A TERRIBLE NIGHT
YES--she was gone--there could be no doubt about it--there was no room
for hope, no chance of some mistake--the scrap of paper, with its
single word ‘Good-bye,’ contained enough information to insure a
terrible certainty. She had gone to her room that evening to lie down,
as she said, whilst her mother was occupied with needlework in her own,
and had stolen away so softly, silently, that her mother had not heard
her footsteps on the stairs. To whom she was gone--if indeed it was to
some person she had fled--in what direction, with what object, remained
unknown; some hours must have passed after her flight had taken place
before her mother discovered the paper she had left. Jenny kept on
repeating in a pitiful, helpless tone that she had sewed downstairs for
hour after hour, until she became ‘skeared’ that Annie did not appear,
and went to her room, and found that she was gone. It was pitiful to
see the condition of the mother, crushed and bewildered, without
strength enough left for any other feeling than that Annie, her Annie,
had really left her home. To Nat it was all a sudden, dreadful
nightmare, the one candle in the cottage, the stillness of the night,
the single word that his sister’s hand had left, the white face of his
mother, and the overwhelming sense of shame. It could not be borne; he
left his home and his mother, and with some muttered words about making
inquiries, went out into the darkness.
That was not a night to be forgotten by mother or by son, the short
summer night spent in this new suffering; by Jenny sitting helplessly
in her chair, whilst the dying candle before her sunk and flickered; by
Nat in wanderings as hopeless and as helpless, and in vain enquiries
which revealed to others their disgrace. He questioned such passers-by
as could be found in the streets at midnight; he roused the inhabitants
of one or two cottages; he ran through the night to the two nearest
village-stations, and found his way by the river to the stations in the
town. The hours of the night seemed short, and yet seemed crowded, too
quickly over, and yet long to endlessness; its shifting scenes, and the
faces of those he questioned, remained with him afterwards as
bewildered dreams. By the grey morning-light that broke above the
river, he found his way back again to his home at last, in some
desperate hope that when he turned the handle of the door he would find
that his sister also had returned. He entered to find everything as he
had left it, the candle burnt out, the cottage dim and silent; his
mother in her chair, pale, sleepless, motionless, and the bit of paper
on the table in front of her. He was worn out; it was all too hard to
bear; he sat down and cried.
By that morning light, breaking over fields and hedges, the men and
boys of the village were starting for their work, whilst gardens and
meadows were drenched with early dew, and tiny pink clouds were bright
above the Fens. Already, as a rumour, the latest piece of news was
passing from mouth to mouth as they paused to join each other; and as
the white light grew clearer in the east, it began to spread amongst
the village homes as well. One thing was clear, so the village-mothers
said, it was not for good that the girl had gone like that; and those
who had accused Mrs Salter and her children of pride were now at last
certain that they would have their punishment. For there is some
consolation attending every sorrow--to those at least who are not the
sufferers.