The Gatehouse was full of long, rambling, dark passages with mysterious
closets at each elbow of them, or curious little unused rooms--passages
which had struck terror to Norah's soul when she was a child, and which
even now she thought it expedient to run through as speedily as
possible, never feeling sure that she might not be caught by some
ghostly intruder behind the half-shut doors. Mrs Drummond followed Susan
through one of these intricate winding ways. It led to a corner room
looking out upon the garden, and close to the kitchen, which was Susan's
bed-chamber. For some forgotten reason or other there was a sort of
window, three or four broad panes of glass let into the partition wall
high up between this room and the kitchen, the consequence of which was
that Susan's room always showed a faint light to the garden. This was
her reason for taking it as the hiding-place for the strange guest.
Mrs Drummond went down the dark passage, feeling herself incapable of
speech and almost of thought; a vague wonder why he should be so hotly
pursued, and how it was that Susan should have known this and taken it
upon herself to receive and shelter one who was a stranger to her,
passed through Helen's mind. Both these things were strange and must be
inquired into hereafter, but in the mean time her heart was beating too
high with personal emotion to be able to think of anything else. Was it
possible that thus strangely, thus suddenly, she was to meet him again
from whom she had been so long parted? Their last interview rushed back
upon her mind, and his appearance then. Seven years ago!--and a man
changes altogether, becomes, people say, another being in seven years.
This thought quivered vaguely through Helen's mind. So many thoughts
went pursuing each other, swift and noiseless as ghosts. It was not
above two minutes from the time she came into the hall until she stood
at the threshold of Susan's room; but a whole world of questions, of
reflections, had hurried through her thoughts. She trembled by intervals
with a nervous shiver. Her heart beat so violently that it seemed at
once to choke and to paralyse her. To see him again--to stand face to
face with him who had come back out of the grave,--to change her whole
being,--to be no more herself, no more Norah's mother, but Robert's wife
again! Her whole frame began to shake as with one great pulse. It was
not joy, it was not fear; it was the wonder of it, the miracle, the
strange, strange, incomprehensible, incredible--Could he be
there?--nothing more between the two who had been parted by death and
silence but that closed door?
Susan turned round upon her just before they reached it. Susan, too,
hard, bony woman, little given to emotion, was trembling. She wiped her
eyes with her apron and gave a sniff that was almost a groan, and thrust
the candle into Helen's hand.
'Oh, don't you be hard upon him, Miss Helen as was!' cried Susan with a
sob; and turned and fled into her kitchen.
Helen stopped for a moment to steady herself--to steady the light of the
poor candle which, held by such agitated, unsteady hands, was flickering
wildly in her grasp. And then she opened the door.
Some one started and rose up suddenly with a movement which had at once
fear and watchfulness in it. Her agitation blinded her so that she
could not see. She held up the light,--if her misty eyes could have made
him out,--and then all at once there came a voice which made her nerves
steady in a moment, calmed down her pulses, restored to her
self-command.
'Helen, is it you? I thought it must be my wife.'
The blood rushed back to Helen's heart with an ebb as sudden as the flow
had been, making her faint and sick. But the revulsion of feeling was as
strong, and gave her strength. The light gave a leap in her hand as she
steadied herself, and threw a wild broken gleam upon him.
'Mr Burton,' she said, 'what are you doing here?'
'Then the news had not come,' he cried, with a certain relief; 'nobody
knows as yet? Well, well, things are not so bad, then, as I thought.'
She put the candle on the table and looked at him. He was dressed in his
morning clothes, those light-coloured summer garments which made his
full person fuller, but which at this hour, and after the scene from
which she had just come, looked strangely disorderly and out of place.
His linen was crushed and soiled, and his coat, which was of a colour
and material which showed specks and wrinkles as much as a woman's
dress, had the look of having been worn for a week night and day. The
air of the vagabond which comes so rapidly to a hunted man had come to
him already, and mixed with his habitual air of respectability, of
wealth and self-importance, in the most curious, almost pitiful way.
'Tell me,' she said, repeating her question almost without knowing what
she said, 'why are you here?'
He did not answer immediately. He made an effort to put on his usual
jaunty look, to speak with his usual jocular superiority. But
something--whether it was the flickering, feeble light of the candle
which showed him her face, or some instinct of his own, which necessity
had quickened into life--made him aware all at once that the woman by
his side was in a whirl of mental indecision, that she was wavering
between two resolves, and that this was no time to trifle with her. In
such circumstances sometimes a man will seize upon the best argument
which skill could select, but sometimes also in his haste and excitement
he snatches at the one which makes most against him. He said--
'I will tell you plainly, Helen. I am as your husband was when he went
down to the river--that night.'
