Works of Ellen Wood

by Ellen Wood

  “Then you ought to have heard!” was the retort of Miss Davenal, at cross-purposes as usual. “You are not turning deaf, I suppose?”

  “What is it, aunt?” repeated Sara, going half-way down the stairs.

  Instead of answering, Miss Davenal turned and went into the breakfast-room again. Sara could only follow her. Her aunt’s manners had never relaxed to her from the sternness assumed at the time of Dr. Davenal’s death: cold and severe she had remained ever since; but she looked unusually cold and severe now.

  “Shut the door,” said Miss Davenal.

  Sara hesitated for a moment, more in mind than action, and then she obeyed. She had left her desk, and wanted to get back to it.

  “Hold this,” said Miss Davenal.

  She had taken her seat in her own chair, and was cutting out some articles of linen clothing that looked as long as the room. Her income was a very moderate one now, and she did a good deal of sewing instead of putting it out. Sara took the stuff in her hand, and held it while her aunt cut: an interminable proceeding to an impatient helpmate, for Miss Davenal cut only about an inch at a time, and then drew a short thread and cut again.

  “Won’t it tear?” asked Sara.

  “It will wear. Did you ever know me buy linen that wouldn’t wear? I have too good an eye for linen to buy what won’t wear.”

  “I asked, aunt, if it would not tear.”

  “Tear!” repeated Miss Davenal, offended at the word — at the ignorance it betrayed. “No, it will not tear; and I should think there’s hardly a parish school child in the kingdom but would know that, without asking.”

  Sara, rebuked, held her part in silence. Presently Miss Davenal lifted her eyes and looked her full in the face.

  “Who was that letter from this morning?”

  “It was a private letter, aunt.”

  “A what?” snapped Miss Davenal.

  Sara let fall the work, and stood fearlessly before Miss Davenal. The most gentle spirit can be aroused at times. “The letter was from a gentleman, aunt. It was a private letter to myself. Surely I am not so much of a child that I may not be trusted to receive one?”

  “A pri-vate let-ter! — A gentleman!” was the amazed reiteration of Miss Bettina. “What do you say?”

  Sara stood quite still for a moment, while the faint flush that was called up died away on her cheeks, and then she bent close to her aunt’s ear, her low voice unmistakably clear and distinct.

  “Aunt Bettina, you knew there was some unhappy business that papa was obliged to meet — and bear — just before he died. The letter I have received this morning bears reference to it. It is from a Mr. King, but I don’t know him. I should be thankful if you would not force me to these explanations: they are very painful.”

  Miss Bettina picked up the work and drew at a thread until it broke. “Who is Mr. King?” she asked.

  “I do not indeed know. I never saw him in my life. He had to write to me just a word about the business, and I must answer him. In telling you this much, Aunt Bettina, I have told all I can tell Pray, for papa’s sake, do not ask me further.”

  “Well, this is a pretty state of things for the enlightened nineteenth century!” grunted Miss Bettina. “We have read of conspiracies and Rye-House plots, and all the rest of it: this seems a plot, I think! Have you nothing more to say?”

  “No, aunt,” was the low, firm answer.

  “Then you may go,” said Miss Bettina, twitching the work out of Sara’s hand. “I can do this myself.”

  And Sara knew that no amount of entreaty would induce her aunt to admit of help in her cutting after that She went up-stairs, and met Neal coming out of the drawing-room.

  “I thought you had finished the room, Neal,” she said, a sudden fear stealing over her as she remembered that her desk was left with the key in it.

  “So I had, Miss. I came up now for this vase. My mistress said it was to be washed.”

  He went down-stairs carrying it: a valuable vase of Sèvres porcelain, never intrusted to the hands of anybody but Neal. It had belonged to poor Richard — was presented to him just before he went out on his unfortunate voyage. Sara walked to her desk; it stood on the centre table. What with vases and other ornaments, and superfluous articles of furniture, the room was somewhat inconveniently full. It was a good-sized room, too; nearly square, the window facing you as you entered it, and the fireplace on the right. Opposite the fireplace was a beautiful inlaid cabinet with a plate-glass back: it had never cost less than forty pounds: but Miss Bettina had not spared money when she bought her furniture years ago. Look at the girandoles on the walls! — at the costly carpet, soft as velvet! Opposite the window stood Sara’s piano, a fine instrument, the gift of her loving father on her eighteenth birthday. Altogether the room was an elegant one, but Miss Bettina could not have reconciled herself to any other. The parlour below was a nice room also, with its handsome sideboard and its glittering mirrors: but it was smaller than the drawing-room.

