ALARMS.
Edward was about a week away from home. He had often been away before,
and his absence had caused no particular commotion: but now it affected
a good many people. To Catherine, if it were possible, it might be said
to have been a certain relief. He and she had got over that explanation
when she had intended to say so many things to him, and had found the
words taken out of her mouth. All things had gone on again in their
usual way. But the suspicion which he had supposed to exist so long
without any reason now had actually arisen in her mind. She showed it
less than he had supposed her to show it when she had no such feeling.
She was on her guard. She did not worry him any longer by her old
affectionate way of going to the window to watch him when he went out;
that had been simple love, admiration of his orderly, regular ways,
pleasure in the sight of him: but somehow instinctively since she had
begun to doubt she came to perceive the interpretation he had put upon
it, and she did it no longer. But at night when all was still in the
house and Edward down stairs at work in his room, or supposed to be at
work, if any sound of the door closing echoed upwards, Catherine would
steal behind the curtains and watch if it was he who was going out, and
which way he took. She believed him, of course; but yet there was always
in her soul a wish to ask--was he really, really sure that he was true?
Doubts like these are beyond the power of any but the sternest
self-command to crush, and Catherine was capable of that in his
presence. She would not betray her anxiety to him: but when he was not
there no such effort was necessary, and she betrayed it freely, to the
silence, to the night, when there was nobody to see.
And her thoughts had travelled fast and far since that evening. She had
no longer any doubt that he loved somebody, and she had made up her mind
that it was Hester who was the object of his love. This had caused her
perhaps the greatest mental conflict she had ever known in her life--for
her life had this good thing in it, that it had been wonderfully free
from struggle. She had been the arbiter of all things in her little
world, and nobody had made any actual stand against her will. Many
pretences had surrounded her, feigned assents and furtive oppositions,
but nobody had stood out against her. It was a great wonder to her that
he or any one should do so now (though he did not: he had opposed her in
nothing, nor ever said a word from which it could be inferred that he
rejected or questioned Catherine's sway), but with all her natural
strength of mind she set herself to reconsider the question. If she
disliked Hester before, if for all these years the bright-eyed,
all-observant girl, mutely defiant of her, had been a sort of Mordecai
to Catherine, it is not to be supposed that she could easily receive her
into favour now. Her parentage, her looks, her mind, her daring setting
up of her own personality as a child, as if she were something
important, had all exasperated Catherine. Even the consciousness of her
own prejudice, of the folly of remembering against a girl the follies of
her childhood, helped to aggravate this sentiment; nor was it likely
that the fact that this girl was Edward's chosen love should make her
heart softer. She said to herself that she could not endure Hester; but
yet she prepared herself for the inevitable from the first day. Perhaps
she thought it well to propitiate fate by going to the very furthest
length at once, and forecasting all that the most evil fortune could
bring her.
It cost her a sharp and painful struggle. No one knew what was going on
in her mind in those wintry days of the early year: her preoccupation
was attributed to other things: afterwards, when events seemed to
account for it, her wonderful prevision was admired and wondered at. But
in reality the previsions in Catherine's mind were all of one kind. She
saw a series of events happen in succession, as to which she was as
confident as if they were past already; and in her imagination she did
the only thing that nobody expected of her, the thing which fate did not
demand of her--she made up her mind that she would make no stand against
this hateful thing. What was the use of it? If the young but held out,
even the most unwise and the most cruel, they must win in the end. It
would not be for her dignity, she said to herself, to stand out. She
would make no opposition to Edward's choice. The separation that must
ensue she would bear as she could--with dignity at least if nothing
else. The elevation of her enemy and her enemy's house she must submit
to. She would withdraw, she would have no hand in it; but at least she
would not oppose. This, by dint of a hard fight, Catherine obtained of
herself. She would say nothing, forestall nothing, but at the same time
oppose nothing. All the long hours which a lonely woman must spend by
herself she appropriated to this. She must lose Edward; had she not lost
him now? He had been her sole weakness, her one delusion; and it was
not, she said to herself, a delusion--the boy had loved her and been
true to her. He had made her happy like a mother with a true son. But
when that vagrant sentiment comes in which is called love (the fools! as
if the appropriation of the name to one kind of affection, and that the
most selfish of all, was not a scorn to love, the real, the
all-enduring!) what was previous virtue, what was truth, and gratitude,
and everything else in life, in comparison? Of course they must all give
place to the fascination of a pair of shining eyes. Father and mother,
and home and duty, what were they in comparison? Everybody was aware of
that, and the old people struggled often enough as was well known.
