CHAPTER XII.

HOW BESSY PRYOR WAS BROUGHT BACK, AND WHAT THEN, BECAME OF HER.

Bessy understood the condition of the old woman much better than did her

son. “I am sad a little,” she said, on her way home, “because of her

disappointment.”

“Sad, because she is to have you,--you yourself,--for her

daughter-in-law?”

“Yes, indeed, Philip; because I know that she has not wanted me. She

will be kind because I shall belong to you, and perhaps partly because

she loves me; but she will always regret that that young lady down in

Cornwall has not been allowed to add to the honour and greatness of the

family. The Launays are everything to her, and what can I do for the

Launays?” Of course he said many pretty things to her in answer to this,

but he could not eradicate from her mind the feeling that, in regard to

the old friend who had been so kind to her, she was returning evil for

good.

But even Bessy did not quite understand the old woman. When she found

that she had yielded, there was disappointment in the old woman’s

heart. Who can have indulged in a certain longing for a lifetime, in a

special ambition, and seen that ambition and that longing crushed and

trampled on, without such a feeling? And she had brought this failure on

herself,--by her own weakness, as she told herself. Why had she given

way to Bessy and to Bessy’s blandishments? It was because she had not

been strong to do her duty that this ruin had fallen upon her hopes. The

power in her own hands had been sufficient. But for her Philip need

never have seen Bessy Pryor. Might not Bessy Pryor have been sent

somewhere out of the way when it became evident that she had charms of

her own with which to be dangerous? And even after the first evil had

been done her power had been sufficient. She need not have sent for

Philip back. She need have written no letter to Bessy. She might have

been calm and steady in her purpose, so that there should have been no

violent ebullition of anger,--so violent as to induce repentance, and

with repentance renewed softness and all the pangs of renewed

repentance.

When Philip had left her on his mission to Normandy her heart was heavy

with regret, and heavy also with anger. But it was with herself that she

was angry. She had known her duty and she had not done it. She had known

her duty, and had neglected it,--because Bessy had been soft to her, and

dear, and pleasant. It was here that Bessy did not quite understand her

friend. Bessy reproached herself because she had made to her friend a

bad return to all the kindness she had received. The old woman would

not allow herself to entertain any such a thought. Once she had spoken

to herself of having warmed a serpent in her bosom; but instantly, with

infinite self-scorn, she had declared to herself that Bessy was no

serpent. For all that she had done for Bessy, Bessy had made ample

return, the only possible return that could be full enough. Bessy had

loved her. She too had loved Bessy, but that should have had no weight.

Though they two had been linked together by their very heartstrings, it

had been her duty to make a severance because their joint affection had

been dangerous. She had allowed her own heart to over-ride her own sense

of duty, and therefore she was angry,--not with Bessy, but with herself.

But the thing was done. To quarrel with Philip had been impossible to

her. One feeling coming upon another, her own repentance, her own

weakness, her acknowledgment of a certain man’s strength on the part of

her son, had brought her to such a condition that she had yielded. Then

it was natural that she should endeavour to make the best of it. But

even the doing of that was a trial to her. When she told herself that as

far as the woman went, the mere woman, Philip could not have found a

better wife had he searched the world all round, she found that she was

being tempted from her proper path even in that. What right could she

have to look for consolation there? For other reasons, which she still

felt to be adequate, she had resolved that something else should be

done. That something else had not been done, because she had failed in

her duty. And now she was trying to salve the sore by the very poison

which had created the wound. Bessy’s sweet temper, and Bessy’s soft

voice, and Bessy’s bright eye, and Bessy’s devotion to the delight of

others, were all so many temptations. Grovelling as she was in sackcloth

and ashes because she had yielded to them, how could she console herself

by a prospect of these future enjoyments either for herself or her son?

But there were various duties to which she could attend, grievously

afflicted as she was by her want of attention to that great duty. As

Fate had determined that Bessy Pryor was to become mistress of Launay,

it was proper that all Launay should know and recognise its future

mistress. Bessy certainly should not be punished by any want of

earnestness in this respect. No one should be punished but herself. The

new mistress should be made as welcome as though she had been the

red-haired girl from Cornwall. Knowl was a good deal put about because

Mrs. Miles, remembering a few hard words which Knowl had allowed herself

to use in the days of the imprisonment, became very stern. “It is

settled that Miss Pryor is to become Mrs. Philip Launay, and you will

obey her just as myself.” Mrs. Knowl, who had saved a little money,

began to consider whether it would not be as well to retire into private

life.

When the day came on which the two travellers were to reach Launay Mrs.

Miles was very much disturbed in her mind. In what way should she

receive the girl? In her last communication,--her very last,--she had

called Bessy her enemy; and now Bessy was being brought home to be made

her daughter-in-law under her own roof. How sweet it would be to stand

at the door and welcome her in the hall, among all the smiling servants,

to make a tender fuss and hovering over her, as would be so natural with

a mother-in-law who loved an adopted daughter as tenderly as Mrs. Miles

loved Bessy! How pleasant to take her by the hand and lead her away into

some inner sanctum where warm kisses as between mother and child would

be given and taken; to hear her praises of Philip, and then to answer

again with other praises; to tell her with words half serious and half

drollery that she must now buckle on her armour and do her work, and

take upon herself the task of managing the household! There was quite

enough of softness in the old woman to make all this delightful. Her

imagination revelled in thinking of it even at the moment in which she

was telling herself that it was impossible. But it was impossible. Were

she to force such a change upon herself Bessy would not believe in the

sincerity of the change. She had told Bessy that she was her enemy!

At last the carriage which had gone to the station was here; not the

waggonette on this occasion, but the real carriage itself, the carriage

which was wont to toddle four miles an hour about the parish. “This is

an honour meant for the prodigal daughter,” said Philip, as he took his

seat. “If you had never been naughty, we should only have had the

waggonette, and we then should have been there in half the time.” Mrs.

Miles, when she heard the wheels on the gravel, was even yet uncertain

where she would place herself. She was fluttered, moving about from the

room into the hall and back, when the old butler spoke a careful word:

“Go into the library, madam, and Mr. Philip will bring her to you

there.” Then she obeyed the butler,--as she had probably never done in

her life before.

Bessy, as soon as her step was off the carriage, ran very quickly into

the house. “Where is my aunt?” she said. The butler was there showing

the way, and in a moment she had thrown her arms round the old woman.

Bessy had a way of making her kisses obligatory, from which Mrs. Miles

had never been able to escape. Then, when the old woman was seated,

Bessy was at once upon her knees before her. “Say that you love me,

aunt. Say that at once! Say that first of all!”

“You know I love you.”

“I know I love you. Oh, I am so glad to have you again. It was so hard

not to be with you when I thought that you were ill. I did not know how

sick it would make me to be away from you.” Neither then nor at any time

afterwards was there a word spoken on the one side or the other as to

that declaration of enmity.

There was nothing then said in way of explanation. There was nothing

perhaps necessary. It was clear to Bessy that she was received at Launay

as Philip’s future wife,--not only by Mrs. Miles herself, but by the

whole household,--and that all the honours of the place were to be

awarded to her without stint. For herself that would have sufficed. To

her any explanation of the circumstances which had led to a change so

violent was quite unnecessary. But it was not so with Mrs. Miles

herself. She could not but say some word in justification of

herself,--in excuse rather than justification. She had Bessy into her

bedroom that night, and said the word, holding between her two thin

hands the hand of the girl she addressed. “You have known, Bessy, that I

did not wish this.” Bessy muttered that she did know it. “And I think

you knew why.”

“How could I help it, aunt?”

Upon this the old woman patted the hand. “I suppose he could not help

it. And, if I had been a young man, I could not have helped it. I could

not help it as I was, though I am an old woman. I think I am as foolish

as he is.”

“Perhaps he is foolish, but you are not.”

“Well; I do not know. I have my misgivings about that, my dear. I had

objects which I thought were sacred and holy, to which I had been wedded

through many years. They have had to be thrust aside.”

“Then you will hate me!”

“No, my child; I will love you with all my heart. You will be my son’s

wife now, and, as such, you will be dear to me, almost as he is dear.

And you will still be my own Bessy, my gleam of sunlight, without whom

the house is so gloomy that it is like a prison to me. For myself, do

you think I could want any other young woman about the house than my own

dear Bessy;--that any other wife for Philip could come as near my heart

as you do?”

“But if I have stood in the way?”

“We will not think of it any more. You, at any rate, need not think of

it,” added the old woman, as she remembered all the circumstances. “You

shall be made welcome with all the honours and all the privileges due to

Philip’s wife; and if there be a regret, it shall never trouble your

path. It may be a comfort to you to hear me say that you, at least, in

all things have done your duty.” Then, at last, there were more tears,

more embracings, and, before either of them went to their rest, a

perfect ecstacy of love.

Little or nothing more is necessary for the telling of the story of the

Lady of Launay. Before the autumn had quite gone, and the last tint had

left the trees, Bessy Pryor became Bessy Launay, under the hand of Mr.

Gregory, in the Launay parish church. Everyone in the neighbourhood

around was there, except Mr. Morrison, who had taken this opportunity of

having a holiday and visiting Switzerland. But even he, when he

returned, soon became reconciled to the arrangement, and again became a

guest in the dining-room of the mansion. I hope I shall have no reader

who will not think that Philip Launay did well in not following the

example of the major-general.

CHRISTMAS AT THOMPSON HALL.

CHAPTER I.

MRS. BROWN’S SUCCESS.

Everyone remembers the severity of the Christmas of 187--. I will not

designate the year more closely, lest I should enable those who are too

curious to investigate the circumstances of this story, and inquire into

details which I do not intend to make known. That winter, however, was

especially severe, and the cold of the last ten days of December was

more felt, I think, in Paris than in any part of England. It may,

indeed, be doubted whether there is any town in any country in which

thoroughly bad weather is more afflicting than in the French capital.

Snow and hail seem to be colder there, and fires certainly are less

warm, than in London. And then there is a feeling among visitors to

Paris that Paris ought to be gay; that gaiety, prettiness, and

liveliness are its aims, as money, commerce, and general business are

the aims of London,--which with its outside sombre darkness does often

seem to want an excuse for its ugliness. But on this occasion, at this

Christmas of 187--, Paris was neither gay nor pretty nor lively. You

could not walk the streets without being ankle deep, not in snow, but in

snow that had just become slush; and there was falling throughout the

day and night of the 23rd of December a succession of damp half-frozen

abominations from the sky which made it almost impossible for men and

women to go about their business.

It was at ten o’clock on that evening that an English lady and gentleman

arrived at the Grand Hotel on the Boulevard des Italiens. As I have

reasons for concealing the names of this married couple I will call them

Mr. and Mrs. Brown. Now I wish it to be understood that in all the

general affairs of life this gentleman and this lady lived happily

together, with all the amenities which should bind a husband and a wife.

Mrs. Brown was one of a wealthy family, and Mr. Brown, when he married

her, had been relieved from the necessity of earning his bread.

