Mr. Jenifer's Inheritance

The Rev. Clement JenifarTiad inherited a property! The lawyer's letter announcint; the fact lay before him, besido the breakfast whicli he had foreotten in the thought of this unexr;ected good fortune. It was not a meagre breakfast, although Mr. Jenifer, at five-and-forty was still only a cúrate on a stipend of L150 per annuni, for through the greater part of his twenty years in holy orders he had acted on the principies Unit if he gave his time to the poor it was as niuch as they could expect, and L0 if they called Parson Jenifer "hard" and "close," and preferred going to the ViB-why, that was not his fault. Hie inheritance consirtted in a good house and several hundreds a year, and he sat and thought over the difference this would make in his future. No more for him the daily service, read a& pare of the day's work - no more visiting of thriftless complaining, muddiing poor, with whom he was completely out ol touch- in a word, no more drudgery! Twenty years of drudgery! That was wliat his life amounted to. Not for him the spirit of love that softens and the high thoughts that sanctify daily tasks; only the grudging gift of obligatory toil. It was written on his face, in linea marked by 20 years - no, not quite 20 - he had thought differently at first- but by more than a dozen years of discontent and repining. Ie was a pity, too, for the face was one of great possibilities, clouded over by the dullness of heart that fails to see through the service the Haster who is served. Even now he had no regret for the kind old friend who had left him a goodly shara of his property; no thought that the hand which had ever been ready to help him and many another was helplesa now henceforth; no spirit of pratitude for this last loving gift- only a sellish pleasure m his own good luck and a feeling of discontent that it had been so long in coming. And thus thinking he rose and went to see his Vicar to make arrangements for the visit tothelawyer, which must precede his taking possession of his new inheritance. He found no diüiculty in obtaining leave of absence for the purpose. The Vicar was a kind and open-hearted man and was pleased at his curate's unexpected prosperity. "W sll, Jenifer, he said, "I am very glad for you, though you can't appreciate it as much as if you had a wife and family dependent on you. At the same you nave rny hearty congratulations." "Ah," said Mr. Jenifer, "thingjj generally come too late. Now if th:s had happened when I was ten years younger, what a difference it would have made to me!" "But your friend's life was a very valuable one to many was it not?" said the Vicar. "From all that I have heard of him, I should think that even now there will be plenty of people to say that the end has come ten years too soon, rather than too late." "Why, he was nearly ninety!" said Jenifer, as if the fat were rather a reproach to the old man. Then he hastened away to make his preparations for leaving, The Vicar's wife came in as the curatewentout. Shefouniherhusband gazing rather sadly into the dull street. "Mary, my dear," he said, "it is iny belief that after the miracles of the loa ves and fislies there were sorae among the five thousand who complained tnat the bread was stalo and the fish not so fresh as it might have been." Meanwhile Clement Jenifer was speeding on to London to see his lawyer. líe found there was one condition which he must fulfill before he could cali himself master of the house and income. Mr. Dacre had only willed Waterdell Hall to him under the proviso that he should pass one night in the house entirely alone. Mr. Jenifer laughed when this clause was read to him. "That's not a very bard thing to do," said he. "But was Mr. Dacre s brain sof ten ing when he made his will?" "Not at all," answered the lawyer shortly. "Any one who saw Mr. Dacre in his last hour will teil you that the dear old man's mind was as clear to the end as in his best days. When you go to Waterdell you will not please your poor neighbors there il you suagest to them that the man who was so unirersally beloved was crazy. I have no doubt this letter, which he instrncted me to deliver to you personally, will explain the matter." This was, ho wever, not the case. The note was but a short one, and gave no reaeon for the testator's wish, except that he had inherited Waterdell Hall under the same stipulation- that he had ever been thankful for having carried it out, and hoped that though his friend Clement Jenifer was older than he himself had been when he carne into the property, ("for," he wrote, with a touch of his ordinary humor. "I have been, like Charles II., an unconscionable time a dying.'Myet, that a solitary night passedin his future home would prove as great a blessing to him as it had been to the writer, and so, without f uit her explanation, signed himself his aflectionate friend, Thomas Dacre. ïhat was all. Clement Jenifer never liked being made ridiculous, and he thought that this will went very near that poBsibility. Yet he could not lose his inheritance for fear of being absurd, so after certain business instructions from the lawyer he went to his hotel or that nlght and next morning smrted for Waterdell. He put up at a little inn in the nearest market town before proceeding to his destination, where, the lawyer had informed him, he would find all things in readiness to receive him for his lonely vigil, if vigil it was to be. The inn was full of farmers of thenelghborhood come in to the market, and after much discourse on arain and turnips the con versation, Mr. Jenifer found - he being, of couise, unknown - tnrned on the death of Mr. Dacre. "They do say," said one red-faced, gray-whiskered man of substantial appearance - "they do say that the ghost has begun to walk again since the 8puire's death." "Wnat ghost?" asked a younger man with an incredulous laugh: "I never heard of a ghost at Waterdell.' "No, you mayn't,,' said the first man; but I've heard teil from my father, times upon times, that before squire Dacre come here, there was a power of queer things seen and heard at Waterdell; and they say that since he's dead they be come back." 