A TERRIBLE DISCOVERY.
The winter of that year was typical--clear and frosty, without fog or
damp, and the young Rushtons almost lived out of doors. Paula, who
was stronger and healthier than she had ever been in her life before,
had developed, under Hal’s instructions, into a good horsewoman, but
she was a still more excellent whip. She took the keenest delight in
driving, and her husband in his desire to indulge her wishes, bought a
match for his mare, and put the pair into a curricle, which Paula used
to spin through the village at such a rate as to bring all the gossips
to their doors with the gruesome prophecy that she would live to break
her neck. It was a pretty sight to see her, with her fair face flushed
with excitement, wrapped up in furs to her chin, and sending her horses
at their smartest pace along the crisp highway.
‘With a groom with ’is arms folded stuck up be’ind ’er like a graven
image,’ as Mrs Gribble remarked to Mrs Axworthy. ‘It’s redikerlous,
in my opinion, not to say wicked, to keep a human creetur in sich a
hattitoode. And did you see her furs, Mrs Axworthy, ma’am? Rooshian
sables, Mrs Roberts says they hare, and it’s sinful to see ’em on sich
a person. For what _is_ she, ma’am, but a school teacher, when all’s
said and done. Mr ’Al Rushton he may have married ’er, but that can’t
hunmake ’er what she his. And I wonder ’ow long it would be before he’d
give our dear good Miss Brown so much as a silk ’ankercher for her
throat.’
‘It would be well if she was nothink but a school teacher, Mrs
Gribble,’ replied her crony; ‘but there’s wuss be’ind, you may depend
on it. I shouldn’t be surprised to ’ear as she’d been used to this
sort of grander before. Folks don’t learn to ’andle the ribbins (as my
good gentleman calls it) in a minute. But ’ow could she ’ave come by
’em, Mrs Gribble, ma’am? _That’s_ the ’orrible thought to wrestle with.’
But whilst they wrestled with it Mrs Hal Rushton spun her bays along
gaily, and with not a little innocent triumph that she had outlived all
the ill-natured things that had been said of her, and risen to be one
of the most important residents and property owners in Deepdale.
‘Paula,’ said Hal one hunting morning, as he stood before her in pink
and top-boots, ‘what are you going to do to-day?’
‘Nothing particular, darling,’ she answered, as she held up the baby to
play with his buttons. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘Because, if you wouldn’t mind driving into Haltham, I particularly
want to know if Ellis has received those patent snaffles from London.
It is more than a fortnight since I ordered them, and I have written
to him twice without receiving an answer. If it hadn’t been a hunting
day, I should have ridden in myself.’
‘Of course I will go, Hal, and if he hasn’t got them yet, what then?’
‘Tell him not to trouble further. I will write to the manufacturers
myself. I never saw such a slow place as Haltham. You have to wait a
twelvemonth for everything.’
‘They are all asleep,’ laughed Paula. ‘Oh, baby, you mustn’t pull your
daddy’s hair. That hurts.’
‘Bless her little fists!’ said Hal, as he disentangled his dark locks
from the chubby hands. ‘She has inherited the power of drawing from her
mother.’
‘_I_ can’t draw,’ cried Paula, pretending to misunderstand him.
‘_Can’t_ you. Who was it drew me, then, from the farm down to the
schoolhouse, night after night, if only to see her shadow on the blind;
drew me to church on hot Sundays in summer, and cold Sundays in winter,
to watch her face bent down upon her prayer book; drew me, in fact,
until there was no further space to draw me over, because I was in her
arms for ever and ever?’
‘It was not _I_ who drew you,’ she whispered, with her face against
his. ‘It was your own good heart that impelled you to come.’
‘Well, anyway, I am very much here, am I not? And my dear girl is happy
to have me?’
‘Happier than she ever conceived it possible she could be.’
‘God bless you both!’ said Hal, as he kissed the mother and the child.
‘But I have no more time for “spooning.” Take your little brat away,
Paula--and don’t forget my commission.’
‘No, indeed. I will drive into Haltham directly after luncheon.’
‘And have luncheon early, dear. Don’t be out after dusk, if you can
help it. I am always nervous when you drive with lamps.’