Nevertheless she had at once yielded to him when he expressed a desire

to spend the winters of their life in the south of France; and he,

though he was by disposition somewhat idle, and but little prone to the

energetic occupations of life, would generally allow himself, at other

periods of the year, to be carried hither and thither by her, whose more

robust nature delighted in the excitement of travelling. But on this

occasion there had been a little difference between them.

Early in December an intimation had reached Mrs. Brown at Pau that on

the coming Christmas there was to be a great gathering of all the

Thompsons in the Thompson family hall at Stratford-le-Bow, and that she

who had been a Thompson was desired to join the party with her husband.

On this occasion her only sister was desirous of introducing to the

family generally a most excellent young man to whom she had recently

become engaged. The Thompsons,--the real name, however, is in fact

concealed,--were a numerous and a thriving people. There were uncles and

cousins and brothers who had all done well in the world, and who were

all likely to do better still. One had lately been returned to

Parliament for the Essex Flats, and was at the time of which I am

writing a conspicuous member of the gallant Conservative majority. It

was partly in triumph at this success that the great Christmas gathering

of the Thompsons was to be held, and an opinion had been expressed by

the legislator himself that should Mrs. Brown, with her husband, fail to

join the family on this happy occasion she and he would be regarded as

being but _fainéant_ Thompsons.

Since her marriage, which was an affair now nearly eight years old, Mrs.

Brown had never passed a Christmas in England. The desirability of doing

so had often been mooted by her. Her very soul craved the festivities of

holly and mince-pies. There had ever been meetings of the Thompsons at

Thompson Hall, though meetings not so significant, not so important to

the family, as this one which was now to be collected. More than once

had she expressed a wish to see old Christmas again in the old house

among the old faces. But her husband had always pleaded a certain

weakness about his throat and chest as a reason for remaining among the

delights of Pau. Year after year she had yielded, and now this loud

summons had come.

It was not without considerable trouble that she had induced Mr. Brown

to come as far as Paris. Most unwillingly had he left Pau; and then,

twice on his journey,--both at Bordeaux and Tours,--he had made an

attempt to return. From the first moment he had pleaded his throat, and

when at last he had consented to make the journey he had stipulated for

sleeping at those two towns and at Paris. Mrs. Brown, who, without the

slightest feeling of fatigue, could have made the journey from Pau to

Stratford without stopping, had assented to everything,--so that they

might be at Thompson Hall on Christmas Eve. When Mr. Brown uttered his

unavailing complaints at the two first towns at which they stayed, she

did not perhaps quite believe all that he said of his own condition. We

know how prone the strong are to suspect the weakness of the weak,--as

the weak are to be disgusted by the strength of the strong. There were

perhaps a few words between them on the journey, but the result had

hitherto been in favour of the lady. She had succeeded in bringing Mr.

Brown as far as Paris.

Had the occasion been less important, no doubt she would have yielded.

The weather had been bad even when they left Pau, but as they had made

their way northwards it had become worse and still worse. As they left

Tours Mr. Brown, in a hoarse whisper, had declared his conviction that

the journey would kill him. Mrs. Brown, however, had unfortunately

noticed half an hour before that he had scolded the waiter on the score

of an overcharged franc or two with a loud and clear voice. Had she

really believed that there was danger, or even suffering, she would have

yielded;--but no woman is satisfied in such a matter to be taken in by

false pretences. She observed that he ate a good dinner on his way to

Paris, and that he took a small glass of cognac with complete

relish,--which a man really suffering from bronchitis surely would not

do. So she persevered, and brought him into Paris, late in the evening,

in the midst of all that slush and snow. Then, as they sat down to

supper, she thought that he did speak hoarsely, and her loving feminine

heart began to misgive her.

But this now was at any rate clear to her,--that he could not be worse

off by going on to London than he would be should he remain in Paris. If

a man is to be ill he had better be ill in the bosom of his family than

at an hotel. What comfort could he have, what relief, in that huge

barrack? As for the cruelty of the weather, London could not be worse

than Paris, and then she thought she had heard that sea air is good for

a sore throat. In that bedroom which had been allotted to them au

quatrième, they could not even get a decent fire. It would in every way

be wrong now to forego the great Christmas gathering when nothing could

be gained by staying in Paris.

She had perceived that as her husband became really ill he became also

more tractable and less disputatious. Immediately after that little

glass of cognac he had declared that he would be---- if he would go

beyond Paris, and she began to fear that, after all, everything would

have been done in vain. But as they went down to supper between ten and

eleven he was more subdued, and merely remarked that this journey would,

he was sure, be the death of him. It was half-past eleven when they got

back to their bedroom, and then he seemed to speak with good sense,--and

also with much real apprehension. “If I can’t get something to relieve

me I know I shall never make my way on,” he said. It was intended that

they should leave the hotel at half-past five the next morning, so as to

arrive at Stratford, travelling by the tidal train, at half-past seven

on Christmas Eve. The early hour, the long journey, the infamous

weather, the prospect of that horrid gulf between Boulogne and

Folkestone, would have been as nothing to Mrs. Brown, had it not been

for that settled look of anguish which had now pervaded her husband’s

face. “If you don’t find something to relieve me I shall never live

through it,” he said again, sinking back into the questionable comfort

of a Parisian hotel arm-chair.

“But, my dear, what can I do?” she asked, almost in tears, standing

over him and caressing him. He was a thin, genteel-looking man, with a

fine long, soft brown beard, a little bald at the top of the head, but

certainly a genteel-looking man. She loved him dearly, and in her softer

moods was apt to spoil him with her caresses. “What can I do, my dearie?

You know I would do anything if I could. Get into bed, my pet, and be

warm, and then to-morrow morning you will be all right.” At this moment

he was preparing himself for his bed, and she was assisting him. Then

she tied a piece of flannel round his throat, and kissed him, and put

him in beneath the bed-clothes.

“I’ll tell you what you can do,” he said very hoarsely. His voice was so

bad now that she could hardly hear him. So she crept close to him, and

bent over him. She would do anything if he would only say what. Then he

told her what was his plan. Down in the salon he had seen a large jar of

mustard standing on a sideboard. As he left the room he had observed

that this had not been withdrawn with the other appurtenances of the

meal. If she could manage to find her way down there, taking with her a

handkerchief folded for the purpose, and if she could then appropriate a

part of the contents of that jar, and, returning with her prize, apply

it to his throat, he thought that he could get some relief, so that he

might be able to leave his bed the next morning at five. “But I am

afraid it will be very disagreeable for you to go down all alone at this

time of night,” he croaked out in a piteous whisper.

“Of course I’ll go,” said she. “I don’t mind going in the least. Nobody

will bite me,” and she at once began to fold a clean handkerchief. “I

won’t be two minutes, my darling, and if there is a grain of mustard in

the house I’ll have it on your chest immediately.” She was a woman not

easily cowed, and the journey down into the salon was nothing to her.

Before she went she tucked the clothes carefully up to his ears, and

then she started.

To run along the first corridor till she came to a flight of stairs was

easy enough, and easy enough to descend them. Then there was another

corridor, and another flight, and a third corridor, and a third flight,

and she began to think that she was wrong. She found herself in a part

of the hotel which she had not hitherto visited, and soon discovered by

looking through an open door or two that she had found her way among a

set of private sitting-rooms which she had not seen before. Then she

tried to make her way back, up the same stairs and through the same

passages, so that she might start again. She was beginning to think that

she had lost herself altogether, and that she would be able to find

neither the salon nor her bedroom, when she happily met the

night-porter. She was dressed in a loose white dressing-gown, with a

white net over her loose hair, and with white worsted slippers. I ought

perhaps to have described her personal appearance sooner. She was a

large woman, with a commanding bust, thought by some to be handsome,

after the manner of Juno. But with strangers there was a certain

severity of manner about her,--a fortification, as it were, of her

virtue against all possible attacks,--a declared determination to

maintain, at all points, the beautiful character of a British matron,

which, much as it had been appreciated at Thompson Hall, had met with

some ill-natured criticism among French men and women. At Pau she had

been called La Fière Anglaise. The name had reached her own ears and

those of her husband. He had been much annoyed, but she had taken it in

good part,--had, indeed, been somewhat proud of the title,--and had

endeavoured to live up to it. With her husband she could, on occasion,

be soft, but she was of opinion that with other men a British matron

should be stern. She was now greatly in want of assistance; but,

nevertheless, when she met the porter she remembered her character. “I

have lost my way wandering through these horrid passages,” she said, in

her severest tone. This was in answer to some question from him,--some

question to which her reply was given very slowly. Then when he asked

where Madame wished to go, she paused, again thinking what destination

she would announce. No doubt the man could take her back to her bedroom,

but if so, the mustard must be renounced, and with the mustard, as she

now feared, all hope of reaching Thompson Hall on Christmas Eve. But

she, though she was in many respects a brave woman, did not dare to tell

the man that she was prowling about the hotel in order that she might

make a midnight raid upon the mustard pot. She paused, therefore, for a

moment, that she might collect her thoughts, erecting her head as she

did so in her best Juno fashion, till the porter was lost in admiration.

Thus she gained time to fabricate a tale. She had, she said, dropped her

handkerchief under the supper-table; would he show her the way to the

salon, in order that she might pick it up? But the porter did more than

that, and accompanied her to the room in which she had supped.

Here, of course, there was a prolonged, and, it need hardly be said, a

vain search. The good-natured man insisted on emptying an enormous

receptacle of soiled table-napkins, and on turning them over one by one,

in order that the lady’s property might be found. The lady stood by

unhappy, but still patient, and, as the man was stooping to his work,

her eye was on the mustard pot. There it was, capable of containing

enough to blister the throats of a score of sufferers. She edged off a

little towards it while the man was busy, trying to persuade herself

that he would surely forgive her if she took the mustard, and told him

her whole story. But the descent from her Juno bearing would have been

so great! She must have owned, not only to the quest for mustard, but

also to a fib,--and she could not do it. The porter was at last of

opinion that Madame must have made a mistake, and Madame acknowledged

that she was afraid it was so.

With a longing, lingering eye, with an eye turned back, oh! so sadly, to

the great jar, she left the room, the porter leading the way. She

assured him that she could find it by herself, but he would not leave

her till he had put her on to the proper passage. The journey seemed to

be longer now even than before, but as she ascended the many stairs she

swore to herself that she would not even yet be baulked of her object.

Should her husband want comfort for his poor throat, and the comfort be

there within her reach, and he not have it? She counted every stair as

she went up, and marked every turn well. She was sure now that she would

know the way, and that she could return to the room without fault. She

would go back to the salon. Even though the man should encounter her

again, she would go boldly forward and seize the remedy which her poor

husband so grievously required.

“Ah, yes,” she said, when the porter told her that her room, No. 333,

was in the corridor which they had then reached, “I know it all now. I

am so much obliged. Do not come a step further.” He was anxious to

accompany her up to the very door, but she stood in the passage and

prevailed. He lingered awhile--naturally. Unluckily she had brought no

money with her, and could not give him the two-franc piece which he had

earned. Nor could she fetch it from her room, feeling that were she to

return to her husband without the mustard no second attempt would be

possible. The disappointed man turned on his heel at last, and made his

way down the stairs and along the passage. It seemed to her to be almost

an eternity while she listened to his still audible footsteps. She had

gone on, creeping noiselessly up to the very door of her room, and there

she stood, shading the candle in her hand, till she thought that the

man must have wandered away into some furthest corner of that endless

building. Then she turned once more and retraced her steps.

