One o'clock tolled out from the tower of Hendon church as Pauline, who,
wearied out by the events of the day, had fallen sound asleep in her
chair, opened her eyes, sat upright, and, after an involuntary shudder,
quietly rose to her feet and approached the bed.
Alice still slept peacefully; her breathing was quiet and regular,
and her unruffled brow and motionless lips proved that she was not
disturbed by haunting dreams. Pauline bent over the slumbering figure,
took up the arm that lay outside the coverlet, and softly felt its
pulse, bent her ear towards the sleeper's mouth to listen to her
respiration, and then, stealing back to her place as noiselessly as
she had approached, threw herself into her chair, and indulged in the
luxury of a long but silent yawn.
'There,' she said to herself, rubbing her eyes, and resuming her usual
comfortable attitude, 'I was right in not denying myself the pleasure
of that slumber which I found coming over me, for I am thoroughly
refreshed, and equal to very much more than I was before. What a day
it has been, my faith! And how wonderfully everything has gone exactly
as I could have wished it! This woman sleeping straight on, steadily
and tranquil, and without a break; the servants accepting me in the
position which I took up so promptly, without a murmur, and only too
glad to find the responsibility transferred from themselves to some one
else. Responsibility? That reminds me of that sly doctor--how do they
call him?--Broadbent! It was right of me to send for him; it might have
seemed suspicious had I not done so; and as I knew so well that he had
been perforce admitted into the mystery of Claxton-Calverley, and as
I had learned from the servants here that he was always most friendly
and kind to this poor doll, I knew that I could explain to him what I
had done, and leave it to him to put the people here at their ease.
He was out, though, this sly rogue--out, and not expected back until
the evening, so they said, though five minutes afterwards I saw a man,
who must have been he--black-clothed, grave, the very semblance of an
apothecary--come out of the side-door of his garden, and hurry down the
path where I stood when I first saw the child. Ah, ha! he has no longer
any desire to visit Rose Cottage, this medico so respectable; he fears
lest his name should be compromised. I could not help laughing as I saw
him creep down the path.
'Let me see. I am rested now, and my head is quite clear. Last night
there was danger of interruption from the servants, and they have
been in and out all day, but now they are thoroughly wearied out, and
I have the house to myself. Now is the time for me to look about me,
and gain what information I can concerning this young woman's previous
life. I think I saw a box or desk of some kind by the side of the
dressing-table. O, yes, here it is. What a funny old box!' Pauline
walked to the dressing-table, stooped, and from underneath the muslin
cover drew forth an old-fashioned writing-desk, made of mahogany, and
bound with brass, with a small brass plate on the middle of its lid,
on which were engraved the letters 'A.D.' This inscription caught
Pauline's eyes as she took up the desk and placed it on the table by
the bedside, within the rays of the shaded lamp.
'A.D.,' she muttered to herself. 'What does that mean? It ought
undoubtedly to have been A.C. Ah, stay; the box is old-fashioned, and
has seen much service. It is probably the desk of her childhood, that
she had before what she thought to be her marriage, when the letters
of her name were A.D. A.D.' repeated Pauline, reflecting. 'Ah, bah!
It is a coincidence, nothing more.' From her pocket she took two
bunches of keys, one large, evidently belonging to the housekeeping,
the other small and neat. From the smaller bunch she made two or three
selections, and at last hit upon the key that opened the desk.
The contents of the desk were two packets of letters, one large, one
small, each tied round with faded ribbon, two or three loose sheets of
blotting-paper, an old diary, and an account-book. Pauline took the
larger packet in her hand, and untied the string. The letters slipped
asunder: they were all written in the same hand, all addressed to 'Miss
Durham, care of J. Preston, Esquire, Heslington-road, York.'
