to go to Belford.”
“Why not?”
“He didn’t say.”
Emily eyed the note in the man’s hand with well-grounded distrust. In all probability, Mirabel’s object in writing was to instruct his sister to prevent her guest from going to Belford. The carriage was waiting at the door. With her usual promptness of resolution, Emily decided on taking it for granted that she was free to use as she pleased a carriage which had been already placed at her disposal.
“Tell your mistress,” she said to the groom, “that I am going to Belford instead of to Redwood Hall.”
In a minute more, she and Mrs. Ellmother were on their way to join Mirabel at the station.
CHAPTER LX.
OUTSIDE THE ROOM.
Emily found Mirabel in the waiting room at Belford. Her sudden appearance might well have amazed him; but his face expressed a more serious emotion than surprise–he looked at her as if she had alarmed him.
“Didn’t you get my message?” he asked. “I told the groom I wished you to wait for my return. I sent a note to my sister, in case he made any mistake.”
“The man made no mistake,” Emily answered. “I was in too great a hurry to be able to speak with Mrs. Delvin. Did you really suppose I could endure the suspense of waiting till you came back? Do you think I can be of no use–I who know Mrs. Rook?”
“They won’t let you see her.”
“Why not? _You_ seem to be waiting to see her.”
“I am waiting for the return of the rector of Belford. He is at Berwick; and he has been sent for at Mrs. Rook’s urgent request.”
“Is she dying?”
“She is in fear of death–whether rightly or wrongly, I don’t know. There is some internal injury from the fall. I hope to see her when the rector returns. As a brother cler gyman, I may with perfect propriety ask him to use his influence in my favor.”
“I am glad to find you so eager about it.”
“I am always eager in your interests.”
“Don’t think me ungrateful,” Emily replied gently. “I am no stranger to Mrs. Rook; and, if I send in my name, I may be able to see her before the clergyman returns.”
She stopped. Mirabel suddenly moved so as to place himself between her and the door. “I must really beg of you to give up that idea,” he said; “you don’t know what horrid sight you may see–what dreadful agonies of pain this unhappy woman may be suffering.”
His manner suggested to Emily that he might be acting under some motive which he was unwilling to acknowledge. “If you have a reason for wishing that I should keep away from Mrs. Rook,” she said, “let me hear what it is. Surely we trust each other? I have done my best to set the example, at any rate.”
Mirabel seemed to be at a loss for a reply.
While he was hesitating, the station-master passed the door. Emily asked him to direct her to the house in which Mrs. Rook had been received. He led the way to the end of the platform, and pointed to the house. Emily and Mrs. Ellmother immediately left the station. Mirabel accompanied them, still remonstrating, still raising obstacles.
The house door was opened by an old man. He looked reproachfully at Mirabel. “You have been told already,” he said, “that no strangers are to see my wife?”
Encouraged by discovering that the man was Mr. Rook, Emily mentioned her name. “Perhaps you may have heard Mrs. Rook speak of me,” she added.
“I’ve heard her speak of you oftentimes.”
“What does the doctor say?”
“He thinks she may get over it. She doesn’t believe him.”
“Will you say that I am anxious to see her, if she feels well enough to receive me?”
Mr. Rook looked at Mrs. Ellmother. “Are there two of you wanting to go upstairs?” he inquired.
“This is my old friend and servant,” Emily answered. “She will wait for me down here.”
“She can wait in the parlor; the good people of this house are well known to me.” He pointed to the parlor door–and then led the way to the first floor. Emily followed him. Mirabel, as obstinate as ever, followed Emily.
Mr. Rook opened a door at the end of the landing; and, turning round to speak to Emily, noticed Mirabel standing behind her. Without making any remarks, the old man pointed significantly down the stairs. His resolution was evidently immovable. Mirabel appealed to Emily to help him.
“She will see me, if _you_ ask her,” he said, “Let me wait here?”
The sound of his voice was instantly followed by a cry from the bed-chamber–a cry of terror.
Mr. Rook hurried into the room, and closed the door. In less than a minute, he opened it again, with doubt and horror plainly visible in his face. He stepped up to Mirabel–eyed him with the closest scrutiny–and drew back again with a look of relief.
“She’s wrong,” he said; “you are not the man.”
This strange proceeding startled Emily.
“What man do you mean?” she asked.
Mr. Rook took no notice of the question. Still looking at Mirabel, he pointed down the stairs once more. With vacant eyes–moving mechanically, like a sleep-walker in his dream–Mirabel silently obeyed. Mr. Rook turned to Emily.
“Are you easily frightened?” he said
“I don’t understand you,” Emily replied. “Who is going to frighten me? Why did you speak to Mr. Mirabel in that strange way?”
Mr. Rook looked toward the bedroom door. “Maybe you’ll hear why, inside there. If I could have my way, you shouldn’t see her–but she’s not to be reasoned with. A caution, miss. Don’t be too ready to believe what my wife may say to you. She’s had a fright.” He opened the door. “In my belief,” he whispered, “she’s off her head.”
Emily crossed the threshold. Mr. Rook softly closed the door behind her.
CHAPTER LXI.
INSIDE THE ROOM.
A decent elderly woman was seated at the bedside. She rose, and spoke to Emily with a mingling of sorrow and confusion strikingly expressed on her face. “It isn’t my fault,” she said, “that Mrs. Rook receives you in this manner; I am obliged to humor her.”
She drew aside, and showed Mrs. Rook with her head supported by many pillows, and her face strangely hidden from view under a veil. Emily started back in horror. “Is her face injured?” she asked.
Mrs. Rook answered the question herself. Her voice was low and weak; but she still spoke with the same nervous hurry of articulation which had been remarked by Alban Morris, on the day when she asked him to direct her to Netherwoods
“Not exactly injured,” she explained; “but one’s appearance is a matter of some anxiety even on one’s death-bed. I am disfigured by a thoughtless use of water, to bring me to when I had my fall–and I can’t get at my toilet-things to put myself right again. I don’t wish to shock you. Please excuse the veil.”
Emily remembered the rouge on her cheeks, and the dye on her hair, when they had first seen each other at the school. Vanity–of all human frailties the longest-lived–still held its firmly-rooted place in this woman’s nature; superior to torment of conscience, unassailable by terror of death!
The good woman of the house waited a moment before she left the room. “What shall I say,” she asked, “if the clergyman comes?”
Mrs. Rook lifted her hand solemnly “Say,” she answered, “that a dying sinner is making atonement for sin. Say this young lady is present, by the decree of an all-wise Providence. No mortal creature must disturb us.” Her hand dropped back heavily on the bed. “Are we alone?” she asked.
“We are alone,” Emily answered. “What made you scream just before I came in?”
“No! I can’t allow you to remind me of that,” Mrs. Rook protested. “I must compose myself. Be quiet. Let me think.”
Recovering her composure, she also recovered that sense of enjoyment in talking of herself, which was one of the marked peculiarities in her character.
“You will excuse me if I exhibit religion,” she resumed. “My dear parents were exemplary people; I was most carefully brought up. Are you pious? Let us hope so.”
Emily was once more reminded of the past.
The bygone time returned to her memory–the time when she had accepted Sir Jervis Redwood’s offer of employment, and when Mrs. Rook had arrived at the school to be her traveling companion to the North. The wretched creature had entirely forgotten her own loose talk, after she had drunk Miss Ladd’s good wine to the last drop in the bottle. As she was boasting now of her piety, so she had boasted then of her lost faith and hope, and had mockingly declared her free-thinking opinions to be the result of her ill-assorted marriage. Forgotten–all forgotten, in this later time of pain and fear. Prostrate under the dread of death, her innermost nature–stripped of the concealments of her later life–was revealed to view. The early religious training, at which she had scoffed in the insolence of health and strength, revealed its latent influence–intermitted, but a living influence always from first to last. Mrs. Rook was tenderly mindful of her exemplary parents, and proud of exhibiting religion, on the bed from which she was never to rise again.