There was no difficulty now as to the way. She knew it, every stair. At

the head of each flight she stood and listened, but not a sound was to

be heard, and then she went on again. Her heart beat high with anxious

desire to achieve her object, and at the same time with fear. What might

have been explained so easily at first would now be as difficult of

explanation. At last she was in the great public vestibule, which she

was now visiting for the third time, and of which, at her last visit,

she had taken the bearings accurately. The door was there--closed,

indeed, but it opened easily to the hand. In the hall, and on the

stairs, and along the passages, there had been gas, but here there was

no light beyond that given by the little taper which she carried. When

accompanied by the porter she had not feared the darkness, but now there

was something in the obscurity which made her dread to walk the length

of the room up to the mustard jar. She paused, and listened, and

trembled. Then she thought of the glories of Thompson Hall, of the

genial warmth of a British Christmas, of that proud legislator who was

her first cousin, and with a rush she made good the distance, and laid

her hand upon the copious delf. She looked round, but there was no one

there; no sound was heard; not the distant creak of a shoe, not a rattle

from one of those thousand doors. As she paused with her fair hand upon

the top of the jar, while the other held the white cloth on which the

medicinal compound was to be placed, she looked like Lady Macbeth as she

listened at Duncan’s chamber door.

There was no doubt as to the sufficiency of the contents. The jar was

full nearly up to the lips. The mixture was, no doubt, very different

from that good wholesome English mustard which your cook makes fresh for

you, with a little water, in two minutes. It was impregnated with a sour

odour, and was, to English eyes, unwholesome of colour. But still it was

mustard. She seized the horn spoon, and without further delay spread an

ample sufficiency on the folded square of the handkerchief. Then she

commenced to hurry her return.

But still there was a difficulty, no thought of which had occurred to

her before. The candle occupied one hand, so that she had but the other

for the sustenance of her treasure. Had she brought a plate or saucer

from the salon, it would have been all well. As it was she was obliged

to keep her eye intent on her right hand, and to proceed very slowly on

her return journey. She was surprised to find what an aptitude the thing

had to slip from her grasp. But still she progressed slowly, and was

careful not to miss a turning. At last she was safe at her chamber door.

There it was, No. 333.

CHAPTER II.

MRS. BROWN’S FAILURE.

With her eye still fixed upon her burden, she glanced up at the number

of the door--333. She had been determined all through not to forget

that. Then she turned the latch and crept in. The chamber also was dark

after the gaslight on the stairs, but that was so much the better. She

herself had put out the two candles on the dressing-table before she had

left her husband. As she was closing the door behind her she paused, and

could hear that he was sleeping. She was well aware that she had been

long absent,--quite long enough for a man to fall into slumber who was

given that way. She must have been gone, she thought, fully an hour.

There had been no end to that turning over of napkins which she had so

well known to be altogether vain. She paused at the centre table of the

room, still looking at the mustard, which she now delicately dried from

off her hand. She had had no idea that it would have been so difficult

to carry so light and so small an affair. But there it was, and nothing

had been lost. She took some small instrument from the washing-stand,

and with the handle collected the flowing fragments into the centre.

Then the question occurred to her whether, as her husband was sleeping

so sweetly, it would be well to disturb him. She listened again, and

felt that the slight murmur of a snore with which her ears were regaled

was altogether free from any real malady in the throat. Then it occurred

to her, that after all, fatigue perhaps had only made him cross. She

bethought herself how, during the whole journey, she had failed to

believe in his illness. What meals he had eaten! How thoroughly he had

been able to enjoy his full complement of cigars! And then that glass of

brandy, against which she had raised her voice slightly in feminine

opposition. And now he was sleeping there like an infant, with full,

round, perfected, almost sonorous workings of the throat. Who does not

know that sound, almost of two rusty bits of iron scratching against

each other, which comes from a suffering windpipe? There was no

semblance of that here. Why disturb him when he was so thoroughly

enjoying that rest which, more certainly than anything else, would fit

him for the fatigue of the morrow’s journey?

I think that, after all her labour, she would have left the pungent

cataplasm on the table, and have crept gently into bed beside him, had

not a thought suddenly struck her of the great injury he had been doing

her if he were not really ill. To send her down there, in a strange

hotel, wandering among the passages, in the middle of the night, subject

to the contumely of anyone who might meet her, on a commission which, if

it were not sanctified by absolute necessity, would be so thoroughly

objectionable! At this moment she hardly did believe that he had ever

really been ill. Let him have the cataplasm; if not as a remedy, then

as a punishment. It could, at any rate, do him no harm. It was with an

idea of avenging rather than of justifying the past labours of the night

that she proceeded at once to quick action.

Leaving the candle on the table so that she might steady her right hand

with the left, she hurried stealthily to the bedside. Even though he was

behaving badly to her, she would not cause him discomfort by waking him

roughly. She would do a wife’s duty to him as a British matron should.

She would not only put the warm mixture on his neck, but would sit

carefully by him for twenty minutes, so that she might relieve him from

it when the proper period should have come for removing the counter

irritation from his throat. There would doubtless be some little

difficulty in this,--in collecting the mustard after it had served her

purpose. Had she been at home, surrounded by her own comforts, the

application would have been made with some delicate linen bag, through

which the pungency of the spice would have penetrated with strength

sufficient for the purpose. But the circumstance of the occasion had not

admitted this. She had, she felt, done wonders in achieving so much

success as this which she had obtained. If there should be anything

disagreeable in the operation he must submit to it. He had asked for

mustard for his throat, and mustard he should have.

As these thoughts passed quickly through her mind, leaning over him in

the dark, with her eye fixed on the mixture lest it should slip, she

gently raised his flowing beard with her left hand, and with her other

inverted rapidly, steadily but very softly fixed the handkerchief on his

throat. From the bottom of his chin to the spot at which the collar

bones meeting together form the orifice of the chest it covered the

whole noble expanse. There was barely time for a glance, but never had

she been more conscious of the grand proportions of that manly throat. A

sweet feeling of pity came upon her, causing her to determine to relieve

his sufferings in the shorter space of fifteen minutes. He had been

lying on his back, with his lips apart, and, as she held back his beard,

that and her hand nearly covered the features of his face. But he made

no violent effort to free himself from the encounter. He did not even

move an arm or a leg. He simply emitted a snore louder than any that had

come before. She was aware that it was not his wont to be so loud--that

there was generally something more delicate and perhaps more querulous

in his nocturnal voice, but then the present circumstances were

exceptional. She dropped the beard very softly--and there on the pillow

before her lay the face of a stranger. She had put the mustard plaster

on the wrong man.

Not Priam wakened in the dead of night, not Dido when first she learned

that Æneas had fled, not Othello when he learned that Desdemona had been

chaste, not Medea when she became conscious of her slaughtered children,

could have been more struck with horror than was this British matron as

she stood for a moment gazing with awe on that stranger’s bed. One

vain, half-completed, snatching grasp she made at the handkerchief, and

then drew back her hand. If she were to touch him would he not wake at

once, and find her standing there in his bedroom? And then how could she

explain it? By what words could she so quickly make him know the

circumstances of that strange occurrence that he should accept it all

before he had said a word that might offend her? For a moment she stood

all but paralyzed after that faint ineffectual movement of her arm. Then

he stirred his head uneasily on the pillow, opened wider his lips, and

twice in rapid succession snored louder than before. She started back a

couple of paces, and with her body placed between him and the candle,

with her face averted, but with her hand still resting on the foot of

the bed, she endeavoured to think what duty required of her.

She had injured the man. Though she had done it most unwittingly, there

could be no doubt but that she had injured him. If for a moment she

could be brave, the injury might in truth be little; but how disastrous

might be the consequences if she were now in her cowardice to leave him,

who could tell? Applied for fifteen to twenty minutes a mustard plaster

may be the salvation of a throat ill at ease, but if left there

throughout the night upon the neck of a strong man, ailing nothing, only

too prone in his strength to slumber soundly, how sad, how painful, for

aught she knew how dangerous might be the effects! And surely it was an

error which any man with a heart in his bosom would pardon! Judging from

what little she had seen of him she thought that he must have a heart

in his bosom. Was it not her duty to wake him, and then quietly to

extricate him from the embarrassment which she had brought upon him?

But in doing this what words should she use? How should she wake him?

How should she make him understand her goodness, her beneficence, her

sense of duty, before he should have jumped from the bed and rushed to

the bell, and have summoned all above and all below to the rescue? “Sir,

sir, do not move, do not stir, do not scream. I have put a mustard

plaster on your throat, thinking that you were my husband. As yet no

harm has been done. Let me take it off, and then hold your peace for

ever.” Where is the man of such native constancy and grace of spirit

that, at the first moment of waking with a shock, he could hear these

words from the mouth of an unknown woman by his bedside, and at once

obey them to the letter? Would he not surely jump from his bed, with

that horrid compound falling about him,--from which there could be no

complete relief unless he would keep his present attitude without a

motion? The picture which presented itself to her mind as to his

probable conduct was so terrible that she found herself unable to incur

the risk.

Then an idea presented itself to her mind. We all know how in a moment

quick thoughts will course through the subtle brain. She would find that

porter and send him to explain it all. There should be no concealment

now. She would tell the story and would bid him to find the necessary

aid. Alas! as she told herself that she would do so, she knew well that

she was only running from the danger which it was her duty to encounter.

Once again she put out her hand as though to return along the bed. Then

thrice he snorted louder than before, and moved up his knee uneasily

beneath the clothes as though the sharpness of the mustard were already

working upon his skin. She watched him for a moment longer, and then,

with the candle in her hand, she fled.

Poor human nature! Had he been an old man, even a middle-aged man, she

would not have left him to his unmerited sufferings. As it was, though

she completely recognised her duty, and knew what justice and goodness

demanded of her, she could not do it. But there was still left to her

that plan of sending the night-porter to him. It was not till she was

out of the room and had gently closed the door behind her, that she

began to bethink herself how she had made the mistake. With a glance of

her eye she looked up, and then saw the number on the door: 353.

Remarking to herself, with a Briton’s natural criticism on things

French, that those horrid foreigners do not know how to make their

figures, she scudded rather than ran along the corridor, and then down

some stairs and along another passage,--so that she might not be found

in the neighbourhood should the poor man in his agony rush rapidly from

his bed.

In the confusion of her first escape she hardly ventured to look for her

own passage,--nor did she in the least know how she had lost her way

when she came upstairs with the mustard in her hand. But at the present

moment her chief object was the night-porter. She went on descending

till she came again to that vestibule, and looking up at the clock saw

that it was now past one. It was not yet midnight when she left her

husband, but she was not at all astonished at the lapse of time. It

seemed to her as though she had passed a night among these miseries.

