"HOW LIKE A WINTER HATH THY ABSENCE BEEN."
Perhaps, among all Valeria's friends and admirers, Sir George Varney
was the only man who had any inkling of the truth, who was keen enough
to discover the real cause of that moral decay which in its results was
obvious to every one. He had enjoyed more of Lady Valeria's confidence
than anybody else, and he had watched her closely, both before and
after her husband's death. She had tried to keep him at a distance when
they first met at Monaco; she had let him see that her resentment was
as strong as ever; but at a race-meeting in the neighbourhood he had
contrived to make his peace with her. The gambler's common instinct
drew them together. She was alone in a strange land--or in other words,
she knew no one except Sir George Varney whose counsel upon turf
questions was worth sixpence; and she humiliated herself, and forgot
that burning wrong of the past, tried to forget that for her sake her
dead husband had beaten this man. She allowed Sir George to call upon
her one February afternoon, and tell her all about his book for the
Craven and the First Spring, across the dainty Moorish tea-tray, with
its little brazen tea-pot, and eggshell cups and saucers. After that
they became staunch allies, if not staunch friends. Valeria had now the
command of ample funds, and could bet as much as she liked. When she
took Sir George's advice she was generally a winner. She invariably
lost when she followed her own inclinations. He initiated her as to
the mysteries of the tables at Monte Carlo, expounded the whole theory
of martingales, and showed her how she might beguile the tedium of her
days with the occult science of chance, as exemplified by pricking rows
of figures on a card.
They were a great deal together as the season wore on, and, as a
natural consequence, they were talked about a great deal by that
section of society whose chief conversation is of the follies and sins
of its own particular set.
Sir George felt that he was getting on; but in his heart of hearts
he knew perfectly well that Valeria did not care a straw for him,
and that she was never likely to care for him. He knew that she
had passionately loved Bothwell Grahame, and that despair at his
abandonment was the mainspring of all her conduct. She was reckless of
herself and of her good name--spent her money like water--ruined her
health--indulged every caprice of the moment--gave way to every fit
of ill-temper--simply because, having lost Bothwell Grahame, she had
nothing in life worth living for, except such things as could give her
feverish excitement, and with that excitement forgetfulness.
Knowing all this, knowing that the woman's heart was like an empty
sepulchre, George Varney was not the less determined to win her for his
wife.
"We suit each other so well," he said modestly, when his friends
congratulated him, considerably in advance, after their manner. "No,
we are not engaged. I only wish we were; but I daresay, if I am good,
it may run to that by and by. She is a very fine woman, and has a
remarkable head for the turf--remarkable, by Jove! She's always wrong;
but the mind is there, don't you know, a very remarkable mind. And
she's a very fair judge of a horse, too, or would be if she would only
look at his legs, which she never does."
"And she has plenty of lucre, eh, George? I think that's the main point
in your case, isn't it?"
"Very sorry for myself, but can't do without the filthy lucre. Couldn't
afford to elope with Mrs. Menelaus, if she was a pauper," answered Sir
George, with cheery frankness.
"Some idiot told me that her husband knocked you down at the last party
they ever gave at Fox Hill," said his friend, with a half grin; "that
was a lie, of course."
"No, there is some truth--we had a little passage at fisticuffs: and
that's why I mean to marry his widow," answered Sir George savagely.
"I meant to have the law of him; but as he bilked the beak by dying
before the hearing of the summons, I mean to have his money by way of
consolation. It will be a pleasanter remedy."
"And the lady thrown in by way of make-weight," grinned his friend.
The time came when Sir George thought he might venture to advance his
claim, in a purely business-like manner. Lady Valeria and he had made a
splendid book for the Derby, and the lady had won something over five
thousand pounds, graphically described by her coadjutor as a pot of
money. The money was of very little consequence to her nowadays, for
she had not yet succeeded in living beyond her income; but she was as
eager to win as she had been in the old time at Simla when losing meant
difficulty, and might mean ruin. She loved the sensation of success,
the knowledge that her horse had struggled to the front and kept there
at the crucial moment.
