again, and her mouth formed a veritable roundO.
Miss Clode herself was in a state of nervous prostration, but she forcedherself to be in the shop and listen, gathering scraps of informationwhich she sifted, casting aside the rubbish and retaining only what wasgood, so as to piece together afterwards, and lay before herself whatwas the whole truth.
The accounts were sufficiently alarming; and among others it was currentthat Sir Harry Payne was eloping with Claire Denville, when Mrs Burnettfollowed to stop them, and Frank Burnett in a fit of rage and jealousy,stabbed her and Sir Harry.
Another account stated that it was Sir Matthew Bray who had stabbed MrsBurnett, and that he had been seized and put in prison for the deed,while Lady Drelincourt had gone mad from love and misery, and had beenfound by Fisherman Dick and a couple of friends six miles inland, loston the Downs, drenched with rain, and raving so that she had had to beheld down in the cart that the fishermen had been using to carrymackerel.
Everybody smiled at the word mackerel, and thought of French brandy forsome reason or another.
This last business was as much canvassed as May Burnett's injury, forsubsequent inquiry proved that Lady Drelincourt really had been broughthome by Fisherman Dick, and that she was delirious and attended by twodoctors.
Sir Matthew Bray, too, was certainly in prison, and nobody troubled himor herself to discriminate between an arrest for debt set about next dayby Josiah Barclay, and one for some criminal offence.
The whole affair was like a godsend, just when scandal was starving forwant of sustenance, and Saltinville at its lowest ebb.
Some one had seen the postboys, and knew that Lord Carboro' was up atthe cross-roads, where he had gone to fight a duel with Colonel Mellershover a card-table quarrel, and they happened to be just in time to helpMay Burnett when her sister stabbed Sir Harry Payne.
Some one else quarrelled indignantly with this version, for she knewfrom Lady Drelincourt's maid that it was her ladyship herself, who in afit of indignant jealousy had stabbed Claire Denville and Sir MatthewBray, whom everyone knew she loved desperately, and that she hadafterwards gone distracted because she had nearly killed Sir Matthew.
This narrator went off in high dudgeon on being openly contradicted, andtold that she was entirely wrong, for the fact was that young CornetMorton Denville, who saved Lady Drelincourt's pet dog, and for whom herladyship had bought a commission, had challenged Sir Matthew Bray tofight with swords at the cross-roads. They had met, but LadyDrelincourt, in alarm, had gone and told Morton Denville's sisters, andthey had all three gone up together in a post-chaise with Sir HarryPayne on horseback. They had come up just in the heat of the fight, andSir Harry and Mrs Burnett had rushed between them, and both beenwounded; and in her horror at being the cause of such bloodshed, LadyDrelincourt had exclaimed, "I would give my diamonds and everything Ipossess to be able to undo this terrible night's work."
Such minute knowledge carried all before it, and for quite an hour thiswas the accepted version.
Somehow, Louis Gravani, save with three or four of the witnesses of thetragedy, dropped entirely out of the affair, going as suddenly as he hadcome, though he seemed always present in the little bedchamber on theParade, where May lay almost at the point of death, muttering feebly,and appealing to him not to be so cruel as to kill her, because shealways thought that he was dead.
The surgeon had done all that was possible, and he had consulted withthe principal physician as to the course to be pursued; and then, in theface of two grave wounds in the neck and breast of the frail, childishlittle creature, they had left her to the wild delirium that had setin--one whose fever was burning away rapidly the flickering life thatwas left.
The window was wide open, and the soft, low rush of the water upon theshingle floated in like soft, murmurous music through the flowers thatit had always been Claire's pleasure to tend. Then a faint, querulouscry, oft repeated, came from seaward, where the soft grey-plumaged gullsswept here and there, and dipped down at the shelly shoals laid bare asthe tide ebbed and flowed. It was a weird, uneasy sound, that accordedwell with the painful scene in the chamber given up to the sick girl, bywhose side stood Claire, pale and anxious, ready to fan the burningface, or rearrange the bedclothes tossed uneasily away.
