Mr. Pym went to the house alone. Frederick St. John met him in the hall as if by accident, and took him at once into the dining-room. Any suspicion that they had met before at the Rectory and come away from it together, was as far from the minds of the assembled company, as that they had both dropped from the clouds.
Mrs. St. John, who was better and had come down since dinner, Mrs. Beauclerc, Mrs. Carleton, and Sir Isaac, had sat down to whist. Mrs. Darling and Miss Denison were talking to each other at the centre table; Miss Denison abusing Georgina as the wildest girl in Christendom, Mrs. Darling protesting that she could not be half so wild as her own daughter Rose. Mrs. Darling was all wonder and astonishment when Mr. Pym came in. Whatcouldhave brought him to Lexington?--how very kind of him to call and see her. And it was she who took him up to introduce him to Sir Isaac.
One moment's recoil, one startled look at the face, and Mrs. Carleton held out her hand to the little surgeon, and was her own calm and gracious self. Seated at whist there, opposite to Sir Isaac, her voice low and sweet, her manner so gentle and collected, it would never have entered into any one's mind to imagine thatshehad been gliding about stealthily in the moonlight like a ghost, or a female poacher on forbidden ground: and perhaps the surgeon might have been excused his momentary doubt whether it was really Mrs. Carleton that they had seen.
"How well you are looking!" he exclaimed, as he shook hands with her.
And it was no hollow compliment. The woman he saw before him now, radiant in beauty, was no more like the distressing shadow he had visited at Ypres, than he himself was like a lamp-post. Mrs. Carleton laughed. Yes, she said, she was quite well now.
Mr. Pym begged he might not interrupt the game, and drew away. Close upon that, the dean and his daughter came in, and then came tea. Ere the surgeon had well swallowed his, he was pacing the terrace outside with Mrs. Darling, no one paying attention to them.
"You see I have obeyed your summons, Mrs. Darling," he began; "have called at Castle Wafer by accident, as you desired. What is the business that you wish to consult me upon?"
Mrs. Darling had caught up her daughter's black lace shawl as she left the room, and put it over her head; just as Charlotte had so recently worn it upon hers. She pulled it tightly round her silk gown as she answered--
"I wish to speak to you about my daughter: I fear she is ill."
"In body, or in mind?"
A moment's struggle with herself ere she should answer. But no; even now, although she had summoned the surgeon, at a great cost and trouble, to her aid, shecouldnot bring her lips to admit a hint of the fatal malady.
"In mind!" she echoed, rather indignantly. "I don't know what you mean, Mr. Pym. What should be wrong with Mrs. Carleton's mind?"
"As you please," he said, with indifference. "I can go back tonight if I am not wanted."
They had come to the end of the gravel walk, and Mrs. Darling stood still, apparently contemplating the lovely prospect to be seen from Castle Wafer. How anxious looked her face in the moonlight; but for those betraying beams the surgeon might not have read the struggle that was going on within her breast.
"Why should you think anything was wrong with her mind?" she again asked, but this time the tones were of pain, not of resentment.
"Mrs. Darling, it may be as well that we should understand each other," said he. "I did not come here to be trifled with. Either let there be confidence between us, or let me go back whence I came. It may facilitate matters if I tell youIhave cause to suspect your daughter's mind to be at present not altogether in a healthy state. If I do go back, I fear it will be my duty to intimate as much beforehand to Sir Isaac St. John."
She looked perfectly aghast. "What do you mean, Mr. Pym?"
"I mean just what I say, and no more. Oh, Mrs. Darling, what nonsense this is--you and I to play at bo-peep with each other! We have been doing it all the years of your daughter's life. You cannot forget how much I know of the past: do you think I have drowned my memory in a draught of Lethe's waters? Surely if there is one man on earth whom you might consult confidentially, it is myself. I know as much as you know."
Mrs. Darling burst into tears, and sobbed for some minutes. "I shall be better now," she said; "it will do me good. Heaven alone knows what the tension has been."
"And now just tell me the whole, from beginning to end," said Mr. Pym, in a more kindly tone, "you ought to have done it years ago. You may be sure I will do what I can for the best: and there may be safety in counsel."
Now that the ice was broken, she entered pretty freely into details, and soon experienced that relief, and it may also be said that satisfaction in talking, which this confidential disclosure of some long-secret trouble is sure to bring. She told Mr. Pym how, ever since Benja's death, she had had her doubts of Charlotte's perfect sanity: and she freely confessed that her hasty return to Castle Wafer was caused by a telegraphic message from Prance, who was growing alarmed at her mistress's symptoms.
"What symptoms were they?" inquired the doctor.
