Volume Three—Chapter Fourteen.Far Seeing.“Poor old soul, she can’t be long for this world,” said Oldroyd one day on receiving a message from Lindham, and, mounting Peter, he rode over across the commons to the old cottage.“Oh, you’ve come at last, then,” said the old woman, raising herself in bed and frowning heavily. “There, don’t you go telling me no lies. I know where you’ve been wasting the parish time as you’re paid for.”“Wasting the time?” said Oldroyd, laughing.“Ah, it’s nothing to make fun of. When I told you to take to Miss Lucy, I didn’t mean you to go courting for months, but to marry her and done with it, so as she might be a bit useful, visiting and nursing some o’ the sick folk on your rounds.”“Why, you dissatisfied old woman,” cried Oldroyd merrily, “I rode over as soon as I got your message.”“Well, then, why don’t you do me some good at once, and not stand talking. If you knowed the aggynies I suffer, you wouldn’t stand talking. You heered the news?”“What, about the French?”“Tchut! What do I know about the French? I mean about my grandbairn.”“Miss Hayle? No.”“The captain took her off, and we thought he’d married her, you know, but he didn’t.”“Poor girl!” said Oldroyd, sadly.“Bah! I haven’t patience with her. Got her head turned up at The Warren, being with that girl there; and then, in spite of all I said, and her father said, she must be always thinking of the captain, and breaking her heart when she heard he was going to marry first this one and then that. She got so that at last he had only to hold up his finger and say come, and away she went; and now she’s back in London, left to shift for herself, with lots of fine clothes. She’s writ home to her father for help. But we shall see—we shall see.”“A scoundrel!” exclaimed Oldroyd.“Yes, he’s a bad un,” said the old woman, “a reg’lar bad un, but he’ll get his deserts; you see if he don’t. Ben Hayle arn’t Sir John Day up at the Hall. He won’t let my gentleman off so easy; you see if he do. Ah, it’s a strange world, doctor, and I begin to think it gets worse and worse.”Oldroyd listened to a good deal more of the old lady’s moralising about the state of the world, as he ministered to her “aggynies,” and finally left, after undertaking to call again very soon.“Mind, you shut the door!” shouted the old woman; “the haps don’t fit well. You must try it after you’ve let go.”“I’ll mind,” said Oldroyd good-humouredly; and, mounting Peter, he was thoughtfully jogging homeward, when the pony stopped in front of a gate, on which a man was seated—the pony having apparently recognised an old patient, and paused for the doctor to have a chat.“Do, sir?” said the man, getting down slowly and touching his hat.“Ah, Hayle, glad to see you looking so strong again.”“Ay, sir,” said the man, smiling sadly; “you ought to be proud o’ me, and make a show of what you’ve done for me. ’Bout your best job, warn’t I?”“Well, I suppose you were, in surgery,” said Oldroyd, looking hard at the man’s pinched face and settled frown; “but, I say, my man, hadn’t you better drop that life now, and try something different?”“Easier said than done, doctor,” replied Hayle grimly. “Give a dog a bad name and hang him. Nobody wouldn’t employ me. S’pose I said to you. ‘Change your life and turn parson.’ Wouldn’t be easy, would it?”Oldroyd shook his head.“Perhaps not,” he said; “but you’re too good a man for a poacher. Look here, Hayle; Morton has left and gone to Lord Bogmere’s. Sir John Day is very friendly to me. Let me go and state your case to him frankly.”“Wouldn’t be no good, sir.”“Don’t say that. He’s a thorough English gentleman, always ready to do anyone a good turn. I believe in you, Hayle; and if I say to him that you would gladly come and serve him faithfully, I should say so believing honestly that you would. Shall I speak to him?”“Thank you kindly, sir, but not now. I’ve got too much else on my mind,” said Hayle, gazing at the doctor searchingly. “Been to see the old lady?”“Yes.”“Did—did she tell you any news?”Oldroyd nodded.“Ah, she would,” said the ex-keeper thoughtfully. “Hah! he’s a bad un; but I didn’t think he’d be quite so bad as that to her; for she’s a handsome gal, doctor—a handsome gal.”“More’s the pity,” thought Oldroyd, though he did not speak.“It’s well for him that I haven’t run again him, I can tell you. Don’t happen to know where the captain is, do you, sir?”“No, I have not the least idea; and if I had, I don’t think I should tell you.”“S’pose not, doctor,” said the man, with a strange laugh, “seeing what’s coming off.”“Why; what are you going to do?”“Do, sir,” said Hayle slowly, as he leaned on the gate, and looked down the dark path in the wood. “When I was a young man, and made up my mind to trap a hare or a fezzan, or p’raps only a rabbud, I trapped it. P’r’aps I didn’t the first time; p’raps I didn’t the second or third; but I kept on at it till I did, and I’m going to trap him.”“What, Captain Rolph! Make him pay for the injury to your daughter?”“I’m going to see if he’ll make it up to her first. If he won’t, I’ll make him pay.”“Make it up! Do you mean marry her?”“Yes; that’s what I mean, sir,” said Hayle slowly, and then, turning round to face the doctor, and fix him with his big dark eyes. “He shall pay his debt if he don’t marry her!”“Do you mean in money—breach of promise?”“No,” said the man, speaking to him fiercely. “No money wouldn’t pay my gal nor me. He took a fancy to her, and she liked him, and I forgive him for his cunning way of following her when I was laid by. I forgive him, too, for what he did to me. It was fair fight so far, but it was his gun as shot me that night. I didn’t bear no malice again him for all that, as long as he was square toward Judith; but he’s thrown her off, and I’m going to see him about it.”“Man, man, what are you going to do?” cried Oldroyd.“What am I going to do?” roared Hayle, blazing up into sudden fury. “You’re going to marry sweet young Miss Lucy, yonder. S’pose eighteen or nineteen years, by-and-by, doctor, there’s another Miss Lucy as you’re very proud on. You’re genteel people, we’re not; but the stuff’s all the same. I was proud o’ my Judith, same as you’ll be proud of your Miss Lucy when she comes. What am I going to do? What would you do to the man as took her from you, and when his fancy was over sent her off?”Oldroyd stood gazing at the fierce face before him.“Doctor, when I heerd first as he’d thrown her over, I said to myself, ‘He’s a proud chap—proud of his strong body, and his running and racing: he shall know what it is to suffer now. Curse him, I’ll break him across my knee.’ Then I stopped and thought, doctor, and made up my mind that he should marry her, and if he don’t—”Hayle stopped short, with his lips tightened and his fists clenched; and then, in a curiously furtive way, he turned his face aside, sprang lightly over the gate into the wood, and disappeared from the doctor’s sight.“If I had done that fellow a deadly wrong I should not feel very happy and comfortable in my own mind,” said Oldroyd, as he looked in the direction in which the man had disappeared. “Ah, well, it’s no business of mine; and, thank goodness, I lead too busy a life to have many of the temptations talked of by good old Doctor Watts.”“Now, then, I’ve taken my physic,” he added, after a few minutes’ thought, and with a cheery smile on his countenance, “so I’ll go and have my sugar. Go on, Peter.”Peter went on, and, as if knowing where to go, took the doctor straight to The Firs.
“Poor old soul, she can’t be long for this world,” said Oldroyd one day on receiving a message from Lindham, and, mounting Peter, he rode over across the commons to the old cottage.
“Oh, you’ve come at last, then,” said the old woman, raising herself in bed and frowning heavily. “There, don’t you go telling me no lies. I know where you’ve been wasting the parish time as you’re paid for.”
“Wasting the time?” said Oldroyd, laughing.
“Ah, it’s nothing to make fun of. When I told you to take to Miss Lucy, I didn’t mean you to go courting for months, but to marry her and done with it, so as she might be a bit useful, visiting and nursing some o’ the sick folk on your rounds.”
“Why, you dissatisfied old woman,” cried Oldroyd merrily, “I rode over as soon as I got your message.”
“Well, then, why don’t you do me some good at once, and not stand talking. If you knowed the aggynies I suffer, you wouldn’t stand talking. You heered the news?”
“What, about the French?”
“Tchut! What do I know about the French? I mean about my grandbairn.”
“Miss Hayle? No.”
“The captain took her off, and we thought he’d married her, you know, but he didn’t.”
“Poor girl!” said Oldroyd, sadly.
“Bah! I haven’t patience with her. Got her head turned up at The Warren, being with that girl there; and then, in spite of all I said, and her father said, she must be always thinking of the captain, and breaking her heart when she heard he was going to marry first this one and then that. She got so that at last he had only to hold up his finger and say come, and away she went; and now she’s back in London, left to shift for herself, with lots of fine clothes. She’s writ home to her father for help. But we shall see—we shall see.”
“A scoundrel!” exclaimed Oldroyd.
“Yes, he’s a bad un,” said the old woman, “a reg’lar bad un, but he’ll get his deserts; you see if he don’t. Ben Hayle arn’t Sir John Day up at the Hall. He won’t let my gentleman off so easy; you see if he do. Ah, it’s a strange world, doctor, and I begin to think it gets worse and worse.”
Oldroyd listened to a good deal more of the old lady’s moralising about the state of the world, as he ministered to her “aggynies,” and finally left, after undertaking to call again very soon.
“Mind, you shut the door!” shouted the old woman; “the haps don’t fit well. You must try it after you’ve let go.”
“I’ll mind,” said Oldroyd good-humouredly; and, mounting Peter, he was thoughtfully jogging homeward, when the pony stopped in front of a gate, on which a man was seated—the pony having apparently recognised an old patient, and paused for the doctor to have a chat.
“Do, sir?” said the man, getting down slowly and touching his hat.
“Ah, Hayle, glad to see you looking so strong again.”
“Ay, sir,” said the man, smiling sadly; “you ought to be proud o’ me, and make a show of what you’ve done for me. ’Bout your best job, warn’t I?”
“Well, I suppose you were, in surgery,” said Oldroyd, looking hard at the man’s pinched face and settled frown; “but, I say, my man, hadn’t you better drop that life now, and try something different?”
“Easier said than done, doctor,” replied Hayle grimly. “Give a dog a bad name and hang him. Nobody wouldn’t employ me. S’pose I said to you. ‘Change your life and turn parson.’ Wouldn’t be easy, would it?”
Oldroyd shook his head.
“Perhaps not,” he said; “but you’re too good a man for a poacher. Look here, Hayle; Morton has left and gone to Lord Bogmere’s. Sir John Day is very friendly to me. Let me go and state your case to him frankly.”
“Wouldn’t be no good, sir.”
“Don’t say that. He’s a thorough English gentleman, always ready to do anyone a good turn. I believe in you, Hayle; and if I say to him that you would gladly come and serve him faithfully, I should say so believing honestly that you would. Shall I speak to him?”
“Thank you kindly, sir, but not now. I’ve got too much else on my mind,” said Hayle, gazing at the doctor searchingly. “Been to see the old lady?”
“Yes.”
“Did—did she tell you any news?”
Oldroyd nodded.
“Ah, she would,” said the ex-keeper thoughtfully. “Hah! he’s a bad un; but I didn’t think he’d be quite so bad as that to her; for she’s a handsome gal, doctor—a handsome gal.”
“More’s the pity,” thought Oldroyd, though he did not speak.
“It’s well for him that I haven’t run again him, I can tell you. Don’t happen to know where the captain is, do you, sir?”
“No, I have not the least idea; and if I had, I don’t think I should tell you.”
“S’pose not, doctor,” said the man, with a strange laugh, “seeing what’s coming off.”
“Why; what are you going to do?”