Sometimes they appealed to heaven and earth, sometimes were hysterical
and made vows and uttered curses. But in the long run the battle was to
the young ones. They had time and passion, and universal human sympathy,
on their side, whereas the old people had none of all these, neither
time to wait, nor passion to inspire, nor sympathy anywhere in heaven or
earth. Catherine said to herself proudly that she would not expose
herself to the pity which attends the vanquished. She would retire from
the fray. She would clothe herself in double armour of stoicism, and
teach herself to see the humour in this as in so many things. Was not
seeing the humour of it the last thing that remained to the noble soul
amid the wonder of life?
Her sense, however, of this great downfall which was approaching, and in
which she meant to enact so proud and magnanimous a part, was so strong
and bitter that Edward's absence was a relief to her. She expected every
day that he would present himself before her, and burst forth into some
agitated statement--a statement which she would not help out with a
word, but which she would receive, not as he would expect her to receive
it, with opposition and wrath, but with the calm of one who knew all
about it, and had made up her mind to it long ago. But when he was
absent she felt that here was a respite. She was freed from the eager
desire she had, against her will, to know what he was doing, where he
went, who he was with, which tormented her, but which she could not
subdue. All this ferment of feeling was stilled when he was away. She
did not ask why he should go away so often, what the business was that
called him to London. For the first time in her life she was
overmastered by a conflict of individual feeling; and she was glad when
there came a lull in it, and when the evil day was postponed. She went
on seeing her friends, visiting and being visited, keeping a fair face
to the world all the time. But it began to be whispered in Redborough
that Catherine Vernon was beginning to fail, that there were signs in
her of breaking up, that she began to show her age. People began to ask
each other about her. "Have you seen Catherine Vernon lately? How did
you think she was looking?" and to shake their heads. Some said she had
been so strong a woman always, and had taken so much out of herself,
that probably the break-up would be speedy if it was true that she was
beginning to break up; while others held more hopefully that with her
wonderful constitution she might yet rally, and see twenty-years of
comfort yet. The fact was that she was not ill at all. It seemed to
herself that she was more keenly alive, more highly strung to every use
of existence than ever. She saw better, heard more quickly, having every
sense on the alert. Nothing had so quickened her and stimulated her
powers for years. She was eager for every new day which might carry some
new crisis in it. She did not even feel the deadly chill of Edward's
desertion for the intense occupation which the whole matter brought her.
And then, though she said to herself it was certain, yet it was not so
certain after all. It might turn out that she was mistaken yet. There
was still an outlet for a secret hope. Sometimes indeed a flattering
unction was laid to her heart, a feeling that if it is only the
unforeseen that happens, the so carefully thought out, so elaborately
calculated upon, might not happen. But this Catherine only permitted
herself by rare moments. For the most part she felt very sure of the
facts, and almost solemnly cognisant of what was to come.
In this way the spring went on. It had appeared to Edward himself as
certain that some great _coup_ must have settled his fate long before.