"I don't know that I can enumerate them to you; they were little odds and ends of things that Prance has noticed. Not much, taken separately, but curious in the aggregate. Of course the message did not contain them: I have learnt them since I arrived. One thing I disliked more than all the rest--Prance awoke one night and found her mistress was out of the room. She was hastening away in search of her, and saw her coming out of Miss Beauclerc's chamber. Now, for some reason or other, Charlotte has taken a prejudice against Miss Beauclerc----."
"A moment, Mrs. Darling. If I am to help you with advice, you must speak without disguise. Do not say 'for some reason or other;' tell the reason, if you know it."
Another struggle with herself:mustshe confess? Mrs. Darling clasped her hands in pain.
"Oh, how cruel it is to have to say these things! And of Charlotte, who has always been so reticent, so honourable, whatever her other failings. There! let me speak out and have done with it. I believe she is jealous of Miss Beauclerc: of Miss Beauclerc and of Sir Isaac St. John."
"Your daughter would like to remain here for ever--mistress of Castle Wafer, and Sir Isaac's wife?"
"Yes, I do believe it is so. And I could have believed such planning of any one in the world rather than of Charlotte. I have striven to persuade her to leave with me, and it is of no use. I would not for the world that she should marry again."
"She ought not to have married at all," remarked the surgeon.
"I could not help it. I did my best. You don't know what a care Charlotte has always been to me!"
"To return to Miss Beauclerc. Do you fear Mrs. Carleton might injure her?"
"Not if she retains her reason. But--should that leave her, even momentarily,--Mr. Pym," she broke off, "it was because I found myself incompetent to deal with these troubles that I wrote for you."
"You must take her away from Castle Wafer without delay."
"But she will not be taken away. In all ordinary matters she is as sane as I am; as capable of judging, of arguing, and of sensibly acting. It is only now and then that a sort of paroxysm comes over her. It may be only violent passion, to which you know she has ever been subject; but, it may be something worse. She is then, as I believe, incapable of controlling her actions; and should she find an opportunity of doing an injury at these times he might do it. There are two people in this house against whom I can see she is desperately incensed: Miss Beauclerc and Honour Tritton. Should she find herself alone with either of them in one of these paroxysms----"
Mrs. Darling stopped. The subject was too painful to continue. But the surgeon took up the thread in a quiet tone.
"We might have a second edition of the Alnwick tragedy."
Mrs. Darling--he could see it in the bright night--seemed to recoil a step. But she strove to answer with more than customary calmness.
"The Alnwick tragedy! I do not understand."
"When Alnwick's heir was--killed."
"Oh, Mr. Pym, Mr. Pym! youcannotthink that was anything but a miserable accident?" cried the unfortunate mother. "It was nothing else. Honour alone was in fault."
"It may be that we shall never know," he answered. "My impression--nay, my belief--you and I had better be outspoken now, Mrs. Darling--always was, that Mrs. Carletonhadsomething to do with that. I think at the time you entertained the same opinion."
Mrs. Darling made no answer. She walked on, her scared face raised in that tell-tale moonlight; her very lips white.
"I thought the probabilities, knowing what you and I know, were greatly against her at the time," repeated the surgeon; "I think them greater now. You are aware, I presume, that the imaginary image of Benja and the lighted church haunted her for months? And in that show of lanterns in France, on St. Martin's Eve----"
"How did you hear of that?" interrupted Mrs. Darling. "Oh, I get to hear of many things," was the reply. "It does not matter how. I fear this terror, in one so cold and impassive as your daughter has always been, is rather suggestive of a guilty conscience."
"Why recall this?" asked Mrs. Darling, with a sob. "I think you are wrong in your suspicions."
"I do not recall it to give you pain. Only to impress upon you how essential it is, with these doubts upon our minds, that Mrs. Carleton should be removed from Castle Wafer."
"Indeed, I see it as strongly as you do. But you know what herwillhas always been. And if our suspicion of her state of mind is wrong, and she is really sane, we are not justified in forcing her actions. Can you remain a few days and watch her, so as to form an opinion of her state? There's a plain, comfortable inn at hand, the Barley Mow, and you could be here very much in the daytime."
"For the matter of that, I could contrive to get invited to stay here," observed the surgeon, with a cough. "That good-natured brother of Sir Isaac's is sure to ask me. And, to tell you the truth, Mrs. Darling, if I undertake to watch her at all, it must be a close and uninterrupted watch."
"Close and uninterrupted!" repeated Mrs. Darling, whom the words did not altogether please. "I am so very fearful of any suspicion being excited abroad as to Charlotte's state."