Emboldened by this brilliant _coup_, Sir George reminded Valeria of
his patience and devotion, and asked her to accept him as her second
husband.
"I don't expect you to marry me just yet," he said. "It's only six
months since the General died--and I know women are sticklers for
etiquette in these matters, though they are leaving off widow's caps,
and a good deal of humbug. But I should like to have your word for the
future. I don't want another fellow to cut in and win the cup after
I've made all the running."
Lady Valeria looked at him in a leisurely way with that contemptuous
smile of hers, a smile that had crushed so many a gallant admirer.
"I thought we understood each other too well for this kind of thing to
happen," she said, with perfect good temper and placidity. "We have
been getting on remarkably well together--and I have even taught myself
to forget your impertinence that night at Fox Hill. As to marriage, you
may be almost sure of one thing, and quite sure of another--first, that
I shall never marry at all; secondly, that I shall never marry you."
Sir George bowed, and said not another word. The partnership on the
turf and at baccarat was too profitable to be imperilled. But he meant
the alliance to become closer and more binding, before he and Lady
Valeria had done with each other.
And now in this lovely July weather, when the river and the woods were
at their fairest, Sir George Varney felt himself several furlongs
nearer the winning-post than he had been at Monaco. Lady Valeria had
become a more sensitive creature of late. The strings of the lyre were
played upon more easily. In other words, Valeria had taken to chloral.
Sir George was on excellent terms with her maid, and had received
information of a character which he himself called "the straight tip"
from that astute damsel. Lady Valeria had her good days and her bad
days; and on the bad days she was sunk in an abyss of despair, from
which not even some great success in her racing speculations could
rouse her. It was in one of these fits of despondency that Sir George
Varney made his second proposal of marriage. But this time he did not
sue as her slave, nor did he adopt the calm and _débonnaire_ tone of
a business man advocating an advantageous alliance. He approached her
with a brutal energy, a coarse plainness of speech, which shocked the
shattered nerves, and frightened her into submission.
He told her the scandals that were rife about her--told her how, if she
did not rehabilitate her character by becoming his wife, she would find
herself cut by society as his mistress--laughed at her half-indignant,
half-hysterical protest--told her that the world was much too wicked
to believe in any innocent alliance between a beautiful woman and a
man of forty, whose past life had not been stainless; talked to her as
no man had ever dared to talk to her until that hour--talked till she
sat trembling before him, vanquished, subjugated by the strangeness of
sheer brutality, she who a year ago had been sheltered and defended
from slander and insult by the protecting love of a noble heart.
She sat cowering before him. Was the world so vile as to suspect
her--and of caring for this man, whom she loathed? She covered her face
with her hands and sobbed aloud.
"There is no one upon earth who would stir a foot to protect me against
their vile slanders; not one of my own kin who would stand up for me,"
she sobbed.
"How could you expect it," asked Sir George, "when you have kept all
your people at arm's length? You may lay long odds not one of _that_
lot will take our part. I would give some of your traducers a sound
horsewhipping to-morrow, but that would do you more harm than good,
unless you mean to marry me."
"Horsewhip them, and I _will_ marry you," cried Valeria, rising and
rushing from the room, tremulous with rage.
Upon this hint Sir George promptly acted. He took an early opportunity
of leading on a harmless youth to say something uncivil of Lady
Valeria, and thereupon chastised him in his flannels before a select
audience. The scapegoat writhed under the strong gut riding-whip, could
not understand why he was so castigated, vowed vengeance, and sent a
friend to Sir George that evening, proposing an early meeting on the
sands near Ostend; at which message Sir George openly laughed.
"When boys are rude they must be punished," he said, "but I don't shoot
boys. Tell your young friend I am sorry I lost my temper; and that if
he will write a nice little letter, apologising to my future wife for
his rashness of speech, I shall consider we are quits."
It was known next day along both banks of the river that Lady Valeria
was to marry Sir George Varney immediately on the expiry of her
mourning. The _Daily Telegraph_ possessed itself of the fact before the
_Morning Post_, and it was recorded in all the society papers of the
following week. Bothwell Grahame read of it a week later in the _United
Service Gazette_, read and was thankful; for now this restless spirit,
which had wrought him so much evil, would be exorcised and bound for
ever in the thrall of matrimony.
