CHAPTER XXXVII. AT THE BEDSIDE.
BEFORE she had uttered a word, I saw in my mother-in-law's face that shebrought bad news.
"Eustace?" I said.
She answered me by a look.
"Let me he ar it at once!" I cried. "I can bear anything but suspense."
Mrs. Macallan lifted her hand, and showed me a telegraphic dispatchwhich she had hitherto kept concealed in the folds of her dress.
"I can trust your courage," she said. "There is no need, my child, toprevaricate with you. Read that."
I read the telegram. It was sent by the chief surgeon of afield-hospital; and it was dated from a village in the north of Spain.
"Mr. Eustace severely wounded in a skirmish by a stray shot. Not indanger, so far. Every care taken of him. Wait for another telegram."
I turned away my face, and bore as best I might the pang that wrung mewhen I read those words. I thought I knew how dearly I loved him: I hadnever known it till that moment.
My mother-in-law put her arm round me, and held me to her tenderly. Sheknew me well enough not to speak to me at that moment.
I rallied my courage, and pointed to the last sentence in the telegram.
"Do you mean to wait?" I asked.
"Not a day!" she answered. "I am going to the Foreign Office about mypassport--I have some interest there: they can give me letters; they canadvise and assist me. I leave to-night by the mail train to Calais."
"_You_ leave?" I said. "Do you suppose I will let you go without me? Getmy passport when you get yours. At seven this evening I will be at yourhouse."
She attempted to remonstrate; she spoke of the perils of the journey.At the first words I stopped her. "Don't you know yet, mother, howobstinate I am? They may keep you waiting at the Foreign Office. Why doyou waste the precious hours here?"
She yielded with a gentleness that was not in her everyday character."Will my poor Eustace ever know what a wife he has got?" That was allshe said. She kissed me, and went away in her carriage.
My remembrances of our journey are strangely vague and imperfect.
As I try to recall them, the memory of those more recent and moreinteresting events which occurred after my return to England getsbetween me and my adventures in Spain, and seems to force these lastinto a shadowy background, until they look like adventures that happenedmany years since. I confusedly recollect delays and alarms that triedour patience and our courage. I remember our finding friends (thanks toour letters of recommendation) in a Secretary to the Embassy and in aQueen's Messenger, who assisted and protected us at a critical point inthe journey. I recall to mind a long succession of men in our employmentas travelers, all equally remarkable for their dirty cloaks and theirclean linen, for their highly civilized courtesy to women and theirutterly barbarous cruelty to horses. Last, and most important of all, Isee again, more clearly than I can see anything else, the one wretchedbedroom of a squalid village inn in which we found our poor darling,prostrate between life and death, insensible to everything that passedin the narrow little world that lay around his bedside.
There was nothing romantic or interesting in the accident which had putmy husband's life in peril.
He had ventured too near the scene of the conflict (a miserable affair)to rescue a poor lad who lay wounded on the field--mortally wounded,as the event proved. A rifle-bullet had struck him in the body. Hisbrethren of the field-hospital had carried him back to their quartersat the risk of their lives. He was a great favorite with all of them;patient and gentle and brave; only wanting a little more judgment to bethe most valuable recruit who had joined the brotherhood.
In telling me this, the surgeon kindly and delicately added a word ofwarning as well.
The fever caused by the wound had brought with it delirium, as usual.My poor husband's mind, in so far as his wandering words might interpretit, was filled by the one image of his wife. The medical attendanthad heard enough in the course of his ministrations at the bedside,to satisfy him that any sudden recognition of me by Eustace (if herecovered) might be attended by the most lamentable results. As thingswere at that sad time, I might take my turn at nursing him, without theslightest chance of his discovering me, perhaps for weeks and weeks tocome. But on the day when he was declared out of danger--if that happyday ever arrived--I must resign my place at his bedside, and must waitto show myself until the surgeon gave me leave.
My mother-in-law and I relieved each other regularly, day and night, inthe sick-room.
