RIVER'S COTTAGE.
Three days after Hugh Stanbury's visit to Manchester Street, he wrote
a note to Lady Rowley, telling her of the address at which might be
found both Trevelyan and his son. As Bozzle had acknowledged, facts
are things which may be found out. Hugh had gone to work somewhat
after the Bozzlian fashion, and had found out this fact. "He lives at
a place called River's Cottage, at Willesden," wrote Stanbury. "If
you turn off the Harrow Road to the right, about a mile beyond the
cemetery, you will find the cottage on the left hand side of the lane
about a quarter of a mile from the Harrow Road. I believe you can go
to Willesden by railway, but you had better take a cab from London."
There was much consultation respecting this letter between Lady
Rowley and Mrs. Trevelyan, and it was decided that it should not
be shown to Sir Marmaduke. To see her child was at the present
moment the most urgent necessity of the poor mother, and both the
ladies felt that Sir Marmaduke in his wrath might probably impede
rather than assist her in this desire. If told where he might find
Trevelyan, he would probably insist on starting in quest of his
son-in-law himself, and the distance between the mother and her child
might become greater in consequence, instead of less. There were many
consultations; and the upshot of these was, that Lady Rowley and her
daughter determined to start for Willesden without saying anything to
Sir Marmaduke of the purpose they had in hand. When Emily expressed
her conviction that if Trevelyan should be away from home they would
probably be able to make their way into the house,--so as to see the
child, Lady Rowley with some hesitation acknowledged that such might
be the case. But the child's mother said nothing to her own mother of
a scheme which she had half formed of so clinging to her boy that no
human power should separate them.
They started in a cab, as advised by Stanbury, and were driven to a
point on the road from which a lane led down to Willesden, passing by
River's Cottage. They asked as they came along, and met no difficulty
in finding their way. At the point on the road indicated, there was
a country inn for hay-waggoners, and here Lady Rowley proposed that
they should leave their cab, urging that it might be best to call at
the cottage in the quietest manner possible; but Mrs. Trevelyan, with
her scheme in her head for the recapture of their child, begged that
the cab might go on;--and thus they were driven up to the door.
River's Cottage was not a prepossessing abode. It was a new building,
of light-coloured bricks, with a door in the middle and one window
on each side. Over the door was a stone tablet, bearing the
name,--River's Cottage. There was a little garden between the
road and the house, across which there was a straight path to the
door. In front of one window was a small shrub, generally called
a puzzle-monkey, and in front of the other was a variegated laurel.
There were two small morsels of green turf, and a distant view round
the corner of the house of a row of cabbage stumps. If Trevelyan were
living there, he had certainly come down in the world since the days
in which he had occupied the house in Curzon Street. The two ladies
got out of the cab, and slowly walked across the little garden. Mrs.
Trevelyan was dressed in black, and she wore a thick veil. She had
altogether been unable to make up her mind as to what should be her
conduct to her husband should she see him. That must be governed by
circumstances as they might occur. Her visit was made not to him, but
to her boy.
The door was opened before they knocked, and Trevelyan himself was
standing in the narrow passage. Lady Rowley was the first to speak.
"Louis," she said, "I have brought your wife to see you."
"Who told you that I was here?" he asked, still standing in the
passage.
"Of course a mother would find out where was her child," said Lady
Rowley.
"You should not have come here without notice," he said. "I was
careful to let you know the conditions on which you should come."
"You do not mean that I shall not see my child," said the mother.
"Oh, Louis, you will let me see him."
