A HORRIBLE SECRET.
Poor Mabin gazed down blankly at the crouching figure of Mrs. Dale.
Were the complications of this mysterious history never to end. The
little lady had shown terror at the mere sight of this man’s portrait;
she had abandoned a room in which she had, as she thought, only dreamt
of him. And yet now, when Mabin tried to reassure her by repeating his
assurance that he would not force himself upon her again, the
inconsistent woman gave every sign of the most profound sorrow.
Mabin looked, with her perplexity puckering her pretty face, at
Rudolph, who had emerged from the wood in his turn. He however, was
too deeply intent upon watching Mrs. Dale to notice his _fiancée’s_
expression, and Mabin felt a pang of jealousy, which she tried in vain
to stifle.
“Don’t talk to her,” said Rudolph presently, as Mrs. Dale struggling
with herself, and still white and trembling, got upon her feet. “Run
into the house, Mabin, and get some _eau de Cologne_, and--and don’t
go too fast, or you will get a headache.”
But Mabin, who felt hurt at this evident attempt to get rid of her,
lingered, and offered the help of her arm to her friend. But to her
astonishment and bitter annoyance, Mrs. Dale not only shrank from her,
but cast upon the young girl a look full of resentment.
“Pray, don’t take so much trouble. I am quite, quite well,” she said
coldly. “And I can walk alone, thank you.”
She had already withdrawn the arm Mabin had taken, and was plunging
into the plantation with reckless steps, as if anxious to bury herself
from observation. And she hastily put her handkerchief to her eyes and
dashed away the tears which rose as she spoke.
Mabin drew herself up, and choked down a rising sob. What had she done
that she should be treated like this? But the climax of her trouble
came, when Rudolph, springing across the grass, and keeping his eyes
still fixed anxiously on Mrs. Dale, as the little lady in black
staggered blindly through the trees, touched her arm gently and
whispered:
“You had better leave her for a little while, dear; she will be
herself again presently.”
Mabin turned her back upon him, and marched off, without a word, in
the direction of the house. He called to her to stop, to listen; but
she would do neither. Wounded to the core, first by her friend, in
whose cause she had been working, and then by her lover, she felt that
she could not trust herself in the vicinity of either of them without
an outbreak of grief or of anger to which her pride forbade her to
give way.
She was in a whirl of feeling; she hardly saw the flowers or the trees
as she walked; she scarcely knew whether she trod on grass or on
gravel as she made her way straight into the house, shut herself up in
her room, and sat down, in a passion of sullen resentment, by one of
the high windows.
It seemed to her that she had sat there for hours, sore, perplexed,
too miserable to think or to do anything but suffer, when her
attention was attracted by a sound which made her start up and look
out of the window. There, sauntering along between the broad beds of
the kitchen-garden, stooping, from time to time, to hunt under the
leaves for a late strawberry, or to gather a flower from the clumps of
sweet-william and of clove-pinks which made a fragrant border to the
more substantial products of the garden, was Mrs. Dale.
No longer melancholy, no longer silent, but bubbling over with high
spirits, and laughing lightly at every other word of her companion,
the lady in black looked more radiant than Mabin had ever before seen
her, and appeared to be as light-hearted and incapable of serious
thought as a child in the sunshine.
And her companion was Rudolph, who followed her, listened to her,
laughed with her, and seemed thoroughly satisfied with her society.
This was the cruellest blow of all. That the deceitful woman who could
pretend to be so miserable at one moment, and could throw off her
grief so lightly the next, should have taken Rudolph and caused him to
forget the girl he pretended to care for so much! Mabin watched them
with a face wrinkled with despair, until her tears hid them from
sight. But even then, Mrs. Dale’s voice, always gay, always bright,
rang in her ears to the accompaniment of Rudolph’s deeper tones.
The girl, however, was not weak-minded enough to cry for long. The
sound of the voices had scarcely died away when she sprang to her
feet, bathed her face, and did her best to hide the traces of her
grief. Pride had come to her assistance. She would show them both that
she did not care; that Mrs. Dale might amuse herself with Rudolph,
might carry him off altogether if she pleased, and she would not break
her heart about it.
