A Bottle in the Smoke: A Tale of Anglo-Indian Life

by Janet Milne Rae

  CHAPTER XXXVII.

  As Mark Cheveril was stepping out of the railway carriage in the Madrasstation, a hand was laid upon his shoulder.

  "The very man I was anxious to meet this morning," said Mr. Morpeth,fixing his deep grey eyes on his young friend. "In fact, it was myanxiety about all of you at Puranapore that brought me here at thishour. I heard rumours yesterday of an impending riot in the town. Then Ihad a bad dream! I haven't actually visited the place for years, but Isaw you all with a furious mob round you, and big champing horses ridingover you. I feared you and Mr. Worsley might be in trouble. But I'm gladto see you're all safe, anyhow, Cheveril. But you do look a bit jaded.Has the rioting been serious? Come and tell me all about it."

  The old man put his arm through Mark's, and walked down the platformwith him.

  "Serious enough," answered Mark. "But a company of soldiers from theFort soon settled the rioters. It's an unexpected event connected withthe riot that has brought me here this morning. You'll be sorry to hear,Morpeth, that our friend, Mrs. Rayner's husband, has beenkilled--literally trampled to death by a savage Mahomedan on horseback."

  "Alfred dead!" gasped Mr. Morpeth, with a look of grief and terror inhis eyes. He stumbled in his walk, and but for Mark's strong arm wouldhave fallen forward.

  His companion regarded him with astonishment.

  "Yes, Rayner's gone, poor fellow! It's very sad! This sudden bad newswill be terrible for his wife. I didn't think you knew him though?"added Mark interrogatively. "I'm just on my way to break the news to herif I can muster up courage. I've been watching by him all night--hepassed away at dawn."

  "God bless you for that," murmured Mr. Morpeth, his face quivering."Cheveril, there's no need to keep the secret any longer. I was wrong tokeep it at all. It was the ruin of him. He was my only son--Alfred."Then in reply to Mark's silent start, he added, "Yes, that was hismother's portrait you and his wife came on that afternoon. The incidentstruck me at the time. I would I had spoken even then."

  "Rayner--your son? It's hardly believable," stammered Mark, suddenlyrecalling the incident of his first evening in Madras, when Rayner inthe mail-phaeton had, it seemed to him, almost deliberately set himselfto trample down the old man on whose cheek the tears were now runningdown in sorrow for his loss. "He did not know this, of course--he neverknew it?" burst forth Mark, in an almost pleading tone.

  "Yes, Alfred did know he was my son--but not in time--not till lately,"the father acknowledged in a faltering voice. "I should like to tell youall about it, Cheveril. And from you, who have stood by his dying bed,there is much I want to hear."

  Mark assented, and tightening his arm on Mr. Morpeth's, he led him to aquiet comer of the big station, where they could carry on a conversationwithout interruption. He would fain have suggested that he should takethe old man to the peace of his own library, but he felt his first dutywas to her who had been the beloved and sheltered one of PinkthorpeRectory, and who was now alone and forlorn in this alien land.

  In broken words David Morpeth told his tale of many-sided pain. MarkCheveril's sympathetic heart read its import even more completely thanthe speaker guessed, though his words were few. After a little silence,he glanced at the clock, saying:

  "I was on my way to Clive's Road to tell her. Do you think----"

  "Ah, yes, it is for me to take that duty," said Mr. Morpeth, starting upfrom the bench where they were sitting. "I've shirked myresponsibilities too long. I see it now when it is too late. I shall goto that sweet child whom I have loved for her own sake as my daughter."

  The proposal was eagerly hailed by Mark, who now began to considerwhether he would share Zynool's communication with the stricken father,but decided that before doing so he would seek fuller information, andarranged to meet Mr. Morpeth at his house an hour or two later. He wasdesirous of returning to Puranapore as soon as possible, not only onaccount of his arrears of work, but also that he might through Zynooleven in prison ascertain the charge that was brought against Rayner,which, on his own acknowledgment, had made him a fugitive in disguise.

  After seeing Mr. Morpeth into his little victoria, Mark drove to theClub, having much food for thought as he pondered over the tragicalstory to which he had listened; and which, as he linked on certainincidents which sprang to his memory with painful vividness, obliged himto acknowledge the utter baseness of Hester's husband.