"That suspicion already exists," remarked the doctor. "Your daughter's manners--these paroxysms that you speak of--have been observed and commented on. It was only a post or two before I got your summons, that I received a letter from this neighbourhood, implying doubts of Mrs. Carleton's state of mind, and inquiring if I could inform the writer whether insanity had been in her family."
Mrs. Darling's breath was nearly taken away with astonishment. "Who could have sent the letter? Surely, not Sir Isaac!"
"The letter was a confidential letter, and I cannot name the writer."
"If it was not Sir Isaac, it must have been Frederick St. John. Why needhemeddle?"
"It was neither Frederick St. John nor Sir Isaac: I may tell you that much. I only mention this to prove to you that even were we willing to allow matters to go on as they have been going, it is now impossible. A weighty responsibility lies upon me, Mrs. Darling: and something must be done in one shape or another. Had I received no summons from you, I think I should still have come to Lexington."
Mrs. Darling walked to the end of the terrace before replying. Matters seemed to be growing complicated. Was the time of exposure really come? It had always lain upon her with an awful dread.
"But what can you do?" she asked. "Suppose, after watching Charlotte, you come to the conclusion that there's nothing really the matter with her----"
"But I should not come to that conclusion," he interrupted. "Were I to remain in the house a month, and see no proof whatever of insanity, I could not be sure that it did not exist. We know how cunning these people are, and----"
"Oh, Mr. Pym, how cruelly you speak!"
"I am sorry to do so. What I was about to say, in answer to your question, is this. Allowing that I perceive no present grounds for alarm, I must still assume that such grounds do exist; in short, both you and I know they do: and there will be one of two courses to pursue. Either you must remove your daughter from Castle Wafer before I quit it: or I must get rid of my responsibility by disclosing my fears to Sir Isaac St. John."
"No, no; not to him--not to any one if it can be prevented," implored Mrs. Darling. "I will get Charlotte away. Anything rather than make the dread public. Think how long I have succeeded in concealing it."
"To speak to Sir Isaac would not be to make it public. And I have already told you, Mrs. Darling, it is not so entirely a secret as you have supposed. However, if you remove Charlotte, undertaking that she does not return, there will be no cause for my speaking to any one."
"I'll do it all; I'll try and do it," said Mrs. Darling. "And now about your own stay at Castle Wafer. How shall you manage it?"
"Leave it to me," replied Mr. Pym. "We medical men often possess a pass-key in an emergency. I think Mrs. Carleton will not like my staying. She did not seem pleased to see me."
"No?"
"It struck me that she did not. I observed a strange sort of shiver, a look of terror, pass over her face when she saw me."
"How observant you are!" was Mrs. Darling's comment, "Isaw nothing of it."
"It is our business to be observant."
"Of course. And very useful I dare say you find the habit."
"You spoke of Honour Tritton," resumed the surgeon, passing by the other remark. "Why do you suppose----"
"Hush!" breathed Mrs. Darling in a warning voice, and she laid her hand upon his arm to enforce the caution more emphatically. "Is that Charlotte?"
Some one had cautiously raised the window of an upper room, and was peeping out. Mr. Pym's quick eyes saw at once that it was not Charlotte, but Prance. Mrs. Prance had her share of curiosity as well as more demonstrative people.
"We had better go in, Mrs. Darling," remarked the surgeon. "Should Mrs. Carleton come out and see us talking together, she might fancy my visit here had reference to her, and be forthwith on her guard accordingly. As she was--I know she was--on her guard when I went to Ypres."
The evening was not quite over, when the anxious pacers on the terrace re-entered the drawing-room; the whist players were just rising. Mrs. Carleton came over at once to Mr. Pym. Handsome and stately did she look, her rich dress sweeping the ground; her face calm, her manner gracious, she seemed just as sane as Mr. Pym himself. He happened to be looking with some interest at Miss Beauclerc; a fair, lovely, attractive girl, in her pretty white dress, and with her grey-blue honest eyes.
"When did you come to Lexington, Mr. Pym?"
The question proceeded from Mrs. Carleton, who had slipped into a seat beside him. He answered that he had arrived only that evening; had been sent for to see a patient.
"Who is it?" she asked.
"A young man suffering from heart disease," promptly responded Mr. Pym, deeming this positive evasion justifiable under the circumstances.
"And so you took the opportunity to call at Castle Wafer!" she said. And there might have been the slightest possible resentment perceptible in the tone, though not to an ear less quick than the surgeon's.
"Just so," he answered. "When we have nothing particular to do with ourselves, we are apt to make use of any past civilities that may be available. I remembered that Mr. Frederick St. John, when I met him at Alnwick, proffered me an invitation to call at Castle Wafer, should I ever travel to its vicinity."