In the hours of his delirium--hours that recurred with a pitilessregularity--my name was always on my poor darling's fevered lips.The ruling idea in him was the fine dreadful idea which I had vainlycombated at our last interview. In the face of the verdict pronouncedat the Trial, it was impossible even for his wife to be really and trulypersuaded that he was an innocent man. All the wild pictures which hisdistempered imagination drew were equally inspired by that one obstinateconviction. He fancied himself to be still living with me under thosedreaded conditions. Do what he might, I was always recalling to him theterrible ordeal through which he had passed. He acted his part, and heacted mine. He gave me a cup of tea; and I said to him, "We quarreledyesterday, Eustace. Is it poisoned?" He kissed me, in token of ourreconciliation; and I laughed, and said, "It's morning now, my dear.Shall I die by nine o'clock to-night?" I was ill in bed, and he gave memy medicine. I looked at him with a doubting eye. I said to him, "Youare in love with another woman. Is there anything in the medicine thatthe doctor doesn't know of?" Such was the horrible drama which nowperpetually acted itself in his mind. Hundreds and hundreds of times Iheard him repeat it, almost always in the same words. On other occasionshis thoughts wandered away to my desperate project of proving him to bean innocent man. Sometimes he laughed at it. Sometimes he mournedover it. Sometimes he devised cunning schemes for placing unsuspectedobstacles in my way. He was especially hard on me when he was inventinghis preventive stratagems--he cheerfully instructed the visionary peoplewho assisted him not to hesitate at offending or distressing me. "Nevermind if you make her angry; never mind if you make her cry. It's all forher good; it's all to save the poor fool from dangers she doesn't dreamof. You mustn't pity her when she says she does it for my sake. See! sheis going to be insulted; she is going to be deceived; she is going todisgrace herself without knowing it. Stop her! stop her!" It was weak ofme, I know; I ought to have kept the plain fact that he was out of hissenses always present to my mind: still it is true that my hours passedat my husband's pillow were many of them hours of mortification andmisery of which he, poor dear, was the innocent and only cause.
The weeks passed; and he still hovered between life and death.
I kept no record of the time, and I cannot now recall the exact date onwhich the first favorable change took place. I only remember that it wastoward sunrise on a fine winter morning when we were relieved at last ofour heavy burden of suspense. The surgeon happened to be by the bedsidewhen his patient awoke. The first thing he did, after looking atEustace, was to caution me by a sign to be silent and to keep out ofsight. My mother-in-law and I both knew what this meant. With fullhearts we thanked God together for giving us back the husband and theson.
The same evening, being alone, we ventured to speak of the future--forthe first time since we had left home.
"The surgeon tells me," said Mrs. Macallan, "that Eustace is too weak tobe capable of bearing anything in the nature of a surprise for some daysto come. We have time to consider whether he is or is not to be toldthat he owes his life as much to your care as to mine. Can you find itin your heart to leave him, Valeria, now that God's mercy has restoredhim to you and to me?"
"If I only consulted my own heart," I answered, "I should never leavehim again."
Mrs. Macallan looked at me in grave surprise.
"What else have you to consult?" she asked.
"If we both live," I replied, "I have to think of the happiness of hislife and the happiness of mine in the years that are to come. I can beara great deal
, mother, but I cannot endure the misery of his leaving mefor the second time."
"You wrong him, Valeria--I firmly believe you wrong him--in thinking itpossible that he can leave you again."
"Dear Mrs. Macallan, have you forgotten already what we have both heardhim say of me while we have been sitting by his bedside?"
"We have heard the ravings of a man in delirium. It is surely hardto hold Eustace responsible for what he said when he was out of hissenses."
"It is harder still," I said, "to resist his mother when she is pleadingfor him. Dearest and best of friends! I don't hold Eustace responsiblefor what he said in the fever--but I _do_ take warning by it. Thewildest words that fell from him were, one and all, the faithful echo ofwhat he said to me in the best days of his health and his strength. Whathope have I that he will recover with an altered mind toward me? Absencehas not changed it; suffering has not changed it. In the deliriumof fever, and in the full possession of his reason, he has the samedreadful doubt of me. I see but one way of winning him back: I mustdestroy at its root his motive for leaving me. It is hopeless topersuade him that I believe in his innocence: I must show him thatbelief is no longer necessary; I must prove to him that his positiontoward me has become the position of an innocent man!"
"Valeria! Valeria! you are wasting time and words. You have tried theexperiment; and you know as well as I do that the thing is not to bedone."
I had no answer to that. I could say no more than I had said already.
"Suppose you go back to Dexter, out of sheer compassion for a madand miserable wretch who has already insulted you," proceeded mymother-in-law. "You can only go back accompanied by me, or by someother trustworthy person. You can only stay long enough to humor thecreature's wayward fancy, and to keep his crazy brain quiet for a time.That done, all is done--you leave him. Even supposing Dexter to be stillcapable of helping you, how can you make use of him but by admitting himto terms of confidence and familiarity--by treating him, in short, onthe footing of an intimate friend? Answer me honestly: can you bringyourself to do that, after what happened at Mr. Benjamin's house?"
