It was a curious position, that of some of the present inmates of Dallory Hall. Sir Nash Bohun, who went down to accompany Arthur more than anything else, and who had not intended to remain above a day or two, stayed on. The quiet life after the bustle of London was grateful to him; the sweet country air really seemed to possess some of the properties madam had ascribed to it. Sir Nash was to go abroad when the genial springtime should set in, and try the effect of some medicinal waters. Until then, he was grateful for any change, any society that served to pass away the time.
Sir Nash had been as much struck with the wonderful beauty of Ellen Adair as strangers generally were. That she was one of those unusually sweet girls, made specially to be loved, he could not fail to see. In the moment of their first arrival, he had not noticed her: there were so many besides her to be greeted; and the appearance of Miss Dallory amongst them was a most unexpected surprise. Not until they were assembling for dinner, did Sir Nash observe her. His eyes suddenly rested on a most beautiful girl in a simple black silk evening dress, its low body and sleeves edged with white tulle, and a black necklace on her pretty neck. He was wondering who she could be, when he heard Richard North speak of her as Ellen Adair. Sir Nash drew Arthur Bohun to the far end of the drawing-room, ostensibly to look at a rare Turner hanging on the walls.
"Arthur, whoisshe? It cannot be Adair's daughter?"
"Yes, sir, it is."
"Mercy be good to her!" cried Sir Nash in dismay. "What a calamity! She looks absolutely charming; fitted to mate with a prince of the blood-royal."
"And she is so."
"To have been born to an inheritance of shame!" continued Sir Nash. "Poor thing! Does she know about it?"
"No, I am sure she does not," replied Arthur warmly, his tone one of intense pain. "She believes her father to be as honourable and good as you are yourself, sir."
For the very fact of Ellen's having put out her hand to him in the hall with that bright and confiding smile, had convinced Arthur Bohun that at present she knew nothing.
It made his own position all the worse: for, to her, his behaviour must appear simply infamous. Yet, how tell her? Here they were, living in the same house; and yet they could only be to each other as strangers. An explanation was due to Ellen Adair; but from the very nature of the subject, he could not give it. If he had possessed the slightest idea that she was attributing his behaviour to a wrong cause--an engagement with Miss Dallory--he would at least have set that right. But who was likely to tell him? No one. Madam and Matilda, be very sure, would not do so: still less would Ellen herself. And so the complication would, and must, go on; just as unhappy complications do sometimes go on. But there is this much to be said--that to have set straight the only point on which they were at cross purposes would not have healed the true breach by which the two were hopelessly separated.
And Sir Nash Bohun never once entered into any sort of intercourse with Ellen Adair. He would not, had he known it beforehand, have taken up his sojourn under the same roof with one whose father had played so fatal a part with his long-deceased brother: but circumstances had brought it about. In herself the young lady was so unobjectionable--nay, so deserving of respect and homage--that Sir Nash was won out of his intended coldness; and he would smile pleasantly upon her when paying her the slight, unavoidable courtesies of everyday life. But he never lingered near her, never entered into prolonged conversation: a bow or two, a good-morning and goodnight, comprised their acquaintanceship. He grew to pity her; almost to love her; and he relieved his feelings at least once a day in private by sending sundry unorthodox epithets after the man, William Adair, for blighting the name held by this fair and sweet young lady.
It was not a very sociable party, taken on the whole. Sir Nash had a sitting-room assigned him, and remained much in it: his grief for his son was not over, and perhaps never would be. Mr. North was often shut up in his parlour, or walking with bent head about the garden paths. Madam kept very much aloof, no one knew where; Matilda was buried in her French and English novels, or chattering above to madam's French maid. Richard was at the works all day. Ellen Adair, feeling herself a sort of interloper, kept her chamber, or went to remote parts of the garden and sat there in solitude. As to Arthur Bohun, he was still an invalid, weak and ill, and would often not be seen until luncheon or dinner-time. There was a general meeting at meals, and a sociable evening closed the day.
Madam had not allowed matters to take their course without a word from herself. On the day after Sir Nash and Arthur arrived, she came, all smiles and suavity, knocking at Ellen's chamber-door. She found that young lady weeping bitter tears--who stammered out, as she strove for composure, some excuse about feeling so greatly the sudden death of Mrs. Cumberland. Madam was gracious and considerate; as she could be when it pleased her: she poured some scent on her own white handkerchief, and passed it over Miss Adair's forehead. Ellen thanked her and smoothed her hair back, and dried her tears, and rose up out of the emotion as a thing of the past.
"I am sorry it should have happened that Sir Nash chose this time for his visit," spoke madam; "you might just now have preferred to be alone with us. Captain Bohun is still so very unwell that Sir Nash says he could but bring him."
"Yes," mechanically replied Ellen, really not knowing what she was assenting to.
"And Arthur--of course he was anxious to come; he knew Miss Dallory would be at home again," went on madam, with candour, like a woman without guile. "We are all delighted at the prospect of his marrying her. Before he was heir to the baronetcy, of course it did not so much matter how he married, provided it was a gentlewoman of family equal to the Bohuns. But now that he has come into the succession through poor James's death, things have changed. Did you know that Sir Nash has cut off the entail?" abruptly broke off madam.
