A fine morning in June. Lovely June; with its bright blue skies and its summer flowers. Walking about amidst his rose-trees, was Mr. North, a rake in his hand. He fancied he was gardening; he knew he was trifling. What did it matter?--his face looked almost happy. The glad sunshine was overhead, and he felt as free as a bird of the air.
The anonymous letter, that had caused so much mischief, was passing into a thing of the past. In spite of Richard North's efforts to trace him out, the writer remained undiscovered. Timothy Wilks was the chief sufferer, and bitterly resentful thereon. To have been openly accused of having sent it by at least six persons out of every dozen acquaintances he met, disturbed the mind and curdled the temper of ill-starred Timothy Wilks. As to the general public, they were beginning to forget all about the trouble--as it is in the nature of a faithless public to do. Only in the hearts of a few individuals did the sad facts remain in all their sternness; and of those, one was Jelly.
Poor Mr. North could afford to be happy to-day, and for many days to come. Bessy also. Madam had relieved them of her presence yesterday, and gone careering off to Paris with her daughter. They hoped she might be away for weeks. In the seductive freedom of the home, Richard North had stayed late that morning. Mr. North was just beginning to talk with him, when some one called on business, and Richard shut himself up with the stranger. The morning had gone on; the interview was prolonged; but Richard was coming out now. Mr. North put down the rake.
"Has Wilson gone, Richard?"
"Yes, sir."
"What did he want? He has stayed long enough."
"Only a little business with me, father," was Richard's answer in his filial care. It had not been agreeable business, and Richard wished to spare his father.
"And now for Bessy, sir?" he resumed, as they paced side by side amongst the sweet-scented roses. "You were beginning to speak about her."
"Yes, I want to talk to you. Bessy would be happier with Rane than she is here, Dick."
Richard looked serious. He had no objection whatever to his sister's marrying Oliver Rane: in fact, he regarded it as an event certain to take place, sooner or later; but he did not quite see that the way was clear for it yet.
"I have no doubt of that, father."
"And I think, Dick, she had better go to him now, whilst we are at liberty to do as we please at home."
"Now!" exclaimed Richard.
"Yes; now. That is before madam comes back again. Poor Edmund is only just put under the sod; but--considering the circumstances--I think the memory of the dead must give place to the welfare of the living."
"But how about ways and means, sir?"
"Ay: how about ways and means. Nothing can be spared from the works at present, I suppose, Dick."
"Nothing to speak of, sir."
Mr. North had felt ashamed even to ask the question. In fact, it was more a remark than a question, for he knew as well as Richard did that there was no superfluous money to draw upon.
"Of course not, Dick. Rane gets just enough to live upon now, and no more. Yesterday, after madam and Matilda had driven off, I was at the front-gates when Rane passed. So he and I got talking about Bessy. He said his income was small now, but that of course it would considerably augment as soon as Alexander had left. As he and Bessy are willing to try it, I don't see why they should not do so, Dick."
Richard gave no immediate reply. He had a rose in his hand and was looking at it absently, deep in thought. His father continued:
"It's not as if Rane had no expectations whatever. Two hundred a-year must come to him at his mother's death. And--Dick--have you any idea how Mrs. Gass's will is left?"
"Not the least, sir."
"Oliver Rane is the nearest living relative to her late husband, Mrs. Cumberland excepted. He is Thomas Gass's own nephew--and all the money was his. It seems to me, Dick, that Mrs. Gass is sure to remember him: perhaps largely."
"She may do so."
"Yes; and I think will do so. Bessy shall go to him; and be emancipated from her thraldom here."
"Oliver Rane has no furniture in his house."
"He has some. The dining-room and his bedroom are as handsomely furnished as need be. We can send in a little more. There are some things at the Hall that were Bessy's own mother's, and she shall have them. They have not been thought much of here, Dick, amidst the grand things that madam has filled the house with."
"She'll make a fuss, though, at their being removed," remarked Dick.
"Let her," retorted Mr. North, who could be brave as the best when two or three hundred miles lay between him and madam. "Those things were your own dear mother's, Dick; she bought them with her own money before she married me, and I have always regarded them as heir-looms for Bessy. It's just a few plain solid mahogany things, as good as ever they were. It was our drawing-room furniture in the early days, and it will do for their drawing-room now. When Rane is making his six or seven hundred a-year, they can buy finer if they choose. We thought great things of it; I know that."
Richard smiled. "I remember once when I was a very little fellow, my mother came in and caught me drawing a horse on the centre-table with pen-and-ink. The trouble she had to get the horse out!--and the whipping I had!"
"Poor Dick! She did not whip often."
"It did me good, sir. I have been scrupulously careful of furniture ever since."
"Ah, nothing like the lessons of early childhood for making an impression," spoke Mr. North. "'Spare the rod and spoil the child!' There was never a truer saying than that."
"Then you really intend them to marry at once," said Richard, returning to the question.
"I do," replied Mr. North in more decisive tones than he usually spoke. "They both wish it: and why should I hold out against them? Bessy's thirty this year, you know, Dick: if girls are not wives at that age, they begin to think it hard. It's better to marry tolerably young: a man and woman don't shake down into each other's ways if they come together late in life. You are silent, Dick."
"I was thinking, sir, whether I could not manage a couple of hundred pounds for them from myself."
"You are ever generous, Dick. I don't know what we should all do without you."
"The question is--shall I give it over to them in money, or spend it for them in furniture?"
"In money; in money, Dick," advised Mr. North. "The furniture can be managed; and cash is cash. Spend it in chairs and tables and it seems as if there were nothing tangible to show for it."
Richard smiled. "It strikes me that the argument lies the other way, sir. However, I think it will be better to do as you advise. Bessy shall have two hundred pounds handed to her after her marriage, and they can do what they consider best with it."