'Miss Durham!' A mist seemed to come over Pauline's sight, and she
rubbed her eyes quickly to clear it away. Miss Durham! And A. D. on the
lid of the desk? Good Heaven! had all the anguish of mind which she had
endured, all the jealousy and rage, all the plotting and planning which
she had carried on for the last few months, had all these sprung from
an unfounded suspicion, from an absurd creation of her own distorted
fancy? Miss Durham! There it was plain enough, in a hand that Pauline
recognised as Mr. Calverley's. The letters were those addressed by him
to Alice before their marriage, were signed 'John Claxton,' and were so
bright and buoyant, so full of affectionate enthusiasm, that Pauline
could scarcely imagine they were the productions of the staid, grave
man whom she had known. Miss Durham! What could it mean? Stay! There
was the other packet. In an instant that was undone, and Pauline had
seized from it one of the letters. And then there was no more to learn,
for at a glance she saw that they were in her husband's handwriting,
that they were addressed to his 'Dearest Alice,' by her 'Loving
brother, Tom.'
The paper dropped from Pauline's hand to the floor, and she sank into
her chair with something like a sense of shame upon her. It was then
as she had just thought. She had been frightened, as it were, by her
own shadow, had herself created the bugbear before which she had fled,
or against which she had fought; she had been befooled by her own
suspicions, and her foolish fancy had allowed her to be jealous of
Tom's sister.
Tom's sister! The pale-faced girl lying there, sleeping on so
peacefully and unconsciously, was Tom's sister. How could she be
supposed to have guessed that? She had seen the girl in Tom's embrace,
had seen her bathed in tears and inconsolable at Tom's departure; how
could she know that this was his sister, of whose existence she had
never been informed?
Why had Tom never taken her into his confidence on that point? Why
had he never told her that he had a sister of whom he was so fond?
Why? And a fierce pang of anger shot through her, and her face drew
dark and hard as the reply rose in her mind. She knew the reason well
enough--it was because her husband was ashamed of her; ashamed of the
unscrupulousness, of the underhand ways, which he was ready enough to
use and to call into play when they could be of service to him; because
he thought her not good enough to associate with his gentle, womanly,
silly little sister, or to appreciate the stupid comfort of the narrow
proprieties of her home. Her home! What if Tom could see that home now,
and could know the truth about his sister, as she lay there, with no
name, no home, no position, a person for her, his distrusted wife, to
patronise and befriend if she chose!
So this was the trust he had placed in her, his wife, his ally, his
colleague, of whose fertile brain and ready hand he had so often
boasted. This one honest honourable association (as he had imagined
it) he had kept hidden from her. And as this thought germinated and
broadened in Pauline's mind her feelings passed into a new channel. She
who had been her husband's adviser so long, and who had served him so
well; she who had fondly imagined herself the trusted confidante and
sharer of his inmost thoughts, now found that she had been slighted
and considered not worthy to associate with this innocent piece of
prettiness. The strange nature of the woman was roused to deadly
retrospective anger, and the kindly contemptuous liking which she had
begun to feel for Alice faded away.
This pale-faced sleeping girl was her successful rival, though not
in the manner she had at first supposed. She had felt an instinctive
hatred of her when she saw her on the platform at Southampton, and her
instinct never betrayed her. Tom Durham's sister! Pauline remembered
that when her husband spoke of his early days, and the inmates of
his home, it was always with a softened voice and manner, and with a
certain implied respect, as though he were scarcely fitted, through
his present surroundings and mode of life, even to mention so sacred
a subject. This pale-faced girl had been one of those associations;
she was too pure and too innocent, forsooth, to be mixed up with
such society as her brother's wife was forced to keep. She, when she
recovered her consciousness, would find herself a mark for the finger
of scorn, a text for the Pharisee, a pariah, and an outcast.
And so that weak, clinging, brainless thing was Tom Durham's sister,
and preferred by him to his wife, with her grasp of mind and energy
of purpose? The wife was to slave with him, and for him, to do the
rough work, to be sent off here and there, travelling night and day,
to lie to such a woman, to flatter such a man, to be always vigilant
and patient, and to be punished with black looks, and sometimes with
curses, if anything went wrong; while from the sister all difficulties
and dangers were to be fended off, she was to be lapped in luxury, and
her simplicity and innocence were to be as strictly guarded as though
she had been a demoiselle in a convent.
