“IHAVE been here only six months,” said Miss Hofland. “I am engaged for a year, like you. I was sent on trial at first to see if the child would take to me, poor little thing! I didn’t think she could take to anybody: but I’ve changed my opinion.” She added, “Hetty, she is fond of you.”
“Poor child!”
“Yes, poor child! but she is a rich child at the same time, and luckier a great deal than either you or I.”
“Oh, don’t say so, Miss Hofland. If you had ever been with us at home, you would not say any one was happier than me.”
“Well, my dear, so much the better for you. I never pretended to be very happy. I have no home at all, and I have been teaching children in one house and another since I was sixteen. I have never had any youth. It is hard to go on teaching all one’s life, and that not even for somebody one cares for, but only just for one’s self, to keep the life in one, which one doesn’t much wish to keep.”
“Oh, Miss Hofland!” Hetty cried.
“It is quite true, my dear. Why should one? One has to live, because one has been brought into the world. And then one goes on working, a stranger everywhere, never with any home just in order to have enough to eat and clothes to put on. Oh, I have always envied the poor girls, whom everybody is sorry for, who have to send their money home to their mothers! It has always been said I was so well off, I had nobody but myself to think of. Well, don’t let us talk like this. It frightens you, and it does me no good. My dear, this is a very strange house.”
“It is very quiet,” Hetty hazarded: and then felt frightened for what she had said.
“Quiet! It wasn’t quiet at one time, I believe, when she first married him; and now they say he’s mad, and she is away. And why is that doctor always about, my dear? Don’t you notice how often he is here? The servants are not always ill, but my belief is that Mr. Darrell is here every day; and when we meet him in the park, how is it that he’s always so anxious to explain where he’s going? I don’t understand about that man.”
“He looks very nice,” said Hetty, apologetically, feeling that it was hard to condemn a man who probably was not to blame.
“Oh, he is nice enough. I don’t say anything about his niceness. But why is he so often here? Mrs. Mills is not a confirmed invalid, but he is always having long talks with her, and when any one sees them they look startled. Would you like to hear what I think? I think both Mrs. Mills and Mr. Darrell are in the secret, and knowwhy Mrs. Rotherham is away: and perhaps Mr. Hayman too.”
“But then it must be quite right if the clergyman knows it,” said Hetty, brought up with a faith in clergymen which her companion did not share. Miss Hofland shook her head.
“I don’t say it’s right, and I don’t say it’s wrong. I say it’s very strange. Clergymen know very queer things sometimes. They can’t help it. Indeed, people who do queer things are very apt in my experience to tell a clergyman. It seems like getting a sanction to it. If he tells them not to do it, they don’t mind; they take their own way: but they always feel a satisfaction in thinking he knows. It shares the responsibility. He can’t be so very hard upon them after if he has known all the time: and I daresay some of them think they can persuade God it’s all right, because the clergyman knows.”
“Oh, Miss Hofland!” cried Hetty again.
“My dear, I know you are shocked by what I say; and I wouldn’t speak to you in this way ifI had any one else to speak to. It is more than human nature is equal to, to keep quite silent. One can’t help noticing, you know. I’ve been in a great many houses, and known a great many family secrets. There is almost always something to find out, but generally it is quite on the surface; either it is a son who is making them unhappy, or a girl who has a love affair, or husband and wife don’t get on: these are the common things. But this place is full of mystery. Don’t you feel it in the air?”
“I should never have thought of anything——” said Hetty: and paused, afraid to seem to reproach her companion, or to say anything that was not quite true.
“If I had not put it in your head? I shouldn’t wonder. When I was like you, I never took any notice. You are not what I call governessy, my dear: but you would be the same as I am if you went in for my kind of life. I can’t help noticing now. I find out things without meaning to; you do when you are in a family without belonging toit, and have no occupation for your mind but to watch, and nobody to say it to. Then every little thing is an interest, and to put two and two together—— But I won’t frighten you. Do your people intend you to be a governess, my dear?”
This question gave Hetty a still greater shock than all the rest. She cried, “Oh, I hope not!” in instinctive alarm; then grew very red, and looked wistfully at her companion, feeling that to repudiate Miss Holland’s profession in this eager way might be an offence.
“You would always have your family to fall back upon,” said Miss Hofland, “and you would be able to help them. If there are so many of you, it would be your duty to do that. And though it’s not Paradise, it’s better than marrying a poor curate, and bringing dozens of children into the world to misery, which is probably what you would do if you were not a governess. I am not fond of this way of living, but it’s better than that; at least you have nobody but yourself, and when you die there’s an end of it. The firstmoney I ever laid by was just enough to bury me. I’ve always kept that safe. I should like to have things decent, and not to be thrown on charity for my last expenses. And when that comes, there’s an end of it: that’s a great comfort; nobody else will be left to trouble and toil on account of me.”
