On the other hand, Jack Dawkins seemed to find the occasion highly entertaining, apart from the dilemma of deciding which knife and fork to use for which course. He had been schooled by Oliver in the etiquette of cutlery but in his excitement the information had slipped from his mind. He cast his eyes to the other diners for clues but in the sepulchral lighting it was difficult to observe their faces let alone their hands.
This minor handicap did not spoil Jack’s enjoyment of the occasion. He thrilled to the idea that he was sharing a dining table in the ancestral dining room with a living lord and lady. This excitement manifested itself in a permanent wide-eyed grin and a constant babble of nonsensical utterances.
However, this almost somnambulistic culinary event took a turn for the dramatic halfway through the main course when the door of the dining hall burst open and a tall figure entered the room in a melodramatic fashion.
It was Jeremiah Throate.
Immediately, it was clear to Oliver that he was the worse for drink. His swagger had a decided uncertainty to it. He strode towards the table in what would have been a threatening manner had he not stumbled along the way causing him to sway dangerously. For a moment Oliver believed he was going to lose his footing altogether but with a determined effort the young Throate managed to regain his balance. His face was suffused with alcohol and anger, he thumped the table with his fist and glared in turn at his mother and father.
‘Where is my place set at the dining table?’ he roared. ‘Am I not welcome to take my last supper with you? I am your son after all. Your only offspring. The heir to the noble name of Throate. Where is my place?’
‘You are in no fit state to be dining with us, Jeremiah,’ said his mother imperiously. ‘We have had our final interview where our views were made very clear. At present you are not welcome in this house’.
‘But I am your son.’
‘In name only. Your behaviour and attitude have alienated you to us.’
‘Indeed, sir,’ rejoined Sir Ebenezer, his words slurring softly. Oliver observed that he would be hard pressed to judge which of the two, father or son, was the worse for drink. After this outburst Sir Ebenezer slumped back in his chair all energy and emotion spent.
Jeremiah Throate thumped the table once again in lieu of uttering some suitable response to this joint rejection. At length, he found the words he had been searching for.
‘You cannot, indeed, you will not get rid of me. If you have rejected me as your son, then you must accept me as your enemy.’
He turned to leave the room, but swivelled round too swiftly and tripped up on his own feet and sank to his knees.
Lady Throate gave a snort of derision. ‘Bulstrode, escort Master Jeremiah to his room and arrange a fresh horse for him in the morning so that he can return to London at the first light.’
The funereal butler materialised from the gloom with a muted ‘Very well, your ladyship’ and proceeded to raise Jeremiah Throate from his recumbent position and help him from the room. The rebellious youth offered no resistance.
During this dramatic interlude, Jack Dawkins had watched events with great interest as though he were in a box at Drury Lane enjoying some highly coloured theatrical performance; but not for one instance did he stop eating. His knife and fork were in constant motion, as was his mouth. It was as though the food was an essential accompaniment to the spicy scenario being played out before him.
Oliver, on the other hand, watched with some sadness. How could it be that mother and father and son could have become so estranged? None of them seemed to care for the other. It was not surprising, therefore, that Sir Ebenezer wanted, in a sense, to start again with his unknown son. What the baronet had not perhaps considered was the possibility that his illegitimate offspring may well be just as rebellious and apparently unprincipled as Jeremiah. Indeed, it was not outside the bounds of probability that he may be even worse. It would seem that this was a risk that the aged aristocrat, who currently was drinking himself in to oblivion, had not considered.
Once Bulstrode and Jeremiah Throate had departed the chamber, Lady Amelia smiled graciously at her diners as though nothing untoward had occurred and then taking up a little bell from the table, she rang it brightly. The sharp clanging noise summoned the housekeeper to collect the dishes. She was a mature woman of some fifty summers, who wore a mob cap pulled down far over her forehead; straggles of grey hair escaped at irregular intervals. With her head bent low so that it was difficult discern her features, especially in the gloom, she moved with practised alacrity around the table collecting the plates and cutlery onto a large wooden tray.