Well, Pauline thought, the new phase of circumstances need not cause
much alteration in the line of conduct she had marked out for herself.
The girl lying there was to her in a different position from what she
had imagined. So far as she was concerned, there was no question of
revenge now, but it would be as well to keep watch over her, and use
her as a tool if occasion should arise. The interest which Martin
Gurwood felt in Alice would induce him to keep up his acquaintance
with her, and to be en rapport with Martin Gurwood was Pauline's fixed
intention. Over him she had obtained a strong influence, which she
did not intend to give up, while the knowledge that she continued to
be acquainted with all that was going on would deprive Martin, or
those friends of his of whom he thought so much--this Mr. Statham for
instance--from attempting to interfere with the exercise of her power
over Mrs. Calverley.
And now, for the first time since she had waited for her husband at
the Lymington station, Pauline began to believe that the conjecture
which she had seen printed in the newspapers had some foundation, and
that Tom Durham was really dead. Hitherto she had imagined that he had
deceived her, as he had deceived the rest of the world; that the tale
which he told her of his intention to dive from the steamer at night,
to swim to the shore, and to meet her the next morning, had been merely
trumped up in order to turn her off the scent, and to prevent her from
tracing him in his flight with the woman of whom he had taken such
an affectionate farewell at the Southampton railway station. But the
identity of that woman with Alice Claxton being now settled, and it
being made perfectly clear that she was Tom Durham's sister, all motive
for that worthy's concealment of himself was done away with. There was
no reason, so far as Pauline knew, why her husband should not acquaint
her with his whereabouts, while there was every reason to believe that,
were he on the face of the earth, he would make himself known, if it
were only for the sake of reclaiming his two thousand pounds. He must
have been drowned, she thought, his strength must have failed him, and
he must have gone down when almost within reach of the shore, to which
he was hastening. Drowned, dead, lost to her for ever! Not lost as she
had once imagined him, seduced by the wiles and fascinations of another
woman into temporary forgetfulness of her, for then there was a chance,
and more than a chance, almost a certainty, that when those wiles and
fascinations ceased to charm he would miss the clear brain and the
ready hand on which he had so long relied, and come back to claim their
aid once more--not lost in that way, but totally lost, drowned, dead,
passed away for ever.
To think of her husband in that phase was new to Pauline. She had never
contemplated him under such circumstances. She had always thought of
him with fierce jealousy, and a burning desire for revenge, as false
to her, and neglectful of her. The idea that he was dead, had died
guiltless of deceiving her, and with the full intention of carrying out
the plan which he had confided to her, had never before entered her
mind, and--no, it could not be true; if it had been she would have felt
the keenest grief, the deepest sorrow; grief for his loss, regret for
the cruel wrong she had done him in suspecting him. She felt nothing of
all this now--he could not be dead.
Straightway Pauline's thoughts reverted to the circumstances in which
she was placed, the persons by whom she was surrounded, and the way in
which her future should be managed. If the conclusions at which she had
arrived were correct, if Tom Durham were not drowned, but, for some
hitherto unexplained purpose of his own, was keeping himself in hiding,
it is towards his sister probably that, when he considers it a proper
opportunity, he will make some sign. Not to his wife; Pauline knew her
husband well enough to understand completely how the knowledge that he
had treated her badly in not keeping his appointment that morning, and
in concealing himself from her so long, would prevent him from making
his first advances to her; the girl slumbering there would be the first
person to whom Tom Durham would reveal the fact that he was not dead,
and if she, Pauline, ever wished for information about him, it was
through that slumbering girl that it must be obtained.
She made a sudden change in the plan and prospects of her life, a
shuffling of the cards, an entire revision of the game, all settled in
an instant, too, as she sat in the easy-chair beside the bed, her hands
clasped together in her lap, her eyes fixed upon the motionless figure.