The governess delivered this little monologue in quite a cheerful tone of voice, without any appearance of being deeply moved by it; her dismal philosophy was so unaffected that it had ceased to touch her feeling. She described this desolate mental condition in tones of steady matter of fact, while the young creature beside her gazed at her with a dismay which was speechless. A thousand thoughts ran through Hetty’s mind as she spoke. To be a governess! would not that be her duty? ought not that to be her life too? She had never been called on to think of such questions. There was so much to do at home. It had not occurred to her that she could even be spared. To help mamma seemed the natural use of the eldest girl. Now there sweptthrough Hetty’s mind a tumult of confused thoughts and newly-awakened alarms. Ah! who could doubt it? This was what must, what ought to be, that she who was the eldest should go out into the world and help the rest. How often had she heard mamma wondering, calculating how to get the boys the needful indispensable education, which would be necessary to fit them for making their way; and it had never occurred to Hetty to say, “Of course I must go and be a governess, and send home the money.” Was it perhaps because she did not know enough to teach? But she knew enough for the nursery. She did teach the little ones at home. And now another thought suddenly leaped into her young soul. Her mother had sent her because of the “advantages,” advantages to which Hetty had given so little thought. She perceived it all now. This was why mamma wanted her to have advantages, that she might be fitted for the life she would have to adopt, that she might be clever enough to be a governess! The discovery (as she thoughtit) fell into Hetty’s little heart like lead, and then a flush of shame swept over her—that she should not have divined it for herself; that she should not have seen that as the eldest it was her duty to help, and to help steadily. This was quite different from the little romance of paying the bills secretly, which had so much delighted her imagination; as much different as the actual burden of life is from the enthusiasm of the ideal. It did not inspire her as that had done; on the contrary, it fell upon her like something crushing and terrible. Not for this year only, as she had thought—not to go back triumphant with her fifty pounds, and buy mamma a sealskin, and settle forever at home. Ah, no! very different. She had left home for good, Hetty said to herself; she must never think of home again but as a holiday refuge. Her destiny was like Miss Hofland’s—to live in other people’s houses, to teach other people’s children, to lay up carefully out of her first earnings enough to bury her. Oh, dreadful, dreadful thought! All this while MissHofland went on quietly with her talk, not distressed at all by the miserable provision which she had thought it right to make.
“You should get up a little earlier to practise, my dear. I shall always be willing to give you a little more time. Rhoda could do very well without you for an hour in the afternoon, after dinner, you know. And if you liked to take up any subject after she has gone to bed?—We might read a little French, for instance; or German. You don’t know German at all, do you? I never grudge a little trouble when it’s for a purpose, and to help on one who has an object. One has more satisfaction in doing that—helping a comrade, as the men would say—than giving lessons to a pack of little girls who don’t want to learn, and never will do any good with it. Should you like to begin German? Well, my dear, I’ll look you out my old grammars, and we’ll begin to-morrow night.”
“You are very, very kind, Miss Hofland. What can I ever do for you, to show my gratitude? Mamma will be so thankful: so—happy.”
It went against the grain with Hetty in the first pang of this discovery to think that mamma would be happy, and yet there was nothing but thanks and gratitude due to Miss Hofland. The girl was half choked by this conflict of gratitude and misery, and did not know what to say.
“Well, my dear, you must work very hard, and take advantage of all your opportunities,” said Miss Hofland; “one always regrets it in after life if one misses a chance. But it’s time now to go to bed. One wise thing in this hermitage,” she added, “is that they give us such good fires. Is your fire always good, my dear?” The governess followed Hetty along the corridor, into which this suite of rooms opened. It was very dimly lighted, and the two figures with their twinkling candles had a mysterious effect between the two dark wainscoted walls, which reflected the flicker of the lights. Miss Hofland went with Hetty into her room, and looked round it. “Yours is the only French window,” she said; “it opens into the garden, don’t you know. I prefer the sash-windows, they are much safer. But why don’t they shut your shutters and draw your curtains, my dear? You must not put up with any neglect.”
“Oh, I don’t like it so dark. I like to see the sky. I can’t breathe when the curtains are drawn. I am not accustomed to curtains,” said Hetty, feeling that she was making a confession of poverty. Miss Hofland gave an approving nod.