Trevelyan hesitated a moment, still keeping his position firmly in
the doorway. By this time an old woman, decently dressed and of
comfortable appearance, had taken her place behind him, and behind
her was a slip of a girl about fifteen years of age. This was the
owner of River's Cottage and her daughter, and all the inhabitants
of the cottage were now there, standing in the passage. "I ought not
to let you see him," said Trevelyan; "you have intruded upon me in
coming here! I had not wished to see you here,--till you had complied
with the order I had given you." What a meeting between a husband and
a wife who had not seen each other now for many months,--between a
husband and a wife who were still young enough not to have outlived
the first impulses of their early love! He still stood there guarding
the way, and had not even put out his hand to greet her. He was
guarding the way lest she should, without his permission, obtain
access to her own child! She had not removed her veil, and now she
hardly dared to step over the threshold of her husband's house. At
this moment, she perceived that the woman behind was pointing to
the room on the left, as the cottage was entered, and Emily at once
understood that her boy was there. Then at that moment she heard her
son's voice, as, in his solitude, the child began to cry. "I must go
in," she said; "I will go in;" and rushing on she tried to push aside
her husband. Her mother aided her, nor did Trevelyan attempt to stop
her with violence, and in a moment she was kneeling at the foot of a
small sofa, with her child in her arms. "I had not intended to hinder
you," said Trevelyan, "but I require from you a promise that you will
not attempt to remove him."
"Why should she not take him home with her?" said Lady Rowley.
"Because I will not have it so," replied Trevelyan. "Because I choose
that it should be understood that I am to be the master of my own
affairs."
Mrs. Trevelyan had now thrown aside her bonnet and her veil, and was
covering her child with caresses. The poor little fellow, whose mind
had been utterly dismayed by the events which had occurred to him
since his capture, though he returned her kisses, did so in fear
and trembling. And he was still sobbing, rubbing his eyes with his
knuckles, and by no means yielding himself with his whole heart to
his mother's tenderness,--as she would have had him do. "Louey,"
she said, whispering to him, "you know mamma; you haven't forgotten
mamma?" He half murmured some little infantine word through his sobs,
and then put his cheek up to be pressed against his mother's face.
"Louey will never, never forget his own mamma; will he, Louey?" The
poor boy had no assurances to give, and could only raise his cheek
again to be kissed. In the meantime Lady Rowley and Trevelyan were
standing by, not speaking to each other, regarding the scene in
silence.
[Illustration: "You haven't forgotten Mamma?"]
She,--Lady Rowley,--could see that he was frightfully altered in
appearance, even since the day on which she had so lately met him
in the City. His cheeks were thin and haggard, and his eyes were
deep and very bright,--and he moved them quickly from side to side,
as though ever suspecting something. He seemed to be smaller in
stature,--withered, as it were, as though he had melted away. And
though he stood looking upon his wife and child, he was not for a
moment still. He would change the posture of his hands and arms,
moving them quickly with little surreptitious jerks, and would
shuffle his feet upon the floor, almost without altering his
position. His clothes hung about him, and his linen was soiled and
worn. Lady Rowley noticed this especially, as he had been a man
peculiarly given to neatness of apparel. He was the first to speak.
"You have come down here in a cab?" said he.
"Yes,--in a cab, from London," said Lady Rowley.
"Of course you will go back in it? You cannot stay here. There is no
accommodation. It is a wretched place, but it suits the boy. As for
me, all places are now alike."
"Louis," said his wife, springing up from her knees, coming to him,
and taking his right hand between both her own, "you will let me take
him with me. I know you will let me take him with me."
"I cannot do that, Emily; it would be wrong."
"Wrong to restore a child to his mother? Oh, Louis, think of it. What
must my life be without him,--or you?"
"Don't talk of me. It is too late for that."
"Not if you will be reasonable, Louis, and listen to me. Oh, heavens,
how ill you are!" As she said this she drew nearer to him, so that
her face was almost close to his. "Louis, come back; come back, and
let it all be forgotten. It shall be a dream, a horrid dream, and
nobody shall speak of it." He left his hand within hers and stood
looking into her face. He was well aware that his life since he had
left her had been one long hour of misery. There had been to him no
alleviation, no comfort, no consolation. He had not a friend left to
him. Even his satellite, the policeman, was becoming weary of him and
manifestly suspicious. The woman with whom he was now lodging, and
whose resources were infinitely benefited by his payments to her, had
already thrown out hints that she was afraid of him. And as he looked
at his wife, he knew that he loved her. Everything for him now was
hot and dry and poor and bitter. How sweet would it be again to sit
with her soft hand in his, to feel her cool brow against his own, to
have the comfort of her care, and to hear the music of loving words!