It was his inexperience, perhaps, and the excitement of his
determination to act for himself, which had made everything appear so
imminent; but after all it did not turn out so. The course of events
went on in that leisurely current which is far more deadly in its sweep
than any sudden cataract. He did not lose or gain anything in a moment,
his ventures either did not turn out so vast as he imagined, or they
were partial failures, partial successes. Step by step he went on,
sacrificing, jeopardising, gradually, slowly, without being himself
aware of what he was doing, the funds he had under his control. He had
been ready in the first passion of his desire for wealth to risk
everything and finish the whole matter at one swoop; but that passed
over, and he was not really aware how one by one his counters were being
swept out of his hands. It went on through all the awakening time of the
year, as it might have gone on for half a life time, and he was
impatient of the delay. Besides, this new accompaniment, this love which
he would not have suffered himself to indulge had he not believed
everything on the eve of a crisis, became a great addition to his
difficulties when the crisis did not come. The habit of resorting to
Hester was one which grew upon him. But the opportunities of indulging
in it were few, for he was as anxious not to betray himself nor to let
Catherine suspect what was going on, as at the beginning, when he
believed that all would be over in a week or two. And Hester herself was
not a girl with whom it was easy to carry on a clandestine intercourse.
The situation chafed her beyond endurance. She had almost ceased now to
think of the mystery in which he hid his proceedings, or to rebel
against the interest and sympathy which he demanded from her blindly,
out of the keen humiliation and distress which it cost her to feel that
she was deceiving her friends and the world, conspiring with him to
deceive Catherine. This consciousness made Hester disagreeable to live
with, an angry, resentful, impatient woman, absorbed in her own affairs,
little accessible to the world. Her mother could not understand what had
come to her, and still less could the old Morgans, who loved and had
understood her so completely, understand. She avoided them now, she
cared for nobody. Week by week with a joyless regularity she went to
Ellen Merridew's dances, where half the evening at least was spent with
Edward in a curious duel of mingled love and dislike--yes, sometimes
hatred almost. It seemed to her that her distaste for everything that
was going on was more than her love could balance, that she so hated the
expedients he drove her to, that he himself took another aspect in her
eyes. Sometimes she felt that she must make the crisis which he had so
often anticipated, and instead of consenting to fly with him must fly by
herself, and cut the tie between them with a sharp stroke. It was all
pain, trouble, misery--and what was worse, falsehood, wherever she
turned. As the year slid round into sunshine, and the days grew longer,
everything became intolerable to Hester. His absence was no relief to
her. She had his secret to keep whether he was there or away, or rather
her secret: for nothing she felt could be so dreadful to her as the
secresy in which her own life was wrapped, and which he was terrified
she should betray.
And though it was now nearly six months after Christmas, Emma Ashton
still lived with the old Morgans, and pursued her adventures with her
bow and spear in the dances and entertainments of the neighbourhood.
Reginald Merridew so far from "speaking" had been sent off by his father
to America, professedly on business, but, as was well known in the
family, to put a stop to the nonsense which at his age was so utterly
out of the question; and though other expectations had stirred her from
time to time, nothing had given certainty to her hopes of being settled.
She was going home at last, to Roland, in the beginning of June, and the
old people were looking forward to their deliverance with no small
impatience. Emma never failed at the _Thés Dansantes_. The old fly with
the white horse rumbled along in the dusk of the early summer nights and
mornings, carrying these two young women to and fro almost as regularly
as the Thursday came--Hester reluctant, angry, and pale, obeying a
necessity which she resented to the very depths of her being; Emma
placid, always with a certain sense of pleasure animating her
business-like arrangements. Catherine, who did not sleep very well on
these nights, got to recognise the sound, and would sometimes look out
from her window and wonder bitterly whether _that girl_ too was glancing
out, perhaps with triumph in her eyes as she passed the shut-up house,
thinking of the day when it would be her own. It gave her a little
pleasure on the first of June when she heard the slow vehicle creeping
by to think that Edward had been called away that afternoon, and that if
Hester had expected to meet him she would be disappointed. That was a
little consolation to her. She heard it creeping back again about one in
the morning, earlier than usual, with a satisfied smile. There had been
no billing and cooing that evening, no advance made towards the final
triumph. She thought there was a sound of disappointment even in the
rumble of the fly; and so indeed there might have been, for Emma was
sobbing, and discoursing among her tears upon the sadness of her
prospects. It was the last _Thé Dansante_ to which Emma could hope to
go. "And here I'm going just as I came," Emma said, "though I had such a
good opening, and everybody has been so kind to me. I can't say here
that it has been for want of having my chance. I have been introduced to
the best people, and grandmamma has given me two new dresses, and you
have never grudged me the best partners, I will say that for you,
Hester; and yet it has come to nothing! I am sure I sha'n't be able to
answer Roland a word if he says after this that balls are an unnecessary
expense--for it is not much I have made by them. To think that not one
single gentleman in all Redborough----! Oh, Hester, either Elinor and
Bee tell awful stories of what happened to them, or things have changed
dreadfully, quite dreadfully, since their day!"
