I Say No by Wilkie Collins (page 7)

CHAPTER L.

MISS LADD ADVISES.

Mrs. Ellmother sat by the dying embers of the kitchen fire; thinking over the events of the day in perplexity and distress.

She had waited at the cottage door for a friendly word with Alban, after he had left Emily. The stern despair in his face warned her to let him go in silence. She had looked into the parlor next. Pale and cold, Emily lay on the sofa–sunk in helpless depression of body and mind. “Don’t speak to me,” she whispered; “I am quite worn out.” It was but too plain that the view of Alban’s conduct which she had already expressed, was the view to which she had adhered at the interview between them. They had parted in grief—perhaps in anger–perhaps forever. Mrs. Ellmother lifted Emily in compassionate silence, and carried her upstairs, and waited by her until she slept.

In the still hours of the night, the thoughts of the faithful old servant–dwelling for a while on past and present–advanced, by slow degrees, to consideration of the doubtful future. Measuring, to the best of her ability, the responsibility which had fallen on her, she felt that it was more than she could bear, or ought to bear, alone. To whom could she look for help?

The gentlefolks at Monksmoor were strangers to her. Doctor Allday was near at hand–but Emily had said, “Don’t send for him; he will torment me with questions–and I want to keep my mind quiet, if I can.” But one person was left, to whose ever-ready kindness Mrs. Ellmother could appeal–and that person was Miss Ladd.

It would have been easy to ask the help of the good schoolmistress in comforting and advising the favorite pupil whom she loved. But Mrs. Ellmother had another object in view: she was determined that the cold-blooded cruelty of Emily’s treacherous friend should not be allowed to triumph with impunity. If an ignorant old woman could do nothing else, she could tell the plain truth, and could leave Miss Ladd to decide whether such a person as Francine deserved to remain under her care.

To feel justified in taking this step was one thing: to put it all clearly in writing was another. After vainly making the attempt overnight, Mrs. Ellmother tore up her letter, and communicated with Miss Ladd by means of a telegraphic message, in the morning. “Miss Emily is in great distress. I must not leave her. I have something besides to say to you which cannot be put into a letter. Will you please come to us?”

Later in the forenoon, Mrs. Ellmother was called to the door by the arrival of a visitor. The personal appearance of the stranger impressed her favorably. He was a handsome little gentleman; his manners were winning, and his voice was singularly pleasant to hear.

“I have come from Mr. Wyvil’s house in the country,” he said; “and I bring a letter from his daughter. May I take the opportunity of asking if Miss Emily is well?”

“Far from it, sir, I am sorry to say. She is so poorly that she keeps her bed.”

At this reply, the visitor’s face revealed such sincere sympathy and regret, that Mrs. Ellmo ther was interested in him: she added a word more. “My mistress has had a hard trial to bear, sir. I hope there is no bad news for her in the young lady’s letter?”

“On the contrary, there is news that she will be glad to hear–Miss Wyvil is coming here this evening. Will you excuse my asking if Miss Emily has had medical advice?”

“She won’t hear of seeing the doctor, sir. He’s a good friend of hers–and he lives close by. I am unfortunately alone in the house. If I could leave her, I would go at once and ask his advice.”

“Let _me_ go!” Mirabel eagerly proposed.

Mrs. Ellmother’s face brightened. “That’s kindly thought of, sir–if you don’t mind the trouble.”

“My good lady, nothing is a trouble in your young mistress’s service. Give me the doctor’s name and address–and tell me what to say to him.”

“There’s one thing you must be careful of,” Mrs. Ellmother answered. “He mustn’t come here, as if he had been sent for–she would refuse to see him.”

Mirabel understood her. “I will not forget to caution him. Kindly tell Miss Emily I called–my name is Mirabel. I will return to-morrow.”

He hastened away on his errand–only to find that he had arrived too late. Doctor Allday had left London; called away to a serious case of illness. He was not expected to get back until late in the afternoon. Mirabel left a message, saying that he would return in the evening.

The next visitor who arrived at the cottage was the trusty friend, in whose generous nature Mrs. Ellmother had wisely placed confidence. Miss Ladd had resolved to answer the telegram in person, the moment she read it.

“If there is bad news,” she said, “let me hear it at once. I am not well enough to bear suspense; my busy life at the school is beginning to tell on me.”

“There is nothing that need alarm you, ma’am–but there is a great deal to say, before you see Miss Emily. My stupid head turns giddy with thinking of it. I hardly know where to begin.”

“Begin with Emily,” Miss Ladd suggested.

Mrs. Ellmother took the advice. She described Emily’s unexpected arrival on the previous day; and she repeated what had passed between them afterward. Miss Ladd’s first impulse, when she had recovered her composure, was to go to Emily without waiting to hear more. Not presuming to stop her, Mrs. Ellmother ventured to put a question “Do you happen to have my telegram about you, ma’am?” Miss Ladd produced it. “Will you please look at the last part of it again?”

Miss Ladd read the words: “I have something besides to say to you which cannot be put into a letter.” She at once returned to her chair.

“Does what you have still to tell me refer to any person whom I know?” she said.

“It refers, ma’am, to Miss de Sor. I am afraid I shall distress you.”

“What did I say, when I came in?” Miss Ladd asked. “Speak out plainly; and try–it’s not easy, I know–but try to begin at the beginning.”

Mrs. Ellmother looked back through her memory of past events, and began by alluding to the feeling of curiosity which she had excited in Francine, on the day when Emily had made them known to one another. From this she advanced to the narrative of what had taken place at Netherwoods–to the atrocious attempt to frighten her by means of the image of wax–to the discovery made by Francine in the garden at night–and to the circumstances under which that discovery had been communicated to Emily.

Miss Ladd’s face reddened with indignation. “Are you sure of all that you have said?” she asked.

“I am quite sure, ma’am. I hope I have not done wrong,” Mrs. Ellmother added simply, “in telling you all this?”

“Wrong?” Miss Ladd repeated warmly. “If that wretched girl has no defense to offer, she is a disgrace to my school–and I owe you a debt of gratitude for showing her to me in her true character. She shall return at once to Netherwoods; and she shall answer me to my entire satisfaction–or leave my house. What cruelty! what duplicity! In all my experience of girls, I have never met with the like of it. Let me go to my dear little Emily–and try to forget what I have heard.”

Mrs. Ellmother led the good lady to Emily’s room–and, returning to the lower part of the house, went out into the garden. The mental effort that she had made had left its result in an aching head, and in an overpowering sense of depression. “A mouthful of fresh air will revive me,” she thought.

The front garden and back garden at the cottage communicated with each other. Walking slowly round and round, Mrs. Ellmother heard footsteps on the road outside, which stopped at the gate. She looked through the grating, and discovered Alban Morris.

“Come in, sir!” she said, rejoiced to see him. He obeyed in silence. The full view of his face shocked Mrs. Ellmother. Never in her experience of the friend who had been so kind to her at Netherwoods, had he looked so old and so haggard as he looked now. “Oh, Mr. Alban, I see how she has distressed you! Don’t take her at her word. Keep a good heart, sir–young girls are never long together of the same mind.”

Alban gave her his hand. “I mustn’t speak about it,” he said. “Silence helps me to bear my misfortune as becomes a man. I have had some hard blows in my time: they don’t seem to have blunted my sense of feeling as I thought they had. Thank God, she doesn’t know how she has made me suffer! I want to ask her pardon for having forgotten myself yesterday. I spoke roughly to her, at one time. No: I won’t intrude on her; I have said I am sorry, in writing. Do you mind giving it to her? Good-by–and thank you. I mustn’t stay longer; Miss Ladd expects me at Netherwoods.”

“Miss Ladd is in the house, sir, at this moment.”

“Here, in London!”

“Upstairs, with Miss Emily.”

“Upstairs? Is Emily ill?”

“She is getting better, sir. Would you like to see Miss Ladd?”

“I should indeed! I have something to say to her–and time is of importance to me. May I wait in the garden?”

“Why not in the parlor, sir?”

“The parlor reminds me of happier days. In time, I may have courage enough to look at the room again. Not now.”

“If she doesn’t make it up with that good man,” Mrs. Ellmother thought, on her way back to the house, “my nurse-child is what I have never believed her to be yet–she’s a fool.”

In half an hour more, Miss Ladd joined Alban on the little plot of grass behind the cottage. “I bring Emily’s reply to your letter,” she said. “Read it, before you speak to me.”

Alban read it: “Don’t suppose you have offended me–and be assured that I feel gratefully the tone in which your note is written. I try to write forbearingly on my side; I wish I could write acceptably as well. It is not to be done. I am as unable as ever to enter into your motives. You are not my relation; you were under no obligation of secrecy: you heard me speak ignorantly of the murder of my father, as if it had been the murder of a stranger; and yet you kept me–deliberately, cruelly kept me–deceived! The remembrance of it burns me like fire. I cannot–oh, Alban, I cannot restore you to the place in my estimation which you have lost! If you wish to help me to bear my trouble, I entreat you not to write to me again.”

