by Thomas Hardy
CHAPTER XXXVI.
Grace was not the only one who watched and meditated in Hintock thatnight. Felice Charmond was in no mood to retire to rest at a customaryhour; and over her drawing-room fire at the Manor House she sat asmotionless and in as deep a reverie as Grace in her little apartment atthe homestead.
Having caught ear of Melbury's intelligence while she stood on thelanding at his house, and been eased of much of her mental distress,her sense of personal decorum returned upon her with a rush. Shedescended the stairs and left the door like a ghost, keeping close tothe walls of the building till she got round to the gate of thequadrangle, through which she noiselessly passed almost before Graceand her father had finished their discourse. Suke Damson had thought itwell to imitate her superior in this respect, and, descending the backstairs as Felice descended the front, went out at the side door andhome to her cottage.
Once outside Melbury's gates Mrs. Charmond ran with all her speed tothe Manor House, without stopping or turning her head, and splittingher thin boots in her haste. She entered her own dwelling, as she hademerged from it, by the drawing-room window. In other circumstances shewould have felt some timidity at undertaking such an unpremeditatedexcursion alone; but her anxiety for another had cast out her fear forherself.
Everything in her drawing-room was just as she had left it--the candlesstill burning, the casement closed, and the shutters gently pulled to,so as to hide the state of the window from the cursory glance of aservant entering the apartment. She had been gone about three-quartersof an hour by the clock, and nobody seemed to have discovered herabsence. Tired in body but tense in mind, she sat down, palpitating,round-eyed, bewildered at what she had done.
She had been betrayed by affrighted love into a visit which, now thatthe emotion instigating it had calmed down under her belief thatFitzpiers was in no danger, was the saddest surprise to her. This washow she had set about doing her best to escape her passionate bondageto him! Somehow, in declaring to Grace and to herself the unseemlinessof her infatuation, she had grown a convert to its irresistibility. IfHeaven would only give her strength; but Heaven never did! One thingwas indispensable; she must go away from Hintock if she meant towithstand further temptation. The struggle was too wearying, toohopeless, while she remained. It was but a continual capitulation ofconscience to what she dared not name.
By degrees, as she sat, Felice's mind--helped perhaps by the anticlimaxof learning that her lover was unharmed after all her fright abouthim--grew wondrously strong in wise resolve. For the moment she was ina mood, in the words of Mrs. Elizabeth Montagu, "to run mad withdiscretion" and was so persuaded that discretion lay in departure thatshe wished to set about going that very minute. Jumping up from herseat, she began to gather together some small personal knick-knacksscattered about the room, to feel that preparations were really intrain.
While moving here and there she fancied that she heard a slight noiseout-of-doors, and stood still. Surely it was a tapping at the window.A thought entered her mind, and burned her cheek. He had come to thatwindow before; yet was it possible that he should dare to do so now!All the servants were in bed, and in the ordinary course of affairs shewould have retired also. Then she remembered that on stepping in bythe casement and closing it, she had not fastened the window-shutter,so that a streak of light from the interior of the room might haverevealed her vigil to an observer on the lawn. How all thingsconspired against her keeping faith with Grace!
The tapping recommenced, light as from the bill of a little bird; herillegitimate hope overcame her vow; she went and pulled back theshutter, determining, however, to shake her head at him and keep thecasement securely closed.
What she saw outside might have struck terror into a heart stouter thana helpless woman's at midnight. In the centre of the lowest pane ofthe window, close to the glass, was a human face, which she barelyrecognized as the face of Fitzpiers. It was surrounded with thedarkness of the night without, corpse-like in its pallor, and coveredwith blood. As disclosed in the square area of the pane it met herfrightened eyes like a replica of the Sudarium of St. Veronica.
He moved his lips, and looked at her imploringly. Her rapid mindpieced together in an instant a possible concatenation of events whichmight have led to this tragical issue. She unlatched the casement witha terrified hand, and bending down to where he was crouching, pressedher face to his with passionate solicitude. She assisted him into theroom without a word, to do which it was almost necessary to lift himbodily. Quickly closing the window and fastening the shutters, shebent over him breathlessly.
"Are you hurt much--much?" she cried, faintly. "Oh, oh, how is this!"
"Rather much--but don't be frightened," he answered in a difficultwhisper, and turning himself to obtain an easier position if possible."A little water, please."
She ran across into the dining-room, and brought a bottle and glass,from which he eagerly drank. He could then speak much better, and withher help got upon the nearest couch.
"Are you dying, Edgar?" she said. "Do speak to me!"
"I am half dead," said Fitzpiers. "But perhaps I shall get overit....It is chiefly loss of blood."
"But I thought your fall did not hurt you," said she. "Who did this?"