"Oh!" she said. "Fred St. John's rather fond of those impromptu invitations. Do you go back tomorrow?"
"Not unless my patient shall have done with me."
Mr. Pym remained at Castle Wafer, a temporary guest. In the most natural manner conceivable, Frederick St. John, without being suspected of any ulterior motive, pressed the invitation on the little surgeon. Castle Wafer would be a more comfortable roof for him than the Barley Mow, and his sojourn there would afford him, Frederick, an opportunity of improving the acquaintance begun at Alnwick, he graciously observed, when they had met at the funeral of Mr. Carleton St. John. Mr. Pym suffered himself to be persuaded. And thus the surgeon took up his task of watching Mrs. Carleton, a very private-detective; installed thereunto by two anxious parties, neither of whom suspected the connivance of the other. What wheels within wheels there are in this world!
In one sense of the word, the step might have been dispensed with, for it did not serve to prevent the disclosure to Sir Isaac St. John. Mrs. Darling's great hope from the respite of the two or three days' watching, was, that she should in the meanwhile succeed in inducing Charlotte to bid adieu to Castle Wafer, and thus obviate the necessity for any appeal to Sir Isaac. It might have proved so, so far as Mr. Pym was concerned; but the initiative was taken by the dean.
Very disagreeably impressed by the fresh doubts of Mrs. Carleton's sanity, acquired during the evening visit of Mr. Pym to the Rectory, the dean considered that there was now sufficient matter to justify a communication to Sir Isaac. He resolved to make it himself; and on the following morning, the one succeeding Mr. Pym's arrival, he went up for that purpose to Castle Wafer, and procured a private interview with Sir Isaac in his sitting-room.
A very different story, this, from the one sought to be told the other evening by Frederick. As the dean, calm, sensible, reliable, went through the whole, point by point, concluding with the fact that Mr. Pym was at Castle Wafer for no other purpose than to watch Charlotte Carleton, Sir Isaac listened with increasing wonder.
"And you say Frederick knew of this!" he exclaimed. "Why did he not tell me?"
"He did attempt to tell you; but failed. I suppose his ultra self-consciousness and the fear that even you might misconstrue his motives, withheld him from saying more."
"How could I be likely to misconstrue them?"
The dean said how. Which certainly did not tend to decrease the wonder of Sir Isaac.
"He has been assuming that Mrs. Carleton was looking after me! That she had designs upon me!Me!You must be mistaking me for Frederick."
"Certainly not for Frederick. Frederick's private opinion is, that the young woman hates him. I fancy there's not much doubt that she would have no objection to your making her Lady St. John."
When Sir Isaac fully comprehended this hypothesis as to himself, which he had little difficulty in doing, he burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter. The dean saw how it was: Isaac St. John had been so firmly fixed in his resolution never to marry, hadlivedso in it, that the very notion of his breaking it, or of any woman's thinking she could induce him to break it, seemed to him nothing less than an impossibility.
"Then you never had an idea of Mrs. Carleton?" observed the dean.
"I never had an idea of Mrs. Carleton in that sense of the word, or of any one else," answered Sir Isaac. "I should as soon think of getting hanged as of getting married. And I do believe you must be wrong in supposing she has entertained such a notion. A young and pretty woman want to tie herself to me! Why, look at me; at what I am. No, no: it is not likely. And it was only the other day she lost her husband and her child; her heart must be buried with them for some time yet to come."
"Well, there lay the cause of Frederick's hesitation," said the dean. "With this idea upon him, no wonder he was tenacious of speaking. I confess I did not agree with him. I thought you were no more likely to take a wife than I am--who possess one already.
"It will be a joke against Frederick for the rest of my days," said Sir Isaac. "Imarry? I wish, by the way,hewould marry! But about poor Mrs. Carleton? I should like to see Mr. Pym."
The surgeon was summoned to the conference. And after the dean's departure, he disclosed to Sir Isaac the fear of her attempting some injury to Miss Beauclerc or to Honour: of which the dean remained in ignorance.
"There is only one thing to do," was the conclusion, come to by Sir Isaac. "Inhospitable though any such measure may seem, Mrs. Carleton must this day quit Castle Wafer."
Mr. Pym appeared to make himself at home at Castle Wafer. One of the best chambers had been assigned him, its door opening exactly opposite to the room occupied by Mrs. Carleton and by Prance. And that gentleman retired to rest with his door propped back, and his gaze on the corridor. Perhaps he slept with his eyes open.