Alban offered the letter silently to Miss Ladd. She signed to him to keep it.

“I know what Emily has written,” she said; “and I have told her, what I now tell you–she is wrong; in every way, wrong. It is the misfortune of her impetuous nature that she rushes to conclusions–and those conclusions once formed, she holds to them with all the strength of her character. In this matter, she has looked at her side of the question exclusively; she is blind to your side.”

“Not willfully!” Alban interposed.

Miss Ladd looked at him with admiration. “You defend Emily?” she said.

“I love her,” Alban answered.

Miss Ladd felt for him, as Mrs. Ellmother had felt for him. “Trust to time, Mr. Morris,” she resumed. “The danger to be afraid of is–the danger of some headlong action, on her part, in the interval. Who can say what the end may be, if she persists in her present way of thinking? There is something monstrous, in a young girl declaring that it is _her_ duty to pursue a murderer, and to bring him to justice! Don’t you see it yourself?”

A lban still defended Emily. “It seems to me to be a natural impulse,” he said–“natural, and noble.”

“Noble!” Miss Ladd exclaimed.

“Yes–for it grows out of the love which has not died with her father’s death.”

“Then you encourage her?”

“With my whole heart–if she would give me the opportunity!”

“We won’t pursue the subject, Mr. Morris. I am told by Mrs. Ellmother that you have something to say to me. What is it?”

“I have to ask you,” Alban replied, “to let me resign my situation at Netherwoods.”

Miss Ladd was not only surprised; she was also–a very rare thing with her–inclined to be suspicious. After what he had said to Emily, it occurred to her that Alban might be meditating some desperate project, with the hope of recovering his lost place in her favor.

“Have you heard of some better employment?” she asked.

“I have heard of no employment. My mind is not in a state to give the necessary attention to my pupils.”

“Is that your only reason for wishing to leave me?”

“It is one of my reasons.”

“The only one which you think it necessary to mention?”

“Yes.”

“I shall be sorry to lose you, Mr. Morris.”

“Believe me, Miss Ladd, I am not ungrateful for your kindness.”

“Will you let me, in all kindness, say something more?” Miss Ladd answered. “I don’t intrude on your secrets–I only hope that you have no rash project in view.”

“I don’t understand you, Miss Ladd.”

“Yes, Mr. Morris–you do.”

She shook hands with him–and went back to Emily.

CHAPTER LI.

THE DOCTOR SEES.

Alban returned to Netherwoods–to continue his services, until another master could be found to take his place.

By a later train Miss Ladd followed him. Emily was too well aware of the importance of the mistress’s presence to the well-being of the school, to permit her to remain at the cottage. It was understood that they were to correspond, and that Emily’s room was waiting for her at Netherwoods, whenever she felt inclined to occupy it

Mrs. Ellmother made the tea, that evening, earlier than usual. Being alone again with Emily, it struck her that she might take advantage of her position to say a word in Alban’s favor. She had chosen her time unfortunately. The moment she pronounced the name, Emily checked her by a look, and spoke of another person–that person being Miss Jethro.

Mrs. Ellmother at once entered her protest, in her own downright way. “Whatever you do,” she said, “don’t go back to that! What does Miss Jethro matter to you?”

“I am more interested in her than you suppose–I happen to know why she left the school.”

“Begging your pardon, miss, that’s quite impossible!”

“She left the school,” Emily persisted, “for a serious reason. Miss Ladd discovered that she had used false references.”

“Good Lord! who told you that?”

“You see I know it. I asked Miss Ladd how she got her information. She was bound by a promise never to mention the person’s name. I didn’t say it to her–but I may say it to you. I am afraid I have an idea of who the person was.”

“No,” Mrs. Ellmother obstinately asserted, “you can’t possibly know who it was! How should you know?”

“Do you wish me to repeat what I heard in that room opposite, when my aunt was dying?”

“Drop it, Miss Emily! For God’s sake, drop it!”

“I can’t drop it. It’s dreadful to me to have suspicions of my aunt–and no better reason for them than what she said in a state of delirium. Tell me, if you love me, was it her wandering fancy? or was it the truth?”

“As I hope to be saved, Miss Emily, I can only guess as you do–I don’t rightly know. My mistress trusted me half way, as it were. I’m afraid I have a rough tongue of my own sometimes. I offended her–and from that time she kept her own counsel. What she did, she did in the dark, so far as I was concerned.”

“How did you offend her?”

“I shall be obliged to speak of your father if I tell you how?”

“Speak of him.”

“_He_ was not to blame–mind that!” Mrs. Ellmother said earnestly. “If I wasn’t certain of what I say now you wouldn’t get a word out of me. Good harmless man–there’s no denying it–he _was_ in love with Miss Jethro! What’s the matter?”

Emily was thinking of her memorable conversation with the disgraced teacher on her last night at school. “Nothing” she answered. “Go on.”

“If he had not tried to keep it secret from us, “Mrs. Ellmother resumed, “your aunt might never have taken it into her head that he was entangled in a love affair of the shameful sort. I don’t deny that I helped her in her inquiries; but it was only because I felt sure from the first that the more she discovered the more certainly my master’s innocence would show itself. He used to go away and visit Miss Jethro privately. In the time when your aunt trusted me, we never could find out where. She made that discovery afterward for herself (I can’t tell you how long afterward); and she spent money in employing mean wretches to pry into Miss Jethro’s past life. She had (if you will excuse me for saying it) an old maid’s hatred of the handsome young woman, who lured your father away from home, and set up a secret (in a manner of speaking) between her brother and herself. I won’t tell you how we looked at letters and other things which he forgot to leave under lock and key. I will only say there was one bit, in a journal he kept, which made me ashamed of myself. I read it out to Miss Letitia; and I told her in so many words, not to count any more on me. No; I haven’t got a copy of the words–I can remember them without a copy. ‘Even if my religion did not forbid me to peril my soul by leading a life of sin with this woman whom I love’–that was how it began–‘the thought of my daughter would keep me pure. No conduct of mine shall ever make me unworthy of my child’s affection and respect.’ There! I’m making you cry; I won’t stay here any longer. All that I had to say has been said. Nobody but Miss Ladd knows for certain whether your aunt was innocent or guilty in the matter of Miss Jethro’s disgrace. Please to excuse me; my work’s waiting downstairs.”

From time to time, as she pursued her domestic labors, Mrs. Ellmother thought of Mirabel. Hours on hours had passed–and the doctor had not appeared. Was he too busy to spare even a few minutes of his time? Or had the handsome little gentleman, after promising so fairly, failed to perform his errand? This last doubt wronged Mirabel. He had engaged to return to the doctor’s house; and he kept his word.

Doctor Allday was at home again, and was seeing patients. Introduced in his turn, Mirabel had no reason to complain of his reception. At the same time, after he had stated the object of his visit, something odd began to show itself in the doctor’s manner.

He looked at Mirabel with an appearance of uneasy curiosity; and he contrived an excuse for altering the visitor’s position in the room, so that the light fell full on Mirabel’s face.

“I fancy I must have seen you,” the doctor said, “at some former time.”

“I am ashamed to say I don’t remember it,” Mirabel answered.

“Ah, very likely I’m wrong! I’ll call on Miss Emily, sir, you may depend on it.”

Left in his consulting-room, Doctor Allday failed to ring the bell which summoned the next patient who was waiting for him. He took his diary from the table drawer, and turned to the daily entries for the past month of July.

Arriving at the fifteenth day of the month, he glanced at the first lines of writing: “A visit from a mysterious lady, calling herself Miss Jethro. Our conference led to some very unexpected results.”

No: that was not what he was in search of. He looked a little lower down: and read on regularly, from that point, as follows:

“Called on Miss Emily, in great anxiety about the discoveries which she might make among her aunt’s papers. Papers all destroyed, thank God–except the Handbill, offering a reward for discovery of the murderer, which she found in the scrap-book. Gave her back the Handbill. Emily much surprised that the wretch should have escaped, with such a careful description of him circulated everywhere. She read the description aloud to me, in her nice clear voice: ‘Supposed age between twenty-five and thirty years. A well-made man of small stature. Fai r complexion, delicate features, clear blue eyes. Hair light, and cut rather short. Clean shaven, with the exception of narrow half-whiskers’–and so on. Emily at a loss to understand how the fugitive could disguise himself. Reminded her that he could effectually disguise his head and face (with time to help him) by letting his hair grow long, and cultivating his beard. Emily not convinced, even by this self-evident view of the case. Changed the subject.”

The doctor put away his diary, and rang the bell.

“Curious,” he thought. “That dandified little clergyman has certainly reminded me of my discussion with Emily, more than two months since. Was it his flowing hair, I wonder? or his splendid beard? Good God! suppose it should turn out–?”

He was interrupted by the appearance of his patient. Other ailing people followed. Doctor Allday’s mind was professionally occupied for the rest of the evening.

CHAPTER LII.

“IF I COULD FIND A FRIEND!”

