“Yes, yes.” he said; “I’ll send for Simon at once.”
“Good,” said Mr Bethany, and more doubtfully repeated “good.” “Now there’s only one thing left,” he went on cheerfully. “I have jotted down a few test questions here; they are questions no one on this earth could answer but you, Lawford. They are merely for external proofs. You won’t, you can’t, mistake my motive. We cannot foretell or foresee what need may arise for just such jog-trot primitive evidence. I propose that you now answer them here, in writing.”
Lawford stood up and walked to the looking-glass, and paused. He put his hand to his head, “Yes,” he said, “of course; it’s a rattling good move. I’m not quite awake; myself, I mean. I’ll do it now.” He took out a pencil case and tore another leaf from his pocket-book. “What are they?”
Mr Bethany rang the bell. Sheila herself answered it. She stood on the threshold and looked across through a shaft of autumnal sunshine at her husband, and her husband with a quiet strange smile looked across through the sunshine at his wife. Mr Bethany waited in vain.
“I am just going to put the arch-impostor through his credentials,” he said tartly. “Now then, Lawford!” He read out the questions, one by one, from his crafty little list, pursing his lips between each; and one by one, Lawford, seated at the dressing-table, fluently scribbled his answers. Then question and answer were rigorously compared by Mr Bethany, with small white head bent close and spectacles poised upon the powerful nose, and signed and dated, and passed to Mrs Lawford without a word.
Mrs Lawford read question and answer where she stood, in complete silence. She looked up. “Many of these questions I don’t know the answers to myself,” she said.
“It is immaterial,” said Mr Bethany.
“One answer is—is inaccurate. “Yes, yes, quite so: due to a mistake in a letter from myself.”
Mrs Lawford read quietly on, folded the papers, and held them out between finger and thumb. ‘the—handwriting...” she remarked very softly.
“Wonderful, isn’t it?” said Mr Bethany warmly; “all the general look and run of the thing different, but every real essential feature unchanged. Now into the envelope. And now a little wax?”
Mrs Lawford stood waiting. ‘there’s a green piece of sealing-wax,” almost drawled the quiet voice, “in the top right drawer of the nest in the study, which old James gave me the Christmas before last.” He glanced with lowered eyelids at his wife’s flushed cheek. Their eyes met.
“Thank you,” she said.
When she returned the vicar was sitting in a chair, leaning his chin on the knobbed handle of his umbrella. He rose and lit a taper for her with a match from a little green pot on the table. And Mrs Lawford, with trembling fingers, sealed the letter, as he directed, with his own seal.
“There!” he said triumphantly, “how many more such brilliant lawyers, I wonder, lie dormant in the Church? And who shall keep this?... Why, all three, of course.” He went on without pausing. “Some little drawer now, secret and undetectable, with a lock.” Just such a little drawer that locked itself with a spring lay by chance in the looking-glass. There the letter was hidden. And Mr Bethany looked at his watch. “Nineteen minutes,” he said. ‘the next thing, my dear child—we’re getting on swimmingly—and it’s astonishing how things are simplified by mere use—the next thing is to send for Simon.”
Sheila took a deep breath, but did not look up. “I am entirely in your hands,” she replied.
“So be it,” said he crisply. “Get to bed, Lawford; it’s better so. And I’ll look in on my way back from Witchett. I came, my dear fellow, in gloomy disturbance of mind. It was getting up too early; it fogs old brains. Goodbye, goodbye.”
He squeezed Lawford’s hand. Then, with umbrella under his arm, his hat on his head, his spectacles readjusted, he hurried out of the room. Mrs Lawford followed him. For a few minutes Lawford sat motionless, with head bent a little, and eyes restlessly scanning the door. Then he rose abruptly, and in a quarter of an hour was in bed, alone with his slow thoughts: while a basin of cornflour stood untasted on a little table at his bedside, and a cheerful fire burned in the best visitors” room’s tiny grate.
At half-past eleven Dr Simon entered this soundless seclusion. He sat down beside Lawford, and took temperature and pulse. Then he half closed his lids, and scanned his patient out of an unusually dark, un-English face, with straight black hair, and listened attentively to his rather incoherent story. It was a story very much modified and rounded off. Nor did Lawford draw Dr Simon’s attention to the portrait now smiling conventionally above their heads from the wall over the fireplace.