In the morning he was up betimes. Going downstairs, he sought Honour, and sat in the housekeeper's room while he talked to her. He had really no ulterior motive in this; but he was a sociable man, and he merely wished to be civil to the girl, whom he had once seen so much of as Benja's nurse.
Honour was excessively gratified. In the first place at seeing the surgeon again; in the next at indulging her gossiping propensities. She had heard little or nothing of Alnwick since she quitted it: Mrs. Tritton having left the Hall and the neighbourhood soon after herself. Question after question did she ask Mr. Pym of the changes, and would probably have gone on for an hour of her own good will, but that Mr. Pym, who was remarkably quick of sight and hearing, and why he wore glasses no one ever could make out--detected some faint sound or movement at the partially closed door, as if somebody were listening at it.
"Is any one wanting to come in, Honour?"
Honour pulled the door open, and saw nothing. But a faint rustling, as of some person turning from the door as soon as he spoke, had caught Mr. Pym's ears.
"Look out," said he, sharply.
Honour looked out, and was just in time to see the petticoats of a lady disappearing round the corner of the passage, and to recognize them as Mrs. Carleton's.
"Mrs. Carleton, was it?" observed the surgeon carelessly, as she made the remark. "Does she often pay you a visit here, Honour?"
"I never saw her here before, sir. Perhaps she was coming in search of you."
"Ah, perhaps so," replied Mr. Pym, carelessly. "What were you saying, Honour?--that you heard I went over to Germany to see the boy? Well, it's true. Whether it was Germany or France, or any other habitable part of the globe, though, I can't take upon myself to say. I could not do him any good. He was at death's-door then. How did you hear it?"
"From Mrs. Darling, sir. She often said a word to me when she was staying here the last time, and she mentioned that you had been had over to Master George, but it was of no use. What a sad thing it was that the child could not be cured!"
"Ay. There are many sad things in the world, Honour; sadder even than that. Well, I must go, or I shall keep breakfast waiting. You'll see me again before I leave."
He made his way to the breakfast-room, and sat down to breakfast with the rest. Mrs. Carleton's face was impassive as usual: but the surgeon saw that she watched him just as keenly as he did her. After breakfast, as if to defeat the purpose for which he was staying at Castle Wafer, she shut herself up in Mrs. St. John's room, and no one could get near her. It was during this time that the interview took place between the dean and Sir Isaac.
"I entrust it all to you, Mr. Pym," Sir Isaac had said. "Perhaps speaking to Mrs. Darling will be sufficient: but--you know the laws of hospitality--I would rather not appear at all in this matter if I can help it. Let the departure be your doing--you understand. Only in case of necessity bring in my name."
Mr. Pym's first step was to seek Mrs. Darling.Shewas shut up in her room too; so, after waiting for some time, he sent a message to her, and she came to him. The observant surgeon saw that there was a blank, disappointed look in her face.
"I can do nothing with Charlotte," she exclaimed. "She refuses most positively to quit Castle Wafer: and when I urged it, she put an end to the colloquy by leaving me. What is to be done?"
The surgeon could not say what was to be done. Only that to get away Mrs. Carleton that day was indispensable.
Mrs. Darling, poor woman, began to temporize. Charlotte was perfectly well now, she was sure, and a day or two's delay could make no difference. Tomorrow, perhaps, or the next day, she might be induced to hear reason. At length Mr. Pym--for Mrs. Darling seemed inclined to become obstinate in her turn--was obliged to hint at the commands of Sir Isaac.
Mrs. Darling was bitterly incensed, believing that Mr. Pym had been the informant. "I did not think you would have been so treacherous," she exclaimed. "You promised me not to speak to Sir Isaac until all means had been tried to get Charlotte away."
"I did not speak to him. He spoke to me."
"He spoke to you! First?"
"Yes. He sent for me into his room, and entered upon it."
"Who could have told him?" cried Mrs. Darling, after a mortified pause. And Mr. Pym remained silent: it was not his business to speak of the dean.
"The less we discuss this matter the better, Mrs. Darling. It would bring no profit. All we have to do is to remove your daughter. And if I were you I would let this hint about Sir Isaac be as if it had not been spoken. It would be painful to you to show consciousness of it; doubly painful to him. He is a true gentleman: but tales have been carried to him of Mrs. Carleton's state of mind, and he deems it necessary that she should not remain."
"I would give half I am worth to know who it is that has been meddling!" exclaimed Mrs. Darling. "What is to be done? Will you speak to Charlotte?"
"Of course I will. If you cannot persuade her, I must try my powers. It will be a very awkward thing if we have to get her away by force or stratagem."
"By stratagem we shall never accomplish it," said Mrs. Darling. "Charlotte is too keen to be imposed upon."