“It is a great deal better for the health,” she said; “still I can’t sleep unless it is dark, and they keep out the cold in this big house. I hope you always see that your window is well fastened. I must speak to Mrs. Mills about it. To live in this queer way, with a regiment of servants and not to be attended to, would be too absurd. Good-night, my dear,” Miss Hofland said. Her room was on the other side of the little passage, which also had a window looking out across the flower-beds of the parterre to the ghostly depths of the park. It was a moonlight night, and they both lingered looking out upon the strange, silent scene. The flower-beds were full of winterlychrysanthemums—for it was by this time November—which drooped their tall heads in the frosty air. The trees beyond stood up half stripped, showing here and there their great branches, with a leaf or two fluttering in the wind against the sky. Miss Hofland opened her own door with a shudder. “How cold it looks,” she said—“how still and deserted! I am glad everything is snug and shut up in my room. If I were to look out much longer I should see ghosts, I know I should. Run away, my dear, and get to bed.”
Hetty heard the little click of the key which Miss Hofland always turned at night, a precaution which had amused the girl on her first coming. “Fancy mamma locking her door!” she had said to herself. But it was eerie standing by that passage window by herself. She went back to her room and put down her candle, and took down her hair. Her mother had always been proud of Hetty’s hair. It was brown and silky, and very abundant, and, indeed, it was not so very long since it was first twisted up in thatgrown-up way which had made Hetty feel so dignified. Now that she had attained to that privilege she liked to shake it down, and feel it about her, rippling over her shoulders. But she had no leisure for any play that night. Her mind was overwhelmed with her new thoughts. An entire revelation had been made to her of her duty, of what girls were born for. To think she should have been so stupid, to suppose that all that was wanted was helping mamma with the children, mending, making, overlooking the housework! No, indeed, that was not all. It would be years before even Harry, the eldest boy, could earn anything; while Hetty was the eldest of all, and the first claim of duty naturally came to her. She strayed towards the window, half-undressed, to look out as people naturally do when they are full of thought, without any regard even to the moonlight, not thinking of anything outside, absorbed in those meditations which were not cheerful. The long pale distance between the trees, the masses of distant shadow, the chrysanthemums drooping asif whispering to each other close at hand, seemed to give a little air and outlet to the musing of her heart.
But all at once Hetty gave a smothered cry, and clung to the nearest solid thing, feeling as if the ground was reeling away from under her feet. Over the grass, which was damp and sodden with winter dews, winding among the beds and ranks of chrysanthemums, what was that she saw? Something black in the moonlight, a moving figure, the sight of which made her heart stand still. Her eyes seemed to strain out of her head, her heart to jump into her throat in sudden panic and horror. A man! Hetty rushed to the door in the first impulse after her senses returned to her; but then she remembered the key turned in Miss Hofland’s door; and though she opened her own softly, she closed it again, and locked it too, in her terror. And then she returned to the window, drawn as by a spell, to watch that mysterious figure slowly moving round and round among the drooping winter flowers.
“HAVE you a headache, my dear? I am sure you have a headache. You are looking quite ghostly. Poor little thing! you look as if you had not slept all night.”
“Oh, it is nothing,” said Hetty. “I didn’t sleep very well, I got off my sleep somehow.”
“I know; people talk about the sleep of youth, but I can remember many nights, when I was a girl like you, when I never closed my eyes. Take your tea, my dear, and it will refresh you. I suppose as you couldn’t sleep you got to thinking, and cried for your mother like a baby, and to go home.”
“Oh, Miss Hofland!” cried Hetty.
“Yes, I know very well how girls do who have got mothers to cry after. I used to envy them, not having one. Don’t cry now, but take your breakfast and cheer up a little. Have a little of this nice toast. When you cannot have what you want, you should try to get all the good you can out of what you have,” the governess said. This philosophy of her profession was dreary, and not suited to Hetty’s tremulous and unaccustomed ease.
“Didn’t you sleep?” said Rhoda. “Oh, isn’t it awfully quiet in the night when one can’t sleep?” The child, who had thawed very much out of her first gravity, threw her arms round Hetty and kissed her; but while she gave her this embrace asked, with a nervous whisper in her ear, “Did you hear anything?—did you see anything?” with an anxious look.
“I heard the stable clock, and the hours striking from the village,” said Hetty. “Oh! don’t say anything more. It was only that I couldn’t sleep.”
Mrs. Mills looked keenly at her from the other side of the table. She seemed to examine the girl’s pale face with questioning eyes. She came in every morning while they were at breakfast, for orders, she said, but there were never any orders to give her. She suggested what there was to be for dinner, if the ladies pleased; and the ladies generally did please, though Miss Hofland, to show her independence, would make an alteration now and then.
“It’s cheerful to hear the clocks when one can’t sleep,” said Mrs. Mills, as if it were possible that she could have heard Rhoda’s question. “And in this quiet place there is nothing else to hear, unless one was to believe the stories of the ghosts about the place, and there’s not much sense in them.”