And, oh, what a night! But there was yet much to be done. She must find

that porter, and then return to her own suffering husband. Ah,--what now

should she say to him? If he should really be ill, how should she

assuage him? And yet how more than ever necessary was it that they

should leave that hotel early in the morning,--that they should leave

Paris by the very earliest and quickest train that would take them as

fugitives from their present dangers! The door of the salon was open,

but she had no courage to go in search of a second supply. She would

have lacked strength to carry it up the stairs. Where now, oh, where,

was that man? From the vestibule she made her way into the hall, but

everything seemed to be deserted. Through the glass she could see a

light in the court beyond, but she could not bring herself to endeavour

even to open the hall doors.

And now she was very cold,--chilled to her very bones. All this had been

done at Christmas, and during such severity of weather as had never

before been experienced by living Parisians. A feeling of great pity for

herself gradually came upon her. What wrong had she done that she

should be so grievously punished? Why should she be driven to wander

about in this way till her limbs were failing her? And then, so

absolutely important as it was that her strength should support her in

the morning! The man would not die even though he were left there

without aid, to rid himself of the cataplasm as best he might. Was it

absolutely necessary that she should disgrace herself?

But she could not even procure the means of disgracing herself, if that

telling her story to the night-porter would have been a disgrace. She

did not find him, and at last resolved to make her way back to her own

room without further quest. She began to think that she had done all

that she could do. No man was ever killed by a mustard plaster on his

throat. His discomfort at the worst would not be worse than hers had

been--or too probably than that of her poor husband. So she went back up

the stairs and along the passages, and made her way on this occasion to

the door of her room without any difficulty. The way was so well known

to her that she could not but wonder that she had failed before. But now

her hands had been empty, and her eyes had been at her full command. She

looked up, and there was the number, very manifest on this

occasion,--333. She opened the door most gently, thinking that her

husband might be sleeping as soundly as that other man had slept, and

she crept into the room.

CHAPTER III.

MRS. BROWN ATTEMPTS TO ESCAPE.

But her husband was not sleeping. He was not even in bed, as she had

left him. She found him sitting there before the fire-place, on which

one half-burned log still retained a spark of what had once pretended to

be a fire. Nothing more wretched than his appearance could be imagined.

There was a single lighted candle on the table, on which he was leaning

with his two elbows, while his head rested between his hands. He had on

a dressing-gown over his night-shirt, but otherwise was not clothed. He

shivered audibly, or rather shook himself with the cold, and made the

table to chatter as she entered the room. Then he groaned, and let his

head fall from his hands on to the table. It occurred to her at the

moment as she recognised the tone of his querulous voice, and as she saw

the form of his neck, that she must have been deaf and blind when she

had mistaken that stalwart stranger for her husband. “Oh, my dear,” she

said, “why are you not in bed?” He answered nothing in words, but only

groaned again. “Why did you get up? I left you warm and comfortable.”

“Where have you been all night?” he half whispered, half croaked, with

an agonising effort.

“I have been looking for the mustard.”

“Have been looking all night and haven’t found it? Where have you

been?”

She refused to speak a word to him till she had got him into bed, and

then she told her story! But, alas, that which she told was not the true

story! As she was persuading him to go back to his rest, and while she

arranged the clothes again around him, she with difficulty made up her

mind as to what she would do and what she would say. Living or dying he

must be made to start for Thompson Hall at half-past five on the next

morning. It was no longer a question of the amenities of Christmas, no

longer a mere desire to satisfy the family ambition of her own people,

no longer an anxiety to see her new brother-in-law. She was conscious

that there was in that house one whom she had deeply injured, and from

whose vengeance, even from whose aspect, she must fly. How could she

endure to see that face which she was so well sure that she would

recognise, or to hear the slightest sound of that voice which would be

quite familiar to her ears, though it had never spoken a word in her

hearing? She must certainly fly on the wings of the earliest train which

would carry her towards the old house; but in order that she might do so

she must propitiate her husband.

So she told her story. She had gone forth, as he had bade her, in search

of the mustard, and then had suddenly lost her way. Up and down the

house she had wandered, perhaps nearly a dozen times. “Had she met no

one?” he asked in that raspy, husky whisper. “Surely there must have

been some one about the hotel! Nor was it possible that she could have

been roaming about all those hours.” “Only one hour, my dear,” she

said. Then there was a question about the duration of time, in which

both of them waxed angry, and as she became angry her husband waxed

stronger, and as he became violent beneath the clothes the comfortable

idea returned to her that he was not perhaps so ill as he would seem to

be. She found herself driven to tell him something about the porter,

having to account for that lapse of time by explaining how she had

driven the poor man to search for the handkerchief which she had never

lost.

“Why did you not tell him you wanted the mustard?”

“My dear!”

“Why not? There is nothing to be ashamed of in wanting mustard.”

“At one o’clock in the morning! I couldn’t do it. To tell you the truth,

he wasn’t very civil, and I thought that he was,--perhaps a little

tipsy. Now, my dear, do go to sleep.”

“Why didn’t you get the mustard?”

“There was none there,--nowhere at all about the room. I went down again

and searched everywhere. That’s what took me so long. They always lock

up those kind of things at these French hotels. They are too

close-fisted to leave anything out. When you first spoke of it I knew

that it would be gone when I got there. Now, my dear, do go to sleep,

because we positively must start in the morning.”

“That is impossible,” said he, jumping up in bed.

“We must go, my dear. I say that we must go. After all that has passed

I wouldn’t not be with Uncle John and my cousin Robert to-morrow evening

for more,--more,--more than I would venture to say.”

“Bother!” he exclaimed.

“It’s all very well for you to say that, Charles, but you don’t know. I

say that we must go to-morrow, and we will.”

“I do believe you want to kill me, Mary.”

“That is very cruel, Charles, and most false, and most unjust. As for

making you ill, nothing could be so bad for you as this wretched place,

where nobody can get warm either day or night. If anything will cure

your throat for you at once it will be the sea air. And only think how

much more comfortable they can make you at Thompson Hall than anywhere

in this country. I have so set my heart upon it, Charles, that I will do

it. If we are not there to-morrow night Uncle John won’t consider us as

belonging to the family.”

“I don’t believe a word of it.”

“Jane told me so in her letter. I wouldn’t let you know before because I

thought it so unjust. But that has been the reason why I’ve been so

earnest about it all through.”

It was a thousand pities that so good a woman should have been driven by

the sad stress of circumstances to tell so many fibs. One after another

she was compelled to invent them, that there might be a way open to her

of escaping the horrors of a prolonged sojourn in that hotel. At length,

after much grumbling, he became silent, and she trusted that he was

sleeping. He had not as yet said that he would start at the required

hour in the morning, but she was perfectly determined in her own mind

that he should be made to do so. As he lay there motionless, and as she

wandered about the room pretending to pack her things, she more than

once almost resolved that she would tell him everything. Surely then he

would be ready to make any effort. But there came upon her an idea that

he might perhaps fail to see all the circumstances, and that, so

failing, he would insist on remaining that he might tender some apology

to the injured gentleman. An apology might have been very well had she

not left him there in his misery--but what apology would be possible

now? She would have to see him and speak to him, and everyone in the

hotel would know every detail of the story. Everyone in France would

know that it was she who had gone to the strange man’s bedside, and put

the mustard plaster on the strange man’s throat in the dead of night!

She could not tell the story even to her husband, lest even her husband

should betray her.

Her own sufferings at the present moment were not light. In her

perturbation of mind she had foolishly resolved that she would not

herself go to bed. The tragedy of the night had seemed to her too deep

for personal comfort. And then how would it be were she to sleep, and

have no one to call her? It was imperative that she should have all her

powers ready for thoroughly arousing him. It occurred to her that the

servant of the hotel would certainly run her too short of time. She had

to work for herself and for him too, and therefore she would not sleep.

But she was very cold, and she put on first a shawl over her

dressing-gown and then a cloak. She could not consume all the remaining

hours of the night in packing one bag and one portmanteau, so that at

last she sat down on the narrow red cotton velvet sofa, and, looking at

her watch, perceived that as yet it was not much past two o’clock. How

was she to get through those other three long, tedious, chilly hours?

Then there came a voice from the bed--“Ain’t you coming?”

“I hoped you were asleep, my dear.”

“I haven’t been asleep at all. You’d better come, if you don’t mean to

make yourself as ill as I am.”

“You are not so very bad, are you, darling?”

“I don’t know what you call bad. I never felt my throat so choked in my

life before!” Still as she listened she thought that she remembered his

throat to have been more choked. If the husband of her bosom could play

with her feelings and deceive her on such an occasion as this,--then,

then,--then she thought that she would rather not have any husband of

her bosom at all. But she did creep into bed, and lay down beside him

without saying another word.

Of course she slept, but her sleep was not the sleep of the blest. At

every striking of the clock in the quadrangle she would start up in

alarm, fearing that she had let the time go by. Though the night was so

short it was very long to her. But he slept like an infant. She could

hear from his breathing that he was not quite so well as she could wish

him to be, but still he was resting in beautiful tranquillity. Not once

did he move when she started up, as she did so frequently. Orders had

been given and repeated over and over again that they should be called

at five. The man in the office had almost been angry as he assured Mrs.

Brown for the fourth time that Monsieur and Madame would most assuredly

be wakened at the appointed time. But still she would trust to no one,

and was up and about the room before the clock had struck half-past

four.

In her heart of hearts she was very tender towards her husband. Now, in

order that he might feel a gleam of warmth while he was dressing

himself, she collected together the fragments of half-burned wood, and

endeavoured to make a little fire. Then she took out from her bag a

small pot, and a patent lamp, and some chocolate, and prepared for him a

warm drink, so that he might have it instantly as he was awakened. She

would do anything for him in the way of ministering to his

comfort,--only he must go! Yes, he certainly must go!

And then she wondered how that strange man was bearing himself at the

present moment. She would fain have ministered to him too had it been

possible; but ah!--it was so impossible! Probably before this he would

have been aroused from his troubled slumbers. But then--how aroused? At

what time in the night would the burning heat upon his chest have

awakened him to a sense of torture which must have been so altogether

incomprehensible to him? Her strong imagination showed to her a clear

picture of the scene,--clear, though it must have been done in the dark.

How he must have tossed and hurled himself under the clothes; how those

strong knees must have worked themselves up and down before the potent

god of sleep would allow him to return to perfect consciousness; how his

fingers, restrained by no reason, would have trampled over his feverish

throat, scattering everywhere that unhappy poultice! Then when he should

have sat up wide awake, but still in the dark--with her mind’s eye she

saw it all--feeling that some fire as from the infernal regions had

fallen upon him, but whence he would know not, how fiercely wild would

be the working of his spirit! Ah, now she knew, now she felt, now she

acknowledged how bound she had been to awaken him at the moment,

whatever might have been the personal inconvenience to herself! In such

a position what would he do--or rather what had he done? She could

follow much of it in her own thoughts;--how he would scramble madly from

his bed, and, with one hand still on his throat, would snatch hurriedly

at the matches with the other. How the light would come, and how then he

would rush to the mirror. Ah, what a sight he would behold! She could

see it all to the last widespread daub.

