Works of Ellen Wood

by Ellen Wood

  “They’d not do such a thing in their own homes to save their lives,” laughed the agent, coming softly out again unseen. “Cattacomb must be in clover among ‘em!”

  He went home then, looked attentively once more at the alarming paragraph, and burnt the newspaper. After that, he paced his little garden, as if in a fit of restlessness, and then leaned over the gate, lost in reflection. The trees of the Maze were perfectly still in the hot summer air; the road was dusty and not a single passenger to be seen on it.

  A few minutes, and footsteps broke upon his ear. They were Miss Blake’s, bringing her home from St. Jerome’s. She stopped to shake hands.

  “Well,” said he, with a laugh, “all the scrubbing done?”

  “How do you know anything about the scrubbing?” returned Miss Blake.

  “I looked in just now, and saw you all at it, dusting and brushing, and thought what an enviable young priest that Cattacomb must be. Now, my lad! don’t ride over us if you can help it.”

  The very same butcher-boy, in the same blue frock, had come galloping up to the Maze gate, rung the bell, and was now prancing backwards across the road on his horse, which was very restive. Something appeared to have startled the animal; and it was to the boy the last remark had been addressed. Miss Blake stepped inside the garden gate, held open for her — for the horse seemed to think the path his own ground as well as the highway.

  “He have been shoed this morning, and he’s always in this dratted temper after it,” spoke the boy gratuitously.

  The woman-servant came out with her dish, received some meat, and disappeared again, taking care to lock the gate after her. She had never left it unlocked since the unlucky day when Miss Blake got in. Glancing over the road, she saw the lady and the agent watching her, and no doubt recognized the former.

  “Looks like a faithful servant, that,” remarked Mr. Smith.

  “Faithful,” echoed Miss Blake— “well yes, she does. But to what a mistress! Fidelity to such a person does her no credit.”

  Mr. Smith turned as grave as a judge. “Hush!” said he, impressively. “Unless one has sure and good ground to go upon, it is better not to assume evil.”

  “No ground was ever surer than this.”

  “My dear young lady, you maybe utterly mistaken.” She liked the style of address from him — my dear young lady: it flattered her vanity. But she would not give way.

  “I have seen what I have seen, Mr. Smith. Sir Karl Andinnian would not be stealing in there at night, if it were proper for him to be going in the open day.”

  “Never speak of it,” cried Mr. Smith, his tone one of sharp, strong command. “What could you prove? I ask, Miss Blake, what you could prove — if put to it?” She did not answer.

  “Why, nothing, madam. Absolutely nothing. How could you?”

  Miss Blake considered. “I think there’s a good deal of negative proof,” she said, at length.

  “Moonshine,” cried Mr. Smith. “Negative proof in a case of this kind always is moonshine. Listen, my dear Miss Blake, for I am advising you now as a good friend. Never breathe a word of this matter to living soul. You don’t know what the consequences to yourself might be.”

  “Consequences to myself!”

  “To yourself, of course: there’s no one else in question — at least in my mind. You might be sued for libel, and get sentenced to pay heavy damages and to a term of imprisonment besides. For goodness sake, be cautious! Remember Jane Shore! She had to stand in the pillory in a white sheet in the face and eyes of a gaping multitude, a lighted taper in her hand.”

  “Jane Shore!” cried Miss Blake, who at the above suggestion had begun to go as pale as she could well go. “Jane Shore! But that was not for libel. It was for — for—”

  Miss Blake broke down.

  “Shoreditch is named after her, you know,” put in Mr. Smith. “Poor thing! she was very lovely: raven hair and eyes of a violet blue, say the old chronicles. Keep your own counsel, young lady, implicitly — and be silent for your own sake.” —

  Miss Blake said good morning, and walked away. The prospect suggested to her, as to the fine and imprisonment, looked anything but a pleasant one. She resolved henceforth to be silent; to Mrs. Cleeve and to all else: and, under the influence of this new and disagreeable suggestion, she wished to her heart she had never opened her lips to Lady Andinnian.

  “Meddlesome tabby cat,” aspirated the gallant Mr. Smith. “She might play up Old Beans with her tongue. Women are the very deuce for being ill-natured to one another.”