"To be sure; to be sure, Dick. Let them be married. Bessy has a miserable life of it here; and she'll be thirty on the twenty-ninth of this month. Oliver Rane was thirty the latter end of March."
"Only thirty!" cried Richard. "I think he must be more than that, sir."
"But he's not more," returned Mr. North. "I ought to know; and so ought you, Dick. Don't you remember they are both in the tontine? All the children put into that tontine were born in the same year."
"Oh, was it so? I had forgotten," returned Richard carelessly, for the tontine had never troubled him very much. He could just recollect that when they were children he and his brother were wont to teaze little Bessy, saying if she lived to be a hundred she would come into a fortune.
"That was an unlucky tontine, Dick," said Mr. North, shaking his head. "Of ten children who were entered for it, only three remain. The other seven are dead. Four of them died in the first or second year."
"How came Oliver Rane to be put into the tontine?" asked Richard. "I thought he came to life in India--and lived there for the first few years of his life. The tontine children were all Whitborough children."
"Thomas Gass did that, Richard. When he received news that his sister had this baby--Oliver--he insisted upon putting him into the tontine. It was a sort of salve to Tom Gass's conscience; at least I thought so: what his sister and the poor baby wanted then was money--not to be put into a useless tontine. Ah, well, Rane has got on without any one's assistance, and I dare say will flourish in the end."
Richard glanced at his watch; twelve o'clock; and increased his pace; a hundred and one things were wanting him at the works. Mr. North walked with him to the gate.
"Yes, it's all for the best, Dick. And we'll get the wedding comfortably over while madam's away."
"What has been her motive, sir, for opposing Bessy's engagement to Rane?"
"Motive!" returned Mr. North. "Do you see that white butterfly, Dick, fluttering about?--as good ask me whatitsmotive is, as ask me madam's. I don't suppose she has any motive--except that she is given to opposing us all."
Richard concluded it was so. Something might lie also in Bessy's patient excellence as a housekeeper; madam, ever selfish, did not perhaps like to lose her.
As they reached the iron gates, Mrs. Cumberland passed, walking slowly. She looked very ill. Mr. North arrested her, and began to speak of the projected marriage of Oliver and Bessy. Mrs. Cumberland changed colour and looked almost frightened. Unobservant Mr. North saw nothing. Richard did.
"Has Oliver not told you what's afoot?" said the former. "Young men are often shyer in these matters than women."
"It's a very small income for them to begin upon," she observed presently, when Mr. North had said his say--and Richard thought he detected some private objection to the union. "So very small for Bessy--who has been used to Dallory Hall."
"It won't always remain small," said Mr. North. "His practice will increase when Alexander goes; and he'll have other money, may be, later. Oh, they'll get on, Fanny. Young couples like to be sufficiently poor to make struggling upwards a pleasure. I dare say you married upon less."
"Of course, if you are satisfied--it must be all right," murmured Mrs. Cumberland. "You and Bessy."
She drew her veil over her grey face, said good-morning, and moved away. Not in the direction of Dallory--as she was previously walking--but back to the Ham. Mr. North turned into his grounds again; Richard went after Mrs. Cumberland.
"I beg your pardon," he said--he was not as familiar with her as his father was--"will you allow me a word. You do not like this proposed marriage. Have you anything to urge against it?"
"Only for Bessy's sake. I was thinking of her."
"Whyfor Bessy's sake?"
There was some slight hesitation in Mrs. Cumberland's answer. She appeared to be drawing her veil straight.
"Their income will be so small.Iknow what a small income is, and therefore I feel for her."
"Is that all your hesitation, Mrs. Cumberland?--the narrowness of the income?"
"All."
"Then I think, as my father says, you may safely leave the decision with themselves. But--wasthis all?" added Richard: for an idea to the contrary had taken hold of him. "You have no personal objection to Bessy?"
"Certainly it was all," was Mrs. Cumberland's reply. "As to any personal objection to Bessy, that I could never have. When Oliver first told me they were engaged, I thought how lucky he was to win Bessy North; I wished them success with all my heart.
"Forgive me, Mrs. Cumberland. Thank you. Good-morning."
Reassured, Richard North turned, and strode hastily away in the direction of Dallory. He fancied she had heard Bessy would have no fortune, and was feeling disappointed on her son's account. It struck him that he might as well confirm this; and he wheeled round.
Mrs. Cumberland had gone on and was already seated on the bench before spoken of, in the shady part of the road. Richard, in a few concise words, entering into no details of any sort, said to her that his sister would have no marriage portion.
"ThatI have long taken as a matter of course; knowing what the expenses at the Hall must be," she answered with a friendly smile. "Bessy is a fortune in herself; she would make a good wife to any man. Provided they have sufficient for comfort--and I hope Oliver will soon be making that--they can be as happy without wealth as with it, if your sister can only think so. Have you--pardon me for recalling what must be an unpleasant topic, Richard--have you yet gained any clue to the writer of that anonymous letter?"
"Not any. It presents mystery on all sides."
"Mystery?"
"As it seems to me. Going over the various circumstances, as I do on occasion when I have a minute to myself, I try to fit the probability into another, and I cannot compass it. We must trust to time, Mrs. Cumberland. Good-morning."
Richard raised his hat, and left her. She sat on with her pain. Mrs. Cumberland was as strictly rigid a woman in tenets as in temperament; her code of morality was a severe one. Over and over again had she asked herself whether--it is of no use to mince the matter any longer--Oliver had or had not written that anonymous letter which had killed Edmund North: and she could not answer the question. But, if he had done it, why then surely he ought not to wed the sister. It would be little less than sin.
Since this secret trouble had been upon her, more than a month now, her face had seemed to assume a greyer tinge. How grey it looked now, as she sat on the bench, passers-by saw, and almost started. One of them was Mr. Alexander. Arresting his quick steps--he always walked quickly--he inquired after her health.
