Lady Audley's Secret (Oxford World's Classics)

by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

  Again, had he been in love with her himself, I fancy that the tender passion would, with him, have been so vague and feeble a sentiment that he might have gone down to his grave with a dim sense of some uneasy sensation which might be love or indigestion, and with, beyond this, no knowledge whatever of his state.

  So it was not the least use, my poor Alicia, to ride about the lanes round Audley during those three days which the two young men spent in Essex; it was wasted trouble to wear that pretty cavalier hat and plume, and to be always, by the most singular of chances, meeting Robert and his friend. The black curls (nothing like Lady Audley’s feathery ringlets, but heavy clustering locks, that clung about your slender brown throat), the red and pouting lips, the nose inclined to be retroussé;* the dark complexion, with its bright crimson flush, always ready to glance up like a signal light in a dusky sky, when you came suddenly upon your apathetic cousin—all this coquettish, espiègle,* brunette beauty was thrown away upon the dull eyes of Robert Audley, and you might as well have taken your rest in the cool drawing-room at the Court, instead of working your pretty mare to death under the hot September sun.

  Now fishing, except to the devoted disciple of Izaac Walton,* is not the most lively of occupations; therefore it is scarcely, perhaps, to be wondered that on the day after Lady Audley’s departure, the two young men (one of whom was disabled, by that heart wound which he bore so quietly, from really taking pleasure in anything, and the other of whom looked upon almost all pleasure as a negative kind of trouble) began to grow weary of the shade of the willows overhanging the winding streams about Audley.

  ‘Fig-tree Court is not gay in the long vacation,’ said Robert reflectively: ‘but I think, upon the whole, it’s better than this; at any rate it’s near a tobacconist’s,’ he added, puffing resignedly at an execrable cigar procured from the landlord of the Sun Inn.

  George Talboys, who had only consented to the Essex expedition in passive submission to his friend, was by no means inclined to object to their immediate return to London. ‘I shall be glad to get back, Bob,’ he said, ‘for I want to take a run down to Southampton; I haven’t seen the little one for upwards of a month.’

  He always spoke of his son as ‘the little one;’ always spoke of him mournfully rather than hopefully. It seemed as if he could take no comfort from the thought of his boy. He accounted for this by saying that he had a fancy that the child would never learn to love him; and worse even than this fancy, a dim presentiment that he would not live to see his little Georgey reach manhood.

  ‘I’m not a romantic man, Bob,’ he would say sometimes, ‘and I never read a line of poetry in my life that was any more to me than so many words and so much jingle; but a feeling has come over me since my wife’s death, that I am like a man standing upon a long low shore, with hideous cliffs frowning down upon him from behind, and the rising tide crawling slowly but surely about his feet. It seems to grow nearer and nearer every day, that black, pitiless tide; not rushing upon me with a great noise and a mighty impetus, but crawling, creeping, stealing, gliding towards me, ready to close in above my head when I am least prepared for the end.’

  Robert Audley stared at his friend in silent amazement; and, after a pause of profound deliberation, said solemnly, ‘George Talboys, I could understand this if you had been eating heavy suppers. Cold pork, now, especially if underdone, might produce this sort of thing. You want change of air, dear boy; you want the refreshing breezes of Fig-tree Court, and the soothing atmosphere of Fleet Street. Or, stay,’ he added suddenly; ‘I have it! You’ve been smoking our friend the landlord’s cigars; that accounts for everything.’

  They met Alicia Audley on her mare about half an hour after they had come to the determination of leaving Essex early the next morning. The young lady was very much surprised and disappointed at hearing her cousin’s determination, and for that very reason pretended to take the matter with supreme indifference.

  ‘You are very soon tired of Audley, Robert,’ she said carelessly; ‘but of course you have no friends here, except your relations at the Court; while in London, no doubt, you have the most delightful society, and——’

  ‘I get good tobacco,’ murmured Robert, interrupting his cousin. ‘Audley is the dearest old place, but when a man has to smoke dried cabbage leaves, you know, Alicia——’

  ‘Then you really are going to-morrow morning?’