Shortly after Miss Ladd had taken her departure, a parcel arrived for Emily, bearing the name of a bookseller printed on the label. It was large, and it was heavy. “Reading enough, I should think, to last for a lifetime,” Mrs. Ellmother remarked, after carrying the parcel upstairs.

Emily called her back as she was leaving the room. “I want to caution you,” she said, “before Miss Wyvil comes. Don’t tell her–don’t tell anybody–how my father met his death. If other persons are taken into our confidence, they will talk of it. We don’t know how near to us the murderer may be. The slightest hint may put him on his guard.”

“Oh, miss, are you still thinking of that!”

“I think of nothing else.”

“Bad for your mind, Miss Emily–and bad for your body, as your looks show. I wish you would take counsel with some discreet person, before you move in this matter by yourself.”

Emily sighed wearily. “In my situation, where is the person whom I can trust?”

“You can trust the good doctor.”

“Can I? Perhaps I was wrong when I told you I wouldn’t see him. He might be of some use to me.”

Mrs. Ellmother made the most of this concession, in the fear that Emily might change her mind. “Doctor Allday may call on you tomorrow,” she said.

“Do you mean that you have sent for him?”

“Don’t be angry! I did it for the best–and Mr. Mirabel agreed with me.”

“Mr. Mirabel! What have you told Mr. Mirabel?”

“Nothing, except that you are ill. When he heard that, he proposed to go for the doctor. He will be here again to-morrow, to ask for news of your health. Will you see him?”

“I don’t know yet–I have other things to think of. Bring Miss Wyvil up here when she comes.”

“Am I to get the spare room ready for her?”

“No. She is staying with her father at the London house.”

Emily made that reply almost with an air of relief. When Cecilia arrived, it was only by an effort that she could show grateful appreciation of the sympathy of her dearest friend. When the visit came to an end, she felt an ungrateful sense of freedom: the restraint was off her mind; she could think again of the one terrible subject that had any interest for her now. Over love, over friendship, over the natural enjoyment of her young life, predominated the blighting resolution which bound her to avenge her father’s death. Her dearest remembrances of him–tender remembrances once–now burned in her (to use her own words) like fire. It was no ordinary love that had bound parent and child together in the bygone time. Emily had grown from infancy to girlhood, owing all the brightness of her life–a life without a mother, without brothers, without sisters–to her father alone. To submit to lose this beloved, this only companion, by the cruel stroke of disease was of all trials of resignation the hardest to bear. But to be severed from him by the murderous hand of a man, was more than Emily’s fervent nature could passively endure. Before the garden gate had closed on her friend she had returned to her one thought, she was breathing again her one aspiration. The books that she had ordered, with her own purpose in view–books that might supply her want of experience, and might reveal the perils which beset the course that lay before her–were unpacked and spread out on the table. Hour after hour, when the old servant believed that her mistress was in bed, she was absorbed over biographies in English and French, which related the stratagems by means of which famous policemen had captured the worst criminals of their time. From these, she turned to works of fiction, which found their chief topic of interest in dwelling on the discovery of hidden crime. The night passed, and dawn glimmered through the window–and still she opened book after book with sinking courage–and still she gained nothing but the disheartening conviction of her inability to carry out her own plans. Almost every page that she turned over revealed the immovable obstacles set in her way by her sex and her age. Could _she_ mix with the people, or visit the scenes, familiar to the experience of men (in fact and in fiction), who had traced the homicide to his hiding-place, and had marked him among his harmless fellow-creatures with the brand of Cain? No! A young girl following, or attempting to follow, that career, must reckon with insult and outrage–paying their abominable tribute to her youth and her beauty, at every turn. What proportion would the men who might respect her bear to the men who might make her the object of advances, which it was hardly possible to imagine without shuddering. She crept exhausted to her bed, the most helpless, hopeless creature on the wide surface of the earth–a girl self-devoted to the task of a man.

Careful to perform his promise to Mirabel, without delay, the doctor called on Emily early in the morning–before the hour at which he usually entered his consulting-room.

“Well? What’s the matter with the pretty young mistress?” he asked, in his most abrupt manner, when Mrs. Ellmother opened the door. “Is it love? or jealousy? or a new dress with a wrinkle in it?”

“You will hear about it, sir, from Miss Emily herself. I am forbidden to say anything.”

“But you mean to say something–for all that?”

“Don’t joke, Doctor Allday! The state of things here is a great deal too serious for joking. Make up your mind to be surprised–I say no more.”

Before the doctor could ask what this meant, Emily opened the parlor door. “Come in!” she said, impatiently.

Doctor Allday’s first greeting was strictly professional. “My dear child, I never expected this,” he began. “You are looking wretchedly ill.” He attempted to feel her pulse. She drew her hand away from him.

“It’s my mind that’s ill,” she answered. “Feeling my pulse won’t cure me of anxiety and distress. I want advice; I want help. Dear old doctor, you have always been a good friend to me–be a better friend than ever now.”

“What can I do?”

“Promise you will keep secret what I am going to say to you–and listen, pray listen patiently, till I have done.”

Doctor Allday promised, and listened. He had been, in some degree at least, prepared for a surprise–but the disclosure which now burst on him was more than his equanimity could sustain. He looked at Emily in silent dismay. She had surprised and shocked him, not only by what she said, but by what she unconsciously suggested. Was it possible that Mirabel’s personal appearance had produced on her the same impression which was present in his own mind? His first impulse, when he was composed enough to speak, urged him to put the question cautiously.

“If you happened to meet with the suspected man,” he said, “have you any means of identifying him?”

“None whatever, doctor. If you would only think it over–“

He stopped her there; convinced of the danger of encouraging her, and resolved to act on his conviction.

“I have enough to occupy me in my profession,” he said. “Ask your other friend to think it over.”

“What other friend?”

“Mr. Alban Morris.”

The moment he pronounced the name, he saw that he had touched on some painful association. “Has Mr. Morris refused to help you?” he inquired.

“I have not asked him to help me.”

“Why?”

There was no choice (with such a man
as Doctor Allday) between offending him or answering him. Emily adopted the last alternative. On this occasion she had no reason to complain of his silence.

“Your view of Mr. Morris’s conduct surprises me,” he replied–“surprises me more than I can say,” he added; remembering that he too was guilty of having kept her in ignorance of the truth, out of regard–mistaken regard, as it now seemed to be–for her peace of mind.

“Be good to me, and pass it over if I am wrong,” Emily said: “I can’t dispute with you; I can only tell you what I feel. You have always been so kind to me–may I count on your kindness still?”

Doctor Allday relapsed into silence.

“May I at least ask,” she went on, “if you know anything of persons–” She paused, discouraged by the cold expression of inquiry in the old man’s eyes as he looked at her.

“What persons?” he said.

“Persons whom I suspect.”

“Name them.”

Emily named the landlady of the inn at Zeeland: she could now place the right interpretation on Mrs. Rook’s conduct, when the locket had been put into her hand at Netherwoods. Doctor Allday answered shortly and stiffly: he had never even seen Mrs. Rook. Emily mentioned Miss Jethro next–and saw at once that she had interested him.

“What do you suspect Miss Jethro of doing?” he asked.

“I suspect her of knowing more of my father’s death than she is willing to acknowledge,” Emily replied.

The doctor’s manner altered for the better. “I agree with you,” he said frankly. “But I have some knowledge of that lady. I warn you not to waste time and trouble in trying to discover the weak side of Miss Jethro.”

“That was not my experience of her at school,” Emily rejoined. “At the same time I don’t know what may have happened since those days. I may perhaps have lost the place I once held in her regard.”

“How?”

“Through my aunt.”

“Through your aunt?”

“I hope and trust I am wrong,” Emily continued; “but I fear my aunt had something to do with Miss Jethro’s dismissal from the school–and in that case Miss Jethro may have found it out.” Her eyes, resting on the doctor, suddenly brightened. “You know something about it!” she exclaimed.

He considered a little–whether he should or should not tell her of the letter addressed by Miss Ladd to Miss Letitia, which he had found at the cottage.

“If I could satisfy you that your fears are well founded,” he asked, “would the discovery keep you away from Miss Jethro?”

“I should be ashamed to speak to her–even if we met.”

“Very well. I can tell you positively, that your aunt was the person who turned Miss Jethro out of the school. When I get home, I will send you a letter that proves it.”

Emily’s head sank on her breast. “Why do I only hear of this now?” she said.

“Because I had no reason for letting you know of it, before to-day. If I have done nothing else, I have at least succeeded in keeping you and Miss Jethro apart.”

Emily looked at him in alarm. He went on without appearing to notice that he had startled her. “I wish to God I could as easily put a stop to the mad project which you are contemplating.”

“The mad project?” Emily repeated. “Oh, Doctor Allday. Do you cruelly leave me to myself, at the time of all others, when I am most in need of your sympathy?”

That appeal moved him. He spoke more gently; he pitied, while he condemned her.