“Did I tell you that I am a miserable sinner?” she asked, after an interval of silence.
Emily could endure it no longer. “Say that to the clergyman,” she answered–“not to me.”
“Oh, but I must say it,” Mrs. Rook insisted. “I _am_ a miserable sinner. Let me give you an instance of it,” she continued, with a shameless relish of the memory of her own frailties. “I have been a drinker, in my time. Anything was welcome, when the fit was on me, as long as it got into my head. Like other persons in liquor, I sometimes talked of things that had better have been kept secret. We bore that in mind–my old man and I—when we were engaged by Sir Jervis. Miss Redwood wanted to put us in the next bedroom to hers–a risk not to be run. I might have talked of the murder at the inn; and she might have heard me. Please to remark a curious thing. Whatever else I might let out, when I was in my cups, not a word about the pocketbook ever dropped from me. You will ask how I know it. My dear, I should have heard of it from my husband, if I had let _that_ out–and he is as much in the dark as you are. Wonderful are the workings of the human mind, as the poet says; and drink drowns care, as the proverb says. But can drink deliver a person from fear by day, and fear by night? I believe, if I had dropped a word about the pocketbook, it would have sobered me in an instant. Have you any remark to make on this curious circumstance?”
Thus far, Emily had allowed the woman to ramble on, in the hope of getting information which direct inquiry might fail to produce. It was impossible, however, to pass over the allusion to the pocketbook. After giving her time to recover from the exhaustion which her heavy breathing sufficiently revealed, Emily put the question:
“Who did the pocketbook belong to?”
“Wait a little,” said Mrs. Rook. “Everything in its right place, is my motto. I mustn’t begin with the pocketbook. Why did I begin with it? Do you think this veil on my face confuses me? Suppose I take it off. But you must promise first–solemnly promise you won’t look at my face. How can I tell you about the murder (the murder is part of my confession, you know), with this lace tickling my skin? Go away–and stand there with your back to me. Thank you. Now I’ll take it off. Ha! the air feels refreshing; I know what I am about. Good heavens, I have forgotten something! I have forgotten _him_. And after such a fright as he gave me! Did you see him on the landing?”
“Who are you talking of?” Emily asked.
Mrs. Rook’s failing voice sank lower still.
“Come closer,” she said, “this must be whispered. Who am I talking of?” she repeated. “I am talking of the man who slept in the other bed at the inn; the man who did the deed with his own razor. He was gone when I looked into the outhouse in the gray of the morning. Oh, I have done my duty! I have told Mr. Rook to keep an eye on him downstairs. You haven’t an idea how obstinate and stupid my husband is. He says I couldn’t know the man, because I didn’t see him. Ha! there’s such a thing as hearing, when you don’t see. I heard–and I knew it again.”
Emily turned cold from head to foot.
“What did you know again?” she said.
“His voice,” Mrs. Rook answered. “I’ll swear to his voice before all the judges in England.”
Emily rushed to the bed. She looked at the woman who had said those dreadful words, speechless with horror.
“You’re breaking your promise!” cried Mrs. Rook. “You false girl, you’re breaking your promise!”
She snatched at the veil, and put it on again. The sight of her face, momentary as it had been, reassured Emily. Her wild eyes, made wilder still by the blurred stains of rouge below them, half washed away–her disheveled hair, with streaks of gray showing through the dye–presented a spectacle which would have been grotesque under other circumstances, but which now reminded Emily of Mr. Rook’s last words; warning her not to believe what his wife said, and even declaring his conviction that her intellect was deranged. Emily drew back from the bed, conscious of an overpowering sense of self-reproach. Although it was only for a moment, she had allowed her faith in Mirabel to be shaken by a woman who was out of her mind.
“Try to forgive me,” she said. “I didn’t willfully break my promise; you frightened me.”
Mrs. Rook began to cry. “I was a handsome woman in my time,” she murmured. “You would say I was handsome still, if the clumsy fools about me had not spoiled my appearance. Oh, I do feel so weak! Where’s my medicine?”
The bottle was on the table. Emily gave her the prescribed dose, and revived her failing strength.
“I am an extraordinary person,” she resumed. “My resolution has always been the admiration of every one who knew me. But my mind feels–how shall I express it?–a little vacant. Have mercy on my poor wicked soul! Help me.”
“How can I help you?”
“I want to recollect. Something happened in the summer time, when we were talking at Netherwoods. I mean when that impudent master at the school showed his suspicions of me. (Lord! how he frightened me, when he turned up afterward at Sir Jervis’s house.) You must have seen yourself he suspected me. How did he show it?”
“He showed you my locket,” Emily answered.
“Oh, the horrid reminder of the murder!” Mrs. Rook exclaimed. “_I_ didn’t mention it: don’t blame Me. You poor innocent, I have something dreadful to tell you.”
Emily’s horror of the woman forced her to speak. “Don’t tell me!” she cried. “I know more than you suppose; I know what I was ignorant of when you saw the locket.”
Mrs. Rook took offense at the interruption.
“Clever as you are, there’s one thing you don’t know,” she said. “You asked me, just now, who the pocketbook belonged to. It belonged to your father. What’s the matter? Are you crying?”
Emily was thinking of her father. The pocketbook was the last present she had given to him–a present on his birthday. “Is it lost?” she asked sadly.
“No; it’s not lost. You will hear more of it directly. Dry your eyes, and expect something interesting–I’m going to talk about love. Love, my dear, means myself. Why shouldn’t it? I’m not the only nice-looking woman, married to an old man, who has had a lover.”
“Wretch! what has that got to do with it?”
“Everything, you rude girl! My lover was like the rest of them; he would bet on race-horses, and he lost. He owned it to me, on the day when your father came to our inn. He said, ‘I must find the money–or be off to America, and say good-by forever.’ I was fool enough to be fond of him. It broke my heart to hear him talk in that way. I said, ‘If I find the money, and more than the money, will you take me with you wherever you go?’ Of course, he said Yes. I suppose you have heard of the inquest held at our old place by the coroner and jury? Oh, what idiots! They believed I was asleep on the night of the murder. I never closed my eyes–I was so miserable, I was so tempted.”
“Tempted? What tempted you?”
“Do you think I had any money to spare? Your father’s pocketbook tempted me. I had seen him open it, to pay his bill over-night. It was full of bank-notes. Oh, what an overpowering thing love is! Perhaps you have known it yourself.”
Emily’s indignation once more got the better of her prudence. “Have you no feeling of decency on your death-bed!” she said.
Mrs. Rook forgot her piety; she was ready with an impudent rejoinder. “You hot-headed little woman, your time will come,” she answered. “But you’re right–I am wandering from the point; I am not sufficiently sensible of this solemn occasion. By-the-by, do you notice my language? I inherit correct English from my mother–a cultivated person, who married beneath her. My paternal grandfather was a gentleman. Did I tell you that there came a time, on that dreadful night, when I could stay in bed no longer? The pocketbook–I did nothing but think of that devilish pocketbook, full of bank-notes. My husband was fast asleep all the time. I got a chair and stood on it. I looked into the place where the two men were sleeping, through the glass in the top of the door. Your father was awake; he was walking up and down the room. What do you say? Was he agitated? I didn’t notice. I don’t know whether the other man was asleep or awake. I saw nothing but the pocketbook stuck under the pillow, half in and half out. Your father kept on walking up and down. I thought to myself, ‘I’ll wait till he gets tired, and then I’ll have another look at the pocketbook.’ Where’s the wine? The doctor said I might have a glass of wine when I wanted it.”