“Do, sir,” said Hayle slowly, as he leaned on the gate, and looked down the dark path in the wood. “When I was a young man, and made up my mind to trap a hare or a fezzan, or p’raps only a rabbud, I trapped it. P’r’aps I didn’t the first time; p’raps I didn’t the second or third; but I kept on at it till I did, and I’m going to trap him.”
“What, Captain Rolph! Make him pay for the injury to your daughter?”
“I’m going to see if he’ll make it up to her first. If he won’t, I’ll make him pay.”
“Make it up! Do you mean marry her?”
“Yes; that’s what I mean, sir,” said Hayle slowly, and then, turning round to face the doctor, and fix him with his big dark eyes. “He shall pay his debt if he don’t marry her!”
“Do you mean in money—breach of promise?”
“No,” said the man, speaking to him fiercely. “No money wouldn’t pay my gal nor me. He took a fancy to her, and she liked him, and I forgive him for his cunning way of following her when I was laid by. I forgive him, too, for what he did to me. It was fair fight so far, but it was his gun as shot me that night. I didn’t bear no malice again him for all that, as long as he was square toward Judith; but he’s thrown her off, and I’m going to see him about it.”
“Man, man, what are you going to do?” cried Oldroyd.
“What am I going to do?” roared Hayle, blazing up into sudden fury. “You’re going to marry sweet young Miss Lucy, yonder. S’pose eighteen or nineteen years, by-and-by, doctor, there’s another Miss Lucy as you’re very proud on. You’re genteel people, we’re not; but the stuff’s all the same. I was proud o’ my Judith, same as you’ll be proud of your Miss Lucy when she comes. What am I going to do? What would you do to the man as took her from you, and when his fancy was over sent her off?”
Oldroyd stood gazing at the fierce face before him.
“Doctor, when I heerd first as he’d thrown her over, I said to myself, ‘He’s a proud chap—proud of his strong body, and his running and racing: he shall know what it is to suffer now. Curse him, I’ll break him across my knee.’ Then I stopped and thought, doctor, and made up my mind that he should marry her, and if he don’t—”
Hayle stopped short, with his lips tightened and his fists clenched; and then, in a curiously furtive way, he turned his face aside, sprang lightly over the gate into the wood, and disappeared from the doctor’s sight.
“If I had done that fellow a deadly wrong I should not feel very happy and comfortable in my own mind,” said Oldroyd, as he looked in the direction in which the man had disappeared. “Ah, well, it’s no business of mine; and, thank goodness, I lead too busy a life to have many of the temptations talked of by good old Doctor Watts.”
“Now, then, I’ve taken my physic,” he added, after a few minutes’ thought, and with a cheery smile on his countenance, “so I’ll go and have my sugar. Go on, Peter.”
Peter went on, and, as if knowing where to go, took the doctor straight to The Firs.
Volume Three—Chapter Fifteen.The Image Fades.“Oh, how you startled me.”“Can’t help being ugly,” said Oldroyd merrily. “Eliza said you had come in, and were down the garden, so I took the liberty of following.”“Does mamma know?” said Lucy, with a guilty look at the house.“I really can’t tell,” said Oldroyd, smiling. “I shall not look for her permission now, since I consider myself your duly qualified medical attendant, your life physician, I hope.”“Really, Mr Oldroyd,” said Lucy, “you need not feel my pulse to-day.”“Indeed, but I must,” he said; “and look into your eyes to see if they are clear.”“What nonsense!” said Lucy. “I suppose next you’ll want me to put out my tongue.”“No,” he said laughing, “your lips will do.”“Philip! For shame! Anyone might have seen. You shouldn’t.”“Save that I would not have anyone witness of so holy a joy as that kiss was to me,” whispered Oldroyd, “the whole world might see my love for you, little wife to be. There’s no shame in it, Lucy. I am so happy. And you?”“I’m very, very miserable,” she cried, looking in his face with eyes that denied the fact.“Then you are to tell me your trouble,” he whispered, fondly, “and I am to console you.”“But I don’t think you can, Philip.”“Well, let us hear,” he said. “What is the trouble?”“It is about poor Moray.”“Ah! Yes!” said Oldroyd slowly.“And Glynne!”“Whom you have just been to see, eh?”“Yes.”“I once knew a case,” said Oldroyd, “where two people were most tenderly attached to each other—the gentleman far more so than the lady; but they, loving as they did, were kept apart by foolish doubts and misconceptions and pride.”“It is not true,” said Lucy sharply.“That they were kept apart like that?”“No; that—that—”“The gentleman was more deeply touched than the lady? No; that part is not true. It was just the reverse.”“And that is not true either,” said Lucy archly.“Well, we’ll not argue the point,” said Oldroyd, laughing. “But I’ll go on. In their case no one interfered to set matters straight, and they only came right through the tender affection and good heart of the dearest little girl who ever lived.”“You may say that again, Philip,” said Lucy, nestling to him, and looking up through a veil of tears; “but it isn’t a bit true. I’m afraid I was very, very weak, and proud and foolish, and I feel now as if I could never forgive myself for much that I have done.”“I’ll forgive you, and you shall forgive me,” said Oldroyd. “And now I don’t think I need go on speaking in parables. I only wanted to point out the difference. Our trouble arranged itself without the help of friends. That of someone else ought soon to be set right, with two such energetic people as ourselves to help.”“But sometimes interference makes matters worse,” sighed Lucy.“Yes; because those who see about these matters are ignorant pretenders. Now, we are both duly qualified practitioners, Lucy, and, I think, can settle the matter right off, and cure them both.”“But how? It is so dreadful.”“Lucy, Lucy!”It was a sharp, agonised call, as of one in extreme anguish, and, startled by the cry, Lucy sprang up and ran towards the house, closely followed by Oldroyd.“Mamma, dear mamma, what is it?” she cried.“Your brother. Oh, thank heaven, Mr Oldroyd, you are here.”“What is it?” cried Oldroyd, catching Mrs Alleyne’s white and trembling hand.“I—I went—I ventured to go into the observatory just now, my son seemed so quiet, and—oh, heaven, what have I done that I should suffer this?”It was a wild appeal, uttered by one in deep agony of spirit, as Mrs Alleyne reeled, and would have fallen, had not Oldroyd caught her in his arms, and gently lowered her on the carpet.“Only fainting,” he whispered. “Let her lie; loosen her dress, and bathe her face. I’ll run on to your brother.”Satisfied that he was not wanted there, and, giving Lucy an encouraging nod, Oldroyd ran quickly along the passage to the observatory, whose door he found open, but almost in total darkness, for the shutters were carefully closed, and the shaded lamp gave so little light, save in one place on the far side of the table, that he was compelled to cross the great room cautiously, for fear of falling over some one or other of the philosophical instruments, whose places the student often changed.On reaching the table, he could see that Alleyne was lying prone upon the well-worn rug before his chair; and, making his way to the window, Oldroyd tore open the shutters, admitting a burst of sunshine, and completely changing the aspect of the great dusty place.Going back to the table, he took in the position at a glance. There were bottles there, in a little rack such a chemist would use, and one stood alone.He caught it up, removed the stopper, then put it down with an impatient “Pish!” and was turning to the prostrate man, when, previously hidden by a book, another stopper caught his eye, and, drawing in his breath with a loud hiss, he sprang to Alleyne’s side, to find that the fingers of his right hand tightly clasped a small cut-glass bottle, the one to which the stopper belonged.“I was afraid so,” muttered Oldroyd, with his eyes scanning the white, fixed countenance before him. “He must have taken it as he stood by the table, and fallen at once. Poor fellow! Poor fellow! He must have been mad.”These words were uttered as, with all the prompt decision of a medical man, Oldroyd was examining his friend; his first act being to ascertain what the little bottle had contained.It was no easy task to free it from the stiffened fingers; but he tore it away at last, held it to the light, to his nostrils, and then set it quickly upon the table, with an impatient exclamation.“And I call myself a practised doctor,” he muttered, “and let my fancy carry me away as it did. Poor fellow! He must have felt it coming on, and tried that ammonia to keep off the sensation. Suffered from it before, perhaps,” he continued, as he laid Alleyne’s head more easily, tore open his handkerchief and collar; and then, after drawing up the lids and examining the pupils of his eyes, he hurriedly threw open both windows, and caught up a chart from a side table.His next act was to ring the bell furiously, and then return to Alleyne’s side and begin fanning his head vigorously.It was Lucy who answered the bell, running in exclaiming,—“Oh, Philip, what is it, pray?”“Don’t make a fuss, darling,” he said, quickly. “Be a firm little woman. I want your help. Cold water, a big basin, sponge, brandy, vinegar. Quick?”Lucy made an effort to compose herself, and the prompt order had its due effect, for she ran out, to return in a few minutes laden with all Oldroyd had demanded.“That’s right,” he said, quickly; and in answer to Lucy’s inquiring eyes, “A fit, dear. He has overdone it. Exhaustion. Brain symptoms. Over pressure. That’s well. Now, the brandy. Here, you take this card and keep on fanning, while I bathe his head with the spirit and water. We must cool his head. Fan away. Be calm now. A doctor’s wife must not cry. That’s brave.”All the while he was applying the sponge, saturated with spirit and water, to Alleyne’s temples, and checking Lucy when she seemed disposed to break down, the result being that she worked busily and well.“Well done, brave little woman,” he cried, encouragingly. “It is a regular fit of exhaustion, and we must not let it come to anything more. Give me the fan, dear. No, go on. I’ll apply some more water. Evaporates quickly, you see, and relieves the brain. Spirit stimulates, even taken through the pores like that. Good heavens, what a mat of hair. Quick! Scissors. I must get rid of some of this.”He now took the extemporised fan from Lucy’s fingers, using it energetically, while she rose from her knees, and ran to get a pair of her sharpest scissors, with which Oldroyd remorselessly sheared off the long unkempt locks from his patient’s temples.Meanwhile Alleyne lay there perfectly motionless, breathing heavily, and with a strange fixed look in his eyes. At times a slight spasm seemed to convulse him, but only to be succeeded by long intervals of rigidity, during which Lucy plied the fan, gazing at her brother with horror-stricken eyes, while Oldroyd continued the cold bathing in the most matter-of-fact manner.“If we could get some ice,” muttered Oldroyd, as as he laid a cool hand upon his patient’s head; and just then Mrs Alleyne, looking very white and weak, came into the room.“I am better now,” she whispered. “It was very foolish of me. What can I do?”“Nothing, at present,” replied Oldroyd. “Yes; send to the Hall. I know they have ice there. Ask Sir John Day to let us have some at once.”Mrs Alleyne darted an agonised look at her son, and then glided out of the room, when Lucy looked up piteously at Oldroyd.“Pray, pray, tell me the truth,” she whispered; “does this mean—death?”“Heaven forbid!” he replied, quickly. “It is a bad fit, but a man may have several such as this and live to seventy. Lucy, we were looking about for a means to a certain—keep on fanning, my dear, that’s right—certain end.”“I don’t understand you,” she said piteously.“Alleyne—Glynne—to bring them together. This is her work—thinking of her and over-toiling. Surely her place is here.”Lucy heaved a sigh, but she held her peace, and busily wafted the cool air to her brother’s forehead.Mrs Alleyne returned, to kneel down a short distance away, in obedience to a whisper from the doctor; and then an hour passed, and there was no change, while hope seemed to be slowly departing from poor Lucy’s eyes.Suddenly a horse’s feet were heard coming at a gallop, and a minute or two later there was a tap at the door.“I came on at once,” said Sir John, entering on tiptoe. “My brother is having the ice well opened, and he will be over directly with one of the men. Now, Mr Oldroyd, what can I do? I have the cob outside. Shall I—don’t be offended, you might like help—shall I gallop over and get Doctor Blunt.”“It is not necessary,” said Oldroyd thoughtfully, “but it would be more satisfactory to all parties. I should be glad if you could go, Sir John.”“Yes; exactly. How is he?”“There’s no change, and not likely to be for some time,” replied Oldroyd, quietly.Sir John looked pityingly at Alleyne, turned to Mrs Alleyne, took her hand and pressed it gently. Then, bending over Lucy, he took her hand in his.“Keep a good heart, my dear,” he whispered. “He’ll be better soon;” and going out on tiptoe, it hardly seemed a minute before the regular beat of his horse’s hoofs could be heard dying away in the distance.A few minutes later the rumble of wheels was heard, and directly after Eliza came to the door with a pail of ice.“And Major Day’s in the dining-room, please, ma’am,” whispered the girl, in a broken voice; “and is master better, and can he do anything?”“Go and speak to him, Lucy. Here, your handkerchief first. That’s right!” said Oldroyd sharply. “Now, the smallest pieces of the ice. That’s right. Go and say—No change. Perhaps he’ll sit down and wait.”As he spoke, with Mrs Alleyne’s help, he was busily arranging the smaller fragments from the pail of ice in a couple of handkerchiefs, and applying them to his patient’s head.“There,” he said, “that’s better than all our fanning. Now, I hope to see some difference.”The change was long in coming, Alleyne remaining perfectly insensible for hour after hour. Towards evening the principal physician of the neighbourhood arrived, and was for some time with the sick man, returning afterwards to where Mrs Alleyne, Lucy, Sir John, and the major were, waiting impatiently for news.He said he was not surprised at the seizure, upon learning the history of the case from his friend, Mr Oldroyd, upon whose treatment he could make no change whatever.“Then you think the worst!” cried Mrs Alleyne piteously.“Pardon me, my dear madam; not at all. There are cases that time alone can decide. The ailment has been growing for many months. Your son must have had premonitory warnings, attacks of faintness, and the like; for he had provided himself with a strong preparation of ammonia; but he has not been leading a life that would improve the general state of his health. Over-study and general mental anxiety have, no doubt, been the causes of this attack; and as it has taken months to reach this culmination, it will take a long time to bring him back to health.”“Then you think there is no danger?” said Sir John eagerly.“I think there is great danger, Sir John; but I hope that we shall be able to successfully ward it off.”Oldroyd and Mrs Alleyne resumed their places by the patient, the observatory being turned into a sick chamber, and mattresses and bedding were brought down; and there the astronomer lay, in the midst of the trophies of his study, his instruments and his piles of notes; the great grim tubes pointing through the opened shutters at the far-off worlds, towards which it almost seemed as if—weary with the struggle to reach them while chained to earth—he was about to wing his flight.Lucy came in on tiptoe to bend forward over her brother, but Oldroyd rose.“Go back, dear,” he said, “and get some refreshment. It is time you dined.”“Dined!—at a time like this!” she said reproachfully.“Yes; at a time like this. It will be a case of long nights of watching. He must not be left, and we must have strength to attend him through it all. Leave it to me, dear, and do as I wish.”Lucy bent down and kissed his hand in token of obedience, and soon after joined Sir John and the major in the dining-room.“Can I do anything else now?” said Sir John; “if not, I’ll go. I promised Glynne to go back with news as soon as there was any to carry. Are you coming, Jem?”“No,” said the major quietly. “I’m going to stop and help, if it’s only to see that Miss Lucy here has rest and food.”