  CHAPTER XVIII.

  A Night Alarm.

  COLONEL and Mrs. Cleeve had departed again, and the time went on. Foxwood Court was comparatively quiet. The opening visits on all sides had been paid and returned, and there was a lull in the dinner parties. The weather continued most intensely hot; and people were glad to be still.

  Never had poor Lucy Andinnian felt the estrangement from her husband so cruelly as now. At first the excitement of resentment had kept her up, and the sojourn of her father and mother, together with the almost daily gaiety, had served to take her out of herself: it was only at night during the lonely hours, when trouble prevented sleep, that she had felt its keenest sting. But now: now when she and Karl were alone, save for Miss Blake: when she sat in her lonely room hour after hour, and had leisure to realize her true position, Lucy gave way to all the abandonment of grief her trial brought. It was indeed a bitter one; a fiery trial: and when she looked back to it in after days, she could never imagine how she had contrived to bear it. —

  Love is an all-powerful master: an overruling tyrant. In the first torments of awakened jealousy, it is all very well to take refuge in revengeful anger, and snap our fingers metaphorically at the beloved one, and say he may go promener. “The reaction comes. Jealousy, alas, does not tend to extinguish love, but rather to increase it. Lucy Andinnian found it so to her cost. Her love for Karl had in no whit abated: and the very fact of knowing he paid these stolen night visits to the Maze, while it tortured her jealousy, in no way diminished her love. She was growing pale and thin; she questioned whether she had done wisely in undertaking this most cruel task of bearing in silence and patience, hoping it might bring him back to his true allegiance; for she knew not whether she could endure on to the end.

  There were moments when in her desolation she almost wished she was reconciled to her husband on any terms, even to the extent of condoning the wrong and the evil. The strict reader must pardon her, for she was very desolate. The idea always went away at once, and she would arouse herself with a shiver. Perhaps, of all phases of the affair, the one that told most upon her, that she felt to be more humiliating than the rest, was the fact of its having been brought close to her home, to its very gates: and a thousand times she asked herself the ambiguous question — Why could not Sir Karl rid the Maze of its inmates, and convey them to a distance?

  She might have schooled her heart to care for Karl less had they been separated: he at the North Pole, say: she at the South. But they were living under the same roof, and met hourly. They went to church together, and paid visits with each other, and sat at the same breakfast and dinner tables. For their public intercourse was so conducted that no suspicion of the truth should get abroad, within doors or without. As to Karl, he was waiting on his side with what patience he might until his wife’s mood should alter; in fact, he had no other alternative; but he treated her with the most anxious kindness and consideration. That she had taken the matter up with unjustifiable harshness, he thought; but he excused it, knowing himself to be the real culprit for having married her. And thus they went on; Lucy’s spirit wounded to the core, and her anguished heart pining for the love that she believed was not hers.

  She was sitting one Saturday evening under the acacia tree, in the delicate muslin she had worn in the day, when Karl came down from his dressing-room ready for dinner, and crossed the lawn to her. He had been to Basham, and she had not seen him since the morning.

&nbs
p; “You are very pale, Lucy.”

  “My head aches badly: and it was so pleasant to remain here in the cool that I did not go in to dress,” she said to him in a tone of apology.

  “And why should you?” returned Karl. “That is as pretty a dress as any you have. What has given you the headache?”

  “I — always have it now, more or less,” had been on the tip of her tongue; but she broke off in time. “The heat, I think. I got very hot to-day, walking to Margaret Sumnor’s.”

  “It is too hot for walking, Lucy. You should take the carriage.”

  “I don’t like the parade of the carriage when I go to Margaret’s.”

  “Would you like a little pony-chaise? I will buy you one if you — —”

  “No, thank you,” she interrupted hastily, her tone a cold one. “I prefer to walk when I go about Foxwood. The heat will pass away sometime.”

  “You were saying the other day, Lucy, to some one who called, that you would like to read that new book on the Laplanders. I have been getting it for you.”

  He had a white paper parcel in his hand, undid it, and gave her a handsomely-bound volume. She felt the kindness, and her sad face flushed slightly.

  “Thank you; thank you very much. It was good of you to think of me.”