Emily found the wine and gave it to her. She shuddered as she accidentally touched Mrs. Rook’s hand.
The wine helped the sinking woman.
“I must have got up more than once,” she resumed. “And more than once my heart must have failed me. I don’t clearly remember what I did, till the gray of the morning came. I think that must have been the last time I looked through the glass in the door.”
She began to tremble. She tore the veil off her face. She cried out piteously, “Lord, be merciful to me a sinner! Come here,” she said to Emily. “Where are you? No! I daren’t tell you what I saw; I daren’t tell you what I did. When you’re pos sessed by the devil, there’s nothing, nothing, nothing you can’t do! Where did I find the courage to unlock the door? Where did I find the courage to go in? Any other woman would have lost her senses, when she found blood on her fingers after taking the pocketbook–“
Emily’s head swam; her heart beat furiously–she staggered to the door, and opened it to escape from the room.
“I’m guilty of robbing him; but I’m innocent of his blood!” Mrs. Rook called after her wildly. “The deed was done–the yard door was wide open, and the man was gone–when I looked in for the last time. Come back, come back!”
Emily looked round.
“I can’t go near you,” she said, faintly.
“Come near enough to see this.”
She opened her bed-gown at the throat, and drew up a loop of ribbon over her head. ‘The pocketbook was attached to the ribbon. She held it out.
“Your father’s book,” she said. “Won’t you take your father’s book?”
For a moment, and only for a moment, Emily was repelled by the profanation associated with her birthday gift. Then, the loving remembrance of the dear hands that had so often touched that relic, drew the faithful daughter back to the woman whom she abhorred. Her eyes rested tenderly on the book. Before it had lain in that guilty bosom, it had been _his_ book. The beloved memory was all that was left to her now; the beloved memory consecrated it to her hand. She took the book.
“Open it,” said Mrs. Rook.
There were two five-pound bank-notes in it.
“His?” Emily asked.
“No; mine–the little I have been able to save toward restoring what I stole.”
“Oh!” Emily cried, “is there some good in this woman, after all?”
“There’s no good in the woman!” Mrs. Rook answered desperately. “There’s nothing but fear–fear of hell now; fear of the pocketbook in the past time. Twice I tried to destroy it–and twice it came back, to remind me of the duty that I owed to my miserable soul. I tried to throw it into the fire. It struck the bar, and fell back into the fender at my feet. I went out, and cast it into the well. It came back again in the first bucket of water that was drawn up. From that moment, I began to save what I could. Restitution! Atonement! I tell you the book found a tongue–and those were the grand words it dinned in my ears, morning and night.” She stooped to fetch her breath–stopped, and struck her bosom. “I hid it here, so that no person should see it, and no person take it from me. Superstition? Oh, yes, superstition! Shall tell you something? _You_ may find yourself superstitious, if you are ever cut to the heart as I was. He left me! The man I had disgraced myself for, deserted me on the day when I gave him the stolen money. He suspected it was stolen; he took care of his own cowardly self–and left me to the hard mercy of the law, if the theft was found out. What do you call that, in the way of punishment? Haven’t I suffered? Haven’t I made atonement? Be a Christian–say you forgive me.”
“I do forgive you.”
“Say you will pray for me.”
“I will.”
“Ah! that comforts me! Now you can go.”
Emily looked at her imploringly. “Don’t send me away, knowing no more of the murder than I knew when I came here! Is there nothing, really nothing, you can tell me?”
Mrs. Rook pointed to the door.
“Haven’t I told you already? Go downstairs, and see the wretch who escaped in the dawn of the morning!”
“Gently, ma’am, gently! You’re talking too loud,” cried a mocking voice from outside.
“It’s only the doctor,” said Mrs. Rook. She crossed her hands over her bosom with a deep-drawn sigh. “I want no doctor, now. My peace is made with my Maker. I’m ready for death; I’m fit for Heaven. Go away! go away!”
CHAPTER LXII.
DOWNSTAIRS.
In a moment more, the doctor came in–a brisk, smiling, self-sufficient man–smartly dressed, with a flower in his button-hole. A stifling odor of musk filled the room, as he drew out his handkerchief with a flourish, and wiped his forehead.
“Plenty of hard work in my line, just now,” he said. “Hullo, Mrs. Rook! somebody has been allowing you to excite yourself. I heard you, before I opened the door. Have you been encouraging her to talk?” he asked, turning to Emily, and shaking his finger at her with an air of facetious remonstrance.
Incapable of answering him; forgetful of the ordinary restraints of social intercourse–with the one doubt that preserved her belief in Mirabel, eager for confirmation–Emily signed to this stranger to follow her into a corner of the room, out of hearing. She made no excuses: she took no notice of his look of surprise. One hope was all she could feel, one word was all she could say, after that second assertion of Mirabel’s guilt. Indicating Mrs. Rook by a glance at the bed, she whispered the word:
“Mad?”
Flippant and familiar, the doctor imitated her; he too looked at the bed.
“No more mad than you are, miss. As I said just now, my patient has been exciting herself; I daresay she has talked a little wildly in consequence. _Hers_ isn’t a brain to give way, I can tell you. But there’s somebody else–“
Emily had fled from the room. He had destroyed her last fragment of belief in Mirabel’s innocence. She was on the landing trying to console herself, when the doctor joined her.
“Are you acquainted with the gentleman downstairs?” he asked.
“What gentleman?”
“I haven’t heard his name; he looks like a clergyman. If you know him–“
“I do know him. I can’t answer questions! My mind–“
“Steady your mind, miss! and take your friend home as soon as you can. _He_ hasn’t got Mrs. Rook’s hard brain; he’s in a state of nervous prostration, which may end badly. Do you know where he lives?”
“He is staying with his sister–Mrs. Delvin.”
“Mrs. Delvin! she’s a friend and patient of mine. Say I’ll look in to-morrow morning, and see what I can do for her brother. In the meantime, get him to bed, and to rest; and don’t be afraid of giving him brandy.”
The doctor returned to the bedroom. Emily heard Mrs. Ellmother’s voice below.
“Are you up there, miss?”
“Yes.”
Mrs. Ellmother ascended the stairs. “It was an evil hour,” she said, “that you insisted on going to this place. Mr. Mirabel–” The sight of Emily’s face suspended the next words on her lips. She took the poor young mistress in her motherly arms. “Oh, my child! what has happened to you?”
“Don’t ask me now. Give me your arm–let us go downstairs.”
“You won’t be startled when you see Mr. Mirabel–will you, my dear? I wouldn’t let them disturb you; I said nobody should speak to you but myself. The truth is, Mr. Mirabel has had a dreadful fright. What are you looking for?”
“Is there a garden here? Any place where we can breathe the fresh air?”
There was a courtyard at the back of the house. They found their way to it. A bench was placed against one of the walls. They sat down.
