They went together to the Maze after dark, Karl letting the doctor in with his own key. The whole history had been revealed to him. Nothing was kept back, save a small matter or two connected with the means of Sir Adam's daily concealment: of those no living soul without the Maze was cognisant, save three: Karl, Hewitt, and Smith the agent. Mr. Moore was entrusted with it later, but not at first. During the lifetime of a medical man, it falls to his lot to hear some curious family secrets, as it had to Mr. Moore; but he had never met with one half so strange and romantic as this.
Sir Adam had dismissed the signs of his illness, and--it will hardly be credited--attired himself in evening dress. With the departure of Mr. Tatton, old habits resumed their sway, with all their surrounding incaution. Mr. Moore saw the same tall, fine man, with the white and even teeth, that he had caught the transient glimpse of in the uncertain twilight some weeks before. The same, but with a difference: for the face was shrunken now, little more than half the size it had been then. In the past week or two he had changed rapidly. He met them when they entered--it was in the upstairs sitting-room: standing at the door erect, his head thrown back. Mr. Moore put out his hand; but the other did not take it.
"Do you know all, sir?" he asked.
"All, Sir Adam."
"And you are not my enemy?"
"Your true friend, Sir Adam. Never a truer one shall be about you than I."
Their hands met then. "But I am not Sir Adam here, you know; I am Mr. Grey. Ah, doctor, what a life it has been!"
"A life that has done its best to kill him," thought the doctor, as he sat down. "Why did you not call me in before?" he asked.
"Well, we were afraid. You would be afraid of everybody if you were in my place and position. Besides, this disease, whatever it may turn out to be, has developed itself so rapidly that but little time seems to have been lost. I do not see how you will come in now, if it is to be a daily visit, without exciting the curiosity of the neighbourhood."
"Oh, nonsense," said the surgeon. "Mrs. Grey has a renewal of illness and I come in to see her. The curious neighbours will understand if they are exacting upon the point. Or old Hopley, your gardener--I'm sure his rheumatism must need a doctor sometimes."
Sir Adam laughed. "Hopley will do best," he said. "And then you know, doctor, if--if the worst comes to the worst; that is, the worst so far as sickness is concerned, I can be carried out as Hopley."
"What do you think of him, Mr. Moore?" enquired Karl gravely when the interview was over.
"I will tell you more about it when I have seen more of him," was the surgeon's answer. But his face and tone both assumed, or seemed to Karl to assume, an ominous shade as he gave it.
Mrs. Cleeve was at Foxwood. She had been staying in London with her sister, Lady Southal, and took the opportunity to come down to see her daughter. Lucy's appearance startled her. As is well known, we are slow to discern any personal change either for the better or the worse in those with whom we live in daily intercourse: it requires an absence of days or weeks, as the case may be, to perceive it in all its naked reality. Mrs. Cleeve saw what none around Lucy had seen--at least, to the extent--and it shocked and alarmed her. The face was a sad, drawn face; dark rims encircled the sweet brown eyes; the whole air and bearing were utterly spiritless.
"What can be the matter with you, my dear?" questioned Mrs. Cleeve, seizing on the first opportunity that they were alone together.
"The matter with me, mamma!" returned Lucy, making believe not to understand why the question should be put: though her face flushed to hectic. "Nothing is the matter with me."
"There most certainly is, Lucy; with your health or with your mind. You could not be as you are, or look as you do unless there were."
"I suffered a great deal from the heat," said poor Lucy.
"My dear--you are suffering from something else; and I think you should enlighten me as to its nature. After that fever even you did not look as you are looking now."
But not an iota of acknowledgment from her daughter could Mrs. Cleeve obtain. Lucy would not admit that aught was amiss in any way; at least, that she was conscious of it. Mrs. Cleeve next appealed to Miss Blake.
But that young lady, absorbed by her own pursuits and interests; by the Reverend Mr. Cattacomb and the duties at St. Jerome's, had really not been observant of Lucy's fading face. She could be regardful enough in a contemptuous sort of way of Sir Karl's delinquencies, and of what she looked upon as his wife's blind infatuation; she did not omit to note the signs of trouble and care too evidently apparent in him, and which she set down as the result of an uneasy conscience: but she had failed to note them in Lucy. One cause of this perhaps was, that in her presence Lucy invariably put on an air of lightness, not to say gaiety: and Miss Blake was rarely at home, except at meals; if she did get an hour there she was up to the ears in silks and church embroidery. What with Matins and Vespers, and the other daily engagements at St. Jerome's; what with looking after St. Jerome's pastors; what with keeping the young fry in order, including Tom Pepp, and seeing to the spiritual interests of their mothers, Miss Blake had so much on her hands that it was no wonder she was not very observant of Lucy.
"I do not think there is anything particular the matter with Lucy," was the answer she made to Mrs. Cleeve.