The companionship of his wife had once been to him everything in the
world; but now, for many months past, he had known no companion. She
bade him come to her, and look upon all this trouble as a dream not
to be mentioned. Could it be possible that it should be so, and that
they might yet be happy together,--perhaps in some distant country,
where the story of all their misery might not be known? He felt all
this truly and with a keen accuracy. If he were mad, he was not all
mad. "I will tell you of nothing that is past," said she, hanging to
him, and coming still nearer to him, and embracing his arm.
Could she have condescended to ask him not to tell her of the
past;--had it occurred to her so to word her request,--she might
perhaps have prevailed. But who can say how long the tenderness of
his heart would have saved him from further outbreak;--and whether
such prevailing on her part would have been of permanent service? As
it was, her words wounded him in that spot of his inner self which
was most sensitive,--on that spot from whence had come all his fury.
A black cloud came upon his brow, and he made an effort to withdraw
himself from her grasp. It was necessary to him that she should in
some fashion own that he had been right, and now she was promising
him that she would not tell him of his fault! He could not thus
swallow down all the convictions by which he had fortified himself to
bear the misfortunes which he had endured. Had he not quarrelled with
every friend he possessed on this score; and should he now stultify
himself in all those quarrels by admitting that he had been cruel,
unjust, and needlessly jealous? And did not truth demand of him that
he should cling to his old assurances? Had she not been disobedient,
ill-conditioned, and rebellious? Had she not received the man, both
him personally and his letters, after he had explained to her that
his honour demanded that it should not be so? How could he come into
such terms as those now proposed to him, simply because he longed
to enjoy the rich sweetness of her soft hand, to feel the fragrance
of her breath, and to quench the heat of his forehead in the cool
atmosphere of her beauty? "Why have you driven me to this by your
intercourse with that man?" he said. "Why, why, why did you do it?"
She was still clinging to him. "Louis," she said, "I am your wife."
"Yes; you are my wife."
"And will you still believe such evil of me without any cause?"
"There has been cause,--horrible cause. You must
repent,--repent,--repent."
"Heaven help me," said the woman, falling back from him, and
returning to the boy who was now seated in Lady Rowley's lap. "Mamma,
do you speak to him. What can I say? Would he think better of me were
I to own myself to have been guilty, when there has been no guilt, no
slightest fault? Does he wish me to purchase my child by saying that
I am not fit to be his mother?"
"Louis," said Lady Rowley, "if any man was ever wrong, mad, madly
mistaken, you are so now."
"Have you come out here to accuse me again, as you did before in
London?" he asked. "Is that the way in which you and she intend to
let the past be, as she says, like a dream? She tells me that I am
ill. It is true. I am ill,--and she is killing me, killing me, by her
obstinacy."
"What would you have me do?" said the wife, again rising from her
child.
"Acknowledge your transgressions, and say that you will amend your
conduct for the future."
"Mamma, mamma,--what shall I say to him?"
"Who can speak to a man that is beside himself?" replied Lady Rowley.
"I am not so beside myself as yet, Lady Rowley, but that I know how
to guard my own honour and to protect my own child. I have told you,
Emily, the terms on which you can come back to me. You had better now
return to your mother's house; and if you wish again to have a house
of your own, and your husband, and your boy, you know by what means
you may acquire them. For another week I shall remain here;--after
that I shall remove far from hence."
"And where will you go, Louis?"
"As yet I know not. To Italy I think,--or perhaps to America. It
matters little where for me."
"And will Louey be taken with you?"