“Oh, how you startled me.”
“Can’t help being ugly,” said Oldroyd merrily. “Eliza said you had come in, and were down the garden, so I took the liberty of following.”
“Does mamma know?” said Lucy, with a guilty look at the house.
“I really can’t tell,” said Oldroyd, smiling. “I shall not look for her permission now, since I consider myself your duly qualified medical attendant, your life physician, I hope.”
“Really, Mr Oldroyd,” said Lucy, “you need not feel my pulse to-day.”
“Indeed, but I must,” he said; “and look into your eyes to see if they are clear.”
“What nonsense!” said Lucy. “I suppose next you’ll want me to put out my tongue.”
“No,” he said laughing, “your lips will do.”
“Philip! For shame! Anyone might have seen. You shouldn’t.”
“Save that I would not have anyone witness of so holy a joy as that kiss was to me,” whispered Oldroyd, “the whole world might see my love for you, little wife to be. There’s no shame in it, Lucy. I am so happy. And you?”
“I’m very, very miserable,” she cried, looking in his face with eyes that denied the fact.
“Then you are to tell me your trouble,” he whispered, fondly, “and I am to console you.”
“But I don’t think you can, Philip.”
“Well, let us hear,” he said. “What is the trouble?”
“It is about poor Moray.”
“Ah! Yes!” said Oldroyd slowly.
“And Glynne!”
“Whom you have just been to see, eh?”
“Yes.”
“I once knew a case,” said Oldroyd, “where two people were most tenderly attached to each other—the gentleman far more so than the lady; but they, loving as they did, were kept apart by foolish doubts and misconceptions and pride.”
“It is not true,” said Lucy sharply.
“That they were kept apart like that?”
“No; that—that—”
“The gentleman was more deeply touched than the lady? No; that part is not true. It was just the reverse.”
“And that is not true either,” said Lucy archly.
“Well, we’ll not argue the point,” said Oldroyd, laughing. “But I’ll go on. In their case no one interfered to set matters straight, and they only came right through the tender affection and good heart of the dearest little girl who ever lived.”
“You may say that again, Philip,” said Lucy, nestling to him, and looking up through a veil of tears; “but it isn’t a bit true. I’m afraid I was very, very weak, and proud and foolish, and I feel now as if I could never forgive myself for much that I have done.”
“I’ll forgive you, and you shall forgive me,” said Oldroyd. “And now I don’t think I need go on speaking in parables. I only wanted to point out the difference. Our trouble arranged itself without the help of friends. That of someone else ought soon to be set right, with two such energetic people as ourselves to help.”
“But sometimes interference makes matters worse,” sighed Lucy.
“Yes; because those who see about these matters are ignorant pretenders. Now, we are both duly qualified practitioners, Lucy, and, I think, can settle the matter right off, and cure them both.”
“But how? It is so dreadful.”
“Lucy, Lucy!”
It was a sharp, agonised call, as of one in extreme anguish, and, startled by the cry, Lucy sprang up and ran towards the house, closely followed by Oldroyd.
“Mamma, dear mamma, what is it?” she cried.
“Your brother. Oh, thank heaven, Mr Oldroyd, you are here.”
“What is it?” cried Oldroyd, catching Mrs Alleyne’s white and trembling hand.
“I—I went—I ventured to go into the observatory just now, my son seemed so quiet, and—oh, heaven, what have I done that I should suffer this?”
It was a wild appeal, uttered by one in deep agony of spirit, as Mrs Alleyne reeled, and would have fallen, had not Oldroyd caught her in his arms, and gently lowered her on the carpet.
“Only fainting,” he whispered. “Let her lie; loosen her dress, and bathe her face. I’ll run on to your brother.”
Satisfied that he was not wanted there, and, giving Lucy an encouraging nod, Oldroyd ran quickly along the passage to the observatory, whose door he found open, but almost in total darkness, for the shutters were carefully closed, and the shaded lamp gave so little light, save in one place on the far side of the table, that he was compelled to cross the great room cautiously, for fear of falling over some one or other of the philosophical instruments, whose places the student often changed.
On reaching the table, he could see that Alleyne was lying prone upon the well-worn rug before his chair; and, making his way to the window, Oldroyd tore open the shutters, admitting a burst of sunshine, and completely changing the aspect of the great dusty place.
Going back to the table, he took in the position at a glance. There were bottles there, in a little rack such a chemist would use, and one stood alone.
He caught it up, removed the stopper, then put it down with an impatient “Pish!” and was turning to the prostrate man, when, previously hidden by a book, another stopper caught his eye, and, drawing in his breath with a loud hiss, he sprang to Alleyne’s side, to find that the fingers of his right hand tightly clasped a small cut-glass bottle, the one to which the stopper belonged.
“I was afraid so,” muttered Oldroyd, with his eyes scanning the white, fixed countenance before him. “He must have taken it as he stood by the table, and fallen at once. Poor fellow! Poor fellow! He must have been mad.”
These words were uttered as, with all the prompt decision of a medical man, Oldroyd was examining his friend; his first act being to ascertain what the little bottle had contained.
It was no easy task to free it from the stiffened fingers; but he tore it away at last, held it to the light, to his nostrils, and then set it quickly upon the table, with an impatient exclamation.
“And I call myself a practised doctor,” he muttered, “and let my fancy carry me away as it did. Poor fellow! He must have felt it coming on, and tried that ammonia to keep off the sensation. Suffered from it before, perhaps,” he continued, as he laid Alleyne’s head more easily, tore open his handkerchief and collar; and then, after drawing up the lids and examining the pupils of his eyes, he hurriedly threw open both windows, and caught up a chart from a side table.
His next act was to ring the bell furiously, and then return to Alleyne’s side and begin fanning his head vigorously.
It was Lucy who answered the bell, running in exclaiming,—
“Oh, Philip, what is it, pray?”
“Don’t make a fuss, darling,” he said, quickly. “Be a firm little woman. I want your help. Cold water, a big basin, sponge, brandy, vinegar. Quick?”
Lucy made an effort to compose herself, and the prompt order had its due effect, for she ran out, to return in a few minutes laden with all Oldroyd had demanded.
“That’s right,” he said, quickly; and in answer to Lucy’s inquiring eyes, “A fit, dear. He has overdone it. Exhaustion. Brain symptoms. Over pressure. That’s well. Now, the brandy. Here, you take this card and keep on fanning, while I bathe his head with the spirit and water. We must cool his head. Fan away. Be calm now. A doctor’s wife must not cry. That’s brave.”
All the while he was applying the sponge, saturated with spirit and water, to Alleyne’s temples, and checking Lucy when she seemed disposed to break down, the result being that she worked busily and well.
“Well done, brave little woman,” he cried, encouragingly. “It is a regular fit of exhaustion, and we must not let it come to anything more. Give me the fan, dear. No, go on. I’ll apply some more water. Evaporates quickly, you see, and relieves the brain. Spirit stimulates, even taken through the pores like that. Good heavens, what a mat of hair. Quick! Scissors. I must get rid of some of this.”
He now took the extemporised fan from Lucy’s fingers, using it energetically, while she rose from her knees, and ran to get a pair of her sharpest scissors, with which Oldroyd remorselessly sheared off the long unkempt locks from his patient’s temples.
Meanwhile Alleyne lay there perfectly motionless, breathing heavily, and with a strange fixed look in his eyes. At times a slight spasm seemed to convulse him, but only to be succeeded by long intervals of rigidity, during which Lucy plied the fan, gazing at her brother with horror-stricken eyes, while Oldroyd continued the cold bathing in the most matter-of-fact manner.
“If we could get some ice,” muttered Oldroyd, as as he laid a cool hand upon his patient’s head; and just then Mrs Alleyne, looking very white and weak, came into the room.
“I am better now,” she whispered. “It was very foolish of me. What can I do?”
“Nothing, at present,” replied Oldroyd. “Yes; send to the Hall. I know they have ice there. Ask Sir John Day to let us have some at once.”
Mrs Alleyne darted an agonised look at her son, and then glided out of the room, when Lucy looked up piteously at Oldroyd.
“Pray, pray, tell me the truth,” she whispered; “does this mean—death?”
“Heaven forbid!” he replied, quickly. “It is a bad fit, but a man may have several such as this and live to seventy. Lucy, we were looking about for a means to a certain—keep on fanning, my dear, that’s right—certain end.”