Near the foot of the bed sat the Master of the Ceremonies, grey,hollow-cheeked, and with a wild look of despairing horror in his eyes,as he gazed at his little fallen idol, for whom he had fought andschemed, and whom he had so obstinately held aloft in his own heart, tothe disparagement of her patient, forbearing sister.
"Is it true, Claire?" he murmured at last; "is it true, or some dreadfuldream? My child! My child!"
Then his face grew convulsed with horror, as May turned her face towardshim, and began speaking rapidly:
"Don't, Louis--pray: don't.--No: I am afraid.--Take me away quickly,dear.--No one will know, and I hate him so.--Little mean wretch!--Theymade me marry him, and I hate him more and more.--Hush!"
Denville groaned, and, as his head drooped upon his breast, Claire heardhim murmur:
"Is it a judgment--is it a judgment for the past?"
She shivered as she listened to his words, but a quick movement and alow cry of pain made her bend over her sister again.
"Take me away," she said, after a few moments; and her pinched face borea look of terror that stabbed those who watched with an agonising pain."I tell you I hate Frank, and I dare not meet poor Louis now. It is nothe, but something from the dead. Claire--Claire--hold me. Sister,help! Don't let me go. Am I going to die?"
"May, May!" whispered Claire soothingly, as she laid her cheek againstthe burning face; and the sick girl sighed, and made an effort to clingto her, but her feeble arm dropped heavily upon the coverlid.
"Don't let Louis come now. Is that Frank? Is that--"
She wandered off, muttering quickly and incoherently as she threw herhead from side to side for a time; and then, utterly exhausted, seemedto sleep.
"Has--has Frank Burnett been?" whispered her father, looking timidly atClaire.
She shook her head sadly.
"No," said Denville; "he will not come. He would not even if she wereto die. She must get better; and we will do as you have often said: goright away, where we are not known, and where we shall be safe."
In spite of herself, Claire darted at him a horrified look, which he sawand winced at, as he rose feebly, and began to pace the room, stoppingat length before the window to gaze out at the sunlit sea.
"Strange!" he murmured; "the world so beautiful, and my life one drearycourse of agony and pain. Claire, what do the doctors really think--that she will live?"
"I pray God they do!" said Claire solemnly.
"Yes; she must live and repent. There is pardon for those who sufferand repent, my child. Don't look at me like that; you do not know.Claire, is this my punishment? Surely no worse suffering can befall menow."
"Dear father," whispered Claire; "let the past be dead."
"Hush!" he cried, grasping her hand; "Don't talk of death, girl--here.She must live, and we will go away before--before it is too late. HasMorton been?"
Claire shook her head mournfully.
"No; he would not come. He must not come," said the old man quickly."He is well placed, and he must not come near such pariahs as we are.No, no; don't look like that," he whispered passionately. "Why shouldhe drag himself down? It is too much to ask of the boy."
He went on tip-toe to the bed, and took the little feverish hand thatlay outside the coverlid, and kissed and stroked it as he muttered tohimself:
"Poor little wandering lamb! So weak and timid, and ready to go astray;but you are safe here with me. Oh, how wrong everything is!"
Claire glanced at him, half stunned by this new trouble; and, as herfather talked of punishment, and the impossibility of a greater troublethan this befalling them, a cold hand seemed to clutch her heart, and avague, black shadow of another horror came back with double force, sheshuddered, and devot
ed herself more and more to her task of attendingthe sister sick apparently unto death.
As she sat there, with the shadow of death impending, after the firstshock, it seemed to lose its terrors, and she found herself looking uponit as less dreadful than she had been wont to do. There was rest in it,and a cessation from the pain and suffering that had so long been herportion; and, as the hours rolled on, her throbbing brain grew dull andheavy, her own suffering lighter, and she seemed better able to attendto the sufferer at her side.
Towards noon there was a soft knock at the front door, and Isaac--whohad been planning with Eliza an immediate flight from the grief-strickenhouse, on the ground that, even if they lost their wages, it was nolonger a place for them to stay at--opened it, and told the visitor thatMiss Denville could see no one.
"But me, young man,"
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