"I am sorry she is to marry a scoundrel," he said to himself;
"otherwise my feeling would be unalloyed gladness."
And now Bothwell dared to hope that the wandering bird Hilda might be
lured home to her nest--now that doubting heart might have faith once
more.
If he could but write to her, tell her of Valeria's engagement, ask
her if he had not proved himself faithful, if she could not trust him
henceforward with perfect trustfulness! She had believed in him when
his fellow-men pointed at him as a suspected murderer; she had fled
from him because an audacious woman claimed him for her lover. Strange
inconsistency of a woman's heart, so strong and yet so weak!
Heathcote was in Italy, and Heathcote was the only channel of
communication between Bothwell and his lost love. He saddled Glencoe
and rode over to The Spaniards, where he hoped to hear of Heathcote's
speedy return; but the Fräulein was quite in the dark as to her
employer's movements. He wrote very seldom; he left everything in her
hands. She had received a little note from Florence nearly a fortnight
ago. He had written not one word as to the probable time of his return.
Bothwell talked about Hilda, and insidiously questioned the Fräulein,
who might perchance know the girl's whereabouts. But Miss Meyerstein
was quite as dark upon the subject as Greek society in general was
about the adventures of Ariadne. All Miss Meyerstein could tell
Bothwell was that Hilda had Glossop with her, which preference of
Glossop the mild Fräulein evidently regarded as something in the way of
a slight to herself.
"If Glossop can be trusted to know where Hilda, is, I think I might
have been trusted," she said.
"I wonder a frivolous person like Glossop has not told the secret to
half Bodmin before now," said Bothwell.
He wrote to Hilda that night, enclosing his letter to Heathcote at
Florence. It seemed a wearily roundabout way of reaching Hilda, who
might be in Scotland or in Scandinavia for all he knew; but it was his
only way, and it was just possible that she might be with her brother,
and receive his letter sooner than he dared hope. He wrote a few lines
to Heathcote with the enclosure, telling him about Lady Valeria's
engagement. "I suppose when they two are married our banns may be put
up in Bodmin Church," he wrote; "unless Hilda has any other objection
to me."
He counted the days, the hours almost, while he waited for a reply
to his letter. He followed the letter in its journey, now over sea,
and then over land--halted with it at Calais, went southward with
it, skirted the Mediterranean, pierced the Alps, and then it was all
darkness. Who could tell where the letter might have to go after it
reached Florence?
"She may be hiding herself somewhere in England, and that wretched
letter may have to travel all the way back again," he told himself
ruefully.
He waited, and waited, and waited; bearing himself with a brave front
before his pupils all the while, teaching them, botanising with them,
boating, riding; shooting with them, and never once losing temper with
them on account of his own trouble. But he was suffering an agony of
impatience and suspense all the same, and one of the more thoughtful of
his lads saw that he was paler than usual, and worn and haggard.
"You mustn't work with us if you are ill, Mr. Grahame," said the boy;
"we'll get on with our work by ourselves for a bit."
"No, my dear boy, I'm not ill; I have not been sleeping very well
lately--that's all. 'Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care.'"
"Yes, we can't get on without that beggar," answered the boy. "I
know what it is to be awake all night with the toothache. I've often
wondered that the nights should be so jolly short when one's asleep,
and so jolly long when one's awake."
At breakfast a few days later one of the lads, the son of a brother
officer of Bothwell's, looked up from the _Evening Standard_ with an
exclamation of surprise.
"Here's the widow of one of your old friends gone and got married, Mr.
Grahame," he said. "'At Galbraith Church, N.B., Sir George Varney,
Bart., of the Hop Poles, Maidstone, to Lady Valeria Harborough, of
Galbraith Castle, Perthshire, and Fox Hill, Plymouth.' You saved the
old General's life up at the hills, didn't you?" asked the boy. "I've
heard my father talk about it."
"It wasn't worth talking about, Hector," answered Bothwell. "The
General was a good friend to me, and I honour his memory."