She gave a strange and sudden cry, and turning round made one quick step
to the door. If she had not seen that Dives in the exhibition, if she
had not been in the grip of wild hope and expectation, I think she would
have gone straightway, driven by that sudden probing of the old wound,
and given him up to his pursuers. At least that would have been her
first impulse; but something turned her back. She turned to him again
with a sudden fire kindled in her eyes.
'It was you who drove him there,' she said.
He made a little deprecating gesture with his hands, but he did not say
anything. He saw in a moment that he had made a mistake.
'You drove him there,' she repeated, 'you and--that man; and now you
come to me and think I will save you--to me, his wife. You drove him to
despair, to ruin, and you think I am to save you. Why should I? What
have you done that I should help you? You had no pity on him; you let
him perish, you let him die. You injured me and mine beyond the reach of
recovery; and now you put yourself into my hands--with your enemies
outside!'
He gave a shudder, and looked at the window as if with a thought of
escape; and then he turned round upon her, standing at bay.
'Well,' he said, 'you have your revenge; I am ruined too. I don't
pretend to hide it from you; but I have no river at hand to escape into
to hide all my troubles in,--but only a woman to taunt me that I have
tried to be kind to--and my wife and my child dancing away close by.
Listen; that is what you call comfort for a ruined man, is it not?'
He pointed towards Dura as he spoke. Just then a gust of the soft
night-wind brought with it the sound of the music from the great house,
that house ablaze with gaiety, with splendour, and light, where Clara
Burton all jewelled and crowned with flowers was dancing at this moment,
while her mother led the way to the gorgeous table where princes might
have sat down. No doubt the whole scene rose before his imagination as
it did before Helen's. He sat down upon Susan's rush-bottomed chair with
a short laugh. One candle flickering in the dim place revealing all the
homely furniture of the servant's bed-room. What a contrast! what a
fate! Helen felt as every generous mind feels, humbled before the
presence of the immediate sufferer. He had injured her, and she,
perhaps, had suffered more deeply than Reginald Burton was capable of
suffering; but it was his turn now; he had the first place. The sorrow
was his before which even kings must bow.
While she stood there with pity stealing into her heart, he put down his
head into his hands with a gesture of utter weariness.
'Whatever you are going to do,' he said faintly, 'let Susan give me
something to eat first. I have had nothing to eat all day.'
This appeal made an end of all Helen's enmity. It had been deep, and
hot, and bitter when all was well with him--but the first taste of
revenge which Ned's disappearance gave her had appeased Mrs Drummond. It
had been bitter, not sweet. And now this appeal overcame all her
defences. If he had asked her to aid in his escape she might have
resisted still. But he asked her for a meal. Tears of humiliation, of
pitying shame, almost of a kind of tenderness came into her eyes. God
help the man! Had it come to this?
She turned into the kitchen, where Susan sat bolt upright in a hard
wooden chair before the fire, with her arms folded, the most watchful of
sentinels. They had a momentary discussion what there was to set before
him, and where it was to be served. Susan's opinion was very strongly in
favour of the kitchen.
'Those villains 'ud see the lights to the front,' said Susan. 'And then
Miss Norah, she'll be coming home, and folks with her. Them policemen is
up to everything. The shutters don't close up to the very top; and if
they was to climb into one o' the trees! And besides, there's a fire
here.'
'It is too warm for a fire, Susan.'
'Not for them as is in trouble,' said the woman; and she had her way.
Helen arranged the table with her own hands, while Susan made up with
her best skill an impromptu meal--not of the richest or choicest, for
the larder at the Gatehouse was poorly enough supplied; but fortunately
there had been something provided for next day's dinner which was
available. And when the fugitive came in to the warm kitchen--he who the
day before had made all the household miserable in Dura over the failure
of a salmi--he warmed his hands with a shiver of returning comfort, and
sniffed the poor cutlet as it cooked, and made a wretched attempt at a
joke in the sudden sense of ease and solace that had come to him.
'He was always one for his joke, was Mr Reginald,' Susan said with a
sob; and as for Helen, this poor pleasantry completed her prostration.