‘What, along a straight road as smooth as a bowling alley. What an
insult to my skill as a whip. But I will be home by daylight, Hal, I
promise you.’
‘Thanks, darling. Well, I must be off. Once more, good-bye.’
His wife accompanied him to the hall door, and held the baby up to see
her daddy mount his hunter and ride down the drive. And then, after
some excellent fooling with her bantling, she dismissed her for her
morning walk, and went singing about the house herself like a bird.
She felt unusually happy that day. The fresh, exhilarating air was
enough in itself to raise her spirits. Then she had perfect health,
and her husband’s love and confidence, and what could any woman desire
more? She could not help, as she went about her household avocations,
contrasting her present lot with her former one, of which she could
not think, even now, without a shudder. How helpless, how hopeless,
how despairing she was then. And now, how warmly sheltered by Hal’s
protection, how full of hope for little Edith, and themselves how
surrounded by love and luxury and comfort. How thankful she should
be--nay, she _was_--for the marvellous change. If a close observer
had detected at this moment a little quiver of Paula Rushton’s lip, it
was dedicated, not to the past or future, not even to a thought of her
dead mother, but to the uncertain fate of her hapless firstborn. That
was the only ruffle on the quiet waters of her life--the remembrance
of Paulie. Often as she caressed her plump, healthy baby, and watched
the intelligence which was so rapidly developing itself in her bright
little face, the mournful eyes and vacant, pathetic smile of the child
for whom she had cared so little would rise up reproachfully before her
mental vision, and force her to swallow down something very like a sob.
But she never spoke of it to Hal, and he believed she had forgotten or
become reconciled to the loss of the imbecile child. For her own part,
she tried hard to believe that he was safe in Heaven, with her dear
mother, who had loved him so tenderly, but she never alluded to the
subject in any way. She had not forgotten the compact she had entered
into with Hal before their marriage, that the past was to be past and
dead for both of them, and not permitted to rise from its unholy grave
to disturb their new-born happiness. So she thrust the faint, momentary
thought of Paulie resolutely away, and went to the piano and sang a
merry song to drown it.
She took her midday meal early, as she had promised her husband, and
by one o’clock she was driving in her usually rapid manner, which Hal
applauded and Deepdale glared at, along the highroad to Haltham. It
was not market day, but the town was rather full, and the saddler’s
shop stood in the busiest part of it. Paula was proceeding in that
direction, guiding her spirited bays very skilfully in and out of
the vegetable barrows and donkey carts that blocked the way, when an
itinerant musician (save the mark), with a cornopean wretchedly out
of tune, commenced to blow a discordant blast which he intended for
‘Annie Laurie.’ At the same time a crowd of urchins were following
and hooting at a shabbily dressed man, apparently not too sober, who
stumbled in front of them over the stony road, muttering to himself,
and occasionally distributing a curse for the benefit of his young
tormentors. Hal’s old mare was well trained and steady enough, but her
pole companion was new to harness as well as cornopeans, and with a
frightened rear made a sudden start forward, dragging the other with
her. Paula could have quieted them if left to herself, but the wretched
urchins on either side, perceiving the chance of a commotion, yelled
to alarm the horses still more, and for a moment they were beyond her
control. In that moment the slouching figure of the intoxicated man,
who had not had the sense to step aside, fell down in the middle of the
road, and the off mare touched him with her hoof. Paula pulled the pair
back on their haunches to prevent further mischief, and her groom was
at their heads in a moment, but the figure of the fallen man remained
motionless, and the yelling urchins called out, ‘You’ve been and killed
’im, missus.’ Paula turned sick with fright. She knew the accident
had happened by no fault of hers, but it was terrible to think she
had been the cause of it. Quite a crowd had assembled by this time--a
policeman among the number--and descending from her seat, Paula ordered
the groom to back the carriage out of the way whilst she ascertained
what injury had been done.
‘Is he much hurt?’ she inquired anxiously of the police officer.