“I beg you won’t speak of anything of the kind before Miss Rhoda!” cried the governess, sharply. “And you, Hetty, you’re trembling, you silly child!”
“N—no, Miss Hofland,” Hetty said; but herhead was racked with pain, and she scarcely knew what she said. Was it a ghost she had seen, a disembodied soul? She had not been so entirely without sleep as she thought, but had dozed and woke again, always in a fever of alarm and misery, recalling to herself the long muffled figure, the slow, soft, noiseless movements, the winding out and in of the flower beds where the yellow and brown heads of the chrysanthemums drooped in the frost. It seemed to stand before her now as Mrs. Mills stood—though very unlike Mrs. Mills—a long thin figure, wrapped from head to foot in some clinging garment.
“If I speak it is in a joke,” said Mrs. Mills; “you don’t think I believe in anything of the sort?”
“I don’t admire that kind of joking,” Miss Hofland said. “Rhoda, come, if you have finished your breakfast it is quite time to begin lessons. I think we are a little late to-day.”
Hetty followed, heavy-eyed and heavy-hearted, her mind oppressed with the secret, which was aburden almost beyond her power of supporting. Should she tell Miss Hofland? she kept asking herself. Should she ask Mrs. Mills? And oh! what was it? it was no thief watching the house, of that Hetty was sure. The fantastic movements of the figure among those flower-beds came up before her eyes a hundred times, and made her almost cry out with terror. She remembered the very poise of the figure, light, with a little swing in the step. Could that be a ghost that moved in such a human way, not gliding, not mystical, as ghosts are described as being? Her head turned round as again and again the moonlight scene rose before her. It seemed impossible to get it out of her eyes. She closed them, to rest her hot strained eyeballs, and lo, there it was before her in those wonderful contrasts of black and white, so clear, so clear! the broad stretch of wistful silvery mist and distance behind, the black solid line of the moving object, the tall flowers drooping their heads, the trees gathering like spectators on every side. The hum of the voices near herwas to Hetty’s ears like a monotonous murmur without meaning. When it came to her turn to read or answer a question, she raised a white face without intelligence to the governess. “My dear, you have not been attending,” Miss Hofland cried, astonished; but this by degrees changed into, “My dear, you must be ill. Is your head bad? have you caught cold? What is the matter?” Miss Hofland was very philosophical on her own account, but to the young people under her charge she was kind, and it was understood in her code of laws that a headache was always to be respected, being in some sort a girl’s only refuge in heartache and all other ills.
“I feel dreadfully stupid,” said Hetty, not knowing how to excuse herself.
“It is your head that is bad. You will be better if you will go and lie down,” said Miss Hofland; but this was a remedy that made Hetty shiver. Lie down with her face towards the window from which she had seen that sight, or, worse still, turning her back to it, so that thefigure might be performing any kind of wild gyration behind her! This made the throbbing in her head and the fluttering at her heart worse than ever.
“Oh no!” she cried, “I don’t want to lie down; let me stay here—oh! let me stay with you. It is so much nicer to be with you.”
“Then lie down on the sofa,” said the governess, “and try to go to sleep. Poor little thing! how you are trembling, your nerves are all wrong. That’s what it is to have anuit blanchewhen one is young.”
“Did you hear anything, Hetty? did you see anything?” cried little Rhoda in her ear, while Miss Hofland covered her up. Hetty, in the agony of her unwonted secret, did not know how to make any reply. She had never known what it was to have a secret before. To know something which she kept to herself seemed wrong to Hetty. If there ever was any little thing unknown to mamma, such as that project for the private paying of the bills, it was breathed to Janey. Littlesecrets about Christmas presents and suchlike—secrets so little, so innocent—were always shared with somebody. To have this dark knowledge in her heart, and nobody to tell it to, made Hetty’s heart sick. And Rhoda’s big eyes appealing to her made everything more difficult. She had heard nothing, not a sound, which made what she had seen still more weird and unearthly. And what did the child mean, whispering as if she had a secret too?
Hetty, however, slumbered a little in the warm room, with the protecting sense of society round her, and the hum of the voices in her ears. Nothing could happen there to her that would not be known. If that thing should really appear again, at least Miss Hofland would be there to see it too. This soothed and brought the ease of rest to the feverish brain.