"Certainly he will go with me. To strive to bring him up so that he
may be a happier man than his father is all that there is now left
for me in life." Mrs. Trevelyan had now got the boy in her arms, and
her mother was seated by her on the sofa. Trevelyan was standing away
from them, but so near the door that no sudden motion on their part
would enable them to escape with the boy without his interposition.
It now again occurred to the mother to carry off her prize in
opposition to her husband;--but she had no scheme to that effect laid
with her mother, and she could not reconcile herself to the idea of
a contest with him in which personal violence would be necessary.
The woman of the house had, indeed, seemed to sympathise with her,
but she could not dare in such a matter to trust to assistance from a
stranger. "I do not wish to be uncourteous," said Trevelyan, "but if
you have no assurance to give me, you had better--leave me."
Then there came to be a bargaining about time, and the poor woman
begged almost on her knees that she might be allowed to take her
child up-stairs and be with him alone for a few minutes. It seemed
to her that she had not seen her boy till she had had him to herself,
in absolute privacy, till she had kissed his limbs, and had her hand
upon his smooth back, and seen that he was white and clean and bright
as he had ever been. And the bargain was made. She was asked to
pledge her word that she would not take him out of the house,--and
she pledged her word, feeling that there was no strength in her for
that action which she had meditated. He, knowing that he might still
guard the passage at the bottom of the stairs, allowed her to go with
the boy to his bedroom, while he remained below with Lady Rowley. A
quarter of an hour was allowed to her, and she humbly promised that
she would return when that time was expired.
Trevelyan held the door open for her as she went, and kept it open
during her absence. There was hardly a word said between him and Lady
Rowley, but he paced from the passage into the room and from the room
into the passage with his hands behind his back. "It is cruel," he
said once. "It is very cruel."
"It is you that are cruel," said Lady Rowley.
"Of course;--of course. That is natural from you. I expect that from
you." To this she made no answer, and he did not open his lips again.
After a while Mrs. Trevelyan called to her mother, and Lady Rowley
was allowed to go up-stairs. The quarter of an hour was of course
greatly stretched, and all the time Trevelyan continued to pace in
and out of the room. He was patient, for he did not summon them; but
went on pacing backwards and forwards, looking now and again to see
that the cab was at its place,--that no deceit was being attempted,
no second act of kidnapping being perpetrated. At last the two ladies
came down the stairs, and the boy was with them,--and the woman of
the house.
"Louis," said the wife, going quickly up to her husband, "I will do
anything, if you will give me my child."
"What will you do?"
"Anything;--say what you want. He is all the world to me, and I
cannot live if he be taken from me."
"Acknowledge that you have been wrong."
"But how;--in what words;--how am I to speak it?"
"Say that you have sinned;--and that you will sin no more."
"Sinned, Louis;--as the woman did,--in the Scripture? Would you have
me say that?"
"He cannot think that it is so," said Lady Rowley.
But Trevelyan had not understood her. "Lady Rowley, I should have
fancied that my thoughts at any rate were my own. But this is useless
now. The child cannot go with you to-day, nor can you remain here. Go
home and think of what I have said. If then you will do as I would
have you, you shall return."
With many embraces, with promises of motherly love, and with prayers
for love in return, the poor woman did at last leave the house, and
return to the cab. As she went there was a doubt on her own mind
whether she should ask to kiss her husband; but he made no sign, and
she at last passed out without any mark of tenderness. He stood by
the cab as they entered it, and closed the door upon them, and then
went slowly back to his room. "My poor bairn," he said to the boy;
"my poor bairn."
"Why for mamma go?" sobbed the child.
"Mamma goes--; oh, heaven and earth, why should she go? She goes
because her spirit is obstinate, and she will not bend. She is
stiff-necked, and will not submit herself. But Louey must love mamma
always;--and mamma some day will come back to him, and be good to
him."