  Sara stood for a moment before her desk: it looked exactly as she left it She turned the key and raised the lid, and saw that had anybody else done the same Mr. Alfred King’s letter was lying face upwards, and might have been read without the slightest trouble in an instant of time. Had Neal seen the letter? Would he be likely to do such a thing as raise her desk surreptitiously? Many a servant would be in a room with an unlocked desk times and again, and never attempt to peer inside it. Was it probable that Neal had any propensity for prying into affairs that did not concern him? It all lay in that:

  Vexed with herself for having allowed the chance to any one, Sara carried her desk to her chamber, and sat down and wrote her note there. But she could not get the thought quite so readily out of her head: it was most inexpedient that Neal, or any one else, should see that letter of Mr. Alfred King’s. There occurred to her mind something her brother Edward had once told her — about a doubt of Dr. Davenal’s — as to whether Neal had not opened a note of Lady Oswald’s. Suddenly she thought of the doctor’s desk. If that had been opened! In an impulse of fear she put the key into the lock.

  It would not turn. Something was the matter with the lock. Had it been tampered with? Sara’s face grew hot.

  Turning and twisting and pulling, but all gently, she worked the key about in the lock. No, it would not open it In the previous summer’s holidays a certain cupboard in Watton’s room downstairs declined to be opened in just the same way, and when inquiries came to be made, Master Dick Davenal boldly avowed that, wanting some jam one day, he had opened it with another cupboard key, and so had spoiled the lock. Had this lock been put out of order in the same way? The proper key to it was always about herself.

  A locksmith had to be brought in to the desk. He speedily opened it and put the lock to rights. “It was only a ward bent,” he said. Sara inquired whether he thought it had been done through a strange key being put into the lock, but she did not get much satisfaction. “Like enough it might,” he said, but “sometimes them wards got out of order with their own key.”

  “It seems quite a common lock,” remarked Sara, as she paid him.

  “Laws, yes! A’most any key might open that.”

  “What was the matter with the desk?” questioned Miss Bettina, who met the man in the passage as he was going away.

  “I don’t know, aunt. It would not open: such a thing has never happened to it before. Do you remember last midsummer holidays Dick spoiled Watton’s cupboard through undoing it with a false key? The man says it may have been the same case here.”

  And Neal, who was standing immediately opposite his young mistress, and met her eye as she spoke, heard the words with unruffled composure; not so much as a shade of change disturbing the equanimity of his impassive countenance. —

  CHAPTER XXXIX.

  AN UNPLEASANT VISIT.

  “SET me down at Essex Street.”

  The request, proffered in a sweet and timid voice, was made by a young lady who had just taken her place in an omnibus.
The conductor’s gracious response was to shut the door with a desperate bang, and call out “hi” to the driver, as a signal that he might go on.

  The young lady was too pretty not to be stared at; but the crape veil, pertaining to her handsome mourning, was not raised from before her face, as she took her seat with that quiet self-possession which rarely forsakes the gentlewoman.

  You will be at no loss to guess that it was Sara Davenal. The expedition she was bound upon was one that nothing save obligation could have forced upon her — a visit to Mr. Alfred King. Her note to that gentleman had brought forth another letter from him. It was to the effect that he could not wait longer for the money without the utmost inconvenience, but he would do himself the honour of calling upon her at eleven o’clock the following morning, to discuss the matter in person.