“It was rather bleak—the wind; and, I think, perhaps, I had had a touch of influenza. It was a silly thing to do. But still, Dr Simon, one doesn’t expect—well, there, I don’t feel the same man—physically. I really cannot explain how great a change has taken place. And yet I feel perfectly fit in myself. And if it were not for—for being laughed at, go back to town, today. Why my wife scarcely recognised me.”
Dr Simon continued his scrutiny. Try as he would, Lawford could not raise his downcast eyes to meet direct the doctor’s polite attention.
“And what,” said Dr Simon, “what precisely is the nature of the change? Have you any pain?”
“No, not the least pain,” said Lawford; “I think, perhaps, or rather my face is a little shrunken—and yet lengthened; at least it feels so; and a faint twinge of rheumatism. But my hair—well, I don’t know; it’s difficult to say one’s self.” He could get on so very much better, he thought, if only his mind would be at peace and these preposterous promptings and voices were still.
Dr Simon faced the window, and drew his hand softly over his head. “We never can be too cautious at a certain age, and especially after influenza,” he said. “It undermines the whole system, and in particular the nervous system; leaving the mind the prey of the most melancholy fancies. I should astound you, Mr Lawford, with the devil influenza plays.... A slight nervous shock and a chill; quite slight, I hope. A few days” rest and plenty of nourishment. There’s nothing; temperature inconsiderable. All perfectly intelligible. Most certainly reassure yourself! And as for the change you speak of”—he looked steadily at the dark face on the pillow and smiled amiably—”I don’t think we need worry much about that. It certainly was a bleak wind yesterday—and a cemetery, my dear sir! It was indiscreet—yes, very.” He held out his hand. “You must not be alarmed,” he said, very distinctly with the merest trace of an accent; “air, sunshine, quiet, nourishment; sleep—that is all. The little window might be a few inches open, and—and any light reading.”
He opened the door and joined Mrs Lawford on the staircase. He talked to her quietly over his shoulder all the way downstairs. “It was, it was sporting with Providence—a wind, believe me, nearly due east, in spite of the warm sunshine.”
“But the change—the change!” Mrs Lawford managed to murmur tragically, as he strode to the door. Dr Simon smiled, and gracefully tapped his forehead with a red-gloved forefinger.
“Humour him, humour him,” he repeated indulgently. ‘rest and quiet will soon put that little trouble out of his head. Oh yes, I did notice it—the set drawn look, and the droop: quite so. Good morning.”
Mrs Lawford gently closed the door after him. A glimpse of Ada, crossing from room to room, suggested a precaution. She called out in her clearest notes. “If Dr Ferguson should call while I am out, Ada, will you please tell him that Dr Simon regretted that he was unable to wait? Thank you.” She paused with hand on the balusters, then slowly ascended the stairs. Her husband’s face was turned to the ceiling, his hands clasped above his head. She took up her stand by the fireplace, resting one silk-slippered foot on the fender. “Dr Simon is reassuring,” she said, “but I do hope, Arthur, you will follow his advice. He looks a fairly clever man.... But with a big practice.... Do you think, dear, he quite realised the extent of the—the change?”
“I told him what happened,”
said her husband’s voice out of the bed-clothes.
“Yes, yes, I know,” said Sheila soothingly; “but we must remember he is comparatively a stranger. He would not detect—”
“What did he tell you?” asked the voice.
Mrs Lawford deliberately considered. If only he would always thus keep his face concealed, how much easier it would be to discuss matters rationally. “You see, dear,” she said softly, “I know, of course, nothing about the nerves; but personally, I think his suggestion absurd. No mere fancy, surely, can make a lasting alteration in one’s face. And your hair—I don’t want to say anything that may seem unkind—but isn’t it really quite a distinct shade darker, Arthur?”
