The Statement of Stella Maberly, and An Evil Spirit

by F. Anstey

  I gave the good lady to understand that I knew nothing and wished to know nothing, and that Evelyn was surely capable of managing her own affairs.

  ‘I’m afraid you are getting to live far too much in a world of your own, my dear,’ she retorted, with a slightly ruffled air. ‘I thought you would take more interest in what concerns her happiness. But perhaps you don’t feel at liberty to repeat confidences, and no doubt you are right, though I have some claim to be told, I consider, and you can certainly depend upon my discretion!’

  She paused invitingly, but I saw no reason to gratify her curiosity, particularly as I knew no more than she did, and remained silent. ‘Ah, well,’ she continued, ‘I certainly expected it would all have been settled long before this, but it’s only a question of time after all. If she meant to refuse him she would not let him be so much with her as he is; she is far too conscientious for that.’

  But as the time went on and nothing happened, I felt a growing dread of the day when the blow should fall. Even this uncertainty had its compensations—I could still indulge in faint delusive hopes. But when I knew that all was over, that they were definitely engaged, when I should have to witness their ecstasies, to sympathise, congratulate, when I found myself condemned to loneliness and dependence again, without even the excitement of occasional contact with him—how could I bear it, how could I live through it?’

  And then the thought came to me: Why should I live through it? Why not escape from it all as soon as the misery became past all bearing?

  They would not miss me at home; Evelyn might be a little sorry at first, but not for long. He would not care. And I should have done with suffering and be at rest.

  I found a medical work in the library which treated of poisons, and this I studied carefully, for I had decided on this means of ending my life, and I wanted to find some drug that would act painlessly, and not leave me hideous after death. I chose chloral,3 as the easiest to procure and the most likely to give the impression of an accidental overdose rather than deliberate suicide, so that I could go out of life carrying my secret with me.

  It was not difficult to induce the chemist in the nearest market town to let me have enough for my purpose. I had dealt there before, and he was satisfied with entering my name and address, and mildly cautioning me against the danger of fighting insomnia (I told him I was suffering from sleeplessness), with so treacherous an ally.

  So, now that I had the means at hand of procuring my own release whenever I chose, I felt calmer and more resigned.

  One afternoon I was sitting in my room, absently wondering, as I fingered the fluted blue phial on my dressing-table, how long it would be before I broke the seal, and whether it was possible that I should repent as I felt the first approach of the sleep which would be my last, when I was startled by finding that Mrs Maitland had entered by the door, which I fancied I had locked.

  ‘I’m afraid I disturbed you, my dear,’ she began. ‘But I knocked three times, and as you didn’t answer, I ventured to peep in, for you have been so unlike yourself lately that I really feel quite anxious about you. . . . Why,’ she broke off, as her eyes caught the phial, which I had not had presence of mind enough to hide in time, ‘surely that bottle is labelled “poison.” Now, what can you possibly want with such a thing?’

  I laughed. ‘Don’t be alarmed,’ I said, ‘it’s only a very ordinary sleeping draught. They’re obliged to label it like this, but, as a matter-of-fact, it’s perfectly harmless, so long as the proper dose is not exceeded. I got it because I’ve been afraid lately that I was in for a bad attack of neuralgia, and I thought I’d have a remedy at hand.’

  ‘Neuralgia is a dreadful thing, I know,’ she said, taking up the bottle and examining it. ‘Ah, I see it tells you here how many drops to take—only I do hope you’ll be very careful, my dear, and not take more than is safe—one hears of so many accidents.’

  ‘If it will make your mind easier,’ I said, ‘I’ll promise to take no more than is necessary, if I am ever reduced to taking it at all.’

  ‘Thank you, my dear. So long as you keep to that and don’t let yourself get dependent on it, I daresay—but I came up to tell you something, and I declare this has driven it quite out of my mind. Now, was it?’

  I was naturally unable to supply the answer, and I daresay I looked as if I could see no reason why she should have invaded me at all in this unceremonious way.