The sight of him warming himself on this July night, eating so eagerly,
like a man famished, filled her with an indescribable pity. It was not
so much magnanimity on her part as utter failure on his. How could she
lay sins to this man's charge, who was not great enough in himself to
frighten a fly? The pity in her heart hurt her like an ache, and she was
ashamed.
But what was to be done? She went softly, almost stealthily (with the
strange feeling that they might hear her out of doors, of which she was
not herself aware), up to her bed-room, which was over the drawing-room,
and looked out into the moonlight. The men still kept their place,
opposite at the Rectory gate--and now a third man, one of the Dura
police, with his lantern in his hand, joined them. Helen was a woman
full of all the natural prejudices and susceptibilities. Her pride
received such a wound by the appearance of this policeman as it would be
difficult to describe. Reginald Burton was her enemy, her antagonist;
and yet now she remembered her cousin. The Burtons had been of
unblemished good fame in all their branches till now. The shame which
had been momentarily thrown upon her husband had been connected with so
much anguish that Helen's pride had not been called uppermost. But now
it seized upon her. The moment the Dura policeman appeared, it became
evident to her that all the world knew, and the pang ran through her
proud heart like a sudden arrow. Her kindred were disgraced, her own
blood, the honest, good people in their graves; and Ned--poor, innocent
Ned!--at the other end of the world. The pang was so sharp that it
forced tears from her, though she was not given to weeping. A policeman!
as if the man was a thief who was her own cousin, of her own blood! And
then the question returned, What was to be done? I don't know what
horrible vision of the culprit dragged through the street, with his
ignominy visible to the whole world, rose before Helen's imagination. It
did not occur to her that such a capture might be very decorously, very
quietly made. She could think of nothing but the poor ragged wretch whom
she had once seen handcuffed, his clothes all muddy with the falls he
had got in struggling for his liberty, and a policeman on either side of
him. This was the only form in which she could realise an arrest by the
hands of justice. And to see the master of Dura thus dragged through the
village, with all the people round, once so obsequious, staring with
stupid, impudent wonder! Anything, anything rather than that! Helen ran
down-stairs again, startling herself with the sound she made. In the
quiet she could hear the knife and fork which were still busy in the
kitchen, and the broken talk with Susan which the fugitive kept up. She
heard him laugh, and it made her heart sick. This time she turned to the
other side, to the long passage opposite to that which led to the
kitchen, which was the way of communication with the apartments of the
Haldanes. The door there, which was generally fastened, was open
to-night, and the light was still in Stephen's window, and he himself,
for the first time for years, had been left to this late hour in his
chair. He was seated there, very still and motionless, when Helen
entered. He had dropped asleep in his loneliness. The candles on the
table before him threw a strange light upon the pallor of his face, upon
the closed eyes, and head thrown back. His hair had grown grey in these
seven years; his face had refined and softened in the long suffering, in
the patient, still, leaden days which he had lived through, making no
complaint. He looked like an apostle in this awful yet gentle
stillness--and he looked as if he were dead.
But even Mrs Drummond's entrance was enough to rouse him--the rustle of
her dress, or perhaps even the mere sense that there was some one near
him. He opened his eyes dreamily.
'Well, mother, I hope you have enjoyed it,' he said, with a smile. Then
suddenly becoming aware who his companion was, 'Mrs Drummond! I beg your
pardon. What has happened?'
She came and stood by him, holding out her hand, which he took and held
between his. There was a mutual pity between these two--a sympathy which
was almost tenderness. They were so sorry for each other--so destitute
of any power to help each other! Most touching and close of bonds!
'Something has happened,' she said. 'Mr Haldane, I have come to you for
your advice.'
He looked up at her anxiously.
'Not Norah--not--any one arrived----'
'Oh, no, no; something shameful, painful, terrible. You know what is
going on at the great house. Mr Haldane, Reginald Burton is here in
Susan's kitchen, hidden, and men watching for him outside.
Men--policemen! That is what I mean. And oh! what am I to do?'
He held her hand still, and his touch kept her calm. He did not say
anything for a minute, except one low exclamation under his breath.
'Sit down,' he said. 'You are worn out. Is it very late?'
'Past midnight. By-and-by your mother will be back. Tell me first,
while we are alone and can speak freely, what can I do?'
'He is hiding here,' said Stephen, 'and policemen outside? Then he is
ruined, and found out. That is what you mean. Compose yourself, and tell
me, if you can, what you know, and what you _wish_ to do.'