Hester could find no words in which to console this victim of the times.
She listened indeed somewhat sternly, refusing compassion. "To be sure,
there was poor Reginald, it was not his fault," Emma sobbed. "If I
should live to be a hundred I never should believe it was his fault.
But, after all, he was very young, and he could have had no money to
speak of, and what should I have done with him? So perhaps that was for
the best. But then there was Dr. Morris, whom I could have got on with;
that was his mother's doing:--ladies are always jealous, don't you
think?--and I should not have minded that Captain Sedgely, that
volunteer captain. But it is of no use talking, for this is my last
Thursday. Oh, you don't mind; you have a good home, and a mother, and
everything you can desire. There is no hurry about you."
Hester made no reply. It seemed to her that she would be willing to
change lives even with Emma, to fall to her petty level, and estimate
the chances of being settled, and count the men whom she could have
managed to get on with, rather than carry on such an existence as hers.
It was no glance of triumph, but one of humiliation, that she had cast,
as they passed, upon the shuttered windows and close-drawn white
draperies at the Grange. In her imagination she stole into the very
bedchamber where Catherine had smiled to think of her disappointment,
and delivered her soul of her secret. "I am not ashamed that we love
each other: but I am ashamed that we have concealed it," she imagined
herself saying. She was very unhappy; there seemed no consolation for
her anywhere. Edward had warned her in a hurried note that he was called
to town. "I think it is coming at last," he said. "I think we have made
the grand _coup_ at last." He had said it so often that she had no faith
in him; and how long was it to go on like this--how long?
Meanwhile the house of the young Merridews was still ringing with mirth
and music. There was no restraint, or reserve, or prudence or
care-taking, from garret to basement. Algernon, the young husband who
was now a father as well, had perhaps taken a little more champagne than
usual in honour of his wife's first re-appearance after that arrival.
She was so brave, so "plucky," they all said, so unconventional, that
she had insisted on the _Thés Dansantes_ going on all the same, though
she was unable to preside over them, and was still up, a little pale but
radiant with smiles, at the last supper-table when every one was gone.
Harry had been looking very grave all the evening. He had even attempted
a little lecture over that final family supper. "If I were you, Algy and
Nell," he said, "I'd draw in a little now. You've got your baby to think
of--save up something for that little beggar, don't spend it all on a
pack of fools that eat you up."
"Oh, you old Truepenny," Ellen said, without knowing what she meant,
"you are always preaching. Hold your tongue, Algy, you have had too much
wine; you ought to go to bed. If I can't stand up for myself it's
strange to me. Who are you calling a pack of fools, Harry? It's the only
thing I call society in Redborough. All the other houses are as stiff as
Spaniards. There is nobody but me to put a little life into them. They
were all dead-alive before. If there's a little going on now I think
it's all owing to me."
"She is a wonderful little person is Nell," cried her husband, putting a
half-tipsy arm round her. "She has pluck for anything. To think she
should carry on just the same, to let the rest have their pleasure when
she was up stairs. I am proud of her, that is what I am. I am proud----"
"Oh, go to bed, Algy! If you ever do this again I will divorce you. I
won't put up with you. Harry, shut up," said the young mistress of the
house, who was fond of slang. "I can look after my own affairs."
"And as for the money," said Algy, with a jovial laugh, "I don't care a
---- for the money. Ned's put me up to a good thing or two. Ned's not
very much on the outside, but he's a famous good fellow. He's put me
up," he said, with a nod and broad smile of good humour, "to two--three
capital things."