Ellen thought she did. The fact was, Arthur had told Mrs. Cumberland of it at Eastsea: but Ellen did not understand much about entails, so the matter had passed from her mind.
"Cutting off the entail has placed Arthur quite in his uncle's hands," continued madam. "If Arthur were to offend him, Sir Nash might not leave him a farthing. It is fortunate for us all that Mary is so charming: Sir Nash is almost as fond of her as is Arthur. And she is a great heiress, you know: she must have at the very least three or four thousand a-year. Some people say it is more; the minority of the Dallory children was a long one."
"It is a great deal," murmured Ellen.
"Yes. But it will be very acceptable. I'm sure, by the way affairs seem to be going on with Mr. North and Richard, it seems as though Arthur would have us all on his hands. It has been agreathappiness to us, his choosing Miss Dallory. I don't believe he thought much of her before his illness. She was staying with us in town during that time, and so--so the love came, and Arthur made up his mind. He had the sense to see the responsibility that James Bohun's death has thrown upon him, the necessity for making a suitable choice in a wife."
Ellen had learnt a lesson lately in self-control, and maintained her calmness. She did not know madam--except by reputation--quite as well as some people did, and believed she spoke in all sincerity. One thing she could not decide--whether madam had known of the projected marriage at Eastsea. She felt inclined to fancy that she had not done so, and Ellen hoped it with her whole heart. Madam lingered yet to say a few more words. She drew an affecting picture of the consolation this projected union brought her; and--as if she were addressing an imaginary audience--turned up her eyes and clasped her hands, and declared she must put it to the honour and good feeling of the world in general not to attempt anything by word or deed that might tend to mar this happy state of things. With that she kissed Ellen Adair, and said, now that she had apologized for their not being quite alone at the Hall and had explained how it happened that Sir Nash had come, she would leave her to dress.
The days went on, and Mary Dallory came on a visit to the Hall. Her brother Frances left home to join a shooting party, and madam seized the occasion to invite his sister. She came, apparently nothing loth; and with her a great trunkful of paraphernalia. Matilda North had once said, when calling Mary Dallory a flirt, that she would come fast enough to the Hall when Richard and Arthur were there. At any rate, she came now. After this, Arthur Bohun would be more downstairs than he was before; and he and she would be often together in the grounds; sitting on benches under the evergreens or strolling about the walks side by side. Sometimes Arthur would take her arm with an invalid's privilege; his limp at the present time more perceptible than it ever had been; and sometimes she would take his. Ellen Adair would watch them through the windows, and press her trembling fingers on her aching heart. She saw it all: or thought she did. Arthur Bohun had found that his future prospects in life depended very much upon his wedding Miss Dallory, or some equally eligible young lady; and so he had resolved to forget the sweet romance of the past, and accept reality.
She thought he might have spoken to her. So much was certainly due to her, who had all but been made his wife. His present treatment of her was simply despicable; almost wicked. Better that he had explained only as madam had done: what was there to prevent his telling her the truth? He might have said, ever so briefly: "Such and such things have arisen, and my former plans are frustrated, and I cannot help myself." But no; all he did was to avoid her: he never attempted to touch her hand; his eyes never met hers if he could help it. It was as though he had grown to despise her, and sought to show it. Had he done so? When Ellen's fears suggested the question--and it was in her mind pretty often now--she would turn sick with despair, and wish to die.
The truth was really this. Arthur Bohun, fearing he should betray his still ardent love, was more studiously cold to Ellen than he need have been. A strange yearning would come over him to clasp her to his heart and sob out his grief and tenderness: and the very fear lest he might really do this some day, lest passion and nature should become too strong for prudence, made him shun her and seem to behave, as Ellen felt and thought, despicably. He knew this himself; and he called himself far harder names than Ellen could have called him: a coward, a knave, a miserably-dishonoured man. And so, in this way things went on at Dallory Hall: and were likely to continue.
One afternoon, a few days after Mrs. Cumberland had been interred, Ellen went to see her grave. Madam, Miss Dallory, Matilda, and Sir Nash had gone out driving: Arthur had been away somewhere since the morning, Mr. North was busy at the celery-bed with his head gardener. There was only Ellen: she was alone and lonely, and she put her things on and walked through Dallory to the churchyard. She happened to meet three or four people she knew, and stayed to talk to them. Mrs. Gass was one; the widow of Henry Hepburn was another. But she made way at last, feeling a little shy at being out alone. When walking as far as Dallory Mrs. Cumberland had always caused a servant to attend her.
The grave was not far from Bessy Rane's. Ellen had no difficulty in distinguishing the one from the other, though as yet there was no stone to mark either. Mrs. Cumberland's was near that of the late Thomas Gass; Bessy's was close to Edmund North's. A large winter tree, an evergreen, overshadowed this corner of the churchyard, and she sat down on the bench that encircled the trunk. Bessy's grave was only a very few yards away.