'Oh, what does my wish matter?' she cried. 'I am asking you what is
possible. I know little more than I tell you. He is here, worn-out,
miserable, ruined, and the men watching to take him. I don't know how it
has happened, why he came, or how they found it out; but so it is. They
are there now in front of the house. How am I to get him out?'
'Is that the only question?' Stephen asked.
She looked at him with an impatience she could not restrain.
'What other question can there be, Mr Haldane? In a few minutes they
will be back.'
'But there is another question,' he said. 'I believe this man has been
our ruin--yours and mine--yours, Mrs Drummond, more fatally than mine.
Golden was but one of his instruments, I believe--as guilty, but not
more so. He has ruined us, and more than us----'
She wrung her hands in her impatience.
'Mr Haldane, I hear steps. We may but have a moment more.'
He put his hand upon her arm.
'Think!' he cried. 'Are we to let him go--to save him that he may ruin
others? Is it just? Think what he has made us all suffer. Is there to be
no punishment for him?'
'Oh, punishment!' she cried. 'Do you know what punishment means, when
you make yourself the instrument of it? It means revenge; and there is
nothing so bitter, nothing so terrible, as to see your own handiwork,
and to think, "It was not God that did this; it was me."'
'How can _you_ tell?'
'Oh, yes, I can tell. There was his son. I thought it was a just return
for all the harm he had done when his poor boy----But Ned went away, and
left everything. It was not my fault; it was not Norah's fault. Yet she
had done it, and I had wished she might. No; no more revenge. How can I
get him away?'
'I am not so forgiving as you,' he said.
Helen could not rest. She rose up from the seat she had drawn to his
side, and went to the window. There were steps that frightened her
moving about outside, and then there was the sound of voices.
'Come in and go over the house! Come in at this hour of the night!' said
a voice. It was Miss Jane's voice, brisk and alert as usual. Helen
hurried into the hall, to the door, where she could hear what was said.
'But Jane, Jane, if any one has got in? A thief--perhaps a murderer! Oh,
my poor Stephen!'
'Nonsense, mother! If you like to stay outside there, I'll go over all
the house with Susan, and let you know. Why, Mrs Drummond! Here are some
men who want to come in to search for some one at this time of night.'
'I have told them already they should not come in,' said Helen.
She had opened the door, and stood in front of it with a temerity which
she scarcely felt justified in; for how did she know they might not rush
past her, and get in before she could stop them? Such was her idea--such
was the idea of all the innocent people in the house. The Dura policeman
was standing by with his truncheon and his lantern.
'I've told 'em, mum, as it's a mistake,' said that functionary; 'and
that this 'ere is the quietest, most respectablest 'ouse--'
'Thanks, Wilkins,' said Helen.
It was a positive comfort to her, and did her good, this simple
testimony. And to think that Wilkins knew no better than that!
'Will you keep near the house?' she said, turning to him, with that
feeling that he was 'on our side' which had once prepossessed Norah in
favour of Mr Rivers. 'My daughter will be coming back presently, and I
don't want to have her annoyed or frightened with this story. No one
except the people who belong to it shall enter this house to-night.'
'As you please, ma'am; but I hope you knows the penalty,' said the
detective.
Helen did not know of any penalty, nor did she care. She was wound up to
so high a strain of excitement, that had she been called upon to put her
arm in the place of the bolt, or do any other futile heroic piece of
resistance, she would not have hesitated. She closed the door upon Mrs
Haldane and her daughter, one of whom was frightened and the other
excited. As they all came into the hall, Susan became visible, with her
candle in her hand, defending the passage to the kitchen. Something
ludicrous, something pathetic and tragic and terrible was in the aspect
of the house, and its guardians--had one been wise enough to perceive
what it meant.
'If Susan will come with me,' said Miss Jane briskly; 'after that idiot
of a man's romance, my mother will think we are all going to be murdered
in our beds. If Susan will come with me, I'll go over all the house.'
'We have examined ours,' said Helen. 'Susan, go with Miss Jane. Mrs
Haldane, Mr Stephen is tired, I think.'
'Stephen must not be alarmed,' said Mrs Haldane with hesitation. 'But
are you sure it is safe? Do you really think it is safe? You see, after
all, when our door is open it is one house. A man might run from one
room to another. Oh, Jane--Mrs Drummond--if you will believe me, I can
see a shadow down that passage! Oh, my dear, you are young and rash! The
men will know better; let them come in.'
'I cannot allow them to come in. There is no one, I assure you, except
your son, who wants your help.'
