by Ellen Wood
“Then you cannot speak as to this handwriting?” asked the coroner.
“Not with any certainty,” was the reply of the witness. “This writing, I fancy, looks not dissimilar to the other, as far as my remembrance carries me; but that is very slight. All ladies write alike nowadays.”
“Few ladies write so good a hand as this,” remarked the coroner, holding the torn sheet of paper. “Are you near-sighted, Mr. Carlton, that you took it to the window?”
Mr. Carlton threw his eyes full in the face of the coroner, incipient defiance in their expression.
“I am not near-sighted. But the rain makes the room dark, and evening is coming on. I thought, too, it must be a document of importance, throwing some great light upon the case, by the commotion that was made over it.”
“Ay,” responded one of the jury, “we were all taken in.”
There was nothing more to be done; no further evidence to be taken. The coroner charged the jury, and he ordered the room to be cleared while they deliberated. Among the crowds filing out of it in obedience to the mandate, went Judith Ford. Judith had gone to the inquest partly to gratify her own pardonable curiosity — though her intense feeling of interest in the proceedings might be characterized by a better name than that; partly to be in readiness in case she should be called to bear testimony, as one of the attendants who had helped to nurse the lady through her illness.
She was not called, however. Her absence from the house at the time the medicine was taken, and at the time of the death, rendered her of no avail from a judicial point of view, and her name was not so much as mentioned during the day. She had found a seat in a quiet but convenient corner, and remained there undisturbed, watching the proceedings with the most absorbed interest. Never once from the witnesses, and their demeanour, as their separate evidence was given, were her eyes taken. Judith could not get over the dreadful death; she could not fathom the circumstances attending it.
In groups of fives, of tens, of twenties, the mob, gentle and simple, stood about, after their compulsory exit from the inquest-room, conversing eagerly, waiting impatiently. Stephen Grey and his brother, Mr. Brooklyn, Mr. Carlton, and a few more gentlemen collected together, deeply anxious for the verdict, as may be readily imagined; whether or not it would be manslaughter against Stephen Grey.
Judith meanwhile found her way to Mrs. Fitch. She was sitting in her bar-parlour — at least, when any odd moment gave her an opportunity of doing so; but Mrs. Fitch could not remember many days of her busy life so full of bustle as this had been. She was, however, knitting when Judith in her deep mourning appeared at the door, and she started from her seat.
“Is it you, Judith? Is it over? What’s the verdict?”
“It is not over,” said Judith. “We have been sent out while they deliberate. I don’t think,” she added, some pain in her tone, “they can bring it in against Mr. Stephen Grey.”
“I don’t think they ought, after that evidence about the cobwebs,” returned the landlady. “Anyway, though, it’s odd how the poison could have got there. And I say, Judith, what tale’s this about a face on the stairs?”
“Well, I — don’t know, ma’am. Mr. Carlton now says he thinks it was all his fancy.”
“It has a curious sound about it, to my mind. I know this — if the poor young lady was anything to me, I should have it followed up. You don’t look well, Judith.”
“I can’t say but it has altogether been a great shock and puzzle to me,” acknowledged Judith, “and thinking and worrying over a thing does not help one’s looks. What with my face having been bad — but it’s better now — and what with this trouble, I have eaten next to nothing for days.”
“I’ll give you a drop of cherry brandy—”
“No, ma’am, thank you, I couldn’t take it,” interposed Judith, more vehemently than the kindhearted offer seemed to warrant. “I can neither eat nor drink to-day.” —
“Nonsense, Judith! you are just going the way to lay yourself up. It is a very dreadful thing, there’s no doubt of that; but still she was a stranger to us, and there’s no cause for its throwing us off our meals.”
Judith silently passed from the topic. “I am anxious to get a place now,” she said. “I shouldn’t think of all this so much if I had something to do. Besides, I don’t like to impose too long on Mrs. Jenkinson’s kindness. I suppose you don’t happen to have heard of a place, Mrs. Fitch?”
“I heard to-day that there was a servant wanted at that house on the Rise — where the new folks live. Their housemaid’s going to leave.”