But when night came again, and Hetty had to go to bed by herself in that room, with the window as usual open to the sky, and the formal flower-beds with the chrysanthemums all spread out inthe moonlight, and the consciousness that Miss Hofland had turned the key in her door, and shut herself off from all possibility of appeal, Hetty’s sensations of alarm were indescribable. She rushed to the window and drew the curtains close that she might not see out; then, feeling still more intolerable the thought that outside, in the whiteness of the moon, that ghastly thing might be pacing, drew them back again in a panic, and gazed out in a trance of speechless terror. But the white light fell unbroken over the garden, and the long vista of the park opened before her, a wistful vacancy stretching to the sky, without a living thing to disturb the scene. Hetty stood clinging to the curtains, half hidden in their folds, as if she were herself afraid to be seen, for a long time, she did not know how long. But there was no movement or shadow upon the undisturbed stillness, and ghostly, motionless, half-frozen calm without. She stood there till she was chilled to the heart with cold; her fire had gone out; her candles were nearly burnt to the socket, andnature began to assert her rights. The stable clock shrilling all the hours close at hand, and the village clock booming in a minute after like a bass accompaniment, were half consoling, half alarming. Twelve! how long it took to strike! and was not this the hour “when churchyards yawn and graves give up——” Hetty hung upon the curtains, half unconscious, for a minute or two; if she had not grasped them so she would have fallen, and probably fainted. But the support of the heavy, thick folds, which sustained her slight little figure, kept her from that climax. And after a time she crept to bed and slept soundly, and woke wondering at herself; trying to laugh at herself; chiding herself for all this excitement. Her night’s rest had restored her nerves. She appeared at breakfast, if still a little tremulous, yet herself again, and smiled as she met Miss Hofland’s sympathetic inquiries, and Mrs. Mills’ keen look. Why did Mrs. Mills look at her with that gaze of suspicion? and little Rhoda, with her big eyes, seizing the first opportunity to whisper,“Did you hear anything?” The look and the question raised again a little flutter in her spirits, but she felt brave in the strength of her night’s sleep, and of the passage of time, which has always a soothing effect: and began to forget.
Another night passed, and she saw nothing, and then another day. The girl felt more safe; life began to wear its usual aspect. It might be one of the servants after all; some one, perhaps, who did not venture to go into the garden during the day, and who had heard of the chrysanthemums; or it might be the gardener, stealing out to cover some of his more delicate plants. None of those common-sense explanations had occurred to Hetty at first. They came upon her now in a crowd. Of course she said to herself, How foolish not to have thought of it before! The frosts were beginning to be harder every night; what more natural than that the gardener should take every precaution against the severe weather? In the reaction from her panic, Hetty became more cheerful, more gay than ever. If suddenly hervision came before her eyes and chilled her, she flung it away, saying to herself: how silly! Why was it that she had not seen how easily the thing was to be accounted for before?
This continued for some time. She was not so courageous when she went into her room at night. There she invariably passed half an hour or so enveloped in the curtains, gazing out; but with less and less alarm, sometimes even with a little bravado, opening her window, giving herself the keen and thrilling sensations of the wintry night. And a long time passed before she had any occasion for a renewal of her alarm. It was close upon Christmas when the second incident occurred. Suddenly, in the grey of a rainy night, as she took her accustomed stand, something seemed to move outside, and brought her heart with a leap into her throat. Something moved; that was all. She could distinguish nothing; the grey of the night, the soft haze of the falling rain, filled up the landscape. The opening of the park was but a pale blotch upon the surrounding darkness.After the first moment of pain, Hetty chid herself again. Yes, she said to herself, something moved. Of that there was no doubt; the rain falling down straight through the windless air moved, of course, keeping a sensation of flow and action in the immovable atmosphere. But this did not still the beating of her heart. She pressed close to the window, holding it with her hand, peering out into the grey. To see anything was impossible through the veil of that falling rain. It went on, not violently—softly, a gentle cold stream of imperceptible drops, soaking everything, obliterating sound and sight. Who could see, had they the sharpest eyes in the world, through that mist of continuous dropping? who could hear anything, had they ears as keen as those of a savage? And yet Hetty, with her heart beating so loud that it filled all the world with commotion, both heard and saw and knew that something—she could not tell what—something living, that had a will and action of its own, was somewhere near her outside, disguised and enveloped in thesoft pouring of the rain. She said to herself, the gardener, one of the servants, as she had done before; but her heart was sick with terror. She could not satisfy herself with that argument; half the night through she watched; and yet she could not say that she had seen anything. No, nothing at all, nothing at all! but she felt in every fibre, in every nerve, that someone had been there.