She was ready to go downstairs, and was crossing the room for that
purpose, when there came a little tap at the door, and Mrs. Dale’s
voice cried:
“May I come in?”
For answer Mabin turned the handle, and her friend, looking at her
inquiringly, tripped into the room with a little affected air of
penitence.
“I’m so sorry I was cross, dear, just now. Will you forgive me? I was
worried, and unhappy--and---- But I’m better now, and so I’ve come to
ask you to forgive me, and to come down to tea.”
She slid her arm round the girl’s waist. But Mabin could not disguise
the change in her own feelings, which she could not help. She drew
herself away with a laugh.
“I’m glad you are happier, and--and better,” she said stiffly. “I
thought you were, when I saw you just now in the kitchen-garden.”
Mrs. Dale looked up at her mischievously.
“Why, you silly child, you have been making yourself miserable. It is
of no use for you to try to deny it,” said she. “I believe you are
jealous, Mabin. You would not be, dear, if you knew all about it.”
She spoke very kindly; and by one of those rapid changes of mood and
manner which were her greatest charm, her face became suddenly clouded
with an expression of gentle sadness.
But Mabin’s unhappiness had been too great to be effaced by a few
gentle words. And her pride would not allow her to bend, to come to
the explanation her friend might be willing to give.
“You are quite wrong,” she said coldly; “I am glad to see him so
happy. I am not jealous.”
And she passed out of the room, as Mrs. Dale invited her to do, and
went downstairs with her head very high in the air, and a sense of
deep resentment at her heart.
At the dining-room door Rudolph met her, with a rose for her in his
hand, and a pretty speech on his lips about her unkindness in hiding
herself away for so long. But then, unluckily, Mabin’s sharp eyes
detected that he threw a glance of intelligence at Mrs. Dale, and
choosing instantly to fancy that there was a little conspiracy between
the two to “get round” her, she was so reserved and silent and stiff
as to make conciliatory advances impossible.
They had tea on the lawn, but it was a very brief affair, for Rudolph
jumped up from his seat in about a minute and a half, and said to Mrs.
Dale:
“If you will write it out now, I will take it at once.”
And then, Mrs. Dale, with a nod of intelligence, rose in her turn, and
went quickly into the house.
Mabin sat very still, looking at the grass.
“Let me put your cup down, dear,” said Rudolph, who seemed to be
subdued by the consciousness of what was in store for him.
As he took the cup, he managed to get hold of her hand.
“And now, Mabin, what’s the matter?”
“Nothing,” said she with a grand air; “and you are treading on my
frock.”
“I beg your pardon. I don’t think I was treading on your frock, by the
bye. It is the table that is on it.”
So he went down on one knee, released her dress, and remained in his
humble attitude, which brought him too low for her to avoid meeting
his eyes, as she would have liked to do.
“And now, Mabin, tell me why you are unkind again so soon.”
“You had better get up. Mrs. Dale might see you,” was the icy answer.
“Well, and why shouldn’t she see me? Mabin, don’t behave like this; it
isn’t worthy of you. I couldn’t have thought it possible you would
sulk without any cause, as you are doing.”
“Without any cause? When Mrs. Dale and you both were unkind, making
excuses to send me away, and----”
She stopped, afraid for her self-control. Rudolph taking a seat beside
her, went on very quietly:
“She was very unhappy; you had said something, without knowing it,
which gave her a great shock. She was hardly mistress of herself; you
must have seen that.”
“But why was I to be sent away, like a child, without any explanation?
When I had just been doing a very difficult thing, too, to try to help
her!”
“What was the difficult thing?”
“I had called at ‘Stone House,’ and seen this man who calls himself
Mr. Banks, and got him to promise that he wouldn’t get into ‘The
Towers’ at night, as he has done twice, and frighten her.”
At this, much to her indignation, Rudolph’s mouth curved into an
irrepressible smile. Mabin sprang up. But before she had fled very
far, he caught her up, and insisted on keeping pace with her, as she
ran toward the house.
“Stop, Mabin, and consider. If you run into the house, you will go
straight into Mrs. Dale’s arms; and if you don’t, I will send her to
your room after you. You had much better ‘have it out’ with me.”
So she turned and confronted him fiercely.
“Why did you laugh at me?”