“Shall I wait till you’re better before I say any more?” Mrs. Ellmother asked. “No? You want to hear about Mr. Mirabel? My dear, he came into the parlor where I was; and Mr. Rook came in too—and waited, looking at him. Mr. Mirabel sat down in a corner, in a dazed state as I thought. It wasn’t for long. He jumped up, and clapped his hand on his heart as if his heart hurt him. ‘I must and will know what’s going on upstairs,’ he says. Mr. Rook pulled him back, and told him to wait till the young lady came down. Mr. Mirabel wouldn’t hear of it. ‘Your wife’s frightening her,’ he says; ‘your wife’s telling her horrible things about me.’ He was taken on a sudden with a shivering fit; his eyes rolled, and his teeth chattered. Mr. Rook made matters worse; he lost his temper. ‘I’m damned,’ he says, ‘if I don’t begin to think you _are_ the man, after all; I’ve half a mind to send for the police.’ Mr. Mirabel dropped into his chair. His eyes stared, his mouth fell open. I took hold of his hand. Cold–cold as ice. What it all meant I can’t say. Oh, miss, _you_ know! Let me tell you the rest of it some other time.”
Emily insisted on hearing more. “The end!” she cried. “How did it end?”
“I don’t know how it might have ended, if the doctor hadn’t come in–to pay his visit, you know, upstairs. He said some learned words. When he came to plain English, he asked if anybody had frig htened the gentleman. I said Mr. Rook had frightened him. The doctor says to Mr. Rook, ‘Mind what you are about. If you frighten him again, you may have his death to answer for.’ That cowed Mr. Rook. He asked what he had better do. ‘Give me some brandy for him first,’ says the doctor; ‘and then get him home at once.’ I found the brandy, and went away to the inn to order the carriage. Your ears are quicker than mine, miss–do I hear it now?”
They rose, and went to the house door. The carriage was there.
Still cowed by what the doctor had said, Mr. Rook appeared, carefully leading Mirabel out. He had revived under the action of the stimulant. Passing Emily he raised his eyes to her–trembled–and looked down again. When Mr. Rook opened the door of the carriage he paused, with one of his feet on the step. A momentary impulse inspired him with a false courage, and brought a flush into his ghastly face. He turned to Emily.
“May I speak to you?” he asked.
She started back from him. He looked at Mrs. Ellmother. “Tell her I am innocent,” he said. The trembling seized on him again. Mr. Rook was obliged to lift him into the carriage.
Emily caught at Mrs. Ellmother’s arm. “You go with him,” she said. “I can’t.”
“How are you to get back, miss?”
She turned away and spoke to the coachman. “I am not very well. I want the fresh air–I’ll sit by you.”
Mrs. Ellmother remonstrated and protested, in vain. As Emily had determined it should be, so it was.
“Has he said anything?” she asked, when they had arrived at their journey’s end.
“He has been like a man frozen up; he hasn’t said a word; he hasn’t even moved.”
“Take him to his sister; and tell her all that you know. Be careful to repeat what the doctor said. I can’t face Mrs. Delvin. Be patient, my good old friend; I have no secrets from you. Only wait till to-morrow; and leave me by myself to-night.”
Alone in her room, Emily opened her writing-case. Searching among the letters in it, she drew out a printed paper. It was the Handbill describing the man who had escaped from the inn, and offering a reward for the discovery of him.
At the first line of the personal description of the fugitive, the paper dropped from her hand. Burning tears forced their way into her eyes. Feeling for her handkerchief, she touched the pocketbook which she had received from Mrs. Rook. After a little hesitation she took it out. She looked at it. She opened it.
The sight of the bank-notes repelled her; she hid them in one of the pockets of the book. There was a second pocket which she had not yet examined. She pat her hand into it, and, touching something, drew out a letter.
The envelope (already open) was addressed to “James Brown, Esq., Post Office, Zeeland. “Would it be inconsistent with her respect for her father’s memory to examine the letter? No; a glance would decide whether she ought to read it or not.
It was without date or address; a startling letter to look at–for it only contained three words:
“I say No.”
The words were signed in initials:
“S. J.”
In the instant when she read the initials, the name occurred to her.
Sara Jethro.
CHAPTER LXIII.
THE DEFENSE OF MIRABEL.
The discovery of the letter gave a new direction to Emily’s thoughts–and so, for the time at least, relieved her mind from the burden that weighed on it. To what question, on her father’s part, had “I say No” been Miss Jethro’s brief and stern reply? Neither letter nor envelope offered the slightest hint that might assist inquiry; even the postmark had been so carelessly impressed that it was illegible.
Emily was still pondering over the three mysterious words, when she was interrupted by Mrs. Ellmother’s voice at the door.
“I must ask you to let me come in, miss; though I know you wished to be left by yourself till to-morrow. Mrs. Delvin says she must positively see you to-night. It’s my belief that she will send for the servants, and have herself carried in here, if you refuse to do what she asks. You needn’t be afraid of seeing Mr. Mirabel.”
“Where is he?”
“His sister has given up her bedroom to him,” Mrs. Ellmother answered. “She thought of your feelings before she sent me here–and had the curtains closed between the sitting-room and the bedroom. I suspect my nasty temper misled me, when I took a dislike to Mrs. Delvin. She’s a good creature; I’m sorry you didn’t go to her as soon as we got back.”
“Did she seem to be angry, when she sent you here?”
“Angry! She was crying when I left her.”
Emily hesitated no longer.
She noticed a remarkable change in the invalid’s sitting-room–so brilliantly lighted on other occasions–the moment she entered it. The lamps were shaded, and the candles were all extinguished. “My eyes don’t bear the light so well as usual,” Mrs. Delvin said. “Come and sit near me, Emily; I hope to quiet your mind. I should be grieved if you left my house with a wrong impression of me.”
Knowing what she knew, suffering as she must have suffered, the quiet kindness of her tone implied an exercise of self-restraint which appealed irresistibly to Emily’s sympathies. “Forgive me,” she said, “for having done you an injustice. I am ashamed to think that I shrank from seeing you when I returned from Belford.”
“I will endeavor to be worthy of your better opinion of me,” Mrs. Delvin replied. “In one respect at least, I may claim to have had your best interests at heart–while we were still personally strangers. I tried to prevail on my poor brother to own the truth, when he discovered the terrible position in which he was placed toward you. He was too conscious of the absence of any proof which might induce you to believe him, if he attempted to defend himself–in one word, he was too timid–to take my advice. He has paid the penalty, and I have paid the penalty, of deceiving you.”
Emily started. “In what way have you deceived me?” she asked.
“In the way that was forced on us by our own conduct,” Mrs. Delvin said. “We have appeared to help you, without really doing so; we calculated on inducing you to marry my brother, and then (when he could speak with the authority of a husband) on prevailing on you to give up all further inquiries. When you insisted on seeing Mrs. Rook, Miles had the money in his hand to bribe her and her husband to leave England.”
“Oh, Mrs. Delvin!”
“I don’t attempt to excuse myself. I don’t expect you to consider how sorely I was tempted to secure the happiness of my brother’s life, by marriage with such a woman as yourself. I don’t remind you that I knew–when I put obstacles in your way–that you were blindly devoting yourself to the discovery of an innocent man.”
Emily heard her with angry surprise. “Innocent?” she repeated. “Mrs. Rook recognized his voice the instant she heard him speak.”
Impenetrable to interruption, Mrs. Delvin went on. “But what I do ask,” she persisted, “even after our short acquaintance, is this. Do you suspect me of deliberately scheming to make you the wife of a murderer?”
Emily had never viewed the serious question between them in this light. Warmly, generously, she answered the appeal that had been made to her. “Oh, don’t think that of me! I know I spoke thoughtlessly and cruelly to you, just now–“
“You spoke impulsively,” Mrs. Delvin interposed; “that was all. My one desire before we part–how can I expect you to remain here, after what has happened?–is to tell you the truth. I have no interested object in view; for all hope of your marriage with my brother is now at an end. May I ask if you have heard that he and your father were strangers, when they met at the inn?”