She leaned her face on her hand, and was still. The past, the present, the future; Mrs. Cumberland, Bessy Rane, Edmund North; her own bitter trouble, and other things--all seemed to be crowding together tumultuously in her brain. But, as she sat on, the tumult cleared a little, and she lost herself in imaginative thoughts of that heaven where pain and care shall be no more. Could they see her? Could Mrs. Cumberland look down and see her, Ellen Adair, sitting there in her sorrow? A fanciful idea came to her that perhaps the dead were the guardian angels appointed to watch the living: to be "in charge over them, to keep them in all their ways." If so, who then was watchingher?--It must be her own mother, Mary Adair. Could these guardian angels pray for them?--intercede with the mighty God and the Saviour that their sins here might be blotted out? How long Ellen was lost in these thoughts she never knew: but she wound up by crying quietly to herself, and she wondered how long it would be before she joined them all in heaven.
Some one, approaching from behind the tree, came round with a slow step and sat down on the bench. It was a gentleman in mourning; she could see so much, though he was almost on the other side of the tree, and had his back to her. Ellen found she had not been observed, and prepared to leave. Twilight had fallen on the dull evening. As she stooped to pick up her handkerchief, which had fallen, the intruder turned and saw her. Saw as well the tears on her face. It was Captain Bohun. He got up more quickly than he had sat down, intending no doubt to move away. But in his haste he dropped the stick that he had used for support in walking since his illness--and it fell close to Ellen's feet. She stooped in some confusion to pick it up, and so did he.
"Thank you--I beg your pardon," he said, with an air of humiliation so great that it might have wrung a tender heart to witness. And then he felt that he could not for very shame go off without some notice, as he had been attempting to do. Though why he stayed to speak and what he said, it might have puzzled him at the moment to tell. Instinct, more than reason, prompted the words.
"She was taken off very suddenly."
Though standing close to Bessy's grave, Ellen thought he looked across at Mrs. Cumberland's. And the latter had been last in her thoughts.
"Yes. I feared we should not get her home in time. And I feel sure that the journey was fatal to her. If she had remained quiet, she would not have died quite so soon."
"It was of Bessy I spoke."
"Oh--I thought you alluded to Mrs. Cumberland. Mrs. Cumberland's death has made so much difference to me, that I suppose my mind is much occupied with thoughts of her. This is the first time I have been here."
Both were agitated to pain: both could fain have pressed their hearts tightly to still the frightful beating there.
"Ellen, I should like to say a word to you," he suddenly exclaimed, turning his face to her for a moment, and then turning it away again. "I am aware that nothing can excuse the deep shame of my conduct in not having attempted any explanation before. To you I cannot attempt it. I should have given it to Mrs. Cumberland if she had not died."
Ellen made no answer. Her eyes were bent on the ground.
"The subject was so intensely painful and--and awkward--that at first I did not think I could have mentioned it even to Mrs. Cumberland. Then came my illness. After that, whilst I lay day after day, left to my own reflections, things began to present themselves in rather a different light; and I saw that to maintain silence would be the most wretched shame of all. I resolved to disclose everything to Mrs. Cumberland, and leave her to repeat it to you if she thought it well to do so--as much of it, at least, as would give you some clue to my strange and apparently unjustifiable conduct."
Ellen's eyes were still lowered, but her hands trembled with the violence of her emotion. She did not speak.
"Mrs. Cumberland's death, I say, prevented this," continued Captain Bohun, who had gathered a little courage now that the matter was opened: "and I have felt since in a frightful dilemma, from which I see no escape. To you I cannot enter on any explanation: nor yet am I able to tell you why I cannot. The subject is altogether so very painful----"
Ellen lifted her head suddenly. Every drop of blood had deserted her face, leaving it of an ashen whiteness. The movement caused him to pause.
"I know what it is," she managed to say from between her white and trembling lips.
"You--know it?"
"Yes. All."
Alas for the misapprehensions of this world.Hewas thinking only of the strange disclosure made to him concerning Mr. Adair;sheonly of his engagement to Miss Dallory. At her avowal a multitude of thoughts came surging through his brain. All! She knewall!
"Have you known it long?" he questioned in low tones.
"The time may be counted by days."
He jumped to the conclusion that Mrs. Cumberland had disclosed it to her on her death-bed. And Ellen's knowledge of it improved his position just a little. But, looking at her, at her pale sweet face and downcast eyes, at the anguish betrayed in every line of her countenance, and which she could not conceal, Arthur Bohun's heart was filled to overflowing with a strange pity, that seemed almost to reach the point of breaking. He drew nearer to her.
"Thank God that you understand, Ellen--that at least you do not think me the shameless scoundrel I must otherwise have appeared," he whispered, his voice trembling with its deep emotion. "I cannot help myself: you must see that I cannot, as you know all. The blow nearly killed me. My fate--our fate, if I may dare still so far to couple your name with mine--is a very bitter one."
