The Detective Club: Dark Days & Much Darker Days

by Hugh Conway

  We were married. Philippa and I were married! Married; and a few months ago I sat lonely, miserable and heart-broken, deeming that the one I loved was lost to me for ever! What matters the things which have filled those months, and made them the most painful of my life? Today we are man and wife, joined together till death us do part!

  I said no word as to the result of my enquiries in Liverpool. I had no difficulty in persuading Philippa, who in some things was as simple and trusting as a child, that it was necessary, or at least advisable, she should be married under the name which her first certificate of marriage affected to bestow upon her. She signed her name for the last, it may, for aught I know, have also been the first time, as Philippa Ferrand; and I noticed that she shuddered as she formed the letters.

  Although my bride was by birth half a Spaniard, and although I had by now in many ways conformed to the Spanish mode of life, we were still English enough to look upon going away somewhere for a honeymoon as indispensable. It would be but a short trip; and as my mother in our absence would be left at Seville alone, or with servants only, we did not care to go very far away. It so happened that, although so close to Cadiz, we had not yet paid that town a visit, and thought the present a capital opportunity for so doing.

  To Cadiz we went, and stayed several days at the Hôtel de Paris. We liked the white-walled town, rising and shining above the dark-blue sea, like, as I have somewhere seen it described, a white pearl in a crown of sapphires; or, as the Gaditanos call it, tazita de plata, a silver cup. We liked the rows of tall terrace-topped houses. We liked the movement and bustle on the quays and in the port. We liked the walks on the broad granite ramparts, and the lovely views of the busy bay and country beyond it; but all the same we agreed that Cadiz bore no comparison to our beautiful Seville, and the sooner we returned to that gay city the better.

  Now that I had gained my desire, was I happy? After all that had past, could I have been happy during those early days of our wedded life? As I look back upon them, I sit and muse, trying in vain to answer the question to my own satisfaction. Philippa loved me—she was my wife; come good, come evil, she was mine for ever. In so much I was happy, thrice happy. Could I have lived but for the present, my bliss would have known no ally.

  But there was the past! I could not altogether forget the path which had led to such happiness as now was mine. I could be thankful that I alone knew all the horrors and dangers with which that path was studded. I alone knew the secret of that one night. Although I could keep it for ever, would it be always a secret?

  Yes, and there was the future. Behind the happiness which was mine at present lurked a dread as to what the future had in store for me—for us. It was a dread which day by day grew stronger. The greater my happiness, the more dreadful the thought of its being wrecked. The feeling that my house of joy was built upon sand was always obtruding on my most blissful hours, and not, I knew, without good reasons.

  Philippa’s very avoidance of speaking of her past life lent some justification to my gloomy forebodings. Not once did Sir Mervyn Ferrand’s name pass between my wife and me. Not once did she ask me for any further particulars concerning the events of that night upon which, in the height of her short-lived mania, she reached my cottage. True that upon becoming my wife, and beginning a new and happier stage of life, it might be but natural for her to wish to consign to oblivion the wrong, the shame, the suffering wrought by a villain’s craft; yet I was so mixed up in the catastrophe that silence on the subject seemed strange. Her reticence alarmed me. I fancied it must be caused by some vague uneasiness connected with that night—some doubt which she dared not seek to set at rest. It is, I know, not unusual for women, after their recovery from that mysterious disease which had for a while driven my poor girl distraught, to be able to recall and accurately describe the delusions which had afflicted them during those wandering hours. I myself had in one or two cases noticed this peculiarity, and the authorities which I had studied during Philippa’s illness mention it as an indisputable fact. My great dread was that at some moment, perhaps when our happiness was as perfect as it could be, some simple chance, some allusion to certain events, even the bare mention of a name, might supply the missing link, and the fearful truth would be revealed to my wife.

