by Ellen Wood
Sara interposed. It might not be wise in her, but she could not help herself: “I once accidentally heard a conversation of yours with Neal. You were speaking of this gentleman, Captain Davenal; it was the very day that we had heard news of his marriage with Miss Reid. I remember you said something to the effect that you would have satisfaction, cost what punishment it would to him. Did you allude to your husband?”
“Yes, I did,” the girl replied. “And I hope he will be punished yet. I remember the time too. I had had a letter that morning from one of the women who went with the regiment, a soldier’s wife. She spoke of my husband in it in a way that vexed me; and she said, amidst other news, that their Captain — Captain Davenal — had just got married. The letter put me up to think that perhaps Captain Davenal could do some good for me with my husband, and I came off at once to Neal and asked him. Neal said he should not trouble Captain Davenal with anything of the sort; and the answer made me angry, and I reminded Mr. Neal that I could say one or two things about him that might not be pleasant if I chose to be ill-natured; and at last he promised to send a letter for me to Captain Davenal, enclosed in one from himself, if I liked to write and state the case. I remember quite well saying that I would have satisfaction somehow, no matter what the punishment to Wentworth. Did my letters ever reach you, sir? I wrote two or three.”
“Never.”
“Like enough Neal never sent them,” she exclaimed with an angry toss. “He said he did; and I have been always asking him whether he received no answer for me.”
“Is Neal your uncle, Mrs. Wentworth?”
“I call him so sometimes, sir, when I want to be pleasant with him, but in point of fact he is no real relation. My step-mother is his sister; and that makes him a sort of uncle-in-law.”
“And you have not — excuse my pressing the question, Mrs. Wentworth, but I have a reason for it — given Neal reason to suppose that you were ever married to any one except Sergeant-Major Wentworth?” resumed Captain Davenal.
“Never in my life, sir,” she replied, and her accent of truth was unmistakable. “Say to Neal that I was married to anybody else! What for? It would be childish to say it; he knows quite well that I was married to Serjeant Wentworth. He was not serjeant-major then.”
The falsehood then had been Neal’s! Captain Davenal glanced at Sara. But the sergeant’s wife spoke again.
“Could you interest yourself for me with Wentworth, sir?”
“Ah, I don’t know. It is a ticklish thing, you see, to interfere between man and wife,” added the captain, a jesting smile upon his lips. “What is your grievance against Wentworth?”
Mrs. Wentworth entered on her grievances; a whole catalogue. She required that her husband should send for her to be with him in India, or else that he should make her a better allowance, so that she could live “as a lady.” She knew he got plenty of prize-money she said, for she had been told so; and she finished up with stating that she had been to the War Office, and to half-a-dozen other offices, to complain of him, and could get no redress.”
“Well,” said Captain Davenal,”
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I will write to your husband — a man for whom I have great respect — and inquire his version of the quarrel between you. We should always hear both sides of a question, you know, Mrs. Wentworth. When I get his answer, you shall hear from me. To be candid with you, I must say that I don’t think Wentworth is one to allow of much interference. He has good judgment, and he likes to exercise it. But I will write to him.”
“And you’ll promise to see me again, sir, in spite of Neal? What his objection was, I don’t know, but he did all he could to prevent my seeing you.”
“I don’t think you need fear Neal’s prevention for the future in regard to seeing me,” said Captain Davenal, in a significant tone, as he civilly bowed out Mrs. Wentworth.
“Well, Sara, and what do you think of Neal now?”
“I can’t understand it; I can’t understand why he should have said it, or what his motive was,” slowly replied Sara. “Oh, if he only knew the cruel days and nights it caused me to pass. Shall you tell Aunt Bettina of Neal’s falsity?”
“Tell her!” repeated Captain Davenal. “Do you think I can allow her and you to be any longer under the same roof with a villain such as Neal?”
CHAPTER LX.
LIGHT.