But she could not see, she could not tell herself, what in such a

position a man would do;--at any rate, not what that man would do. Her

husband, she thought, would tell his wife, and then the two of them,

between them, would--put up with it. There are misfortunes which, if

they be published, are simply aggravated by ridicule. But she remembered

the features of the stranger as she had seen them at that instant in

which she had dropped his beard, and she thought that there was a

ferocity in them, a certain tenacity of self-importance, which would not

permit their owner to endure such treatment in silence. Would he not

storm and rage, and ring the bell, and call all Paris to witness his

revenge?

But the storming and the raging had not reached her yet, and now it

wanted but a quarter to five. In three-quarters of an hour they would be

in that demi-omnibus which they had ordered for themselves, and in half

an hour after that they would be flying towards Thompson Hall. Then she

allowed herself to think of the coming comforts,--of those comforts so

sweet, if only they would come! That very day now present to her was the

24th December, and on that very evening she would be sitting in

Christmas joy among all her uncles and cousins, holding her new

brother-in-law affectionately by the hand. Oh, what a change from

Pandemonium to Paradise;--from that wretched room, from that miserable

house in which there was such ample cause for fear, to all the domestic

Christmas bliss of the home of the Thompsons! She resolved that she

would not, at any rate, be deterred by any light opposition on the part

of her husband. “It wants just a quarter to five,” she said, putting

her hand steadily upon his shoulder, “and I’ll get a cup of chocolate

for you, so that you may get up comfortably.”

“I’ve been thinking about it,” he said, rubbing his eyes with the back

of his hands. “It will be so much better to go over by the mail train

to-night. We should be in time for Christmas just the same.”

“That will not do at all,” she answered, energetically. “Come, Charles,

after all the trouble do not disappoint me.”

“It is such a horrid grind.”

“Think what I have gone through,--what I have done for you! In twelve

hours we shall be there, among them all. You won’t be so little like a

man as not to go on now.” He threw himself back upon the bed, and tried

to readjust the clothes round his neck. “No, Charles, no,” she

continued; “not if I know it. Take your chocolate and get up. There is

not a moment to be lost.” With that she laid her hand upon his shoulder,

and made him clearly understand that he would not be allowed to take

further rest in that bed.

Grumbling, sulky, coughing continually, and declaring that life under

such circumstances was not worth having, he did at last get up and dress

himself. When once she knew that he was obeying her she became again

tender to him, and certainly took much more than her own share of the

trouble of the proceedings. Long before the time was up she was ready,

and the porter had been summoned to take the luggage downstairs. When

the man came she was rejoiced to see that it was not he whom she had

met among the passages during her nocturnal rambles. He shouldered the

box, and told them that they would find coffee and bread and butter in

the small salle-à-manger below.

“I told you that it would be so, when you would boil that stuff,” said

the ungrateful man, who had nevertheless swallowed the hot chocolate

when it was given to him.

They followed their luggage down into the hall; but as she went, at

every step, the lady looked around her. She dreaded the sight of that

porter of the night; she feared lest some potential authority of the

hotel should come to her and ask her some horrid question; but of all

her fears her greatest fear was that there should arise before her an

apparition of that face which she had seen recumbent on its pillow.

As they passed the door of the great salon, Mr. Brown looked in. “Why,

there it is still!” said he.

“What?” said she, trembling in every limb.

“The mustard-pot!”

“They have put it in there since,” she exclaimed energetically, in her

despair. “But never mind. The omnibus is here. Come away.” And she

absolutely took him by the arm.

But at that moment a door behind them opened, and Mrs. Brown heard

herself called by her name. And there was the night-porter,--with a

handkerchief in his hand. But the further doings of that morning must be

told in a further chapter.

CHAPTER IV.

MRS. BROWN DOES ESCAPE.

It had been visible to Mrs. Brown from the first moment of her arrival

on the ground floor that “something was the matter,” if we may be

allowed to use such a phrase; and she felt all but convinced that this

something had reference to her. She fancied that the people of the hotel

were looking at her as she swallowed, or tried to swallow, her coffee.

When her husband was paying the bill there was something disagreeable in

the eye of the man who was taking the money. Her sufferings were very

great, and no one sympathised with her. Her husband was quite at his

ease, except that he was complaining of the cold. When she was anxious

to get him out into the carriage, he still stood there leisurely,

arranging shawl after shawl around his throat. “You can do that quite as

well in an omnibus,” she had just said to him very crossly, when there

appeared upon the scene through a side door that very night-porter whom

she dreaded, with a soiled pocket-handkerchief in his hand.

Even before the sound of her own name met her ears Mrs. Brown knew it

all. She understood the full horror of her position from that man’s

hostile face, and from the little article which he held in his hand. If

during the watches of the night she had had money in her pocket, if she

had made a friend of this greedy fellow by well-timed liberality, all

might have been so different! But she reflected that she had allowed him

to go unfee’d after all his trouble, and she knew that he was her enemy.

It was the handkerchief that she feared. She thought that she might have

brazened out anything but that. No one had seen her enter or leave that

strange man’s room. No one had seen her dip her hands in that jar. She

had, no doubt, been found wandering about the house while the slumberer

had been made to suffer so strangely, and there might have been

suspicion, and perhaps accusation. But she would have been ready with

frequent protestations to deny all charges made against her, and, though

no one might have believed her, no one could have convicted her. Here,

however, was evidence against which she would be unable to stand for a

moment. At the first glance she acknowledged the potency of that damning

morsel of linen.

During all the horrors of the night she had never given a thought to the

handkerchief, and yet she ought to have known that the evidence it would

bring against her was palpable and certain. Her name, “M. Brown,” was

plainly written on the corner. What a fool she had been not to have

thought of this! Had she but remembered the plain marking which she, as

a careful, well-conducted British matron, had put upon all her clothes,

she would at any hazard have recovered the article. Oh that she had

waked the man, or bribed the porter, or even told her husband! But now

she was, as it were, friendless, without support, without a word that

she could say in her own defence, convicted of having committed this

assault upon a strange man in his own bedroom, and then of having left

him! The thing must be explained by the truth; but how to explain such

truth, how to tell such story in a way to satisfy injured folk, and she

with only barely time sufficient to catch the train! Then it occurred to

her that they could have no legal right to stop her because the

pocket-handkerchief had been found in a strange gentleman’s bedroom.

“Yes, it is mine,” she said, turning to her husband, as the porter, with

a loud voice, asked if she were not Madame Brown. “Take it, Charles, and

come on.” Mr. Brown naturally stood still in astonishment. He did put

out his hand, but the porter would not allow the evidence to pass so

readily out of his custody.

“What does it all mean?” asked Mr. Brown.

“A gentleman has been--eh--eh--. Something has been done to a gentleman

in his bedroom,” said the clerk.

“Something done to a gentleman!” repeated Mr. Brown.

“Something very bad indeed,” said the porter. “Look here,” and he showed

the condition of the handkerchief.

“Charles, we shall lose the train,” said the affrighted wife.

“What the mischief does it all mean?” demanded the husband.

“Did Madame go into the gentleman’s room?” asked the clerk. Then there

was an awful silence, and all eyes were fixed upon the lady.

“What does it all mean?” demanded the husband. “Did you go into

anybody’s room?”

“I did,” said Mrs. Brown with much dignity, looking round upon her

enemies as a stag at bay will look upon the hounds which are attacking

him. “Give me the handkerchief.” But the night-porter quickly put it

behind his back. “Charles, we cannot allow ourselves to be delayed. You

shall write a letter to the keeper of the hotel, explaining it all.”

Then she essayed to swim out, through the front door, into the courtyard

in which the vehicle was waiting for them. But three or four men and

women interposed themselves, and even her husband did not seem quite

ready to continue his journey. “To-night is Christmas Eve,” said Mrs.

Brown, “and we shall not be at Thompson Hall! Think of my sister!”

“Why did you go into the man’s bedroom, my dear?” whispered Mr. Brown in

English.

But the porter heard the whisper, and understood the language;--the

porter who had not been “tipped.” “Ye’es;--vy?” asked the porter.

“It was a mistake, Charles; there is not a moment to lose. I can explain

it all to you in the carriage.” Then the clerk suggested that Madame had

better postpone her journey a little. The gentleman upstairs had

certainly been very badly treated, and had demanded to know why so great

an outrage had been perpetrated. The clerk said that he did not wish to

send for the police--here Mrs. Brown gasped terribly and threw herself

on her husband’s shoulder,--but he did not think he could allow the

party to go till the gentleman upstairs had received some satisfaction.

It had now become clearly impossible that the journey could be made by

the early train. Even Mrs. Brown gave it up herself, and demanded of her

husband that she should be taken back to her own bedroom.

“But what is to be said to the gentleman?” asked the porter.

Of course it was impossible that Mrs. Brown should be made to tell her

story there in the presence of them all. The clerk, when he found he had

succeeded in preventing her from leaving the house, was satisfied with a

promise from Mr. Brown that he would inquire from his wife what were

these mysterious circumstances, and would then come down to the office

and give some explanation. If it were necessary, he would see the

strange gentleman,--whom he now ascertained to be a certain Mr. Jones

returning from the east of Europe. He learned also that this Mr. Jones

had been most anxious to travel by that very morning train which he and

his wife had intended to use,--that Mr. Jones had been most particular

in giving his orders accordingly, but that at the last moment he had

declared himself to be unable even to dress himself, because of the

injury which had been done him during the night. When Mr. Brown heard

this from the clerk just before he was allowed to take his wife

upstairs, while she was sitting on a sofa in a corner with her face

hidden, a look of awful gloom came over his own countenance. What could

it be that his wife had done to the man of so terrible a nature? “You

had better come up with me,” he said to her with marital severity, and

the poor cowed woman went with him tamely as might have done some

patient Grizel. Not a word was spoken till they were in the room and the

door was locked. “Now,” said he, “what does it all mean?”

It was not till nearly two hours had passed that Mr. Brown came down the

stairs very slowly,--turning it all over in his mind. He had now

gradually heard the absolute and exact truth, and had very gradually

learned to believe it. It was first necessary that he should understand

that his wife had told him many fibs during the night; but as she

constantly alleged to him when he complained of her conduct in this

respect, they had all been told on his behalf. Had she not struggled to

get the mustard for his comfort, and when she had secured the prize had

she not hurried to put it on,--as she had fondly thought,--his throat?

And though she had fibbed to him afterwards, had she not done so in

order that he might not be troubled? “You are not angry with me because

I was in that man’s room?” she asked, looking full into his eyes, but

not quite without a sob. He paused a moment and then declared, with

something of a true husband’s confidence in his tone, that he was not in

the least angry with her on that account. Then she kissed him, and bade

him remember that after all no one could really injure them. “What harm

has been done, Charles? The gentleman won’t die because he has had a

mustard plaster on his throat. The worst is about Uncle John and dear

Jane. They do think so much of Christmas Eve at Thompson Hall!”

Mr. Brown, when he again found himself in the clerk’s office, requested

that his card might be taken up to Mr. Jones. Mr. Jones had sent down

his own card, which was handed to Mr. Brown: “Mr. Barnaby Jones.” “And

how was it all, sir?” asked the clerk, in a whisper--a whisper which had

at the same time something of authoritative demand and something also of

submissive respect. The clerk of course was anxious to know the mystery.