The man turned the prostrate figure about with one hand, and then let
it drop again. It appeared to be that of a beggar or tramp. The clothes
were ragged and dirty, coated with clay and other earths, as though the
wearer was used to sleep out at nights, and the torn hat, which had
tumbled off when he fell, revealed a thick head of yellow hair, the
face being downwards and hidden from view.
‘_I_ don’t think so, ma’am,’ replied the official. ‘The ’orse’s ’oof
may have touched ’im, but he fell first. He’s more drunk, to my mind,
than ’urt. I’d better take ’im to the lock-up, and then we can see
what’s the matter with ’im.’
‘Oh, no!’ exclaimed Paula; ‘he must not go to the lock-up. I am very
much afraid it was my fault, and I will pay for medical assistance for
him. Where shall we take him, policeman? Who is the nearest doctor?’
‘Well, Dr Brown’s surgery is just round the corner, but he won’t thank
me for taking a drunken man there. There’s no blood, you see, ma’am,
nor nothing.’
‘But he may be bruised. I am sure the horse struck him. Speak to him,
policeman, and see if he can understand you.’
‘Here you, mister,’ commenced the official, as he touched the arm of
the prostrate figure, ‘can’t you get up and shake yourself? You’re not
hurt, you know. Come, now, let’s see if you can’t stand.’
He pulled him roughly by the arm as he spoke, and the man rose to a
sitting posture and then fell back again, with his face upturned to
the sky. Paula, who had been watching the proceedings with the deepest
interest, glanced at the features thus revealed to the public, and gave
a sharp cry.
‘There’s no cause to be afeard, ma’am,’ said the policeman consolingly.
‘’E’s too drunk to touch you. But ’ere’s the doctor coming. Stand back,
you boys, will you, and let the gentleman pass.’
Someone in the crowd had run unasked to inform Dr Brown of the
accident, and he now appeared upon the scene.
‘Dead! dead!’ he exclaimed quickly, as he examined the prostrate man.
‘Not a bit of it. Dead drunk, you mean. This seems more in _your_ line,
Jones, than mine. Run over, do you say? Well, he may have a bruise or
two to-morrow, but he’s too full of liquor to have sustained much hurt.
Wheels would roll over him as they would over a bladder of water. Is
this the lady who drove the carriage?’
He turned to Paula as he spoke, and was startled by her appearance. Her
eyes, which seemed fixed in her head, were staring at the vagrant’s
face, her countenance was the colour of death, and her limbs were
twitching involuntarily. Dr Brown believed her condition to be the
effect of fear.
‘You mustn’t take it like this, madam,’ he said; ‘there is no real harm
done, and if there were, it is by no fault of yours. The man was too
drunk to keep his feet. Why, _you_ look in more need of my services
than he does.’
‘Who--who is he?’ she asked in a low husky voice, that seemed to have
the greatest difficulty in issuing from her dry, parched lips.
‘_Who is he?_ I don’t fancy anybody can tell you that. A tramp, most
likely, and evidently a disreputable one. Does anyone know him in the
town?’ continued the doctor, addressing the gaping audience.
‘’E lodges with Mother Sims,’ replied a squeaky voice.
‘Yes, sir,’ chimed in a dozen others; ‘’is name is Bonson, and ’e lives
in Sims’ hattic.’
‘Let him be taken home, then,’ said Dr Brown, ‘and I’ll attend him
there. Jones, fetch a stretcher, and have him removed at once. This
lady requires my attention the more of the two.’
Paula shook her head silently, and with a face white as death, and
trembling fingers, extracted a couple of pounds from her purse and
pressed them into the doctor’s hands.
‘My dear lady--Mrs Rushton of Highbridge Hall, if I am not mistaken--’
She moved her head mechanically. ‘This is far too much. You exaggerate
the injury, I assure you. The man will be quite well by to-morrow.’
‘Please--take--it,’ she said, with an effort, and looking as if she
were about to swoon. But he still refused to accept it.
At the sound of her voice, low as she had spoken, the vagrant on the
ground rolled his head round and regarded her, and their eyes met.
Paula said nothing, but leaning up against the little doctor, fainted
away in his arms.
‘There, now,’ he exclaimed fussily, ‘didn’t I tell you this lady was
alarming herself unnecessarily. Look at this. Who will help me to carry
her to my surgery? Here, my man!’ he continued, addressing the groom.