“I don’t understand you,” she said piteously.
“Alleyne—Glynne—to bring them together. This is her work—thinking of her and over-toiling. Surely her place is here.”
Lucy heaved a sigh, but she held her peace, and busily wafted the cool air to her brother’s forehead.
Mrs Alleyne returned, to kneel down a short distance away, in obedience to a whisper from the doctor; and then an hour passed, and there was no change, while hope seemed to be slowly departing from poor Lucy’s eyes.
Suddenly a horse’s feet were heard coming at a gallop, and a minute or two later there was a tap at the door.
“I came on at once,” said Sir John, entering on tiptoe. “My brother is having the ice well opened, and he will be over directly with one of the men. Now, Mr Oldroyd, what can I do? I have the cob outside. Shall I—don’t be offended, you might like help—shall I gallop over and get Doctor Blunt.”
“It is not necessary,” said Oldroyd thoughtfully, “but it would be more satisfactory to all parties. I should be glad if you could go, Sir John.”
“Yes; exactly. How is he?”
“There’s no change, and not likely to be for some time,” replied Oldroyd, quietly.
Sir John looked pityingly at Alleyne, turned to Mrs Alleyne, took her hand and pressed it gently. Then, bending over Lucy, he took her hand in his.
“Keep a good heart, my dear,” he whispered. “He’ll be better soon;” and going out on tiptoe, it hardly seemed a minute before the regular beat of his horse’s hoofs could be heard dying away in the distance.
A few minutes later the rumble of wheels was heard, and directly after Eliza came to the door with a pail of ice.
“And Major Day’s in the dining-room, please, ma’am,” whispered the girl, in a broken voice; “and is master better, and can he do anything?”
“Go and speak to him, Lucy. Here, your handkerchief first. That’s right!” said Oldroyd sharply. “Now, the smallest pieces of the ice. That’s right. Go and say—No change. Perhaps he’ll sit down and wait.”
As he spoke, with Mrs Alleyne’s help, he was busily arranging the smaller fragments from the pail of ice in a couple of handkerchiefs, and applying them to his patient’s head.
“There,” he said, “that’s better than all our fanning. Now, I hope to see some difference.”
The change was long in coming, Alleyne remaining perfectly insensible for hour after hour. Towards evening the principal physician of the neighbourhood arrived, and was for some time with the sick man, returning afterwards to where Mrs Alleyne, Lucy, Sir John, and the major were, waiting impatiently for news.
He said he was not surprised at the seizure, upon learning the history of the case from his friend, Mr Oldroyd, upon whose treatment he could make no change whatever.
“Then you think the worst!” cried Mrs Alleyne piteously.
“Pardon me, my dear madam; not at all. There are cases that time alone can decide. The ailment has been growing for many months. Your son must have had premonitory warnings, attacks of faintness, and the like; for he had provided himself with a strong preparation of ammonia; but he has not been leading a life that would improve the general state of his health. Over-study and general mental anxiety have, no doubt, been the causes of this attack; and as it has taken months to reach this culmination, it will take a long time to bring him back to health.”
“Then you think there is no danger?” said Sir John eagerly.
“I think there is great danger, Sir John; but I hope that we shall be able to successfully ward it off.”
Oldroyd and Mrs Alleyne resumed their places by the patient, the observatory being turned into a sick chamber, and mattresses and bedding were brought down; and there the astronomer lay, in the midst of the trophies of his study, his instruments and his piles of notes; the great grim tubes pointing through the opened shutters at the far-off worlds, towards which it almost seemed as if—weary with the struggle to reach them while chained to earth—he was about to wing his flight.
Lucy came in on tiptoe to bend forward over her brother, but Oldroyd rose.
“Go back, dear,” he said, “and get some refreshment. It is time you dined.”
“Dined!—at a time like this!” she said reproachfully.
“Yes; at a time like this. It will be a case of long nights of watching. He must not be left, and we must have strength to attend him through it all. Leave it to me, dear, and do as I wish.”
Lucy bent down and kissed his hand in token of obedience, and soon after joined Sir John and the major in the dining-room.
“Can I do anything else now?” said Sir John; “if not, I’ll go. I promised Glynne to go back with news as soon as there was any to carry. Are you coming, Jem?”
“No,” said the major quietly. “I’m going to stop and help, if it’s only to see that Miss Lucy here has rest and food.”
Volume Three—Chapter Sixteen.Celestial Matters.Sir John nodded and went straight back to Brackley to find Glynne dressed and impatiently pacing the drawing-room, pale even to ghastliness, and with eyes dilated and looking large and wild.“How long you have been!” she panted, catching his hand. “Tell me quickly—how is he? Tell me the worst.”“The worst is that he is very bad. It is a serious seizure, my dear, but the doctors give hope.”“Father, this long waiting has been more than I could bear,” she cried hysterically. “I felt as if I should go mad. Now take me there—at once.”“Take you—to The Firs?”“Yes; now. The carriage is ready. I told them to have it waiting.”“But, Glynne—my darling, is it—is it quite right that you should go? Well, perhaps as Lucy’s friend.”“I am not going as Lucy’s friend, father,” cried Glynne; “this is no time for paltry subterfuge. I am going to him who is stricken down. I must go; I cannot stay away.”Sir John looked serious, but beyond knitting his brows, he said nothing, only rang for the carriage, and then hurried away to fortify himself with a tumbler of claret and some biscuits.In a few minutes they were being rapidly driven to The Firs, Glynne remaining perfectly silent till they were near the gates, when she laid her hand upon her father’s.“Don’t think me strange,” she said in a low voice. “I feel as if I must go to him now. I may never hear his voice again.”They were shown into the drawing-room, where, at Oldroyd’s wish, Mrs Alleyne had been taken by Lucy to partake of some refreshment, and, as Glynne advanced into the dimly-lighted room, their neighbour rose from her seat and stood confronting her.“Well?” she said bitterly; “have you come to see your work?”Glynne did not speak, but catching at Mrs Alleyne’s hand, sank upon her knees, while Sir John drew back with Lucy.“Why do you come here?” said Mrs Alleyne, after a pause, painful in its silence to all.The door closed softly just then, and Glynne started and glanced round to see that she was alone with Mrs Alleyne. Then she uttered a low, weary cry.“You do not know—you do not know how I have suffered, or you would not speak to me like this,” she whispered.“Suffered!” retorted Mrs Alleyne, bitterly; “what have your sufferings been to his? Woman, you came upon this house like a curse, to play with his true, noble heart; and when you had, with your vile coquetry, won it, you tossed it from you with insult, leaving him to suffer patiently, till nature could bear no more; and now you have come to look upon the wreck you have made. But you were not to go unpunished. Do you hear me, woman—he, my brave, true son, is stricken to his death.”“No, no, no,” cried Glynne, flinging her arms round Mrs Alleyne; “it is not true—he is not dying—he shall not die, for I love him; I love him with all my weary heart.”“You?” cried Mrs Alleyne, striving to free herself from the frantic grasp that was about her.“Yes; I—even now,” cried Glynne, rising and clinging to her firmly; “it is true that I loved him from the first. How could I help loving one so wise and true?”“And yet you trifled with him,” cried Mrs Alleyne fiercely.“No; it was with my own heart,” sobbed Glynne, “I did not know. What could I do? You know all. I seemed to wake at last standing upon the brink of an abyss;” and then, “Mrs Alleyne, is there to be no pardon for such as I? Was my act such a crime in the sight of Heaven that the rest of my life was to be blasted, for he loved me—he loved me with all his heart.”Mrs Alleyne shuddered and shrank away. “Are you, too, pitiless?” cried Glynne. “You must know all—how he loved me, and loves me still. Has he told you all?”“Told me—all? What do you mean?”“Must I speak to you?” whispered Glynne hoarsely, as she sank upon her knees and clung to Mrs Alleyne’s dress, “I would have given the world to go back upon my promise, for I knew how he loved me, but in my blindness I said it was too late.”“Yes; it was too late,” said Mrs Alleyne coldly. “But you will let me see him. Let me go to him. I ask no more. Let me be at his side, for it may be that I can save his life. Then—send me away, and let me have but one thought—that I have given life to him I loved. Mrs Alleyne, have I not suffered enough? Have some pity on me. Have pity on your son.”Mrs Alleyne caught her by the shoulder and drew her nearer, so that she could gaze into the thin, white face; and, as she studied its lines of care, her fierce look softened, and she caught Glynne tightly to her breast, sobbing over her wildly, and crying from time to time, “My child!—my poor child!”Some time had passed before they went in softly, hand in hand, to where Oldroyd sat by his patient’s head.The doctor did not look in the least surprised, but nodded his head as if it was exactly what he had expected, and, after bending down over Alleyne for a moment, he left the room.And so it was, that when reason began to resume its seat in Moray Alleyne’s mind, his eyes rested upon the pale, careworn face of Glynne. For she had stayed. There was no question of her leaving The Firs while the patient was in danger, and when the peril seemed past she still stayed, to glide large-eyed, pale and patient about the quiet chamber, Mrs Alleyne giving up to her, as her hand smoothed the pillow and lent support, when, feeble as an infant, Moray lay breathing the summer breeze which came perfumed through the pines.It was when speech had returned that Glynne sat near him one evening, watching his white face with its grey silken hair, and the heavy beard which had been spared by the doctor when his patient was at the worst.Neither had spoken for some time, but gazed, each with a strange yearning, in the other’s eyes. For it had been coming for days, and instinctively they knew that it must come that night—the end, and with it a long farewell, perhaps only to meet again upon the further shore.Glynne was the first to speak, and it was in a whisper.“Moray, when I knew that you were stricken down, I prayed that I might come to you, and struggle with the deadly shade to save your life.”He looked at her with a wistful gaze, and his lips trembled as he closed his eyes.“My work is done now. Forgive me for coming. I cannot touch your hand again.”“No,” he said sadly; and his voice was so low and deep that she bent forward to hear his words, and lowered her face into her hands that she might not let him see the agony and despair working, as she bent to her unhappy fate.For there had been some vague, undefined idea floating through her brain, that he might have said one gentle, sorrowing, pitying sentence before she went—he, the man whom she knew now to have loved her tenderly and well. But he had acquiesced so readily. That simple little “no” had gone to her heart like a stiletto thrust. She, degraded as she was, could not take him by the hand again.Then she started up to gaze at him wildly and reproachfully, for he repeated the negative, and added,—“Better, may be, dear, that I had died, as perhaps I shall before long. But, before you go, take with you the knowledge that I loved you dearly from the first. Ah, Glynne, what might have been!”“Yes, what might have been!” she said sadly. “Better too that I had died, as I have often prayed that I might; but I was mad to offer such a prayer, for my work in life was not at an end. I did not know then. I know now, and my task is done.”He was silent then, and she rose to go.“Good-bye,” she whispered. “We shall never meet again.”She had glided to the door, and her hand was raised to the fastening, when he cried faintly,—“Stop!”A low sigh escaped her lips.Was he, then, going to speak one loving word to soften the bitterness of the last farewell? Her eyes brightened at the thought, and she turned and took a step or two towards him, with outstretched hands, which fell to her sides as she uttered a groan full of the despair at her heart.“No, no: don’t touch me,” he cried wildly. “You—innocent and sinned against—cannot take me by the hand again. Listen, Glynne, I must tell you before you go. It will be our secret, dear, for the confession to another, and my punishment, would mean fresh suffering and agony to you.”“I—I do not understand you,” she faltered, as she looked at him wildly.“No; it has been my secret until now. Glynne, dear, in my mad despair, I had gone to watch your window from the fir wood, as I had watched it scores of times before, and I said. ‘It is for the last time. To-morrow she belongs to him, and I will not degrade the idol of my love by thoughts that are not true.’ I reached the place sacred to me for my sorrow, but that night I could not rest there. It was as if something impelled me, against which I fought for hours before it mastered me, and as if by a strange magnetism—an evil planet attracted to a good—I was drawn nearer and nearer to the spot which contained all I held dear in life.”A faint ejaculation, half wonder, half horror, escaped Glynne’s lips, and, with one quick movement she was close to his side, bending over him and gazing with wildly dilated eyes at the dimly-seen face upon the pillow, the faint smile upon his lips, as he referred to her in his astronomical simile, seeming almost repellent at such a time.“I felt guilty, dear,” he went on, and she shivered while he turned his face a little toward the faint light of the window, and was silent for a few moments, while a fit of trembling came upon Glynne, and she had to catch at the bed and support herself.“I was not master of myself, dear. I loved you, and in my madness, weak from my bitter struggle with the power which led me on, I stole like some guilty wretch across the park till I reached the garden, and there I once more paused to renew the fight—to master the desire to be near you for the last time and then go back.”“Oh, Moray, Moray,” she cried, with a piteous moan, and she sank upon her knees, uttering low, hysterical sobs.“My poor lost love!” he whispered faintly; and his hand was laid feebly upon her bent head, which sank lower at his touch. “It was in vain. I can hardly recall it dear, for I tell you I must have been mad, but I crept closer and closer till I was beneath your window, and could touch the long, rope-like stems that reached from where I stood praying for your happiness, and a wild and guilty joy thrilled me, for I touched the tendrils which clung around the chamber which held you, my love—my love!”“Moray!” she cried wildly; and in ecstasy of horror, wonder, and confused thought mingled, she clasped her arms about his neck, and buried her burning face in his breast.“Ah!” he sighed; and his trembling hands rose to press her head closer and closer to his fluttering heart.A few moments only, and then she started from him.“No, no,” she cried wildly, as she cast back the thought which, for a moment, she had gladly harboured. “Impossible! It could not be.”“I speak the truth,” he said gently. “I must tell you now—while there is time.”She clasped her hands, and her fingers seemed to grow into her flesh with the agonised pressure as she crouched there, trembling, by his bed, her lips apart, her throat dry, and her breath coming and going with a harsh laboured sound, while his came feebly, and his words were harder to hear in the darkness which now shrouded them.“Yes,” he sighed; “I must tell you before it is too late.”He was silent for a moment or two, and then went on, with every word sending a pang of agony and shame through his listener’s ears.“Glynne, dearest, since that night I have often prayed that I might die, but death is long in coming to those who ask its help. I had raised my hand to steal one leaf from the creeper, when it fell to my side. Yes,” he said, with a hurried intensity now taking the place of his feeble whisper, “I remember—I see all clearly now. I had raised my hand, but it fell to my side, and a pang of horror shot through me, for there was the noise of struggling overhead, faint, half-stifled cries, and then the baying of a dog. For a moment I was dazed, then I turned to run to the door and raise an alarm, when a cry rang out again, and, for the first time, I knew that it came from your window above my head.”He stopped, panting heavily, and Glynne, trembling violently now, drew nearer and nearer to him, with the darkness closing in, and Alleyne’s face dimly seen on the grey pillow.“Listen,” he went on; “it was dark—so dark that I could hardly see that your window was thrown wide; but it was as if a horrible scene were being flashed into my brain, as I ran back over the short grass to stand beneath and begin to climb up by the thick rope-like stems that ran above. Then, as I grasped them, they were shaken violently; a man who had climbed out slipped rapidly down, and I seized him. But he was lithe and active, as I was slow, heavy, and unused to such an effort. He shook himself free, but I grasped him again, and once more he escaped me. But again I tried to seize him, and this time he struck at me, and I felt a sharp blade pass through my hand.“It gave him a few moments’ start, but not more; and as he ran, a madman was at his heels. Yes, a madman, for the passion within me was not that of one in the full possession of his senses.”Alleyne paused for a few moments, and, as Glynne’s hands once more, tremblingly and with a pleading gesture, stole to his breast, his, cold and dank in their touch, slowly pressed them to his heart, and held them there.“Guilty,” he murmured, “but for your sake, dearest, and there must be forgiveness. For my love was strong, and the maddening feeling within me burned, as in my rage I tore on after the dark shadow that was hurrying away.”He was silent again for a few minutes, and once more Glynne’s head went down till her forehead rested upon the cold, dank hands which prisoned hers against the labouring heart beneath.He spoke again, hurriedly and excitedly now, but the coherency of his narrative was at an end.“Some day,” he babbled hurriedly, “she shall know—my sweet, pure angel—what—who says that?—a lie—pure—pure as heaven above. No—never take her hand in mine—a murderer’s hand.—Hah! dog—at last. Mother—Lucy—it has eaten my heart away—what do you say—her disgrace? I tell you she is pure as those above—but there is his blood upon my hands. I cannot—dare not go to her now. What—they have found him? Yes, I know you—Caleb Kent—no use to struggle—there—wretch—venomous hound—down into the black slime. Dead? Who said that? I did not know till I loosened my grasp. There, amongst the cotton rushes—my hands all wet and numbed—blood? No, the cold, black bog water. I killed him—I did not know till he was dead, mother. There, dear, I have told you. Nearly two years now. Let them find him. For her sake I could not speak. Can you say, dear, that it was guilt? There—some day she must know—some day, when we are old and grey, and life’s passions have burned to their sad, grey ashes, and once more I can tell her how I loved.”He was silent again, and Glynne tried to raise her head, but he held it fast pressed down to his labouring breast. Then, feebly and hurriedly, he went on,—“These figures—all wrong—I cannot—so vast—so grand. Who’s this?”“I, Moray, my own, own love,” she whispered, as she clung to him wildly now. “Ah!”One long, deep sigh of content. “Some day—I must tell you—but look—there—so far—so vast—so grand—the dazzling stars—the tiny glittering point—then the faint golden dust—and beyond—the infinite. Who spoke? Glynne? Forgive me, dear—I loved you—so—”“Help! help!”Wild, agonised shrieks, and there were hurried footsteps. Mother, sister, and a light, which gleamed upon dilated eyes, gazing straight up into the infinite he had so long tried to pierce.
Sir John nodded and went straight back to Brackley to find Glynne dressed and impatiently pacing the drawing-room, pale even to ghastliness, and with eyes dilated and looking large and wild.
“How long you have been!” she panted, catching his hand. “Tell me quickly—how is he? Tell me the worst.”
“The worst is that he is very bad. It is a serious seizure, my dear, but the doctors give hope.”
“Father, this long waiting has been more than I could bear,” she cried hysterically. “I felt as if I should go mad. Now take me there—at once.”
“Take you—to The Firs?”
“Yes; now. The carriage is ready. I told them to have it waiting.”
“But, Glynne—my darling, is it—is it quite right that you should go? Well, perhaps as Lucy’s friend.”
“I am not going as Lucy’s friend, father,” cried Glynne; “this is no time for paltry subterfuge. I am going to him who is stricken down. I must go; I cannot stay away.”
Sir John looked serious, but beyond knitting his brows, he said nothing, only rang for the carriage, and then hurried away to fortify himself with a tumbler of claret and some biscuits.
In a few minutes they were being rapidly driven to The Firs, Glynne remaining perfectly silent till they were near the gates, when she laid her hand upon her father’s.
“Don’t think me strange,” she said in a low voice. “I feel as if I must go to him now. I may never hear his voice again.”
They were shown into the drawing-room, where, at Oldroyd’s wish, Mrs Alleyne had been taken by Lucy to partake of some refreshment, and, as Glynne advanced into the dimly-lighted room, their neighbour rose from her seat and stood confronting her.
“Well?” she said bitterly; “have you come to see your work?”
Glynne did not speak, but catching at Mrs Alleyne’s hand, sank upon her knees, while Sir John drew back with Lucy.
“Why do you come here?” said Mrs Alleyne, after a pause, painful in its silence to all.
The door closed softly just then, and Glynne started and glanced round to see that she was alone with Mrs Alleyne. Then she uttered a low, weary cry.
“You do not know—you do not know how I have suffered, or you would not speak to me like this,” she whispered.
“Suffered!” retorted Mrs Alleyne, bitterly; “what have your sufferings been to his? Woman, you came upon this house like a curse, to play with his true, noble heart; and when you had, with your vile coquetry, won it, you tossed it from you with insult, leaving him to suffer patiently, till nature could bear no more; and now you have come to look upon the wreck you have made. But you were not to go unpunished. Do you hear me, woman—he, my brave, true son, is stricken to his death.”
“No, no, no,” cried Glynne, flinging her arms round Mrs Alleyne; “it is not true—he is not dying—he shall not die, for I love him; I love him with all my weary heart.”
“You?” cried Mrs Alleyne, striving to free herself from the frantic grasp that was about her.
“Yes; I—even now,” cried Glynne, rising and clinging to her firmly; “it is true that I loved him from the first. How could I help loving one so wise and true?”
“And yet you trifled with him,” cried Mrs Alleyne fiercely.
“No; it was with my own heart,” sobbed Glynne, “I did not know. What could I do? You know all. I seemed to wake at last standing upon the brink of an abyss;” and then, “Mrs Alleyne, is there to be no pardon for such as I? Was my act such a crime in the sight of Heaven that the rest of my life was to be blasted, for he loved me—he loved me with all his heart.”
Mrs Alleyne shuddered and shrank away. “Are you, too, pitiless?” cried Glynne. “You must know all—how he loved me, and loves me still. Has he told you all?”
“Told me—all? What do you mean?”
“Must I speak to you?” whispered Glynne hoarsely, as she sank upon her knees and clung to Mrs Alleyne’s dress, “I would have given the world to go back upon my promise, for I knew how he loved me, but in my blindness I said it was too late.”
“Yes; it was too late,” said Mrs Alleyne coldly. “But you will let me see him. Let me go to him. I ask no more. Let me be at his side, for it may be that I can save his life. Then—send me away, and let me have but one thought—that I have given life to him I loved. Mrs Alleyne, have I not suffered enough? Have some pity on me. Have pity on your son.”
Mrs Alleyne caught her by the shoulder and drew her nearer, so that she could gaze into the thin, white face; and, as she studied its lines of care, her fierce look softened, and she caught Glynne tightly to her breast, sobbing over her wildly, and crying from time to time, “My child!—my poor child!”
Some time had passed before they went in softly, hand in hand, to where Oldroyd sat by his patient’s head.
The doctor did not look in the least surprised, but nodded his head as if it was exactly what he had expected, and, after bending down over Alleyne for a moment, he left the room.
And so it was, that when reason began to resume its seat in Moray Alleyne’s mind, his eyes rested upon the pale, careworn face of Glynne. For she had stayed. There was no question of her leaving The Firs while the patient was in danger, and when the peril seemed past she still stayed, to glide large-eyed, pale and patient about the quiet chamber, Mrs Alleyne giving up to her, as her hand smoothed the pillow and lent support, when, feeble as an infant, Moray lay breathing the summer breeze which came perfumed through the pines.
It was when speech had returned that Glynne sat near him one evening, watching his white face with its grey silken hair, and the heavy beard which had been spared by the doctor when his patient was at the worst.
Neither had spoken for some time, but gazed, each with a strange yearning, in the other’s eyes. For it had been coming for days, and instinctively they knew that it must come that night—the end, and with it a long farewell, perhaps only to meet again upon the further shore.