  Our return journey to Seville was made by water. Although the Guadalquiver is not a very interesting river, we thought travelling by steamer would be a pleasant change from the journeys in the hot, stuffy, slow trains, full from end to end with the odour of garlic and tobacco; so early one morning we left Cadiz and were soon steaming up the sluggish, dull, turbid river, with the great flat stretches of swampy land on either hand.

  There were not many passengers on board the steamer. The boat itself was a wretched affair, and before an hour was over we wished we had chosen the train as a mode of transit. Mile after mile of the level deserted land through which the river flows passed by, and presented no objects of interest greater than herds of cattle or flights of aquatic birds. Save that Philippa was by my side, it was the dullest journey I ever made.

  Of course there were English tourists on board; no spot is complete without them. Two of them, young men, and apparently gentlemen, had seated themselves near us; and after the usual admiring glances at my beautiful Philippa, commenced a desultory talk with each other.

  From the unrestrained way in which they spoke, and from the strength of some of their unfavourable comments on the scenery, or lack of scenery, it was clear that they took us for natives, before whom they could speak without being understood. Philippa, of course, looked a thorough Spaniard, and my own face had become so tanned by the sun that I might have been of any nationality.

  The young fellows chatted on, quite oblivious to the fact that two of their neighbours understood every word they spoke. For some time I listened with great amusement; then the lulling motion of the steamer, the sluggish muddy flow of the stream, the monotonous banks past which we stole, exercised a soporific effect upon me, and I began to doze and dream.

  Through my dreams I heard a name, a hated name, spoken clearly and distinctly. I started and opened my eyes, Philippa’s head was stretched forward as if she was intent upon catching some expected words spoken by another. ‘Sir Mervyn Ferrand,’ I heard one of our fellow-voyagers repeat. ‘Yes, I remember him; tall, good-looking man. Where is he now? He was a bad lot.’

  ‘Surely you read or heard about it?’ said his companion in a tone of surprise.

  I touched my wife’s arm. ‘Come away, Philippa,’ I said.

  She made a motion of dissent. Again I urged her. She shook her head pettishly.

  Ah! I forgot where you have been for months,’ said the second tourist, laughing; ‘out of the pale of civilisation and newspapers. Well, Ferrand was murdered—shot dead!’

  ‘Philippa, dearest, come, I implore you,’ I whispered.

  It was too late! The look on her face told me that nothing would now move her—nothing! She would hear the dreadful truth, told perhaps with distorted details. I groaned inwardly. The moment I had so long dreaded had come. If I dragged her away by force—if I interrupted the speakers—what good could it do? She had heard enough. She would force me to tell her the rest. I could only pray that she would not in any way associate herself with the man’s death.

  ‘Murdered! Poor fellow! Who murdered him?’ I heard the first speaker say.

  ‘No one knows. He was shot dead on a country roadside, just as that fearful snow-storm of last winter began. It seems almost incredible, but the snow drifted over him, and until it melted the crime was not discovered. In the interval the murderer had, of course, got clean away.’

  ‘Poor devil! I never heard any good of him; but what an end!’

  I was not looking at the speakers. I was noting every change in my wife’s face. I saw the colour fly from her cheek. I saw her lips and throat working convulsively, as though she was trying to articulate. I saw her dark eyes contract as in anguish. I knew that she was clasping her hands
together, as was her way when agitated. Suddenly she turned her eyes to mine, and in her eyes was a look of horror which told me that the very worst had come to pass—that the dread which had haunted me was realised! Then with a low moan she sank, white and senseless, on my shoulder.

  Though in a whirl of despair, I believe that I assumed a kind of mechanical calm. I seem to remember that the two English tourists offered their assistance; that, as we bore Philippa to an extemporised couch in the shadiest and coolest place we could find, I smiled, and attributed my wife’s fainting-fit to the heat of the sun, the smell of engines, or something of that kind. Little did those young men guess what their chance words had wrought. Little could they think that in speaking of Sir Mervyn Ferrand’s death they had, perhaps, wrecked the happiness of two lives. My heart was full of grief and fear, but I believe I bore myself bravely.