NOT to Miss Bettina, however, did Captain Davenal at once take his way, but to Parliament Street The revelation of Sara that morning — that the one dark episode in his own past history had been known to Oswald Cray — was troubling Edward Davenal’s mind far more than any sense of the inconvenience wrought by Mr. Neal. They stood together in Oswald’s sitting-room, the doors closed. A few words of greeting on both sides, and then the captain plunged wholesale, without any ceremony or preparation, into the object which had brought him.
“I have come to ask you a question,” he began, dropping his voice to a confidential whisper. “How did you become acquainted with that miserable business of mine?”
“With what miserable business?” returned Oswald, in surprise. “Don’t you recall what I mean? That affair that swamped me Or, I’m sure I may better say, swamped my father. The — the — those bills, you know.”
Oswald did not know in the least. And said so.
“Hang it, Cray,” exclaimed the captain, “why force a man to speak out? Those forged bills that I put into circulation, and couldn’t get back again.”
“I protest I do not know what you are talking of,” returned Oswald. “I don’t understand what it is you would ask me.”
“I only ask how you became acquainted with the affair.”
“I never was acquainted with the affair: with any affair such as you allude to,” persisted Oswald. “I am not acquainted with it now.”
“Do you mean to say that you did not become cognisant of that dreadful trouble I got into before leaving England? — The signing of those bills?”
“I never heard of it in my life. I never heard, or knew, that you were in any trouble whatever.”
Captain Davenal sat staring at Oswald. How reconcile this denial with Sara’s positive assurance of an hour ago?— “You are telling me truth?” he cried, with a perplexed air.
“Entire truth,” said Oswald. “Why should I not?”
“What then could Sara mean?” debated Captain Davenal aloud. “She tells me that you did know of it.”
“Sara tells you so?”
“She does. She says that — I don’t see that I need scruple to speak,” broke off Captain Davenal, “it’s all over and done with, I suppose — Sara says it was your knowledge of the affair that caused the breaking off of the engagement between yourself and her.”
Oswald Cray was silent. A doubt crossed him of whether the gallant captain could have received some sabre-cut or sunstroke in India which had affected his brain. Captain Davenal noted his puzzled look, and strove to be more explanatory.
“When you and I were returning to town from Hallingham the night of Caroline’s wedding, you hinted that there existed an attachment or engagement between you and Sara. For the first time I spoke of this to Sara this morning. She admitted that something of the kind had existed, but said it was over; and I saw that the subject was painful — one she wished to avoid. So I dropped it. Afterwards, in speaking of this worse business of mine, I observed that it had been known to three people only: my father, Alfred King, and Sara; but Sara interrupted me, saying that it was known to Oswald Cray. I disputed the fact; I said it could not have been known to you, but she persisted in her assertion, and finally confessed that it was in consequence of its coming to your knowledge that you broke off the engagement to her, deeming she was not worthy, as my sister to become your wife. Pardon me yet a moment while I state that I am not here to question the decision; I don’t wish to enter upon it at all, except to say that many would have done as you did, after what I, her brother, had been guilty of. All that is apart from the business, and I
am only telling you how it came out Sara assures me that it was the sole cause of breaking off the engagement, and that you must have known of it almost as soon as — as my father knew. Now, I want you to tell me, Mr. Oswald Cray, how and whence that affair came to your knowledge. Have I made myself clear?”
“Perfectly clear, so far as explanation goes; but it is nothing but obscurity to me, for all that. In the first place, allow me to repeat to you that I never knew before now that you were in any trouble whatever. This is my first intimation of it.”
“And was it not that knowledge that caused you and Sara to part?”
“It was not. How could it have been when I assure you I did not possess the knowledge? A — a great trouble, of which I would prefer not to speak, did lead to the parting, but it was entirely unconnected with you.”
“Well, this is Greek,” returned Captain Davenal. “There was no other trouble connected with the family, except mine. I suppose you mean that it was connected with them?”
“Yes.”