“I can hardly tell you. No, don’t go off again; I mean that the reason
is part of a secret that is not mine.”
“A secret, of course; I knew that. A secret which has been confided to
you, but which I am not to know.”
Rudolph was silent.
“Can you expect me to be satisfied, to be laughed at and neglected,
while you and Mrs. Dale exchange confidences, and forg-g-get me?”
“Now, Mabin, you are silly, my darling, silly, childish! You have
known just as well as I that there was a secret somewhere. Can’t you
be content to wait till the proper time comes for you to be told,
instead of behaving like an inquisitive school-girl?”
Now this was the very worst sort of speech he could have made. If
Rudolph had not been himself a good deal excited that afternoon by the
story which Mrs. Dale had confided to his ears, he would have
exercised greater restraint, greater choice in his words, and would
have given more consideration to his _fiancée’s_ point of view.
Mabin grew white.
“I can wait, certainly,” she said with a sudden change to an extremely
quiet manner and tone, “for the great secret which absorbed you so
deeply. But there is another, a little mystery, which I want to know
now; and that is--how a woman who is in the depths of despair at four
o’clock, as Mrs. Dale appeared to be, can be in the very highest
spirits at five? Or is that a secret I have to wait to know?”
“It’s all part of the same story,” replied Rudolph humbly, feeling
perhaps that greater demands were being made upon her patience than
was quite fair. “And I can only repeat that you will know everything
presently.”
“And why not now?”
“The whole thing was confided to me, and I don’t feel at liberty to
say any more even to you! Surely you can trust me, can trust us both.
Why, Mabin, I thought you were so proud of your loyalty to your
friends!”
The tears sprang to the girl’s eyes. She was giving way, and yet
feeling all the time that she had not been well treated, when
unluckily she noticed a little movement on the part of her companion,
and looked up quickly enough to see that Mrs. Dale, with a mischievous
smile on her face, was standing at the door of the house, and waving a
strip of paper to him as a signal.
“Go. Make haste. Mrs. Dale wants you!” cried Mabin bitterly.
And without leaving him time to protest or explain, she ran away.
That evening passed uncomfortably for both Mabin and Mrs. Dale. When
they met at dinner, they both showed traces of recent tears on their
pretty faces, and both unwisely tried to behave as if nothing had
happened to disturb the usual course of things.
Mrs. Dale did indeed make advances toward a modified half-confidence;
but it was so abundantly evident that she did so against her will, and
that she was afraid of saying too much, that she repelled rather than
encouraged the shy, proud girl.
Rudolph did not return. This was another sore point with poor Mabin,
who ended by persuading herself that Mrs. Dale had succeeded in
alienating from her the affections of her lover.
So that the hours dragged wearily by until bed-time, and both ladies
showed an unusual anxiety to get early to bed.
But next morning there was a change in Mrs. Dale’s manner; she had
lost her feverish high spirits, and was in such a state of nervous
irritability that even the sound of Mabin’s voice, coldly asking a
question at the breakfast-table, made her start and flush painfully.
Her eyes were heavy; her cheeks were white; there were dark lines
under her eyes which told of a sleepless night.
Mabin felt sorry for her, and was quite ready to “kiss and be
friends.” After all, she said to herself with resignation not
unmingled with bitterness, if Rudolph found the lovely widow with the
interesting history more attractive than a girl with no fascinating
mystery attached to her, it was not his fault, and it was not
surprising. She felt ashamed now of her jealousy and ill-temper of the
previous evening, excusable as they had been. And she deliberately
made up her mind that, whatever happened, she would take matters
quietly; and even if Rudolph deserted her altogether for Mrs. Dale,
that she would give him up without a murmur, whatever the effort cost
her.
After all, what was the use, she said to herself with a heavy sigh, of
trying to keep a man’s love against his will? It had been a very
fleeting happiness, that of his love; but the superstitious feeling
the girl had had about its suddenness made her inclined to accept the
loss of it as inevitable; and no one would have guessed, from her calm
manner and measured voice, that Mabin was suffering the keenest sorrow
she had ever known.