“What new folks?” asked Judith.
“Those fresh people who came from a distance. What’s the name? — Chesney, isn’t it? The Chesneys. I mean Cedar Lodge. It might suit you. Coming! coming!” shrieked out Mrs. Fitch, in answer to a succession of calls.
“Yes, it might suit me,” murmured Judith to herself. “They look nice people. I’ll go and see after it.”
The words were interrupted by a movement, a hubbub, and Judith hastened to ascertain its cause. Could the deliberation of the jury be already over? Yes, it was even so. The door of the inquest-room had been thrown open, and the eager crowd were pressing on to it. A few minutes more, and the decree was spoken; was running like wildfire to every part of the expectant town.
“We find that the deceased, whose married name appears to have been Crane, but to whose Christian name we have no clue, came by her death through swallowing prussic acid mixed in a composing draught; but by whom it was thus mixed, or whether by mistake or intentionally, we consider that there is not sufficient evidence to show.”
So Stephen Grey was yet a free man. His friends pressed up to him, and shook him warmly by the hand. While young Frederick, with a cheek of emotion, now white, now crimson, galloped home through the mud and shut himself into his bedroom, there to hide his thankfulness and his agitation.
CHAPTER XIV.
CAPTAIN CHESNEY’S HOME.
WRETCHED as the weather had been with the wind and the rain, the sun showed itself just before its setting, and broke forth with a red gleam, as if it would, in compassion, accord a glimpse of warmth and brightness to the passing day which had been longing for it.
Its beams fell on that pleasant white house on the Rise, the residence of Captain Chesney; they came glimmering through the trees and dancing on the carpet in the drawing-room. The large French window opening to the ground looked bright and clear with these welcome rays, and one of the inmates of the room turned to them with a glad expression; an expression that told of some expectant hope.
Seated at the table was the eldest daughter, Jane Chesney; a peculiarly quiet-looking, lady-like young woman of thirty years, with drooping eyelids, blue eyes, and fair hair. She had some loose sheets of paper before her that looked wonderfully like bills, and an open account-book lay beside them. There was a patient, wearied expression in her face, that seemed to say her life was not free from care.
Touching the keys of the piano with a masterly hand, but softly, as if she would subdue its sound, her brilliant brown eyes flashing with a radiant light, and her exquisite features unusually beautiful, sat Laura Chesney. Three and twenty years of age, she yet looked younger than she was; of middle height, slight and graceful, with the charm of an unusually youthful manner, Laura never was taken for her real age. She was one of the vainest girls living; though none detected it. Girls are naturally vain; beautiful girls very vain; but it has rarely entered into the heart of woman to conceive vanity so intense as that which tarnished the heart of Laura Chesney. It had been the one passion of her life — the great passion which overpowered other implanted seeds, whether for good or for evil, rendering them partially dormant. Not that vanity was her only failing; far from it; she had other less negative failings: self-will, obstinacy, and a rebellious spirit.
Latterly, another passion had taken possession of her; one which seemed to change her very nature, and to which even her vanity became subservient — love for Mr. Carlto
n. It is her eyes which are turning to this bright sunshine; it is her heart which is whispering he will be sure to come! She was dressed in a handsome robe of glittering silk, falling sleeves of costly lace shading her small white arms, on which were gold bracelets. Jane wore a violet merino, somewhat faded, a white collar, and small white cuffs on the closed sleeves its only ornament. The one looked fit to be the denizen of a palace; the other, with her plain attire and gentle manner, fit only for a quiet home life.
And, standing near the window, softly dancing to the time of Laura’s music, and humming, in concert, was the little girl, Lucy. Her frock was of similar material to Jane’s, violet merino, but far more faded, the frills of her white drawers just peeping below its short skirt. She was a graceful child of eleven, very pretty, her eyes dark and luminous as Laura’s, but shining with a far sweeter and softer light, and there was a repose in her whole bearing and manner, the counterpart of that which distinguished her eldest sister.