“My poor dear child, I should be cruel indeed, if I encouraged you. You are giving yourself up to an enterprise, so shockingly unsuited to a young girl like you, that I declare I contemplate it with horror. Think, I entreat you, think; and let me hear that you have yielded–not to my poor entreaties–but to your own better sense!” His voice faltered; his eyes moistened. “I shall make a fool of myself,” he burst out furiously, “if I stay here any longer. Good-by.”

He left her.

She walked to the window, and looked out at the fair morning. No one to feel for her–no one to understand her–nothing nearer that could speak to poor mortality of hope and encouragement than the bright heaven, so far away! She turned from the window. “The sun shines on the murderer,” she thought, “as it shines on me.”

She sat down at the table, and tried to quiet her mind; to think steadily to some good purpose. Of the few friends that she possessed, every one had declared that she was in the wrong. Had _they_ lost the one loved being of all beings on earth, and lost him by the hand of a homicide–and that homicide free? All that was faithful, all that was devoted in the girl’s nature, held her to her desperate resolution as with a hand of iron. If she shrank at that miserable moment, it was not from her design–it was from the sense of her own helplessness. “Oh, if I had been a man!” she said to herself. “Oh, if I could find a friend!”

CHAPTER LIII.

THE FRIEND IS FOUND.

Mrs. Ellmother looked into the parlor. “I told you Mr. Mirabel would call again,” she announced. “Here he is.”

“Has he asked to see me?”

“He leaves it entirely to you.”

For a moment, and a moment only, Emily was undecided. “Show him in,” she said.

Mirabel’s embarrassment was visible the moment he entered the room. For the first time in his life–in the presence of a woman–the popular preacher was shy. He who had taken hundreds of fair hands with sympathetic pressure–he who had offered fluent consolation, abroad and at home, to beauty in distress–was conscious of a rising color, and was absolutely at a loss for words when Emily received him. And yet, though he appeared at disadvantage–and, worse still, though he was aware of it himself–there was nothing contemptible in his look and manner. His silence and confusion revealed a change in him which inspired respect. Love had developed this spoiled darling of foolish congregations, this effeminate pet of drawing-rooms and boudoirs, into the likeness of a Man–and no woman, in Emily’s position, could have failed to see that it was love which she herself had inspired.

Equally ill at ease, they both took refuge in the commonplace phrases suggested by the occasion. These exhausted there was a pause. Mirabel alluded to Cecilia, as a means of continuing the conversation.

“Have you seen Miss Wyvil?” he inquired.

“She was here last night; and I expect to see her again to-day before she returns to Monksmoor with her father. Do you go back with them?”

“Yes–if _you_ do.”

“I remain in London.”

“Then I remain in London, too.”

The strong feeling that was in him had forced its way to expression at last. In happier days–when she had persistently refused to let him speak to her seriously–she would have been ready with a light-hearted reply. She was silent now. Mirabel pleaded with her not to misunderstand him, by an honest confession of his motives which presented him under a new aspect. The easy plausible man, who had hardly ever seemed to be in earnest before–meant, seriously meant, what he said now.

“May I try to explain myself?” he asked.

“Certainly, if you wish it.”

“Pray, don’t suppose me capable,” Mirabel said earnestly, “of presuming to pay you an idle compliment. I cannot think of you, alone and in trouble, without feeling anxiety which can only be relieved in one way–I must be near enough to hear of you, day by day. Not by repeating this visit! Unless you wish it, I will not again cross the threshold of your door. Mrs. Ellmother will tell me if your mind is more at ease; Mrs. Ellmother will tell me if there is any new trial of your fortitude. She needn’t even mention that I have been speaking to her at the door; and she may be sure, and you may be sure, that I shall ask no inquisitive questions. I can feel for you in your misfortune, without wishing to know what that misfortune is. If I can ever be of the smallest use, think of me as your other servant. Say to Mrs. Ellmother, ‘I want him’–and say no more.”

Where is the woman who could have resisted such devotion as this–inspired, truly inspired, by herself? Emily’s eyes softened as she answered him.

“You little know how your kindness touches me,” she said.

“Don’t speak of my kindness until you have put me to the proof,” he interposed. “Can a friend (such a friend as I am, I mean) be of any use?”

“Of the greatest
use if I could feel justified in trying you.”

“I entreat you to try me!”

“But, Mr. Mirabel, you don’t know what I am thinking of.”

“I don’t want to know.”

“I may be wrong. My friends all say I _am_ wrong.”

“I don’t care what your friends say; I don’t care about any earthly thing but your tranquillity. Does your dog ask whether you are right or wrong? I am your dog. I think of You, and I think of nothing else.”

She looked back through the experience of the last few days. Miss Ladd–Mrs. Ellmother–Doctor Allday: not one of them had felt for her, not one of them had spoken to her, as this man had felt and had spoken. She remembered the dreadful sense of solitude and helplessness which had wrung her heart, in the interval before Mirabel came in. Her father himself could hardly have been kinder to her than this friend of a few weeks only. She looked at him through her tears; she could say nothing that was eloquent, nothing even that was adequate. “You are very good to me,” was her only acknowledgment of all that he had offered. How poor it seemed to be! and yet how much it meant!

He rose–saying considerately that he would leave her to recover herself, and would wait to hear if he was wanted.

“No,” she said; “I must not let you go. In common gratitude I ought to decide before you leave me, and I do decide to take you into my confidence.” She hesitated; her color rose a little. “I know how unselfishly you offer me your help,” she resumed; “I know you speak to me as a brother might speak to a sister–“

He gently interrupted her. “No,” he said; “I can’t honestly claim to do that. And–may I venture to remind you?–you know why.”

She started. Her eyes rested on him with a momentary expression of reproach.

“Is it quite fair,” she asked, “in my situation, to say that?”

“Would it have been quite fair,” he rejoined, “to allow you to deceive yourself? Should I deserve to be taken into your confidence, if I encouraged you to trust me, under false pretenses? Not a word more of those hopes on which the happiness of my life depends shall pass my lips, unless you permit it. In my devotion to your interests, I promise to forget myself. My motives may be misinterpreted; my position may be misunderstood. Ignorant people may take me for that other happier man, who is an object of interest to you–“

“Stop, Mr. Mirabel! The person to whom you refer has no such claim on me as you suppose.”

“Dare I say how happy I am to hear it? Will you forgive me?”

“I will forgive you if you say no more.”

Their eyes met. Completely overcome by the new hope that she had inspired, Mirabel was unable to answer her. His sensitive nerves trembled under emotion, like the nerves of a woman; his delicate complexion faded away slowly into whiteness. Emily was alarmed–he seemed to be on the point of fainting. She ran to the window to open it more widely.

“Pray don’t trouble yourself,” he said, “I am easily agitated by any sudden sensation–and I am a little overcome at this moment by my own happiness.”

“Let me give you a glass of wine.”

“Thank you–I don’t need it indeed.”

“You really feel better?”

“I feel quite well again–and eager to hear how I can serve you.”

“It’s a long story, Mr. Mirabel–and a dreadful story.”

“Dreadful?”

“Yes! Let me tell you first how you can serve me. I am in search of a man who has done me the cruelest wrong that one human creature can inflict on another. But the chances are all against me–I am only a woman; and I don’t know how to take even the first step toward discovery.”

“You will know, when I guide you.”

He reminded her tenderly of what she might expect from him, and was rewarded by a grateful look. Seeing nothing, suspecting nothing, they advanced together nearer and nearer to the end.

“Once or twice,” Emily continued, “I spoke to you of my poor father, when we were at Monksmoor–and I must speak of him again. You could have no interest in inquiring about a stranger–and you cannot have heard how he died.”

“Pardon me, I heard from Mr. Wyvil how he died.”

“You heard what I had told Mr. Wyvil,” Emily said: “I was wrong.”

“Wrong!” Mirabel exclaimed, in a tone of courteous surprise. “Was it not a sudden death?”

“It _was_ a sudden death.”

“Caused by disease of the heart?”

“Caused by no disease. I have been deceived about my father’s death–and I have only discovered it a few days since.”

At the impending moment of the frightful shock which she was innocently about to inflict on him, she stopped–doubtful whether it would be best to relate how the discovery had been made, or to pass at once to the result. Mirabel supposed that she had paused to control her agitation. He was so immeasurably far away from the faintest suspicion of what was coming that he exerted his ingenuity, in the hope of sparing her.

“I can anticipate the rest,” he said. “Your sad loss has been caused by some fatal accident. Let us change the subject; tell me more of that man whom I must help you to find. It will only distress you to dwell on your father’s death.”

“Distress me?” she repeated. “His death maddens me!”

“Oh, don’t say that!”

“Hear me! hear me! My father died murdered, at Zeeland–and the man you must help me to find is the wretch who killed him.”

She started to her feet with a cry of terror. Mirabel dropped from his chair senseless to the floor.

CHAPTER LIV.

THE END OF THE FAINTING FIT.