“Any great strain will change the colour of a man’s hair,” said Lawford stolidly; “at any rate, to white. Why, I read once of a fellow in India, a Hindu, or something, who—”
“But have you HAD any intense strain, or anxiety?” broke in Sheila. “You might, at least, have confided in me; that is, unless—But there, don’t you think really, Arthur, it would be much more satisfactory in every way if we had further advice at once? Alice will be home next week. Tomorrow is the Harvest Festival, and next week, of course, the Dedication; and, in any case, the Bazaar is out of the question. They will have to find another stall-holder. We must do our utmost to avoid comment or scandal. Every minute must help to—to fix a thing like that. I own even now I cannot realise what this awful calamity means. It’s useless to brood on it. We must, as the poor dear old vicar said only last night, keep our heads clear. But I am sure Dr Simon was under a misapprehension. If, now, it was explained to him, a little more fully, Arthur—a photograph. Oh, anything on earth but this dreadful wearing uncertainty and suspense! Besides ...is Simon quite an English name?”
Lawford drew further into his pillow. “Do as you think best, Sheila,” he said. “For my own part, I believe it may be as he suggests—partly an illusion, a touch of nervous breakdown. It simply can’t be as bad as I think it is. If it were, you would not be here talking like this; and Bethany wouldn’t have believed a word I said. Whatever it is, it’s no good crying it on the housetops. Give me time, just time. Besides, how do we know what he really thought? Doctors don’t tell their patients everything. Give the poor chap a chance, and more so if he is a foreigner. He’s”—his voice sank almost to a whisper—”he’s no darker than this. And do, please, Sheila, take this infernal stuff away, and let me have something solid. I’m not ill—in that way. All I want is peace and quiet, time to think. Let me fight it out alone. It’s been sprung on me. The worst’s not over. But I’ll win through; wait! And if not—well, you shall not suffer, Sheila. Don’t be afraid. There are other ways out.”
Sheila broke down. “Anyone would think to hear you talk, that I was perfectly heartless. I told Ada to be most careful about the cornflour. And as for other ways out, it’s a positively wicked thing to say to me when I’m nearly distracted with trouble and anxiety. What motive could you have had for loitering in an old cemetery? And in an east wind! It’s useless for me to remain here, Arthur, to be accused of every horrible thing that comes into a morbid imagination. I will leave you, as you suggest, in peace.”
“One moment, Sheila,” answered the muffled voice. “I have accused you of nothing. If you knew all; if you could read my thoughts, you would be surprised, perhaps, at my—But never mind that. On the other hand, I really do think it would be better for the present to discuss the thing no more. Today is Friday. Give this miserable face a week. Talk it over with Bethany if you like. But I forbid”—he struggled up in bed, sallow and sinister—”I flatly forbid, please understand, any other interference till then. Afterwards you must do exactly as you please. Send round the Town Crier! But till then, silence!”
Sheila with raised head confronted him. ‘this, then, is your gratitude. So be it. Silence, no doubt! Until it’s too late to take action. Until you have wormed your way in, and think you are safe. To have believed! Where is my husband? that is what I am asking you now. When and how you have learned his secrets God only knows, and your conscience! But he always was a simpleton at heart. I warn you, then. Until next Thursday I consent to say nothing provided you remain quiet; make no disturbance, no scandal here. The servants and all who inquire shall simply be told that my husband is confined to his room with—with a nervous breakdown, as you have yourself so glibly suggested. I am at your mercy, I own it. The vicar believes your preposterous story—with his spectacles off. You would convince anybody with the wicked cunning with which you have cajoled and wheedled him, with which you have deceived and fooled a foreign doctor. But you will not convince me. You will not convince Alice. I have friends in the world, though you may not be aware of it, who will not be quite so apt to believe any cock-and-bull story you may see fit to invent. That is all I have to say. Tonight I tell the vicar all that I have just told you. And from this moment, please, we are strangers. I shall come into the room no more than necessity dictates. On Friday we resume our real parts. My husband—Arthur—to—to connive at... Phh!”
Rage had transfigured her. She scarcely heard her own words. They poured out senselessly, monotonously, one calling up another, as if from the lips of a Cassandra. Lawford sank back into bed, clutching the sheets with both lean hands. He took a deep breath and shut his mouth.