  ‘Positively—by the express that leaves at 10.50.’

  ‘Then Lady Audley will lose an introduction to Mr Talboys, and Mr Talboys will lose the chance of seeing the prettiest woman in Essex.’

  ‘Really——’ stammered George.

  ‘The prettiest woman in Essex would have a poor chance of getting much admiration out of my friend, George Talboys,’ said Robert. ‘His heart is at Southampton, where he has a curly-headed little urchin, about as high as his knee, who calls him “the big gentleman,” and asks him for sugarplums.’

  ‘I am going to write to my step-mother by to-night’s post,’ said Alicia. ‘She asked me particularly, in her letter, how long you were going to stop, and whether there was any chance of her being back in time to receive you.’

  Miss Audley took a letter from the pocket of her riding-jacket as she spoke—a pretty, fairy-like note, written on shining paper of a peculiar creamy hue.

  ‘She says in her postscript, “Be sure you answer my question about Mr Audley and his friend, you volatile, forgetful Alicia!”’

  ‘What a pretty hand she writes!’ said Robert, as his cousin folded the note.

  ‘Yes, it is pretty, is it not? Look at it, Robert.’

  She put the letter into his hand, and he contemplated it lazily for a few minutes, while Alicia patted the graceful neck of her chestnut mare, which was anxious to be off once more.

  ‘Presently, Atalanta, presently. Give me back my note, Bob.’

  ‘It is the prettiest, most coquettish little hand I ever saw. Do you know, Alicia, I never believed in those fellows who ask you for thirteen postage stamps, and offer to tell you what you have never been able to find out yourself; but upon my word I think that if I had never seen your aunt, I should know what she was like by this slip of paper. Yes, here it all is—the feathery, gold-shot, flaxen curls, the pencilled eyebrows, the tiny straight nose, the winning childish smile, all to be guessed in these few graceful up-strokes and down-strokes. George, look here!’

  But absent-minded and gloomy George Talboys had strolled away along the margin of a ditch, and stood striking the bulrushes with his cane, half a dozen paces away from Robert and Alicia.

  ‘Never mind,’ said the young lady impatiently; for she by no means relished this long disquisition upon my lady’s little note. ‘Give me the letter, and let me go; it’s past eight, and I must answer it by tonight’s post. Come, Atalanta! Good-by, Robert—good-by, Mr Talboys. A pleasant journey to town.’

  The chestnut mare cantered briskly through the lane, and Miss Audley was out of sight before those two big bright tears that stood in her eyes for one moment, before her pride sent them back again, rose from her angry heart.

  ‘To have only one cousin in the world,’ she cried passionately, ‘my nearest relation after papa, and for him to care about as much for me as he would for a dog!’

  By the merest of accidents, however, Robert and his friend did not go by the 10.50 express on the following morning, for the young barrister awoke with such a splitting headache, that he asked George to send him a cup of the strongest green tea that had ever been made at the Sun, and to be furthermore so good as to defer their journey until the next day. Of course George assented, and Robert Audley spent the forenoon lying in a darkened room, with a five-days’-old Chelmsford paper to entertain himself withal.

  ‘It’s nothing but the cigars, George,’ he said repeatedly. ‘Get me out of the place without my seeing the landlord; for if that man and I meet there will be bloodshed.’

  Fortunately for the peace of Audley, it happened to be market-day at Chelm
sford; and the worthy landlord had ridden off in his chaise-cart to purchase supplies for his house—amongst other things, perhaps, a fresh stock of those very cigars which had been so fatal in their effect upon Robert.

  The young men spent a dull, dawdling, stupid, unprofitable day; and towards dusk Mr Audley proposed that they should stroll down to the Court, and ask Alicia to take them over the house.

  ‘It will kill a couple of hours you know, George; and it seems a great pity to drag you away from Audley without having shown you the old place, which I give you my honour is very well worth seeing.’

