MARY WELLS, like other uneducated women, was not accustomed to think
long and earnestly on any one subject; to use an expression she once
applied with far less justice to her sister, her mind was like running
water.
But gestation affects the brains of such women, and makes them think
more steadily, and sometimes very acutely; added to which, the peculiar
dangers and difficulties that beset this girl during that anxious
period stimulated her wits to the very utmost. Often she sat quite
still for hours at a time, brooding and brooding, and asking herself
how she could turn each new and unexpected event to her own benefit.
Now so much does mental force depend on that exercise of keen and long
attention, in which her sex is generally deficient, that this young
woman's powers were more than doubled since the day she first
discovered her condition, and began to work her brains night and day
for her defense.
Gradually, as events I have related unfolded themselves, she caught a
glimpse of this idea, that if she could get her mistress to have a
secret, her mistress would help her to keep her own. Hence her
insidious whispers, and her constant praises of Mr. Angelo, who, she
saw, was infatuated with Lady Bassett. Yet the designing creature was
actually fond of her mistress: and so strangely compounded is a heart
of this low kind that the extraordinary step she now took was half
affectionate impulse, half egotistical design.
She made a motion with her hand inviting Lady Bassett to listen, and
stepped into Sir Charles's room.
“Childless! childless! childless!”
“Hush, sir,” said Mary Wells. “Don't say so. We shan't be many mouths
without one, please Heaven.”
Sir Charles shook his head sadly.
“Don't you believe me?”
“No.”
“What, did ever I tell you a lie?”
“No: but you are mistaken. She would have told me.”
“Well, sir, my lady is young and shy, and I think she is afraid of
disappointing you after all; for you know, sir, there's many a slip
'twixt the cup and the lip. But 'tis as I tell you, sir.”
Sir Charles was much agitated, and said he would give her a hundred
guineas if that was true. “Where is my darling wife? Why do I hear this
through a servant?”
Mary Wells cast a look at the door, and said, for Lady Bassett to hear,
“She is receiving company. Now, sir, I have told you good news; will
you do something to oblige me? You shouldn't speak of it direct to my
lady just yet; and if you want all to go well, you mustn't vex my lady
as you are doing now. What I mean, you mustn't be so downhearted--
there's no reason for't--and you mustn't coop yourself up on this
floor: it sets the folks talking, and worries my lady. You should give
her every chance, being the way she is.”
Sir Charles said eagerly he would not vex her for the world. “I'll walk
in the garden,” said he; “but as for going abroad, you know I am not in
a fit condition yet; my mind is clouded.”
“Not as I see.”
“Oh, not always. But sometimes a cloud seems to get into my head; and
if I was in public I might do or say something discreditable. I would
rather die.”
“La, sir!” said Mary Wells, in a broad, hearty way--“a cloud in your
head! You've had a bad fall, and a fit at top on't, and no wonder your
poor head do ache at times. You'll outgrow that--if you take the air
and give over fretting about the t'other thing. I tell you you'll hear
the music of a child's voice and little feet a-pattering up and down
this here corridor before so very long--if so be you take my advice,
and leave off fretting my lady with fretting of yourself. You should
consider: she is too fond of you to be well when you be ill.”
“I'll get well for her sake,” said Sir Charles, firmly.
At this moment there was a knock at the door. Mary Wells opened it so
that the servant could see nothing.
“Mr. Angelo has called.”
“My lady will be down directly.”
Mary Wells then slipped into the dressing-room, and found Lady Bassett
looking pale and wild. She had heard every word.
“There, he is better already,” said Mary Wells. “He shall walk in the
garden with you this afternoon.”
“What have you done? I can't look him in the face now. Suppose he
speaks to me?”
“He will not. I'll manage that. You won't have to say a word. Only
listen to what I say, and don't make a liar of me. He is better
already.”
“How will this end?” cried Lady Bassett, helplessly. “What shall I do?”
“You must go downstairs, and not come here for an hour at least, or
you'll spoil my work. Mr. Angelo is in the drawing-room.”
“I will go to him.”
Lady Bassett slipped out by the other door, and it was three hours,
instead of one, before she returned.
For the first time in her life she was afraid to face her husband.