This time she resolved on telling Miss Hofland. It was impossible to live under the spell of this terror. She must, at least—she must—have somebody to share it; and insensibly she began to hope that perhaps Miss Hofland, being older, and having seen so much in her life, might be able to suggest some explanation, and clear the mystery up. Hetty slept little that night. Her resolution gave her a little steadiness, but it did not restore her calm; and in the dawn of the winter morning she was up before any one, unable to rest. When there was something like daylight in the grey skies, a ghost of morning just making the garden and its formal flower-beds visible, shestole again to her window; and finally, encouraged by the hour, and the consciousness that, though there was still so little light, it was day and not night that was approaching, opened it softly and stole out. The rain had ceased, but everything was sodden and wet, her foot sinking into the spongy grass, which came close up to the window ledge. There was nothing there that could conceal any lurking figure. If there had been anything, any clandestine visitor, whoever it was must have crouched by the wall, close, close to where she stood within. Hetty thought she saw some of the moss upon the wall scraped away as by some one rubbing against it; and her heart sprang up once more with the flutter of terror to think of this possibility. Only the wall between her—so young, so frightened, and helpless—and that presence, whether spirit or man, whatever it was. It was all she could do to stand upon her trembling limbs and keep upright, though it was now morning and no longer dark. And when suddenly something appeared round the corner of
“I FEAR I HAVE DISTURBED YOU” (p. 243).
“I FEAR I HAVE DISTURBED YOU” (p. 243).
“I FEAR I HAVE DISTURBED YOU” (p. 243).
the house, a dark figure making its way towards her, she could not restrain a scream as she flew back to the shelter of her window. Quick as her movements were, she was not quick enough, however, to elude this presence; and Hetty’s fear gave place to a stupefied astonishment when she recognised the doctor, Mr. Darrell, who touched her shoulder, and called her by her name.
“Let me speak to you a moment,” he said, breathlessly. “I fear I have disturbed you—perhaps more than once.”
“You!” was all that Hetty could say, panting with fright, relief, and profound surprise above all. He was in his usual dress, looking somehow as if he had not taken it off all night, and looked harassed and pale.
“Yes,” he said. “I was afraid you had seen me, and might be frightened. I have a patient with whom I have to be at all hours, both night and day; who is not quite sane but quite harmless. Forgive me; and might I ask you not to speak of it to frighten the house?”
TO say nothing of it, to frighten the house! Hetty had never encountered in her own youthful person such a difficulty before. To keep the secret of something which had happened, which now it was very clear to her was not accidental—something perhaps that might be important, to keep the secret from those whom it might concern! In a moment her little fiction about the gardener disappeared, and she felt that she had never truly believed it. Something of far greater meaning lay beneath. She confronted it vaguely with frightened eyes; the conditions of her coming, and of the life here, and of Miss Hofland’s wonder and questioning, all flashingupon her in a moment. Everything went to prove that there was a mystery involved, something connected with the family that probably ought not to be concealed. She looked at Mr. Darrell with eyes which woke from a sort of stupefaction of fear and wonder into intelligence and acute anxiety. She did not speak, having scarcely regained sufficient possession of herself to trust her voice, but examined him with those awakened eyes.
“There is nothing wrong,” he said, with a slight tremulousness. “I would not deceive you. Whatever may be the rights of the matter, nothing could be gained by disturbing the house.”
“Oh, what is it?” cried Hetty, in spite of herself.
He shook his head with a smile. “Nothing,” he said, “that can affect you, nothing indeed. You have seen or heard me going to my patient?”
“Oh, Mr. Darrell,” said Hetty, with the indignation of sincerity, “it was not you.”
He shrank a little from her look. “I think you are mistaken,” he said; “how can you tell in the night who it is? I have to be about at all hours. I go through the park, or even across the garden, as the shortest way.”
Hetty eyed him once more with the superiority of fact over fiction. She looked at him as if she saw through him, he thought, and, what was worse, undervalued him, and set him down as a deceiver. In reality Hetty was far too much perplexed and disturbed in her mind to come to any such decided conclusion. She was looking at him instinctively to try to make him out. And in this look a great many things were communicated by the one to the other which did not at all involve the immediate question. Hetty saw a face which was full of anxiety, and perhaps of desire to veil a certain secret, but which at the same time was open and true, the countenance of a man in whom guile was not. The true recognise the true, however different may be their mental altitude or position. She thought he wasdeceiving her, and yet by instinct she believed in him. And he saw, in the young face lifted to him with such troubled questioning, the look of a judge before whose decision he trembled. If she should judge him from the surface, as it was so natural she should—if she took the fiction on his lips for the indication of his character, the young doctor in a moment felt that the work in which he was engaged, and which already his conscience disapproved, would cost him dear.
“Miss Asquith,” he said, hurriedly, “I must not stop to explain. Will you remember, whatever may happen, that I am always about? even when you don’t see anything of me, I’m near. Don’t let yourself be frightened; whatever happens, I am always near.”
“It would be better to tell me what it is. Then I could not be frightened,” said Hetty, with as much calm as she could muster. But before he could reply, he no less than she started at the sound of a step—one step and no more, at which she clutched his arm with terror unspeakable, andhe looked quickly round with a look of alarm in which there was no counterfeit. There was but one step, which was a thing to curdle the blood, as it seemed to Hetty, more than any succession of footsteps—one single stealthy step and no more.