“It reminds me, Sheila,” he began arduously, “of our first quarrel before we were married, the evening after your aunt Rose died at Llandudno—do you remember? You threw open the window, and I think—I saved your life.” A pause followed. Then a queer, almost inarticulate voice added, “At least, I am afraid so.”
A cold and awful quietness fell on Sheila’s heart. She stared fixedly at the tuft of dark hair, the only visible sign of her husband, on the pillow. Then, taking up the basin of cold cornflour, she left the room. In a quarter of an hour she reappeared carrying a tray, with ham and eggs and coffee and honey invitingly displayed. She laid it down.
“There is only one other question,” she said, with perfect composure—“That of money. Your signature as it appears on the—the document drawn up this morning, would, of course, be quite useless on a cheque. I have taken all the money I could find; it is in safety. You may, however, conceivably be in need of some yourself; here is five pounds. I have my own cheque-book, and shall therefore have no need to consider the question again for—for the present. So far as you are concerned, I shall be guided solely by Mr Bethany. He will, I do not doubt, take full responsibility.”
“And may the Lord have mercy on my soul!” uttered a stifled, unfamiliar voice from the bed. Mrs Lawford stooped. “Arthur!” she cried faintly, “Arthur!”
Lawford raised himself on his elbow with a sigh that was very near to being a sob. “Oh, Sheila, if you’d only be your real self! What is the use of all this pretence? Just consider MY position a little. The fear and horror are not all on your side. You called me Arthur even then. I’d willingly do anything you wish to save you pain; you know that. Can’t we be friends even in this—this ghastly—Won’t you, Sheila?”
Mrs Lawford drew back, struggling with a doubtful heart.
“I think,” she said, `it would be better not to discuss that now.”
The rest of the morning Lawford remained in solitude.
CHAPTER SIX
There were three books in the room—Jeremy Taylor’s “Holy Living and Dying,” a volume of the Quiver, and a little gilded book on wildflowers. He read in vain. He lay and listened to the uproar of his thoughts on which an occasional sound—the droning of a fly, the cry of a milkman, the noise of a passing van—obtruded from the workaday world. The pale gold sunlight edged softly over the bed. He ate up everything on his tray. He even, on the shoals of nightmare, dreamed awhile. But by and by as the hours wheeled slowly on he grew less calm, less strenuously resolved on lying there inactive. Every sparrow that twittered cried reveille through his brain. He longed with an ardour strange to his temperament to be up and doing.
What if his
misfortune was, as he had in the excitement of the moment suggested to Sheila, only a morbid delusion of mind; shared too in part by sheer force of his absurd confession? Even if he was going mad, who knows how peaceful a release that might not be? Could his shrewd old vicar have implicitly believed in him if the change were as complete as he supposed it? He flung off the bedclothes and locked the door. He dressed himself, noticing, he fancied, with a deadly revulsion of feeling, that his coat was a little too short in the sleeves, his waistcoat too loose. In the midst of his dressing came Sheila bringing his luncheon. “I’m sorry,” he called out, stooping quickly beside the bed, “I can’t talk now. Please put the tray down.”
About half an hour afterwards he heard the outer door close, and peeping from behind the curtains saw his wife go out. All was drowsily quiet in the house. He devoured his lunch like a schoolboy. That finished to the last crumb, without a moment’s delay he covered his face with a towel, locked the door behind him, put the key in his pocket, and ran lightly downstairs. He stuffed the towel into an ulster pocket, put on a soft, wide-brimmed hat, and noiselessly let himself out. Then he turned with an almost hysterical delight and ran—ran like the wind, without pausing, without thinking, straight on, up one turning, down another, until he reached a broad open common, thickly wooded, sprinkled with gorse and hazel and may, and faintly purple with fading heather. There he flung himself down in the beautiful sunlight, among the yellowing bracken, to recover his breath.
He lay there for many minutes, thinking almost with composure. Flight, it seemed, had for the moment quietened the demands of that other feebly struggling personality which was beginning to insinuate itself into his consciousness, which had so miraculously broken in and taken possession of his body. He would not think now. All he needed was a little quiet and patience before he threw off for good and all his right to be free, to be his own master, to call himself sane.
The Altar of the Dead And Other Morbid Tales Page 19