It is hardly too much to say that everyone in that vast hotel was by

this time anxious to have the mystery unravelled. But Mr. Brown would

tell nothing to anyone. “It is merely a matter to be explained between

me and Mr. Jones,” he said. The card was taken upstairs, and after

awhile he was ushered into Mr. Jones’ room. It was, of course, that very

353 with which the reader is already acquainted. There was a fire

burning, and the remains of Mr. Jones’ breakfast were on the table. He

was sitting in his dressing-gown and slippers, with his shirt open in

the front, and a silk handkerchief very loosely covering his throat. Mr.

Brown, as he entered the room, of course looked with considerable

anxiety at the gentleman of whose condition he had heard so sad an

account; but he could only observe some considerable stiffness of

movement and demeanour as Mr. Jones turned his head round to greet him.

“This has been a very disagreeable accident, Mr. Jones,” said the

husband of the lady.

“Accident! I don’t know how it could have been an accident. It has been

a most--most--most--a most monstrous,--er,--er,--I must say,

interference with a gentleman’s privacy, and personal comfort.”

“Quite so, Mr. Jones, but,--on the part of the lady, who is my wife--”

“So I understand. I myself am about to become a married man, and I can

understand what your feelings must be. I wish to say as little as

possible to harrow them.” Here Mr. Brown bowed. “But,--there’s the fact.

She did do it.”

“She thought it was--me!”

“What!”

“I give you my word as a gentleman, Mr. Jones. When she was putting that

mess upon you she thought it was me! She did, indeed.”

Mr. Jones looked at his new acquaintance and shook his head. He did not

think it possible that any woman would make such a mistake as that.

“I had a very bad sore throat,” continued Mr. Brown, “and indeed you may

perceive it still,”--in saying this, he perhaps aggravated a little the

sign of his distemper, “and I asked Mrs. Brown to go down and get

one,--just what she put on you.”

“I wish you’d had it,” said Mr. Jones, putting his hand up to his neck.

“I wish I had,--for your sake as well as mine,--and for hers, poor

woman. I don’t know when she will get over the shock.”

“I don’t know when I shall. And it has stopped me on my journey. I was

to have been to-night, this very night, this Christmas Eve, with the

young lady I am engaged to marry. Of course I couldn’t travel. The

extent of the injury done nobody can imagine at present.”

“It has been just as bad to me, sir. We were to have been with our

family this Christmas Eve. There were particular reasons,--most

particular. We were only hindered from going by hearing of your

condition.”

“Why did she come into my room at all? I can’t understand that. A lady

always knows her own room at an hotel.”

“353--that’s yours; 333--that’s ours. Don’t you see how easy it was? She

had lost her way, and she was a little afraid lest the thing should fall

down.”

“I wish it had, with all my heart.”

“That’s how it was. Now I’m sure, Mr. Jones, you’ll take a lady’s

apology. It was a most unfortunate mistake,--most unfortunate; but what

more can be said?”

Mr. Jones gave himself up to reflection for a few moments before he

replied to this. He supposed that he was bound to believe the story as

far as it went. At any rate, he did not know how he could say that he

did not believe it. It seemed to him to be almost

incredible,--especially incredible in regard to that personal mistake,

for, except that they both had long beards and brown beards, Mr. Jones

thought that there was no point of resemblance between himself and Mr.

Brown. But still, even that, he felt, must be accepted. But then why had

he been left, deserted, to undergo all those torments? “She found out

her mistake at last, I suppose?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Why didn’t she wake a fellow and take it off again?”

“Ah!”

“She can’t have cared very much for a man’s comfort when she went away

and left him like that.”

“Ah! there was the difficulty, Mr. Jones.”

“Difficulty! Who was it that had done it? To come to me, in my bedroom,

in the middle of the night, and put that thing on me, and then leave it

there and say nothing about it! It seems to me deuced like a practical

joke.”

“No, Mr. Jones!”

“That’s the way I look at it,” said Mr. Jones, plucking up his courage.

“There isn’t a woman in all England, or in all France, less likely to do

such a thing than my wife. She’s as steady as a rock, Mr. Jones, and

would no more go into another gentleman’s bedroom in joke than---- Oh

dear no! You’re going to be a married man yourself.”

“Unless all this makes a difference,” said Mr. Jones, almost in tears.

“I had sworn that I would be with her this Christmas Eve.”

“Oh, Mr. Jones, I cannot believe that will interfere with your

happiness. How could you think that your wife, as is to be, would do

such a thing as that in joke?”

“She wouldn’t do it at all;--joke or anyway.”

“How can you tell what accident might happen to anyone?”

“She’d have wakened the man then afterwards. I’m sure she would. She

would never have left him to suffer in that way. Her heart is too soft.

Why didn’t she send you to wake me, and explain it all? That’s what my

Jane would have done; and I should have gone and wakened him. But the

whole thing is impossible,” he said, shaking his head as he remembered

that he and his Jane were not in a condition as yet to undergo any such

mutual trouble. At last Mr. Jones was brought to acknowledge that

nothing more could be done. The lady had sent her apology, and told her

story, and he must bear the trouble and inconvenience to which she had

subjected him. He still, however, had his own opinion about her conduct

generally, and could not be brought to give any sign of amity. He simply

bowed when Mr. Brown was hoping to induce him to shake hands, and sent

no word of pardon to the great offender.

The matter, however, was so far concluded that there was no further

question of police interference, nor any doubt but that the lady with

her husband was to be allowed to leave Paris by the night train. The

nature of the accident probably became known to all. Mr. Brown was

interrogated by many, and though he professed to declare that he would

answer no question, nevertheless he found it better to tell the clerk

something of the truth than to allow the matter to be shrouded in

mystery. It is to be feared that Mr. Jones, who did not once show

himself through the day, but who employed the hours in endeavouring to

assuage the injury done him, still lived in the convicsion that the lady

had played a practical joke on him. But the subject of such a joke never

talks about it, and Mr. Jones could not be induced to speak even by the

friendly adherence of the night-porter.

Mrs. Brown also clung to the seclusion of her own bedroom, never once

stirring from it till the time came in which she was to be taken down to

the omnibus. Upstairs she ate her meals, and upstairs she passed her

time in packing and unpacking, and in requesting that telegrams might be

sent repeatedly to Thompson Hall. In the course of the day two such

telegrams were sent, in the latter of which the Thompson family were

assured that the Browns would arrive, probably in time for breakfast on

Christmas Day, certainly in time for church. She asked more than once

tenderly after Mr. Jones’ welfare, but could obtain no information. “He

was very cross, and that’s all I know about it,” said Mr. Brown. Then

she made a remark as to the gentleman’s Christian name, which appeared

on the card as “Barnaby.” “My sister’s husband’s name will be Burnaby,”

she said. “And this man’s Christian name is Barnaby; that’s all the

difference,” said her husband, with ill-timed jocularity.

We all know how people under a cloud are apt to fail in asserting their

personal dignity. On the former day a separate vehicle had been ordered

by Mr. Brown to take himself and his wife to the station, but now, after

his misfortunes, he contented himself with such provision as the people

at the hotel might make for him. At the appointed hour he brought his

wife down, thickly veiled. There were many strangers as she passed

through the hall, ready to look at the lady who had done that wonderful

thing in the dead of night, but none could see a feature of her face as

she stepped across the hall, and was hurried into the omnibus. And there

were many eyes also on Mr. Jones, who followed very quickly, for he

also, in spite of his sufferings, was leaving Paris on the evening in

order that he might be with his English friends on Christmas Day. He, as

he went through the crowd, assumed an air of great dignity, to which,

perhaps, something was added by his endeavours, as he walked, to save

his poor throat from irritation. He, too, got into the same omnibus,

stumbling over the feet of his enemy in the dark. At the station they

got their tickets, one close after the other, and then were brought into

each other’s presence in the waiting-room. I think it must be

acknowledged that here Mr. Jones was conscious, not only of her

presence, but of her consciousness of his presence, and that he assumed

an attitude, as though he should have said, “Now do you think it

possible for me to believe that you mistook me for your husband?” She

was perfectly quiet, but sat through that quarter of an hour with her

face continually veiled. Mr. Brown made some little overture of

conversation to Mr. Jones, but Mr. Jones, though he did mutter some

reply, showed plainly enough that he had no desire for further

intercourse. Then came the accustomed stampede, the awful rush, the

internecine struggle in which seats had to be found. Seats, I fancy, are

regularly found, even by the most tardy, but it always appears that

every British father and every British husband is actuated at these

stormy moments by a conviction that unless he proves himself a very

Hercules he and his daughters and his wife will be left desolate in

Paris. Mr. Brown was quite Herculean, carrying two bags and a hat-box in

his own hands, besides the cloaks, the coats, the rugs, the sticks, and

the umbrellas. But when he had got himself and his wife well seated,

with their faces to the engine, with a corner seat for her,--there was

Mr. Jones immediately opposite to her. Mr. Jones, as soon as he

perceived the inconvenience of his position, made a scramble for another

place, but he was too late. In that contiguity the journey as far as

Calais had to be made. She, poor woman, never once took up her veil.

There he sat, without closing an eye, stiff as a ramrod, sometimes

showing by little uneasy gestures that the trouble at his neck was still

there, but never speaking a word, and hardly moving a limb.

Crossing from Calais to Dover the lady was, of course, separated from

her victim. The passage was very bad, and she more than once reminded

her husband how well it would have been with them now had they pursued

their journey as she had intended,--as though they had been detained in

Paris by his fault! Mr. Jones, as he laid himself down on his back, gave

himself up to wondering whether any man before him had ever been made

subject to such absolute injustice. Now and again he put his hand up to

his own beard, and began to doubt whether it could have been moved, as

it must have been moved, without waking him. What if chloroform had been

used? Many such suspicions crossed his mind during the misery of that

passage.

They were again together in the same railway carriage from Dover to

London. They had now got used to the close neighbourhood, and knew how

to endure each the presence of the other. But as yet Mr. Jones had never

seen the lady’s face. He longed to know what were the features of the

woman who had been so blind--if indeed that story were true. Or if it

were not true, of what like was the woman who would dare in the middle

of the night to play such a trick as that? But still she kept her veil

close over her face.

From Cannon Street the Browns took their departure in a cab for the

Liverpool Street Station, whence they would be conveyed by the Eastern

Counties Railway to Stratford. Now at any rate their troubles were over.

They would be in ample time, not only for Christmas Day church, but for

Christmas Day breakfast. “It will be just the same as getting in there

last night,” said Mr. Brown, as he walked across the platform to place

his wife in the carriage for Stratford. She entered it the first, and as

she did so there she saw Mr. Jones seated in the corner! Hitherto she

had borne his presence well, but now she could not restrain herself

from a little start and a little scream. He bowed his head very

slightly, as though acknowledging the compliment, and then down she

dropped her veil. When they arrived at Stratford, the journey being over

in a quarter of an hour, Jones was out of the carriage even before the

Browns.