  When Mr. Morpeth alighted from his carriage at Clive's Road and walkedup the broad steps, he caught sight of Hester seated in the verandah,looking like a ghost of her former self.

  "The poor child must have heard already," he said to himself, as he wentforward. Even the sound of the carriage wheels seemed to have struckterror into Hester's heart. She clung to the arms of her chair as sheessayed to rise, and looked at her visitor with scared, questioningeyes.

  "You know already, then?" murmured Mr. Morpeth, taking her hand andgazing pitifully into her face.

  "Oh, have they caught him? Is he in prison?" she cried, the bloodrushing into her pale cheeks. "Oh, I can't bear it!"

  "In prison, my dear? What do you mean?" asked Mr. Morpeth in abewildered tone. "No, Hester, death is not prison! Pray that in spite ofall it may be the Gate of Life."

  "'Death'! Have you come to tell me that my husband is dead?" she askedwith startled air.

  Mr. Morpeth briefly narrated to her the events of which Mark Cheverilhad put him in possession at the station. Hester listened, dry-eyed, asone spell-bound.

  "And Hester," he added slowly, "I prayed that I might bring this news toyou because I am Alfred's father----"

  "You are? Then it _was_ true!" cried Hester, as if awakening from adream. "But oh, why did not poor Alfred have all the good a father likeyou might have been to him? I thought these women who told me were onlygossiping, but I even wished that it _were_ true. Why did you ever losehold of your son?" asked Hester, looking reproachfully on the worn, greyface.

  So it happened, that for the second time that morning, David Morpeth,with aching heart, had to take up the tangled skein of the past. AndHester, as she listened, with her quick perception easily filled up thegaps in the narration.

  "Oh, the loss to him!" she murmured. "If he had been brought up by onegood and true like you he might have been different, instead of beingembittered, reckless, mad."

  In her turn, she had to unfold to the father the story of his son'scrime and the fear of its consequences, which had driven him from hishome, a fugitive from justice.

  The father's grey head was bowed in grief. He sat in silence for sometime, then looking up with a sob he said:

  "If he had only come to me--even that night. I was his father--but hewould have none of me."

  "But how could he go to you--he did not know," faltered Hester.

  "Ah, child, that is the worst sorrow of all--Alfred did know," said thetruth-loving man, looking at Hester with his earnest eyes.

  "Not that evening on the beach when he was so rude--so cruel? Oh, say hedid not know then?"

  Hester's eyes as well as her tone pleaded for an assurance that at leastshe could exonerate her husband from the terrible stain such knowledgemust shed on his conduct that evening.

  "How can I tell her," he thought. "Listen, my child! When Alfred was inCalcutta he learnt that David Morpeth, the old East Indian, was hisfather. He disowned me and scornfully refused my allowance to him fromthat day forward. As I have explained to you, it was my own fault forweakly consenting to a foolish promise--for allowing my child to passfrom me as I did. The fact is my own will inclined to it. I had alwaysbeen too sensitively conscious of the disabilities of Eurasians--perhapsunduly dominated by the aristocracy of colour in the white man. Mr.Cheveril, now, has turned those very disabilities which were my weaknessinto strength, but I bent my head before the prejudice, having sufferedin many-sided ways from my youth up. To shield my son against it seemedin my mistaken judgment worthy of the sacrifice I had to make. I desiredto save him from the cup that had been so bitter to my taste, forgettingthat the cup Ou
r Father offers is the only safe one for us. I dreamt tooof his having a very different training in England, idealisingeverything there, as I did in those days. I thought no sacrifice toogreat to bring about this end; but my wife's sister thwarted my purposesand even deceived me for long. Ignorant as I was of English ways savethrough literature, I shrank from going there to arrange matters for myson until it was too late. I have long known, however, that it was notonly my foolish promise to the dead mother that bound me--it was my ownpride and self-will. Long ago, of course, I saw the fatal mistake I hadmade. But we have to reap as we sow. My reaping time is sore indeed. Oh,the bitterness to think of his being a forger and a felon."

  With a groan the old man bent his head and covered his face with hishands. Hester's pity, even at this her own dark hour, was stirred forthe forlorn man. She rose and laid her hand on his grey head.

