I heard next day that two passages, booked in the name of “Mr. and
Mrs. Norris,” had actually been taken by him on board a ship which
left Liverpool for New York on the very Thursday when we were to have
started on our journey “to Monaco.” The tickets were found upon him
and also the necklace, which proved to be a valuable ornament of
rubies that had belonged to Mrs. Cunningham, which he had clasped
round my neck on the night of his death, but which I had flung upon
the floor. These were the only ones, of all the stolen jewels, which
were ever recovered, with the exception of the diamond pendant, which
I sent back to its owner, Lord Dalston. Upon the house being searched,
the candle which had fallen from my hand when I first went into the
cellar under the store-room was found under the stagnant water there,
and also the brown portmanteau, which was identified as one belonging
to Sir Jonas Mills; but the jewels, with the exception of a stray drop
from an ear-ring, had disappeared.
I heard about Gordon, as he had told me I should, through Mr.
Carruthers, who, long before the impression these events made had died
away, received a letter dated from New York, in which Gordon, in a
very respectful manner, apologized for the inconvenience his sudden
disappearance might have caused his master, who had, he could not
doubt, by this time learned the reason of it through the London
papers. Mr. Carruthers would find that the bills he had commissioned
him to settle in Beaconsburgh on that unfortunate Wednesday afternoon
had been paid, and he begged to forward him the receipts; he had also
left the silver-mounted flask to be repaired at Bell’s, and the
hunting-stock at Marsden’s. He had given up service for the present
and taken to a different profession, as he felt, if he was not taking
a liberty in saying so, that it would be impossible for him to find in
America a master who gave him in all respects so much satisfaction as
Mr. Carruthers had done.
Nothing more has ever been heard of Gordon under that name; but some
time afterwards a representative of the United States Congress, who
was described as a rich West India merchant, made a great sensation by
a very impressive speech upon some financial question; a rough sketch
of him in a New York illustrated paper fell into the hands of Mr.
Carruthers, who sent it to Laurence, and under the trimly-cut mustache
and hair parted very much on one side we fancied we recognized
something like the clear-cut features and bland expression of our old
friend Gordon.
I was married to Laurence before the trial of poor Tom Parkes and of
the subordinate who had been caught removing the plate from the Hall.
I had to give evidence, and I was so much distressed at having to do
so that Tom, good-natured to the last, called out--
“Don’t take on so, miss. Lor’ bless you, you can’t say any worse than
they know! It’s only a matter of form.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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