‘Bring the carriage round the corner, and as soon as your mistress is
recovered, you must drive her home. Here’s a pretty bit of business
about a drunken tramp,’ he ended with, as he and another man carried
the unconscious Paula to his consulting room. As they passed him, the
vagrant raised himself on his elbow and looked after them.
‘Aye, there she goes,’ he cried, ‘with her carriage and horses, whilst
I lie upon the ground, and may rot here for aught _she_ cares. Curse
her!’
‘Come, now,’ said the policeman, ‘stop that. The lady’s been a deal too
good to you. You would have been in the lock-up by this time but for
’er. Them ’orses’ ’oofs never touched yer. Get up, and go to your home.
D’ye hear?’
‘_My home!_’ repeated the man bitterly. ‘If I had my rights, my home
would be with her.’
‘Why, you’re drunker than I thought you were,’ said the policeman. ‘If
you speaks another word like that I’ll run you in. Get up, I say. Do
you mean to lie here till another wehicle drives over you?’
At this hint the vagrant rose to his feet, and having made a pretence
of dusting his tattered coat, shambled off the highway into a
by-street, where he disappeared.
Meanwhile Paula, coming to herself in the little doctor’s surgery,
gazed vacantly at the cane benches and white-washed walls.
‘You’re better now,’ said Dr Brown, as he held a glass to her lips.
‘Drink this and you will soon be yourself again.’
But Paula pushed the cordial from her, and staggering to her feet,
exclaimed,--
‘Let me go home.’
‘Of course you shall, directly you are able to do so. Your carriage is
waiting at the door. But let me entreat you to drink this first. Your
nerves are shaken, Mrs Rushton. That drunken brute frightened you, and
you are not fit to take so long a drive without a stimulant.’
She drank the draught, as he desired her, conscious that to continue to
refuse it was to delay her return to Deepdale. But as soon as it was
down she turned an ashen face to Dr Brown, and repeated,--
‘My carriage, please. I wish to go home.’
‘To be sure,’ replied the doctor cheerily; ‘but you mustn’t attempt to
drive yourself, Mrs Rushton. Take your mistress back very carefully,
Green, and she’ll be all right by the time she reaches Deepdale.’
And then he assisted Paula into the curricle, where she lay back
against the cushions, with half-closed eyes, and in a few minutes was
out of sight.
‘Strange,’ thought the little doctor, as he looked after her. ‘I’ve
always heard her spoken of as such a brave and dependable woman,
but she doesn’t seem to be much more use in an emergency than the
generality of her sex. A great deal of good sympathy wasted on a
worthless vagabond.’ And with that he dismissed the subject from his
mind.
It was not the groom’s business to watch the features or actions of his
mistress, and indeed it was as much as he could do to keep the two
ruffled mares in hand on their way home. But had he looked at her he
would have seen that Paula never altered her position, nor moved her
eyes, until he drew rein at the front door of Highbridge Hall. Then
she stumbled to the ground somehow, and felt her way, almost blindly,
to her own room. The afternoon was still at its height, the hour being
four, but there was a bright fire burning in her grate, before which
was spread a snowy sheepskin rug. Paula closed the door and locked it,
almost mechanically, and then, having torn off her furred mantle and
hat, she flung herself down, in a position of the utmost abandonment,
upon the sheepskin rug, with both her hands pressed tightly against
her temples. Even as she lay there the room seemed to go round and
round with her, the floor to shake and tremble beneath her weight, the
air to be full of buzzing, whirring noises that made thought almost
an impossibility. What was it that her mother had told her when she
returned from the journey to London, which she undertook solely to
satisfy her daughter’s anxious fear? That Carl Bjornsën had died in the
Paddington workhouse, from drink and disease, and that she was freed
from him by God as well as man--free to become Hal Rushton’s wife, and
to look him in the face and say truly that her first husband was dead,
and could never trouble either of them again. And to-day she had seen
Carl Bjornsën in the streets of Haltham, drunk, but living, tattered,
dirty and disreputable, yet living--a jibe for boys, a case for the
police, a wretched waif of humanity, apparently both friendless and
homeless, but still living, living, _living_--to curse and kill her
new-found happiness.