"More than Lady Valeria does, or she wouldn't marry such a cad as
Varney. I've heard my father say he is a cad."
"It is safer not to repeat opinions of that kind," said Bothwell.
He tried to play the schoolmaster while his heart was beating
furiously for very joy. She was married, that viper who had so
well-nigh spoiled his life; she was married to a scoundrel who would
make her life miserable, and he, Bothwell, was his own man again. Hilda
could have no further justification for distrust. He had held himself
aloof from the siren, he had demonstrated by his conduct that he had
no hankering after her or her fortune; and now that she was safely
disposed of in second wedlock, Hilda could have no excuse for delaying
his happiness.
All things had gone well with him, except this one thing. He had built
and furnished his house, and laid out his garden; people were full
of praises for his taste and cleverness. He had been lucky with his
pupils, and he liked his work. He was able to save money, and before
the year was out he had laid aside the first hundred pounds towards the
extinction of his debt to his cousin. But Dora did not want the debt
extinguished, and had written him an indignant letter when he offered
to pay the money into her banking account.
"How dare you pinch and scrape in order to pay me off?" she wrote. "How
do I know that you are not half-starving those poor lads, in your
desire to get out of my debt? It is your paltry pride which rebels at
an obligation even to your adopted sister."
To atone for the harshness of her letter she sent him an old Florentine
cabinet of ebony and ivory, a gem which glorified his drawing-room,
already enriched by her gifts; for she had sent him bronzes from one
place, and pottery from another, and glass from a third. She had made
up her mind that when the time came for Bothwell to lead his young wife
home, the home should be in some wise worthy of the wife.
And now there was an end of all uncertainties about that first unhappy
entanglement of Bothwell's; and nothing but caprice need keep him and
Hilda apart any longer.
A fortnight had gone since he had written to Hilda, and there had been
no sign. It was the fifth day after the announcement of Lady Valeria's
marriage in the London papers, and Bothwell started once more upon
that long ride by moorland and lane, across country from Trevena to
Bodmin, and thence to The Spaniards. He expected the smallest comfort
at the end of his journey; only a little talk with the Fräulein, who
might have had a recent letter from Heathcote, and might be able to
tell him something, were it ever so little. She was always friendly
and compassionate; and she was always ready to talk to him about
Hilda, and that was much. On one occasion she had gone so far as to
take him into Hilda's private sitting-room, and let him gloat over
the rows of prettily-bound books--Tennyson and Browning, and Dickens
and Thackeray--and the little tables, and manifold nicknacks, the
mantelpiece border which those dear hands had worked. There stood his
own photograph, framed and curtained with plush, as if it were too
sacred for the common eye. He had given her a smaller copy of the same
photograph, and he hoped that she had taken that with her, that she
looked at it sometimes, among strange faces.
Miss Meyerstein expatiated on Hilda's abrupt departure, and the little
luggage with which she had provided herself.
"Only her dressing-bag and a small portmanteau," said the Fräulein.
"She left all her pretty frocks hanging in the wardrobe; all her laces
and ribbons, and gloves and ornaments in her drawers. She must have had
to buy everything new. And there is her wedding-gown, just as it came
from the dressmaker's the day after she left home."
And then, at Bothwell's urgent, reiterated entreaty, Miss Meyerstein
went into the adjoining room, and came back, after a rattling of keys,
bringing with her a white object which looked like the sheeted dead
being carried away from a plague-stricken house.
It was only Hilda's wedding-gown, wrapped in voluminous coverings of
white linen.
Miss Meyerstein flung off the coverings, and shook out the white
satin gown, satin of so rich a fabric that it took all manner of
pearly and opal hues in the autumn light--a smart little frock, with
a round skirt, and just one big puff at the back of the waist, like a
carelessly-tied sash.
"Short, for dancing," said Miss Meyerstein, as she held out the frock
at arm's length, dangling in the air.
"But she didn't expect to dance upon her wedding-day!" ejaculated
Bothwell stupidly.
"No, but afterwards. She would go to dances, and she would be expected
to appear as a bride."