"Ned!" cried Harry, almost with a roar of terror and annoyance, like the
cry of a lion. "Do you mean to say you've put yourself in Ned's hands?"
Upon which Ellen jumped up, red with anger, and pushed her husband away.
"Oh, go to bed, you stupid!" she cried.
Harry had lost all his colour; his fair hair and large light moustache
looked like shadows upon his whiteness. "For God's sake, Ellen!" he
said; "did you know of this?"
"Know of what?--it's nothing," she cried. "Yes, of course I know about
it. I pushed him into it--he knows I did. What have you got to do with
where we place our money? You may be sure we sha'n't want you to pay
anything for us," she said.
Harry had never resented her little impertinences; he had always been
submissive to her. He shook his head now more in sorrow than in anger.
"Let's hope you won't want anybody to pay for you," he said, and kissed
his sister and went away.
Harry had never been in so solemn a mood before. The foolish young
couple were a little awed by it, but at last Ellen found an explanation.
"It's ever since he was godfather to baby. He thinks he will have to
leave all his money to him," she said; and the incident ended in one of
Algy's usual bursts of laughter over his wife's _bons mots_.
Harry, however, took the matter a great deal more seriously; he got
little or no sleep that night. In the morning he examined the letters
with an alarmed interest. Edward was to be back that evening, it was
expected, and there was a mass of his letters on his desk with which his
cousin did not venture to interfere. Edward had a confidential clerk,
who guarded them closely. "Mr. Edward did not think there would be
anything urgent, anything to trouble you about," he said, following
Harry into the room with unnecessary anxiety. "I can find that out for
myself," Harry said, sharply, turning upon this furtive personage. But
he did not meddle with any of the heap, though it was his right to do
so. They frightened him, as though there had been infernal machines
inside, as indeed he felt sure enough there were--not of the kind which
tear the flesh and fibre, but the mind and soul. When he went back to
his room he received a visit very unexpectedly from the old clerk, Mr.
Rule, with whom Hester had held so long a conversation on the night of
the Christmas party. It was his habit to come now and then, to patronise
everybody, from the youngest clerks to the young principals, shaking his
white head and describing how things used to be "in John Vernon's time."
Usually nobody could be more genial and approving than old Rule. He
liked to tell his story of the great crisis, and to assure them that,
thanks to Miss Catherine, such dangers were no longer possible. "A woman
in the business just once in a way, in five or six generations," he
thought an admirable institution. "She looks after all the little things
that you young gentlemen don't think worth your while," he said. But
to-day Mr. Rule was not in this easy way of thinking. He wanted to know
how long Edward had been gone, and where he was, and when he was
expected back? He told Harry that things were being said that he could
not bear to hear. "What is he doing away so often? Is it pleasure? is it
horse-racing, or that sort of thing? Forgive me, Mr. Harry, but I'm so
anxious I don't know what I'm saying. You have always taken it easy, I
know, and left the chief management to Mr. Edward. But you must act,
sir, you must act," the old clerk said.
Harry's face had a sort of tragic helplessness in it. "He's coming back
to-night--one day can't matter so much. Oh, no, it's not horse-racing,
it's business. Edward isn't the sort of fellow----"
"One day may make all the difference," cried the old man, but the more
fussy and restless he was, the more profound became Harry's passive
solemnity. When he had got rid of the old clerk he sat for a long time
doing nothing, leaning his head in his hands: and at last he jumped up
and got his hat, and declared that he was going out for an hour.
"Several gentlemen have been here asking for Mr. Edward," he was told as
he passed through the outer office. "Mr. Merridew, sir, the old
gentleman: Mr. Pounceby: and Mr. Fish has just been to know for certain
when he will be back." Harry answered impatiently what they all knew,
that his cousin would be at the bank to-morrow morning, and that he
himself would return within the hour. There were some anxious looks cast
after him as he went away, the elder clerks making their comments. "If
Mr. Edward's headpiece, sir, could be put on Mr. Harry's shoulders," one
of them said. They had no fear that _he_ would be absent when there was
any need for him, but then, when he was present, what could he do?