“Yes; I know that.”
“If there had been any conversation between them, when they retired to rest, they might have mentioned their names. But your father was preoccupied; and my brother, after a long day’s walk, was so tired that he fell asleep as soon as his head was on the pillow. He only woke when the morning dawned. What he saw when he looked toward the opposite bed might have struck with terror the boldest man that ever lived. His first impulse was naturally to alarm the house. When he got on his feet, he saw his own razor–a blood-stained razor on the bed by the side of the corp se. At that discovery, he lost all control over himself. In a panic of terror, he snatched up his knapsack, unfastened the yard door, and fled from the house. Knowing him, as you and I know him, can we wonder at it? Many a man has been hanged for murder, on circumstantial evidence less direct than the evidence against poor Miles. His horror of his own recollections was so overpowering that he forbade me even to mention the inn at Zeeland in my letters, while he was abroad. ‘Never tell me (he wrote) who that wretched murdered stranger was, if I only heard of his name, I believe it would haunt me to my dying day. I ought not to trouble you with these details–and yet, I am surely not without excuse. In the absence of any proof, I cannot expect you to believe as I do in my brother’s innocence. But I may at least hope to show you that there is some reason for doubt. Will you give him the benefit of that doubt?”
“Willingly!” Emily replied. “Am I right in supposing that you don’t despair of proving his innocence, even yet’?”
“I don’t quite despair. But my hopes have grown fainter and fainter, as the years have gone on. There is a person associated with his escape from Zeeland; a person named Jethro–“
“You mean Miss Jethro!”
“Yes. Do you know her?”
“I know her–and my father knew her. I have found a letter, addressed to him, which I have no doubt was written by Miss Jethro. It is barely possible that you may understand what it means. Pray look at it.”
“I am quite unable to help you,” Mrs. Delvin answered, after reading the letter. “All I know of Miss Jethro is that, but for her interposition, my brother might have fallen into the hands of the police. She saved him.”
“Knowing him, of course?”
“That is the remarkable part of it: they were perfect strangers to each other.”
“But she must have had some motive.”
“_There_ is the foundation of my hope for Miles. Miss Jethro declared, when I wrote and put the question to her, that the one motive by which she was actuated was the motive of mercy. I don’t believe her. To my mind, it is in the last degree improbable that she would consent to protect a stranger from discovery, who owned to her (as my brother did) that he was a fugitive suspected of murder. She knows something, I am firmly convinced, of that dreadful event at Zeeland–and she has some reason for keeping it secret. Have you any influence over her?”
“Tell me where I can find her.”
“I can’t tell you. She has removed from the address at which my brother saw her last. He has made every possible inquiry–without result.”
As she replied in those discouraging terms, the curtains which divided Mrs. Delvin’s bedroom from her sitting-room were drawn aside. An elderly woman-servant approached her mistress’s couch.
“Mr. Mirabel is awake, ma’am. He is very low; I can hardly feel his pulse. Shall I give him some more brandy?”
Mrs. Delvin held out her hand to Emily. “Come to me to-morrow morning,” she said–and signed to the servant to wheel her couch into the next room. As the curtain closed over them, Emily heard Mirabel’s voice. “Where am I?” he said faintly. “Is it all a dream?”
The prospect of his recovery the next morning was gloomy indeed. He had sunk into a state of deplorable weakness, in mind as well as in body. The little memory of events that he still preserved was regarded by him as the memory of a dream. He alluded to Emily, and to his meeting with her unexpectedly. But from that point his recollection failed him. They had talked of something interesting, he said–but he was unable to remember what it was. And they had waited together at a railway station–but for what purpose he could not tell. He sighed and wondered when Emily would marry him–and so fell asleep again, weaker than ever.
Not having any confidence in the doctor at Belford, Mrs. Delvin had sent an urgent message to a physician at Edinburgh, famous for his skill in treating diseases of the nervous system. “I cannot expect him to reach this remote place, without some delay,” she said; “I must bear my suspense as well as I can.”
“You shall not bear it alone,” Emily answered. “I will wait with you till the doctor comes.”
Mrs. Delvin lifted her frail wasted hands to Emily’s face, drew it a little nearer–and kissed her.
CHAPTER LXIV.
ON THE WAY TO LONDON.
The parting words had been spoken. Emily and her companion were on their way to London.
For some little time, they traveled in silence–alone in the railway carriage. After submitting as long as she could to lay an embargo on the use of her tongue, Mrs. Ellmother started the conversation by means of a question: “Do you think Mr. Mirabel will get over it, miss?”
“It’s useless to ask me,” Emily said. “Even the great man from Edinburgh is not able to decide yet, whether he will recover or not.”
“You have taken me into your confidence, Miss Emily, as you promised–and I have got something in my mind in consequence. May I mention it without giving offense?”
“What is it?”
“I wish you had never taken up with Mr. Mirabel.”
Emily was silent. Mrs. Ellmother, having a design of her own to accomplish, ventured to speak more plainly. “I often think of Mr. Alban Morris,” she proceeded. “I always did like him, and I always shall.”
Emily suddenly pulled down her veil. “Don’t speak of him!” she said.
“I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“You don’t offend me. You distress me. Oh, how often I have wished–!” She threw herself back in a corner of the carriage and said no more.
Although not remarkable for the possession of delicate tact, Mrs. Ellmother discovered that the best course she could now follow was a course of silence.
Even at the time when she had most implicitly trusted Mirabel, the fear that she might have acted hastily and harshly toward Alban had occasionally troubled Emily’s mind. The impression produced by later events had not only intensified this feeling, but had presented the motives of that true friend under an entirely new point of view. If she had been left in ignorance of the manner of her father’s death–as Alban had designed to leave her; as she would have been left, but for the treachery of Francine–how happily free she would have been from thoughts which it was now a terror to her to recall. She would have parted from Mirabel, when the visit to the pleasant country house had come to an end, remembering him as an amusing acquaintance and nothing more. He would have been spared, and she would have been spared, the shock that had so cruelly assailed them both. What had she gained by Mrs. Rook’s detestable confession? The result had been perpetual disturbance of mind provoked by self-torturing speculations on the subject of the murder. If Mirabel was innocent, who was guilty? The false wife, without pity and without shame–or the brutal husband, who looked capable of any enormity? What was her future to be? How was it all to end? In the despair of that bitter moment–seeing her devoted old servant looking at her with kind compassionate eyes–Emily’s troubled spirit sought refuge in impetuous self-betrayal; the very betrayal which she had resolved should not escape her, hardly a minute since!
She bent forward out of her corner, and suddenly drew up her veil. “Do you expect to see Mr. Alban Morris, when we get back?” she asked.
“I should like to see him, miss–if you have no objection.”
“Tell him I am ashamed of myself! and say I ask his pardon with all my heart!”
“The Lord be praised!” Mrs. Ellmother burst out–and then, when it was too late, remembered the conventional restraints appropriate to the occasion. “Gracious, what a fool I am!” she said to herself. “Beautiful weather, Miss Emily, isn’t it?” she continued, in a desperate hurry to change the subject.
Emily reclined again in her corner of the carriage. She smiled, for the first time since she had become Mrs. Delvin’s guest at the tower.
BOOK THE LAST–AT HOME AGAIN.
CHAPTER LXV.
CECILIA IN A NEW CHARACTER.