She had no doubt whatever that it was he; that the degraded being
her horses had nearly run over was the blue-eyed, flaxen-haired Carl
Bjornsën she had once believed she loved. The sight of his thick crop
of yellow hair had given her a shock even before she had seen his
countenance (it had so painfully reminded her of that of the Swede);
but when she had looked at his face, and their eyes had met, although
his features were bloated by vice and distorted by passion at the
sight of her, she had recognised him at once as the husband whom she
believed to be lying in his grave. Everybody had misled her, then. Seth
Brunt, when he assured her his captain was dying, and her poor dear
mother, when she accepted the landlady’s assurance that her lodger had
breathed his last in the workhouse. They had not meant to deceive her,
perhaps (her mother assuredly not), but the terrible upshot was the
same. Carl Bjornsën lived, and had followed her to Haltham. But for
what purpose? Did he intend to make his way to Deepdale--to insult her,
perhaps, before her servants--to expose her secret to their neighbours,
to confront her in the very presence of her beloved husband, who had
felt the mere fact of his having existed so keenly as to extract an
oath from her never to mention it in his hearing again? Oh, no, no. At
whatever risk, Paula felt, she must keep this awful discovery from
Hal, or all their happiness might be wrecked with the knowledge of
it. If she could only meet Carl Bjornsën face to face, and learn his
intentions, and bribe him with money to go away, and to keep away,
their future peace might be secured. For a few moments she thought of
telling everything to Hal, who was so good and kind to her, and had
it not been for his exaggerated horror of divorce she would have done
so. But he did not believe in divorce. He had often told her that
if a marriage under such circumstances was legalised by man, it was
not blest by Heaven. He was a simple-minded, country-bred gentleman,
far behind all the fashionable foibles of the day, but such were his
opinions, and his wife shuddered as she recalled them. At all costs,
she decided in a bewildered manner, Hal must not hear the truth unless
it became absolutely necessary. But oh, how wretched that single
interview had made her. It seemed to have cast a gloom over her whole
life. Nothing _really_ was altered. Nothing _could_ be altered, and
she was quite innocent of having attempted to deceive her husband,
yet, as she lay face downwards on the rug, Paula felt as though she
were the guiltiest creature upon earth. At last the sound of the hall
clock striking six made her remember that Hal would soon be home from
his sport, and demanding to see her. She rose hastily, and approaching
the glass, was frightened at the sight of her white face and swollen
eyelids. How could she disguise the effects of the emotion she had
passed through? What should she say if Hal observed it? In another
moment she had plunged her face into a basin of cold water, and was
trying, though ineffectually, to remove the traces of her indisposition
and her tears. Her husband knocked at the door for admittance in the
very midst of it, and she had no excuse to deny his entrance. In he
came, laughing and happy as usual, with the fresh colour in his face
heightened by air and exercise, looking just what he was, a specimen of
a young and healthy Englishman, and stood before her fire warming his
hands, whilst she hid her face somewhat with her towel.
‘Well, my darling,’ he began briskly, ‘we have had a glorious run,
after all. Those few drops of rain last night freshened up the scent
considerably, and made it quite easy going. Did you enjoy your drive?
What did Ellis say about the snaffles?’
Paula lowered the towel in her surprise.
‘_Ellis!_ Oh, Hal, what will you say to me? I forgot all about him.’
‘Forgot _Ellis_. You _are_ a trustworthy messenger. What else did you
go to Haltham for?’
‘It _was_ stupid of me. But the new mare gave me a little trouble as we
got opposite the “Fox and Grapes,” and I turned the horses’ heads at
once, and drove home as quickly as possible.’
‘What did she do?’
‘A lot of boys began shouting at her, and she grew restive and reared.’
‘Did she frighten you, Paula? What’s the matter with your face?’
He left the fireplace, and walking up to her, examined her swollen
features.
‘Why, you’ve been crying, my darling. What is the matter? Has anything
annoyed you?’