"Of course," muttered Bothwell, wondering how many dances--save the
dances of pixies in a moonlit glen--might be expected to occur within
easy reach of Trevena.
He knelt and kissed the hem of the white satin frock, and then turned
away with a sigh that was almost a sob.
"Not a grain of dust has got to it," said Miss Meyerstein. "It will be
ready when it is wanted."
"Yes," answered Bothwell. "The gown will be ready when it is wanted;
but who can tell who the bridegroom will be?"
"He will be nobody if he is not you," said Miss Meyerstein. "That poor
child positively adores you."
"How do you know? It is nearly a year since you saw her."
"Such love as that does not wear itself out in a year."
To-day Bothwell felt that he wanted even such poor comfort as might be
had from feminine twaddle of this kind. He felt that even a romp with
the twins would do him good. They were of her race, and she had loved
them, and they could prattle to him about her.
It was a rainy afternoon late in October, a dreary day for that long
ride over the hills. The Atlantic yonder had a look of unspeakable
melancholy; a great gray sea into which gray earth and sky melted.
It would be dark before Bothwell could get back to Trevena, and the
ride was not the pleasantest after nightfall; but a man who had ridden
through Afghan passes in his time was not to be scared by dark hills
and narrow lanes. Bothwell was in a mood to ride somewhere, were it
only in the hope of riding away from his own impatient thoughts. He
had delayed starting till after luncheon, having waited to give his
boys the full benefit of a long morning's work. It was between five
and six when he came to the iron gates of The Spaniards, and the sun
was setting behind the hills yonder above Penmorval, poor deserted
Penmorval, where the pictured faces looked out upon empty floors, and
where the housekeeper sighed as she went from room to room, attending
to fires that warmed desolate hearths.
The Spaniards looked a little more cheerful than when Bothwell had seen
it last, for there were lights in many of the lower windows, and those
lamp-lit casements glowed brightly across the rainy dusk. He would be
able to get a good cup of tea from the Fräulein, and to put up his
horse for an hour or two before he turned homewards again.
An empty carriage passed him in the drive, and turned towards an
opening in the shrubbery that led to the stable-yard. There were
visitors at The Spaniards, upon that wet evening! Bothwell wondered who
the guest, or guests, could be, in the absence of the master.
Or was it the master himself who had come back? His heart beat faster
at the thought. He dismounted and rang the bell. The door was opened
directly. There were a couple of servants in the hall and some luggage.
Yes, the master of the house had returned.
"Take my horse to the stables, like a good fellow," said Bothwell to
the man who had opened the door. "Your master has come home, I see."
"Yes, sir, ten minutes ago."
Bothwell waited to ask no further questions, did not wait to be
announced even, but walked straight to the library, Heathcote's usual
sitting-room, opened the door, and went in.
There was no lamp. The room was lighted only by the fire-glow, which
gleamed on bookshelves and old oak panelling, and on the massive
timbers of the ceiling. There was a tea-table in front of the wide old
fireplace--one of those vagabond tea-tables which can make themselves
at home anywhere--and the tea was being poured out by a girl who wore a
neat little black velvet toque and dark cloth jacket, a girl who looked
as if she had just come off a journey, while Heathcote reposed in his
armchair on the other side of the hearth.
No one but Hilda could have been so much at her ease in that room,
which was in some wise a sacred chamber, especially reserved for the
master of the house. No one but Hilda had such pretty hair, or such a
graceful bend of the head. The girl in the velvet toque was sitting
with her back to Bothwell; but he had not a moment's doubt as to her
identity.
He went over to the hearth, gave his hand to Heathcote silently, and
then seated himself by Hilda's side, she looking up at him dumbly the
while, half in fear.
"What have you to say to me, Hilda, after having used me so ill?" he
asked, taking her hand in his.
"Only that it was for your own sake I went away on the eve of our
marriage," she answered seriously. "I did not want to stand between you
and happiness."
"Would it not have been wiser, and fairer to me, if you had taken my
views upon the matter before you ran away?"
"You would have been too generous to tell me the truth; you would have
sacrificed yourself to your sense of honour. How could I tell you did
not love Lady Valeria better than me?"