Glynne was the first to speak, and it was in a whisper.
“Moray, when I knew that you were stricken down, I prayed that I might come to you, and struggle with the deadly shade to save your life.”
He looked at her with a wistful gaze, and his lips trembled as he closed his eyes.
“My work is done now. Forgive me for coming. I cannot touch your hand again.”
“No,” he said sadly; and his voice was so low and deep that she bent forward to hear his words, and lowered her face into her hands that she might not let him see the agony and despair working, as she bent to her unhappy fate.
For there had been some vague, undefined idea floating through her brain, that he might have said one gentle, sorrowing, pitying sentence before she went—he, the man whom she knew now to have loved her tenderly and well. But he had acquiesced so readily. That simple little “no” had gone to her heart like a stiletto thrust. She, degraded as she was, could not take him by the hand again.
Then she started up to gaze at him wildly and reproachfully, for he repeated the negative, and added,—
“Better, may be, dear, that I had died, as perhaps I shall before long. But, before you go, take with you the knowledge that I loved you dearly from the first. Ah, Glynne, what might have been!”
“Yes, what might have been!” she said sadly. “Better too that I had died, as I have often prayed that I might; but I was mad to offer such a prayer, for my work in life was not at an end. I did not know then. I know now, and my task is done.”
He was silent then, and she rose to go.
“Good-bye,” she whispered. “We shall never meet again.”
She had glided to the door, and her hand was raised to the fastening, when he cried faintly,—
“Stop!”
A low sigh escaped her lips.
Was he, then, going to speak one loving word to soften the bitterness of the last farewell? Her eyes brightened at the thought, and she turned and took a step or two towards him, with outstretched hands, which fell to her sides as she uttered a groan full of the despair at her heart.
“No, no: don’t touch me,” he cried wildly. “You—innocent and sinned against—cannot take me by the hand again. Listen, Glynne, I must tell you before you go. It will be our secret, dear, for the confession to another, and my punishment, would mean fresh suffering and agony to you.”
“I—I do not understand you,” she faltered, as she looked at him wildly.
“No; it has been my secret until now. Glynne, dear, in my mad despair, I had gone to watch your window from the fir wood, as I had watched it scores of times before, and I said. ‘It is for the last time. To-morrow she belongs to him, and I will not degrade the idol of my love by thoughts that are not true.’ I reached the place sacred to me for my sorrow, but that night I could not rest there. It was as if something impelled me, against which I fought for hours before it mastered me, and as if by a strange magnetism—an evil planet attracted to a good—I was drawn nearer and nearer to the spot which contained all I held dear in life.”
A faint ejaculation, half wonder, half horror, escaped Glynne’s lips, and, with one quick movement she was close to his side, bending over him and gazing with wildly dilated eyes at the dimly-seen face upon the pillow, the faint smile upon his lips, as he referred to her in his astronomical simile, seeming almost repellent at such a time.
“I felt guilty, dear,” he went on, and she shivered while he turned his face a little toward the faint light of the window, and was silent for a few moments, while a fit of trembling came upon Glynne, and she had to catch at the bed and support herself.
“I was not master of myself, dear. I loved you, and in my madness, weak from my bitter struggle with the power which led me on, I stole like some guilty wretch across the park till I reached the garden, and there I once more paused to renew the fight—to master the desire to be near you for the last time and then go back.”
“Oh, Moray, Moray,” she cried, with a piteous moan, and she sank upon her knees, uttering low, hysterical sobs.
“My poor lost love!” he whispered faintly; and his hand was laid feebly upon her bent head, which sank lower at his touch. “It was in vain. I can hardly recall it dear, for I tell you I must have been mad, but I crept closer and closer till I was beneath your window, and could touch the long, rope-like stems that reached from where I stood praying for your happiness, and a wild and guilty joy thrilled me, for I touched the tendrils which clung around the chamber which held you, my love—my love!”
“Moray!” she cried wildly; and in ecstasy of horror, wonder, and confused thought mingled, she clasped her arms about his neck, and buried her burning face in his breast.
“Ah!” he sighed; and his trembling hands rose to press her head closer and closer to his fluttering heart.
A few moments only, and then she started from him.
“No, no,” she cried wildly, as she cast back the thought which, for a moment, she had gladly harboured. “Impossible! It could not be.”
“I speak the truth,” he said gently. “I must tell you now—while there is time.”
She clasped her hands, and her fingers seemed to grow into her flesh with the agonised pressure as she crouched there, trembling, by his bed, her lips apart, her throat dry, and her breath coming and going with a harsh laboured sound, while his came feebly, and his words were harder to hear in the darkness which now shrouded them.
“Yes,” he sighed; “I must tell you before it is too late.”
He was silent for a moment or two, and then went on, with every word sending a pang of agony and shame through his listener’s ears.
“Glynne, dearest, since that night I have often prayed that I might die, but death is long in coming to those who ask its help. I had raised my hand to steal one leaf from the creeper, when it fell to my side. Yes,” he said, with a hurried intensity now taking the place of his feeble whisper, “I remember—I see all clearly now. I had raised my hand, but it fell to my side, and a pang of horror shot through me, for there was the noise of struggling overhead, faint, half-stifled cries, and then the baying of a dog. For a moment I was dazed, then I turned to run to the door and raise an alarm, when a cry rang out again, and, for the first time, I knew that it came from your window above my head.”
He stopped, panting heavily, and Glynne, trembling violently now, drew nearer and nearer to him, with the darkness closing in, and Alleyne’s face dimly seen on the grey pillow.
“Listen,” he went on; “it was dark—so dark that I could hardly see that your window was thrown wide; but it was as if a horrible scene were being flashed into my brain, as I ran back over the short grass to stand beneath and begin to climb up by the thick rope-like stems that ran above. Then, as I grasped them, they were shaken violently; a man who had climbed out slipped rapidly down, and I seized him. But he was lithe and active, as I was slow, heavy, and unused to such an effort. He shook himself free, but I grasped him again, and once more he escaped me. But again I tried to seize him, and this time he struck at me, and I felt a sharp blade pass through my hand.
“It gave him a few moments’ start, but not more; and as he ran, a madman was at his heels. Yes, a madman, for the passion within me was not that of one in the full possession of his senses.”
Alleyne paused for a few moments, and, as Glynne’s hands once more, tremblingly and with a pleading gesture, stole to his breast, his, cold and dank in their touch, slowly pressed them to his heart, and held them there.
“Guilty,” he murmured, “but for your sake, dearest, and there must be forgiveness. For my love was strong, and the maddening feeling within me burned, as in my rage I tore on after the dark shadow that was hurrying away.”
He was silent again for a few minutes, and once more Glynne’s head went down till her forehead rested upon the cold, dank hands which prisoned hers against the labouring heart beneath.
He spoke again, hurriedly and excitedly now, but the coherency of his narrative was at an end.
“Some day,” he babbled hurriedly, “she shall know—my sweet, pure angel—what—who says that?—a lie—pure—pure as heaven above. No—never take her hand in mine—a murderer’s hand.—Hah! dog—at last. Mother—Lucy—it has eaten my heart away—what do you say—her disgrace? I tell you she is pure as those above—but there is his blood upon my hands. I cannot—dare not go to her now. What—they have found him? Yes, I know you—Caleb Kent—no use to struggle—there—wretch—venomous hound—down into the black slime. Dead? Who said that? I did not know till I loosened my grasp. There, amongst the cotton rushes—my hands all wet and numbed—blood? No, the cold, black bog water. I killed him—I did not know till he was dead, mother. There, dear, I have told you. Nearly two years now. Let them find him. For her sake I could not speak. Can you say, dear, that it was guilt? There—some day she must know—some day, when we are old and grey, and life’s passions have burned to their sad, grey ashes, and once more I can tell her how I loved.”
He was silent again, and Glynne tried to raise her head, but he held it fast pressed down to his labouring breast. Then, feebly and hurriedly, he went on,—“These figures—all wrong—I cannot—so vast—so grand. Who’s this?”
“I, Moray, my own, own love,” she whispered, as she clung to him wildly now. “Ah!”
One long, deep sigh of content. “Some day—I must tell you—but look—there—so far—so vast—so grand—the dazzling stars—the tiny glittering point—then the faint golden dust—and beyond—the infinite. Who spoke? Glynne? Forgive me, dear—I loved you—so—”
“Help! help!”
Wild, agonised shrieks, and there were hurried footsteps. Mother, sister, and a light, which gleamed upon dilated eyes, gazing straight up into the infinite he had so long tried to pierce.