“There is Uncle John’s carriage,” said Mrs. Brown, thinking that now, at

any rate, she would be able to free herself from the presence of this

terrible stranger. No doubt he was a handsome man to look at, but on no

face so sternly hostile had she ever before fixed her eyes. She did not,

perhaps, reflect that the owner of no other face had ever been so deeply

injured by herself.

CHAPTER V.

MRS. BROWN AT THOMPSON HALL.

“Please, sir, we were to ask for Mr. Jones,” said the servant, putting

his head into the carriage after both Mr. and Mrs. Brown had seated

themselves.

“Mr. Jones!” exclaimed the husband.

“Why ask for Mr. Jones?” demanded the wife. The servant was about to

tender some explanation when Mr. Jones stepped up and said that he was

Mr. Jones. “We are going to Thompson Hall,” said the lady with great

vigour.

“So am I,” said Mr. Jones, with much dignity. It was, however, arranged

that he should sit with the coachman, as there was a rumble behind for

the other servant. The luggage was put into a cart, and away all went

for Thompson Hall.

“What do you think about it, Mary?” whispered Mr. Brown, after a pause.

He was evidently awe-struck by the horror of the occasion.

“I cannot make it out at all. What do you think?”

“I don’t know what to think. Jones going to Thompson Hall?”

“He’s a very good-looking young man,” said Mrs. Brown.

“Well;--that’s as people think. A stiff, stuck-up fellow, I should say.

Up to this moment he has never forgiven you for what you did to him.”

“Would you have forgiven his wife, Charles, if she’d done it to you?”

“He hasn’t got a wife,--yet.”

“How do you know?”

“He is coming home now to be married,” said Mr. Brown. “He expects to

meet the young lady this very Christmas Day. He told me so. That was one

of the reasons why he was so angry at being stopped by what you did last

night.”

“I suppose he knows Uncle John, or he wouldn’t be going to the Hall,”

said Mrs. Brown.

“I can’t make it out,” said Mr. Brown, shaking his head.

“He looks quite like a gentleman,” said Mrs. Brown, “though he has been

so stiff. Jones! Barnaby Jones! You’re sure it was Barnaby?”

“That was the name on the card.”

“Not Burnaby?” asked Mrs. Brown.

“It was Barnaby Jones on the card,--just the same as ‘Barnaby Rudge,’

and as for looking like a gentleman, I’m by no means quite so sure. A

gentleman takes an apology when it’s offered.”

“Perhaps, my dear, that depends on the condition of his throat. If you

had had a mustard plaster on all night, you might not have liked it. But

here we are at Thompson Hall at last.”

Thompson Hall was an old brick mansion, standing within a huge iron

gate, with a gravel sweep before it. It had stood there before Stratford

was a town, or even a suburb, and had then been known by the name of Bow

Place. But it had been in the hands of the present family for the last

thirty years, and was now known far and wide as Thompson Hall,--a

comfortable, roomy, old-fashioned place, perhaps a little dark and dull

to look at, but much more substantially built than most of our modern

villas. Mrs. Brown jumped with alacrity from the carriage, and with a

quick step entered the home of her forefathers. Her husband followed her

more leisurely, but he, too, felt that he was at home at Thompson Hall.

Then Mr. Jones walked in also;--but he looked as though he were not at

all at home. It was still very early, and no one of the family was as

yet down. In these circumstances it was almost necessary that something

should be said to Mr. Jones.

“Do you know Mr. Thompson?” asked Mr. Brown.

“I never had the pleasure of seeing him,--as yet,” answered Mr. Jones,

very stiffly.

“Oh,--I didn’t know;--because you said you were coming here.”

“And I have come here. Are you friends of Mr. Thompson?”

“Oh, dear, yes,” said Mrs. Brown. “I was a Thompson myself before I

married.”

“Oh,--indeed!” said Mr. Jones. “How very odd,--very odd, indeed.”

During this time the luggage was being brought into the house, and two

old family servants were offering them assistance. Would the new comers

like to go up to their bedrooms? Then the housekeeper, Mrs. Green,

intimated with a wink that Miss Jane would, she was sure, be down quite

immediately. The present moment, however, was still very unpleasant. The

lady probably had made her guess as to the mystery; but the two

gentlemen were still altogether in the dark. Mrs. Brown had no doubt

declared her parentage, but Mr. Jones, with such a multitude of strange

facts crowding on his mind, had been slow to understand her. Being

somewhat suspicious by nature, he was beginning to think whether

possibly the mustard had been put by this lady on his throat with some

reference to his connexion with Thompson Hall. Could it be that she, for

some reason of her own, had wished to prevent his coming, and had

contrived this untoward stratagem out of her brain? or had she wished to

make him ridiculous to the Thompson family,--to whom, as a family, he

was at present unknown? It was becoming more and more improbable to him

that the whole thing should have been an accident. When, after the first

horrid torments of that morning in which he had in his agony invoked the

assistance of the night-porter, he had begun to reflect on his

situation, he had determined that it would be better that nothing

further should be said about it. What would life be worth to him if he

were to be known wherever he went as the man who had been

mustard-plastered in the middle of the night by a strange lady? The

worst of a practical joke is that the remembrance of the absurd

condition sticks so long to the sufferer! At the hotel that

night-porter, who had possessed himself of the handkerchief and had read

the name, and had connected that name with the occupant of 333 whom he

had found wandering about the house with some strange purpose, had not

permitted the thing to sleep. The porter had pressed the matter home

against the Browns, and had produced the interview which has been

recorded. But during the whole of that day Mr. Jones had been resolving

that he would never again either think of the Browns or speak of them. A

great injury had been done to him,--a most outrageous injustice;--but it

was a thing which had to be endured. A horrid woman had come across him

like a nightmare. All he could do was to endeavour to forget the

terrible visitation. Such had been his resolve,--in making which he had

passed that long day in Paris. And now the Browns had stuck to him from

the moment of his leaving his room! he had been forced to travel with

them, but had travelled with them as a stranger. He had tried to comfort

himself with the reflection that at every fresh stage he would shake

them off. In one railway after another the vicinity had been bad,--but

still they were strangers. Now he found himself in the same house with

them,--where of course the story would be told. Had not the thing been

done on purpose that the story might be told there at Thompson Hall?

Mrs. Brown had acceded to the proposition of the housekeeper, and was

about to be taken to her room when there was heard a sound of footsteps

along the passage above and on the stairs, and a young lady came

bounding on to the scene. “You have all of you come a quarter of an hour

earlier than we thought possible,” said the young lady. “I did so mean

to be up to receive you!” With that she passed her sister on the

stairs,--for the young lady was Miss Jane Thompson, sister to our Mrs.

Brown,--and hurried down into the hall. Here Mr. Brown, who had ever

been on affectionate terms with his sister-in-law, put himself forward

to receive her embraces; but she, apparently not noticing him in her

ardour, rushed on and threw herself on to the breast of the other

gentleman. “This is my Charles,” she said. “Oh, Charles, I thought you

never would be here.”

Mr. Charles Burnaby Jones, for such was his name since he had inherited

the Jones property in Pembrokeshire, received into his arms the ardent

girl of his heart with all that love and devotion to which she was

entitled, but could not do so without some external shrinking from her

embrace. “Oh, Charles, what is it?” she said.

“Nothing, dearest--only--only--.” Then he looked piteously up into Mrs.

Brown’s face, as though imploring her not to tell the story.

“Perhaps, Jane, you had better introduce us,” said Mrs. Brown.

“Introduce you! I thought you had been travelling together, and staying

at the same hotel--and all that.”

“So we have; but people may be in the same hotel without knowing each

other. And we have travelled all the way home with Mr. Jones without in

the least knowing who he was.”

“How very odd! Do you mean you have never spoken?”

“Not a word,” said Mrs. Brown.

“I do so hope you’ll love each other,” said Jane.

“It shan’t be my fault if we don’t,” said Mrs. Brown.

“I’m sure it shan’t be mine,” said Mr. Brown, tendering his hand to the

other gentleman. The various feelings of the moment were too much for

Mr. Jones, and he could not respond quite as he should have done. But as

he was taken upstairs to his room he determined that he would make the

best of it.

The owner of the house was old Uncle John. He was a bachelor, and with

him lived various members of the family. There was the great Thompson of

them all, Cousin Robert, who was now member of Parliament for the Essex

Flats, and young John, as a certain enterprising Thompson of the age of

forty was usually called, and then there was old Aunt Bess, and among

other young branches there was Miss Jane Thompson, who was now engaged

to marry Mr. Charles Burnaby Jones. As it happened, no other member of

the family had as yet seen Mr. Burnaby Jones, and he, being by nature of

a retiring disposition, felt himself to be ill at ease when he came into

the breakfast parlour among all the Thompsons. He was known to be a

gentleman of good family and ample means, and all the Thompsons had

approved of the match, but during the first Christmas breakfast he did

not seem to accept his condition jovially. His own Jane sat beside him,

but then on the other side sat Mrs. Brown. She assumed an immediate

intimacy,--as women know how to do on such occasions,--being determined

from the very first to regard her sister’s husband as a brother; but he

still feared her. She was still to him the woman who had come to him in

the dead of night with that horrid mixture,--and had then left him.

“It was so odd that both of you should have been detained on the very

same day,” said Jane.

“Yes, it was odd,” said Mrs. Brown, with a smile looking round upon her

neighbour.

“It was abominably bad weather you know,” said Brown.

“But you were both so determined to come,” said the old gentleman. “When

we got the two telegrams at the same moment, we were sure that there

had been some agreement between you.”

“Not exactly an agreement,” said Mrs. Brown; whereupon Mr. Jones looked

as grim as death.

“I’m sure there is something more than we understand yet,” said the

Member of Parliament.

Then they all went to church, as a united family ought to do on

Christmas Day, and came home to a fine old English early dinner at three

o’clock,--a sirloin of beef a foot-and-a-half broad, a turkey as big as

an ostrich, a plum-pudding bigger than the turkey, and two or three

dozen mince-pies. “That’s a very large bit of beef,” said Mr. Jones, who

had not lived much in England latterly. “It won’t look so large,” said

the old gentleman, “when all our friends downstairs have had their say

to it.” “A plum-pudding on Christmas Day can’t be too big,” he said

again, “if the cook will but take time enough over it. I never knew a

bit go to waste yet.”

By this time there had been some explanation as to past events between

the two sisters. Mrs. Brown had indeed told Jane all about it, how ill

her husband had been, how she had been forced to go down and look for

the mustard, and then what she had done with the mustard. “I don’t think

they are a bit alike you know, Mary, if you mean that,” said Jane.

“Well, no; perhaps not quite alike. I only saw his beard, you know. No

doubt it was stupid, but I did it.”

“Why didn’t you take it off again?” asked the sister.

“Oh, Jane, if you’d only think of it! Could you?” Then of course all

that occurred was explained, how they had been stopped on their journey,

how Brown had made the best apology in his power, and how Jones had

travelled with them and had never spoken a word. The gentleman had only

taken his new name a week since, but of course had had his new card

printed immediately. “I’m sure I should have thought of it if they

hadn’t made a mistake with the first name. Charles said it was like

Barnaby Rudge.”