  “And I have been subscribing to the Basham library, Lucy, and brought home the first parcel of books. It may amuse you to read them.”

  “Yes, I think it will. Thank you, Sir Karl.”

  She had never called him “Karl” when they were alone, since the explosion. Now and then occasionally before people, she did, especially before her father and mother. But he understood quite well that it was only done for appearance’ sake.

  The dinner hour was at hand, and they went in. Very much to the surprise of both, Mr. Cattacomb was in the drawing-room with Miss Blake. Lucy had neither heard nor seen him: but the acacia tree was out of sight of the front entrance.

  “I have been telling Mr. Cattacomb — he came to me in the heat, on business of St. Jerome’s — that you will be charitable enough to give him some dinner,” said Miss Blake, introducing Mr. Cattacomb to Sir Karl in form — for it was the first time he had met that reverend man. Of course Karl could only return a civil answer; but he had not been at all anxious for the acquaintanceship of Mr. Cattacomb, and was determined not to treat him precisely as though he had been an invited guest.

  “I think you may perhaps prefer to take in your friend Miss Blake, as Lady Andinnian is a stranger to you,” he said, when Hewitt announced dinner. “We are not on ceremony now.”

  And Sir Karl caught his wife’s hand within his. “I was not going to leave you to him, Lucy,” he whispered.

  So they went parading in to dinner arm-in-arm, this estranged man and wife, brushing past Hewitt and the tall new footman, who wore powdered hair.

  “It is just as though he did care for me!” thought Lucy, glancing at her husband as he placed her in her seat at the table’s head.

  Mr. Cattacomb and Miss Blake, seated opposite each other, talked a great deal, Karl scarcely at all. When alone, the dinners at the Court were simply served, Sir Karl carving. He was attentive to his impromptu guest, and sent him of the best: but he thought he had never in all his life been in company with so affected and vain a man as that belauded clergyman. Once, with the fish before him, Karl fell into a reverie. He woke up with a start, looking about him like a man bewildered.

  “Some more fish, Lucy, my darling?”

  Lucy’s plate had gone away long before. They all saw that he had been, so to speak, unconscious of what he said. He rallied then; and did not lose himself again.

  Dinner over, Mr. Cattacomb, making an apology, hurried away for some slight service at St. Jerome’s, Miss Blake accompanying him as a matter of course. Lucy disappeared: and Karl, thus abandoned, went to his smoking-room. Not to smoke; but to muse upon the acute angles of his position — as he was too much given to do. Karl Andinnian was as a man in a net: as things looked at present, there seemed to be no chance of freedom from it, no hope of it at present or in the future. And his ill-fated brother again! The past night he, Karl, had dreamt one of those ugly dreams. He thought he saw Adam fleeing from his pursuers; a number of them, and they all looked like warders of Portland Prison. Panting, crying, Adam rushed in, seized hold of Karl, and begged him, as he valued salvation hereafter, to hide and save him. But the warders burst in and surrounded them. Poor Karl woke up as usual in fright and agony. This dream had been recurring to his mind all day: it was very vivid now in the silent evening hour after sunset.

  “I’d give my life to place him in safety,” ran his thoughts. “Not much of a gift, either, for I verily believe this constant, distressing suspense will kill me. If he were but safe in some distant land! He might — Why, what is Lucy doing?”

  Opposite this south window there was a beautiful vista through the trees of the grounds beyond. Sir Karl had seen his wife running swiftly from one walk to another, and suddenly stoop — as he fancied. Looking still, he found she did not get up again.

  “She must have fallen,” he exclaimed, and rushed out.

  He was with her in a minute. She was getting up after her fall, but her ankle felt intolerably painful. Karl was very tender: he had her in his arms, and took her to a leafy arbour close by. There he put her to sit down, and held her to him for support.

  “I have twisted my ankle,” she said. “It’s nothing.”

  But the tears of pain stood in her eyes. He soothed her as he would have soothed her in the bygone days; holding her in his firm protection, whispering terms of sweet endearment. What with the ankle’s sharp twinges, what with his loving words, and what with her chronic state of utter wretchedness, poor Lucy burst into sobs, and sobbed them out upon his breast.

  “My darling! The ankle is giving you pain.”