He waited until luncheon-time. He thought it better to lead to an interview with Mrs. Carleton, than to send and demand it. She came down with Mrs. St. John, and the luncheon passed off as usual, every one being at table except Sir Isaac. Mr. Brumm said his master was taking luncheon in his room, but offered no other apology for his absence, and Georgina went boldly in to him.
But Mr. Pym was destined to be defeated, at least in a degree. He whispered to Mrs. Carleton to come and walk with him on the terrace as they rose from table, and drew her hand within his arm and went out with her. It was a dull lowering day, threatening rain, and she looked up at the skies with rather a vacant look. Mr. Pym told her as gently as he could, that it was deemed necessary she should have change of air; that he and Mrs. Darling were both anxious on the score of her health, and thought immediate change of scene essential. She laughed in his face; she set him and her mother at defiance; she spoke of appealing to Sir Isaac: and then Mr. Pym hinted--as he had done to her mother--that Sir Isaac acquiesced in the measure.
No sooner had the words left his lips, than a change passed over her face. Medical man though he was, Mr. Pym shrank from it: never had its aspect been more livid, its expression so wildly terrible. He caught her arm, put it within his, and began to speak words of soothing kindness. But she broke from him; muttered something incoherently about the plot against her, which those in the house had been planning to carry out, and escaped indoors. Mr. Pym had little doubt that by "those in the house," she meant Miss Beauclerc and Honour. It is very likely she included himself and Mrs. Darling.
He followed her; he called Mrs. Darling to his aid. That she had secreted herself in her own room, they found at once, since the door was fastened inside, and no reply was given to their knocks. The surgeon grew alarmed. This state of things was more than likely to end in a paroxysm of insanity. By-and-by mutterings were heard inside; violent pacings of the room; short derisive laughs; and one shrill scream. Mrs. Darling was nearly beside herself; and Prance--Prance the impassive--for once betrayed terror.
"I shall break open the door," said Mr. Pym.
But he went first of all to apprise Sir Isaac of what he was going to do. Sir Isaac gave himcarte blancheto do what he pleased; but urged that poor Mrs. Carleton's comfort should be studied as much as was practicable. And under the circumstances he did not press for her departure; only stipulating that Mr. Pym should undertake the charge of her until she did leave.
When Mr. Pym got back to the corridor, he found the dismayed watchers and waiters outside it, Mrs. Darling and Prance, had been joined by another--Honour Tritton.
It is not possible for a commotion such as this to occur in a house without its sounds transpiring to the household. Quietly as these knockings and callings had been carried on, news of them penetrated to the servants below. "Mrs. Carleton had bolted herself in her chamber, and could not be got at." Honour, in her interest, it may be in her curiosity, went upstairs at once. Perhaps she deemed she had a sort of right to do so, from her former relations with Mrs. Carleton.
Mr. Pym scarcely noticed her. The noise inside the room had increased; that is, the pacings to and fro were louder and quicker. Mrs. Darling clasped her hands in helpless dismay: she lifted her imploring face to the surgeon; she put her lips to the key-hole for the twentieth time.
"Charlotte! my darling Charlotte! I want to come in. I must come in. I--I have left a key in your room. It will soon be time to dress for dinner."
There was no response. But the pacings increased to a run. The dull day had become darker, and Honour turned into Miss Beauclerc's room, and brought out a tall wax candle, lighted, in a silver candlestick.
"Mrs. Carleton, I must beg of you to unlock the door," cried out the surgeon. "If you do not, I shall be compelled to break it open. Pray undo it."
It was of no avail. A mocking laugh was again heard, but there was no other response.
"Take care of yourselves," said Mr. Pym.
The door flew open with a burst. The first object they saw was Mrs. Carleton, standing against the opposite wall and glaring at them. Glaring! the word has been used often in regard to her eyes at times, but there is no other so applicable. Mr. Pym went straight up to her. She eluded him with a spring, pounced upon the unsuspecting and terrified Honour, and in another moment was grappling with her, a fight for dear life.
Poor lady! What her thoughts had been during that self-imprisonment she alone knew. That they had tended rapidly to increase the mind's confusion, to speed her on to the great gulf of insanity, already so near at hand, perhaps to have been its very turning-point, there could be no doubt of. And it may be that the sight of Honour amidst her enemies, of Honour bearing a lighted candle, recalled her mind to that dreadful night not yet two years gone by.
Whatever it may have been, whether any single cause, or many causes combined: the mortification of being turned from Castle Wafer, the visit of Mr. Pym, the seeing him that morning with Honour, or the opposition and confusion of this one afternoon: certain it was, that the moment her mother and Prance had been dreading in secret so long, had come. Mrs. Carleton was insane.