  The sun was low in the skies as they took a short cut through the meadows, and crossed a stile into the avenue leading to the archway—a lurid, heavy-looking, ominous sunset, and a deathly stillness in the air, which frightened the birds that had a mind to sing, and left the field open to a few captious frogs croaking in the ditches. Still as the atmosphere was, the leaves rustled with that sinister, shivering motion which proceeds from no outer cause, but is rather an instinctive shudder of the frail branches, prescient of a coming storm. That stupid clock, which knew no middle course, and always skipped from one hour to the other, pointed to seven as the young men passed under the archway; but, for all that, it was nearer eight.

  They found Alicia in the lime-walk, wandering listlessly up and down under the black shadow of the trees, from which every now and then a withered leaf flapped slowly to the ground.

  Strange to say, George Talboys, who very seldom observed anything, took particular notice of this place.

  ‘It ought to be an avenue in a churchyard,’ he said. ‘How peacefully the dead might sleep under this sombre shade! I wish the churchyard at Ventnor was like this.’

  They walked on to the ruined well; and Alicia told them some old legend connected with the spot—some gloomy story, such as those always attached to an old house, as if the past were one dark page of sorrow and crime.

  ‘We want to see the house before it is dark, Alicia,’ said Robert.

  ‘Then we must be quick,’ she answered. ‘Come.’

  She led the way through an open French window, modernised a few years before, into the library, and thence to the hall.

  In the hall they passed my lady’s pale-faced maid, who looked furtively under her white eyelashes at the two young men.

  They were going up-stairs, when Alicia turned and spoke to the girl.

  ‘After we have been in the drawing-room I should like to show these gentlemen Lady Audley’s rooms. Are they in good order, Phœbe?’

  ‘Yes, Miss; but the door of the ante-room is locked, and I fancy that my lady has taken the key to London.’

  ‘Taken the key! Impossible!’ cried Alicia.

  ‘Indeed, Miss, I think she has. I cannot find it, and it always used to be in the door.’

  ‘I declare,’ said Alicia impatiently, ‘that it is not at all unlike my lady to have taken this silly freak into her head. I dare say she was afraid we should go into her rooms, and pry about amongst her pretty dresses, and meddle with her jewellery. It is very provoking, for the best pictures in the house are in that ante-chamber. There is her own portrait, too, unfinished, but wonderfully like.’

  ‘Her portrait!’ exclaimed Robert Audley. ‘I would give anything to see it, for I have only an imperfect notion of her face. Is there no other way of getting into the room, Alicia?’

  ‘Another way?’

  ‘Yes; is there any door, leading through some of the other rooms, by which we can contrive to get into hers?’

  His cousin shook her head, and conducted them into a corridor where there were some family portraits. She showed them a tapestried chamber, the large figures upon the faded canvas looking threatening in the dusky light.

  ‘That fellow with the battle-axe looks as if he wanted to split George’s head open,’ said Mr Audley, pointing to a fierce warrior whose uplifted arm appeared above George Talboys’ dark hair.

  ‘Come out of this room, Alicia. I believe it’s damp, or else haunted. Indeed I believe all ghosts to be the result of damp. You sleep in a damp bed—you awake suddenly in the dead of the night with a cold shiver, and see an old lady in the court costume of George the First’s time, sitting at the foot of the bed. The old lady is indigestion, and the cold shiver is a damp sheet.’

  There were lighted candles in the drawing-room. No newfangled lamps had ever made their appearance at Audley Court. Sir Michael’s rooms were lighted by honest, thick, yellow-looking wax candles, in massive silver candlesticks, and in sconces against the walls.

  There was very little to see in the drawing-room; and George Talboys soon grew tired of staring at the handsome modern furniture, and at a few pictures by some of the Academicians.*

  ‘Isn’t there a secret passage, or an old oak chest, or something of that kind, somewhere about the place, Alicia?’ asked Robert.

  ‘To be sure!’ cried Miss Audley; with a vehemence that startled her cousin; ‘of course. Why didn’t I think of it before? How stupid of me, to be sure!’

  ‘Why stupid?’

  ‘Because, if you don’t mind crawling upon your hands and knees, you can see my lady’s apartments, for that very passage communicates with her dressing-room. She doesn’t know of it herself, I believe. How astonished she’d be if some black-visored burglar, with a dark lantern, were to rise through the floor some night as she sat before her looking-glass, having her hair dressed for a party!’