‘This is Lizzie,’ said Lady Amelia, giving a nod towards the industrious skivvy. ‘Our treasured housekeeper and cook. It is her apple pie you will be trying next. She is a wizard in the kitchen. I can assure you that you will find it delicious, eh Lizzie?’
The servant gave a nervous nod of the head but said nothing. She seemed embarrassed by being brought to the attention of the guests and was obviously relieved when she was able to scurry away back to the kitchen.
Jack Dawkins leaned forward in a conspiratorial fashion. ‘Apple pie’s me favourite,’ he said, as though he was revealing the secret to the location of a hidden hoard of treasure.
Sir Ebenezer burped.
The pie was indeed delicious, but it seemed to Oliver to have an unpleasant after-taste. Sir Ebenezer ate his mechanically and quickly, eager to return to his drinking. Despite her recommendation, Lady Amelia seemed to pick at her portion in a desultory fashion.
At last the ghastly experience drew to a close and Oliver was able to excuse himself, mumbling sentiments about a long day and a tiring journey. He rose somewhat unsteadily from his chair, a little surprised at how fatigued he felt. He had drunk little that evening and yet he experienced the strange softening sensation that overindulgence in alcohol brings. Reality was held slightly out of focus and at a distance.
‘Come, Mr Dawkins,’ he found himself saying, the words echoing in his head.
Jack, who apparently seemed content to remain at the dining table, threw him a look of surprise before reluctantly rising to his feet. He too seemed a little the worse for wear and his raised eyebrows and twisted mouth told Oliver that he was also taken aback by how unsteady he felt.
However, their host hardly noticed their rather shambling departure from the dining hall. By now Sir Ebenezer’s prodigious chins were resting on his chest and he was snoring gently while his wine glass was still gripped precariously in his hand. Lady Amelia seemed to be examining a piece of stray food which had landed on her napkin, a smile touching her thin lips and her usually bright eyes hooded with tiredness.
By the time Oliver and Jack had reached the first staircase, they were supporting each other in order to progress further. Like two antic clowns, they stumbled and wavered their way up the staircase and along the draughty corridors towards their rooms, each mumbling words to each other which neither of them understood.
Ten minutes later, Jack Dawkins staggered into his room and sat down on a chair in order to take his boots off but before he was able to unfasten one lace Morpheus ambushed him and he remained there in the chair frozen in sleep.
Next door, Oliver managed to reach the bed in his own room before collapsing on it. Just as sleep finally overtake him, one thought floated in his somewhat befuddled mind. ‘I have been drugged,’ he told himself.
Dark, moonless, starless night wrapped itself around Throate Manor, not in a protective sense but as an aid against discovery, an indigo curtain behind which evil deeds could take place unnoticed and undiscovered. Out beyond the confines of the house, an owl screeched its mad cry to the blank heavens: ‘the fatal bellman which gives the stern’st goodnight.’
Within the great house, strange shadows shifted along the walls and muffled creaks and groans of the old timbers settling to rest filled the air. Sleep had shrouded most of its inhabitants for the duration.
But not all.
Unusually, as midnight struck, Sir Ebenezer was fast asleep. There were no qualms and quakes this night to trouble his mind about a spectral visitation. This may well have been because he had carried out the ghost’s injunctions and set in motion a plan which he hoped would in time bring about a reunion with his lost child and to some extent make amends for his harsh and selfish actions an age ago. His conscience was eased and he felt at peace with himself, a state of affairs that was almost unique. It was also the case that he had also consumed a great deal of wine that evening, partly out of relief and partly to celebrate the fact that he taken action at last, action that he should have taken years before. As his mind crumbled and consciousness oozed out of his corpulent frame, he was convinced that his intake of claret had contributed to his sense of ease and his innate assurance that a night of untroubled sleep awaited him. However, if he had been able to think rationally – or, indeed, think at all - he would have realised that on previous evenings he had sometimes drunk far more than he had that night in order to anesthetise himself and ward off the night fears but yet he had shivered and trembled around midnight in his bed chamber cold sober with fear as he anticipated the arrival of his nocturnal spirit.