"Not any better and not much worse," she answered. "Complaints, such as mine, are always tediously prolonged."
"They are less severe to bear, however, than sharper ones," said the doctor, willing to administer a grain of comfort if he could. "What a lovely day! And madam's off for a couple of months, I hear."
"Have the two any connection with each other, Mr. Alexander?"
"I don't know," he said laughing. "Her presence makes winter at the Hall, and her absence its sunshine. If I had such a wife, I'm not sure that I should think it any sin to give her an overdose of laudanum some day, out of regard to the general peace. Did you hear of her putting Miss Bessy's wrist out?"
"No."
"She did it, then. Something sent her into a passion with Miss Bessy; she caught her hand and flung it away so violently that the wrist began to swell. I was sent for to bind it up. Why such women are allowed to live, I can't imagine."
"I suppose because they are not fit to die," said Mrs. Cumberland. "When are you leaving?"
"Sometime in July, I think, or during August. I enter on my new post the first of September, so there's no especial hurry in the matter."
Mrs. Cumberland rose and continued her slow way homewards. Passing her own house, she entered that of her son. Dr. Rane was engaged with a patient, so she went on to the dining-room and waited.
He came in shortly, perhaps thinking it might be another patient, his face bright. It fell a little when he saw his mother. Her visits to him were so exceedingly rare that some instinct whispered him nothing pleasant had brought her there. She rose and faced him.
"Oliver, is what I hear true--that you are shortly to be married?"
"I suppose it is, mother," was his answer.
"But--is there no impediment that should bar it?" she asked in a whisper.
"Well--as to waiting, I may wait to the end, and not find the skies raining gold. If Bessy's friends see no risk in it, it is not for me to see it. At any rate, this will be a more peaceful home for her than the Hall."
"I am not talking of waiting--or of gold--or of risk, Oliver," she continued solemnly, placing both her hands on his arm. "Is there nothing on your mind that ought to bar this marriage? Is your conscience at rest? If--wait and let me speak, my son; I understand what you would say; what you have already told me--that you were innocent--and I know, that I ought to believe you. But a doubt continually flashes up in my mind, Oliver; it is not my fault; truth knows my will is good to bury it for ever. Bear with me a moment; I must speak. If the death of Edmund North lies at your door, however indirectly it was caused, to make his sister your wife will be a thing altogether wrong; little less than a sin in the sight of Heaven. I do not accuse you, Oliver; I suggest this as a possible case; and now I leave it with you for your own reflection. Oh, my son, believe me--for it seems to me as though to-day I spoke with a prophet's inspiration! If your conscience tells you that you were not innocent, to bring Bessy North home to this roof will be wrong, and I think no blessing will rest upon it."
She was gone. Before Oliver Rane in his surprise could answer a word, Mrs. Cumberland was gone. Passing swiftly out at the open window, she stepped across the garden and the wire-fence, and so entered her own home.
Apparently Dr. Rane found nothing on his conscience that could present an impediment, and the preparation for the wedding went quietly on. Secretly might almost be the better word. In their dread lest the news should reach madam in her retreat over the water, and bring her back to thwart it, those concerned deemed it well to say nothing; and no suspicion of what was afloat transpired to the world in general.
Bessy--upon whom, from her isolated position, having no lady about her, the arrangements fell--was desired to fix a day. She named the twenty-ninth of June, her birthday. After July should come in, there was no certainty about madam's movements; she might come home, or she might not, and it was necessary that all should be over by that time, if it was to be gone through in peace. The details of the ceremony were to be of the simplest nature: Edmund North's recent death and the other attendant and peculiar circumstances forbidding the usual gaiety. The bridal party would go to church with as little ceremony as they went to service on Sundays, Bessy in a plain silk dress and a plain bonnet. Mr. North would give his daughter away, if he were well enough; if not, Richard. Ellen Adair was to be bridesmaid; Arthur Bohun had offered himself to Dr. Rane as best man. It might be very undutiful, but Arthur enjoyed stealing a march on madam as much as the best of them.
Mrs. Cumberland was no doubt satisfied with regard to the scruples she had raised, since she intended to countenance the wedding, and go to church. Dr. Rane and his bride would drive away from the church-door to the railway-station at Whitborough. The bridal tour was to last one week only. The doctor did not care to be longer away from his patients, and Bessy confessed that she would rather be at home, setting her house in order, than prolonging her stay at small inns in Wales. But for the disconcerting fact of madam's being in Paris, Dr. Rane would have liked to take Bessy across the Channel and give her her first glimpse of the French capital. Under madam's unjust rule, poor Bessy had never gone anywhere: Matilda North had been taken half over the world.
The new household arrangements at Dr. Rane's were to be accomplished during their week's absence: the articles of furniture--that Mr. North chose to consider belonged to Bessy--to be taken there from the Hall; the new carpet, Mrs. Cumberland's present, to be laid down in the drawing-room; Molly Green to enter as helpmate to Phillis. Surely madam would not grumble atthat?Molly Green, going into a temper one day at some oppression of madam's, had given warning on the spot. Bessy liked the girl, and there could be no harm in engaging her as her own housemaid.
One of those taken into the secret had been Mrs. Gass. Richard, who greatly respected her in spite of her grammar, and liked her also, unfolded the news. She received it in silence: a very rare thing for Mrs. Gass to do. Just as it had struck Richard in regard to Mrs. Cumberland, so it struck him now--Mrs. Gass did not quite like the tidings.
"Well, I hope they'll be happy," she said at length, breaking the silence, "and I hope he deserves to be. I hope it with all my heart. Do you think he does, Mr. Richard?"
"Rane? Deserves to be happy? For all I see, he does. Why should he not?"