Emily recovered her presence of mind. She opened the door, so as to make a draught of air in the room, and called for water. Returning to Mirabel, she loosened his cravat. Mrs. Ellmother came in, just in time to prevent her from committing a common error in the treatment of fainting persons, by raising Mirabel’s head. The current of air, and the sprinkling of water over his face, soon produced their customary effect. “He’ll come round, directly,” Mrs. Ellmother remarked. “Your aunt was sometimes taken with these swoons, miss; and I know something about them. He looks a poor weak creature, in spite of his big beard. Has anything frightened him?”

Emily little knew how correctly that chance guess had hit on the truth!

“Nothing can possibly have frightened him,” she replied; “I am afraid he is in bad health. He turned suddenly pale while we were talking; and I thought he was going to be taken ill; he made light of it, and seemed to recover. Unfortunately, I was right; it was the threatening of a fainting fit–he dropped on the floor a minute afterward.”

A sigh fluttered over Mirabel’s lips. His eyes opened, looked at Mrs. Ellmother in vacant terror, and closed again. Emily whispered to her to leave the room. The old woman smiled satirically as she opened the door–then looked back, with a sudden change of humor. To see the kind young mistress bending over the feeble little clergyman set her–by some strange association of ideas–thinking of Alban Morris. “Ah,” she muttered to herself, on her way out, “I call _him_ a Man!”

There was wine in the sideboard–the wine which Emily had once already offered in vain. Mirabel drank it eagerly, this time. He looked round the room, as if he wished to be sure that they were alone. “Have I fallen to a low place in your estimation?” he asked, smiling faintly. “I am afraid you will think poorly enough of your new ally, after this?”

“I only think you should take more care of your health,” Emily replied, with sincere interest in his recovery. “Let me leave you to rest on the sofa.”

He refused to remain at the cottage–he asked, with a sudden change to fretfulness, if she would let her servant get him a cab. She ventured to doubt whether he was quite strong enough yet to go away by himself. He reiterated, piteously reiterated, his request. A passing cab was stopped directly. Emily accompanied him to the gate. “I know what to do,” he said, in a hurried absent way. “Rest and a little tonic medicine will soon set me right.” The clammy coldness of his skin made Emily shudder, as they shook hands. “You won’t think the worse of me for this?” he asked.

“How can you imagine such a thing!” she answered warmly.

“Will you see me, if I come to-morrow?”

“I shall be anxious to see you.”

So they parted. Emily returned to the house, pitying him with all her heart.

BOOK THE SIXTH–HERE AND THERE.

CHAPTER LV.

MIRABEL SEES HIS WAY.

Reaching the hotel at which he was accustomed to stay when he was in London, Mirabel locked the door of his room. He looked at the houses on the opposite side of the street. His mind was in such a state of morbid distrust that he lowered the blind over the window. In solitude and obscurity, the miserable wretch sat down in a corner, and covered his face with his hands, and tried to realize what had happened to him.

Nothing had been said at the fatal interview with Emily, which could have given him the slightest warning of what was to come. Her father’s name–absolutely unknown to him when he fled from the inn–had only been communicated to the public by the newspaper reports of the adjourned inquest. At the time when those reports appeared, he was in hiding, under circumstances which prevented him from seeing a newspaper. While the murder was still a subject of conversation, he was in France–far out of the track of English travelers–and he remained on the continent until the summer of eighteen hundred and eighty-one. No exercise of discretion, on his part, could have extricated him from the terrible position in which he was now placed. He stood pledged to Emily to discover the man suspected of the murder of her father; and that man was–himself!

What refuge was left open to him?

If he took to flight, his sudden disappearance would be a suspicious circumstance in itself, and would therefore provoke inquiries which might lead to serious results. Supposing that he overlooked the risk thus presented, would he be capable of enduring a separation from Emily, which might be a separation for life? Even in the first horror of discovering his situation, her influence remained unshaken–the animating spirit of the one manly capacity for resistance which raised him above the reach of his own fears. The only prospect before him which he felt himself to be incapable of contemplating, was the prospect of leaving Emily.

Having arrived at this conclusion, his fears urged him to think of providing for his own safety.

The first precaution to adopt was to separate Emily from friends whose advice might be hostile to his interests–perhaps even subversive of his security. To effect this design, he had need of an ally whom he could trust. That ally was at his disposal, far away in the north.

At the time when Francine’s jealousy began to interfere with all freedom of intercourse between Emily and himself at Monksmoor, he had contemplated making arrangements which might enable them to meet at the house of his invalid sister, Mrs. Delvin. He had spoken of her, and of the bodily affliction which confined her to her room, in terms which had already interested Emily. In the present emergency, he decided on returning to the subject, and on hastening the meeting between the two women which he had first suggested at Mr. Wyvil’s country seat.

No time was to be lost in carrying out this intention. He wrote to Mrs. Delvin by that day’s post; confiding to her, in the first place, the critical position in which he now found himself. This done, he proceeded as follows:

“To your sound judgment, dearest Agatha, it may appear that I am making myself needlessly uneasy about the future. Two persons only know that I am the man who escaped from the inn at Zeeland. You are one of them, and Miss Jethro is the other. On you I can absolutely rely; and, after my experience of her, I ought to feel sure of Miss Jethro. I admit this; but I cannot get over my distrust of Emily’s friends. I fear the cunning old doctor; I doubt Mr. Wyvil; I hate Alban Morris.

“Do me a favor, my dear. Invite Emily to be your guest, and so separate her from these friends. The old servant who attends on her will be included in the invitation, of course. Mrs. Ellmother is, as I believe, devoted to the interests of Mr. Alban Morris: she will be well out of the way of doing mischief, while we have her safe in your northern solitude.

“There is no fear that Emily will refuse your invitation.

“In the first place, she is already interested in you. In the second place, I shall consider the small proprieties of social life; and, instead of traveling with her to your house, I shall follow by a later train. In the third place, I am now the chosen adviser in whom she trusts; and what I tell her to do, she will do. It pains me, really and truly pains me, to be compelled to deceive her–but the other alternative is to reveal myself as the wretch of whom she is in search. Was there ever such a situation? And, oh, Agatha, I am so fond of her! If I fail to persuade her to be my wife, I don’t care what becomes of me. I used to think disgrace, and death on the scaffold, the most frightful prospect that a man can contemplate. In my present frame of mind, a life without Emily may just as well end in that way as in any other. When we are together in your old sea-beaten tower, do your best, my dear, to incline the heart of this sweet girl toward me. If she remains in London, how do I know that Mr. Morris may not recover the place he has lost in her good opinion? The bare idea of it turns me cold.

“There is one more point on which I must touch, before I can finish my letter.

“When you last wrote, you told me that Sir Jervis Redwood was not expected to live much longer, and that the establishment would be broken up after his death. Can you find out for me what will become, under the circumstances, of Mr. and Mrs. Rook? So far as I am concerned, I don’t doubt that the alteration in my personal appearance, which has protected me for years past, may be trusted to preserve me from recognition by these two people. But it is of the utmost importance, remembering the project to which Emily has devoted herself, that she should not meet with Mrs. Rook. They have been already in correspondence; and Mrs. Rook has expressed an intention (if the opportunity offers itself) of calling at the cottage. Another reason, and a pressing reason, for removing Emily from London! We can easily keep the Rooks out of _your_ house; but I own I should feel more at my ease, if I heard that they had left Northumberland.”

With that confession, Mrs. Delvin’s brother closed his letter.

CHAPTER LVI.

ALBAN SEES HIS WAY.

During the first days of Mirabel’s sojourn at his hotel in London, events were in progress at Netherwoods, affecting the interests of the man who was the especial object of his distrust. Not long after Miss Ladd had returned to her school, she heard of an artist who was capable of filling the place to be vacated by Alban Morris. It was then the twenty-third of the month. In four days more the new master would be ready to enter on his duties; and Alban would be at liberty.

On the twenty-fourth, Alban received a telegram which startled him. The person sending the message was Mrs. Ellmother; and the words were: “Meet me at your railway station to-day, at two o’clock.”

He found the old woman in the waiting-room; and he met with a rough reception.

“Minutes are precious, Mr. Morris,” she said; “you are two minutes late. The next train to London stops here in half an hour–and I must go back by it.”

“Good heavens, what brings you here? Is Emily–?”

“Emily is well enough in health–if that’s what you mean? As to why I come here, the reason is that it’s a deal easier for me (worse luck!) to take this journey than to write a letter. One good turn deserves another. I don’t forget how kind you were to me, away there at the school–and I can’t, and won’t, see what’s going on at the cottage, behind your back, without letting you know of it. Oh, you needn’t be alarmed about _her!_ I’ve made an excuse to get away for a few hours–but I haven’t left her by herself. Miss Wyvil has come to London again; and Mr. Mirabel spends the best part of his time with her. Excuse me for a moment, will you? I’m so thirsty after the journey, I can hardly speak.”

She presented herself at the counter in the waiting-room. “I’ll trouble you, young woman, for a glass of ale.” She returned to Alban in a better humor. “It’s not bad stuff, that! When I have said
my say, I’ll have a drop more–just to wash the taste of Mr. Mirabel out of my mouth. Wait a bit; I have something to ask you. How much longer are you obliged to stop here, teaching the girls to draw?”