“Who is there? Speak,” cried the young doctor, with a voice which was not loud, but seemed to penetrate the intense morning stillness like a knife. And then, while Hetty stood speechless, there suddenly appeared round the corner of the house the paltry figure of Mrs. Mills the housekeeper, in extremely simple morning apparel, with a scared look in her face.
“Oh, Mr. Darrell, is it you?” she cried in her turn, in a voice full of relief.
It would have been embarrassing for an older and more experienced young woman than Hetty to find herself discovered by the housekeeper in close colloquy with young Mr. Darrell, in the early morning before the house was astir. But Hetty was too young for any such feeling. She was frightened, but relieved beyond measure. Itis not pleasant to think that even the housekeeper stands and looks in at your window in the grey of the morning before any one is awake. But still this seemed to Hetty, somehow, more possible than if it had been the doctor making mysterious, impossible journeys round the house. Her hand dropped from that clutch upon his arm. She felt restored at once to the practicable world.
“I am trying to persuade Miss Asquith,” he said, “that she heard nothing worse than myself passing through the garden, and that she must not be surprised if she hears me again.”
The woman, who looked pale, as if she had been up all night, melted into an uneasy smile. “No, no, she mustn’t be afraid. There are a many noises about this house,” she said.
“Nothing more than the doctor going his rounds, late or early,” said Darrell; “you will believe Mrs. Mills? And now go back to your room, and I hope you won’t let me disturb your rest again. Remember,” he said, with emphasis, “I’m always about. I’m always near.”
“You’ve got your window all open, miss,” said the housekeeper. “Bless me! it should always be well fastened and the shutters shut. I must give the housemaid a piece of my mind.”
Hetty followed her in, unresisting, as she pushed into the privacy of the room, which on ordinary occasions the girl was jealous of exposing to vulgar eyes, with its little array of photographs and family treasures. Mrs. Mills took no notice of these, but she quickly shut and fastened the window. “It’s very early for you to be up. Don’t you know it’s very awkward for the servants, Miss Asquith, when a young lady takes to getting up at these unearthly hours?”
“I did not mean to trouble anybody. I heard a step, and I opened the window to see what it was.”
“Dear me!” said the housekeeper; “I shouldn’t have done that. What a daring thing for a young lady to do! Supposing it had been housebreakers, and your window so nice and handy for them to step into the house?”
“Do you think it was housebreakers?” Hetty cried.
“Bless you, my child, no, not in daylight. They’re not as bold as that. But another time, Miss Asquith, take my advice, and don’t open your window in that confiding way. You’re always a deal safer with everything shut. And there are always sounds about an old house like this. For my part, I never pay any attention. Have everything well shut and fastened, and then you can’t take any harm, whoever may be about.”
“I thought perhaps,” said Hetty, timidly, “there might be some danger—that it might be right to call some one—that I ought to ring the bell, or something.”
“Bless me!” said the housekeeper again. “You would be as good as an extra watchman for the family. But look here, my dear young lady, don’t you take any trouble. What is the house to you? You’re only a stranger in it. Shut up your window and lock your door, and nothing can harm you. I’ll have it done myselfto-night. As for the house, there are plenty to see to that, and no danger of housebreakers here.”
Hetty was very much agitated by these interviews. She found no satisfaction in them. The doctor’s repeated assurance that he was always near was little more consolatory than the housekeeper’s injunctions to shut herself up, and take no concern for the house. Hetty could not understand anything of the kind. To be shut up in shivering safety, a poor little atom of terrified consciousness in the midst of unknown dangers, indifferent to and shut off from everybody around, seemed to her so unnatural, so horrible. She remembered now the chill she had felt when she heard Miss Hofland lock her door. Was it possible to live in a house like this—each shut in, safe under lock and key, and no one taking any interest in the panic or trouble which might be in the next room?
This thought was more strange to Hetty than even the thought of danger. Danger! She had known what it was to feel a thrill of terror whenshe woke in the night and heard some of those sounds which are always alarming to a watcher: the vague noises of the darkness, sounds exaggerated by the surrounding silence into something inexplainable, mysterious creaks and cracklings. But then there was the sense of habitation in the house, the certainty of father and mother always ready to be appealed to, and at whose appearance all dangers were disarmed. At Horton the sensation was very different. The house felt empty, cold, with a mysterious chill in it, and a few trembling individuals dotted along the side of the house, each shut up in her separate room. This was more dreadful to Hetty than words could say. She was very silent all day, shivering from time to time, extremely pale, as unlike the bright-faced girl she had been a little while before as it is possible to conceive. And they were all very kind. Miss Hofland flew to her favourite idea of a headache and to her favourite expedient of lying on the sofa, which was her panacea for all troubles. “I’ll get you a book, my dear,” shesaid. “I have a very nice book, which I brought with me. I am sure you have never read it; and now you can lie quite comfortably, and not be disturbed by anything. Going to bed may be better when you have a headache; some people think so: but itisgiving in so when you go to bed, and then it’s lonely, and unless you can sleep, I don’t see the advantage. You are just as well on the sofa, and more cheerful. I am afraid Horton is not going to agree with you: and that would be such a bore when we have just got so nicely settled down.”