Reaching the cottage at night, Emily found the card of a visitor who had called during the day. It bore the name of “Miss Wyvil,” and had a message written on it which strongly excited Emily’s curiosity.
“I have seen the telegra m which tells your servant that you return to-night. Expect me early to-morrow morning–with news that will deeply interest you.”
To what news did Cecilia allude? Emily questioned the woman who had been left in charge of the cottage, and found that she had next to nothing to tell. Miss Wyvil had flushed up, and had looked excited, when she read the telegraphic message–that was all. Emily’s impatience was, as usual, not to be concealed. Expert Mrs. Ellmother treated the case in the right way–first with supper, and then with an adjournment to bed. The clock struck twelve, when she put out the young mistress’s candle. “Ten hours to pass before Cecilia comes here!” Emily exclaimed. “Not ten minutes,” Mrs. Ellmother reminded her, “if you will only go to sleep.”
Cecilia arrived before the breakfast-table was cleared; as lovely, as gentle, as affectionate as ever–but looking unusually serious and subdued.
“Out with it at once!” Emily cried. “What have you got to tell me?’
“Perhaps, I had better tell you first,” Cecilia said, “that I know what you kept from me when I came here, after you left us at Monksmoor. Don’t think, my dear, that I say this by way of complaint. Mr. Alban Morris says you had good reasons for keeping your secret.”
“Mr. Alban Morris! Did you get your information from _him?_”
“Yes. Do I surprise you?”
“More than words can tell!”
“Can you bear another surprise? Mr. Morris has seen Miss Jethro, and has discovered that Mr. Mirabel has been wrongly suspected of a dreadful crime. Our amiable little clergyman is guilty of being a coward–and guilty of nothing else. Are you really quiet enough to read about it?”
She produced some leaves of paper filled with writing. “There,” she explained, “is Mr. Morris’s own account of all that passed between Miss Jethro and himself.”
“But how do _you_ come by it?”
“Mr. Morris gave it to me. He said, ‘Show it to Emily as soon as possible; and take care to be with her while she reads it.’ There is a reason for this–” Cecilia’s voice faltered. On the brink of some explanation, she seemed to recoil from it. “I will tell you by-and-by what the reason is,” she said.
Emily looked nervously at the manuscript. “Why doesn’t he tell me himself what he has discovered? Is he–” The leaves began to flutter in her trembling fingers–“is he angry with me?”
“Oh, Emily, angry with You! Read what he has written and you shall know why he keeps away.”
Emily opened the manuscript.
CHAPTER LXVI.
ALBAN’S NARRATIVE.
“The information which I have obtained from Miss Jethro has been communicated to me, on the condition that I shall not disclose the place of her residence. ‘Let me pass out of notice (she said) as completely as if I had passed out of life; I wish to be forgotten by some, and to be unknown by others.’ With this one stipulation, she left me free to write the present narrative of what passed at the interview between us. I feel that the discoveries which I have made are too important to the persons interested to be trusted to memory.
1. _She Receives Me_.
“Finding Miss Jethro’s place of abode, with far less difficulty than I had anticipated (thanks to favoring circumstances), I stated plainly the object of my visit. She declined to enter into conversation with me on the subject of the murder at Zeeland.
“I was prepared to meet with this rebuke, and to take the necessary measures for obtaining a more satisfactory reception. ‘A person is suspected of having committed the murder,’ I said; ‘and there is reason to believe that you are in a position to say whether the suspicion is justified or not. Do you refuse to answer me, if I put the question?’
“Miss Jethro asked who the person was.
“I mentioned the name–Mr. Miles Mirabel.
“It is not necessary, and it would certainly be not agreeable to me, to describe the effect which this reply produced on Miss Jethro. After giving her time to compose herself, I entered into certain explanations, in order to convince her at the outset of my good faith. The result justified my anticipations. I was at once admitted to her confidence.
“She said, ‘I must not hesitate to do an act of justice to an innocent man. But, in such a serious matter as this, you have a right to judge for yourself whether the person who is now speaking to you is a person whom you can trust. You may believe that I tell the truth about others, if I begin–whatever it may cost me–by telling the truth about myself.’
2. _She Speaks of Herself_.
“I shall not attempt to place on record the confession of a most unhappy woman. It was the common story of sin bitterly repented, and of vain effort to recover the lost place in social esteem. Too well known a story, surely, to be told again.
“But I may with perfect propriety repeat what Miss Jethro said to me, in allusion to later events in her life which are connected with my own personal experience. She recalled to my memory a visit which she had paid to me at Netherwoods, and a letter addressed to her by Doctor Allday, which I had read at her express request.
“She said, ‘You may remember that the letter contained some severe reflections on my conduct. Among other things, the doctor mentions that he called at the lodging I occupied during my visit to London, and found I had taken to flight: also that he had reason to believe I had entered Miss Ladd’s service, under false pretenses.’
“I asked if the doctor had wronged her.
“She answered ‘No: in one case, he is ignorant; in the other, he is right. On leaving his house, I found myself followed in the street by the man to whom I owe the shame and misery of my past life. My horror of him is not to be described in words. The one way of escaping was offered by an empty cab that passed me. I reached the railway station safely, and went back to my home in the country. Do you blame me?’
“It was impossible to blame her–and I said so.
“She then confessed the deception which she had practiced on Miss Ladd. ‘I have a cousin,’ she said, ‘who was a Miss Jethro like me. Before her marriage she had been employed as a governess. She pitied me; she sympathized with my longing to recover the character that I had lost. With her permission, I made use of the testimonials which she had earned as a teacher–I was betrayed (to this day I don’t know by whom)–and I was dismissed from Netherwoods. Now you know that I deceived Miss Ladd, you may reasonably conclude that I am likely to deceive You.’
“I assured her, with perfect sincerity, that I had drawn no such conclusion. Encouraged by my reply, Miss Jethro proceeded as follows.
3. _She Speaks of Mirabel_.
“‘Four years ago, I was living near Cowes, in the Isle of Wight–in a cottage which had been taken for me by a gentleman who was the owner of a yacht. We had just returned from a short cruise, and the vessel was under orders to sail for Cherbourg with the next tide.
“‘While I was walking in my garden, I was startled by the sudden appearance Of a man (evidently a gentleman) who was a perfect stranger to me. He was in a pitiable state of terror, and he implored my protection. In reply to my first inquiries, he mentioned the inn at Zeeland, and the dreadful death of a person unknown to him; whom I recognized (partly by the description given, and partly by comparison of dates) as Mr. James Brown. I shall say nothing of the shock inflicted on me: you don’t want to know what I felt. What I did (having literally only a minute left for decision) was to hide the fugitive from discovery, and to exert my influence in his favor with the owner of the yacht. I saw nothing more of him. He was put on board, as soon as the police were out of sight, and was safely landed at Cherbourg.’
“I asked what induced her to run the risk of protecting a stranger, who was under suspicion of having committed a murder.
“She said, ‘You shall hear my explanation directly. Let us have done with Mr. Mirabel first. We occasionally corresponded, during the long absence on the continent; never alluding, at his express request, to the horrible event at the inn. His last letter reached me, after he had established himself at Vale Regis. Writing of the society in the neighborhood, he infor med me of his introduction to Miss Wyvil, and of the invitation that he had received to meet her friend and schoolfellow at Monksmoor. I knew that Miss Emily possessed a Handbill describing personal peculiarities in Mr. Mirabel, not hidden under the changed appearance of his head and face. If she remembered or happened to refer to that description, while she was living in the same house with him, there was a possibility at least of her suspicion being excited. The fear of this took me to you. It was a morbid fear, and, as events turned out, an unfounded fear: but I was unable to control it. Failing to produce any effect on you, I went to Vale Regis, and tried (vainly again) to induce Mr. Mirabel to send an excuse to Monksmoor. He, like you, wanted to know what my motive was. When I tell you that I acted solely in Miss Emily’s interests, and that I knew how she had been deceived about her father’s death, need I say why I was afraid to acknowledge my motive?’