Volume Three—Chapter Seventeen.The Last Look Around.About two years after his marriage, Philip Oldroyd was some five miles from home on the capital cob, a present from Sir John, one of his own breeding, when temptation fell in his way, for the Queen’s hounds came along in full cry, and after them a very full field.“I must have a gallop for once in a way,” said the doctor, and, yielding to the temptation, away he went, till, feeling he had done enough, he was about to draw rein, when he saw that something was wrong on his left. Cantering up, he was directly after one of a group helping to free a lady from her fallen horse, which was struggling frantically to extricate itself from a ditch into which both had come down.A gate was brought, the lady borne to the nearest cottage, and Oldroyd’s services eagerly accepted.“Badly injured,” he said, after a rapid examination. “Someone had better ride over and get a carriage from the nearest place—an open carriage in which a hurdle and mattress can be laid. I’ll stay and do my best, but I should telegraph to town for Sir Randall Bray. An operation will be necessary. Are any of the lady’s friends here?”“No; but I saw Major Rolph leading the field half-an-hour ago. This is Mrs Rolph.”Oldroyd started, and bent down over the insensible woman for a moment, at the same time softly pressing back the thick, dark hair from her clammy brow, and there were the lineaments he had not before recognised; it was the face of the keeper’s daughter, softened and refined, though now terribly drawn with pain.“Yes, doctor, she’s gettin’ over it,” said Hayle, one day when Oldroyd met him close to Brackley. “But she’s had a near shave. It’s you, though, as saved her life, same as you did mine.”“I’m glad she’s better, I’m sure,” said Oldroyd. “And you—do you ever feel your old wound?”“Oh, yes, just a twinge or two when the weather changes. But Sir John’s very kind, and things go very easy with me now, thanks to you, sir—thanks to you.”“Oh, all right, Hayle, all right. Got a good show of pheasants this winter? Plenty left?”“Heaps, sir. Oh, you may trust me. I look pretty sharp after ’em, I can tell you. I know, I do.”The great dark fellow gave a solemn wink as he stood before Oldroyd, in his brown velveteen coat and buttons, with a capital double gun under his arm.“Yes, I suppose you do,” said the doctor. “Game-keeping is better than poaching, eh?”“When you’ve got a good master, sir. But, look here, sir, when are you coming over? Sir John said you were last week.”“As soon as I can; too busy yet.”“When you do, sir, you shall have as fine a bit o’ shooting as a gentleman could wish to have. Talk about a warm corner, sir; it shall be the best in the whole preserves.”“Well, I’m glad your daughter is getting better. Is there any prospect of her coming down here?”“Not a bit, sir, and I don’t know as I want her. They don’t want me, and I don’t want them. You see I’m not a fool, doctor. I know well enough that if I went seeing ’em, it would look bad before the servants. I shouldn’t be comfortable. I should want to go down in the kitchen to have my meals, so I don’t go.”“Perhaps it is wise,” said Oldroyd. “I’m sure it is, sir. He’s made a lady of her, and, of course, he couldn’t make a gentleman of me. Judy sends me some money now and then, but I allus have it sent back. I couldn’t take his money. He don’t like me, and has never forgiven me, and I don’t like him. Poor lass! She’d have done better and been happier if she’d stopped at home, and took to some stout young chap of our lot.”“Poacher?”“Well, no, sir,” said the great dark fellow, smiling grimly; “keeper, sir. There’s not many poachers about here now. I told all I knowed as they must clear out, for I meant to do my dooty; and they saw that it was sense, for there’d be no chance for them again a man as knowed as much as I did, so they went off.”“By the way, Hayle,” said the doctor, “didn’t you go to the major on the day before his appointed wedding?”“Night, sir, night? I went to him straight as soon as I knew it for certain; but it was days before I could get to him. When I did get face to face with him, I says, ‘It’s my Judith, captain,’ I says, ‘or one of us is going to be hung for this night’s work.’ He blustered a bit, and tried to frighten me; but he couldn’t do that; and when he found I meant mischief, he gave in. He swore he’d marry her, but he cheated me then. Next time I got hold of him, there was no nonsense, I can tell you. He rang for his man to fetch the police, and I went off; but he never stirred after that without seeing me watching him, and at last he gave in out of sheer fright, and come to where I’d got Judith waiting, and he married her. If he hadn’t, I’d have—”The man’s lips tightened, and he involuntarily cocked the double gun he carried, but only to lower it once more beneath his arm.“I’m not a boasting man, sir,” said the keeper huskily; “but I loved that gal, and the man who did her harm was no better than so much varmin to me. I should have stopped at nothing, sir; I was that wound up. He’d give me nothing but treachery, leading my gal astray, making her lie and say she was going to nurse the old granny out there on the common, when it was only to go off in the woods to him. I told him of it all, and that I was a father—her father. I told him a rat would fight for its young, and that if he expected, because I was a common man, I was not going to do my duty by my gal, he was mistaken.“‘Why, what will you do?’ he says.“‘Do?’ I says to him; ‘do you think I’ve forgotten that you shot me down out there in the fir wood that night?’“‘It was an accident,’ he says.“‘It was no accident,’ I says. ‘There was light enough for me to see you take aim at me; and then, when I was lying half dead there in my bed, you took advantage of it to lead my child away. It’s no use for you to pretend you didn’t know. She told you fast enough that I was lying there, and that made it safe.’“‘Look here, sir,’ I says at last, ‘there shall be no more shilly-shally between you and me. As I say, I’ll let bygones be bygones, if you’ll do the right thing. If you don’t—well, p’r’aps it won’t be this year, nor next year. My chance will come some day, and then—’”There was a pause, and Oldroyd marked the strange glare in the keeper’s eyes as he drew in his breath with a loud hiss.“Yes, doctor,” he said, after looking round him for a few moments, as if in search of the object he named, “he’d have been like so much varmin to me, and if he hadn’t married my poor lass, I should have shot him as I would a stoat.”Time ran on after its fashion, but few changes took place at Brackley. Sir John Day used to thank Oldroyd for introducing to him the best keeper who ever stepped, for Hayle was the higher in favour from his being a man who was a capital judge of stock, and one who could keep a good eye upon the farm when the squire went away year by year for a long stay abroad. When at home, Glynne was her uncle’s constant companion in his botanical walks, and these generally ended in her being left at the cottage where Mrs Alleyne, widowed of son as well as husband, took up her residence in full view of the gloomy old Firs, lately taken by a famous astronomer, who vastly altered the former occupant’s position by his eagerness to acquire Moray Alleyne’s costly instruments which had been carefully cared for by his mother’s hands.At The Warren, Mrs Rolph, grown careworn and grey, resided still with her niece for companion, her son never having been there since Marjorie was left to her despair. The servants were not above talking, and rumours reached Brackley Hall that Mrs Rolph had cursed her son, and was never going to see him again, that it was a place no servant could stop in, for the old lady’s temper was awful, and Miss Marjorie as mad as a March hare; while even Oldroyd hinted to his wife, after being called in, that Miss Emlin was rather flighty and strange.“They never go out anywhere,” he said; “and from what I saw, I should say they are always either quarrelling or making it up. Seem fond of one another though, all the same.”“But what do you mean by flighty and strange?” said Lucy. “You don’t mean ready to flirt with men?”Oldroyd burst into a hearty laugh, and caught up his youngest child.“Don’t be alarmed,” he cried. “Never will I be false to thee. How does the song go? She’s got the complaint that ladies have who have been crossed in love as folks call it. Seriously, dear, I should not be surprised if she did turn a little crazy.”“Oh, Phil; how horrible!”“Yes; my dear,” he said seriously, but with a humorous twinkle in his eye; “I understand these things. I knew a young doctor once who very nearly became a candidate for a private asylum.”“Phil!—Yes; what is it?”“Messenger, ma’am, from Brackley. Would master be kind enough to step over.”“Oh, Phil, dear; Glynne is ill,” cried Lucy, piteously. “I had a presentiment last night. Here, I’ll take the children over to mamma, and come with you.”“Wait a moment,” cried Oldroyd, and he ran out to speak to Sir John’s groom and came back.“All right,” he said. “No one ill? Something about Hayle the keeper the man says. Wanted directly.”“Poor fellow’s wound has broken out again,” thought Oldroyd, as he jumped into the dog-cart the groom had waiting, and he questioned the man, who only knew that the keeper had come in to see Sir John that morning, and then he had been sent off to fetch the doctor.“Terrible dry time, sir,” said the man as the horse sped along toward the park. “We out of the stables had all to go and help the gardeners two whole days watering.”“Yes; the crops are suffering badly, my man.”“They just are, sir. The lake’s half empty, and the fish getting sick, and Hayle says the boggy bits beyond the park where they get the snipe in winter’s nearly all dried up.”“The conversation ended as the dog-cart was rattled up the lime avenue, and there, at the great porch, stood Sir John, the major, and Hayle the keeper.”“Morning! Glad you’ve come,” said Sir John, shaking hands. “That will do, Smith.”The groom, who was eager to know what was the matter, drove sulkily round to the stables, while Sir John took the doctor’s arm.“Look here, Oldroyd,” he said; “the keeper has made a discovery in the bog wood over yonder.”“Poacher shot!” exclaimed the doctor.“Wait and see,” said Sir John, who was looking pallid; while the major had a peculiarly stern look in his fierce face.Oldroyd bowed, and they walked rapidly across the park, and through some of the preserves. Then in and out among the pines till an open moorland patch was reached, dotted here and there with scrubby pines, and here Sir John turned.“Now, Hayle,” he said; “you lead.”The keeper went in front, and Sir John followed; while the major came abreast of the doctor.“We thought it better to have you with us, doctor,” whispered the major. “It’s a terrible business—a clearing up of a sad event from what I can see.”Oldroyd felt more mystified than ever, but he was soon to be illumined, for the keeper led them over the dry cotton rushes and rustling reeds to a dried up pool, half in the open, half hidden by a dense growth of alder.Here he paused and pointed.“On yonder, Sir John, about fifty yards.”The baronet walked straight forward, parting the growth with his stout stick, till he stopped short at the edge of a dried up pool, where the first thing Oldroyd saw was Marjorie Emlin seated on the edge, where a wiry tuft of rushes grew, with her feet amongst the dried confervae and crowfoot at the bottom of the pool. She had taken off her hat, and the sun turned her rich, tawny, red hair to gold as she bent over something which glittered in her hands; and this she transferred to one wrist as they came up.It was not till they were close beside her that she turned her head, and nodded and smiled in a childish, vacant way, and then held up the glittering bracelet upon her wrist for them to admire.“Better speak to her,” whispered Sir John. “Hayle says she’s quite mad.”Oldroyd stooped and picked up the hat and handed it to the girl.“The sun is very powerful,” he said; “had you not better put it on.”She snatched the hat with childish petulance, and then held up the bracelet again.“It’s the one she gave to Glynne,” said Sir John involuntarily.Marjorie looked at him sharply, and then pointed down at something covered partially by the dried scum of the pool.“Quick, for God’s sake, get her away, Oldroyd!” whispered the major, stepping between the wretched woman and the ghastly remains at her feet.The task did not prove an easy one, for Marjorie resented the doctor’s interference, and seemed determined to stay, but suddenly turned upon her heel and walked away, looking back once to smile and nod at the group standing by the bed of the dried up pool.“I found her here, sir, this morning, soon after breakfast, and tried to persuade her to come away,” said Hayle; “but, poor girl, she didn’t seem to know me a bit, and I didn’t like to go and tell Mrs Rolph, for I’m afraid she’s crazed.”“He came on and told us, Oldroyd,” said Sir John; “and we thought it would be better to have you here. How long is it since you were by here, Hayle?”“Close upon three weeks, Sir John,” said the keeper; “and there was a little water left in the pool then. Shall I try and find out who it is?”Sir John looked at the remains with horror. “Better leave it to the police,” he said. “They must be told, of course. Try, though, if there are any means of identification, and pick up the loose cases. Jem,” he whispered, with a look of horror, “has judgment come upon this man as we see?”The major made no reply, but eagerly watched the keeper who picked up case after case, rotted and stained by the mud in which they had lain. These were placed together, and then Hayle stooped to cut open a discoloured piece of velveteen which had once been brown.From this he extracted a rusty knife, and a tobacco-box of brass, which set all at rest directly, for Hayle held the latter before Sir John.“Don’t want any further search to find out that, Sir John,” he said sharply. “A man has been missing from these parts for years now, and there’s his name.”Sir John looked at the tarnished metal box, with a shudder of disgust and horror for the memories it revived, and read there roughly scratched upon the lid—“Caleb Kent.”“Remember what I said to you one day, Lucy?” said Oldroyd, about a year later. “I think it was that day when I was called over to Brackley about something being found.”“Oh, Phil, don’t bring that up,” cried Lucy, with a shudder; “but what do you mean?”“About Miss Emlin. I’ve just come from there.”“Yes, dear. Some fresh trouble?”He nodded his head gravely.“They’ve taken her to a private asylum. I did not say anything to you before, for fear of upsetting you, but she was not fit to be left with poor old Mrs Rolph, and she has tried to drown herself twice.”The End.
About two years after his marriage, Philip Oldroyd was some five miles from home on the capital cob, a present from Sir John, one of his own breeding, when temptation fell in his way, for the Queen’s hounds came along in full cry, and after them a very full field.
“I must have a gallop for once in a way,” said the doctor, and, yielding to the temptation, away he went, till, feeling he had done enough, he was about to draw rein, when he saw that something was wrong on his left. Cantering up, he was directly after one of a group helping to free a lady from her fallen horse, which was struggling frantically to extricate itself from a ditch into which both had come down.
A gate was brought, the lady borne to the nearest cottage, and Oldroyd’s services eagerly accepted.
“Badly injured,” he said, after a rapid examination. “Someone had better ride over and get a carriage from the nearest place—an open carriage in which a hurdle and mattress can be laid. I’ll stay and do my best, but I should telegraph to town for Sir Randall Bray. An operation will be necessary. Are any of the lady’s friends here?”
“No; but I saw Major Rolph leading the field half-an-hour ago. This is Mrs Rolph.”
Oldroyd started, and bent down over the insensible woman for a moment, at the same time softly pressing back the thick, dark hair from her clammy brow, and there were the lineaments he had not before recognised; it was the face of the keeper’s daughter, softened and refined, though now terribly drawn with pain.
“Yes, doctor, she’s gettin’ over it,” said Hayle, one day when Oldroyd met him close to Brackley. “But she’s had a near shave. It’s you, though, as saved her life, same as you did mine.”
“I’m glad she’s better, I’m sure,” said Oldroyd. “And you—do you ever feel your old wound?”
“Oh, yes, just a twinge or two when the weather changes. But Sir John’s very kind, and things go very easy with me now, thanks to you, sir—thanks to you.”