"Idon't know," answered Mrs. Gass, looking into Richard's face. "Oliver Rane is my late husband's nephew, but he's three parts a stranger to me, except as a doctor; for he attends here, you know, sir,--as is natural--and not Alexander. Is he truthful, Mr. Richard? Is he trustworthy?"
"He is, for anything I know to the contrary," replied Richard North, a little wondering at the turn the conversation was taking. "If I thought he was not, I should be very sorry to give Bessy to him."
"Then let us hope that he is, Mr. Richard, and wish 'em joy with all our hearts."
That a doubt was lying on Mrs. Gass's mind, in regard to the scrap of paper found in her room, was certain. Being a sensible woman, it could only be that--when surrounding mists had cleared away--she should see that the only likely place for it to have dropped from, was Dr. Rane's pocketbook. Molly Green had been subjected to a cross-examination, very cleverly conducted, as Mrs. Gass thought, which left the matter exactly as it was before. But the girl's surprise was so genuine, at supposing any receipt for making plum-pudding (for thus had Mrs. Gass put it) could have been dropped by her, that Mrs. Gass's mind could only revert to the pocketbook. How far Oliver Rane was guilty, whether guilty at all, she was quite unable to decide. A doubt remained in her mind, though she was glad enough to put it from her. One thing struck her as curious, if not suspicious--that from the hour she had handed him over the paper to this, Dr. Rane had never once spoken of the subject to her. It almost seemed to Mrs. Gass that an innocent man would have done so, though it had only been to say, I have found no clue to the writer.
And if a little of the same doubt rose to Richard North during his interview with Mrs. Gass, it was due to her manner. But he was upright himself, unsuspicious as the day. The impression faded again; and he came away believing that Mrs. Gass, zealous for the Norths' honours, rather disapproved of the marriage for Bessy, on account of the doctor's poverty.
And so, there was no one to give a word of warning where it might have been effectual, and the day fixed for the wedding drew on. After all, the programme was not strictly carried out, for Mr. North had one of his nervous attacks, and could not go to church.
At five minutes past nine o'clock, in the warm bright June morning, the Dallory Hall carriage drove up to Dallory Church. Richard North, his sister, and Arthur Bohun were within it. The forms and etiquette usually observed at weddings were slighted here, else how came Arthur Bohun, the bridegroom's best man, to come to church with the bride? What did it matter? Closely in its wake came up the other carriage--which ought to have been the first. In after days, when a strange ending had come to the marriage life of Oliver Rane and his wife, and Oliver was regarded with dread, assailed with reproach, people said the marriage had been the Norths' doings more than his. At any rate, Bessy was first at church, and both were a little late.
But Mr. North was not the only one who failed them; the other was Mrs. Cumberland. She assigned no reason for absenting herself from the ceremony, excepting a plea that she did not feel equal to it--which her son believed or not, as he pleased. Her new bright dress and bonnet were spread out on the bed; but she never as much as looked at them: and Ellen Adair found that she and Dr. Rane had to drive to church alone, in the hired carriage, arriving there almost simultaneously with the other party.
Richard North conducted his sister up the aisle, the bridegroom following close on their steps. Ellen Adair and Captain Bohun, left behind, walked side by side. Bessy wore a pretty grey silk and plain white bonnet: she had a small bouquet in her hand that the gardener, Williams, had arranged for her, Ellen Adair was in a similar dress, and looked altogether lovely. Mr. Lea, the clergyman, stood ready, book in hand. The spectators in the church--for the event had got wind at the last moment, as these events almost always do, and many came--rose up with expectation.
Of all the party, the bridegroom alone seemed to suffer from nervousness. His answering voice was low, his words were abrupt. It was the more remarkable, because he was in general so self-contained and calm a man. Bessy, always timid and yielding, spoke with gentle firmness; not a shade of doubt or agitation seemed to cross her. But there occurred a frightful contretemps.
"The ring, if you please," whispered the officiating clergyman to the bridegroom at that part of the service where the ring was needed.
The ring! Oliver Rane felt in his waistcoat-pocket, and went into an agony of consternation. The ring was not there. He must have left it on his dressing-table. The little golden symbol had been wrapped in white tissue paper, and he certainly remembered putting it into his waistcoat-pocket. It was as certainly not there now: and he supposed he must have put it out again.
"I have not got the ring!" he exclaimed hurriedly.
To keep a marriage ceremony waiting while a messenger ran a mile off for the ring and then ran a mile back again, was a thing that had never been heard of by the clergyman or any other of the startled individuals around him. What was to be done? It was suggested that perhaps some one present could furnish a ring that might suffice. Ellen Adair, standing in her beauty behind the bride, gently laid down the glove and bouquet she was holding, took off her own glove, and gave Oliver Rane a plain gold ring from her finger: one she always wore there. Arthur Bohun alone knew the history of the ring; the rest had never taken sufficient interest inherto inquire it; perhaps had never noticed that she wore one.
The service proceeded to its end. Had Oliver Rane gone a pilgrimage to all the jewellers' shops in Whitborough, he could not have chosen a more perfectly fitting wedding-ring than this. When they went into the vestry, Bessy, agitated by the mishap and the emotional position altogether, burst into tears, asking Ellen howshecame by a wedding-ring.
The history was very simple. It arose--that is the possession of the ring--through the foolish romance of two young girls. Ellen and one of her schoolfellows named Maria Warne had formed a sincere and lasting, attachment to each other. At the time of parting, when Ellen was leaving school for Mrs. Cumberland's, each had bought a plain gold ring to give the other, over which eternal friendship had been vowed, together with an undertaking to wear the ring always. Alas, for time and change! In less than six months afterwards, Ellen Adair received notice of the death of Maria Warne. The ring had in consequence become really precious to Ellen; but in this emergency she had not scrupled to part with it.