“I understood that Miss Jethro might well be afraid of the consequences, if she risked any allusion to Mr. Brown’s horrible death, and if it afterward chanced to reach his daughter’s ears. But this state of feeling implied an extraordinary interest in the preservation of Emily’s peace of mind. I asked Miss Jethro how that interest had been excited?
“She answered, ‘I can only satisfy you in one way. I must speak of her father now.'”
Emily looked up from the manuscript. She felt Cecilia’s arm tenderly caressing her. She heard Cecilia say, “My poor dear, there is one last trial of your courage still to come. I am afraid of what you are going to read, when you turn to the next page. And yet–“
“And yet,” Emily replied gently, “it must be done. I have learned my hard lesson of endurance, Cecilia, don’t be afraid.”
Emily turned to the next page.
4. _She Speaks of the Dead_.
“For the first time, Miss Jethro appeared to be at a loss how to proceed. I could see that she was suffering. She rose, and opening a drawer in her writing table, took a letter from it.
“She said, ‘Will you read this? It was written by Miss Emily’s father. Perhaps it may say more for me than I can say for myself?’
“I copy the letter. It was thus expressed:
“‘You have declared that our farewell to-day is our farewell forever. For the second time, you have refused to be my wife; and you have done this, to use your own words, in mercy to Me.
“‘In mercy to Me, I implore you to reconsider your decision.
“‘If you condemn me to live without you–I feel it, I know it–you condemn me to despair which I have not fortitude enough to endure. Look at the passages which I have marked for you in the New Testament. Again and again, I say it; your true repentance has made you worthy of the pardon of God. Are you not worthy of the love, admiration, and respect of man? Think! oh, Sara, think of what our lives might be, and let them be united for time and for eternity.
“‘I can write no more. A deadly faintness oppresses me. My mind is in a state unknown to me in past years. I am in such confusion that I sometimes think I hate you. And then I recover from my delusion, and know that man never loved woman as I love you.
“‘You will have time to write to me by this evening’s post. I shall stop at Zeeland to-morrow, on my way back, and ask for a letter at the post office. I forbid explanations and excuses. I forbid heartless allusions to your duty. Let me have an answer which does not keep me for a moment in suspense.
“‘For the last time, I ask you: Do you consent to be my wife? Say, Yes–or say, No.’
“I gave her back the letter–with the one comment on it, which the circumstances permitted me to make:
“‘You said No?’
“She bent her head in silence.
“I went on–not willingly, for I would have spared her if it had been possible. I said, ‘He died, despairing, by his own hand–and you knew it?’
“She looked up. ‘No! To say that I knew it is too much. To say that I feared it is the truth.’
“‘Did you love him?’
“She eyed me in stern surprise. ‘Have _I_ any right to love? Could I disgrace an honorable man by allowing him to marry me? You look as if you held me responsible for his death.’
“‘Innocently responsible,’ I said.
“She still followed her own train of thought. ‘Do you suppose I could for a moment anticipate that he would destroy himself, when I wrote my reply? He was a truly religious man. If he had been in his right mind, he would have shrunk from the idea of suicide as from the idea of a crime.’
“On reflection, I was inclined to agree with her. In his terrible position, it was at least possible that the sight of the razor (placed ready, with the other appliances of the toilet, for his fellow-traveler’s use) might have fatally tempted a man whose last hope was crushed, whose mind was tortured by despair. I should have been merciless indeed, if I had held Miss Jethro accountable thus far. But I found it hard to sympathize with the course which she had pursued, in permitting Mr. Brown’s death to be attributed to murder without a word of protest. ‘Why were you silent?’ I said.
“She smiled bitterly.
“‘A woman would have known why, without asking,’ she replied. ‘A woman would have understood that I shrank from a public confession of my shameful past life. A woman would have remembered what reasons I had for pitying the man who loved me, and for accepting any responsibility rather than associate his memory, before the world, with an unworthy passion for a degraded creature, ending in an act of suicide. Even if I had made that cruel sacrifice, would public opinion have believed such a person as I am–against the evidence of a medical man, and the verdict of a jury? No, Mr. Morris! I said nothing, and I was resolved to say nothing, so long as the choice of alternatives was left to me. On the day when Mr. Mirabel implored me to save him, that choice was no longer mine–and you know what I did. And now again when suspicion (after all the long interval that had passed) has followed and found that innocent man, you know what I have done. What more do you ask of me?’
“‘Your pardon,’ I said, ‘for not having understood you–and a last favor. May I repeat what I have heard to the one person of all others who ought to know, and who must know, what you have told me?’
“It was needless to hint more plainly that I was speaking of Emily. Miss Jethro granted my request.
“‘It shall be as you please,’ she answered. ‘Say for me to _his_ daughter, that the grateful remembrance of her is my one refuge from the thoughts that tortured me, when we spoke together on her last night at school. She has made this dead heart of mine feel a reviving breath of life, when I think of her. Never, in our earthly pilgrimage, shall we meet again–I implore her to pity and forget me. Farewell, Mr. Morris; farewell forever.’
“I confess that the tears came into my eyes. When I could see clearly again, I was alone in the room.”
CHAPTER LXVII.
THE TRUE CONSOLATION.
Emily closed the pages which told her that her father had died by his own hand.
Cecilia still held her tenderly embraced. By slow degrees, her head dropped until it rested on her friend’s bosom. Silently she suffered. Silently Cecilia bent forward, and kissed her forehead. The sounds that penetrated to the room were not out of harmony with the time. From a distant house the voices of children were just audible, singing the plaintive melody of a hymn; and, now and then, the breeze blew the first faded leaves of autumn against the window. Neither of the girls knew how long the minutes followed each other uneventfully, before there was a change. Emily raised her head, and looked at Cecilia.
“I have one friend left,” she said.
“Not only me, love–oh, I hope not only me!”
“Yes. Only you.”
“I want to say something, Emily; but I am afraid of hurting you.”
“My dear, do you remember what we once read in a book of history at school? It told of the death of a tortured man, in the old time, who was broken on the wheel. He lived through it long enough to say that the agony, after the first stroke of the club, dulled his capacity for feeling pain when the next blows fell. I fancy pain of the mind must f ollow the same rule. Nothing you can say will hurt me now.”
“I only wanted to ask, Emily, if you were engaged–at one time–to marry Mr. Mirabel. Is it true?”
“False! He pressed me to consent to an engagement–and I said he must not hurry me.”
“What made you say that?”
“I thought of Alban Morris.”
Vainly Cecilia tried to restrain herself. A cry of joy escaped her.
“Are you glad?” Emily asked. “Why?”
Cecilia made no direct reply. “May I tell you what you wanted to know, a little while since?” she said. “You asked why Mr. Morris left it all to me, instead of speaking to you himself. When I put the same question to him, he told me to read what he had written. ‘Not a shadow of suspicion rests on Mr. Mirabel,’ he said. ‘Emily is free to marry him–and free through Me. Can _I_ tell her that? For her sake, and for mine, it must not be. All that I can do is to leave old remembrances to plead for me. If they fail, I shall know that she will be happier with Mr. Mirabel than with me.’ ‘And you will submit?’ I asked. ‘Because I love her,’ he answered, ‘I must submit.’ Oh, how pale you are! Have I distressed you?”
