Nothing could be kinder than Sir Harry. It was plain that he suspected nothing of the real situation.
“You’ll be missing your hit of backgammon with Lemuel Blount,” he said, “and your sail on the mere wi’ myself, and our talk round the tea-table of an evening. ‘Twill be dowly down here, lass; but ye’ll be coming soon where you’ll see sights and hear noise enough for a dozen. So think o’ that, and when we are gone you munnon be glumpin’ about the house, but chirp up, and think there are but a few weeks between you and Brighton and Lunnon.”
How directly this kind consolation went to the source of my dejection you may suppose.
So the time came, and I was alone. Solitude was a relief. I could sit looking at the lake, watching the track where his boat used to come and go over the water, and thinking of him half the day. I could walk in the pathway, and sit under the old beech-tree, and murmur long talks with him in fancy, without fear of interruption; but oh! the misgivings, the suspense, the dull, endless pain of separation!
Not a line reached me from Richard. He insisted that while I remained at Dorracleugh there should be no correspondence. In Golden Friars, and about the postoffice, there were so many acute ears and curious eyes.
Sir Harry had been gone about three weeks, when he sent me a really exquisite little enamelled watch, set in brilliants; it was brought to Dorracleugh by a Golden Friars neighbour whom he had met in his travels. Then, after a silence of a week, another letter came from Sir Harry. He was going up to London, he said, to see after the house, and to be sure that nothing was wanted to “make it smart.”
Then some more days of silence followed, interrupted very oddly. I was out, taking my lonely walk in the afternoon, when a chaise with a portmanteau, a hat-box, and some other luggage on top, drove up to the hall-door; the driver knocked and rang, and out jumped Richard Marston, who ran up the steps, and asked the servant, with an accustomed air of command, to take the luggage up to his room.
He had been some minutes in the hall before he inquired whether I was in the house. He sat down on a hall-chair, in his hat and greatcoat, just as he had come out of the chaise, lost in deep thought. He seemed for a time undecided where to go; he went to the foot of the stairs, and stopped short, with his hand on the banister, and turned back; then he stood for a little while in the middle of the hall, looking down on his dusty boots, again in deep thought; then he walked to the hall-door, stood on the steps in the same undecided state, and sauntered in again, and said to the servant:
“And Miss Ware, you say, is out walking? Well, go you and tell the housekeeper that I have come, and shall be coming and going for a few days, till I hear from London.”
The man departed to execute his message. Richard Marston had paid the vicar a visit of about five minutes, as he drove through the town of Golden Friars, and had had a very private and earnest talk with him. He seemed very uncomfortable and fidgety. He took off his hat and laid it down, and put it on again, and looked dark and agitated, like a man in a sudden danger, who expects a struggle for his life. He went again to the foot of the stairs, and listened for a few seconds; and then, without much ado, he walked over and turned the key that was in Sir Harry’s study-door, took it out, and went into the room, looking very stern and nervous.
In a little more than five minutes Mrs. Shackleton, the housekeeper, in her thick brown silk, knocked sharply at the door.
“Come in,” called Richard Marston’s voice.
“I can’t, sir.”
“Can’t? Why? What’s the matter?”
“You’ve bolted it, please, on the inside,” she answered, very tartly.
“I? I haven’t bolted it,” Richard Marston answered, with a quiet laugh. “Try again.”
She did, a little fiercely; but the door opened, and disclosed Richard Marston sitting in his uncle’s easy chair, with one of the newspapers he had bought in his railway carriage expanded on his knees. He looked up carelessly.
“Well, Mrs. Shackleton, what’s the row?”
“No row, sir, please,” she answered, sharply rustling into the room, and looking round. She didn’t like him. “But the door was bolted, I assure you, sir, only a minute before, when I tried it first; and my master, Sir Harry, told me no one was to be allowed into this room while he’s away.”
“So I should have thought; his letters lying about — but I found the door open, and the key in the lock — here it is; so I thought it safer to take it out.”
The old woman made a short curtsey as she took it, dryly, from his fingers; and she stood, resolutely waiting.
“Oh! I suppose,” he said, starting up, and stretching himself, with a smile and a little yawn, “you want me to turn out?”
“Yes, sir, please,” said Mrs. Shackleton peremptorily.
The young gentleman cast a careless glance through the far window, looked lazily round, as if to see that he had not forgotten anything, and then said, with a smile:
“Mrs. Shackleton, happy the man who has such a lady to take care of his worldly goods.”
“I’m no lady, sir; I’m not above my business,” she said, with another hard little curtsey. “I tries to do my dooty accordin’ to my conscience. Sorry to have to disturb you, sir.”
“Not the least; no disturbance,” he said, sauntering out of the room, with another yawn.
He was cudgelling his brains to think what civility he could do the old lady, or how he could please or make her friendly; but Mrs. Shackleton had her northern pride, he knew, which was easily ruffled, and he must approach her very cautiously.
CHAPTER LX.
SIR HARRY’S KEY.
Up to his room he went; his things were all there — he wished to get rid of the dust and smuts of his railway journey.
He made his toilet rapidly; and just as he was about to open his door, a knock came to it.