As they came out of the vestry, Ellen found herself face to face with Jelly. The clerk, and the two women pew-openers, and the sexton, considering themselves privileged people, pressed up where they chose: Jelly, who of course--living with Mrs. Cumberland--could not be at all confounded with the common spectators, chose to press with them. Her face was long and serious, as she caught "hold of Miss Adair.
"Howcouldyou, Miss Ellen?" she whispered. "Don't you know that nothing is more unlucky than for a bride to be married with anybody else's wedding-ring?"
"But it was not a wedding-ring, Jelly. Only a plain gold one."
"Anyway it was unlucky foryou. We have a superstition in these parts, Miss Ellen, that if a maid takes off a ring from her own finger to serve at a pinch for a bride, she will never be a wife herself. I wouldn't have risked it, miss."
Ellen laughed gaily, Jelly's dismay was so real and her face so grave. But there was no time for more. Richard held out his arm to her; and Oliver Rane was already taking out his bride. Close up against the door stood Mr. North's carriage, into which stepped the bride and bridegroom.
"My shawl! where's the shawl?" asked Bessy, looking round.
She had sat down upon it; and laughed gaily when Oliver drew it out. This shawl--a thin cashmere of quiet colours--was intended to be thrown on ere they reached the station. Her silk dress covered with that, and a black lace veil substituted for the white one on her bonnet, the most susceptible maid or matron who might happen to be travelling, would never take her for a bride.
Arthur Bohun deliberately flung an old white satin slipper after the carriage--it struck the old coachman's head, and the spectators shouted cheerily. Richard was going to the works. He placed Ellen in the carriage that had brought her.
"Will you pardon me, if I depute Captain Bohun to see you safely home instead of myself, Miss Adair? It is a very busy day at the works, and I must go there. Arthur, will you take charge of this young lady?"
What Ellen answered, she scarcely knew. Captain Bohun entered the carriage. The situation was wholly unexpected: and if their hearts beat a little faster in the tumult of the moment's happiness, Richard at least was unconscious of it.
"It is the first wedding I ever was at," began Ellen, feeling that she must talk to cover the embarrassment of the position. Both were feeling it: and moved as far apart from each other as if they had quarrelled: she in one corner, he in the further one opposite. "Of course it had been arranged that I should go home with Mrs. Cumberland."
"Is she ill?"
"Dr. Rane thinks it is only nervousness: he said so as we came along. I had to come with him alone. I am sure the people we passed on the road, who had not heard about Bessy thought it was I who was going to be married to him, they stared so into the carriage."
Ellen laughed as she said it. Arthur Bohun, drinking in draughts of her wondrous beauty, glanced at her meaningly, his blue eyes involuntarily betraying his earnest love.
"It may be your turn next, Ellen."
She blushed vividly, and looked from the window as though she saw something passing. He felt tempted there and then to speak of his love. But he had a keen sense of the fitness of time and place; and she had been placed for these few minutes under his protection: it seemed like putting him on his honour, as schoolboys say. Besides, he had fully made up his mind not to speak until he saw his way clear to marry.
Ellen Adair brought her face round again. "Jelly is in a terrible way about the ring, foretelling all sorts of ill-luck to every one concerned, and is thankful it did not happen toher. Will Bessy keep my ring always, do you think? Perhaps she would not be legally married if she gave it me back and took to her own--when it is found?"
Arthur Bohun's eyes danced a little. "Perhaps not," he replied in the gravest tones. "I don't know what they, would have done without it, Ellen."
"I did not tell Bessy one thing, when she asked me about it in the vestry. I will never tell her if I can help it--that Maria Warne is dead. How was it Mr. North did not come?"
"Nervousness too, in my opinion. He said he was ill."
"Why should he be nervous?"
"Lest it should come to his wife's ears that he had so far countenanced the marriage as to be present at it."
"Can you tell why Mrs. North should set her face against it?"
"No. Unless it is because other people have wished it. I should only say as much to you, though, Ellen: she is my mother."
The implied confidence sounded very precious in her ears. She turned to the window again.
"I hope they will be happy. I think there is no doubt of it. Bessy is very sweet-tempered and gentle."
"He is good-tempered too."
"Yes, I think so. I have seen very little of him. There's Mrs. Gass!"
They were passing that lady's house. She sat at the open window; a grand amber gown on, white satin ribbons in her cap. Leaning out, she shook her handkerchief at them in violent greeting, just as though they had been the bride and bridegroom. As Ellen drew back in her corner after bowing, her foot touched something on the carpet at the bottom of the carriage.
"Why! what is this?"
They both stooped at once. It was the wedding-ring enclosed in its tissue paper. Captain Bohun unfolded the paper.
"Dr. Rane must have lost it out of his pocket as we went along," cried Ellen. "He said, you know, that he felt so sure he had put it in. What is to be done with it?"
"Wear it instead of your own until they come back again," said Arthur. "Bessy can then take her choice of the two."
Accepting the suggestion without thought of dissent, Ellen took off her right glove and held out the other hand for the ring. He did not give it. Bending forward, he took her right hand and put it on for her.
"It fits as well as my own did."
Their eyes met. He had her hand still, as if trying how far the ring fitted. Her sweet face was like a damask rose.
"I trust I may put one on to better purpose some day, Ellen," came the murmuring, whispered, tremulous words. "Meanwhile--if Bessy does not claim this, remember that I have placed it on your finger."
Not another syllable, not another look from either. Captain Bohun sat down in his corner; Ellen in hers, her hot face bent over the glove she was putting on, and fully believing that earth had changed to Paradise.
