.

'What a mistake to make!' was her inward comment, and she laughed as she said it. 'I did not sufficiently allow for the lapse of years. If that younger one had lost his life in the gravel pits, he would have died an innocent man.'

Away to the yard now, as fast as her legs would carry her. In turning in, she ran against Austin Clay.

'I want to speak with Mr. Hunter,' she imperiously said. 'Mr. Lewis Hunter—not the one I saw in the gig.'

'Mr. Hunter is out of town, Miss Gwinn,' was Austin's reply. 'We do not expect him at the yard to-day; he will not be home in time to come to it.'

'Boy! you are deceiving me!'

'Indeed I am not,' he returned. 'Why should I? Mr. Hunter is not in the habit of being denied to applicants. You might have spoken to him yesterday when you saw him, had it pleased you so to do.'

'I never saw him yesterday.'

'Yes, you did, Miss Gwinn. That gentleman who came into the office and bowed to you was Mr. Hunter.'

She stared Austin full in the face, as if unable to believe what he said. ' That Mr. Hunter?—Lewis Hunter?'

'It was.'

'If so, how he is altered!' And, throwing up her arms with a strange, wild gesture, she turned and strode out of the yard. The next moment Austin saw her come into it again.

'I want Mr. Lewis Hunter's private address, Austin Clay.'

But Austin was on his guard now. He did not relish the idea of giving anybody's private address to such a person as Miss Gwinn, who might or might not be mad.

She detected his reluctance.

'Keep it from me if you choose, boy,' she said, with a laugh that had a ring of scorn. 'Better for you perhaps to be on the safe side. The first workman I meet will give it me, or a court guide.'

And thus saying, she finally turned away. At any rate for the time being.

Austin Clay resumed his work, and the day passed on to evening. When business was over, he went home to make some alteration in his dress, for he had to go by appointment to Mr. Hunter's, and on these occasions he generally remained with them. It was beginning to grow dusk, and a chillness seemed to be in the air.

The house occupied by Mr. Hunter was one of the best in the west-central square. Ascending to it by a flight of steps, and passing through a pillared portico, you found yourself in a handsome hall, paved in imitation of mosaic. Two spacious sitting-rooms were on the left: the front one was used as a dining-room, the other opened to a conservatory. On the right of the hall, a broad flight of stairs led to the apartments above, one of which was a fine drawing-room, fitted up with costly elegance.