"You must see how ill she looks, Theresa."
"She is not ill. At least, that I know of. She eats her dinner, and dresses, and goes out, and has company at home. I really had not observed that she was looking ill."
"She talks of the heat," continued Mrs. Cleeve; "but that is all nonsense. Extreme heat may make a person thin, but it cannot make them sad and spiritless."
"Lucy is neither sad nor spiritless--that I have noticed."
"Perhaps you have not noticed, Theresa. You have so many out-of-door pursuits, you know. I suppose," continued Mrs. Cleeve, with some hesitation, and lowering her voice to a confidential tone as she put the question, "I suppose there is nothing wrong between her and her husband?"
"Wrong in what way, do you mean?" rejoined Miss Blake.
"Any misunderstanding or unpleasantness."
"I should saynot," returned Miss Blake, with some acrimony. "It is rather the other way. Lucy is blindly, absurdly infatuated with Sir Karl. If he boxed her on the one ear, she would offer him the other."
"It cannot be that, then," sighed Mrs. Cleeve. "I only thought of it because there was nothing else I could think of. For I cannot help fancying, Theresa, that the malady is on her spirits, more than on her health. I--I wonder whether that ague-fever left unsuspected consequences behind it that are developing themselves now?"
Theresa, her attention given to the employment in her hand--a cross she was working in gold thread to adorn some part or other of Mr. Cattacomb's canonicals--a great deal more than it was given to the conversation, allowed the doubt to pass undiscussed. Mrs. Cleeve had always been accustomed to worry herself over Lucy: Theresa supposed it was the habit of mothers to do so, who had only one daughter. So the subject of Lucy's looks dropped for the time.
"What is that for?" resumed Mrs. Cleeve, directing her attention to the small gold cords.
"This? Oh, a little ornament I am making. Please don't touch it, Mrs. Cleeve, or you will entangle the threads."
Thus rebuked, Mrs. Cleeve sat for some moments in silence, inhaling the fresh air through the open window, and the perfume of the late flowers. The mignonette, in its large clusters, seemed as though it intended to bloom on until winter.
"Theresa, how much longer do you intend to remain here?" she suddenly asked. "Your stay has been a very long one."
Theresa was aware of that. She was slightly suspicious that Sir Karl and his wife had begun to think the same thing, though in their courtesy they were not likely to let it appear. In truth the matter was causing her some little reflection: for she would willingly have made the Court her permanent home. While Mr. Cattacomb remained at St. Jerome's,sheshould remain. It might have been somewhat of a mistake to institute St. Jerome's, and to bring Mr. Cattacomb to it: Miss Blake could recognise it now: but as that step had been taken, she could only abide by it.
"I am not likely to leave at present," she replied. "It would be very dull for Lucy to be here without me. As the winter weather comes on, my out-door duties will be somewhat curtailed, and I shall be able to give her more of my time. Lucy would be lost by herself, Mrs. Cleeve. She was always rather given to moping."
Yes. There was no doubt Lucy did "mope." Mrs. Cleeve sighed deeply. A cloud lay on Foxwood Court, and she could not trace out its source.
The cloud, she thought, lay on Sir Karl as well as on Lucy. That is, his sadness, his weary face, and his evident preoccupation were quite as visible to Mrs. Cleeve as were her daughter's. But for Theresa's emphatic assurance to the contrary, she might still have doubted whether the cloud did not lie betweenthem. She was a single-minded, kind-hearted, simple-natured lady, not given to think ill, or to look out for it: but in this case she did try to observe and notice. She could not help seeing how seldom Karl and his wife were together. Karl would drive Lucy out occasionally; but as a rule they saw but little of him. He was generally present at meals, and always sociable and kind, and he would come into the drawing-room when visitors called, if at home; spending his other time chiefly in his own room, and in walking out alone. Late in the evenings he would usually be absent: Mrs. Cleeve noticed that. She had seen him walk across the lawn in the gloom to one of the little gates; she had seen him come in again after an hour or two's interval; and she wondered where he went to.
The truth was, Karl was obliged to go to the Maze more frequently than he used to go, or than was at all prudent. Mr. Moore had not yet pronounced the fatal fiat on Sir Adam that Dr. Cavendish had--doubtfully--imparted to Mr. Detective Tatton; but he concealed from none of them that the case was one of extreme gravity; ay, and of danger. That Sir Adam grew more attenuated might be seen almost daily; he himself assumed that he had but a short span left of life; and he would not allow Karl to be for one single evening absent. Sometimes in the day Karl also went there. The conviction that Adam would not be long among them lay on every heart more or less: and it will be readily understood that Karl should sacrifice somewhat of caution to be with him while he might.
"Karlo, brother mine, you'll come over to-morrow morning?" Sir Adam would say, when their hands met for the evening farewell--and he would keep the hand until the answer should be given.