The days went on, and Dr. Rane's house was being made ready for the reception of the bride. No time could be lost, as the wedding tour was intended to be so short a one. As Jelly said, They would be at home before folk could look round. Mrs. Cumberland presented the new carpet for the drawing-room; the furniture that had been the first Mrs. North's, arrived from Dallory Hall. Molly Green arrived with it, equally to take up her abode in the house of Dr. Rane. The arranging of these things, with the rest of the preparations, was carried on with a considerable amount of bustle and gossip, Jelly being at the doctor's house continually, and constituting herself chief mistress of the ceremonies. Phillis and Molly Green, with native humility, deferred to her in all things.
It was said in a previous chapter that Jelly was one of those who retained an interest in the anonymous letter. She had a special cause for it. Jelly in her propensity to look into her neighbours' affairs, was given to taking up any mysterious cause, and making it her own. Her love of the marvellous was great, her curiosity insatiable. But Jelly's interest in this matter was really a personal one and concerned herself. It was connected with Timothy Wilks.
Amongst Jelly's other qualities and endowments, might be ranked one that was pre-eminent--love of admiration. Jelly could not remember to have been without an "acquaintance" for above a month at a time since the days when she left off pinafores. No sooner did she quarrel with one young man and dismiss him, than she took up another. Dallory wondered that of all her numerous acquaintances she had never married: but, as Jelly coolly said, to have a suitor at your beck and call was one thing, and to be tied to a husband was quite another. So Jelly was Jelly still; and perhaps it might be conceded that the fault was her own. She liked her independence.
The reigning "acquaintance" at this period happened to be Timothy Wilks. Jelly patronizedhim;hewas devoted to her. There was a trifling difference in their ages--some ten years probably, and all on Jelly's side--but such a disparity had often happened before. Jelly had distinguished Tim by the honour of taking him to be her young man; and when the damaging whisper fell upon him, that he had probably written the anonymous letter resulting in the death of Edmund North, Jelly resented the aspersion far more than Timothy did. "I'll find out who did do it, if it costs me a year's wages and six months' patience," avowed Jelly to herself in the first burst of indignation.
But Jelly found she could not arrive at that satisfactory result any sooner than other people. It is true, she possessed a slight clue that they did not, in the few memorable words she had overheard that moonlight night between her mistress and Dr. Rane, but they did not assist her. The copy of the letter was said to have dropped out of Dr. Rane's pocketbook on somebody's carpet, and he denied that it had so dropped. Neither more nor less could Jelly make of the matter than this: and she laboured under the disadvantage of not being able to speak of what she had overheard, unless she confessed that she had been a listener. Considering who had been the speakers, Jelly did not choose to do that. From that time until this, quite two months, had the matter rankled in Jelly's mind; she had kept her ears open and put cautious questions whenever she thought they might avail, and all to no purpose. But in this, the first week of July, Jelly had a little light thrown on the clue by Molly Green. The very day that damsel arrived at Dr. Rane's as helpmate to Phillis, and Jelly had gone in with her domineering orders, the conversation happened to turn on plum-pudding--Phillis having made a currant-dumpling for dinner, and let the water get into it--and Molly Green dropped a few words which Jelly's ears caught up. They were only to the effect that Mrs. Gass had asked her whether she did not let fall on her carpet a receipt for making plum-pudding, the night of Edmund North's attack; which receipt Mrs. Gass had said, might have belonged to madam, and been brought from the Hall by Molly Green's petticoats. Jelly put a wary question or two to the girl, and then let the topic pass without further comment. That same evening she betook herself to Mrs. Gass, acting craftily. "Where's that paper that was found on your carpet the night Edmund North was taken?" asked Jelly boldly. Upon which Mrs. Gass was seized with astonishment so entire that in the moment's confusion she made one or two inconvenient admissions, just stopping short of the half-suspicion she had entertained of Dr. Rane.
In the days gone by, when Mrs. Gass was a servant herself, Jelly's relatives--really respectable people--had patronized her. Mrs. Gass was promoted to what she was; but she assumed no fine airs in consequence, as the reader has heard, and she and Jelly had remained very good friends. Vexed with herself for having incautiously admitted that the paper found was the copy of the anonymous letter, Mrs. Gass turned on Jelly and gave her a sharp reprimand for taking her unawares, and for trying to pry into what did not concern her. Jelly came away, not very much wiser than she went, but with a spirit of unrest that altogether refused to be soothed. She dared not pursue the inquiry openly, out of respect to her mistress and Dr. Rane, but she resolved to pump Molly Green. This same Molly was niece to the people with whom Timothy Wilks lodged, and rather more friendly with the latter gentleman than Jelly liked.
On the following morning when Jelly had swallowed her breakfast, she went into the next house with her usual want of ceremony. Phillis and Molly Green were on their knees laying down the new carpet in the drawing-room, tugging and hammering to the best of their ability, their gowns pinned round their waists, their sleeves up to the elbows; Phillis little and old, and weak-looking; Molly a comely girl of twenty, with rosy cheeks.
"Well, you must be two fools!" was Jelly's greeting, after taking in appearances. "As if you could expect to put down a heavy Brussels yourselves! Why didn't you get Turtle's men here? They served the carpet, and they ought to put it down."
"They promised to be here at seven o'clock this morning, and now it's nine," mildly responded Phillis, her pleasant dark eyes raised to Jelly's. "We thought we'd try and do it ourselves, so as to be able to get the table and chairs in, and the room finished. Perhaps Turtles have forgot it."
"I'd forget them, I know, if it was me, when I wanted to buy another carpet," said Jelly, tartly.
But, even as she spoke, a vehicle was heard to stop at the gate. Inquisitive Jelly looked from the window, and recognized it as Turtle's. It seemed to contain one or two pieces of new furniture. Phillis did not know that any had been coming, and went out. Molly Green rose from her knees, and stood regarding the carpet. This was Jelly's opportunity.
"Now, then!" she cried sharply, confronting the girl with imperious gesture. "Did you drop that, or did you not, Molly Green?"
Molly Green seemed quite bewildered by the address--as well she might be. "Drop what?" she asked.