“With which of them? There was no scapegoat in it except me.”
“It was connected with Dr. Davenal,” said Oswald reluctantly. “I cannot say more.”
“With my father? Nonsense, if you mean anything wrong. A more upright man never breathed. Fancy him sending forth bad bills!”
“I could not fancy him doing so,” replied Oswald. “The matter had nothing to do with money.”
“I’ll lay all I am worth it had to do with me, with my business,” impulsively spoke Captain Davenal. “I will tell you how it was—”
“Nay, it is not worth while,” was Oswald Cray’s interruption, as he thought how very different a thing was Lady Oswald’s unhappy death from the topics under discussion. “Believe me, you had not, and could not have had, anything to do with the real question.”
“But I’ll tell you, now I have begun. I and my choice friend, as I thought him then,” — Captain Davenal spoke with scornful bitterness, “ got into an awful mess together, and could not get out of it. No matter whether it was gambling or horse-racing, or what not; money we were compelled to have. King assured me on his honour that in three weeks’ time he should be in the possession of several thousand pounds, if we could only stave off exposure until then, and in an evil hour I yielded to his persuasion and wrote my father’s name. The suggestion was King’s, the persuasion was King’s, the full assurance that all would be well was King’s. I don’t say this in extenuation of myself; the guilt and madness of yielding were all mine. Well, the days went on, and when the time came, and the thing was on the point of exploding, King had not got the thousands he had counted on: moreover, I found that his expectation of getting them had been from the first very vague indeed, and we had a desperate quarrel. The sneak turned round; threatened me with exposure, with ruin, and I had to go down and confess the truth to my father. He saved me — saved me at the sacrifice of all he had, and, I fear, of his life.”
There was a pause. Oswald had grown strangely interested. Captain Davenal continued.
“I shall never forget the effect it had upon him — never, never. I speak only of the hour of the communication; I never saw him after that I told him there might be trouble with these bills, to get them at all; that even with the money in hand to redeem them I was not sure the consequences could be averted from me. I saw the change pass over his face; the grey, scared look; and it did not quit it again.”
“Where did you see him?”
“At Hallingham. I went down at some peril, after leave had been refused me at head-quarters, getting to Hallingham about eleven o’clock on a Sunday night. I stayed an hour or so with my father in his study, and then went back to the station again, for I had to be at my post on duty the following morning. No one at home knew of my visit I tapped at my father’s study window and he let me in. Before I left, I asked to see Sara. I knew quite well, though they did not, that I should not go down again, and I did not care to leave for years without saying a word to her, so my father fetched her down from her room. We did not tell her the particulars, only that I had been doing something wrong, was in danger, and that my visit to Hallingham must be kept quiet. My poor father! I remember his asking in a burst of feeling what he had done that all this trouble should fall upon him. Another great trouble had befallen him that night in the death of Lady Oswald.”
“Yes?” said Oswald with a calm manner but a beating heart His thoughts were in that long past night, and Neal’s description of it “It was very dreadful,” resumed Captain Davenal, alluding to the matter of Lady Oswald. “My father was sadly cut up. Mark Cray had killed her through administering the chloroform.”
Oswald felt his heart stand still, his face flush with a burning heat. He moved nearer to Captain Davenal: but his voice was quiet still.
“Did you say Mark administered the chloroform?”
“It was Mark. Yes. My father said he had especially forbidden Mark Cray to give her chloroform. Mark in the course of the day had proposed doing it, but the doctor warned him that chloroform would not do for Lady Oswald. When all was ready, he (my father) had to carry Lady Oswald’s maid from the chamber in a fainting-fit, and when he got back to it he found Mark had administered the chloroform, which he had taken with him to the house surreptitiously, and was commencing the operation. The doctor said he could not make out Mark Cray that night. He was beginning the operation in so unskilful, so unsurgeon-like a manner, that my father had to push him away as he would have pushed a child, and perform it himself. But they could not recover Lady Oswald.”