"Mamma is good,--always," said the child. Trevelyan had intended on
this very afternoon to have gone up to town,--to transact business
with Bozzle; for he still believed, though the aspect of the man was
bitter to him as wormwood, that Bozzle was necessary to him in all
his business. And he still made appointments with the man, sometimes
at Stony Walk, in the Borough, and sometimes at the tavern in
Poulter's Court, even though Bozzle not unfrequently neglected to
attend the summons of his employer. And he would go to his banker's
and draw out money, and then walk about the crowded lanes of the
City, and afterwards return to his desolate lodgings at Willesden,
thinking that he had been transacting business,--and that this
business was exacted from him by the unfortunate position of his
affairs. But now he gave up his journey. His retreat had been
discovered; and there came upon him at once a fear that if he left
the house his child would be taken. His landlady told him on this
very day that the boy ought to be sent to his mother, and had made
him understand that it would not suit her to find a home any longer
for one who was so singular in his proceedings. He believed that his
child would be given up at once, if he were not there to guard it.
He stayed at home, therefore, turning in his mind many schemes. He
had told his wife that he should go either to Italy or to America at
once; but in doing so he had had no formed plan in his head. He had
simply imagined at the moment that such a threat would bring her to
submission. But now it became a question whether he would do better
than go to America. He suggested to himself that he should go to
Canada, and fix himself with his boy on some remote farm,--far away
from any city; and would then invite his wife to join him if she
would. She was too obstinate, as he told himself, ever to yield,
unless she should be absolutely softened and brought down to the
ground by the loss of her child. What would do this so effectually
as the interposition of the broad ocean between him and her? He sat
thinking of this for the rest of the day, and Louey was left to the
charge of the mistress of River's Cottage.
"Do you think he believes it, mamma?" Mrs. Trevelyan said to her
mother when they had already made nearly half their journey home in
the cab. There had been nothing spoken hitherto between them, except
some half-formed words of affection intended for consolation to the
young mother in her great affliction.
"He does not know what he believes, dearest."
"You heard what he said. I was to own that I had--sinned."
"Sinned;--yes; because you will not obey him like a slave. That is
sin--to him."
"But I asked him, mamma. Did you not hear me? I could not say
the word plainer,--but I asked him whether he meant that sin.
He must have known, and he would not answer me. And he spoke of
my--transgression. Mamma, if he believed that, he would not let me
come back at all."
"He did not believe it, Emily."
"Could he possibly then so accuse me,--the mother of his child! If
his heart be utterly hard and false towards me, if it is possible
that he should be cruel to me with such cruelty as that,--still he
must love his boy. Why did he not answer me, and say that he did not
think it?"
"Simply because his reason has left him."
"But if he be mad, mamma, ought we to leave him like that? And, then,
did you see his eyes, and his face, and his hands? Did you observe
how thin he is,--and his back, how bent? And his clothes,--how they
were torn and soiled. It cannot be right that he should be left like
that."
"We will tell papa when we get home," said Lady Rowley, who was
herself beginning to be somewhat frightened by what she had seen.
It is all very well to declare that a friend is mad when one simply
desires to justify one's self in opposition to that friend;--but
the matter becomes much more serious when evidence of the friend's
insanity becomes true and circumstantial. "I certainly think that a
physician should see him," continued Lady Rowley. On their return
home Sir Marmaduke was told of what had occurred, and there was a
long family discussion in which it was decided that Lady Milborough
should be consulted, as being the oldest friend of Louis Trevelyan
himself with whom they were acquainted. Trevelyan had relatives of
his own name living in Cornwall; but Mrs. Trevelyan herself had never
even met one of that branch of the family.
Sir Marmaduke, however, resolved that he himself would go out and
see his son-in-law. He too had called Trevelyan mad, but he did not
believe that the madness was of such a nature as to interfere with
his own duties in punishing the man who had ill used his daughter. He
would at any rate see Trevelyan himself;--but of this he said nothing
either to his wife or to his child.