The Man in Black: An Historical Novel of the Days of Queen AnneJames, G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford)
History
The Man in Black: An Historical Novel of the Days of Queen Anne
James, G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford)
Great Britain -- History -- Anne, 1702-1714 -- Fiction
Mr. Hastings indeed would fain have persuaded his young friend to
remain where he was, and looked at Emily with some of that tenderer
feeling of a parent which so often prompts to every sacrifice for a
child's sake. But Emily thanked Marlow eagerly for proposing to go;
and Mrs. Hastings, even, expressed some gratitude.
The arrangements were soon made. There being no time to send for
Marlow's own carriage and horses, it was agreed that he should take a
carriage belonging to Mr. Hastings, with his horses, for the first
stage; the prisoner's valet was to accompany his friend, and immediate
orders were given for the necessary preparations.
When all was ready, Emily asked some question of her father, in a low
tone, to which he replied, "On no account, my child. I will send for
you and your mother should need be; but do not stir before I do. This
is a mere cloud--a passing shower, which will soon be gone, and leave
the sky as bright as ever. We do not live in an age when kings of
England can play at foot-ball with the heads of innocent men, and I,
as you all know, am innocent."
He then embraced his wife and child with more tenderness than he was
wont to show, and entering the carriage first, was followed by the
messenger. The other men mounted their horses, and Marlow did not
linger long behind the sad cavalcade.
CHAPTER XXIX.
Philip Hastings had calculated much upon his Roman firmness; and he
could have borne death, or any great and sudden calamity, with
fortitude; but small evils often affect us more than great ones. He
knew not what it is to suffer long imprisonment, to undergo the
wearing, grinding process of life within a prison's walls. He knew not
the effect of long suspense either, of the fretful impatience for some
turn in our fate, of the dull monotony of long continued expectation
and protracted disappointment, of the creeping on of leaden despair,
which craves nothing in the end but some change, be it for better or
for worse.
They took him to Newgate--the prison of common felons, and there, in a
small room, strictly guarded, he remained for more than two months. At
first he would send for no lawyer, for he fancied that there must
either be some error on the part of the government, or that the
suspicion against him must be so slight as to be easily removable. But
day went by on day, and hour followed hour, without any appearance of
a change in his fate. There came a great alteration, however, in his
character. He became morose, gloomy, irritable. Every dark point in
his own fate and history--every painful event which had occurred for
many years--every doubt or suspicion which had spread gloom and
anxiety through his mind, was now magnified a thousand-fold by long,
brooding, solitary meditation. He pondered such things daily, hourly,
in the broad day, in the dead, still night, when want of exercise
deprived him of sleep, till his brain seemed to turn, and his whole
heart was filled with stern bitterness.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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