  In spite of such restoratives as we could administer, Philippa’s swoon lasted for a considerable time. I troubled little about that fact. Indeed, to me it seemed well that syncope should have supervened, and for a time banished the dreadful memories which had so suddenly invaded her brain. Could such a thing have been possible, I would almost have wished that her insensibility would continue until we reached Seville. But it was not to be so. By-and-by she sighed deeply, and her eyes opened. Consciousness and all its dreaded sequence was hers once more.

  I spoke to her, but she made no reply. She turned her eyes from mine; she shunned my gaze; she even seemed to shrink from the touch of my hand. During the remainder of that dreary journey not one word passed her lips. She lay with her face turned to the side of the vessel, needless of curious glances from fellow-passengers; heedless of my whispered words of love; heedless of all save her own thoughts—thoughts which led her, I trembled to picture whither.

  Through all those long sultry hours whilst the wretched steamboat ploughed its way up the broad muddy stream. I sat beside her, trying to find some way out of our sorrow. Alas! Every road was stopped by the impassable obstacle of Philippa’s knowledge of what she had done. For she knew it, I was certain. That look in her eyes had told me so much. The duration of her insanity had been so short that I could gather no comfort from the fact that by some merciful arrangement maniacs who recover their erring senses are troubled little by the deeds they have done in their moments of madness. I felt that in my wife’s case my only hope was to endeavour by argument to bring her to my own way of thinking; that is, to consider herself unaccountable by any law, human or divine, for her actions at the time. But I doubted if her sensitive, impulsive nature could ever be induced to take this view of her act. I doubted, had she not been the woman I loved with a passionate love, if I could have quite absolved her from the crime, with the remembrance of her words, ‘Basil, did you ever hate a man?’ still with me.

  Yet, strange anomaly, I would, in fair fight of course, have shot that man through the heart and have gloried in the deed. But then Philippa was a woman, and had she not been the woman I loved I might have shrank from the one who, even in her madness, was urged to take such fearful vengeance.

  I smiled bitterly as I thought how a chance breath of wind had tumbled my house of cards to the ground. I smiled almost triumphantly as I told myself that, come what might—misery—shame—death—I had won and held for a week the one desire of my life. Nothing could deprive me of that memory.

  Home at last! Still silent, or answering my questions by monosyllables, Philippa was brought by me to our once happy home in Seville. My mother, with arch smiles of welcome on her comely face, was at the gate of the patio ready to receive us. As she saw her a kind of shiver ran through my poor love’s frame. She let my mother embrace and caress her without any display of reciprocal affection.

  ‘Philippa is ill,’ I said, in explanation. ‘I will take her to her room.’

  I led her to the apartment which my mother had in our absence fitted up for us. It was gay and beautiful with flowers, and there were many other careful little evidences of the hearty welcome which was waiting us. Philippa noticed nothing. I closed the door and turned towards my wife.

  She looked at me with those wondrous dark eyes, which seemed to search my very soul. ‘Basil,’ she said, in a low, solemn voice, ‘tell me—tell me the truth. What had I done that night?’

  CHAPTER XI

  SPECIAL PLEADING

  IT was over! She knew! The hope which may have buoyed my spirits, that Philippa’s agitation at learning of Sir Mervyn Ferrand’s death was but due to the fact that once she loved the man, entirely vanished. I could see no loop-hole of escape, no possibility of persuading her that she was fancying horrors which had never taken place. Moreover, although I would have given my life to have saved her from the knowledge of this thing, I could not meet the eyes of her I loved and lie to her.

  I did indeed, if but for the sake of gaining time, attempt to stammer out some evasive answer; but she interrupted me before I had spoken five words.