It took all three, the surgeon, Mrs. Darling, and Prance, to secure her in her violence: just as it had taken more than one to secure her father in the years gone by. Honour was released, terrified nearly to death, bruises on her arms, and a bite on her cheek, of which she would never lose the mark.
When she was secured from doing harm to herself or others, Mr. Pym touched Prance, and motioned her to a room apart. Had Prance been capable of astonishment at anything, she might have felt it then. He closed the door and pointed to a chair.
"The time for evasion has gone by," he began. "Tomorrow will see your mistress in an asylum, Prance, from which she can never more be released in safety. And--do you know for what cause I have brought you here?"
"No, sir," answered Prance; but in some hesitation, as if she half-divined what the cause might be.
"I am about to speak of that past night at Alnwick; the burning of Benja. I feel as sure"--and he raised his finger to her impressively--"that your mistress had something to do with that, and that you knew it, as I am that you are before me there. Few persons can deceive me; and your manner that night and subsequent to it, clever as you may have thought yourself, convinced me there was a tale to tell. I did not press for it then; I had my reasons; but I must hear it now."
"I had nothing to do with it, sir," replied Prance, not daring to equivocate; feeling perhaps, with him, that the time for suppression had gone by.
"I don't suppose you had," returned Mr. Pym. "But you were in that niche, where Honour saw you, for all that. Come! You must acquaint me with the particulars of that night: they may be a guide to my treatment of your mistress. I must know them, whether or not. Did she set the child on fire?"
"No, sir, I don't think she did. At least, not intentionally."
"At any rate, she was in the room at the time?"
"Yes, she was. But I think he caught fire accidentally. There was some scuffle, and I fancy his white pinafore set alight."
"But she bolted the door upon him?"
Prance actually for a moment looked distressed. "I'm afraid she did, sir: the one door. The other, I have always believed, and always shall believe, the child fastened himself."
"She bolted it on him when he was burning?"
"Ah, I don't know that, sir; I don't know it for certain."
"You have feared it."
"Yes; only that."
Mr. Pym sat down in a chair opposite Prance, the table being between them. "Begin at the beginning, Prance," he said. "This is a waste of time. How much of that night's occurrences did you see and hear?"
"You--you are not asking for the purpose of proving the crime against her, are you, sir?" demanded Prance.
"Of proving the crime against her, woman!" echoed Mr. Pym,served wrathfully. "Your mistress is past having anything of that sort proved against her: past its consequences, for that is, I presume, what you mean. Had I wished to bring it home to her, I should have stirred in it at the time. I have been as quiet and careful as you. Now then, begin. Let us hear what you had to do with it, and what brought you in the niche. You have not forgotten, I suppose?"
"No, indeed, sir! I have thought of it all a great deal too often to be pleasant," she said, leaning her head upon her hand. "The account I gave before had very much of truth in it: though not the whole of the truth," she added, after a pause.
"Then tell the whole now," said Mr. Pym, growing impatient at the delay.
The substance of Prance's communication was as follows. After she had been in the herb-room, she went upstairs to wash her hands, which had become soiled from picking the herbs. Whilst in her chamber, which was next to Mrs. Carleton's, she heard her mistress come up from the dining-room and go into her chamber, and she followed her in, to ask whether she wanted a light or anything, for it was getting quite dusk. Mrs. Carleton was not in her room, but had gone through the dressing-room, and was standing in the nursery, just inside the door, apparently gazing at something, as one transfixed: a dull sort of light came from the nursery, enabling Prance to see her distinctly. Being rather curious, she peeped in, and saw Master Benja slowly parading a lighted church about, which he carried before him: it was on this her mistress's eyes were fixed. It was really a pretty object, Prance said, lighted up in the dark room. The child was speaking; words calculated to irritate Mrs. Carleton----
"What were they!" interrupted Mr. Pym, when Prance had got thus far in her narrative. "Can you repeat them?"