"If you had read _Tom Jones_ you would have had a very easy way of
solving that question. You would have had only to look in the glass,
and there you would have seen, as Sophia Western saw, the reason for a
lover's devotion. You would have seen purity and innocence, and fresh
young beauty; and you would have known that your lover could not falter
in his truth to you."
"I don't think Tom's conduct was altogether blameless, in spite of the
looking-glass, eh, Bothwell?" said Heathcote, laughing at him. It is
so hard to have to make love before a third person. "You have to thank
me for bringing home your sweetheart. I read the advertisement of Lady
Valeria's marriage at Genoa three days ago, as I was on my way home; so
I stopped in Paris, and brought this young lady away from her musical
studies at an hour's notice. I suppose she was getting tired of the
Conservatoire, for she seemed uncommonly glad to come."
"And you were in Paris?" cried Bothwell. "So near! If I had only known!"
"There would have been nothing gained by following her," said
Heathcote. "I never met with a more resolute young woman than this
sister of mine. When she was determined to have you, there was not
the least use in opposing her, and when she had made up her mind not
to have you, she was just as inflexible. But now that Lady Valeria has
taken to herself a second husband, and that you seem to bear the blow
pretty cheerfully, perhaps Hilda may be inclined to change her mind for
the second time."
"Her wedding-gown is hanging in her wardrobe ready for her," said
Bothwell, drawing a little closer to his truant sweetheart, in the
sheltering dusk, that delicious hour for true and loving hearts,
blind-man's holiday, betwixt dog and wolf.
"How did you know that?" asked Heathcote.
"The Fräulein told me. She has been taking care of your wedding-gown,
Hilda. She knew that it would be wanted. You had better wear it as soon
as possible, dearest. It is a year old already; and it is going more
and more out of fashion every day."
"She shall wear it before we are a month older," said Heathcote. "I
have had too much trouble about this marriage already; and I'll stand
no more shilly-shallying. We'll put up the banns next Sunday; and in
less than a month from to-day you two foolish people shall be one."
Edward Heathcote kept his word, and the smart white satin frock was
worn one bright morning in November, worn by the prettiest bride
that had been seen in Bodmin Church for many a year, the townspeople
said--those townspeople who had now only praises and friendliest
greetings for Bothwell Grahame, albeit a year ago he had seemed to them
as a possible murderer.
A telegram had informed Dora Wyllard of the wedding-day, so soon as
ever the date had been fixed, but she had not responded, as Hilda
and her brother had hoped she would respond, to the invitation to be
present at the wedding. She could not bear to see the Cornish hills yet
awhile, she told Hilda, in her letter of congratulation. Years must
pass, in all probability, before she could endure to look upon that
familiar landscape again, or to see that roof-tree which had sheltered
her when she was Julian Wyllard's happy wife.
"I am rejoiced to know that you and Bothwell have come to a safe haven
at last," she wrote. "I shall always be interested in hearing of your
welfare, cheered and comforted by the thought of your bright home.
I cannot blame you for having made Bothwell wait for his happiness,
Hilda; for I feel that you have acted wisely in making sure of his free
choice. There can now be no after-thought, no lurking suspicion to come
between you and your wedded love.
"For my own part I am at peace here, and that is much. I read a great
deal, paint a little every day; and my picture, however bad it may be,
is a kind of companion to me, a thing that seems to live as it grows
under my hand. My models interest me, and through them I have become
acquainted with several humble households in Florence, and find a great
deal to interest me in this warmhearted, hot-headed race. Best of all,
I am away from old scenes, old associations; and sometimes, sitting
dreaming in my sunny balcony, with the blue waters of the Arno gliding
past under my feet, I almost believe that I am some new creature
without a history, and not that Dora Wyllard who was once mistress of
Penmorval.
"I wish you and Bothwell would take your honeymoon holiday in the
South, and spend a week or two here with me. There is plenty of
accommodation for you in these grand old apartments of mine--a
first-floor of a dozen rooms, all large and lofty. My old servants keep
everything in exquisite order, and are devoted in their attention to me.