'They say; who say?" asked a thin weasel-Iaced farmer. "Well my man Marvel for one; he went across by the spinney last niyht, where he has been alniost every evening these thirty year, and he swears that he saw some one walking up and down the long path, and heard some awful noises." "Ah!" sxid tlie thin man, with a grunt, "M "-vel always were a liar." "Liar or no liar," said thefat farmer rather angrily, "ni y lat her sw the ghost himself sixty ye&rsago; often;and ofcenhehastold meof ïtjand I beheve the old Squire knew of it too, for he never laughed or scoffed as some fools do [with asignificant sniff] when folk talked of ghosts." And so the talk drifted on to other matters, and Mr. Jenifer was left to contémplate another element of absurdity introduced into his well arranged comtnonplace existence, and feit quite angry at the thought that he of all men should, by the irony of fate.be brought into a ghost story. But as he never had believed in ghosts he did not mean to begin now; and after inquiring nis way to Waterdell Hall he found that he must start at once if he wished to reach there before nightfall. It was a somewhat dull walk which led him at last along a narrow road ending in an abrupt descent. The high hedges on either side had lost tbeir summer beauty without yet gaining the glory of Autumn; the few roseberries were sickly looking and withered and frosted with a whitish blight, and their lea ves hung shivering on the twigs, while in the fields beyond the evening mists were already risine. The road turned sharply to the right, and then Waterdell Hall lay before its future owner. To a cheerful eye it might have seemed nestling in a bower of greenery; but Jenifer, out of tune with things in general and tired with his walk, saw in its withdrawal from the high road a guilty seclusion from observation. Four tall Wellingtonias rose dark and solemn above the little wicket gate and cast a gloom over the garden path, in which some late geraniums and petunias only served by their touches of brilliant color to accentuate the general melancholy. The house itself instead of boldly looking forth on the passers by, turned its face away from the road, and had no prospect but the little bit of garden and the four sentinel trees. The door stood open, and Mr. Jenifer entered a narrow passage where no welcoming footsteps carne to meet his own; only a virginian creeper torn by the wind tapped ontheporch; otherwise all was still. Mr. Jenifer looked round him for a moment, and then went through the silent house to the chief sitting room. It was neither large nor high, but it had that individual charm which only age and years of occupancy can give. The old-fashioned mantle reached, with its dark rich carvings, to the ceiling, across which was a massive oaken beam, nearly black with age, the fireplace, with its glaring logs, gave out a cheerful glimmer, reflected in the small quarries of the window opposite, over which hung a carved scroll, whose inscription there was not light enough to read. Mr. Jenifer breathed a si_'h of relief at the comfortable appearance here, in contrast to the depressing aspect of the rest ol the house; but instead of settling himselt (as he feit tempted to do) by the the fíre, he again went out to look over the surroundine property. Behind, the round roee abruptly, and was bounded by a closely growing coppice, through which a narrow path seemed to strike in the directionof the village. The parson climbed the hill, leaving the coppice on his left, and standing on the highest portion of the meado w, looked across the low hedge at the last pageant of the sunset. Some elm trees were silhouetted againat the sky, athwart which lay bars of rosy fíame, tender and evanescent, One moment the (Jying light leaped up brighter and throbbed through all the burning heaven, and then suddenly it died away, and the day was not. Jenifer turned and looked at the hall. Already It seemed to be losing itself in the darkness which gathered round it, hiding in the recesses of the gables, drawing curtains of mist over the t wisted chimneys. The silence, entire and absolute, struck almost with oppression on the mind of this man accustomed to city noi6es; but even as he thought to himself, "How still it all is," there sounded in the coppice close behind him a long, sobbmg, ruoanin? cry, which rose and feil, and rose again, and then ceased. Clement Jenifer was not a particularly tender-hearted or compassionate man, but that sudden cry filled him with a vague fear of some cruel deed iust perpetrated- some awful mystery to be brought to light; and after a moment's hesitation he turned in the direction whence it had seemed to come, and found himself on a long path, with a tbick yew hedge on either side. Far ahead, in the dim twilight, he could descry a figure walking slowly away from him; he could hear a moaning sound, as of some one in pain, Mr. Jenifer hastened his pace in order to come up with the sufferer, and as he gained on