"If I can, Adam."
"That won't do. You must. Promise."
"I will, then. I will, if I can do it with safety."
And of course he had to go. Under other and happier circumstances, he would never have quitted the invalid night or day.
The lack of what Karl considered "safety," as he spoke it in his answer, would have consisted in the highway before the Maze gates being peopled; in his being seen to enter. It was so very unfrequented a road that not a soul would pass up or down for a quarter of an hour together; nay, for half one; and, as a rule, Karl was safe. But he exercised his precaution always. He would saunter towards the gate, as though merely taking a stroll on the shady side path; and then, the coast being clear, ring--for by day-time he never used his own key. His ears and eyes alike on the alert; he, if by mal-chance some solitary passenger should appear, would saunter over to Mr. Smith and talk to him: and then slip in when the intruder should have passed, Ann Hopley having the door by that time ready to open. Karl would use the same precaution coming out: and hitherto had escaped observation.
It was not always to be so.
The time passed on: Sir Adam fluctuating, some days fearfully ill, some days feeling well and hearty; and Mrs. Cleeve continuing at Foxwood, for she could not bear to leave Lucy.
Karl went across one morning soon after breakfast. His brother had been very ill indeed the evening before: so ill that Karl had brought most unpleasant thoughts away with him. He was ringing at the gate when it suddenly opened; Ann Hopley was letting out Mr. Moore.
So far ashisvisits went, there had been no trouble. Foxwood had taken care to inform itself as to what patient at the Maze it was that Mr. Moore was again in regular attendance upon, and found it to be Hopley the gardener. The old man had caught an attack of rheumatic fever, or some other affection connected with age and knee joints--said the Miss Moores to the rest of the fair flock going to and from St. Jerome's. There was neither interest nor romance attaching to the poor old man; so the doctor was at liberty to pass in and out at will without the slightest thought being given to it. In the doctor's day-book the patient, was entered as "James Hopley, Mrs. Grey's servant" The doctor's assistant, a fashionable young man from London, who wore an eye-glass stuck in his eye, could have the pleasure of reading it ten times a day if he chose.
"How is he?" asked Karl of Mr. Moore.
"Oh, better this morning--as I expected he would be," was the surgeon's answer. "But I have ordered him to lie in bed for the day. This time I think he will obey me, for he feels uncommonly weak."
"Every fresh attack makes him weaker," observed Karl.
"Why of course it does: it must do so. I don't half like the responsibility that lies on me," continued the doctor. "We ought to have another opinion."
"How can it be had?" remonstrated Karl.
"There it is--how? I wish he could be in London under the constant care of one of its practised men."
"We wish this, and wish the other, Mr. Moore," said Karl, sadly, "and you know how impossible it is for us to do more than we are doing. Answer me truly--for I think you can answer. Would there be a fair chance of his recovery if we had other advice than yours? Would there be any better chance of it?"
"Honestly speaking I do not think there would. I believe I am doing for him all that can be done."
Ann Hopley drew the gate open again, and the doctor went out. Karl passed on through the labyrinth.
Sir Adam liked to use his own will in all respects, and it was the first time he had made even a semblance of obeying Mr. Moore's orders of taking rest by daytime. He looked very ill. The once handsome face seemed shrunk to nothing; the short hair was almost white; the grey-blue eyes, beautiful as Karl's, had a strangely wistful, patient look in them.
"I thought you would be here, Karlo. I have wanted you ever since daylight."
"Are you feeling better, Adam? Free from pain?"
"Much better. Quite free from it."
"Moore has been saying he wishes we could get you to London, that you might have more skilled advice."
"What nonsense!" cried Adam. "As if any advice could really avail me! He knows it would not. Did it avail my father, Karl?"
Karl remained silent. There was no answer he could make.
"Sit down, old fellow, and tell me all the news. Got a paper with you?"
"The papers have not come yet," replied Karl, as he drew a chair to the bedside.
"Slow coaches, people are in this world! I shall get up presently."
"No, Adam, not to-day. Moore says you must not."
"Good old man! he is slow too. But he won't keep me in bed, Karl, when I choose to quit it. Why should I not get up?" continued Sir Adam, his voice taking a tone of its old defiance. "I am the best judge of my own strength. If I lay here for a month of Sundays, Karl, it would not add a day to my life."
Perhaps that was true. At any rate, Adam was one whom it was of no use to urge one way or the other.
"What's the old adage, Karlo?--'a short life and a merry one?' Mine has not been very merry of late, has it?"
"I wish we could get you well, Adam."
"Do you? We are told, you know, that all things as they fall, are for the best. The world would say, I expect, that this is. I wonder sometimes, though, how soon or how late the enemy would have shown itself, had my life continued smooth as yours is."