However, tonight he would not be visited by the spectral apparition but by a more formidable force with a dreadful purpose. Despite the silence of the chamber, the loud creaking of the door as it opened to admit the malefactor failed to pierce the Sir Ebenezer’s stupor. It is probable that an explosion of gunpowder at his bedside would not have roused him. He was, as some might folk say, and in this case with a morbid prescience, dead to the world.
The shadowy figure approached the bed where the baronet lay on his back, his mouth agape, snoring like a grizzling dog. From the folds of its cloak the figure produced a dagger, a sharp, long-bladed dagger which it raised high above its head. The figure paused for a moment and then with great determination and force it plunged the dagger deep into the chest of the sleeping master of Throate Manor.
A strange gurgling noise emanated from Sir Ebenezer’s mouth and then the snoring ceased.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
That night, in their respective bedrooms, two young people lay in the gloom staring at the ceiling unable to sleep, their minds a whirlwind of emotions and thoughts. Roger Lightwood was warm in the conviction that he had found the love of his life and the girl of his dreams – goals which his over-sentimentalised and over-romanticised nature had been seeking since he had reached the state of manhood. His lonely childhood had led him to pine for the idolised form of domestic life: a pretty, adoring wife, two perfect children, a cottage somewhere in the country, far away from the foul vapours of the city all wrapped in the ribbon of financial security and domestic happiness. It was a fairly mundane dream, the fanciful aspirations of every hard-pressed clerk and seamstress in the land – but for Roger it was a fantasy that he believed could be reality. His mind forever ignored the impracticalities, and improbability of such a situation actually happening. Now it seemed, after meeting Felicity Waring, that dream was within his grasp. He would marry her, with Sir Ebenezer’s blessing, and be granted a cottage on the Throate estate where they would live happily ever after.
In her room in the Royal Hotel, Miss Waring was viewing the same scenario but with a more business-like and practical approach. She accepted without any reluctance that she had met the man she wanted to marry. He was good-looking (in a fey kind of way), kind, brave and caring. And had potential. What more could a girl require? The answer to this query was swift in coming. Wealth. That commodity which made the best use of all the others. What use is it to be tied to a man however handsome (in a fey kind of way) kind, brave and caring, if one has to live a penurious life? In this respect Roger Lightwood was not the ideal, but Felicity knew that in the real world the ideal was rarely if ever attainable. However, in gambling parlance, he was ‘a good bet’: he was ambitious and intelligent and already allied to the aristocracy. Certainly, his role as private secretary to Sir Ebenezer Throate was a considerable number of rungs up the ladder from the position of footman to Lady Whitestone. Oh, she was fond of dear Arthur. He was a decent and loving man and had brought solace and comfort to her dreary existence with her Ladyship in that gloomy mausoleum in Chelsea but now she had met Roger she had come to realise that her fondness for Arthur had been based on gratitude and a kind of desperate relief to find a kindred spirit in the Whitestone desert. In simple terms, it was not the real thing, just a pretence conjured out of a desperate desire for that to be the case. She saw that now with a revelatory clarity. On the other hand, Roger, it seemed to her, was the real thing. It was practical and had potential. With Arthur, the potential was at best restricted and, if she was honest, realistically non-existent. In the brief time she and Roger had known each other, so much had been achieved. The usual social proprieties had been leap-frogged. In a strange, mystical unspoken fashion, both of them knew they were destined to be together.