“Oh, all right, Hayle, all right. Got a good show of pheasants this winter? Plenty left?”
“Heaps, sir. Oh, you may trust me. I look pretty sharp after ’em, I can tell you. I know, I do.”
The great dark fellow gave a solemn wink as he stood before Oldroyd, in his brown velveteen coat and buttons, with a capital double gun under his arm.
“Yes, I suppose you do,” said the doctor. “Game-keeping is better than poaching, eh?”
“When you’ve got a good master, sir. But, look here, sir, when are you coming over? Sir John said you were last week.”
“As soon as I can; too busy yet.”
“When you do, sir, you shall have as fine a bit o’ shooting as a gentleman could wish to have. Talk about a warm corner, sir; it shall be the best in the whole preserves.”
“Well, I’m glad your daughter is getting better. Is there any prospect of her coming down here?”
“Not a bit, sir, and I don’t know as I want her. They don’t want me, and I don’t want them. You see I’m not a fool, doctor. I know well enough that if I went seeing ’em, it would look bad before the servants. I shouldn’t be comfortable. I should want to go down in the kitchen to have my meals, so I don’t go.”
“Perhaps it is wise,” said Oldroyd. “I’m sure it is, sir. He’s made a lady of her, and, of course, he couldn’t make a gentleman of me. Judy sends me some money now and then, but I allus have it sent back. I couldn’t take his money. He don’t like me, and has never forgiven me, and I don’t like him. Poor lass! She’d have done better and been happier if she’d stopped at home, and took to some stout young chap of our lot.”
“Poacher?”
“Well, no, sir,” said the great dark fellow, smiling grimly; “keeper, sir. There’s not many poachers about here now. I told all I knowed as they must clear out, for I meant to do my dooty; and they saw that it was sense, for there’d be no chance for them again a man as knowed as much as I did, so they went off.”
“By the way, Hayle,” said the doctor, “didn’t you go to the major on the day before his appointed wedding?”
“Night, sir, night? I went to him straight as soon as I knew it for certain; but it was days before I could get to him. When I did get face to face with him, I says, ‘It’s my Judith, captain,’ I says, ‘or one of us is going to be hung for this night’s work.’ He blustered a bit, and tried to frighten me; but he couldn’t do that; and when he found I meant mischief, he gave in. He swore he’d marry her, but he cheated me then. Next time I got hold of him, there was no nonsense, I can tell you. He rang for his man to fetch the police, and I went off; but he never stirred after that without seeing me watching him, and at last he gave in out of sheer fright, and come to where I’d got Judith waiting, and he married her. If he hadn’t, I’d have—”
The man’s lips tightened, and he involuntarily cocked the double gun he carried, but only to lower it once more beneath his arm.
“I’m not a boasting man, sir,” said the keeper huskily; “but I loved that gal, and the man who did her harm was no better than so much varmin to me. I should have stopped at nothing, sir; I was that wound up. He’d give me nothing but treachery, leading my gal astray, making her lie and say she was going to nurse the old granny out there on the common, when it was only to go off in the woods to him. I told him of it all, and that I was a father—her father. I told him a rat would fight for its young, and that if he expected, because I was a common man, I was not going to do my duty by my gal, he was mistaken.
“‘Why, what will you do?’ he says.
“‘Do?’ I says to him; ‘do you think I’ve forgotten that you shot me down out there in the fir wood that night?’
“‘It was an accident,’ he says.
“‘It was no accident,’ I says. ‘There was light enough for me to see you take aim at me; and then, when I was lying half dead there in my bed, you took advantage of it to lead my child away. It’s no use for you to pretend you didn’t know. She told you fast enough that I was lying there, and that made it safe.’
“‘Look here, sir,’ I says at last, ‘there shall be no more shilly-shally between you and me. As I say, I’ll let bygones be bygones, if you’ll do the right thing. If you don’t—well, p’r’aps it won’t be this year, nor next year. My chance will come some day, and then—’”
There was a pause, and Oldroyd marked the strange glare in the keeper’s eyes as he drew in his breath with a loud hiss.
“Yes, doctor,” he said, after looking round him for a few moments, as if in search of the object he named, “he’d have been like so much varmin to me, and if he hadn’t married my poor lass, I should have shot him as I would a stoat.”
Time ran on after its fashion, but few changes took place at Brackley. Sir John Day used to thank Oldroyd for introducing to him the best keeper who ever stepped, for Hayle was the higher in favour from his being a man who was a capital judge of stock, and one who could keep a good eye upon the farm when the squire went away year by year for a long stay abroad. When at home, Glynne was her uncle’s constant companion in his botanical walks, and these generally ended in her being left at the cottage where Mrs Alleyne, widowed of son as well as husband, took up her residence in full view of the gloomy old Firs, lately taken by a famous astronomer, who vastly altered the former occupant’s position by his eagerness to acquire Moray Alleyne’s costly instruments which had been carefully cared for by his mother’s hands.
At The Warren, Mrs Rolph, grown careworn and grey, resided still with her niece for companion, her son never having been there since Marjorie was left to her despair. The servants were not above talking, and rumours reached Brackley Hall that Mrs Rolph had cursed her son, and was never going to see him again, that it was a place no servant could stop in, for the old lady’s temper was awful, and Miss Marjorie as mad as a March hare; while even Oldroyd hinted to his wife, after being called in, that Miss Emlin was rather flighty and strange.
“They never go out anywhere,” he said; “and from what I saw, I should say they are always either quarrelling or making it up. Seem fond of one another though, all the same.”
“But what do you mean by flighty and strange?” said Lucy. “You don’t mean ready to flirt with men?”
Oldroyd burst into a hearty laugh, and caught up his youngest child.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he cried. “Never will I be false to thee. How does the song go? She’s got the complaint that ladies have who have been crossed in love as folks call it. Seriously, dear, I should not be surprised if she did turn a little crazy.”
“Oh, Phil; how horrible!”
“Yes; my dear,” he said seriously, but with a humorous twinkle in his eye; “I understand these things. I knew a young doctor once who very nearly became a candidate for a private asylum.”
“Phil!—Yes; what is it?”
“Messenger, ma’am, from Brackley. Would master be kind enough to step over.”
“Oh, Phil, dear; Glynne is ill,” cried Lucy, piteously. “I had a presentiment last night. Here, I’ll take the children over to mamma, and come with you.”
“Wait a moment,” cried Oldroyd, and he ran out to speak to Sir John’s groom and came back.
“All right,” he said. “No one ill? Something about Hayle the keeper the man says. Wanted directly.”
“Poor fellow’s wound has broken out again,” thought Oldroyd, as he jumped into the dog-cart the groom had waiting, and he questioned the man, who only knew that the keeper had come in to see Sir John that morning, and then he had been sent off to fetch the doctor.
“Terrible dry time, sir,” said the man as the horse sped along toward the park. “We out of the stables had all to go and help the gardeners two whole days watering.”
“Yes; the crops are suffering badly, my man.”
“They just are, sir. The lake’s half empty, and the fish getting sick, and Hayle says the boggy bits beyond the park where they get the snipe in winter’s nearly all dried up.”
“The conversation ended as the dog-cart was rattled up the lime avenue, and there, at the great porch, stood Sir John, the major, and Hayle the keeper.”
“Morning! Glad you’ve come,” said Sir John, shaking hands. “That will do, Smith.”
The groom, who was eager to know what was the matter, drove sulkily round to the stables, while Sir John took the doctor’s arm.
“Look here, Oldroyd,” he said; “the keeper has made a discovery in the bog wood over yonder.”
“Poacher shot!” exclaimed the doctor.
“Wait and see,” said Sir John, who was looking pallid; while the major had a peculiarly stern look in his fierce face.
Oldroyd bowed, and they walked rapidly across the park, and through some of the preserves. Then in and out among the pines till an open moorland patch was reached, dotted here and there with scrubby pines, and here Sir John turned.
“Now, Hayle,” he said; “you lead.”
The keeper went in front, and Sir John followed; while the major came abreast of the doctor.
“We thought it better to have you with us, doctor,” whispered the major. “It’s a terrible business—a clearing up of a sad event from what I can see.”
Oldroyd felt more mystified than ever, but he was soon to be illumined, for the keeper led them over the dry cotton rushes and rustling reeds to a dried up pool, half in the open, half hidden by a dense growth of alder.
Here he paused and pointed.
“On yonder, Sir John, about fifty yards.”
The baronet walked straight forward, parting the growth with his stout stick, till he stopped short at the edge of a dried up pool, where the first thing Oldroyd saw was Marjorie Emlin seated on the edge, where a wiry tuft of rushes grew, with her feet amongst the dried confervae and crowfoot at the bottom of the pool. She had taken off her hat, and the sun turned her rich, tawny, red hair to gold as she bent over something which glittered in her hands; and this she transferred to one wrist as they came up.
It was not till they were close beside her that she turned her head, and nodded and smiled in a childish, vacant way, and then held up the glittering bracelet upon her wrist for them to admire.
“Better speak to her,” whispered Sir John. “Hayle says she’s quite mad.”
Oldroyd stooped and picked up the hat and handed it to the girl.
“The sun is very powerful,” he said; “had you not better put it on.”
She snatched the hat with childish petulance, and then held up the bracelet again.
“It’s the one she gave to Glynne,” said Sir John involuntarily.
Marjorie looked at him sharply, and then pointed down at something covered partially by the dried scum of the pool.
“Quick, for God’s sake, get her away, Oldroyd!” whispered the major, stepping between the wretched woman and the ghastly remains at her feet.
The task did not prove an easy one, for Marjorie resented the doctor’s interference, and seemed determined to stay, but suddenly turned upon her heel and walked away, looking back once to smile and nod at the group standing by the bed of the dried up pool.
“I found her here, sir, this morning, soon after breakfast, and tried to persuade her to come away,” said Hayle; “but, poor girl, she didn’t seem to know me a bit, and I didn’t like to go and tell Mrs Rolph, for I’m afraid she’s crazed.”
“He came on and told us, Oldroyd,” said Sir John; “and we thought it would be better to have you here. How long is it since you were by here, Hayle?”
“Close upon three weeks, Sir John,” said the keeper; “and there was a little water left in the pool then. Shall I try and find out who it is?”
Sir John looked at the remains with horror. “Better leave it to the police,” he said. “They must be told, of course. Try, though, if there are any means of identification, and pick up the loose cases. Jem,” he whispered, with a look of horror, “has judgment come upon this man as we see?”
The major made no reply, but eagerly watched the keeper who picked up case after case, rotted and stained by the mud in which they had lain. These were placed together, and then Hayle stooped to cut open a discoloured piece of velveteen which had once been brown.
From this he extracted a rusty knife, and a tobacco-box of brass, which set all at rest directly, for Hayle held the latter before Sir John.
“Don’t want any further search to find out that, Sir John,” he said sharply. “A man has been missing from these parts for years now, and there’s his name.”
Sir John looked at the tarnished metal box, with a shudder of disgust and horror for the memories it revived, and read there roughly scratched upon the lid—“Caleb Kent.”
“Remember what I said to you one day, Lucy?” said Oldroyd, about a year later. “I think it was that day when I was called over to Brackley about something being found.”
“Oh, Phil, don’t bring that up,” cried Lucy, with a shudder; “but what do you mean?”
“About Miss Emlin. I’ve just come from there.”
“Yes, dear. Some fresh trouble?”
He nodded his head gravely.
“They’ve taken her to a private asylum. I did not say anything to you before, for fear of upsetting you, but she was not fit to be left with poor old Mrs Rolph, and she has tried to drown herself twice.”