“Not at all like Barnaby Rudge,” said Jane; “Charles Burnaby Jones is a

very good name.”

“Very good indeed,--and I’m sure that after a little bit he won’t be at

all the worse for the accident.”

Before dinner the secret had been told no further, but still there had

crept about among the Thompsons, and, indeed, downstairs also, among the

retainers, a feeling that there was a secret. The old housekeeper was

sure that Miss Mary, as she still called Mrs. Brown, had something to

tell if she could only be induced to tell it, and that this something

had reference to Mr. Jones’ personal comfort. The head of the family,

who was a sharp old gentleman, felt this also, and the member of

Parliament, who had an idea that he specially should never be kept in

the dark, was almost angry. Mr. Jones, suffering from some kindred

feeling throughout the dinner, remained silent and unhappy. When two or

three toasts had been drunk,--the Queen’s health, the old gentleman’s

health, the young couple’s health, Brown’s health, and the general

health of all the Thompsons, then tongues were loosened and a question

was asked, “I know that there has been something doing in Paris between

these young people that we haven’t heard as yet,” said the uncle. Then

Mrs. Brown laughed, and Jane, laughing too, gave Mr. Jones to understand

that she at any rate knew all about it.

“If there is a mystery I hope it will be told at once,” said the member

of Parliament, angrily.

“Come, Brown, what is it?” asked another male cousin.

“Well, there was an accident. I’d rather Jones should tell,” said he.

Jones’ brow became blacker than thunder, but he did not say a word. “You

mustn’t be angry with Mary,” Jane whispered into her lover’s ear.

“Come, Mary, you never were slow at talking,” said the uncle.

“I do hate this kind of thing,” said the member of Parliament.

“I will tell it all,” said Mrs. Brown, very nearly in tears, or else

pretending to be very nearly in tears. “I know I was very wrong, and I

do beg his pardon, and if he won’t say that he forgives me I never shall

be happy again.” Then she clasped her hands, and turning round, looked

him piteously in the face.

“Oh yes; I do forgive you,” said Mr. Jones.

“My brother,” said she, throwing her arms round him and kissing him. He

recoiled from the embrace, but I think that he attempted to return the

kiss. “And now I will tell the whole story,” said Mrs. Brown. And she

told it, acknowledging her fault with true contrition, and swearing

that she would atone for it by life-long sisterly devotion.

“And you mustard-plastered the wrong man!” said the old gentleman,

almost rolling off his chair with delight.

“I did,” said Mrs. Brown, sobbing, “and I think that no woman ever

suffered as I suffered.”

“And Jones wouldn’t let you leave the hotel?”

“It was the handkerchief stopped us,” said Brown.

“If it had turned out to be anybody else,” said the member of

Parliament, “the results might have been most serious,--not to say

discreditable.”

“That’s nonsense, Robert,” said Mrs. Brown, who was disposed to resent

the use of so severe a word, even from the legislator cousin.

“In a strange gentleman’s bedroom!” he continued. “It only shows that

what I have always said is quite true. You should never go to bed in a

strange house without locking your door.”

Nevertheless it was a very jovial meeting, and before the evening was

over Mr. Jones was happy, and had been brought to acknowledge that the

mustard-plaster would probably not do him any permanent injury.

THE TELEGRAPH GIRL.

CHAPTER I.

LUCY GRAHAM AND SOPHY WILSON.

Three shillings a day to cover all expenses of life, food, raiment,

shelter, a room in which to eat and sleep, and fire and light,--and

recreation if recreation there might be,--is not much; but when Lucy

Graham, the heroine of this tale, found herself alone in the world, she

was glad to think that she was able to earn so much by her work, and

that thus she possessed the means of independence if she chose to be

independent. Her story up to the date with which we are dealing shall be

very shortly told. She had lived for many years with a married brother,

who was a bookseller in Holborn,--in a small way of business, and

burdened with a large family, but still living in decent comfort. In

order, however, that she might earn her own bread she had gone into the

service of the Crown as a “Telegraph Girl” in the Telegraph Office.[A]

And there she had remained till the present time, and there she was

earning eighteen shillings a week by eight hours’ continual work daily.

Her life had been full of occupation, as in her spare hours she had been

her brother’s assistant in his shop, and had made herself familiar with

the details of his trade. But the brother had suddenly died, and it had

been quickly decided that the widow and the children should take

themselves off to some provincial refuge.

Then it was that Lucy Graham had to think of her independence and her

eighteen shillings a week on the one side, and of her desolation and

feminine necessities on the other. To run backwards and forwards from

High Holborn to St. Martin’s-le-Grand had been very well as long as she

could comfort herself with the companionship of her sister-in-law and

defend herself with her brother’s arm;--but how would it be with her if

she were called upon to live all alone in London? She was driven to

consider what else she could do to earn her bread. She might become a

nursemaid, or perhaps a nursery governess. Though she had been well and

in some respects carefully educated, she knew that she could not soar

above that. Of music she did not know a note. She could draw a little

and understood enough French,--not to read it, but to teach herself to

read it. With English literature she was better acquainted than is usual

with young women of her age and class; and, as her only personal

treasures, she had managed to save a few books which had become hers

through her brother’s kindness. To be a servant was distasteful to her,

not through any idea that service was disreputable, but from a dislike

to be subject at all hours to the will of others. To work and work hard

she was quite willing, so that there might be some hours of her life in

which she might not be called upon to obey.

When, therefore, it was suggested to her that she had better abandon the

Telegraph Office and seek the security of some household, her spirit

rebelled against the counsel. Why should she not be independent, and

respectable, and safe? But then the solitude! Solitude would certainly

be hard, but absolute solitude might not perhaps be necessary. She was

fond too of the idea of being a government servant, with a sure and

fixed salary,--bound of course to her work at certain hours, but so

bound only for certain hours. During a third of the day she was, as she

proudly told herself, a servant of the Crown. During the other

two-thirds she was lord,--or lady,--of herself.

But there was a quaintness, a mystery, even an awe, about her

independence which almost terrified her. During her labours she had

eight hundred female companions, all congregated together in one vast

room, but as soon as she left the Post Office she was to be all alone!

For a few months after her brother’s death she continued to live with

her sister-in-law, during which time this great question was being

discussed. But then the sister-in-law and the children disappeared, and

it was incumbent on Lucy to fix herself somewhere. She must begin life

after what seemed to her to be a most unfeminine fashion,--“just as

though she were a young man,”--for it was thus that she described to

herself her own position over and over again.

At this time Lucy Graham was twenty-six years old. She had hitherto

regarded herself as being stronger and more steadfast than are women

generally of that age. She had taught herself to despise feminine

weaknesses, and had learned to be almost her brother’s equal in managing

the affairs of his shop in his absence. She had declared to herself,

looking forward then to some future necessity which had become present

to her with terrible quickness, that she would not be feckless,

helpless, and insufficient for herself as are so many females. She had

girded herself up for a work-a-day life,--looking forward to a time when

she might leave the telegraphs and become a partner with her brother. A

sudden disruption had broken up all that.

She was twenty-six, well made, cheery, healthy, and to some eyes

singularly good-looking, though no one probably would have called her

either pretty or handsome. In the first place her complexion was--brown.

It was impossible to deny that her whole face was brown, as also was her

hair, and generally her dress. There was a pervading brownness about her

which left upon those who met her a lasting connection between Lucy

Graham and that serviceable, long-enduring colour. But there was nobody

so convinced that she was brown from head to foot as was she herself. A

good lasting colour she would call it,--one that did not require to be

washed every half-hour in order that it might be decent, but could bear

real washing when it was wanted; for it was a point of her inner creed,

of her very faith of faith, that she was not to depend upon feminine

good looks, or any of the adventitious charms of dress for her advance

in the world. “A good strong binding,” she would say of certain

dark-visaged books, “that will stand the gas, and not look disfigured

even though a blot of ink should come in its way.” And so it was that

she regarded her own personal binding.

But for all that she was to some observers very attractive. There was

not a mean feature in her face. Her forehead was spacious and well

formed. Her eyes, which were brown also, were very bright, and could

sparkle with anger or solicitude, or perhaps with love. Her nose was

well formed, and delicately shaped enough. Her mouth was large, but full

of expression, and seemed to declare without speech that she could be

eloquent. The form of her face was oval, and complete, not as though it

had been moulded by an inartistic thumb, a bit added on here and a bit

there. She was somewhat above the average height of women, and stood

upon her legs,--or walked upon them,--as though she understood that they

had been given to her for real use.

Two years before her brother’s death there had been a suitor for her

hand,--as to whose suit she had in truth doubted much. He also had been

a bookseller, a man in a larger way of business than her brother, some

fifteen years older than herself,--a widower, with a family. She knew

him to be a good man, with a comfortable house, an adequate income, and

a kind heart. Had she gone to him she would not have been required then

to live among the bookshelves or the telegraphs. She had doubted much

whether she would not go to him. She knew she could love the children.

She thought that she could buckle herself to that new work with a will.

But she feared,--she feared that she could not love him.

Perhaps there had come across her heart some idea of what might be the

joy of real, downright, hearty love. If so it was only an idea. No

personage had come across her path thus to disturb her. But the idea, or

the fear, had been so strong with her that she had never been able to

induce herself to become the wife of this man; and when he had come to

her after her brother’s death, in her worst desolation,--when the

prospect of service in some other nursery had been strongest before her

eyes,--she had still refused him. Perhaps there had been a pride in

this,--a feeling that as she had rejected him in her comparative

prosperity, she should not take him now when the renewal of his offer

might probably be the effect of generosity. But she did refuse him; and

the widowed bookseller had to look elsewhere for a second mother for his

children.

Then there arose the question, how and where she should live? When it

came to the point of settling herself, that idea of starting in life

like a young man became very awful indeed. How was she to do it? Would

any respectable keeper of lodgings take her in upon that principle? And

if so, in what way should she plan out her life? Sixteen hours a day

were to be her own. What should she do with them? Was she or was she not

to contemplate the enjoyment of any social pleasures; and if so, how

were they to be found of such a nature as not to be discreditable? On

rare occasions she had gone to the play with her brother, and had then

enjoyed the treat thoroughly. Whether it had been _Hamlet_ at the

Lyceum, or _Lord Dundreary_ at the Haymarket, she had found herself

equally able to be happy. But there could not be for her now even such

rare occasions as these. She thought that she knew that a young woman

all alone could not go to the theatre with propriety, let her be ever so

brave. And then those three shillings a day, though sufficient for life,

would hardly be more than sufficient.

But how should she begin? At last chance assisted her. Another girl,

also employed in the Telegraph Office, with whom there had been some

family acquaintance over and beyond that formed in the office, happened

at this time to be thrown upon the world in some such fashion as

herself, and the two agreed to join their forces.

She was one Sophy Wilson by name,--and it was agreed between them that

they should club their means together and hire a room for their joint

use. Here would be a companionship,--and possibly, after awhile, sweet

friendship. Sophy was younger than herself, and might probably need,

perhaps be willing to accept, assistance. To be able to do something

that should be of use to somebody would, she felt, go far towards giving

her life that interest which it would otherwise lack.