Ellen had begun to shiver. Something in his words grated terribly on her ear: and pride enabled her to keep down outward emotion.
"You left the ring and licence with me," she abruptly said, in perhaps a sudden bitterness of temper. "What am I to do with them?"
"Burn them--destroy them," he fiercely replied. "They are worthless to us now."
But he so spoke only in his anguish. Ellen interpreted it differently.
"God help us both, Ellen! A cruel fate has parted us for this world: but we may be permitted to be together in the next. It is all my hope now. Heaven bless you, Ellen! Our paths in life must lie apart, but I pray always that yours may be a happy one."
Without further word, without touching her hand, thus he left her. Limping on to the broad path, and then down it towards the churchyard gate.
There are moments into which a whole lifetime of agony seems to be compressed. Such a moment was this for Ellen Adair. Darkness was coming on rapidly now, but she sat on, her head bent low on her hands. They were, then, separated for ever; there was no further hope for her!--he himself had confirmed it. She wondered whether the pain would kill her; whether she should be able to battle with it, or must die of the humiliation it brought. The pain and the humiliation were strong and sharp now--now as she sat there. By-and-by there stole again into her mind those thoughts which Captain Bohun's appearance had interrupted--the heavenly place of rest to which Bessy and Mrs. Cumberland had passed. Insensibly it soothed her: and imagination went roving away unchecked. She seemed to see the white robes of the Redeemed; she saw the golden harps in their hands, the soft sweet light around them, the love and peace. The thoughts served to show her how poor and worthless, as compared with the joys of that Better Land, were the trials and pains of this world: how short a moment, even at the longest, they had to be endured: how quickly and surely all here must pass away! Yes, she might endure with patience for the time! And when she lifted her head, it was to break into a flood of violent yet soothing tears, that she could not have shed before.
"Father in heaven, Thou seest all my trouble and my agony. I have no one in the world to turn to for shelter--and the blast is strong. Vouchsafe to guide and cover me!"
But night was falling, and she rose to make her way out of the churchyard. In a sheltered nook that she passed, sat a man: and Ellen started a little, and quickened her pace. It was Captain Bohun. Instead of going away, he had turned back to wait. She understood it at once: at that hour he would not leave her alone. He wished to be chivalrous to her still, for all his utter faithlessness. In the very teeth of his avowed desertion, his words and manner had proved that he loved her yet. Lovedher, and not another. It brought its own comfort to Ellen Adair. Of course it ought not to have done so, but it did: for the human heart at best is frail and faulty.
Captain Bohun followed her out of the churchyard, and kept her in sight all the way home, every feeling he possessed aching for her. He had seen the signs and traces of her weeping; he knew what must be the amount of her anguish. He might have been ready to shoot himself could it have restored her to peace; he felt that he should very much like to shoot Mr. Adair, whose bad deeds had entailed this misery upon them.
At the Hall gates he was overtaken by Richard, striding home hastily to dinner. Richard, passing his arm through Arthur's, began telling him that he feared he was going to have some trouble with his ex-workmen.
And as they, the once fond lovers, sat together afterwards at table, and in the lighted drawing-room, Arthur as far from her as he could place himself, none present suspected the scene that had taken place in the churchyard. Ellen Adair's eyes looked heavy; but that was nothing unusual now. It was known that she grieved much for Mrs. Cumberland.
Jelly--to whom we are obliged to refer rather frequently, as she holds some important threads of the story in her hands--found times went very hard with her. A death within the house in addition to the death close without it, was almost more than Jelly could well put up with in her present state of mind. The startling circumstances that had characterized Mrs. Rane's demise did not attend Mrs. Cumberland's: but it had been very sudden at last, and Jelly was sincerely attached to her mistress.
Dr. Rane was left sole executor to his mother's will. It was a very simple one: she bequeathed to him all she had. That was not much; for a portion of her income died with her. He found that he had two hundred a-year--as he had always known that he should have--and her household furniture. Of ready money there was little. When he should have discharged trifling claims and paid the funeral expenses, some twenty or thirty pounds would remain over, that was all.
Dr. Rane acted promptly. He discharged two of the servants, Ann and Dinah, retaining Jelly for the present to look after the house. He wished, if he could, to get the furniture taken with the house; so he advertised it in the local papers. He had been advertising his practice--I think this has been already said--but nothing satisfactory had come of it. Inquiries had been made, but they all dropped through. Perhaps Dr. Rane was too honest to say his practice was worth much, or to conceal the fact that Mr. Seeley had the best of it in Dallory. Neither was the tontine money as yet paid over to him; and, putting out of consideration all other business, the doctor must have waited for that.