“You have done me good.”
“Will you see him?”
Emily pointed to the manuscript. “At such a time as this?” she said.
Cecilia still held to her resolution. “Such a time as this is the right time,” she answered. “It is now, when you most want to be comforted, that you ought to see him. Who can quiet your poor aching heart as _he_ can quiet it?” She impulsively snatched at the manuscript and threw it out of sight. “I can’t bear to look at it,” she said. “Emily! if I have done wrong, will you forgive me? I saw him this morning before I came here. I was afraid of what might happen–I refused to break the dreadful news to you, unless he was somewhere near us. Your good old servant knows where to go. Let me send her–“
Mrs. Ellmother herself opened the door, and stood doubtful on the threshold, hysterically sobbing and laughing at the same time. “I’m everything that’s bad!” the good old creature burst out. “I’ve been listening–I’ve been lying–I said you wanted him. Turn me out of my situation, if you like. I’ve got him! Here he is!”
In another moment, Emily was in his arms–and they were alone. On his faithful breast the blessed relief of tears came to her at last: she burst out crying.
“Oh, Alban, can you forgive me?”
He gently raised her head, so that he could see her face.
“My love, let me look at you,” he said. “I want to think again of the day when we parted in the garden at school. Do you remember the one conviction that sustained me? I told you, Emily, there was a time of fulfillment to come in our two lives; and I have never wholly lost the dear belief. My own darling, the time has come!”
POSTSCRIPT.
GOSSIP IN THE STUDIO.
The winter time had arrived. Alban was clearing his palette, after a hard day’s work at the cottage. The servant announced that tea was ready, and that Miss Ladd was waiting to see him in the next room.
Alban ran in, and received the visitor cordially with both hands. “Welcome back to England! I needn’t ask if the sea-voyage has done you good. You are looking ten years younger than when you went away.”
Miss Ladd smiled. “I shall soon be ten years older again, if I go back to Netherwoods,” she replied. “I didn’t believe it at the time; but I know better now. Our friend Doctor Allday was right, when he said that my working days were over. I must give up the school to a younger and stronger successor, and make the best I can in retirement of what is left of my life. You and Emily may expect to have me as a near neighbor. Where is Emily?”
“Far away in the North.”
“In the North! You don’t mean that she has gone back to Mrs. Delvin?”
“She has gone back–with Mrs. Ellmother to take care of her–at my express request. You know what Emily is, when there is an act of mercy to be done. That unhappy man has been sinking (with intervals of partial recovery) for months past. Mrs. Delvin sent word to us that the end was near, and that the one last wish her brother was able to express was the wish to see Emily. He had been for some hours unable to speak when my wife arrived. But he knew her, and smiled faintly. He was just able to lift his hand. She took it, and waited by him, and spoke words of consolation and kindness from time to time. As the night advanced, he sank into sleep, still holding her hand. They only knew that he had passed from sleep to death–passed without a movement or a sigh–when his hand turned cold. Emily remained for a day at the tower to comfort poor Mrs. Delvin–and she comes home, thank God, this evening!”
“I needn’t ask if you are happy?” Miss Ladd said.
“Happy? I sing, when I have my bath in the morning. If that isn’t happiness (in a man of my age) I don’t know what is!”
“And how are you getting on?”
“Famously! I have turned portrait painter, since you were sent away for your health. A portrait of Mr. Wyvil is to decorate the town hall in the place that he represents; and our dear kind-hearted Cecilia has induced a fascinated mayor and corporation to confide the work to my hands.”
“Is there no hope yet of that sweet girl being married?” Miss Ladd asked. “We old maids all believe in marriage, Mr. Morris–though some of us don’t own it.”
“There seems to be a chance,” Alban answered. “A young lord has turned up at Monksmoor; a handsome pleasant fellow, and a rising man in politics. He happened to be in the house a few days before Cecilia’s birthday; and he asked my advice about the right present to give her. I said, ‘Try something new in Tarts.’ When he found I was in earnest, what do you think he did? Sent his steam yacht to Rouen for some of the famous pastry! You should have seen Cecilia, when the young lord offered his delicious gift. If I could paint that smile and those eyes, I should be the greatest artist living. I believe she will marry him. Need I say how rich they will be? We shall not envy them–we are rich too. Everything is comparative. The portrait of Mr. Wyvil will put three hundred pounds in my pocket. I have earned a hundred and twenty more by illustrations, since we have been married. And my wife’s income (I like to be particular) is only five shillings and tenpence short of two hundred a year. Moral! we are rich as well as happy.”
“Without a thought of the future?” Miss Ladd asked slyly.
“Oh, Doctor Allday has taken the future in hand! He revels in the old-fashioned jokes, which used to be addressed to newly-married people, in his time. ‘My dear fellow,’ he said the other day, ‘you may possibly be under a joyful necessity of sending for the doctor, before we are all a year older. In that case, let it be understood that I am Honorary Physician to the family.’ The warm-hearted old man talks of getting me another portrait to do. ‘The greatest ass in the medical profession (he informed me) has just been made a baronet; and his admiring friends have decided that he is to be painted at full length, with his bandy legs hidden under a gown, and his great globular eyes staring at the spectator–I’ll get you the job.’ Shall I tell you what he says of Mrs. Rook’s recovery?”
Miss Ladd held up her hands in amazement. “Recovery!” she exclaimed.
“And a most remarkable recovery too,” Alban informed her. “It is the first case on record of any person getting over such an injury as she has received. Doctor Allday looked grave when he heard of it. ‘I begin to believe in the devil,’ he said; ‘nobody else could have saved Mrs. Rook.’ Other people don’t take that view. She has been celebrated in all the medical newspapers–and she has been admitted to come excellent almshouse, to live in comfortable idleness to a green old age. The best of it is that she shakes her head, when her wonderful recovery is mentioned. ‘It seems such a pity,’ she says; ‘I was so fit for heaven.’ Mr. Rook having got rid of his wife, is in excellent spirits. He is occupied in looking after an imbecile old gentleman; and, when he is asked if he likes the employment, he winks mysteriously and slaps his pocket. Now, Miss Ladd, I think it’s my turn to hear some news. What have you got to tell me?”
“I believe I can match your account of Mrs. Rook,” Miss Ladd said. “Do you care to hear what has become of Francine?”
Alban, rattling on hitherto in boyish high spirits, suddenly became serious. “I have no doubt Miss de Sor is doing well,” he said sternly. “She is too heartless and wicked not to prosper.”
“You are getting like your old cynical self again, Mr. Morris–and you are wrong. I called this morning on the agent who had the care of Francine, when I left England. When I mentioned her name, he showed me a telegram, sent to him by her father. ‘There’s my authority,’ he said, ‘for letting her leave my house.’ The message was short enough to be easily remembered: ‘Anything my daughter likes as long as she doesn’t come back to us.’ In those cruel terms Mr. de Sor wrote of his own child. The agent was just as unfeeling, in his way. He called her the victim of slighted love and clever proselytizing. ‘In plain words,’ he said, ‘the priest of the Catholic chapel close by has converted her; and she is now a novice in a convent of Carmelite nuns in the West of England. Who could have expected it? Who knows how it may end?”
As Miss Ladd spoke, the bell rang at the cottage gate. “Here she is!” Alban cried, leading the way into the hall. “Emily has come home.”