In the room above was the naval half-pay captain, unusually fierce and choleric to-night, as was sure to be the case when recovering from his gouty attacks. Far more noisy and impatient was he at these times than even when the gout was full upon him. The means of the family were grievously straitened, the captain having nothing but his half-pay — and what is that to live upon? They were encumbered with debt. Life had long been rendered miserable by it. And in truth, how can these straitened men, gentlemen, and well connected, as they often are, keep debt from their door? Captain Chesney was, to use a familiar expression, over head and ears in it. He had quitted the neighbourhood of Plymouth, where they had lived for so many years, simply because the place grew too hot to hold him, his creditors too pressing to be borne with. South Wennock was becoming the same, and people were growing troublesome.
It was Jane who bore the burden of it all. Perhaps no father had ever been loved with a more yearning, ardent, dutiful love than was Captain Chesney by his daughter Jane. To save him one care she would have forfeited her existence. If by walking through fire — and this is not speaking metaphorically — she could have eased him of a minute’s pain, Jane Chesney would have gone lovingly to the sacrifice. Not upon him, not upon the others, had fallen the daily pains and penalties inseparable from a state of debt, but upon Jane. The petty hourly cares and crosses, the putting-off of creditors, the scheming how to make ten shillings go as far as other people made twenty, the anxiety for the present, the sickening dread of the future, and what might be the climax — Jane bore it all meekly, patiently. But it was wearing her out.
She sat now over last week’s bills, leaning her aching head — aching with care more than pain — upon her hand, and adding them up. Jane was not a good accountant; few women are; they are not trained to be so; and she had to go over the columns more than once. It was not the work which wearied and depressed her; it was the dread glance at the sums total, and the knowledge that these bills could only be put away with those of many many weeks back, unpaid. She put them from her, but with a gentle action — there was gentleness in every movement of Jane Chesney — and leaned back in her chair with a long-drawn sigh.
“Lucy, child, I wish you would not dance so. It puts me out.”
The little girl looked half surprised. “I am not making a noise, Jane.”
“But the movement, as you wave about, makes my head worse.”
“Have you a headache, Jane?”
“Yes. At least — my head is so perplexed that it seems to ache.”
Laura turned round, her eyes flashing. “You are worrying your brains over those wretched bills, Jane! I wonder you get them about! I should just let things go on as they can, and not torment myself.”
“Let things go as they can!” echoed Jane, in a tone of pain. “Oh, Laura!”
“What good can you do by worrying and fretting over them? What good do you do?”
“Some one must worry and fret over them, Laura. If I were not to do it, papa must.”
“Well, he is more fit to battle with such troubles than you are. And it is his own imprudence which has brought it all on. But for the extravagance of bygone years, papa would not have reduced himself to his half-pay—”
“Be silent, Laura!” interrupted Jane in tones of stern authority. “How dare you presume to cast a reflection on my dear father?”
Laura’s face fell, partly in submission to the reproof, partly in angry rebellion. Laura, of them all, most bitterly resented the petty annoyances brought by their straitened life.
“Papa is as dear to me as he is to you, Jane,” she presently said, in apology for her words. “But I am not a stick or a stone, and I can’t help feeling the difference there is between ourselves and other young ladies in our rank of life. Our days are nothing but pinching and perplexity; theirs are all flowers and sunshine.”
“There is a skeleton in every closet, Laura; and no one can judge of another’s sorrows,” was the quiet answer of Jane. “The lives that look to us all flowers and sunshine — as you term it — may have their own darkness just as ours have. Recollect the Italian proverb, ‘Non v’ e rosa senza spina?”
“You are going altogether from the point,” returned Laura. “What other young lady — in saying a young lady, I mean an unmarried one — still sheltered from the world’s cares in her father’s home has to encounter the trouble and anxiety that you have?”
“Many a one, I dare say,” was the reply of Jane. “For myself, if I only save trouble and anxiety to my dear father, I think myself amply repaid.”
Too true; it was all that was thought of by Jane; the one great care of her life — saving annoyance to her father. In the long night watches, when a dread of what these debts might result in for Captain Chesney would press upon her brain, Jane Chesney would lay her hand on her burning brow and wish that England’s laws could be altered, and permit a daughter to be arrested in place of her father. Laura resumed.