Now, of all things that could have happened, Jelly most disliked and dreaded being left alone in the house. From having been as physically brave as a woman can be, she had latterly become one of the most timid. She started at her own shadow; she would not for the world have entered alone at night the room in which Mrs. Cumberland died. Having seen one ghost, Jelly could not feel sure that she should not see two. Some people hold a theory that to a very few persons in this world--and not to others--is given the faculty, or whatever you may please to call it, of discerning supernatural sights or visions. Jelly had heard this: and she became possessed of the idea that for some wise purpose she had been suddenly endowed with it. To remain in the house alone was more than her brain would bear; and she selected Ketler's eldest girl, a starved damsel of thirteen, called "Riah," to come and keep her company. As it was one less to feed, and they had tried in vain to get Riah a place--for the strike and badness of trade had affected all classes, and less servants seemed to be wanted everywhere--Ketler and his wife were very glad to let her go.
How do rumours get about? Can any one tell? How did a certain rumour get about and begin to be whispered in Dallory? Certainly no one there could have told. Jelly could have been upon her Bible oath if necessary (or thought she could) that she had not set it floating. It was a very ugly one, whoever had done it.
Late one afternoon Jelly received a call from Mrs. Gass's smart housemaid. The girl brought a letter from her mistress; Mrs. Gass wanted very particularly to see Jelly, and had sent to say that Jelly was to go there as soon as she could. Jelly made no sort of objection. She had been confined to the house much more closely of late than she approved of: partly because Dr. Rane had charged her to be in the way in case people called to look over it: partly because she had found out that Miss Riah had a tendency to walk off, herself, if she could get Jelly's back turned.
"Now, mind you sit still in the kitchen and attend to the fire, and listen to the door; and perhaps I'll bring you home a pair of strings for that bonnet of yours," said Jelly to the girl, when she was ready to start. "The doctor will be in by-and-by, so don't attempt to get out of the way."
With these injunctions, Jelly began her walk. She had on her best new mourning--and was in a complaisant mood. It looked inclined to rain--the weather had been uncertain of late--but Jelly had her umbrella: a silk one that had belonged to her mistress, and that Dr. Rane had given, with many other things, to Jelly. She rather wondered what Mrs. Gass wanted with her, but supposed it was to tell her of a situation. It had been arranged that if an eligible one offered, Jelly should be at liberty to depart, and a woman might be placed in the house to take care of it. Mrs. Gass had said she would let Jelly know if she heard of anything desirable. So away went Jelly with a fleet foot, little thinking what was in store for her.
Mrs. Gass, wearing mourning also, was in her usual sitting-room, the dining-room. As Jelly entered, the smart maid was carrying out the tea-tray. Mrs. Gass stirred up her fire, and bade Jelly to a chair near it, drawing her own pretty closely to her.
"Just see whether that girl have shut the door fast before I begin," suggested Mrs. Gass. "It won't do to have ears listening to me."
Jelly went, saw the door was closed, came back and sat down again. She noticed that Mrs. Gass looked keenly at her, as if studying her face before speaking.
"Jelly, what is it that you have been saying about Dr. Rane?"
The question was so unexpected that Jelly did not immediately answer it. Quite a change, this, from an offer of a nice situation.
"I've said nothing," she replied.
"Now don't you repeat that to me. You have. And it would have been a'most as well for you that you had cut your tongue out before doing it."
"I said--what I did--to you, Mrs. Gass. To nobody else."
"Look here, Jelly--the mischiefs done, and you'd a great deal better look it full in the face than deny it. There's reports getting up about Dr. Rane, in regard to his wife's death, and no mortal woman or man can have set 'em afloat butyou. This morning I was in North Inlet, looking a bit after them scamps of workmen that won't work, and won't let others work if they can help it: and after I had given a taste of my mind to as many of 'em as was standing about, I stepped into Mother Green's. She has the rheumatics--and he has a touch of 'em. Talking with her of one thing and another, we got on to the subject of Dr. Rane and the tontine; and she said two or three words that frightened me; frightened me, Jelly; for they pointed to a suspicion that the doctor had sacrificed his wife to get it. I pretended to understand nothing--she didn't speak out broad enough for me to take it up and answer her--and it was the best plannotto understand----"
"For an old woman, Mother Green has the longest tongue I know," interrupted Jelly.
"You've a longer," retorted Mrs. Gass. "Just wait till I've finished, girl. 'Twas a tolerable fine morning, and after that I went walking on, and struck off down by the Wheatsheaf. Packerton's wife was standing at the door with cherry ribbons in her cap, and I stopped to talk to her.Shebrought up Dr. Rane; and lowered her voice as if it was high treason; asking me if I'd heard what was being said about his wife's not having died a natural death. I did give it the woman; and I think I frightened her. She acknowledged that she only spoke from a hint dropped by Timothy Wilks, and said she had thought at the time it couldn't have anything in it. But whatIhave to say to you is this," continued Mrs. Gass to Jelly more emphatically, "whether it's Tim Wilks that's spreading the report, or whether it's Mother Green, they both had it in the first place from you."
Jelly sat in discomfort. She did not like this. It is nothing to be charged with a fault when you are wholly innocent; but when conscience says you are partly guilty it is another thing. Jelly was aware that one night at Mother Green's, taking supper with that old matron and Timothy, she had so far yielded to the seductions of social gossip as to forget her usual reticence; and had said rather more than she ought. Still, at the worst, it had been only a word or two: a hint, not a specific charge.