"Felice--my father-in-law!...I have crawled to you more than a mile onmy hands and knees--God, I thought I should never have got here!...Ihave come to you--be-cause you are the only friend--I have in the worldnow....I can never go back to Hintock--never--to the roof of theMelburys! Not poppy nor mandragora will ever medicine this bitterfeud!...If I were only well again--"
"Let me bind your head, now that you have rested."
"Yes--but wait a moment--it has stopped bleeding, fortunately, or Ishould be a dead man before now. While in the wood I managed to make atourniquet of some half-pence and my handkerchief, as well as I couldin the dark....But listen, dear Felice! Can you hide me till I am well?Whatever comes, I can be seen in Hintock no more. My practice is nearlygone, you know--and after this I would not care to recover it if Icould."
By this time Felice's tears began to blind her. Where were now herdiscreet plans for sundering their lives forever? To administer to himin his pain, and trouble, and poverty, was her single thought. Thefirst step was to hide him, and she asked herself where. A placeoccurred to her mind.
She got him some wine from the dining-room, which strengthened himmuch. Then she managed to remove his boots, and, as he could now keephimself upright by leaning upon her on one side and a walking-stick onthe other, they went thus in slow march out of the room and up thestairs. At the top she took him along a gallery, pausing whenever herequired rest, and thence up a smaller staircase to the least used partof the house, where she unlocked a door. Within was a lumber-room,containing abandoned furniture of all descriptions, built up in pileswhich obscured the light of the windows, and formed between them nooksand lairs in which a person would not be discerned even should an eyegaze in at the door. The articles were mainly those that had belongedto the previous owner of the house, and had been bought in by the lateMr. Charmond at the auction but changing fashion, and the tastes of ayoung wife, had caused them to be relegated to this dungeon.
Here Fitzpiers sat on the floor against the wall till she had hauledout materials for a bed, which she spread on the floor in one of theaforesaid nooks. She obtained water and a basin, and washed the driedblood from his face and hands; and when he was comfortably reclining,fetched food from the larder. While he ate her eyes lingered anxiouslyon his face, following its every movement with such loving-kindness asonly a fond woman can show.
He was now in better condition, and discussed his position with her.
"What I fancy I said to Melbury must have been enough to enrage anyman, if uttered in cold blood, and with knowledge of his presence. ButI did not know him, and I was stupefied by what he had given me, sothat I hardly was aware of what I said. Well--the veil of that templeis rent in twain!...As I am not going to be seen again in Hin
tock, myfirst efforts must be directed to allay any alarm that may be felt atmy absence, before I am able to get clear away. Nobody must suspectthat I have been hurt, or there will be a country talk about me.Felice, I must at once concoct a letter to check all search for me. Ithink if you can bring me a pen and paper I may be able to do it now.I could rest better if it were done. Poor thing! how I tire her withrunning up and down!"
She fetched writing materials, and held up the blotting-book as asupport to his hand, while he penned a brief note to his nominal wife.
"The animosity shown towards me by your father," he wrote, in thiscoldest of marital epistles, "is such that I cannot return again to aroof which is his, even though it shelters you. A parting isunavoidable, as you are sure to be on his side in this division. I amstarting on a journey which will take me a long way from Hintock, andyou must not expect to see me there again for some time."
He then gave her a few directions bearing upon his professionalengagements and other practical matters, concluding without a hint ofhis destination, or a notion of when she would see him again. Heoffered to read the note to Felice before he closed it up, but shewould not hear or see it; that side of his obligations distressed herbeyond endurance. She turned away from Fitzpiers, and sobbed bitterly.
"If you can get this posted at a place some miles away," he whispered,exhausted by the effort of writing--"at Shottsford or Port-Bredy, orstill better, Budmouth--it will divert all suspicion from this house asthe place of my refuge."
"I will drive to one or other of the places myself--anything to keep itunknown," she murmured, her voice weighted with vague foreboding, nowthat the excitement of helping him had passed away.
Fitzpiers told her that there was yet one thing more to be done. "Increeping over the fence on to the lawn," he said, "I made the railbloody, and it shows rather much on the white paint--I could see it inthe dark. At all hazards it should be washed off. Could you do thatalso, Felice?"
What will not women do on such devoted occasions? weary as she was shewent all the way down the rambling staircases to the ground-floor,then to search for a lantern, which she lighted and hid under hercloak; then for a wet sponge, and next went forth into the night. Thewhite railing stared out in the darkness at her approach, and a rayfrom the enshrouded lantern fell upon the blood--just where he had toldher it would be found. She shuddered. It was almost too much to bearin one day--but with a shaking hand she sponged the rail clean, andreturned to the house.
The time occupied by these several proceedings was not much less thantwo hours. When all was done, and she had smoothed his extemporizedbed, and placed everything within his reach that she could think of,she took her leave of him, and locked him in.