Smooth as yours is! The unconscious words brought a pang to Karl's heart; they sounded so like mockery. Heaven alone knew the distress and turbulence of his.
"I got Moore into a cosy chat the other day," resumed Sir Adam: "the wife was safe away, trimming the plants in the greenhouse--Rose is nearly as good a gardener as I am, Karl."
"I know she is fond of gardening."
"Ay, and has been amidst it for years, you see. Well--I led Moore on, saying this, and asking the other, and he opened his mind a bit. The disease was in me always, he thinks, Karl, and must have come out, sooner or later. It was only a question of time. I have said so myself of late. But I did not look to follow the little olive branch quite so quickly."
"We may keep you here a long while yet, Adam. It is still possible, I hope, we may keep you for good. Moore has not said to the contrary."
"You think he knows it, though?"
Karl was really not sure. His own opinion was this--that Adam had less chance of getting well where he was than he would have had under those of the London faculty, whose specialty embraced that class of disease.
"Shall you put on mourning for me, old fellow? It will be a risk, won't it? I shan't care to be held up to the world as Adam Andinnian, dead, any more than I do, alive. You'll not care to say, either, 'This black coat is worn for that brother of mine: the mauvais sujet who set the world all agog with his scandal.'"
What kind of a mood was Sir Adam in this morning? Karl's grave eyes questioned it. One of real, light, careless mockery?--or was it an underlying current of sadness and regret making itself too uneasily felt in his heart?
"Don't, Adam. It jars on every chord and pulse. You and I have cause to be at least more sober than other men."
"What have I said?" cried Sir Adam, half laughing. "That you may have to put on mourning for me. It is in the nature of things that the elder should go before the younger. You look well in black, too, Karl; men with such faces as yours always do."
"I hope it will be a long while before I have to wear it," sighed Karl, perceiving how hopeless it was to change his brother's humour.
"I'd bet Foxwood with you that it will be before Christmas."
"Adam, is it right to speak in this way?"
"Is it particularly wrong?"
"Why do you do it?"
"Need of change, I suppose. I have had a solemn night of it, old fellow: and I hardly know yet whether I was asleep or awake. It was somewhat of both, I expect: but I thought I was amidst the angels. I can see them now as they looked; a whole crowd of them gathered about my bed. And, Karlo, when a man begins to dream of angels, and not to be able to decide afterwards whether it be a dream or a shadowed reality, it is a pretty sure sign, I take it, that no great time will elapse before he is with them."
Before Karl left, Adam had talked himself into a doze. With his worn and haggard face turned to the wall, he slept as peacefully as a child. Karl stole away, and went into the greenhouse. Rose was there amid the plants; the sunlight shining on her beautiful hair turned it into threads of gold. She lifted her white face, with its sad expression.
"I knew you were with him, Karl, so I did not come in. Don't you think he looks very, very ill this morning."
"Yes, he certainly does. He is asleep now."
"Asleep! In the daytime!"
"He had a bad night, I fancy."
"Do you think there's hope, Karl?" she piteously asked--almost as if all hope had left herself.
"I don't know, Rose. Mr. Moore has not told me there is none."
"Perhaps it is that he will not say," she rejoined, resting her elbow on the green steps amid the plants, and her cheek on her hand. "I seem to see it, Karl; to see what is coming. Indeed, you might tell me the truth. I shall not feel it quite so much as I should had our circumstances been happier."
"I have told you as far as I know, Rose."
"There's my little baby gone: there's my husband going: all my treasures will be in the better world. I shall have nothing to do but live on for, and look forward to, the time when I may go to them. Six months ago, Karl, had I known Adam must die, I think the grief would have killed me. But the apprehension we have undergone the last few weeks--Adam's dread, and my awful fear for him--has gone a great way to reconcile me. I see--and I think he sees--that Death would not be the worst calamity. Better for him to be at rest than live on in that frightful peril night and day; each moment as it passes one of living agony, lest the next should bring the warders of Portland Island to retake him. No wonder it is wearing him out."
Karl went away echoing the last sentence; every word she had spoken leaving its echo of pain on his heart. No: it was no wonder that fatal illness had seized on Adam Andinnian before its time.
Well, on this day Karl was not to escape unnoticed so easily. Ann Hopley unlocked the gate, and then both of them stood listening according to custom. Not a sound broke the stillness, save the furious chirping somewhere of two quarrelsome sparrows: not a step could be heard awaking the echoes or the ground. Ann Hopley drew back the half of the gate, and Karl went forth.
Went forth to find himself, so to say, in the very arms of Mrs. Cleeve and Miss Blake. They were standing quite still (which fact accounted for their footsteps not being heard) gazing at these same two fighting birds in the hedge. What with Karl's naturally nervous organization, and what with the dread secret he had just left, every drop of blood went out of his face. But he did not lose his presence of mind.