  ‘Why do I ask?’ she echoed. ‘I knew it all—all—all! In dreams it has come to me—the whitened road—the dull dead face—the whirling snow! In dreams I have stood over him, and said to myself, “He is dead!” But, Basil, my love, my husband, I thought it was but a dream. I drove it away. I said, “It must be a dream. I hated him, and so I dreamed that I killed him.” Basil, dearest Basil, tell me, if you can, that I dreamed it!’

  Her voice sank into accents of piteous entreaty. She looked at me yearningly.

  ‘Dearest, it must have been a dream,’ I said.

  She threw out her arms wildly. ‘No, no! It was no dream. Even now I can see myself standing in the night over that motionless form. I can feel the cold air on my cheek. I can see myself flying through the snow. Basil, I hated that man, and I killed him!’

  The tears were streaming down my cheeks. I seized her hands, and strove to draw her to me. She tore herself from my grasp, and, throwing herself wildly on the bed, broke into a paroxysm of sobs. As I approached her she turned her head from me.

  ‘I killed him! Killed him!’ she whispered in awe-struck tones. ‘Oh, that fearful night! It has haunted me ever since. I knew not why. Now I know! He wronged me, and I killed him! Killed him!’

  I placed my arm around her neck, and my cheek against hers. As she felt my touch she started up wildly.

  ‘No, no!’ she cried. ‘Touch me not! Shun me! Shrink from me! Basil, do you hear? Do you understand? I have murdered a man!’

  Once more she threw herself on the bed, her whole frame quivering with anguish.

  ‘A shamed—a ruined woman!’ she muttered. ‘A villain’s forsaken toy, and now a murderess! You have chosen your wife well, Basil!’

  ‘Sweetest, I love you,’ I whispered.

  ‘Love me! How can you love me? Such love is not holy. If you love me, aid me to die, Basil! Give me something that will kill me! Why did you save my life?’

  ‘Because I loved you then, as I love you now.’

  She was silent, and I hoped was growing calmer. I was but waiting for the first shock of her newly-born knowledge to pass away, in order to reason with her, and show her that by every moral law she was guiltless of the fearful crime. Suddenly she turned to me.

  ‘How did I kill him?’ she said, with a shudder.

  ‘Dearest, rest. We will talk again presently.’

  ‘How did I kill him?’ she repeated with vehemence.

  ‘He was found shot through the heart,’ I answered, reluctantly.

  ‘Shot through his heart—his wicked heart! Shot by me! How could I have shot him? With what? Basil, tell me all, or I shall go mad! I will not have the smallest thing concealed. I will know all!’

  ‘He was shot with a pistol.’

  ‘A pistol! A pistol! How did I come by it? Where is it?’

  ‘I threw it away.’

  ‘You! Then you knew!’

  I bowed my head. I felt that concealment was useless. She must know all.

  I told her everything. I told her how she had promised to come f
or me; how, as she did not keep that promise, I went in search of her. I told her how she had swept past me in the snow-storm; how I had overtaken her. I repeated her wild words, and told her how the fatal weapon had fallen at my feet, and how I had, on the impulse of the moment, hurled it away into the night; how she had broken away from me, and fled down the lonely road; how, excited and terrified by her words, I had gone on to learn their meaning; how I had found the body of Sir Mervyn Ferrand; how, without thought of concealing the deed, I had laid the dead man by the roadside; how I had rushed home, and found her, Philippa, waiting for me, and in the full height of temporary insanity. I told her all this, and I swore that from the moment I discovered that her senses had gone astray I held her, although she had done so dreadful a deed, as innocent of crime as when she slept, a baby, on her mother’s breast.

  She listened to me with fixed dilated eyes. She interrupted me neither by word nor gesture; but when I had finished speaking she covered her face with her hands, and great tears trickled through her fingers. ‘No hope! No hope!’ she cried. ‘Oh, Basil, I dared to hope that something you would tell me would show me it was not my hand which did this thing! My love, my own love, we have been so happy whilst I could persuade myself all this was a dream! We shall be happy no more, Basil!’