I had told her of my last interview with Miserrimus Dexter, inthe natural confidence that she inspired in me as relative andfellow-traveler; and this was the use to which she turned herinformation! I suppose I had no right to blame her; I suppose the motivesanctioned everything. At any rate, I had no choice but to give offenseor to give an answer. I gave it. I acknowledged that I could neveragain permit Miserrimus Dexter to treat me on terms of familiarity as atrusted and intimate friend.
Mrs. Macallan pitilessly pressed the advantage that she had won.
"Very well," she said, "that resource being no longer open to you, whathope is left? Which way are you to turn next?"
There was no meeting those questions, in my present situation, by anyadequate reply. I felt strangely unlike myself--I submitted in silence.Mrs. Macallan struck the last blow that completed her victory.
"My poor Eustace is weak and wayward," she said; "but he is not anungrateful man. My child, you have returned him good for evil--you haveproved how faithfully and how devotedly you love him, by suffering allhardships and risking all dangers for his sake. Trust me, and trusthim! He cannot resist you. Let him see the dear face that he has beendreaming of looking at him again with all the old love in it, and he isyours once more, my daughter--yours for life." She rose and touched myforehead with her lips; her voice sank to tones of tenderness which Ihad never heard from her yet. "Say yes, Valeria," she whispered; "and bedearer to me and dearer to him than ever!"
My heart sided with her. My energies were worn out. No letter hadarrived from Mr. Playmore to guide and to encourage me. I had resistedso long and so vainly; I had tried and suffered so much; I had met withsuch cruel disasters and such reiterated disappointments--and he was inthe room beneath me, feebly finding his way back to consciousness andto life--how could I resist? It was all over. In saying Yes (if Eustaceconfirmed his mother's confidence in him), I was saying adieu to theone cherished ambition, the one dear and noble hope of my life. I knewit--and I said Yes.
And so good-by to the grand struggle! And so welcome to the newresignation which owned that I had failed.
My mother-in-law and I slept together under the only shelter that theinn could offer to us--a sort of loft at the top of the house. The nightthat followed our conversation was bitterly cold. We felt the chillytemperature, in spite of the protection of our dressing-gowns and ourtraveling-wrappers. My mother-in-law slept, but no rest came to me. Iwas too anxious and too wretched, thinking over my changed position, anddoubting how my husband would receive me, to be able to sleep.
Some hours, as I suppose, must have passed, and I was still absorbed inmy own melancholy thoughts, when I suddenly became conscious of a newand strange sensation which astonished and alarmed me. I started up inthe bed, breathless and bewildered. The movement awakened Mrs. Macallan."Are you ill?" she asked. "What is the matter with you?" I tried to tellher, as well as I could. She seemed to understand me before I had done;she took me tenderly in her arms, and pressed me to her bosom. "My poorinnocent child," she said, "is it possible you don't know? Must I reallytell you?" She whispered her next words. Shall I ever forget the tumultof feelings which the whisper aroused in me--the strange medley of joyand fear, and wonder and relief, and pride and humility, which filled mywhole being, and made a new woman of me from that moment? Now, for thefirst time, I knew it! If God spared me for a few months more, the mostenduring and the most sacred of all human joys might be mine--the joy ofbeing a mother.
I don't know how the rest of the night passed. I only find my memoryagain when the morning came, and when I went out by myself to breathethe crisp wintry air on the open moor behind the inn.
I have said that I felt like a new woman. The morning found me with anew resolution and a new courage. When I thought of the future, I hadnot only my husband to consider now. His good name was no longer hisown and mine--it might soon become the most precious inheritance thathe could leave to his child. What had I done while I was in ignorance ofthis? I had resigned the hope of cleansing his name from the stain thatrested on it--a stain still, no matter how little it might look in theeye of the Law. Our child might live to hear malicious tongues say,"Your father was tried for the vilest of all murders, and was neverabsolutely acquitted of the charge." Could I face the glorious perils ofchildbirth with that possibility present to my mind? No! not until I hadmade one more effort to lay the conscience of Miserrimus Dexter bare tomy view! not until I had once again renewed the struggle, and broughtthe truth that vindicated the husband and the father to the light ofday!
I went back to the house, with my new courage to sustain me. I opened myheart to my friend and mother, and told her frankly of the change thathad come over me since we had last spoken of Eustace.
She was more than disappointed--she was almost offended with me. The onething needful had happened, she said. The happiness that might sooncome to us would form a new tie between my husband and me. Every otherconsideration but this she treated as purely fanciful. If I left Eustacenow, I did a heartless thing and a foolish thing. I should regret, tothe end of my days, having thrown away the one golden opportunity of mymarried life.