"Looking on at a fight, Mrs. Cleeve!" he exclaimed in a light tone. "Birds have their hasty passions as well as men, you see. You wicked combatants! Let one another's heads alone. They'll not look any the better without feathers."
One of the noisy birds, as if in obedience, flew away to a distant tree; the other followed it. Karl stayed talking for a minute with the ladies; heard that they had come out for a little walk; and then he went on to his home. Mrs. Cleeve, as she continued her way, glanced inquisitively at the iron gate in passing.
"Do the same people live there still, Theresa? Let me see--a Mrs. Grey, was it not?"
"Oh yes, she lives there," slightingly returned Miss Blake. "She had a baby at the close of summer, but it died."
"A baby! Why, she was a young widow? Stay--no--what was it?--Oh, her husband was abroad. Yes, I remember now. Has he come home yet?"
"As much as he ever will come, I expect," observed Miss Blake. "The girl has just as much a husband as I have, Mrs. Cleeve."
"Why, what is it that you would imply?" cried Mrs. Cleeve, struck with the words and the tone.
"I once, quite accidentally, heard her sing, 'When lovely woman stoops to folly?' You know the song? It was, in one sense of the word, sung in character."
"Oh, dear!" cried Mrs. Cleeve! "But--but what does Sir Karl do there?"
"Sir Karl? Oh--he is her landlord."
The taunting kind of way in which Miss Blake said it, turned Mrs. Cleeve's delicate cheeks to a rosy red. All kinds of unpleasant thoughts began crowding into her mind.
"Theresa, what do you mean?" she asked, her voice dropping with its own dread. "Haveyou any meaning?"
And the chances were--taking into consideration the love of gossip and of scandal so inherent in woman--that Theresa Blake would there and then have disclosed that she had a meaning, and what the meaning was: but in that self-same moment she happened to turn her eyes on Mr. Smith, the agent. He was leaning over his garden gate, playing with a bunch of late roses; and he gravely lifted his hat to Miss Blake as she looked at him.
There was something in the grave look, or in the sight of the man himself, or in the roses, telling of summer, that recalled most vividly to Miss Blake's mind the private conversation she had once held with Mr. Smith, and the caution he had given her. At any rate, Jane Shore and the lighted taper, and the white sheet, and all the other accessories, rose up before her mental vision as plainly as one can see into a mirror. The penance looked no more palatable to Miss Blake now than it had then. As well keep clear of such risks, great and small. She changed her tone.
"I really don't know anything about the young woman, Mrs. Cleeve. Pray do not take up a mistaken notion. She is Sir Karl's tenant; that is all."
"But if she is not--quite--quite circumspect in her conduct, it must be rather unpleasant to have her close to the Court," said Mrs. Cleeve.
"Oh, she lives a perfectly retired life."
"She is very pretty, I think?"
"Beautiful as an angel."
Nothing more passed. The two sparrows came flying to a proximate tree, and began fighting again. But an uneasy impression was left on Mrs. Cleeve's mind; for she could not forget the strangely-significant tone in which Miss Blake had spoken, and its too sudden change to cautious indifference.
Karl was pacing one of the broad paths that evening, in his grounds, when he found himself joined by Mrs. Cleeve. She had thrown a warm shawl over her grey silk evening dress. He gave her his arm. The shadows were deepening: the evening star was already twinkling in the clear sky.
"I want to tell you of a little plan I have formed, Sir Karl, and get your assent to it. It cannot have escaped your notice that Lucy is looking very ill."
"I have seen it for some time," he answered.
"And I should have spoken to you of it before," resumed Mrs. Cleeve, "only that Lucy herself seems so much annoyed when I allude to it, telling me that nothing is the matter with her, and begging me not to take up fancies. Are you aware of anything being wrong with her general health?"
"No, I am not: there is nothing wrong with it that I know of," returned Karl, unpleasantly conscious that he was not likely to know more about his wife's general health than any other of the Court's inmates.
"Well, what I wish to do is this: to take Lucy to town with me when I leave, and let some physician see her."
"But you are not leaving us yet?"
"Not just yet, perhaps; but when I do go. In fact, I really must take her. I could not be easy to go back home and leave Lucy looking as she is, without having some good medical opinion. Have you any objection to this?"
"Not the slightest. I do not fancy any physician could do much good to Lucy--she has certainly, as I believe, no specific disease--but I think change of air and scene may be of much benefit to her. I am glad that she should go."
"Well, now that I have your permission, Sir Karl, I shall know how to act. Lucy has been telling me that she does not need a physician, and will not see one; and that she does not care to go to London. But that we have never had consumption in our family, I should fear it for Lucy."
Karl was silent. That Lucy had taken the unfortunate secret to heart in a strange manner, and that it was telling upon her most unaccountably, he knew.