“I leave Netherwoods in three days more,” Alban replied.

“That’s all right! You may be in time to bring Miss Emily to her senses, yet.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean–if you don’t stop it–she will marry the parson.”

“I can’t believe it, Mrs. Ellmother! I won’t believe it!”

“Ah, it’s a comfort to him, poor fellow, to say that! Look here, Mr. Morris; this is how it stands. You’re in disgrace with Miss Emily–and he profits by it. I was fool enough to take a liking to Mr. Mirabel when I first opened the door to him; I know better now. He got on the blind side of me; and now he has got on the blind side of _her_. Shall I tell you how? By doing what you would have done if you had had the chance. He’s helping her–or pretending to help her, I don’t know which–to find the man who murdered poor Mr. Brown. After four years! And when all the police in England (with a reward to encourage them) did their best, and it came to nothing!”

“Never mind that!” Alban said impatiently. “I want to know how Mr. Mirabel is helping her?”

“That’s more than I can tell you. You don’t suppose they take me into their confidence? All I can do is to pick up a word, here and there, when fine weather tempts them out into the garden. She tells him to suspect Mrs. Rook, and to make inquiries after Miss Jethro. And he has his plans; and he writes them down, which is dead against his doing anything useful, in my opinion. I don’t hold with your scribblers. At the same time I wouldn’t count too positively, in your place, on his being likely to fail. That little Mirabel–if it wasn’t for his beard, I should believe he was a woman, and a sickly woman too; he fainted in our house the other day–that little Mirabel is in earnest. Rather than leave Miss Emily from Saturday to Monday, he has got a parson out of employment to do his Sunday work for him. And, what’s more, he has persuaded her (for some reasons of his own) to leave London next week.”

“Is she going back to Monksmoor?”

“Not she! Mr. Mirabel has got a sister, a widow lady; she’s a cripple, or something of the sort. Her name is Mrs. Delvin. She lives far away in the north country, by the sea; and Miss Emily is going to stay with her.”

“Are you sure of that?”

“Sure? I’ve seen the letter.”

“Do you mean the letter of invitation?”

“Yes–I do. Miss Emily herself showed it to me. I’m to go with her–‘in attendance on my mistress,’ as the lady puts it. This I will say for Mrs. Delvin: her handwriting is a credit to the school that taught her; and the poor bedridden creature words her invitation so nicely, that I myself couldn’t have resisted it–and I’m a hard one, as you know. You don’t seem to heed me, Mr. Morris.”

“I beg your pardon, I was thinking.”

“Thinking of what–if I may make so bold?”

“Of going back to London with you, instead of waiting till the new master comes to take my place.”

“Don’t do that, sir! You would do harm instead of good, if you showed yourself at the cottage now. Besides, it would not be fair to Miss Ladd, to leave her before the other man takes your girls off your hands. Trust me to look after your interests; and don’t go near Miss Emily–don’t even write to her–unless you have got something to say about the murder, which she will be eager to hear. Make some discovery in that direction, Mr. Morris, while the parson is only trying to do it or pretending to do it–and I’ll answer for the result. Look at the clock! In ten minutes more the train will be here. My memory isn’t as good as it was; but I do think I have told you all I had to tell.”

“You are the best of good friends!” Alban said warmly.

“Never mind about that, sir. If you want to do a friendly thing in return, tell me if you know what has become of Miss de Sor.”

“She has returned to Netherwoods.”

“Aha! Miss Ladd is as good as her word. Would you mind writing to tell me of it, if Miss de Sor leaves the school again? Good Lord! there she is on the platform with bag and baggage. Don’t let her see me, Mr. Morris! If she comes in here, I shall set the marks of my ten finger-nails on that false face of hers, as sure as I am a Christian woman.”

Alban placed himself at the door, so as to hide Mrs. Ellmother. There indeed was Francine, accompanied by one of the teachers at the school. She took a seat on the bench outside the booking-office, in a state of sullen indifference–absorbed in herself–noticing nothing. Urged by ungovernable curiosity, Mrs. Ellmother stole on tiptoe to Alban’s side to look at her. To a person acquainted with the circumstances there could be no possible doubt of what had happened. Francine had failed to excuse herself, and had been dismissed from Miss Ladd’s house.

“I would have traveled to the world’s end,” Mrs. Ellmother said, “to see _that!_”

She returned to her place in the waiting-room, perfectly satisfied.

The teacher noticed Alban, on leaving the booking-office after taking the tickets. “I shall be glad,” she said, looking toward Francine, “when I have resigned the charge of that young lady to the person who is to receive her in London.”

“Is she to be sent back to her parents?” Alban asked.

“We don’t know yet. Miss Ladd will write to St. Domingo by the next mail. In the meantime, her father’s agent in London–the same person who pays her allowance–takes care of her until he hears from the West Indies.”

“Does she consent to this?”

“She doesn’t seem to care what becomes of her. Miss Ladd has given her every opportunity of explaining and excusing herself, and has produced no impression. You can see the state she is in. Our good mistress–always hopeful even in the worst cases, as you know–thinks she is feeling ashamed of herself, and is too proud and self-willed to own it. My own idea is, that some secret disappointment is weighing on her mind. Perhaps I am wrong.”

No. Miss Ladd was wrong; and the teacher was right.

The passion of revenge, being essentially selfish in its nature, is of all passions the narrowest in its range of view. In gratifying her jealous hatred of Emily, Francine had correctly foreseen consequences, as they might affect the other object of her enmity–Alban Morris. But she had failed to perceive the imminent danger of another result, which in a calmer frame of mind might not have escaped discovery. In triumphing over Emily and Alban, she had been the indirect means of inflicting on herself the bitterest of all disappointments–she had brought Emily and Mirabel together. The first forewarning of this catastrophe had reached her, on hearing that Mirabel would not return to Monksmoor. Her worst fears had been thereafter confirmed by a letter from Cecilia, which had followed her to Netherwoods. From that moment, she, who had made others wretched, paid the penalty in suffering as keen as any that she had inflicted. Completely prostrated; powerless, through ignorance of his address in London, to make a last appeal to Mirabel; she was literally, as had just been said, careless what became of her. When the train approached, she sprang to her feet–advanced to the edge of the platform–and suddenly drew back, shuddering. The teacher looked in terror at Alban. Had the desperate girl meditated throwing herself under the wheels of the engine? The thought had been in both their minds; but neither of them acknowledged it. Francine stepped quietly into the carriage, when the train drew up, and laid her head back in a corner, and closed her eyes. Mrs. Ellmother took her place in another compartment, and beckoned to Alban to speak to her at the window.

“Where can I see you, when you go to London?” she asked.

“At Doctor Allday’s house.”

“On what day?”

“On Tuesday next.”

CHAPTER LVII.

APPROACHING THE END.

Alban reached London early enough in the afternoon to find the doctor at his luncheon. “Too late to see Mrs. Ellmother,” he announced. “Sit down and have something to eat.”

“Has she left any message for me?”

“A message, my good friend, that you won’t like to hear. She is off w ith her mistress, this morning, on a visit to Mr. Mirabel’s sister.”

“Does he go with them?”

“No; he follows by a later train.”

“Has Mrs. Ellmother mentioned the address?”

“There it is, in her own handwriting.”

Alban read the address:–“Mrs. Delvin, The Clink, Belford, Northumberland.”

“Turn to the back of that bit of paper,” the doctor said. “Mrs. Ellmother has written something on it.”

She had written these words: “No discoveries made by Mr. Mirabel, up to this time. Sir Jervis Redwood is dead. The Rooks are believed to be in Scotland; and Miss Emily, if need be, is to help the parson to find them. No news of Miss Jethro.”

“Now you have got your information,” Doctor Allday resumed, “let me have a look at you. You’re not in a rage: that’s a good sign to begin with.”

“I am not the less determined,” Alban answered.

“To bring Emily to her senses?” the doctor asked.

“To do what Mirabel has _not_ done–and then to let her choose between us.”

“Ay? ay? Your good opinion of her hasn’t altered, though she has treated you so badly?”

“My good opinion makes allowance for the state of my poor darling’s mind, after the shock that has fallen on her,” Alban answered quietly. “She is not _my_ Emily now. She will be _my_ Emily yet. I told her I was convinced of it, in the old days at school–and my conviction is as strong as ever. Have you seen her, since I have been away at Netherwoods?”

“Yes; and she is as angry with me as she is with you.”

“For the same reason?”

“No, no. I heard enough to warn me to hold my tongue. I refused to help her–that’s all. You are a man, and you may run risks which no young girl ought to encounter. Do you remember when I asked you to drop all further inquiries into the murder, for Emily’s sake? The circumstances have altered since that time. Can I be of any use?”

“Of the greatest use, if you can give me Miss Jethro’s address.”

“Oh! You mean to begin in that way, do you?”

“Yes. You know that Miss Jethro visited me at Netherwoods?”