Harry went on with long strides past the Grange to the Heronry; it was a
curious place to go for counsel. He passed Catherine sitting at her
window, she who once had been appealed to in a crisis and had saved the
bank. He did not suppose that things were so urgent now, but had they
been so he would not have gone to Catherine. He thought it would break
her heart. She had never been very kind to him, beyond the mere fact of
having selected him from among his kindred for advancement; but Harry
had a tender regard for Catherine, a sort of stolid immovable force of
gratitude. His heart melted as he saw her seated in the tranquillity of
the summer morning in the window, looking out upon everything with, he
thought, a peaceful interest, the contemplative pleasure of age. It was
not so, but he thought so--and it seemed to him that if he could but
preserve her from annoyance and disturbance, from all invasion of rumour
or possibility of doubt as to the stability of Vernon's, that there was
nothing he would not endure. He made himself as small as he could, and
got under the shadow of the trees that she might not observe him as he
passed, and wonder what brought him that way, and possibly divine the
anxiety that was in him. He might have spared himself the trouble.
Catherine saw him very well, and the feeling that sprang up in her mind
was bitter derision, mixed with a kind of unkindly pleasure. "If you
think that _you_ will get a look from her, when she has _him_ at her
feet?" Catherine said to herself, and though the idea that Hester had
_him_ at her feet was bitter to her, there was a pleasure in the
contempt with which she felt Harry's chances to be hopeless indeed. She
was very ungrateful for his kindness, thinking of other things, quite
unsuspicious of his real object. She smiled contemptuously to see him
pass in full midday when he ought to have been at his work, but laughed,
with a little aside, thinking, poor Harry, he would never set the Thames
on fire, it did not matter very much after all whether he was there or
not. The master head was absent, too often absent, but Edward had
everything so well in hand that it mattered the less. "When he is
settled he will not go away so often," she said to herself. What a
change it would have made in all her thoughts had she known the gloomy
doubts and terrors in Harry's mind, his alarmed sense that he must step
into a breach which he knew not how to fill, his bewildered questionings
with himself. If Edward did not turn up that night there would be
nothing else for it, and what was he to do? He understood the common
course of business, and how to judge in certain easy cases, but what to
do in an emergency he did not know. He went on to the Heronry at a great
rate, making more noise than any one else would with the gate, and
catching full in his face the gaze of those watchful observers who
belonged to the place, Mr. Mildmay Vernon in the summer-house with his
newspaper, and the Miss Vernon-Ridgways at their open window. He thought
they all rose at him like so many serpent-heads erecting themselves with
a dart and hiss. Harry was so little fanciful that only an excited
imagination could have brought him to this.
Mrs. John was in the verandah, gardening--arranging the pots in which
her pelargoniums were beginning to bloom. She would have had him stay
and help her, asking many questions about Ellen and her baby which Harry
was unable to answer.
"Might I speak to Hester?" he said. "I have no time to stay; I would
like to see her for a moment."
"What is it?" cried Mrs. John. Harry's embarrassment, she thought, could
only mean one thing--a sudden impulse to renew the suit which Hester had
been so foolish as to reject. She looked at him kindly and shook her
head. "She is in the parlour; but I wouldn't if I were you," she said,
her eyes moist with sympathy. It was hard upon poor Harry to be
compelled thus to take upon himself the credit of a second humiliation.
"I should like to see her, please," he answered, looking steadfastly
into Mrs. John's kind, humid eyes, as she shook her head in warning.
"Well, my dear boy; she is in the parlour. I wish--I wish---- But, alas!
there is no change in her, and I wouldn't if I were you."
"Never mind, a man can but have his chance," said magnanimous Harry. He
knew that few men would have done as much, and the sense of the
sacrifice he was making made his heart swell. His pride was to go too;
he was to be supposed to be bringing upon himself a second rejection;
but "Never mind, it is all in the day's work," he said to himself, as he
went through the dim passages and knocked at the parlour door.