  ‘I remember now,’ she said, ‘of course—how stupid of me to forget! Mr Dallas is here again, and though, goodness knows, I was never an eavesdropper, I really couldn’t help overhearing part of what he was saying to Evelyn just now, and from what I could make out, there is a hitch, and in some way it depends on you, my dear Miss Maberly, to put it right. It seems she has got it into her head that you disapprove of him—which, of course, is nonsense—and he was urging her to let him have an opportunity of seeing you, and I think she is willing to accept him if only he can succeed in getting you on his side—though why, as she is evidently fond of him, she should let anyone else—even you, my dear—dictate her answer to her, I don’t know! But there it is, and though I’m sure that you see as well as I do myself what a thousand pities it would be if such a perfectly suitable match were broken off for some fanciful scruple, and I know you will make dear Evelyn understand how mistaken she is in thinking you could be opposed to anything so obviously for her happiness, I thought I had better give you just a hint how matters stand. And, now I’ve done it, I’ll go away and not worry you any longer, for I see you’re thinking me a tiresome old woman.’

  She fussed out of the room, highly satisfied, I have no doubt, with her own consummate diplomacy, and I was left to think over what she had told me.

  Part of it I had already guessed for myself, but it had never occurred to me that Evelyn would actually leave it to me of all people to decide what her answer should be. Such self-­abnegation was unnatural, it could not be sincere; she had made up her mind to accept him long since, but she wanted to gain my formal approval to satisfy her own conscience, and she felt confident that I could not well refuse it.

  And she had allowed him to plead to me—the man who would lacerate my heart by every word that showed how ardently he loved her! Could she really be so selfishly blind? After all, she was a woman; she ought to have—she must have read me better, in spite of myself, than to have no suspicion that it was not dislike which had made me shun him as I had. She had too much insight not to see, if she had cared to see, the cruelty of forcing me to figure like this in her triumph.

  Still, I would go through this final ordeal; the fierce indignation I felt against both of them would give me strength to play my part to the end without faltering or betraying myself. He was there in the house now; if I chose to go downstairs I might get this interview over; I had never been alone with him yet. I felt a kind of eagerness for the exquisite suffering of hearing the avowal of his love for Evelyn from his own lips—death would be all the easier afterwards.

  And so—though he would not notice whether I was looking ill or well—I hastily bathed my hot eyes and re-arranged my disordered hair, and feeling defiantly sure of myself, I went down to the drawing-room, where I knew he and Evelyn would probably be.

  IV

  As I expected, I found them together in the drawing-room, Hugh Dallas seated in the window-bay, and Evelyn at some distance from him. His troubled, despondent look was certainly not that of an accepted lover, and there was an air of constraint and consciousness in them both as I entered, from which I guessed that the conversation I had interrupted was chiefly about myself.

  We talked for a while in a rather perfunctory manner, and I think that I was the most self-possessed of the three, and succeeded perfectly in hiding my torment of jealousy and suspense behind the mask of indifference that I had schooled myself to wear in his company. At last Evelyn made some pretext for quitting the room, and as she did so I saw the glance of secret encouragement she threw him.

  We were alone
together, he and I, for the first time since we had met, and I could hear the beating of my heart, even above the patter of the fountain on the lawn outside, in the silence. I watched him covertly as he sat there moodily pulling about some flowers in a vase which stood on the window-sill. I knew he was nerving himself to make an appeal to me. I knew, or thought I knew, what that appeal would be and suddenly I felt that I could not trust myself to listen to it. I had overrated my courage, and the one thing I desired now was to escape before the words were spoken. I had already risen with some incoherent excuse for joining Evelyn, when he stopped me with a mastery I felt powerless to defy.

  ‘You will not go to Evelyn yet,’ he said. ‘I have something to say to you first, and you must hear it, Miss Maberly. Surely you will not refuse me so small a thing as that?’

  There was a suppressed passion in his tone that thrilled me; for the moment I could almost have believed that it was I whose love he was seeking and even though I knew how cruelly fleeting such an illusion would prove, I surrendered myself to it.