“What is it?” he asked.
“The vicar has called, sir, and wants to know if you can see him.”
“Certainly. Tell him I’ll be down in a moment.”
Mr. Marston had foreseen this pursuit with a prescience of which he was proud. He went downstairs, and found the white-haired vicar alone in the drawingroom.
“I am so delighted you have come,” said Richard Marston, advancing quickly, with an outstretched hand, from the door, without giving him a moment to begin. “I have only had time to dress since I arrived, and I have made up my mind that it is better to replace this key in your hand, without using it — and, in the meantime, it is better in your keeping than in mine. Don’t you think so?”
“Well, sir,” said the good vicar, “I do. It is odd, but the very same train of thought passed through my mind, and, in fact, induced me to pay you this visit. You see it was placed in my charge, and I think, until it is formally required of me, I should not part with it.”
“Just so,” acquiesced the young man.
“We both acted, perhaps, a little too precipitately.”
“So we did, sir,” said Richard Marston, “but I take the entire blame on myself. I’m too apt to be impulsive and foolish. I generally think too late; happily this time, however, I did reflect, and with your concurrence, I am now sure I was right.”
The young man paused and thought, with his hand on the vicar’s arm.
“One thing,” he said, “I would stipulate, however; as we are a good deal in the dark, my reason for declining to take charge of the key would be but half answered, as I must be a great deal in this house, and there may be other keys that open it, and I can’t possibly answer for servants, and other people who will be coming and going, unless you will kindly come into the next room with me for a moment.”
The vicar consented; and Mr. Marston was eloquent. Mrs. Shackelton was sent for, and with less reluctance opened the door for the vicar, whom she loved. She did not leave it, however — they did not stay long. In a few minutes the party withdrew.
“Won’t you have some luncheon?” asked Richard, in the hall.
“No, than
k you,” said the vicar, “I am very much hurried. I am going to see that poor boy to whom Mr. Blount has been so kind, and who is, I fear, dying.”
And with a few words more, and the key again in his keeping, he took his leave.
I was all this time in my favourite haunt, alone, little thinking that the hero of my dreams was near, when suddenly I saw him walking rapidly up the path. With a cry, I ran to meet him. He seemed delighted and radiant with love as he drew me to him, folded me for a moment in his arms, and kissed me passionately. He had ever so much to say; and yet, when I thought it over, there was nothing in it but one delightful promise; and that was that henceforward, he expected to see a great deal more of me than he had hitherto done.
There was a change in his manner, I thought — he spoke with something of the confidence and decision of a lover who had a right to command. He was not more earnest, but more demonstrative. I might have resented his passionate greeting, if I had been myself less surprised and happy at his sudden appearance. He was obliged to go down to the village, but would be back again, he said, very soon. It would not do to make people talk, which they would be sure to do, if he and I were not very cautious.
Therefore I let him go, without entreaty or remonstrance, although it cost me an indescribable pang to lose him, even for an hour, so soon after our long separation. He promised to be back in an hour, and although that was nearly impracticable, I believed him. “Lovers trample upon impossibilities.”
By a different route I came home. He had said:
“When I return, I shall come straight to the drawingroom — will you be there?”
So to the drawingroom I went. I was afraid to leave it even for a moment, lest some accident should make him turn back, and he should find the room empty. There was to me a pleasure in obeying him, and I liked him to see it. How I longed for his return! How restless I was! How often I played his favourite airs on the piano; how often I sat at the window, looking down at the trees and the mere, in the direction from which I had so often seen his boat coming, you will easily guess.
All this time I had a secret misgiving. There was a change in Richard’s manner, as I have said; there was confidence, security, carelessness — a kind of carelessness — not that he seemed to admire me less — but it was a change. There seemed something ominous about it.
As time wore on I became so restless that I could hardly remain quiet for a minute in any one place. I was perpetually holding the door open, and listening for the sound of horses’ hoofs, or wheels, or footsteps. In vain.
An hour beyond the appointed time had passed; two hours. I was beginning to fancy all sorts of horrors. Was he drowned in the mere? Had his horse fallen and killed him? There was no catastrophe too improbable to be canvassed among the wild conjectures of my terror.
The sun was low, and I almost despairing, when the door opened, and Richard came in. I had heard no sound at the door, no step approaching, only he was there.
CHAPTER LXI.
A DISCOVERY.
I started to my feet and was going to meet him, but he raised his hand, as I fancied to warn me that some one was coming. So I stopped short, and he approached.
“I shall be very busy for two or three days, dear Ethel; and,” what he added was spoken very slowly, and dropped word by word, “you are such a rogue!”
I was very much astonished. Neither his voice nor look was playful. His face at the moment wore about the most disagreeable expression which human face can wear. That of a smile, not a genuine but a pretended smile, which, at the same time, the person who smiles affects to try to suppress. To me it looks cruel, cynical, mean. I was so amazed, as he looked into my eyes with this cunning, shabby smile, that I could not say a word, and stood stock-still looking in return, in stupid wonder, in his face.
At length I broke out, very pale, for I was shocked, “I can’t understand! What is it? Oh, Richard, what can you mean?”