"That plum-pudding receipt on Mrs. Gass's parlour carpet."
"Well, I never!" returned Molly after a pause of surprise. "What is it to you, Jelly, if I did?"
Now the girl only spoke so by way of retort; in a spirit of banter. Jelly, hardly believing her ears, accepted it as an admission that she had dropped it. And so the two went floundering on, quite at cross-purposes.
"Don't stare at me like that, Molly Green. I want a straightforward answer. Did it drop from your skirts?"
"It didn't drop from my hands. As to staring, it's you that's doing that, Jelly, not me."
"Where had you picked up the receipt? Out of Mr. Edmund North's room?"
"Out of Mr. Edmund North's room!" echoed Molly in wonder. "Whatever should have brought me doing that?"
"It was the night he was taken ill."
"And if it was! I didn't go a-nigh him."
A frightful thought now came over Jelly, turning her quite faint. What if the girl had gone to her aunt Green's that night and picked the paper up there? In that case it could not fail to be traced home to Timothy Wilks.
"Did you call in at your aunt's that same evening, Molly Green?"
"Suppose I did?" retorted Molly.
"And howdareyou call in there, and bring--bring--receipts away with you surreptitious?" shrieked Jelly in her anger.
Molly Green stooped to pick up the hammer lying at her feet, speaking quietly as she did so. Some noise was beginning to be heard outside, caused by Turtle's men getting a piano into the house, and Phillis talking to them.
"I can't think what you are a-driving at, Jelly. As to calling in at aunt's, I have a right to do it when I'm out, if time allows. Which it had not that night, at any rate, for I never went nowhere but to the druggist's and Mrs. Gass's. I ran all the way to Dallory, and ran back again; and I don't think I stopped to speak to a single soul, but Timothy Wilks."
Jelly's spirits, which had been rising, fell to wrath again at the name. "You'd better say you got it fromhim, Molly Green. Don't spare him, poor fellow; whiten yourself."
Molly was beginning to feel just a little wrathful in her turn. Though Jelly was a lady's-maid and superior to herself with her red arms and rough hands, that could be no reason for attacking her in this way.
"And what if I did get it from him, pray? A plum-pudding prescription's no crime."
"But a copy of an anonymous letteris," retorted Jelly, the moment's anger causing her to forget caution. "Don't you try to brazen it out to me, girl."
"WHAT?" cried Molly, staring with all her eyes.
But in a moment Jelly's senses had come back to her. She set herself coolly to remedy the mischief.
"To think that my mind should have run off from the pudding-receipt to that letter of poor Mr. Edmund's! It's your fault, Molly Green, bothering my wits out of me! Wheredidyou pick up the paper? There. Answer that; and let's end it."
Molly thought it might be as well to end it; she was growing tired of the play: besides, here were Turtle's men coming into the room to finish the carpet.
"I never had the receipt at all, Jelly, and it's not possible it could have dropped from me: that's the blessed truth. After talking to me, just as you've done, and turning me inside out, as one may say, Mrs. Gass as good as confessed that it might have fell out of her own bundle of receipts that she keeps in the sideboard drawer."
Slowly, Jelly arrived at a conviction that Molly Green, in regard to knowing nothing about the paper, must be telling the truth. It did not tend to lessen her anger.
"Then why on earth have you been keeping up this farce with me? I'll teach you manners with your betters, girl."
"Well, why did you set upon me?" was the good-humoured answer. "There's no such great treason in dropping a plum-pudding-receipt, even if I had done it--which I didn't. I don't like to be brow-beat for nothing: and it's not your place to do it, Jelly."
Jelly said no more. Little did she suspect that Mr. Richard North, leaning against the door-post of the half-open drawing-room door, whilst he watched the movements of the men, had heard every syllable of the colloquy. Coming round to see what progress was being made in the house, before he went to the works for the day, it chanced that he arrived at the same time as Turtle's cart. The new piano was a present from himself to Bessy.
Turtle's men leaving the piano in the hall, went into the room to finish the carpet, and Jelly came out of it. She found her arm touched by Mr. Richard North. He motioned her into the dining-room: followed, and closed the door.
"Will you tell me the meaning of what you have just been saying to Molly Green?"
The sudden question--as Jelly acknowledged to herself afterwards--made her creep all over. For once in her life she was dumb.
"I heard all you said, Jelly, happening to be standing accidentally at the door. What was it that was dropped on Mrs. Gass's carpet the night of my brother's illness?"
"It--was--a receipt for making plum-pudding, sir," stammered Jelly, turning a little white.
"I think not, Jelly," replied Richard North, gazing into her eyes with quiet firmness. "You spoke of a copy of an anonymous letter; and I am sure, by your tone, you were then speaking the truth. As I have overheard so much, you must give me a further explanation."
"I'd have spent a pound out of my pocket, rather than this should have happened," cried Jelly, with much ardour.
"You need not fear to tellme. I am no tattler, as you know."
Had there been only the ghost of a chance to stand out against the command, Jelly would have caught at it. But there was none. She disclosed what she knew: more than she need have done. Warming with her subject, when the narrative had fairly set in--as it was in Jelly's gossiping nature to warm--she also told of the interview she had been a partial witness to between Mrs. Cumberland and the doctor, and the words she had overheard.
Richard North looked grave--startled. He said very little: only cautioned Jelly never to speak of the subject again to other people.
"I suppose you will be asking Mrs. Gass about it, sir," cried Jelly, as he was turning to leave.
"I shall. And should be thankful to hear from her that it really was nothing more than a receipt for plum-pudding, Jelly."
Jelly's head gave an incredulous toss. "I hope you'll not let her think that I up and told you spontaneous, Mr. Richard. After saying to her that I should never open my lips about it to living mortal, she'd think I can't keep my word, sir."