  ‘I will hear anything you wish to say to me,’ I said.

  ‘I want to know first,’ he said, ‘why you persist in looking upon me as an enemy?’

  ‘Have I given you any reason for supposing so?’ I asked. ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Any reason?’ he repeated. ‘Have you ever condescended to be commonly civil to me? Would you speak to, or look at me? Would you be here in the same room with me, if you could help yourself? Do you suppose I am too dense to see that? Perhaps enemy is too strong a word; you may not think me sufficiently important to deserve even such a title as that, but you have taken very little trouble to hide the fact that you dislike me about as thoroughly as one human being can dislike another. You will not deny that?’

  At least I had kept my wretched secret from him! It was some comfort even then.

  ‘And if I do not deny it,’ I said, ‘what then?’

  ‘I have the right to ask what I have done to deserve it—and I do ask.’

  ‘I can give you no answer. Except that liking and disliking are sentiments beyond one’s control.’

  ‘Justice ought not to be at all events,’ he retorted. ‘Can you not be just to me? I don’t claim to be a better sort of fellow than my neighbours, but I can honestly say that there is nothing in my life which makes me unworthy of any woman’s friendship.’

  Ah! I did not need to be told that—though he might have been the worst of men, and I should have loved him just the same. It was hard to see him standing there, pleading with me to lay aside what he supposed to be a rooted antipathy, and not to undeceive him by some mad words which would force him to understand my real feelings.

  ‘Why should you wish to gain my friendship?’ I said. ‘It can make no difference to you whether you have it or not.’

  ‘It makes this difference,’ he said, ‘that, unless I have it, I must keep away from Tansted for the future.’

  ‘And you think Evelyn would be willing that you should go?’ I said incredulously.

  ‘She would be sorry, of course, but you must know that you have the first place in her heart. It distresses her too much to see, as she cannot help seeing, that my presence here is distasteful to you, that for some reason or other it has brought about a change in your feelings for her.’

  ‘So she has sent you to me to try whether you cannot overcome my—my prejudices. Is that what I am to understand?’

  ‘She thought that if I spoke to you and could get you to tell me plainly what you have against me, I might possibly succeed in showing you that you have judged me too harshly,’ he replied. ‘Look here, Miss Maberly, why can’t you bring yourself to think of me as, at all events, a possible friend? Why do you wish to drive me away from Tansted altogether?’

  ‘I shall not drive you away,’ I said; ‘it is I who will leave Tansted, and then you will be able to come here as before.’

  ‘As if Evelyn or I would permit that. If you really detest me so much that, rather than endure the sight of me, you would separate yourself from such a friend as Evelyn, there is no more to be said. I must go away, give up all hope of happiness here. Is that what you wish? It rests with you.’

  ‘It does not rest with me!’ I said angrily. ‘I will not have the responsibility thrust on me. And it is all so hollow and insincere. If Evelyn wishes to keep you she will—whether I approve or disapprove. It is a mockery to leave it to me like this.’

  ‘I have already told you that Evelyn’s first consideration is your happiness and peace of mind,’ he said. ‘I am bound to respect her feelings in the matter, to say nothing of yours. So I ask you once more whether I am to go or stay.’

  ‘What is it to me which you do?’ I cried wildly. ‘Do I not know that, whatever I say, it will make no difference. Evelyn will be willing enough to make you happy when I am once out of the way. Why should you not marry when you are so plainly intended for one another? And I shall not care—do you understand that? I am utterly indifferent. Why should it matter to me, so long as I never see you again? There, I have given you your answer—now let me go.’

  ‘Yes, I have had my answer,’ he said. ‘I hoped it would have been a kinder one; but I suppose I had no right to expect anything else from you. Our interview,’ he added grimly, as he held open the door for me, ‘has not been such a pleasant one that I should wish to prolong it. Good-bye, Miss Maberly, you need not be afraid of any further persecution from me. You have shown me plainly enough that your decision is final.’