'You are like Jane,' said the old lady; 'you are so bold and rash. Oh, I
wish I had begged them to stay all night. I wouldn't mind giving a
shilling or two. Think if Stephen should be frightened! Oh, yes, I am
going; but don't leave me, dear. I couldn't be alone; I shall be
frightened of my life.'
This was how it was that Helen was in Stephen's room again when Miss
Jane came down, bustling and satisfied.
'You may make yourself perfectly easy, mother. We have gone over all the
rooms--looked under the beds and in the cupboards, and there is not a
ghost of anything. Poor Susan is tired sitting up for us all; I told her
I'd wait up for Norah. Well, now you don't ask any news of the ball,
Stephen. Norah has danced the whole evening; I have never seen her
sitting down once. Her dress is beautiful; and as for herself, my dear!
But everybody was looking their best. I don't admire Clara Burton in a
general way; but really Clara Burton was something splendid--Yes, yes,
mother; of course we must get Stephen to bed.'
'Good-night,' said Helen, going up to him. She looked in his face
wistfully; but now the opportunity was over, and what could he say? He
held her hand a moment, feeling the tremor in it.
'Good-night,' he said; and then very low he added hurriedly, 'The gate
into the Dura woods--the garden door.'
'Thanks,' she said, with a loud throb of her heart.
The excitement, the suspense, were carrying Helen far beyond her will or
intention. She had been sensible of a struggle at first whether she
would not betray the fugitive. Now her thoughts had progressed so fast
and far, that she would have fought for him, putting even her slight
strength in the way to defend him or protect his retreat. He was a man
whom she almost hated; and yet all her thoughts were with him, wondering
was he safe by himself, and what could be done to make him safer still.
She left the Haldanes' side of the house eagerly, and hurried down the
passage to the kitchen. He was there, in Susan's arm-chair before the
fire. His meal was over, and he had turned to the fire again, and fallen
into a doze. While she was moving about in a fever of anxiety, he
himself with his head sunk on his breast, was unconscious of his own
danger. Helen, who felt incapable of either resting or sleep, stood
still and looked at him in a sort of stupor.
'Poor dear, poor dear!' said Susan, holding up her hand in warning,
'he's been worrited and worn out, and he's dozed off--the best thing he
could do.'
He might rest, but she could not. She went down the few steps to the
garden, and stole out into the night, cautiously opening and closing
the door. The garden was walled all round. It was a productive, wealthy
garden, which, even when the Gatehouse had been empty, was worth keeping
up, and its doors and fastenings were all in good order. There was no
chance of any one getting in by that side. Mrs Drummond stole out into
the white moonlight, which suddenly surged upon her figure, and blazoned
it all over with silver, and crept round, trembling at every pebble she
disturbed, to the unused door which opened into the Dura woods. It had
been made that there might be a rapid means of communication between the
Gatehouse and the mansion, but it had never been used since the
Drummonds came. She had forgotten this door until Stephen reminded her
of its existence. It was partially hid behind a thicket of
raspberry-bushes, which had grown high and strong in front. Fortunately,
a rusted key was in the lock. With the greatest difficulty Helen turned
it, feeling as if the sound, as it grated and resisted, raised
whirlwinds of echoes all round her, and must betray what she was doing.
Even when it was unlocked, it took all her strength to pull it open, for
she could do no more. For one moment she pressed out into the dark,
rustling woods. Through the foliage she could see the glance of the
lights from the house and the moving flicker of carriage-lamps going
down the avenue. The music came upon her with a sudden burst like an
insult. Oh, heaven! to think that all this should be going on, the
dancing and laughter, and _him_ dozing there by Susan's kitchen fire!
She paused a little in the garden in the stillness--not for rest, but
that she might arrange her thoughts, without interruption. But there was
no stillness there that night. The music came to her on the soft wind,
now lower, now louder; the sound of the carriage wheels coming and going
kept up a low, continuous roll; now and then there would come the sound
of a voice. It was still early; only a few timid guests who feared late
hours, old people and spectators like the Haldanes, were leaving the
ball. It was in full career. The very sky seemed flushed over Dura
House, with its numberless lights.
Helen formed her plan as she crept about the garden in the moonlight.
Oh, if some kindly cloud would but rise, and veil for a little this poor
earth with its mysteries! But all was clear, well seen, visible; the
clear night and the blue heavens were not pitiful, like Helen. Man is
often hard upon man, heaven knows, yet it is man only who can feel for
the troubles of mankind.