“Go on.”

“She showed me your answer to a letter which she had written to you. Have you got that letter?”

Doctor Allday produced it. The address was at a post-office, in a town on the south coast. Looking up when he had copied it, Alban saw the doctor’s eyes fixed on him with an oddly-mingled expression: partly of sympathy, partly of hesitation.

“Have you anything to suggest?” he asked.

“You will get nothing out of Miss Jethro,” the doctor answered, “unless–” there he stopped.

“Unless, what?”

“Unless you can frighten her.”

“How am I to do that?”

After a little reflection, Doctor Allday returned, without any apparent reason, to the subject of his last visit to Emily.

“There was one thing she said, in the course of our talk,” he continued, “which struck me as being sensible: possibly (for we are all more or less conceited), because I agreed with her myself. She suspects Miss Jethro of knowing more about that damnable murder than Miss Jethro is willing to acknowledge. If you want to produce the right effect on her–” he looked hard at Alban and checked himself once more.

“Well? what am I to do?”

“Tell her you have an idea of who the murderer is.”

“But I have no idea.”

“But _I_ have.”

“Good God! what do you mean?”

“Don’t mistake me! An impression has been produced on my mind–that’s all. Call it a freak or fancy; worth trying perhaps as a bold experiment, and worth nothing more. Come a little nearer. My housekeeper is an excellent woman, but I have once or twice caught her rather too near to that door. I think I’ll whisper it.”

He did whisper it. In breathless wonder, Alban heard of the doubt which had crossed Doctor Allday’s mind, on the evening when Mirabel had called at his house.

“You look as if you didn’t believe it,” the doctor remarked.

“I’m thinking of Emily. For her sake I hope and trust you are wrong. Ought I to go to her at once? I don’t know what to do!”

“Find out first, my good fellow, whether I am right or wrong. You can do it, if you will run the risk with Miss Jethro.”

Alban recovered himself. His old friend’s advice was clearly the right advice to follow. He examined his railway guide, and then looked at his watch. “If I can find Miss Jethro,” he answered, “I’ll risk it before the day is out.”

Tile doctor accompanied him to the door. “You will write to me, won’t you?”

“Without fail. Thank you–and good-by.”

BOOK THE SEVENTH–THE CLINK.

CHAPTER LVIII.

A COUNCIL OF TWO.

Early in the last century one of the picturesque race of robbers and murderers, practicing the vices of humanity on the borderlands watered by the river Tweed, built a tower of stone on the coast of Northumberland. He lived joyously in the perpetration of atrocities; and he died penitent, under the direction of his priest. Since that event, he has figured in poems and pictures; and has been greatly admired by modern ladies and gentlemen, whom he would have outraged and robbed if he had been lucky enough to meet with them in the good old times.

His son succeeded him, and failed to profit by the paternal example: that is to say, he made the fatal mistake of fighting for other people instead of fighting for himself.

In the rebellion of Forty-Five, this northern squire sided to serious purpose with Prince Charles and the Highlanders. He lost his head; and his children lost their inheritance. In the lapse of years, the confiscated property fell into the hands of strangers; the last of whom (having a taste for the turf) discovered, in course of time, that he was in want of money. A retired merchant, named Delvin (originally of French extraction), took a liking to the wild situation, and purchased the tower. His wife–already in failing health–had been ordered by the doctors to live a quiet life by the sea. Her husband’s death left her a rich and lonely widow; by day and night alike, a prisoner in her room; wasted by disease, and having but two interests which reconciled her to life–writing poetry in the intervals of pain, and paying the debts of a reverend brother who succeeded in the pulpit, and prospered nowhere else.

In the later days of its life, the tower had been greatly improved as a place of residence. The contrast was remarkable between the dreary gray outer walls, and the luxuriously furnished rooms inside, rising by two at a time to the lofty eighth story of the building. Among the scattered populace of the country round, the tower was still known by the odd name given to it in the bygone time–“The Clink.” It had been so called (as was supposed) in allusion to the noise made by loose stones, washed backward and forward at certain times of the tide, in hollows of the rock on which the building stood.

On the evening of her arrival at Mrs. Delvin’s retreat, Emily retired at an early hour, fatigued by her long journey. Mirabel had an opportunity of speaking with his sister privately in her own room.

“Send me away, Agatha, if I disturb you,” he said, “and let me know when I can see you in the morning.”

“My dear Miles, have you forgotten that I am never able to sleep in calm weather? My lullaby, for years past, has been the moaning of the great North Sea, under my window. Listen! There is not a sound outside on this peaceful night. It is the right time of the tide, just now–and yet, ‘the clink’ is not to be heard. Is the moon up?”

Mirabel opened the curtains. “The whole sky is one great abyss of black,” he answered. “If I was superstitious, I should think that horrid darkness a bad omen for the future. Are you suffering, Agatha?”

“Not just now. I suppose I look sadly changed for the worse since you saw me last?”

But for the feverish brightness of her eyes, she would have looked like a corpse. Her wrinkled forehead, her hollow cheeks, her white lips told their terrible tale of the suffering of years. The ghastly appearance of her face was heightened by the furnishing of the room. This doomed woman, dying slowly day by day, delighted in bright colors and sumptuous materials. The paper on the walls, the curtains, the carpet presented the hues of the rainbow. She lay on a couch covered with purple silk, under draperies of green velvet to keep her warm. Rich lace hid h er scanty hair, turning prematurely gray; brilliant rings glittered on her bony fingers. The room was in a blaze of light from lamps and candles. Even the wine at her side that kept her alive had been decanted into a bottle of lustrous Venetian glass. “My grave is open,” she used to say; “and I want all these beautiful things to keep me from looking at it. I should die at once, if I was left in the dark.”

Her brother sat by the couch, thinking “Shall I tell you what is in your mind?” she asked.

Mirabel humored the caprice of the moment. “Tell me!” he said.

“You want to know what I think of Emily,” she answered. “Your letter told me you were in love; but I didn’t believe your letter. I have always doubted whether you were capable of feeling true love–until I saw Emily. The moment she entered the room, I knew that I had never properly appreciated my brother. You _are_ in love with her, Miles; and you are a better man than I thought you. Does that express my opinion?”

Mirabel took her wasted hand, and kissed it gratefully.

“What a position I am in!” he said. “To love her as I love her; and, if she knew the truth, to be the object of her horror–to be the man whom she would hunt to the scaffold, as an act of duty to the memory of her father!”

“You have left out the worst part of it,” Mrs. Delvin reminded him. “You have bound yourself to help her to find the man. Your one hope of persuading her to become your wife rests on your success in finding him. And you are the man. There is your situation! You can’t submit to it. How can you escape from it?”

“You are trying to frighten me, Agatha.”

“I am trying to encourage you to face your position boldly.”

“I am doing my best,” Mirabel said, with sullen resignation. “Fortune has favored me so far. I have, really and truly, been unable to satisfy Emily by discovering Miss Jethro. She has left the place at which I saw her last–there is no trace to be found of her–and Emily knows it.”

“Don’t forget,” Mrs. Delvin replied, “that there is a trace to be found of Mrs. Rook, and that Emily expects you to follow it.”

Mirabel shuddered. “I am surrounded by dangers, whichever way I look,” he said. “Do what I may, it turns out to be wrong. I was wrong, perhaps, when I brought Emily here.”

“No!”

“I could easily make an excuse,” Mirabel persisted “and take her back to London.”

“And for all you know to the contrary,” his wiser sister replied, “Mrs. Rook may go to London; and you may take Emily back in time to receive her at the cottage. In every way you are safer in my old tower. And–don’t forget–you have got my money to help you, if you want it. In my belief, Miles, you _will_ want it.”

“You are the dearest and best of sisters! What do you recommend me to do?”

“What you would have been obliged to do,” Mrs. Delvin answered, “if you had remained in London. You must go to Redwood Hall tomorrow, as Emily has arranged it. If Mrs. Rook is not there, you must ask for her address in Scotland. If nobody knows the address, you must still bestir yourself in trying to find it. And, when you do fall in with Mrs. Rook–“

“Well?”

“Take care, wherever it may be, that you see her privately.”

Mirabel was alarmed. “Don’t keep me in suspense,” he burst out. “Tell me what you propose.”

“Never mind what I propose, to-night. Before I can tell you what I have in my mind, I must know whether Mrs. Rook is in England or Scotland. Bring me that information to-morrow, and I shall have something to say to you. Hark! The wind is rising, the rain is falling. There is a chance of sleep for me–I shall soon hear the sea. Good-night.”

“Good-night, dearest–and thank you again, and again!”

CHAPTER LIX.

THE ACCIDENT AT BELFORD.

Early in the morning Mirabel set forth for Redwood Hall, in one of the vehicles which Mrs. Delvin still kept at “The Clink” for the convenience of visitors. He returned soon after noon; having obtained information of the whereabout of Mrs. Rook and her husband. When they had last been heard of, they were at Lasswade, near Edinburgh. Whether they had, or had not, obtained the situation of which they were in search, neither Miss Redwood nor any one else at the Hall could tell.