It was Mrs. Dale who was reticent to-day. She told Mabin that she
expected a visitor that evening, but she did not say who it was. And
from the fever which burned in her eyes, and the restlessness which
increased upon her as the day went on, the young girl guessed that
some matter of great importance was to be discussed or arranged.
Was the visitor to be Mr. Banks? she asked herself. But she did not
dare to put the question to her hostess.
One unprecedented occurrence signalized the occasion. The musty
drawing-room was turned out, aired, and prepared for the reception of
the visitor.
“Do take your work in there, and leave it about, and try to make the
place look a little less like a charnel-house,” cried Mrs. Dale to
Mabin that afternoon, when they had gone together to inspect the state
apartment.
“It does look rather dreary certainly,” admitted Mabin. “But it won’t
look so bad to any one who hasn’t been used, like us, to knowing it is
always shut up.”
“That’s true. I hadn’t thought of that. However, I still beg you to
drop a few bits of filoselle about, and to read a few books and strew
them about. And I’ll run out and get some bits of copper beech and
bracken to fill those yawning bowls. Flowers would be quite lost in
them.”
“Not the peonies. They would look splendid!” Mabin called out after
her, as the widow went out through the French window on to the gravel
path outside.
It was already late in the afternoon, and, darkened as it was by the
trees and shrubs which grew near the large windows, the room was so
dimly lighted that Mabin took her work--it was still the cooking
apron--to the window. It had required some self-control to take up a
piece of work to which such recent memories were attached; and as she
sewed, Mabin had great difficulty in keeping back the tears. Here were
the very stitches Rudolph had put in, the very bag on which their
fingers had closed together. She felt the thrill of that contact now.
And even as she let the apron fall into her lap, while the longing to
hear his voice speak tender words in her ear stirred in her heart and
made it beat fast, she heard his footstep on the gravel outside; she
saw him pass the window.
Scarcely repressing the cry: “Rudolph! Rudolph!” which rose to her
lips, she saw that he was hurrying across the grass without having
seen her. And looking out of the window, she saw that Mrs. Dale was
standing under the lime trees, holding out her hand to him with a
smile of greeting.
And the look of confidence and pleasure which irradiated the widow’s
face filled Mabin with despair.
She stood still at the window, but she no longer saw anything; she was
blinded by her tears. She hardly heard the door of the drawing-room
open, or, if she heard, she did not notice it. She did not turn her
head when the door closed.
It was not until a hard voice, close to her, said dryly:
“Are you the young lady whom I met here before--who refused to take
the warning I gave?” that Mabin, dashing away the tears from her
blinded eyes, recognized in the erect figure standing beside her Mrs.
Dale’s former mysterious visitor.
“I--I beg your pardon,” said Mabin hastily; “I--I did not see you come
in. You want to see Mrs. Dale. I will go and tell her.”
“You need not take that trouble,” replied the majestic lady in the
same hard tones as before. “She expects me. She sent for me by
telegraph yesterday.” And following the glance Mabin threw across the
lawn, she asked quickly, and in a harsher tone than ever: “Who is the
young man with her?”
“Mr. Bonnington, the Vicar’s son,” answered Mabin in a low voice.
“And what is he doing here?”
“He’s a friend of Mrs. Dale’s, and a friend of mine too,” added the
girl with the generous wish to save her friend from the anger she saw
in the elder woman’s eyes. “I am engaged to him.”
“Engaged to him! Engaged to marry him!” repeated the other sharply.
“And you trust him with that woman!”
Mabin’s loyalty was fired by the tone.
“Yes. She is my friend,” said she proudly.
The elder lady uttered a short, hard sound, which she meant for a
derisive laugh.
“Well, you are an independent young person, upon whom warnings are
thrown away. However, it may be of passing interest for you to know
that the lady you call your friend--” Mabin put her hands to her ears,
instinctively guessing that she was to hear some horrible thing. In
the darkness of the room the face above her seemed to her to be
distorted with the passion of a fiend as, in a voice so piercing that
the girl heard it distinctly, in spite of herself; she went on: “that
the lady you call your friend has ruined the life of a man who loved
her.” And Mabin caught her breath, thinking of the white face of Mr.
Banks. Still the hard voice went inexorably on: “and that she murdered
her own husband!”
Mabin uttered a shriek, as her hands fell down from her ears.