This was a new and exciting chapter in her life. She hoped that within a year she would have slipped the Whitestone shackles and be ensconced on the Throate estate, living a life more in the manner which she believed was due to her, one in which she had autonomy and freedom. With these thoughts pleasantly settled in her mind, she surrendered her body to sleep, a gentle smile touching her lips.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Dawn came sluggishly bringing with it a grey mist and a fine sheen of rain. Throate Manor loomed out of gloom of the burgeoning day like some huge leviathan adrift on an undulating dark green sea. At precisely eight o’clock, Bulstrode entered his master’s bedroom bearing a tray containing hot tea and toast. He placed it beside the bed and drew back the window curtains allowing the dreary reluctant beams of daylight to struggle in providing the chamber with a faint gloomy illumination. The butler then carried out the same procedure with the drapes around the bed, the metal curtain rings clanking eerily in the silence. The sight that met his eyes made him gasp and take two steps backwards. For the self-contained, unemotional Bulstrode this was a dramatic reaction. Had he been still holding the tray he certainly would have dropped it. On recollecting the scene later, the predominant impression was one of blood, bright red blood smeared, as it appeared to him, everywhere.
Sir Ebenezer was lying half out of bed, his arm dangling, fingers almost touching the floor, while his mouth was agape and his eyes closed. The top half of his nightgown, visible above the bedclothes was covered in blood. For some time Bulstrode stood mesmerised by the gruesome scene set before him. He seemed incapable of action as many thoughts crowded into his brain. Eventually the practical side of his nature took hold. He had to decide what to do now. Someone needed to be informed. Not her ladyship, he reasoned. Likely there would be tears and hysterics. Under normal circumstance he would have gone to Mr Lightwood, but he was away and not due back until the following day. Certainly, Jeremiah should be informed but the butler had no wish to encounter this rash and unpredictable youth so early in the day. It would, therefore, have to be the lawyer, the young gentleman from London – a legal fellow like him would know the correct course of action to take.
Oliver was in mid-shave when there came a fierce rapping at his door. It caught him by surprise, and he nicked his cheek with the razor just below his left ear. Clamping a damp towel to the wound he answered the door. Bulstrode, the butler, stood before him exhibiting more animation than Oliver had believed he was capable.
With eyes wide in a frenzied stare, he stated bluntly: ‘Sir Ebenezer has been murdered.’
The statement seemed so bizarre and delivered in such a blunt melodramatic fashion that Oliver smiled.
‘Surely not,’ he said lightly, dabbing his cheek and then examining the towel to check if the bleeding had stopped.
‘I tell you sir that the master has been killed. There’s blood everywhere. Come and look for yourself.’
Oliver’s smile faded. The fellow was serious. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Show me.’
It was, thought Ol
iver, like a scene from one of Marie Tussaud’s gruesome wax exhibits. Indeed, the waxen features of Sir Ebenezer and the copious amounts of bright red blood seemed to emphasise this impression. Oliver moved in closely to try and ascertain the source of the blood. It did not take long to discover it. The baronet’s nightshirt was torn just below the left shoulder and pulling the material gently to one side Oliver observed through the ragged gap a vicious wound – probably a knife wound he thought – to the upper chest. As he leaned forward to scrutinise the breach further, something remarkable occurred.
Sir Ebenezer opened his eyes and sighed. The pupils failed to focus on the world before the eyelids fluttered shut again.
‘My God!’ cried Oliver. ‘He’s still alive.’ With a violence he never intended he reached down grabbed the old man’s exposed right arm, his fingers testing the wrist for a pulse. It was there. Faint and irregular. But it was there.
‘We must get a doctor without delay,’ snapped Oliver.
‘Yes sir,’ responded the butler, his face a mask of shock and confusion. He turned quickly on his heel and left the chamber.
Dr Cornelius Benbow arrived on the scene less than an hour later. He lived in the nearby hamlet and Bulstrode had virtually dragged the medical man from his bed to bring him back to the manor house. Dr Benbow looked and dressed like a scarecrow, appearing in a rough shapeless tweed jacket with patches at the elbows and frayed cuffs, with ill-matching baggy trousers and shabby mud-spattered boots covering his lower half. He was looked far more agricultural than medical. His thick greying hair exploded from his head in all directions as though it had seen neither brush nor comb in recent times. His face was round and shiny with two distinct rosy cheeks but, Oliver observed, his bright blue eyes radiated a kind of sharp intelligence that was at once both reassuring and comforting.
Oliver Twist and the Mystery of Throate Manor Page 7