him and could see him more distinctly it seemed to him that there was some thmg familiar in the gait and bearing of the Unknown. And as he thought so the figure turned, and, facing him, advanced with slow, uncertain footsteps, wringing his hands a? he carne. What was it that struck Mr. Jenifer as so well known to him? What was it that filled him with a sudden horror, and sent the blood back to his 1 heart? All the tales of ghosts and haunting noises at which he had scoffed so lately recurred to his mind, and yet there was nothing unearthly in the aspect of the man who was apI proaching him. And now they two stood face to face, and Clement Jenifer saw that this- he knew not what to cali it- bore the face which he himself had borne twenty years ago, and he knew- though how he conld not teil- that he was standing face to face with the ghost of his own dead past. Then ensued a conversation- strange, unnatural - between these two, who still were one; but whether the words were uttered on the evening air, or whether the knowledge of what was in the mind of each was mutual to both, it were hard to say. "Why do I haunt you?'r said this this doublé of himself, gazing on him with reproachful eyes. "Do not mardered victims haunt their slayers, and have not you murdered that which was the best part of me? Where are the promises of your young days? Where are the aspirations, the desires after a higher life, the noble purpose with which my soul was filled? Dead- dead and buried beneath a crust of selfishness!" "Youthful follies," answered Jenifer; "gonethe way of all suchearlyfancies. Why do you prosecute me? Have I stolen, or murdered, or lived unclsanly? Have I not kept to my work and done it thoroughly, distasteful as it ?" "It is true," said the other, "the commandmentsyou have not broken; but where are the hearts you have helped to bind up? How many have you helped by your example? Rather, have you not by daily carelessness, by dryness of spirit, by perfunctory performance of your duty, quencted the light that was, aye, God knows it was in me? And in doing so you have wounded many another. There are sinners who slay the body, ■ but you have slain your own soul; and woe be to him of whom this can be said." Jenefer laughed in scorn. "When I was what you are all this would have had its terrors for me; now I am not to be frightened with false fire.' I know what you are, who think to scare me thus - an illusion of the brain, a disturbance in the neryoub system. Come daylight, and this will be m if it had never been." But the other with the ad and youthful eyes looked at him in sorrow, and said: "Even in your blindness you speak the truth; for when you were as I am, ere the world had dimmed your sight you would have seen the precipice on which you stand. Oh, brother of me, though how degraded! give up yonr dreams of a selfish future; turn back while yet you may; use the wealth that has come to you, not for yourself only, but for others. Redeem the time that is left to you, and bnng to a happier second life the protnises, the aspirations of your youth." "Begone!" said Jenifer. "Il not an illusion, then you are an accomplics in some conspiracy to betray me into a rash vow. Did you and the old man who is in his grave plan it between you and laugh to think how you would scare your foolish dupe? Away from me! and do not hope to work your will. I have inheritea, and I will enioy!" "Nay," then, said his doublé," see to what an end your enjoyment shall bring you. I, whom you have destroyed, am what you were; see now what you Bhall be. Then for an awful moment the parson knew that net only he himself stood there with the spirit of his once E ure and earnest-hearted youth beside im but a third and dreadful shape - himself as he should be, if no hand of ?race staid his downward couree. The lightning flash of awakened perception showed him his own old age, where that which he had called economy had grown to averice.where callousne8S had become cruelty- discontent, envy - carelessness, impiety. He saw himself, degraded, mean, despicable, bad, without affections, without tenderness, without hope, and as the horror of it swept over him withresistless force, Clement Jenifer - the icy crust of years of life for self brclcen at last- feil upon his face, with the agonized cry of the apostle of old, "Who shall deliver me from the body of thia death?" When he carne tq himself he was in the quaint old sitting room in his new home. The fire had burned low, and only dimly illumlned the room, but as he gazed into the glowing embers a hitherto unkindled log broke into llame, and as it leaped and flickered the scroll which he had bef ore remarked and failod to decipher caught and threw back the yellow light, and Mr. Jenifer read in letters of gold the poet's words - "Nor deern the irrevocablo past As wholly wasted, wholly vain, If, riaing on its wrecks, at last To something noblet wo attain." He sank on his knees, and there in contrition of spirit and anguish of soul dedicated anew to his Maker the years that should be granted to him, the wealth that he had inherited- himself, body soul, and spirit, for evermore. People said afterward that prosperity had been good for Mr. Jenifer, that it had made him softer, more compas8ionate, more tender. He alone knew that the visión he had seen had come only just in time to save him from that utter ruin of soul to which he was tendinc; and when he thought, as many a time he did, of that awful night, he bowed his head in contrite humility, and gave thanks for the warning that had been sent him.-