Paula was going to answer him in the negative when a thought stopped
her. The groom, James Green, had witnessed the accident, and seen her
faint. He would be sure to speak of it in the kitchen, and it might get
round to her husband’s ears. She had better tell him the truth (or part
of the truth) at once.
‘Yes, I have been frightened, dear; but I would rather have kept it
from you, because you make such a fuss over every little thing that
happens to me. A tipsy man fell down in the road, and the horses nearly
went over him. It gave me a dreadful turn, and I--I--fainted.’
Hal’s loving arms were instantly folded round her, as though to shield
her from further harm.
‘Oh, my darling, why didn’t you tell me this at first? _Fainted!_ I
didn’t know you _could_ faint. Were you in the carriage?’
‘No. I had got out to see if the man was hurt.’
‘And who looked after you? Did you fall in the road?’
Paula felt as if he would draw the whole truth out of her before he had
finished.
‘Please don’t make a fuss about it,’ she said impatiently; ‘it was of
no consequence. I was afraid I had run over the man, and it gave me a
shock. Someone took me in somewhere and gave me a glass of water, and
I was all right in a minute or two, and then Green drove me home. I
shouldn’t have told you if you hadn’t seen my face.’
‘I should have thought it very strange if you had _not_ told me, Paula.
It is so unusual for you to show the white feather. Was the man hurt?’
‘Oh, no. He was only intoxicated, the policeman said, and the horses
had not touched him. When I heard that, of course I was all right. But
tell me about the meet, Hal. Who was there?’
‘Oh, the usual set. Mrs Simpson was out with us, looking a regular guy.
That woman must weigh fifteen stone. I pity her horse. I wonder if the
policeman was correct about that man? It would be very shocking if you
had really hurt him. It would be our duty to make him some recompense.’
Paula tapped her foot fretfully upon the floor.
‘Didn’t I tell you he wasn’t hurt, Hal? I know what you’re thinking
about--that I have been driving too fast; but Green said it was a
wonder I didn’t go right over him, and that, if I hadn’t pulled up the
horses as promptly as I did, I must have done so. He was lying right in
the road.’
‘I am very thankful you _did_ pull up so quickly. Was he a Haltham man?’
‘No, no; a common tramp, with ragged clothes. Don’t talk of him any
more, please. I’d rather forget all about it.’
‘It has excited you more than you like to acknowledge, little woman,’
replied Hal, as he sauntered out of the room to change his dress.
As he disappeared, Paula threw herself into an arm-chair. What had she
said? How much had she acknowledged? How far had she betrayed herself?
Her head was going round and round, and the faces of Carl Bjornsën
and Hal Rushton were revolving before her sight like the colours in a
kaleidoscope. Her old life and her new life seemed to be mingling into
one, until she hardly felt sure to which she belonged. The sight of
Carl Bjornsën had revived the past even whilst the voice of Hal Rushton
assured her of the present. She could neither reason with herself,
nor decide what was best to be done--she was only sure of this, that
she must carefully and calmly think over the best plan to get rid
of Carl Bjornsën. How she hated the man at that moment: the inhuman
wretch who had blighted her former life, and now had risen from the
dead (as it seemed to her) to torture her present. Had he stood before
her at that moment, and she had held a knife in her hand, she would
have been quite capable of running it into him. She _hated_ him, she
repeated to herself, with clenched teeth--she hated and despised him.
If he attempted to come between her and her Hal, if by persecutions or
annoyances he wrested from her but one tithe of her darling’s love or
confidence, she would poison him like some venomous animal whom it was
quite justifiable to put out of the way.
The meek girl, who had submitted to such outrageous tyranny in the days
gone by, and was now the most ductile and loving woman in creation,
seemed suddenly to have been transformed into a fury, thirsting for
revenge.
But her righteous anger was a very poor imitation of the passion of the
gods. It was the stamping hoof of the incensed ewe trying to defend her
lamb--the peck of the turtle-dove as the hand of the spoiler robs her
of her eggs.
A knock for admittance at her bedroom door was followed by the entrance
of the nurse, with the cooing infant in her arms, and in a few moments
Paula had washed away all her angry feelings in a burst of tears over
her baby girl.