It cost me a hard struggle, it oppressed me with many a painful doubt;but I held firm this time. The honor of the father, the inheritance ofthe child--I kept these thoughts as constant ly as possible before mymind. Sometimes they failed me, and left me nothing better than a poorfool who had some fitful bursts of crying, and was always ashamed ofherself afterward. But my native obstinacy (as Mrs. Macallan said)carried me through. Now and then I had a peep at Eustace, while he wasasleep; and that helped me too. Though they made my heart ache and shookme sadly at the times those furtive visits to my husband fortifiedme afterward. I cannot explain how this happened (it seems socontradictory); I can only repeat it as one of my experiences at thattroubled time.
I made one concession to Mrs. Macallan--I consented to wait fo
r two daysbefore I took any steps for returning to England, on the chance that mymind might change in the interval.
It was well for me that I yielded so far. On the second day the directorof the field-hospital sent to the post-office at our nearest town forletters addressed to him or to his care. The messenger brought back aletter for me. I thought I recognized the handwriting, and I was right.Mr. Playmore's answer had reached me at last!
If I had been in any danger of changing my mind, the good lawyer wouldhave saved me in the nick of time. The extract that follows contains thepith of his letter; and shows how he encouraged me when I stood in soreneed of a few cheering and friendly words.
"Let me now tell you," he wrote, "what I have done toward verifying theconclusion to which your letter points.
"I have traced one of the servants who was appointed to keep watch inthe corridor on the night when the first Mrs. Eustace died at Gleninch.The man perfectly remembers that Miserrimus Dexter suddenly appearedbefore him and his fellow-servant long after the house was quiet for thenight. Dexter said to them, 'I suppose there is no harm in my going intothe study to read? I can't sleep after what has happened; I must relievemy mind somehow.' The men had no orders to keep any one out of thestudy. They knew that the door of communication with the bedchamber waslocked, and that the keys of the two other doors of communication werein the possession of Mr. Gale. They accordingly permitted Dexter togo into the study. He closed the door (the door that opened on thecorridor), and remained absent for some time--in the study as the mensupposed; in the bedchamber as we know from what he let out at hisinterview with you. Now he could enter that room, as you rightlyimagine, in but one way--by being in possession of the missing key.How long he remained there I cannot discover. The point is of littleconsequence. The servant remembers that he came out of the study again'as pale as death,' and that he passed on without a word on his way backto his own room.
"These are facts. The conclusion to which they lead is serious in thelast degree. It justifies everything that I confided to you in my officeat Edinburgh. You remember what passed between us. I say no more.
"As to yourself next. You have innocently aroused in Miserrimus Dexter afeeling toward you which I need not attempt to characterize. There is acertain something--I saw it myself--in your figure, and in some of yourmovements, which does recall the late Mrs. Eustace to those who knew herwell, and which has evidently had its effect on Dexter's morbid mind.Without dwelling further on this subject, let me only remind you thathe has shown himself (as a consequence of your influence over him) tobe incapable, in his moments of agitation, of thinking before he speakswhile he is in your presence. It is not merely possible, it is highlyprobable, that he may betray himself far more seriously than he hasbetrayed himself yet if you give him the opportunity. I owe it to you(knowing what your interests are) to express myself plainly on thispoint. I have no sort of doubt that you have advanced one step nearerto the end which you have in view in the brief interval since you leftEdinburgh. I see in your letter (and in my discoveries) irresistibleevidence that Dexter must have been in secret communication with thedeceased lady (innocent communication, I am certain, so far as _she_was concerned), not only at the time of her death, but perhaps for weeksbefore it. I cannot disguise from myself or from you, my own strongpersuasion that if you succeed in discovering the nature of thiscommunication, in all human likelihood you prove your husband'sinnocence by the discovery of the truth. As an honest man, I am boundnot to conceal this. And, as an honest man also, I am equally boundto add that, not even with your reward in view, can I find it inmy conscience to advise you to risk what you must risk if you seeMiserrimus Dexter again. In this difficult and delicate matter I cannotand will not take the responsibility: the final decision must rest withyourself. One favor only I entreat you to grant--let me hear what youresolve to do as soon as you know it yourself."
The difficulties which my worthy correspondent felt were no difficultiesto me. I did not possess Mr. Playmore's judicial mind. My resolution wassettled before I had read his letter through.
The mail to France crossed the frontier the next day. There was a placefor me, under the protection of the conductor, if I chose to takeit. Without consulting a living creature--rash as usual, headlong asusual--I took it.
The Law and the Lady Page 37