"I may have let fall an incautious word there," confessed Jelly. "But it was nothing anybody can take hold of."
"Don't you make sure of that," reprimanded Mrs. Gass. "We are told in the sacred writings--which it's not well to mention in ordinary talk, and I'd only do it with reverence--of a grain of mustard seed, that's the least of all seeds when it's sown, and grows into the greatest tree. You remember Who it is says that, Jelly, so it's not for me to enlarge upon it. But I may say this much, girl, that that's an apt exemplification of gossip. You drop one word, or maybe only half a one, and it goes spreading out pretty nigh over the world."
"I'm sure, what with the weight and worry this dreadful secret has been on my mind, almost driving me mad, the wonder is that I've been able to keep as silent as I have," put in Jelly, who was growing cross. Mrs. Gass resumed.
"If the thing is what you think it to be---a dreadful secret, and it is brought to light through you, why, I don't know that you'd get blamed--though there's many a one will say you might have spared your mistress's son and left it for others to charge him. But suppose it turns out to be no dreadful secret; suppose poor Bessy Rane died a natural death of the fever, what then?--where would you be?"
Jelly took off her black gloves as if they had grown suddenly hot for her hands. She said nothing.
"Look here, girl. My belief is that you've just set a brand on fire! one that won't be put out until it's burnt out. My firm belief also is,that you be altogether mistaken. I have thought the matter over with myself hour after hour; and, except at the first moment when you whispered it to me in the churchyard, and I own I was startled, I have never been able to bring my common sense to believe in it. Oliver Rane loved his wife too well to hurt a hair of her head."
"There was that anonymous letter," cried Jelly.
"Whatever hand he might have had in that anonymous letter--and nobody knows the truth of it whether he had or whether he hadn't--I don't believe he was the man to hurt a hair of his wife's head," repeated Mrs. Gass. "And for you to be spreading it about that he murdered her!"
"The circumstances all point to it," said Jelly.
"They don't."
"Why, Mrs. Gass, they do."
"Let's go over 'em, and see," said Mrs. Gass, who had a plain way of convincing people. "Let's begin at the beginning. Hear me out, Jelly."
She went over the past minutely. Jelly listened, growing more uncomfortable every moment. There was absolutely not one fact inconsistent with a natural death. It is true the demise had been speedy, but the cause assigned, exhaustion, might have been the real one; and the hasty fastening down of the coffin was no doubt a simple measure of precaution, taken out of regard for the living. No; as Mrs. Gass put it in her sensible way, there was positively not a single fact that could be urged for supposing that Mrs. Rane came to an untimely end. Jelly twirled her gloves, and twisted her hands, and grew hot and uncomfortable.
"There was what I saw--the ghost," she said.
But Mrs. Gass ridiculed the ghost--that is, the idea of it--beyond everything earthly. Jelly, however, would not give way there; and they had some sparring.
"Ghost, indeed! and you come to this age! It was the beer, girl; the beer."
"I hadn't had a drop of beer," protested Jelly, almost crying. "How was I to get beer at Ketler's? They've none for themselves. I had had nothing inside my lips but tea."
"Well; beer or no beer, ghost or no ghost, it strikes me, Jelly, that you have done a pretty thing. This story is as sure to get wind now as them geraniums of mine will have air when I open the window tomorrow morning. You'll be called upon to substantiate your story; and when you can't--and I'm sure you know that you can't--the law may have you up to answer for it. I once knew a man that rose a bad charge against another; he was tried for it, and got seven years' transportation. You may come to the same."
A very agreeable prospect! If Jelly's bonnet had not been on, her hair might have risen up on end with horror. There could be no doubt that it was she who had started the report; and in this moment of repentance she sat really wishing she had first cut her foolish tongue out.
"Nothing can be done now," concluded Mrs. Gass. "There's just one chance for you--that the rumour may die away. If it will, let it; and take warning to be more cautious in future. The probability is that Mother Green and Tim Wilks have mentioned it to others besides me and Packerton's wife: if so, nothing will keep it under. You have been a great fool, Jelly."
Jelly went away in terrible fright. Mrs. Gass had laid the matter before her in its true light. Suspect as she might,she had no proof; and if questioned by authority could not have advanced one.
"Dr. Rane have been in here three times after you," was young Riah's salutation when Jelly reached home.
"Dr. Rane has?"
"And he said the last time you oughtn't to be away from the house so long with only me in it," added the damsel, who felt aggrieved, on her own score, at having been left.
"Oh, did he!" carelessly returned Jelly.
But she began considering what Dr. Rane could want. For her parting charge to Riah, that Dr. Rane was coming in, had been a slight invention of her own, meant to keep that young person up to her duty. Just as she had decided that it might refer to this same report, which he might have heard, and Jelly was growing more and more ill at ease in consequence, he came in. She went to him in the dining-room.
"Jelly," said the doctor, "I think I have let the house."
"Have you, sir?" returned Jelly, blithely, in the agreeable revulsion of feeling. "I'm sure I am glad."