"Be at ease, Jelly; she shall not suppose I learnt it by any thing but accident."
"And I am glad he knows it, after all!" decided Jelly to herself, as she watched him away up the Ham. "Perhaps he'll now be able to get at the rights and the wrongs of the matter."
Richard North walked along, full of trouble. It could not be but that he should have taken up a suspicion that Oliver Rane--now his brother-in-law--might have been the author of the anonymous letter. How, else, could its copy have dropped from his pocketbook--if, indeed, it had so dropped? Jelly had not thrown so much as a shadow of hint upon the doctor; either she failed to see the obvious inference, or controlled herself to caution: but Richard North could put two-and-two together. He went straight to Mrs. Gass's, and found that lady at breakfast in her dining-room, with window thrown up to the warm summer air.
"What is it you, Mr. Richard?" she cried, rising to shake hands. "I'm a'most ashamed to be found breakfasting at this hour; but the truth is, I overslept myself: and that idiot of a girl never came to tell me the time. The first part of the night I had no sleep at all: 'twas three o'clock before I closed my eyes."
"Were you not well?" asked Richard.
"I'd a touch of my pain; nothing more. Which is indigestion, Dr. Rane says: and he's about right. Is it a compliment to ask you to take some breakfast, Mr. Richard? The eggs are fresh, and here's some downright good tea."
Richard answered that it would be only a compliment; he had breakfasted with his father and Arthur Bohun before leaving home. His eyes ran dreamily over the white damask cloth, as if he were admiring what stood on it; the pretty china, the well-kept silver, the vase of fresh roses. Mrs. Gass liked to have things nice about her, although people called her vulgar. In reality Richard saw nothing. His mind was absorbed with what he had to ask, and with how he should ask it.
In a pause, made by Mrs. Gass's draining her cup of tea, Richard North bent forward and opened the communication, speaking in low and confidential tones.
"I have come to you thus early for a little information, Mrs. Gass. Will you kindly tell me what were the contents of the paper that was found here on your carpet, the night of Edmund's seizure?"
From the look that Mrs. Gass's countenance assumed at the question, it might have been thought that she was about to have a seizure herself. Her eyes grew round, her cheek and nose red. For a full minute she made no answer.
"What cause can you have to ask me that, Mr. Richard?Youcan't know nothing about it."
"Yes, I can; and do. I know that such a paper was found; I fear it was a copy of the anonymous letter. But I have come to you for particulars."
"My patience!" ejaculated Mrs. Gass. "To think you should have got hold of it at last. Who in the world told you, sir?"
"Jelly. But----"
"Drat that girl!" warmly interposed Mrs. Gass. "Her tongue is as long as from here to yonder."
"But not intentionally, I was about to add. I overheard her say a chance word, and I insisted upon her disclosing to me what she knew. There is no blame due to Jelly, Mrs. Gass."
"I say Yes there is, Mr. Richard. What right has she to blab out chance words about other folk's business? Let her stick to her own. That tongue of hers is worse than a steam-engine; once set going, it won't be stopped."
"Well, we will leave Jelly. It may be for the better that I should know this. Tell me all about it, my dear old friend."
Thus adjured, Mrs. Gass spoke; telling the tale from the beginning. Richard listened in silence.
"He denied that it came out of his pocketbook?" was the first remark he made.
"Denied it out and out. And then my thoughts turned naturally to Molly Green; for no other stranger had been in the room but them two. He said perhaps she had brought it in her petticoats from the Hall; but I don't think it could have been. I'm afraid--I'mafraid, Mr. Richard--that it must have dropped from his pocketbook."
Their eyes met: each hesitating to speak out the conviction lying at heart, notwithstanding there had been confidential secrets between them before to-day. Richard was thinking that he ought not to have married Bessy--at least, until it was cleared up.
"Why did you not tell me, Mrs. Gass?"
"It was in my mind to do so--I said a word or two--but then, you see, Icouldn'tthink it was him that wrote it," was her answer. "Mrs. Cumberland told me she saw the anonymous letter itself; Mr. North showed it her; and that it was not a bit like any handwriting she ever met with. Suppose he is innocent--would it have been right for me to come out with a tale, even to you, Mr. Richard, that he might have been guilty?"
On this point Richard said no more. All the talking in the world now could not undo the marriage, and he was never one to reproach uselessly. Mrs. Gass resumed.
"If I had spoke ever so, I don't suppose it would have altered things, Mr. Richard. There was no proof; and, failing that, you wouldn't have liked to say anything at all to Miss Bessy. Any way they are man and wife now."
"I hope--Ihopehe did not write it!" said Richard, fervently.
Mrs. Gass gave a sweep with her arm to all the china together, as she bent her earnest face nearer to Richard's.
"Let's remember this much to our comfort, Mr. Richard: if itwashim, he never thought to harm a hair of your brother's head. He must have wrote it to damage Alexander. Oliver Rane has looked upon Alexander as his mortal enemy--as a man who did him a right down bad turn and spoilt his prospects--as a man upon whom it was a'most a duty to be revenged."
"Do you think this?" cried Richard, rather at sea.
"No; but I say he thinks it. He never meant worse nor better by the letter than to drive Alexander away from the place where, as Rane fancies, he only had a footing by treachery. That is,ifhe wrote it. Sometimes I think he did, and sometimes I think he didn't."
"What is to be done?"
"Nothing. You can do nothing. You and me must just bury it between us, sir, for Miss Bessy's sake. It would be a nasty thing for her if a whisper of this should go abroad, let him be as innocent as the babe unborn. They are fond of one another, and it would just be a cruelty to have stopped the marriage withthis. He is a well-intentioned man, and I don't see but what they'll be happy together. Let us hope that he has made his peace with the Lord, and that it won't be visited upon him."
"Amen!" Was the mental response of Richard North.