In half an hour more, another horse was harnessed, and Mirabel was on his way to the railway station at Belford, to follow Mrs. Rook at Emily’s urgent request. Before his departure, he had an interview with his sister.

Mrs. Delvin was rich enough to believe implicitly in the power of money. Her method of extricating her brother from the serious difficulties that beset him, was to make it worth the while of Mr. and Mrs. Rook to leave England. Their passage to America would be secretly paid; and they would take with them a letter of credit addressed to a banker in New York. If Mirabel failed to discover them, after they had sailed, Emily could not blame his want of devotion to her interests. He understood this; but he remained desponding and irresolute, even with the money in his hands. The one person who could rouse his courage and animate his hope, was also the one person who must know nothing of what had passed between his sister and himself. He had no choice but to leave Emily, without being cheered by her bright looks, invigorated by her inspiriting words. Mirabel went away on his doubtful errand with a heavy heart.

“The Clink” was so far from the nearest post town, that the few letters, usually addressed to the tower, were delivered by private arrangement with a messenger. The man’s punctuality depended on the convenience of his superiors employed at the office. Sometimes he arrived early, and sometimes he arrived late. On this particular morning he presented himself, at half past one o’clock, with a letter for Emily; and when Mrs. Ellmother smartly reproved him for the delay, he coolly attributed it to the hospitality of friends whom he had met on the road.

The letter, directed to Emily at the cottage, had been forwarded from London by the person left in charge. It addressed her as “Honored Miss.” She turned at once to the end–and discovered the signature of Mrs. Rook!

“And Mr. Mirabel has gone, “Emily exclaimed, “just when his presence is of the greatest importance to us!”

Shrewd Mrs. Ellmother suggested that it might be as well to read the letter first–and then to form an opinion.

Emily read it.

“Lasswade, near
Edinburgh, Sept. 26th.

“HONORED MISS–I take up my pen to bespeak your kind sympathy for my husband and myself; two old people thrown on the world again by the death of our excellent master. We are under a month’s notice to leave Redwood Hall.

“Hearing of a situation at this place (also that our expenses would be paid if we applied personally), we got leave of absence, and made our application. The lady and her son are either the stingiest people that ever lived–or they have taken a dislike to me and my husband, and they make money a means of getting rid of us easily. Suffice it to say that we have refused to accept starvation wages, and that we are still out of place. It is just possible that you may have heard of something to suit us. So I write at once, knowing that good chances are often lost through needless delay.

“We stop at Belford on our way back, to see some friends of my husband, and we hope to get to Redwood Hall in good time on the 28th. Would you please address me to care of Miss Redwood, in case you know of any good situation for which we could apply. Perhaps we may be driven to try our luck in London. In this case, will you permit me to have the honor of presenting my respects, as I ventured to propose when I wrote to you a little time since.

“I beg to remain, Honored Miss,

“Your humble servant,

“R.
ROOK.”

Emily handed the letter to Mrs. Ellmother. “Read it,” she said, “and tell me what you think.”

“I think you had better be careful.”

“Careful of Mrs. Rook?”

“Yes–and careful of Mrs. Delvin too.”

Emily was astonished. “Are you really speaking seriously?” she said. “Mrs. Delvin is a most interesting person; so patient under her sufferings; so kind, so clever; so interested in all that interests _me_. I shall take the letter to her at once, and ask her advice.”

“Have your own way, miss. I can’t tell you why–but I don’t like her!”

Mrs. Delvin’s devotion to the interests of her guest took even Emily by surprise. After reading Mrs. Rook’s letter, she rang the bell on her table in a frenzy of impatience. “My brother must be instantly recalled,” she said. “Telegraph to him in your own name, telling him what has happened. He will find the message waiting for him, at the end of his journey.”

The groom, summoned by the bell, was ordered to saddle the third and last horse left in the stables; to take the telegram to Belford, and to wait there until the answer arrived.

“How far is it to Redwood Hall?” Emily asked, when the man had received his orders.

“Ten miles,” Mrs. Delvin answered.

“How can I get there to-day?”

“My dear, you can’t get there.”

“Pardon me, Mrs. Delvin, I must get there.”

“Pardon _me_. My brother represents you in this matter. Leave it to my brother.”

The tone taken by Mirabel’s sister was positive, to say the least of it. Emily thought of what her faithful old servant had said, and began to doubt her own discretion in so readily showing the letter. The mistake–if a mistake it was–had however been committed; and, wrong or right, she was not disposed to occupy the subordinate position which Mrs. Delvin had assigned to her.

“If you will look at Mrs. Rook’s letter again,” Emily replied, “you will see that I ought to answer it. She supposes I am in London.”

“Do you propose to tell Mrs. Rook that you are in this house?” Mrs. Delvin asked.

“Certainly.”

“You had better consult my brother, before you take any responsibility on yourself.”

Emily kept her temper. “Allow me to remind you,” she said, “that Mr. Mirabel is not acquainted with Mrs. Rook–and that I am. If I speak to her personally, I can do much to assist the object of our inquiries, before he returns. She is not an easy woman to deal with–“

“And therefore,” Mrs. Delvin interposed, “the sort of person who requires careful handling by a man like my brother–a man of the world.”

“The sort of person, as I venture to think,” Emily persisted, “whom I ought to see with as little loss of time as possible.”

Mrs. Delvin waited a while before she replied. In her condition of health, anxiety was not easy to bear. Mrs. Rook’s letter and Emily’s obstinacy had seriously irritated her. But, like all persons of ability, she was capable, when there was serious occasion for it, of exerting self-control. She really liked and admired Emily; and, as the elder woman and the hostess, she set an example of forbearance and good humor.

“It is out of my power to send you to Redwood Hall at once,” she resumed. “The only one of my three horses now at your disposal is the horse which took my brother to the Hall this morning. A distance, there and back, of twenty miles. You are not in too great a hurry, I am sure, to allow the horse time to rest?”

Emily made her excuses with perfect grace and sincerity. “I had no idea the distance was so great,” she confessed. “I will wait, dear Mrs. Delvin, as long as you like.”

They parted as good friends as ever–with a certain reserve, nevertheless, on either side. Emily’s eager nature was depressed and irritated by the prospect of delay. Mrs. Delvin, on the other hand (devoted to her brother’s interests), thought hopefully of obstacles which might present themselves with the lapse of time. The horse might prove to be incapable of further exertion for that day. Or the threatening aspect of the weather might end in a storm.

But the hours passed–and the sky cleared–and the horse was reported to be fit for work again. Fortune was against the lady of the tower; she had no choice but to submit.

Mrs. Delvin had just sent word to Emily that the carriage would be ready for her in ten minutes, when the coachman who had driven Mirabel to Belford returned. He brought news which agreeably surprised both the ladies. Mirabel had reached the station five minutes too late; the coachman had left him waiting the arrival of the next train to the North. He would now receive the telegraphic message at Belford, and might return immediately by taking the groom’s horse. Mrs. Delvin left it to Emily to decide whether she would proceed by herself to Redwood Hall, or wait for Mirabel’s return.

Under the changed circumstances, Emily would have acted ungraciously if she had persisted in holding to her first intention. She consented to wait.

The sea still remained calm. In the stillness of the moorland solitude on the western side of “The Clink,” the rapid steps of a horse were heard at some little distance on the highroad.

Emily ran out, followed by careful Mrs. Ellmother, expecting to meet Mirabel.

She was disappointed: it was the groom who had returned. As he pulled up at the house, and dismounted, Emily noticed that the man looked excited.

“Is there anything wrong?” she asked.

“There has been an accident, miss.”

“Not to Mr. Mirabel!”

“No, no, miss. An accident to a poor foolish woman, traveling from Lasswade.”

Emily looked at Mrs. Ellmother. “It can’t be Mrs. Rook!” she said.

“That’s the name, miss! She got out before the train had quite stopped, and fell on the platform.”

“Was she hurt?”

“Seriously hurt, as I heard. They carried her into a house hard by–and sent for the doctor.”

“Was Mr. Mirabel one of the people who helped her?”

“He was on the other side of the platform, miss; waiting for the train from London. I got to the station and gave him the telegram, just as the accident took place. We crossed over to hear more about it. Mr. Mirabel was telling me that he would return to ‘The Clink’ on my horse–when he heard the woman’s name mentioned. Upon that, he changed his mind and went to the house.”

“Was he let in?”

“The doctor wouldn’t hear of it. He was making his examination; and he said nobody was to be in the room but her husband and the woman of the house.”

“Is Mr. Mirabel waiting to see her?”

“Yes, miss. He said he would wait all day, if necessary; and he gave me this bit of a note to take to the mistress.”

Emily turned to Mrs. Ellmother. “It’s impossible to stay here, not knowing whether Mrs. Rook is going to live or die,” she said. “I shall go to Belford–and you will go with me.”

The groom interfered. “I beg your pardon, miss. It was Mr. Mirabel’s most particular wish that you were not, on any account,