“And who, except us, has to live as we live? barred up — it’s no better — in a house, like so many hermits; not daring to visit or be visited, lest such visiting might increase by a few shillings the weekly liabilities? It’s a shame.”
“Hush, Laura! If we take to repining, that will be the worst of all. It is our lot, and we must bear it patiently.”
Laura Chesney did not appear inclined to bear it very patiently just then. She struck the keys of the instrument loudly and passionately, playing so for a few moments, as if finding a vent for her anger. The little girl had leaned against the window in silence, listening to her sisters, and turning her sweet brown eyes from one to the other. Suddenly there came a sound on the floor above as if a heavy walking-stick was being thumped upon it.
“There, Laura! that’s because you played so loudly!” cried the child. “To-day, when I was practising, I forgot myself and took my foot off the soft pedal, and down came papa’s stick as if he would knock the floor through.”
Laura Chesney rose, closed the piano, not quite so gently as she might have done, and went to the window. As she stood there looking out, her soft dark hair acquired quite a golden tinge in the light of the setting sun.
Thump! thump! thump! came the stick again. Jane sprang from her seat. “It is not the piano: papa must want something.”
A voice loud and imperative interrupted her as she was hastening from the room. “Laura! Laura!”
Jane drew back. “It is for you, Laura. Make haste up.”
And Laura Chesney, as she hastened to obey, caught up a small black mantle which lay on a chair, and threw it over her white shoulders. It served to conceal her rich silk dress and the bracelets that glittered on her wrists.
Lucy Chesney remained a few minutes in thought as her sister left the room. Things were puzzling her.
“Jane, why does Laura put that black mantle on to go ‘up to papa? It must be to hide her dress. But if she thinks that papa would be angry with her for wearing that best dress and mamma’s gold bracelets every evening, why does she wear them?”
A somewhat difficult question for Jane Chesney to answer — to answer to a young mind which was being moulded for good or for ill.
“Laura is fond of dress, Lucy. Perhaps she fancies papa is less fond of it.”
“Papa is less fond of it,” returned the child. “I don’t think he would care if we wore these old merinos — oh, until next winter.”
Jane sighed. “Dress is expensive, Lucy, and you know—”
“Yes, I know, Jane,” said the little girl, filling up the pause, for Jane had stopped. “But, Jane, why should Laura put that best dress on at all? She used not to put it on.”
Now, in truth, this was a question which had likewise occurred to Miss Chesney. More than once, of late, when Laura had appeared dressed for the evening, Jane wondered why she had so dressed. Not a suspicion of the cause — the unhappy cause which was to bring ere long a great trouble upon them — had yet dawned on the mind of Jane Chesney.
“And I want to ask you something else, Jane. What did you mean by saying there was a skeleton in every closet?”
“Come hither, Lucy.” She held out her hand, and the child came forward and placed herself on a stool at Jane’s feet. Jane held the hand in hers, and Lucy sat looking upwards into her sister’s calm, placid face.
“If mamma had lived, Lucy, perhaps you might not have needed to ask me this, for she would have taught you and trained you more efficiently than I have done—”
“I’m sure, Jane,” interrupted the child, her large eyes filling with tears, “you are as good to me as mamma could have been, and you teach me well.”
“As we pass through life, Lucy, darling, troubles come upon us: cares, more or less heavy—”
“Do they come to us all, Jane? To every one in the world?”
“They come to us all, my dear; it is the will of God. I do not suppose that any one is without them. We know what our own cares are; but sometimes we cannot see what others can have — we cannot see that they have any, and can scarcely believe it. We see them prosperous, with pleasant and plentiful homes; nay, with wealth and luxury; they possess, so far as we can tell, health and strength; they are, so far as we can see, a happy and united family. Yet it often happens that these very people, who seem to us to be so fortunate as to be objects of envy, do possess some secret care, so great that it may be hastening them to the grave before their time, and all the greater because it has to be concealed from the world. Then we call that care a skeleton in the closet, because it is unsuspected by others, hidden from others’ eyes. Do you understand now, Lucy?”