Her sojourn in the wretchedly dull house in Great Walpole-street should
speedily be brought to an end. She had borne long enough with that old
woman's grimness and formality, with her icy patronage and impassable
stiffness, with her pharisaical utterances and querulous complaints;
she would have no more of such a life of dependence. The time during
which she had been Mrs. Calverley's companion had not, indeed, been
ill-spent. Had she not secured for herself that position, she would
probably have remained in ignorance that the woman of whom she saw her
husband taking leave was his sister; she would not have been intrusted
with the secret of the Calverley and Claxton mystery, the possession
of which gave her such power over all those concerned in it; she would
never have made the acquaintance of Martin Gurwood. How strangely
in earnest that man was, how innocent, and void of guile! And yet
she was so sure that the suspicion which she had originally formed
about him--that he had a secret of his own--was correct; hence that
impossibility to return your gaze, that immediate withdrawal of his
soft beautiful eyes, that quivering of his delicate, sensitive mouth.
It had served her purpose, that position of dependence, but now she
would have no more of it. There is nothing to be gained by continuing
with the grim old woman except the money, and Pauline sees her way
to an equal amount of money, combined with far more freedom, and an
infinitely pleasanter life.
A better life, too, if there be anything in that, Pauline wonders, with
a shrug of her shoulders; for this slumbering girl, this mere child
in her ignorance of the world's ways, is now left to herself, and is
henceforth to live alone, with no one to battle for her, no one to
shield her from the thousand and one assailants, to guide her through
the thousand and one temptations to which she will be exposed. That
shall be her task, Pauline thought to herself; to undertake it she had
a prescriptive right, if she chose to declare the truth, and to assert
her relationship. There would be no occasion, however, to take that
step, at all events for the present. She could trust to her influence
with Martin Gurwood to procure for her the trust which she coveted, the
position of Alice's companion and guardian. Her influence with Martin
Gurwood, what did that amount to? Why did she experience an inward
thrill of satisfaction in reflecting on that influence? Martin Gurwood!
She thought of him as she had seen him first, under his mother's roof;
she thought of him on the last occasion of their meeting, when they
walked side by side in the Hendon lanes. Yes, her influence with Martin
Gurwood was undoubtedly strong, and the knowledge of its strength gave
her inexplicable satisfaction.
At twelve o'clock the next day, Pauline, from her position at the
bedroom window, saw a hansom cab stop at the top of the hill, and
two gentlemen, one of whom was Martin Gurwood, alight from it. Then
Pauline, whose bonnet and shawl lay ready to her hand, put them on
without an instant's delay, and sallied forth.
She had not advanced more than fifty steps when she saw that her
approach was perceived. Martin Gurwood looked up and said something
to his companion, who, on their meeting, was presented to her as Mr.
Statham.
'The friend of whom I have already spoken to you, Madame Du Tertre,' he
said, 'and whose advice has been most invaluable to me in this matter.'
Pauline gave a direct and earnest glance at Statham, a glance which
enabled a woman of her natural quickness to recognise the presence
of the characteristics which his friend had declared him to possess.
Martin Gurwood was pliant and malleable; this man looked hard and
unimpressionable as granite. If he and she were to be thrown much
together for the future, it would be advisable, Pauline thought, that
her wishes should agree as much as possible with his intentions.
'I am pleased to see Mr. Statham,' she said; 'pleased, indeed, to see
you both, for I have been anxiously expecting your arrival.'
'There is no change in the patient's condition, I suppose?' asked
Statham.
'None; she still remains perfectly tranquil and asleep; but my own
experience, and two or three signs which I have observed, tell me that
this sleep will soon be at an end.'
'It was in that expectation that we have hurried here,' said Martin
Gurwood. 'Mr. Statham is of opinion that it would be impossible to
conceal the truth from Mrs. Claxton any longer, and has accompanied me
to assist in breaking the news to her.'
'Ah, exactly,' said Pauline. 'Will you and Mr. Statham be very much
surprised, very much, horrified, if I venture to make a suggestion?'