"But only for a short time," continued Dr. Rane. "Two ladies of Whitborough are wanting temporary change of air, and will take it if it suits them. They are coming tomorrow to look at it."
"Very well, sir."
"They will occupy the house for a month, and perhaps take it for longer. This will give me time to let it for a permanency. If you feel inclined to take service with them, I believe there will be room for you."
"Who are they?" asked Jelly.
"Mrs. and Miss Beverage. Quakers."
She knew the name. Very respectable people; plenty of money.
"You'll show them over it tomorrow when they come: I may or may not be in the way at the time," concluded Dr. Rane.
Jelly attended him to the door. It was evident he had not heard the rumour that had reached Mrs. Gass; or, at least, did not connect Jelly in any way with it. But how was he likely to hear it? The probability was, that all Dallory would be full of it before it reached him.
Jelly could not eat her supper. Mrs. Gass's communication had left no room for appetite. Neither did she get any sleep. Tossing and turning on her bed, lay she: the past doubt and present dread troubling her brain until morning.
But, when Jelly had thus tormented herself and regarded the matter in all its aspects, the result was, that she still believed her own version of the tale--namely, that Mrs. Rane had not come fairly by her death. True, she had no proof: but she began wondering whether proof might not be found. At any rate, she resolved to search for it. Not openly; not to be used; but quietly and cautiously: to hold, as it were, in case of need. She could not tell how to look for this, or where to begin. No one had seen Mrs. Rane after death--excepting of course the undertakers. Jelly resolved to question them: perhaps something might be gleaned in this way.
It was afternoon before the expected ladies arrived. Two pleasant women, dressed after the sober fashion of their sect. Mrs. Beverage, a widow, was sixty; her daughter nearly forty. They liked the house, and said they should take it; and they liked Jelly, and engaged her as upper maid, intending to bring two servants of their own. After their departure, Jelly had to wait for Dr. Rane: it would not do for him to find only Riah again. He came in whilst Jelly was at tea. She told him the ladies wished to enter as soon as convenient; and the doctor said he would at once go over to Whitborough and see them.
This left Jelly at liberty. It was growing late when she set out on her expedition, and she started at the hedge shadows as she went along. Jelly's thoughts were full of all kinds of uncanny and unpleasant things. Jelly's disposition was not a secretive one; rather the contrary; and she hated to have to do with anything that might not be discussed in the broad light of day.
The commencement of her task was at any rate not difficult: she could enter the Hepburns' house without excuse or apology, knowing them sufficiently well to do so. When they were young, Thomas Hepburn, his wife, and Jelly had all been companions at the same day-school. Walking through the shop without ceremony, saving a nod to young Charley, who was minding it, Jelly turned into the little parlour: a narrow room with the fireplace in the corner surmounted by a high old-fashioned wainscoting of wood, painted stone-colour. Thomas Hepburn, who seemed to be always ailing with something or other, had an inflammation on his left arm, and his wife was binding bruised lily leaves round it. Jelly, drawing near, at once expressed her disapprobation of the treatment.
"I can't think how it should have come, or what it is," he observed. "I don't remember to have hurt it in any way."
Jelly took the seat on the other side the fireplace, and Mrs. Hepburn, a stout healthy woman, sat down at the small round table and began working by lamplight. Thomas Hepburn, nursing his arm, which pained him, led all unconsciously to the subject Jelly had come to speak about. Saying that if his arm was not better in the morning, he should show it to Dr. Rane, he thence went on to express his sorrow that the doctor should talk of leaving Dallory, for they liked him so much both as a gentleman and a doctor.
"But after such a loss as he has experienced in his wife, poor lady, no wonder the place is distasteful to him," went on Hepburn. And Jelly felt silently obliged for the words that helped her in her task.
"Ah, that was a dreadful thing," she observed. "I shall never forget the morning I heard of it, and the shock it gave me."
"I'm sure I can never forget the night he came down here, and said she was dead," rejoined the undertaker. "It was like a blow. Although I was in a degree prepared for it, for the doctor had told me in the afternoon what a dangerous state she was in--and I didn't like his manner when he spoke: it seemed to say more than his words. I came home and told Martha here that I feared it was all over with Mrs. Rane. Poor Henry was lying dead at the same time."
"And the answer I made to Thomas was, that she'd get over it," said Mrs. Hepburn, looking up from her sewing at Jelly. "I thought she would: Bessy North was always hearty and healthy. You might have taken a lease of her life."
"We had shut up the shops for the night, though the men were at work still next door, when the doctor came," resumed Thomas Hepburn, as if he found satisfaction in recalling the circumstances for Jelly's benefit. "It was past eleven o'clock; but we had to work late during that sad time; and Henry's illness and death seemed to make a difference of nearly as much as two hands to us. I was in the yard with the men when there came a knocking at the shop-door: I went to open it, and there stood the doctor. 'Hepburn,' said he, 'my poor wife is gone.' Well, I did feel it."