"It is rather ungrateful of her to say she does not care to go to London, considering that she has never stayed with her aunt since that time of illness at Winchester," resumed Mrs. Cleeve. "Though, indeed, Lucy seems to have no energy left, and her cheerfulness appears to me more sham than reality. Lady Southal is anxious for her to go up with me."
"Are you intending to stay again with Lady Southal yourself?"
"I shall now; as long as Lucy does. And, armed with your authority, I shall insist on Lucy's going up with me. I wish you would come too, Sir Karl: my sister would be so glad to see you."
With his unfortunate brother dying at the Maze, it was not possible for Karl to quit Foxwood. But he was exceedingly glad that Lucy should be absent for a time. It would leave him more at liberty. At least, in spirit. With Lucy's intense contempt and hatred for the Maze and its troubles, Karl never went there but he was conscious of feeling something like a school-boy, who is in mischief away from home.
"I cannot leave home just now," said Karl. "But you must tell Lady Southal that I shall be most happy to take a future opportunity of paying her a visit."
"Are you busy, that you cannot leave?"
"My Uncle Joseph's papers are not arranged yet; I am anxious to get on with them," he said, by way of excuse. And in truth that, so far, was so. In his mind's terrible distress the sorting of the papers had been much neglected.
"At least, you will come to town to fetch Lucy home."
"Of course I will."
The affair decided, they strolled the whole length of the walk in silence. Karl's thoughts were no doubt busy: Mrs. Cleeve was wishing to say something else, and did not quite know how to begin.
"What a nice evening it is!" cried Karl. "How fair the weather continues to be!"
"Yes. But the hedges are showing signs of winter. I noticed it particularly when I was out with Theresa this morning. That was the Maze, I think, that we saw you coming out of."
Karl assented. There was no help for it.
"Does the young lady live there alone still?"
"She has her servants with her."
"But not her husband."
"Mr. Grey, it is understood, spends a good deal of his time in travelling."
"Sir Karl, I think I must ask you plainly. I have been wanting to ask you," she said, taking courage. "Is there any reason for supposing that this lady is not--is not quite what she ought to be?"
"Why, what do you mean?" returned Karl, standing still in his surprise. "Are you speaking of Mrs. Grey?"
"It is almost impossible to avoid attaching some doubt to a young and lovely woman, when she lives so unaccountably secluded a life," returned Mrs. Cleeve, calling up the most plausible excuse she could for her suspicions.
"The very fact of her keeping herself so secluded ought to absolve Mrs. Grey from it," said Karl warmly. "She is a good and honourable lady."
"You feel sure of that?"
"I am sure of it. I know it. Believe me, dear Mrs. Cleeve, that Lucy herself is not more pure and innocent than that pure lady is," he added, taking Mrs. Cleeve's hands in his earnestness, in his anxiety to convince her. "She has had great trouble to try her; she may be said to live in trouble: but heaven knows how good she is, and how persistently she strives to be resigned, and endure."
Mrs. Cleeve kept the sensitive hands in hers; she saw how worthy of trust he was in his earnestness; and every doubt went out of her.
"I am very glad to hear it. I hope she and you will pardon my foolish thoughts. You go to see her sometimes, I believe?"
"When I think I can be of any use, I go. Her husband was once my dear friend: I go there for his sake."
"Why does he not live here with her?"
"He cannot always do just as he would. Just now he is in bad health."
"And she lost her baby, I hear."
"Yes. It was a great grief to both of them."
The sounding of the dinner-gong stopped the questioning. We may be assured Karl lost no time in conducting Mrs. Cleeve to the house.
Foxwood was going on quietly with the approach of winter. Mrs. Cleeve had gone to London with her daughter; leaving Miss Blake to keep house at the Court. Some ladies, fearing the world's chatter, might have objected to remain with so young and attractive a man as Sir Karl Andinnian; Miss Blake was a vast deal too strong-minded for any thought of the kind. She was busy as ever with St. Jerome's and its offices; but she nevertheless kept a tolerably keen look-out on the Maze and on Sir Karl's movements as connected with it. He went there more than he used to do: by day now as well as by night: and she wondered how long the simple neighbourhood would keep its eyes closed to facts and figures, that, to her, were so offensively plain.
There had been a sharpish frost in the night, but the glorious morning sun had chased its signs away. At midday it was shining hotly; and Karl was almost glad of the thin screen of leaves left in the labyrinth as he made his way through it. Some days had passed now since Adam had had any sharp amount of illness: he was wasting away rapidly, and that was the worst outward sign. But his will in these intervals of ease was indomitable, and it imparted to him a fictitious strength.
As Karl came in view of the lawn, he saw Rose standing by one of the distant beds, talking to Hopley. The old man was digging; and had bent himself nearly double over his work. Karl crossed over, a reprimand on his lips.