"'I'll tell you what I shall do, Honour, when I am master of Alnwick,'" repeated Prance. "'You shall be mistress, and give all the orders, and we'll have a great wall built up, so that mamma can't come near us. But we'll have Georgy, and keep him to ourselves.'" Those were the words, Prance continued, and they seemed to irritate her mistress: she darted forward, and gave the child a sharp blow on the ear. She (Prance) went away, leaving a sound of noise and crying behind her. Declared, if it were the last word she had to speak, that she had no thought of real injury. She went through the dressing-room, through the bedroom, which door she shut, and went down into the dining-room. Georgy was asleep on the large chair, his legs hanging down. A very short while--immediately, indeed--her mistress followed her down; noticed, and thought it very singular, that she bolted the dining-room door after her. Seemed greatly excited; walked about in a strange manner; Prance thought she must have been quarrelling with Honour. Presently she sat down, and took Georgy's feet upon her lap. This gave Prance an opportunity of slipping back the bolt, and quitting the room. Had not liked to do so before; must have been there at least a quarter-of-an-hour. Went up to her room; heard no noise whatever; never supposed but that Honour was in the nursery with Master Benja. Stood a minute or two in the passage, listening; thought she might hear them speaking of the quarrel. Heard nothing--all was quite still, and then supposed Honour had taken Master Benja down to the servants' hall, which had been forbidden by Mrs. Carleton. Was stealing along the passage to find this out, intending to tell of her, when Honour came running up the backstairs, and Prance, not to be seen, slipped into the niche until Honour should have entered the nursery. Found then that Master Benja was in the nursery. Honour could not open the door, and called out to ask why he had turned the button. Was peeping out of the niche, and saw Honour drop a load of things from her apron, and come flying past her into the dressing-room. Did not think at the time she was seen; passage was pretty dark. Took the opportunity to escape into her own room, and was lighting a candle when Honour's cries startled her. Came out of her room, saw Honour running down the front staircase, her cries awful. It brought the servants from the kitchen, it brought Mrs. Carleton and Georgy out of the dining-room; and then she (Prance) found out what had happened. That was all.
"And you mean to tell me you did not suspect anything wrong until then?" asked Mr. Pym, as she concluded.
"As I am a living, breathing woman, sir, I never suspected it," answered Prance, showing for once some emotion. "I don't think Honour herself was more shocked than I was."
"And why did you not tell the truth about your being in the niche?"
"Ah, sir, I did not dare. Might it not, in the questioning that would have ensued, have directed suspicion to my mistress? The moment I discovered that Honour was not in the room when my mistress attacked Master Benja, I felt frightened to death, fearing she had done it. I----"
"Stay a minute. I don't understand," interrupted Mr. Pym. "You say you looked into the nursery. You must have seen that Honour was not there."
"Indeed, sir, I did not. I saw but a very small portion of the room; the door opens inwards to the wall, and obstructs the best part of the room to any one standing as I did. I never supposed but that Honour was present in her usual seat; otherwise I should not have left my mistress alone with the child. The boy himself, helped to mislead me: those few words he said appeared to be spokento Honour. I concluded afterwards, that when he heard his mamma enter, he must have thought it was Honour who had gone in, and was too much occupied with his toy to turn his head to look."
"It's an awful thing!" ejaculated Mr. Pym.
"It has driven my mistress mad," returned Prance. "But, sir--she did not purposely set him on fire: she did not. I have gathered a great deal from words she has let drop in her paroxysms, and I know it was not done purposely. 'The church fell and set fire to his pinafore, in blazing up,' she said one night when she was moaning: and I am sure it did."
"But she bolted the door on him."
"Ah, yes, she did that; bolted it upon him, knowing he was on fire; there's no doubt of it. I have gathered that much. I think at the moment she was mad, unconscious of what she did. She is not naturally cruel, only in these uncontrollable attacks. And then--and then----"
"And then, what?" asked the surgeon.
"She had taken too much wine that afternoon," continued Prance, lowering her voice. "Not intentionally; not from the love of drinking: unthinkingly, as it were. You see, sir, she had dined at the hour when she usually took her luncheon, and she did not eat much, I noticed; made a luncheon more than a dinner. But she seemed to have a great thirst upon her, and drank a good deal of wine; champagne, and sherry, and port; altogether, I think her head was a little confused; indeed, I'm sure it was. She would not have beaten Benja in the dining-room, but for that. Oh, the remorse that has been hers!"
"I suppose so."
"It is remorse that has turned her brain. I thought in Flanders it would come on then; it did in a measure; but she got over it. Over and over again would she have given her own life to recall the boy's; I think she would even have given Georgy's. What she did, she did in a moment of passion; of aberration; and she has repented it ever since, and lived in dread of detection. Her horror of Honour has arisen from the feeling that had the girl not left Benja alone, it could not have happened, and she had not had the sin upon her. Indeed, sir, she is to be pitied; to be pitied more than condemned."
"Let us think so, at any rate, Prance," remarked Mr. Pym. "Does Mrs. Darling know this?"
"Well, sir, no; not exactly. I have dropped a word or two, and I know she guesses the rest; but I have not said it."
"Best not, perhaps," said the surgeon. "It is a secret that may remain between you and me."