  "Try to forgive him," she murmured. "It is terrible to think of, butAlfred is dead. We must try not to judge him hardly any more."

  The pathetic ring in her voice caused the old man to look up at her.

  "You have suffered too, my child," he said, taking her hand. "Have I notbeen a silent witness of your trials--haunted by the thought of themeven when I went about my daily work? How I longed to spare you, toprotect you. Now, at last, in that matter I can have my wish," he added,with a touch of his old energy coming into his face. "As Alfred'sfather, it is my right to do all I can to help and protect you at thisterrible time. The responsibility will be my greatest comfort now.First, may I go and ask your good friend Mrs. Fellowes to come and bewith you?"

  "No, no, just for to-day let me be alone. There is such a thing asgetting acquainted with grief, you know," returned Hester, with a sadsmile.

  "As you will, my dear! Then, I should like to tell you that all theoffices for the dead will be my care. You will let me have my son justonce in his father's house?" he asked, in a pleading tone. "It is mypurpose to take him to Calcutta and lay him beside his young mother. Andyou, Hester, will want to return to your happy home? You have youth andhope still with you. It is no doubt your wish to go back to England?"

  "Oh, yes, I shall go home. He needs me no more. I did try to helphim--but----" She broke off with a sob.

  "Didn't I see you did? Ah, how my heart yearned for you as well as formy poor wayward son! But I was powerless to help either the one or theother. That was my punishment. But now you must allow me to atone for itby giving you all the help I can."

  "When he is with you on the sea, I shall go on my voyage too. I cannotstay in this house longer--or anywhere else in this place."

  "Nor need you. All can be arranged. Can you be ready to start in acouple of days?"

  "Easily. Everything here must be left to pay the debts we owe--thatmoney he took too. I can only give up everything I have. It's not much,I fear, but it's all I can do just now. When I get home, my father----"

  "Not a word about that matter," interrupted Mr. Morpeth, rising. "Theseburdens are all my right now. I must go, but I shall look in again thisevening, since you prefer to be alone to-day. Go and lie down, my child,you are overwrought," he added, glancing at Hester's worn face.

  Beckoning to the butler, he briefly told him of his master's death, andcharged him to see well to his mistress, who would soon have to cross"the black water" again. Then, with his habitual calm taking possessionof him once more, Mr. Morpeth hurried away to face a more difficult andtrying day than Hester had any idea of.

  She too had her hours of storm and stress as the long, hot hours woreon. The terrible tension arising from the suspense was now at an end.Her weak, erring husband had gone to another Bar than the earthly oneshe had so dreaded for him. Her brief married life lay in ruins, andthough love was dead, its spectre haunted her at every turn. Now it wasthe beautiful face, the impassioned eyes of the almost unknown suitor inthe Woodglade arbour that rose before her. Again, it was one incidentafter another disclosing his disordered heart; scenes before which shehad learnt to quail in fear--not for herself, she soon learnt to outlivethat--but for the restless, unhappy one to whom she had pledged herwedded troth. Sometimes it was the recollection of that morning on whichhe had spoken such insulting words to his own father that sprang intoher mind. And as she vividly recalled the scene, she began to wonder if,all along, Alfred could have had some subconscious glimmering of theclose relationship between him and the noble-hearted man he was spurningwhich goaded him to a sense of desperation. Then the memory of her happymorning ride with Mark Cheveril came to her mind. How kind, howcomforting, how high-toned and self-restrained he had ever proved, andyet, for her sake, he had to endure taunts which, had they been flung athim by any other than her husband, she felt sure would have been dealtwith very differently. Yet it had been that friend who had smoothed thedying pillow of her disgraced husband!

  Deeply grateful as she was to Mark Cheveril for all that he had been toher, she felt no desire to meet him on this dark day, and was thankfulthat Mr. Morpeth, and not he, had been the messenger of the eviltidings. Perhaps Mark and she would never meet again in this world; yetbetween them she felt there would ever be the bond forged during theseeventful months when faith and honour and fealty had called her to turnfrom the true man to him whom she had too late awakened to find deeplyfalse, although he was the husband of her youth.

  Even the thought of the home-going--that thought so thrilling to thehearts of Anglo-Indians--brought no lightening to Hester's load of painthat day, nor for many a succeeding one.