"Adam, you should not. You promised me you would not again take a spade or other gardening implement in your hand. Your strength is not equal to it, and it must do you harm."
"Just hark at him, Rose. It would not be Karlo if he did not find fault with me. What shall you do for somebody to croak at, brother mine, when I am gone?"
Was it Hopley who spoke?--or was it Sir Adam? The falling-in mouth and the speech, the crooked back, the tottering and swelling knees, the smock-frock and the red comforter and the broad straw hat, all were Hopley's. But the manner of speech and the eyes too, now you came to see them as he looked up at Karl, were Sir Adam's.
Yes. They were one and the same. Poor old Hopley the gardener was but Sir Adam in disguise. With the padded knees and the false hump he had managed to deceive the world, including Mr. Detective Tatton. He might not perhaps have so surely deceived Mr. Tatton had the latter been looking after Sir Adam Andinnian and been acquainted with his person. But the decrepid gardener bore no resemblance to Philip Salter: and, that fact ascertained, it was all that concerned Mr. Tatton.
It may be remembered that when Mrs. Andinnian was staying at Weymouth, she and her servant, Ann Hopley, were in secret communication with one of the warders of Portland Prison: in point of fact, they were negotiating with him the possibilities of Sir Adam's escape. This man was James Hopley; a warder--as Karl had taken him to be, and also Ann's husband. In the scuffle that took place the night of the escape, the man really killed was the other prisoner, Cole: and it was he who was taken to Foxwood and lay buried in its churchyard. Hopley was drowned.
At that period, and for some little time before it, Philip Smith was at Portland Prison. Not as a prisoner: the man had never in his life done aught to merit incarceration: but seeking employment there, through the interest of one of the chief warders who was a friend of his--a man named O'Brian. From the date of the frauds of Philip Salter, Philip Smith had been--as he considered it--a ruined man: at any rate he was unable to obtain employment. A ruined man must not be fastidious, and Smith was willing and was anxious to become a warder if they would make him one. It was while he was waiting and hoping for the post, and employed sometimes as an assistant, and thoroughly trusted, that the attempted escape of the prisoners occurred. Smith was one of those who put off in the boat after the fugitives: the other two being Hopley and O'Brian. In the scuffle on the Weymouth shore, Sir Adam was wounded and left for dead. O'Brian saw him lying there apparently dead, and supposed him to be so. O'Brian, however, afterwards received a blow that stunned him--for the night was dark, and friends and foes fought indiscriminately--and Smith contrived to get Adam away into a place of concealment. It is very probable that Smith foresaw in that moment how valuable a prize to him the living and escaped Sir Adam might become. O'Brian really believed him to be dead, and so reported him to the authorities. A dead man is worthless: and Sir Adam was allowed to be retained by his friends for interment: the beaten and disfigured Cole, shot in the face, being looked upon as Sir Adam.
After that, the path was easy. Sir Adam, very badly injured, lay for many weeks hidden away. Smith continued at Portland Prison keeping his own counsel, and unsuspected, visiting Sir Adam cautiously at intervals. As soon as it was practicable for him to be moved, the step was ventured on. He was got away in safety to London, and lay in retirement there, in a house that had been taken by Smith: his wife (formerly Rose Turner) coming up to join him; and Ann Hopley, faithful to Sir Adam's fortunes through all, waiting on them. She had no one else left to be faithful to now, poor woman. Smith managed everything. He had withdrawn himself from Portland Island, under the plea that he could no longer, in consequence of his disabled arm, aspire to a wardership--for his arm had been damaged that fatal night, and it was thought he would never have the full use of it again. The plea was unsuspiciously recognised by the prison authorities; Smith retained his friendship with O'Brian, and occasionally corresponded with him, getting from him scraps of useful information now and then. From that time his services were devoted to Sir Adam. It was he who communicated between Sir Adam and his mother; for, letters they did not dare to transmit. It was he who first disclosed to Mrs. Andinnian the fact that Miss Rose Turner was her son's wife; it was he who made the arrangements for Sir Adam's taking up his abode at the Maze, and provided the disguise to arrive at Foxwood in, as the decrepid old husband of the servant, Ann Hopley. To do Mr. Smith justice, he had fought against the scheme of coming to the Maze; but Mrs. Andinnian and Adam were both bent upon it; and he yielded. Adam and his wife had stayed in London under the name of Mrs. Grey, and she retained it.
Amidst the injuries Sir Adam received was one to the mouth and jaw. It destroyed those beautiful front teeth of his. After his recovery he sought the services of a clever but not much known dentist named Rennet, went to the pain of having the rest of his teeth extracted, and an entire set of false ones made. Two sets, in fact. The journey Rose took to London, when Miss Blake espied her with Karl, was for the purpose of getting one of these sets of teeth repaired, Sir Adam having broken the spring the night before. The teeth had to be conveyed personally to Mr. Rennet and brought away; for they were too cautious to entrust him with their address.