  ‘Shall we try the secret passage, George?’ asked Mr Audley.

  ‘Yes, if you wish it.’

  Alicia led them into the room which had once been her nursery. It was now disused, except on very rare occasions when the house was full of company.

  Robert Audley lifted a corner of the carpet, according to his cousin’s directions, and disclosed a rudely-cut trap-door in the oak flooring.

  ‘Now listen to me,’ said Alicia. ‘You must let yourself down by your hands into the passage, which is about four feet high; stoop your head, and walk straight along it till you come to a sharp turn which will take you to the left, and at the extreme end of it you will find a short ladder below a trap-door like this, which you will have to unbolt; that door opens into the flooring of my lady’s dressing-room, which is only covered with a square Persian carpet that you can easily manage to raise. You understand me?’

  ‘Perfectly.’

  ‘Then take the light; Mr Talboys will follow you. I give you twenty minutes for your inspection of the paintings—that is about a minute apiece—and at the end of that time I shall expect to see you return.’

  Robert obeyed her implicitly, and George, submissively following his friend, found himself, in five minutes, standing amidst the elegant disorder of Lady Audley’s dressing-room.

  She had left the house in a hurry on her unlooked-for journey to London, and the whole of her glittering toilette apparatus lay about on the marble dressing-table. The atmosphere of the room was almost oppressive from the rich odours of perfumes in bottles whose gold stoppers had not been replaced. A bunch of hothouse flowers was withering upon a tiny writing-table. Two or three handsome dresses lay in a heap upon the ground, and the open doors of a wardrobe revealed the treasures within. Jewellery, ivory-backed hairbrushes, and exquisite china were scattered here and there about the apartment. George Talboys saw his bearded face and tall gaunt figure reflected in the cheval-glass, and wondered to see how out of place he seemed among all these womanly luxuries.

  They went from the dressing-room to the boudoir, and through the boudoir into the ante-chamber, in which there were, as Alicia had said, about twenty valuable paintings besides my lady’s portrait.

  My lady’s portrait stood on an easel covered with a green baize in the centre of the octagonal chamber. It had been a fancy of the artist to paint her standing in this very room, and to make his background a faithful reproduction of the pictured walls. I am afraid the young man belonged to the pre-Raphaelite brotherhood,* for he had spent a most unconscionable time upon the acce
ssories of this picture—upon my lady’s crispy ringlets and the heavy folds of her crimson velvet dress.

  The two young men looked at the paintings on the walls first, leaving this unfinished portrait for a bonne bouche.*

  By this time it was dark, the one candle carried by Robert only making one bright nucleus of light as he moved about holding it before the pictures one by one. The broad bare window looked out upon the pale sky, tinged with the last cold flicker of the dead twilight. The ivy rustled against the glass with the same ominous shiver as that which agitated every leaf in the garden, prophetic of the storm that was to come.

  ‘There are our friend’s eternal white horses,’ said Robert, stopping before a Wouvermans. ‘Nicholas Poussin—Salvator*—ha—hum! Now for the portrait!’

  He paused with his hand on the baize, and solemnly addressed his friend.

  ‘George Talboys,’ he said, ‘we have between us only one wax candle, a very inadequate light with which to look at a painting. Let me, therefore, request that you will suffer us to look at it one at a time: if there is one thing more disagreeable than another, it is to have a person dodging behind your back and peering over your shoulder, when you’re trying to see what a picture’s made of.’

  George fell back immediately. He took no more interest in my lady’s picture than in all the other weariness of this troublesome world. He fell back, and leaning his forehead against the window-panes, looked out at the night.

  When he turned round he saw that Robert had arranged the easel very conveniently, and that he had seated himself on a chair before it for the purpose of contemplating the painting at his leisure.

  He rose as George turned round.

  ‘Now, then, for your turn, Talboys,’ he said. ‘It’s an extraordinary picture.’

  He took George’s place at the window, and George seated himself in the chair before the easel.