'Not the least,' said Statham. 'I am sure I answer for my friend and
myself when I say that we are deeply grateful for the services you
have already rendered us, although the means for the end are certainly
somewhat strong, and that we shall listen readily to anything you may
have to propose.'
'Most certainly, yes,' assented Martin Gurwood.
'Well, then,' said Pauline, addressing herself to Statham, after a
fleeting glance at Martin, 'my proposition is, that this ceremony of
the breaking the news, which at such pain to yourself, as I know, you
have come to perform, should be dispensed with altogether.'
'Dispensed with?' cried Statham.
'Altogether,' repeated Pauline.
'Do you mean that Mrs.--Mrs. Claxton should not be made acquainted with
what has occurred?' asked Martin, in astonishment.
'With what has occurred,' said Pauline firmly, 'yes; with the
circumstances under which it has occurred, no! She knows that the man
whom she considered to be her husband is dead. Let her be informed
that, during the unconscious state into which she fell on hearing the
news, he has been buried, but for Heaven's sake, monsieur, let her be
kept in ignorance of the fact that he was not her husband, and that by
his cruelty she is now a woman without name or position, abandoned and
outcast. Why should we cover her with shame, and blight her life, with
this announcement? A quoi bon? If we do not tell it to her, there is no
one else who will. She has no friends but yourselves and me. She is too
innocent and ignorant of the world to ask for any papers--a will, or
anything of that kind. She has already, without inquiry, accepted Mr.
Gurwood's guardianship at once and unsuspectingly, and she has not the
faintest dream that the man whom she loved and the position which she
held were other than she believed them.'
'Well, but--' said Martin.
'But what?' said Pauline, turning to him. 'Can you give me one reason
why this horrible story should be told to her in its truth, why one
more victim should be added to the number of those over whom the
yellow flag waves, cutting them off from all the privileges of social
citizenship, and dragging them down to the depths of misery and shame?
Ah, she is too young and too innocent for such a doom! Am I not right,
Mr. Statham? Do you not agree with me?'
It was easy to see that the passionate earnestness of Pauline's appeal
had not been without its effect on Humphrey Statham. There was a
tremulousness in his lip and in his voice as he said, 'You certainly
make out a strong case to support your views, Madame Du Tertre; but
what do you propose should be done with this young lady?'
'I propose,' said Pauline, 'that she should live on in the belief that
she is Mr. Claxton's widow; and as it would be impossible, young and
unsuspecting as she is, that she should be alone, I propose that I
should live with her. Not on her, mind!' she added, with a proud toss
of her head. 'I have a little money of my own--quite enough to keep me
in independence--but I am a woman of the world, Mr. Statham, who has
learned its ways from dire necessity, and has come out of the struggle
I hope unimpaired. I was interested in this girl's story before I saw
her; since I saw her my interest has naturally increased. Let it be as
I say, and you will find your trust has not been wrongly bestowed!'
The two men stepped aside for a few minutes; then Statham, raising his
hat, approached Pauline.
'Have you well weighed the responsibility you are about to undertake,
Madame Du Tertre?'
'I have,' she said, looking straight into his eyes, 'and accept it
cheerfully.'
'Then,' said Humphrey, 'Mr. Gurwood consents that it should be as you
say. For the present only, mind; the arrangement is but temporary, and
is liable to alteration at any moment.'
'I thank Mr. Gurwood most heartily,' said Pauline, turning to Martin,
and holding out her hand, 'and you, too, Mr. Statham. As I said before,
you will find in this instance that your trust has not been wrongly
bestowed. I think, perhaps, it will be better to leave me to announce
to Mrs. Calverley my intention of leaving her, and I will take an early
opportunity of doing so. I must hurry back now, as there is a chance of
our friend waking up at any moment. You shall hear from me to-morrow,
with full details of what I purpose to do.'
And, as she entered the garden gate, the two men regained their cab and
were driven off to London.