Hester was sitting alone over a little writing-desk on the table. She
was writing hurriedly, and he could see her nervous movement to gather
together some sheets of paper, and shut them up in her little desk, when
she found herself interrupted. She gave a great start when she perceived
who it was, and sprang up, saying, "Harry!" breathlessly, as if she
expected something to follow. But at first Harry was scarcely master of
himself to speak. The girl he loved, the one woman who had moved his
dull, good, tenacious heart--she whom, he thought, he should be faithful
to all his life, and never care for another; but he knew that her start,
her breathless look, the colour that flooded her face, coming and going,
were not for him, but for some one else, and that his question would
plunge her into trouble too; that he would be to her henceforth as an
emissary of evil, perhaps an enemy. All this ran through his mind as he
stood looking at her and kept him silent. And when he had gathered
himself together his mission suddenly appeared to him so extraordinary,
so presumptuous, that he did not know how to explain it.
"You must be surprised to see me," he said, hesitating. "I don't know
what you will think. You will understand I don't mean any impertinence,
Hester--or prying, or that sort of thing."
"I am sure you will mean to be kind, Harry; but tell me quick--what is
it?" she cried.
He sat down opposite, looking at her across the table. "It is only from
myself--nobody's idea but mine; so you need not mind. It is just this,
Hester, in confidence. Do you know where Edward is? It sounds
impertinent, I know, but I don't mean it. He's wanted so badly at the
bank. If you could give me an address where I could telegraph to him?
Don't be vexed; it is only that I am so stupid about business. I can do
nothing out of my own head."
"Is anything going wrong?" she cried, her lips quivering, her whole
frame vibrating, she thought, with the beating, which was almost
visible, of her heart.
"Well, things are not very right, Hester. I don't know how wrong they
are. I've been kept out of it. Oh, I suppose that was quite natural, for
I am not much good. But if I could but telegraph to him at once, and
make sure of getting him back----"
"I think, Harry--I have heard--oh, I can't tell you how! he is coming
back to-night."
"Are you quite sure? I know he's expected, but then---- So many things
might happen. But if he knew how serious it was all looking----"
Her look as she sat gazing at him was so terrible that he never forgot
it. He did not understand it then, nor did he ever after fully
understand it. The colour had gone entirely out of her face; her eyes
stared at him as out of two deep, wide caves. It was a look of wonder,
of dismay, of guilt. "Is he wanted--so much?" she said. Her voice was no
more than a whisper, and she gave a furtive glance at the door behind
her as if she were afraid some one might hear.
"Oh, wanted--yes! but not enough to make you look like that. Hester, if
I had thought you'd have felt it so! Good Lord, what can I do? I thought
you might have told me his address. Don't mind, dear," cried the
tender-hearted young man. "I've no right to call you dear, but I can't
help it. If it's come to this, I'd do anything for him, Hester, for your
sake."
"Oh, never mind me, Harry--it is--nothing. I have got no address: but I
know--he's coming to-night."
"Then that's all right," Harry said. "I wanted to make sure of that. I
don't suppose there is anything to be frightened about so long as he is
on the spot you know--he that is the headpiece of the establishment. He
is such a clear-headed fellow, he sees everything in a moment, and he
has got everything on his shoulders. It's not fair, I know. I must try
and shake myself up a little and take my share, and not feel so helpless
the moment Ned's away--that's all," he said, getting up again
restlessly. "I have only given you a fright and made you unhappy; but
there's no reason for it, I assure you, Hester, so long as Ned is to be
here."
What he said did not comfort her at all, he could see. Her face did not
relax nor her eyes lose their look of horror. He went away quite humbly,
not saying a word to Mrs. John, who on her part gave him a silent, too
significant, pathetic grasp of her hand. Harry was half tempted to
laugh, but a great deal more to weep, as he went back again to
Redborough. He reflected that it was hard upon a fellow to have to allow
it to be supposed that he had offered himself to a girl a second time
when he was doing nothing of the kind. But then he thought of Hester's
horrified look with a wonder and pain unspeakable, not having the
remotest idea what such a look might mean. Anyhow, he concluded, Edward
was coming home. That was the one essential circumstance after all.