“Now don’t be a little fool. I really believe you are going to cry. You are a great deal too clever, you lovely little rogue, to fancy that a girl’s tears ever yet did any good. Listen to me; come!”
He walked away, still smiling that insulting smile, and he took my hand in his, and shook his finger at me, with the same cynical affectation of the playful. “What did I mean?”
“Yes, what can you mean?” I stamped the emphasis on the floor, with tears in my eyes. “It is cruel, it is horrible, after our long separation.”
“Well, I’ll tell you what I mean,” he said, and for a moment the smile almost degenerated to a sneer. “Look here; come to the window.”
I faltered; I accompanied him to it, looking in his face in an agony of alarm and surprise. It seemed to me like the situation of a horrid dream.
“Do you know how I amused myself during the last twenty miles of my railway journey?” he said. “Well, I’ll tell you: I was reading all that time a curious criminal trial, in which a most respectable old gentleman, aged sixty-seven, has just been convicted of having poisoned a poor girl forty years ago, and is to be hanged for it before three weeks!”
“Well?” said I, with an effort — I should not have known my own voice, and I felt a great ball in my throat.
“Well?” he repeated; “don’t you see?”
He paused with the same horrid smile; this time, in the silence, he laughed a little; it was no use trying to hide from myself the fact that I dimly suspected what he was driving at. I should have liked to die that moment, before he had time to complete another sentence.
“Now, you see, the misfortune of that sort of thing is that time neither heals nor hides the offence. There is a principle of law which says that no lapse of time bars the Crown. But I see this kind of conversation bores you.”
I was near saying something very wild and foolish, but I did not.
“I won’t keep you a moment,” said he— “just come a little nearer the window; I want you to look at something that may interest you.”
I did go a little nearer. I was moving as he commanded, as if I had been mesmerised.
“You lost,” he continued, “shortly before your illness, the only photograph you possessed of your sister Helen? But why are you so put out by it? Why should you tremble so violently? It is only I, you know; you need not mind. You dropped that on the floor of a jeweller’s shop one night, when I and Droqville happened to be there together, and I picked it up; it represents you both together. I want to restore it; here it is.”
I extended my hand to take it. I don’t know whether I spoke, but the portrait faded suddenly from my sight, and darkness covered everything. I heard his voice, like that of a person talking in excitement, a long way off, at the other side of a wall in another room — it was no more than a hum, and even that was growing fainter. I forgot everything, in utter unconsciousness, for some seconds. When I opened my eyes, water was trickling down my face and forehead, and the window was open. I sighed deeply. I saw him looking over me with a countenance of gloom and anxiety. In happy forgetfulness of all that had passed, I smiled and said:
“Oh, Richard! Thank God!” and stretched my arms to him.
“That’s right — quite right,” he said; “you may have every confidence in me.”
The dreadful recollection began to return.
“Don’t get up yet,” he said, earnestly, and even tenderly; “you’re not equal to it. Don’t think of leaving me — you must have confidence in me. Why didn’t you trust me long ago? — trust me altogether? Fear nothing while I am near you.”
So he continued speaking, until my recollection had quite returned.
“Why, darling, will you not trust me? Can you be surprised at my being wounded by your reserve? How have I deserved it? Forget the pain of this discovery, and remember only that against all the world, to the last hour of my life, with my last thought, the last drop of my blood, I am your defender.”
He kissed my hands passionately; he drew me towards him, and kissed my lips. He murmured caresses and vows of unalt
erable love — nothing could be more tender and impassioned. I was relieved by a passionate burst of tears.
“It’s over now,” he said— “it’s all over; you’ll forgive me, won’t you? I have more to forgive, darling, than you — the hardest of all things to forgive in one whom we idolise — a want of confidence in us. You ought to have told me all this before.”
I told him, as well as I could between my sobs, that there was no need to tell any one of a madness which had nothing to do with waking thoughts or wishes, and was simply the extravagance of delirium — that I was then actually in fever, had been at the point of death, and that Mr. Carmel knew everything about it.
“Well, darling,” he said, “you must trouble your mind no more. Of course you are not accountable for it. If people in brain fever were not carefully watched and restrained, a day would not pass without some tragedy. But what care I, Ethel, if it had been a real crime of passion? Nothing. Do you fancy it would or could, for an instant, have shaken my desperate love for you? Don’t you remember Moore’s lines:
‘I ask not, I care not, if guilt’s in thy heart; I but know that thou lov’st me, whatever thou art.’
“That is my feeling, fixed as adamant; never suspect me. I can’t I never can, tell you how I felt your suspicion of my love; how cruel I thought it. What had I done to deserve it? There, darling, take this — it is yours.” He kissed the little photograph, he placed it in my hand, he kissed me again fervently. “Look here, Ethel, I came all this way, ever so much out of my way, to see you. I made an excuse of paying the vicar a visit on business — my real business was to see you. I must be this evening at Wrexham, but I shall be here again tomorrow, as early as possible. I am a mere slave at present, and business hurries me from point to point; but cost what it may, I shall be with you some time in the afternoon tomorrow.”
Delphi Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu Page 651