Jelly gave a groan by way of sympathy. She was inwardly deliberating how she could best lead on to what she wanted to ask. But she was never at fault long.
"I have heard you express distaste to some of the things that make up your trade, Thomas Hepburn, but at least they give you the opportunity of taking last looks at people," began Jelly. "I'd have given I don't know how much out of my pocket to have had a farewell look at Mrs. Rane."
"That doesn't always bring the pleasure you might suppose," was the answer of the undertaker.
"Did you go to her?" asked Jelly.
"No. I sent the two men: Clark and Dobson. They took the coffin at once: the doctor had brought the measure."
"And they screwed her down at once," retorted Jelly, more eagerly than she had intended to speak.
"Ay! It was best. We did it in some other cases that died of the same."
"Did the men notice how she looked--whether there was much change in her?" resumed Jelly, in a low tone. "Some faces are very sweet and placid after death: so much so that one can't help thinking they are happy. Was Mrs. Rane's so?"
"The men didn't see her," said Hepburn.
"Didn't see her!"
"No. The doctor managed that they should not. It was very kind of him. Dobson had had an awful dread all along of catching the fever; and Clark was beginning to fear it a little: Dr. Rane knew this, and said he'd not expose them to more risk than could be helped. The men carried the coffin up to the ante-room, and he said he would manage all the rest."
Jelly sat with open mouth and eyes staring. The undertaker put it down to surprise.
"Medical men are used to these things, Jelly. It comes as natural to them as to us. Dr. Rane said to Clark that he would call Seeley over if he found he wanted help. I don't suppose he would want it: she was small and light, poor young lady."
Jelly found her speech. "Then they--Clark and Dobson--never saw her at all!"
"Not at all. She was in the far room. The door was close shut, and well covered besides with a sheet wet with disinfecting fluid. There was no danger, Dr. Rane assured them, so long as they did not go into the room where she lay. The men came away wishing other people would take these precautions; but then, you see, doctors understand things. He gave them each a glass of brandy-and-water too."
"And--then--nobodysaw her!" persisted Jelly, as if she could not get over the fact.
"I dare say not," replied Thomas Hepburn.
"He must have hammered her down himself!" cried the amazed Jelly.
"He could do it as well as the men could. They left the nails and hammer."
"Well--it--it--seems dreadful work for a man to have to do for his wife," observed Jelly, after a pause, staring over Mr. Hepburn's head into vacancy.
"He did violence to his own feelings out of consideration to the men," said the undertaker. "And I must say it was very good of him. But, as I've observed, doctors know what's what, and how necessary it is to keep away from danger in perilous times."
"Did he manage the lead coffin as well as the first one?" continued Jelly, in a hard, sarcastic tone, which she found it impossible to suppress. "And then there was the third coffin, after that?"
"I went and soldered down the lead myself. The men took up the last one and made all ready."
"Were you not afraid to run the risk, Thomas Hepburn?" asked Jelly, tauntingly, for she despised the man for being so unsuspicious.
"The rooms had been well disinfected then, the doctor said. Any way, we took no harm."
That Thomas Hepburn had never discerned cause for the slightest suspicion of unfair play on the part of Dr. Rane was evident. Jelly, in her superior knowledge, could have shaken him for it. In his place she felt sure she should not have been so obtuse. Jelly forgot that it was only that superior knowledge that enabled her to see what was hidden from others: and that whilst matters, from Hepburn's point of view, looked all right; from her own, they were all wrong.
"Well, I must be wishing you good-evening, I suppose," she said. "I've left only Riah in the house--and she's of no mortal use to anybody, except for company. With people dying about one like this, one gets to feel dull, all alone."
"So one does," answered the undertaker. "Don't go yet."
Jelly had not risen. She sat looking at the fire, evidently deep in thought. Presently she turned her keen eyes on the man again.
"Thomas Hepburn, did you ever see a ghost?"
He received the question as calmly and seriously as though she had said, Did you ever see a funeral? And shook his head negatively.
"I can't say I ever saw one myself. I've known those who have. That is, who say and believe they have. And I'm sure I've no reason to say they haven't. One hears curious tales now and then."
"They are not pleasant things to see," remarked Jelly a little dreamily.
"Well, no; I dare say not."
"For my part, I don't put faith in ghosts," said hearty Mrs. Hepburn, looking up with a laugh. "None will ever come near me, I'll answer for it. I've too many children about me, and too much work to do, for pastime of that sort. Ghosts come from nothing but nervous fancies."
Jelly could not contradict this as positively as she would have liked, so it was best to say nothing at all. She finally rose up to go--Riah might be falling asleep with her head in the candle.
And in spite of the suggested attractions of a supper of toasted cheese and ale, Jelly departed. Things had become as clear as daylight to her.
"I don't so much care now if it does come out," she said to herself as she hastened along. "What Thomas Hepburn can tell as good as proves the doctor's guilt. I knew it was so. And I wish that old Dame Gass had been smothered before she sent me into that doubt and fright last night!"
But the road seemed terribly lonely now; and Jelly more nervous than ever of the shadows.