  “The ankle’s nothing,” she said. “It will soon be well.” But she lay there still and sobbed pitiably.

  He waited in silence until she should grow calmer, his arm round her. A distant nightingale was singing its love-song.

  “Lucy,” began Karl, then, “I would ask you — now that we seem to be for the moment alone with the world and each other — whether there is any sense in living in the way we do? Is there any happiness for either of us? I want you to forgive all, and be reconciled: I want you to see the matter in its proper light, apart from prejudice. The past is past and cannot be recalled: but it leaves no just reason in the sight of God or man for our living in estrangement.”

  Her head was hidden against him still. She did not lift her eyes as she whispered her answer.

  “Is there no reason for it now, Karl? Now, at the present time. None?”

  “No. As I see it, NO; on my word of honour as a gentleman. The notion you have taken up is an unsound and utterly mistaken one. You had grave cause to complain: granted: to resent; I admit it all: but surely it was not enough to justify the rending asunder of man and wife. The past cannot be undone — Heaven knows I would undo it if I could. But there is no just cause for your visiting the future upon me in this way, and making us both pay a heavy penalty. Won’t you forgive and forget? Won’t you be my own dear wife again? Oh, Lucy, I am full of trouble, and I want your sympathy to lighten it.”

  Her whole heart yearned to him. He drew her face to his and kissed her lips with the sweetest kisses. In the bliss and rest that the reconciliation brought to her spirit, Lucy momentarily forgot all else. Her kisses met his; her tears wet his cheeks. What with one emotion and another — pain, anguish, grief and bliss, the latter uppermost — poor Lucy felt faint The bitter past was effaced from her memory: the change seemed like a glimpse of Paradise. It all passed in a moment, or so, of time.

  “Oh, Karl, I should like to be your wife again!” she confessed. “The estrangement we are living in is more cruel for me than for you. Shall it be so?”

  “Shall it!” repeated Karl. “Is there need to ask me, Lucy?” —

  “It lies w
ith you.”

  “With me! Why, how? How does it lie with me? You know, my darling—”

  A slight ruffle, as if some one were brushing past the shrubs in the opposite path, caused Sir Karl to withdraw his arm from his wife. Miss Blake came up: a note in her hand. Sir Karl politely, in thought, wished Miss Blake at York.

  “As I was coming in, Sir Karl, I overtook a woman with this note, which she was bringing you. It was the servant at the Maze — or some one very like her.”

  Miss Blake looked full at Sir Karl as she spoke, wishing no doubt that looks were daggers. She had added the little bit of information, as to the messenger, for Lucy’s especial benefit. Karl thanked her coolly, and crushed the note, unopened, into his pocket. Lucy, shy, timid Lucy, was limping away. Miss Blake saw something was wrong and held out her arm.

  “What is the matter, Lucy? You are in paint You have been crying!”

  “I slipped and hurt my ankle, Theresa. It was foolish to cry, though. The pain is much less already.”

  Miss Blake helped her indoors in lofty silence. Anything like the contempt she felt for the weakness of Lucy Andinnian, she perhaps had never felt for any one before in all her life. Not for the weakness of crying at a hurt: though that was more befitting a child than a woman: but for the reprehensible weakness she was guilty of in living on terms of affection with her husband. “Must even sit in a garden arbour together hand in hand, listening to the nightingales,” shrieked Miss Blake mentally, with rising hair. “And yet — she knows what I disclosed to her!” —

  The note was from Mrs. Grey. Had Miss Blake herself presided at its opening, she could not reasonably have found fault with it. Mrs. Grey presented her compliments to Sir Karl Andinnian, and would feel obliged by his calling to see her as soon as convenient, as she wished to speak with him on a little matter of business concerning the house.

  There was nothing more. But Karl knew, by the fact of her venturing on the extreme step of writing to the Court, that he was wanted at the Maze for something urgent. It was several days since he had been there: for he could not divest himself of the feeling that some one of these nightly visits of his, more unlucky than the rest, might bring on suspicion and betrayal. To his uneasy mind there was danger in every surrounding object. The very sound of the wind in the trees seemed to whisper it to him as he passed; hovering shades of phantom shape glanced out to his fancy from the hedges.