  A most unsatisfactory, dismaying communication to Sara. To receive him in her Aunt Bettina’s house was out of all question; for that estimable lady would undoubtedly have insisted upon making a third at the interview. To have the secret brought home to her very hearth would be too fortunate an opportunity to miss acquainting herself with its nature and details, even though she had to draw the information from Mr. Alfred King. Sara saw what must be done, however she might dislike it; and she wrote a hasty note to the gentleman, saying that it would not be convenient to receive him in her own house, but she would instead wait upon him in Essex Street. Hence her unwonted omnibus journey.

  The omnibus dashed along on its road. It was full, and therefore there was no loitering. Leaving Pimlico behind it, it passed Charing Cross and gained the Strand. There it stopped for somebody to get out, and Sara looked up at an exclamation made by the passenger seated immediately opposite to her next the door, a lady apparently but little older than herself: a quiet, steady, self-possessed girl with a pleasing face and fair hair.

  The passing of a gentleman on the payment, close up to which the omnibus was drawn, had apparently caused the exclamation to escape her. His eyes in the same moment caught the fair face bent towards him from the door, and he approached. A bright smile greeted him, and he took her hand and kept it as they spoke together.

  “You, Jane!” he exclaimed, and the voice, subdued though it was, bore a laughing sound. “It is about the last place I should have expected to see you in. I thought you and omnibuses were decided foes.”

  “But I am going a long way this morning; too far to walk,” she answered. “We have had a letter from—”

  She bent her face lower, and the words became indistinct The gentleman resumed.

  “And you are going to inquire about it? Well, Jane, don’t be in a hurry. I’ll tell you why another time. Inquire particulars if you like, but fix nothing. The fact is, I have something else in view.”

  “Of course we’d not fix anything without consulting you,” she answered in her pleasant Scotch accent “When will you be coming?”

  “To-night most likely. Good-bye, Jane. Take care of yourself.”

  He released her hand which he had been holding all the while, the conductor gave the door a bang, and the omnibus dashed on. Sara had turned white as death. A variety of emotions that she would not have cared to analyse were at conflict within her — for the voice was the voice of Oswald Cray.

  And he had gone away, not seeing her. For that she was on some accounts thankful. He might have been as much surprised to see her in an omnibus — perhaps more so — as he was the young lady opposite; and least of all to Oswald Cray could Sara have explained the errand on which she was bent. She stole a glance at the girl’s interesting face: a good and sensible face; one that might well win the regard even of Oswald Cray; and that baneful plant, jealousy, which perhaps had taken root in her heart before, suddenly shot forth its sharp tendrils into every corner. What right had she, Sara Davenal, to indulge any such passion? — had she not parted from Oswald Cray for ever?

  “Did you not ask to be put down at Essex Street?”

  The question aroused her from her pain. It came from the same young lady opposite, and Sara looked up with a stark “Yes,” she answered.

  “Then we must have passed it, for this that we are going through is Temple Bar, and I know Essex Street is before we come to that. This young lady told you to set her down at Essex Street,” she added to the conductor. And the man stopped the omnibus without offering the slightest apology.

  “Thank you,” said Sara to her courteously. And she walked away with the pleasant voice ringing in her ears, and the conviction within her that it must be Jane Allister.

  She walked slowly down Essex Street, looking out for the offices of Messrs. Jones and Green, and soon found them. It was a large and dusty-looking house, on the right-hand side of the street, and was apparently let out to different occupants, as there were various names on the door. The top one was “Mr. Carberry it was simply written in black letters on the door-post; the second was on a great brass plate, nearly as large as the post itself, “Jones and Green:” and there was another brass plate, which had on it “Messrs. Knollys, Solicitors to the Great Chwddyn Mining Company.”

  Sara stood still as the last words caught her eye, arrested by surprise. It was not the unpronounceable name that drew her attention; but the fact that this Great Chwddyn scheme was the very one in which Mark Cray had embarked; the El Dorado of his friend Barker; the source of Mark’s present flourishing prosperity and of his future greatness.