“I don’t wonder it does not agree with her,” said the housekeeper, “a young lady that sleeps with her window open in this weather.”
“Oh, goodness!” cried Miss Hofland. “A window opening on the park in any weather! You must not do it, my dear. Why,anythingmight run in—a rabbit or a squirrel out of the woods, or one of the sheep that’s grazing about, or even a cow. Fancy being woke in the middle of the night by a cow! I can’t conceive what Ishould do—shriek till I brought the house down. Fancy a cow’s breath suddenly puffed out upon you, and a great ‘Mo—oo’ in the middle of the night!”
“A cow’s an innocent thing,” said Mrs. Mills. The housekeeper kept appearing all day, coming in with every meal, keeping an eye upon Hetty. The girl felt this confusedly, though she could not think why it was.
“Oh yes! it is an innocent thing and a nice thing in its proper place. But in your bedroom at the dead of night! My dear, you must consider, if not for your own sake, yet for the sake of other people. I make it a rule to shut up my windows, even in summer. When you get used to living in strange houses that are nothing to you, where you are only for a time, you have to be particular. Why, anybody might come in—a tramp that had got into the park.”
“Don’t frighten the young ladies, Miss Hofland, please. There’s no such thing possible. A tramp could no more get in here than at Windsor Castle.It would be as much as their places were worth to the lodge-keepers. And it’s a thing that never happened. No, it’s an old house, and if any one says there are noises about, that can’t be quite accounted for, well, I’ll not go against them: but as for tramps!” Mrs. Mills cried, with a laugh. The derision in her tone seemed to Hetty to be addressed to herself. What a little fool you are! but at least keep it to yourself, that look seemed to say.
And at night, when they all went to bed, both Miss Hofland and the housekeeper went with Hetty to her room. The latter had given instructions to the housemaid, and everything was fastened in Hetty’s room, the shutters closed, the curtains drawn, a dreadful sense of being shut up and cut off from everything breathing in the motionless air. Hetty gasped, with a feeling that she could not get breath. But the room was large and lofty, and not without air, so that the sensation was imaginative rather than real. There was a bright fire blazing, which madeeverything look cheerful. “This is what I call comfortable,” Miss Hofland said. “Don’t you think so too, my dear? Those nice soft curtains keep out every bit of draught. I must say they understand comfort in this house. Mine are so thick, if a gale is blowing, I never feel it in the least—and these are nearly as good. Surely you like that better than an open window at this time of the year?”
“Some people have a fad about open windows, and say you should have them all the year through. Some people have a fad about curtains. I don’t blame Miss Asquith, for she’s very young: but I think when a young lady is living with other people she should go by the ways of the house.”
“I don’t see that at all,” said Miss Hofland. “If you’ve any sort of rights, you’ve a right to arrange your own room as you choose, and I have never done otherwise. A lady that has to live in other people’s houses has many things to put up with, but I never should give in to that. All the same, my dear, when you sleep on the ground-floor you can’t be too particular. Now lock the door after me, and you will be as snug and as safe as if you were in a box. Good-night, dear, and sleep well, and don’t mind if you should hear the house tumbling down. It’s no concern of ours.”
With this Miss Hofland crossed the little passage to her own door, and waving her hand, shut and locked it, as Hetty could very well hear. The housekeeper retired by the other, repeating Miss Hofland’s advice. “Just turn the key when I’m gone, and then you’ll be sure nothing can happen to frighten you. And there’s really nothing to frighten any one, only noises such as you hear in every old house.”
Hetty, with a beating heart, did as she was told; and then the oppression of this shut-in solitude and silence came round her like a shroud. The curtains seemed to close round with an ominous envelopment. The straight lines of the walls, with no windows to break them, frightened her as if they were the sides of a box, as Miss Hofland had said. The girl’s nerves were so strained thatshe burst into one of those youthful tempests of tears which relieve the bosom. She had nothing to cry for, nothing. Comfort, luxurious and elaborate, surrounded her, and no harm was near that she knew of. The fire burned cheerfully; everything was shut out that could frighten or trouble her. For what did Hetty cry, or what had she to fear?