"It was a pleasure to me to see your brother when he was staying in
Florence. Tell him that I left Vallombrosa only a week ago, and was
very sorry to come away from wood and mountain even then."
Hilda and her husband accepted this friendly invitation, and spent
half their honeymoon on the road to Florence, and the other half in
that picturesque city. They found Dora the shadow of her former self.
She had a gentle air of resignation, a pensive placidity which was
inexpressibly touching. She never mentioned her dead husband. She was
full of thoughtfulness for others, and had made herself the adored
benefactress of a little colony of poor Florentines. She had furnished
her rooms and established herself in a manner which indicated the
intention to make a permanent home in the city; and here Bothwell and
his wife left her, with deep regret.
"Will you never come back to Cornwall, Dora?" Hilda asked piteously, in
the last farewell moments at the railway-station.
"Never is a long word, dearest. I suppose I shall see the old places
again some day; but I must be a good deal older than I am now--a good
deal further away from my old sorrows."
Dora spoke without reckoning upon that Providence which shapes our ends
in spite of us; and happily for the cause of true love, Providence
found a way of bringing Dora Wyllard back to Cornwall much sooner than
she had intended to return.
A little more than a year after Bothwell and his wife left Florence,
the happy home at Trevena was darkened by the shadow of an awful fear.
A son had been born to Bothwell Grahame; and before the boy was a week
old the young mother was in imminent danger of death. Edward Heathcote
was in Italy, spending his autumn holiday, going over much of the same
ground that he had visited before, and loitering longer and later than
the previous year. A telegram from Bothwell told him of his sister's
peril; and another telegram reached Mrs. Wyllard from the same source.
Moved by the same impulse, Dora and Heathcote met at the station, each
on the same errand, bent on starting by the first train for Paris. They
travelled together in sad and silent companionship, each oppressed by
the fear of a great calamity.
Heathcote had telegraphed before he started, asking for a telegram to
meet him at the Paris station, and here the message brought a ray of
comfort.
"A little better. The doctors are more hopeful."
Anxious days and nights followed Dora's arrival at Trevena. Poor
Bothwell suffered a suppressed agony of grief, which seemed to have
aged him at least ten years by the time the crisis was past, and the
young mother was able to smile upon her firstborn. Happily these
markings of care are soon erased from youthful faces; and before
Christmas Bothwell was himself again, and ready to receive a new batch
of pupils, the old lot having been disposed of triumphantly in the
summer before his son's birth.
Dora stayed in Cornwall during that winter of '83 and '84, and she is
in Cornwall still, but not at Penmorval. She has established herself
at her birth-place, Tregony Manor, near the Land's End; and here old
friends and neighbours flock round her, the people who knew her mother,
the friends of her childish days, of her happy girlhood. They bring
back sweet memories of the old time, and help to wean her from her
gloomy thoughts.
One of her old companions, a spinster of thirty summers, is very often
with her in the familiar home. They seem almost like the girl-friends
of the past, painting together, playing, singing, working. All the old
occupations have been resumed; as if the ten years intervening had
hardly made any break in the two lives.
"Sometimes I fancy it is all a dream, and that you have never been away
from Tregony," says Miss Beauchamp, one morning when they are sitting
at work. "If we had but your dear good mother over there in her
favourite, chair by the fireplace, I should quite believe the last ten
years to be only a dream. But she is gone, dear soul, and that makes
a sad difference. Do you know, yesterday, when I looked out of the
window, and saw you and Mr. Heathcote walking on the terrace, I rubbed
my eyes to make sure that I was awake. You both looked exactly as you
used to look ten years ago, when you were engaged."
Dora went on with her work in placid silence.
"Dora, he is so good, so loyal, so devoted to you," cried Miss
Beauchamp, in her affectionate impulsive way. "You cannot be so cruel
as to spoil his life for ever. Surely you will reward him some day."
"Some day," sang Dora softly, with her face bent low over her work: and
her story ends thus with the refrain of a popular ballad.
* * * * *
THE END.
End of Project Gutenberg's Wyllard's Weird, by Mary Elisabeth Braddon