  She felt sure it was the same name, though nobody ever wrote it twice alike; and whether this, or any other, might be the correct way of spelling it, the Messrs. Knollys themselves could not have told. Mark Cray and Barker, finding the word rather difficult to the tongue, had got into the habit of calling it the “Great Wheal Bang Company,” as being readier than the other: “Wheal Bang” being some technical term connected with the mine; though whether applicable to any particular stratum of its ore, or to the works, or to the mine generally, or to anything else, Sara had never yet clearly understood. “The Great Wheal Bang Mining Company” was the familiar term in Mark’s mouth, and in that of others interested in the mine: so prone we are to catch up phrases: and “The Great Wheal Bang” was certainly better for English tongues than the Great Chwddyn, with its variety of spelling in uninitiated hands. For once that Sara had heard the difficult name she had heard the easier one a hundred times; nevertheless, now that her eyes fell upon it, she knew it to be that, and no other.

  The fact in itself was not of moment to her, but thought is quick; and the thought that darted across Sara’s mind was, that if Messrs. Knollys were the solicitors to this rich and important company, there might possibly be a chance of Mark Cray’s or of his friend Barker’s calling in at these offices at any moment, in which case they might see her. And that would not be at all convenient.

  But there was no help for it. She could but go in; and the chance only added another drop to the cup of pain. Most painful was it to Sara, from more causes than one, to come thus publicly to these places of business: and to come, as may be almost said, in secret; not daring to speak of her real errand.

  With her crape veil drawn more closely over her face she stepped into the passage. A door on the left bore the words “Messrs. Knollys and Sara was looking around her when a young man with a paper in his hand came hastily out of it “Did you want Knollys’s office?” he asked, in a civil tone, noting her look of indecision.

  “I want Messrs. Jones and Green’s.”

  “Up-stairs, first floor.”

  Sara thanked him, and passed through the inner entrance, which stood open, and ascended the stairs. In great white letters on the door facing her at the top, she read, “ Office: Jones and Green.’” She knocked at the door, and a middle-aged man in a seedy suit of black opened it “I wish to see Mr. Alfred King,” she said. “ Is he here?”

  “Mr. Alfred King?” repeated the man. “He is not here now, and I don’t know — Stay, I’ll inquire.”

  Leaving her standing there, he retreated, and she heard a remote colloq
uy carried on in an undertone. Then he came back again.

  “Mr. King won’t be here until twelve o’clock.”

  “I had an appointment with him at eleven,” said Sara, wondering whether there could be any mistake.

  “Perhaps so,” said the man. “But he dropped us a line this morning to say he could not get here until twelve. I daresay if you come then you can see him.”

  He shut the door, and Sara went down-stairs again. What should she do with herself this long hour — for it was not quite eleven yet. Suddenly she bethought herself that she would go to see Watton. St Paul’s Churchyard, as Watton had told them — for she had paid Miss Davenal and Sara two or three visits since their arrival in London — was in a line with Temple Bar.

  Sara walked quickly through the crowded streets. Once she stopped to look in at an attractive shop, but somebody came jostling against her, she thought purposely, and she did not stop again. She easily found the house of business where Watton now was, and its private door. Watton came forward all in surprise, and took her into a plain comfortable sitting-room, which was her own, she said. Sara inquired if she liked the situation any better: for at first Watton had not liked it “Well, yes, miss; I think I do,” was the woman’s answer. “Use and time soften most things. There’s a great deal of responsibility on me, and enough work also. What I can’t get reconciled to is the dust and the noise. As to the dust and dirt, I’d never have believed in it without seeing it. Being in mourning for my late master I have not worn white caps yet, and don’t believe I ever can wear them: I’m sure I might put on three a-week and not be clean. Sometimes I wash my hands four times in a morning.”

  “Then think what it is for my aunt Bettina, with her delicate hands and her delicate lace,” returned Sara. “I suppose the dirt is not quite so bad with us as it is here; but it seems as if nothing could be worse, and my aunt makes it a perpetual grievance. Shall you remain here, Watton?”

  “I have made up my mind to try it for a twelvemonth, Miss Sara,” was the answer. “It’s too good a situation to be given up lightly; and it shall have a fair trial. I miss my country life; I miss the green fields and the gossipping neighbours at Hallingham: oftentimes I wake from a dream, thinking I’m there, and then I am fit to cry with the disappointment. I fear the pleasant old times have gone away from me for ever.”