  I passed out without venturing to look at him, and went up to my own room. I felt relieved, elated, at having triumphed over my own weakness. I had met him face to face and without faltering; he would never suspect now my real feelings towards him. I could almost believe that I really had ceased to care—or how came it that my suicidal intentions of an hour or so ago seemed only cowardly and sentimental.

  I had courage to go on living now, if only to see how Evelyn would act when she found that I could not be cajoled into sanctioning her desertion of me, and how long it would be before her pretended scruples were thrown to the winds.

  We did not meet again till dinner, when, although we were obliged to keep up some sort of conversation on indifferent topics, I could tell by her troubled expression that Hugh Dallas had informed her before leaving of the result of his appeal.

  1 evaded our usual after-dinner stroll in the garden by pleading that I had a headache and wished to be quiet, so she and Mrs Maitland went without me. I sat in the drawing-room, in the same seat in which I had listened to him, and tried to imagine him there in the window-bay, and to live through the scene again, sentence by sentence. The butler brought in the lamps without disturbing my reverie, and the trees outside were becoming a blurred bronze against the violet evening sky, before I heard Evelyn enter the room softly.

  ‘Is your head better now, Stella?’ she said, coming up to me and laying one hand on my shoulder, ‘because—if you will let me—I want to talk to you about—about somebody.’

  I shrank involuntarily from her light touch. ‘I know what you want to say,’ I said, ‘and it will be no good—you will only waste your words!’

  ‘But you will hear me, dearest,’ she said. ‘We have been such friends till—till something came between us. Don’t harden yourself against me now. You must know how I love you! Stella, you sent Hugh away this afternoon very unhappy. It makes me miserable, too, to find that you are so bitterly prejudiced against him. I like him very dearly. Can’t you try to like him a little, for my sake? It will grieve me to have to send him away, but, if you really cannot bring yourself to tolerate him, what else can I do?’

  ‘Why do you insist on making me responsible?’ I said. ‘Except to put me in the wrong! I tell you I will have nothing to do with it. You are your own mistress—do as you choose.’

  ‘How can I choose to make you wretched and uncomfortable, Stella! This is your home as well as mine, and as long as you and I are together I want you to be happy here, as
you were at first. And though I was afraid to say anything, I have fancied lately that you are not happy with me. Was I right?’

  ‘I never am happy long anywhere,’ I said impatiently. ‘I get unsettled and restless. And I—I don’t think this place agrees with me quite. I shall have to leave you sooner or later, Evelyn; it had better be soon.’

  ‘Leave me, Stella!’ she exclaimed. ‘I hoped that nothing would ever separate you and me!’

  Did she actually imagine that I could live in the same house—with them?

  ‘Not even Hugh Dallas?’ I said sardonically.

  ‘Laleham is not so far from here—we should not be separated, even then. But you say you dislike him so. I begin to wonder, Stella, whether you are not the least bit jealous?

  I felt myself turning hot. ‘Jealous,’ I cried. ‘What do you mean, Evelyn—do you suppose—?’

  ‘Don’t be jealous any more, dear, there is no need. I do like him very much, he is so manly and honourable. I feel sure that he will make the woman he loves very happy, Stella, but still—but still, he can never be what you are to me, and if you tell me that you really cannot—’

  ‘I hate insincere talk like that, Evelyn,’ I interrupted. ‘You don’t mean it—and you know you don’t.’

  She flushed painfully. ‘You are very strange to-night, Stella,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why you should think I am not sincere. But I would rather see the two dearest friends I have liking and respecting one another, and I do want you to make an effort to overcome this antipathy so that we could all three be happy. After all, you can have no real reason for it. You have got some morbid, fanciful idea into your head about him, which I know I could convince you in a moment was unjust. Trust me, Stella. Tell me you dislike him.’

  ‘I will not be catechised like this,’ I said, writhing in impotent anger; ‘it is too humiliating! You are simply trying to exasperate me. You do understand, or if you really don’t, you might have before this—only you were too blinded by your own selfishness!’