And now it will be seen how Sir Adam had concealed himself at the Maze. In the daytime he was the toothless, hump-backed, infirm old Hopley, working at his garden with enlarged knees and tottering steps: as soon as dusk came on, his false padding was thrown of with his smock frock and coarse clothes, and he was the well-bred gentleman, Sir Adam Andinnian, in his evening attire and with his white and even teeth. His assumed role was maintained always during the day; his meals were taken in the kitchen to be safe in case of any possible surprise, Ann attending upon him with all respect. The delay in admitting Nurse Chaffen, kept waiting once on the wrong side of the kitchen door, was caused by "Hopley's" taking out his set of teeth and putting on his broad-brimmed hat: for it was convenient to assume the teeth during the short period devoted to dinner. The deafness was of course assumed as an additional precaution. Thus he had lived, in a state of semi-security, tending his flowers and occupied with the care of his garden generally, an employment that he loved so well. The day that General Lloyd's party went in, Karl was transfixed with apprehension and amazement to see Hopley showing himself. Adam enjoyed it: it was so like him to brave things; and he feared no danger from a pleasure party like that.
Well, I think that is all that is needed in the way of explanation; and we can go on. Karl was looking at the digging with regretful eyes.
"You ought to be glad to see me at work again, Karl, instead of groaning over it," cried Sir Adam.
"And so I should be, Adam, only that I fear you will feel its effects unpleasantly by and by."
"I asked him not to do it, but he only laughed at me," said Rose.
"Somebody must do it. I can't see the garden quite neglected. Besides, if I am well enough to work there's no reason why I should not. I am not sure, Karl, but I shall cheat you now."
"Cheat me?"
"By getting well. What should you say to that?"
"Thank heaven for it: and do my best to get you away to a place of safety."
"By George, old fellow, I don't know that I shan't. I am feeling as blithe as a bee. Rose, take yourself a trifle further off; out of the mould."
He was throwing about the spadefuls almost as well as he had ever thrown them in his strength. Rose was cheated into something like hope, and her face for the moment lost its sadness.
"I wish to goodness I had a draught of beer," cried Adam. "Where's Ann, I wonder."
Karl went to fetch it. Ann Hopley shook her head at the idea of hope, when Karl spoke of it as she gave him the beer.
"You never saw any person, who was to live on, have the look in his face that he has, sir."
"He looks fairly well to-day."
"And so he will at times to the last, as it strikes me. I have had a good deal of experience in illness, sir. As to his talking about getting well--why, sir, you know what he is: saying this and that without meaning it. There's no doubt he feels pretty sure himself how it will be."
Karl sighed as he went back with the beer. Yes, there was no real hope.
That same night--or rather on the following morning, for the dawn was more than glimmering--Karl in his bed began to dream that he was out in a shower of hail. It seemed to be falling with great violence: so much so that a sharper crash awoke him. Lying awake for a moment and questioning where he was, he found the noise to be reality. The hail was beating on the chamber windows.
Wasit hail? Scarcely. It was crashing but on one window, and only came at intervals. It sounded more like gravel. Karl rose and opened the window. Smith the agent stood underneath. A prevision of evil shook Karl as he leaned out.
"He is very ill indeed, sir," said Smith in the lowest whisper possible to be heard, and extending his finger to indicate the Maze. "Mr. Moore's there and thinks it will be for death. I thought you would like to know it."
"How did you hear it?" asked Karl.
"Ann Hopley ran over and knocked me up, that I might go for the doctor."
"Thank you," replied Karl. "I'll be there directly."
Now it so happened that for some purposes of cleaning--for the Court was not exempt from those periodical visitations any more than the humble dwelling of Mrs. Chaffen--Miss Blake's chamber had been temporarily changed to the one next to that recently occupied by Lady Andinnian. Miss Blake was in the habit of sleeping with her window open; and, not being asleep at the time, she had heard Mr. Smith's footsteps and the crashes at Sir Karl's window. Of course she was curious as to what could cause the noise, and at first thought of housebreakers. Had Mr. Smith chanced to turn his head in the right direction during the colloquy with Sir Karl, he might have seen an elaborately night-capped head peeping forth cautiously.
"Why, it is Mr. Smith!" thought Miss Blake, as he walked away. "What an extraordinary thing! He must have been calling up Sir Karl."
Listening inside as well as out, Miss Blake heard the bell that was in Hewitt's chamber ring gently; and, after a minute or two, the latter proceeding to his master's room. Then they both went down together, and Hewitt let Sir Karl out at the hall door, and came upstairs again. Miss Blake, after a good deal of self-puzzling, arrived at the conclusion that the affair must be in some way connected with poachers--who had been busy on the land latterly--and returned to her bed.