Oswald made no remark. He felt as one stunned.
“It struck me as being a most shocking thing,” continued Captain Davenal. “I remarked to my father that it seemed like murder, and he said Yes, he supposed the world would call it such.”
“But why did not Dr. Davenal declare the truth — that it was Mark who had given the chloroform?” interrupted Oswald. “Why suffer himself to rest under the imputation?”
“What imputation? There was no imputation to lie under. All the world supposed the chloroform had been rightly and properly administered, according to the best judgment of both of them.”
True; true. Oswald Cray had been speaking in accordance with his own private knowledge, not with publicly-known facts.
“My father kept the secret for Mark Cray’s sake. If it went forth to the world, he said it would blight Mark’s professional career for life. He told me the facts, but he intended to keep them from all others, and he warned me not to divulge them. I never did. I am not sure that I should feel justified in telling even you now, but that Mark is no longer in his profession. My poor father made the remark that they were two heavy secrets for his breast to keep, mine and Mark Cray’s.”
The murmur of the words fell upon Oswald’s ear, but he was as one who heard them not. A weighty amount of self-reproach was rising up within him. Captain Davenal talked on, and then hastened away, for he had Mr. Neal to settle with yet, leaving Oswald alone.
The scales, so long obscuring Oswald Cray’s eyes, had fallen from them, and he saw the past in its true colours. The one wondering question that seemed to press upon him now was, how he could ever have doubted Dr. Davenal. Above his own self-reproach; above the bitter feeling of repentance for the wrong he had dealt out to her whom he best loved on earth; above his regrets for the late years wasted in a miserable illusion; was his remorse for having so misjudged that good man, misjudged him even to his grave. He saw it all now: how, when he questioned Dr. Davenal about his motives for administering the fatal medicine, he had taken the odium upon himself for Mark’s sake: not even to him, his brother, would he, in his loving-kindness, betray Mark.
Never had the pride, the self-esteem, of Oswald Cray received a blow like unto this. He had plumed himself on his superiority; he had cast off Dr. Davenal as one unworthy of him; he had dared, in his self-sufficiency, to cast off Sara. Her father was a man of suspicion, and therefore she was no fit mate for him! Whereas, Oswald now lear
nt that it was his own brother who was the offender: Dr. Davenal and his daughter were the victims. The full value, the Christian conduct of that good man was patent to him now; the patient endurance of Sara became clear to him.
He lifted his hat and wiped the moisture from his brow, as he walked through the streets, all these considerations doing battle in his brain. The winter’s day was cold, but Oswald’s brow was hot; hot with inward fever. He was on his way to Miss Davenal’s, to seek a conference with his half-brother: there were one or two questions he would put to him. He had taken his hat and come out the moment Captain Davenal left him: business and all else gave way before this.
CHAPTER LXI.
THE BARGAIN SEALED.
MARK CRAY sat in his wife’s sick-room. Mark Cray found it (between ourselves) rather tiresome to sit in his wife’s sick-room: and Mark was very apt to doze asleep at his post. Mark was asleep now. He was dreaming a charming dream of greatness — in which some grand scheme of Barker’s had succeeded, and he and that gentleman were sailing about the atmosphere in a triumphal car of gold, looking down with complacency on the poor toiling mortals in the world below — when Dorcas came in with a whisper, and aroused him. Mr. Oswald Cray was in the dining-parlour waiting to see him, she said: and Mark, after a stare at the girl, descended, pushing back his clustering hair, which had disarranged itself in his sleep.
Oswald was standing near the fire. He turned to Mark and spoke in a quiet tone.
“I have a question to ask you, Mark. It relates to the past. Who—”
“Oh, never mind the past,” interrupted Mark, with a half-testy, half-careless sort of manner. “I’m sure there’s enough worry in the present without going back to that of the past I wish that horrid mine had been sunk a thousand fathoms deep before I had had anything to do with it I daresay I shall pay you back some time!”